This movement has been entwined wth American society arguably since the founding of the nation but at least since the millennial revivalist movement known as The Second Great Awakening, and flows through the KKK, the John Birch Society, and Moral Majority. 5/🧵 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_...
Yep. Nothing new. And being fully exploited by the populist psychopathic crime boss. He knows how stupid they are.
Moral Majority...what an oxymoron.
Right? Somehow their morals are far below even a minimal standard.
In the late 1970s and 1980s there was an effort to capture this movement for the Republican Party. Prior to that, adherents weren't completely concentrated in a single political party, and in some eras the movement seemed almost apolitical, focused on the afterlife. 6/🧵 tubitv.com/movies/10002...
Yes. The right wing figured out who amongst our nations populace were the easiest to make believe anything they were told without proof.. Naturally evangelicals were their target of choice because they had already been indoctrinated in the belief of ‘blind faith and obedience’.
The Evangelicals weren't just unwitting marks for the far right. Probably the other way around. Evangelicals have been working on taking over the GOP from movement conservatives for longer than most of us have been alive.
Obama ⚠️blamed the media⚠️ for America’s epistemological crisis. “…our research… found the opposite—that dueling fact perceptions are driven by internal beliefs rather than external influences. Citizens project their preferred values onto the perceived facts.” www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/inco...
I did not read it that Obama blamed the media for this epistemological crisis; although, I agree it exists. Rather, I read that he referenced one's upbringing as to what fact sets you pay attention to. Preferred values... The 4th estate does have a duty, but have been falling quite short lately.
The press does amplify the problem by way of an obsession with “fairness” which misrepresents false equivalence as journalistic objectivity. mediahelpingmedia.org/advanced/fal...
Consumers of real news want truth, facts, historical context, not “balance,” not equal weight to truth and lies, science and claptrap, reality and fantasy. It may have political consequences, but it’s not meant to be a political exercise.
Moreover, the Fourth Estate (the free press) should understand that the open society which makes the press *possible* must be defended by the press. Defending objective reality, defending the rule of law, defending democracy are not "biased" they are essential. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_...
In September 1997 the NPR show This American Life stumbled upon something odd in Colorado Springs. They don't seem to have quite realized what they were seeing, but they did manage to capture a glimpse of the rising Christian Dominionist movement. 7/🧵 www.thisamericanlife.org/77/pray
NPR did a story on the growing religious influence on the Air Force Academy around this time. May be the same story. I was hugely alarmed (I’m an Air Force brat with a nephew in the branch). Props to NPR for sounding the alarm. I wish it had spurred change.
When Sarah Palin was selected by John McCain to be his running mate in late summer of 2008, people including @brucewilson.bsky.social noticed that she was using what was then thought to be politically fringe evangelical-coded language. 8/🧵 www.huffpost.com/entry/sarah-...
Although there were some articles about it, her membership in what was thought to be a fairly whacky fringe church wasn't well incorporated into the national consciousness. Today there's no mention of her church on the Wikipedia article about her VP run. 9/🧵 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vice_pr...
In the fall of 2011, NPR's Fresh Air with Terry Gross did an excellent story on the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR) and the influence of C. Peter Wagner, a figurehead in that cross-denominational Christian dominionist movement. 10/🧵 www.npr.org/2011/10/03/1...
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this all makes sense on why the Manchurian Cantaloupe is defunding from NPR..
Wait, this thread is fascinating and terrifying, but The Manchurian Cantaloupe is hilarious 😂
I met Perry around 2000 at a friend’s house. He held my hand and showed me his “fisherman Jesus” bracelet and told me he came to nyc (where I lived most of the time). I played dumb & told him I didn’t fish. He creeped me out. Ick.
In 2008 investigative journalist @jeffsharlet.bsky.social Jeff Sharlet published The Family, his first book about a group with growing influence near the heart of American political power and some international influence as well. 11/🧵 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fam...
There is a chilling documentary that I saw some years ago The Family, think it was Netflix. That's a big male very quiet group of "Jesus-lovers" that hate LGBTQRI etc. Bad in Uganda etc!!
Jeff Sharlet's @jeffsharlet.bsky.social The Family was brought to film in 2019. The Netflix series is the brightest light ever shone not only on The Family as a secretive political group but on the larger Christian dominionist movement of which it's part. www.netflix.com/title/80063867 12/🧵
bery good to watch - horrifying that it is!
Yeah now I have more questions..😂🤬👍
I’ve watched this and there’s no doubt in my mind that “cult” is the best descriptor of the conservative part which has now absorbed the far right. A bunch of kooks, zealots, and Nazis just rampaging civilization.
A very good documentary.
The movement isn't limited to Washington D.C. insiders, though. Investigative journalist Katherine Stewart @katherinestewart.bsky.social wrote about the ongoing efforts of the Christian right to assert control over local schools in The Good News Club. 13/🧵 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katheri...
In two subsequent books, The Power Worshipers, and Money Lies, and God, journalist Kathrine Stewart @katherinestewart.bsky.social explores the wider movement and its ongoing efforts to dismantle the American secular (non-religious) state. 14/🧵 www.publishersweekly.com/9781635578546
This documentary by @foldablehuman.bsky.social Dan Olson describes the rise of QAnon, a conspiracy theory belief cluster with apocalyptic end-times roots and ties to the Flat Earth movement. In the few years since it was made, these beliefs have become GOP litmus tests. 15/🧵 youtu.be/JTfhYyTuT44
I'm not American and not in the US, but I've been seeing that across American institutions over decades. Gary, I'd like to contact you via DM to share a bit of what I know of American overseas schools and evangelical movements. It underscores what you are saying, and shows that it's a global issue.
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