The Martyr Mentality

When I say that the modern conservative moment is at heart a victim complex, this is what I mean. Sen. Marco Rubio's insipid insistence that Christianity, the dominant religious group in this country, is somehow on the verge of being outlawed because of same-sex marriage is patently ridiculous, and yet you will see conservatives argue that the Obama administration is targeting Christians and is just hours away from rounding them up.

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) warned in a newly published interview that condemnation of those who oppose gay marriage on religious grounds poses a "real and present danger" to Christianity.

The interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network marked the latest input from a Republican presidential hopeful on an issue that has received widespread attention in the nascent campaign.

"We are at the water's edge of the argument that mainstream Christian teaching is hate speech," Rubio told CBN in the interview published online Tuesday. "Because today we've reached the point in our society where if you do not support same-sex marriage you are labeled a homophobe and a hater."

Rubio went on to talk about what the next step will be.

"After they are done going after individuals, the next step is to argue that the teachings of mainstream Christianity, the catechism of the Catholic Church, is hate speech," he said. "That's a real and present danger."

Mind you, this is not a fringe lunatic saying this.  This is a sitting United States Senator running for the White House on a major party ticket. It's embarrassing and deeply ignorant...and yet if Marco Rubio really was being persecuted for his speech, he's still able to give a national interview, picked up by national media outlets, to make his free speech heard.  And as Tim Teeman of the Daily Beast reminds us, the LGBTQ community really has been the victim of persecution and hate speech for decades in America.

Does Marco Rubio have any idea of the toxicity of the phrase he is flinging around to score some cheap political capital?

Does he have any idea of the true ‘hate speech’ LGBTs have suffered, not just on political platforms at the hands of people like Marco Rubio in their stoking of their Christian voting base—words like ‘unnatural,’ ‘pretend families,’ words of exclusion that seek to put us outside the boundaries of family, home, and love?

Because ‘hate speech’ doesn’t end on political platforms. They’re the words that LGBTs hear before they are beaten by homophobes on street corners and in schoolyards. Beaten, sometimes fatally. How dare Marco Rubio seek to invoke a phrase like ‘hate speech’ to feed his own pathetic persecution complex? Has he any idea of the true cost of ‘hate speech’ as it has been used against LGBT people?

Because now that there's a movement towards equality in this country, suddenly Christianity is the target.  If your view of Christianity includes, say, stoning and beating gay people to death, maybe that's not compatible with America's laws.

And yet, you're allowed to hold that opinion without people bursting into your house to drag you out into the street to murder you, unlike people who are gay in America.

Rubio is playing victim to people who want to hear how they are victims when those people finally fight back. Fifty years ago, Rubio would have been fighting for segregation and telling us the KKK was on the verge of being classified as a hate group.

Which, by the way, it is today.