Only Love Can Save Us Now

I've seen a lot of ugliness on social media in the last few days.  A lot of ignorance, a lot of hate, and a lot of views that are just plain wrong.
Was what happened in Orlando because of mental illness?  Yes.
Was it because of homophobia?  Yes.
Was it because of Radical Islam?  Yes.
Was it a hate crime?  Yes.
Was it terrorism?  Yes.
Was it because someone who shouldn't have had guns had them?  Yes.
It was all of these things.   Why are we arguing about which of these things to blame?  It's all of these things.  Anyone who opens fire in a packed club is mentally ill.  Anyone who holds radical Islamic jihadist views is necessarily homophobic, because they believe homosexuals should be punished by death.  Anyone who kills a person because of sexual orientation has committed a hate crime.  Anyone who kills people because of religious extremism is a terrorist.  Anyone who sympathizes with or pledges allegiance to terrorist organizations should not have a gun, especially someone who was investigated by the FBI multiple times for terror ties and beat his now ex-wife.  The two most contentious issues here have been over Islam and gun control, but both are missing what should be the biggest issue.  I'll get to that in a moment, but first touch on those two issues.

On one hand, you have those who are actually being Islamophobic, saying that we should deport all Muslims, implying that they are all terrorists, and encouraging violence against them.  Those people are fucktards.  On the other hand, you have people who are genuinely worried about the violent threat posed by Islamic extremists, Radical Islamic terrorists, jihadists, or whatever you want to call them.  Maybe they want to halt immigration of Muslims until we figure out what's going on, or maybe not, and maybe they know parts of the Quran that incite violence for Fundamentalists, but these people are not saying that all Muslims are terrorists, nor are they encouraging violence against them.  These people are realistic.  Let's face it, if people are killing people in the name of any religion or anything in the way we've seen in New York City, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania on 9/11, or in Boston, Paris, San Bernardino, and Orlando more recently, we should probably take a long, hard look at the beliefs that these people are subscribing to.  But then there are the Liberals who go out of their way to point out that Islam is a peaceful religion, that anyone who says anything against it is Islamophobic, that we shouldn't use certain terms like "Islamic extremists" to describe these terrorists, and that we need to make sure Muslims in this country feel safe, especially now, because this rhetoric does not make them feel safe.  Yeah, because rhetoric questioning religious beliefs is what should make people feel unsafe, not extremists who want to shoot up or blow up places because they believe the people in them to be infidels or sinners.

And speaking of shooting, shooting is done with a gun.  Several of my Liberal friends on social media pointed out that this shooter should not have been able to get a machine gun.  He did not have a machine gun.  Some of my Conservative friends posted pictures of a few guns and asked which should be banned and why.  That's a good point actually.  Banning a gun because it looks or sounds scary is not a good reason, although it is an excellent way to make people feel good because then it looks like we're actually doing something to help stop this from happening in the future.  But in reality, the terrorists will either use another gun, get a gun illegally, build bombs, or use some other method to carry out their evil plans.  So, the Liberal solution that seems to come up the most is the banning of assault rifles.  Would that ban have stopped this tragedy or lowered the death count?  I doubt it, very highly.  And a lot of the Conservatives have said that everyone in that club should have had a gun on them, and that would have stopped this from happening.  To be fair, that would have guaranteed that the death toll would have been a lot lower, but it's also a horrible idea.  For one, mandating that everyone carry a weapon is ridiculous and irresponsible.  For another, people carrying guns into a nightclub where people typically drink alcohol is ill-advised for obvious reasons.  It would almost certainly cause more deaths than it would prevent over time.

But how do we stop guns from getting into the hands of people like the killer in Orlando (whose name I refuse to repeat, per my standard procedure)?  Hillary actually stumbled on to something when she said that people under investigation by the FBI should not be allowed to purchase guns, but her statement was problematic in a few ways.  For one, SHE is under investigation by the FBI, and somehow she's running for President.  Go figure.  So, at least the reason for investigation needs to be a factor.  And the second issue with this?  Well, now we've stumbled upon the real problem that we need to solve.  The shooter was NOT currently under investigation by the FBI.  He had been investigated multiple times, but the FBI had CLOSED those investigations, having found nothing.  Whoa.

