30 Reasons Why Bryan Fischer is Dangerous and Must Be Stopped

Bryan Fischer, major douchebag

Despite his growing role as a kingmaker in Republican politics, not many people know about Bryan Fischer. His name is benign-sounding, like a cross between a chess player and a washed up 80's pop singer. But don't be fooled. This guy is arguably more dangerous than Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry, and any other batshit GOP politician you could name.

The scariest thing about Bryan Fischer is that, despite the fact that he spews hateful bile on a daily basis (via his talk radio show and via his role as spokesperson for the American Family Association), GOP politicians continue to cozy up to him, and (seemingly) none of them seem to believe he should tone it down.

People for the American Way have just released a ginormous profile on Bryan Fischer entitled, The GOP's Favorite Hate-Monger: How the Republican Party Came to Embrace Bryan Fischer. It's exhaustive, and it's scary.

From PFAW's Introduction:

Responsible politicians wouldn’t fawn over an unhinged activist who opposes civil rights and religious freedom for minorities, wants to make being gay a crime and decries his personal rivals as enemies of God, right? But that is exactly what is taking place today in the Republican Party, as likely and declared GOP presidential candidates line up to win the approval of Bryan Fischer...

Fischer’s unabashed bigotry is on full display throughout his writings and on-air rants. His entire career is based on leveling venomous attacks against gays and lesbians, American Muslims, Native Americans, progressives and other individuals and groups he detests. He wants to redefine the Constitution to protect only Christians, persecute and deport all American Muslims, prohibit gays and non-Christians from holding public office and impose a system of biblical law.

While Fischer’s views are undeniably shocking, what is most disturbing is his growing influence within not only the Religious Right but also the Republican Party.

Scary stuff.

Here's a partial list, pulled from PFAW's report, of why Bryan Fischer is full-on batshit and dangerous:

1. He successfully pressured Hallmark stores in Idaho to refuse to carry greeting cards for same-sex weddings.
2. He fought legislation that would provide workplace protections for gays and lesbians.
3. He has likened gays to domestic terrorists, pedophiles, slave traders and murderers, and decried the adoption of children by gay parents as a “terrible, inexcusable, inhumane thing to do to children.”
4. He espouses the view that gays were responsible for the Nazi Party and the Holocaust. 
5. He believes that “homosexuals should be disqualified from public office,” banned from serving as judges and barred from working as teachers, and that “homosexual behavior should be against the law.”
6. He claims that bullying-prevention programs will be used for the “brainwashing” of children to make them gay, arguing that “homosexuals cannot reproduce, so they have to recruit; it’s the only way to swell their numbers.” For example, Fischer believes that the television show Glee is “glamorizing homosexual behavior” and “promoting deviant sexuality,” as well as idolatry.
7. He warned, after DADT was repealed, that the military would “now be feminized and neutered beyond repair” and insisted that “the world is now a more dangerous place for us all.” 
8. He likened African Americans to rabbits.
9. He said Native Americans cannot be considered full-fledged American citizens until they convert to Christianity.
10. He said Native Americans “remain mired in poverty and alcoholism because many native Americans continue to cling to the darkness of indigenous superstition instead of coming into the light of Christianity and assimilating into Christian culture."
11. He says American Muslims are a “toxic cancer” to American society and that Muslim Student Associations are “parasites.”
12. He urged the U.S. to ban the construction of mosques, likened mosques to IEDs, and prayed for the destruction of the Dome of the Rock. He has repeatedly claimed that Muslims are inherently dangerous, unintelligent and mentally ill due to inbreeding.
13. He believes that Muslims must be purged from the military and prohibited from enlisting, and that the U.S. not only ban Muslim immigration but also deport and expel all American Muslims.
14. He maintains that only Muslims who renounce their religion and convert to Christianity should be allowed to come into and live in the U.S. 
15. He maintains that Muslims deserve no First Amendment rights.
16. He believes that the Founding Fathers only wanted to extend rights to different Protestant denominations.
17. He denies the existence of the separation of church and state, and believes that states and localities should be allowed to establish official religions. 
18. He wants to model the U.S. justice system on the biblical law of ancient Israel (He cites Genesis to attack Muslims and uses Leviticus to demonize gays and lesbians).  
19. He says President Obama is tyrannical, anti-Christian and intentionally weakening the country so the U.S. can join “every other nation which has ignored God or kicked him to the curb.”
20. He maintains that Obama “nurtures this hatred for the United States of America” and “nurtures a hatred for the white man.”
21. He believes that progressives are “unpatriotic” and “un-American,” arguing that they want to muzzle Christians and overthrow the Constitution in order to advance their social and political agenda.
22. He blamed Sarah Palin’s unpopularity on actual demonic forces that emerged from the political left, calling criticism of Palin “unvarnished demonic evil on full display” and “pure homicidal rage and hate.” He made clear that his charges of demonic conspiracy were not metaphorical.
23. He urged right-wing activists to have more children in order to give conservatives a numerical advantage in the political and cultural battles of the future.
24. He demands that the government “close down Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and welfare,” claiming that Social Security and Medicare represent an “an ungodly and unconstitutional recipe for national suicide.” 
25. He insists that the only difference between progressives and terrorists is that “so far [progressives] haven’t taken to killing people”
26. He demanded, following the tragic news that the SeaWorld whale Tilikum had killed a trainer, that the whale be put to death. He claimed that the courts should use the “ancient civil code of Israel” in dealing with Tilikum.
27. He blamed a deadly attack by a grizzly bear in Yellowstone Park on the fact that American “culture has jettisoned a biblical view” of animals, and called it a sign that God is punishing America.
28. He maintains that Christians should not vote for any candidate who supports gay rights in any form because, he says, homosexuality is an “abomination in the nostrils of God” that “no rational society should ever endorse.”
29. He said that gays should be “ashamed” and “embarrassed,” contends that the “deviancy cabal” is responsible for suicide among gay youth and that “homosexual activists are not wholly innocent in these tragedies.
30. He says the separation of church and state is an idea straight out of Nazi Germany.

