What’s with all the Olympic pearl-clutching from leaders in the state known for Mardi Gras?

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Here’s a newsflash for the culturally challenged: Some of the French are really creative, to the point that one might consider them strange. And that’s OK. 

This shouldn’t come as much of a surprise or offense to those of us from Louisiana, where our heritage is drenched with French origins like remoulade on crab cakes. We celebrate our uniqueness in ways that will likely have future archeologists scratching their heads.

Take, for instance, grown men riding horses through town, enjoying libations while chasing an unlucky chicken for the annual Courir de Mardi Gras. 

And where else but Louisiana do people celebrate the Shrimp and Petroleum Festival (that’s in lovely Morgan City, if you haven’t been)? 

Zwolle tamales, anyone? 

C’est la vie, non? 

In this context, reactions from a couple of Louisiana leaders to the Olympic opening ceremony — in which drag performers staged a tableau that they argue resembled DaVinci’s “The Last Supper” painting — are difficult to grasp.

For the record, Olympic organizers say the performance was an homage to Dionysius, the god of wine and pleasure in the Greek tradition from whence the Olympic games were born.   

But when you consider the hard right religious turn Republican politics has taken, you begin to understand why some elected officials seized on the ostentatious ceremony to preach to their choirs of sanctimony.

“Last night’s mockery of the Last Supper was shocking and insulting to Christian people around the world who watched the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games,” U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-Bossier City, wrote on X. “The war on our faith and traditional values knows no bounds today. But we know that truth and virtue will always prevail. ‘The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.’ (John 1:5)”

Last night’s mockery of the Last Supper was shocking and insulting to Christian people around the world who watched the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games.

The war on our faith and traditional values knows no bounds today. But we know that truth and virtue will always… pic.twitter.com/s88c9ymG9j

— Speaker Mike Johnson (@SpeakerJohnson) July 27, 2024

Apparently, Johnson’s “traditional values” includes his philosophical embrace of Elon Musk, with whom he posted a photo of himself on X a day later.

“Among the many important visitors on Capitol Hill this week was one of the most brilliant minds of our time,” Johnson wrote in reference to Musk.

This is the same Elon Musk who has fathered 12 children with three women. That’s seven more kids with the same number of mothers as former President Donald Trump, whom Musk has endorsed in the 2024 election.  

Hey, no judgment here, Don and Elon. We’d certainly love to hear the speaker declare his support for non-traditional families. It could be argued that they fit Johnson’s definition of “individual freedom” as listed in his “7 Core Principles of Conservatism.”

But where we’re more likely to see Johnson and Musk in lockstep is when it comes to their views on taking away the rights of LGTBQ+ people. Both have made no secret of where they stand here.

Before his political career, Johnson provided attorney services to now-defunct Exodus International and partnered with the organization to hold an annual anti-gay event for teens, CNN reported. Exodus once actively supported conversion therapy, a discredited practice of trying to eliminate same-sex attraction.   

Also, Johnson and his wife Kelly operate a business, Onward Christian Counseling Services, through which they have likened gay relationships to incest and bestiality, according to the Huffington Post.     

As for Musk, his 20-year-old daughter, Vivian Jenna Wilson who is transgender, last week described him to NBC News as an absent father who was cruel to her as queer, feminine youth. Wilson’s comments were in response to reported remarks from Musk that she was figuratively “dead” and that he had been “tricked” into supporting her transgender medical care when she was 16.

Given this anti-LGBTQ common ground between Johnson and Musk, it makes sense that state Rep. Gabe Firment jumped on the virtual coattails of the speaker’s Olympic outrage. 

“Thanks @SpeakerJohnson for publicly condemning the blasphemous perversion at last night’s Olympics opening ceremony,” Firment said in his repost of Johnson’s comments. “I’m waiting for prominent state Democrats to join him.”

Thanks @SpeakerJohnson for publicly condemning the blasphemous perversion at last night’s Olympics opening ceremony. I’m waiting for prominent state Democrats to join him….#lalege https://t.co/n9RRG8T5ia

— State Representative Gabe Firment (@FirmentGabe) July 27, 2024

It’s understandable if Democrats don’t jump to meet Firment’s challenge. 

You’ll recall it was Firment that sponsored legislation in 2023 to ban gender-affirming health care to transgender minors in Louisiana. The Republican-majority Legislature voted to override the veto of then-Gov. John Bel Edwards, a Democrat, to make Firment’s proposal law.

What’s really a “perversion” is the tendency for Firment, Johnson and other conservatives to cite Bible verses in their own convenient context and wave the flag of Christianity with such prominence. 

Their actions as leaders are in complete contrast to Jesus’ commandment, as written in the Gospel of John (13:34): “that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.”

And yes, gentlemen, Jesus meant you must even love those freaky French folks.

So until jumping on your high horse becomes an Olympic event, “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone …”