The social networking web program Facebook has decided to toss its lot in with the militant homosexual activists, and will encourage FB thought police to report any comments deemed to be ‘hateful’ and therefore to be censored. Thus blatant censorship and restriction of anything deemed to be politically incorrect is now well underway at FB.
It has jumped into bed with leading homosexual activist groups, and is now urging its users to act as the gaystapo, reporting any comments that might in any way be critical of the homosexual lifestyle and agenda. Here is how one article is reporting the story:
“The social networking site Facebook has teamed up with a who’s who list of homosexual advocacy groups to set up a Network of Support for homosexuals, part of an effort to remove ‘hateful’ speech and bullying from the social network site.
“But pro-family groups are expressing serious concern about the arrangement, as some of the homosexualist organizations call not only for the removal of legitimately hateful or violent speech, but also censorship of statements that are merely critical of homosexuality….
“The Network of Support encourages users to report ‘hateful’ comments to Facebook, which will then be deleted by the site, and gives instructions on how to prevent such comments from happening in the first place, such as blocking profiles, reporting harassment, sticking up for others, thinking twice about posts, or directing individuals to FB’s Network of Support.
“The social network site announced that it is teaming up with MTV’s A Thin Line campaign; the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD); the Human Rights Campaign (HRC); the Trevor Project; the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN); and Parents, Families & Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) in establishing this Network of Support for troubled homosexual youth.
“Family Research Council President Tony Perkins blasted the partnership, expressing concern that groups like GLAAD may actually try to use their influence to push Facebook to adopt a much wider definition of hate speech. GLAAD President Jarrett Barrios has indicated that Facebook’s efforts are only ‘an important first step,’ and Perkins says he believes GLAAD will work to expand the definition of hate speech beyond hateful attacks to include any speech critical of homosexual behavior. ‘It may happen slowly, but I guarantee that Facebook will begin to broaden its definition of what’s ‘hateful’ based on GLAAD’s prior actions,’ said Perkins.
“The pro-family leader referred to GLAAD’s campaign to get him banned from the Washington Post’s editorial page after he penned a column where he said the blame for bullying should rest at the feet of bullies themselves and not at church-going Christians, who believe homosexual behavior is wrong, but affirm the goodness of the person.
“Perkins had made clear in that opinion piece that Christians condemn bullying and violence against homosexuals, and said Christian compassion motivates them to seek to turn homosexuals away from ‘self-destructive’ behavior. However, GLAAD told its followers, ‘Perkins blames the recent teen suicide tragedies on the victims themselves’ and accused the Post of making its editorial pages a ‘platform for an anti-gay activist.’
“Perkins warned that the Facebook partnership with GLAAD ‘is significant because it puts Facebook on the media’s growing path toward censorship. Like the mainstream media, they’re succumbing to pressure to silence free speech’.”
The original story seems to have come from another site, which said in part: “But not all threatening language is created equal, apparently. Among Facebook’s many online communities are groups such as, ‘I Hate Rush Limbaugh,’ ‘I Can’t Wait For Rush Limbaugh to Die,’ and ‘Rush Limbaugh Should Die Slowly.’ Hateful? Yes. Threatening? Sure. So why are these groups still on Facebook?”
Indeed, there are all sorts of abusive, hate-filled and ugly bullying sites on FB targeting Christians, conservatives, pro-lifers, and those concerned about marriage and family. There is even a fake FB page claiming to be from me, full of vile attacks and slander about me. Andrew Bolt has had a similar experience, as have many others.
Thus one can really question the FB policy here. It is being very selective indeed in whom it is trying to protect. And sadly some believers are already defending the FB move. As is so often the case, they are being rather naive and gullible here. There is a worldwide campaign by homosexual activists to shut down all criticisms of their destructive lifestyle. And since the Bible so clearly calls the lifestyle sinful and against God’s creation purposes, they are especially targeting Christians. So they would be quite happy to see someone like me languish in prison for “hate crimes”.
This is not about a general concern for hatred and bullying on FB. If it were, it would not countenance anti-Christian and anti-conservative bigotry and hatred. Indeed FB does not seem to worry much about pedophilia either (see the link below).