It's very easy for progressives and moderates to look at Bryan Fischer and assume that someone with these ideas would never be taken seriously, much less garner serious political clout.  Those people are forgetting that the same thing has been said about potential GOP presidential candidates Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry, and Rick Santorum, who have been mocked endlessly by the left.

Ben Adler wrote of Bryan Fischer's growing influence in Newsweek:

You might think that attention in the form of mockery is not what a public-policy organization would want. But when your business is waging a culture war, there is no such thing as bad publicity for ideological or rhetorical extremism. Being criticized by liberals in the media raises the profile of a socially conservative organization, and burnishes its credibility among the base. Just ask Sarah Palin, or her fans.

Fischer's radio show is distributed on over 200 stations across the country, and reaches over 2 million listeners. While that may seem like chicken scratch compared to Limbaugh or Beck, Fischer's show attracts some of the GOP's biggest names. Guests on Fischer's show include: Herman Cain, Mike Huckabee, Tim Pawlenty, Haley Barbour, Newt Gingrich, Michele Bachmann, Jim DeMint, Jim Inhofe, Roger Wicker, Lamar Smith, Steve King, Jack Kingston, etc., etc.

Many of these GOP figures have expressed support for Fischer's bigotry and extremism, even making campaign promises to Fischer to enact legislation supporting some of his views, or to repeal certain legislation he disagrees with.

Aside from the realization that more people think like Bryan Fischer than one would imagine, is the scariest realization of all: This man might actually run for president one day.

Bryan Fischer: 'Why Not Feature Hitler & John Wayne Gacy During LGBT Month?'

Sorry, Bryan Fischer, but you've already earned your Asshole merit badge. We can't keep handing these things out.

American Family Association spokesman and gigantic asshole, Bryan Fischer, just keeps raising the bar, folks. Yesterday on his radio show, Bryan discussed his favorite bogeyman: Teh Gays. More specifically, Mr. Fischer was discussing LGBT History Month. Boy, did he get his panties in a bunch.

While LGBT History Month is nearly over, Fischer addressed it in relation to the Viki Knox controversy. You can hear his comments here.

This whole thing is about Lesbian, Gay, Bi, Transgender History Month. So my question again, if this is about homosexual history month, are they going to feature all the homosexuals that had an enormous impact on history?

Are they going to feature John Wayne Gacy? He's the homosexual pedophile, remember, that killed thirty-three young boys and young teenagers and buried them under the crawlspace in his house. He was a homosexual. Is he going to be a part of their display?

Adolf Hitler had a record as a homosexual prostitute in the streets of Vienna in the 1910s. He was denied promotions in the German military in World War I because of his homosexual behavior. He formed the Nazi Party in a homosexual bar, a gay bar, in Munich. All of his enforcers, almost every one of the Brownshirts; all the officers and almost all the Brownshirts were homosexuals. Is that going to be a part of Lesbian, Gay, Bi, Transgender Month? We will wait to see.

Not only are Fischer's comments hateful, offensive, and inaccurate, but his logic is completely stupid.

Bryan Fischer, asshole

I suppose, by his logic, Fischer would suggest we celebrate Susan Smith and Andrea Yates on Mother's Day.

Do you suggest we canonize Aileen Wuornos during Women's History Month, Bryan? Do we pay tribute to Richard Ramirez and the Menendez Brothers during National Hispanic Heritage Month? Do we honor the Dahmers during Military Family Week?

We can play this game all day long. I know you love to vilify an entire group of people by propping up one bad example. You also think that by pointing out that some bad people accepted evolution, that evolution should be rejected. Guess what, Brian? Evolution is still a naturally occurring phenomenon whether bad people accept it or not. LGBT people still exist even if one of them happens to do something wrong.  Guess how many serial killers and dictators were heterosexual, Bryan? A whole lot of them.

I keep thinking that, sooner or later, even the American Family Association (which despite its benign and virtuous-sounding name is a bona fide hate group) will think that he's gone too far.

And you'd think that American politicians would have the dignity to refuse to be associated with such a hateful little bile-spewing butthole, but they're practically waiting in line to hang out with him (or share the stage with him).

Don't hold your breath. Actually, in this case you might want to.

Bryan Fischer & The Creation Museum's Scientist Link Evolution To Hitler

Today, AFA spokesman and all-around horrible person, Bryan Fischer, had Dr. Georgia Purdom on his show.

For those unfamiliar with Dr. Purdom, she is one of the actual scientists employed by the Creation Museum. In other words, she is a scientist who has found a way to completely ignore science in order to indoctrinate children with the idea that the earth is only several thousand years old, and that God created humans in their present form.

As I've mentioned before in these pages, evolution deniers like Bryan Fischer, Ray Comfort, and the crew at Answers in Genesis love to play the Hitler card in their attacks on evolution.

Take Fischer and Purdom from today's Focal Point (video segment is below)

FISCHER: So it seems like you could draw a straight line between Charles Darwin, Margaret Sanger, the eugenics movement, and Adolph Hitler. You have an unbroken line from the theory of evolution to Hitler's Germany. Is that an over-exaggeration?

PURDOM: No it's not.

What Fischer and Purdom are trying to do is sully Darwin's name, and his theory of evolution -- a theory which is considered to be a fact by most modern biologists -- by association.

I guess the idea is that if they keep repeating over and over that "evolution = Hitler," the poor souls who pay attention to these loons (over 200 radio stations and over 1 million visitors to the Creation Museum) will simply say, "Welp, Hitler was evil, so evolution has to be a lie!"

Here's the thing:

Evolution doesn't care. Evolution happens, has happened, and will happen, regardless of who embraces it, or who mirrors its mechanisms for whatever nefarious purpose.

It doesn't matter if Mother Theresa, Pope Benedict, or Adolf Hitler embraced the theory of evolution. It doesn't change anything. Because change is always occurring, and it doesn't give a shit about you, politics, religion, or Bryan Fischer.

Next thing you know, Fischer and Purdom will be bad-mouthing Sir Isaac Newton and his theory of gravitation because of the millions who have died by falling.

