Kim Davis: Christian believer or homophobe?
By now you’ve probably all read the story of Kim Davis:
A federal judge ordered Kim Davis ”” the defiant Kentucky county clerk who has cited her Christian faith in refusing to issue marriage licenses to gay couples ”” to jail Thursday afternoon for refusing to carry out the duties of her position.
Davis has become a symbol of religiously motivated disobedience after the landmark Supreme Court decision legalizing gay marriage in June ”” she’s said she is acting under “God’s authority” when she repeatedly turns gay couples away.
But you may not be aware of the reasonable accommodations that other jurisdictions have made for officials with a similar dilemma:
In Utah, North Carolina, Texas and other states, local governments are shifting responsibilities so that employees who object to gay marriage do not have to be involved with wedding licenses at all. In this scenario, the objectors’ co-workers or other government officials rotate to handle the task, allowing clerks who object to fade into the background and not participate.
Here’s what’s called “the Utah compromise”:
…which carves out personal exemptions for government officials while extending housing and hiring protections to LGBT people. In Utah, county clerk employees who don’t want to marry gay people can privately notify the government of that and then appoint someone else in the community to handle all marriage licenses.
“There are good reasons to try to allow people who have been in these jobs for a long time to be able to keep their jobs,” Wilson says. “That’s a really noble thing to do in our culture, especially at a time of deep division.”
Kim Davis says she will not resign, because then she “would have no voice for God’s word.” Apparently she has weighed the possibilities, and has decided to take a public stand rather than go quietly.
I’m not sure why her office doesn’t do some version of the Utah approach, but I read (can’t find the link now, unfortunately) that in that jurisdiction she is required to sign off on other clerks, or be some part of the process in some way, and she refuses to do that. She is an elected official and can’t be fired. She can only be impeached, but that would take time and the cooperation of the legislature. Thus, the stalemate.
Why on earth send her to jail? Apparently the judge was well aware that any fine would probably be paid by donations, and would not constitute enough of a deterrent. So Davis becomes a martyr for the cause of traditional Christian belief and freedom of religion, although I think there would have been better ways to handle it on all sides.
This is clearly a bona fide religious objection of Davis. She is merely espousing a point of view that was standard until a very short time ago, leading up to the SCOTUS decision in Obergefell which was rendered only in June 0f 2015 and was a close one at 5-4. Anyone who doesn’t acknowledge that Davis’ protest is motivated by sincere and traditional religious beliefs that have been unquestioned for millennia is either lying or fooling him/herself. But the same sex movement seems determined not only to get their marriage rights, but to compel participation and relabel any reluctance to comply as bigotry, and to do that they must stomp on religious freedom. This is part of the war that the left has been waging on religion for a long, long time.
You see a lot of it in posts and comments section on many blogs on the left; just go to any of them and it’s easy to find a combination of hatred and ridicule of Davis and celebration at her sentence. The fact that until just a couple of years ago, many leftists and liberals (among them Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton) stated their opposition to gay marriage—and in Obama’s case, in 2008 he cited his Christianity as a reason—is dropped down the rabbit hole of revisionist memory, in the general and accustomed leftist manner.
Back then, the same leftist/liberal anti-religious pro-same-sex-marriage advocates were not calling Obama a bigot and a hater. At least, if they were, I certainly haven’t read about it. But Kim Davis, who so far has not been reported to have breathed a word of actual bigotry towards gay people—is obviously a bigot to those same people. Her bigotry is so obvious that the author of a column such as this one merely has to assert it for it to be so, and to compare her to George Wallace:
…[T]his uncivil civil servant [Davis] isn’t a religious freedom fighter. She’s a homophobe, pure and simple.
And note how the author gets around the issue of the fact that Wallace never mentioned religion as a justification for his actions:
…[E]ven the shameless Wallace didn’t try to hide his bigotry behind the Bible.
So, Wallace was better than Davis, because he didn’t lie about religion in order to explain his bigotry.
