Rachel Held Evans Responds to Rev. Mike Huckabee's Defense of Trail of Tears: White Male Christian Leaders Pounce on Her

Hard to believe there are some like @GovMikeHuckabee who see the Trail of Tears as a bright spot in American history. https://t.co/4M9xEa8mJU

— Rachel Held Evans (@rachelheldevans) March 16, 2017

Trail of Tears went through my hometown. There are markers. @GovMikeHuckabee's nostalgia for that event is evil. He is no follower of Jesus.

— Rachel Held Evans (@rachelheldevans) March 16, 2017

Rachel Held Evans made the preceding two tweets yesterday after Southern Baptist minister Reverend Mike Huckabee had tweeted that he hoped Mr. Trump would treat the ruling of Judge Derrick Watson putting a hold on his anti-Muslim travel ban the same way Andrew Jackson treated the Supreme Court ruling declaring the eviction of the Cherokees from their homes unconstitutional. The result of Jackson's defiance of the Supreme Court was the Trail of Tears, on which some 4,000 of 15,000 Cherokees forcibly removed from their land and homes died.

When Rachel Held Evans made the two tweets above, several men — straight white men, Christian leader-type men — jumped all over her. Here are some reflections I've just shared on Facebook about what I witnessed as I saw what Rachel Held Evans had to deal with from these men on Twitter:

I saw very clearly yesterday — all over again — what many women put up with online, when Rachel Held Evans tweeted her honest assessment of Mike Huckabee's remarks about Andrew Jackson and the Trail of Tears.

Several men — "liberal" Christian white males — jumped all over her for what she said. They tried to silence her, to discipline her, to shame her.

And they used rubrics like "love" and "tolerance" as they did so, abusing Christian language to blunt her necessary, valuable critique of a white male Christian leader who, as she said plainly, betrays the Christian gospel by defending the indefensible.

I saw. I saw this happening to her. I see this happening routinely to women online.

And the inability of far too many straight white male Christian leaders and gurus to turn the critical focus on themselves and begin to see and deal with their unmerited power and privilege as straight white men: deeply disturbing. And repulsive — a major reason many of us want nothing to do with the churches.