Shame on You, Perez Hilton

It brings a wry smile to my face with the tolerance crowd shows their true colors.  No matter how much they try to promote “tolerance” as the ultimate good, they show over and over again that they actually don’t believe that.

The most recent example is the controversy surrounding the runner up to Miss America, Carrie Prejean.  During her interview process, she was asked, by Perez Hilton, a question about her views on same-sex marriage.  She explained that, “in my country, and in my family, marriage is between a man and a woman – no offense to anone out there”.  Needless to say, she did not win the Miss America crown.

Hilton took the opportunity to do get as much exposure as possible, Larry King, MSNBC arguing against Prejeans statements.  On his Twitter page, Hilton called Prejean a “dumb b****”, apologized for the comment, and then took back the apology.

To Perez Hilton:

So basically, tolerance only applies to those that agree with you, right?  You expect everyone to be tolerant of your redefinition of marriage, but the minute someone disagrees with you, the tolerance rule no longer applies, right?  You can go around calling women b****es but if someone is derogatory towards homosexuals, boy do they deserve to pay.

Can you not respect that Prejean didn’t bow to popular opinion and expressed her beliefs?  She basically gave up her dream of being Miss America to be true to what she believes, wouldn’t you do the same for your beliefs Perez?

Your hypocrisy knows no bounds, Perez.  I thank you for showing the world who you truly are so that we will no longer be fooled by your mask of “tolerance”.  Your vile comments prove that you are just as dogmatic a believer as the religious whom you berate.

Keith Olbermann’s Humanism

It has become quite a popular video, the one with Keith Olbermann giving his “special comment” on the Prop. 8 in California.  Keith basically asks those who voted for the measure a series of questions.  However, Keiths opinion is not just that, it is indicative of a spreading, media supported worldview. 

 

Secular Humanism

 

Wikipedia defines secular humanism as “a humanist philosophy that upholds reason, ethics and justice, and specifically rejects the supernatural and the spiritual as the basis of moral reflection and decision-making“.  This partial definition begs the question of where they get their values of reason, ethics and justice in the first place, and what makes those words “valuable” absent of God.  Wikipedia continues, “Like other types of humanism, secular humanism is a life stance focusing on the way human beings can lead good and happy lives.”  This the entire basis for Keith’s opinion on the matter of same-sex marriage. 

This is verified by the Council for Secular Humanism’s affirmations,

“We deplore efforts to denigrate human intelligence, to seek to explain the world in supernatural terms, and to look outside nature for salvation.”

I honestly wonder how they are defining “salvation” here.  Are they attempting to assert that salvation exists inside of nature, and if so, is death “salvation”?  Or, are they just showing that, according to them, there is no such thing as salvation and the entirety of humanity shares the same fate of eventual meaningless annihilation.  This forces me to ask how reason, ethics and justice are meaningful when there is no difference between my fate and Hitlers’?

 

But I digress.

 

The point is that, in this video, Keith is a self-righteous preacher of the religion of secular humanism and the television camera is his pulpit.  As you will see, Keith attacks any notion of truth in regards to God’s Word.  That there can be no greater calling than his humanist calling, no greater cause than the happiness of human beings, regardless and in spite of what any religous text says.  In fact, Keith is willing to use Biblical quotes to further his humanist agenda while ignoring the Biblical ideals that deny humanism.  This will become apparent as you watch the video.  I really recommend watching it instead of just reading my responses.  It’s quick, and a great example of the battle of the worldviews that we find ourselves in.

 

 

 

 

(I apologize ahead of time for the snark in some of my replies.  Mr. Olbermann is so condescending that I just can’t help it)

 

“What does this matter to you?”

 

I have a question as an answer.  Who is Keith to suggest that it shouldn’t?  Who is he to tell me that human history, my conscious, my religion and my God are wrong in telling me the traditional definition of marriage?  Who is he to suggest that I am wrong in sticking up for this?

 

Keith also says that homosexual couples, “want the same chance at permanence and happiness that is your option . . .”

 

Putting away the ridiculous assertion that a marriage license is synonymous with permanence (especially in California), I have another question as an answer.  Their relationships aren’t already permanent and happy?  The marriage license will make them MORE happy, MORE permanent?  Aren’t they committed to each other because they’re committed to each other, not because some license tells them they are?  A marriage license instantly makes you more happy, therefore we are denying homosexual couples happiness?  Talk about a strawman of epic proportions.  In fact, most of married America, and the divorce rate, will tell you that being married leads to a DECREASE in happiness!

 

Keith goes on, ” . . . they don’t want to deny you yours.”

 

The point that he ignores is:  Yes they do.  They want to deny me my right to define marriage as between a man and a woman.  They literally want to force me to define marriage as they define it.  This is exactly what the issue is about. 

 

Keith continues, “. . . they want what you want, a chance to be a little bit less alone in the world.”

 

This is sensationalism that I didn’t think Keith was capable of; I guess I didn’t know him enough.  Keith is suggesting that Prop. 8 breaks apart same-sex couples.  Are you kidding me?  How can he take himself seriously, much less expect anyone else to, if he makes these kind of comparisons?  He is equating the people of California standing up for the traditional definition of marriage with us FORCING couples apart, making them more alone.  The ridiculousness of the suggestion speaks for itself.

 

“…just as you are taking away the legal right that they already had.”

 

How did they acquire this ability?  By a court ignoring the will of the people and overturning Prop. 22, essentially creating legislation, which courts aren’t supposed to be allowed to do.  Remember that system of checks and balances that our government is based upon?  The In re Marriage Cases decision violated that system, and yet, nobody is talking about this part of it.

