RE: History’s Greatest Monster

Tuesday evening, the distinguished city council member from Macon, Georgia posed a question to the readers of this site.

Yesterday, Erick Erickson –the 69th most influential conservative in America– asked, “Does Anyone Really Care That History’s Greatest Monster is No Longer a Southern Baptist?”

The question presented by Erickson was directed towards former President Jimmy Carter who, in 2000, left the Southern Baptist Convention after that body declared its opposition to women as pastors and called for wives to be submissive to their husbands [Sengupta, Somini (October 21, 2000). Carter Sadly Turns Back On National Baptist Body. The New York Times.].

Now let us dismiss for a second the fact that Erick Erickson is reacting to a nine year old story. Erickson proclaimed our nation’s thirty-ninth president, and one of only two Georgians to win the Nobel Peace Prize, “history’s greatest monster.” Regrettably, the freshman city council member from Macon didn’t provide a lick of evidence to support his audacious claim.

It is estimated that humans have inhabited the Earth for over 200,000 years. Throughout that time, we’ve had some truly terrible people on this planet. Some names that immediately come to mind are Adolf Hitler, Osama Bin Laden, Charles Manson, Jeffrey Dahmer, The Boston Strangler; these folks certainly qualify in the top ten percent of history’s greatest monsters. Jimmy Carter doesn’t.

Dictionary.com defines a monster as “a person who excites horror by wickedness, cruelty, etc.” [monster. (n.d.). Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1). Retrieved July 22, 2009, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/monster]. The five people I just named excited horror through their wickedness, their cruelty, their malice and their hatred. Hitler, Manson, Bin Laden, and Dahmer certainly fit the definition of the word monster. Jimmy Carter doesn’t.

The five people I named are collectively responsible for the senseless deaths of millions of people. Jimmy Carter, on the other hand, served in the Navy, brokered a peace deal between Israel and Egypt, helped put the United States on path towards fewer nuclear weapons and has fought for human rights around the world.

Fourteen years ago, then-First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton declared to the United Nations 4th World Conference on Women that it is “no longer acceptable to discuss women’s rights as separate from human rights.”

“If there is one message that echoes forth from this conference, let it be that human rights are women’s rights and women’s rights are human rights once and for all. ”

United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women, Beijing. The White House. 1995-9-5. Retrieved on 2009-7-22.

Five years later, President Carter severed ties with the Southern Baptist Convention after that organization decided to, in the words of Carter, “[quote] a few carefully selected Bible verses and [claim] that Eve was created second to Adam and was responsible for original sin, [and ordained] that women must be “subservient” to their husbands and prohibited from serving as deacons, pastors or chaplains in the military service” [Carter, Jimmy (July 12, 2009). The words of God do not justify cruelty to women. The Observer. Retrieved on 2009-7-22.].

Carter recently wrote in the British newspaper The Observer:

This view that women are somehow inferior to men is not restricted to one religion or belief. It is widespread. Women are prevented from playing a full and equal role in many faiths.

This discrimination, unjustifiably attributed to a Higher Authority, has provided a reason or excuse for the deprivation of women’s equal rights across the world for centuries. The male interpretations of religious texts and the way they interact with, and reinforce, traditional practices justify some of the most pervasive, persistent, flagrant and damaging examples of human rights abuses.

While I do not want to put words in Erick Erickson’s mouth, it seems as if his proclamation that “[Jimmy]Carter wants to be free to live as he wants, not as God wants him to,” suggests that Erickson supports the Southern Baptist Convention’s declaration against women and women’s rights. Erickson’s own words suggest that he believes God wants women to be subservient and submissive to men. Which, of course, begs to question. . .

. . .If women must be subservient and submissive to men, then must Secretary of State Karen Handel –a Republican gubernatorial candidate endorsed by Erickson– bow to her husband’s wishes should he demand that she end her campaign for governor? If the word of God says women must be subservient and submissive to men, then would I not be completely within my rights as a man to demand a female have sex with me regardless of whether she wants it or not; would I be completely within my rights as a man to demand that my wife have an abortion regardless of whether she wanted to or not? Would I be completely within my rights as a man to kill my wife if I caught her cheating?

The answers to all those questions is a very loud no. Not just no, but hell no.

To do any of the things I just described would constitute a violation of not just women’s rights, but human rights.

So I end this very long missive with three simple questions for Erick Erickson:

1.) What evidence do you have that can verify your claim that former President Jimmy Carter is “history’s greatest monster?;”

2.) Do you believe women should be submissive and subservient to men as the Southern Baptist Convention does?; and

3.) If you do not share the same beliefs as the Southern Baptist Convention, then why raise a ruckus over Jimmy Carter leaving that group?