Fundy Values:

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Not quite an oxymoron, just misguided (by defensiveness).
by shock
Thu Apr 20, 2006 at 09:33:02 PM PDT

As I've written about here before (for example, here and here), I was raised as a fundamentalist and a Republican and have undergone a radical shift in beliefs in my adult life. While reading the comments for the highly-recommended diary, Romans 13: the reason fundamentalists still support GWB (for example, this thread), my memory was jogged to something I'd written a few years ago to a group of my friends who'd been (playfully, but genuinely) asking me to try to help them make sense of the fundamentalist mindset with respect to politics. I think this may be somewhat useful to some people here.

First, I am not posting this to try to defend the fundamentalist belief set, but rather because way back then we found it useful for strategizing going into the 2004 election in our area. That is, I hope this generates ideas for people here and/or politicians as to how to approach fundamentalists in the future.

* shock's diary :: ::
*

Despite all of the discussion about this topic here (and in the liberal press, among which I highly recommend Jim Wallis' book), I still believe that this is very important and still necessary. The voting power of this subset of our population cannot be denied -- and they are growing more influential. For example, in an episode of Frontline called "The Jesus Factor" that looked at how Republicans (in particular Bush) appeal to Christians, the following two points were made:

1. It is possible to win the presidency by carrying only the Evangelical Christian vote. (With some turnout assumptions, of course.)
2. The single most predictive "variable" as to which way a person voted in the last presidential election was whether or not they attended church (a religious service) on a weekly basis. This beat out class, race, income, education, etc.

This has long been recognized by Republican strategists. We now recognize it too. How we are going to deal with it is still up in there air. One option is to write off the fundy vote (and instead try to recruit more progressive voters into the voting pool -- essential because of #1). I'm partial to this to an extent. But, as a former fundy who was "reformed" and am now very politically active on for the "good guys", I'd like to think that there are better ways than writing off everyone like I used to be. In what follows, I offer first a rather-shallow analysis/diagnosis and then some modest suggestions.



Core "Conservative" values

(Snarkiness aside: I understand that to many here the phrase seems like an oxymoron, but I assure you that many fundies really do believe that they are operating within a self-consistent framework of values, whether they are or not. Remember, I'm presenting this through their viewpoint, not ours, and so I make no comments on some of the hypocricy.)

For many (or most?) conservatives, the core of their political views come from their religious values. (Thus, when their politics are attacked, it is likely to trigger a deeper defensive response than you might expect. More on this below.)

What follows is what I consider to be a core set of conservative ideals that I have heard expressed to various extents by religious conservatives that I know (especially my parents). The list is by no means meant to be exhaustive and lots of these overlap. I divided them into two main categories. The first are the values that stem directly from "Western religion" (as exemplified here primarily by modern Christianity, which I understand the best). The second set are more secular, but typically accompany the first. (It is obviously possible to adopt subsets of these.)

* Religion-based
1. "Decisiveness" ("clarity")
Little or no moral ambiguity
--> "Categorical" politics of generalizations and labels
Good vs. Evil worldview ("We" are the "Good Guys". Period.)
--> Security (protection from and battle against "evil") is very important
--> Strong patriotism / loyalty.
2. "Morality"
Actions are either right or wrong.
--> Against adultery (any sex outside marriage), homosexuality, abortion.
Human Laws are (or should be) based upon God's absolute law
--> Religion in government, Prayer in schools
(Given "clarity", it is possible to decide what is "moral".)
3. "Discipline and Accountability" ("individual responsibility")
--> Against abortion.
Pro death penalty
Low spending on social programs (e.g. welfare)
"Authoritarian" government in terms of law enforcement
(Given the "morality" and "clarity", there are no qualms about punishing "guilty" people.)
4. (Nuclear) "Family values"
Traditional (paternalistic) Gender Roles
--> Against adultery and homosexuality and feminism.
Want "values" (morality) taught at home, not from school (or "liberal TV")
--> Against sex education, teaching about evolution, etc.
The "Home" is a sacred place: anything that threatens its sanctity is "evil"
--> Pro guns, Favor tough law enforcement, Even "neighborhood diversity" is bad
* Non-Religious
1. "Freedom"
Security is a requirement for this to work
Free Market Capitalism
--> Pro corporation
--> Consumerism (the less savvy or informed people are the better!)
--> Globalization and the active spread of the capitalistic system
Small Government (less laws and regulations)
For some, also partly due to view that it is amoral! (But interestingly, this one sometimes goes against the authoritarianism and morality of Social Conservatives.)
--> Pro guns
2. "Stability"
Don't rock the boat. Change is unpredictable and therefore destabilizing. (Predictability is good for the markets.)
--> Maintain traditional distinctions (based on class/race/gender/etc.)



Main Point: Religious conservatives feel they are under attack!


1. Moral attack

Commercial (entertainment) media is:
1) Socially liberal
Negative portrayal of religion (or minimization), sexual promiscuity, acceptance of non-traditional gender roles and homosexuality), depicting rebellious behavior, etc.
2) YET economically conservative
Pro-consumerism, pro-corporation, pro-war (good for business), etc.
(But most Republicans don't notice #2 because they never question "the system".)
#1 has created the perception among many socially conservative (religious) Republicans that they (their value systems) are under attack. Notice that mainstream entertainment media routinely violates every single one of the religion-based values above! This leads to an "embattled" feeling that everyone else in America disagrees with them and thinks they are prudes. There is a feeling of marginalization that leads to (self-righteous) anger.
"Evil is winning! Society is falling apart!"
--> Quest for media reform
--> A Victorian style culture that over-reacts to promiscuity (think Lewinsky)

2. Intellectual attack

Not only are their values attacked, but also their intelligence:
* Science is portrayed as a quest to supplant religion.
* Intellectuals / academics look down upon and even ridicule religious people.
Many religious conservatives are keenly aware of this. As a reaction, scientists are perceived as arrogant know-it-alls who are out of touch with reality.
--> Home schooling movement
--> Rejection of "nuance" in politics
--> Anti-intellectualism (rejection of "book smarts") leading to things like the discounting of scientific evidence for global warming.

3. Personal attack

Furthermore, conservatives are (rightly, but not in their eyes) portrayed as bigots for their stand against homosexuality and affirmative action.
--> Mistrust of all "diversity" programs

4. Political attack

Finally, they believe they are under political attack. They believe (wrongly) that the country was founded on religious principles and that these are slowly but surely being removed from the government. (Note that, as many here have written about, most do NOT believe that a separation between church and state is written into the constitution and many are willing to argue this tooth and nail. Believe it or not, many have undertaken to prove this point historically -- and these attempts are rightly refuted by the likes of Frederick Clarkson.)

They point to the removal of prayer from government and schools, the gradual removal of religious symbols, the "pledge controversy", Roe vs. Wade, etc. as evidence of this sustained attack.
--> Strong reaction to "political correctness"



Consequences

In addition to causing them to take more extreme political positions related to the above points, this perception that they are under moral, intellectual and political attack has more general consequences as well. Importantly, it causes them to become even more conservative because it:
1) Further reinforces their fundamental notion of a struggle between Good and Evil;
2) Causes to unite to "defend" themselves and their way of life, empowering right-wing organizations (e.g. the "Moral Majority", "Christian Coalition", and even Fox News). In doing so, this polarizes and homogenizes their world even further.

These, in turn, lead them to favor government policies and institutions that will help "defend" them against the onslaught AND (importantly) give more more power to their organizations (which they perceive as "defending" them as well). They also lead them to the urge to go on the "offensive" and "fight back". (A favorite quote of theirs is the one about the only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing.)



Possible Approaches

Obviously: take them off the defensive.

But how?
I don't know, and here I am just brainstorming. I have a couple of ideas though.

At a personal level:

Call attention to their defensiveness. Acknowledge that they have legitimate reasons to be defensive. (They really do!) And, of course, don't try to "proselytize" them to change their values (at first)... this would obviously just make them even more defensive!

A LOT of their values hinge upon the first one in the list -- the sense of moral absolutes and Good vs. Evil. This can be undermined using their own principles in several ways. For example, although the Bible does clearly reinforce notions of Good and Evil and an eternal struggle, there are also passages that challenge the traditional conservative notion of moral absolutes, man's judgment of other people, and how people should react to evil, including many famous ones, like Matthew 5:38-32, Matthew 5:43-45, Matthew 7:1-5, Matthew 12:1-14 (where Jesus actually breaks one of the 10 commandments! --> situational ethics), Romans 12:14-21, etc. (I can provide more examples for more contexts as well.)

Also, providing specific examples of where there are gray areas in their own lives might be helpful. (Of course this can be accomplished by asking questions about their views, not by just flat out telling them.)

Finally (although it wasn't out at the time I originally wrote this), I would highly recommend Jim Wallis' book to help expand the rhetoric about values to include things like poverty (as he so rightly says, budgets are statements of our morals/values).

At a political level:

Liberal/Progressive goals and policies shouldn't change but they can be couched in terms of the above values. For example, Lakoff's now-famous (and much discussed) example of reframing "taxes" as being like dues to imply that "everyone should want to do their fair share" makes an appeal to the value that I call above "personal responsibility" or "accountability".

When conservative political leaders fail to uphold these values, it is probably useful to (gently) point it out -- again couching it into their system. For example, one flaw of Bush that is more important to conservatives than you think is his lack of accountability. (That's why those questions at his [third!] press conference about whether he would admit any mistakes were very important. I personally couldn't believe he wasn't prepared for that!) His pattern is to blame others. Recall that he campaigned on the promise to restore "moral integrity" and "accountability" to the White House. It is very easy (especially now, a few years later!) to show that he failed to do this -- especially the accountability part. Indeed, his reaction to all of the scandals -- not just the scandals themselves -- is hurting him deeply in the accountability department. (And of course the scandals themselves are hurting him in the "clarity" department. Some people are starting to wonder if we are really on the side of Good. But I personally believe he is more vulnerable on his accountability failures because they are so blatant and so obviously his own fault, by definition.)

What else?