Hemant Mehta's Blog, page 1847

Why Progressives Must Oppose Anti-Intellectualism

A couple of years ago, David Niose, a past President of both the American Humanist Association and the Secular Coalition for America, wrote a wonderful book called Nonbeliever Nation. It was all about the growing demographic of “Nones” and what that meant for the country.

His latest book is all about how to harness those numbers to achieve political and social gains. It’s called Fighting Back the Right: Reclaiming America from the Attack on Reason (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014).

In the excerpt below, Niose talks about how the Religious Right powerfully blended together faith and politics, and why progressives must oppose anti-intellectualism:

MORE THAN JUST RELIGION

Few would deny that [Rick] Perry’s rally is a reflection of the increased influence of conservative religion in modern American politics. But less obvious is how the event reflects the convergence of conservative religion and anti-egalitarianism mentioned in chapter 1. As Perry and others cite scripture and praise Jesus, they also sprinkle rhetoric that validates their harsh, anti-egalitarian political and economic views. “Father, our heart breaks for America,” Perry proclaimed at the rally. “We see discord at home. We see fear in the marketplace. We see anger in the halls of government, and as a nation we have forgotten who made us, who protects us, who blesses us, and for that we cry out for your forgiveness.”

Tellingly, as Perry surveys all the problems confronting America, he notes “fear in the marketplace” — not poverty, not health, not the environment, not even jobs — as being worthy of a call-out for divine intervention. Financial markets, not real human problems, need God’s attention, as if the divinity is some sort of stockbroker in chief. Of course, the performance of securities and commodities markets ultimately can have a ripple effect that reaches the lives of ordinary people, but it is revealing that Perry and many others like him would place these markets so near the center of their worldview and their public prayers. This alarming combination of fundamentalist religion and conservative economics has driven America away from human-centered policy.

To understand this, just imagine if conservative religion had become a trendy social phenomenon in America without also becoming a powerful political force. After all, people can be deeply religious without also engaging politically; in fact, some (if not most) major religious movements are completely apolitical. If, for example, rather than launching the highly politicized Moral Majority in the late 1970s, Jerry Falwell had instead called for a purely religious uprising of fundamentalist believers, it is doubtful that American public policy would have been much affected. We might still have a large portion of the population with biblical literalist beliefs, but few of those adherents would have infiltrated local, regional, and national party machines; instead, they likely would have focused their energies on pure evangelism and worship. While such a trend might have had some negative social impact (because widespread biblical literalism is unlikely to lead to a highly enlightened population), its repercussions would be relatively mild compared to what we have seen with the rise of the politically mobilized Religious Right.

The path of intense political engagement has allowed conservative religion to have a devastating anti-egalitarian impact in America. In modern times, a voter’s religiosity is among the most accurate predictors of behavior at the polls, with regular churchgoers and self-described born-again Christians showing a devotion to conservative candidates that is unmatched by other demographic categories. By giving reliable numbers to anti-egalitarian interests, religious conservatives allow those interests to claim mass support that otherwise would not exist.

This is true both in the area of social anti-egalitarianism, where religious fundamentalists frequently back policies that obstruct equality for women, gays, racial minorities, and religious minorities, as well as in economic anti-egalitarianism, where the support of religious conservatives enables policies favoring corporate interests and the wealthy and disfavoring the poor and middle class. The resulting irony is millions of devout Christians, often of modest economic means, actively supporting candidates who pander to their socially conservative views on abortion, gay rights, creationism, and other culture war issues, even as those same candidates push economic policies — such as tax cuts for upper income brackets and deregulation of industries — that cater to the rich and to large corporate interests.

OPPOSING ANTI-INTELLECTUALISM

Though Rick Perry provides an easy example of what progressives don’t want in a candidate, he also highlights one of the vulnerabilities of the progressive position. If we criticize Perry as a religious fanatic and a sort of simpleton, conservatives fire back that we are intellectual snobs. This accusation is a potent weapon in the conservative political arsenal, one that immediately puts progressives on the defensive. After all, at a glance it seems to make sense. If the country’s rightward tilt has been achieved through the manipulation of ordinary citizens, often by exploiting fundamentalist religious views and other anti-intellectual tendencies, one might assume that those on the other side are the highly educated intellectuals.

