Nihilists in Christians' Clothing

[arendt]

Nihilists in Christians' Clothing
by arendt

...."The key to Nietzsche's thinking is his philosophical skepticism. He believed that...there is no
....moral truth and no scientific natural truth that governs our existence...If there is no moral truth, then
....there can be no absolute notions of good and evil.

...."He felt that Christianity tamed the heart in man and must be condemned for denying the value of
....'exuberant sprits, splendid animalism, the instincts of war and conquest, the deification of passion,
....revenge, anger, voluptuousness, adventure, knowledge'. For Nietzsche, if one cannot speak of
....good and evil, then one is left to measure the value of things and people in terms of greatness and
....excellence. The measure of greatness is the power of 'the will' That is, the power to overcome
....others' morality and others' suffering in pursuit of great art and strong leadership.

...."(Nietzsche) never married, and his fear and contempt of women was reflected in his writing."

........- Martyn Oliver, "History of Philosophy"

"....what Nietzsche called the 'superman', or the 'next man', (Leo) Strauss calls the 'philosopher'."

..........Tony Papert, "The Secret Kingdom of Leo Strauss"


How in God's name did nihilism come to an America that couldn't care less about philosophy even if you could put in a can of Budweiser? The totally amoral neocon followers of Leo Strauss have brought it to us by hiding American Nihilism inside the very Christianity that Nietzsche raged against. It is amazing that a neocon can attend a Fundamentalist Christian gathering without bursting out in laughter at selling these religious suckers the social program of the quintessential anti-religious philosopher, Nietzsche (God is Dead).

Nihilism was the dark side of the 19th century "counter-Enlightenment", the Romantic Movement being the bright side. After World War 1, nihilism's impulse towards cultural suicide, tearing down a corrupt society, was a major influence on the rise of totalitarianism. Ironically, after WW2, one of Nietzche's major goals was peacefully accomplished in Europe: the total collapse of the "slave religion" of Christianity. This came about because the pre-dominant Christian sect, Catholicism, had morally disgraced itself during the war.

Throughout the entire 20th century, however, most Americans treated European philosophy like plague germs. So, the only way nihilism was going to get in here was if it were smuggled in via a sealed boxcar - the same way the Germans shipped Lenin into Russia. And that is exactly how George W. Bush and the virus of nihilism was deposited in America.

...."The psychological 'problem of Otherness' translates historically into Manicheanism - Good vs.
....Evil, Us vs Them. The Reformation, the Puritan Revolution, and the scientific and industrial
....revolutions exacerbated these trends in a quantum leap. (This led to)...the threat of nuclear
....holocaust, a world made 'pure' - Conquest of Them by Us. (That is)...suicide is the ultimate 'solution'
....to the problem of Otherness.

........- Morris Berman, "Coming To Our Senses"

The primary manifestation of this American Nihilism is the *embrace* of suicide by the victims:

..- the economic suicide of the ruinous deficits, off-shorings, and de-industrializations of the last fifteen
.....years;

..- the geopolitical suicide of offending the entire world, repeatedly violating the Geneva Convention in
....wars of agression and torture;

..- the environmental suicide of sabotaging pollution control, habitat preservation, population control,
.....and global warming efforts

..- the Constitutional suicide of destroying checks and balances, and separation of Church and State;

..- and, lately, the nuclear suicide, mentioned in the above quote by Berman, of bunker-buster nukes.

I'm going to part company with the many people who argue that Bush's hard core support of 25-30% is made up entirely of terminally stupid people. Even stupid people have a sense of self-preservation - unless they are suicidal. On the contrary, I have met a lot of well-educated, middle class people who are intent on going down with the S.S. Bush.

The thing often missed is that the hard core are also intent on taking as many other people with them as they can. It is the kind of grandiosity and viciousness common to losers, such as assassins: by killing someone important, I can become famous. What is happening in America today is a carefully-engineered replay of early 20th century Europe: the suicide of a pauperized middle class in the form of choosing military dictatorship and reactionary cultural censorship over democracy.

