Yesterday, conservative commentator Steven Crowder released a video that, in his view, shows that the "Religious Freedom" bill in Indiana is not something that allows folks to discriminate, but rather allows businesses to simply opt out of "certain activities that they don't agree with." How does he prove his point? By posting a video of Muslim bakeries refusing him service as he does his best Bruno impersonation.
Confused? Yeah, me too. So begins the new conservative love affair with radical Islam.
The argument goes something like this: liberals think that Christian are horrible for wanting to refuse service to gay people? Well it's not the people they are discriminating against, it's just the activities of the people, which just so happen to include denying goods and services to the people themselves. In Crowder's view, the Indiana bill allows businesses to discriminate not because they are LGBT, but because LGBT Americans want to do this one thing that just so happens to define an individual as LGBT--commit to a same-sex partner. Oh, and Muslims do it too, so there.
In his commentary, Crowder lists a number of "facts" regarding the treatment of LGBT people in the Middle East. We can only assume that this is supposed to provide us the kind of "perspective" that Republican Senator Tom Cotton argues, when he defended Indiana's law, "In Iran they hang you for the crime of being gay." So here the message suddenly becomes clear. The government of Iran, which if you're a racists might as well stand for every Muslim in the Middle East, will kill you for being gay, but we're much nicer because we are just asking for the legal right to refuse to acknowledge your human dignity. Here, is where they hope to appear reasonable.
We could just dismiss this whole mess there. But since Crowder asks, "where is the liberal outrage over this?" Please allow me to oblige. First, let's dismiss the racist conflation of three Muslim bakeries as representative of everything Muslim. Not only is this absurd, but even Crowder admits that he only showed the bakeries that refused him service. As David Ferguson has noted elsewhere,
"'Many' of the Muslim bakeries did agree to bake the cakes for Crowder and his pretend partner, he admitted. More, he said, that probably would have agreed had the bakeries been run by Christians. His video, however, only featured the three bakeries that refused."
Yet Crowder conflates the most radical members of Islam with every Muslim. It makes sense to him because they all look alike(?), and because racists rely on essentialism to make such arguments. Not only does this give Crowder a simple enemy to fight, but within this worldview, it's also how conservatives can grossly misunderstand liberal challenges to such laws. Crowder thinks that by opposing Indiana's law, liberals are doing the same thing, but in reverse: by saying that liberals are discriminating against all Christians by opposing some Christians' right to discriminate.
Well let's just address this "reverse-discrimination" BS by stating very clearly: no religion affords the right to deny someone their dignity, and no Liberal thinks that Crowder or Mike Pence represent all Christians (even though they may claim it so). No, that is the mistake that Crowder and Pence make. Indeed, Indiana Governor Mike Pence thinks he is protecting all Christians. The Indiana law had Christian authors and Christian supporters, who no doubt also believe this is true. Like the Islamic extremist they court, they believe their own brand of Christianity gives them the right to do as they believe no matter the consequence for others.
In light of this, it is no coincidence that Crowder chose Michigan to shoot his video "a while ago." Michigan is also a state with a "religious freedom" law currently under debate within its Senate. But we should point out that the law hasn't yet passed, which means Crowder could be an LGBT hero were he an actual gay person who was willing press charges over being discriminated against. He won't, of course. That would only subvert his agenda: legalized discrimination for him and his three Muslim baker friends.
As Crowder defends the rude dismissal of his request, not only does he defend the bakers' right to discriminate, but also adds, "they absolutely should and many more of them would then Christian bakeries." So while he reveals his racism by saying that he was afraid the Muslim bakers "might blow up" in front of him, he simultaneously supports their actions.
And this is how folks like Crowder and Cotton and Pence find themselves both tongue tied and in bed with the Muslim extremists they simultaneously claim to oppose. Their only defense is that they claim to be kinder about how they discriminate.
It is this last assumption that above all compels me to write. They assume liberals won't challenge this outrageous assertion because...they are only one step removed from Islamic Extremists themselves? Because defending Islam is in liberal vogue? Maybe we can assume they are thinking about the Tea Party's racist caricatures of President Barack Obama here when they make this staggering intellectual leap to grasp at a thin straw. In short, find me a liberal who would defend these three Muslim bakeries for discriminating against Crowder.
So let me just say very clearly and very plainly: Thank you, Crowder, for proving our point. Here is your liberal outrage, and here let's make clear the conservative love affair with radical Islam. You would rather support three Muslims' right to discriminate than support the other Muslims who obliged or the American ideal of liberty and justice for all.