How slavishly was the Media Research Center devoted to the manufactured right-wing outrage over Easter appearing on the same day as Transgender Visibility Day and President Biden recognizing both of them? It published an unhinged April 1 column by Craig Shirley laughably likening Biden to Pontius Pilate that also appeared, among other places, at Newsmax. The column began with this note: “Note from MRC President Brent Bozell: I came across this op-ed one day after Easter. No matter. It is important to the entire NB family, so we reprint it now.” It says something about Bozell and the MRC that they consider such an unhinged screed “important.”
The MRC proper, meanwhile, tried to keep the outrage narrative alive. An April 2 post by comedy cop Alex Christy complained that late-night TV hosts made hay of said outrage:
Stephen Colbert, Biden fundraiser and host of The Late Show on CBS, demanded on Monday that those who condemned President Biden for issuing a proclamation on Easter Sunday recognizing Transgender Day of Visibility get over it because Biden, apparently, has nothing to do with his own actions and because Easter sometimes falls on different days. It was a sentiment echoed by NBC Late Night host Seth Meyers as both men claimed conservatives are hypocrites for not being outraged that Easter sometimes falls on April Fools’ Day.
Colbert was up first, and he, a supposedly devout Catholic, didn’t see what the big deal was, “Over the weekend, Trump also attacked Biden over the fact that Easter, this year, coincided with Transgender Day of Visibility. So what? And Biden had nothing to do with that. Since 2009, International Transgender Day of Visibility has been held annually on March 31. The date of Easter, meanwhile, changes from year to year.”
Sure, Biden didn’t have anything to do with the selection of March 31, but he absolutely had something to do with the proclamation. Nobody forced the White House to do that.
Christy then bizarrely suggested being transgender is like being a drug addict, complete with a religious lecture:
However, Colbert was just getting started, “I’ve got some bad news for people who are upset that another thing was celebrated on Easter this year because it’s gonna keep happening. In 2029, Easter is going to fall on April Fools’ Day. Oh! So my religion is a big joke to you? Is that what it is? Or are you claiming that Jesus didn’t actually rise from the dead? It was all a big prank on the apostles. You got Jesus’d! And smoke ’em if you got ’em, because just next year, Easter falls on 4/20.”
If Biden issued a proclamation celebrating drug use on Easter, that would also be wrong. April Fools’ Day, on the other hand, is a fun day that is not contrary to Easter. Transgenderism, on the other hand, relies on the premise that God made a mistake in creating someone male or female. If God makes mistakes, He is not perfect. If he is not perfect, He is not God. If He is not God, He could not have rose from the dead on that first Easter Sunday.
Christy went on to whine that Seth Meyers did much the same as Colbert did:
Like Colbert, Meyers also tried to suggest that Biden had nothing to do with his own proclamation and that Transgender Day of Visibility is analogous to April Fools’ Day, “I can’t believe I have to explain this, but sometimes two things happen on the same day. For example, in 2018, Easter and April Fools’ were the same day, and I don’t recall any Republicans going on Fox and claiming, the sacred resurrection of Christ has been sullied by all these frivolous pranks and goofs, although who can forget when Mary Magdalene rushed to Jesus’ tomb, discovered it was empty, and told Peter and John, ‘My dudes, I think we’ve been pranked.’”
Indeed, two things can happen on the same day, such as two late night hosts completely missing the point.
Actually, the person missing the point is Christy, who is apparently blind to all the manufactured outrage from his side.
Chief transphobe Tierin-Rise Mandelburg whined in her weekly April 2 video that is nothing but manufactured anti-LGBT outrage:
Easter happened to fall on the same day as Transgender Visibility Day this year, and President Joe Biden posted a nearly 650 word press release about it. He also shared multiple social media posts honoring transgender people this past Sunday. At the same time, his Easter press release was less than 100 words and he made it very clear that on Sunday, it was more important to celebrate delusion than Jesus.
Later that day, Mandelburg appeared on a little-watched far-right channel to spew more outrage:
On Tuesday, MRCTV’s Tierin-Rose Mandelburg appeared on One America News Network’s In Focus with Alison Steinberg. And though it was April Fools Day, the content the girls talked about was nothing to laugh about, considering how it all showed the moral and mental decline of our nation.
Steinberg asked Mandelburg about Joe Biden’s obvious prioritization of transgender people over Easter this past weekend, after the White House declared a “Transgender Day of Visibility” coinciding with the most significant holiday on the Christian calendar. They concluded that his goal was to virtue signal and convince Christians that they should deny and ignore one of the holiest of holy days in order to praise and promote transgenderism.
Needless to say, his second goal failed. All his attempts to erase the meaning of Easter just made Christians celebrate the day more intently and pray more intensely for these fallen souls.
Mandelburg is lying — Biden did nothing to “erase the meaning of Easter,” and she knows it.
Christy returned to further demonstrate how little he knows about comedy despite being the MRC’s comedy cop in an April 4 post:
The cast of Comedy Central’s Wednesday installment of The Daily Show managed to hit all the wrong notes as it reacted to conservative criticism of President Joe Biden recognizing Easter Sunday as Transgender Visibility Day. Temp host Desi Lydic tried to suggest that Biden had nothing to do with his own proclamations and butchered multiple Biblical references, while correspondent Michael Kosta claimed Christians should be happy because the controversy brought attention to Easter that it normally doesn’t receive because it is just “shitty Christmas.”
Lydic didn’t see what the big deal was, “Yes, by total coincidence, Trans Visibility Day happened to fall on Easter this year. Which seemed like, I don’t know, a good fit to me. I mean, Jesus did identify as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. So, live your truth, queen! Now you wouldn’t think Easter falling on a holiday that’s been on March 31 for 15 years would be that big of a deal, but conservatives processed this like a child meeting the Easter Bunny: By losing their [bleep] minds.”
Two things. First, Lydic is spreading heresy to own the cons because God the Son never claimed to be God the Father and God the Holy Spirit. Second, nobody forced Biden to issue a proclamation recognizing Transgender Visibility Day. He could have simply ignored it, but he chose not to.
Um, isn’t it the job of a comedian to occasionally say heretical things? Also, nobody’s looking to Lydic for theological guidance. When Lydic pointed out that right-wingers want to eliminate transgender people entirely from society (if not the planet), Christy actually defended the notion: “The Trump whataboutism aside, loving your neighbor does not mean affirming destructive behavior, and not judging people does not mean throwing logic out the window.”
Christy, of course, is quite comfortable being quite judgy of anyone who’s not as heterosexual and right-wing as he is.
UPDATE: Jorge Bonilla ranted in an April 2 post that the manufactured controversy got “no mention whatsoever on any of its Spanish-language social media platforms and feeds. So much for diversity! But rather than covering this shameless pander, the nation’s corporate Spanish-language media enabled it.” He further whined that “the networks covered the transgender parades in Mexico City. In hindsight, a very easy choice. All of the agenda signaling with none of the messy and inconvenient domestic politics,” adding: “And in so doing, both Univision and Telemundo actively aided and abetted the Biden White House in covering and concealing its promotion of Transgender Visibility Day. Time and again, we’ve established that these networks are not representative of the Hispanic community. Rather, they represent the liberal media to the community.” Bonilla didn’t explain why Hispanic media must spew hate at transgender people the way he does.