This being Good Friday, I thought a show about Christianity and the dissident right would be a good topic. I was torn on how I wanted to do it, so it did not come out as well as I hoped. I had a few ideas on how to approach the subject, but I could not settle on one, so I ended up coming at it from a few different angles. In retrospect, I should have mulled it over a bit longer to get my thoughts in order. On the other hand, it means I can revisit the topic at some point in the future.
One of the odd things about dissident politics is that our side of the great divide has different tribes that probably would not find common cause if not for having been driven off the public stage. Thirty years ago, the “secular right” was not all that fond of the religious right. They even setup a site for themselves as a refuge from those Bible-wielding conservatives. It looks like they ran out of steam a couple of years ago, which is fitting given the circumstances of the moment.
It seems like there is an opportunity for the two main wings of the dissident right to find common cause again. If you look at the main players in the new free speech movement, for example, they tend to be men of faith. The American First crowd is very proudly Christian, even though they do not get into the details of what that means. On the other hand, the authority of the secular wing is rooted in biological reality. The quantifiable differences in people are the starting point for many dissidents.
In the before times, the secular wing always chaffed at the rhetoric of Christian conservatives, mostly out of ignorance. People drawn to secular politics tend not to be comfortable with the topics in religion. Today, Christians tend to be uncomfortable with the langue of most dissidents. Talk of evolution is alienating to them, because they have been conditioned to view it as an enemy of their faith. Our side of the great divide is an uneasy alliance of people who do not entirely trust one another.
That is the main point of the show this week. Secular people need to get more comfortable talking about religion, but dissident Christians need to reexamine their hostility to certain dissident topics. The fact is a large majority of white people consider themselves Christians. On the other hand, a large majority of dissidents long for a return to tradition. There is no reason why religion should not be an integral part of dissident politics, even if many dissidents are not religious.
This week I have the usual variety of items in the now standard format. Spreaker has the full show. I am up on Google Play now, so the Android commies can take me along when out disrespecting the country. I am on iTunes, which means the Apple Nazis can listen to me on their Hitler phones. The anarchists can catch me on iHeart Radio. I am now on Deezer, for our European haters and Stitcher for the weirdos. YouTube also has the full podcast. Of course, there is a download link below.
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This Week’s Show
Contents
- 00:00: Opening
- 02:00: Evolution
- 22:00: Camp Counselor Z
- 42:00: Meaning & Purpose
Direct Download, The iTunes, Google Play, iHeart Radio, RSS Feed, Amazon
Full Show On Spreaker
Full Show On YouTube
There are a couple of irreconcilable differences between the religious creationists and secular evolutionists. First, evolutionists tend to radically overreach in their explanations for human behavior, generally by assuming the conclusion or commiting post hoc errors.
Second, and more importantly, evolution in particular, and science in general simply cannot provide moral guidance or direction. For example, even though it is generally accepted as true by some that Africans evolved differently than Asians, it simply cannot provide any moral guidance on what to do about it. How to deal with this fact is fundamentally a moral question and must be answered within a moral framework.
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But this is an error in logic. This is called Hume’s Law or the is-ought problem. You cannot make claims about what ought to be based on what is. Science and faith are not irreconcilable. Many Christians have been conditioned to think this is true, but it is false, which is covered in the show.