opinion

Wise up to Southern Poverty Law Center's scam

Gil Spencer is a Hyde Park resident and member of the Enquirer Board of Contributors.

For too long now respectable newspapers and other news outlets have lent credibility and succor to one of the most dishonest and unprincipled “civil rights” organizations in America.

Under the guise of identifying and fighting "extremist hate groups," the Southern Poverty Law Center has actually become one. And a rich one at that.

In recent weeks, Apple and JP Morgan have donated $1 million and $500,000, respectively, to the SPLC. Kentucky’s most famous liberal George Clooney has kicked in $1 million from his own foundation. All to help the SPLC in its self-proclaimed mission to fight “hate” in America.

“We are proud to support the Southern Poverty Law Center in its efforts to prevent violent extremism in the United States,” Mr. Clooney and his wife wrote in a statement. “What happened in Charlottesville, and what is happening in communities across our country, demands our collective engagement to stand up to hate.”

“Here, here” to that last part. But what the Clooneys think the SPLC has done to prevent “extremist violence” they don’t say exactly.

What the SPLC does do is supposedly identify and keep tabs on scary groups across the nation. Of course, there are the easy ones; like self-identified neo-Nazis groups and the Klan. But these are so roundly despised, small and insignificant that the SPLC had to expand its definition of “hate” and “extremist” to the point of ludicrousness and slander.

The Family Research Council is a non-profit group that supports and promotes traditional ideas of marriage and family. For its efforts, the SPLC designated it an “extremist” hate group deserving of condemnation.

Floyd Lee Corkins II thought it deserved even more than that. Based on the SPLC’s “hate map,” which included the FRC for its opposition to gay marriage, Corkins attacked the FRC headquarters in Washington D.C.

He shot and wounded a security guard before being subdued and arrested. He directly named the SPLC as his inspiration for the assault.

Corkins was convicted of domestic terrorism in 2011 and locked up.

But the violence inspired by left-wing groups like the SPLC continues to grow. The violent Antifa “movement” is a natural outgrowth the SPLC’s dire warnings against real and imagined right-wing extremists.

But, at least, this much can be said of Antifa fanatics, they are less cynical and money-grubbing than the SPLC.

Karl Zinsmeister has written the ultimate take-down of the SPLC for the Philanthropy Roundtable, pointing out that the organization spends far less money on fighting hate and legal services for the poor than it does on its fund-raising and “propaganda operations.”

Liberal journalist Ken Silverstein has been on to the SPLC since the year 2000.

“Today, the SPLC spends most of its time – and money – on a relentless fund-raising campaign, peddling memberships in the church of tolerance with all the zeal of a circuit rider passing the collection plate,” Silverstein wrote in Harper’s back then.

And the group has gotten much worse in the 17 years since.

The Atlantic’s Megan McArdle most recently felt the need to call out the SPLC for “lumping together principled conservatives with bigots.”

For instance, the SPLC has labeled respected sociologist Charles Murray a “white supremacist” for his work on how America is creating a cognitive elite that is leaving millions of less gifted people behind.

Also smeared by the SPLC is Somali-born Ayana Hirsi Ali for her strong views about the horror of fundamentalist Islam.

As a black woman, former Muslim, and self-described feminist, she has earned the right to speak from experience about the brutality of the large and growing Islamist movement.

For her trouble (and bravery) she has been labeled an “anti-Muslim extremist,” by the SPLC. All for telling the truth about the violent jihadists who murdered her friend Danish filmmaker Theo Van Gogh and who have threatened to murder her as well.

Dozens of other groups and individuals have been so slimed as haters and bigots by SPLC staffers for the crime of holding religious or political views that differ from their own.

It’s time for the broader media to wise-up to this scam. And to call it out for what it is: a con game designed to promote fear and guilt and to separate gullible white people from their hard-earned money.