Bill O'Reilly of Fox News is boldly reporting what no other media outlets are touching – physical assaults, and an attempted sexual assault, of praying Christians by enraged homosexuals in
A mob of hundreds gathered Friday, Nov. 14 when a small group of evangelical Christians made their weekly trek to
According to the personal account [1] of one of the members of the group:
We began to sing “Amazing Grace,” and basically sang that song the whole night. (At some points we also sang “Nothing but the Blood of Jesus” and “Oh the Blood of Jesus.”) At first, they just shouted at us, using crude, rude, and foul language and calling us names like “haters” and “bigots.” Since it was a long night, I can't even begin to remember all of the things that were shouted and/or chanted at us. Then, they started throwing hot coffee, soda and alcohol on us and spitting (and maybe even peeing) on us.
Then, a group of guys surrounded us with whistles, and blasted them inches away from our ears continually. Then, they started getting violent and started shoving us. At one point a man tried to steal one of our Bibles. Chrisdene noticed, so she walked up to him and said, “Hey, that's not yours, can you please give it back?” He responded by hitting her on the head with the Bible, shoving her to the ground, and kicking her. I called the cops, and when they got there, they pulled her out of the circle and asked her if she wanted to press charges. She said, “No, tell him I forgive him.” Afterwards, she didn't rejoin us in the circle, but she made friends with one of the people in the crowd, and really connected heart to heart.
As of November 19, O'Reilly is the only mainstream media figure to cover the story. He aired video clips during the November 18 O'Reilly Factor in which police escorted the prayer group out of the neighborhood. An angry protester appears in the video yelling, “And we don't ever want them coming back, ever. Do you understand that other Christians? Do you understand that, other Mormons? I'm talking to you people, yes, you. Stay out of our neighborhood if you don't like us. Leave us alone!” Sharp, piercing whistles can be heard in the background.
Christian actor Kirk Cameron discussed the Castro district attack with O'Reilly and defended traditional marriage and Proposition 8:
KIRK CAMERON: Well, I say that it really comes down to who defines marriage. I certainly don't define marriage, and neither does anybody else. Marriage is not a new institution. It's been around for thousands of years, if not longer. And it's defined by God. None of us have the opportunity to redefine that without coming into -- up against serious consequences and unraveling the fabric of our society.
…
[W]e can make laws in our country based on what the majority of people say. And the majority of people in our country say that marriage is worth fighting for, and they did. And the definition of it stays.
…
For me, marriage is -- it's a theological issue. It's a moral issue. It's a family issue. And marriage is what it is. And we understand what it is. And when we start playing with that, there is going to be serious consequences for it.
On November 17, O'Reilly also aired video in which radical homosexual activists stormed [2] a church in
Austin Nimock, senior counsel of the Christian legal organization Alliance Defense Fund told O'Reilly:
It's quite clear that the pretense of tolerance is over. I mean, the advocates in this country for redefining marriage for years have built their campaign on the pretense of tolerance. And what you have here, is tolerance – or no tolerance, I should say, for anybody who dares to disagree with their viewpoint. The opposite of tolerance, Bill, is tyranny.
These are not the only attacks directed at at supporters of Prop. 8, and virtually ignored by the establishment media. Homosexual activists at a “No on Prop. 8” rally in
Life Site News reported [4] last week that protestors shouted racial slurs, including the n-word, at African-Americans due to the high levels of African-American support for Prop. 8. A higher percentage of blacks, 70 percent, supported Prop. 8 than any other ethnic group.
The Associated Press reported [5] on November 13 that Mormon temples in
A Nexis search revealed that the three broadcast networks – ABC, CBS, and NBC – and the three cable news channels – CNN, Fox News and MSNBC – collectively aired 75 stories on the Prop 8 protests between November 5 and November 17. Incidents in which homosexuals attacked Prop. 8 backers were largely ignored by the television news.
None of the stories mentioned the use of the n-word by homosexual activists. On November 13, O'Reilly quoted homosexual activist Wayne Besen's saying that he found African-American support for Prop. 8 “galling and repugnant” from “people who have felt the sting of discrimination [and] turn around and step on another minority.” CNN reported on comedienne Roseanne Barr's observation that African-Americans who support traditional marriage are “as bigoted and ignorant as their white Christian right-wing counterparts.”
Only NBC aired a brief report of the white powder sent to the Mormon temples. ABC reported on it in an article on their Web site.
CMI previously noted [6] that the majority of the coverage following
Colleen Raezler is a research assistant at the Culture and Media Institute, [8] a division of the