I saw Falwell and Robertson referred to as “America’s Taliban” by Randy Cassingham of This Is True: http://www.thisistrue.com/taliban.html
I mostly wanted to just share the above page, but since it might be a subject for debate, I put it here in GD.
That’s an assinine assertion. Until Falwell and Robertson start killing people, the comparison is offensive.
Still, I have no respect for either one of those clowns, and I hope people remember what they said for a long, long time, and they become marginalized because of it.
And I hope the same for those on the left spewing just as much hatred. Michael Moore is the prime example, and you can add Susan Sontag, Noam Chomsky, and a few other prominent liberals to the list.
Seeing the reactions of various public figures in the last couple of weeks has been very enlightening. There are many on the left that surprised me with the content of their character (Al Gore, Bill Clinton, Hillary to some extent, and all of the Congress), and there are those that didn’t surprise me at all. Same on the right - I was never a fan of Guliani’s before, but I think he wore his true character on his sleeve last week - and it was a good one.
But some things never change. For example, did anyone notice the complete absence of most of the Hollywood lefties from last night’s tribute show? No Sheens to be seen, and no Baldwins. No Fondas, either. I suspect that they can’t get past their hatred of Bush, and their near hatred of America, to come out and support the effort.
Sam Stone writes:
> Michael Moore is the prime example, and you can add Susan
> Sontag, Noam Chomsky, and a few other prominent liberals
> to the list.
Chomsky is no doubt a jerk, and what little overt political statement I’ve read by Sontag is also stupid, but could you give us some specific examples of Michael Moore “spewing political hatred” (as opposed to just saying things you don’t like)? (I also personally think Chomsky’s effect on the field of linguistics has been bad.)
He further writes:
> For example, did anyone notice the complete absence of
> most of the Hollywood lefties from last night’s tribute
> show? No Sheens to be seen, and no Baldwins. No Fondas,
> either.
Oh, get real. Would you actually expect them to ask Jane Fonda to appear on the program? Given how some people froth at the mouth at the mention of her name, there’s no way that she would have been allowed to appear even if she had asked. The only one of the Sheens that isn’t just a minor celebrity is Martin Sheen and the only one of the Baldwin’s that is almost a major celebrity is Alec Baldwin, and it may be that neither of them was asked.
Do you really feel that the “Hollywood Lefties” have a near-hatred of America? Or do you feel that hatred of Bush = hatred of America? Anyway, I thought I did see Alec Baldwin manning a phone, but I could be wrong. I wasn’t on a “Hollywood Lefty” hunt.
In any case, my take on calling the religious right “America’s Taliban” is referring to their desire to make this country a Christian theocracy, not an accusation of murder.
Offensive to whom, Falwell and Robertson or the Taliban? None of the above am I too worried about offending by the comparison.
Falwell, Robertson, et. al. differ from the Taliban only in degree and success rate.
You have GOT to be kidding! Falwell and Robertson are simply religious fundamentalists. There are about a billion other fundamentalists on the planet. They aren’t all evil, you know. Frankly, I find them both highly offensive, and I always have. Mostly because I think they are also both frauds and using religion to line their own pocketbooks and attain power. They are also apparently stupid, because even if they believe the crap they mouth off, they should have been smart enough to realize that this was not a particuarly good time to declare that it was God punishing America.
But neither of them has shown any inclination towards hurting other humans. To assume that they *would if they just had the opportunity may be true or false, but you have no evidence one way or the other. And the charge is so serious that you should be ashamed of yourself for making it without evidence.
And I wasn’t only a ‘Hollywood Lefty-hunt’, and in fact I’d like to retract the phrase - it’s inappropriate. There were plenty of people on that stage last night with left-wing political views (Rosie O’Donnell for one, who I think is behaving marvelously through this whole thing.)
I was really thinking specifically of Alec Baldwin, the other Baldwins and the Sheens. Those families are almost virulent in their hatred of George Bush. And I say this as a big fan of Alec Baldwin’s work, and I have a lot of respect for Martin Sheen, who I think is a genuinely good human being. He has proven his courage and dedication to his principles, and I can respect that even I think his principles are misguided.