Mormon-Hating Bigot Bryan Fischer To Follow Romney At Values Voter Summit

Bryan Fischer, douchebag

The Values Voter Summit is coming up this weekend, when some of the most hateful, bigoted, xenophobic, and theocratic figures in American faith and politics will line up to speak to thousands in Washington, DC.

Among those speakers will be seven of the top GOP hopefuls: Rick Perry, Mitt Romney, Michele Bachmann, Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum, and Ron Paul. 

Of all the hateful figures appearing, the most bigoted one in the bunch is none other than Bryan Fischer of the American Family Association. 

He's so controversial that even the organizers of the Values Voter Summit kept him off the list of speakers. However, if you dig a little deeper into the event's schedule, one will find that Fischer is indeed speaking. 

And no, he's not buried in some breakaway session. He's speaking right after GOP front-runner Mitt Romney. 

Rachel Maddow commented earlier this week on Fischer's awkward placement on the schedule. See, Bryan Fischer has said some pretty nasty stuff about Mormons, including his belief that the First Amendment doesn't apply to them. 

Perhaps this is a subtle way for the VVS folks to undermine Mitt Romney's recent positioning as front-runner for the GOP nomination.  Herman Cain has recently tied Romney in polls, and Fischer would like nothing more than to see Cain get the nomination. (Cain is, according to Fischer, "authentically black," unlike our current president.) Or maybe this is just poor scheduling. Wait, no, that's not likely at all.

Bryan Fischer: 'Gays Aren't Born That Way -- Here's The Proof!'

"Part of maturity is recognizing that there are certain impulsing that we need to resist," says Bryan Fischer.

Bryan Fischer, douchebag

It sounds to me like Bry has some impulse issues of his own. He stated on his radio show today:

"I have made it my mission in life to never be alone in a room with a woman other than my wife. I've never ridden in a car with a woman. I've never had coffee at a restaurant with a woman. I've never had lunch -- not even a business lunch, not even a professional lunch with a colleague...have never done it, and never will do it."

Apparently, if you don't want gay things to happen, you should make sure you are always alone, or in a crowd.

Fischer is thrilled about a new study that suggests "religiously-mediated sexual orientation change" is possible. He writes

All it takes is one man to prove that homosexuals aren't inevitably trapped in that lifestyle, and that sexual orientation is not an immutable characteristic like race. As the saying goes, it's impossible to meet an ex-black, but it turns out that it is not impossible to meet an ex-gay.

In fact, there are a bunch of them out there.

And the research proving that change is possible has now been published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal, which takes that snide and snarky objection away from the deviancy cabal.

Stanton L. Jones and Mark A. Yarhouse have published a longitudinal study of "religiously-mediated sexual orientation change" in the Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy. It's found in Volume 37, pages 404-427 for any doubters in the crowd.

How did the study work, exactly?

Jones and Yarhouse followed 61 individuals over a 6-7 year period who completed reparative therapy work with Exodus International. Of these 61 men and women, 53% had successful outcomes. Twenty-three percent reported a successful conversion to heterosexuality, both in orientation and functioning, while an additional 30% achieved behavioral chastity as well as substantive "dis-identification" with a homosexual orientation. (Twenty percent of the subjects abandoned the process and fully embraced a homosexual identity.)

The most amazing quote in Fischer's piece is this gem:

The left is profoundly anti-science and will be predictably anti-science in responding to these findings.

Wow. That's rich, coming from Fischer, who categorically denies evolution and climate change.

Exodus International, for the uninitiated, is a Christian ex-gay therapy organization which promotes "the message of Freedom from homosexuality through the power of Jesus Christ."

It's important to note that Michael Bussee, one of the founders of Exodus, and Gary Cooper, a leader within the ministry of Exodus, left the group to be with each other in 1979. Bussee has been a long-time critic of Exodus.

In 2007, Bussee, along with Jeremy Marks, the former president of Exodus International Europe, and Darlene Bogle, the founder of Paraklete Ministries, an Exodus referral agency. issued an apology to those who had been misled by Exodus. The three stated that although they acted sincerely at the time of their involvement, their message had caused isolation, shame and fear. The three had, in time, become disillusioned with promoting gay conversion.

"Some who heard our message were compelled to try to change an integral part of themselves, bringing harm to themselves and their families," stated the three in the apology.

Another Exodus Chairman, John Paulk was removed by the board of directors when he was identified drinking and flirting at Mr. P's, a Washington, D.C. gay bar, Paulk was introducing himself to patrons of the bar as "John Clint," a name he had used in his previous life as a hustler in Ohio. Paulk was the author of "Not Afraid to Change; The Remarkable Story of How One Man Overcame Homosexuality," and was on staff with Focus on the Family, where was manager of their Homosexuality and Gender Department.

According to the press release for the study Fischer cites, "the results do not prove that categorical change in sexual orientation is possible for everyone or anyone, but rather that meaningful shifts along a continuum that constitute real changes appear possible for some."

So, the study shows that some people can actually deny their impulses through religion, guilt, and shame -- we all know how well chastity has worked out for the Catholic Church.

Personally, I'm a little blown away that the Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy published such garbage. The study proves nothing, except that religion-based bigotry and coercion therapy can shame people into living dishonestly.

How many more participants will eventually reach a breaking point, like 20% of the study's participants, and like Bussee, Cooper, Marks, Bogle, and Paulk --- five higher-ups in the Exodus organization -- and eventually admit that they were simply buying into a lie?

Certainly, the likes of Bryan Fischer will simply shrug any such instances off as cases who were not strong enough in their resistance to deviant impulses. Perhaps they ended up having coffee with a member of the same sex and it all went to hell.

Bryan Fischer's Christian Approach To Health Care: Hospitals, Turn Away The Poor

Another day, another batshit quote from the AFA's Bryan Fischer.

In a blog post on the AFA website, Fischer serves up some ideas on fixing Obamacare. The post is titled, Bringing down health care costs so easy a caveman could do it.

Apparently, Fischer is not aware that Neanderthals actually showed "a deep seated sense of compassion."