To make my own opinion on all of this clear: I don’t agree with Kim Davis on gay marriage. I’m not a Christian of any sort, much less a fundamentalist one. As a public official, she needs to carry out her duties, which now (unexpectedly and as a result of a seismic change) include issuing gay marriage licenses, or she needs to resign or to face the consequences, which could include jail. I don’t think she should have been sent there; I would have much preferred that the state or the county or the municipality or the judge had figured out a creative solution to this one. But I applaud her willingness to be jailed in order to defend her principles and her religious beliefs. To me, this is clearly a principled stand and a form of civil disobedience in the classic Thoreauvian sense.
So the proper analogy is to Thoreau, not Wallace. But that’s not one you’ll be hearing from the left.
Sean Davis (no relation to Kim) makes an excellent point about the left’s hypocritical inconsistency in the Davis case:
Davis’s arrest was met with cheers by same-sex marriage advocates who for some reason did not demand imprisonment of officials who lawlessly issued gay marriage licenses in clear contravention of state and federal laws. Take, for example, Democrat Gavin Newsom, who is currently the California lieutenant governor. Back in 2004, when gay marriage was banned under California state law, Newsom openly defied the law and used his power as the mayor of San Francisco to force taxpayer-funded government clerks to issue gay marriage licenses…
Just like Kim Davis, who is an elected Democrat, Newsom justified his lawlessness by citing his own conscience and beliefs about right and wrong rather than deferring to the actual laws of his state.
If you look for evidence of gay rights advocates chastising Newsom for his blatant lawlessness, you won’t find it. Because it doesn’t exist. You similarly won’t find any evidence of these principled law enforcement purists chastising California state officials for refusing to enforce or defend the Prop 8 ballot initiative in California, which was passed overwhelmingly by California voters.
The piece goes on to list other examples. There are many, including this:
Perhaps natural marriage advocates should abandon their religious liberty arguments and instead declare whole cities to be marriage sanctuaries. That strategy has worked splendidly for open borders advocates.
Don’t sit on a hot stove until it happens. Consistency of argument and assumption of goodwill on the part of the Christians opposing gay marriage went out of the window a long time ago for a very vocal majority of same-sex marriage proponents online, and I assume they are relatively representative of the whole.
[NOTE: This essay sparked a memory for me. As a teenager, I was part of a class that was assigned Thoreau’s Civil Disobedience to read in my junior year of high school, along with Leviathan by Hobbes. Not bad for a public high school in New York, although it was in the honors classes rather than part of the regular curriculum. But still, I wonder whether this sort of thing happens much anymore. Anyone with teenagers have an answer to that question?]
Fight the Power, kill the system, no justice, no peace.
Middle class anarchy …
But you may not be aware of the reasonable accommodations that other jurisdictions have made for officials with a similar dilemma:
In Utah, North Carolina, Texas and other states, local governments are shifting responsibilities so that employees who object to gay marriage do not have to be involved with wedding licenses at all.
I’ve been doing a little reading on this and, like the fact that Davis is a Democrat, her real objection is being either misrepresented or obfuscated because it’s inconvenient to the narrative.
Davis isn’t merely a clerk in the office, she is the County Clerk (as you note, she was elected to the post and can’t be ‘fired’) and as such her name is auto-signed onto each license. What she has asked for, and not been granted, is the accommodation that her name be stricken from the license. I’m not sure I’ve seen a description of why a judge can’t order than done but can find her in contempt of court for not issuing the licenses.
DerHahn:
I think a judge (or some other official) probably can order it but has decided not to. That what I think should have been done; that’s the sort of thing I meant when I indicated they could and should have found some reasonable way around putting her in jail. Perhaps, however, there is some impediment to changing it. Perhaps it needs to be changed by statute? I haven’t seen anything on that.
She may be Christian or just opposed to the principle of congruence (e.g. “=”) with an arbitrary but selective modulus. Selective exclusion under the State-established pro-choice doctrine is notorious for violating human rights, civil rights, and creating moral hazards.
DerHahn:
This is not the first schism evident in the Democrat Party. The most notable one to be exposed during the progress of congruence was in California where a transgender judge overrode the Democrat base and democratic will.
I too perceive Mrs Davis to be sincere in her civil disobedience but think that if she can’t “render on to Caesar what is Caesar’s”, she should resign.
