This is Life!: Revolutions Around the Cruciform Axis

The AFA Responds

Apparently I wasn't the only one to give the American Family Association what-for. Here's the latest email from the AFA:

Dear Clifton,

. . . I wanted you to know that we have received a significant number of complaints from AFA supporters about the graphic nature of the video clip from the NBC show Las Vegas, contained in a recent e-mail alert AFA sent out. We understand and share the feelings and sentiments of those who expressed concern. We have to make judgement calls from time to time on how much to say or show about the subject matter presented.

Forgive me, but there was no "judgment call" here. It's pretty damn straightforward: don't promote the viewing of soft porn for any dadgum reason! Politics doesn't save souls, and it may well damn them. We don't save people by merely changing their TV content. So whipping up a bunch of FCC complaints, while it's nothing to denigrate per se, is such a lower priority when it comes to the state of a person's soul.

How many husbands, having viewed that brief little clip, will now find it easier to succumb to those unsolicited emails enticing them on to more pornography. An alcoholic can become such in the very first drink. And a man's addiction to porn, the denigration of his wife, and the dissolution of a marriage may have started with one little click.

Provided courtesy of the AFA.

We receive about an equal number of complaints from those who get upset when we don't provide the actionable material. So we are caught in a bind. Provide the actional material and get complaints, or don't provide the actionable material and get complaints.

Aww, poor fella. Don't know which constituency to placate? Tough ain't it when we play politics.

Let me say it with 100% clarity: There is no bind here! You don't provide pornography for Christian viewing. Any time. Any where. Period. End of story. Go back and read the freakin' Sermon on the Mount, fer pity's sake.

We face a dilemma because in order to file an official complaint with the Federal Communications Commission, the agency requires that the person complaining provide as much information as possible.

Hmmm. Yes, I see. And the only way to get that was to have thousands of your Christian supporters view porn? A written description wouldn't do it, huh?

Right.

This is immoral C Y A talk. Here's a clue, AFA: There is a hierarchy of goods, and political action is way way way WAAAAAY down the list compared to keeping a brother from sin. You might want to refresh your memory of 1 John. I'm just sayin'.

But wait! There's more!

The good news is that 170,000 people responded to our e-mail alert and filed an official complaint with the FCC!

I see, so what sort of ratio of click-and-view does that work out to? Maybe a bit more than half, say 100K? You possibly enabled one hundred thousand Christians to view porn? And this is good news?

You have lost your Christian mind.

But don't say that the AFA hasn't learned its lesson:

In the future we will send pixilated shots along with a description of the objectionable scene.

Well, you can put lipstick on a pig . . . .

I will be posting my comments here in another email to the AFA.

Posted by Clifton at February 14, 2006 08:30 AM | TrackBack