Facebook Decrees Christian Speech As Hate Speech: Free speech is now being banned based on political preferences. If this continues the result will be disastrous for our nation. Tune in now to learn more.

Air Date: 08/14/2019

Guest: Dr. Everett Piper

On-air Personalities: David Barton, Rick Green, and Tim Barton

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Transcription note:  As a courtesy for our listeners’ enjoyment, we are providing a transcription of this podcast. Transcription will be released shortly. However, as this is transcribed from a live talk show, words and sentence structure were not altered to fit grammatical, written norms in order to preserve the integrity of the actual dialogue between the speakers. Additionally, names may be misspelled or we might use an asterisk to indicate a missing word because of the difficulty in understanding the speaker at times. We apologize in advance.

Faith And The Culture

Rick:

Welcome to the intersection of faith and the culture. This is WallBuilders Live! Where we”€™re talking about today”€™s hottest topics on policy, faith, and the culture, always doing that from a Biblical, historical, and Constitutional perspective.

We’re here with David Barton, America’s premier historian and the founder of WallBuilders. Also, Tim Barton, national speaker and President of WallBuilders, and my name is Rick Green, I’m a former Texas state legislator, national speaker, and author. 

All of those different areas where culture seems to be changing so rapidly, and people are asking questions they feel like sometimes there are no solid answers. Our purpose here at WallBuilders Live is to take those questions and look at them from these solid foundations of the Bible, of our Constitution, and what we can learn from history—what works what doesn’t work— and what is truth. We look at all of those things on the hottest topics of the day. 

We appreciate you joining us in that conversation. 

You can find out more about all three of us and the ministry right there at WallBuildersLive.com. We’ve got some archives of the program over the last few weeks if you missed that. You want to listen to some of those programs that are available right now at the website. It’s also a great place for you to go to make a donation. Yes, I’m asking you to invest in freedom by investing in this program. We are equipping and inspiring people all over the nation to study the Constitution, to actually bring the Constitution to their communities, and teach it. 

A Generation Spoiled

We’re encouraging people to open up their homes or go to us you know get some of our videos and DVDs and take them into their Sunday school classes. All these different ways that they can study history and study the Constitution and get those good answers for the culture today. 

And you can be a part of that solution as well by donating, making that one time or monthly contribution, coming alongside us as supporters of the program, or by being one of the people that takes the information and shares it either through social media, or in your Sunday school class, or in your home. 

We’re asking you to do something take action be a part of the solution to saving our constitutional republic.

Alright guys, we talk a lot about why we should study the Constitution and study our rights, of course, John Jay, first Chief Justice, told us you need to know your rights so you’ll know when they’ve been violated. 

We’ve had this incredible you know 200 year run of freedom in America and frankly our generation we’ve said it before is a little bit spoiled we don’t realize how good we’ve got it.

We’ve had this freedom for so long we’ve got a little bit spoiled, we just assume it’s going to survive no matter what and no matter how we act, even when we start to take that freedom away a little bit from other people.

David:

Yeah. There’s so many things in culture right now that we’re questioning, and we see in polling certain things. Take, for example, the concept of socialism. 

Why is Socialism Becoming so Popular Among Youth?

There’s such high support for socialism. Well, they’re able to say that because they live in a free market society that provides them a lot of prosperity. But let’s say that a lot of these younger folks who support socialism, because they are individual, and because they want their own business, because they want their own income, they want financial freedom. 

They start a business, and they start that business and they want to do what they’re skilled at, and the government comes in says, “€œNo, we don’t need more of that business. You need to do this. By the way, even though you have this great skill, we want you to take all your profits share it with everyone else.”€Â 

Suddenly they”€™re gonna say, “€œWait a minute, that’s not fair!”€Â 

That’s exactly right. That’s not fair, that’s what socialism does, that’s what you support. But you’ve had a free market so long that you just think that any other kind of economic system you have is going to be free market, and it’s not because they haven’t lost that right.

