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Kali Ramirez
Mrs. Bermudez
AP Language
April 15, 2014
Should the Duck Dynasty Reign?
The First Amendment of the United States Constitution has protected the right of
freedom of religion and expression. The Robertson family practices this right on a regular basis.
Considering the fact that their lives’ are displayed on national television, everybody can see this.
The Robertsons are a strong Christian family, and speak their mind on their show ‘Duck
Dynasty’ which has over ten million viewers each week (Yan and Ford). Being Christians and
following what the Bible says, the Robertsons believe that being homosexual is a sin and in an
interview with GQ magazine Phil Robertson expressed this belief. By doing so, Mr. Robertson
ignited an up rise and was suspended from the show.
Adam Zyglis created a political cartoon portraying this controversy, including a major
political figure Sarah Palin, who stood up for Mr. Robertson during these few weeks of negative
publicity. The cartoon shows Phil Robertson holding a sign that says “sinning gays equals
bestiality” which may seem confusing if you have not read the GQ interview. Robertson did, in
fact say something similar to this statement in the interview, but what he meant by it was that all
sin is equal, therefore being a homosexual is the same in God’s eyes as bestiality. Zyglis also
included Sarah Palin in this cartoon to show the amount of attention this controversy got. On a
fox interview Palin said she personally loves the show ‘Duck Dynasty’ and it would be illogical
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for the A&E network to further suspend the patriarch Roberson from the show. This would have
ultimately caused the fall of the show. Palin argued for Mr. Robertson’s right to have freedom of
speech and religion, and so did many other fans of ‘Duck Dynasty.’
Not only did the ‘Duck Dynasty’ fans stand up for Phil Robertson but in Yan and Ford’s
article, they wrote how his family offered to cancel the whole show if he was unable to be on the
show. The mass support for this duck hunting patriarch, grew as the controversy continued.
Along with the supporters, there were critics who believed the remarks Robertson said were
homophobic and unjustified. The NAACP wrote a letter to the president of A&E saying these
concerns. They claimed that there is nothing wrong with being homosexual and the individuals
that are LGBT do not choose to be his way. Despite these comments and pleads to have Phil
