The Matt Walsh Show - Ep. 124 - Why Is The Genocide Of Christians Being Ignored?

Episode Date: October 16, 2018

Why are Trump's enemies always doing stupid and self-destructive things? And why are white Americans always so desperate to prove that they have non-white or non-American heritage? What's wrong with just being a white American? Also, we'll talk about Pastor Andrew Brunson, who was released from a Turkish prison last week after spending two years behind bars for "Christianization." Why is the persecution and genocide of Christians across the globe ignored by people in this country? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today on the Matt Wall Show, we'll talk a little more about Elizabeth Warren's hilarious attempts to prove that she's Native American. Why do Trump's enemies always self-destruct like this? Why are they always stepping on rakes? Why are they always stepping on landmines? Then we'll talk about the return of Pastor Andrew Brunson, who was freed from a Turkish prison after two years. And we'll discuss the persecution of Christians across the world and why it's ignored in this country. All of that is coming up. Well, before we get into the more important discussion, I have to say that I'm still marveling at this thing with Elizabeth Warren. Ben Shapiro wrote something yesterday where he said that Trump's superpower is that he gets his opponents to say stupid things and do stupid things, which is a great superpower to have, especially as we head into the midterms. And certainly to release your DNA results to prove that your great, great, great, great, great, great, grand uncle may have been possibly Native American or maybe just Mexican or Colombian or. or something. Well, that is a stupid thing. That is a very stupid thing. It's stupid not just because

the results are so sad and they actually disprove the very thing you're trying to prove, but because this is an embarrassing subject for Warren and for the Democrats, and it's something that they should be ignoring. You know, the right approach for them was just to act like this Pocahontas thing wasn't happening to ignore it completely, call it a distraction. Anytime the Republicans bring it up to say, oh, they're talking about these silly things because They don't want to talk about a plan for America. They don't want to talk about the economy. You know, that whole thing the politicians do.

But to actually bring it up yourself, I mean, that is astoundingly stupid. This is the thing you're not supposed to want to talk about. This is the embarrassing thing for you. Everyone's laughing at you. And that's the, as a politician, the worst thing in the world is to become a punchline. That's the worst thing. You don't want people to laugh at you. they could hate you, they can be angry at you, but for them to laugh at you and consider you a punchline,

I think that's the worst thing in the world. Which, by the way, for Democrats and for liberals in their opposition of Trump, by far for them, the more effective move is to make him into a punchline and to try. treat him like a cartoon and a caricature, which they do that quite a bit. And I think that's far more effective than, but on the other hand, they also mix that in with taking him very seriously and, you know, saying, well, he's the second coming of Hitler and he's going to destroy the world and everything else. That's like the opposite of treating him as a punchline. That's taking him very, very seriously. So they're doing both things and that it's the latter, the second one. That is not effective. It's not an

effective strategy. But it's all, it's all part of this where he kind of can coax them into doing stupid things. And why did she do this stupid things? Well, this stupid thing. Well, because this is what happens when you have blind seething hate in your heart for somebody else. And I think in any competitive environment, whether it's, whether it's politics or anything else, it doesn't help to be filled with hate and rage. You don't want that because you can't think clearly in that condition. You don't have the calm, cool kind of head that you need to analyze

the situation, choose the most expedient path, form a strategy, and execute it. You can't do that when you're filled with hatred. It's like in, think about in football, you know, if you're a linebacker on a football team, it helps to play a little bit angry. It helps to be aggressive to get pumped up. to have a little bit of a grudge against your opponent, but you can't be overcome with hatred for your opponent because then you get flustered. You make dumb decisions. You're not strategic and you're thinking.

So when a player is way too angry and he hates the other team, he hates another play on the other team, they've gotten into his head. That's when he might go and punch a guy in the head or tackle someone after the whistle, which may be satisfying for him in the moment, but then it detracts from his overall objective

of actually winning the game because then he gets the penalty, he gives a first down to the other team. And when it comes to politics, I think Trump's opponents are constantly taking personal foul penalties. They're constantly giving Trump first downs. Trump is marching up and down the field

and because of penalties all the time. And it's because they're making decisions based on sheer hatred, not strategy. These are not pragmatic, strategic decisions. And in this case, I think Warren, the only thing she could think about,

the only thing on her mind was that she wanted to prove Trump wrong and she wanted to try to make him look stupid, but in the process, she just made herself look stupid because that's all she could think about. She wasn't thinking clearly. Now, let me say something else. Because this whole Warren thing

has brought up a conversation about putting the politics aside for a minute, there's been a conversation about when can you really say that you're part something. Everyone likes to claim in America, this is an American thing. I'll get to that in a minute,

but everyone in America likes to claim that they have some kind of ethnic heritage. So people will say, oh, I'm Italian, I'm Irish, I'm Native American, I'm French, whatever. but when does it really count? When can you really say it? And let me just, in this just general PSA, okay, because we're on the subject, here is the rule, I think, okay? If you're off the boat yourself, then obviously that counts.