Now, happy people do not commit suicide; and America has historically been an optimistic country. But, by thirty years of deliberate deconstruction of the U.S. economy, the social safety net, the public discourse, and finally, the rule of law, the neocons have created a Hobbesian nightmare world in what used to be the richest, most free country on earth. America today is like the Pottersville of "Its a Wonderful Life" on steroids.

...."The ways of self-narcotization: intoxication as music; intoxication as cruelty in the tragic
....enjoyment of the destruction of the noblest; intoxication as blind enthusiasm for single human
....beings or ages (as hatred, etc.)...as narcotic states of disgust with oneself; some kind or other of
....continual work, or of some stupid little fanaticism...

........F. Nietsche, "The Will to Power"

And, as they have sunk into economic penury, the American middle class has been provided with all the implements of avoiding this painful reality that an inwardly-gloating corporate state can provide: the destruction of high art, or even popular art, by crass commercialism and violent spectacle; the replacement of knowledge by trivia and celebrity; the smearing and dragging down of liberals, educated people, unions, Democrats, and the government in a media version of feeding Christians to lions; and finally the mainstreaming of the fanaticism of fundamentalism.

As the increasingly wrecked economy and government generated social problems, the fundamentalists performed the classic inversion of cause and effect: bad times don't cause bad behavior, they argued; bad behavior causes bad times. From that premise, the witch hunts were begun. And, as usual, they are rounding up the wrong witches. The middle class recognizes, but dares not admit, that it has no power to keep the corporate "Otherness" out of their small town, their childrens' worldview, or even their own heads.

So, in these darkening times, they turn their feelings of despair into rage against the officially designated scapegoats: liberals, feminists, gays, blacks, and now Moslems. And, they turn to the power of "will" to hold back the suicidal impulses let loose by the loss of their traditional status and their taken-for-granted economic security.

----

The similarities between fundamentalism and nihilism are "hidden in plain sight". But once you puncture the illusion of religiosity, the identification is unmistakable.

Like Nietzsche, fundamentalists exalt willpower over reason. This is most obvious in their denial of scientific reality, or in their derision for the "reality-based community" in the political realm. It shines out in the white-knuckled grip Bush has on his dubious sobriety.

Like all nihilists, fundamentalists are in counter-revolution against the Enlightenment, and everything it stands for. One major target for them is the American Constitution, which was one of the most important results of Enlightenment thinking. Another is higher education, which (apologies to H.L. Mencken) might lead to thinking.

Like Nietzsche, fundamentalists fear women and have contempt for them as anything beyond breeding stock.

Instead of Christ's pacifism, the fundamentalists want "muscular Christianity" (kosher pork). They hold high the nihilist "instincts of war and conquest". Unlike genuine Christians, nihilists do not have compassion for the weak. They want to kill the weak because they think them inferior, and because they increase their "greatness" by this murder.

At the very top, the neocon leadership and the figurehead Bush are totally amoral thugs. Like nihilists, they feel free to manipulate the labels of good and evil, slapping them on anyone they please. They engage in the "reckless" behavior touted by nihilism to demonstrate their "excellence". The GOP domination of the government has allowed them to press their agenda way beyond the point of no return. They have recklessly staked everything on staying in power. And if they begin to lose that power, they have every intention of taking the whole world down with them. World-scale suicide.

Suicide is also the motor behind all the fundamentalists being played by the neocons. Look at Bush - he is hanging onto his sanity by his fingernails with the help of all the anti-depressants they can pump into him. His entire life is a history of failure, self-abuse, false bravado, and cruelty to others. Faced with a final humiliation, he wouldn't hesitate to push the button.

According to genuine Christianity, we are put on this world to prove our worth to God by good works, humility, and love - even of your enemies. Fundamentalism, on the other hand, is pure Manichaenism. You are with us, or we will kill you. This is Berman's final solution to "Otherness". Whereas Christianity urges its followers to "be good stewards" of what god has provided, fundamentalists are in a mad rush to trash the planet, laboring under the delusion that the Rapture will come when the trashing is completed. Whereas the Bible says "vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord", the fundamentalists exalt the nihilistic pantheon of "passion, revenge, and anger".

