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February 10, 2012 at 12:03 pm 
Ed Brayton Every once in a while, Bill O’Reilly seems to have a momentary lapse of his usual douchebaggery and actually says something that isn’t insane or designed solely to soothe his macerated ego. He did it recently when he had a wingnut on the show to defend the campaign to get JC Penney to fire Ellen Degeneres as spokesperson.
O’Reilly calls the One Million Moms action a form of McCarthyism and a “witch hunt”.
Says Rios: “It isn’t about Ellen Degeneres, but it is about mainstreaming something that is not acceptable to Christian and traditional family people all over the country.”
Asks O’Reilly: “What is the difference between a McCarthy-era Communist blacklist and the Million Moms saying hey, JC Penney, don’t you hire any gay people. Don’t you dare. What is the difference?”
Says Rios: “The problem is that Ellen DeGeneres has chosen to act out her lesbian lifestyle, marry her partner, and what that represents…we are seeing homosexuality so embedded in our culture in alarming ways.”
So you see, it’s okay for them to hire a gay person. As long as the wingnuts don’t know they’re gay. And if they find out that they’re gay, then they’ll demand you fire them. O’Reilly is right here, but for the wrong reasons. The problem isn’t people trying to influence the behavior of corporations; the problem is that they’re doing so based solely on bigotry.
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Are you sure he didn’t mean that as a compliment?
Well, I think his reasons are half-right. Although obviously there is nothing wrong with influencing the behavior of corporations, it’s a little witch hunt-esque to be making a big deal out of a corporation hiring someone with whom you disagree on social issues when the job they are being hired for is completely irrelevant to their position on social issues. (That sentence ended up more awkward than I thought it would, but hopefully my meaning is clear)
As an example, I have no problem with World of Warcraft using Chuck Norris in their current advertising campaign. Norris is a grade-A douchebag when it comes to politics and social issues, but WoW’s hiring of him for their ad campaign has nothing to do with that: they hired him because he’s an action movie star with a reputation for playing bad-ass characters. It would be a little witch hunt-y if liberals like myself had a big “Boycott Wow!” campaign over Norris. We can afford a live-and-let-live approach in that case.
But it’s also true that there’s nothing wrong with being gay, whereas there is something wrong with being Chuck Norris. So it’s not quite apples to apples.
O’Reilly immediately reverted to pure BS as reaction to the ruling about Prop. 8.
Well, except that Blizzard needs a lesson on LGBT issues anyway.
jamessweet, #2: But it’s also true that there’s nothing wrong with being gay, whereas there is something wrong with being Chuck Norris.
God, I love Free Thought Blogs.
Well, that and the whole “Chuck Norris” meme has been an ingrained part of the general chat channel in the Barrens zone in WoW for years.
“…it is about mainstreaming something that is not acceptable to Christian and traditional family people all over the country.”
Yes, and I’m sure they’re going to demand next that Newt be taken out of the mainstream discussion because if his infidelity. And Mitt, because his religion added books at the end of the traditional bible and that’s strictly forbidden. And anyone that keeps their money with bankers. And Tim Tebow, he does a lot more than just gather sticks on the Sabbath. And Michele Bachmann and Sarah Palin, both have spoken in church and has tried to teach men things.
I’ll hold my breath.
Wouldn’t all his reasoning here also apply to Ludracris?
Also, I don’t think he’s being reasonable here. He’s reaching the correct conclusion, but that’s not the same thing. Basically, he’s only arguing companies have a legal right to pick whoever they want. That’s not OMM’s objectiion. He’s staw-manning and yelling over his guest as usual.
http://www.sohh.com/2010/03/ludacris_ends_feud_w_bill_oreilly_the_lo.html
If you aren’t familiar with the Ludacris story. Either Bill changed his views after talking to the guy, or he’s a hypocrite.
I think that deep down, O’Reilly is just a plain old contrarian. When I first saw him while I was in high school, he was actually arguing against SUVs, which really is not a common conservative position. I remember it because it was so out of character for him. He’s just disagreeable and will argue against anyone.
I am not now, nor will I ever be, a Bill O’Reilly fan.
But I must give him credit for taking the right side in this ‘controversy’. That doesn’t make him a saint–much less a Democrat. But for once he is right and we ought to acknowledge that.
And I’m still not a fan. But even a stopped clock …
For conservatives, gays are the new blacks. They are starting to realize that anti-gay bigotry is a political liability for them, and the demographics show it becoming more so.
After it becomes a virtual non-issue the right-wing will embrace civil rights for gays.
Then they’ll claim they always supported civil rights for gays.
Then they’ll claim they led the fight for civil rights for gays.
Not only does Billo make a very sane point in this video – he is also eloquent! What the hell is going on here ? I saw this video before:
http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2012/02/10/episode-ccc-an-empathetic-thoughtful-republican/
and now I really start believing that I woke up in Bizarro World this morning…
I don’t think this has anything to do with Bill O’Reilly being on the right side of this issue. I think he simply recognizes the War On Ellen as a losing battle, so he’s sitting it out.
There’s also some possible irony in the way O’Reilly stated his opposition to the OMM anti-Ellen campaign. What I mean by that is I suspect that the overlap between O’Reilly viewers and Josephy McCarthy admirers is not exactly small.
Ugh, “Joseph”