If I wanted to bash Fundamentalist Christians, there are fewer places I can
think of that would give me a warmer reception than here. Not that I don't
want to bash fundamentalist Christians (at least not until I have
established a solid alibi), it's just that I don't want to read a lot of
knee-jerk, fight-hate-with-hate, "yeah, they really suck", marshmallowey
stickiness.
To reiterate, if batshit fundamentalists (and they don't have to be
Christian) are symptoms of a social sickness (and nobody has come up with a
better theory than that as far as I am concerned), then what is
that sickness? I'm also not going to sit still for the "It's just human
nature" cop-out. All primates (and that includes you and me) have
demonstrated in experimental settings that they have a deep-rooted sense of
social justice. It's not just their "nature" to enjoy watching others
suffer. Sometimes we do enjoy watching others suffer, but there
is a laundry list of psychological steps we have to go through in order to
make that happen (primarily, we have to use one of any various means to
dehumanise or objectify the "other" so that we can convince ourselves that
what we are doing is "fair"). But this doesn't explain the gleeful sadism
we are seeing here.
What the fuck is wrong with us?
____________________ "I believe that woman is planning to shoot me again."
Schizo
Extreme Fanatic
Posts: 897 Registered: 31/12/1969 Status: Offline
posted on 22/12/2005 at 04:04 AM
I'm not sure if this is exactly what you're trying to get at, but I think
one of the roots of organizations like fundamentalist Christianity is
groundless elitism.
Take the fundamentalist population of America today, as a whole. Most (not
all) have very little going for them. They are, to a large extent, the
dregs of society. This is key, I think.
Christianity offers worth, even superiority, to those who have not earned
it. In fact, that is one of the tenents of the Christian faith. It is not
your worth, but the worth of the God you have accepted. The only criteria
towards acceptance into this elite society is belief.
And then what do you have? You have a large group of individuals sporting
a grandeur and position they have not earned. Maybe in this life they are
nothing, but just wait until the afterlife!
The story of the apocalypse is very dear to the hearts of these
underprivileged people. Why? Because it brings the switch in power into
this life - this world. Someday - maybe in our lifetime - our Leader will
come and bring down those who have disregarded us and looked down their
noses at us. Because, as sweet as pie in the sky when we die can be,
nothing satisfies quite like a nice blood bath of revenge right here and
now.
After all, where was Christianity born except in the outcast and enslaved
nation of Israel, even among the poorest and most debased of that nation.
There, on the dusty byways of Palestine, the desperate created a dream that
grew until it swept the world.
Why then do the rich, talented, and powerful buy into this, you may ask?
Well, it's not only the poor who appreciate unearned power. The lords and
kings of this earth saw this thing called Christianity, and found it to be
a tool worth using. The underprivileged became an army for them to
general. To further the will of God on this earth became a battle cry.
Christianity became the reins by which the elite controlled those who
wished they were elite.
So, in the end, poor fundamentalism is about unearned glory for those who
have none of their own, or about controlling the masses for those who have
more than they know what to do with it.
"True" Christianity is a completely different animal, of course.
____________________ "You can tell by the scars on my arms and the cracks in my hips and the
dents in my car and the blisters on my lips that I'm not the carefullest of
girls." - Dresden Dolls, "Girl Anachronism"
Monolycus
Fanatic
Posts: 580 Registered: 31/12/1969 Status: Offline
posted on 22/12/2005 at 08:20 AM
Interesting point, Schiz. I should mention that what you are describing as
"groundless elitism" (good description) is usually referred to by the term
"exceptionalism" (and even more often as "American exceptionalism"). It's
a process like the one I described earlier that allows us to circumvent our
inborn sense of social justice. Why should the US be allowed to hoard
resources like petroleum and deny it to developing nations? We feel we are
a "special case" for a variety of imaginary reasons. Needless to say,
exceptionalism does not usually play very well with the groups who are
excluded.
And you did a very good job of explaining where some of this murderous rage
comes from as it applies to the "dregs of society" (although I have had
some pretty vicious arguments recently with non-US citizens who do not
believe that anybody in the USA actually suffers, or if they do, they only
suffer in trivial ways). What you kind of glossed over, though, is why the
genuine elite also feel this murderous rage. As a matter of fact,
since it is only the privileged who have any significant voice in our
culture, the formalised doctrine of sadism must come nearly exclusively
from them.
