The Christian Right on Cats, Condoms and Charles Taylor
 

June 14 2005
Counterbias.com
Mel Seesholtz
 

Are fundamentalist Christians now attacking cats? Do they continue to condemn teaching condom use in the age of AIDS? Yes they are, and yes they do. And an architect and patriarch of the Christian Right was “in bed with” a dictator wanted for crimes against humanity.

“Are cats for true Christians?” is the title of an article posted by “J.R.” His (or her) basic argument was:

Many conscientious ones among Jehovah’s people today have wondered if Christians should own cats in view of their somewhat sordid symbolic history and the many health risks associated therewith. … This can become a life-or-death issue since to move the steps of a brother away from the path of Christ’s ransom sacrifice is tantamount to ‘putting a millstone around the neck and being thrown into the sea.’ -Matt. 18:6. Clearly, in a matter where our eternal salvation is involved, the mature Christian will not pursue a purely selfish course based on his own personal choices, but will adopt a congregational viewpoint as scripturally prescribed.

In other word, cats are evil and demonic, as J.R. continued to explain in what seemed to be a call to holy war against felines:

Clearly, the Bible … shows beyond any reasonable doubt that the basic nature of cats, while created perfect by God, has become evil or ‘beastlike’ since the fall of Adam six thousand years ago, and more probably, since the Great Flood of Noah’s time (c 2350 B.C.E.). This is a development of the condition borne by the ‘Original Serpent’, the ‘Great Dragon’ Lucifer himself. (Gen. 3:1) Indeed, modern studies of classification of cats, while not necessarily being reliable as they may be based on the discredited ‘theory’ of evolution, strongly associate felines with serpents (despite some external differences in physiology and morphology, which confuse those who do not study these matters deeply). (italics mine)

“Some external differences in physiology and morphology” between mammals and serpents? Apparently J.R. flunked Biology 101.

Noah’s flood in 2350 BCE? Apparently the worldwide flood swept around the Egyptian civilization as well as Saragon the Great of Akkad, who began the conquest of Sumeria and founded one of the first great empires in 2350 BCE.

Okay, so J.R. is a lunatic from somewhere beyond the fringe of the Christian Right. But the Traditional Vales Coalition is “mainstream.” Its executive director Andrea Lafferty was as well informed and reasonable as J.R. when she said on the June 1, 2005 edition of Fox News’ Your World with Neil Cavuto, “We know these kids [teenagers] cannot pick up their towels. How are they going to know how to put on a condom correctly, when adults have at best a 15 percent failure rate?”

If “kids” don’t know how to put on a condom correctly, could that be a consequence of TVC’s and their allied organizations’ obdurate objection to, lobbying against and suing of any school, school district or organization that produces a sex ed program which teaches the correct method? TVC considers the graphics used in condom education to be “pornographic” and, of course, “promoting homosexuality”: two things they adamantly oppose. (But apparently it’s okay for the GOP to accept campaign contributions from the pornographer and his porn star date George W. Bush and Karl Rove will dine with.)

In responding to Lafferty’s comments, mediamatters.org pointed out her numerous factual errors and distortions. She based hers on those propagated by the faith-based abstinence-only sex “education” programs advocated – and funded – by the Bush administration: more than $900,000,000 since George W. took office, despite such programs’ failure and their preposterous lies.

The most recent evidence of these programs’ failure came from Yale and Columbia University researchers in an article entitled “After the promise: The STD consequences of adolescent virginity pledges” in the April 2005 issue of the Journal of Adolescent Health. The research of Dr. Hannah Brückner and Dr. Peter Bearman was also the subject of an Associated Press story: “Teens who pledge to remain virgins until marriage are more likely to take chances with other kinds of sex that increase the risk of sexually transmitted diseases, a study of 12,000 adolescents suggests.”

Evidence of the programs’ preposterous lies came in December 2004, when the office of Representative Henry Waxman (D-CA) issued a scathing report on the failure and dangers of “abstinence-only” sex education programs. From Doreen Brandt’s 365Gay.com report on the report:

The Waxman staff report found that two thirds of the abstinence programs in use in schools distort the facts on the use of condoms.

 

It also found that the program is teaching teens that abortion can lead to sterility and suicide, that half of the gay male teenagers in the U.S. have tested positive for HIV, and that touching a person's genitals can result in pregnancy. … (italics mine)

“Abortion can lead to sterility and suicide” (italics mine). Like any OB/GYN surgically invasive procedure an abortion “can” lead to complications that “can” sometimes lead to sterility. But when performed by a licensed physician in an appropriate medical setting, such cases are extremely rare. Simply saying that abortions “can” – without the necessary explanations, qualifications and supporting information – is nothing more than disinformation and a scare tactic.

“Half of the gay male teenagers in the U.S. have tested positive for HIV.” When were all the gay teenagers (in and out of the closet) in America tested? Was this a national event – the “Day of Testing” – completely missed by the liberal, mainstream, conservative, and evangelical media?