We need to fix National Security.  The FBI, the CIA, Homeland Security, the Secret Service, and other organizations have failed us.  Even our President has severely downplayed the threat of ISIS.  Look, if the FBI has investigated you multiple times for possible terrorist ties, how do they not know that you beat women, what you're searching for on the internet, and what guns you are buying?  No, he should not have been able to get a gun.  The FBI should have never closed the investigation, and it may not be a politically correct thing to say, but if someone is suspected (multiple times in this case, even) of being an Islamic terrorist and has a history of violence, then yes, that person should FAIL a background check when he or she goes to buy a gun.  Isn't this the reason why we do background checks, which SHOULD be done when people buy guns?  Of course, terrorists can still get guns illegally, which is why the FBI must do a better job monitoring potential terrorists.  But, as a nation, we're too busy fighting over whether or not a Christian baker should be forced to bake a cake for a gay wedding, and how much he should be fined if he refuses.  And we're too busy trying to make everything into a "Safe Space."  The world is not a safe space.  True safe spaces don't exist.  Pulse was a safe space for many, and it became the opposite of that in the most extreme way possible when a terrorist walked in and opened fire.  Not with uncomfortable or hateful words.  With a gun.

The FBI will never be perfect, but the American people must help stop terrorism and mass shooting before they happen.  Often times, there are signs, and people may even know of the evil being planned.  There is NO EXCUSE for the shooter's wife, who KNEW about the plot ahead of time and actually drove with him to the club to scout it out for the shooting, not reporting her husband to the authorities.  How were reports today saying that the FBI was considering whether or not to charge her?  She could have prevented 50 deaths and 50+ serious injuries!  She should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, as should anyone else who is found withholding information in this case or any like it.  We need to report things that we know, things that seem like they might not be quite right, and domestic violence.

Now, as a Christian, let me say right here that it is appalling to me for any Christians to preach that these homosexuals got what they deserved, that Orlando was God's judgement, that God hates fags, or anything of that nature.  There is no way that the people who say this can possibly know that this happened because God was judging.  Actually, every single person who ever lived, regardless of sexual orientation, deserves to go to hell for their sins, apart from Jesus.  God allows tragedies to happen, and we don't always know why, but we live in a fallen, sinful world, where God has allowed freewill.  But it is not acceptable to call out people for specific sins and not others.  God loves every single person.  In fact, he loves us so much that he sent Jesus here to die for our sins, and if we accept him as Savior, we have eternal life.  But Christians are also called to act like Jesus.  The Bible says that God is Love.  Jesus is God, so if God is Love, then Jesus is Love, and if Jesus is Love, then we are called to Love.  And in Love, there is no hate, "And love is love is love is love is love is love is love is love..."  Shout out to Lin-Manuel.  So instead of going to that gay pride parade to tell homosexuals things that are directly opposed to the Bible, like "God hates fags", go there to hug people in the queer community and tell them that God loves them and so do you.  Tell your Muslim friends that you love them, and so does God.  Hate does not overcome hate.  Love does.  We need to be vigilant, and we need to be wise, but only love can save us now.  To further quote fellow Wesleyan Alum Lin-Manuel Miranda's recent speech,  "We lived through times when hate and fear seemed stronger, we rise and fall, and light from dying embers, remembrances that hope and love last longer, and love is love is love is love is love is love is love is love cannot be killed or swept aside."

The Deadly Hate We've Been Ignoring

At least 50 people are dead, and 50 more injured, after an Islamic terrorist opened fire inside of a Gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida.  In an act of terrorism fueled by hate from the very pit of hell, a lone terrorist, reportedly pledged to ISIS, carried out this massacre.  This man was a coward in every sense of the word.  Reports have come out that the reason he and his wife divorced was because he beat her.  And in the wee hours of the morning in a place where firearms are not allowed, where most people were drinking and trying to have a good time on a Saturday night, in a club packed largely with gay people, this man chose to murder people he hated who could not fight back.  The result was another shooting in a gun-free zone, with the largest death toll of any shooting in the history of our nation, and this time, the targets were homosexuals.  It was a hate crime.  It was terrorism.  Break the fuck out of your chains of political correctness and acknowledge the fact that this was an act of Radical Islamic terrorism, carried out by a Radical Islamic extremist.  Ignoring the elephant in the room is no longer an option when that elephant goes on a deadly rampage.

