I think the Duck Dynasty fiasco scares me so much because I agree wholeheartedly with both sides. As a religious person who follows an ancient, antiquated document that didn’t really keep up with the times (bigotry, idol worship, slavery, child marriage, sacrifice, etc) it’s becoming harder and harder to hold a public view about my religion because of it’s decidedly anti-modern times views. If you state your supposedly God-given views, you will be ostracized from your workplace for not following the status quo. What happened to freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and living in a country where people are not discriminated against because they hold an unpopular or in this case, an un-liberal view? Sounds pretty scary to me, what about you?
Sure sounds scary when someone cannot espouse their religious beliefs in public without fearing for the Salem Witch Hunt. It kind of reminds me of those days of yore where Commies were called reds and they were hunted for their personal views. Well, how would you feel if someone was awfully religious and started spewing things about it being sinful to be Jewish? That would scare me a bit, would scare others too, and I’m sure if someone like this Duck Dude said that in an interview, we would all be calling for his resignation, apology and so on. The gays, no matter if you “agree’ with them, are pretty much the same as any other group of people. In fact the gays are probably a larger percentage of the US population than the Jews. Yet, when someone makes an anti-Jewish statement the same thing happens, do the gays deserve any less rights than the Jews? I think not.
So for me this Duck Dynasty thing is actually scarier than for you, because both sides make sense to me. I’m fearful that this is one step in the direction towards censorship of religion and religious views. A step towards declaring the Torah or the Bible as racist documents, towards bannings, towards a day where we must become like the Morano’s and learn Torah in secret. Is my fear too unrealistic? I’m not sure, but I guess I listened to too much Micheal Savage and Rush before I moved to the left coast. It takes me back to those times I was warned by my elders about America becoming so left wing that it would ban Judaism and religion in general, are we headed that way?
Or maybe it’s time for religion to get with the program, if you think ancient religious documents apply literally to modern day times, maybe you should keep that to yourself. Religion has evolved for thousands of years, but suddenly it’s stuck on the gay thing, suddenly it can’t evolve and people feel the need to tell the world that they are willing to believe in the modern world, except for sexual relationships. It’s kind of weird, that some aspects of religion have evolved, while some stay exactly the same.
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Satire aside, companies do this all the time. If you say stuff in public that embarrasses them they tend to fire you, especially if you reach a large number of people.
What’s really revolting is the hypocrisy. The same “free-speech absolutists” who whine about how Gawd-Given Robertson has a First Amendment RIGHT to that scripted sitcom job demanded that Martin Bashir get the arse for saying something nasty about Sarah Palin. They cheered when the Dixie Chicks had their contracts dropped and careers destroyed. So on and so forth.
You can’t have it both ways when you right whinge.
A. Nuran, you are wrong. The Dixie Chics did not have their contracts cancelled. Nor has anyone suffered a material negative consequence for criticizing Palin.
Boycotts and cancellations is generally reserved for publicly expressing conservative positions that the liberals hate. The First Amendment be damned.
Getting fired is not a material negative consequence?
The first amendment has literally nothing to do with any of this.
I am not American, but doesn’t the First Amendment basically say that you can’t be targeted by the government for expressing an opinion?
Boycotts and cancellations are not government actions, so I can’t see how the First Amendment fits in.
Yes, it does. I might take the folks agitating for “freedom of speech” and “First Amendment rights” for Robertson a bit more seriously if any of them showed even the slightest understanding of what the First Amendment actually says and what protections it actually offers.
Also, let’s put aside the comments about gays for just a moment and discuss what was said, in the same interview, about the Jim Crow laws and black people, shall we? Personally, I found that much worse, yet it’s being totally ignored.
“I never, with my eyes, saw the mistreatment of any black person. Not once. Where we lived was all farmers. The blacks worked for the farmers. I hoed cotton with them. I’m with the blacks, because we’re white trash. We’re going across the field …. They’re singing and happy. I never heard one of them, one black person, say, ‘I tell you what: These doggone white people’—not a word! … Pre-entitlement, pre-welfare, you say: Were they happy? They were godly; they were happy; no one was singing the blues.”
Yep, I’m sure everyone was just loving life down there in Louisiana in the early ’60s, and if they weren’t, I’m sure the first person a black guy would tell would be the white guy working the next row.
He wasn’t fired for expressing Christian views. He was fired for being offensive. A person can say they think homosexuality is wrong without comparing it to things like bestiality. And don’t forget the whole part he said about African Americans being happy before the Civil Rights era, and comparing them to white trash.