“Touching a person’s genitals can result in pregnancy.” But that’s not the only lie the Bush administration and the Christian Right call “sex education.” In a “Crossfire” program broadcast on CNN in December 2004, Genevieve Wood of the Family Research Council repeatedly refused – five times, according to the transcript – to disown, qualify, explain, or document her claim that masturbation can cause pregnancy.

Reality Check I: most teenagers today, like most of their parents and grandparents and most of their parents before them, are going to experiment with pre-marital sex in one form or another. In the age of AIDS, would knowledge of condoms and how to use them effectively be better than no knowledge?

An alternative to such knowledge was proposed by Lafferty’s boss, Rev.Louis Sheldon, founder and chairman of Traditional Values Coalition. He suggested rounding up all HIV+ people (and gays, of course) and putting them in concentration camps.

Reality Check II: the Bush administration has consistently censored scientific and medical research and turned them into faith-based ideologies. Philadelphia Inquirer science writer Faye Flam’s November 30, 2003 article entitled “Spinning Science as a Political Tool” listed several books that documented “how scientific results are being contorted to fit political agendas”:

In recent months, editors of major science journals have complained that the Bush administration is distorting science to push an agenda influenced by religion and by industry wishes. The journal Science published editorials accusing the [Bush] administration of stacking panels on lead poisoning and pollution with people with ties to the lead and petroleum industries, and loading panels on HIV/AIDS prevention with Christian pro-abstinence groups.

The same concerns were raised in an October 31, 2004 New York Times editorial entitled “Subverting Science.” A recent article in the Toronto Globe and Mail noted TVC’s key role in aiding the faith-based distortion of science: 

[S]cientists across the United States [find] themselves in a surreal era of self-censorship. Conservatives used key-word Internet searches to compile their watch lists, so researchers are hunting for euphemisms for homosexuals and prostitutes. …

 

Never before has the U.S. scientific community been embroiled in such a broad, sustained battle with political leaders, and not just over sexuality matters. The government ignored the protests of its top geologists in 2003 when it decided to allow the sale of a book at Grand Canyon National Park [in the “science” section of the bookstore] claiming that Noah's biblical flood created the chasm just 4,500 years ago.

That’s the same Noah’s flood that J.R. believes perverted the nature of cats.

Further down steam in the mainstream of the Christian Right is televangelist and personal confidant of God, Pat Robertson, who claims to know a lot about the fall of man, hell and, no doubt, demonic cats and condoms. This excerpt is from one of his “teachings” on hell:

That’s the choice people have. But to tell them it’s all sweetness and light, you can live the way you want to, I’m okay, you’re okay. If you’re drinking and fornicating and cheating and stealing and lying and greedy and all the rest of it, it’s okay. You’re okay. You’re an American, don’t worry about it. Boy, that, folks, is what you’d call a lie of Hell. And the one thing the devil would like to do is to keep us from believing in him, or believing in any kind of punishment because we don’t like punishment.

-- Pat Robertson, February 2004

Aside from the usual litany of sins, how interesting Robertson would include greed. Journalist Bill Sizemore followed Robertson’s political and economic activities for years. In 1999 he published an article in The Virginian-Pilot newspaper reporting that Robertson had signed a development agreement with then Liberian President Charles Taylor, a man frequently criticized by international human rights groups. Robertson established a for-profit corporation known as Freedom Gold, Ltd. based in the Cayman Islands, with himself as President and the firm’s only director. Televangelist Robertson reportedly told President Taylor, “I pray that this investment may become a wonderful blessing to the people of Liberia and will be one of the many significant investments that will be made under your administration in the nation of Liberia.”

According to Sizemore, there are similarities between this venture and an earlier enterprise Robertson was involved in with another African strongman, Zaire dictator Mobutu Sese Siko. In that arrangement, Robertson was wined-and-dined on Mobutu’s private yacht and established the African Development Company after receiving lucrative concessions to develop timber and diamond reserves. Mobutu – dubbed the “President of Kleptocracy” for his looting of Zaire’s wealth – was driven into exile in 1997, and subsequently died of cancer. It is estimated that he embezzled as much as $2 billion from his nation, but Robertson remained firm in defending Mobutu as “a good Christian” despite the televangelist’s own words: “If you’re…cheating and stealing and lying and greedy.”

Mobutu is dead, but Charles Taylor is in the news again. Recall Robertson’s words: “And the one thing the devil would like to do is to keep us from believing in him, or believing in any kind of punishment because we don’t like punishment.” Apparently neither does Pat’s friend and former business partner.

Charles Taylor is currently in protected exile, living largesse in a government guesthouse in Nigeria (where homosexuality is a crime punishable by a mandatory 14 year prison sentence). His former actions – during the time of his association with Robertson – have resulted in him being wanted by the United Nations-backed war crimes court, where he faces 17 counts of “crimes against humanity.”

That charge could be leveled against the leaders of the Christian Right and their political minions. From J.R. to Lafferty and Sheldon to Robertson, their words and actions are nothing less than a call to commit crimes against humanity (and felines).

Think Mel's exaggerating? He's not, and he'll explain why in his next article on Counterbias.com.

---