----

The unavoidable conclusion is that fundamentalists are nihilists hiding behind religion. They have stated the goal of unilaterally destroying our secular society, by means fair or foul. They have stated their desire that the world should perish in flames in the near future. (And Rumsfeld, Bolton, and the other highly placed neocon lunatics are doing their best to provoke it.) These are the actions of nihilists. That they find no contradiction between their actions and the total corpus of Jesus' words proves how dangerously irrational and unreachable they are.

Fundamentalism is Christianity without Christ. Fundamentalists narrowly preach the Old Testament, Paul, and the Apocalypse. None of these are the direct words of Jesus; and the Apocalypse is very dubious as a work of Christianity, as opposed to some druggie's bad trip. In reality, fundamentalism is yet another reincarnation of the lust for dominance by angry, brutal, anti-intellectual men. On a planet of six billion which is passing peak oil, fundamentalism is not a religion; it is a suicide pact.

It cannot be repeated enough: the hard core of Bush supporters are suicidal, not stupid. They come from all classes, races, sexual orientations, and educational backgrounds. They are bitter, ground down people, compensating for their disappointments with excessive self-righteousness. This bitterness and jealousy leaks out, no matter how many pharisaical protestations are made. They are the worst kind of potential suicides - cowards. Rather than kill themselves out of shame, they have decide to kill others in order to demonstrate their "excellence"; or, failing that, to let someone else be responsible for their "suicide by cop". So, we shouldn't be laughing at these dead men walking. We should be afraid, very afraid.

It is way too late to just be making this connection; but better late than never. Its time to put the frame of "religious nihilist" around the fundamentalist movement. Its time to challenge the pretensions to Christianity of these frauds and bullies. When you do challenge them, remind them to "turn the other cheek" and "love your enemies". They will hate you for it, like the false Christians they are.

[Warpy]

1. Well, yes and no

because the current crop of fundies does believe in eternal truths and moral absolutes, even the ones in the White House. However, once they've been "saved," and they profess their belief (endlessly), they are exonerated from any sins they may commit, any outrages against that faith. Thus, moral absolutes must be respected by thee and me, but not by the fundies, who have carte blanche to lie, cheat, kill, steal, and covet all they want. As long as they honor those first 3 commandments, the rest become hot air and burdens for everybody else. Their burden is to create enough havoc that Armageddom occurs and they are magically lifted away from all the people they have been vicious to for years, something that will happen because of their belief.

This is what is so very dangerous about the present form of loopy Calvinism infused with Rand and topped off with a doomsday cult. They don't respect any of this country's laws because they "know" they've been exempted from having to respect them by their beliefs.

[arendt]

2. Did I say only non-fundies were taken in by the "illusion of religiosity"?

> Thus, moral absolutes must be respected by thee and me, but not by the fundies...

That is, nihilism for me; but not for thee.

The suckers don't see it. The neocons most certainly do. If I'm having trouble getting you
to see it, just think how hard a fundie will fight this insight!

I like your parsing of the ten commandments. The "burden to create enough havoc that
Armageddon occurs" reminds me that I neglected to mention how completely on-target
the epithet "Christo-fascist, zombie death cult" is.

arendt

[msongs]

3. that's why hitler is in heaven....all he had to do is say "I believe.."

and he and all those christian germans can and will get away with everything they did. its the "get out of hell free" card. if there was no such card, nobody on the planet would fall for any of the christian myths. One can live the principles of the alleged jesus without the sadomasochistic rituals.

Msongs
www.msongs.com
batik & digital art
mugs and shirts

[arendt]

4. Does "I believe I'll have another drink" count?

As the saying goes, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

As you so succinctly point out "I believe" covers a multitude of sins -
from the murderer who "believed his life was in danger" to the weasely
CEO who "believed what his underlings told him".

People ought to reach for their wallets when someone says "I believe".

arendt

[arendt]

5. Front page kick n/t

[hatrack]

6. K & R - "Fundamentalism is Christianity without Christ"

That, my friend, is IT.

