Why the Chick-fil-a Fight is Important

When I posted on the Chick-fil-a controversy last week, I mentioned that I did not pay much attention to it at first.  I thought it was just more lib city silliness.  But the more I think about it, the more I see its importance.

The bullying of Chick-fil-a brings together the Left’s wars on freedom of speech and freedom of religion.  The business is being attacked because the CEO, out of his deeply held Christian beliefs, has publicly supported traditional marriage and supported groups that share those values. That governments are joining in on the attack makes this all the more important.

Now the mayors of Boston and of Chicago are backing down somewhat.  Perhaps advisors whispered in their ears that Obama has not abolished the Constitution yet.  But the dangerous nature of their attacks remain.

For Leftist governments and activists in the West are using two tactics that we see in this controversy.  First, they are attacking freedom of religion while insisting they are doing no such thing.  They do this by “defining religious liberty down” by defining it as “freedom of worship” (as I’ve warned over a year ago), that you can worship in private as you please, but to actually live out your religious beliefs out in the world is another matter.  In daily life, the Almighty State is a jealous god that must be served, regardless of one’s petty outdated religious beliefs.

Second, they are attacking freedom of speech, both directly as the city governments of Boston and Chicago threatened to do, or indirectly by defining politically incorrect speech as “bigotry” unworthy of protection and worthy of vicious attack.  The bigot card is becoming more and more common in attempts to demonize opponents and shut down debate. 

William Jacobson opines that the use of the bigot card is accelerating now that Obama is on the politically correct side of the gay marriage debate.  But it is hard to miss that its use was becoming more frequent well before then.  Voicing traditional conservative views on social issues practically guarantees being smeared as a “bigot.”

Now people with backbones can handle the insults of the evil and of the stupid.  But with the mentality of the Left, it is a short step from attacking “bigoted” speech to banning it with the force of the government, as Christians and conservatives in the West have already experienced.

So this is why I hope Christians and conservatives do not let up in defending Chick-fil-a and in counterattacking the mayors of Boston and Chicago and their ilk.  The Left must taught and taught well that if you attack freedom of speech and freedom of religion in America, there is hell to pay.  Those moral midgets who hate freedom must be put in their place for the sake of the rest of us who still value freedom.