Words are actions. But so are actions:
I believe from what I read that in the US Christianity is, at last, showing the same pattern of decline that it has in Europe - and I’m sure that the reason for the utterly batshit crazy ideas like you cite is related; cults that feel under threat tend to become more extreme as their leaders try to control the faithful. But, you know, Christian extreme cults tend to self-destruct. (The Jehovah’s Witnesses schism even faster than the various liberation fronts in The Life of Brian, for instance.)
The question is whether a cult like the Rapturists would ever gain real traction. Trump might consider them to be useful idiots - but I suspect that what the Republicans are after now is stability. Stability can be pretty awful - being in shit up to your neck is not pleasant even if it isn’t going up and down very much - but if you read up on equivalent cults from, say, about 900 AD on you will find that the authorities quickly suppress them or transform them.
I appreciate that an awful lot of people are extremely worried - I am extremely worried myself - and I don’t know how far Trump, and the even worse Republicans like Cruz, Ribio, Priebus et al, will actually go. As I say in a post above, I am actually slightly optimistic that Israel’s Dolphin class submarines and nuclear IRBMs will make the new Administration think very hard about who to attack. It’s the Mexicans, I feel, who have most to worry about.
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I’m pretty sure you don’t live in the US and probably haven’t spent much time hanging out with typical Americans off the beaten path. ~83% of Americans are Christians, 42% are Young Earth creationists, 37% are Evangelicals. Rapturists are common, normal, and not only don’t see their ideas as utterly batshit crazy, but aren’t treated or considered utterly batshit crazy by the general populace and rarely have their beliefs challenged anywhere. The Premillennial Dispensationalists (“Rapturists”) have been around for around a century and a half, and are one of the most dominant forces in US politics. While you and I think they’re batshit crazy, they don’t think their views are extreme, aren’t treated as though their views are extreme, they are more common than people who think they’re batshit crazy, and they control the school boards and work to ensure the populace stays poorly educated in any domain where a modern scientific view of the world threatens their dogma. People who think Rapturists are nuts in the US - we are in the minority and those people aren’t the fits of a dying religion - they’re been a consistent presence for ~150 years.
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Something like 41% of evangelicals voted FOR trump while 50% voted against HRC so something like 85% of evangelicals ended up voted for trump. There’s some wonderful values on display there. Seriously though, their vote has nothing to do with morals but everything to do with abortion, purging America of undesirables, and keeping things lined up for the Rapture.
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Everyone needs to watch the film “Look Who’s Back.” The premise is that Hitler is inexplicably transported into the present and goes around in his old uniform trying to revive the Nazi movement. The media assume he’s a comedian and keep giving him a wider and wider platform, until finally people start to listen. You know — like we just did with Donald Trump.
The actor who plays Hitler is phenomenal. The filmmakers truly get Hitler’s personality, diabolical genius and charisma, and the parallels to current events are downright chilling.
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To add to what nemomen said, although not all our standard Biblical literalists believe that the Bible describes a rapture, a large number of them do. (They disagree about the timing, though. Some believe in a pre-tribulation rapture, others in a post-tribulation rapture. They don’t seem to care enough about that to fight over it, though.) Beyond that, basically all literalists (including pretty much anyone who would identify as a Fundamentalist and including many Evangelicals) accept the story of the 144,000 Jewish virgins being taken into heaven as part of the events of the Second Coming.
All those Evangelical politicians who are big on the State of Israel are hoping that Israeli Jews will go rebuild the Temple and hasten the return of Jesus. I lack words.
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Most evangelicals believe this, apart from the weird 144,000 JWs thing. The thinking is that the end times will come after the Battle of Armageddon, which is (was) in Israel. Therefore, Israel must exist as a Jewish state so the end times prophecies can come true and all good Christians can ascend to Heaven. For most evangelicals, whether all Jews return to Israel is not really relevant, though I suspect many would prefer that. It is entirely possible for them to hate Jews and still support the state of Israel with equal fervor.
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18,3% of Germans voted for the NSDAP in 1930, and with 37,4% in 1932.
There were frequent clashes between the SA and communist groups at that time, as well as other violence by the SA. But they were not yet in power. Voter turnout was beyond 80% anyway. It was a democratic election, secret ballots.
It may have been safer for recognizably Jewish people to stay home on election day, but the 37% were not coerced votes from suppressed people.
Those 37% were definitely about “making Germany great again”.
As someone whose grandmother was an actual supporter of the Nazis at the time, I have to say that this sounds credible to me. Once there was a war, a lot of people would have supported “their country, right or wrong”.
I hear there are soldiers in the US military that did not actually support the war crime of aggression against Iraq. I hear that among opponents of the Iraq invasion, the position of “Support the troops, not the war” was reasonably popular. Apparently, large parts of the American population consider “serving your country” a good thing, even if the politicians in charge sometimes give the wrong orders.