The explanation that it is a tactic for control only goes so far, though.
While I agree with you that it is part of it, it assumes that they do not
genuinely believe the message themselves and that their messages to the
rest of us are consciously cynical. Yes and no. I'm sure that when it
comes to specifics and details, they are fully conscious of what they are
doing. Everything that is presented to the masses is done with the aim of
manipulating and controlling them. There is a term for this as well...
actually there have been a few. The phrase currently in vogue is
"perception management" and there are civilian and military institutions
dedicated exclusively to its application and study.
But not all of it is a front. How "Christian" are the fundamentalists in
seats of power in the US who are resurrecting the Dark Ages doctrines of
fuedalism and a "clash of civilizations"...? That's highly debatable, and
an ultimately fruitless discussion. What is not debatable is that
whether they have a genuine belief that they are acting from a percieved
Divine Will or whether they are writing their own agendae from whole cloth,
they are also filled with murderous and sadistic rage against the
"other" . In some ways... many ways... those who are not
disempowered in our society are more murderously inclined than those who
are, even if they aren't the ones physically pulling the switches
themselves. Why should this be if the root of this rage comes from
feelings of inadequacy? Do the underprivileged have one cause for their
sadism and the privileged another?
I'm not sure, but I suspect the justifications are different even if the
causes are the same. One thing the "elite" already have going for them is
that they have already confronted the issue that they have more than others
and have at least begun the process of "making it fair" to themselves. I
pointed out above that primates have a deep-rooted sense of "fairness", and
we are always engaged in the fiction of justifying why this or that
injustice is "right". A wealthy person, one who is already the benefactor
of the "unfairness" of life (and who dedicates most of their time trying to
consolidate more capital and power instead of trying to distribute it more
evenly) must have very sophisticated psychological tools to allow
themselves to do this. It seems impossible, at least to me, that an
"elite" can maintain the same sense of conscious "fairness" that someone
who is underprivileged would have.
One tool that Chrisitianity (or at least Protestantism) offers towards this
justification is the elitist Calvinist doctrine. According to Calvinism,
there are the "saved" and the "unsaved", and since God is omnipotent, He
already knows who is who. Nothing we do on Earth can change a decision
that was made from the beginning of time and there is no way that we can
truly know which group we fall into. We can suspect, though.
Since being "saved" is a position of privilege, God must favor privilege
and our material success is a good indication of our standing in His books.
Ergo, having more than my neighbour puts me in better standing with the
Big Guy. Needless to say, some of the biggest bastards in the last four
hundred or so odd years have, at the end of the day, been Calvinists.
But I think Calvinism itself is just one more of those psychological games
we play to justify being sadistic monsters. It is not a cause in itself,
it is caused by something else... our need to rationalise it. We need
fairness, or at least we need to make things appear to be fair to
ourselves. At the same time, we are going out of our way to foster
sadistic norms that fly in the face of any standard of fair play. The
feeling that we are underprivileged victims or that we are "exceptional"
due to our circumstances, or even Christianity (as it is preached and
practiced, anyway), are simply a few of many psychological tools we are
currently using to "make it look fair" and justify it to ourselves, but
where does this driving need in us to murder, to torture, to dominate, to
inflict suffering come from in the first place?
Why are we driven to make things as unfair as we can possibly make them so
that we even have to justify them fallaciously to ourselves?
Are all of our twisted rationalisations and the hoops we jump through to
make things seem "right" to us partly due to the fact that "fairness" does
not, and can not, really exist?
____________________ "I believe that woman is planning to shoot me again."
Starlight
Extreme Fanatic
Posts: 618 Registered: 27/9/2002 Status: Offline
posted on 22/12/2005 at 10:45 AM
Fairness might be, for the most part, simply a state of mind. What seems
fair to one person is sometimes so biased by their experiences within a
group that they lose touch with the group's collective beliefs. Then, the
person instead begins basing fairness on their subgroup's ideals instead.