Fischer writes:

People need medical care, you will say. Right. People need to eat, too. How long would a grocer stay in business if he was required to offer food to everyone who walked in the door regardless of their ability to pay? He’d be broke in a week, and then nobody would have food.

In the very next paragraph, Fischer actually states the following:

The American people, because of the spirit of Christianity, are the most generous people on earth.

There you have it. Bryan Fischer is not only a terrible human being. As I've stated over and over, he is also the world's least self-aware.

Fischer: Muslim Immigrants Must Convert To Christianity

A day hardly goes by when Bryan Fischer doesn't say something insane.

Bryan Fischer, asshole

Now, we know that Bryan Fischer is an Islamaphobe. He's said Muslims have no first amendment rights. He thinks they should be banned from the military. He's urged the US to ban the construction of mosques. He's stated that they are dangerous, unintelligent and mentally ill due to inbreeding. He's called Muslim Americans a toxic cancer to society. It goes on and on.

Yesterday, Fischer continued his ignorant, anti-Muslim tirade, calling (once again) for the conversion of all Muslim immigrants to Christianity.

On his hateful little show, "Focal Point," Fischer stated that all Muslim immigrants have "got to embrace your God, they've got to embrace your faith," claiming once again that "America is a Christian nation."

One of my favorite of Fischer's claims from this particular tirade was, "Muslims worship an entirely different God." You know, that other God who revealed himself to Abraham.

Watch:

Bryan Fischer: 'The Left Hates Women'

According to Bryan Fischer of the AFA, it's not conservatives who are disrespecting women -- it's the left. Liberals, says Fischer, are almost always the source of misogyny, hatred, and verbal attacks. They're just like Islamic Radicals, he says, treating women as something less than human.

Fischer, looking down on women

Fischer's idea of respect sure is strange.

In February, he stated that "women are not wired, either by evolution or by God, whoever is responsible for this difference, they are not prepared by DNA and innate personality characteristics to be in [combat]."

Last August, Fischer stated that a woman can only be president only if there aren't any godly men available to do the job.

Just last week, he stated that Sandra Fluke is "sleeping with so many guys she can't keep track," and that the "definition of "slut" is "a promiscuous woman." The left got Rush to apologize for using the dictionary accurately."

In January, responding to a report that 96.6% of all sexual assaults in military are male on female or male on male, Fischer actually said this: "Remove women and gays, problem vanishes."

Also in January, Fischer blamed women, and the feminization of public policy, for the sorry state of affairs in America.

Last April, Fischer said that welfare provides incentive for black women to "rut like rabbits."

This man has zero self-awareness.

Watch:

Fischer, Citing Quran, Calls For Military Ban On Muslims, Apparently Forgetting All That Bible Violence

Bryan Fischer, douchenozzle

If I didn't know any better, I would suspect that The American Family Association's Bryan Fischer is an invention -- brilliant comedy-slash-performance art for the ages, joining the ranks of Tony Clifton and Neil Hamburger.

His anti-LGBT, xenophobic, extreme Christian Right views are so ridiculously over the top, you'd be crazy not to wonder if he's simply an elaborate hoax.

If his extreme ideology wasn't enough, Fischer also lacks any hint of self-awareness, spouting blatant hypocrisy at every turn.

Take his recent post at World Nut Daily, in which he doubles down on his belief that Muslims have no place in the US military.

To my knowledge, I was the first voice in America to call for stopping the practice of Muslims serving in the U.S. military. I did so the day after the Fort Hood shootings in November of 2009.

I endured a withering firestorm of criticism from friend and foe alike, and was summoned to both CNN and the Alan Colmes radio show to explain myself.

Now a prominent Tennessee legislator, Rep. Rick Womick, is joining me in this call. Said he, at a Sharia-awareness-event over the weekend, "If you believe it (the Quran), you are commanded to kill anybody who will not convert to Islam."

And of course he is right about what the Quran teaches the followers of Muhammad and Allah. There are 109 verses in the Quran, by one count, that call for violence against infidel Christians and Jews. One example will suffice: "Slay the idolaters wherever you find them. Arrest them, besiege them, and lie in ambush everywhere for them" (Sura 9:5).

What part of "slay the idolaters wherever you find them" do brain-addled idolaters not understand? Muslims have been ordered by their god to kill you! What about that do you not get?

Further on:

Arresting, besieging and lying in ambush is exactly the kind of thing the United States military does to our enemies. Who are Muslims obligated to do that to? Who are the enemies of Islam that devout Muslims are ordered to arrest, besiege and ambush? Why, their fellow soldiers who believe in the God of Christianity.

It would be one thing if this ideology were covert and we were just finding out about it. But it's right there in their holy book where it has been for 1,400 years, where everybody, including our next commander in chief, can read it. It is sheer lunacy not to take this seriously.

In fact, I would suggest that I am showing more honor to Muslims than anyone else, because I am taking their religion more seriously than they are. I believe what Allah said through his Prophet, peace be upon him, that his followers have a sacred duty to slay infidel Americans. It shows a shameless lack of respect for Islam not to believe what their holy book says about their own religion. I have too much respect for Muslims and their sincerity and devotion to make that mistake.

That last paragraph is classic Fischer: Pure unadulterated hatred slathered in smarmy, patronizing righteousness.

While he is certainly correct in that the Quran is not in short supply of violent rhetoric and barbaric ideology, he seems to not also be aware that his Christian Bible is also not in short supply of the same violent rhetoric and barbaric ideology.

If Fischer wishes to ban all adherents of one religion based on the barbarism of its holy book, and the actions of some of its most extreme followers, then he might want to just call for a ban of Christians and Jews as well.

In a comparison of the Quran and the Bible for NPR, religion historian Philip Jenkins stated:

"Much to my surprise, the Islamic scriptures in the Quran were actually far less bloody and less violent than those in the Bible," Jenkins says.

"By the standards of the time, which is the 7th century A.D., the laws of war that are laid down by the Quran are actually reasonably humane," he says. "Then we turn to the Bible, and we actually find something that is for many people a real surprise. There is a specific kind of warfare laid down in the Bible which we can only call genocide."