Tim:

Well, it’s not just the free market. This is a financial issues, right? It’s also the free market of ideas that’s out there. It’s not just that I have the right to do something and when I have really skilled labor in my workforce. No, you also have the right to post stupid things on social media because it’s also a free market of ideas, and the free market of of speech. 

Suppressing Speech

There’s a lot of freedoms we have, and yet we live in a culture now that saying, “€œWell, if I don’t like what you’re doing, or if I disagree with you, or if you take a position that I don’t understand, whatever the case is, then I want to stop you, I want to oppress you, I want to oppose you.”€Â 

And although you might have the majority of people right now who oppose a certain kind of speech, or a certain kind of behavior, a certain kind of attitude, or business, what happens when you go in the minority because if the principle that we’re applying is whoever is in the majority gets to make the rules. Well, that’s dangerous. That’s a dangerous principle to apply, and that’s actually one reason the Founding Fathers did not choose a democracy. 

We chose a republic. 

We really tied the hands of our elected officials with the Constitution, we said, “€œYou can only do what the Constitution allows.”€Â 

We’ve grown beyond a lot of those restraints today, but that was—the idea is—we want to keep people grounded. If we rule by just emotions, or feelings, or ideas, or what I want and what I think, it’s ultimately going to be dangerous. Yet this is what we’re seeing so much in culture around us. 

We’re saying, “€œI disagree with that and I don”€™t like that. I think you’re wrong and therefore you don’t have a right to do it, or say it, or think it, or we will silence and suppress you.”€

St. Augustine Quote Banned?

David:

And it’s interesting that those who think you shouldn’t have the right to say it, they want their right to say things to be protected. We know polling wise that 53% millennials say that they believe there should be restrictions on free speech. Well, the next generation coming up, GenZers, we know that 19 percent of college students, which are the top end of GenZ, say they think that violence is an appropriate response to free speech they disagree with. 

So let’s say the GenZers disagree with the free speech of the millennials, and millennials get popped in the nose for what they say. They’re not gonna like that, but that’s the new definition. 

“€œI don’t think you should have free speech.”€Â 

When they start losing the rights that we’ve just taken for granted, and that we define from our own internal viewpoint, then you get a dangerous situation. 

We’re seeing the absurdity of some of that happening now with what happened with Facebook. 

There was a quote put out from St. Augustine—and we’re talking about one of the early church fathers—-and it’s not a quote that deals with anything going on today at all. It’s just a simple self reflection kind of quote. But because it came from him, it’s bad. 

Here’s the quote. 

“€œLet us never assume that if we live good lives, we will be without sin. Our lives should be praised only when we continue to beg for pardon. But men are hopeless creatures, and the less they concentrate on their own sense, the more interested they become in the sense of others. They seek to criticize, not to correct. Unable to excuse themselves, they’re ready to accuse others.”€Â 

Facebook Banning Free Speech

It’s a quote against hypocrisy. Don’t be a hypocrite. Look at yourself. Make sure you’re in good shape before you start criticizing others. 

That quote got banned on Facebook. It’s free speech they disagree with, and if it keeps going that direction it’s just absurd what the results will be. 

That’s why one of the clearer voices that is so cogent on this topic issue—helps us get back to seeing the principles—is Dr. Everett Piper. He was the president of Oklahoma Wesleyan University. Has been very outspoken on this kind of clarity on moral issues for a long time. We thought to be really good to get his perspective on Facebook banning this free speech quote.

Rick:

Banning something that’s causing people to think on a deeper level, not just a quick accusatory you know post that we typically engage in on Facebook.

This is really good for the culture to think on this deep level, and yet Facebook says, “€œNo,”€ and bans it just because they thought it might be offensive to someone. 

Dr. Piper to comment on that when we come back from break. You’re listening to WallBuilders Live.

Front Sight Handgun Training Course

Hey friends! Rick Green here, from WallBuilders Live. What do Dennis Prager, Larry Elder, Ben Shapiro, Rick Green, Tim Barton, David Barton – what do all these folks have in common other than the fact that they’re conservative commentators that defend the Constitution and educate America on the Constitution?

