Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia traveled to Princeton yesterday as part of his ongoing book tour. While there he took some heat from a student about his comments comparing laws banning sodomy with those barring bestiality and murder. The justice responded by saying that such comparisons weren't necessary but they were "effective," the Associated Press reports:

Scalia was asked by a gay student why he equates laws banning sodomy with those barring bestiality and murder.

"It's a form of argument that I thought you would have known, which is called the 'reduction to the absurd,'" Scalia told [freshman Duncan] Hosie of San Francisco during the question-and-answer period. "If we cannot have moral feelings against homosexuality, can we have it against murder? Can we have it against other things?"

Scalia said he is not equating sodomy with murder but drawing a parallel between the bans on both.

Scalia's comments are particularly noteworthy given they come only days after the high court announced that it would consider two cases challenging the constitutionality of bans on gay marriage