Dawkins is a well known celebrity with a huge audience and considerable influence, so whether you agree with him or not he's at least earned the right to be taken seriously.
Even when he's not being serious?
The preacher in the OP vid is an obscure here-to-fore unknown fanatic who's only claim to fame is his own idiocy. Basically, except as leverage for anti-Christian rhetoric the guy serves no purpose, poses no threat, and doesn't warrant serious consideration.
Well, apparently his congregation doesn't think he's an idiot. However you regard him, this is a person who is a pastor - therefore a representative of the Christian belief system as appointed by his church - speaking to an audience who believe that his words are to some extent divinely inspired, and using this position of authority to deliver a speech significantly more hateful and harmful than the off-hand comment Dawkins made. And this pastor is definitely not alone.
No matter what way you try to look at it, this is not something that should be ignored.
If you don't see as many people attacking him at least part of the reason is probably because you don't see anyone in here defending him. Most people are just ignoring him.
And that's the problem. There's no objection, no anger, no frustration, just defensiveness. Forgive me if I'm reading too much into this, but right now a lot of people on this forum seem to be giving me the following impression:
Somebody make a vague comment that has potentially negative consequences or criticisms of Christianity: "This person is scum and a bigot and hateful and we must talk about this at length to get to the root of his sheer ignorance and diplorable level of sadistic behaviour! This warrants as much attention as possible and we must show as much objection to this person as we can!"
Christian pastor says that homosexuals should be killed: "Meh, he's not significant."
Don't try and spin this. This is pure and simple hypocrisy. The general feeling I'm getting is that it's okay to be a hateful bigot as long as you're a part of the club, but if anyone says something remotely negative about the in-group they deserve to be purged from society. No matter what way people try to spin it, that is what is being said.
So no, it isn't "a pretty glaring example of sheer hypocrisy on the part of some people on this forum". IMO, this thread doesn't make any sort of viable point so there's nothing here for anyone who isn't rabidly anti-religious to respond to. It's just one more in a never ending series of "Lets take an isolated incident of extremism and pretend it's representative of religion as a whole".
Again, using phrases like "rabidly anti-religious" just further indicates the above. There's plenty for lots of people to be angry about here. Here's a list:
People who hate homophobia
People who hate institutional homophobia
People who hate homophobes being given a prominant position within a supposedly moral organization
People who feel that the position of the Christian Church is done a disservice by homophobes
People who hate people that encourage murder
People who hate bigotry
People who are concerned about extremist fundamentalism undermining their own beliefs and people who share them
This isn't hard to get. In other threads, when confronted by homphobia I've seen Soujourner go on to write extensively about their disgust of their opinions and condemn, in terms as strong and passionate as I've seen anywhere, their beliefs as being both a misrepresentation and an embarrassment to Christianity. Why is the same anger not directed towards this guy? The thread was started on the premise that it is disgusting that such people are happily given a platform to express their bigotry by an beleif system that holds itself in the highest moral regard.
I'm not expecting Christians on here to suddenly jump ship in the face of this guy, but I was at least expecting a different reaction from "meh, he's not important", especially when considering the massive, glowing ball of anger that was the thread about Dawkins' speech. I was at least hoping the Christians here would grapple intelligently with the issue of institutional homophobia within certain areas of the church. Don't forget that this isn't an isolated incident - right now people throughout America are assessing whether not not gay marriage should be legal, and gay rights are under pressure across the country, and where most (if not all) opposition to such movements comes from Christian majorities.
I think by this time, most of the sensible people in here know better than to waste too much of their time with these kinds of threads.
So, the use of the word "mock" deseveres several threads and thousands of posts. But the subject of homophobia in the Church should be ignored.
There's no other way to spin that. It's hypocrisy of the highest order.