It is called herem, and it means total annihilation. Consider the Book of 1 Samuel, when God instructs King Saul to attack the Amalekites: "And utterly destroy all that they have, and do not spare them," God says through the prophet Samuel. "But kill both man and woman, infant and nursing child, ox and sheep, camel and donkey."

When Saul failed to do that, God took away his kingdom.

"In other words," Jenkins says, "Saul has committed a dreadful sin by failing to complete genocide. And that passage echoes through Christian history. It is often used, for example, in American stories of the confrontation with Indians — not just is it legitimate to kill Indians, but you are violating God's law if you do not."

Jenkins notes that the history of Christianity is strewn with herem. During the Crusades in the Middle Ages, the Catholic popes declared the Muslims Amalekites. In the great religious wars in the 16th, 17th and 19th centuries, Protestants and Catholics each believed the other side were the Amalekites and should be utterly destroyed.

Let's have a look at some of the passages from Fischer's Bible:

If there be found among you, within any of thy gates which the LORD thy God giveth thee, man or woman, that hath wrought wickedness in the sight of the LORD thy God, in transgressing his covenant; And hath gone and served other gods, and worshipped them, either the sun, or moon, or any of the host of heaven, which I have not commanded; And it be told thee, and thou hast heard of it, and enquired diligently, and, behold, it be true, and the thing certain, that such abomination is wrought in Israel; Then shalt thou bring forth that man or that woman, which have committed that wicked thing, unto thy gates, even that man or that woman, and shalt stone them with stones, till they die. (Deuteronomy 17:2-5)

If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or thy son, or thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which is as thine own soul, entice thee secretly, saying, Let us go and serve other gods, which thou hast not known, thou, nor thy fathers; Namely, of the gods of the people which are round about you, nigh unto thee, or far off from thee, from the one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth; Thou shalt not consent unto him, nor hearken unto him; neither shall thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal him: But thou shalt surely kill him; thine hand shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. And thou shalt stone him with stones, that he die; because he hath sought to thrust thee away from the LORD thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage. And all Israel shall hear, and fear, and shall do no more any such wickedness as this is among you. (Deuteronomy 13:6)

Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass. (1 Samuel 15)

Surely, Fischer would be the first to state that the above passages are out of context, relate to a particular time and place in human history, and don't represent modern Christianity.

Most Muslims would say the same thing about the passages Fischer has cherry-picked from the Quran.

Violence in the Quran, [Jenkins] and others say, is largely a defense against attack.

"By the standards of the time, which is the 7th century A.D., the laws of war that are laid down by the Quran are actually reasonably humane," he says.

And certainly, Fischer has a point when he points to some of the sensational stories of Islamic-fueled violence in recent times. We also must understand that these acts are a whole other animal, and most modern Muslims are far less extreme in their religious views than is Fischer.

That may be the popular notion of jihad, says Waleed El-Ansary, but it's the wrong one. El-Ansary, who teaches Islamic studies at the University of South Carolina, says the Quran explicitly condemns religious aggression and the killing of civilians. And it makes the distinction between jihad — legal warfare with the proper rules of engagement — and irjaf, or terrorism.

"All of those types of incidences — [Sept. 11], Maj. Nidal Hasan and so forth — those are all examples of irjaf, not jihad," he says. According to the Quran, he says, those who practice irjaf "are going to hell."

So what's going on here? After all, we all have images of Muslim radicals flying planes into buildings, shooting up soldiers at Fort Hood, trying to detonate a bomb on an airplane on Christmas Day. How to reconcile a peaceful Quran with these violent acts?

El-Ansary says that in the past 30 years, there's been a perfect storm that has created a violent strain of Islam. The first is political: frustration at Western intervention in the Muslim world. The second is intellectual: the rise of Wahhabi Islam, a more fundamentalist interpretation of Islam subscribed to by Osama bin Laden. El-Ansary says fundamentalists have distorted Islam for political purposes.

"Basically what they do is they take verses out of context and then use that to justify these egregious actions," he says.

El-Ansary says we are seeing more religious violence from Muslims now because the Islamic world is far more religious than is the West. Still, Jenkins says Judeo-Christian cultures shouldn't be smug. The Bible has plenty of violence.

"The scriptures are still there, dormant, but not dead," he says, "and they can be resurrected at any time. Witness the white supremacists who cite the murderous Phineas when calling for racial purity, or an anti-abortion activist when shooting a doctor who performs abortions.

In the end, the scholars can agree on one thing: The DNA of early Judaism, Christianity and Islam code for a lot of violence.

Pot, meet kettle.


Further reading: 30 Reasons Why Bryan Fischer is Dangerous and Must Be Stopped

The 10 Nuttiest Quotes From The Values Voter Summit (And 1 Sensible One)

This past weekend, thousands of cultural conservatives descended upon Washington, DC for the Values Voter Summit, sponsored by designated hate group Family Research Council. Each of the major GOP presidential hopefuls were in attendance, as were dozens of political and religious figures with well-documented affinity for religious bigotry, discrimination, xenophobia, and dishonesty. 

While this cast of characters generally toned down their rhetoric on the national stage, the event was in no way devoid of bilious remarks and poisonous ideology (and some good old fashioned insanity):

Bryan Fischer: "I submit to you that not a single one of our unalienable rights will be safe in the hands of a president who believes that we evolved from slime and that we are the descendents of apes and baboons."

Glenn Beck, in reference to Occupy Wall Street: "The violent left is coming to our streets" to "smash, to tear down, to kill, to bankrupt, to destroy."

Bryan Fischer: "Just as Islam represents the greatest long term threat to our liberty so the homosexual agenda represents the greatest immediate threat to every freedom and right that is enshrined in the First Amendment...we must choose as a nation between homosexuality and liberty, because we cannot have both."

Mat Staver: "The battles we face in America today are not about necessarily tangible borders but intangible ones, they involve the borders around life, liberty and family. And these borders like those physical borders in Israel are under intense attack. In America we are witnessing fierce battles to boot God out of the public schools and out of the public squares, to teach even the youngest of our children about sex and homosexuality, to make America a tax-supported right for any reason and to redefine the very definition of family and marriage."

