The Martyrdom of Mark Elrod

All of us here at Politics & Culture are crying a river of tears over Mark Elrod’s announcement that he will be making his blog private. He and all his cronies are lamenting the fact that he is pretty much being forced to do this because his employer (Harding University) is so close-minded. All his disciples are also doing their best to kiss his butt in an effort to be invited to his new private blog.

In all this, Elrod is trying very hard to play the martyr. But as they say in his part of the country, “That dog won’t hunt.”

He works at a Christian university that is conservative theologically and politically. Did he really think he could publicly endorse things like gay marriage in such an environment with no repercussions? Of course not. He knows what he’s doing — he’s stroking his own ego, trying to make the Harding University administration look bad, and perhaps even setting himself up for another job elsewhere.

I’ll bet that Facebook groups like “Free Mark Elrod” and “Stop Censorship at Harding” are already being formed. We were going to comment on his post today, but alas, Politics & Culture was banned from his blog a while back. So much for “dissent in a public forum.”

The good people over at The Moratorium Site will be weighing in on The Martyrdom of Mark Elrod later today.

Stay Tuned!

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Update: Burt Hollandsworth, Assistant Professor of Chemistry at Harding University, made this brilliant observation regarding The Martyrdom of Mark Elrod: “I’m moving to China. There’s more freedom of speech there than in Searcy”

Update 2: Elrod removed the Trackback to this blog post from his comment section.  I guess I over-estimated his ability to deal with critical thinking or dissent in a public forum.