Reply #37: As I've said before, the fundies do NOT listen to us

[Lydia Leftcoast]

Their leaders warn them against us. I've seen a local TV preacher warn against MY parish.

Furthermore, the media like outrageous statements. So if the self-ordained high school dropout Rev'run Fundie says that gays are going to hell, Noah left the dinosaurs behind when he packed the ark, and Eve gave Adam a Granny Smith apple, the media love that. Rev'run Fundie gets front page coverage. If The Reverend Faith Hopencharity, ordained by a mainstream denomination after three years of graduate study in a seminary, says that homosexuality is a natural human variation not a sin and that God gave us brains to distinguish science from myth, that shows up on page 24 of the B section of the paper.

An anti-choice rally gets mainstream coverage. A rally of liberal religious meeting before lobbying legislators against cuts in health care for the poor--their signs aren't outrageous, so their footage gets left on the cutting roomfloor.

I've seen it happen again and again.

I've come to the conclusion that while fundamentalism started as a purely religious movement, right-wing political operatives are currently directing and funding the movement. How else could megachurches spring up with huge campuses overnight?