Richard Paul Evans is a New York Times bestselling author who is quite popular among Christian reading audiences for The Christmas Box, his Broken Road series, as well as his Michael Vey books which embrace conservative, faith-based themes for young readers. (He, himself, is actually Mormon.)
Lately, Evans has been facing charges of sexual misconduct toward a fellow award-winning Mormon author. The alleged incident took place at FanX, a Comic Con-like event that takes place annually in Salt Lake City. Author Shannon Hale has accused Evans of kissing, groping, and hugging her without her consent.
So, Evans granted the Salt Lake news channel KUTV an interview to presumably clear things up. Even the reporter Chris Jones said, “We expected him to maybe be contrite, maybe even offer up an apology… What we got was absolutely unexpected.”
This is what they got:
There is a movement to hurt them [men] . . . There are books written saying, again, that men should be taken out, that they should account for no more than 10% of the population. Well, that makes us men feel like the Jews in Nazi Germany.
These [#metoo] trends tend to swing too far the other way, where innocent men are being caught up into it. And we’re in a culture where right now it’s a war on men.
After the inevitable outcry, Evans later released a statement which started out okay, but ultimately compounded the problem, as he got even more specific about how men today are being treated like Jews in Nazi Germany.
That was a very poor comparison though also slightly misunderstood. I was referring to the Pre-Holocaust phase when the Jewish people were being unjustly blamed for everything that was wrong in society. Still, having met an amazing Holocaust survivor and hearing of the intense suffering he endured, I’m embarrassed for the comment and offer my sincere apology for such a stupid comparison.
So, men today are like Nazi-era Jews in Germany — but before the actual gas chambers. Very comforting.
Sidenote: Evans also thinks most racism today is directed toward white men. He told KUTV:
There’s less racism today than there was—unless it’s directed towards white men—there’s less racism today than there was in our parents’ generation.
–Joshua James
BCNN1 WP 