ANALYSIS/OPINION:

Tyranny can arrive fast in the form of tanks and jackboots. Or it can come gradually, snuffing out liberty and replacing it with fear.

The latter is what we’re facing today, as cultural Marxists advance their doctrines and silence any dissension.

Each day brings new examples, but here are a few that show why a sleeping church and any friend of liberty had better wake up before it’s too late.

Social media giants Facebook, Twitter, Vimeo, Google’s YouTube and even Pinterest have all been caught censoring Christians and conservatives. Most of it is being done at the behest of LGBTQ activists.

If that particular issue is of no concern, consider the famous quote by once-Nazi supporter and then-foe Martin Niemoller. Various versions of the pastor’s statement have circulated, but here is the gist: “First they came for the communists, and I did not speak out — because I was not a communist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out — because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out — because I was not a Jew.

“Then they came for me — and there was no one left to speak for me.”

This past week, we learned that Amazon.com has banned books by psychologist Joseph Nicolosi, Ph.D., at the request of an LGBTQ activist who did not like Mr. Nicolosi’s theory of the origins of male homosexuality and his advocacy of reparative therapy to reduce such inclinations.

It’s part of a pattern. Last December, Amazon removed an app from Living Hope Ministries, which helps people who want to leave homosexuality. Amazon, however, has no problem carrying materials promoting every sort of sexual behavior no matter how unhealthy, even such odious practices as pedophilia (“Male Intergenerational Intimacy.”)

Joe Nicolosi was a courageous and insightful therapist. The founder and director of the Thomas Aquinas Psychological Clinic in Encino, California, and a founder and president of the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH), he died in 2017 at age 60 after a bout with a virulent strain of flu.

Over the years, Joe (he was a friend) had personally helped hundreds of men understand the nature of their sexuality and why their behavior reflected a flawed attempt to recover their masculinity. Many went on to marry and have children, something they never thought possible.

But the brave new world fashioned by LGBTQ activists and their fellow cultural Marxists must crush any hope of escape. They’ve managed to outlaw what they derisively label “conversion therapy” in 18 states, denying client self-determination and parents’ ability to get licensed counseling for troubled children. In California, where a proposed law would have banned any materials advocating counseling toward natural sexual identity (up to and including the Bible), the K-12 curriculum promotes every form of sexual activity under the sun while preventing parents from opting out their children.

The advocates of this pagan, state-blessed religion, epitomized by Drag Queen Story Hour in public libraries, are ruthlessly building a social Berlin Wall to keep everyone locked into their bizarre version of what’s acceptable. Thus, books like Mr. Nicolosi’s “A Parent’s Guide to Preventing Homosexuality” and “Reparative Therapy of Male Homosexuality: A New Clinical Approach,” have to be digitally burned. There is some resistance: A petition at change.org urges Amazon to restore the books.

It’s not only books but people who are being banned. Last week, Circles, a “three-day creative conference for graphic & UX designers, illustrators, and makers,” disinvited a church’s communications and resources director from its September conclave in Richardson, Texas.

David Roark was bounced because the Dallas-Fort Worth chapter of the American Institute of Graphic Arts announced that it would refuse to participate because the roster included someone from a church that “does not meet our standards of inclusion because of openly discriminatory policies and practices towards women and the LGBTQ+ community.”

The Village Church, as Christianity has taught for 2,000 years, believes that sex belongs only within marriage between a man and a woman. Its pastor, Matt Chandler, along with Mr. Roark, wrote the book “Take Heart: Christian Courage in the Age of Unbelief.”

The Circle’s website virtue-signals its “respect for diverse world views and experiences.” No, they don’t. Conform or else.

On Thursday, The Washington Post front page featured the New York City parade for the U.S. women’s soccer team, which won the World Cup. At the center of the photo is team captain and lesbian activist Megan Rapinoe, who used the f-word to describe what her reaction might be to a White House invitation by President Trump. Above is the headline: “Queens of the new age.”

Conversely, star defender Jaelene Hinkle, a Christian, has been ostracized for choosing not to play in a 2017 scrimmage in a rainbow jersey during gay pride month.

It’s a new age, all right. One in which darkness poses as light, and light is suppressed by darkness, all in the name of tolerance.

When Amazon founder Jeffrey Bezos took over The Post, he placed this slogan on the front-page banner: “Democracy Dies in Darkness.”

Now that Amazon is descending into censorship, we have to wonder whether Mr. Bezos, who began his empire as a bookseller, sees the irony.

• Robert Knight is a contributor to The Washington Times.

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