Electoral Values
OK, one final political comment, then I'm going cold turkey through the weekend. This is basically a revise-and-extend job on a comment I posted to a pseudonymous LiveJournal yesterday, but I need to get it out of my system.
Much is being made of the fact that "moral values" was apparently the deciding issue for a key set of voters on Tuesday. There's some quibbling about whether that's really true, and some outrage over definitions, but there's been a lot of hand-wringing about why the Democrats lose those votes, and what they need to do.
First and foremost, I do not think that this is a problem that can be addressed by the candidate, or the national-level party. John Kerry handled the faith issue about as well as it could be handled, and it didn't make a bit of difference. The problem is not on the political side, it's on the religious side-- the Democrats don't need a candidate who talks more about religion, they need religious people who talk more about politics.
The Republican majority has been built on a network of people pushing the notion that Jesus wants you to vote for Republicans. Yes, they're using some weird, hateful warped image of an Old Testament style Jesus that doesn't ring true to the Gospel readings of my Catholic upbringing, but that's their message: Jesus wants you to vote for the Republicans.
The counter to this needs to be not "It's OK to vote your conscience" or "It's not actually a sin to vote for a Democrat" (which liberals were pathetically grateful to get from the Church this time out), but an active "Jesus wants you to vote for the Democrats." Backed up with the full weight and majesty of Scripture-- which is an easy case to make, if people are willing to stand up and make it.
The problem here is that liberal religious people are not generally of that temperament. That's why they're liberal religious people, after all: they approach religion with a greater sense of humility, and human fallibility, and are more likely to be forgiving of lapses or character flaws than the fire-and-brimstone hypocrites of the Right. Standing up and declaring affirmatively that Jesus wants you to vote for the Democrats is not a thing that comes easily to the religious liberals I know-- the mere thought of claiming to know the mind of God is enough to give them hives.
But if liberals want to take back religious issues, that's what we need. Complaining about how the media misuse terms won't help, putting more religion in the stump speech won't do the trick, complicated and nuanced explanations of how there's nothing wrong with holding different opinions will just bore people. The message you need is short and simple: Jesus wants you to vote for the Democrats. Cast the money-changers out of the Temple, and all that.
I hate saying this for two reasons: first and foremost, because this is necessarily and unavoidably advice to others. I am not a religious person, though I retain some reflexive Catholicism. I can't claim the kind of faith that I would need to have to be an active part of this, and I won't pretend to believe for the sake of politics-- that would belittle the deep faith of many people I respect and admire. And this can't come from political operatives or non-believers: it's got to come from people who are within the religious community.
The second reason I hate to say this is that it's a horrible thing to ask. Pushing the sort of counter-message that needs to be out there will require the politicization of people who are not, by nature, political. It means asking good and decent people to behave in a manner that they will not like. And I'm not sure any of us would be entirely happy with the long-term effects.
But that's the only way I see to counter the Right's domination of religious issues. Chipping away at the flaws in the arguments, and pointing out their hypocrisies won't do it-- that's fundamentally a reactive strategy, and it's too easy for them to shrug off. You need an active and affirmative message to put out there: Jesus wants you to vote for the Democrats. It won't get the real fire-breathing "God hates fags" crowd to change their mind-- they cling too tightly to their selective readings of the nasty bits of the Old Testament for even the entire New Testament to dislodge them-- but it's a strong case, and can move some of the more moderate people who vote on cultural issues. And more importantly, it can start to shift the public perception of religion back in the direction of sanity-- even the "he-said, she-said" quasi-balance you get with mainstream journalism would be an improvement at this point.
There's my one bit of political strategization for you: Jesus wants you to vote for the Democrats. If we want to take back religious issues, we need ten thousand people like Fred Clark, only louder, to start spreading that message. Changing candidates won't help, changing platforms won't help-- the occasional stump-speech God talk will just get drowned out by hundreds of preachers thundering that Jesus wants you to vote for the Republicans. Their braying needs to be answered by other preachers, or even just members of the congregation, coming back with: "No, Jesus wants you to vote for the Democrats."
Unless that starts happening, the only thing you can do is wait for older conservative voters to start dying off.
Update: I wrote the above this morning, before I saw Jim Henley's post on more or less the same subject, which is worth reading. What I'm saying is pretty much complementary to what Jim says: religious talk won't make the difference for Democrats, because religious voters have specific policy goals in mind. What I'm saying is that the solution is to work on this from the religious end, and try to change those goals.
Posted at 7:17 AM | link | follow-ups | [ hide comments ]
Sure, now you've got one group of people making that argument, and doing pretty well with it, which is bad enough. It'd be so much worse if you join them.
Ray, 11.04.2004, 8:42am [link]
It wouldn't be my first choice, either.
But it's a damn sight better than what we've got.
Chad Orzel, 11.04.2004, 10:17am [link]
Yes, exactly. More like that, please. Only much, much louder.
Chad Orzel, 11.04.2004, 10:24am [link]
VKW, 11.04.2004, 10:56am [link]
Because the Republicans are obviously superior in both numbers and cause, and their values oriented agenda should no doubt be a boon to human kind, there's obviously only one thing left to do at this point. Convert. Therefor, in an act of supreme solidarity to our new national conservative alliance and their emphasis on values, I would just like to say, they’re right. I’m ready to sign up.
But first I need to declare that I too no longer care about losing millions of American jobs. I too no longer care about health care. Or social security. I also no longer care about education. I no longer care what happens to the poor, the elderly or the millions of American children growing up in poverty, despair and hopelessness. I no longer care that the US ranks a lowly 41st in infant mortality. I no longer care that the gap between rich and poor is approaching third world levels. I no longer care that Fortune 500 corporations can avoid paying taxes by opening an offshore mailbox and I no longer care that the working class will be forced pick up the difference. I no longer care that we've taken a record fiscal surplus and in three years turned it into the largest debt in the history of our country or that it will be our children, and their children, that will have to pay it back. I also no longer care how many Americans die at the hands of terrorists (as long as they're dying over there and not here at home) or how many thousands of foreign civilians die in the course of our projecting American global hegemony. I no longer care what the rest of the world thinks of America, as long as they know to fear us. I no longer care about the science of potential medical breakthroughs nor do I care about slowing the spread of AIDS nor whether we have sufficient supplies of safe vaccines. I no longer care that the number of abortions is on the rise (though I’ll pound my chest and pretend that I do) because I no longer care about birth control, sex education or family planning. I no longer care about our environment and whether we're allowing industries to poison our water, our air and ultimately our food supply, and I no longer care about the consequences of releasing massive amounts of greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere and its likelihood of accelerating global warming. I no longer care that our Bill of Rights, once enshrined to protect our personal freedoms and liberty, is being stripped down or that our 200 year old Constitutional protections are being traded for a false sense of security.
So what do I share with our new majority as my #1 concern? Values. I care about moral values.
Now that I’ve completed the switch to the other side moral values are all that matters to me. Moral values. Yes sir, I care enough that sufficient numbers of people share these moral values to make sure that we elect politicians that will put these moral values into law (even if it takes rigging the new electronic voting machines) and that those politicians in turn appoint judges guaranteed to ensure that everyone else is forced to live by these same moral values. Now some of you remaining Unbelievers may ask, “But if everything you no longer care about isn’t a moral value, what are your moral values?” Easy. The single most important moral value, overriding all other concerns, is that two people of the same sex are blocked from achieving secular legal recognitions that could in any way be similar to that enjoyed by heterosexual couples. Health and survivor benefits? Forget it. Employment protection? Come on. Inheritance rights? No way. Hospital visitation? Get real. Adoption? GOD FORBID!
You few, final remaining Democrats, moderates, greens and libertarians really need to get onboard the bandwagon. This new stripped down moral value is so easy I don’t know why I didn’t think of this myself earlier. Effortless morality. That’s the ticket. It’s like a gift from God. Now let’s jam it down everyone’s throat.
And God bless the New American Morality.
Thumb, 11.04.2004, 2:56pm [link]
In other words, you can point out all you want that Jesus wants them to feed the hungry and clothe the naked, but if the preacher tells them that Jesus wants them to vote for Bush and hate gays, that pretty much seals the deal.
So here's the interesting question: why is it the other way around in African-American churches? Because black preachers don't like gays, immodesty or swearing any more than the white ones do, but they *do* preach the social-activist gospel and tell the congregation that Jesus wants them to vote Democratic.
Obviously, blacks have a grudge against Republicans that dates from the breakdown of the old Democratic coalition and the defection of the Dixiecrats to the Republican Party. And what the preachers say reflects that, and outweighs any cultural qualms they might have with liberalism.
So maybe trying a religious pitch aimed at white evangelicals is putting the cart before the horse: it'll happen automatically if and only if they have some *other* reason to be Democrats.
Matt McIrvin, 11.04.2004, 6:16pm [link]
David, 11.04.2004, 8:37pm [link]
One thing about the NT is that because it's the scripture of an evangelizing, universalist religion, it's proportionally more self-reinforcement and less cultural payload. On the other hand, there's also less in it about killing enemies and stoning violators and such.
