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June 19, 2015 - Sargon of Akkad - Carl Benjamin
10:25
What the #CharlestonShooting Was Not About
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I thought it was a nice bonus video.
I'd go over the Fox News coverage of the Charleston shooting because, you know, I was being unfair.
You know, Chenk was full of shit, obviously.
But then it's not like Fox News were any less full of shit.
I do kind of feel bad for them because they're struggling to kind of catch up with the identity politics game that the far left have been playing for a while and know much better than they do.
And this is their kind of sad attempt.
Well, last night's deadly attack taking place at a historic church in South Carolina, the gunman's horrifying attack on faith.
Whoa, whoa, whoa, hang on, hang on.
Did you say horrifying attack on faith?
Horrifying attack on faith.
Right, okay.
So if it's a horrifying attack on faith, how exactly do you explain that witnesses say the gunman said, you've raped our women and you're taking over the country.
I have to do what I have to do.
I mean, that doesn't really sound like the sort of thing someone would say about Christians in general.
And the witnesses did also say that he said he was there to shoot black people.
I mean, this is rather unambiguous.
Killing nine people, including a famed pastor.
So if we're not safe in our own churches, then where are we safe?
You are all as white as the driven fucking snow.
You are all perfectly safe in churches.
You know, from time to time, I get people asking me, why don't you ever take the piss out of Fox News?
And I always reply with, well, Fox News takes the piss out of Fox News.
Who is right now is senior pastor of Hope Christian Church, Bishop E.W. Jackson.
Good morning to you, sir.
Good morning.
Your thoughts this morning?
What a wild coincidence that you just happened to get a black guy on.
I know, I know.
I did say that if they hadn't done that, the Young Turks would be on their case about it.
And I think they really would be, because being white is now a crime.
But come on, this whole thing is just, it's a farce, isn't it?
That's the thing.
Well, first of all, I'm pastor of the Call Church in Chesapeake, Virginia, but we had a prayer vigil this morning at 6 a.m. praying for the people in Charleston, South Carolina.
We're urging people, wait for the facts, don't jump to conclusions.
Fair enough.
I think that's completely sensible.
Don't jump to conclusions.
Very reasonable.
We don't really need to jump to conclusions, though, as we have a direct quote from the gunman about his motivation.
But I have to tell you, I am deeply concerned that this gunman chose to go into a church.
Go on.
Because there does seem to be a rising hostility against Christians across this country.
You know what there is?
I'm sure there really is.
I can see it from the far left all the time.
But this guy wasn't a part of the far left, was he?
Because of our biblical view.
You know what?
That's probably true.
I mean, maybe it's the you shall not wear material of mixed wool and linen together.
Frankly, I don't really think Christians are in any way entitled to dictate how I dress.
And that does seem rather micromanagey for God, doesn't it?
I just think it's something that we have to be aware of and not create an atmosphere in which people take out their violent intentions against Christians.
Oh my god, it's like 66 AD all over again, isn't it?
And I would mention one other thing very quickly, and that is I would urge pastors and men in these churches to prepare to defend themselves.
It's sad, but I think that we've got to arm ourselves, at least have some people in the church who are prepared to defend the church when women and children are attacked.
Why the fuck not?
You're calling for armed guards in schools.
You may as well call for people to be armed in church.
Do you think that that is something that would fly inside a church to have a pastor with a gun to have security with a gun?
Of course it fucking would.
Look, it's the real, I'm a pastor.
If someone comes in to hurt my church members, I have an absolute obligation to defend them, to protect them.
You know what?
I actually don't think that the pastor in a church has got an obligation to be a warrior in addition to a man of peace.
So, nine people dead?
Of course, I think people understand that it's sad, but this is the world.
I understand it.
I just, from the pastor perspective, I want to know if that's something you would do.
Well, as a pastor, it's absolutely something that I would do to protect the people whom God has given me charge over.
Because it's exactly what Jesus would do.
Protect and shepherd your flock, I'm sure, in any way that you certainly can in faith and in practicality.
You know, aren't you guys like good people and stuff?
Don't you think you're going to go to heaven?
Is death really so scary for the religious?
I mean, it's scary for me because I'm an atheist.
I get one life and when I die, that's it.
But if I was a Christian, then surely I would believe in an afterlife, presumably a heaven, that I was going to go to because hypothetically, I would think I was a good person and I'd done right by God.
Or am I taking religion too literally?
