Is Right Wing Populism the Rubric of the Christian Right?

Excerpts from

Chip Berlet and Matthew N Lyons in

Right Wing Populism in America: Too Close for Comfort

New York, NY: Guilford Press, 2000. 

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More on the Mental Burqa

Richard of By His Grace, For His Glory has come up with a different graphic that is now displayed on the White Washed Feminists website sidebar, but I would like to make note here that it was Jeanette of Taliban Rising who officially coined the phrase. Jeanette contacted me after finding the patriarchy video on YouTube (from the workshop I gave as an invited lecturer at an unnamed apologetics organization at an unnamed Baptist seminary in March). She wanted to talk to me because there is a similar patriocentric movement in the Roman Catholic Church, and the parallels are very striking, if not disturbing.

This Roman Catholic analog to the so-called "Biblical patriarchy" movement in Protestant churches also focuses on homeschooling, and according to Jeanette, has connections to the neo-nazi groups in Europe. Also interwoven more directly is the concept of "Perennialism," which the Chambers Initiative notes thusly as it pertains to patriocentrism:

Those who adhere to these “faiths” can, through specific ascetic processes, arrive at the knowledge of the “perennial wisdom” and a state of enlightened consciousness. This state is for the “initiated”, hence the term “Gnosticism” is often used to define Perennialism. Perennialism was a reaction against the rational, materialist spirit of the Enlightenment and Industrial Revolution. Its founders rejected modern Western Civilization because of its departure from the traditional paths that led to “wisdom and enlightenment.” Thus, the central focus of Perennialism is a fierce adherence to natural, human traditions and a bitter rejection of “modernity,” all the Perennialists perceive to flow from the “modern spirit.”

Patriocentricity in America, on the Protestant side approaches very many of the same concepts, theories and goals of Perennialism through their strong connections to the agrarian movements and neo-Confederate ideology. The fathers of the foundations of the modern patriocentricity follow ideals of the very gnostic higher life and Keswick movements, believing that holy living can produce greater sanctification, following after the "Christian perfection" doctrines of John Wesley. This is comingled with devotion to Confederate Presbyterians like Robert Lewis Dabney and Benjamin Morgan Palmer along with many of the sentiments of modern Southern secessionist movements. This Luddite mentality also pervades many pockets within patriarchy, and also corresponds to sentiments that arose from early 20th century revivalism that viewed wholesome living as God's most powerful agency in the Christian life.

What is interesting is that I understand that notable figures in US Evangelical Christianity and evangelists for the complementarian message turn up in association with some of the Pereniallist groups affiliated with this similar movement in the Roman Catholic Church. Jeanette was shocked (as was I) to recognize these names as we discussed the similarities of each of these movements on the phone. I hope that more writings emerge in the future comparing and contrasting these different groups (the Protestant patriocentrists and the Perennialists largely affiliated with Roman Catholicism's own patriocentricity). [It's not traditional patriarchy, to be certain!]

I was also shocked but pleased to see that my site is listed as a resource and "Site of Interest" at the Chambers Initiative site (along with Jeanette's Taliban Rising: Fight the Mental Burqa). So with that interesting tidbit set to simmer on the back burners of your brain, here's some more thoughtful insight from Jeanette, SHE who officially coined the term "Fight the Mental Burqa!" as the subtitle to her blog, named Taliban Rising. I look forward to more good posts here.

More On Fighting The Mental Burqa!

Another section from "In Defense of My Mind":

A woman is imprisoned by a Mental, Burqa if her entire formation, or her present indoctrination by those claiming to speak in God's name, does not inform or enable her to choose the other good means that God allows her in the pursuit of her final end. A girl is living under the Mental Burqa if she is told that she is “resisting God’s Biblical plan for her” by pursuing a higher education or by exercising a legitimate profession, before settling down to marry, should she believe that is God's will for her. She is oppressed by the Mental Burqa if she is trained to believe she is not fit to choose whom she will marry. Patriocentrism treats women as interchangeable, and castigates as “modern sentimentality” a woman’s loathing to be “given in marriage” to a man she finds repulsive, one with whom she has neither affinity of character nor compatibility of intellect. So, yes, I am for the woman's right to live as a human being with a rational nature. I am for her right to know she has a God-given choice between the legitimate means to reach Him. I am for her right to the education that will equip her to embrace any state of life. I am for her right to determine, if she decides to marry, which man she thinks will make a good husband for herself and father for her children. I am for the woman's right not to be extinguished by the neo-fascist philosophy of a group of men who know that their own agenda is best served by women who have been denied or who have abdicated their duty to act as rational, responsible human beings. We have a face and a mind. Fight the Mental Burqa.

If you haven't already, read the full post HERE.

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What is Right Wing Populism? (Quiverfull , Patriarchy Fringe and the Catholic Church?)

Recently, I’ve become acquainted with some Catholic Believers in the Lord Jesus who note nearly identical patriocentric trends in the Catholic Church as we’ve described with Evangelical Christianity, particularly within homeschooling circles. 

