Jim Bob Duggar Gloats About ’19 Kids And Counting’ Success After Anti-Gay Actions

Jim Bob Duggar and his family members try really hard to look humble and harmless on 19 Kids and Counting, but the forever-grinning patriarch couldn’t resist gloating after a petition to have his family’s show removed from TLC failed to succeed.

According to E! News, Jim Bob Duggar bragged about his show’s success during a press conference at the Booster Banquet at Hannibal-LaGrange University. Basically he said that 19 Kids and Counting is the Keeping Up with the Kardashians of TLC.

“They won’t succeed. Our show is the No. 1 show on TLC. It’s a small group creating this fuss. All it has done is give us more exposure.”

The “small group” causing the fuss included thousands of LGBT people and their supporters. After learning that Jim Bob Duggar and his family members have actively campaigned against LGBT rights, concerned citizen Jim Wissick created a petition begging TLC to quit giving the Duggars a platform to promote their discriminatory views. The Change.org petition to remove 19 Kids and Counting from the air currently has over 180,000 signatures.

During the press conference, Jim Bob also boasted about the amount of “likes” that the Duggar Family Facebook page received after news of the petition broke. The Duggar dad credited his favorite deity for blessing his family with 50,000 Facebook likes, so now God isn’t just responsible for making Kim Kardashian gain a little weight — he’s also taken a keen interest in social media, and he’s rewarding his followers with virtual thumbs up.

Jim Bob’s wife Michelle equated transgender people to child predators in a robocall begging Fayetteville, Arkansas citizens not to support an ordinance that would protect members of the LGBT community from discrimination, and the Duggars removed photos of LGBT couples from their Facebook “kissing challenge.” However, Jim Bob Duggar claims that his family is full of love for the LGBT community.

“We love everybody, but we don’t always agree with them.”

Jim Bob’s son Josh Duggar also thinks that the best way to show “love” for the gay community is by campaigning against them. Josh works for the Family Research Council, which has been designated as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center, and he actively campaigns for anti-gay rights politicians like Rick Santorum. According to Rawstory, Josh recently appeared on the FRC’s Washington Watch radio show, and he tried to explain why his family is fighting so hard to make sure that Christians have a right to discriminate against members of the LGBT community.

“We have got to stand up in love and say, ‘We’re gonna stand up for what’s right and we believe in this.'”

Josh Duggar went on to claim that he and his family are compassionate people, but their beliefs prevent them from being compassionate enough to see that members of the LGBT community deserve the same rights as everyone else.

“We still love everyone as Christ commands, we still have compassion, we still have those kinds of feelings, but we also have our convictions. We have our beliefs.”

What do you think of Jim Bob Duggar and Josh Duggar’s latest comments?

[Image via Duggar Family Facebook]