Tag Archive for: violence

WATCH: ANTIFA Launches 4 Chord Song Video Demanding Violent Action for 2024 Election + Alliance with Hamas

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This video needs a lot of breaking down.

First, its clearly AI generated from the images to the music, including the voice of the singer(s)

The song consists of 2 basic parts. A chorus and verse.

The verses are one note or chord music with a rap like singing on top of it. The Chorus is the 4 chord song that makes up all music today. Which, frankly is very depressing all on its own. Compare the Beatles’ creativity to everything you hear today.

Below is a funny and entertaining bust of the 4 chord song:

Now compare the chorus of this ANTIFA advocacy for political violence musically at least with the above.

(This video came from a Tweet that seemed to be from ANTIFA but I cannot find it at this time. So here is the video from another source)

So much for the artistic part of the critique. The images by now all of us will recognize as AI generated. But we can be content that the words are written by ANTIFA.

First thing to know is, if you think they are fighting for freedom or a better world, spend a month in Portland. Businesses there, the ones who are left, have to at least appear to support whatever woke policy of the day ANTIFA endorses or be attacked, broken into, burned down or otherwise destroyed. There is no freedom in Portland or anywhere ANTIFA have enough influence. They are political thugs and nothing else.

The fact that they appear to be being paid by US tax dollars via the DNC, well that deserves at least its own post. But as the claim is huge, for the moment this will have to suffice:

While she may not mention ANTIFA by name, listen to the views of the groups that got the funding and tell me they aren’t,. let us say, ANTIFA adjacent. Canada and Germany and likely France and the UK would have to be using the same scam. Appropriate, meaning print, a ton of money for ‘environmental’ reasons and use it to pay political thugs and grease the revolution. Germany finances ANTIFA directly and the Green Party in Germany openly demanded more money for them.

Back to ANTIFA and their song…

Nice of them to take credit for their actions under the rubric of BLM in 2020. Not that we didn’t know, but it’s nice to see in writing.

But now they have shifted their allegiance to Hamas. Which means the Muslim Brotherhood. ANTIFA, the communist/anarchist thugs, are now officially genocidally antisemitic as part of their anti-nation state positions. Israel just being the first domino of course. But a solid one to knock over. If they can destroy Israel, then using similar ‘reasoning’ its hard to see why they can’t claim England is a Colonial state that doesn’t deserve to exist.

Also nice of them to admit that they are the ones who instigated the violence in 2020 against police and that the police are guilty of fighting back. Classic leftist reasoning. “The fight started when they hit me back”.

In this piece they make it clear they intend to create more violence than ever, apparently in Portland. Can’t blame them for that. It is the safest place for violent communist revolutionaries to act out. If they did it in most of Texas they would get killed in the process at worst, and very very likely jailed for a long, long time. Portland is already communist territory with Soros picked judges and political leaders. Nothing will happen to them there unless people who believe in rule of law chose to stand up to them. Not very likely though as they would be branded as far right terrorists and arrested and jailed for years without even a trial most likely.

Rule of law is dead in many places now. It would be interesting to see if Soros or his companies are selling short various assets in Portland. If I didn’t hate derivatives so much I would be tempted to do it myself. That and not having any money of course.

The message of “Free Palestine” is now deeply embedded in the ANTIFA messaging. Like the protests themselves, extracting the communist from the anti-Israel activists is like trying to remove the flour from the cake after it’s baked.

The lyrics insist they are “fighting for freedom we’re fighting for the oppressed”.

This would be in keeping with the way the Ikwan (Muslim Brotherhood) use the terms, or more directly the way Lenin did.

Ikwan, (The Muslim Brotherhood) most recently in the form of the Freedom and Justice party of Egypt (which Obama helped install after the Arab Spring) used Freedom to mean Free from man made laws, and freedom to implement the sharia, and justice to mean implement sharia.

Lenin believes that capitalism oppresses everyone because they are too comfortable to know they are oppressed and so don’t fight back. Hence the need for ‘Liberating Tolerance vs. Oppressive Tolerance”.

The only true form of Democracy, Lenin believed, is communism, because only communism speaks for all the people. This would be how they have the temerity to use our key words against us. They redefine them so they can trick us into serfdom.

It is also refreshing to see them use the words, “Against the colonizers”. A nice clear indicator of their intentions to destroy the nation state as an organizing principle altogether. After all, in thier view, all nations or countries are colonies. And in fact they are. The fact that the people here before us also colonized the land from someone else doesn’t fit the narrative, so it doesn’t get mentioned. Exactly like China’s building thousands of coal burning power plants every year doesn’t get mentioned in terms of global warming and man made CO2.

“Against the Zionists” is another great tell.

At this point it has to be said out loud.

Zionism is to Israel, what Irishism is to Ireland. If people believe that the Irish have no right to the country of Ireland, that it can as easily be given over entirely to Somalis and the laws, customs and traditions be changed to Somali ones making the Irish effectively non citizens in their own lands, then OK. Be against Zionism. But they are identical. Zionism simply means the right of the Jewish people to live in, and determine the culture and laws of Israel in exactly the way Hungarians believe that of Hungary. I mention that because the guy who formalized the idea of Zionism, was Hungarian, and Jewish.

ANTIFA’s lyric, “Againast the Zionists” is both a brick thrown at the Nation state. But it is also playing into the narrative that Zionism is somehow a nefarious plot to create wokeism and take down the rest of the world. A concept that is ludicrous at every level. But for the sake of doubters, at least one reason for an intact non-Jewish civilization can be understood in an old joke. “Someone”, as the joke goes, “has to pay retail.”

Of course, when the song sings about free our people, they, like Islam, mean their right to oppress us. To ‘liberate’ our property and decide how it shall be used by their standards, and those standards will be a lot more cruel, destructive and arbitrary than merit or any Western notions or human organizing principles. At 2:12 is actually says specifically: “It’s time to get violent”. This is probably why it went missing on Twitter and likely will here as well.

Lastly, if any of you find it catchy and find yourself humming it, don’t beat yourselves up over it. The 4 Chord Song is the Orange and Teal of music. It is the McDonalds Hamburger of Music. Sadly, our science has developed to the point where the human aesthetic has become sufficiently understood that we know what combination of colours, flavours or sounds create the most pathos, the most willing suspension of disbelief, the most immediate triggering of our taste buds. In fact this video also uses the Orange and Teal colours so common in TV shows and movies now.

This isn’t them being creative to get a message out. This is them exploiting your basic human make-up to make you think their burgers are better than they are.

EDITORS NOTE: This Vlad Tepes Blog column with videos posted by  is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Why Democrats Want to Forget George Floyd

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The Democrats set fire to America in the run up to the 2020 Presidential election.

The riots, murder and violence served its propose.

Now they want to pretend it never happened.

Why progressives want to forget George Floyd

BLM revolutionaries squandered their opportunity

By: , Unherd, May 24, 2024;

….while reading Morning After the Revolution, the new book by journalist Nellie Bowles. Described as “a moment of collective psychosis preserved in amber”, it is a look back at the social justice movement which had been simmering under the surface of American society since roughly 2014, then exploded into a reckoning four years ago tomorrow, when George Floyd was murdered by police in Minneapolis. The book is, among other things, a historical record — one that the movement in question would definitely not choose to permanently inscribe on its skin. The fact that Bowles used to be a New York Times writer and card-carrying member of the woke crowd herself makes her account at once more credible to the reader and less convenient to its subjects.

If the summer of 2020 was a party that eventually devolved into a chaotic rager, Morning After the Revolution is the album of unflattering photos taken by a guest who left before the police showed up. Look: there’s the moment from the pandemic where Donald Trump said he wanted schools to reopen, so we shut them down until 2023. There’s the time a male spa-goer displayed an erect penis in front of a 14-year-old girl, and media commentators hurried to dismiss the entire thing as a Right-wing hoax. There’s the one where we started recreationally destroying the lives of random white women who looked a little too much like manager-callers; there’s the $3,000 anti-racist dinner party and the “Defund the Police” banner!

The revolutionaries are in this picture, and they don’t like it. Even as early as 2022, there were signs that people were happy to forget the movement once the marching-shouting-posting action was over; when reporters discovered that the $90 million raised by Black Lives Matter had been squandered on, among other things, a party house in Los Angeles, the response was a studied incuriosity. But even then, it’s hard to exaggerate how much this attempt to defund, dismantle and drastically remake every institution in service of social justice has been… well, not-that. Four years after his death became the spark that lit the flame of revolution, George Floyd’s lingering impact can mainly be seen in the hastily-installed DEI programmes in corporate offices nationwide, where hourly wage workers sit through interminable sensitivity trainings — and where the main beneficiaries are 28-year-old college-educated white women from HR, who now receive six-figure salaries to lecture their coworkers on the importance of daily pronoun exchanges and the scourge of microaggressions.

Meanwhile, in Minneapolis, the vacant gas station parking lot that was the site of Floyd’s death, and which used to be flooded with so many protestors that it had to be closed to traffic, is now deserted save for the occasional social justice tourist. They come to photograph the murals, the graffiti, the tattered plastic flowers around the perimeter of a former bus shelter, where a high-contrast portrait of Floyd’s now-familiar face has been painted on a piece of plastic sheeting — but there’s little to keep them there. The city has promised a plan to redevelop the memorial site, although it’s more like a plan to have a plan; the neighbourhood remains blighted by crime and vandalism, partially owing to lack of police presence. The third precinct police station in the neighbourhood remains permanently closed after being burned by rioters in 2020.

As for the anniversary of Floyd’s death, it has quickly faded from a national event to an afterthought; this year, the George Floyd Global Memorial will be hosting a “Self-Care Fair”, including “free wellness services including bodywork, meditation, arts and crafts”. The arc of the social justice universe is long, but it bends toward free massages and macaroni art……

Continue reading.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

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EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

The Issue is Never the Issue. The Issue is Always the Revolution!

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“The Issue is Never the Issue. The Issue is Always the Revolution.” — Sol Alinsky

I was shocked to hear so many say about the demonstrations on campus. This is unprecedented. It never happened in America.  As a college student in the 60’s we learned Sol Alinsky’s Rules.  We followed them to a tee. We organized and demonstrated.

David Horowitz writes,” This focus on power was illustrated by an anecdote recounted in a New Republic article that appeared during Obama’s presidential campaign: “When Alinsky would ask new students why they wanted to organize, they would invariably respond with selfless bromides about wanting to help others. Alinsky would then scream back at them that there was a one-word answer: ‘You want to organize for power!’ In Rules for Radicals, Alinsky wrote: “From the moment an organizer enters a community, he lives, dreams, eats, breathes, sleeps only one thing, and that is to build the mass power base of what he calls the army.” The issue is never the issue. The issue is always building the army. The issue is always the revolution.”

There was one major difference from our marches and demonstrations today. We knew what we were fighting for. Our demand was simple. END THE DRAFT. If a reporter asked our answer was the same, END THE DRAFT.  ( for the Vietnam War.) We could also find Vietnam on a map. In the end of the era, many of us learned that we were being misguided into a place where the ends justified the means, lies became the new truth. This group was a morality free society that would say or do anything to maintain power.

In the 70’s I learned that there was not any difference between the Democrat or Republican party. It didn’t matter who was in office, nothing changed. I knew it was happening but I didn’t know who was involved. Then I read this from Richard Nixon:

The press is the enemy

The press is the enemy

The press is the enemy

The establishment is the enemy

The professors are the enemy

The professors are the enemy

Write that on the blackboard 100 times and never forget it.

Richard Nixon, Dec 14, 1972

I was attending the New School at that time and I learned all about subliminal message, the place of the press in society and the real purpose of marketing. Marketing was used to create division.  Like: Keeping up with the Jone’s pitted neighbor against neighbor.

Planned obsolescence of products made sure there would always be a sale. Creating the desire that the people want it so much they throw all logic and reason out and replace that with impulse buying.  In order to create that desire, you must destroy the old. Out with the old, in with the new. The issue then became one thought, one goal, everyone on the same page. No one being better than another, except the leaders who determined everything. These leaders never look back to see the results of their mandates, They don’t care because the goal is not greatness, the goal is destruction by any means necessary,

How do you get millions of people to follow you? You lie. You use school to educate in mediocrity not excellence. You create followers, not leaders.  And so I learned that everything I though I knew was a lie.  Nixon was right. I as teaching then. I noticed that the text were changing. Everything had to relate to climate/environment. Everything had to be sustainable and follow a United Nations plan that no one talked about because it didn’t make sense.  Sustainability meant no growth. That didn’t make sense. Until now.

For a long time I thought I was the only one who thinks like this. But technology and the multiple ways we can communicate has changed my opinion. We are many, they are few.  I thought Cherie Currie – Lead singer for band The Runaways said it best:

“It used to be PUNK, R&R to vote Democrat. I fell for it. But when your party demands you live in fear, squallier, beyond your means by just buying groceries, gasoline, disrespecting our veterans, our police, our elderly, supporting CRIMINALS, chaos, riots, Hamas, FAILING Israel, demeaning us at every turn! HURTING our CHILDREN! Wasting OUR MONEY. Ineptitude with every policy! Lies and more lies.. NO MORE! The Democrat Party can KISS MY A$$. They don’t give a damn. That’s true. Voting Dem used to be cool. But now, it just makes you a FOOL.”

Sadly Cherrie is right. The demonstrations at the universities are a perfect example of the damage we have done to our children by giving them no boundaries, no competition, no morality, no truth, no value and not holding them accountable. We have totally destroyed a generation. They can never be leaders. If it wasn’t so sad it it would be funny. Look at some of their demands:

  1. Gluten-free meals
  2. Voxx bottled water
  3. Total dismantling of Western Civilization
  4. All toxic men transition to female
  5. All attractive women transitioned to male
  6. All college campuses are gun free, meat free, Jew free zones
  7. Unlimited Ben and Jerry’s ice cream
  8. Donald Trump admits to guilty to all charges
  9. US government funds relocations to Hamas controlled Gaza

Victor Davis Hanson asks, “Are the universities worth saving?”

I pray that this is not the best America has to offer. But I have hope that the American people will not be fooled and sucked into the lies. We the people are in control of term limits. Simply stop voting for the same trash over and over. America is on a path of failure. If you want change, make it happen.

We can not forget the past. Bill Federer is my guest this week and he will tell us about the past riots of America. I have hope because many grass roots candidates are stepping up.  Gerry James will be this week’s grass roots candidate. If you know a candidate running for any office in Florida, tell them to contact me for an interview.

This is important so I am repeating it.

The W.H.O. the Globalist UN World Health Organization is setting this policy and the RINOS in the House  made it possible by giving our borrowed tax dollars to the WHO. . The WHO decided they should control world health under any emergency they declare like climate change. I do not want our legislators to give away our national sovereignty or money to a group of power hungry control freaks in the UN. Tell your legislators. Communicate with congress, join the Sovereignty Coalition today. 

Globalists want Money, Control and Power. They can only get Power if we give it to them. Don’t give them yours. Challenge them with the truth. Doing Nothing is Affirmation. The Regime will not go quietly, Prepare.  Share with your 5.   So join me on the radio with guest  and you will learn about some of the riots of America.

Podcast of the week: Glenn Beck interviews Alex Newman

©2024. Karen Schoen. All rights reserved.

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Show Link https://www.americaoutloud.news/the-prism-of-americas-education/

Show: Sat and Sun 7AM ET and 5PM ET on  https://www.americaoutloud.news/

Podcasts and Articles:    karenbschoen.com      karenschoen.substack.com

Prime Minister Netanyahu: ‘Campus Antisemitism Reminiscent of 1930s Germany’

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“What’s happening in America’s college campuses is horrific.” — Benjamin Netanyahu, Prime Minister of Israel.

Netanyahu: ‘Campus antisemitism reminiscent of 1930s Germany’

The Prime Minister condemned the antisemitic incidents and protests currently occurring on university campuses in the US and called on administrators to stop them.

By: Israel National News, Apr 24, 2024:

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu released a video in English on Wednesday in which he condemned the anti-Israel and antisemitic rallies currently being held in universities in the United States.

“What’s happening in America’s college campuses is horrific. Antisemitic mobs have taken over leading universities. They call for the annihilation of Israel. They attack Jewish students. They attack Jewish faculty. This is reminiscent of what happened in German universities in the 1930s. It’s unconscionable. It has to be stopped. It has to be condemned and condemned unequivocally. But that’s not what happened. The response of several university presidents was shameful,” the Prime Minister stated.

With this, he noted that “fortunately, state, local, and federal officials, many of them have responded differently but there has to be more. More has to be done. It has to be done not only because they attack Israel, that’s bad enough, not only because they want to kill Jews wherever they are, that’s bad enough, it’s also when you listen to them, it’s also because they say not only, ‘Death to Israel. Death to the Jews,” but “death to America.’ And this tells us that there is an antisemitic surge here that has terrible consequences.

“We see this exponential rise of antisemitism throughout America and throughout Western societies as Israel tries to defend itself against genocidal terrorists, genocidal terrorists who hide behind civilians. Yet it is Israel that is falsely accused of genocide, Israel that is falsely accused of starvation, and all sundry war crimes. It’s all one big libel. But that’s not new. We’ve seen in history that antisemitic attacks were always preceded by vilification and slander, lies that were cast against the Jewish people that are unbelievable yet people believed them.”

Netanyahu added: “Now, what is important now is for all of us, all of us who are interested and cherish our values and our civilization, to stand up together and to say enough is enough. We have to stop antisemitism because antisemitism is the canary in the coal mine. It always precedes larger conflagrations that engulf the entire world.

“So I ask all of you, Jews and non-Jews alike, who are concerned with our common future and our common values to do one thing: stand up, speak up, be counted. Stop antisemitism now,” he concluded.

Continue reading.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

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EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

The Shameful Silencing of Foes of Jihad Violence and Sharia Oppression of Women

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Brendan O’Neill is right: “The intention is as clear as it is repellent: to send the message that it isn’t Islamism that’s the problem – it’s ‘Islamophobia.’” But this endeavor has been going on far longer than the brouhaha over Lee Anderson.

It goes back to incidents such as the British government’s persecution of Tommy Robinson and the banning of foreign foes of jihad violence and Sharia oppression from entering the country.

Many, if not most, of the “respectable” critics of “radical Islam” had little or nothing to say about those incidents, and now they, and Britain at large, are reaping the rewards of their cowardice and pusillanimity.

The shameful silencing of radical Islam’s critics

by Brendan O’Neill, Spiked, February 25, 2024:

What Tory MP Lee Anderson said this week was dumb. But what the cultural elites are doing on the back of Anderson’s comments is outright sinister.

They are using his outburst about ‘the Islamists’ having ‘control’ over London mayor Sadiq Khan to distract attention from the very real threat Islamists pose in 21st-century Britain. They are holding him up as oafish proof that the ‘real threat’ is the ‘far right’ and ‘Islamophobes’ – gruff gammon like him – not those mystical ‘Islamists’ people keep banging on about. They are exploiting the Anderson scandal to achieve something they’ve wanted to achieve since the 7 October pogrom and the orgy of bigotry it licensed in Britain and other Western nations – that is, shift the public’s attention away from Islamism and back to ‘Islamophobia’. It is one of the most cynical political manoeuvres of modern times….

And yet, for all their daftness, the reaction to Anderson’s comments has felt wildly overblown. Not to mention transparently self-serving. Political influencers have not contented themselves with criticising him, or branding him a raging Islamophobe, if that’s what they want to do. No, they’ve made him into the archetype of ‘Islamophobic Britain’. They’ve crowned him King Gammon, who merely gives voice to a phobic derangement that is all-pervasive. The irony is too much – they damn the conspiracist mindset that sees Islamists as the puppeteers of public life while promoting their own unhinged theory that actually it’s Islamophobes who haunt every corridor of power.

Khan says Anderson’s blather is symptomatic of a ‘massive increase in Islamophobia’. The Scottish first minister, Humza Yousaf, says Anderson’s comments are proof of ‘how acceptable and pervasive Islamophobia has become in our society’. We now know that ‘Islamophobia is rampant in the Tories’, says the Guardian’s Owen Jones.

This giddy extrapolation from one loudmouth’s musings on a TV show to the end of tarring the entire nation as ‘Islamophobic’ is not only cynical – it’s ominous. The intention is as clear as it is repellent: to send the message that it isn’t Islamism that’s the problem – it’s ‘Islamophobia’. Worse, Anderson-bashers are implying, if not outright stating, that critics of Islamism pose a larger threat to the nation than Islamism itself. Especially its right-wing critics, those ‘far right’ goons like Anderson and Braverman, as they crazily view those outspoken Tories. We are witnessing nothing less than a top-down cultural assault on truth – the truth here being that radical Islam is indeed a major threat to life, limb and democracy….

Continue reading.

AUTHOR

ROBERT SPENCER

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EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Memo to Democrats — Lawlessness Started Long Before January 6

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With nothing but three years of failure to campaign on, President Biden has made it clear that he intends to use January 6 as the theme of his reelection bid. The first evidence of that was his speech in Charleston on Monday, when he told the audience, “Let me say what others cannot: We must reject political violence in America. Always. Not sometimes — always.” Conservatives agree — we just didn’t wait until January 6 to say so.

Like most Americans, I thought the chaos created in the Capitol was foolish, and in some cases, criminal. But it was a riot, not an insurrection. You don’t stage an insurrection with signs, placards, and flags. The difference between many Republicans and President Biden is that we’ve been talking about the destructive nature of lawlessness for the last several years. But apparently, the burning down of major cities, the lobbing of Molotov cocktails, and destruction of federal property all went down the memory hole for the Left.

Now, suddenly, the legacy media has decided to care about these things, running headlines like The Washington Post’s, “Violent Political Threats Surge as 2024 Begins Haunting American Democracy.” The article starts with the story of Rusty Bowers, former speaker of the Arizona House and the latest victim of “swatting” that we’ve seen across America. “It was one of many violent threats and acts of intimidation that have defined the lives of various government officials since the 2020 election,” they claimed.

According to them, these political attacks just started. That’s interesting, since it was eight years earlier when, inspired by the radical Southern Poverty Law Center, a gunman followed SPLC’s “hate map” to Family Research Council and shot one of our employees. Armed with 100 rounds of ammunition, Floyd Corkins said his goal was to “kill as many people as possible.”

Despite that and so many other horrifying incidents, Steven Levitsky, a Harvard professor, suggested in the article that “while violent threats span the political spectrum, the ‘vast majority’ come from activists on and others on the far right.”

Does the entire Left suffer from clinical amnesia? When then-House Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) was shot at a congressional baseball practice in 2017, it wasn’t a threat from the “far right.” It was a politically-motivated attack that almost took my good friend’s life. And after it happened, what did Democrats do? They fanned the flames.

High-ranking officials like former Attorney General Eric Holder seconded Hillary Clinton’s call for incivility, telling a rowdy crowd to start roughing up conservatives in 2018 — two years before the supposed genesis of all political violence. “Michelle [Obama] always says, ‘When they go low, we go high,’” Holder told the audience. “No. No. When they go low, we kick them!”

This is the same party who told Americans to get up in people’s faces. “You have to be ready to throw a punch,” former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi said. “Push back on them,” Democrat Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) coached the crowd. “Tell them they’re not welcome anymore, anywhere!” “[We’ll] fight Trump… in the streets,” Congressman Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) vowed. “Get up in their face,” Senator Cory Booker (D-N.J.) demanded. Even the Vice President of the United States, Kamala Harris, encouraged the Left to loot, burn, and torment their opponents. “I support them,” she said.

And what about the hostility toward the newest members of the Supreme Court? Senator Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) openly declared that Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh “will pay a price” for not supporting abortion. “You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions,” he fumed, escalating tensions that were already evident outside the justices’ homes. But sure, it’s Trump supporters who “embrace political violence.”

Over at Reuters, reporters claims this all started with Biden’s predecessor. “Incidents of political violence began rising in 2016,” Gary LaFree argued, “around the time of Trump’s first run for the presidency.”

But let’s consider the context. In the summer of 2020, 140 American cities were torched in the most expensive explosion of civil disobedience, rioting, and looting that’s ever taken place in the country. As many as two dozen people died as a result of the mayhem unleashed after George Floyd’s death, causing $2 billion dollars worth of damage. But the media doesn’t factor in any of this. Nor do they take into account the hostility against pro-lifers since the overturning of Roe v. Wade, which has yet to earn a footnote in their distorted reporting.

In The Washington Times, experts on violence called for bipartisan solutions. Here’s a solution. This one goes back to the very first president of the United States, George Washington. In his farewell address, he says, “Of all of the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports.” He continues, “And let us with caution, indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion …”

In other words, the very thing our country needs is being driven out, and that is a recognition of God and religion — allowing people to live out their faith in such a way that it affects the world around them. That, my friends, is the answer to incivility, lawlessness, and division.

AUTHOR

Tony Perkins

Tony Perkins is president of Family Research Council and executive editor of The Washington Stand.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2024 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

‘We’re Not a Soft Target’: Ohio School Superintendent Arms Teachers

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As violence continues to surge amongst America’s youth and both politicians and civilians hotly debate gun control, an Ohio school superintendent has decided to start arming his teachers.

John Scheu, superintendent of the Benjamin Logan Local School District, has trained and armed nearly 20 faculty and staff members in his district in order to respond to active shooter incidents and protect students. Scheu had implemented a similar program in the nearby Sidney City Schools district 10 years ago. In a recent interview, he explained why he decided to arm teachers, even though he says he’s “not a gun person.”

According to Scheu, the idea originated in the wake of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting. Scheu worked closely with his county sheriff to bolster campus security across the district, upgrading security cameras and reinforcing doors and locks. “But the Sandy Hook situation showed us that we can have the most secure buildings in the country,” he said, “and if an active shooter wants to come in and do that kind of carnage to students, they can, so that’s when we sat down and came up with the plan that had an armed presence trained by the sheriff’s department.” Scheu explained that school board members were told by the sheriff that it could take up to 15 minutes before a deputy was able to arrive on the scene in the event of a shooting, and agreed that “time is of paramount importance” and greenlit the formation of armed response teams.

“The policy we came up with is one to train volunteers — secretaries, custodians, teachers’ aides, principals — to either conceal carry or have an assigned firearm that’s securely stored and available to them in the event of an active shooter,” Scheu explained. “They go through intense training and are the first line of defense if there’s a shooter. They don’t help the police once they arrive — they’re instructed to put the threat out as soon as possible and retreat as soon as law enforcement identifies themselves.”

Scheu also noted that, while teachers have had mixed reactions to the programs, parents have almost unanimously supported it. He said that “the parents overwhelmingly have supported the armed response team, so we feel pretty confident that the community in general is supportive of having a trained and qualified armed response team to back up our school resource officers and the police.”

Many teachers, according to Scheu, expressed concern over the program, insisting they’re trained to educate children, not to serve as law enforcement. The superintendent responded, “I understand that, but what I go back to is no one is being forced to do this, and every one of these people are very, very committed to protecting their fellow teachers and students in the unlikely event of an active shooter.”

Meg Kilgannon, senior fellow for Education Studies at Family Research Council commented to The Washington Stand, “School children should enjoy the same level of protection we require for our most precious assets. As a country we have watched the disappointing responses to active shooter situations in Parkland, Florida, and Uvalde, Texas in contrast to the heroic response of the police in the Nashville, Tennessee, massacre. Allowing willing and trained teachers and staff to serve on an armed response team is a reasonable and praiseworthy endeavor.”

Although Scheu admitted that the chances of a school shooting occurring are relatively low, he added that having trained, armed adults on campuses acts as a deterrent. Schools in his district now have signs warning that active shooters will be met by an armed response team. He explained, “By putting up signs telling people, it’s not that we’re bragging. It’s just a matter of telling people we’re not a soft target. Do not pick us to do your carnage.”

Kilgannon agreed. “The ‘school shooter’ is a result of the breakdown of the family and the rejection of God,” she told TWS. “The disturbed coward who would attack school children is looking for a ‘soft target,’ making ‘gun free zones’ in schools very attractive. Armed response teams will be a deterrent, and if worst comes to worst, they can respond immediately to an attack. Parents want their children to learn safely in excellent schools.”

Armed response teams on school campuses are growing in popularity across the U.S. For example, the Mad River school district, also in Ohio, is reinstating a once-active armed response team, and several school districts in Indiana are in the process of training teachers to participate in armed response teams in the near future.

State legislators are also funding the effort, at least in part. As of June, there are 33 states that legally permit teachers to carry firearms on campus and in the classroom. The armed response team program in Ohio’s Benjamin Logan Local School District went into effect at the beginning of the 2023-2024 school year.

AUTHOR

S.A. McCarthy

S.A. McCarthy serves as a news writer at The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

An America with God on the Outskirts

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Our nation is in crisis. It isn’t a gun crisis. Or fentanyl crisis. It’s not a border crisis — or even a government funding crisis.

It is a moral and spiritual crisis.

A sickening video that went viral last weekend fully displays it. The video was of two 17-year-old males, who were apparently identifying as heartless, demon-possessed thugs, recording their joyride in a stolen car. The video shows the two cheering as they ram and force one car off the road.

Then they spotted 64-year-old Andreas Probst, a retired police officer, taking his morning bike ride. The driver asked his passenger if he was ready to capture their feat on camera.

Swerving into the bike lane behind Probst, they blew the horn and then plowed into the back of him, throwing him onto the windshield, over the car, and onto the pavement as they accelerated. The punk in the passenger seat turned to catch on camera Probst bounce onto the road, who died of his injuries that day.

The driver was arrested shortly after and taken to the juvenile detention center. The Clark County District Attorney’s Office has announced it will try the teenagers as adults.

Don’t expect the White House or others, who see violent crime as little more than justification to grab more power over law-abiding citizens, to pay any attention to a drive-over killing. However, this crime is so shocking some are asking how we arrived at such a place where cold-blooded murder is callously carried out like a virtual video game.

But should we really be surprised? As a nation, we’ve pushed God to the outskirts of society. Instead of teaching our children that they are created in the image of God and therefore have value, we are telling them they come from animals, and then we are shocked when they act like animals.

This is a moral and spiritual crisis. But don’t expect political leaders, especially on the Left, to acknowledge that fact because they refuse to look beyond the symptoms.

Take the Mayor of Chicago, Brandon Johnson, who is calling for city-owned grocery stores to be placed in neighborhoods that have become what he calls “food deserts” after Walmart and Whole Foods shuttered their stores because of unsustainable losses.

Retailers nationwide are going under and shutting their doors because of a $100 billion-dollar shoplifting epidemic. It’s gotten so bad here in Washington, D.C. that almost everything is behind locked plexiglass.

Commentators and conservatives point to lax policies like California’s Prop 47, which reduced theft from a potential felony to a misdemeanor. These lenient policies only compound the lawlessness fostered by depleted and demoralized police departments in the wake of the Left’s Defund the Police movement.

But it’s not just civil government that has facilitated this moral and spiritual crisis that threatens the future of our country. I’ve often been asked this question while in conversation with political leaders. “Tony, why do pastors want us to vote on and speak about issues they won’t preach about from the pulpit?”

To be sure, many pastors are preaching on these issues; some were at Family Research Council’s recent Pray Vote Stand Summit: Jack Hibbs of Calvary Chapel Chino Hills, Cornerstone Chapel’s Gary Hamrick, Bishop Vincent Mathews, and others. But far too many fail to see their God-given role to not just preach the truth but challenge people to live by the truth in every area of life. In the church, pastors must rediscover their prophetic voice to address this moral and spiritual crisis.

Yes, the lawless, anti-God policies of government have fostered this violent and deadly environment, and the church has, for the most part, only whispered its objections. But where are the parents?

I know the government has usurped the role of moms and dads in many ways, hiding critical information from them about their children’s mental and spiritual well-being at school. In some cases, they’ve refused to allow parents to get counseling for their children if it is not in lockstep with leftist ideology.

But a recent report from King’s College London suggests parents in the United States are not concerned with their children being civil or even obedient. Coming in nearly dead last in the two dozen surveyed countries, only 21% of American adults said obedience was a priority for children. What did rank near the top of priorities? Tolerance.

There was little tolerance for Mr. Probst.

To 21st century ears, it is archaic to quote a Founding Father. But considering that they did craft what has become the longest-surviving written charter of government in the world, maybe we can learn from them how to keep this experiment in liberty going.

John Adams, America’s second president, warned, “Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

In other words, if we don’t go beyond the litany of crises facing our nation, which are just symptoms — whether it be the border, fentanyl, guns, or stolen cars used to run over innocent people — to see what is truly at the heart of this crisis, we will lose this country as we have known it, because we will miss the moral and spiritual crisis confronting us.

We must return to God and to His word.

AUTHOR

Tony Perkins

Tony Perkins is president of Family Research Council and executive editor of The Washington Stand.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Country Star’s Small-Town Anthem Stirs Controversy, He Responds PERFECTLY to Commies Trying to Cancel Him

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UPDATE: Jason Aldean responds PERFECTLY to Commies trying to cancel him

A country music star is getting backlash after releasing a music video disparaging riots and rising crime rates. Jason Aldean released a music video last week for his single “Try That In A Small Town,” a song praising the close-knit communities found in (as the title might suggest) small towns and rural areas while criticizing riots and rising crime rates common in more urban areas. Country Music Television (CMT) stopped airing the music video days after its release in the face of criticism accusing Aldean of encouraging violence and racism.

WATCH: Jason Aldean—Try That In A Small Town

Although the song received little publicity when released as a single in May, it has shot to a number one spot on iTunes since the music video’s release, topping songs from all other genres. The song contains lyrics daring would-be criminals to “Carjack an old lady at a red light / Pull a gun on the owner of a liquor store” and “Cuss out a cop, spit in his face / Stomp on the flag and light it up” in a small town, warning ne’er-do-wells, “See how far ya make it down the road. / Around here, we take care of our own. / You cross that line, it won’t take long / For you to find out, I recommend you don’t / Try that in a small town.” The music video contains news footage of flag burnings and riots, especially the Black Lives Matter riots from 2020, and contrasts those images against home video footage of families playing ball and riding bikes, fathers and sons hunting together, and a young boy raising the American flag.

Fellow singer Sheryl Crow, a gun control activist, accused Aldean of promoting violence, tweeting, “Even people in small towns are sick of violence. There’s nothing small-town or American about promoting violence. … This is not American or small town-like. It’s just lame.” Another gun control advocate, Moms Demand founder Shannon Watts, said Aldean’s song is “about how he and his friends will shoot you if you try to take their guns.” She also publicly claimed credit for CMT scrubbing the Aldean music video, saying she is “[p]roud to have had a hand in getting CMT to reject this racist and violent song.”

The music video has also been smeared as racist, with critics saying it encourages racially-motivated violence and endorses lynchings. That claim is chiefly rooted in the location the video was shot, the Maury County Courthouse in Columbia, Tenn. The city has allegedly been the site of several lynchings in the early 20th century. Mississippi Free Press editor Ashton Pittman tweeted, “Jason Aldean shot this at the site where a white lynch mob strung Henry Choate up … after dragging his body through the streets with a car in 1927. That’s where Aldean chose to sing about murdering people who don’t respect police.” The use of Black Lives Matter riot footage has also drawn criticism, with many major media outlets referring to the images of rioters smashing windows, firebombing cars, throwing Molotov cocktails, and attacking police officers as footage of “protests.”

Aldean has vehemently denied his song endorses violence or racism. In response to criticism, the singer wrote on social media:

“In the past 24 hours I have been accused of releasing a pro-lynching song (a song that has been out since May) and was subject to the comparison that I (direct quote) was not too pleased with the nationwide BLM protests. These references are not only meritless, but dangerous. There is not a single lyric in the song that references race or points to it — and there isn’t a single clip that isn’t real news footage — and while I can try and respect others to have their own interpretation of a song with music — this one goes too far.”

He explained that the song “refers to the feeling of a community that I had growing up, where we took care of our neighbors, regardless of differences of background or belief. Because they were our neighbors, and that was above any differences.” When releasing the music video, Aldean wrote on Twitter, “It feels like somewhere along the way, that sense of community and respect has gotten lost. Deep down we are all ready to get back to that. I hope my new music video helps y’all know that u are not alone in feeling that way.”

Additionally, the production company responsible for Aldean’s music video, TackleBox Productions, clarified that the singer did not choose the location where the video was shot. TackleBox founder Shaun Silva explained, “Any alternative narrative suggesting the music video’s location decision is false.” Aldean ended his statement saying:

“My political views have never been something I’ve hidden from, and I know that a lot of us in this country don’t agree on how we get back to a sense of normalcy where we go at least one day without a headline that keeps us up at night. But the desire for it to — that’s what this song is about.”

Aldean and his wife Brittany have been supportive of former President Donald Trump, promoted anti-Biden clothes, and been critical of the trans agenda, with Brittany Aldean releasing a series of t-shirts featuring the slogan “Don’t tread on our kids.” Brittany wrote on Instagram last year, “I’d really like to thank my parents for not changing my gender when I went through my tomboy phase. I love this girly life.” Her husband responded, “I’m glad they didn’t too, cause you and I wouldn’t have worked out,” accompanied by a laughing emoji.

Despite the backlash, Aldean has also seen a rise in support after the music video’s release. In addition to the song taking the top spot on iTunes, several prominent conservatives have publicly supported Aldean and his intended message. Trump posted on Truth Social, “Jason Aldean is a fantastic guy who just came out with a great new song. Support Jason all the way.” Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) tweeted, “When the media attacks you, you’re doing something right. Jason Aldean has nothing to apologize for.” Speaking to Fox News on the subject, DeSantis quipped, “We need to restore sanity to this country. I mean, what is going on that that would be something that is censored?”

Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders (R) tweeted, “The Left is now more concerned about Jason Aldean’s song calling out looters and criminals than they are about stopping looters and criminals. That tells you everything you need to know about the priorities of Democrats and woke companies like CMT that cave to the liberal mob.” South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem (R) posted a video online, saying, “I am shocked by what I’m seeing in this country, with people attempting to cancel the song and cancel Jason and his beliefs.” She said she’s appalled that Aldean is being “persecuted” for writing a song about “law and order” and “the freedom and liberty that this country was founded on,” adding, “Thank you for writing a song that America can get behind.” She also invited Aldean to perform outside the South Dakota governor’s residence.

Fellow country singer Travis Tritt tweeted to remind Aldean “that Twitter and social media in general is not a real place. The views shared by many accounts on this platform are not actually representative of the vast majority of the population of this country.” He encouraged his friend to “[s]ay what you want to say and be who you want to be. Damn the social media torpedoes.”

Legendary gospel singer Pat Boone also weighed in on the controversy, saying that the backlash against Aldean’s song is symptomatic of a “moral sickness” in the nation. Holding a Colt .44 given to him by his grandfather, Boone explained:

“In our earliest days, our most productive, positive days, we knew that what we had these guns for was not for offense and usually not even for animal hunting — because shotguns or rifles were for that — but for a pistol, if somebody broke into your house. That’s what small town America is geared for. They’re not wanting to kill anybody in the streets. They don’t want to break into stores. They don’t want to deprive any citizen of whatever color of anything they’re entitled to, but they do want to defend their lives and their honor.”

Despite the controversy, ABC aired a live performance of “Try That In A Small Town” during Wednesday night’s Country Music Awards. The music video currently has nearly four-and-a-half million views on YouTube.

AUTHOR

S.A. McCarthy

S.A. McCarthy serves as a news writer at The Washington Stand.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Radical LGBT ‘Pride’ Is Full of Extreme Violence

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Over the last several years, the United States has seen a disturbing uptick in K-12 schools protecting the instigators of assault against other students in the name of solidarity with the LGBT community. Children are being abused in school bathrooms, and leftist school administrators and the liberal media are covering it up because it doesn’t fit their narrative.

We are living in a world where political agendas are often placed ahead of protecting innocent youth in their places of education. Just last week, Fox News reported the account of a 15-year-old girl from Oklahoma who was attacked and beaten by a 17-year-old male who identified as transgender in the girls’ bathroom.

The trans-identifying male not only violated the young girl but also violated state law, which directs students to use the bathroom designated by the gender on their birth certificate. The school was quick to defend its position, even though the male student had been targeting the girl previously, to the point of being searched by police for weapons. The girl had told school administrators that the trans-identifying student was in fact a male, but the school later claimed in a statement that it had no previous reason to believe the abuser was a male. Lawyers for the girl have pushed back, stating the school did know and are responsible for failing to pursue the matter.

Because of the school’s failure to investigate multiple red flags and comply with state law, a young girl was brutally beaten in the bathroom. In March, a school in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin came under fire when three 14-year-old girls complained to school administrators that an 18-year-old male student who identified as a transgender entered the communal shower in the girls’ locker room and exposed himself.

The school did not notify its Title IX coordinator, nor did it launch an investigation into the incident. According to a local report, the adult male had not been in the PE class with girls and they were surprised to see him in the locker room. The girls asserted they were aware the male identified as transgender and were uncomfortable with his presence, but they received no protection. According to the girls’ account, the male entered the shower space after them and proceeded to disrobe, exposing his male genitalia and commenting, “I’m trans, by the way.”

Regardless of how some folks feel about the issue of transitioning genders, everyone should recognize the moral and legal problems of a biological adult male exposing himself to underage girls. And, in this case, the emotional problems associated with it happening against their will. Protecting indecency and sexual abuse isn’t progressive, it’s regressive. For centuries, women and allies have been fighting for equal opportunities and equal protections. Permitting and protecting sex abusers and pedophiles (by definition) is a dangerous, illegal, and disgusting slope.

There are countless examples of young girls and boys being assaulted in places that would have traditionally been protected, such as changing rooms, bathrooms, and locker rooms. Instead of ensuring the safety of young girls, schools are allowing boys to enter private spaces and create an increased risk of harm and sexual abuse. All children should be protected from sexual aggression but instead, it’s often adult administrators who are protecting the assailants rather than the victims. Girls in particular are being beaten, sexually assaulted, and even raped in school bathroom stalls.

And what are schools doing? Preserving the abuser and delegitimizing the victims. Schools frequently and intentionally withhold the assault of minors from parents, and many of them are failing to comply with state and federal reporting laws. Why? To protect the supposed “minority” LGBT-identifying students who are perpetuating the violence.

And it isn’t just happening in our schools — there is an entire movement within the LGBT community that is promoting violence as a means of revenge. Just two months ago, a trans-identifying woman entered a Christian elementary school and opened fire, slaughtering three nine-year-old children and three staff members. Leading up to the shooting, a “Trans Day of Vengeance” had been planned. Following the shooting, a group called the Trans Revolutionary Action Network issued a statement JUSTIFYING the actions of the shooter, stating that “hate has consequences.”

This was met by support from other LGBT community members and allies, essentially asserting that the so-called suffering of trans-identifying individuals is bound to cause violence.

And the Covenant School shooter is not an outlier. In November 2022, an LGBT night club in Colorado Springs was attacked by a male who identified as non-binary. In Denver, a school was attacked by a gunman who identified as transgender, leaving one student killed and another eight seriously injured.

As Christians, we should not be surprised by the increased violence coming from individuals who refuse to recognize or fear God. And while they blame others, the truth is that rejection of God results in greater depravity. Solomon, the wisest man the world has ever known, described it perfectly: “Do not enter the path of the wicked and do not proceed in the way of evil men. Avoid it, do not pass by it; Turn away from it and pass on. For they cannot sleep unless they do evil; And they are robbed of sleep unless they make someone stumble. For they eat the bread of wickedness and drink the wine of violence” (Proverbs 4:14-17 NASB).

Leftist politicians and media have contributed to the radicalization of the LGBT movement. The ever-increasing instances of privacy violations, violent assaults, and death resulting from the outrage of the LGBT community cannot and should not be tolerated.

Accepting the beliefs of a person is one thing, condoning immoral behavior or violence is entirely different. Something must be done to stop the radicalization of LGBT individuals and to protect children in schools. Let’s begin by allowing God and morality to be taught and embraced by our culture. Obviously, this will require the church to be more intentional at fulfilling Christ’s call to be “salt and light.” Then, we must enforce laws that protect people from violent individuals, and stop children from being exposed to sexualized material or people against their will — and then purposefully hiding the details from their parents.

We are on the verge of losing the next generation. It’s time for biblical morality, common sense, and legal ramifications to be reintroduced to our culture. Let’s protect our children.

AUTHOR

Jody Hice

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

‘Black Marxist’ Professor Fired after Vandalizing Pro-Life Display, Chasing Reporter with Machete

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The art professor fired for holding a machete to a reporter’s throat and throwing a pro-life campus display on the ground is a self-described “black Marxist” who posted violent poetry on her personal website and said she identified with “real drag queens, real street dykes” and “risk-taking, sexually free nihilistic utopians.”

Shellyne Rodriguez, a 46-year-old adjunct art professor at New York’s Hunter College, “has been relieved of her duties at Hunter College effective immediately, and will not be returning to teach at the school,” said Hunter College spokesman Vince DiMiceli on Tuesday.

Two videos of Rodriguez’s escalating aggression went viral. On May 2, she accosted a Students for Life display portraying the effects of the abortion pill on an unborn child. On Tuesday, a New York Post reporter posted a video of Rodriguez holding a machete to his neck, then chasing him down the block while wielding the deadly weapon.

The twin videos vividly illustrate the violence and hostility pro-life young people are “dealing with on a daily basis … unhinged, unreasonable, and aggressive opposition to pro-life free speech including from those in leadership at schools across the country,” said Students for Life of America President Kristan Hawkins.

YouTube footage of the May 2 encounter shows Rodriguez launching into a profanity-laden rant against young adults presenting the effects of abortion on the unborn at Hunter College, a part of the City University of New York (CUNY). “This is bull—t. This is violent,” she said of the scientifically accurate, life-affirming display. “You can’t even have a f—ing baby,” she told pro-life student Patrick Rubi, assuming the gender of a male student.

“Get this s–t the f–k out of here! F–k this s–t!” she said as she twice threw fetal models and topic cards to the ground with her hands. Hunter College administrators reportedly called Rodriguez into an administrative hearing on May 12, pending an “investigation.”

“This is clearly unacceptable behavior for a professional in any field, but particularly stunning for someone who is meant to educate students in a professional and unbiased manner,” said SFLA Northeast Regional Coordinator Taylor McGee.

But CUNY for Abortion Rights and Palestine Solidarity Alliance praised the professor for her “fully justified” and “courageous action” on May 2. “This kind of disinformation should never be allowed to take root at our college.” “We refuse to allow CUNY to welcome Students for Life and other far-right groups onto our campuses.”

“Anti-abortion propaganda actually endangers people’s lives, and incites other far-right views and actions to emerge,” the group said in an Instagram post. “In solidarity with Shellyne, we commit to disrupting, dismantling, and uprooting any of these far-right groups when they attempt to plant seeds of harm.”

When New York Post reporter Reuven Fenton came to her door Tuesday morning, she first threatened and then assaulted him, according to published accounts. When he knocked, she yelled, “Get the f–k away from my door, or I’m gonna chop you up with this machete!” from inside her apartment, the reporter states. Video taken moments later shows Rodriguez open the door and hold the machete to his neck.

Footage then captures Rodriguez following the reporter downstairs onto the street, wielding a machete and making unspecified threats, including, “If I see you on this block one more f—ing time.” She then chased him down the street, with machete in hand, before kicking him in the shins.

By “attacking a pro-life student group — and holding a machete to the neck of a New York Post reporter — Ms. Rodriguez is demonstrating just how deranged and ideologically strident some on the academic Left have become,” said Gerard Kassar, chairman of the Conservative Party of New York State, a potent, pro-life force in Empire State politics. “In academia today, any dissension of progressive orthodoxy comes at a price. Sadly, many moderate to conservative students now hold their tongues rather than risk the wrath of professors and administrators.”

Hunter College announced her firing shortly afterwards.

Rodriguez has long walked the line of revolutionary socialist rhetoric and incitement of violence, according to reports. In 2019, the combination artist and community organizer led Decolonize This Place, which led a targeted campaign of vandalism against the New York City transit system on January 31 to demand “free” subway fares.

The group urged its members to get out and “f–k s–t up,” culminating in $100,000 damage and 13 arrests, including two for harming police officers.

Rodriguez’s personal website posts a handful of texts, including June Jordan’s poem, “I Must Become a Menace to My Enemies,” which an LGBTQ analyst describes as envisioning “a new, unknowable world made possible by black feminist vengeance.”

“I plan to blossom bloody on an afternoon surrounded by my comrades singing terrible revenge in merciless accelerating rhythms,” it says. “I will not walk politely on the pavements anymore.”

Rodriguez described herself as “a black Marxist” in a 2019 article, adding that she hopes a world revolution will ensue following the ideology of a radical, anti-Semitic poet born LeRoi Jones who later changed his name to Amiri Baraka. “I, too, like Baraka, believe that the black proletariat is the vanguard of the world revolution.” (Baraka is also a favorite of Biden administration Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke, who has pursued dozens of charges against pro-life advocates while claiming transgender procedures may be a minor’s constitutional right.)

Her essay goes on to denounce the United States as “Amerikkka” and to cite the “Draft Theses on National and Colonial Questions” by Communist Party founder Vladimir Lenin.

Several colleges have hired Rodriguez to share her insights on art and socialist intersectional politics. She gave a visiting lecture on “Insurgent Practices against Neoliberalism” at the School of Visual Arts in 2022.

In a profanity-laden discussion, Rodriguez quoted Sarah Schulman, who deplored the wealthier people who displaced her “artist” neighbors: “freaky, faggy, community-based people who took drugs” and included “real drag queens, real street dykes … and really inappropriate, risk-taking sexually free nihilistic utopians.”

“That sounds like my crowd. I don’t know about y’all,” commented Rodriguez.

Rodriguez was the inaugural artist-in-residence for The Latinx Project, housed at New York University in February 2019. She curated an art exhibit focused on “displacement and the ways it affects the Latinx community in New York” through gentrification.

She also wrote about “The Unbridgeable Chasm Between the Bronx and the Police” in 2017.

Professors who blend radical ideology with violent activism have no place in academia, say her critics.

“Demanding that students agree with progressive positions is not education, it’s indoctrination,” said Kassar. “Hunter Professor Shellyne Rodriguez has no business teaching young minds, and CUNY is right to dismiss her. New York City and State must ensure that Ms. Rodriguez is not rehired by any other public college or university in the state.”

Rodriguez’s fate, and her previous acts of intimidation, will never silence pro-life students, said Hawkins.

“Free speech rights students are afraid to use don’t exist, which is why we have to keep fighting for our constitutional freedoms.”

AUTHOR

Ben Johnson

Ben Johnson is senior reporter and editor at The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

The Dobbs Leaker Intended to ‘Kill One of the Justices,’ Expert Says

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One year after the leak of the Dobbs decision, Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito said the pro-life ruling made the conservative majority “targets of assassination” — a deadly outcome which a legal expert described as the “ultimate purpose” of the unauthorized disclosure.

Last May 2, Politico posted a draft of the landmark Supreme Court ruling, which returned abortion to the constitutional standard that prevailed for the 184 years of U.S. history before the controversial Roe v. Wade decision. A wave of pro-abortion violence swept the nation, targeting traditional churches, pro-life women’s centers — and the homes of the six Supreme Court justices believed to have crafted the decision. One year later, Alito said the still-unsolved release was designed to normalize the intimidation of constitutionalist judiciary.

“Those of us who were thought to be in the majority, thought to have approved my draft opinion, were really targets of assassination,” Justice Alito told The Wall Street Journal on Friday. “It was rational for people to believe that they might be able to stop the decision in Dobbs by killing one of us.”

He added, while the official investigation concluded it could not identify the individual who released the report, “I personally have a pretty good idea who is responsible.” But, he added, “that’s different from the level of proof that is needed to name somebody.” While most observers believe a left-leaning clerk, or justice, leaked the opinion in an attempt to alter the course of judicial history, liberals have countercharged that Alito released the draft decision to the media himself — charges Alito calls “infuriating” and “implausible.”

“This made us targets of assassination. Would I do that to myself? Would the five of us have done that to ourselves?” Alito, the author of Dobbs, asked WSJ’s James Taranto. “It was a part of an effort to prevent the Dobbs draft . . . from becoming the decision of the court,” one component of a six-week-long “campaign to try to intimidate the court.”

That campaign reached its apogee last June 8, when a mentally disturbed man who camouflaged himself appeared among raucous crowds of protesters outside Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s home with the intention of assassinating the embattled justice. The suspect turned himself in before carrying out his plan. Police reported the man — who was armed with a gun, a tactical knife, pepper spray, and zip ties — confessed “he was upset about the leak of a recent Supreme Court draft decision regarding the right to an abortion” and believed killing Kavanaugh would “give his life meaning.” Media outlets reported that the would-be assassin, Nicholas Roske of California, identified online as a “trans gamer girl” and “sissy slave” named “Sophie.”

The murder plot is the foreseeable, possibly intended, effect of the Biden administration’s refusal to protect pro-life justices and soft targets following last May’s leak, a legal expert told The Washington Stand.

“I don’t think the Biden administration did anything to help protect the justices of any substance. They stood on the sidelines,” Mat Staver, founder of Liberty Counsel, told TWS. “They should have prosecuted individuals. Not a single individual was prosecuted.”

“It was pretty clear, both from the leak and from the assassination threats, that the ultimate purpose was to intimidate a justice into changing his or her mind or inciting people to kill one of the justices in the majority in order to stop the overturn of the abortion decisions,” Staver added.

He accused Attorney General Merrick Garland of maintaining “shameful silence” while “these justices’ lives were being threatened.”

Federal law makes it illegal to protest, picket, or parade outside a federal official’s home “with the intent of influencing” his or her official duties, such as changing the vote of a Supreme Court justice. Garland testified that U.S. Marshals decided of their own accord not to arrest any of the pro-abortion activists outside numerous justices’ homes.

But slide presentations specifically instructed law enforcement not to arrest anyone without first coordinating with the U.S. Attorney Attorney’s office. “[A]rrests of protestors are a last resort to prevent physical harm to the Justices [sic] and/or their families,” said training documents exposed by Senator Katie Britt (R-Ala.). The law, the slides contended, “logically goes to criminal threats and intimidation,” not other forms of protest specifically listed in the statute.

Democrats slow-walked legislation that would have given justices greater protections, with then-Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) insisting that “no one is in danger” just one day after the Kavanaugh arrest. “The justices are protected.”

“Perhaps some Democrats may want this dangerous climate hanging over the justices’ heads as they finish the term,” said Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) last summer.

The Biden administration’s inaction comes amid a surging wave of threats targeting judges. The number of threats against judges and jurors skyrocketed 387% between 2015 and 2021, from 926 to 4,511 six years later, according to statistics released by the U.S. Marshals Service.

Congress has since voted to give the justices around-the-clock protection by U.S. Marshalls outside their homes. Alito says he’s now “driven around in basically a tank, and I’m not really supposed to go anyplace by myself without the tank and my members of the police force.”

Pro-life advocates marked the ignominious anniversary by declaring that violence, against grown jurists or unborn children, will not prevail. “Here is our message to those who use violence to impose their violent pro-abortion ideology: You will not win. Love is stronger than hate,” said Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America’s vice president of government affairs, Marilyn Musgrave. “The overwhelming majority of Americans are on the side of life. Threats and intimidation will not deter us from our mission. We will not rest until every child in America is protected and all mothers are free from abortion coercion.”

Nonetheless, the offender will probably elude justice, Staver said. “I don’t expect anyone’s ever going to be held accountable” for the Dobbs disclosure, Staver told TWS. “I wish that their investigation would have been more definitive.” The list of potential leakers is “very short, and Justice Alito would be in a good position to know that list of names.”

“That person, and probably more than one person who assisted with this leak, should be held accountable,” Staver concluded.

AUTHOR

Ben Johnson

Ben Johnson is senior reporter and editor at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLE: ALL Nine SCOTUS Justices Issue Rare Statement Rejecting Senate Democrats’ New “Ethics Oversight” Measures

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Society-Wide Lack of Restraint a Cause of Mass Shootings: Mohler

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Only two weeks after the Covenant School shooting in Nashville, another mass murderer killed six people and wounded nine at a shooting at Old National Bank in Louisville, Ky. The incident was “absolutely horrifying and frightening,” Dr. Al Mohler, president of Southern Theological Seminary in Louisville, said on “Washington Watch,” but that should make it a call to action for Christians.

Mohler, whose predecessor’s son-in-law died in the Louisville shooting, diagnosed the tragedy as a symptom of “restraint being lifted off” of American society; “you see it just about in every dimension of life.” “Washington Watch” guest host Jody Hice said that “it seems like almost daily something like this is taking place,” these “extreme acts of violence taking place across the country.”

“There’s only one explanation for this, and that is premeditated violence carried out with a murderous rampage. There is no other factor here,” said Mohler. He warned against the attempts of secular society to reduce a mass shooter’s moral culpability to either socioeconomic factors or mental infirmity; neither explanation, he argued, applied in this case. “Many people want to reduce all sin and wrongdoing, even criminal behavior to some kind of socioeconomic explanation,” he added. “That’s basically all a secular society has.”

But Mohler said the real root cause is the same affliction we all suffer from. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” said the Lord through Jeremiah (17:9). “If it turns out someone says this is ‘just this’ or ‘just that,’ I think we as Christians know that is not plausible,” Mohler summarized.

“As we’re watching more of these events take place all across the country,” Hice agreed, “we can’t blame it all on guns. We can’t blame it all on mental issues. There is a heart issue that must at some point be addressed.”

“When you look at … both the Old and the New Testaments, there’s plenty of evidence to the fact that one of God’s great gifts to humanity is restraint. And when those restraints are taken off of a society, horrible things happen,” Mohler continued. “When you look at the entire structure of biblical morality and biblical law, if you begin to unravel things over here, the unraveling is going to take place over [t]here as well.”

After recounting how a Sodom-esque crime unraveled into civil war, the book of Judges concludes, “In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes” (21:25). David’s last words poetically celebrate restraining authority, “When one rules justly over men, ruling in the fear of God, he dawns on them like the morning light, like the sun shining forth on a cloudless morning, like rain that makes grass to sprout from the earth” (2 Samuel 23:3-4). Paul wrote, “Rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, for he is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain” (Romans 13:3-4).

For decades, Americans “have been unraveling the entire moral fiber, the moral structure of Western civilization … that’s based upon very clear biblical principles of morality,” Mohler went on. “Eventually, you end up with people who basically demonstrate what it looks like for a restraint to be gone, for inhibitions to be gone, and for people to follow example after example of horrifying behavior. … If God’s restraining grace is taken away from a society, the list of horrible things happening just continues.”

Mohler insisted the “break down of order and … restraint” is “not just in terms of giant crimes,” but it “gets all the way down to the way parents deal with children, the way that the schools deal with students. … Frankly, you look at America’s major cities, [and] you don’t see much restraint about anything.” Paul warned that “in the last days … people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God” (2 Timothy 3:1-4).

Mohler said the digital revolution and especially social media was instrumental in creating the conditions for people to cast off restraint. “It used to be that people were told, ‘think before you say something. Take responsibility for your words. Don’t say anything you don’t want to live with the rest of your life,’” he said. But now, “it’s an unmitigated … just sheer express. It is just absolute, uncontrolled, rampag[ing] emotion.”

Hice agreed, “It’s so easy just to throw out emotions” on social media. “And that certainly is fuel to the fire of extremism and whatever other isms we want to talk about.”

Given the societal ills we face, “we do not have a toolkit of policies with which to respond to this,” explained Mohler. “We as Christians understand that there is no solution for the basic problem of the human heart that comes from within ourselves, or that can be arranged by society. … Policies and laws? They can suppress, to some extent, the full expression of human evil. But the problem is in the heart and the only solution for the problem in the heart is the gospel of Jesus Christ.”

So, “what we have is the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ,” Mohler said. “The gospel of Jesus Christ is first and foremost about how sinners are saved from our sin through the blood atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ and the full justification of sins that comes to those who, by faith, come to know the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior.”

This means that “we have to return to first principles biblically,” Mohler argued. “We as Christians don’t have anywhere else to go anyway. The Christian church doesn’t have some kind of ‘policy exit’ from theology. … The New Testament gives us our agenda, that is, to preach the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, to build godly families, to build churches, and through that, to help bear witness to Christ.”

“But the larger society benefits by the presence of Christians and by the influence of Christianity,” Mohler added, because Christians “also have the sure biblical knowledge that the way you build a civilization is with healthy marriages based in a mother and a father and a husband and a wife who love each other and are devoted to each other; having children and raising them in the nurture and admonition of the Lord; building a society, a civilization based upon consistency with God’s law and God’s command; and seeking human flourishing in such a way that we know can only come by obedience to the Word of God and can only come by God blessing and providing restraint and protection.”

“As we look at a more radically secularizing society, it’s not just a challenge to us evangelistically,” said Mohler.” It’s a challenge to us just with the breakdown we see in the order around us.” Proverbs states, “Where there is no prophetic vision the people cast off restraint, but blessed is he who keeps the law” (29:18).

“The answer for Christians has to come back to the gospel of Jesus Christ and our eager witness to the fact that there is no rescue from sin but Jesus,” Mohler concluded. For this purpose, even the apostle Paul said his powers were insufficient apart from the power of God, “not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God” (2 Corinthians 3:5).

In keeping with Paul’s recognition of his own weakness, Mohler urged Christians to pray. “Our priority,” he said, “has to be to pray that God’s grace and mercy will be evident, especially in a situation such as this, and that Christ’s people will be deployed as agents of grace … that Christian parents will teach their children, Christian pastors will teach their congregations, and all of us will together learn by the spirit and the word what it means to be faithful Christians in such a difficult age.”

“God put us here in this time by his sovereignty for a purpose,” said Mohler. “Let’s pray we’ll be faithful to that purpose.”

AUTHOR

Joshua Arnold

Joshua Arnold is a staff writer at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLE: The GOP Should Look To New Solutions To Win Over Blue-State Voters Concerned About Crime And Mass Shootings

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. ©2023 Family Research Council

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

‘Day of Vengeance’: Trans Activist Group Organizes a Gathering in D.C.

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Although it’s only Tuesday, Americans have lived through several sobering breaking news stories already this week, ranging from the aftermath of the tornado that ripped through Mississippi to the Nashville school shooting that left three adults and three children dead. And based on the Left’s latest call to action, leaders worry the violence may only continue.

A transgender activist group, referred to as TRAN (Trans Radical Activist Network), will be hosting an event called “Day of Vengeance” in Washington, D.C. from March 31 through April 2. Attendees are encouraged to wear a mask and arrive at the Supreme Court at 11 a.m. on Saturday. Although details are still being finalized, TRAN has heavily advertised for the event by posting graphics on TikTok and promoting their motto, “The time is now.”

“The Trans/Non-Binary/Gender Non-Conforming/Intersex communities are facing astronomical amounts of hate from the world,” the activist group states on their Day of Vengeance website. “The trans/non-binary/gender non-conforming/intersex communities have always existed. ‘We’re Here, We’re Queer, and We aren’t going anywhere’ needs to be echoed loudly.”

The “nationwide network of activists and community organizers for transgender/non-binary rights” have also announced their plans to raise funds that will allow transgender-identifying individuals in the state of Virginia to receive firearms and self-defense training. TRAN tweeted an encouragement to their selective viewers to attend the dance at a Richmond club, saying, “Come boogie with us and defend trans life!”

The “Day of Vengeance” is set to occur the same week a Wayne State University (WSU) professor was suspended for his threatening words against “right-winged speakers.” College of Liberal Arts and Sciences professor Steven Shaviro wrote a Facebook post, claiming it is “far more admirable to kill a racist, homophobic, or transphobic speaker than it is to shout them down.”

“The transgender community is, by definition, mentally troubled,” said Joseph Backholm, senior fellow for Biblical Worldview and Strategic Engagement at Family Research Council. “That doesn’t mean they will all become school shooters any more than it means all young white men will become school shooters because some have been. But denying that a troubled population is troubled isn’t going to make anything better, but that’s what we’ve been doing for a while now.”

The idea for “Day of Vengeance” was adopted from another transgender awareness day called “International Transgender Day of Visibility,” devoted “to celebrating transgender people and raising awareness of discrimination faced by transgender people worldwide.” According to TRAN co-founder Tsukuru Fors, visibility is no longer enough.

“We are calling for Trans Day of Vengeance,” he said in an interview with Struggle La Lucha. “Vengeance means fighting back with vehemence. It is our battle cry to declare to the world that we the transgender/non-binary communities will neither be silenced nor eradicated. And we are calling to our allies, members of other marginalised communities to make themselves known and to fight with us.”

In light of this weekend’s event, Backholm shared that there may be a bigger issue at hand. “A transgender day of vengeance is consistent with their worldview. Forgiveness is part of a broader worldview that acknowledges your own need to be forgiven and the ability to place your hope in something other than your circumstances. Many people who identify as transgender have embraced a worldview in which all their problems are someone else’s fault and forgiveness simply perpetuates their oppression. In that world, vengeance is the evil but logical response.”

AUTHOR

Abigail Olsson

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. ©2023 Family Research Council.

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The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

3 Questions to Shape a Biblical Perspective on the Nashville Shooting

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On Sunday, March 26, Reverend Chad Scruggs faithfully preached God’s Word from John 12:36-50 to Covenant Presbyterian Church in Nashville, Tennessee, extolling 1) God’s plan in the Jews’ rejection of Jesus and 2) Jesus’s subsequent glory. On Monday, March 27, his nine-year-old daughter Hallie was one of six people shot dead at the church’s Christian school by a 28-year-old former student.

The shooter carried out a horrific act of evil. Sudden, devastating loss is hard to process at any time. But, under such circumstances, it can cause us to doubt the goodness of God or provoke us to respond in sinful anger. Thinking through three questions can help us to shape a more biblical perspective on tragedies like the Nashville shooting.

1. Why did it happen?

The Bible teaches that all evil and suffering in the world is a consequence of mankind’s sin. When God created the world, he declared all that he had made “very good” (Genesis 1:31). But when Adam and Eve disobeyed God, he cursed creation and drove them out of the garden (Genesis 3); when mankind commits evil, God justly dispenses suffering as a consequence. Mankind quickly multiplied their sin, even committing (Genesis 4:8) and then boasting about (Genesis 4:23) murder. This general truth is foundational to a biblical understanding of suffering.

However, it does not follow that every bit of suffering in the world can be directly tied to a particular sin. The Bible supplies different categories, with numerous examples for each. People can suffer because of their own sins, because of the sins of others, or because of no discernable sin at all.

This often means that we suffer, or know others who suffer, without being able to identify a reason. Even if we can identify a proximate or instrumental reason — such as a school shooter — we often don’t understand why God allows the suffering, or why a trial afflicts a particular person.

Unexplained suffering is a thread that runs throughout the Bible. Joseph was sold into slavery (Genesis 37:28) and thrown into prison (Genesis 39:20) for no discernable reason. Only later, after his imprisonment led to his preventing a seven-year famine and saving his family from starvation, did Joseph clearly see God’s purpose behind his suffering (Genesis 45:5-8). The man born blind (John 9:1) lived to adulthood without receiving an explanation for his lack of sight. Jesus said the reason for his blindness was not any particular sin, but “that the works of God might be displayed in him” (John 9:3). His years of unexplained blindness led to his believing in Jesus unto eternal life (John 9:38). We read that the reason for Job’s suffering was that God was holding him up to Satan as an example of righteousness (Job 1:8). But, as far as we know, even after God restored Job to health and prosperity, he never told Job the reason for his suffering. David complained, “More in number than the hairs of my head are those who hate me without cause” (Psalm 69:4). Even as a prophet, he could hardly comprehend how his words looked forward to his greater son, Jesus Christ (John 15:25).

The Bible teaches that God is working out his good purposes even amid seemingly senseless suffering. We have God’s promise that “for those who love God all things work together for good” (Romans 8:28). Paul lists some of the things he had in mind, “tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword” (Romans 8:34). God even turns the evil purposes of man to the ultimate good of his people. Joseph told his treacherous brothers, “You meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive” (Genesis 50:20). Peter reminded his readers that their trials were “now” — not later — “for a little while” — not forever — and “if necessary” — not pointless (1 Peter 1:6).

2. What should I think about this?

The Bible teaches that God will only give his children trials that are necessary for them. At the same time, it teaches that they will face trials. “In the world you will have tribulation,” said Jesus, “but take heart; I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). The conclusion to draw from these two teachings is that sufferings and trials are necessary for us.

One purpose of the trials we face is “so that the tested genuineness of your faith — more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire — may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:7). Like pure gold, pure faith is tested and proven genuine in the fire of affliction. Job’s trials revealed his faith, “I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth” (Job 19:25).

Another purpose of our trials is our sanctification. Trials produce steadfastness, making us “perfect and complete, lacking in nothing” (James 1:4). Our sufferings produce endurance, character, and hope (Romans 5:3-4). Our humiliation conforms us to the pattern of Christ Jesus who, “emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross” (Philippians 2:7-8).

One particular trial Christians should expect is persecution. We don’t know yet whether the Nashville shooter targeted the school because of its Christian beliefs; if she did, it would be entirely consistent with the Bible’s teaching. We do know that terrorists in Nigeria killed 27 Christians in two attacks this month because of their beliefs. “Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you,” Jesus told his disciples the night before is persecutors put him to death (John 15:20).

Remember, too, that other word of Jesus, “Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you” (Matthew 5:11-12).

3. How should we respond?

Christianity is no abstract religion; its doctrines resolve into action. So, given the truths about sin, suffering, and trials presented above, how should Christians respond in action?

For starters, we should “weep with those who weep” (Romans 12:15). The communities of Covenant Presbyterian Church and The Covenant School must be devastated right now. It’s appropriate to feel compassion for them, mourn with them, and take time just to bear that grief. By the way, that includes the shooter’s mother, who made the financial sacrifice to enroll her daughter in the Christian school and presumably earnestly desired her salvation.

At the same time, let’s be careful how we respond to the perpetrator. “Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them,” said Paul in the same place (Romans 12:14). It can be tempting to let our minds run to angry, evil thoughts, or at least to let our mouths run to name-calling or condemnations of a whole class. But those aren’t Christlike responses. “When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly” (1 Peter 2:23).

That raises another way in which we should take Jesus for our model: trusting God. “Let those who suffer according to God’s will entrust their souls to a faithful Creator while doing good” (1 Peter 4:19). This means continuing to worship God, adore his character, and look to his providential care even when he fills our days with bitter sorrow. It means continuing to believe that God “exists and that he rewards those who seek him” (Hebrews 11:6).

This trust in God entails an acknowledgment that God can order all things as he pleases. “In the day of prosperity be joyful, and in the day of adversity consider: God has made the one as well as the other, so that man may not find out anything that will be after him” (Ecclesiastes 7:14). Or, as Job put it, “Shall we receive good from God, and shall we not receive evil?” (Job 2:10). Such a response is neither easy nor natural. It’s only possible if we are more convinced of the reality and worth of God’s character and promises than in our own circumstances. But it’s the type of supernatural response that God-given trials are designed to reveal in us to his glory.

Finally, when suffering touches us, we should endure obediently. “If when you do good and suffer for it you endure, this is a gracious thing in the sight of God,” wrote Peter (1 Peter 2:20). Scripture gives several practical reasons to encourage us in obedient endurance.

First, humility is the path to honor. “Everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted,” Jesus repeated (Luke 14:11, 18:14). “Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you” (1 Peter 5:6).

Second, all our striving against God’s mighty hand can accomplish nothing. “Consider the work of God: who can make straight what he has made crooked?” (Ecclesiastes 7:13). In his book, “The Crook in the Lot,” Puritan pastor Thomas Boston explained that, instead of squirming and striving against the trial, a wiser approach is to consider what work God is doing through the trial. If the infinitely wise God has appointed this trial for you, and nothing you can do can make the trial go away until God takes it away, then the way to make the best of your circumstances is to consider what God is doing and submit yourself to his plan.

Third, God uses trials to sanctify us. The preacher said, “Better is the end of a thing than its beginning, and the patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit” (Ecclesiastes 7:8). The proud in spirit has yet to be humbled by God, and God will most certainly bring him down. But the patient in spirit can say with Paul, “I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound” (Philippians 4:11-12).

These biblical doctrines and instructions for holy living are difficult to accept — even more so when intense suffering besets us. But often, times of suffering are what God uses to change our hearts so that we can accept them.

The goal in trials should be to acknowledge God’s eternal plan and Christ’s eternal glory, as Reverend Scruggs preached on Sunday.

What is God doing through this Nashville shooting? Perhaps he intends to grow that church’s understanding of the truths preached to them just before this horrific tragedy. Perhaps he intends to display his glory through the supernatural responses of Christians struggling through unimaginable bitterness and sorrow. Perhaps he intends to confuse his enemies and advance his kingdom by converting the souls wandering furthest from him.

God has many good purposes in every good and bad thing that happens. Some we know. Some we can reason towards, based upon what we find in Scripture. Some we will learn about someday. But some purposes of the infinite, eternal Creator we will never know.

Of one thing we can be certain: all of our suffering will one day dissolve into insignificance when God himself will dwell with his people and “wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away” (Revelation 21:3-4). No stranger to suffering, the apostle Paul reasoned, “the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us” (Romans 8:18).

AUTHOR

Joshua Arnold

Joshua Arnold is a staff writer at The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. ©2023 Family Research Council.

RELATED ARTICLE: Shock Poll: Americans’ Respect for Faith, Patriotism, and Family Plunges

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.