THE NAACP AND THE MEDIA OUGHT TO BE ASHAMED FOR ATTEMPTING TO EXPLOIT AND MISREPRESENT PHIL ROBERTSON’S REMARKS REGARDING HOMOSEXUALITY AND RACE
WHY BELIEVERS SHOULD SUPPORT DUCK DYNASTY STAR, PHIL ROBERTSON
By William Dwight Mckissic, Sr.
UNBELIEVABLE!!! Duck Dynasty star, Phil Robertson, has been suspended indefinitely from the most popular show in the history of cable television for simply expressing a biblical worldview regarding homosexuality.
The A&E Television Network has determined that silencing and punishing Phil Robertson was/is more important than respecting his right of free speech and alienating millions of kingdom-minded Bible believing Christians just like him. If A&E does not withdraw their decision to suspend Phil Robertson, the believers who share his views need to boycott A&E and her sponsors.
If no one else will, I will submit a resolution at the SBC Annual Meeting in Baltimore encouraging all believers to boycott watching the A&E Network and to boycott their sponsors if they don’t retract their position. Why? An attack on Phil Robertson’s views and free speech on this matter is also an attack on the millions of other believers who share his view.
Furthermore, I am deeply disappointed in the NAACP for taking Robertson’s innocent racial remarks regarding relationship that he had with Blacks on the bayou’s of Louisiana during his earlier years and spinning it into some kind of racial animus or insensitivity toward Blacks during the Jim Crow Era. Shame on the NAACP for this exploitation of such a sensitive and volatile topic!
Robertson was simply expressing his personal observations and relationships with Blacks that he knew in the Louisiana swamps and farmland. He stated:
“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.”
This is simply an account of one man’s experience with a people group that he interacted with. He described them as “happy” and “godly.” If you asked me to describe Black people in my sphere of observation during my childhood in the late 50’s and 60’s, I would make a similar observation. We were “farmers,” “hoeing cotton,” “godly,” going to church, “singing” and “happy.” That was the general disposition of Black people in the South in my childhood.
Did racism exist? Was it a reality? Absolutely! Did Black people discuss it and address it primarily among themselves? Absolutely! Did the Black Preacher take on the role and responsibility of addressing racism because quite often he was the only Black in a given community self-employed? Absolutely! In many ways morally, spiritually, family oriented and self-reliant were Blacks better off in the “pre-entitlement, pre-welfare” era? Absolutely! The facts would support such a conclusion. Are Robertson’s remarks racists, wrong, or insensitive or untrue? Absolutely Not!!! Robertson was not addressing the over-all obvious racism that existed in the South during that era. He was simply commenting on the general daily disposition of Blacks in his circle of acquaintances and relationships. It is tragic that the media, NAACP and others are unfairly using race in a twisted and shameful manner, because they simply disagree with his righteous and biblical stand on homosexuality.
The Civil Rights Community ought to be in the streets marching and protecting the free speech rights of Phil Robertson. The egregious act of suspending him for his statement should be aggressively repudiated and marched and protested against as if he were a Black man fired for making a similar remark. There is not a Black man in America who grew up in the South, who would have made a similar remark, and it would have been viewed as controversial or racist. Therefore, Robertson’s racial comment should be a non-issue.
May the Lord bless Phil Robertson! He is being persecuted for righteousness sake. His persecution is a fulfillment of biblical prophecy. Jesus said that believers would be hated because of His name’s sake. The prophet Isaiah said that the day would come when wrong would be called right and right would be called wrong. Phil Robertson is a classic example of both prophecies being fulfilled.
Believers of every kind throughout America ought to support Phil Robertson simply because his comments were/are scriptural, racially innocent, sincere, sensitive, supportive and true. Therefore, the negative and unwarranted response to his comments is simply orchestrated by “the prince of the power of the air.”