Jesus said we must be wise as serpents. Sometimes believers are not very understanding of the war being directed against them. We need to discern the times, and not be unwise here. If a group has declared war on you, being naive or ignorant about it is not going to help anyone. We must be informed about what is happening in the culture wars, and we must resist attempts at censorship and attack of religious freedom.
Sure, all true bullying and hatred is unacceptable, but it depends on how these activities are defined. For the militant homosexual lobby and their PC supporters, any statement whatsoever which questions their lifestyle is considered to be “hate speech” and “vilification”.
We are very quickly moving into a situation of vast censorship and restriction on freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and freedom of conscience. As usual, it is a gradual process, so that many people are not even aware that it is happening. But it most certainly is, and if we all do not wake up soon, we will find one day soon that many of our core freedoms have been taken away.
I have been reading your commentary for a few months now and I have found it refreshing compared to some of my left leaning christian friends.
I have had discussions on FB regarding homosexual lifestyle and its impact on our society. I have no idea how this is hate speech. I have also been harassed by those who are now receiving protection.
I have a suggestion for an article: I have been informed that an Iranian pastor is to be executed on the 24th of October. http://www.assistnews.net/stories/2010/s10100068.htm
I have heard nothing of this from mainstream media. Maybe you could write about the disproportionate reporting that occurs in the media. At the age of 19 it is sad to see society falling apart around me.
Cheers,
Caleb McKee
“The culpability of ‘gays’ relative to the spreading effects of sexual license in society is akin to that which we assign to drug pushers, even though it is the addicts themselves who destroy their own communities through criminal behaviour“. – Dr Scott Lively
An oft repeated statement by the gays is that “there is so much more work to be done.”
How dreadful are the curses which being gay lays on those who are enslaved to it! Besides the militant frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful evolutionary fatalism. The effects are increasingly apparent in many countries. The rise in sexual violence, promiscuity, sexually transmitted diseases, mental instability, suicidal tendencies, drug taking, a threat to the economy, a hatred of truth, justice and righteousness, a threat to freedom of speech, freedom of conscience and thought itself, a terrible threat to children, and a threat to marriage and the family exist wherever the followers of the prophets of Cultural Marxism, like Gramsci, Lukacs, Marcuse, Horkheimer and Alfred Kinsey rule or live.
A degraded and perverted sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity, sanctity and humanity. The fact that with gayness, queerness – whatever- every woman becomes a second class citizen, simply a machine for bearing children, must delay the final extinction of sado – masochism, bondage and sexual slavery, until gay perversion has ceased have its terrible hold on men .
Individual gays may show splendid qualities. Many become the brave and loyal soldiers of the Queen; all know how to die in the cause of diversity and gay affirmation, but the influence of Frankfurt School and its cultural Marxist ideology paralyses the personal and social development of those who follow it.
Apart from Islam, no stronger retrograde force exists in the world.
Far from being moribund, gayness is a militant and proselytising ideology. It has already spread throughout Britain and other western nations, raising strutting and cavorting followers at every gay pride parade. No technology, no reasoned debates, no appeal to common sense, or health and safety can stop this cancer eating away at the heart of our nation. Just as ancient Greece and Rome vainly struggled with inner moral decay so we too are condemned to fall, unless by a supreme recovery of moral courage and martial vigour we arise again and take our stand for freedom as in the olden times.
There is an unfortunate tendency for many in the church today to think: Unless I think that conduct ‘x’( in this case, sodomy) is not a sin or at least not a sin that puts one’s inheritance in the kingdom at risk, I cannot truly love the perpetrator of conduct ‘x.’ This is an anti-Christian view. Jesus reached out to the biggest economic exploiters (tax collectors) and sexual sinners in his day not because he believed that their sins were inconsequential or even non-sins but rather precisely because he believed such behavior put them at serious eternal risk.
Why would we ever think that these two things, loving outreach and intensified ethics, do not belong together? If someone is putting his or her life at risk, for example, by skating on thin ice, it is not love to say nothing or, worse, affirm the act (“Have a nice day skating on thin ice!”) and work to dismantle any disincentives (signs, fences) for skating on the thin ice. And if my children disobey me after I warn them not to skate on thin ice, I don’t discipline out of hate but out of love.
