Even with the governor sidelined, SC remains a hotbed of junk-religious hypocrites -- like homophobic hate-crimes liar Sen. Jim DeMint

Sen. Jim DeMint hopes South Carolinians remember that just because Gov. Mark Sanford is in disgrace doesn't mean the state lacks a first-class fire-and-brimstone-style faux-religious hypocrite to turn to.

by Ken

Our friend Balakirev made an excellent point in a comment yesterday on the fading fortunes of South Carolina Gov. Mark "Do As I Say, Not As I Do" Sanford:

You know, the sad thing is that what counts as "anti-values" is being caught having an affair while married. It doesn't matter if you try to screw tens of thousands of people in your home state out of federally funded jobs in order to advance your national political career. Christian values, indeed.

Of course one of the things that gets people like our Mark in such trouble when they stray is that they have set themselves up as moral exemplars and, worse still, they make careers out of presuming to hurl thunderbolts, from their position of assumed moral superiority, against all those who fail to live up to their examples.

I've seen only the excerpts broadcast last night by Rachel Maddow, but one intriguing motif that threaded through the governor's barely coherent rambling at his press conference yesterday was his belief that religious teachings exist to protect people from themselves. He left no doubt that he considers this so with regard to himself. I don't think I'm stretching what he said to infer that he considers himself a giant mass of sin waiting to explode were it not for the restraints imposed by his religion.

Doesn't seem all that remarkable to you? We're all conceived in sin, right?

Well, I think this is perhaps more telling than the "Christian values" people realize. In this view, morality isn't a matter of choosing to do what's right, it's a matter of internalizing voices that aren't part of you to prevent you from acting the way you really want to. Moral behavior becomes in essence the opposite of human instinct.

Now obviously we need to learn to control many of our impulses. This is a crucial part of what maturing and spiritual growth are about. But again, that isn't what these people are saying. They're saying that people can't ever be trusted to understand the difference between right and wrong and make choices accordingly, but instead have to have these external drillmasters metaphorically whacking their knuckles with rulers to keep them from straying from the path of righteousness.

This sounds like a pretty degraded vision of morality to me, not to mention a pretty degraded view of human nature. More importantly, though, it does tend to explain why such an overwhelming number of our most vociferous fire-and-brimstone preachers of morality fail so badly at practicing what they preach. They are, after all, merely cesspools of immorality waiting to emerge. Mark Sanford got all teary when he talked about how he betrayed his family, as he unquestionably did -- and rather more lengthily about how he betrayed his friends and political supporters, which struck me as odd, though no doubt also true. Yet there didn't seem to be much sense that these were choices he made rather than mere givings-in to those debbil urges inside him.

It can be powerfully disconcerting when someone we admire deeply -- and obviously I'm not thinking here of any-day-now sinners like Governor Sanford, but of people we like to think of as genuinely moral -- "falls from grace," or falls short of the principled standards we expect of them. It's the sort of thing that sends us into sieges of introspection about human frailty, from which some good often emerges. But that doesn't apply to these phony moralists and junk religionists; they're just fighting inevitably losing battles against themselves.


SOUTH CAROLINA: HOME OF JUNK-RELIGIOUS
HYPOCRISY AND OUTRIGHT LIES IN PUBLIC LIFE

South Carolina, I'm sorry to say (sorry because it is in many ways such a lovely state with so many fine people), has an especially unfortunate history of this sort of junk moralizing. Remember that it was in South Carolina that George W. Bush, a man totally without moral fiber, unleashed his agents of evil to destroy the campaign of the 2000-model John McCain (i.e., back when Young Johnny still practiced some moral values) with a campaign of whispered lies.

This is probably not good for the career prospects of the governor. He who lives by the sword, we're often told, will die by the sword, and sometimes, at least, the same is true of fake values. (And let me be clear about this phrase "fake values." I don't mean that the values themselves are fake. Mark Sanford's obligations to his wife and family were real, and his betrayal of them despicable. What I consider fake is his commitment to a set of values, as opposed to a bunch of rules he'll get his knuckles rapped if he breaks.)

Believe it or not, I'm actually trying to get somewhere here. Friends in South Carolina have lately been calling attention to an especially monstrous initiative by one of the vilest of the fake-values-mongering monsters, their state's junior U.S. senator, Jim DeMint.

Last week Senator DeMint sent out a letter, on United States Senate letterhead, to "pastors and religious leaders" with the heading:

"Subject: Hate Crime Leigislation Must Be Stopped!"

It's certainly his right to do so, of course. What's not his right is to write such a letter in the form of an unbroken tissue of lies and misrepresentations, which mark him as either a profoundly immoral man or maybe just a pathological liar. He conjures up all sorts of heinous consequences to religious freedom and practice, all bogus, if Congress extends hate crimes penalties for crimes involving gay people.

You can find the full text of the letter in a Monday post by Alvin McEwen on his Holy Bullies and Headless Monsters blog, "Tell Senator DeMint to stop lying about hate crimes legislation."

SC Equality has followed up with a mailing that summarizes the DeMint letter as " a series of inaccuracies, misrepresentations, and lies to galvanize his target audience of anti-gay religious leaders," noting specifically:

* DeMint says the law will "criminalize biblical truth as 'hate speech,'" that pastors will be prosecuted for hate speech, and that the law takes away freedom of speech. He says the law will "take away your right to say some things are wrong." THIS IS SIMPLY NOT TRUE. NO PASTOR WILL BE ARRESTED FOR TEACHING THAT HOMOSEXUALITY IS WRONG. The law includes language that explicitly prevents this, guaranteeing that it cannot be used to inhibit freedom of speech. DeMint's claims are wrong, and only perpetuate lies currently used by the anti-gay right.

* DeMint further assumes religious leaders condemn homosexuality and oppose hate crimes legislation. THIS IS NOT TRUE. We know that many faith leaders support gay and lesbian civil rights and support hate crimes legislation.

* DeMint claims that homophobic "religious principles and biblical teaching" are responsible for America's goodness and prosperity. He implies that legislation protecting gay and lesbian people and our families will contribute to the decline of our country. THIS IS OFFENSIVE. We know that America's success is based on beliefs in freedom, democracy, separation of church and state, and fundamental human rights, not on religious teachings or the suppression of gay and lesbian people.

* At the end, DeMint cites the Family Research Council as an important source of information on hate crimes. THIS IS MISLEADING. The Family Research Council is a prominent anti-gay organization that supports "the traditional family unit" and most recently opposed President Obama's extension of federal benefits to same-sex couples. Indeed, the FRC is one of the organizations sponsoring a "Values Voter Summit" in Washington in September that will focus on "protecting marriage" and will include such speakers as Rush Limbaugh, Sarah Palin, Mike Huckabee, and Laura Ingraham. For a useful resource on hate crimes legislation and what it will and will not do, please visit MatthewShepard.org.

The mailing suggests two things we can do:

"First, call or write Senators Jim DeMint and Lindsey Graham and tell them you support hate crimes legislation. Second, tell Senator DeMint to stop lying about hate crimes legislation."

Here's the link for e-mailing Senator DeMint. Tell him it's time for good Christians to stop lying their guts out.

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