Tim Scott, the man likely to replace Jim DeMint in the U.S. Senate, is a minority. He’s a black conservative, which certainly makes him part of a very tiny group. But he’s persecuted, you see, because he’s a Christian — the most persecuted minority group in American today!
Over the last 17 years of public service, I have seen the concept of faith tested time and time again. The greatest minority under assault today are Christians. No doubt about it.
When I was on county council in 1995, I posted the Ten Commandments. And the ACLU and the folks for separation of church and state all came and attacked us at Charleston County and said we were wasting taxpayer dollars.
Think about where we are today, 17 years later. We are in desperate need of a compass, a moral compass that tells us the difference between right and wrong. And I believe that you can look no further than the word of God to find that compass.
So he’s got that fake martyr pose down pat. That will serve him well. He’s still gotta work on it to reach Pat Robertson’s level of crazy — “Just like what Nazi Germany did to the Jews, so liberal America is now doing to the evangelical Christians. It’s no different. It is the same thing. It is happening all over again. It is the Democratic Congress, the liberal-based media and the homosexuals who want to destroy the Christians. Wholesale abuse and discrimination and the worst bigotry directed toward any group in America today. More terrible than anything suffered by any minority in history.” — but he’s young.
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busterggi
December 26, 2012 at 12:40 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
“We are in desperate need of a compass, a moral compass that tells us the difference between right and wrong. ”
The 10 commandments say nothing about rape, incest, slavery, genocide, discrimination (of any kind), recreational drug use, gambling, heavy-metal music, etc being wrong in Yahweh’s eyes.
pacal
December 26, 2012 at 12:41 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Like Pat Robertson this guy is either lying or bullshitting to score agit-prop points. Either way the truth doesn’t matter very much.
slc1
December 26, 2012 at 12:55 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Another Uncle Tom Alan Keyes wannabee.
hexidecima
December 26, 2012 at 12:58 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
It’s fun to see Christians intentionally lying and denigrating real persecution. But totally expected. Poor things, can’t keep their stories straight. Golly, Christians insist that the US is a Christian nation since so many Christian live here but then poor ol’ Tim Scott goes and ruins the story by claiming that Christians are a persecuted minority in the same country.
wilsim
December 26, 2012 at 1:10 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Do they just flip the dice first thing in the morning,
heads – we’re a persecuted minority!
tails – this is a christian country founded on christian principles!
Or is it more of an alternating day kind of thing, where Saturday, Tuesday, and Thursday it’s a christian country all day, and Monday, Wednesday, and Friday christians are a persecuted minority. Sunday must be blame obama and democrats for shootings and abortions.
wilsim
December 26, 2012 at 1:11 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Erm… die don’t flip, they roll. I was thinking coin but my fingers pecked out dice…
This must be Obama’s fault, somehow.
lldayo
December 26, 2012 at 1:42 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
You underestimate the lack of ingenuity of some idiots…
Area Man
December 26, 2012 at 1:42 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
I remember that episode. You were wasting taxpayer dollars. Your own lawyers told you so. This was well after the courts had set precedent on this issue, so there was no sense in fighting it other than to play the martyr. And when you predictably lost and the county was ordered to pay the plaintiff’s legal costs, you refused, leading to another pointless legal battle which your lawyers also told you you’d lose. All told, an infuriating waste of taxpayer dollars for nothing more than your personal aggrandizement.
This doesn’t make you a persecuted minority, it makes you a complete dumbshit who is unfit to hold office.
Sastra
December 26, 2012 at 1:47 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
They can be both a persecuted minority AND the proper foundation of the nation if you look at the U.S. as if it was analogous to a home which has been invaded by hostile troops. This army is “supposed” to be on your side but they are not. They’re wrecking everything you own, destroying your right to live as you want, in peace.
Watch, They’re going to start complaining that the separation of church and state violates the Third Amendment.
joachim
December 26, 2012 at 1:48 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Careful, Ed, I see a little touch of racism bleeding through on that post. Obviously the “black conservative” bothers you on multiple levels.
Sastra
December 26, 2012 at 1:52 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
joachim #10 wrote:
Of course it does. You’d have to argue that there IS no racism in order to fail to see any irony in a black politician down South complaining that Christians are ‘persecuted.’
John Hinkle
December 26, 2012 at 1:57 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Woa Sastra. That’s… I mean… I… *gasping for air* … that’s… way too heady. Could you boil that down into a bumper sticker platitude?
John Hinkle
December 26, 2012 at 2:07 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
And we all know how to solve that problem. There’s only one way. One way to combat the persecution. That’s right, we need to send money.
d.c.wilson
December 26, 2012 at 2:32 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Translation from Wingnutese: We’re not allowed to use government to force our religion onto others.
joachim
December 26, 2012 at 2:49 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Well, at least if atheists get control of the government, we can hope that they don’t enforce atheism on the society.
I mean, has that ever happened?
Randomfactor
December 26, 2012 at 3:10 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
“Greatest minority”…wouldn’t that be a majority in this case?
I mean, has that ever happened?
Not once, in this country. No.
dan4
December 26, 2012 at 3:34 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
@1: What kind of nonsensical posting was that? If you looked at Scott’s comments, his “moral compass” line was about the “word of God” IN GENERAL, not just the 10 Commandments. Are you really not aware that a. the Bible contains a lot more material in it than just the aforementioned commandments, and b. it condemns plenty of behavior that’s not mentioned in these commandments?
grumpyoldfart
December 26, 2012 at 3:35 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
When a Christian mentions the Ten Commandments I point them to Exodus 34 which explains what happened after Moses broke the first set of commandments before anybody had a chance to see them. I encourage the Christian to read all the way to the end of verse 28 and then get back to me. Usually they don’t get back to me.
