I see that Andrew Sullivan has been sucked into a war of the words against the self-annointed net-nanny Ann Althouse and self-styled libertarian Glenn Reynolds over the term Christianist. Says Glenn:
I continue to think that the term draws an unfair equivalence between Islamist terror, and mere Christian social conservatism, which are hardly comparable. I disagree with the latter, but those people aren’t the enemy, just people with whom I disagree.
I am not sure why he continues to think that, as Sullivan has pretty clearly explained what he means by the term:
I should underline that the term Christianist is in no way designed to label people on the religious right as favoring any violence at all. I mean merely by the term Christianist the view that religious faith is so important that it must also have a precise political agenda. It is the belief that religion dictates politics and that politics should dictate the laws for everyone, Christian and non-Christian alike.
Of course, when dealing with Althouse and others, I have learned it doesn’t matter what you actually say, it is what they think you have said and what they can convince their legions of air-headed readers/yes-men what you have said. It really doesn’t matter that Sullivan is not talking about rank and file Christians, but rather the folks who think that the government’s primary role is instilling and maintaining morality in the populace.
Andrew
If Althouse and Reynolds combined genetic material in a laboratory, their offspring would make Darrell look like Einstein.
Can you imagine?
“I’m a libertarian! You’re sexist! Heh. Glue tastes yummy!”
neil
People read Althouse and Reynolds for the same reason they listen to Rush Limbaugh: To be lied to with consistency. I mourn anyone who goes into that morass looking for intellectually independent opinion, although I doubt there are too many of these seekers who haven’t caught on yet.
RSA
Here’s what Wikipedia has to say about “Islamism”:
If you substitute Christian equivalents for Islamic terms, I think it’s a pretty clear and correct description of a social conservative political movement within the U.S., even down to the objections of some within the movement.
rilkefan
Word formation and interpretation isn’t entirely arbitrary – Sullivan can’t use a neologism to mean whatever the heck he feels like (imagine I coined “reynoldsisameathead” as an adjective which I insisted means “smart and debonair”). Those idiots arguing with him have a point. On the other hand, they don’t get to decide what “Islamist” means either.
srv
The irony is that Glenn and Ann repeatedly conflate Islamist and terrorist throughout their posts (as Sully has shown). Sullivan never calls any Christianist terrorists (w/o explicitly identifying McVeigh, etc), but brilliant Glenn and Ann presume the connection.
It speaks more to their corrupt world view and inability to read a paragraph w/o tripping all over themselves.
SomeCallMeTim
I disagree with the latter, but those people aren’t the enemy, just people with whom I disagree.
It’s worth remembering that Reynolds is a full Red, a law professor who was comfortable voting for an Administration that claimed the right to lock up an American citizen indefinitely without a fair hearing, and that he comes from a region that, for all its claims of patriotism, was the seed bed of the great act of treason in American history. His interests and American interests may be quite different, and his assessment of the danger various groups present to the US might be quite different from that of most actual Americans. So, you know, who the fuck cares what he thinks?
Note also that the “Christianists” (or “American Taliban,” if that’s the preference) even assuming less troubling intent, have the significant advantage of actually being here in huge numbers. If the US ends up with a substantial and long-term problem with terrorism, it will be because of the McVeighs, not the Muslims.
rilkefan
Hilarious.
Refers to this.
Zifnab
But that’s the big joke. We’ve put Timmothy McVeigh in charge of the US Government. The Taliban didn’t strap bombs to their chests when they were running Afganistan. Bathists didn’t start joining the militias until after Saddam fell. The extremist don’t get really extreme until they start losing. Notice how much domestic terrorism we had under Clinton? Compare that to Bush. When “evil liberals” start running the country again, I bet you’ll see a marked increase in people trying to rapture themselves and office-buildings full of government officals a bit early.
Tulkinghorn
pre-emptive terrorism, like the anthrax letters sent to Democrats and certain journalists, should not be forgotten.
Anthrax letters are terrorism, right?
John Cole
Considering Sullivan’s opponents have co-opted, bastardized, and redefined the terms patriotism, interrogation, conservatism, and dozens of others, I would argue that they are on even shakier ground when it comes to telling him what he means when he uses the phrase ‘christianist.’
neil
Add “anti-war” to the terms that Reynolds has redefined.
