What has surprised me, however, is what this debate has been about, namely the “right” of people to speak their mind and not be punished for it. The “right” one has to their own opinion, in this case one founded in religion.
I think everyone’s missing a point.
To rewind, let’s remember just what Phil said to GQ magazine:
“Everything is blurred on what’s right and what’s wrong. Sin becomes fine," he later added. “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. 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.”(1)
It was at this point that A&E, the network that produces “Duck Dynasty” saw many LGBT supporters get really angry, so A&E suspended Phil. And then, a week or so later, when A&E saw eve more Duck Dynasty fans get angry, they unsuspended him. Meanwhile, the debate raged on -- all about the wrong thing.
It is not about religion, Christianity or otherwise. There are literally dozens of Christian faiths that support the LGBT community, and to make this about religion demonizes some of the very people that support us.
Is there a case to be made that people like Phil Robertson are flat out wrong in their interpretation of the Bible? There is, and others have made it better than I ever could. Whether it’s a question of translation, interpretation or context, many Biblical scholars question the Duck Dynasty star’s interpretation of Biblical teachings.(2)
This argument, however, means nothing to those that support Phil, and I’m not sure it should. Telling someone how to interpret the Bible, how they should understand their faith, is folly to me. Do I think they’re wrong? Absolutely.
But many of these people also think that LGBT’s people desire to love someone in a non-heterosexual relationship is wrong. They do not understand it, therefore it must be false, demented, or worse. They condemn what they do not understand; I refuse to do the same thing when it comes to other people’s faith. If they’ll keep their hands off my law books, I’ll keep my hands off their Bible.
My issue is not that Phil gets the Bible wrong. It’s that he gets the facts wrong. When he says: “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 is stating that one thing leads to another as a matter of fact.
He is wrong.
Take his first claim, that homosexuality leads to bestilaity. There is absolutely no evidence whatsoever that this is true. Researching, I found only one text that even discussed the two in the same pages, and it was a French language text written in 1994 about life in Greece.(3) (I doubt Phil has read it.)
His second claim, that homosexuality leads to promiscuity is not as clear cut. Even some websites that are neutral on, or are generally supportive of, LGBT issues have statistics showing gay men tend to be more promiscuous than their straight counterparts.(4)
There are numerous statistics, however, that show exactly the opposite. Whether it’s data produced by social networking and dating sites or research studies from places like the University of Chicago, there’s plenty of evidence to suggest gay promiscuity is a myth.(5))(6)
Understandably, LGBT supporters and those opposed to LGBT rights are both confused on this; I can see where Phil might be, too. Indeed, in my next “Unbroken Raina Thought” I’ll explain more about why so much confusion about this issue exists, even in the LGBT community.
But for Phil to state gay promiscuity as a fact is once again simply wrong.
Now, this is the point where you hear people say he has a right to his opinion. Whether people I know at my job, or leaders of major religions, like Catholics and Southern Baptists, all of them are touting Phil Robertson’s “right” to his opinion.(7)(8) And I agree -- to a point.
When he says, “Sin becomes fine… 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,” I cannot argue with Phil and his followers.
Do I think they’re right? Of course not, but I am never going to change their mind, just as they will never change mine about who I choose to love and why. You can’t show me one person who can prove what the kingdom of God is. Thus, Phil Robertson can have his opinions.
He cannot, however, have the same latitude with his “facts.” Phil’s statements on bestiality and promiscuity are debatable at best, flat out lies unsupported by evidence at worst. He is using his religion as an excuse to justify and reinforce negative stereotypes of the LGBT community, nothing more.
I cannot help but wonder if those who defend Phil Robertson’s “right” to his “opinion” would be so up in arms if a Muslim leader came out and reinforced a negative stereotype of Catholics. What if this hypothetical Muslim leader had said that “in his opinion” being a Catholic priest leads to molesting young boys? What if a Mormon political candidate said that “in his opinion” all Southern Baptists were banjo-playing, uneducated rednecks?