They’re all raving about Front Sight Firearms Training Institute. In fact, if you go to my website right now today at RickGreen.com, you can watch the video of Dennis Prager training at Front Sight, or Larry Elder, or Tim Barton, or myself out there training at Front Sight. It’s an opportunity for you to learn how to defend yourself and your family to make sure that you are ready and able to do that. It is a fantastic place to train. They train 30 to 40,000 people a year, and they’re just wonderful to work with. 

And, you can go with us! We’re headed back out. We’re going to have a great time out there as the WallBuilders family and if you’re a supporter of WallBuilders, we have an amazing deal for you. It”€™s actually going to cost you 1/10th the normal price to attend this two day handgun training because you”€™re going with us. And, you”€™ll also get the Constitution crash course. I”€™ll be teaching on the Constitution, you”€™ll get the intellectual ammunition that you need to defend the Second Amendment and our Constitution. As well as getting the physical training on how to defend yourself and your family.  

And, this is for everyone – guys, gals, everyone should take this class. No matter how much you”€™ve shot your whole life or if you”€™ve never touched a gun, learn how to defend your family. We”€™re going to be going several times throughout the year and we would love to have you be a part of that. Check it out at RickGreen.com today to find out the dates, get all the specifics, and get all of your questions answered. Check out RickGreen.com today to join us on this Front Sight trip for both your constitutional and handgun defense training. 

Moment From American History

This is Tim Barton from WallBuilders with another moment in American history. America is a special and unique nation. The average length for a constitution in other countries is only 17 years. But, we’ve had ours for over two centuries. Our 4 percent of the world’s population produces 24 percent of the world’s gross domestic product and every year we produce more inventions and technology than the other 96 percent of the world combined. 

In 1831 Alexis de Tocqueville of France came to America, traveled the country, and in his famous book, “€œDemocracy in America” reported,  “€œThe position of the Americans is therefore quite exceptional. It may be believed that no Democratic people will ever be placed in a similar one.”€Â 

This is the origin of the phrase “€œAmerican exceptionalism”€ and affirms that America is unique because of the distinctive ideas on which we’ve been based. Including in inalienable rights, individuals, and limited government, and the importance of religion, and morality. For more information about American exceptionalism go to WallBuilders.com.

Welcome Dr. Everett Piper

Rick:

Welcome back! Thanks for staying with us here on WallBuilders Live. It’s been probably the longest stretch without Doctor Everett Piper on the program that I can remember.

We miss you, brother! Dr. Everett Piper back with us. Glad to have you back, bro!

Dr. Piper:

Well, you need to stop waiting so long to have me back on, Rick. 

Rick:

I don’t know what the world happened! I don’t know if we couldn’t find you or what, I am so thrilled that you’re out there as a logical, rational voice across the country, man. You’ve been on all kinds of Fox programs and other programs across the nation, and continued to write and speak truth. We missed you, so it’s good to have you back.

Dr. Piper:

Thank you.

Rick:

So many different topics we’ve covered with you in the past. I think that’s the first time we’ve seen a St. Augustine quote banned on Facebook, that I know of. This isn’t just like a random, technological bot accidentally banned this, they went through all kinds of guys that were trying to put this quote on Facebook, and Facebook—finally, a real person came back and said, “€œNope, this violates our community standards.”€ Unbelievable.

Dr. Piper:

It is. It’s just stunning. We’ve got one of the patriarchs of the church, St. Augustine, who’s merely speaking about the fact that you should focus on confessing your own sins rather than lurk looking outward and blaming everyone else for their sins. In other words, don’t accuse as long as you’re trying to excuse your own sins. You’ve got the quote there, and I’m sure I just butchered it. 

Saying Hypocrisy is Bad is now Hate Speech?

But the bottom line is St. Augustine is talking about confession. He’s talking about repentance, he’s about the core of the Gospel and that human beings need that particular function of Christian religion, and that brings you to the point of being born again, and being renewed as a result of confessing your sins. 