I guess their absence was especially noteworthy because they are usually on the front-lines of their own causes, and are not shy about carrying their causes to the people. Yet none of them chose to be part of that show last night. My only conclusion is that they unfortunately cannot rise above their own partisanship.
I doubt that’s the only possible reason they weren’t there. The whole thing was thrown together in about three days, and you never know who might have been vacationing in India or filming in Australia or just unable to get out of prior commitments. And as was pointed out, they probably didn’t have time to ask every star in the firmament either.
That’s a valid point, although I note that lots of acts were beamed in from other parts of the world. It also occurred to me that perhaps they weren’t asked, because someone felt their presence would be too controversial.
Can anyone think of other major stars that weren’t there? Eddie Murphy comes to mind, and I see no reason why he wouldn’t have wanted to be there, so I’m sure it’s possible that they just ran out of time to organize it. I’ll cut 'em all some slack.
Please note that I did not say all fundamentalists, of whatever religious stripe or persuasion, were evil. I said that Falwell, Robertson and the others who express the type of viewpoint that they did in the wake of the attacks (that the attacks were successful because God has lifted his “curtain of protection” from the United States because of internet porn and homosexuals) differs from the message of the Taliban only in degree (some Christian fundamentalists have called for, for example, death by stoning for homosexuals) and success rate (Falwell and Robertson don’t completely control the government yet–although try getting elected dogcatcher in this country without giving a shout out to God and see how far you get).
Sam, I have the greatest respect for your posts, but I might have to take issue here.
The homophobic spewing of Falwell and Robertson more than likely helps to program some of the violent @ssholes who then go out and gay bash. This results in many deaths per year. Although certainly not on the scale of bin Laden, there is nonetheless a consistent and similarly disgusting thread of intolerance in these individuals.
For these @sswipes to try and make moral capital out of the World Trade Center Atrocity is so repugnant that I hope they die very slowly.
I agree with the article’s points in that Falwell and Robertson are America’s Taliban. To be sure, neither of these two men are suspected of murder, and I don’t have any cites, but I’m pretty sure that they have no sympathy for any abortion doctors that have been murdered. I believe that they twist religion to suit their own twisted thought processes. Jerry Falwell, in my opinion, didn’t apologize for his offensive remarks. He merely said that his remarks were insensitive and were offered at a bad time. Nowhere did he say that he was wrong. Pat Robertson, at the time of the interview, agreed with everything Jerry Falwell said. Now that people are catching the drift, he is distancing himself like crazy. I’ll bet he’s only doing this because he’s afraid the money will dry up. I myself am a recently born-again Christian and these two jerks don’t speak for me. All that my faith gives me is a calm feeling of closeness with God and the knowledge that humans can’t presume to know what God thinks. My faith has made me painfully aware of what a sinner I am, and how I need to look within and live my life to please God. I am in no position to point fingers at anyone else.
In closing, I hope that Falwell’s and Robertson’s followers discover that they are mean, petty, small-minded fundamentalists who mirror Osama bin Laden’s mindset.
I’d have to add that Fred Phelps comes a wee bit closer every day.
I think it’s pretty silly to try and figure which stars were at the “Tribute to Heroes” and which were not, and to try and infer anything from it. After all, it was to raise money for the victims of the attack and their families, not Bush’s re-election campaign.
I agree about the ‘Tribute to Heroes’ thing. I’m guilty of writing before engaging my brain, and I retract any negative comments I made about who did or didn’t show. My fault.
Back to Falwell: Look, I despise the man. Same with Pat Robertson. I think they twist and pervert religion for their own purposes.
But to equate them to the Taliban is really over the top. I mean, we’re talking about a regime that just shot a woman and her 3-year old child in the back of the head because the woman violated some obscure Muslim law. Say what you want about Falwell and Robertson, I’ve NEVER heard them support anything even remotely resembling that kind of evil. And both of them at least pay lip service to the notion that Christ’s message is a message of love and tolerance. Too bad neither of them practice it.
