First there were comments made in a GQ article by Duck Dynasty Patriarch, Phil Robertson, declaring that homosexuality is for sinners. Now there’s a video of Robertson addressing his Church on his thoughts about homosexuality, using phrases like “gross sexual immorality” and declaring, “they will dishonor their bodies with one another, degrade each other. Look around. Boy is there some immorality going on around here.”  Of course there are other instances of his distaste for homosexuality that have yet to come to light but should anyone really be surprised or shocked? And while his comments are ignorant and offensive, he has every right to make them.  Speech can not simply be protected when people are speaking words with which we agree.  It’s not because he’s unintelligent or backwards.  Despite his appearance, Robertson does have a Master’s Degree in education.

A&E has suspended Robertson and the family is now considering whether to continue with the show as he is the head of the family. The network must now consider whether or not it wishes to continue to support Duck Dynasty or the other family members.  To be sure, there are other networks that would pick up the show as a number of conservative stations would certainly see nothing wrong with what Robertson said.  His comments will not hurt the show’s ratings as the makeup of the audience aren’t those who would be offended.

While you can’t always judge a book by its cover, more often than not you can look at a person, know where they’re from and tell at least something about them.  Robertson was obviously intelligent enough to become a teacher but he’s also a religious person and intelligence, open-mindedness and religion often don’t go hand-in-hand.