In a new report alleging anti-conservative bias in the military, Fox News Todd Starnes claims that a U.S. Army officer sent an e-mail to subordinates, listing the American Family Association and the Family Research Council as "domestic hate groups." The basis for this label? Both oniations oppose same-sex marriage and homosexuality.
The message, apparently sent by Lt. Col. Jack Rich at Fort Campbell in Kentucky, also instructed those who received the e-mail to be on the look-out for fellow soldiers who might be supporters of the organizations (or who, at the least, aren't upholding "Army Values").
"Just want to ensure everyone is somewhat educated on some of the groups out there that do not share our Army Values," the note read, according to Starnes' report. "When we see behaviors that are inconsistent with Army Values -- don’t just walk by -- do the right thing and address the concern before it becomes a problem."
Photo Credit: AP
Starnes has more about the controversial e-mail in question:
The 14-page email documented groups the military considers to be anti-gay, anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim. Among the other groups mentioned are Neo-Nazis, Racist Skinheads, White Nationalists and the Ku Klux Klan.The Family Research Council and the American Family Association were listed as being anti-gay.
“The religious right in America has employed a variety of strategies in its efforts to beat back the increasingly confident gay rights movement,” the officer wrote. “One of those has been defamation.”
The officer accused the “Christian Right” of “engaging in the crudest type of name-calling, describing LGBT people as ‘perverts” with ‘filthy habits’ who seek to snatch the children of straight parents and ‘convert’ them to gay sex,” he wrote.
Some cultural warriors would likely look at this, teamed with some of the other incidents unfolding of late, and assume that there's a war on Christianity -- one that has worked its way into the U.S. military. Of course, others would dismiss such a notion as silly and unfounded. While Tony Perkins, who heads FRC, called the e-mail evidence that the military has become anti-Christian in nature, a Pentagon spokesperson denied such allegations.
"The notion that the Army is taking an anti-religion or anti-Christian stance is contrary to any of our policies, doctrines and regulations," said Army spokesperson George Wright. "Any belief that the Army is out to label religious groups in a negative manner is without warrant."
Wright told Starnes that the military is looking into the e-mail's origins, who commanded it be sent and other surrounding details.
This story follows another from last week in which a U.S. Army training instructor listed Evangelical Christianity, Catholicism and even “Islamophobia” as examples of “religious extremism" during a training brief.
Read Starnes entire article here.
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