:toast:

[Lady Effingbroke]

7. Thank you, arendt.

K&R

[kineneb]

8. another thank you

from one who has actually read Nietzsche in the original German- Also Sprach Zarathustra.

[Jara sang]

9. Christian nihilist = Buddhist

[arendt]

10. Too brief. What exactly are you saying?

Nietzsche himself was enamored of Buddhism.

Some Catholics have added Buddhist practice to their religion,
although the Vatican is waffling there.

Basically, the history of Christianity is one of "the menu instead
of the meal". They come down on hard on any kind of "interiority",
which is what the old Gnostics and the Cathars were doing.

The Protestant record is hardly any better. Calvinism and all
its offshoots were totally repressive of the body.

Are you saying that if you take away the dogma, Christianity
collapses and all that is left is interiority, i.e. Buddhist meditation
practice?

arendt

[Jara sang]

11. I'm saying that if you find yourself with both traits.

Little bit of Christianity, (.ie I adhere to Christ's over all message but not the religous dogma) and you also find yourself philosphically in line with some nihilist writers then it has been my experience that Buddhism is a nice "blend" of the two.

[arendt]

16. I agree...and its a lot less violent, too. n/t

[lillilbigone]

12. Nietzsche

You misrepresent one of the most confusing philosophers of our tradition. Are you aware that Nietzsche had a sister who was a Nazi sympathiser and that she used him to her advantage after his mental collapse? She dressed him in robes and had people come look at the great philosopher. She gave lectures on his works. She even had the nerve to collect and "edit" many of his unpublished desk notes in his name. That book was named The Will to Power. Perhaps you should read On the Genealogy of Morals in which Nietzsche speaks of the moral crises in which we now find ourselves.

Nietzsche's political philosophy, as I attempt to tease out of the master and slave morality, is twofold. Of course the uberman, the one who can face the death of god and collapse of the old meanings of life and create anew, become a god, is the champion for Nietzsche. The other slaves, perhaps they are better off in the binds of slavery, in the bondage of facism, with the thoughtlessness of religion. These people, when they realize their freedom, will not create and invest and become gods, but run loose like bats out of hell. Man is a freedom, but Sartre says it well,"Man is condemned to be free," and of course his contemporary, Merleau-Ponty, said it even better, "Man is condemned to meaning."

The question, then, of government, is what do we do with the overwhelming majority of the population who are just going to be slaves no matter what? Do we want to free them all, take care of them, use them for our profit and gain? As for myself, I evaluate every decision I make based upon the morals and values that I have created and discovered. I hold a principle based on the Buddhist thought that I should never intentionally and avoidably do harm to another creature. Should I help and save the masses? How do we save them, do they want to be saved, what is best for everyone?

I think your psychoanalysis is, honestly, wrong. The problem is obviously more complicated, and you would do well to read Nietzsche's book "The Gay Science, where he explains his epistemology, or theory of the origins of knowledge. For Neitzsche, knowledge is based on perspectives, and we all have different perspectives. Rather than trying to prove why one perspective is better, we need to gather and understand as many perspectives as we can. Something that doesn't make sense, that is illogical and possibly even totally evil to your way of thinking is an opportunity to make a choice. You can choose to write it off because you already know it makes no sense, or you can seek to expand your mind and your perspective.

The different perspectives are what got us into this mess with the current state of affairs, and what we need people to do is seek to understand what we don't understand, to know what we know not, to make sense out of the senseless, to learn and allow our minds to flourish, to seek to educate rather than persuade others.

[readmoreoften]

13. Thanks. Context is important.

The OP was a simplistic and ahistorical reduction of Nietzsche. Nietzsche's works were misused by the Nazi party due to the ravings of his sister. But, hell, Johnny Cash was co-opted by the neo-cons after his death. That doesn't mean he was a neo-con.

[arendt]

18. As I said, I used Nietzsche as a label - for name recognition...

my essay was about nihilism.

If you hero worship Nietzsche, you should seek out a Buddhist as he did.
Non-violence is a necessity in today's world.

You equate Nietzsche to Johnny Cash. That's about the right level for the
man.

arendt

[rman]

28. The OP isn't so much about Nietzshe as it is about nihilists

Though it looks like Nietzshe wasn't one.