Bryan Fischer: “We need a president who will treat homosexuality not as a political cause at all, but as a threat to public health...Homosexual behavior represents the same threat to human health that injection drug use does. I believe we need a president who understands that neither homosexual behavior nor injection drug use represent lifestyles that any responsible government ought to normalize, legitimize, legalize, protect, sanction, or subsidize."

Bryan Fischer: "By God's blessing, we have not been hit by a Muslim attack since 9/11. I suggest that in part, we have Major League Baseball to thank. You remember that the week after 9/11 Major League Baseball converted the seventh inning stretch from the singing of 'Take Me Out To The Ballgame' to the singing of 'God Bless America?'"

Rep. Steve King: "I believe that the declaration was written with divine guidance. I believe that God moved the Founding Fathers around this country and the globe like men on a chess board."

Robert Jeffress: "That is a mainstream view, that Mormonism is a cult...Every true, born again follower of Christ ought to embrace a Christian over a non-Christian.”

Glenn Beck: "There is a race war that is going on in our country, declared by the black panthers and Louis Farrahkaun and anybody else says that America, somehow or another, stole the land from Mexico. There is a race war. It wasn't started by us, but they have declared it and we must end it."

Ed Vitagliano: "...The male desire to go out and conquer and to wander. I think that is part of the makeup of a man, but marriage helps to channel those things in a constructive way. I believe that's why there's so much promiscuity in the male homosexual community, because they're two men who behave the same way and there is no civilizing influence in their lives."

The most sensible and compassionate quote from the weekend came from Mitt Romney who stated:

“Our values ennoble the citizen and strengthen the nation. We should remember that decency and civility are values too. One of the speakers who will follow me today [Bryan Fischer], has crossed that line. Poisonous language does not advance our cause. It has never softened a single heart nor changed a single mind."

Amen.

Fischer: AIDS Caused By Rampant Promiscuity & 'Poppers'

This week, AFA spokesman Bryan Fischer continued to perpetuate his dangerous and hateful 'HIV does not cause AIDS' baloney.

Bryan Fischer, tool

Via Right Wing Watch:

So what is the cause of AIDS, according to Fischer? Well, it is the thousands of sexual partners that gay men have coupled with the fact that they need to take "poppers" in order to have that much sex. It is these poppers, Fischer says, that destroy the immune system and "96% of the people who engage actively in homosexuality" use these drugs.

Fischer, like most conservative anti-LGBT blowhards, have this wildly distorted view of homosexuality in which every single member of the LGBT community is living some kind of alternate-universe Freddie Mercury-on-steroids lifestyle:

God's design is one sexual partner for life. Now, in the homosexual community, the average homosexual has hundreds of sexual partners over the course of a lifetime. Hundreds. Some of them have between 500 and 1000 and there are any number of homosexuals, and they admit this in their own literature, have more then a 1000 sexual partners.

Now they're talking about numerous sexual encounters on the same night. Now, in order to do that, they've got to take drugs to enhance the experience and to make it possible to have numerous encounters on the same night. These drugs are called "poppers," is the street name for them. They're amyl nitrites, alkyl nitrites ... they inhale these things and they dilate the blood vessels, increase blood flow and all that kind of thing - they're real tough on the heart, in fact, you find homosexuals frequently dying at early ages of heart attacks. Why? Because they've just overstimulated their heart with these nitrites because of the kind of sexual behavior that they engage in.

And we know, [Peter] Duesberg say, look we know, we can demonstrate in the lab the way these nitrites, the way these inhalants break down the immune system. And the research indicates that 96% of the people who engage actively in homosexuality, homosexual behavior, use these nitrites. The inhalants are very common.

So he suggests that this is the cause of AIDS: it's the rampant promiscuity, coupled with this drug use. That's what causes the human immune system to break down.

Watch:

Top Posts Of 2011...Plus A Blogger's Dozen

Is it silly to post a year-end review for a blog that has only been in existence for 11 months?

Perhaps. But here goes.

Top 10 posts of 2011:

Of the 318 posts this year, the following were the most popular.

1. Why A Heterosexual, Married, North Carolinian Father Of Three Cares About LGBT Equality
I sat down to write this the day after the NC Senate voted to approve a proposed constitutional amendment banning any legal relationship recognition for same-sex couples. I never would have imagined that this post would have been read by over 127,000 people. Most of these people read it because someone else shared it or passed it along. This happy accident showed me that, while there's a lot of work to be done before the May 8 vote, there are a lot of people who are fired up and ready to fight this anti-LGBT amendment -- including many dedicated straight allies (a crucial piece of the campaign.) Common sense, empathy, and reason, are contagious.

2. Why Not? Evolution, Videos & Rockstar Scientists
My friend Matt Shipman, a science writer based in Raleigh, NC, was not the only person who grumbled after watching the Miss USA contestants discuss whether or not evolution should be taught in school. However, he very well may be the only one who did so and then decided to create a video response featuring several kick-ass female scientists discussing the importance of evolution education. Matt's post provided the backstory to the creation of this video, which has since been featured at Jezebel, The Guardian, BoingBoing, Scientific American, Nature, and by Richard Dawkins and PZ Myers. I am honored that Matt wanted to publish this post in these pages (his second post for this blog). I look forward to more guest posts by Matt.

3. Penn Jillette's 10 Commandments For Non-Believers
As part of his book, 'God No,' Penn Jillette serves up his (godless) version of The Ten Commandments.

4. Hi, I'm Rick Perry, And I Don't Understand Things
Like many people, the minute I saw Rick Perry's 'Strong' ad, my blood began to boil. I believe he may have set a record for political ads (not to mention a record for Youtube dislikes). Never before has there been so much bullshit crammed into 30 seconds of video. Thirty seconds of lies, misconceptions, offensive presumptions, and good ol' fashioned bigotry.




5. Faith Healing: Six Die After Church Tells Them They No Longer Need HIV Treatment
Faith-healing church leader tells HIV-positive congregation members that they are cured and no longer need treatment. They die. The sad part? This is only one of many disgusting examples of faith healing ideology leading to deaths in 2011 -- nearly all of which could easily have been prevented by simply going to, and listening to, an actual medical doctor.

