Recent comments from MSNBC's "The ReidOut" host Joy Reid was met with intense criticism after she likened the Taliban militant group in Afghanistan to American Republicans and conservative Christians. The 52 year old New Yorker shared her reaction to a tweet that spoke of ground zero in Afghanistan on Saturday from BBC's Yalda Hakim.
"Women in #Herat, now under Taliban control are telling me when they tried to enter the grounds of their university today they were told to go home. Schools have been shut down," Hakim wrote on Twitter. "60 percent of university students in Herat were women."
Reid then retweeted Hakim, adding that "This is the real-life Handmaid's Tale," referring to the 1985 novel "The Handmaid's Tale" by Canadian author Margaret Atwood, which details a strongly patriarchal, totalitarian state. The novel was adapted into a highly acclaimed, Emmy Award-winning television series that told the story of a dystopian post-second American Civil War society in which a totalitarian society forces fertile women to child-bearing slavery.
"A true cautionary tale for the U.S., which has our own far religious right dreaming of a theocracy that would impose a particular brand of Christianity, drive women from the workforce and solely into childbirth, and control all politics," the mainstream media host wrote on Twitter.
On Sunday, Reid broken down her comparison of the Taliban to the "religious right" in a series of tweets, in which she wrote that "whether in Afghanistan or here in the U.S., is that religious extremism, backed by a willingness to use violence to impose a particular sectarian belief system as governing law is incredibly dangerous."
According to the Christian Post, Reid shared articles that highlighted how some pro-Trump protesters who allegedly caused the January 6 riot in Washington D.C. were of Christian faith. One article was from Sojourners titled "They Invaded the Capitol Saying 'Jesus is My Savior. Trump is My President" and featuring a photo that showed a man holding up a sign that said "In God We Trust."
Another article Reid shared featured a photo of a January 6 rioter who was proudly holding a Bible. The mainstream media host also reposted a tweet from a person who claimed that the Republicans are so concerned about the wellbeing of Afghan women but are "actively working to strip women of their freedom to vote and make reproductive decisions" at home," concluding that they're "more in line with the Taliban than Democrats" when it comes to women's issues.
Conservative media watchdog NewsBusters editor Curtis Houck came to the defense of conservative Christians and Republicans like himself, writing that "I don't believe the press is the enemy of the people, but the far too many in the press (including Joy) think we're enemies of the people."
Insider reported that Republican strategist Matt Whitlock called out Reid for repeatedly comparing American conservatives to the fictional repressive religious figures in Atwood's dystopian novel, sharing screenshots on Twitter.