There are, reportedly, even European connections to neo-Nazi groups within the Catholic homeschooling groups, just as there is some overlap between patriarchy and those who espouse racialist/kinist/agrarian ideals. The many parallels amaze me, as the same message within a growing faction also now grows within a margin of the Catholic Church as well. Here follows an example of one of the many questions that these Catholic Believers posed to me:

“The main question my wife and I never could answer is whether this was a philosophical problem or a political one. (Which came first the chicken or the egg?) In all actuality it is probably both. As with all things human, ideas are eventually played out in action and politics. I think this movement needs to be exposed and fought. Movements like James Town and Nazism are never fought until there is carnage or sexual abuse, but then it is too late. I believe that Perennialist ideals are forming a "Super-Religion" which can unite people of various backgrounds to common belief and action. It offers a salvation similar to the Marxist ideal of a paradise in this world. A paradise with no need for Our Lord.”

[Note: I understand “perennialism” to describe a society’s cycle through paradigms and prosperity as foundational, enduring, “perennial” truths emerge repeatedly within each cycle.] Considering that the church and religion defines its own type of government and that the term “politics” defines that which involves law-making and governance, the question is one that is somewhat difficult to answer. 

 I am reminded of Christian Reconstruction and the overlap of religious and political ends within the Christian Right. I certainly don’t agree with Berlet and Lyons, bu I found their description of “Right Wing Populism” to be quite interesting, particularly pertaining to this topic. As I pulled this material from the book, I noted the many similarities between this approach and the tactics employed by the new, brave breed of “complementarians” that promote the concepts of “Christian feminism” and the “evils” of the egalitarian perspective as they attempt to “win the gender debate.” 

I was also asked what I believed the “patriocentrist world” would look like. Given the authoritarian and elitist tactics employed thus far; personally, I believe that it would have some totalitarian, bureaucratic, Orwellian flavor of some type. Indeed, I hope that none of us find out. More ideas to ponder…    

Excerpts from. Chip Berlet and Matthew N Lyons in “Right Wing Populism in America: Too Close for Comfort.” New York, NY: Guilford Press, 2000. 

CHARACTERISTICS OF RIGHT WING POPULISM (pg 6-13)

1. Producerism

One of the staples of repressive and right-wing populist ideology has been producerism, a doctrine that champions the so-called producers in society against both “unproductive” elites and subordinate groups defined as lazy or immoral… [. . .]White farmers, laborers, artisans, slave-owning planters, and “productive” entrepreneurs; it excluded bankers, speculators, monopolists – and people of color. In this way, producerism bolstered White supremacy, blurred actual class divisions, and embraced some elite groups while scapegoating others.[. . .]In the 1920s industrial philosophy of Henry Ford, and Father Coughlin’s fascist doctrine in the 1930s, producerism fused with anti-Semitic attacks against “parasitic” Jews.

Producerism, with its baggage of prejudice, remains today the most common populist narrative on the right, and it facilitates the use of demonization and scapegoating as political tools [Saxon, A “Rise and Fall of the White Republic, p 313].

2. Demonization and Scapegoating 

Jean Hardesty argues that the contemporary Right has frequently relied on “mobilizing resentment” as an organizing process (Hardesty, JV. “Mobilizing Resentment: Conservative Resurgence from the John Birch Society to the Promise Keepers”. Boston, MA: Beacon, 1999).  

Demonization of an enemy often begins with marginalization, the ideological process in which targeted individuals or groups are placed outside the circle of wholesome mainstream society through political propaganda and age-old prejudice. This creates an us-them or good-bad dynamic of dualism, which acknowledges no complexity or nuance and forecloses meaningful civil debate or practical political compromise.  

The next step is objectification or dehumanization, the process of negatively labeling a person or group of people so they become perceived more as objects than as real people. Dehumanization often is associated with the belief that a particular group of people is inferior or threatening. 

The final step is demonization, the person or group is framed as totally malevolent, sinful and evil. It is easier to rationalize stereotyping, prejudice, discrimination, scapegoating and even violence against those who are dehumanized or demonized (Aho,JA. “Phenomenology of the Enemy.” Seattle: University of Washington Press, pp. 107 -121. Young-Breuhl, E. “Anatomy of Prejudices.” Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univerisity Press, 1996.).  

The word scapegoat has evolved to mean a person or group wrongfully blamed for some problem, especially for other people’s misdeeds. We use the term scapegoating to describe the social process whereby the hostility and grievances of an angry, frustrated group are directed away from the real causes of a social problem onto a target group demonized as malevolent wrongdoers.  

The scapegoat bears the blame, while the scapegoaters feel a sense of righteousness and increased unity. The social problem may be real or imaginary, the grievances legitimate or illegitimate, and members of the targeted group may be wholly innocent or partly culpable. What matters is that the scapegoats are wrongfully stereotyped as all sharing the same negative trait, or are singled out for blame while other major culprits are left off the hook (Alport, GW. “Nature of Prejudice,” Cambridge MA: Addison-Westley, 1954, pp 243-260. Girard,R. “The Scapegoat.” Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press, 1986.).  