Susan is right. Freedom of speech gives you the right to express yourself. The duck dude could have simply stated that homesexuality is wrong and say no more. Anotherwords, criticize the action and do not personalize it.
I;m with the duck dude on this one. Reporter asked him about his opinion, he was honest about his christian beliefs, and now the network jumps on him. Funny how they enjoyed his religious views when it’s popular, they end every single episode with him praying before dinner, and yet, when he quotes the bible they suddenly freak out.
Liberal political correctness gone insane with their hypocritical double standards.
So you have no problem with what he had to say about black people and the Jim Crow era? Because even if we set aside his comments about gay people (which I don’t think got him fired, in terms of their general point, namely that homosexuality is sinful- what got him canned was the manner in which he chose to express those opinions), the garbage he was spewing about how “no one was singing the blues” back in Jim Crow-era Louisiana was more than enough justification for a firing.
I also find it very, very hard to believe that neither A&E nor his publicist have had previous conversations with him about his beliefs and the best way to express those beliefs without putting his job on the line. The guy isn’t stupid- he was a millionaire long before A&E came knocking, and while he plays an ignorant hick on TV, that’s not who he is in real life.
I’m also curious to know where A&E’s rights as an employer enter into all of this. Are they obligated to keep someone around who is damaging their brand and putting their investment at risk just because… Well, because he’s Christian? Because he’s religious? Sounds like affirmative action or something to me. And if they are obligated to keep him around, when, exactly, are they allowed to fire him or take other disciplinary action? When he makes poorly-considered statements in an interview? When he cusses out his boss? When he says something anti-Semitic? Where is the line?
Must be nice, having a job where you can say *anything you want* with no repercussions, ever. I’ve never encountered such a magical beast here in the real world.
Didn’t read the interview/article with Duck dude. As such, I don’t know what his views are on black people. The comments that seem to have got him in trouble were that he considered homo acts sinful, just as bestiality, adultery, lying, etc. Don’t know who Jim Crow is either, I’m not from the US.
A&E made plenty of $$$ of his uber redneck image. I doubt the viewers thinks he’s stupid or ignorant, it’s part of the show, just as their beards are.
Finally, I don’t think he’s technically considered an employee. Business relationship is probably more accurate. You’d have to see their contract to figure out what the fine print says, but it’s definitely bad business for them to fire him. Cracker barrel has already reversed their position, and no doubt that a&e will follow.
gays deserve less rights? depends what? when marriage is designed to be for a man and a woman, the state doesn’t have a right to change that. As far as other things goes….
I imagine that gay people feel that marriage is designed for them, too. As the recent court ruling in Utah states, the reasoning that marriage is only for producing children clearly discriminates against not only gay people, but heterosexual couples that cannot or choose not to have children.
As the recent court ruling in Utah states, the reasoning that marriage is for producing children discriminates not only against gay people, but heterosexual couples who cannot or choose not to have children.
States have changed laws about marriage plenty of times. It used to be illegal for white people to marry black people. Lots of people arguing back then that that was what “marriage was designed to be”.
Right. Which is exactly why incestuous marriage will be permitted as well. So will polygamy.
Is there any line, or should we let any/all marry? After all, it is their business, right?
You do know “seriously?” was, like, named one of the most annoying words of 2013, right? Whatever, dude!
Wow. You have some very impressive debate skills.
Play the ball, not the pitcher.
states don’t have the right to define what marriage is. so it’s irrelevant what utah thinks
Freedom of speech is a funny animal. We can say whatever we want, whenever we want to say it, but no one is required to agree or endorse what we’ve said. The netwfirstork in this instance wants to communicate that this duck fellow’s opinion is not seen as being endorsed by them. Nothing wrong with that.
The public outrage in both sides is what baffles me. No one was really surprised that he held those beliefs. Nor is anyone really surprised that the liberal media doesn’t endorse that view.
Mr. Robertson hasn’t been jailed for what he said; therefore, the First Amendment is doing exactly what it’s supposed to do. No more, and no less.
This has nothing to do with the first amendment, since it wasn’t government action.
But it is a disturbing thing about liberals the way they are a thought police and think that it is proper to coerce everyone in the country into agreeing with them. They really are just as intolerant as any organized religion ever was.
How is this coersion?
If you don’t think like us, we fire you. How is this not coercion?
If I fire you because you aren’t religious, is that coercion? If I fire you because you are religious, is that coercion?
Dan-
That would be a nice thought… if that was in any way what happened.
Here’s how television works:
A network can’t afford to air a show without advertisers. Advertisers don’t want their products associated with racism/sexism/anyism/etc.