Bombadil
Since the Republicans loved to point out that, while they were in power, “there were no terrorist attacks on American soil” after 9/11, apparently they were not terrorism. Or were conveniently forgotten.
MattM
“It really doesn’t matter that Sullivan is not talking about rank and file Christians, but rather the folks who think that the government’s primary role is instilling and maintaining morality in the populace.”
To be fair, the latter probably describes a significant percentage of Evangelicals. Which is probably why Reynolds and Althouse get so nervous when people start pointing it out.
jg
I’m just glad that JC is finally seeing these people for what they really are. When he was on their side he couldn’t see it but now the light is on.
They can’t think for themselves, for various reasons, and let trusted sources tell them how to feel about current events. I wish they understood that the job of the right wing ‘news’ was to influence, not inform.
cleek
Anthrax letters are terrorism, right?
yes, even the fake ones mailed by Freepers.
see USA PATRIOT sec. 802
Jay
Yeah. Clearly he has never heard an abortion clinic go BOOM. Or even stood outside a Planned Parenthood when the fetus defedning freak show is in full swing. And has he ever heard of Fred Phelps and his brood? These inbred SOBs get all squishy-pants when an IED blows up under a soldier and then try to disrupt their funerals. If those guys aren’t on NSA’s Bastards to Watch list, I’d like to know why.
And a glance back through history at some of the things people have done in the name of Christ shows…Holy Crap! [Urp, Puke]. Yeah, there are some sick mofo’s clutching Bibles on the loose.
I would think the “real” Christians would appreciate a separate term. Not too long ago the Washington Post ran a whiny and wildly inaccurate column about how it wasn’t fair to paint all Evan. Christians as spit flinging bigots. Boo frickin hoo. Why not denounce the the loons in your midst? Tell Dobson and his ilk to take a hike. But that’s not what the Christianists want. They just don’t want to be called on it while they make a determined power grab.
They started out playing coy: But we’re just lil’ ol’ Christians, how can we want to do anything bad? And when that didn’t work they started flashing their fangs: You’re a sinner if you don’t agree with us.
Next step could easily be: God told me to smite the Capitol with several pounds of HEX.
Krista
Oh, SNAP!
Nicely put, John.
Pb
Jay,
That’s why there are many terms at work here… Christians, Christianists (also see ‘Dominionists’), and Christian fascists (or Christofascists, if you prefer). Break out the Venn diagrams, baby!
Matt
You know, I actually like Althouse, and when Glenn Reynolds bothers to post his own thoughts (rather than engaging in some passive-aggressive link/quote circle jerk), I find him fairly reasonable. But on this issue–like so many others, unfortunately–they’re way off.
I’m not going to say that Sullivan has been entirely consistent in his use of the word, but he’s been pretty clear about its meaning, and the conventions of our language, I tend to think, support his definition more than it does the “it means Christians cut peoples’ heads off!” crowd’s.
rilkefan
Just saying they’re having the argument on the wrong grounds – it doesn’t matter much what Sullivan says he means, it matters what the word means to a sensible informed reader. RSA‘s comment above ought to settle the issue. The problem for Reynolds and Althouse is they want to use “Islamist” as shorthand for “Islamic terrorist”.
Kimmitt
Again, why would one bother to read Andrew Sullivan, Glenn Reynolds, or Ann Althouse?
cleek
it matters what the word means to a sensible informed reader
the author of this CS Monitor article figured it out, a year ago:
and, here is Sullivan back in May 2006:
he’s pretty clear about what he’s saying. and it even sounds like he thinks he made up the word. if people can’t be bothered to figure out what he’s actually saying, instead of what they hear, F’em.
jg
The sensible informed reader isn’t looking to Ann or Glen to decipher the meaning behind Sully’s use of the term. Its the reactionary idealogues that look to people and places for understanding. The sensible informed reader understands how writers use words to provoke a reaction, to make you think. The sensible informed reader sees a word like ‘christianist’ and their critical thinking skills kick in. These critical thinking skills will lead the sensible informed reader to the conclusion that christianity, like islam, can be used as a tool by the powerful to achieve an end. Ann and Glen don’t want people to see that. Its contrary to the goal to allow people to come to their own conclusions. They only want people to know that islam is bad and christianity is good so they must attack anyone who isn’t clearly and loudly stating that islam is bad and christianity will save this country. Its the same shit the party did with the torture debate. They shifted the focus off the facts of the issue onto the people making the arguments and divided them up into patriots and non. Who wants to hear from a terrorist coddling, islam loving, america hater anyway?
alex
thanks for telling me why i listen to Limbaugh and read Reynolds….do i take this to mean that the people who read your blog are the same people that listen to Al Franken and Michael Moore??
norbizness
You listen to Limbaugh! Lame!