[arendt]

15. You ask some good questions, but I don't hear any answers.

The main focus of my essay is nihilism - a destructive frenzy brought on by realization
that life is not ordered as one previously thought - not Nietzche. What is important to
me are the consequences of the philosophy, not the personal life of one of its authors.

Frankly, the story about Nietzsche's sister is totally irrelevant to my essay. On the other
hand, the fact that Leo Strauss and his neocon disciples espouse exactly the same philosophy
is at the heart of my essay. I used Nietzsche strictly for name recognition and philosophy identification.
I know little about his personal life, and care less than I know. Post-Kantian philosophy
is a quagmire that I have no desire to wade into. I'm not reading "The Gay Science" or
epistemology, or anything else that is a laugh line in "The Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy" or
"Red Dwarf".

In your first sentence you say that Nietzsche is "one of the most confusing philosophers
of our tradition". Fine. Then don't beat me up for misunderstanding him. I'm not trying
to. He went nuts. So, I'm not going to respond to your first two paragraphs, which are
about Nietzsche. I will respond to your later paragraphs, which are about the issues
which led Nietzsche and others to right about nihilism.

The bottom line for me is that nihilism, the philosophical grouping that his work is assigned
to by the scholars and historians I quoted, has had a violent and negative effect on Western
civilization. That is not to defend Western civilization, which has been off the rails for quite a while.

It is true that large masses of people have a bad mentality. Wilhelm Reich (who did some
good stuff before he went nuts - what is it about German philosophers and insanity?)
described this mentality, the mentality of the working class man, very well in "The Mass
Psychology of Fascism". But, once again, I do not want to bring fascism into this. You
will note I scrupulously avoided references to fascism or Nazis or Hitler in my essay.

But, I do believe that the questions you ask cut to the core of our problem with fundamentalism
in America today:

> The question, then, of government, is what do we do with the overwhelming majority of the population
> who are just going to be slaves no matter what?

First of all, I object to the term of art "slaves". It automatically buys into the frame of nihilism. There
are other ways of framing this. For example, what of people who can't be bothered with the work
of self-government, but would rather watch TV and drink beer? Are they slaves or soma-holics and
alcoholics. Is the problem one of mentality or addiction?

> Do we want to free them all, take care of them, use them for our profit and gain?

I want to do neither. I want to educate them and make them take responsibility for their lives and their
community, instead of handing that over to whatever demagogue comes on the air.

> As for myself, I evaluate every decision I make based upon the morals and values that I have created and
> discovered.

And, for most non-fundamentalists in the 21st century, the idea that our brains structure the world by
projecting categories onto reality is much more accepted than it was 100 years ago. And, the Western
world is much more influenced by Eastern meditation practices than earlier as well. The fundamentalists
are in reaction against this increase in knowledge.

> I hold a principle based on the Buddhist thought that I should never intentionally and avoidably do harm
> to another creature. Should I help and save the masses? How do we save them, do they want to be saved,
> what is best for everyone?

Is it "doing harm" to consider someone else to be a "slave"? Does judging them hurt them? I haven't thought
that through. But, I only want to help them insofar as if I don't, I will get hurt by them. I don't want to save them.
I want to save me and the intellectual life that has given me a decent world.

> I think your psychoanalysis is, honestly, wrong. The problem is obviously more complicated...Something that
> doesn't make sense, that is illogical and possibly even totally evil to your way of thinking is an opportunity to
> make a choice. You can choose to write it off because you already know it makes no sense, or you can seek
> to expand your mind and your perspective. The different perspectives are what got us into this mess with the
> current state of affairs, and what we need people to do is seek to understand what we don't understand,

This is very philosophical. I cannot unpack it. You do not point at anything specific. You say I am wrong. But,
as to why I'm wrong, there is just some vague verbiage.

So, while thanking you for your erudition, I am not quite sure that you have added to my knowledge of what
is wrong with saying that fundamentalists are nihilists and that they are very dangerous people.

arendt

[karlrschneider]

17. Nietzsche is peachy but Sartre is smarter

according to someone long ago. ;-)

[bloom]

14. "Fundamentalism is Christianity without Christ."