A&E suspended him because Duck Dynasty currently makes them a lot of money and they want to keep it that way. If he was on the show the advertisers would pull out and they’d have to take the show (which makes money now) off the air.
So he wasn’t fired by liberals. Liberals didn’t coerce A&E into firing him. The half of the country that doesn’t agree with his views made the advertisers (rightfully) afraid their products would be boycotted and the network tried to save their show the only way they knew how.
That’s even worse. You’re just agreeing that it is actually you who is the bigot!
You’re telling me that you don’t buy products from companies who advertise on TV shows whose actors don’t agree with you?
And you don’t think that is coercing people into thinking like you?
Are you so unable to tolerate anybody thinking differently than you?
It’s like you didn’t read what I wrote at all.
I’m not the one who doesn’t buy products if somebody doesn’t agree with me. That’s just a fact of the situation.
And before you go and blame liberals for that, the same problem has occurred when people have expressed very liberal beliefs.
Companies simply can’t be in a discussion that has two sides. They need everyone to buy their products.
Michael Jordan was once asked to endorse a candidate in his home state of North Carolina. The guy was a democrat and almost everybody supported him, but Jordan wouldn’t make any statement. When asked why not, he said, “Republicans buy shoes too.”
Right, so those are the people I’m criticizing.
And I’d like your example of someone losing their job for having very liberal beliefs.
(v’kol haposel, b’mumo posel. I’m pretty sure you aren’t responding to what I wrote.)
A&E will be the ones to get screwed in the long run. If they hadn’t stepped in and fired the duck dude, people may or may not have decided to boycott the company “duck commander” ,instead of the show “duck dynasty”. Now they’ve managed to piss off the other half of their viewership, who are now calling for widespread boycott if A&E.
Personally, I don’t feel what was said amounts to hate speech in any way, shape or form. If you believe in biblical heaven and hell, then, logically, you should believe that sinners will be punished, with homo relations being a capital offense.
He didn’t make his statements on the show (which belongs to A&E), so certainly not an issue to fire someone over. I hope the show moves to another channel, will teach the over liberal A&E a well deserved lesson, namely, that their are plenty of viewers that still have moral values, and that their viewership is worth just as much $$$.
Again, A&E didn’t screw up. If they hadn’t suspended him, the show would have lost the advertisers and gone off the air. This was their only way to save it.
It doesn’t appear to have worked because the rest of the family has said they are quitting, but it was A&E’s only shot.
Nothing to do with them being liberals, they didn’t really fire him because of the statements but rather for their consequences, they won’t move to another channel because they still won’t have advertisers, and A&E was trying to make money and keep viewers not take a moral stand.
Other than that, you are right.
I don’t think they would have lost any advertisers, and even if they did, I’m sure they could have replaced them with other ad slots. Ads are sold based on viewership, and I very highly doubt that the show would have lost any viewers because of what Phil said.
Now they are facing losing the show entirely, and possibly a conservative/right wing viewer boycott as well.
Had they pleaded the 5th or no comment when this whole fiasco came out, the whole thing would have blown over and been forgotten in a few days. Instead of thinking smart business, they tried to make a strong, liberal, “pro lgbt” statement, and it blew up in their faces.
Serves them right as far as I’m concerned.
Except that hadn’t lost a single advertiser when they fired him, and in the interim, only one store said it would stop carrying his products (cracker barrel), and then it apologized to him and said it would continue after an uproar at them.
So you story simply isn’t what happened. But nice try.
This disturbs you? For decades Conservatives have been screeching about how The Market must be Free to do whatever the fark it wants, no exceptions, no limits. Because otherwise Communism and slavery. Then when The Sacred Market decides that it can maximize its utility by dumping a bunch of yuppies cosplaying rednecks it’s the fault of the Liberals.
False equivalence is false equivalence.
I’m not asking for government intervention. I’m just calling out you bigots as bigots.
False equivalence is false equivalence.
As if false intellect.
Almost as disturbing as it is when the same people who champion the primacy of the free market and the rights of job creators begin saying that people are entitled to retain their jobs regardless of what damage they may do to their employer’s public reputation or investment. I’m curious to know where A&E’s rights as a company have gone in all of this. Or does an employer, upon hiring an employee, assume a permanent obligation to retain that employee for life, regardless of his conduct, productivity or satisfactory job performance?
Just for the record, I’ve never seen Duck Dynasty, I have no plan to watch it now, and I don’t particularly care what A&E does in all of this, but I can’t help but scratch my head to see so many free market, corporate advocates suddenly going into paroxysms at the idea of a company exercising its hiring and firing rights, just like any other company is entitled to do. I hope none of the people posting here have voted in favor of “Freedom to Work” laws or agitated against unions.
