Matt Barber - Still a Hate Merchant and Advertisement for Leaving Christianity

Yesterday this blog an others noted that Matt Barber - Assistant Dean at Liberty University's toxic law school - was promoting a columnist who advocated the execution of gays base, naturally, on the "literal word of God" found in Leviticus and a few other phrases in the Bible.  In apparent reaction to the firestorm that resulted (or perhaps the disclosure that the promoted "columnist" had a lengthy criminal record), Barber took down the post advocating for the murder of gays.  Now, Barber seems to think that he is exonerated from all his promotion of anti-gay violence.  This, of course, is anything but the case given Barber's ugly anti-gay history.  Indeed, if Barber is typical of "godly Christians," then decent people should be hastening to flee Christianity entirely.  A piece at Right Wing Watch reminds us of Barber's true role as a constant hate merchant and the ugliness that he promotes daily. Here are some highlights:

[Philip] Stallings’ column has disappeared, and today Barber tweeted at us, “Wow! Thanks for the tip. We obviously weren’t aware of that & find the position appalling. The answer is life in Christ.”

Well. It’s good to have Matt Barber say he finds the idea of executing gay people appalling. We agree.

But if that’s the case he ought to consider vetting the material he promotes a little more carefully. Just over a week ago we noted that BarbWire had run a column praising Pastor Steven Anderson, who has called for the execution of gays, and has said, “You want to know who the biggest hypocrite in the world is? The biggest hypocrite in the world is the person who believes in the death penalty for murderers and not for homosexuals.”

And given how much anti-gay extremism is promoted by Barber and his Religious Right allies, that got us wondering if anything else short of calling for the killing of gay people would cross the line for Barber.

We collected some other statements that Barber apparently doesn’t find appalling, because they’ve all been in columns promoted on his site:

·       * Gays are degenerates.

·       * Transgender people are demonic.

·      *  Gays “have your children as a target”

·       * Pastors who marry same-sex couples are “servants of Satan.”

·        * “The homosexual leaders are the most vile, vicious, and vitriolic people in the world.”

·      *“ISIS is truly the manifestation of the purest form of the homosexual agenda: sodomizing men as both torture and pleasure, and killing those who disagree with them.”

·      * “The fictional ‘rights’ based on homosexual deviance and the genuine, God-given, First Amendment-protected rights of the vast majority of Americans cannot coexist.”

 

Here are some other things we find appalling that Matt Barber seemingly does not:

 

Jeff Allen, a BarbWire editor, compares the gay rights movement to “a malignant cancer” and says, “Each victory for the homosexual activists represents another nail in America’s coffin.”  Allen has supported brutal anti-gay laws in Uganda, Nigeria, and Ethiopia, which include imprisonment not only for sexual conduct but also for joining social clubs or advocating for equality. Allen was upset when criticized for his “innocent mistake” of calling a fake photo of “NAMBLA for Obama” an example of “the undeniable link between homosexuality and pedophilia.” More Allen: “Satanism, sodomy, and slaughter are each part of the Devil’s sinister agenda to destroy America.”

This spring, BarbWire published a column by former Indiana lawmaker Don Boys recounting his attempt to recriminalize homosexuality. In a similar column a few years earlier, Boys had explained that he wanted to make homosexuality a crime punishable by up to twelve years in prison.

Robert Oscar Lopez wrote for BarbWire that almost every situation “involving a same-sex couple with exclusive custody of small children is adult misconduct at best or a crime against humanity at worst.”

BarbWire publishes notorious anti-gay activist Scott Lively, who wrote this summer that the US and its State Department had become “The Great Satan” of the world for opposing anti-gay legislation overseas. Lively has promoted anti-gay policies in Uganda and around the world.

And that’s just a sampling of the anti-gay extremists who have found a home on BarbWire. Not to mention Barber himself, who says he has been “called by God” to “sound the alarm” about the fact that gay sex is always sinful, and “The wages of sin is death.”

Barber is indeed a foul piece of work.  It is individuals like Barber that make me increasingly not to even the moniker of being a Christian.