That’s why Augustine formulated the saying, “Love, and do what you want” (Dilige, et quod vis fac; Homilies on First John 7.8), to show that love cannot be watered down to mean permissiveness and tolerance. His illustration for the saying? A father disciplines rigorously his child, while a “boy-stealer” caresses a boy. Which expresses love? The father, of course. So if you act out of love you can do what you want, meaning that you can implement disincentives as regards the commission of sinful behavior. Perhaps it is best to conclude with Augustine’s own words on the subject:
If any of you perhaps wish to maintain love, brethren, above all things do not imagine it to be an abject and sluggish thing; nor that love is to be preserved by a sort of gentleness, nay not gentleness, but tameness and listlessness. Not so is it preserved. Do not imagine that . . . you then love your son when you do not give him discipline, or that you then love your neighbor when you do not rebuke him. This is not love, but mere feebleness. Let love be fervent to correct, to amend. . . . Love not in the person his error, but the person; for the person God made, the error the person himself made. (7.11; NPNF, slightly modified)
Can you supply a link to the FB page abusing you? I am on FB and will report it for you.
Anne Winters
Thanks Anne
I just tried to look it up now and it seems to have been taken down. Other people have complained on my behalf in the past so it may have done some good. But I need to keep being aware of when and where I am being attacked under false pretenses. For example, my enemies have also posted entries about me on Wikipedia to also attack me and drag my name and reputation in the mud.
It is hard to keep up with the various fake sites and hate sites. I tend to ignore them. But others must have come to my aide on these.
Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch
That FB is one of the forefront drivers of the Spirit of the Age is very unsurprising. Although it can be used for the Kingdom, I have no doubt that it’s founders had absolutely no intention that it should be. If society is obsessed with something as it is with FB, you can be sure that the object of their obsession is going to be an enemy of God whether it be celebrities, a particular TV program, FB or Google. It’s only going to get worse and I’m sure that it doesn’t bother them in the least that Christians and Conservatives think it to be unfair. With judicial activists and increasingly vague and subjective laws open to all kinds of interpretation, our protections are rapidly disappearing as they have done in totalitarian societies down through history.
Dee Graf
The answer would seem to lie in an anti-facebook campaign to withdraw from participation in this media, by those who find themselves being unfairly discriminated against. It would work both ways. If users find their freedom to express their views are being suppressed then get out of it. If enough people dropped out then things might change.
Pat Brams
Who could be bothered using Facebook anyway. Honestly, haven’t people got better things to do with their time?
Jane Petridge
Thanks Jane
Yes, if people are on FB just to play games and waste time, then I fully agree with you. But what if they are there to use it for the Kingdom, as I seek to do?
Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch
Good points, Jane and Bill.
I think a good case can be made for avoiding FB altogether, but I think there are a lot of reasons to use it.
For example, CMI’s (Creation Ministries International) Facebook group posts a lot of articles which can easily be shared with friends, family, and coworkers. Though CMI’s efforts are often distracted by people hostile to their cause, there still are many good conversations and information exchanges that could not be duplicated through e-mail and printed media alone.
I would not want to base an entire ministry on it for reasons mentioned in the article, but I believe it can be a good addition to an existing one.
Dan Brinkman
Thank you Bill, for speaking out the truth.
Those folk trying to shut down our freedom to speak out about homosexuality are the ones who are the real homophobics – and they are legitimizing behaviour that will lead homosexual/lesbian people to hell, unless they repent/turn away from their choice to live a life-style that is in defiance of almighty God. The RULE maker/GOD, the God of Creation, who set the laws/standards, created Adam and Eve and gave them the task of going for and multiplying (populating the world) we would not be here now, if God had created Adam and Steve as the first humans in the Garden of Eden. It is God who instigated marriage as between a man and a woman.
One day, we will all stand before the Judgment seat of God, and those who are being lulled into thinking their life-style of choice that is in direct violation to God’s laws, will have a huge shock on Judgment day!!!!
