The engagement of Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce and pop star Taylor Swift has dominated the news, not only in Kansas City but across the nation. Only The Babylon Bee, however, has given readers 10 spiritual insights from the engagement (tongue in cheek, of course) as reported by Metro Voice.
“Because satire is entertaining, people are more likely to share it,” Seth Dillon, CEO of The Babylon Bee, said in an interview with Metro Voice. “When you use humor, especially when talking about big cultural or political issues or ideas that matter, you can address it in a way that is disarming. You can be critical of something you think is bad for our culture and make people see it from a perspective that highlights the absurdity. They laugh and then maybe think something about that idea that they hadn’t before.”
Dillon will be the featured speaker at the Vitae Foundation’s Kansas City Pro-Life Dinner on October 21. His willingness to find humor in topics that others are afraid to touch has gained The Babylon Bee a large and loyal following, not only from Christians but also among such secular influences as Joe Rogan and Elon Musk.
“We are not just a Christian alternative to something secularists have always done better,” Dillon said. “We are a good alternative that happens to be run by Christians.”
He saw a need for a fearless form of satire at a time when many comedians failed to see humor in the foibles of the Obama and Biden administrations and their woke agendas.
“You had so-called comedians up there going for clap-ter, the applause of affirmation,” Dillon said. “They weren’t really going for laughs but were pulling punches and preaching all of the time. That’s not funny, so anyone willing to step in and make the kinds of jokes that need to be told at the moment is going to capture a large audience, because people want to laugh at the absurdity. They want to laugh at the powerful. They want to hold the powerful accountable. If comedians are derelict in doing that, anybody who steps in and offers an alternative is going to be successful. I think the Bee just did that at the right time.”
Satire that hits the mark and makes a point is as difficult to define as it is to write.
“Explaining what makes good satire is like trying to explain a joke; you dissect it, and it dies,” he said. “It’s not easy to do or obviously, a lot of people would be doing it. You have to have the right process and the right people. We are looking for people who have an understanding of the inner workings of the church, different denominations and a Christian worldview but who also are in tune with what is going on politically. We are very ecumenical and have different views internally. but there are several common denominators.”
Satire about human life issues, while difficult to achieve, can drive home a message in a powerful way.
“It’s a tough topic, because there is nothing funny about abortion,” Dillon said. “You can’t just laugh about it. This is where satire has some layers to it. A lot of jokes we tell are aimed just at getting some laughter, but issues such as life and gender have to be treated with more delicacy and seriousness. There is a serious side of satire that people often miss, where you’re really not trying to provoke laughter. You’re trying to provoke thought, make people wince and make a point that needs to be made:”
For example, The Babylon Bee once did a joke about how an abortion pill got lost in the mail and failed to arrive on time, resulting in a beautiful baby being born.
“We have changed some people’s minds,” he said. “We got some feedback about one we did where unborn babies were disguising themselves as death-row inmates so the Democrats would want to spare them. Some people emailed to say it helped them see the abortion issue from another perspective that they had never thought of before. They started to see the inconsistency of treating the violent and the guilty as deserving of compassion but the innocent and defenseless as deserving of death. The joke helped reveal and expose that complete moral inversion.”
In much the same way, Dillion expects his upcoming talk to incorporate humor to reinforce his message about the sanctity of life.
“I will start out by telling a little bit of our story, the fight for free speech and why that matters,” he said. “We have been on the frontlines of the battle for free speech in the public square. The right to speak freely is not the most fundamental right – the most fundamental right is the right to life. But you can’t defend life or any of your other rights if you can’t speak freely. You have to defend one so you can defend the other.
“I then will transition to the primary purpose for which we use free speech, which is to push back on bad ideas. Chief among these bad ideas is the idea promoted by the pro-abortion side that not all human life is valuable, that not all of it has dignity and is worth preserving.”
Although the missions of The Babylon Bee and the Vitae Foundation may seem different at first glance, Dillon sees remarkable similarities.
“They want to understand the reasons why women seek an abortion so we can thoroughly see where the problem is and where demand is being driven from so we can address it and shape the culture, hearts and minds,” he said. “So establishing the right messaging to meet the culture where it is is vitally important. That is the work they are doing, and it ties right in with what we do in trying to promote truth to a post-truth culture. We use a different method, which is humor, but the end goal is the same.”
Learn more about The Babylon Bee and how to support its work through a premium subscription at www.babylonbee.com. The Vitae Foundation’s Kansas City Pro-Life Dinner will be held on October 21 at Fiorella’s Event Space in Overland Park. To register or explore sponsorship opportunities, visit Kansas City Pro-Life Dinner – Vitae Foundation
–Alan Goforth