You are not speaking out against all Muslims by condemning the extremist followers of Islam who are terrorists.  Why won't you say it?  You'll condemn the Christian baker who won't bake a specific cake for a homosexual wedding.  You'll applaud as the government allows the lives of the baker's entire family to be ruined by a six-figure financial penalty for not baking that cake.  You'll talk about those intolerant Christians and say that they're what's wrong with America.  It's not like they have the right to hurt your feelings by not selling you baked goods customized for your gay wedding if they take religious exception to it, right?  And they're against women's rights too!  They're trying to make abortion illegal.  How dare they try to limit the situations in which you can murder the child living inside of your own body?  And then you'll say that they're not just homophobic and against women's rights.  They're Islamophobic too.  How dare they say that Muslims don't worship the same God as them?  How dare they point out that Islam's great prophet married and had sex with a prepubescent girl?  How dare they use the term "Islamic Terrorist" and accuse any Muslims, all of whom are peaceful, of being against women's rights and homosexuals?

I think that maybe the Left in this country was under the delusion that they had an unspoken deal with all the Muslims.  They'll go to bat for the rights of Muslims in exchange for them not acting out against homosexuals or women.  Perhaps they believed that Muslims, homosexuals, and women in this country were all united together somehow, against the Right.  You see, while the majority of Muslims in the United States are indeed peaceful, there are some here and many around the world who are not.  They follow Islamic teachings in which violence against women is accepted, and the punishment for homosexuality is death.  Following through with the latter belief is a textbook example of Islamic terrorism.  And that's what we have here.  A mass execution of homosexuals by a militant follower of Islam.  He would have killed all 350 people in that club if he could have.  And every single mosque in the world is under the obligation to condemn this act, but not every single one will.  Because some of them are indeed breeding grounds for more terrorists like him.  To them, homosexuals deserve to die, so he is a hero.  And to Westboro Baptist Church, he is an agent bringing God's judgement upon homosexuals.  We must condemn radical, evil religion of all types, including those who are or claim to be Muslim, Jewish, Christian, or whatever.  It is never acceptable to kill people because of their sexual orientation, their race, or their gender.

For those of you who don't know, Westboro Baptist Church is a hate group masquerading as a Christian church.  They hate a lot of things, but they especially hate homosexuals.  The Jesus they follow is not the Jesus of the Bible.  The Jesus of the Bible ate dinner with prostitutes and thieving tax collectors.  The Jesus of the Bible would eat dinner with homosexuals today.  Christians are supposed to show the love of Jesus Christ to the world.  This is not what Westboro Baptist Church is doing when it spews its hate and directly contradicts the Bible by stating that "God hates fags."  This is not true.  The Bible is crystal clear that God loves all people.  What the people who belong to this group do and say is appalling, no doubt, but at least they are not going around killing homosexuals, even if they take sick joy in those who do.

And in this particular case, in the worst mass shooting in the history of our nation, "those who do" boils down to one Islamic terrorist who pledged allegiance to ISIS and apparently acted alone.  Yet the FBI had been monitoring him as a possible terrorist before he carried out the mass murder.  If I say that it's problematic that he was able to legally buy a gun, I'll upset the Left if I say that the reason he shouldn't have a gun is because he's a Muslim who might be a terrorist.  That's not politically correct.  If I say that the reason he shouldn't have a gun is because people suspected of being terrorists by the government shouldn't have a gun, I'll upset the Right.  What we can all agree on is that he shouldn't have had a gun.  So why don't we fix the terror watch list so it doesn't suck as bad as the rest of the things that the government runs, and then we can not allow people like him to have guns?  If the FBI thinks that you might be a terrorist pledged to ISIS, you should not have a gun!  Also, were there not any previous complaints against him for viciously beating his wife?  We have violence against women, and violence against homosexuals.  He beat his wife without a gun, and he killed those at the club with a gun.  There are hundreds of millions of other guns in this country that were not used to massacre 50 people in a gay nightclub, where guns are not allowed.  At the very heart of this tragedy, beyond whatever violent means are used, is homosexual-hating, woman-hating Radical Islam. 

Hateful religious extremism kills.  And gun-free zones are easy targets.  The target was not a Gays with Guns club.  It was a Gay nightclub, where the only people with guns were the authorities who came in and killed the terrorist after he had already killed 50 people.  Fifty.  Thinking about that makes me sick to my stomach.  And this happened in Orlando.  I've been to Orlando.  Disney World is in Orlando.  It's supposed to be the happiest place on earth.  On this day, it was the saddest place on earth.  These people did not deserve to be murdered.  I am a Christian, and while I do indeed believe that homosexual acts are against the Bible, I do not take issue with the Supreme Court's ruling that allows them to get married.  There must be separation of Church and State, and the case considered was a matter of State, and thus the decision made sense, but I would vehemently oppose any legislation that would mandate a church to perform a gay marriage ceremony.  However, Christians are called to show everyone the great Love of Christ, especially homosexuals.  They will know we are Christians by our love.  And while I have friends who are Christians who would refuse to bake a cake for a gay wedding, and I respect their decision, I am on the side with my friends who would not refuse to bake a cake for a gay wedding.  I don't care.  It's just cake.

But while we are distracted fighting over baked goods, evil lurks and plots its move.  Like many people, I have friends who are Christians, Jews, Atheists, Agnostics, and Muslims.  My Muslim friends are peaceful.  If you have a Muslim friend who beats his wife and/or has pledged to ISIS, please report him to the authorities immediately.  If you have a friend of any religion who appears to want to murder people, please report him or her to the authorities immediately.  The signs of extremism are often there long before a massacre is planned.  We must take action when we see these signs.  Evil is lurking in our midst.  We can no longer ignore it.  And lately, it has manifested itself in the form of Radical Islamic Terrorism.  While I may not agree with Donald Trump's idea that we should ban all Muslims from entering the United States, it sure makes a hell of a lot more sense than refusing to accept that we need to acknowledge and vanquish our very serious problem of Radical Islamic Terrorism.  My heart aches for the victims and their families and friends.  God help us.

Hey, Now We Won't Be Raped

A top story in the news and in discussions on social media over the past several days has been the case of the Stanford student athlete who was found guilty on three felony counts stemming from raping an unconscious woman behind a dumpster last year.  Normally, this would not be a big story.  There was no doubt he did it, and if he was found guilty, justice would be served.  However, the judge decided to sentence him to 6 months in prison for this (which could end up at 3 months with good behavior apparently).  That's why this is a story.  And it's sickening.  This man raped an unconscious woman.  The heroes that came across him doing the deed pried him off of her and held him until police arrived.  There was no consent whatsoever.  This was a very clear case of rape.  Rape is a felony.  It's a serious felony.  It's right up there with crimes against children and treason, just below murder.  There are misdemeanors that carry a longer sentence than 3-6 months.  This is a very serious miscarriage of justice, and the judge should be removed from the bench.


A lot of the outrage over this case has come from what the man's father said--that the sentence that the prosecution was seeking was a steep price to pay for his actions in 20 minutes of his life, after 20 years of otherwise good behavior.  That is a despicable argument.  Remember the Newtown shooter (who I won't even dignify by stating his name)?  Five minutes of his life defined him, despite 20 years of not having a criminal record.  If you rape or murder someone, you are a rapist or a murderer.  Yes, that defines you, and it should.  You are not the victim.  If someone raped or killed a member of this father's family, I cannot imagine he would have written a letter to the judge saying that the penalty that the prosecution was seeking was too steep.  Not a chance.  But I don't blame the father nearly as much as I blame the judge for what happened with the sentencing.  Of course the father is going to go to bat for his son.  The judge should not have taken pity on a person who raped an unconscious woman.  Whatever impact years of prison would have on his life would have been deserved.