 

“What if someone passed a law saying that you couldn’t marry”

 

If I didn’t meet the requirements for acquiring a driver’s license, I wouldn’t expect the government to give me one.  Same-sex couples just don’t meet the requirements for acquiring a marriage license.  It’s that simple, and it’s nothing personal, nor are any rights being violated.  As Keith just admitted (and passed over as quickly as he could), same-sex couples right now have the exact same rights under the law. 

 

However, if Keith wanted to argue that since “marriage” is a religious distinction and a religious issue, therefore “marriage” should not be legislated by the state, that the state should call everything a “civil union” and leave the definition of marriage, and wether couples get married or not, to the individuals.  I would stand next to him, in support of such legislation.  Let’s take the principle of “separation of church and state” to it’s logical conclusion and keep the word “marriage” out of government.  We can all agree on this, right?

 

“If this country hadn’t redefined marriage, black people still couldn’t marry white people…”

 

Justifying an incorrect redefining of marriage (same-sex marriage) with ANOTHER incorrect redefinition of marriage (racial restrictions) doesn’t make his argument valid.  In fact, it shows that Keith has no argument because he must pull on the heart strings of Americans who are still hurting from the racial strife of our past.  This issue isn’t about race, it’s about redefining a word and forcing that definition upon everyone else.  In fact, Keith, you should be ashamed of yourself for bringing up race.  This country now has an African American president-elect, and you want to shove us back fifty years.  You should be ashamed for pulling the race card.

 

“Marriages were not legally recognized to be married if the people were slaves.”

 

Now Keith is comparing same-sex couples to slaves.  Again I must wonder how he expect us to take him seriously.  Also, no one is comparing the “correct definition of marriage” to America fifty years ago.  I haven’t heard that once.  We are comparing the definition of marriage to that which the Bible lays down from the book of Genesis on, what has been the definition of marriage since the beginning of recorded history.

 

This next part is hard to quote, but basically Keith is saying that it is a travesty that homosexuals used to have to hide in fake marriages with members of the opposite sex, therefore we should allow same-sex couples to marry.

 

I must be mistaken here, but I was under the impression that American government is not in the business of legislating happiness.  That we aren’t trying to fix the personal problems of those who felt and feel they must hide their chosen lifestyles. 

 

Keith then says that those sham marriages violated the term “the sanctity of marriage”, so much so that the term has no meaning.

 

It’s inconsistent to use the Biblical idea of the sanctity of the marriage bed to try and violate the Biblical definition of marriage between a man and a woman.

 

Again, Keith says, “What is this to you, no one is asking you to embrace their expression of love.”

 

By legislating it, yes they are.  But now Keith has switched from making this issue about race, to making it about “love”.  Do we really agree on a definition for that word “love”?  What kind of love are we talking about?  But more on this a bit later. . .

 

“But don’t you, as human beings, have to embrace that love?”

 

Yes I do Keith, I really do.  People are people and I have compassion and love for all human beings.  But love is not license.  Love does not force me to enable what I see as a destructive lifestyle, to approve of what God tells me is an issue of morality.  Love does not force me to allow the redefinition of marriage and the redefinition of basic human rights.

 

“With so much hate in the world, and so much needless division . . . this is what your religion tells you to do?”

 

Keith has just degraded the Word of God to mere religion.  He is assuming that there is no truth in religion, only meaningless tradition, pomp and circumstance.  Who is Keith to degrade the beliefs of others?  Who is he to trivialize the Word of God, to assume that such a notion as objective truth doesn’t exist?  He is asking those who believe there is truth in God’s Word to violate their beliefs.  Does his public pulpit really afford him the right to do this?

 

“You want to honor your god, and the universal love you believe he represents?  Then spread happiness.”  

 

Just after degrading my religion to mere tradition, Keith appeals to my religion?  Well done.  Just as God is Love, He is also Righteousness, Truth, Justice and Wrath.  To attempt to separate one aspect of God from the rest is to create your own version of god.  This is something that I suspect Keith did a LONG time ago.  Not once, in all of Scripture, did God say He was concerned with our happiness.  But you know what He does say He’s concerned with?  Our righteousness.  Let me give an illustration.  If running into the street makes your child happy, will you allow him/her to do so?  Of course not.  Your child doing the right thing, being safe, is more important than what makes them happy.  This is similar to God’s love for us.

 

And then, Keith takes the cake with this one…

 

“You can quote me whatever you want from your religious leader or your book of choice, telling you to stand against this.  And then tell me how you can believe both that statement, and another statement, ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you’.”

 

I wonder if he sees the inherent contradiction in quoting one verse of the Bible, while ignoring the Bible on how it defines marriage? 

 

“You are asked now to stand, not on a question of politics, not on a question of religion, not on a question of gay or straight . . .You are asked to stand on a question of love.”
 

This is where Keith’s secular humanistic belief system rears it’s ugly head.  Keith assumes that human love is the ultimate love.  That how humans define love is the ultimate definition.  He defines love as allowing people to do whatever makes them happy.  And that “happiness” is the ultimate good.  If we believe that God exists, then our definitions of love and happiness should necessarily be defined as God sees it.   In fact, this definition of love assumes that Scripture is not God’s Word and that no God exists.  If we don’t find the ultimacy of the human mind to be convincing, then the question becomes, how DOES God define love?

 

God’s Definition of Love, Not Keith’s, is the One that Matters

 

I’ll give you God’s definition of love, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16).  The sacrifice of Jesus Christ is God’s definition of love.  It doesn’t find much searching to discover why Christ died on the cross; He died to save us from our sins.  Homosexuality is one of those sins.  It’s no more or no less a sin than lying, no different than heterosexual adultery, there is no greater or lesser sin with God, but it’s still a sin.  So those who are refusing to support a redefining of marriage ARE doing it out of love.  Love for their God and God’s love for their fellow man.