That said, RE: “U.S. District Court Judge David Bunning ordered that Davis be put in jail until she agrees to comply with court orders that she issue gay marriage licenses.” [my emphasis]
So the judge has stated that a lifetime jail sentence is an appropriate sentence for a matter of conscience in conflict with the state. That is, IMO well worth reflecting upon.
Two wrongs do not make a right.
At base, the impetus for this case boils down to 5 SCOTUS judges declaring a new ‘right’, heretofore unmentioned in the Constitution, solely based in those five judges interpretation of ‘implied rights’. i.e. the Fourteenth Amendment
Unfortunately, that ruling opens the door to plural marriage as well, given that if it is unconstitutional discrimination to bar two men or women from marrying, then by that LEGAL logic it is ALSO unconstitutional discrimination to bar ANY amount of men and/or women from marrying.
Nor does it stop there, implicit to these 5 judges rationale is that ANY arbitrary definition of who may or may not marry is unconstitutional discrimination. Now that the biologically objective standard of one man – one woman has been abandoned, ONLY the ability to consent (not the arbitrary age of consent) now remains as a non-arbitrary standard.
After the bar to plural marriage falls, as it legally must, consensual, adult incestuous marriage will follow.
NY State blesses ‘incest’ marriage between uncle, niece
“While the laws against “parent-child and brother-sister marriages . . . are grounded in the almost universal horror with which such marriages are viewed . . . there is no comparably strong objection to uncle-niece marriages,” Tuesday’s ruling reads.”
Out on the fringe of the fringe there must a teeny tiny group of people under the lash of conservative discrimination who want to marry their dog. I suppose the ‘progressives’ will be fine with this as long as both partners are of the same sex.
Caution, don’t laugh on a slippery slope, its easy to fall into the abyss.
This is where the fight is going to likely be going strong next, and note the student walkout: http://www.mrctv.org/blog/students-walk-out-anger-over-transgender-bathroom-dispute?utm_campaign=naytev&utm_content=55e661cfe4b0c431d7bc3905#.yo0kmy:cu0N
Example 2 : http://www.breitbart.com/california/2015/09/03/sf-school-adds-gender-neutral-kindergarten-bathrooms/
I share Davis’ views on gay marriage and I believe she should have the right to refuse to participate in issuing the license based on her religious beliefs. However, in this situation I think she should step aside and let a deputy in her office issue the license (as I understand it, there are deputies available and willing to do that) or, as Geoffrey Britain mentioned, she should resign if she is not able to follow the law that she took an oath to uphold. I don’t think Davis should be thrown in jail, obviously, but she might not be the best poster child for the cause of religious freedom (which is most definitely under attack):
http://www.mercatornet.com/articles/view/is-kim-davis-doing-the-right-thing-for-marriage/16774
Caution, don’t laugh on a slippery slope, its easy to fall into the abyss.
18-year-old plans to marry her long-lost father
Snark …
NY Mag:
What It’s Like to Date Your Dad
This is about a girl dating her Dad not a boy ….
The Frankfurt School work is done!
Neo: “Kim Davis says she will not resign”
Geoffrey Britain: “I too perceive Mrs Davis to be sincere in her civil disobedience but think that if she can’t “render on to Caesar what is Caesar’s”, she should resign.”
Hm.
Davis’s dilemma and choice to disobey brings to mind this new polemical and practical counter-left guide:
http://www.amazon.com/SJWs-Always-Lie-Taking-Thought-ebook/dp/B014GMBUR4
I haven’t read the book – from what I gather, its political POV is alt-right – but this practical advice from a free excerpt of the book applies to Davis’s situation:
http://www.voxday.net/mart/SJW_Attack_Survival_Guide.pdf
As always, the activist game is the only social cultural/political game there is. Davis has taken upon herself to play it. She can’t win it alone, of course. Collective action is necessary to compete for real in the activist game; I wonder who will stride into the arena as activists to take up her cause.
How, exactly, is Mrs. Davis’ refusal to comply with the law as written by the SCOTUS different from President Obama’s refusal to enforce immigration law as written by the Congress of the United States? Inquiring minds want to know.
I wasn’t aware that SCOTUS could write laws. Oh, wait, didn’t they decide to change the affordable care act language to mean something else.