Scapegoating often targets socially disempowered or marginalized groups. At the same time, the scapegoat is often portrayed as powerful or privileged. In this way, scapegoating feeds on people’s anger about their own disempowerment but diverts this anger way from the real systems of power and oppression.  

A certain level of scapegoating is endemic in most societies, but it more readily becomes an important political force in times of social competition or upheaval. At such times, especially, scapgoating can be an effective way to mobilize mass support and activism during a struggle for power. 

 3. Conspiracism 

Conspiracism is a particular narrative form of scapegoating that frames the enemy as part of a vast, insidious plot against the common good, while it valorizes the scapegoater as a hero for sounding the alarm. Like other forms of scapegoating, conspiracism often, though not always, targets oppressed or stigmatized groups. In many cases, conspiracism uses coded language to mask ethnic or racial bigotry, for example, attacking the Federal Reserve in was that evoke common stereotypes about “Jewish bankers.” 

 Far right groups have often used such conspiracy theories as an opening wedge for more explicit hate ideology. Conspiracism differs in several ways from legitimate efforts to expose secret plots. First, the conspiracist worldview assigns tiny cabals of evildoers with superhuman power to control events; it regards such plots as the major motor of history.

Conspiracism blames individualized and subjective forces for political, economic, and social problems rather than analyzing conflict in terms of systems, institutions, and structures of power. Second, conspiracism tends to frame social conflict in terms of a transcendent struggle between Good and Evil that reflects the influence of the apocalyptic paradigm.

In its efforts to trace all wrongdoing to one vast plot, conspiracism plays fast and loose with the facts. While conspiracy theorists often start with a grain of truth and “document” their claims exhaustively, they make leaps of logic in analyzing evidence, such as seeing guilt by association or treating allegations as proven fact (Hofstadter, R. “Paranoid Style in American Politics and Other Essays.” New York, NY: Knopf, 1965, pp 37-38.).  

Conspiracist attacks can be directed either “upward” or “downward.” Antielite conspiracism (or antielite scapegoating) targets groups seen as sinister elites abusing their power from above. Countersubversive scapegoating targets groups portrayed as subversives trying to overturn the established order the established order from below or from within[. . .]What these versions share, and what especially defines antielite conspiracism, is that the scapegoat is seen as a subjective, alien force that distorts the normal workings of society. Thus, despite its “radical” veneer, antielite conspiracism shares the mainstream assumptions that the United States is fundamentally democratic, and that any injustice results from selfish special interest groups, not from underlying systems of power and oppression.  

 As Donner argued, “In a period of social and economic change during which traditional institutions are under the greatest strain, the need for the myth is especially strong as a means of transferring blame, and outlet for the despair [people] face when normal channels of protest and change are closed (Donner, FJ. “Age of Surveillance: The Aims and Methods of America’s Political Intelligence System.” New York, NY: Knopf, 1980, pg 11.)  

In these ways, countersubversive scapegoating has played an important role in this country’s system of social control, bolstering elite privilege and power. 

4.  Apocalyptic Catastrophizing

Apocalypticism – the anticipation of a righteous struggle against evil conspiracies – has nfluenced social and political movements throughout US History. In its generic sense, the word apocalypse has come to mean the belief in an approaching confrontation, cataclysmic event, or transformation of epochal proportion, about which a select few have forewarning so they can make appropriate preparations.  

Those who believe in a coming apocalypse might be optimistic about the outcome of the apocalyptic moment, anticipating a chance for positive transformational change; or they might be pessimistic, anticipating a doomsday; or they might anticipate a period of violence or chaos with an uncertain outcome (Bromley, DG. “Constructing Apocalysm.” pp 31-45. Wessinger, C “Millennialism With and Without Mayhem.” pp 47-59. Both in Robbins, T & Palmer, SJ (ed.). “Millennium, Messiahs and Mayhem: Contemporary Apocalyptic Movements.” New York, NY: Routledge, 1997.). 

5.  Millenial Visons

Millennialism is a specific form of apocalyptic expectation. Most contemporary Christian fundamentalists believe that when Christ returns, He will reign for a period of 1,000 years – a millennium. Yet not all contemporary Christians promote apocalyptic demonization. Within Christianity, there are two competing views of how to interpret the apocalyptic and millennial themes in the Bible, especially the book of Revelation.  

One view identifies evil with specific persons or groups, seeking to identify those in league with the Devil. A more optimistic form of interpreting apolcalyptic prophecy is promoted by Christians who see evil in the will to dominate and oppress. Apocalyptic thinking, in this case, seeks justice for the poor and weak.  

The two interpretations represent a deep division within Christianity. The dangerous form of millennialism comes not from Christianity per se, but from Christians who combine biblical literalism, apocalyptic timetables, demonization and oppressive prejudices… These social movements sought to influence public policy, social conduct, and cultural attitudes, sometimes coming into conflict with the established order and state power.

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