This, in turn, alters their beliefs to be either more extreme or more
relaxed than the larger group's, and their tolerance level of outsider's
views is altered as well.
I agree that a lot of what goes on is all about superiority issues. Mainly
some people wanting to fit in with a group that makes them feel like they
are better than the people in the other groups. This sometimes is all a
person needs to feel like they belong. Then in order to stay in this or
that group, they are willing to do whatever it takes not to be an outcast.
That's when reasoning seems to end and fanaticism starts to take over.
We seem to be a nation of followers. However, instead of a bunch of
wolf-packs led by alpha members, it seems more like a bunch cow herds led
by the cowboys with the biggest horses.
I am encountering fewer and fewer people, in daily life, who are capable
of giving a straight answer on their feelings on a subject without the
answer starting with a disclaimer of some sort. I hear a lot of answers
that start with things along the lines of: "Well, my boss says...", "My
pastor tells us...", "Our group leader has told us...", "My family says
it's...", and other similar openers. It seems that answers that start with
such things as: "Well, my feelings on the matter are...", "I always like
to...", "I used to do that until...", "That's okay, but I like to...", and
so forth, are becoming rarer. I don't know if it's so much a conscious
thought process as it is that some have become brainwashed by the
cowboys.
Fortunately, there is still a minority of people who have not yet
succumbed to the brainwashing process. So there is still hope, albeit that
hope is a very small ember down below a pile of wet wood.
____________________ "When choosing between two evils, I always like to try the one I've never
tried before." ~Mae West
Schizo
Extreme Fanatic
Posts: 897 Registered: 31/12/1969 Status: Offline
posted on 22/12/2005 at 02:54 PM
Humans as a whole are a greedy and grasping race. He who can amass the
most possessions has the power do to what he pleases. Humans can become
downright vicious when something they consider theirs is threatened. They
can also be incredibly adept at justifying annexing the possessions of
others.
The rich are attracted to creeds like fundamentalist Christianity because
it A. eases their consciences by forgiving their past transgressions
incurred while amassing their wealth, and B. gives them an excuse to go
after other people's wealth, as long as they can somehow attribute it to
the cause of Christ. It is necessary for the rich fanatic to believe in
his creed with all his might, because it provides both the justification
and the forgiveness he needs to keep from realizing what a cruel and greedy
bastard he really is.
I think, between justification for greed and power over the masses, you
probably cover most of the reasoning behind rich and powerful fanatics
since the beginning of history.
____________________ "You can tell by the scars on my arms and the cracks in my hips and the
dents in my car and the blisters on my lips that I'm not the carefullest
of
girls." - Dresden Dolls, "Girl Anachronism"
BlueLinn
Fanatic
Posts: 246 Registered: 31/12/1969 Status: Offline
posted on 26/12/2005 at 07:55 PM
all I have to say is try living in Springfield mo......
____________________ When the world is over, will we wonder how it began?
Monolycus
Fanatic
Posts: 580 Registered: 31/12/1969 Status: Offline
posted on 27/12/2005 at 01:51 PM
@Starlight
You raise a couple of interesting side-issues... well, maybe they aren't
side-issues since I started this whole thing off as sideways as I could to
begin with. Your observation about "followers" and "non-thinking" is a
damned interesting one and one that needs to be explored a bit. Bear with
me now.
There was a psychological experiment in the 1940's in which a subject was
given a post-hypnotic suggestion. That suggestion was this: They would try
to find something on their person and it wouldn't be there (since it never
existed). They would then blame observer A (not the hypnotist, but another
person in the room) for taking it. Sure enough, after the session, they
looked for the object, couldn't find it and got angry with observer A,
coming up with a whole slew of reasons why they must have taken this
object. Now this is the interesting part... the hypnotist never provided
any reasons to blame observer A; they simply supplied the suggestion that
observer A took the object. The reasons the subject came up with were all
apparently rational and logical... if observer B had walked into the room
after the subject had been hypnotised, they would have had no way to know
that the subject was operating on a premise that they, themselves, had not
come to on their own.
