Australia’s Largest Christian News Site

There appears to be only one acceptable narrative these days, despite the constant trumpeting of “diversity” and “inclusion”. A professor opines on the Manly rugby players’ apparent lack of education in progressive values.

If only the naive Manly Sea Eagles players who refused to wear the pride jersey Thursday night had education!

Yes, education is the key!

If Christian young people had education — by which I mean indoctrination into LGBTQ+ theory — then they wouldn’t be so, well, Christian.

And they would be free to reclaim their, er, our queer perspective.

Oh, but we love diversity! Diversity is wonderful. And it will be even more wonderful when everyone thinks uniformly, which is to say when everyone thinks like LGBTQ+ activists.

Now of course, the professor interviewed on the ABC’s The Drum didn’t put it quite like that. But anyone, with ears to hear, heard exactly what he said.

Whitewashed History

Pity those poor young Manly players espousing Christian views pushed on Pacific Islanders two hundred years ago by stuffy white colonising missionaries.

The Pacific was a gay wonderland before the arrival of frigid whites carrying their Bibles.

So the Manly players are not to be blamed for their outdated, bigoted views. They’re just poor Islanders needing education.

Or re-education, if you will.

Chair of Social Work and Policy Studies at Sydney University Professor Jioji Ravel told the ABC:

“Education is the key. It’s about being able to have a collaborative conversation with everyone.”

Well ‘conversation’ sounds okay.

But what kind of conversation?

One-Sided

“A conversation about how do you as a team effectively and proactively celebrate ethnic, religious and sexual diversity,” he said.

Okay, forgive me for butting in here, professor, but I think you’re going to have trouble persuading Christians to “celebrate” homosexuality and gender fluidity.

And I’m not sure that homosexual players are going to “celebrate” the Christian view of marriage as being between a man and a woman; or indeed that genderqueer players will “celebrate” the Christian view that male and female are fixed biological realities.

Couldn’t we just agree to celebrate football, despite our passionate disagreement on sexuality and religion?

Before the professor can continue to expand on the merits of “conversation”, the ABC host had a very important point to make. He interjected:

“There are going to be kids, queer kids, watching this who now know that a whole bunch of their players don’t support them.”

Oh yes, the kids! Will no one think of the kids?

There are gay and genderfluid kids all across the country this week in fear of their lives — perhaps suicidal — because seven Christians didn’t want to run around a footy field wearing a rainbow!

Seriously?

Religious Freedom

Why don’t they ever worry about the Christian kids?

You know, the Christian kids watching this who now know that if you stand up for your beliefs, you’ll be told by police it’s not safe for you to go to the football? (The Manly seven were warned not to attend Thursday’s game as their safety could not be guaranteed.)

What about the Christian kids watching this who now know that if they embark on a sporting career, they’ll likely be forced to choose between the game they love and their most deeply held personal beliefs on sexuality and gender?

The kids! Think of the kids!

Pffft.

Slippery Slope

But I digress. Back to the professor and his call for… what was it? … ah yes, collaborate conversation.

“I think this is an awesome opportunity for us to continue to have a shared conversation with Pacific community and the broader queer community and the whole community around mental inclusion of sexual diversity.”

Hang on a moment. Suddenly we’ve gone from a conversation about celebrating religion and sexual diversity to a conversation about “inclusion of sexual diversity”.

Having softened the audience up with his mushy rhetoric about “collaborative conservations” and “shared conversations” and “celebrating” this and “understanding” that, the professor came to his real point:

“Interestingly enough, prior to colonisation across all of our Pacific Islands, and our communities within, our sexuality was fluid.

“So we actually learned from white Western perspectives to have shame and stigma around our sexuality.

“So it’s an opportunity for even us as Pasifika communities to reclaim some of those queer perspectives from our Pasifika heritage.”

(Pacific Islanders also learned from white Western perspectives not to eat each other.)

The professor’s point was that these Christian Islander footballers are homophobic, but only because of white man’s religion. (Christianity actually began as a Middle Eastern religion.)

However, salvation is at hand. With a little indoctrination, they can quickly be stripped of their religious beliefs and become LGBTQ+ activists like the professor.

Hmmm… this “conversation” is sounding a little bit like “conversion therapy” to me!

The professor, who has worked extensively with NRL players across the competition, has been getting a good run in the media this week, describing the sexual utopia that existed in the Pacific before the arrival of Christianity.

He wrote in the Sydney Morning Herald:

“Before the missionaries visited our beautiful island homes in the period of colonisation during the 1800s, sexuality among many Pacific communities was fluid. Men would have sex with men without fear and shame. Sexuality was seen as an expression of connecting socially and relationally with others.

“Pasifika people need to be proud of our pre-colonial views of queerness and reclaim such views as part of our ability to love our neighbour as ourselves.”

“Love our neighbour as ourselves.”

Hmmm, that phrase rings a bell.

Let me think a moment…

Wasn’t that…

Yes. Yes it was! It was Jesus who said that!

It was the Jesus whom those white colonising homophobic missionaries imposed on Pacific Islanders in the 1800s who said “love your neighbour”, though I’m not sure Jesus meant that we were to love our neighbour by reclaiming our latent homosexuality.

Anyway, once these naive Islander lads refusing to wear the rainbow jersey get educated by the professor, they’ll be totally on board with gay genderqueer Jesus and will be able to truly celebrate diversity. And possibly love their neighbour in a very special way.

You know it makes sense. And if you doubt it, you’re just another bigot who needs edumacating.

___

Originally published at The James Macpherson Report.

Subscribe to his Substack here for daily witty commentary.