The mainstream media, epitomised by that bastion of establishment conventional wisdom, the BBC, should be careful what they wish for.
If you treat the deliberately and cunningly absurd Jacob Rees-Mogg as a loveable piece of English furniture rather than the typically ambitious politician that he is, then one day you may be shocked to find that, well, he may not be so loveable after all.
I've long argued that the BBC is not, in fact, 'left wing' (and was appalled when the former director general Mark Thompson told me that the corporation had a 'massive left wing bias') but I've reluctantly and slowly come to respect the view of several senior insiders I trust who insist that its staff are predominantly socially liberal.
How horrified, then, those liberals must be now – those influential individuals who so often picked the oh-so-amusing Old Etonian in the double breasted suit for two-ways from Westminster, and for star billing on panels and sofas in the studios – after his comments on ITV's Good Morning Britain yesterday.
The father of six, who has become so fashionable in the media in recent weeks, made it clear that he opposed same sex marriage, as well as abortion under any circumstances. Asked if that included rape, he replied: 'Afraid so.'
Front pages were cleared (even that of the popular, national freesheet 'Metro') and by this morning the media hero had become the media villain. With the view in Westminster summed up by the right-on former footballer Gary Lineker, of all people, who said Rees-Mogg's prime ministerial hopes must be 'aborted,' it was, perhaps, another scalp for what could be called the tyranny of social liberalism which in June claimed the head of the unfortunate evangelical Christian former Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron.
Jacob Rees-Mogg is entitled to his views however archaic they may be. But hopefully any plans for him to be the next PM will be aborted.
— Gary Lineker (@GaryLineker) September 6, 2017
Only the Daily Mail's Sarah Vine – married to the socially liberal and libertarian (and practising Christian) Michael Gove – stands out from the crowd today, cleverly knowing, as ever, how to please her editor as well as (some, though surely not all) her readers.
Although she made clear that she disagrees with his most recently expressed views, Vine took the chance to lavish praise on Rees-Mogg.
'I don't think any of this will damage his chances of promotion,' she wrote. 'Far too many politicians in recent years have been revealed as paper tigers, incapable of delivering the standards of intellect or the level of competence they promised. Someone who presents themselves for what they are, warts and all, is so much more appealing a proposition. Rees-Mogg represents a return to core family values, a sense of order and civilisation and above all a certain moral clarity that many people feel is distinctly lacking in modern life.'
As it happens, I violently disagree. Having never bought shares in this wildly overrated figure in the first place, I don't feel any need to defend him now, and can assert that in my view he has failed (so far) to achieve promotion from the back-benches not because of what are after all conventionally Catholic views, but because he is, well, not very capable. His late father William, the former Times editor, was in contrast very capable (and showed through his editorship that he was far from immune to societal changes, but that's another story) but as Matthew Parris has said, Jacob is merely a 'boy' who simply never got over 'a silly phase at Oxford'.
Contrasting with Vine, a more conventional and full-frontal attack came from the leader of the pack when it comes to social liberalism, Cathy Newman, who wrote in the Telegraph that the MP could set the Tories back decades.
Newman has form. She first asked Farron the famous 'Is gay sex a sin?' question for Channel 4 News in 2015, a question from which he never, in the end, escaped while leader until just after what was for him a gruelling general election campaign which saw senior (more secular) Lib Dems in despair.
And surely once again, Newman is, along with Lineker, on what will be the winning side.
For in the end, Jacob Rees-Mogg is irrelevant to the bigger picture here. Which is that, although Farron had other faults that his resignation speech portraying himself as a martyr tried to gloss over, he was surely right when he said that it is now all but impossible to hold traditional Christian views and rise to the top of British politics.
Yes, Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, David Cameron and Theresa May are all, in their own ways that should be respected, practising Christians, but ones who appear to compartmentalise their private beliefs from their views - and voting records - on public policy. Had they held more overtly traditional views, they surely would never have reached Number Ten.
You don't have to agree with Farron – or for that matter Rees-Mogg – to observe this trend, or indeed to regret it.