What does this mean? It means the subject did not think on their
own, but rationalised a thought given to them from an external source to
provide the illusion of original thought. The subject convinced
themself (and attempted to convince everyone else) that they were thinking
when, in fact, they were operating entirely from a conclusion they had
absorbed from an external source, but one they had convinced themselves was
their own idea. If you can think of a million other examples of this
illusion of thinking and free will , then you've figured out where
I'm going with this.
The bottom line is that even if a person can produce sound, rational
premises for what they are saying, it is no indication that that person is
doing any real thinking at all.
@Schiz
Well... not exactly. As I tried to indicate with the primatology studies,
we aren't born to be greedy and grasping; that comes about as a
perversion of our inborn sense of justice. And even if we were
naturally avaricious to the core, it doesn't explain the rage I'm
talking about. Where does is the underlying sadism (demonstrated in the
Left Behind books) coming from? The fundamentalist isn't after a
world which is purified from sin; they want to watch the "unrighteous"
being tortured. They don't want to "save" anyone, they want to give the
"unsaved" a divine curb stomp. This is the angle that is not making sense
to me; not the question of how they rationalise and convince themselves
that stealing and hoarding is the "right thing" to do.
@BlueLinn
I'm not sure what you are trying to say. Are you saying that Springfield,
Misery has a higher per capita of dumbasses? I've been around a few places
and talked to a number of indigenous denizens. I've noticed that the
quality tends to change slightly, but the quantity tends to remain fairly
stable. You'll have to clarify a bit.
____________________ "I believe that woman is planning to shoot me again."
Monolycus
Fanatic
Posts: 580 Registered: 31/12/1969 Status: Offline
posted on 27/12/2005 at 03:00 PM
I don't want to give up my sideways approach, but maybe I can come at this
from another angle.
Is rage a thought? Is it an idea? Is it a philosophy? Is it a
doctrine?
None of the above. It's an emotion.
Do emotions produce thoughts? Not so much; but it does work pretty well
the other way around. Ideas produce emotions, but emotions only produce
the illusion of ideas (that is to say, rationalisations... or
tricking ourselves into thinking that we are thinking ). Boiled
down: Emotions disguise themselves as thoughts, and we can, and often do,
generate "rational and logical" arguments to support these non-thoughts.
Now, given that there is a whole lot of rage disguised as theological or
geopolitical doctrine floating around in John Q. Public, it has to be
coming from somewhere. Since rage is an emotion (and therefore a
by-product of an idea), is this source coming from within the individuals
who make up a culture (that is to say, is everybody sitting around and
coming up with the same thought that is making them want to hurt other
people), or is this source coming from somewhere that is external to
the individual but rationalised as if it were the product of original
thinking?
____________________ "I believe that woman is planning to shoot me again."
Schizo
Extreme Fanatic
Posts: 897 Registered: 31/12/1969 Status: Offline
posted on 27/12/2005 at 03:28 PM
I don't know about not being born to be greedy and grasping. Do we really
have an inborn sense of justice? Maybe there's a little of both in all of
us - the desire to be fair, and at the same time the desire to have more
than our share. Something pulling us both ways. It seems that with some,
greed is a stronger pull than justice.
It is a question that has been bothering me for years - why do some people
choose to give in to one pull within themselves primarily, when another in
a similar situation will follow a different path. What makes some people
become walking pieces of excrement, while others are worth their weight in
gold? It doesn't seem to have any corelation to circumstance - you find
both kinds among the poor and the rich. Does it have to do with an inborn
something that nudges one to one direction or the other? Is one person
just plain born with a higher tendency to cruelty while another is just
born naturally kind?
You might say it has to do with parental training (or lack thereof), but
then how do you explain those sweet, patient, amazing people who come out
of horrible, abusive homes? Or those "bad seeds" that had loving, caring
parents?
What is it in me that prompts me to choose a higher path over a lower one?
Or maybe the opposite?
I don't know. I'm still mystified by why I was born hating tomatoes, but
my daughter just plain loves them. The idea of choice, even of mere likes
and dislikes, let alone creeds and morality, really boggles my mind.
But I definitely think concepts such as greed and cruelty are just as
inborn as justice and kindness.
____________________ "You can tell by the scars on my arms and the cracks in my hips and
the
/>
dents in my car and the blisters on my lips that I'm not the carefullest
of