Sally Quinn & Jon Meacham spin Hume/Woods controversy as anti-Christian bias

Sally Quinn and Jon Meacham offer a one-sided and misleading summary of the Brit Hume/Tiger Woods controversy on their Washington Post “On Faith” site:

THE QUESTION

Media biased against Christians?

Fox News analyst Brit Hume said “widespread media bias against Christianity” was to blame for criticism of his suggestion that Tiger Woods should embrace Christianity to find redemption. “Instead of urging that Tiger Woods turn to Christianity, if I had said what he needed to do was to strengthen his Buddhist commitment or turn to Hinduism, I don't think anybody would have said a word,” Hume told Christianity Today. “It's Christ and Christianity that get people stirred up.”

Sarah Palin and other conservative Christians have made similar claims. Is there widespread media bias against Christianity? Against evangelicals such as Hume and Palin? Against public figures who speak openly and directly about their faith? Against people who believe as you do?

That might -- might -- have been a reasonable post had Hume merely suggested that Woods “should embrace Christianity to find redemption.” But that isn't what happened. Hume also suggested Woods' current religion is inadequate -- that's the part that upset people.

An accurate and neutral framing of the “question” of whether the media is “biased against Christians” wouldn't have adopted Hume's claim that nobody would have been upset if Hume had said Woods needed to “strengthen his Buddhist commitment.” Instead, such a framing might have asked what the reaction would be if a someone said Christianity lacks a clear-eyed, fact-based view of the world, so he should adopt atheism instead. That's directly analogous to what Hume said. And had, say, Keith Olbermann, said anything like that, there would have been a firestorm that would have made the Hume/Woods controversy look like a love-in.

In a post raising the possibility of media bias, Quinn and Meacham only demonstrate their own.