Barb Hoc
And here is how the Victorian Labor Party plans to further promote the homosexual agenda, and penalise anyone who dares to stand in their way: http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/labors-bold-play-to-win-pink-vote-20101022-16xvi.html
Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch
Hi Bill,
I have been reading your commentary for a few months now and I have found it refreshing compared to some of my left leaning christian friends.
I have had discussions on FB regarding homosexual lifestyle and its impact on our society. I have no idea how this is hate speech. I have also been harassed by those who are now receiving protection.
I have a suggestion for an article: I have been informed that an Iranian pastor is to be executed on the 24th of October.
http://www.assistnews.net/stories/2010/s10100068.htm
I have heard nothing of this from mainstream media. Maybe you could write about the disproportionate reporting that occurs in the media. At the age of 19 it is sad to see society falling apart around me.
Cheers,
Caleb McKee
“The culpability of ‘gays’ relative to the spreading effects of sexual license in society is akin to that which we assign to drug pushers, even though it is the addicts themselves who destroy their own communities through criminal behaviour“. – Dr Scott Lively
An oft repeated statement by the gays is that “there is so much more work to be done.”
How dreadful are the curses which being gay lays on those who are enslaved to it! Besides the militant frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful evolutionary fatalism. The effects are increasingly apparent in many countries. The rise in sexual violence, promiscuity, sexually transmitted diseases, mental instability, suicidal tendencies, drug taking, a threat to the economy, a hatred of truth, justice and righteousness, a threat to freedom of speech, freedom of conscience and thought itself, a terrible threat to children, and a threat to marriage and the family exist wherever the followers of the prophets of Cultural Marxism, like Gramsci, Lukacs, Marcuse, Horkheimer and Alfred Kinsey rule or live.
A degraded and perverted sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity, sanctity and humanity. The fact that with gayness, queerness – whatever- every woman becomes a second class citizen, simply a machine for bearing children, must delay the final extinction of sado – masochism, bondage and sexual slavery, until gay perversion has ceased have its terrible hold on men .
Individual gays may show splendid qualities. Many become the brave and loyal soldiers of the Queen; all know how to die in the cause of diversity and gay affirmation, but the influence of Frankfurt School and its cultural Marxist ideology paralyses the personal and social development of those who follow it.
Apart from Islam, no stronger retrograde force exists in the world.
Far from being moribund, gayness is a militant and proselytising ideology. It has already spread throughout Britain and other western nations, raising strutting and cavorting followers at every gay pride parade. No technology, no reasoned debates, no appeal to common sense, or health and safety can stop this cancer eating away at the heart of our nation. Just as ancient Greece and Rome vainly struggled with inner moral decay so we too are condemned to fall, unless by a supreme recovery of moral courage and martial vigour we arise again and take our stand for freedom as in the olden times.
Apologies to Winston Churchill: The River War, first edition, Vol. II, pages 248-50 London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1899.
http://www.danielpipes.org/comments/27711
David Skinner, UK
Robert Gagnon wrote:
There is an unfortunate tendency for many in the church today to think: Unless I think that conduct ‘x’( in this case, sodomy) is not a sin or at least not a sin that puts one’s inheritance in the kingdom at risk, I cannot truly love the perpetrator of conduct ‘x.’ This is an anti-Christian view. Jesus reached out to the biggest economic exploiters (tax collectors) and sexual sinners in his day not because he believed that their sins were inconsequential or even non-sins but rather precisely because he believed such behavior put them at serious eternal risk.
Why would we ever think that these two things, loving outreach and intensified ethics, do not belong together? If someone is putting his or her life at risk, for example, by skating on thin ice, it is not love to say nothing or, worse, affirm the act (“Have a nice day skating on thin ice!”) and work to dismantle any disincentives (signs, fences) for skating on the thin ice. And if my children disobey me after I warn them not to skate on thin ice, I don’t discipline out of hate but out of love.