The Catholics and the Southern Baptists would be outraged -- and they’d be right. And yet they support Phil Robertson. Not because he’s expressing an “opinion,” but because he’s expressing their similar “opinion.”
Somehow, some people in this country have come to believe that anything that is tied to their belief system is a protected opinion. And while people like Phil often make the most news, he is by no means alone.
How many people have you heard say, “Religion has been responsible for more of the world’s deaths and misery than any other thing?” They wear it like a badge of honor, this statement of fact. Too bad it’s not true.
Running quickly through Wikipedia’s list of wars and deaths caused by human activity in the last 2000 years, you’ll see that when it comes to killing people, religion isn’t even close. Politics, ethnic struggles, forced famines: They’ve killed nearly six times as many people.(9)(10)
Closer to home, when you hear about a religious leader arrested for domestic violence, people immediately point to it as another example of religion’s negative influence on the role of women. This, too, isn’t backed up in any actual research I could find. Indeed, I found one study that suggests “religious involvement is correlated with reduced levels of domestic violence.”(11)
The facts are there, if you want them. Too bad it’s so much easier to be ignorant.
And this is the number one reason I detest Phil Robertson. Not because of his misguided opinions. Not because he’s also a racist.(8) But because he’s willingly ignorant.
More, he’s not only made the choice to be ignorant himself, but he’s decided to use the platform A&E has given him to make sure millions of other people are as well. This, when he and his family claim part of their show is to show people the truth.
“Show people the truth.” Did I really say that? I did, because at least some of the Robertson family already has.
“‘When we first met with the production company,’ recalled Korie (Robertson), ‘they had an intern give us kind of a script they had written that was going to look like our show, and it was just so not us. It was like, the wives get up and go chase the varmints; it was just total redneck. That is not us. That’s not the way we live.’”(12)
A show that was created by the Robertson’s to show how they really lived in defiance of stereotypes is now being used to further them for another group of people. Making Phil Robertson not just an ignorant homophobic racist, but a hypocrite as well.
And that may be the worst thing of all.
References:
1) 'Duck Dynasty' Star Phil Robertson Makes Anti-Gay Remarks, Says Being Gay Is A Sin [UPDATED]
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/18/duck-dynasty-phil-robertson-gay_n_4465564.html
2) CNN Belief Blog: Does Phil Robertson get the Bible wrong?
http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2013/12/20/does-phil-robertson-get-the-bible-wrong/?hpt=hp_c2
3) Wikipedia: Bestiality
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bestiality
4) Facts About Youth: Promiscuity
http://factsaboutyouth.com/posts/promiscuity/
5) The Guardian: So you think gay men are promiscuous?
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/oct/19/gay-men-promiscuous-myth
6) Political Stew: gays are more promiscuous, and other myths
http://www.politicalstew.com/bb/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=111701
7) Catholic Online: Duck Dynasty and the GQ Interview of Phil Robertson: Rejecting Political Correctness
http://www.catholic.org/national/national_story.php?id=53618&wf=rsscol
8) Black Southern Baptist leader slams ‘Duck Dynasty’ star’s race remarks
http://thegrio.com/2013/12/26/black-southern-baptist-leader-slams-duck-dynasty-stars-race-remarks/
9) Wikipedia: List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deadliest_wars#Wars_and_armed_conflicts
10) In case you were wondering, The Spanish Inquisition and The Crusades put together killed around 80,000 people. This would place them in the bottom four percent of Wikipedia’s list. Yeah, I was surprised, too.
‘10a) Wikipedia: Spanish Inquisition
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_inquisition#Death_tolls
10b) Wikipedia: The Crusades
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Crusades
11) Baylor University: Race/Ethnicity, Religious Involvement, and Domestic Violence
http://www.baylor.edu/content/services/document.php/55373.pdf
12) The New York Times: Lured In by a Family Just Being Itself on TV
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/08/arts/television/duck-dynasty-lures-a-growing-audience-on-ae.html?pagewanted=all