If Thomas Frank is correct in saying that there were quite a few Fundamentalists who were socialists 100 years ago - it seems more likely that Fundamentalists are simply easily co-opted - if they can be persuaded to a cause. (Than to say that they were always necessarily nihilists). Like a good example of sheeple. Or at least the Fundamentalists of today seem easy prey to propaganda when it's mixed with Patriotic fervor.


As far as, "When you do challenge them, remind them to "turn the other cheek" and "love your enemies"....


As I've recorded before - I witnessed someone doing that very thing - challenging Fundamentalists that way - and the response was "The unsaved are dead already" and something to the effect that" Jesus loves by the sword" (some weird interpretation of Revelation). As far as the Fundamentalists were concerned - they are right - and are not threatened by people interested in "love" at least they are not worried about loving people who are not like them.


The lesson of loving (or at least having some concern for) people who are not like us seemed to be a central message following WWII. The essential liberal message anyway. But you'll see atheists condemning anyone religious just as you will Fundamentalist condemning anyone non-Fundamentalist.

I think it makes sense to condemn people for condemning others for no particularly good reason.

[arendt]

19. 3 points by you. 3 replies by me.

You address three points:

1) fundies are easily manipulated, rather than nihiilistic.

My whole point was that a large number of fundamentalists are not stupid,
but suicidal. It is a contradiction to say you are not stupid, but you are easily
manipulated into a religion that is the violent, bloodthirsty, hate-filled antithesis
of the teachings of Jesus. So, I do not buy it. The non-stupid among the fundamentalists
are losers who want to hurt others out of revenge. It is my contention that the
non-stupid minority manipulates your easily co-opted mass of fundies, and
gains some sense of self-worth by doing so.

As my wife says, the deal on offer to lower class men is to submit to the dictator,
in return for which the man can be dictator to his wife and children. Ditto for
white people, who can be dictator to colored people.

It is this hierarchy of brutal people that is at the core of fundamentalism. Just as
such hierarchies have always been at the heart of anti-democratic regimes from
time immemorial.

2) Fundamentalists have de-humanized their opponents so that arguments
from the words of Jesus are worthless.

Well, my ending was just a flippant way to end things. But, your response proves
my main point. These people use religion as camoflague. They decide when they
will apply it. As another poster said: nihilism for me, but not for thee.

I think we are in agreement on this point.

3) Some point about condemnation, not clear to me.

> But you'll see atheists condemning anyone religious just as you will Fundamentalist
> condemning anyone non-Fundamentalist. I think it makes sense to condemn people
> for condemning others for no particularly good reason.

If you are saying that I am an atheist who has no good reason to condemn a
phony religion that is trashing my country, my education, my civil rights, I will
debate that. But, what you say is not clear. Please clarify.

arendt

[Protagoras]

25. Great analysis

of nihilism. K/R

[Kurovski]

20. K&R.(nt)

[arendt]

21. Wake up kick. n/t

[arendt]

22. One last kick n/t

[arendt]

23. Carl Schmitt and the Bush Dictatorship - at Kurt Nimmo's site

Just so we are all clear, that my post is NOT about Nietzsche, but about nihilimsm,
I offer an article published the day after my post. The article discusses another Nihilist,
Carl Schmitt, who comes right after Nietzsche in my History of Philosophy book.

http://kurtnimmo.com/?p=355

Carl Schmitt and the Bush Dictatorship
Sunday April 30th 2006, 4:43 pm

Bush’s Straussians have put into practice the political philosophy of Carl Schmitt, who wrote Die Diktatur (On Dictatorship) and believed the office of the Reichspräsident should rule supreme and transform the juridical system into a deadly juggernaut.

“These ideas came to neoconservatism both directly through Carl Schmitt and through Leo Strauss who has taught many of the most prominent neoconservatives in the present administration and indeed in neoconservative think-tanks throughout the city, and indeed, throughout the country,” writes the political theorist Anne Norton.