6. Douchebag Of The Day: Bryan Fischer
Although I wrote many posts about Bryan Fischer in 2011 (he may very well be the person I most blogged about), for some reason this is the one that hit a nerve with folks, and was shared and tweeted the most. There's plenty more where this came from.

Catholic smut

7. The Catholic Church's $2.4 Billion Bookstore Peddles Loads Of Smut
Hands-down hypocrites of the year, the Catholic church absolutely is very much involved in the publishing, manufacturing, distribution, and selling, of erotica.

8. The Relative Insignificance Of Your Problems (And Perhaps, Humanity)
Personally, I feel there's nothing more life-affirming and stress-relieving than truly appreciating one's place in the big picture. While many feel that acknowledging insignificance somehow detracts from their sense of meaningfulness, it can be incredibly awe-inspiring, and actually quite freeing. Don't sweat the small stuff, indeed.

9. Happy Birthday, Carl
This simple post comprised of the text from Carl Sagan's 'The Pale Blue Dot,' and an accompanying montage created by a Sagan fan and proponent of scientific literacy/education, resonated with a lot of folks who have been inspired and entertained by the late, great astrophysicist.

10. Does The GOP Really Want A President Who Believes We Are In The Last Days?
Michele Bachmann serves up an insane prayer for her homophobic heavy metal BFF's 'You Can Run But You Cannot Hide' ministry.


A Blogger's Dozen:

Part of what makes blogging so interesting is that one can never know which (or even if) posts will find their way to readers in the bloated blogosphere (there are over 156 million public blogs in existence).

Here are a dozen posts readers might enjoy if they missed them the first time around:

Leaving the flock

1. Ask A Humanist: Reflections On Leaving Faith In The Bible Belt
This ongoing series of posts has been a way to publicly address many of the questions I've been asked by people here in the Bible Belt, where it is too often assumed that everyone belongs to a church congregation. Additionally, although there is no shortage of books about non-belief, there are not many which address the real-life impacts that leaving religion can have -- on our families, our neighbors, our children, and our emotions. I wanted, at the very least, to put my own views and experiences out there for others who might find them helpful.



2. Toss The Ten Commandments
Although many believe the Ten Commandments to be indispensable (and the cornerstone of American law), when you really look at them, they don't have much to offer from a moral/ethical perspective. We would do just fine by tossing them out and following only one.

3. Biblical Literalism and Circular Logic: Protecting the House of Cards
For many people, admitting that certain claims in the Bible are not true would mean reevaluating beliefs which had been treated as truths for a large part of their lives. They feel that any compromise on these beliefs  might cause the whole house of cards to come down. It doesn't have to be that way.

4. Religion And Well-Being
A look at the striking similarities of US maps depicting religiosity, well-being, poverty, and political leanings. How much does religion influence well-being, and vice-versa?

5. Reflections on The Rapture That Wasn't
It appears that we needed the rapture more than it needed us. A look at how Harold Camping's bizarre end-times beliefs are really not much crazier than the beliefs held by many Americans.

No, that's not in The Bible

6. That's Not In The Bible: Phantom Passages and Biblical Illiteracy
We tend to attribute many anecdotes, ideologies, and quotes to scripture even though they do not exist anywhere in The Bible. This points to a larger problem, one that affects politics, science, education, and even the enjoyment of art and literature. This post offers a secular argument for biblical literacy.

7. 30 Reasons Why Bryan Fischer is Dangerous and Must Be Stopped
Despite his growing role as a kingmaker in Republican politics, not many people know about Bryan Fischer. The scariest thing about Bryan Fischer is that, despite the fact that he spews hateful bile on a daily basis (via his talk radio show and via his role as spokesperson for the American Family Association), GOP politicians continue to cozy up to him, and none of them seem to believe he should tone it down.

8. Jesus: Anti-Welfare, Randian Capitalist?
How are so many Christians able to reconcile their Randian anti-welfare, capitalistic ideology with a religion based on a man who urged his followers to sell their possessions and give to the poor?

9. Welfare Myths, Christian Charity, And The Insanity Of Welfare Drug Screening
In 2011, we witnessed a growing chorus of resentment among self-described Christians towards the recipients of welfare and the assumption that welfare recipients are lazy, good-for-nothing, baby-having, divorced, drug and alcohol-abusing, freeloading minorities who are gaming the system. A look at how these myths are dead wrong, and how welfare drug screening is idiotic.

10. Is Religion Complicit In The Suicides of Gay Teens?

Bullied to death

It's true that bullying has occurred for as long as humans have been social beings, and that much of bullying is not directed at LGBT teens, but the bullying that LGBT teens experience is something different altogether. While no bullying should be acceptable, the bullying of LGBT teens should be of great concern, due to the nature of the bullying and its devastating effects on our children. The religious component of bullying is especially damaging.

11. Rabbi Thinks Non-Believers Actually Believe (But I Don't Believe Him)
Over at Huffington Post, Rabbi Adam Jacobs tries to make a case that everyone, regardless of what they tell you (or what they think they believe), believes in God. While I was willing to give the Rabbi the benefit of the doubt, it didn't take long to realize that I don't think he knows what he's talking about.

12. A Godless Proposal: A Kinder, Gentler Atheist
I am quite fond of many secular organizations and their members. I applaud many of their fantastic philanthropic projects, awareness campaigns, community-building initiatives, and the support systems they provide and foster. However, I have trouble committing to some of them due to philosophical differences. Why atheists could stand to tone down some of the antagonism and build bridges with religious folks who share their views on equality, science, church-state separation, and social justice.


Thanks for reading in 2011.  There should be plenty of fodder in 2012, and I don't plan on going anywhere.

I wish everyone a Happy New Year -- one full of sanity, tolerance, and reason.

Bryan Fischer: Gays Responsible For The Nazi Party

Bryan Fischer, total dickhead

Bryan Fischer, of the American Family Association (the hate group sponsoring Gov. Rick Perry's prayer and fasting rally) wants to clear something up.