Apparently that’s hate speech. Amazing.

Rick:

You were one of the most outspoken against safe spaces, and the snowflake mentality, and all of those things that we created on university campuses across the country. During your tenure as president of a university you did he didn’t put up with that stuff. He said, “€œWe’re not a we’re we’re not a daycare. This is a place where you learn to exchange ideas and discuss and all of those different things.”€

You talk about a snowflake mentality, as you said, this quote is not even like a hellfire and brimstone quote, this is this is a quote aimed at the people that would normally be the ones accused of being hateful on Facebook and saying to them, “€œHey, make sure you’re getting rid of the log out of your own eye first.”€Â 

And yet that’s not even acceptable in this new safe space world.

Dr. Piper:

I’ve said it before on your show Rick. We’re it we’re living in a time of of ideological fascism rather than intellectual freedom. This is not freedom of speech, this is not open inquiry. 

This is Not Classical Liberalism

It”€™s not classical liberalism, where we believe in a good debate and a good argument that will lead us to a conclusion, that’s grounded in something that’s true. That was why the Liberal Arts Academy was established a thousand years ago, to have a good argument so that truth would judge the debate and we would all be better off for it at the end of the day and be a free people as the result of that argument. 

We are no longer there. 

What we are living in today with Facebook as the poster child is actually representing what’s taking place on college and university campuses from Berkeley to Brown, where there is an idea—even St. Augustine’s ideas of calling people to confess their own sins rather than worrying about someone else’s sins—that is offensive to someone. So somebody at Facebook decides to shut it down and to exclude that idea from the debate. It’s the antithesis of intellectual freedom. It’s ideological fascism. 

“€œYou must agree you must submit, you must be part of us, you must be one of us, you must look like us, you must talk like us, you must believe like us, or you are verboten you are expelled.”€Â 

That’s exactly what you’re seeing at Facebook. But unfortunately you see it at universities across the land, and you see it in Congress, and you see it in the political debate. 

A Reflection of the Culture

Rick:

The Facebook approach on this, it just reflects what you’ve been seeing in the college world for for more than a decade. And I know there’s a big debate right now even among conservatives on how far to go with regulation, and free market, and all of those things. I don’t necessarily get into that. But I do want to ask you about on college campuses now, that’s a different animal. 

That’s that’s taxpayer funded 99 percent of the time, and we’re still watching state after state, and federal, billions of dollars, hundreds of billions of dollars, going into these college campuses to create an environment that is ultimately undermining everything the country stands for, and undermining the strength of our nation, and certainly not preparing our young people for a world where they can they can compete.

Dr. Piper:

It’s propaganda. It’s not education. Yeah it’s, “€œYou must agree with these ideas that we’re going to present to you, and if you have a critical view, or critical eye, and if you want to question anything that I, as the professor, is smarter than thou, is going shoved down your throat, then you will be graded down or you might even be expelled from the institution.”€Â 

And that’s not hyperbole that is happening even with faculty. Here’s a poster child of part of what you’re suggesting right now. Dr. Allen Josephson, who was the head of psychiatry the child psychiatric department at the University of Louisville, was notified that his job was terminated. He’d been chair of that department for 15 years.

He’s been told that his contract will not be revoked for the 2019-2020 year. Why? What was his sin? What did he do that caused him to get fired? 

Fired for Suggesting Four Year Olds Not Be Allowed to Choose Gender Changing Surgery

He dared to suggest that four year olds, five year olds, and six year olds, should not be engaging in surgical treatment to change their gender because it could be damaging to those children. He dared to suggest the lunacy of the trans argument could be harmful and unhealthy for children, and therefore he was fired. 

Rick:

Wow. 

Dr. Piper:

How dare he have a different idea of the politically correct story as it relates to the LGBTQ argument.