When you are speaking now, we saw prayer circles forming immediately after at that church through the night saying, This doesn't matter what religion we are, we need God's protection right now.
We pray for peace.
When you see this, Emmanuel means God with us.
There are people out there right now who say, Well, evil was there as well with this man who is now on the loose.
Do you say to churches, close your doors, keep them open?
What's your message right now to churches across the states?
We have to keep our doors open, but we have to be discerning.
Yeah.
No one wants to arrive at an eternity of love, peace, and happiness before their time.
There are evil people out there, and they want to hurt and kill and destroy.
But no, we have to love people and invite people.
Look, you know, being a Christian means taking a risk because it means loving the unlovable.
It means helping people maybe who want to hurt you.
And we have to keep doing that.
You know, all joking aside, this is actually what the teenage children of one of the victims of the shooting have said, that they have forgiven their mother's killer, which is a very mature thing to do.
Seriously, good for them because I would probably never be able to get past someone murdering my mother under any circumstances.
I've read the Bible enough times to know that this is probably what Jesus would actually suggest that one does.
But on the other hand, we also have to be prepared to defend those innocent people against these kinds of vicious attacks.
It was released earlier, and extraordinarily, they called it a hate crime.
And some look at it as, well, it's because it was a white guy, apparently, and a black church.
Wearing the flags of apartheid era, South Africa and Rhodesia, which, you know, does have connotations.
And on the other video, I have had a bunch of people saying, well, to be honest with you, the Confederate flag and all that may be a bit racist as well.
It might well be.
I don't know.
I try not to judge on what people's enemies say about them.
But you made a great point just a moment ago about the hostility toward Christians.
And it was a church.
Yeah, nice try.
Let's be honest with ourselves.
He went to the church out of convenience.
KFC had closed.
There is nothing off limits to be joked about.
So maybe that's what they're talking about.
They haven't explained it to us.
Well, yeah, I don't know whether most people jump to conclusions about race.
I long for the day when we stop doing that in our country.
Again, all joking aside, I do as well.
I really do long for the day when we don't really have to talk about the race of the perpetrator.
It's not made a big deal of.
However, this is not that day.
The perpetrator is very, very, very specific that he is killing black people because they're taking over the country.
There's simply no room for interpretation here.
But we don't know why he went into a church, but he didn't choose a bar.
He didn't choose a basketball court.
He chose a ch.
Yeah, I think it's really just that he knew that there'd be a lot of black people congregated in one area.
Maybe he did it because he hates Christians as well, but we know he definitely did it because he hated black people.
And we need to be looking at that very closely.
Absolutely.
Look, let's be honest with ourselves.
You guys are not going to play the identity politics victim with Christianity.
No one's going to buy it.
No one is going to buy it.
Nobody really has sympathy for Christians.
They have sympathy for people who have been shot.
They have sympathy for black people who are the victims of racism.
But they don't really have sympathy for Christians.
Not the public at large, anyway.
Not the non-Christian public.
So, you know, don't even try to go down the road.
You're not going to win.
You don't have the skills.
You don't have the jargon.
You don't have the academic backing of all things to make this work.
Reports are saying he was there sitting there for about an hour and then decided to kill the nine people that he shot dead.
Sick.
Which is an amazing thing that somebody would come in like they're peaceful and intent on receiving what's being taught and then they turn and attack people.
And it's just, it's a tragedy beyond human comprehension.
We pray for those people down there.
But yes, I think churches have got to be a lot more vigilant perhaps than we've ever been before.
Unfortunately, there's really not all that much you can do, is there?
I mean, how do you know if someone's going to come in and sit down for an hour's service that they're going to go on a killing spree?
You can't really know that.
And I mean, how vigilant can you possibly be?
Especially if you're telling people, look, bring a gun because if there's a shooter, we want someone armed.
That means that you're going to have arms people coming to the church and you're not going to know if one of them is a shooter.
It's a really horrible catch-22 that you find yourself in.
And, you know, I know I joke around and stuff, but this is a horrible, horrible thing to have happened for whatever reason.
You know, just it's really quite chilling.
So I do, my heart does go out to a lot of these people because it's fucking horrible in there.
But it really, really gets my goat that people think, oh, you know what?
I'm going to use this as political ammunition.
Oh, come on.
Can we just have one fucking day where something bad happens, something fucking terrible happens?
And this doesn't happen.
Everyone's just like, you know what?
That's awful.
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