Duck Dynasty and the secular theocracy

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The following excellent essay is from David Theroux, who is Founder, President and Chief Executive Officer of The Independent Institute. I thought this passage that Theroux quotes is telling: “‘We’re just sick of all this redneck Jesusy stuff,’ A&E representative Moe Ronic told reporters. ‘And besides, making truckloads of money is really overrated.’” Part II of this essay will be available Thursday. Theroux recently appeared on WichitaLiberty.TV; see WichitaLiberty.TV December 1, 2013.

Duck Dynasty and the Secular Theocracy

By David J. Theroux

With A&E Network facing an avalanche of public protest and in just over one week of its decision to place family-patriarch Phil Robertson on “indefinite hiatus” from its megahit reality series Duck Dynasty, the network caved.

When the PC outrage industry went into high gear with an angry Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) demanding Robertson’s head regarding his comments on homosexuality in an article by Drew Magery in the January 2014 issue of GQ (the magazine commonly viewed as having branded the concept of “metrosexual”), A&E executives promptly suspended Robertson from the enormously popular, cable-TV program, and support for his suspension echoed throughout the conventional media with cries of his being “homophobic” and “antigay.”

In the article, when asked about his religious faith, Robertson noted that his own youthful debauchery was self-destructive and put his marriage on the rocks, and that these were reversed only by his conversion to Christianity. He added that he now considers sexual relations other than those between a man and woman in wedlock to be sinful. In so doing, Robertson did not support bans on homosexual advocacy or relations but instead paraphrased Corinthians: “Don’t be deceived. Neither the adulterers, the idolaters, the male prostitutes, the homosexual offenders, the greedy, the drunkards, the slanderers, the swindlers — they won’t inherit the kingdom of God. Don’t deceive yourself. It’s not right.”

Continue reading at Duck Dynasty and the Secular Theocracy at patheos.