But this is not necessarily the case. More accurately, the typical progressive is not so much an intellectual but simply not anti-intellectual. This distinction often gets lost, since conservatives are astonishingly effective at painting their opponents as “elites,” academics, or otherwise out of touch with the problems of average people. In reality, of course, human-centered public policy is beneficial to — and sought by — ordinary people, most of whom have no advanced degrees or other intellectual credentials. Those opposed to anti-intellectualism in politics are not necessarily fluent in complex scientific ideas or sophisticated art and culture, but they do recognize the value of critical thinking. Put another way, while an aversion to anti-intellectualism is a common denominator among progressives and freethinkers, it would be just as accurate to say that the embrace of anti-intellectualism is a defining characteristic of their opponents.

Consider, for example, the baffling belief — held by many Americans — that Barack Obama was not born in the United States, even though irrefutable evidence has been produced showing that he was born in Hawaii in 1961. Even years after Obama was elected, one in four Americans surveyed — and almost half of Republicans and Tea Party supporters — stated that they believed he was foreign born. This is the kind of senseless thinking that can proliferate only in a society that has not learned to extrapolate facts, that doesn’t value honest analysis of widely accessible data. A slightly lower number of Americans (17 percent) believed Obama was a Muslim, according to a Pew survey conducted almost four years into his presidency, another absurd belief given the available facts. Obama was raised a freethinker by a secular humanist mother and was nonreligious well into adulthood; when he finally joined a church, it was a Protestant congregation in Chicago. Whether one supports Obama or not, there is simply no factual basis for a belief that he is a Muslim. Yet the conviction persists.

When more rational Americans criticize or ridicule blatant public ignorance, they run the risk of being called elitist, which is a right-wing code word for those opposed to anti-intellectualism. This is another example of the contrast between the anti-intellectualism of conservatives and the freethinking of progressives. The typical progressive is not an elitist but merely one whose habits of thought are sufficiently independent. Of course, all humans are susceptible to lazy thinking, groupthink, and emotional appeals, but the freethinker is at least mindful of such tendencies and, therefore, more likely to be on guard against them. No individual is always rational, and few would want a world without emotional impulses and spontaneity, but an appreciation of rational and critical thinking, especially on the subject of politics and public policy, is hardly in itself elitist. In fact, accusations of such are surely a sign of affirmative anti-intellectualism.

Rational debate becomes impossible when anti-intellectualism has taken root, because the anti-intellectual position is usually based on fear, unsupported prejudices, or some other irrational impulse, making it immune to the influence of facts and data. One could try to reason with the enraged citizen who screams, “Keep your government hands off my Medicare!” — but it probably won’t work. Even if one gently points out that Medicare is itself a government program, the mind-set of the angry citizen rarely changes. Similarly, the panic-stricken belief that Obama’s Affordable Care Act, better known as Obamacare, will eventually result in some kind of quasi-Stalinist “death panels” — an idea that gained currency as the bill was being debated — is usually unmoved by pesky facts.

To be sure, there are many sensible arguments in opposition to the Affordable Care Act: that it forces individuals to purchase health insurance, to the great benefit of profit-driven corporate entities; that it’s a cash cow for the pharmaceutical industry and other medical businesses; and certainly that universal, single-payer health care could deliver quality health care more efficiently and affordably. But these objections get less airtime than positions that stoke irrational fear. Even after the law was implemented, Representative Michele Bachmann (R-MN) warned that “it will be very unpleasant if the death panels go into effect,” describing them, baselessly, as “the greatest fear that Americans have.”

Now, factual inaccuracies, stupid arguments, and fear-based manipulation are nothing new in politics, nor are they uniquely American, but the heights of idiocy reached in the modern American dialogue are downright embarrassing. Anti-intellectualism is not just a reality but a point of pride for many officeholders and candidates. Examples of this are abundant, but the poster boy for American anti-intellectualism is, of course, George W. Bush, who scorned analytical thinking and instead made decisions from his “gut,” regularly mispronounced common words, and relied on fundamentalist religious leaders for policy advice. Such traits would be less troublesome if we were discussing the leader of an obscure backwater republic, but Bush of course was commander in chief of the world’s most powerful military, a fact that became clear as he defied world opinion and stormed into Iraq in 2003, with horrific consequences.

Under Bush, America and the rest of the world saw the disastrous results of the rise of the Religious Right. Bush did not just pander to religious conservatives, he was one of them; and despite his rhetoric of “compassionate conservatism,” his hard-right policies made clear that he saw egalitarianism — in either its social or economic form — as anathema. And not surprisingly, after eight years of his presidency, the country was absolutely devastated, in complete financial collapse at home and grossly over- extended overseas.

Fighting Back the Right is available online and in bookstores starting today.

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Excerpted with permission, Fighting Back the Right: Reclaiming America from the Attack on Reason by David Niose. Available from Palgrave Macmillan Trade. Copyright © 2014.

Michigan Officials Wanted to Keep a Satanist Display Out of the Capitol, but Their Rules Backfired on Christians

Looks like we’ll have to make a visit to the Michigan State Capitol building this year since officials there just gave the green light to a display from the Satanic Temple:

It comes just a couple of weeks after they received an okay to show their display in the Florida Capitol Building as well.

The display, which depicts a snake wrapped around the Satanic cross presenting a book as a holiday gift, will be featured on the northeast lawn at the Capitol Dec. 21 to 23, said Jex Blackmore, a member of the Detroit chapter of the Satanic Temple. The cross reads, “The greatest gift is knowledge.”

“Encouraging families to have important discussions and to learn from each other and to spend the holidays promoting knowledge … is just something we think is important,” Blackmore, whose phone number begins with the digits 666, said today.

There are three really incredible things about this story.

1) The Satanic Temple is never the aggressor in these cases. They always respond to what Christians do. The only reason they filled out an application to put up a display in Michigan is because a Christian group wanted to put up a Nativity scene first.

And now?

The Nativity… has been scrapped. [Michigan State Capitol Commission John] Truscott said today the Nativity was approved but the out-of-state person backing it couldn’t find someone to put up and tear down the display each day. That’s necessary because Capitol rules forbid permanent displays.

Hilarious. So Michigan will have a Satanic display that’ll go up and come down each day… and Christians will have nothing.

2) Check out what Truscott said in response to approving the Satanic display:

“We are restricted by the Constitution and bound by the Constitution to recognize their First Amendment rights,” said Truscott. “We don’t have the ability to reject them if they meet the guidelines of the Capitol.”

But on a personal level, Truscott said he thinks it is “absolutely disgusting to hijack a Christian holiday,” and he expressed hope that the public will “just completely ignore these negative forces.”

Yeah! How dare anyone hijack a Christian holiday… even though it’s a holiday that was hijacked from Pagans to begin with…

3) Last night, I spoke with The Satanic Temple spokesperson Lucien Greaves, who shared with me this incredible story:

When Jex first reached out to the Capitol Commission to learn how she could submit our display, she refrained from mentioning that she is a representative of the dreaded Satanic Temple.

Jex was told at that time that the new requirement for holiday displays (that they be taken down each evening and replaced again in the morning) was a result of trying to deter “that group from Florida” — clearly a reference to The Satanic Temple — winning the right to exhibit our holiday display in the Florida Capitol Rotunda.

It seems that, despite Michigan’s efforts to specifically exclude The Satanic Temple’s display, they’re going to get it, anyway. And they won’t even have the Nativity scene they obviously favored.

That’s the greatest thing ever. They tried to create rules to exclude Satanists… and those same rules will now exclude Christians.

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All of these “problems” would go away if state officials just put a blanket ban on displays from religious and non-religious groups. It’s that easy. (That wouldn’t even stop them from putting up lights and trees and being festive.)

If anyone wants to complain, though, then start by calling up the folks who fight every year to put up a Nativity scene. If they stop, so will the Satanists.

Gay-Friendly Kansas Minister Hears How One Christian Opponent Wants To Cut Her Head Off and Put It On a Stick

Could it be that some Christians are a greater threat to churches than the staunchest anti-theists? For Jackie Carter of Wichita, Kansas, the answer may well be yes.

Rev. Jackie Carter, a Wichita minister at First Metropolitan Community Church, says she has received death threats because of the gay weddings she has performed. The calls have been escalating since the state’s ban on gay marriage was struck down by a federal judge last month.

