The Steve Deace Struggle Session

Steve Deace is one of the top news commenters on the right. His podcast is generally top 20 in Conservative Inc., and there are very few in that list that are explicitly and credibly Christian. During Covid, he was one of the few established figures on the right who did not go along with the narrative, and his career was rewarded for it. Deace has built a reputation for being an idol smasher and an honest broker, but this past year the idol smashing is more facade as there is one idol Steve Deace will go woke: Zionism.

The Three-Pronged War With The Audience

The Steve Deace Show has dipped in quality in 2024, and the primary driver of that is the hosts war with the audience. The easiest example to point out is that Steve Deace announced his intentions to support Donald Trump after being one of the largest influencers backing DeSantis in the primary. He’s stated his position and his reasons, but rather than moving on, he keeps arguing with the dissenting audience members on this point.

On a more complicated issue, the cohost Todd Erzen, a Papist, has increasingly had a one-dimensional attack on the audience, men in general, for being “too comfortable” hating anonymous accounts, and forms of escapism (while praising Caitlin Clark). Erzen has also become increasingly antagonistic towards Protestants, including past guests who espoused basic Protestant distinctions.

And then there’s the disdain for the Dissident Right. Steve Deace’s theology has generally been eclectic. Steve Deace counter-signaled “Christ Is King.” He attacked Protestia after a long period of time praising and using their work as Calvinists who believe anyone outside of MacArthur’s world isn’t saved. And he’s reiterated a staunch support for Zionism. One has to conclude going to an egalitarian multicampus megachurch has something to do with the current behavior.

The Struggle Session

In the most recent struggle session, Steve Deace goes on a 13 minute rant denouncing Candace Owens for her views and all who hold similar views as “demonic.” Being less familiar specifically with Owens’s views, its worth noting that these are rehashed points he’s made in prior struggle sessions where he pandered lectured the right on antisemitism akin to the liberals lecturing the right on racism.

Steve Deace compares Candace Owens to Blaire White, drawing an equivalency between antisemitism (a liberal buzzword) and transgenderism. He argues that those who question official narratives be summarily dismissed, citing the Patristics’ dismissals of Gnostic heresies. Quite a few of these same Patristics, John Chrysostom and Justin Martyr, would be considered demonic by Deace’s broad standard.

Deace, wrongly, argues that October 7 was the beginning of the current wave of antisemitism, ignoring the ongoing trend or meme of “noticing.” Deace strawman the opposing side as believing a Zionistic cabal with Benjamin Netanyahu at the helm, to knock it down by pointing out the Democrats refusal to listen to him speak.

Deace is lost on history here. Although Zionism is a Jewish political force, it’s not the only one. The other has had multiple names, Bolshevism, internationalism, etc. This force is the primary one inside the Democrat Party whereas Zionism embodies the Republicans.

Winston Churchill, several times, refers to a type of Jew as international or Bolshevik while arguing for Zionism. Steve Deace would hardly accuse Winston Churchill of antisemitism even though he noticed the disproportionate impact of Jews in communism.

In the recorded conversation between President Richard Nixon and Billy Graham, it is actually Billy Graham who goes harder on the noticing. Both Nixon and Graham argue that the behavior of Jews is giving rise to antisemitism and they talk about how to convince Jews to get their act together. Billy Graham brings up the Jewish connection to the pornography industry and drops the term “Synagogue of Satan.” This, too, is antisemitic and was received as such by modern audiences. However, there was no actual hatred for Jews in their words. They just noticed.

Noticing is ultimately what Steve Deace refuses to do, the idol he’s unwilling to smash. He refuses to notice just how much of the Biden Administration is Jewish, especially the key cabinet positions. This would wreck the heretical theology that presupposes that Jews and Christians worship the same god, which he seemingly believes.

In closing Steve Deace makes the mistake of asking when has mainstreaming antisemitism ever worked out. He’s apparently never heard of the Spanish Reconquista which expelled non-Christians from Spain coinciding with the Spanish Golden Age. Nor has he heard of the First Crusade which was not friendly to Jews and Muslims alike. And of course, there’s Rome, where the sacking of Jerusalem was followed by its greatest expansion.

What’s remarkable is that Steve Deace refused to go woke for Black people but will go woke for Jews. There are many such cases in Conservative Inc, and people are noticing.