Rod Dreher and Francis Beckwith misrepresent P.Z. Myers

Rod Dreher wrote a column on the Beliefnet blog titled "P.Z. Myers hates Christians exclusively," in ignorance of the fact that his desecration of a consecrated host also included pages from the Koran and from Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion. I think it's fair to criticize Myers for being too easy on the Muslims who have reacted with violence for the Mohammed cartoons, but to say that he "hates Christians exclusively" is a gross misrepresentation of his views.

I've responded to a couple of comments at the blog, which is full of comments from blinkered hypocrites who fail to recognize the beams in their own eyes:

Houghton writes (July 14, 2008 3:08 PM): "Those who think of themselves as "brights" will now start behaving in increasingly nakedly aggressive ways in America and the rest of the West. There won't be a need to "spiritualize" at that point, because the snarling rage and violent attacks we'll witness will be quite open for all to see."

But it's not Myers who has promoted violence or criminal activity, it's the Catholics who have been sending him death threats and threats of violence against his children, yet where is your condemnation of that?

A "Fr. J", posting at Pharyngula, made a similar remark to the above, and tried to claim that the recent attempted attack on a Christian radio station on College Station, PA was by an atheist--when in fact the man was a mentally ill Christian off his meds. And the FBI's primary suspect for the 2001 anthrax attacks who just killed himself was a Catholic. Back in 2006, a conservative Christian was arrested in Los Angeles for sending threats and fake anthrax.

Francis Beckwith commented (July 15, 2008 11:36 AM): "According to PZ, Catholic outrage is unwarranted, but Muslim outrage is, though the latter hurt their cause because they resort to violence. Muslims are portrayed as victims, albeit irrational and misguided, who harm their cause by overreacting. Catholics are told by PZ to remain completely silent and speak only when spoken to as they sit in the back of the secular bus."

Where has P.Z. Myers criticized Catholics for being outraged, as opposed to criticizing them for issuing death threats, threatening the lives of his children, trying to get him fired from his job, trying to get Webster Cook and his friend expelled from the University of Central Florida, and for saying things that are idiotic, like the Confraternity of Catholic Clergy's laughably absurd statement about the meaning of the First Amendment. You should give that statement a read.