What do the threats entail? Carter quotes one:

“I’m going to chop your head off and put it on a stick and carry it around the town square.”

She says the threats have led to vandalism that has included broken windows. The church has even stepped up security. “I’ve asked folks who support the church to help with purchasing cameras that we can have outside the building for the protection. We have a security company now.”

Carter says she wants to ignore the threats, but she is scared. “When you’re here and the phone rings, and there’s heavy breathing and two seconds later the doorbell rings and then somebody’s throwing rocks through the windows. All those things combined create fear.”

It hasn’t affected her resolve. Carter says that despite everything, she’s going to continue to marry committed couples, straight and gay.

50 Years of Humanism in Star Trek

Brandon Fibbs honors Star Trek, which he calls “one of the most robust presentations and defenses of humanism ever conceived,” with this compilation of Humanism-themed clips:

If This is the Best God Can Do, We Should All Question the Holy Ghost’s Powers

If I had as much power as this Christian pastor, I’d like to say I’d use it for something a little more important than pushing people over from a distance:

So that’s what happens when peer pressure meets gullibility.

(via Christian Nightmares)

Montgomery, Louisiana Reminds Us That They Are “PROUD to Keep CHRIST in Our Christmas Celebrations”

Earlier this month, the city of Piedmont, Alabama changed the theme of its annual Christmas parade from “Let’s Keep Christ in Christmas” to the more generic “Piedmont Christmas Parade” after a warning letter from the Freedom From Religion Foundation.

Looks like Montgomery, Louisiana never received that message. They’re advertising their annual Christmas celebration on Facebook with a peculiar description line:

Why is the city not-so-subtly talking about how it’ll make sure this is a Christian celebration? Are non-Christians not allowed to participate in the event? What kind of “Fellowship” are they talking about? And why is the banner image for the celebration a great big Nativity scene?

All of this would be fine if it were a church putting on the event, but it’s not okay for the government to be hosting a religious celebration.

FFRF has been notified.

What I don’t understand is why they’re doing this when they absolutely don’t have to. There’s already a parade and fireworks display — it’s welcoming to the whole community. But by bringing religion into this, they’re going out of their way to exclude a portion of their population.

(Thanks to Randall for the link)

Friendly Atheist Podcast Episode 33: Fred Clark, Progressive Christian Blogger

Our latest podcast guest is Fred Clark, the progressive Christian blogger who writes at Slacktivist, here on the Patheos network.

Fred is one of those Christians who defies all the stereotypes atheists tend to have of Christians. He’s for gay marriage, critical of church leaders, and constantly frustrated with what his “tribe” does in the name of Jesus.

We spoke with Fred about why he’s still working on the longest-running book review ever, what will happen to the Christian church after gay marriage becomes legal everywhere, and how Christians can change church culture from the inside.

We’d love to hear your thoughts on the podcast. If you have any suggestions for people we should chat with, please leave them in the comments, too.

You can subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, get the MP3 directly, check it out on Stitcher, or just listen to the whole thing below.

And if you like what you’re hearing, please consider supporting this site on Patreon and leaving us a positive rating!

No, Dutch Bankers Don’t Have to Swear an Oath to God

***Update***: Terry Firma wrote about this issue earlier in the year — definitely worth checking out!

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If you read this New York Times article about banking in the Netherlands, you might be forgiven for thinking government officials want bankers to swear an oath to God:

The sinners of the banking industry seem so uncowed by regulators and prosecutors that one country is trying a higher deterrent: the fear of God.

In the financial industry equivalent of the Ice Bucket Challenge, executives in the Netherlands have been taking the bankers’ oath.

“I swear that I will endeavor to maintain and promote confidence in the financial sector,” the oath reads in part. “So help me God.”

It’s an oath that 90,000 bankers will have to take beginning next year, and if they don’t adhere to all eight integrity points, they could face some serious penalties. Sounds nice in theory. We’ll see if it changes anything in practice.

But about that God thing.

It isn’t until much later in the online-only piece that we find out that God is actually irrelevant in this oath:

For bankers whose beliefs or inclinations prevent them from swearing oaths to God, the association will accept a simple “I promise.” But in a country that likes to promote its Calvinist work ethic, bankers who have taken the oath speak of it in solemn tones.