Now, multiply present-day America’s militaristic attitude by some factor, and you get Germany in the 30s. If your country gets into a war, even if you disapprove of the war, as an able-bodied male it is your duty to fight for your country. Not only legally (you really had no option to refuse), but also morally. Until very late in the war, even a lot of definite non-nazis would proudly serve the “German cause”.
So in a hypothetical future, the people who are just fighting for “the American cause” are the people who are defending American soil against the Chinese-led international coalition that is marching on Washington to depose Trump. And I am pretty sure that such a group of American patriots would include staunch supporters of Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.
On the whole, a regime like the Nazi regime is not a simple matter of a few jack-booted hyper-racist thugs being in power and everyone else being suppressed. That is just how things are depicted in movies.
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A lot of Iraqis thought the same about Saddam: better a domestic tyrant than foreign occupation, which is intrinsically humiliating because it proves that the nation was too weak to resist invasion.
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Russian government officials today admitted to communicating with Trump’s campaign. Sign a petition to appoint a Special Prosecutor to investigate links between Donald Trump and the Russian government. https://wh.gov/ieZy1
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I rather like the way Martin Luther put it in his Small Catechism:
The Eighth Commandment: "You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor."
What does this mean?
We are to fear and love God so that we do not tell lies about our neighbors, betray or slander them, or destroy their reputations. Instead we are to come to their defense, speak well of them, and interpret everything they do in the best possible light.
Oh, yes–if you wonder who your neighbor is, read the story of the Samaritan in Luke 10:25-37 (First century Jews regarded Samaritans about the same way that Trump regards Mexican immigrants.)
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Never miss a chance to post this one:
“They say America First, but they mean America next…”
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I seems to me that would be playing into their hands. Nothing would have been said about the putin stooges’ efforts to damage the US, and by direct extension, Western Civilisation, unless it was intended as yet more damage they can do to us all.
They certainly helped trump, and did so at the express direction of poo-tin. Almost certainly they have spoken out now at his direction. He would cream his pants to see the virtual civil war impeaching trump would bring about.
I was so totally sure intelligent, self respecting Americans would make it impossible for trump to win, I had absolute faith in even hardened Republicans having more respect for the truth, then their sectarian preference.
I would be ashamed, but then it isn’t a shame to me that I misjudged your numbers, and even a lost cause is worth dying in if it is the right one. Good luck, Cousins.
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Oh. Sorry, Rachel.
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It was about States Rights in a way, just not the way it sounds.
The South wanted to take States Rights away from the North. The northern States resisted and ignored the federal government, even the Supreme Court, on enforcing the capture and return of runaway slaves. When the they wouldn’t capitulate, the South declared Independence, formed their confederation, and attacked the North.
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I’ve said it before, but to say it again:
This book is essential reading if you want to understand current US politics. There’s a lot of 1850’s in the air right now.
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1922 was pretty early. I’ll forgive them for not being able to predict the next 20 years accurately. I would have come to the same conclusion. The 1923 coup attempt, should have been a red flag though. Or maybe his book, where he spells out pretty clearly what he intends to do and how, maybe that should have given them pause. In 1922 though, maybe giving him the benefit of the doubt was appropriate.
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Yea, The argument is along the lines of the Civil War being about "States Rights."
A states right to do what?
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A lot of Hitler’s rise to power had a lot to do with the Treaty of Versailles which the Germans considered to be extremely unfair and which they universally condemned. Hence, the “German cause” focused primarily on regaining lost territories and rebuilding of the army.
I’d focus on two issues when drawing comparisons: the “only rightwing Germans are real Germans, everyone else is a traitor” (socialists were accused of actively supporting the Versailles cause) attitude, and the widespread disdain for democracy among conservatives leaders at the time.
By the by: My grandfather on my dad’s side was one of the first SS members in my hometown (late 1920s), whereas my mom’s father was a member of the Christian resistance & executed in the last days of the war. And there’s me wondering as a kid why my two grandmas never got along…
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The 83% comes from an unscientific poll with a vaguely worded question “What if anything is your religion.” It therefore does not test the strength of affiliation. It was also conducted on a sample of only 1024 adults.
For serious analysis we need to consult an organisation like Pew Research.
“The latest survey was conducted in English and Spanish among a nationally representative sample of 35,071 adults interviewed by telephone, on both cellphones and landlines, from June 4-Sept. 30, 2014.”
(You can inspect their methodology in detail on their website).
Comparing the results of a one-vague-question asked of 1024 people and a detailed survey asked of over 30000 is not likely to be to the advantage of the former.
http://www.pewforum.org/2015/05/12/americas-changing-religious-landscape/
http://www.pewresearch.org/daily-number/jesus-christs-return-to-earth/
Pew’s research suggests that about a quarter of Americans are Evangelicals of the batshit tendency. That is still a ridiculously high number for the most powerful country on Earth, but I’m inclined to give them more credibility than ABC News.
The research also shows that Hindus and Jews are now the best educated and possibly highest income social groups in the US. I have seen suggestions elsewhere that evangelical protestants are now on average poorer than Catholics, an interesting reversal.
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