“No wonder that Schmitt admired thinkers such as Machiavelli and Hobbes, who treated politics without illusions,” writes Alan Wolfe. “Leaders inspired by them, in no way in thrall to the individualism of liberal thought, are willing to recognize that sometimes politics involves the sacrifice of life. They are better at fighting wars than liberals because they dispense with such notions as the common good or the interests of all humanity…. Schmitt’s German version of conservatism, which shared so much with Nazism, has no direct links with American thought. Yet residues of his ideas can nonetheless be detected in the ways in which conservatives today fight for their objectives.” Of course, Wolfe has it wrong—Schmitt’s fascism, his desire for totalitarian dictatorship, has nothing to do with conservatives, although it has everything to do with what we now call neoconservatives, more accurately defined as Straussian neocons.

-------------

How much clearer does it have to be: nihilism celebrates dictatorship and violence. So do fundamentalists.

arendt

[IrateCitizen]

24. I think you miss a few things regarding Evangelical Christianity...

... and the difference between the evangelicals and right-wing fundamentalists that are commonly glossed over on this site.

Now, the fundamentalists of whom you speak certainly fit into your parallel with nihlists -- especially when one considers that they all take the literal interpretation of Revelations to heart, and believe that the end times are upon us. That, after all, is their most cited reason for opposing any environmental legislation, programs for the poor, and so forth. What's the use if the world is going to end in their lifetime, anyway?

Evangelicals, OTOH, certainly share many things in common with fundamentalists. Where they differ is in their approach to life, and the need to relate EVERYTHING to them in terms of Christianity if you want to sway them. The Nation ran an excellent article on this a couple of weeks ago, and discussed the dearth of leadership on the "Religious Left" that could help sway evangelicals to progressive causes. Evangelicals vote Republican not because they are uncaring, judgemental people -- they vote Republican because the Republicans slap the label of "Christian" on almost everything they do, and the Democrats either avoid doing so or do it in such a clumsy and pandering fashion that it reeks of superficiality.

One problem I see repeatedly on the left in this country is the complete ignorance surrounding the role of Christianity in the formation of America. I'm not talking about the founders being born-agains -- they clearly were not. What I am talking about is the way in which Christianity served as the unifying social force in this country. The English and French and Dutch could coalesce a national identity out of the fact that they were, well... English, French and Dutch. The United States, however, was largely a polyglot nation. As such, there could be no calls to unity based upon nationality. The unifying force came in the form of religion, especially in the 1st and 2nd great awakenings. It was Evangelical Christianity, it is said, that turned New England Puritans into Yankees. The significance of this statement should not be denied too quickly, because what it explains is that prior to the 1st great awakening, New Englanders identified themselves by their local communities organized around Puritan congregationalist churches. Afterward, they lost the strict provincial self-identification -- they were all brothers and sisters in Evangelical Christianity.

Now, you may receive the hatred of the fundamentalists when you urge them to turn the other cheek, but not the evangelicals. It should be noted that virtually EVERY successful social movement in American history traces a good part of its heritage to the Christian faith. Abolitionism did not catch fire until after the 2nd great awakening, and its notion of completely cleansing one's self from sin instead of gradually weaning away from it. If slavery were a national sin, then, abolitionists reasoned, it must be gotten rid of IMMEDIATELY. Likewise, the success of the Civil Rights movement came not from militant stances or black separatism, but rather from basing it in terms of Christianity and an appeal to our founding documents. Similar campaigns have begun to take shape on local and state levels. Recent anti-poverty campaigns in the South have been successful by naming themselves after specific Bible verses that challenge Christians to take care of the poor, and appealing to people's conscience from the perspective of Christianity.

After I looked back over your essay, I don't think that you're really in disagreement with me -- you're just pointing out the dangers of the fundamentalists. I just think that these kinds of nuances are important to point out on here, because it is a short (and false) line among many on the left from fundamentalist ---> evangelical ---> Christian.

[jokerman93]

26. K&R This is core stuff

:kick:

[rman]

27. So Nietzsche was a Neocon avant-la-lettre,

thinking along similar lines as Machiavelli and Leo Strauss.

On second thougt: may be not.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x1063366#1065810