Bombadil
For the most part, yeah. And we’re smarter than you for it.
SeesThroughIt
Game, set, and match to Glenn Greenwald.
Sherard
Oh please, John. I don’t care what Sullivan CLAIMS the definition of his new term “Christianists” is, it is way too much coincidence that it mirrors the terrorist murdering term for Islamic Fascists – Islamists. It’s nothing more than a rhetorical wordplay to equate those opposed to Sullivan’s ONLY ISSUE – gay marriage – to murdering terrorists.
You act as if Sullivan actually wants to engage in honest debate when anyone with a pulse knows that he (much like you) is as intellectually dishonest as they come. For Sullivan the logic is simple – Bush is against gay marriage, gay marriage is the only issue on earth that matters, therefore Bush = evil and anyone remotely supporting Bush is coincidently evil and wrong.
In fact, my personal opinion is that this whole “Christianist” flasp is so intentionally misleading, that Sullivan is probably getting quite a chuckle out of fellow BDS sufferers like yourself taking up his cause. At least he knows he’s being dishonest about it, but you actually argue as if he is being genuine. Pretty funny, actually.
Here’s a good analogy: I can tell you I think this blog is just TERRIF!, but I think (at least I hope) you and Tim are smart enough to know that the truth is otherwise.
Oh, and BTW, Glenn is right. Even though I disagree with the so-called “Christianists” it is still their right to advocate for whatever laws they wish. If that is up to and including Christian value driven puritanical laws for everyone, that’s their perogative. It will never happen, but if they want to advocate for it, more power to them.
Bombadil
Shorter Sherard: “Screw your facts! This straw man is much easier to knock down!”
SomeCallMeTim
You can’t reason with the Reds like Sherard, John. You can only identify them and hope that they aren’t able to harm our country too much.
cleek
Oh please, John. I don’t care what Sullivan CLAIMS the definition of his new term
if you’d take your fingers out of your ears, you wouldn’t have to shout.
Sherard
Also, “Seesthroughit” channeling sockpuppet Greenwald could not be more wrong. The GOP is NOT dominated by group #2. That is preposterous. Anyone that would argue in favor of that position is, frankly, a fucking moron. The VAST majority of people in this country are lucky to make to church at all, on both sides of the political spectrum. There is a vocal minority that could be considered group 2, and a number of elected Republicans are fond of catering to that group. But to characterize a majority of republicans as “those who seek to have their religious beliefs dictate politics and law” is laughable.
And for many who actually take Islamic terrorism seriously, Islamist = Islamofascist. What Sock Puppet refers to as group 2 in the Islamic faith is so small as to be insignificant. There are Muslims and there are Islamofascists.
Zifnab
Thank God Sherad didn’t… you know… read Sullivan’s posts (or apparently even Reynolds or Althouse), in which each of them seem to agree to define “Islamists” as people with a faith-based political intent. Not as people who blow themselves up in market districts. I was worried Sherad might be posting an informed opinion.
Bombadil
Shorter Sherard: “I reject your reality and substitute one of my own.” (Sorry, Adam.)
Krista
I’m happy for you that you’re so confident that it would never happen. But there was an extremely close call in South Dakota, thank you very much. I truly think you’re minimizing the influence and determination held by those who would happily replace your Constitution and Bill of Rights with the Bible, as the guiding document by which to run the country.
Jay
For
SullivanChristianists the logic is simple – Bush is against gay marriage, gay marriage is the only issue on earth that matters, therefore Bush =evilannointed by God and anyone remotelysupportingdisagreeing with Bush is coincidently evil and wrong.You’re welcome.
capelza
Not me!
I don’t know why this is such a hard concept for people to grasp. I agree that because people like Reynolds and Althouse have conflated the term Islamist with terrorists, they must squirm when the term Christianist is used, because they assume that people using it are also conflating. Projection.
Zifnab
That one world seems to perfectly encapsulate the Republican Party.