He never once said that gays were responsible for the HOLOCAUST. He said that the gays were responsible for the NAZI PARTY (which was responsible for the Holocaust).

Remember, folks! Bryan Fischer will be praying for America alongside Texas governor and potential GOP presidential candidate Rick Perry on August 6 at the seven-hour fasting and prayer-fest, Response: A Call to Prayer For a Nation in Crisis. 

Bryan Fischer: HIV Does Not Cause AIDS, Massive Drug Use Among Gays Causes AIDS

I am a horrible person.

By now, it's clear that Bryan Fischer, of SPLC-designated hate group The American Family Association, is either a brilliant work of performance art or simply just a horrible, willfully ignorant, bible-thumping hatemonger suffering from acute narcissistic personality disorder.

He was already vying for 'Worst Person in the World,' but this week Fischer ratcheted up the batshit yet again.

Via Right Wing Watch:

It really should come as no surprise that there is no depth to which Bryan Fischer will not sink in his relentless assault against all things gay, as he is now openly promoting the idea that the HIV virus is not the cause of AIDS.

Fisher dedicated two segments on his program yesterday to interviewing Peter Duesberg, author of "Inventing the AIDS Virus," who asserts that the idea that HIV causes AIDS was a scheme concocted by scientists in order to get research grants and that the symptoms attributed to AIDS are really caused by massive recreational drug use among gay men.

And it is a theory which Fischer wholeheartedly endorses.

The full interview can be viewed below, if you can stomach it.

AFA's Bryan Fischer: Criminalize Homosexuality In All 50 States

The American Family Association's Douchebag-In-Chief Bryan Fischer wants to re-criminalize sodomy in all 50 states.

Is anything Bryan Fischer says surprising anymore? Hardly. He has a long history of making ignorant, hateful, and downright bizarre comments. But that doesn't mean we should stop paying attention to what he's saying.

We need to remember that Fischer has been embraced by many of the GOP's 2012 presidential candidates. His organization hosted Rick Perry's Texas prayer rally. And the AFA continues to host "policy briefings" to introduce GOP candidates to pastors.

Those who have dismissed Fischer as a fringe lunatic with no real political sway are of the same mindset as folks who dismissed Michele Bachmann as too fringe-y to have a shot at higher office.

What Part Of 'Consent" Does Bryan Fischer Not Understand?

Bryan Fischer's latest batshit rant is about how condoning gay marriage will only lead to the legalization of pedophilia and bestiality.  Not that we haven't heard that one before.


It's a common refrain with Fischer.  His Twitter feed is rife with comparisons of homosexuality to pedophilia and bestiality.

The anti-gay spokesman for the American Family Association has this meme he thinks is clever. To support his view that it's perfectly okay to discriminate against LGBT folks, he serves up endless examples of our intolerance of pedophilia and bestiality.

Here's the thing, Bry. In cases of child molestation or sex with a minor, the acts are not consensual. In cases of bestiality, the acts are not consensual. In gay marriage, there are two consenting adults.

I can't decide if you're willfully ignorant or just an idiot.

Bryan Fischer: Gays Have 'No Business' Being Republican

In an interview with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Bryan Fishcer of the American Family Association said that gays have "no business" in the Republican Party.

"They have no business being there. Our message is to them is that your home is in the Democratic Party," said Bryan Fischer, director of issue analysis for the Tupelo, Miss.-based American Family Association, a conservative radio host and a leading anti-gay figure in the GOP.

"These groups are actively working to undermine and subvert the Republican party platform and the principles of the Republican Party," Mr. Fischer said in a telephone interview. "They are undermining the moral foundations of the Republican Party."

It's no matter to him that Log Cabin Republicans support nearly every other party platform from tax policy to gun rights.

"There is no place for the homosexual agenda," he said. "The Republican platform is very clean on the issues of marriage and family and parenting, and these are people that are actively working against the principles of the party."

"The reason they are for gay marriage is that it is an issue of liberty for people to have the freedom to do what they want ... but we oppose gay marriage because it threatens liberty," he said.

He offered two examples of businesses whose freedoms were trumped by what he calls the gay agenda. First, he said several mayors are trying to keep Chick-fil-A restaurants out of their cities because the company's devout Christian owners oppose gay marriage. In another example, he said, the New Mexico Civil Rights Commission fined Christian photographer Elaine Huguenin for refusing to photograph a lesbian couple's commitment ceremony.

"The gay agenda is a threat to religious liberty. It is a danger to the liberty that the party stands for ... and it's tyranny that's being launched against businesses," Mr. Fischer said.

He said younger members of his party don't see that "because they are young and they are immature and they are unaware of the severe dangers to liberty that is posed by the homosexual agenda."

There you have it, my LGBT friends. The Republican Party does not want you. The Democrats, on the other hand, could sure use your help voting bigots out of office.

Douchebag Of The Day: Bryan Fischer

Bryan Fischer, Director of Issues Analysis at hate group American Family Association, is a huge douchebag.  I've called attention to his insanity in these pages on a regular basis, so nothing he says is ever terribly surprising, sadly.

Fischer tweeted the following today:

It cannot be stressed enough that Fischer is not part of the lunatic fringe.  He is in bed with many high profile religious right politicians, including current Texas governor and potential President of the United States, Rick Perry (The AFA is paying for Perry's 'Response' prayer rally in Texas.)

Bryan Fischer: Satan Behind Gay Rights, Planned Parenthood & Environmentalism

Another day, another batshit rant from Bryan Fischer.

According to Fischer, Old Scratch is behind everything from gay rights to Planned Parenthood to environmentalism.

Watch:

Bryan Fischer On Why God Designed Men To Be Leaders In Home, Church & Society

American Family Association spokesman, and biggest douchebag in the world, Bryan Fischer thinks he's figured out why America is in so much trouble.

It's women's fault, of course (remember that whole Garden of Eden thing?

According to Fischer, God designed men and women differently so that men could run everything.

"The way we have gotten in trouble in public policy, is we have gotten away from masculine characteristics of public policy We have feminized our public policy."

Watch: