Gun-related murders? Blame it on the gays

There's a link between the epidemic of gun-related murders in the U.S. and the campaign for same-sex marriage, says Morality in Media's Robert Peters.

Three days before the 1994 mid-term elections, Newt Gingrich decided the time was right to link the case of Susan Smith -- the South Carolina woman who had been accused of murdering her two sons -- to the upcoming election. As reported by journalist Norman Solomon, then Congressman Gingrich, responding to an Associated Press reporter who asked him to assess the campaign, stated: "Slightly more moving our way. I think that the mother killing the two children in South Carolina vividly reminds every American how sick the society is getting and how much we need to change things." Gingrich concluded, "The only way you get change is to vote Republican. That's the message for the last three days."

According to Solomon, "Two days later, less than 24 hours before the polls opened, Gingrich defended his comments on the Smith case as no different than what he'd been saying for years -- that violence and related ills arise from a Democratic-controlled political system: 'We need very deep change if we're going to turn this country around.'"

Nearly 15 years later, Robert Peters, the head of an outfit called Morality in Media, has put his own personal stamp on Gingrich's theme, only instead of blaming the Democrats for society's woes, he's blaming the gays. In a Morality in Media press release dated April 9, Peters commented on two articles that appeared of the front page of The New York Times five days earlier: One was on the Iowa Supreme Court's decision legalizing same-sex marriage, and the other was about the gunman who had killed 13 people in Binghamton, New York.

Peters linked the two items by arguing that they had a common root, the sexual revolution: "The underlying problem is that increasingly we live in a 'post-Christian' society, where Judeo-Christian faith and values have less and less influence. ... This secular value system is also reflected in the 'sexual revolution,' which is the driving force behind the push for 'gay marriage;' and the Iowa Supreme Court decision is another indication that despite all the damage this revolution has caused to children, adults, family life and society (think abortion, divorce, pornography, rape, sexual abuse of children, sexually transmitted diseases, trafficking in women and children, unwed teen mothers and more), it continues to advance relentlessly."

Less than week later, in response to criticism from gays and others, Peters found it necessary to clarify his position. In a piece titled "Connecting the Dots: The Link Between Gay Marriage, Mass Murders and Growing Unemployment," and posted at the Washington, D.C.-based Christian Newswire - a pay-to-play press release service -- Peters declared that he "should have included" another The New York Times front-page story from April 4: "That story reported on our nation's rapidly growing unemployment problem, which can also be explained in good measure by the precipitous decline in morality. Among other things, the current economic crisis is a result of arrogance, blind ambition, deceit, dishonesty, envy, foolishness, greed, irresponsibility, lack of integrity, recklessness, etc."

That sounds reasonable, After all, a number of critics are pointing to the economic downturn, with its rising unemployment rate, as a factor that could lead to the unleashing of all sorts of social discord.

But Peters didn't stop there. He pointed out that he "should have also included quotations from gay activists," to further elucidate his point about how the culture has been coarsened by the struggle for gay rights.

Peters trucked out two quotes from articles written in the 1980s. In 1980, the Village Voice's Richard Goldstein wrote that "the gay alternative means a departure not just from heterosexuality, but from social orthodoxy... In its most moderate politics -- the enactment of civil rights legislation -- it has radical potential, because civil rights opens the way to acceptance, and acceptance opens the way to dissolution of the norm."

The other quote comes from a 1983 piece in the New York Native by Dennis Altman, who maintained that the goal of the gay rights movement was to create a climate of "genuine acceptance of homosexuality... in society at large." Altman noted that "In the long run, the sort of changes that are needed to make genuine equality possible require a change in the underlying values and attitudes of society toward sexuality..."

For Peters, "the success of the 'gay rights movement' is inversely proportional to the degree of influence that the historic Christian faith and morality have on American society. This is not to say that the 'gay rights movement' is the primary cause of our nation's moral decline. But if Christianity has been integral to the success of this nation, then the success of the 'gay rights movement' is not a good sign." Peters pointed out that it isn't just he that "thinks that Christianity's influence in the U.S. has declined. The cover story for the April 13 issue of Newsweek is entitled, 'The End of Christian America.'"

Peters suddenly dropped the gay thing, and concluded with three points:

While he doesn't "think that the United States was ever or is now a 'Christian nation' .... [he does] think that without the positive influence of Christianity we would not have become a great nation, and common sense ought to inform us that we will not remain the same nation without that influence...

"Second, a basic level of morality is necessary for the good of any people, and it is religion that has under girded morality. Religion doesn't just teach right from wrong. It also provides carrot and stick."

For his third point, Peters, cited a special called "If Only I Had a Gun," which aired on April 10 on ABC News' 20/20 program, and charged that the media has ignored "the influence of video games and movies that glorify gun violence..."

There are two explanations for the news media's reluctance to point a finger at popular culture when discussing the problem of gun violence. First, to a significant extent the news media are owned by companies that profit from the depiction of gun violence as entertainment. Second, the news media are afraid that if the people knew the truth about the negative impact of media violence, they would insist that something be done about it; and that, the news media say, would threaten the First Amendment.

But in a leading case, the U.S. Supreme Court said that the 'main purpose' of freedom of speech and press is to prevent all 'previous restraints upon publications,' not to prevent 'subsequent punishment of such as may be deemed contrary to the public welfare.' To put it another way, the First Amendment was not intended to absolve the media from all responsibility for all the harm it causes.

Morality in Media is no fly by the seat of its pants organization. The non-profit group was founded in New York City in 1962, with the goal of "combat[ing] obscenity and uphold[ing] standards of decency in the media." And while MIM's president, Robert Peters, may not be a household name, it is likely that either he or his work have popped up in your home at one time or another. According to his MIM bio, interviews with him and articles by him have appeared in publications such as The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Boston Globe, Boston Herald, Chicago Tribune, The Dallas Morning News, Detroit Free Press, Los Angeles Times, The Miami Herald, The New York Times, New York Daily News and Newsday, New York Post, The Philadelphia Inquirer, San Francisco Chronicle, The Washington Post, and USA Today.

He has also garnered face time on CNN's "Larry King Live" and CNN Headline News' "Glenn Beck (now with the Fox News Channel); Fox News Channel's "Hannity & Colmes" and "The O'Reilly Factor"; MSNBC's "Hardball with Chris Matthews" and "Scarborough Country"; PBS' "The News Hour with Jim Lehrer"; ABC Evening News and "PrimeTime"; CBS Evening News and "48 Hours"; and NBC Nightly News and "Today" show.

Speaking at the Fourth International Congress on Life and Family at the Autonomous University of Baja California, Peters claimed that "at least 10% of the world's population is addicted to pornography and that the vice causes many failed marriages." According to the Catholic News Agency, in his speech, titled "The Effects of Pornography on Our Children," "Peters noted that one of the problems pornography poses to marriages is that the one with the addiction begins to lose interest in his or her spouse and wants to re-create the acts depicted in pornography."

On a related matter, earlier this year Peters got involved in the battle over President Barack Obama's nomination of David Ogden as Deputy Attorney General, the No. 2 man in the Justice Department. Before Ogden was confirmed, Peters, in typical non-hyperbolic mode, declared: "Nominating David Ogden for such a high position in the Justice Department raises questions about whether the new President means business about curbing sexual trafficking in women and children and other sexual exploitation of children and about standing up for policies that value families."

Bill Berkowitz is a longtime observer of the conservative movement and a frequent writer for Z Magazine, Religion Dispatches and other online publications. He documents the strategies, players, institutions, victories and defeats of the American Right from a progressive perspective.

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