So, I'm not going to be posting as much over the next few weeks. As some may know, we are experiencing a heat dome in the northeast. What does it have to do with me posting? Well, my PC is in an un air conditioned room, and I am basically writing this on my tablet. My tablet has more limited capabilities than my desktop does, and I produce inferior articles. I'm basically writing this on a keyboard with a semi broken spacebar. So yeah, this leads to less content, both in size and frequency.
But I did see Kyle Kulinski and Krystal Ball cover the story of Louisiana mandating the 10 commandments in every classroom, and they seemed a bit confused by it. They dont seem to see the end goal of it and wonder why the right would explicitly go against previous court rulings on the matter knowing it will be shot down, as this is settled law.
But that's the thing, is it really settled? And as an ex "Christian nationalist", let me explain the end game hear. In the fundie Christian worldview, society was great until the 1960s. In the 1960s, according to them, these liberal activist judges put in place by FDR and other progressives decided to take God out of schools, and forbid god from being mentioned in schools, and this is bad, because God needs to be in schools, and yeah, we need to pack the supreme court so we can overturn all of ths judicial precedent that we (they) don't like.
And they've been trying to do this since at least the 1970s. Pat Robertson's "moral majority" as part of Reagan's coalition is coming home to roost here. They've been pushing this for DECADES. They dont believe in separation of church and state. They believe the US is a fundamentally Christian nation, and that the point of the establishment clause was explicitly to forbid a state church similar to the church of england. They believe that the US was supposed to be Christian, that's what the founders wanted, and that secularists are just activists who want to push their vision on us instead.
As someone who has been on both sides, here's how I see it. Yes, the 1960s represented a newer shift in judicial precedent that tended to remove religion from schools and government, BUT....having studied it from both perspectives, I tend to believe in the secular argument. Schools are no place for religious indoctrination. If you want to teach kids that, take them to church or put them in private school. Teaching religion to people in public schools is discriminatory toward those who don't believe in that religion for various reasons. It could lead to an uncomfortable environment where those who dont believe in the religion are singled out, and under the establishment clause, why are public tax dollars going to religious purposes in the first place? Again, the point in taking religion out of schools is actually to provide a neutral environment for everyone.
This is also why you see satanists challenge these religious incursions into the public space. The alternative to having no religion is to value them all equally, and that includes the satanists. So in a sense, satanists legally troll the christians by pushing their own monuments and classes, which pisses off christians majorly, but the moral of the story is, well, you take your crap down, we'll take ours down. But if you wanna push you crap down kids' throats then we're gonna do the same, your move, Christians (I love this tactic, btw).
But...again, Christians have been wanting to push their crap since the 1960s, and why are they doing this knowing it will be shot down? Because they want it to be shot down. Because this will create a legal challenge. And it will go up through the courts. And hopefully, in their eyes, hit the supreme court where now because there's a conservative majority on the court, they can overturn the precedent that banned this stuff in the first place.
This is what they've been trying to do since the 70s. They hate the liberal legacy in legal precedent. They hate griswold v connecticut, and roe v wade, obergefell, etc. They wanna go back to when homosexuality was illegal, abortion was abortion was illegal, CONTRACEPTION was illegal (thats crazy even for formerly christian me, but given roe came from griswold it makes sense), they want PORN to be illegal. They want "God back in the schools", they wanna overturn engel v vitale and all associated court cases that took bible study, prayer etc out of schools. They want christianity to be openly taught in schools. This is their idea of a christian nation. They want to overturn over a half century liberal legacy and return religion to being paramount in peoples' lives. They wanna force this crap down our throats. And the supreme court might let them. That's the scary thing. They've been planning this for 50 years and they're finally succeeding. And this is what the right stands for.
And I know this is new now to many with people calling them christofascists and christian nationalists, but no, they were pushing this stuff back when i was in high school in christian school. They'd teach me all about this stuff as a young adult. Heck, they were basically trying to brainwash us into being able to function as ideological fundmaentalist christians in a mainstream society that rejected them. It didn't work on me, because i did go on to study this stuff from other angles and i eventually found my way out. But yeah, this stuff is disturbingly common on the right. And it's actually been a thing going back to the 1970s and 1980s. Reagan mobilized these people to win elections. And those chickens are still coming home to roost.
We gotta oppose these guys. if we want us to remain a free, secular nation, these guys have to be told no, and they have to be shown the door. Coalitionally, I think fundamentalists are on the decline. People have been leaving religion for decades, although it is kinda bottoming out with gen z it seems as the political divide shifts from religion vs secularism to woke vs alt right. But, despite that, trump and the republicans remain popular for various reasons, and democrats are unpopular for various reasons. And when democrats lose elections, these nuts take the opportunity to push their insular views on the rest of the country.
In a sense, if Hillary was right about anything in 2016, it was the "but the court" argument. Not that it was the election cycle to lean into the court, the public was more pissed off about neoliberalism and economics. Moreover, I blame Clinton first and foremost for holding the court hostage to force people to vote for her. But yeah, Trump was able to pick up 3 justices because of this. And we're seeing the consequences of that.
I dont think this is the end of the world itself. I mean, Clarence Thomas is getting old. So is Samuel Alito. They'll likely be up for replacement in the next 10 years. And then things can swing back. But yeah, of the 4 justices clinton talked about dying or retiring in 2016, 3 of them did, and thats why the balance of the court shifted so hard.
So yeah, we're gonna have to vote for democrats to shift it back. Even if the public downplays this, this election cycle, I do think that ultimately, demographic shifts will make what the court is doing quite unpopular. And the GOP might see the public shift away from them if they start pushing this nonsense. Sure, like 35-40% of the population might love this, but the other 60-65% isn't going to, and theyre gonna turn on the right HARD. Or maybe be apathetic. Who knows.
But yeah. That's what these guys' goals are. They basically want a theocracy except we dont call it that. And they've been pushing this stuff since at least reagan. They're just finally getting away with it because they got a SCOTUS majority.
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