Rick:

And Mario Lopez, the same thing,that three year olds maybe shouldn”€™t be making these decisions as to whether they want to change their gender, they’re already that the data is already showing that they regret it and that it causes psychological damage later on, and all the damage that’s being caused by it. 

Just to question it and say, “€œHey, maybe we ought to slow down on allowing three, four, or five, year olds to do this.”€

Just to suggest that causes outcry against Lopez. They”€™ve been trying to get him fired for saying that, and I did know this story, so this was a professor for 15 years, the same basic question, “€œShould we be doing this?”€ and fired for it, right?

Dr. Piper:

And Matt Walsh had a perfect response the low Lopez situation, and the still substance situation he said. 

Culture Swinging Back?

“€œI’ve got a three year old. I don’t let him make any decisions about anything. If I ask him what he wants for lunch, he says gummy bears. If I tell him to go dress himself, he comes out with a diaper on his head. I don’t allow my 3 year old to make any decisions because 3 year olds can’t. How dare anybody suggest that they should be making a decision about what kind of sex they are or what gender they are.”€

Rick:

Yeah, yeah. Wow. The lunacy. Oh, just craziness! Well, that’s why we bring a rational voice to this and hopefully are raising up enough of a remnant in this next generation to bring some common sense, because the damage is happening already.

We’re seeing almost the—don’t see that the pendulum is swinging back, but Dr. Piper, did you see that? I think it was—I can’t remember if it was Galloper—It was one of the major polling companies actually showing that the acceptance of all this craziness finally took a dip for the first time. I could just continue to go up started with jus accepting homosexuality, then it is transgenderism, now it’s kids and transgender, all the agenda just keeps getting worse, and for the first time in their polling it actually said that that fewer Americans were okay with all of this. 

It was finally coming back the right direction. Are you sensing that if they push so far that maybe just the average American that that tries not to even dive into this stuff is going, “€œOK, enough is enough!”€

The Abolition of Women

Dr. Piper:

I do think that’s evidence of hope.

And I do believe that we can we win at the end of the day. I would argue that, biblically, we know the end of the story and the truth will win out. So we know that the battle we’re fighting is a victorious battle at the end of the day. And here’s why I think we can have confidence. 

I wrote an article for the Washington Times. You probably haven’t had a chance to read it yet, but I titled it abolition of women. I’m playing off of C.S. Lewis’s 1960s work abolition of man. And I’m suggesting that we’ve already reached a point where we’ve abolished man we’ve created a culture of toxic masculinity where men are dishonored. We’ve we’d like like Lewis says, “€œWe’ve gilded the stallion and we bid him be fruitful,”€ in other words we demand virtue, but yet we cut out the soul. 

Now we celebrate a culture that is without men. 

But we’re also reaching into a culture where we dishonor women. 

We actually are imbibing the Kool-Aid to the extent that we’re taking women’s bathrooms away from them. We’re telling three and four year olds that if they want to be a boy, it’s actually better to be a boy than to accept the biological fact that they’re a female. How is it possible to be pro woman if you deny the reality of the female? How can you tell me you’re a feminist if you’re arguing that the feminine doesn’t objectively exist. 

The Absurdity of a Lie

So in other words, we’re in a time in our culture where we are we are abolishing women. Lewis said we had a culture of men without chests, in other words they had no virtue, and character, and chivalry. We now have a culture of women without breasts, because women are not biological facts any longer. They’re a contrived construct of a dysphoric male who wants to pretend and dress up.

We can win this argument because the absurdity of the lie is so extreme right now. 

Rick:

And where can we find that? 

Dr. Philips:

It’s in The Washington Times opinion section under Dr. Everett Piper. I’m one of the columnists for The Washington Times.

Or you can follow it on my Twitter feed on Dr. Everett Piper. I posted that column again it’s titled The abolition of women.

Rick:

We’re going to do links today WallBuildersLive.com to both your Twitter page and directly to Washington Times article, and your others there as well. And Doctor, you bring so much common sense to the conversation and solutions to a crazy world.