The actual oath makes clear that God is merely optional. It even comes with the alternative ending:

So help me God!/This I declare and promise!

Sure, God makes for a catchier headline here, but it feeds into a pervasive idea that oaths are meaningful only because you’re swearing them to God… which is silly, especially to those who don’t believe in one. Oaths are as serious as you want them to be. I don’t believe for a second the words themselves will change bankers, but if the sentiments in this one are enforced, maybe it could actually do some good.

(Thanks to Tania for the link)

Lamar Advertising Rejected a Harmless Atheist Billboard, but They Allowed This Christian One?

In 2009, the Freedom From Religion Foundation wanted to put up this billboard in Alabama:

At the time, Lamar Advertising rejected the ad, with the local general manager saying this:

“It was offensive to me,” said Tom Traylor, general manager of Lamar Advertising in Birmingham. “We have the autonomy to decide what’s in the best interests of our company and what’s offensive. I don’t think it was the kind of message we wanted to stand behind.

“You have to know what area of the country you’re in,” he said. “A heavy percent of our population is Christian. That’s who we cater to.”

That’s offensive? A hypothetical that doesn’t even directly slam religion? Seems like a pretty low bar for someone who runs an advertising company…

But I guess you do have to know your audience, since, last week, this billboard went up through Lamar Advertising in Richmond, Virginia:

Jamie Machut, vice president of Lamar of Richmond, said that the ads are scheduled to stay up until early January.

“We support the First Amendment right of advertisers. Please keep in mind that the advertisement is a message from PFOX and not Lamar Advertising Company,” Machut said in a statement.

Yes, these are local decisions, so it’s not necessarily as hypocritical as a certain meme makes it out to be:

But still. There’s something messed up within a company when anti-gay bigotry is permissible in some parts of the country but a harmless pro-atheist slogan can be rejected in another. Surely they could issue a directive from above to clear up what is and isn’t allowed so that billboards can’t just be rejected at the whim of local managers.

(via Joe. My. God.)

Principal, After Being Told Students Can Sit During the Pledge, Tells Employee to “Say It Loud, Make Them Mad”

We know some students have it rough when it comes to sitting down during the Pledge of Allegiance, but rarely have I seen a principal become as unhinged as Gerard LeBlanc of Thomas Jefferson High School in Gretna, Louisiana did.

On December 5, 2014… the school principal Gerard LeBlanc made a morning announcement stating that all students are required to stand for the Pledge of Alliance.

… Principal LeBlanc told [a student] that she is required to stand for the Pledge and that she should also do so out of “respect” and “courtesy.”

…

As a punishment [for not standing], Principal LeBlanc told [the student] that she would be required to report to the principal’s office every morning that she refuses to participate in the Pledge. [The student] reluctantly said “okay” to which Principal LeBlanc replied, “Where you will stand with me.” She once again informed him she would not be standing for the Pledge. At that point, Principal LeBlanc demanded that [the student] bring her mother into school on Monday December 8, 2014, for a meeting with the principal. Another student similarly reports that the principal announced that all students will have to stand for the Pledge or else they will be punished.

At that point, the American Humanist Association’s Appignani Humanist Legal Center stepped in and sent the district a letter warning them of the legal consequences of continuing to push students to stand. The AHA requested that the meeting essentially be canceled (since there was nothing worth discussing), and that the school remind teachers and students that no one has to stand for the Pledge.

Problem solved? Not quite.

Late last week, the AHA heard from that student again. Things had only gotten worse:

Yesterday [the student] was in the principal’s office to turn in some papers and observed the principal “yelling” the words to the Pledge. She then observed the principal instruct a nearby school employee: “say it loud, make them mad.”

That resulted in a second letter to the district (they never responded to the first one).

Today, the district finally got back to the AHA and promised this shit wouldn’t happen again:

Today, the Jefferson Parish Public School System made written assurances to the legal center that the matter is being addressed. School officials stated that “No disciplinary or retaliatory action will be taken against any JPPSS student who exercises his or her constitutional rights.”

We’ll see if the principal acts in accordance with that. Administrators who get that visibly upset over a student not standing for the Pledge need to rethink their career choice.

(Image via Shutterstock)