Are headlines becoming the new funny pages?

A couple days ago I was gathering up news stories for our website at ChristianAction.org when I simply started laughing.

Who needs funny papers anymore when you can just read the headlines?

One story talked about high school students being considered racists for not wanting to dance to a Spanish-language song. Another talked about an elementary school canceling a Halloween Parade because the event might offend “students of color.” And yet another talked about a Moccasin shoemaker issuing a public apology for making Native American shoes. (The owners were white)

Meanwhile, the Rolling Stones announced they would no longer play Brown Sugar during public performances because the song is perceived (incorrectly, I might add) as depicting slavery in a favorable light. Piers Morgan called the Rolling Stones ‘cowards’ for dropping the song.

Then there’s the story of Walgreens shutting down five more stores in San Francisco because of legalized theft in that city. Walgreens had already closed 17 stores in ‘The Golden City’ during the past five years. NY Mayor Bill DeBlasio made the news too, ordering a statue of President Thomas Jefferson to be removed from City Hall’s Council chambers, where it had rested peacefully for the past 187 years.

So what I gathered from these news articles (as headlines certainly direct my moral compass) is that it is racist to refuse to dance to songs that are not of one’s own culture, that it is insensitive to celebrate a holiday that people of color don’t enjoy, and that it is racist to serve, produce or sell a cultural product if my skin color does not match the consumer.

But I also learned that things are free in San Francisco.

And while the moral of the story for banishing Thomas Jefferson into a dungeon escapes me, I have learned that it is wise to check your surroundings when playing music, not that I fully understand most of the lyrics I listen to anyway.But I do understand the lyrics of this song from Threshold, ‘Return of the Thought Police.”All the things we believe in and know fall like targets in a war. All the thoughts we were thinking long ago have become unthinkable.”

Here’s some additional reading from our website:

Teen girl is handcuffed and put in jail for going to school without a mask

Orange County school board orders police to forcibly eject parents

Walmart goes woke and orders executives to attend CRT training classes

Virginia school accused of covering up rape in gender-neutral bathroom

North Carolina governor faces calls to resign over church sermon