David McElroy

It finally occurred to me over the weekend why I hate the responses of people on both sides of the Phil Robertson controversy. I would object to pretty much any reaction to what Robertson said — because paying attention to him at all is treating something trivial as though it’s important.

I’m no more interested in what Robertson has to say about homosexuality than I would be if he weighed in on whether McDonald’s or Burger King has better burgers — or whether Ukraine should join the European Union. He’s just a random nobody who has been elevated to being a faux “somebody” because of “reality” television. His views should matter about as much as the views of any random person from the phone book.

The more I think about it, the more I realize that my biggest objection to this entire controversy isn’t what anyone says about homosexuality or sin or free speech or anything like that. I simply object that we as a society are going down a pop-culture road that leads to becoming “Idiocracy.” Taking the theological and political views of a star of “Duck Dynasty” seriously makes no sense. When do we put “Ow! My Balls” on the air?

When Miley Cyrus made herself into a spectacle four months ago and everybody seemed to be taking her seriously, I begged the culture to quit worshiping celebrities. I’m not going to repeat what I said there, but I’ve realized that the Robertson case is more of the same. It’s a matter of taking a carnival sideshow and pretending it matters to serious discussion.

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The more I try to figure out what to say about the whole “Duck Dynasty” flap, the more I wish everybody on all sides would just shut up and go away. It’s just another idiotic battle in a war between two groups of people who seem to wake up every morning looking for a reason to be offended.

If Phil Robertson is the standard-bearer for your religious faith, you might want to rethink your theology. And if the religious beliefs of this eccentric clown threaten you, then you need to get out more and discover how many other people disagree with you in more serious ways. It’s insane that this “nobody” has become a celebrity and that people are yelling profanity at each other over his views.

I’ve never seen “Duck Dynasty,” and I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have seen it even if I still watched television. It’s a “reality” show on A&E centered around a strange Louisiana swamp family that makes duck calls. Or something like that. Doesn’t it sound like something worth wasting your time on?

Robertson is widely known as a social conservative and he talks openly about his religious beliefs. In an interview with GQ magazine this week, Robertson asserted that homosexuality is wrong. He didn’t advocate legal consequences for being gay or lesbian. He just expressed the belief that it’s sin and he said he thought men should be more attracted to a woman’s vagina than a man’s anus.

“It seems like, to me, a vagina — as a man — would be more desirable than a man’s anus,” Robertson said. “That’s just me. I’m just thinking: There’s more there! She’s got more to offer. I mean, come on, dudes! You know what I’m saying? But hey, sin: It’s not logical, my man. It’s just not logical.”

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Are we really arguing about what color Santa Claus is? Has anyone broken the news to the people arguing that he’s just a fictitious character?

That’s right. Santa doesn’t exist. But that hasn’t stopped culture warriors from trying to turn him into a cause. On Fox News this week, anchor Megyn Kelly started the ball rolling.

“For all you kids watching at home, Santa just is white,” Kelly told viewers. “Santa is what he is…. I wanted to get that straight.”

Other people have struck back, arguing that to claim Santa is white is “oppressive.” In the Los Angeles Times, there was a piece about why “we deserve a Santa for the people, not just white folks.” Over at the progressive left website Think Progress, they were writing about “Megyn Kelly’s fear of a black Santa.” And a blogger at the conservative Washington Times was defending Kelly and writing about “why Santa Claus’ skin color matters.”

One of my friends reports that a very intelligent friend of his believes that “having a white Santa is just cultural dominance over a disenfranchised and unempowered race and we might want to consider transitioning to a less-white Santa and for me to insist that a character keep his image just because said character is and always has been depicted as a white male is oppressive in nature.”

That’s right. Our culture has been reduced to arguing about whether a fictitious character’s ethnicity is “cultural dominance” over “disenfranchised” people and what kind of Santa “we deserve.”

To all of the combatants, I simply say, “Who cares?”

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