That’s why Augustine formulated the saying, “Love, and do what you want” (Dilige, et quod vis fac; Homilies on First John 7.8), to show that love cannot be watered down to mean permissiveness and tolerance. His illustration for the saying? A father disciplines rigorously his child, while a “boy-stealer” caresses a boy. Which expresses love? The father, of course. So if you act out of love you can do what you want, meaning that you can implement disincentives as regards the commission of sinful behavior. Perhaps it is best to conclude with Augustine’s own words on the subject:
If any of you perhaps wish to maintain love, brethren, above all things do not imagine it to be an abject and sluggish thing; nor that love is to be preserved by a sort of gentleness, nay not gentleness, but tameness and listlessness. Not so is it preserved. Do not imagine that . . . you then love your son when you do not give him discipline, or that you then love your neighbor when you do not rebuke him. This is not love, but mere feebleness. Let love be fervent to correct, to amend. . . . Love not in the person his error, but the person; for the person God made, the error the person himself made. (7.11; NPNF, slightly modified)
Gagnon and Augustine
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:Ip1TWy22J7MJ:www.robgagnon.net/Achtemeier-LaymanControReply.htm+love+augustine+gagnon&cd=3&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk
David Skinner, UK
Thanks Bill,
Can you supply a link to the FB page abusing you? I am on FB and will report it for you.
Anne Winters
Thanks Anne
I just tried to look it up now and it seems to have been taken down. Other people have complained on my behalf in the past so it may have done some good. But I need to keep being aware of when and where I am being attacked under false pretenses. For example, my enemies have also posted entries about me on Wikipedia to also attack me and drag my name and reputation in the mud.
Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch
The Wikipedia article seems to have been deleted Bill.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Muehlenberg
Garth Penglase
Thanks Garth
It is hard to keep up with the various fake sites and hate sites. I tend to ignore them. But others must have come to my aide on these.
Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch
That FB is one of the forefront drivers of the Spirit of the Age is very unsurprising. Although it can be used for the Kingdom, I have no doubt that it’s founders had absolutely no intention that it should be. If society is obsessed with something as it is with FB, you can be sure that the object of their obsession is going to be an enemy of God whether it be celebrities, a particular TV program, FB or Google. It’s only going to get worse and I’m sure that it doesn’t bother them in the least that Christians and Conservatives think it to be unfair. With judicial activists and increasingly vague and subjective laws open to all kinds of interpretation, our protections are rapidly disappearing as they have done in totalitarian societies down through history.
Dee Graf
The answer would seem to lie in an anti-facebook campaign to withdraw from participation in this media, by those who find themselves being unfairly discriminated against. It would work both ways. If users find their freedom to express their views are being suppressed then get out of it. If enough people dropped out then things might change.
Pat Brams
Who could be bothered using Facebook anyway. Honestly, haven’t people got better things to do with their time?
Jane Petridge
Thanks Jane
Yes, if people are on FB just to play games and waste time, then I fully agree with you. But what if they are there to use it for the Kingdom, as I seek to do?
Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch
Good points, Jane and Bill.
I think a good case can be made for avoiding FB altogether, but I think there are a lot of reasons to use it.
For example, CMI’s (Creation Ministries International) Facebook group posts a lot of articles which can easily be shared with friends, family, and coworkers. Though CMI’s efforts are often distracted by people hostile to their cause, there still are many good conversations and information exchanges that could not be duplicated through e-mail and printed media alone.
I would not want to base an entire ministry on it for reasons mentioned in the article, but I believe it can be a good addition to an existing one.
Dan Brinkman
Thank you Bill, for speaking out the truth.
Those folk trying to shut down our freedom to speak out about homosexuality are the ones who are the real homophobics – and they are legitimizing behaviour that will lead homosexual/lesbian people to hell, unless they repent/turn away from their choice to live a life-style that is in defiance of almighty God. The RULE maker/GOD, the God of Creation, who set the laws/standards, created Adam and Eve and gave them the task of going for and multiplying (populating the world) we would not be here now, if God had created Adam and Steve as the first humans in the Garden of Eden. It is God who instigated marriage as between a man and a woman.
One day, we will all stand before the Judgment seat of God, and those who are being lulled into thinking their life-style of choice that is in direct violation to God’s laws, will have a huge shock on Judgment day!!!!
Barb Hoc