Last week, while speaking with fellow Fox personality Megyn Kelly, Bill O\u2019Reilly catapulted himself into the center of controversy when he asserted that the opponents of \u201cgay marriage\u201d do nothing but \u201cthump the Bible.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
O\u2019Reilly said that \u201cthe compelling argument was on the side of homosexuals [.]\u201d The latter make \u201cthe compelling argument\u201d that \u201c\u2018We\u2019re Americans.\u00a0 We just want to be treated like everybody else.\u201d\u00a0 In meeting this tour de force, O\u2019Reilly continued, \u201cthe other side hasn\u2019t been able to do anything but thump the Bible.\u201d Kelly agreed.<\/p>\n
With lightning quick speed, O\u2019Reilly\u2019s remarks raised the ire of \u201cthe conservative movement\u201d\u2014both that of its base as well as that of some of its most notable representatives.<\/p>\n
Admittedly, I am among those who O\u2019Reilly rattled.\u00a0 But this has less to do with his use of the expression \u201cthump<\/em> the Bible\u201d and more to do with his claim that the opponents of so-called \u201cgay marriage\u201d do nothing but <\/em>thump the Bible.\u00a0 The latter just simply isn\u2019t true.<\/p>\n O\u2019Reilly must <\/em>know this, in which case he speaks dishonestly.\u00a0 On the other hand, if, by some remote chance, he doesn\u2019t know this, then he is woefully unqualified to even weigh in on the marriage issue, much less hold down a position as a very visible, and very audible, commentator.<\/p>\n In short, with respect to this issue, at any rate, it is either dishonesty or ignorance from which O\u2019Reilly\u2019s judgment springs. \u00a0<\/p>\n I suspect that it is true that most (American) opponents of \u201cgay marriage\u201d are moved by biblical considerations.\u00a0 However, contra O\u2019Reilly, it is most certainly not <\/em>the case that they \u201cthump the Bible.\u201d\u00a0 While conscripting Fox News colleagues, Megyn Kelly, Laura Ingraham, and Charles Krauthammer in the service of damage control, O\u2019Reilly explained that, in his estimation, to \u201cthump\u201d the Bible is to cite it without further ado.\u00a0<\/p>\n Unfortunately for O\u2019Reilly, by his own lights, there has been little to no Bible thumping on the part of the defenders of marriage.<\/p>\n The enemies of \u201cgay marriage\u201d have insisted that never in the history of the human race has \u201cthe definition\u201d of marriage referred to the union of members of the same sex.\u00a0 They have leveled the slippery slope argument that once we \u201credefine\u201d marriage to include homosexuals, we will then have no option but to permit polygamy and other morally troublesome marital arrangements.\u00a0 They have argued that \u201cgay marriage\u201d will divest \u201ctraditional marriage\u201d of its time-honored position of privilege by reducing it to just another alternative.\u00a0<\/p>\n Granted, (as this opponent of \u201cgay marriage\u201d has noted on more than one occasion) these are indeed bad <\/em>arguments.\u00a0 But they are <\/em>arguments. No Bible thumping here.\u00a0 In fact, there isn\u2019t even any referencing of the Bible to be found in these lines of reason.<\/p>\n Anyone who is in the slightest informed about this marriage issue must know that O\u2019Reilly\u2019s remark about the argumentative strategy of the forces for \u201ctraditional marriage\u201d is emphatically false.\u00a0<\/p>\n So, why did he say it?\u00a0 I submit two theories that might answer this question.<\/p>\n First, O\u2019Reilly may very well actually favor \u201cgay marriage.\u201d\u00a0 For all of his talk of the evils of \u201csecular progressivism\u201d and the virtues of \u201ctraditionalism\u201d\u2014i.e. \u201cthe folks\u201d\u2014this is not at all a stretch.\u00a0 After all, he did say that the proponents of \u201cgay marriage\u201d have, not just the stronger <\/em>argument on their side, but \u201cthe compelling<\/em> argument.\u201d\u00a0 A compelling argument is impossible to intellectually resist.<\/p>\n O\u2019Reilly may have had some other idea of \u201ccompelling\u201d in mind.\u00a0 Yet he seemed to have been awfully impressed with the argument in question.\u00a0 Is it so unreasonable to think that it got to him?\u00a0 If it did, then perhaps he was engaging here in an all too common political strategy whereby one advances one\u2019s own team by reducing its competitor to a one-dimensional straw man.<\/p>\n Second, to anyone who has watched O\u2019Reilly for any length of time, it is painfully obvious that he aches to be viewed as a \u201crespectable\u201d journalist by the left. Toward this end, he not infrequently says things about those on the right that sound at once stupid and dishonest. It isn\u2019t that the right, to say nothing of \u201cthe conservative movement,\u201d is immune to legitimate criticism.\u00a0 Yet O\u2019Reilly\u2019s criticisms, far from sounding legitimate, almost always strike the ear as thoughtless.\u00a0<\/p>\n His latest Bible thumping remarks dovetail seamlessly into this pattern.<\/p>\n Ultimately, though, it doesn\u2019t much matter why O\u2019Reilly said what he did.\u00a0 What matters is that his conservative critics understand why O\u2019Reilly deserves their anger.\u00a0 What matters is that they understand that it isn\u2019t his allegation that they \u201cthump the Bible\u201d that should upset them, but the wildly false allegation that they do nothing but thump the Bible while debating \u201cgay marriage.\u201d\u00a0 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Last week, while speaking with fellow Fox personality Megyn Kelly, Bill O\u2019Reilly catapulted himself into the center of controversy when he asserted that the opponents of \u201cgay marriage\u201d do nothing but \u201cthump the Bible.\u201d\u00a0 O\u2019Reilly said that \u201cthe compelling argument was on the side of homosexuals [.]\u201d The latter make \u201cthe compelling argument\u201d that \u201c\u2018We\u2019re…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":399,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-810","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n