As I said, the world is full of fundamentalists, and we have just spent a lot of effort telling people not to blame all Muslims just because a few of them have embraced violence. I think everyone here would agree with that. Why can’t we extend the same tolerance to Christians, even ones who use the faith to line their pocketbooks? Criticise them for what they said, remember it later, and fight like crazy to make sure that neither of those clowns ever come close to anything resembling elective offices, but let’s put away the tar and feathers, okay?
As much as I despise Falwell and Robertson, I’d have to say this guy is more along the lines of what the “American Taliban” would look like. (Here is his opinion of the United States Constitution and its Bill of Rights. Here are his ideas for solving the “population explosion”.) Fortunately, he appears to have no serious following. (As far as I can tell, the “Society” consists of him and his son.) If it ever looks like ideas like his are in danger of catching on in this country, then we know we’re in big trouble.
What the heck, here is a whole page of people who are loonier than Falwell or Robertson. Talibans galore!
Which is not to say we shouldn’t all be vigilant against even the likes of Falwell and Robertson.
I don’t know much about Falwell, but from what Robertson has said if he ran the country we could pretty much forget about religious freedom, but I don’t think he has any intention of extending the death penalty to include, say, sodomy. That isn’t to say that there aren’t people in this country who, if we handed them power, would do just that. Check this out.
http://www.tencommandments.org/homosexual.html
They ain’t kidding, either.
Whoa. That’s kind of a creepy little simul-post.
See, Mr. Lee, your message is getting out. Someone says “America’s Taliban”, and people automatically think of you!
He must be so proud.
I’m still waiting for Sam Stone to bring up the evidence that Michael Moore “spews hatred,” as opposed to simply saying things Sam dislikes. Moore might be a bit excessive, but from the stuff I’ve seen, he does do his homework and has cites on his side (which is more than you can say for Falwell and Robertson, but hey).
Here are some choice tidbits from Michael Moore’s column the day after the attack:
http://www.michaelmoore.com/2001_0912.html
Here’s the part where he implies the government is lying, and if they aren’t it’s their fault anyway:
Here’s the part where he says the U.S. is just as bad or worse:
So, according to Michael Moore, the government is lying to you, they are racist (“A-Rabs”), and besides, we are bigger terrorists than Bin Laden. And he finds it more likely that a redneck American would have done this than a known international terrorist with a huge organization and millions of dollars.
He sees this as a big evil American government plot to whip the people into a frenzy against the ‘A-Rabs’. And why? Let me quote him:
And finally, who is ultimately responsible for this? Bin Laden? Any other terrorist? Nope. George Bush is responsible, of course:
Now, since I suspect you will agree with him, you probably won’t see a lot of ‘hate’ in there. But if you ask me, Moore pretty much hates everything America stands for. The guy has parlayed a pretty good comedic sense into a position as a political pundit. Unfortunately, he has neither the education or the intelligence to fit that role. The analysis above is completely whacked. The logic is skewed and simplistic. He finds it easy to believe that American Rednecks could have done this, but wonders how it is possible that a known terrorist with millions of dollars and thousands of peeople could manage to get four of them trained to fly jets. He’s an idiot. And he doesn’t just disagree with the government and anyone else on the right - he HATES them.
Let me further clarify my contention that Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson are America’s equivalent to Osama bin Laden. Of course, they have never actually wielded weapons to kill anyone. I have no cites for this, but a lot of the well known religious leaders create an atmosphere where their revulsion to a particular topic is well known, such as killing abortion doctors. In every reputable national newspaper, one can read about rallies, television programs and interviews where religious leaders condemn abortion and those who provide it. These leaders say that these abortion providers are committing murder and must be stopped. Fanatics go one step further and kill the abortion provider. Afterwards, these religious leaders intimate that while killing the abortion provider was not the correct response (wink, wink, nod, nod), they got what they deserved. Osama bin Laden operates the same way. He maintains training camps to teach weapons handling, bomb making, and other terrorist tactics. When the perpetrators of the embassy bombings showed him a picture of the embassy, he picked a location where a truck bomb would do the most damage. But, he says that he was not responsible for the attack. I realize that this post was very generalized and I can’t offer any proof to back up my claims, but this is my opinion after all of the articles I’ve read.