You are missing the point. Nobody is asking for government intervention.
Go back, reread and try again. Reading comprehension is a useful skill, my friend.
I’m not saying that anyone is asking for government intervention. I’m saying that if, as a general rule, you support “right to work” laws, argue in favor of the free market and in favor of employers’ rights and vote for politicians who enact laws that support these positions, but you’re now upset that a company is exercising its rights as an employer to hire and fire (namely, because they fired someone you like or with whose opinions you agree), you’re a hypocrite.
If you’re angry (general “you,” not “you” specifically, although maybe this applies to you, I don’t know) because you agree with Phil Robertson’s views of black people or gays or because you like Duck Dynasty or because you have paranoid delusions about a liberal world takeover, hey, good for you. But at least have the courage of your convictions and intellectual honesty to come right out and say so. Don’t try to use the Constitution as a shield when it doesn’t have anything whatsoever to do with this situation, and don’t try to pretend that you’re just mad because you think that “no company should fire someone for their opinions.” Really? My opinion is that my boss is a tool, but if I go up to him and say that to his face, it’s pretty reasonable to assume that I’ll get fired. As Heshy points out, you wouldn’t much of anything if this guy had gone on a rant about Jews drinking the blood of Christian children, and I doubt you were out there protesting in support of Mel Gibson way back when. The only reason you’re supporting him now is because you agree either that homosexuality is the same a bestiality or that blacks didn’t have it all that bad during the Jim Crow era or both. Which is your prerogative, of course, but it would be nice if people would just cut the crap and say so outright.
About this I am GLAD. But absolutely not (or with) GLAAD.
Duck Dynasty rules. Is a duck kosher? I mean, inherently if it is slaughtered
by a shochet, can I make Peking Duck? Cite Issur v’Heter to support you
answer.
Ugh. Now they have transexual middle schoolers making lawsuits about what restroom or gym shower they can use!
You won’t see that in a Yeshiva. You may see other things that are totally
suspect but I bet you won’t see a transexual bochur with his chavruta partner
in full on frum drag. It would be funny to see one of them in a sheitl or
wearing a wig though.
Heshy…does this make Purim a holiday for gay Jews to “come out” for the day
without any stigma? Think about it!
It is simple. The Duck Dude is free to speak. A&E is free to react as they see fit. Everyone is free to squawk all they want.
Free speech is not free if it does not offend. Nobody has a right to not be offended. A vigorous exchange of views is entirely appropriate – that is, after all, how people figure out what they think.
The exchange of views sometimes loses its vigor when you get fired for those views.
The amusing thing is that A&E now hold no cards. The Duck folk are very much in demand – and if they jump ship, A&E will lose big time.
“You won’t see that in a Yeshiva. You may see other things that are totally
suspect but I bet you won’t see a transexual bochur”…
…No, you’ll see a “guy” in a white shirt and black pants, potentially with some much-hated facial hair, attempting to live out the Lakewood image that has been set before them. The trans woman won’t emerge, in many cases, until said “bochur” leaves yeshiva. And THAT’s the problem.
you had a short lived stint of fame and are now irrelevant
Another person’s relevancy is not determined by you. He made an on-topic comment that was better thought out than your lame sentence.
Whether Y-Love will continue to have fame is an open question, but you do not need to be famous to contribute to a conversation.
I definitely see tolerance increasing for everything but religion and religious beliefs, and yes, it is frightening. I cannot stand how homosexuality is presented as “love” and anyone who disagrees with it is a hateful homophobe. I have known many gay people up close and their behavior only affirms the Torah for me. The promiscuity is alarming, and funnily enough, they objectify women more than straight men.
Looks like the idiots at cracker barrel finally got the message: http://www.mikehuckabee.com/2013/12/cracker-barrel-reverses-itself
Bet A&E will be next…
Nowhere in the Torah is there any such thing as “gay people”. Homosexuality is only an act according to the Torah. They choose to identify themselves based on the actions they do. That is their choice. They don’t get any special status because they choose to identify themselves based on an action when the Torah doesn’t identify them as such. There is no noun for a homosexual person in Hebrew. There is a word for an adulterer, there is a word for a eunuch, there is a word for a thief, there is a word for a murderer, there is a word for a baker, a butcher, etc. There is no word for a homosexual person – so really there is no such thing as sexual orientation – straight or gay for that matter – in the hashkafah of a believing Jew.
Sure enough, the yuppie management at a&e has given in, Phil & family will be back filming when duck season hunting season ends.