Eric,
Some clarification.
My view is that, if no other alternative (as neo speculated) to refusing to sign marriage licenses was available, she should have resigned.
Now that the judge has thrown her in jail, I’m actually against her resigning. She is now a religious/political prisoner serving what is effectively a life sentence for a matter of conscience that demands civil disobedience from her.
J.J.
The Congressional democrats, in protecting Obama, have made him above the law. The rule of law now applies selectively, in accord with its political correctness.
The founders are rolling over in their graves.
Lincoln’s words come to mind; “Elections belong to the people. It’s their decision. If they decide to turn their back on the fire and burn their behinds, then they will just have to sit on their blisters.”
“A house divided against itself cannot stand.”
“America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter, and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.”
No one is under any obligation to adhere to lawless Supreme Court decisions. Governors should ban the implementation of this decision of the nine dictators.
If conservatives/Republicans weren’t weak and feckless they would be making as much trouble and chaos as possible over this decision.
So I applaud Davis for throwing a monkey wrench into the plans of the totalitarians on the left.
Interesting insight in this:
“So, follow me closely here. Chesterton once said that art, like morality, consists of drawing the line somewhere. We have a set up where a line must be drawn at some point. And in the abstract all evangelical Christians would almost certainly agree that when that line was crossed, wherever it is, the revolt of the county clerks would be a good thing. With me?
Let me spell it out further. Back in the thirties, if a county clerk had refused a marriage license to a couple because they attended a church where the pastor baptized people with heads upstream, instead of her preferred way, with heads downstream, we would all agree that said clerk had gotten above himself. And if a county clerk expedited and stamped all the processing papers for trains full of Jews headed to Auschwitz, we would all have no problem with said clerk being prosecuted after the war. And when he was prosecuted, “it was entirely legal” would not be an adequate defense. Got that? Two positions, marked clearly on the map, and there is a line somewhere between them.
Where is that line? Why is that line there? By what standard do we make that determination? Who says? These questions cannot be answered apart from the law of God, and that is why we are having such trouble with them. We want a pagan society to respect our sentimental religiosity, and that is not going to happen any time soon.
The point here is not just private conscience. The right to liberty of conscience is at play with florists, bakers, and so on. But Kim Davis is not just keeping herself from sinning, she is preventing Rowan County from sinning. That is part of her job. “
From In Which I Paint With Some Bright Yellows | Blog & Mablog
“I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.”
Thomas Jefferson
Oh well, he was an old white slaveholder, anyway.
I haven’t read, and don’t intend to ever read, the briefs and opinions in Obergefell, but if someone here has, did any happen to mention that the United States fought a war in 1853 to preserve the notion that marriage was between one man and one woman? And that Congress subsequently required Utah and other western territories to include such a provision in their constitutions before they could be admitted to the Union?
Why should she give in to the fascist tyrants that are the gay lobby and the 5 tyrants on the so-called Supreme Court?
She’s a hero. Good for her. These fascist pigs misnamed Supreme Court Justices will have us all marched off to jail before long anyway.
The Supreme Court is not Supreme. It no longer has any moral or even legal authority. It has guns and prisons and police. That is the entirety of its moral authority. Period.
St. Sir Thomas More, pray for us.
How, exactly, is Mrs. Davis’ refusal to comply … different from President Obama’s refusal to enforce immigration law
Leverage. The pro-choice doctrine that gave us selective-child (i.e. indiscriminate killing), gender congruence (i.e. selective exclusion), etc., is a reiteration of the traditional “might makes right.”
A lot [most] of the lefty comments about Davis accuse her of “violating the law.” Even her defenders have been making that claim.
I don’t, however, see it that way. She swore to uphold Kentucky law. Kentucky law still does not recognize SSM. Yes, SCOTUS has declared that law unconstitutional, but striking down a law does not replace it with another; currently, there is NO law directing her to issue SSM licenses, and won’t be until the Kentucky legislature writes one and the Governor signs it.
I don’t understand how she can break a law which does not yet exist, or on what principle she can be jailed for not breaking a law. Perhaps she is guilty on the same principle which was applied to the Colorado baker who refused to bake a “wedding” cake before SSM was even legal in that state, i.e., arbitrary and vindictive power?