Matt McIrvin, 11.04.2004, 11:56pm [link]
Beliefs which are different are now being warped?! Cause what we really need now is more religious intolerance to make things better...
agm, 11.05.2004, 2:38am [link]
That's why I say it has to come from religious people, preferably preachers who are liberal, but members of the congregation if no-one else is available. An unbeliever like me has no chance of swaying any of those people, but someone with a little religious street cred might get through.
David: I agree with all the important things you say, but what is with the Old Testament/New Testament divide? It's the Old Testament that constantly tells us to feed the hungry, clothe the naked and free the captive, to remember that we were strangers in the land of Egypt.
It's also the Old Testament that has all the unpleasant bits about stoning people who have transgressed in some way. The gay-bashing has its origin in the Old Testament-- that's the bit I'd like to see got rid of.
agm: Beliefs which are different are now being warped?! Cause what we really need now is more religious intolerance to make things better...
I'm fairly comfortable with saying that a theology which holds that it's more important to prevent homosexuals from marrying than to condemn torture is a warping of Christian principles. It's certainly not a Christianity that bears any resemblance to what I was taught as a child.
Your mileage may vary, and all that.
Chad Orzel, 11.05.2004, 7:06am [link]
Tony Zbaraschuk, 11.05.2004, 1:00pm [link]
I am curious to know just what this means, because it seems like there are hordes of people who keep going, "No, no way. There can't be that many people who believe that." Which is a head-in-the-sand response to the fact that yes, enough people believe that way to have given Bush another four years at the helm.
The feel of this, to me, is that you subscribe (or used to) to the belief that what you were taught as a child is the "correct" version of Christianity, which renders all the other "incorrect" (leaving aside quibbling about the degree of incorrectness for now). But then we reach the part of the argument where "...there are more than one of these religions and people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that all people and souls go to hell..."; in essence, how does one support the argument that "I was taught the truth, you weren't", epsecially in light of the fact that the other person can make the same claim?
(FYI: The current poster is a recovering Southern Baptist playing Devil's advocate. And isn't it amusing that two non-practiciioners are tussling over interpretation...)
agm, 11.05.2004, 7:14pm [link]
Oh, yes. That's the thing: religion is like moral rocket fuel. The trick is just figuring out how to point the thing in the right direction.
Matt McIrvin, 11.06.2004, 8:41am [link]
Grabbing the religious high ground will not work with a lot of people (especially Catholics) because for them only one issue matters .
(Unless, of course, Democrats want to compromise on that issue, but I don't see it happening.)
Laurel Amberdine, 11.06.2004, 9:03am [link]
I'd really rather not have this particular flamewar in my comments section.
The point of my comments is that Democrats need to look for ways to put other issues onto the radar for some of those people. And, more importantly, to start taking back some of the language of religion and morality-- "moral issues" is code for "abortion and gay marriage" thanks to many years of a concerted effort to hammer on those issues. There needs to be some hammering back in the other direction.
Chad Orzel, 11.06.2004, 9:27am [link]
How about, "The Money Changers have taken over the Temple" for starters?
Thumb, 11.06.2004, 2:21pm [link]
I agree that we need to take the language of morality out of the hands of narrow sectarian cultists. So let's go all the way!
You can scare off the very people the Democrats need to reach.
The Religious Right have spent the past few decades pushing the idea that anybody left of Limbaugh is a godless atheist who wants to force everyone into gay marriages with box turtles. The point is to counter that image, not reinforce it.
Liberal religious people are already voting for the Democrats, and conservative religious people are never going to vote for a Democrat no matter what. What the Democrats need to do is reach out to the moderate religious people who are currently leaning Republican because the only religious people getting any attention at all are fire-breathing conservative loons telling them that Jesus would want them to vote for Republicans.
That requires outreach from other believers, not insults from atheists.
Chad Orzel, 11.18.2004, 12:02pm [link]
COMMENTS ARE CLOSED.
Please visit Uncertain Principles' new location at ScienceBlogs to comment.
May God Have Mercy On Us All
Jon Stewart's job stays easy, while the work gets harder for the rest of us.
Physics and pop culture blogging will return tomorrow (assuming schedules hold), but I'm really not in the mood today.
Posted at 8:20 AM | link | follow-ups | 22 comments
STOP READING WEBLOGS AND GO VOTE
Unless you're, you know, foreign or something. In which case, well, pardon our spectacle.
But if you're an American, go out and make Jon Stewart's job difficult.
Posted at 8:16 AM | link | follow-ups | 5 comments
The Italian Job
Back when the Marky Mark remake of The Italian Job came out, there was a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth from various UK types, over the fact that anyone would dare to remake such a classic film. As I'd never even heard of the original at that point, I sort of shrugged it off, and found the new version to be a perfectly competent and enjoyable caper movie.
