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do i think about this ALL THE TIME these days?
Listen, I am not saying that James Dobson is personally responsible for our authoritarian moment in the U.S.*
But I absolutely am saying that when you take a half century of religious authoritarian parenting practices in which violence and submission to authority were the foundation stones of the upbringing of several generations of people,** and simultaneously there was an entire infrastructure funded by huge amounts of money dedicated to getting those very same people*** into politics...
it is no surprise that we're currently having an authoritarian moment in the U.S. And I don't understand why everyone else isn't talking about this all the time.
*There's an upswing around the world that also has to be taken into account. And also there's always been an authoritarian streak in American culture
**For the explicitly-stated reason of undoing the cultural revolution of the 1960s and in ways that scarily reflect religious authoritarian parenting practice in Germany in the late 19th and early 20th century...
***Two of the most horrifying words in the English language are "Joshua Generation"
But I absolutely am saying that when you take a half century of religious authoritarian parenting practices in which violence and submission to authority were the foundation stones of the upbringing of several generations of people,** and simultaneously there was an entire infrastructure funded by huge amounts of money dedicated to getting those very same people*** into politics...
it is no surprise that we're currently having an authoritarian moment in the U.S. And I don't understand why everyone else isn't talking about this all the time.
*There's an upswing around the world that also has to be taken into account. And also there's always been an authoritarian streak in American culture
**For the explicitly-stated reason of undoing the cultural revolution of the 1960s and in ways that scarily reflect religious authoritarian parenting practice in Germany in the late 19th and early 20th century...
***Two of the most horrifying words in the English language are "Joshua Generation"
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"Joshua Generation" is indeed a very scary term.
It's so odd, because I can remember being entirely thrilled with Focus on the Family. Like… recently. (Okay. 20 years ago. But it feels recent.)
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Something I've observed from closely observing AIPAC is that if you're lobbying the government it's advantageous to act like you have more influence than you actually do, it both helps you fundraise and helps you actually gain influence. Obviously the christian right has more juice than AIPAC, but I still think when we talk about them as if they're running the country we're falling victim of their marketing efforts.
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1. These people would not be in power if it weren't for evangelical Christians voting as a block for them. Authoritarians need a base if they're going to take over.
2. The main infrastructure of this subculture is focused on the judiciary, lobbying, and local government (and to a lesser extent the legislature), not on the executive branch. Most of the leaders within the movement will tell you straight out that they care far less about the presidency than they do about the Supreme Court. Now, this may start to shift now that Trump has weaponized the executive branch--the focus may come to be more on that. But thus far, that has not been the case. It's a bonus when they get a Bush II in the White House, but they're just as happy to have a Trump. In fact, these people love Trump far MORE than they ever loved Bush II. It's worth grappling with why that is.
3. I am not sure you're right about USAID. Many, many evangelical Christians believe that government should not be involved in charity work--this should be left to the church and private individuals. (My own family, who are relatively moderate in many ways as far as evangelicals go, believe this.) That's even before we add in the angle of the ascendant New Apostolic Reformation movement which is explicitly isolationist. I would be interested in hearing more about why you think this, though, as I am not as familiar with USAID and there may be an angle to it that I'm not considering.
4. It's evangelical Christians who got the Dobbs decision. (And they're gunning for Obergefell.) If Trump, et al. had been in charge of that decision, it wouldn't have happened--or it would have been far down the list of things to accomplish. But 50 years of dedication to ending abortion got results, and it happened because everybody else didn't take them seriously. This infrastructure I'm talking about has hugely consequential results for individual and collective life in this country.
5. I have lived 90% of my life in the south. I'm sure things look different in blue states, but where I live, Moms for Liberty are dominating school boards, local judges are voted into office by evangelical Christians, and evangelical Christians are the ones who control local primaries. That's before we get into gerrymandering. If I lived in a blue state and hadn't grown up in this world, I would probably feel as you do. But my life experience doesn't allow me to.
if you're lobbying the government it's advantageous to act like you have more influence than you actually do, it both helps you fundraise and helps you actually gain influence.
I am sure you're right about this. But I think the danger of underestimating them is far greater than the danger of taking them too seriously. Though, as with most things, we probably need the tension of people pulling in different directions re: how to view it.
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1) Agreed, but I didn't think that's what you're arguing, and if it was then you're right but it seems to miss the bigger point. The Christian theocrats want a Christian theocracy, the Trump regime wants a secular autocracy. The Christian theocrats are not actually getting what they want even if they enabled it.
2) Okay, fine, inasmuch as some don't seek a christian theocracy imposed across America but merely the freedom to establish their own personal Gileads within America, they are gaining much more leeway right now. And this is dangerous, absolutely, and you're right to call me out in that it will affect me less living in the Northeast.
3) Bush II retooled USAID and foreign aid more generally in an evangelical direction and none of the subsequent presidents changed that much. Several of the largest USAID contractors are explicitly evangelical organizations and they've lost a massive amount already, pending lawsuits. PEPFAR is surely more popular among evangelicals than among the coastal elites, that's why even as Musk cuts it he has to pretend it was an accident and pretend he's restoring it. I'm not saying there are no reasons why they are mistrustful of USAID, but there's a huge swath of its work that is considered a form of mission, and the point is, Elon Musk doesn't care. I saw an interview with Franklin Graham after the USAID freeze where he walked this tightrope of admitting his aid group got USAID money but it wasn't a big percentage of their funding and actually we didn't want it anyway, and the whole thing made it very clear that people like him are not running the show right now and feel the need to be careful not to upset Trump, rather than the other way around.
