I was going to let the whole Phil Robertson controversy slide by, because it seems like another one of those mutually advantageous opportunities for free publicity on the one hand and on the other a good excuse for people to get their outrage on. Free speech is a two way street and if Phil Robertson wants to throw his two cents out there he should be prepared to get some criticism back. However, that criticism should be based on his actual words and not some dishonest attempt to distort them for what they are not.
Phil Robertson believes homosexual acts are a sin and millions of Americans agree with him. The LGBT community says that belief amounts to bigotry against them and millions of other Americans agree with that. While some on both sides wish to make it cut and dried in their favor, it's a complicated issue that truly deserves respect and patience from all sides if there is to be a civil discussion.
What this controversy makes clear once again though, is that some in the LGBT community and their supporters don't want to have a civil discussion. They are more than willing to lie and distort in an "ends justify the means" sort of righteousness that threatens to damage their hard won tolerance and support from the broader community.
First case in point from Dean Obeidallah:
The words at issue were when Robertson equated people having sex with animals as the same as sex between consenting gay adults.
I've seen this all over the place on the internet and it is such a deliberate distortion of the actual quote that it is simply a blatant lie. Here's the actual quote from the GQ interview in response to the(possibly paraphrased) question from the interviewer of "What, in your mind, is sinful?"
“Start with homosexual behavior and just morph out from there. Bestiality, sleeping around with this woman and that woman and that woman and those men,” he says. Then he paraphrases Corinthians: “Don’t be deceived. Neither the adulterers, the idolaters, the male prostitutes, the homosexual offenders, the greedy, the drunkards, the slanderers, the swindlers—they won’t inherit the kingdom of God. Don’t deceive yourself. It’s not right.”
Robertson clearly did not "compare" or "equate" homosexual behavior with bestiality, any more than he "equated" it with drunkenness, slander, or swindling. He included them all in a category of different "sins" that the bible says will keep you from heaven. Disagreeing with Robertson on that is a perfectly reasonable position. Claiming that Robertson "equated" homosexuality with bestiality is a falsehood at best, and at worst a deliberate lie.
Is Dean Obeidallah too stupid to get that or is he a liar? I can't say for sure, but I don't think he's that stupid.
No social or political controversy is complete these days without some asshole from "Think Progress" weighing in and this one is no exception. In this case someone named Zack Ford not only makes the same "mistake" as Obeidallah, he has to play the race card too.
On Wednesday, Duck Dynasty patriarch Phil Robertson made comments in a GQ interview condemning homosexuality as sinful and comparable to bestiality, as well as claiming that African Americans were better off under Jim Crow laws.
You can always tell you are dealing with a mendacious jerk at "Think" "Progress" when they make some nasty assertion about what somebody said and they don't directly link back to an actual quote. Of course, that should be a red flag everywhere else too.
So what is the basis of Ford's assertion that Robertson was "...claiming that African Americans were better off under Jim Crow laws? The only mention of race I saw in the interview was this remembrance:
Phil On Growing Up in Pre-Civil-Rights-Era Louisiana
“I never, with my eyes, saw the mistreatment of any black person. Not once. Where we lived was all farmers. The blacks worked for the farmers. I hoed cotton with them. I’m with the blacks, because we’re white trash. We’re going across the field.... They’re singing and happy. I never heard one of them, one black person, say, ‘I tell you what: These doggone white people’—not a word!... Pre-entitlement, pre-welfare, you say: Were they happy? They were godly; they were happy; no one was singing the blues.”
Could Robertson be looking back through rose-colored glasses? Possibly, but to take his memory of poor blacks and whites working in the fields together and turn it into a claim that blacks were better off under Jim Crow requires a finding of mean-spiritedness on the part of Robertson that is not actually in evidence, in the entire interview in fact. Shame on Ford for claiming that it is, and shame on anyone who unthinkingly embraces it.
Speaking of mean-spiritedness, that takes us back to Obeidallah and my final criticism of the disingenuous mob in this controversy.
Obeidallah, almost certainly deliberately, butchers another quote from Robertson in order to demonize him:
Together with his comments likening gays to terrorists, “whether they’re homosexuals, drunks, terrorists. We let God sort ’em out later, you see what I’m saying?” This was clearly a homophobic rant that demonized Americans simply because of their sexual orientation.
Here's Robertson's actual quote and the context:
As far as Phil is concerned, he was literally born again. Old Phil—the guy with the booze and the pills—died a long time ago, and New Phil sees no need to apologize for him: “We never, ever judge someone on who’s going to heaven, hell. That’s the Almighty’s job. We just love ’em, give ’em the good news about Jesus—whether they’re homosexuals, drunks, terrorists. We let God sort ’em out later, you see what I’m saying?”
The irony here is that unlike a few bible thumpers I know, if you read the whole thing Phil Robertson clearly comes across in that interview as a kind and humble man. He would no more hurt or hate a gay person than he would his own family. And yet a good many of the LGBT community in this country are more than eager to bring the hate against him, and stir up more by being deceptive about what he really said and really believes.
It's funny. Even though I think Robertson is wrong in some of his beliefs, I bet I could have a civil conversation about our different points of view. People like Obeidallah and Ford, so poisoned by their own bigotry, malice, and hate?
Not so much.
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