Ellison, Ellensburg, Ellers, and Lambchop
Do you guys realize that there was a country called the United States of America before abortion was legalized, right? And it wasn’t a Gulag Concentration Camp Religionist Terror Zone at all.
If only FDR knew what a fascist, Christianist state he was running, he’d — well, he’d actually be pretty OK with it, I’m guessing.
Bombadil
If I were a projectionist, I’d be offended by that.
Richard 23
Sherard: Good DAY, sir!
Ben
Okay… the GOP LEADERSHIP is dominated by Christianists because they believe pandering to them will give them political capital. The rest of you are just dimwitted enablers.
Krista
Exaggerate much?
The country also existed while slavery was legal, and it existed while women didn’t have the vote and wasn’t, as you hysterically put it, a “Gulag Concentration Camp Religionist Terror Zone.”
It doesn’t mean that it was the ideal state of affairs either now, does it?
Ellison, Ellensburg, Ellers, and Lambchop
Sorry, I thought it was your “hysterical” argument that the South Dakota decision would “happily replace your Constitution and Bill of Rights with the Bible.” It must’ve been some other Krista. My mistake.
rbl
Of course you would say that, the Democrat Party is full of people who call their opponents whatever they themselves are.
Mike
The Christian Right Is Neither.
Zifnab
Except
it was
Abortion is kinda a big step back. And there’s a reason it couldn’t even pass in South Dakota, where it supposedly should have had a rampant bible-thumping support. People don’t want to give up abortion for the same reason that they don’t want to give up their automobiles or their cigerettes. It’s a convinence, sometimes a hazardous, questionable convinence, but for many people a very necessary and important one.
capelza
I was somewhere on the web yesterday and saw a quote from Pat Robertson basically calling Episcopalians the antichrist. I can’t find it now. Anyone familiar with it?
I wonder what he would say about HH’s Evangelical Roman Catholic Presbyterianism?
These people are Christianists..just to keep on topic.
Tax Analyst
Having read Sullivan on a fairly regular basis for at least a year now I can tell you that he has been very clear about separating “ordinary” Christians from the folks he considers “Christianists”. Folks here have already delineated the differences so I won’t repeat them. But he been VERY CLEAR about who he is referring to. As to the remark that “all he talks about is gay marriage”, that is patently false. I do believe gays should have equal rights – including marriage, but it’s not a predominant issue with me…perhaps it should be – it does have the earmarks of “injustice” and I am decidedly against injustice. But anyway, I tend to skip a lot of those posts. I agree, but they don’t resonate enough to call me to action. He HAS consistently voiced an opposition to torture and called the current Administration to account for itself – and he was doing it while a lot of other folks were still wetting a finger and sticking it in the air to see which way the wind was blowing. I don’t agree with him in several areas, but I respect his candor and commitment to honesty and his willingness to speak out. He’s also, in my opinion, a very interesting writer.
Pb
Ok, who’s writing ‘Sherard’ this week…
Anyone with a pulse knows that no one can really be this stupid… at least not honestly… or seriously…
…right? Please?
Pb
Tax Analyst,
Agreed. I used to read his blog too, and for the same reasons, more or less. He also had some very good posts on Hurricane Katrina at the time. Maybe one day I’ll check out his book (perhaps after I maybe one day check out Glenn Greenwald’s book…)
John Cole
It is so much easier to ignore Sherard when he doesn’t even bother to read what he wants to argue about.
Since reading is obviously kicking his ass, I will do this short and sweet:
Islam is not equal to Islamist is not equal to Islamofascist
Christian is not equal to Christianist is not equal to ….
Regardless, Christianist does not equal Islamofascist, anyway.
Zifnab
Perhaps Sherad is just dividing by zero.
John D.
You know, a course in remedial reading might help.
“Islamist” does not mean “Islamic terrorist”, so “Christianist” does not mean “Christian terrorist”. The awkward neologism “Islamofascist” means “Islamic Fascist”. You’d think the changing of only one syllable would not be too much for you to handle, but I guess not.
Perry Como
How about Islamofascikingzarkonnazicommieists? It rolls off the tongue.
RSA
“Holy shit, these are like the analogies that kicked my ass on the SATs.”
Pooh
Ah, so that’s were we went wrong…
Jay
capelza:
Found it here. Warning: This link will take you to a number of quotes by PRobertson. Cover your keyboard in plastic so you don’t gum up the works with puke.
