How Can Christians Have An Impact On A Secular Company?

It's just not politically correct to be a Christian in America in this day and age. Our beliefs are made fun of on television, in the news and on the big screen. Lawsuits have been filed (or threatened) to remove God from our pledge, our schools and our money. Companies don't care if they insult us by removing anything remotely religious from their ad campaigns. So how can we have an impact on secular companies?

South Park Lashes Out Against Jesus

This Holy Week (2006), while most Christians are making plans for Easter celebrations, another shot was fired across our bow by the animated television show South Park. Apparently Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the creators and Executive producers of the Comedy Central show, decided to lash out about Comedy Central's decision to not allow them to show an image of Muhammad. This came only a couple of months after a decision to cancel a repeat airing of an episode which mocked Scientology.

They created an episode around the Muhammad decision that has the character Kyle trying to persuade an executive at the Fox network to air an episode of cartoon Family Guy which features an image of Muhammad.

"Either it's all okay, or none of it is," Kyle says. "Do the right thing."

The executive agrees to show the image, but what you see is a caption that reads: "Comedy Central has refused to broadcast an image of Muhammad on their network."

This is followed by an image of Jesus defecating on President George Bush and the US flag.

And This Makes Sense How?

Out of the 280 news articles that I can find on Google News about the incident, sadly and amazingly, only two of them talk about how offensive the episode was to Christians. The other 278 were all solely focused on their "strike" at censorship ... not who got hurt or offended in the process. Yes, Trey Parker and Matt Stone showed the entire world that Comedy Central has a hypocritical double-standard. They won't allow any images of Muhammad to even be shown, but they'll let Jesus be drug through the mud without a blink. But at what cost to Christians? We basically were dragged into a fight that wasn't even ours, without an apparent care by both South Park or Comedy Central.

In the past 24 hours I've seen quite a few comments from civil-rights attorneys trying to make this solely about censorship. They wave the First Amendment around like a flag with a battle cry of "Freedom of Speech." While I strongly believe in Freedom of Speech, I just as strongly believe that with that freedom comes great responsibility. Just because we're free to say hurtful things we can't take that to mean that we shouldn't be responsible with what we say.

When singer Isaac Hayes left the show as the voice of Chef after the episode on Scientology, he gave a statement, saying, "There is a place in this world for satire, but there is a time when satire ends and intolerance and bigotry towards religious beliefs of others begins. Religious beliefs are sacred to people, and at all times should be respected and honored. As a civil-rights activist of the past 40 years, I cannot support a show that disrespects those beliefs and practices." I don't think it gets much simpler or more eloquent than that.

So What Can We Do?

Just last week, South Park won US broadcasting's prestigious Peabody prize. Last year the cable network extended the contract of South Park creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker for three more years, ensuring that the animated series will continue through 2008. So it's not likely that they're going off the air any time soon. But we can speak out and we can be heard.

Next - How To Write A Letter That Will Have An Impact On A Secular Company