Okay, so if you're off the boat from France, or I guess it would be the plane these days, then you can say that you're French. if your parents were off the boat, then that counts. If two or more grandparents are off the boat, that counts. But here's where it gets complicated. So I think that's all pretty straightforward, right? But here's where it gets complicated. What if, say, only one grandparent,

just your paternal grandmother was from Italy? can you then say that you're Italian? And here's how I think we sort through that, okay? If it's only one grandparent, I think you can claim that heritage as your own if you were close with her growing up and you were around her a lot and you spent a lot of time with her.

Because then you have more than just a trace of Italian DNA because if it's just one grand, even as even a grandparent, If it's just one grandparent that was from this country, but when it comes to your actual, to the actual, you know, in a literal sense, there's not much there, right? It's pretty diluted.

But if you're around her a lot and you're very close with this Italian grandmother, then you have the heritage, you have the customs, you have the culture, which you would have absorbed from your, Italian grandmother. And then I think in that case, it's fair to say, well, I'm part of Italian. But if your Italian grandmother died when you were three and all of your living relatives and the only ones you ever spent any time with were all just American, no accent, nothing, then you're American.

You're not Italian American. You're just, you're American. That's all. You're American. Which, by the way, is fine. It's great. It's awesome. And this is the weirdest thing about America is that everyone wants to here, but nobody wants to be from here for some reason. Everyone wants to claim that they're from somewhere else. Well, what's wrong with just being from America? If your family has been here for generations, then you're from America. You're not from Poland. You're from America.

And what's wrong with that? What's wrong with having American heritage? I mean, if you've been in this country for generations and almost all of your family members are from this country, well, then that's why go around saying, oh, I'm, I'm a quarter Irish, a 10th Polish, a 13th Australian. No, you're not. You're American. None of that means anything.

What do you mean you're a quarter Irish, a quarter this, a quarter? What is that? Again, unless you really grew up in a house that was just immersed in that culture, then fine. But if you just have a quarter, that doesn't mean, you're, you're American. That's what you are. And that's the thing with Warren. Her family has apparently been here in America. for a very long time.

If she can trace her blood back 300 years to find that potentially someone in her family reproduced with a Native American, well, that means that her family's been here for a very long for centuries. And that's something to be proud of. That is a heritage in and of itself. It's not like you could only have a heritage

if you're from some other country. Like we don't have our own heritage. We can't, you can't have one. from America? If your family has been here since the Civil War or earlier, that's really cool. That's awesome. You should be proud of that. Stop trying to erase your family history by homing in on that little fraction of some other

culture that you allegedly have in your blood, but that has really had very little influence on you, or I should say, no influence at all, really. People don't do that in other countries, by the way. Nobody in China is going, well, I'm a quarter Korean, a 10th South African. No, they're not doing that. They're Chinese and they're proud of it. They're saying, I'm Chinese. So why not be American?

I mean, America was an unsettled, wild frontier country only 150 years ago. America is a very young country. So if your family has been here for a long time, then your family was here when the country was still being built and tamed and formed. And that's awesome. That is a heritage. That is history. That is American history, American heritage, and you should be proud of it. Stop trying to comb through your ancestry so that you can say, well, I'm one 16th Mongolian. Who cares? That doesn't mean anything. That's had no influence on you whatsoever. You are American, period. Be it. All right.

Switching gears. So over the weekend, speaking of Americans, American pastor Andrew Brunson was released after two years in a Turkish prison. He had been arrested on charges of Christianization, which, yes, that's a real thing in many countries across the world. Christianization is a crime that you can commit. And the Trump administration negotiated for his release, and he finally arrived home. And there was a wonderful scene at the White House where Pastor Brunson was thanking Trump and prayed for him, prayed over him, and was a great scene. But I think Pastor Brunson's plight, and as far as I know, he hasn't spoken much yet

about his actual experiences in prison, which I'm sure were not pleasant experiences. I'm sure we'll hear that story eventually. But his plight brings our minds back, or ought to bring our minds back anyway, to the problem of Christian persecution across the world. Remember, he was arrested for being Christian. That was his crime. And that is a crime, as I said, in many countries.

In fact, there was a recent report released a few months ago that said that Christian persecution today is worse now than it's ever been in history, You know, China, Egypt, India, Iraq, Nigeria, North Korea, Pakistan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia. The situation is very bad in all these countries. Christians are arrested, tortured, killed, persecuted in many other ways. Their churches are burned down, and their very existence, their faith, their existence has been criminalized. There's a story in Newsweek, of all places, about this problem a few months ago.