I have to wonder, if things go as the Fundamentalists want (rapture, Heaven as exclusive country-club, the rest of us decorating pitch forks) how long it would take before they got bored? “You mean there aren’t any sinners for us to pick on? What Hell-Cam? Can we watch them writhe in firey torment? No? Well this sucks!”
rilkefan
On Sullivan’s intellectual honesty, he links to more race-difference crap from Charles Murray today. Sully says the white/black test score gap “isn’t going away”, even though there’s a paper at his link from Flynn (of Flynn effect fame) showing a decrease in the IQ gap over time. Maybe it’s just intellectual deficiency instead of dishonesty, but geez.
Ellison, Ellensburg, Ellers, and Lambchop
Huh? It was? Funny, I don’t recall horrific tales of “Gulag America 1959” from the history books, but if you say so… It’s amazing that our ancestors lived through such horrors!
I’m not sure which is more odd, the lynching statistic that for somewhat suspicious reasons lumps together Reconstruction-era and Civil Rights-era lynchings (when only 0.5% of lynchings occurred post-WWII) or your misguided attempt to link lynchings and blacklisting to Roe v. Wade. I mean, even if Roe v Wade were reversed, it’s not like there will be a return to lynchings and character assassinations (except if they’re gay Republicans, of course).
Again, I have to wonder at the deification of FDR and JFK if they were just the Bible-thumping leaders of a Christianist fascist state where most abortions were illegal and some people were racists or virulent anti-Communists!
Tulkinghorn
No, I was not aware of that, because this argument is historically false. Not just slanted, or mischaracterized, but flat out, straightforwardly, simply wrong. As in ‘right or wrong’, if you are familiar with the concepts.
If googling is so hard, at least check wikipedia or something. Anything.
Pooh
I believe that it is more commonly known as the Balloon Juice variety of Jackalope.
chopper
what the hell is the “democrat party”?
Mike
E.E.E.L,
If you would please take a few minutes and Google “history books sanitized” and read some of the results, you would hopefully begin to understand that our kids textbooks, perhaps some of the ones you seem to have used, have only told the “good parts” of our history, and either removed or glossed over the “bad parts”.
Here is a good site which I found by searching for the above terms which clearly illustrates examples of the differences in the way history has been taught, using Christopher Columbus as the subject.
I know that history is written by the winners, and there will be a natural tendency by any society to do it “for the children” or whatever bullshit reason they came up with at the time, but it is a tendency that must be fought against, vigorously, actively, or that society is doomed to fail.
BlogReeder
I’m confused by what you’re saying. Are you saying we should only tell the “bad parts” to our children? That’s what we have liberals for! They are today’s Puritans. Think of something good, anything, and you can be sure there is a liberal somewhere that’s against it. Boy, even history.
Mike, your link seems to be broken. So I googled “History is a Weapon” and was disappointed. Go here instead. The future is full of promise.
SeesThroughIt
Which parts of history are you denying, BlogReeder? Mike’s link talks about the genocide Christopher Columbus perpetrated upon the Arawak Indians, for example. Are you denying that it happened? Or are you denying that it gets sanitized from high-school history?
Ellison, Ellensburg, Ellers, and Lambchop
What exactly do you think I’d be surprised by? I can guarantee you that the answer is: “Nothing.”
CaseyL
This should be so obvious it doesn’t even need to be pointed out, but apparently it does need to be pointed out:
The US during the 18th and 19th Centuries was a very different place from today: if people didn’t like the laws they lived under, they could pack up and go to a semi-sovereign state or territory whose laws suited them better, or go to the frontier and create their very own independent communities. (That was less true for slaves and indentured servants, of course, but not wholly untrue: escaped slaves and indentured servants who made it to the territories or to the Wild Wild Wests were as free as anyone else.)
Why do you think so many people wanted – dreamed, ached, schemed and saved for years and years – to go West? Because they liked deprivation, terror, heatstroke, freezing, dying of thirst or hunger, getting lost, getting eaten, getting caught between warring tribes and US soldiers?
Jeez.
Well, now there’s no more frontier, no more semi-autonomous territories, no place left to go to carve out one’s own piece of Heaven. Now, we have to get along with one another whether we like it or not.
