Family Research Council (FRC) Executive Vice President Jerry Boykin spoke at the Values Voters Summit last week, and unleashed a conspiracy-theory laden confluence of attacks that culminated with the false claim that the ACLU and the Southern Poverty Law Center are front groups for progressives working to make America into a Marxist nation. “Adolph Hitler was a progressive,” Boykin told the audience at the “Religious Hostility in America†panel. “America is moving rapidly to Marxism under the influence of these people that call themselves progressives. And their leading advocates and their leaving front groups are organizations like the ACLU and the Southern Poverty Law Center,” Boykin added, suggesting a plot to “dethrone God and to destroy capitalism,” as was Marx’s “objective.”
Below is the transcript from the video:
BOYKIN: I want you all the harken back and remember that one of the terms they used for Adolph Hitler was a progressive. I didn’t make that up, that’s historic. I want you to also realize that Karl Marx said, “religion is the opiate of the masses.” Karl Marx also said that “my objective is to dethrone God and to destroy capitalism.” I think that the people who are behind this would not call themselves “Marxists,” but I would tell you that they are following to the letter the Marxist model. America is moving rapidly to Marxism under the influence of these people that call themselves “progressives.” And their leading advocates and their leaving front groups are organizations like the ACLU and the Southern Poverty Law Center which has just recently gone after me again. So why, why is this happening, why is  Christianity singled out, because Christianity is the true light. It is the most powerful beacon of light in the world. Now when you think about the fact that we’re the only nation in history that was it was founded on the concept of inalienable rights, and then you look at the fact that what Karl Marx, Joseph Stalin, and Vladimir Lenin, as well as Hitler himself, what they wanted to do was move everyone in the society away from the notion that there is a sovereign God that provides those  inalienable rights, so that you are dependent upon the government and the people in power. What you’re seeing happen in America today is Marxism. They don’t call it that but it is Marxism and they are destroying the concept of a soverign God incrementally so that we ultimately become dependent upon government and Christianity is the most powerrful force in America, it goes back to the founding of this nation, Judeo-Christian principles, and they have to take God out of our society in order to insert government.
Josh Glasstetter at Right Wing Watch adds:
Boykin argued that progressives are attacking him, not because of his bigoted attacks on gays, Muslims, and others, but because of his Christian faith. Going further, he said that progressives, just like Marx, Stalin, Lenin, and Hitler, are leading a Marxist attack on Christianity so that God can be replaced with government.
Boykin’s analysis, if you can call it that, doesn’t seem to be grounded in any real understanding of the various ideologies, quotes and terms he throws around. From his right-wing fundamentalist perspective, Hitler may as well be Marx, a liberal atheist may as well be an Islamist, President Obama may as well be Mohammed Morsi, and a Christian who doesn’t agree with him may as well be a secular Jew.
It’s important to remember, too, that Tony Perkins claims his Family Research Council is not a hate group.