4) This was so infuriating to me in Lavin's book, again with the lack of rigor. Trump's commitment to judges that led to Dobbs was to the Federalist Society, not to any evangelical organization. The Trump SCOTUS judges were two Catholics and whatever the hell Neil Gorsuch is (raised Catholic, currently maybe Anglican?). Lavin had a passage talking about the toxicity of evangelical purity culture and then to show how that culture affects our legal system cited to some things Leonard Leo has done- Leo is also a Catholic, and while Catholics have issues about virginity they are not the same as evangelical purity culture. She thus has to argue that there has been an evangelical-conservative catholic alliance. And she's not wrong that they align on some issues, but what it points to again is that evangelicals aren't cultural or political leaders, they're just a political base that can be bought, but which pretends that's the same as running the show. The podcast about the NAR that you linked a while back was extremely rigorous about distinguishing the way that sometimes the NAR coordinated to lobby for their interests with some effectiveness, but a lot of the time what looked like coordination was just the spread of spiritual memes, but it looked like it suggested a coordination and political reach that really wasn't there. The NAR is at most a few million people. That's a lot of people, enough to pay attention to, but not enough to run things. Evangelical Christians as a whole are a larger group but it's more heterogeneous and thus more diffuse in its impact on politics.
5) See 2. But while you're definitely right about this at the moment, I'm not sure how long it lasts. If the fascists are able to consolidate power eventually they will come in conflict with their base, because their objectives are not the same and the disdain that the fascists running the country have for sincere belief of any form is evident.
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You're right about their desires being at cross-purposes atm. But: a) the things Trump is giving them are not inconsequential. He doesn't give a damn about abortion but we still got the Dobbs decision. He knows he has to give them some things they care about if he wants them to keep voting for them. I will not be at all surprised if same-sex marriage gets overthrown in the next few years too. So they're absolutely getting some of what they want. And b) Trump's VP and a number of his closest advisors are theocrats. They're using him to set the stage for their future plans. They may or may not be successful, but they're using him as a wedge.
2. a christian theocracy imposed across America but merely the freedom to establish their own personal Gileads within America, they are gaining much more leeway right now.
Yes, I think this is a big distinction that's important. I do not think we are in danger of having a complete Christian theocracy anytime soon. I do, however, think there will be hundreds (or more) of counties across the country that start to move in that direction. Those places already to some extent exist in the inland Northwest/mountain West, there's a group of them trying to do it about an hour and a half from where my parents live and where I grew up (warning for antisemitism in that link), and it isn't just exvangelicals who are worried about it.
3. I saw an interview with Franklin Graham after the USAID freeze where he walked this tightrope of admitting his aid group got USAID money but it wasn't a big percentage of their funding and actually we didn't want it anyway, and the whole thing made it very clear that people like him are not running the show right now and feel the need to be careful not to upset Trump, rather than the other way around.
I am sure you're right about all this! Like I said, I'm not as up on USAID as I am on other things.
4. Agreed with you about the passage about purity culture and Leo. Those things should not be inflated.
but what it points to again is that evangelicals aren't cultural or political leaders, they're just a political base that can be bought, but which pretends that's the same as running the show.
I don't disagree with this, necessarily, but I'm also not sure that this distinction matters as much as you think it does. There was a substantial divide between even conservative Catholics and evangelicals until the early 2000s, but it's being erased more all the time. The dynamic I see over and over again is Catholics (Claremont types, especially) as the intellectual leaders and evangelicals the footsoldiers. There are simply not enough conservative Catholics in the US to give these conservative Catholics power, but there ARE enough right-wing Christians of all stripes to do so. The Trad Catholics are very, very smart about creating think tanks and institutes to build leaders, but they know those leaders can only get into power if they appeal to the evangelicals. They use each other, and sometimes their desires are in conflict, but more of then than not they are not. The thing I see a lot of is Trad Catholics and evangelicals doing completely different math but arriving at the same conclusions, which is basically white Christian patriarchy. If their ideas about how to arrange the world are the same, does it matter that the leaders are Catholic and not evangelical?
And it all keeps coming back to the fact that if there's no evangelical voting block, there is no Trump presidency. I'm just unsure of why that isn't scary to you.
5. If the fascists are able to consolidate power eventually they will come in conflict with their base, because their objectives are not the same and the disdain that the fascists running the country have for sincere belief of any form is evident.
This I agree with, and I think that conflict is coming. Depending on its timing, the outcomes could be very different. If Trump loses power in 2028 and actually concedes it, I definitely think the question will be whether the Republican party goes in the direction of the tech bros or in the direction of the evangelicals, and I do not know who will maintain power.
That said, watching just Musk's trajectory is watching him get closer and closer to the evangelical beliefs about how the world should be set up, just without any of the God-talk. The pro-natalism, the hatred of women and especially trans people, the nationalism...there is considerable overlap between the tech bros and the evangelicals and while I do think there will be constant power struggles between them, I won't be surprised if it doesn't all become more or less the same thing eventually in the way that two colors mix. Again, it's a case of doing different math but ending up with the same solutions. The two streams may disdain each other, but they hate everyone else so much more that I think it's entirely possible that this coalition holds together long-term. I hope I'm wrong about that though. I hope they end up ripping each other apart.