Chris from Europe
December 26, 2012 at 3:40 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
@dan4
Isn’t Scott talking in reference to attempts to put up some Ten Commandments plates with public money in/on a public building?
d.c.wilson
December 26, 2012 at 4:26 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Or we would just keep government from granting special favors to religion.
You know, like the Constitution says.
fifthdentist
December 26, 2012 at 5:26 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
OK, now it seems like they’re just misusing words on purpose with the ultimate goal of making language useless. When words can mean anything one wants them to mean, then they mean nothing.
At that point it will be impossible to criticize them, as language will no longer be capable of expressing meaning. And it won’t really matter to their sheep, because they’ll mindlessly bleat approval to whatever their leaders say anyway.
Ed Brayton
December 26, 2012 at 5:57 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
joachim wrote:
You here cordially invited to go fuck yourself.
jnorris
December 26, 2012 at 6:17 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Here is what Ed is missing, the True Christians are a minority. You can tell True Christians from Bill O’Reilly Philosopher Christians by the NAZI level persecution.and the yellow crosses they wear.
Rob
December 26, 2012 at 8:00 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Wilsim -
No. That’s Rebecca Watson tweaking your neurons at long range. All her fault.
Dan4 - Even if I were to acknowledge the Ten Commandments as the Word Of God (I don’t), I certainly wouldn’t acknowledge the
Biblebable as such. Not even indirectly. It’s not written by god, or even the supposed prophets. It’s been refined into its current form(s) by the meddling and outright errors of countless scribes and church PR men over centuries. Probably explains why it’s a pile of contradictory babbling nonsense.d.c.wilson
December 26, 2012 at 10:16 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Damnit! That Rebecca Watson ruins everything!
Akira MacKenzie
December 27, 2012 at 12:45 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
joachim @ 10
It should bother him as it does me. It should especially bother other blacks. A self-hating African-American (or a member of any other historically disenfranchised group such as GLBTs, women, latinos, asians, atheists… Yeah! ‘m looking at YOU Ms. Cupp! Mr. Stedman!) who is willing suck up to the white supremacists who make up and run the GOP by supporting policies and laws that will ultimately make things worse for African-Americans should make any black uneasy.
We have this word for people like Mr. Scott (along with Mr. Clarence Thomas, Mr. Walter Williams, Mr. Thomas Sowell, etc.):
They are called “Traitors.”
Dan4 @ 17
Yes, we are well aware that there are more than just the Decalogue in the Bible. In point of fact, when compared to the rest of Yahweh various rules and regulations on moral living, I’d say that the the Ten Commandments (well, that is the two of them about theft and murder) are among the least barbaric things in the whole damn book!. But please! Kindly tell us how stoning homosexuals, disobedient children, and women who didn’t cry out if they’ve been raped in a city, along with the various divine edicts about eating pork and shellfish, wearing multi-fabric clothing, and killing followers of other religions is suppose to inform anyone’s “moral compass?”
I’d love to hear you or Mr. Scott try to explain that to us poor, benighted sinners, how seem to be able to figure out right and wrong quite nicely without this “god” bullshit.
Azkyroth, Former Growing Toaster Oven
December 27, 2012 at 2:53 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Well, suicide IS a disturbing subject.
democommie
December 27, 2012 at 7:33 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Joeyclown:
I’d like to apologize for this:
“You here cordially invited to go fuck yourself”.
I simply cannot agree with that.
You ARE cordially invited to go fuck yourself”, now, THAT I can wholeheartedly concur with.
“Are you really not aware that a. the Bible contains a lot more material in it than just the aforementioned commandments, and b. it condemns plenty of behavior that’s not mentioned in these commandments?”
Are you really not aware that the Wholly Babble was NOT written by POOPYGOD*? Are you also unaware that the “Idiots’ Guide To Understanding The Universe” has a lot of rules that happen to have reflected, amazingly, the greed, rage, fear and prejudice of the bronze agers who swore it was “The Word-O-GOD”?
* Pissed Off Old Patriarchal GOD
F [disappearing]
December 27, 2012 at 8:32 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
If only you were a minority, you faux-martyr douchelords.
dingojack
December 27, 2012 at 8:57 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
You wanna be a persecuted minority? Report next Monday for crucifixion at one mile intervals along the I-90.
That is all.
Dingo
hunter
December 27, 2012 at 9:03 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
“We are in desperate need of a compass, a moral compass that tells us the difference between right and wrong.”
I suppose if you’re so morally clueless that you can’t figure it out for yourself, you do. But I forget — conservative Christians need to be told by someone in authority.
timgueguen
December 27, 2012 at 9:49 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
No doubt dan4 thinks that a bunch of the “bad” stuff in the Old Testament has been replaced by the “new covenant” of Jesus.
Except for those parts that agree with whatever his prejudices are.
Ellie
December 27, 2012 at 9:51 am (UTC -4) Link to this comment
Personally, I do not feel persecuted or assaulted. I’m able to worship freely, and voice my opinions and beliefs without fear of arrest or imprisonment and nobody stops me on my way to church to check my papers. Of course, I suppose I am fortunate in that I am able to remember the “big 10″ without them being written on a rock or carved into the side of a public building.
Likely upcoming Senator wants you to know how difficult it is for a minority like Christians in the United States.
December 27, 2012 at 4:03 pm (UTC -4) Link to this comment
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