Kate got both versions on DVD for her birthday, and we finally watched the original this weekend. Having seen it, I have to say that all those worries were unfounded: there was very little chance that a remade version would actually be worse.
Criticizing "classic" movies is always a dodgy business, of course, mostly because the expectations for films have changed so dramatically in the last few decades. A lot of my dissatisfaction with the film has to do with the pacing-- it includes lots of pointless scenery interludes, and sort of wanders casually from one plot point to the next. In that, it's very much a movie of its time-- it reminded me very much of the film of The Hot Rock and its extended "Look, Ma, we rented a helicopter!" sequence. Modern American audiences are conditioned to want much more bang-bang action in their movies, and I'm nothing if not a modern American.
But there's a general sloppiness to the movie that I found unappealing. Benny Hill is supposed to be essential to the job, but he doesn't seem to do anything, and nobody is the least bit worried when he disappears just before the job goes down. A great deal is made of the Mafia and their threats to kill the crooks, but nothing is really done with that-- they don't even participate in the main chase scene. The girl is sent off just before the job starts, and is never seen again. There are bits of unfulfilled plot all over the movie.
A bigger problem is that it really just isn't that good as a caper movie. The special features make reference to "a band of lovable crooks," but there are about fifteen of them, which means none of them get more than a couple of lines. They never have any personality, other than Michael Caine, and all he does is wander around yelling at people. It's not even clear what's so special about him, given that the entire plot was pretty much handed to him by the dead guy from the first scene. And the caper itself is awfully simple other than the getaway, which involves a remarkable amount of pointless faffing about in small cars before they actually try to get out of the city.
The remake improves on just about every aspect of this: the crew is smaller, meaning that they all get enough screen time to be distinct characters (albeit one-note characters, for the most part); the actual plan is mor complicated, allowing for more suspense as it unfolds; and there aren't the blind alleys and dropped threads of the original. Also, the car chase is much cooler, though that's mostly a matter of it being a better match to modern tastes.
Had I seen this version first, I might've found it more charming. Seeing it after the remake, though, my reaction is essentially "What's the big deal?"
Posted at 9:44 PM | link | follow-ups | 10 comments
Music Notes
Quick comments on recent pop-music items:
U2's new single, "Vertigo," has been everywhere, and makes me kind of uneasy about the album. It's a catchy tune, but pretty vapid in their usual "soaringly vague" manner, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it also has strong echoes of their ill-conceived forays into dance pop in the mid-90's, which were less than good. I'd rather not replay that. Also, it opens with Bono counting (in Spanish) "1, 2, 3, 14." Stick to English, OK?
Meanwhile, REM has a new single out, "Leaving New York." And, boy, have these guys embraced their inner Lite Rock nature. If you're a person who thought that "Everybody Hurts" rocked a bit too hard, then this is the song for you. (Not that it's all that bad a song, but it's a long way from their roots.)
That said, the prize for "Stupidest Single Ever (Right Now)" goes to Lenny Kravitz's "Lady," which boldly combines a plodding, uninteresting guitar riff with grade-school lyrics. I half expected him to start making up new words that sort-of rhyme with "lady," since he had clearly exhausted English's normal stock. I mean, he was never Bob Dylan, but he was at least vaguely interesting around the time of Are You Gonna Go My Way? But this? Yeesh.
On a more positive note, I've started taking the iTunes Party Shuffle from the recently purchased music category, just so I can hear some of this stuff while it's reasonably fresh. Tentative thumbs-up reviews: Bright Eyes ("Make War" was just playing, and sounds like a lost Old 97's track), Reigning Sound (It might be a bit much as an album, but the individual tracks mixed in with other things are pretty good), Get Up Kids (Pretty much the same as their other albums, really), The Mountain Goats (Thank you KEXP), The Ike Reilly Assassination (Exhibit A in the case that all the good band names have already been taken), and Har Mar Superstar (Who has a kind of ironic Jackson 5 thing going on, which might get old, but is a lot of fun on first listen).
Still to be determined: Weezer (Both the "Blue Album" which I previously had only on cassette and Pinkerton, which Nathan keeps talking up. I haven't heard enough of the latter to really say anything sensible.), Superchunk (Foolish, which got rave reviews and then dropped out of print so fast that I never saw a copy. Let's hear it for back catalogue on iTunes...), Ben Harper and the Blind Boys of Alabama (The idea has promise, but the songs I've heard just sound like Ben Harper solo), and Muse (Talked up enthusiastically by some of my students, so I figured I'd give it a shot, but I'm not sold on it).
Posted at 8:45 AM | link | follow-ups | 6 comments
Matt McIrvin, 11.04.2004, 8:33am [link]