Savage hate

A virulent gay activist, who interestingly works with Bill Maher (see earlier post), in a recent speech to high school journalism students confirmed the fundamentalist doctrine of human depravity. And I’m not referring to his sexual activities.

Dan Savage is a journalist, media pundit, and sex advice columnist well known in media circles for his outspokenness on homosexual issues and crude and hateful comments about those who disagree with him. He was twice invited to the White House by President Obama’s administration.

In 2010 he started an anti-bullying project geared to homosexual youth called “It Gets Better” and was invited to speak on this to hundreds of teens at a national journalism conference last month. But instead he used the opportunity to do some bullying of his own. (Anti-Bullying Speaker Curses Christian Teens)

Savage used his “bully pulpit” to denigrate the Bible and those who believe it, repeatedly referring to it as “bull****”, then ridiculed the hundred or so teens who walked out of his talk as “pansy-assed.” And in so doing he demonstrated that he is no better than the schoolyard bullies and “anti-gay bigots” he hates so much.

Without God, the average person will respond to criticism, disapproval, or feelings of inadequacy and powerlessness with hatred in various forms. It’s expressed physically on the playground and in back alleys, but also verbally in the school hallway, on the internet, and from a platform to a captive audience.

Savage’s anti-Christian rant was hostile and no different at its core than the “anti-gay” bullying that prompted his project. But it’s not the first time he’s revealed his affinity with haters. In 2000 while on assignment covering the Iowa caucuses for salon.com, he volunteered for conservative Republican candidate Gary Bauer’s campaign hoping to infect him with the flu Savage was suffering from at the time. Simply because he didn’t like Bauer’s opposition to same-sex marriage.

And in later years he publicly and persistently used his multiple forums, including his column “Savage Love”, to crudely attack Rick Santorum and pastor and author Rick Warren for their opposition to homosexuality. On Bill Maher’s show he said, “I wish the Republicans were all f***ing dead.”

If the things Savage has said and done (and you can read about them here) were aimed at any gay figure from a conservative Christian, the mainstream news media would have been all over it and there would be public protests in every major American city.

Anyone who hopes to influence others for their cause needs to live a life of integrity. It’s true for the believer, but also for the non. Those who preach tolerance as the highest good yet ridicule all who don’t share their beliefs are violating the value they profess to hold most dear.

And hate is hate, whether it’s directed at gays or at the group that seems to be fair game these days…Christians.