FROM THE PRESIDENT’S DESK
William Donohue
Catholic League members are not unfamiliar with the raging hypocrisy that governs our cultural elites. We know all about their unlimited tolerance for Catholic bashing, and their equally unlimited intolerance for bigotry aimed at the protected classes. But in the last month alone, the chasm has widened significantly. Consider the following, all of which demonstrate that there are no principles left.
In the run-up to the October 5 episode of the Fox program, “Glee,” we learned that the show tackles the “tricky subject” of religion. As it turned out, there was nothing tricky about the show for Jews to worry about; they only endured light jabs. Muslims had less to worry about as they were invisible throughout. Christians, on the other hand, were the subject of ridicule, with special treatment afforded Catholics. Similarly, the October 12 show also mocked Catholicism, giving all other religions a pass.
The artwork at the Loveland Museum showing a man performing oral sex on Jesus did not seem to bother the director of Cultural Services, Susan Ison, but she was “appalled” when the art was smashed with a crowbar. Others, including the man who organized the exhibition, and an art writer for the Huffington Post, chose to lie: they said the offensive graphic was not in the display. We know they lied because a local TV station showed the art with the sex scene blotted out.
African American ministers can stump for politicians right from the pulpit, and they can do so with impunity: no newspaper will accuse them of violating separation of church and state. This happened recently when theNew York Times ran a news story on how gubernatorial candidate Andrew Cuomo was endorsed at a black Baptist church. Not surprisingly, the reporter never noted the blatant abuse and there was no editorial on the subject. Yet when Washington Archbishop Donald Wuerl simply held the annual Red Mass, with Supreme Court Justices and other lawyers present, he was blasted on the Internet for mixing politics and religion. And when St. Paul-Minneapolis Archbishop John Nienstedt spoke out against gay marriage, he was cited by ABC News.
The trailer for the movie, “The Dilemma,” had a scene where the lead character said, “Ladies and Gentlemen, electric cars are so gay.” Gays at the studio, Universal, were fine with it, and so, apparently, was a gay rights group. But when CNN’s Anderson Cooper objected, the gay group changed its mind and joined the protest. The director of the movie, Ron Howard, had no problem making the change, though when the Catholic League asked him to put a disclaimer in the movie “The Da Vinci Code”—saying it was based on fiction—he got his artistic back up and said no.
The Westboro Baptist Church is anti-Catholic, anti-gay, anti-Semitic and anti-military. In October, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments about the right of the Church to engage in an obscene protest outside a Catholic church where a funeral for a slain Marine was taking place. It was the anti-military animus of the Church that motivated the protesters to be there. Yet in its coverage, the New York Times never missed an opportunity to mention the anti-gay elements of Westboro Baptist, without citing its anti-Catholic legacy. We checked back to see if it had ever written about the Catholic-bashing history of the Church, and found that in a total of twenty stories, it never did (though it did mention anti-Semitism a few times).
Recently, Rick Sanchez of CNN was interviewed on the radio and called Comedy Central’s Jon Stewart a “bigot.” At that point, the host told Sanchez that Stewart is Jewish, a member of a “minority” group. Sanchez responded with ridicule, noting the influence of Jews in the media, saying they are hardly an oppressed minority. For that he was fired. The previous week, in a CNN documentary, they implied that the pope is more interested in punishing dissident Catholics than he is in punishing pedophile priests. But for that scripted insult, no one was fired.
In October, one newspaper after another refused to run a cute cartoon that was totally innocent. The reason? At the bottom, there was the question, “Where’s Muhammad”? But the Muslim prophet was nowhere depicted. That didn’t matter. These same papers all have a history of publishing anti-Catholic cartoons.
This fall, a teacher in El Paso, Texas, was arrested for videotaping himself having sex with almost 70 children; more than 200 videos were found. In New York City, the same day that a teacher admitted to her recent past as a prostitute, she was awarded tenure (by a board which knew of her status). In a Chicago elementary school, two parents sought to transfer their children after their teacher allowed kids to have sex in the classroom. Finally, the teacher was fired, but when new sexual abuse problems surfaced, the parents’ request for a transfer was still denied. But don’t look for Jay Leno, Joy Behar or Bill Maher to joke about any of these stories. They’re just interested in decades-old stories about priests.
No one can rationally justify such duplicity. Quite simply, there are no principles left.
