Hate Speech for Christians

Christians have been punching bags for as long as I can remember, but the level of vitriol poured on (what are now referred to as) “People of Faith” is akin to the kind of things black people (they used to be known as negroes) experienced before the civil rights movement. I’m referring, of course, to verbal abuse. Back when it was OK to refer to blacks by using the “N” word (note how we are not even allowed to use the term any more?) When their worth ethic was impugned, when their intelligence was assumed to be inferior, when their morals were maligned?

There is a popular radio personality on the Tidewater area, Tony Macrini, who hosts a morning news and talk program from 6 to 10 AM. He is a libertarian. But get him talking about religion and you find him a fanatic on the subject. Raised a Catholic, he now finds it amusing and liberating to bash religion and people of faith without mercy. Were to carry on about blacks in the same way, he would be off the air before his shift ended, but verbal abuse of religion – or at least the Christian religion – is tolerated.

That is why I found the blog entry on Shot In the Dark resonated with me. Before I get into it, here is the first comment following a fine post by Shot In the Dark:

“The following may be a touch overboard but, I feel they will be talking about how dangerous people of faith are while they are rounding us up and transporting us in cattle cars for the final solution to the faith question.”

The post begins:

Since 9/11, we've established that one can not call dissenters from American foreign policy - even the most wacked-out dissenters, people who actively support our enemies - "Anti-American". Indeed, as the bumper sticker says, "Dissent is patriotic".

Fine.

Could we grant faith the same pass?

Oh, don't get me wrong; the left is just fine with people of faith - as long as its adherents can't be heard, much less consider their faith more important than their government. Unitarians, liberal Catholics (think Daniel Berrigan) and mushy-left Protestants are just fine, of course, but you don't have to go too far to the left - by no means to the fringe - to find anyone outspoken about the role of faith in their life and their political leanings (if they're to the right) compared to the Taliban, called Jihadis, and so on.
I started noticing during the eighties; the "cynical, hypocritical fundie minister" was a most frequent, convenient villain on TV and in the movies.

Far from passing from use, the stereotype drove much of the left in the last Presidential election. The "Jesusland" meme was the most obvious symptom, the anti-semitism rampant in the American academic left, and the continued portrayal of faith as being some sort of base, benighted aberration are just leading indicators of a simple observation; the American "elite" is developing a full-blown, Klan-level bigotry against people of faith.

He quotes Stanley Kurtz in National Review:

There’s a real venom on the Left against conservative Christians.
Harper’s Magazine’s May cover stories about “The Christian Right’s War On America,” frightened me, although not the way Harper’s meant them to. I fear these stories could mark the beginning of a systematic campaign of hatred directed at traditional Christians. Whether this is what Harper’s intends, I cannot say. But regardless of the intention, the effect seems clear.

The phrase “campaign of hatred” is a strong one, and I worry about amplifying an already dangerous dynamic of recrimination on both sides of the culture wars. I don’t doubt that conservatives, Christian and otherwise, are sometimes guilty of rhetorical excess.

Yet despite what we’ve been told, the most extreme political rhetoric of our day is being directed against traditional Christians by the left.

Indeed.