Let me read a little bit of that to you, just to give you the, just so you understand what's happening. It says the persecution and genocide of Christians across the world is worse today than, quote, at any time in history. And Western governments are failing to stop it. A report from a Catholic organization said, the study by aid to the church in need said the treatment of Christians has worsened substantially in the past two years compared with the two years prior and has grown more violent than any other period in modern time. Not only are Christians more persecuted than any other faith group, but ever-increasing numbers are experiencing the very worst forms of persecution, the report said. The report examined the plight of Christians in China, Egypt, India, Iran, Iraq, Nigeria, North Korea, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syria, Turkey over the period lasting from 2015 until 2017.

And the research showed that in that time, Christians suffered crimes against humanity. some were hanged, some were crucified. It says Saudi Arabia was the only country where the situation did not get worse, but that doesn't mean it got any better. The report put a special focus on Middle Eastern countries like Iraq and Syria where the authors argued Christians would have been entirely wiped out if it weren't for military action and the assistance of Christian humanitarian organizations. that it talks about the situation for Coptic Christians in Egypt,

and then for Christians in various African countries, it's very bad as well. So this is a widespread problem across the globe, yet despite this Newsweek article, it gets very little attention. Even though every once in a while you have a story like the pastor being freed, which got a little bit of attention from the mainstream media. Why is it getting more attention? Well, as I think I've explained before, I think the main reason, well, there are two reasons we don't pay attention that much

to Christian persecution across the globe. The first reason is that it's far away, and it's just hard for us to care about things that are far away. So it's similar to if there's a natural disaster in Indonesia, that's not going to get our attention as much as a disaster in the Florida Panhandle because these things are closer to us. And to a certain extent, and to a certain extent, that makes sense. It makes sense for us to care particularly, especially about the things that are close to us.

That's a very human thing. It's a very normal thing. But when it comes to the persecution of Christians overseas, I think it seems as though we've basically entirely. ignored it. At least the media has. Like, it doesn't matter at all. And that, of course, is not okay. That's not natural. That's not human. And what's the reason for that? What's the special reason for ignoring the persecution of Christians overseas? I think that the reason is that Christians have been historically and are today on a massive scale victims. Christians are in a very real sense

a victim group. Not in every country, certainly, but then there's no group of people in the world anymore who are victims in every country. Okay, there isn't, which is a great thing. But there isn't any type of person, any demographic left

that is violently persecuted everywhere across the globe. Unborn babies may come the closest to that designation. There are 50 million abortions across the globe every year, so I think they fall to that category, but among born people, that doesn't really exist, which again, is great. That's we should celebrate that.

Yet, the victimization of Christians is endemic. It is an epidemic. It may not be happening everywhere, but it's happening in many, many places. But we don't talk about it because, remember, in America, victimization is power. Everybody wants to be a victim. And the whole point of identity politics, like we talked about yesterday, it's to divide people into two groups, victim and victimizer. And the left has made it very easy for itself. And it's said that basically everyone except for white Christian males belong in the victim group.

So if they acknowledge that actually Christians, Christians of all races and ethnicities are being persecuted across the globe, that it throws off their whole system. Also, I think the left, it considers the victim title to be a great honor. to be a very trendy and kind of cool thing to be a victim. And so they don't want to share that title with Christians because they hate Christians. And indeed, on a global scale, they would say that Christianity is perhaps the greatest villain of all. That's the narrative that they've established. And this just interferes with that narrative.

And that's why they tell stories about the Inquisition and the Crusades, because they They have to go back centuries to find even an arguable or alleged example of Christians systematically persecuting anyone. That's why they have to immediately, you know, they go to the Crusades is a thousand years ago. So that should really tell you something, that when people want to make a case that the Christian church has been this violent persecutor, the first thing they do is they go back a thousand years to the Crusades. And, of course, we can talk about how the Crusades are misunderstood and they were largely,

at least they were originally launched as defensive struggles against against Muslim aggression. But even aside for that, even if that is an example and it was just straightforward, the Christians were evil and they did terrible things and there was nothing redeeming about it. Well, that was a thousand years ago. And the fact that you have to go back a thousand years, that should really tell you something. But again, this is all about the narrative. And their narrative, their entire worldview, is really thrown for a loop if they admit

Christians into the persecuted club. They can't do that because their philosophy on life hinges on this idea of persecution and victimization. And so they've got a very strict formula and they just can't they can't fit Christians into the into the victimized group. They can't do it. It ruins everything. And so I think that combined with how distant all of this is to us, geographically. Those two things together just are the two ingredients that are needed to basically completely ignore what this report I think accurately calls genocide. But we, we, and when I say we, I mean, those of us who are not on the left and who are

not Christian haters, we should not ignore it. This is something that we should be paying attention to. Thanks everybody for listening. Thanks for watching. I'll talk to you tomorrow. Godspeed.