Who Cares?

That’s what a few people standing up for Porter Corn have to say in his defense.

They don’t care about his morals, they say, just his opinions. That, my friends, is a multi-faceted misjudgement, and yet, it does present a moral dilemma about letting such information go public. At least it did for me.

Morality is difficult to legislate, even in the U.S. where lawmakers try to do so. Morality is subjective, different people have different views on what’s “right” and what’s “wrong”. For some people, moral boundaries are more clearly defined than for others. Some people have grey areas, and some do not. When it comes down to it, who cares what a person does in their private life? Who cares what they do in bed, or how kinky it might be, as long as it’s legal?

There is one distinct reason why it matters in this case.

Porter Corn put the abbreviation Rev. in front of his name. He put it there, and flaunted it about as an indicator of his character. The title “Reverend” would indicate someone with upstanding morals of the Christian variety. Prostitution –using it or promoting it– is not consistent with that value set. Corn still denies his association with prostitution, therefore, he is also lying. Lying would also be inconsistent with Christian values.

How can it be proven that he is lying? The ultimate defense to slander is truth. Here's some more truth: The same AIM, Yahoo IM, and e-mail addresses, exist time and again on sites where Corn has set up accounts to talk about the Mexican truck issue. Those same names are used again on other sites where he talks about using prostitution, and helping others find it.

That’s quite the charitable mission there, Rev. Corn.

Moving on.

Say these things had existed in Corn’s past, and that he had reformed. Well, that’s possible, with the exception of his searching for “Latin girls content” earlier this year. Still, one would expect a “reverend” to explain what immoral things he might have once done, and how he has reformed-- or maybe the proper word here is “repented”. That is the point of the whole darn thing, now isn’t it?

Or maybe this is some other religion in which prostitution is completely acceptable?

Since the character presented to the readers is that of someone who not only follows Christian values, but leads others in following them, Mr. Corn should not be upset or surprised that those readers with those values are upset to find that he does not follow them himself. He should also not be surprised to find that he is discredited by his own efforts to cover that up with lies.