There have been many movies, all of them terrible, with the plot of two people magically changing places (parent and child, a man and a woman, a black man and a white man, etc). The religious right seems to be repeating that plot in their absurd claims to be the victims of their own past behavior, now perpetrated by liberals.
We’ve seen this pattern operate in a myriad of ways as they try to flip reality on its head, portraying themselves to be the modern equivalent of liberal victims of right-wing authoritarianism in the past. They’ve declared themselves to be the true heirs of Martin Luther King (Glenn Beck particularly loves this one, aided by Alveda King, MLK’s right wing niece). Lately we’ve seen them claim to be the new Rosa Parks more than once. Now Bryan Fischer and Al Mohler are claiming that Christian righters are victims of a “new McCarthyism.”
As usual, they stand reality completely on its head with these declarations. All of the people whose legacy they now claim to be the rightful heirs to were victims of right wing bigotry and authoritarianism. If Glenn Beck had been active when Martin Luther King was alive, he would have been standing at his blackboard drawing connections and declaring King to be a communist out to destroy America (as he’s done with practically every liberal in the country). If Bryan Fischer had a radio show during the McCarthy era, he would undoubtedly be supporting those witch hunts. This is the sort of rhetoric that sets Orwell’s corpse to spinning.