The rapist blamed his decisions that night on alcohol.  Alcohol does not turn you into a rapist.  If I drink alcohol and become drunk, nowhere in my mind will I think it's acceptable to rape an unconscious woman behind a dumpster.  Alcohol can lead to poor decisions, and alcohol can make you more apt to do things that you want to do anyway but were holding back on doing while you were sober, but alcohol does not turn you into a rapist.  That is not an excuse.  It actually makes less sense than getting caught for drunk driving and blaming it on alcohol.  At least alcohol is the cause of drunk driving.  It is not the cause of someone being a rapist.  Now, the victim here was unconscious because she drank too much alcohol, thus became unconscious and could not give consent.  She was inebriated from ingesting an unsafe and dangerous amount of alcohol.  This was not a case of two conscious young people hooking up after drinking alcohol.  That's not rape, even if one or both regret it the next day.  This was a case of one conscious young person raping one unconscious young person after they both drank alcohol.  That's rape.  That deserves a lot more than 3-6 months in prison.


Now that we've defined what this is, let's talk a bit about what it's not.  This is not about race.  I've seen some articles and plenty of posts on social media comparing this white student athlete's lenient sentence with a heftier sentence for a black man who was sentenced to prison for a rape that he did not commit.  Both cases are miscarriages of justice, but that's about all they have in common.  Not everything is about race, despite what the race baiters would have you think.  There is no indication that the judge is racist or that this would have gone any differently if the rapist were a black student athlete.  It doesn't matter whether he was white, black, purple, or striped.  If we turn this into a racial issue, we've really lost sight of the key problems with what went on here.


This also is not about making a point that we should all beware of white student athletes because they are rapists, as I've seen in a few misguided social media posts.  Yes, anyone may be a rapist, despite how they look, how nice they seem, or how much money they have.  Most of us never expected that the rich, mild-mannered, fatherly Bill Cosby would have turned out to be a serial rapist, giving women pills and raping them while they were unconscious for several decades.  But rapists are not always black men, or white men, or men in general.  And rape victims are not always women either.  I know men and boys who were raped by men.  I know men who were raped by women.  Men are not very apt to report rapes either, often because they are ashamed or because of the presumed reaction they would get, with folks not taking them seriously or asking how that could happen to a man.


There is a double standard at work here.  Look no further than the cases of teachers having sex with underage students if you don't believe me.  If the teacher is an attractive woman and the victim is male, most males in our society want to congratulate the boy on his conquest.  It's every boy's dream after all, right?  But if the teacher is a man and the victim is female, we don't want to congratulate the girl on her conquest.  We want to throw that man in prison for a long time.  The idea that men are always the rapists and women are always the rape victims does not help create a healthy culture.  It's also not healthy to unquestionably believe someone who says he or she was raped, because that mindset allows things like the Duke Lacrosse incident to occur, where a woman falsely accused multiple men of rape, the general public believed her and judged those athletes from the media stories before the facts came out, and the lives of the student athletes in this situation were turned upside-down.


Unfortunately, most of the time when a rape is reported, it actually occurred (and there are many more that are never reported at all).  We have a very serious problem with rape in this country.  I think it's in part because young people think they are entitled to what they want and are not used to not getting their way.  Moral relativism and the defense of religions and cultures where the rape of women is permissible makes the problem worse.  It is not acceptable to rape, even if you are a Muslim and the Quran says it is in certain situations (it's also not acceptable for a U.S. soldier to be dishonorably discharged for stopping the rape of young boys).  It is not acceptable to rape, even if your Christian church tells women what to wear, because if they wear something too revealing, men will lust after them and not be able to control themselves.  Victim blaming is NOT acceptable.  Remember that passage in the Bible where King David saw Bathsheba, who was married to Uriah, bathing naked, and then committed adultery with her and had her husband killed?  Remember how God said it was all Bathsheba's fault because she should have put on some clothes?  Me neither.  Because He never said that.  He blamed and punished David.  While no rape occurred here, the point is that it is never acceptable to blame anything that occurs on what a woman is or isn't wearing.


There is no excuse whatsoever for raping an unconscious person, male or female.  There is no excuse whatsoever for a judge to give only a 3-6 month sentence.  There is no justification of the idea that the punishment for the crime would make a rapist into a victim, or that a few minutes of bad judgment should be outweighed by a life otherwise free of a criminal record.  Can you imagine a judge sentencing a murderer to 6 months in prison for murdering people, because it was a few minutes of bad judgment and there was no prior criminal history?  Me neither.  But maybe we're not far from that, because what happened here is pretty unimaginable too.