Comments on: Dobson Doesn't Get It

By: Duke

Duke — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 16:15:17 +0000

I didn’t expect them to persuade you.

Most people on both sides of issues like abortion and same-sex marriage are set in their ways and don’t care what arguments the other side makes.

I added your rss feed a while back because I appreciate the fact that you are much more logical and clear-thinking in your approach to the issues than most people on either side.

And good luck on your bar.

By: Peter

Peter — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 14:52:47 +0000

I don’t think people in the media really picked out Dobson and decided to go after him as representative of evangelical Christians. From what I can tell of the coverage on this issue, Dobson sought out some attention on this matter by making attack-type statements on an enormously popular candidate. This should not be surprising because his long career as head of Focus on the Family has typically involved actions designed to grab media attention with the hopes of steering a political campaign toward an outcome he prefers.

If people from Stand to Reason went public with statements criticizing Barack Obama for his position on specific issues, based on non-religious perspectives, I suspect they would get media attention, too.

Thanks for the link regarding same-sex marriage. I briefly skimmed each of the arguments there. I don’t expect any of them would persuade me in the least, but I certainly appreciate the attempt to formulate arguments that do not require acceptance, from the outset, of a particular religious view.

By: Duke

Duke — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 14:33:49 +0000

As someone who considers themselves an evangelical Christian, I would have to agree with you on this one. Unfortunately the “spokesmen” are generally the people chosen by the media because they give outrageous sound bites, rather than someone who actually presents an argument most evangelical Christians would agree with.

Why don’t they ever pick someone from organizations like Stand to Reason where they even instruct other Christians that the arguments made on issues like same-sex marriage and abortion must be arguments that stand alone in the public discussion without being based on Biblical arguments? I suspect it’s because those arguments don’t make good news stories.

For reference, here are a few web pages they have regarding same-sex marriage that don’t rely on biblical arguments: http://www.str.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=7937