On Monday and Tuesday of this week, I wrote about two defenses of Roy Moore: Tully Borland\u2019s article in the Federalist urging Alabamians to vote for Moore whether he did what he is accused of or not, and Doug Wilson\u2019s insistence that we use \u201cbiblical criteria\u201d for judging Moore. As I read the two pieces, I was struck by a common appeal to violence.<\/p>\n
Tully Borland\u00a0wrote as follows<\/a>:<\/p>\n I have a 14-year-old daughter. If I caught him doing what was alleged, for starters I would kick him where it counts. Hard. That being said, I don\u2019t think it\u2019s wrong to vote for Moore.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n For his part,\u00a0Doug Wilson wrote this<\/a>:<\/p>\n If the allegations are true, the citizens of Alabama ought to do more than politely request that Moore step out of the race. If the allegations are\u00a0true<\/em>, they ought all to pitch in, buy the world\u2019s biggest frying pan, fill it with about half a foot of piping hot bacon grease, and fry the good judge a deep brown on both sides.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n I\u2019ve noticed something of a pattern, among conservatives, in dealing with\u00a0to allegations of sexual abuse. \u201cIf he really did what he is accused of,\u201d the line goes, \u201che should be taken out and shot.\u201d Or some derivative. This is generally followed by insistence that in this<\/em> case, the accused is actually innocent, or that the situation is more complicated than generally reported. The part about taking him out and shooting him is there\u00a0to make sure you know that the speaker really is tough on sexual abuse<\/em>. The toughest, in fact!<\/p>\n Borland\u00a0throws in an\u00a0appeal to violence as a way to assure\u00a0his readers that, despite what he\u2019s actually arguing, he\u2019s not easy on sexual abuse<\/em>. Of course,\u00a0what he\u2019s arguing is that Alabama voters should give Moore a U.S. Senate seat even if he\u00a0did<\/em> sexually molest 14-year-old Leigh Corfman. But by appealing to violence\u2014and elevating his own man\u2019s man<\/em> status\u2014he attempts to ward off criticism. How can you say he\u2019s not tough on sexual abuse? He just said he would totally have kicked Moore in the nuts if Moore had\u00a0messed with his<\/em> daughter!<\/p>\n Wilson, for his part, tries to preserve his claim to moral authority by couching his\u00a0his defense of Moore with\u00a0an insistence\u00a0that he would support literally\u00a0torturing<\/em>\u00a0Moore if the allegations against him are<\/em> in fact true. But would he actually?<\/a><\/p>\n When\u00a0Steven Sitler, then a student at Wilson\u2019s New Saint Andrews college, sexually molested numerous children in multiple states\u2014and admitted it<\/em>\u2014Wilson responded by\u00a0writing to the judge in the case<\/a>, begging for leniency:<\/p>\n \u201cI would urge that the civil penalties applied would be measured and limited. I have a good hope that Steven has genuinely repented, and that he will continue to deal with this to become a productive and contributing member of society.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n After Sitler\u00a0was released from jail, Wilson welcomed him\u00a0back into his\u00a0church. When asked to explain why he did this, Wilson wrote in a statement on his blog<\/a>\u00a0that \u201csince Steven\u2019s conviction and conditional release from prison and jail, Steven, as a penitent Christian, has been welcome at Christ Church\u201d and that \u201che is as welcome as any other sinner is, which is to say,\u00a0he is very welcome<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n And it didn\u2019t end there. An\u00a0elder at Wilson\u2019s church introduced Sitler to a young woman looking for a husband<\/a>, and Wilson himself officiated the marriage, calling on God to bless the couple with children.\u00a0What happened to Wilson\u2019s calls for violence? If the allegations against Moore are true, he said, the citizens of Alabama should literally<\/em> fry Moore\u00a0in a vat of grease. But when a man in Wilson\u2019s church community was\u00a0accused of the same thing\u2014and confessed that the allegations were true<\/em>\u2014Wilson did no such thing. Instead, he did the exact opposite.<\/p>\n And then there was Jamin Wight. While\u00a0a student at Wilson\u2019s Greyfriar\u2019s Seminary<\/a>, 24-year-old Wight groomed and sexually abused Natalie Greenfield, the 13-year-old daughter of the family he was boarding with (Wilson encourages students at his college and seminary to board with families in his church). Descriptions of what Wight did to Greenfield\u00a0are horrific<\/a>. Wilson claimed (falsely) that Wight and Greenfield were in a parent-approved courtship relationship and treated\u00a0this as an extenuating circumstance.\u00a0\u201cI do not believe that this situation in any way paints Jamin as a sexual predator,\u201d Wilson\u00a0wrote a letter to the investigating officer in the case.<\/p>\n By the way, shortly after the birth of his son, Sitler was ordered by the court<\/a> to move out of his house and his wife was removed from the \u201capproved chaperone\u201d list after the court found that he\u00a0\u201chad contact with his child that resulted in actual sexual stimulation\u201d and that his wife had not acted as an effective chaperone.\u00a0Wight, who also married and had children after leaving prison, later came under church discipline<\/a> for abusing his wife and children, and is also accused of abuse by a woman who left him when Natalie\u2019s case came to court.<\/p>\n All of this is to say that Wilson\u2019s appeal to violence\u2014his suggestion that Alabamians ought to\u00a0fry Moore in a vat of grease if the allegations against him are true\u2014is a sham.<\/p>\n This isn\u2019t just about Wilson. It\u2019s about every conservative who talks about shooting anyone who so much as messes with<\/em> his daughter, and then turns around and knee-jerk defends Moore\u2014or Trump\u2014against allegations of sexual abuse. It\u2019s about every conservative who claims to want to castrate<\/em> child sex offenders, and the next day defends someone in their church against allegations of child sexual abuse, because that child was always\u00a0lying to get\u00a0attention, and saying\u00a0sexually inappropriate things.<\/p>\n This talk of violence is a cover. It\u2019s meant to distract from what\u2019s actually going on.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" This is about every conservative who talks about shooting anyone who so much as messes with his daughter, and then turns around and knee-jerk defends Moore—or Trump—against allegations of sexual abuse. It’s about every conservative who claims to want to castrate child sex offenders, and the next day defends someone in their church against allegations of child sexual abuse, because that child was always lying to get attention, and saying sexually inappropriate things.<\/p>\n Click through to read more!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":845,"featured_media":34530,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40,11],"tags":[92,684,181],"class_list":["post-34503","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-evangelicalism-fundamentalism","category-politics","tag-doug-wilson","tag-roy-moore","tag-sexual-abuse"],"yoast_head":"\n