The wall between Church and State was created by people very, very aware that their ancestral homelands fought religious wars for centuries; that putting Church and State together is quintessentially tyrannical because it results in a government-by-God, in which dissent against ANY policy, action or utterance by ANY government official, and by ANY church official, is a mortal sin and a capital crime.
Anyone who thinks those centuries of oppression, tyranny, ignorance, torture and bloodshed are mere relics of a darker age is an idiot, because the Christianists yammering on about putting The Bible First have precisely the same mindset as their medieval forebears and would commit precisely the same atrocities given the chance.
It has nothing to do with how well a person is educated, or how sincere their intentions are. It’s a specific mindset – that “my” beliefs are the only legitimate ones; and therefore everyone must share them, voluntarily or not; therefore it is right and righteous that “I” be allowed to force everyone to believe as I believe, and do as I do.
The separation of Church and State means that laws should and must have justifications other than theological. It means laws should and must pass utilitarian muster, pragmatic analysis – have some quantifiable, objective rationale. If the only reason to make something illegal or, worse, make it compulsory is “because God says so” then there is no utilitarian, pragmatic, quantifiable, objective justification for it, and it should not be a law.
Andrew
Well, it’s time to get busy with the identification program. Do we just tag them with paintball guns or do we dart them and put radio collars on?
Andrew
Well, it’s time to get busy with the identification program. Do we just tag them with paintball guns or do we dart them and put radio collars on?
BlogReeder
Who is denying history? Look, when I was in school we had sanitized Columbus too. So what? I’ve read the horror stories since then. Today’s kids will do the same thing. Society isn’t going to be “doomed to failure” because the whole story wasn’t given to kids during elementary school. Did you know some Indians weren’t very nice either? Wait. I might have bruised some liberal’s feelings there. Yea. America is the only bad country. I forgot.
BlogReeder
CaseyL, your post started out so promising. Then:
Geez. You keep saying “Christianists” but I do not think it means what you think it means. First off Andrew says:
So no violence or atrocities. Second, Andrew says:
This is so stupid. Politics is an agenda. If someone feels strongly about something that will be their agenda. Substitute environmentalist and it’s the same thing.
Andrew used the term Christianist precisely and Althouse caught him at it. We already have the term Fundamentalist Christians don’t we?
Perry Como
Christian Coaltion:
Jesus could care less about the poor. Except, like, the entire New Testament.
The poor and the environment are not the Christian base.
Awesome.
Pb
Yeah, so what? Telling the truth is for suckers. We lie to kids about Santa Claus and The Tooth Fairy, so why not lie to them about Columbus in History class? In the meantime, we can lie to them about spontaneous generation in Science class, and we can lie to them about the existence of irrational numbers in Math class–brilliant!
BlogReeder
History is for suckers. Right? Sure, Columbus was bad against the standards we have now. But he did start the whole ball rolling so to speak, so if anything; we have to give him that. Don’t we? Let’s say you could rewrite the text about Columbus, what would you say?
Tulkinghorn
Sullivan is trying to use language precisely, while you are muddying it. A fundamentalist Christian may or may not be a Christianist, per Sullivan’s definition. Indeed, and non-fundamentalist Christian may qualify as a Christianist, so long as that Christian employs their Christianity as an instrumentality of political power.
Tulkinghorn
If that is unclear, think of the considerable power of the Church of England, which has never been fundamentalist. If you were a religious minority in 18th century England, you would know from Christianism.
The Other Steve
I have to agree a bit with Blogreeder here. Although I don’t like the right’s insistence on keeping people ignorant, I don’t like guilt.
The problem with the truth is it’s complicated. The story that you even believe about Columbus is most likely completely wrong.
I don’t think teaching Guilt is an appropriate context to place around History.
I was in England not to long ago, and was struck by how they talked about things that had happened at the Tower of London. They talked about them as if they were in the past. That is, there was no sense of guilt, no “woe is me”, but an acknowledgement that something had happened, but it was different people in a different time who committed those acts.
I found that rather refreshing compared to the guilt some people try to teach here.
Steve
I never did figure out why Michelle Malkin stopped using the word “Islamist.”
The Other Steve
Political Correctness
Pb
Well, I’d say that he was the first European to find America–but I wouldn’t say that he ‘discovered’ it. And it wouldn’t hurt to mention his trial:
Jay
How does knowing the full scope of human history (no matter how gory) lead to guilt? And guilt for whom? Perhaps I’m particularly crass but when I read about how European settlers treated Native Americans or slaves from Africa, I don’t feel guilt. I have to wonder how many people really do feel guilty when they learn such things and if so, why?
