By now most, if not all, of you have heard of Kirk Cameron’s new Christmas movie “Saving Christmas”, and the horrible reviews it has received from critics on Rotten Tomatoes, the movie rating aggregation site. It sits at a dismal 8% as of the time of this writing (11/25, at approximately 12:15 PM CST). You have also no doubt heard of Mr. Cameron’s furious reaction, and his call to all of his Facebook followers to go on the site and inflate the fan rating number as high as possible, because that’s after all what Jesus would want, and has absolutely nothing to do with Kirk’s desire to make more money off a piece of shit film. Just go to the original Facebook post to see with what enthusiasm his mindless minions pledge to go and defeat Satan by artificially increasing the percentage, and thus the perceived awesomeness of the film as rated by fans (Rotten Tomatoes has a rating determined by critics, and also, separately, one where fans can give their own rating. This is the one he was trying to raise).
For a time, this seemed to work. In the wee hours of Friday, November 21st, the fan favorability percentage was up to 94%. Oh, but those damned atheists caught wind of his scheme, and decided to counterattack the charge of the Christians by leaving their own negative reviews. So the fan rating went from a peak of 94% to its current rotten (but not quite as bad) level of 36%, with a total of 15,103 ratings, which is an average “tomato” rating of 2.1 out of 5. So it looks like his plan has, at least for the moment, backfired on him.
Now, there’s a couple of things about the ratings you could argue about. For one, the average critics’ review is only based on 13 ratings, which isn’t a very large sampling size, so the film’s backers could claim the judgment of “rotten” is thus invalid. Also, it says on the page itself that there is “no consensus yet”, which basically means they are conceding the point I heretofore mentioned. On the other side, the fan rating of 36% has almost certainly been inflated by his automatons, and probably is in actuality much lower.
Whether the rating of the movie on Rotten Tomatoes is accurate or not is really beside the point, however. The real issue is this is yet another example of what I call the Christian Persecution Complex (or CPC, if you like). As more groups actually call Christianity out, especially the far-right variant prominent in the U.S., on there ignorant and hateful bullshit, the proponents of the nutjob sects are starting to cry out that they are being persecuted. What is really happening is that instead of people standing by and allowing them to spew their poisonous bile as has happened for far too long in this country, the people are actually raising their voices and saying that, no, we don’t have to accept your sexist, homophobic, and all-around ignorant assertions any longer. We are going to speak out against you and all the destructive impulses you represent as an institution. Now, Christianity has to operate, not as a privileged and sacred cow impervious to attack, but in the free market of ideas, where it is subject to the same scrutiny as any other idea, and people are starting to realize just how fucked up this idea really is. Plus, in a world where anyone can Google anything from their fingertips and find out the answer to even the most mundane queries, people are starting to learn some uncomfortable truths about these religions ideologies that have held sway for so long. And these people are starting to question the basis of these ideologies. After all, there is a reason why man Christian sects want you to only read their holy texts with guidance from clergy : they don’t want you to see the ugly, vengeful man behind the curtain.
I give two shits about Kirk Cameron and his piece of medium that he chooses to call a “film”. This is a free country, and he can put out whatever tripe he wants. If some mindless morons watch it and want to artificially inflate the rating on a website, so be it. They have to live with their own stupidity. The thing I have a problem with is the furtherance of this notion that Christians are being persecuted because of their beliefs, and that they might be shipped off in boxcars to FEMA camps to concentration camps; or that they will be made to have gay sex; or that they will be forced to live under Shariah Law by some Muslim Dictator of The World. Because what this does is to minimize the suffering of the people who are REALLY persecuted in this country, mainly by these very same Christians. The LGBT community is one major target, but really anyone who has adversely affected by the very real and harmful damage done to them by Christian Fundamentalism is also a victim. All you need to do is hear some de-conversion stories from atheists coming out of religion to know what kind of emotional, mental, and physical trauma can be experienced by those who are the recipients of such abuse. It is truly horrifying. And, of course, there are also moderate Christians who do not condone these extreme practices. But they enable this behavior by not speaking up nearly enough against it. Until this country comes to grips with the people who are really persecuted, those under Christianity’s relentless dogmatic vise, it will not make any progress towards true justice.