The Danger of Fundamentalism

I was doing some research onto Islamism and Saudi Wahhabists–and came across the following:

“Fundamentalism is an aggressive and marginalized religious movement which, in reaction to the perceived threat of modernity, seeks to return its home religion and nation to traditional orthodox principles, values and texts through the co-option of the central executive and legislative power of both the religion itself and the modern national state.” —Patrick Arnold, originally written to describe changes in American Catholicism, 1987

In turn, that led me to a quote from Pope Francis:

“Fundamentalism is a sickness that is in all religions … Religious fundamentalism is not religious, because it lacks God. It is idolatry, like idolatry of money … We Catholics have some — and not some, many — who believe in the absolute truth and go ahead dirtying the other with calumny, with disinformation, and doing evil.” –Pope France, 11/30/15

That got me thinking–which means a non-VB blog posting.

I think fundamentalism has three other characteristics beyond claiming religious inspiration (and remember–religion and faith are two distinctly different things):

Fundamentalists are reactive. They do not wish to advance. They want to return to a mythical golden-age in the past almost always seen as having pure values. They are reactive in a different sense as well–inevitably growing angry when things change. You can see this in recent American society with the fundamentalist response to same-sex marriage. You can see it in the white response to the Civil Rights Movement across the South.

That leads to the second point. Fundamentalists are intolerant of dissent. If you do not agree completely with their views, you are the enemy. Within the US, you see this again with the portrayal of Jesus–and the fury ignited if a person notes Jesus’ rather socialist, left-leaning ideas regarding providing food, tolerance, and towards massive taxation/exploitation of the poor. This is NOT just a Christian thing–you see this in Islamist reaction to political cartoons of Mohammed or in the (secular) Chinese response to something like an American politician flying into Taiwan.

The other characteristic of fundamentalists is that they deny issues are complicated. In terms of guns in America, the fundamentalists are absolutely binary–some want unlimited guns, others want all guns banned. Both sides REFUSE to see the middle ground–things like gun rights have been enshrined by states back to colonial days…or that the guy in the NRA who made ‘unlimited guns’ the NRA’s driving force was a racist murderer (Harlon Carter…look him up)–or even that until the 1970s, the NRA was responsible for writing up gun control legislation with the idea that no weapons should be permitted that exceed the regularly available firepower of law enforcement personnel.

Ultimately, there are political aims. It is not about religion/faith–it is all about political power and control. Can you think of any nation or government with a representative government successfully run by fundamentalists? I can’t. I can look at nations like Iran and Afghanistan though to see that fundamentalism is nothing more than cronyism and repression of any and all dissent. The Cult of Kim in North Korea is the same thing…and I’m not so sure China isn’t on the same path with Xi and repressing objections to his actions (such as the removal of Hu from the Party Congress in light that he may have cast an objecting vote to Xi getting a third term).

From an American point of view, religious fundamentalists helped put Trump in the White House because they felt that that would guarantee decisions favorable to fundamentalism and Christian nationalism. But is that really Christian or even Abrahamic? There’s an Old Testament lesson about golden calves and putting idols at the front of the line. Isn’t that what has happened with Christian fundamentalists? They’ve put political control as their primary goal–not saving souls, not preparation for the Hereafter.

Noted ‘libtard’ Dwight Eisenhower said that the Soviets weren’t the danger to America–the real danger, just as it had been in post-WW1 Germany, just as it had been in post-Revolution France–was from the far-right of American politics, the fundamentalists. Ike elaborated on this with: “Never let yourself be persuaded that any one Great Man, any one leader, is necessary to the salvation of America. When America consists of one leader and millions of devoted followers, it will no longer be America.” (I’ve found that self-proclaimed political “conservatives” really hate this quote…but…if the shoe fits, y’know?)

Eisenhower’s liberal vice-president (Richard Nixon) said in his memoirs that his great regret was making a political deal with the far-right/conservatives of the American South–that that deal (circa his writing in 1990 or so) was destroying the soul of the Republican Party and that if changes weren’t implemented soon, would turn it into the same southernreactionary party that the Democrats had been during the Civil Rights movement.

Oof.

TO BE CLEAR–this doesn’t mean the Democratic Party is a great party, organized, or competent. They aren’t. But the Democratic Party is FAR from being fundamentalist or dogmatic. Just for the record.

The problem is–how do you fix all of this?

The simple answer is education–but that’s not simple because you have many areas cutting educational money or trying to disrupt education so new private schools (run for-profit) can flourish instead. You’ve got parents interfering in schools, saying they know best as parents…even as they leave kids at home unsupervised on a regular basis. You have state bureaucracies putting oppressive paperwork requirements on teachers, reducing the time teachers have with students…and then, of course, the joy of competence being tied to success on standardized tests.

So maybe we should start small–acknowledge that life is messy and complicated. Acknowledge that in a nation of 350,000,000 there will be differing views and ideas–and that sometimes other people will be right and we will be wrong. Sometimes we will all be wrong. Sometimes both sides can be right…that politics was never meant to be a zero-sum game…just as life is not zero-sum.

Now…time to roll up the sleeves and go back to trying to make a difference. Get enough butterflies flapping wings and maybe we can create a tsunami of tolerance.