A Los Angeles Times columnist mocked politicians who have suggested a return to religious faith is a possible solution for gun violence.
LZ Granderson’s LA Times bio states that he “was named Journalist of the Year by the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Assn. … His TED Talk on LGBTQ equality has more than 1.6 million views.”
Granderson began his opinion column, “A number of so-called religious conservatives like to explain away national tragedies — be they natural or man-made — through the lens of God’s wrath, or at least indirect punishment for ‘sins.’”
Noting some prominent Christian politicians, Granderson opined, “They clearly have a period in mind in which they believe God was happier with the direction of the country, but our history makes it impossible to pinpoint a date without looking racist. So they tend to talk in nostalgic Judeo-Christian generalities.”
He quoted Wisconsin GOP Senator Ron Johnson, who stated that the “solution is renewed faith.” Then Granderson contended “as if there’s an agreed-upon faith or showing of that faith that we all should agree to return to.”
“The adherents of this thinking say after any horror: We have to fight evil,” Granderson theorized, then shifted to an attack on America: “My question is how a nation that romanticizes, even monetizes, its own evil beginnings can even start to fight the kind of evil some of these politicos speak of.”
Granderson, who told ABC News in 2017, “I don’t feel comfortable telling people what they should do with their lives,” accused Johnson and like-minded politicians of “pandering”:
The needle of our moral compass is susceptible to political spin. The kind of spin elected officials like Johnson deploy because it panders to our desire to see ourselves as good people. That’s much more pleasant for us than acknowledging we were never as holy as we like to tell ourselves.
Noting Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick argued after the Uvalde, Texas, school shooting, “You just cannot change character without changing a heart, and you can’t do that without turning to God,” Granderson snapped, “I would ask Patrick: When exactly did a nation built on stolen land, kidnapping and enslavement turn away from God?”
He pointed out Fox News’ Rachel Campos-Duffy stated, “We took God out of schools and we wonder how this evil comes in.”
He concluded, “Many of us don’t wonder how this evil came in. We wonder why people like you won’t admit it’s been here since the beginning.”