Only you can decide which hotel chain is best for you & make the decision for your own reasons.

I think that there's a conflagration by some (including you) re: the Mormon church & the Marriott corporation. As noted earlier, neither Bill Marriott personally nor the Marriott corporation as an entity contributed to Prop 8, even though the Mormon church did. Marriott corporation sells liquor in its hotel properties, even though the Mormon church prohibits alcohol and Bill Marriott doesn't drink.

And, as Adam1222 said (his comments in italics right after this as I don't know how to do the quotes w/in quotes thing),

"So is the concern that a small portion of profits will go to private individuals who then in their personal capacity will make donations to their religious institutions? Considering how many people on here see no problem flying Emirates this strikes me as insanely hypocritical. Are we now saying that you are concerned about any business with Mormon shareholders?

How a corporation treats its employees is far more telling than what church some of its shareholders belong to. Marriott passes that test. It sponsors many many LGBt causes and events. (more than Starwood). It publicly supports ENDA. There is no record of a pattern of discrimination towards guests. Basically, the only thing identified is that you disagree with the positions of the church that some of its shareholders belong to. That strikes me as an illogical reason to be "concerned" that any aspect of Starwood properties is suddenly going to be less gay friendly. (In mathematical terms, the percent of a dollar spent that goes to the Mormon Church is tiny...."

I don't understand deciding to switch chains (MAR/SPG) on a 'guess' that the two chains combined will be less progressive towards gays moving forward. I truly don't see that happening.

And you're going to have a lot of homework ahead of you if you want to find a chain that doesn't put bibles in the rooms. Granted Marriott is the only one that has BOM, but multiple hotel chains have had & continue to have bibles in their rooms. Gideon still spends $100 million/year putting bibles in hotels, prisons & hospitals worldwide.

Bibles in hotel rooms may lessen in the future, but it won't be just due to gays. More to do w/ younger people being more secular, some people carrying a digital version, and hotels not wanting to offend gays, but also not wanting to offend atheists and those from other faiths such as Muslims and Buddhists.

Hilton's founder (Conrad Hilton) was very involved w/ the Catholic church & created a foundation that to this day supports Catholic schools and Catholic nuns (amongst other charities such as working w/ children affected by HIV & AIDS). It's not like the Catholic church is a big supporter of gay rights. Will you drop Hilton from your list too?

Marriott has said the various brands on both sides will continue, so what makes those brands unique will probably stay. Whether all 30 brands remain a few years from now is up in the air, as there is a bit of overlap. But I doubt W & LeM are suddenly going to turn into cookie cutter brands.

FWIW - getting off LGBT & onto generic, my guess is both the Marriott elites & the SPG elites are going to lose out a bit come 2018. There are some nice things Marriott offers just as there are nice things SPG offers. And we know from airline mergers that the best of both are not always kept. Sigh.

Cheers.