Unless there are some former slave owners or explorers still lurking around…
Tulkinghorn
Upon learning that one’s ancestors abused and misused people, and that one’s contemporaries continue to do so, should, for a healthy person, inspire a sense of compassion and obligation to that group. Guilt may not be the right word for it, though often used to describe liberal motivations.
But what is wrong with guilt? Should we not feel at least some shame for profound injustices done on our behalf? Is indifference or gloating supposed to be a superior moral values?
SeesThroughIt
See, knee-jerk bullshit like this is why it’s so hard to take wingers seriously, much less hold an intelligent conversation with them.
BlogReeder: How do you make the leap from “America has done some pretty ugly things in its past” to “America is the only bad country.” This is a serious question. How do you get the latter from the former? Because there is nothing in the former that suggests the latter, and yet here you are not only drawing the suggestion, but the equivalence. How does that work?
Pb
None of them were done on *my* behalf, and I certainly didn’t ask for any of it. Then again, I don’t believe in ‘original sin’ either–the original ancestral guilt trip!
However, there’s a lot to be said for learning from the past mistakes of others, so as not to repeat them ad infinitum.
Darrell
That’s bullshit John, and you know it. Andrew Sullivan uses the term “Christianist” exclusively against Christians on right side of the politcal spectrum and never against left wing Christians like Jesse Jackson who also think the government’s primary role is instilling morality as they see fit ( gov. mandated race based preferences).. or leftist anti-war Christians, or leftist christians who advocate government increase welfare benefits.
Sullivan is clearly engaging in double standards, while denying that he’s doing so, pointing us to his “clear” definitions of the term Christianist. See any problem with that kind of dishonesty John?
Tulkinghorn
Darrell –
Sullivan uses the term against some right-wing christians (stating, I think persuasively, that these people are no conservatives). But don’t you see plenty of difference between Jesse Jackson, who employs religion as moral justification for a political position, and a Dobson, who asserts religiosity as a political position?
I dislike both the Jacksons and the Dobsons, but they are committing different sins. I would state it that Dobson is a Christianist (ie, a subtype of Authoritarian), Jackson a scam artist and extortionist who employs a religious and racialist shtick (type of, well, choose your own term here).
Darrell
No I don’t, and that’s the big problem I have. You’re making a distinction where none exists.
Dobson has never advocated, to my knowledge, that all Americans be forced to practice Christianity… he has advocated government positions/policies using religion, as Jesse Jackson and other Christians on the left routinely do, which are consistent with his moral beliefs… Same with all the anti-war priests, same with all those who use their religion to push for increased welfare, etc.
Sullivan uses the term Christianist to exclusively go after Christians on the right with whom he disagrees… never doing the same to those Christians on the left on the basis of their Christianity. All the while Sullivan is pointing to his “clear” definitions of Christianist which are inconsistent and hypocritical as hell.
Jake
When appropriate, nothing is wrong with guilt. Feelings of guilt should arise from actions or inactions of an individual.
In those cases guilt can drive people to correct whatever they have done wrong. Feeling guilt for something someone else has done makes no sense. If the action was in the distant past (slavery, genocide) what good does your guilt do that person’s victims? If the action is something you could have stopped, then yes guilt is appropriate, but that is because you as an individual had a chance to stop it and by your inaction allowed a bad thing to happen.
Are those the only choices, guilt or gloating? If you read that a stranger half-way across the country has killed his family, do you feel guilt? I doubt it. What about anger, revulsion, a resolve to call the cops the next time your neighbor starts beating up his family. In instances where a past evil (slavery) still causes current evil (racism) you might decide to do something about that. No guilt needed.
Another thing to consider: Inappropriate guilt is draining and destructive. I’ve nothing to base this on but observations but it seems people who are moved by what I’ve heard called “white guilt” may for a while join a movement and write letters and go on marches or what ever but eventually they start to resent the people they represent. “I’m so tired of feeling guilty!” they shout, and give up. They may even turn on the group they once supported (“Oh, I was in a pro-[blank] group once. Those people are so [rude/mean/horny etc]”) Who the hell asked them to feel guilty in the first place?