“How, exactly, is Mrs. Davis’ refusal to comply … different from President Obama’s refusal to enforce immigration law”
It is Obama’s job t “enforce”. He is in the Executive Branch. It is not Davis job to enforce. And there is no law for her to enforce anyway. A dictatorial edict issued by five fascists is not a “law”. It was passed by no one. Voted on by no one.
Ms. Davis, at least, is obeying a higher law – against the low life pigs who fancy themselves some sort of supreme law.
They deserve no respect, and merit no obedience. They only get away with their decadent thuggery because they have guns and prisons and police.
My point was that we are no longer a nation of laws, but of men deciding which laws shall be obeyed and which shall be ignored. And, yes, I’m aware that SCOTUS cannot make law, but they did in this case.
I have always been a believer in working within the system to change the system. That belief is wavering now.
The Left doesn’t even know what a law is.
The time to reform the system without a civil war, has long been past. To stop CW I in America, one would have had to use Active Measures against the Democrat faction in 1820s, way before 1860 ever happened.
In this America, the Left with their Democrat founding members, have been active for a century at least, if not more. Time is not something you can buy with billions of fiat money.
Mr. Britain, Jesus followed that statement by saying, “and render unto God that which is God’s.”
Now, sir, what lies outside of the Lord’s jurisdiction? THAT was the real point of Jesus’ statement. (People always miss that, which is interesting.)
Kim Davis is a rare case of an American Christian making a public stand against those who would force her to contradict the Son of God: who said that God made us male and female for the purpose of marriage. This is no fringe matter, and Jesus is quoted DIRECTLY addressing the topic in the Gospel of Matthew. No wiggle room on this one — IF you believe he truly is the Son of God.
All true Christians should side with the Messiah over the Supreme Court’s dicta. Because, if you believe Jesus is the Savior, you can’t justify contradicting his direct words.
Yes, I know: it’s socially awkward.
Another point: This vendetta by the Social “Justice” Wankers isn’t about homosexual marriage. It’s simply a case of them using homosexuals as a weapon to attack Christianity. And only Christianity. Note that they leave the other major religions, none of which endorse homosexual “marriage,” strictly alone.
“The ‘issue’ is never the issue” with these people.
Kim Davis: The modern Rosa Parks.
The courts have ruled that same sex marriage is now legal; you don’t have to like it; but, it is now the law. period.
Davis is a bigot.
She is using her position of power to steal civil rights from couples wishing to obtain a license to get married. This is a CIVIL license not a religious one; so, her religious beliefs should not come into play.
In my opinion she is violating the commandment “thou shalt not steal.” Under the law couples have the right to these licenses, she doesn’t have the right, God-given or otherwise, to refuse to grant them their rights. When she refuses someone else’s rights she is stealing their rights.
Would folks be so quick to defend her if she was claiming that her religion didn’t allow for women to hold a business license? And, as a result she refused to grant business licenses?
Even worse than her stealing, she is clearly violating the commandment “don’t use the Lord’s name in vain” to defend that theft. She is not only breaking the commandment against stealing; she is violating God’s name by claiming it is his wish. She is NOT a prophet and, therefore, does not, and cannot, speak for God.
She is also judging others, read or watch what she has said about God making them pay for their sins. Clearly, this woman has never read “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.” Again, she is NOT a prophet and, therefore, does not, and cannot, speak for God.
I know many here will disagree with my view of what this bigot is doing; but, supporting her, defending her, when she claims it is about HER religious freedom is NOT what this country was founded upon.
Would some be so quick to defend those who claim their religion doesn’t allow them to touch pork; but, they still want that good-paying meat inspector job at the sausage factory?
Would some be so quick to defend Muslim taxi drivers who refuse to allow see-eye dogs into their cabs? Or how about the Muslim cabbies who refused to pick up single women because they believe that women should not be unaccompanied outside the home without their menfolk?
If she is to be seem as a hero for “religious freedom” then how about these cases I just mentioned?
I often read comments about the “slippery slope” here; do others not see that if she gets her way that it truly is a slippery slope?
@ Charles: “The courts have ruled that same sex marriage is now legal; you don’t have to like it; but, it is now the law. period.