That’s what it’s going to take to turn this thing around. We appreciate your time today. We’re not going to wait so long to get you back this time. 

Dr. Piper:

OK Rick. Thanks for having me.

Rick:

I appreciate you, brother. Stay with us folks, we’ll be right back with David and Tim Barton.

Share a veteran’s story

We Want To Hear Your Vet Story

Rick:

Hey friends! If you have been listening to WallBuilders Live for very long at all, you know how much we respect our veterans and how appreciative we are of the sacrifice they make to make our freedoms possible. One of the ways that we love to honor those veterans is to tell their stories here on WallBuilders Live.  Once in awhile, we get an opportunity to interview veterans that have served on those front lines that have made incredible sacrifices have amazing stories that we want to share with the American people. 

One of the very special things we get to do is interview World War II veterans. You’ve heard those interviews here on WallBuilders Live, from folks that were in the Band of Brothers, to folks like Edgar Harrell that survived the Indianapolis to so many other great stories you heard on WallBuilders Live. 

You have friends and family that also served.  If you have World War II veterans in your family that you would like to have their story shared here on WallBuilders Live, please e-mail us at [email protected]  Give us a brief summary of the story and we’ll set up an interview. Thanks so much for sharing here on WallBuilders Live!

A Summary

Rick:

We’re back to our WallBuilders Live! A special thanks to Dr. Ererett Piper for coming on the program today. It was good to have him back. 

We’re back now with David and Tim Barton.

Always rapid fire from Dr. Piper. I have to I had to stop and think when he does one of those long explanations, and there’s so much depth and then I got to go, “€œOkay, wait, let me digest this a second.”€Â 

Good stuff though.

David:

It is good stuff. And as always, he tends to put his finger on the core issues. As he pointed out, what’s going on Facebook is what’s going on at campuses. The social media is a reflection of what we’ve been putting into the culture for the last generation or so. It really does reflect that. 

He brought up that example of this head of the department being fired for suggesting that you should not have life altering surgery for children who are 5 or 6 and think they might want to be of the opposite gender. Clearly they don’t have enough experience at that point to even know what the genders are. But you’re going to do this permanent basically irreversible type of surgery.

Tim:

And we were talking about just putting on clothes or dressing up. We’re talking about physically changing and altering the body. The the reproductive organs, etc. So this wasn’t just putting on dresses, this was changing the whole body.

David:

It was changing the body. The head of this department says, “€œHey, let’s not do it that young, you know? Get a little more perspective on life.”€Â 

He gets fired. 

No Discussion, No Debate, Just Suppression

At the same time, we find out from Donna, in the program we just had, we find out that John Hopkins University, one of the most noted medical universities in America, is no longer doing those surgeries, and that for medical reasons that they think is the wrong thing to do. 

So here you’ve got. This required conformity that that with the university wants you to conform to what they believe, and they don’t care what anybody else says. What you have in this mindset where Facebook is banning this quote is, “€œWe don’t want discussion, we don’t want debate, we don’t want an exchange of ideas, we personally believe this is a bad quote and we don’t want anyone else to be able to read it off our social media platform.”€Â 

That is a crazy position to be in. Were that even in that debate over transgender, you’ve got different sides same from professional community, but one side won’t even listen to the other side because they value their own opinions so highly.

Rick:

Well, in fact we’ve mentioned it a couple times the last few weeks that the Proverbs 18 about, “€œA fool only wants to give their opinion. They don’t want to seek truth. They don’t want to find actual answers and here we have the wisdom.”€Â 

Wisdom of the ages, from nearly two centuries ago, telling us how we should approach these things and making sure that we’re not being hypocritical, and yet even that gets banned. 

So it’s not a good situation. But the solution is for more of us to speak up, and maybe everybody out there share the quote on Facebook. Be a great way to send a message to Facebook, without a doubt. 

St. Augustine Called Hate Speech 

Well, we’re out of time for today folks. Thanks so much for listening to WallBuilders Live.

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Thanks so much for listening. You’ve been listening to WallBuildersLive.