Davis is a bigot.”
The courts no longer have any legitimacy. There so-called “rulings” mean nothing and no one on Planet Earth has any moral obligation to listen to them one bit. The only reason anyone must listen to these fascist pigs is because they have police and guns and prisons.
Period.
Davis is not a bigot. You are a typically hateful bigot of the lefto-fascist sort. If it was 1935 Germany you’d just be another run-of-the-mill Nazi.
Your fate will no doubt be their fate.
My comment at 6:07 and the Mike’s at 9:16 calling me a “typically hateful bigot of the lefto-fascist sort” and “run-of-the-mill Nazi”; only a few hours before someone chimes in with name-calling.
Not surprised.
Neo’s is usually filled with great postings from Neo herself, very in-depth, well-thought-out, and interesting. The kind of commentary I used to get from newspapers back in the day before they all became ideological echo chambers.
Most of the commenters are the same – well thought out and interesting; but, even so, I’m not surprise and I expected some name-calling from a few for daring to voice an opinion different from most.
I also want to say thank you Neo, for allowing ALL of us to voice our opinion. It is one of the things that makes your blog so great!
As for MY fate, Mike? Only God knows that now; but, I suspect I’ll find out soon enough. However, I do believe that I will have no regrets in using God’s name in vain as I only voice my opinion as to what certain texts mean; by no means am I some sort of expert.
Here’s a good example of my point:
http://www.bookwormroom.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/The-double-standard-on-violating-the-law.jpg
The law is being ignored or violated frequently by the elected officials. Let a Christian challenge or ignore a law and she goes to jail. Of course it is much easier to throw a mere County Clerk in the pokey than to call the President, Attorney General, Secretary of State, or Commissioner of the IRS to account for not following the law.
If you don’t see that, charles, there is not much that can be done to convince you that Mrs. Davis is the devil incarnate. I’ll not call you a name. Only ask that you try to see the truth of what is actually happening.
Edit: …….to convince you that Mrs. Davis is NOT the devil incarnate.
Why don’t you have a Facebook “share” button?
Here’s more on this issue from Bookworm:
http://www.bookwormroom.com/
“Nowadays, though, if the right type of Leftist breaks the right type of law, he does so with impunity and to applause. The best example of this in the context of Kim Davis’s true act of civil disobedience took place in 2004, when then-San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsome took a stance that is the mirror image of what Davis is doing: He announced that he was going to ignore California’s laws banning same sex marriage and, instead, have the City issue marriage licenses to all gay couples desiring them.
The consequences that came Newsome’s way as a result of his theoretical act of “civil disobedience” would have surprised Thoreau, Gandhi, and King. There was no martyrdom involved. Instead, Newsome was suddenly a fifteen minute wonder, which set him on the path to California’s Lieutenant Governorship (and, he hopes, eventually to the Governor’s chair). The Press oooh’ed and aaah’ed about Newsome’s bravery.”
Charles was behind the Leftist, DemoNcrat, homo activist agenda group that forced the morally upstanding righteously high standing, horse sitting, propaganda down the throats of Americans when they said:
Homo marriage is a human right, it has nothing to do and will have no interference with normal traditional marriage.
So they claimed. So they wanted everyone to believe, at elast.
When the Left lacks the power to do something, they say things like “minority rights” and how human rights negate the power of the majority or the Rule of Law, or defense in foreign or domestic spheres.
When the Left obtains the power to crush their foes, they no longer ask for mercy. Now they will slit your throats and if you beg them for mercy, they’ll spit on you and say “this is the Rule of Law, obey or die”.
“When the Left obtains the power to crush their foes, they no longer ask for mercy. Now they will slit your throats and if you beg them for mercy, they’ll spit on you and say “this is the Rule of Law, obey or die”.”
You have stated the truth based on hundreds if years of actual history. The Left, sons and daughters of the Lie, do what the Lie always does.
For that you can consult the New Testament.
charles:
Actually, Davis is stealing nothing and is not a bigot, and I offer as evidence this, which hasn’t gotten much press (because it would tend to exonerate her of those charges):
In other words, to make a long story short: she wants her name removed from the licenses.