Now, you’ve all heard about Christian fundamentalists. They’re the guys that ignore famine, disease, and war to protest the REAL evils of the world such as Harry Potter, Dungeons and Dragons, Pokémon, and Tinky Winky. (In case you didn’t guess, that’s sarcasm.) And yes, I know that not all fundamentalists are religious extremists. However, I think a convincing case can be made that all religious extremists (at least, of the type I’m referring to here) are fundamentalists. But in all the cases of this type of religious extremism, almost all of them come from American churches such as the Southern Baptists. Why is this kind of Christian fundamentalism uniquely American?
Really? What about the English Puritans? The Spanish Inquisitors? Weren’t the people that burned the Library of Alexander extremist Christians (and not Americans)?
Perhaps it has to do with power. The Puritan movement in England, the Spanish Inquisition, and American fundamentalism all roughly coincide with the height of power of the respective societies. Perhaps when people are at the top of the hill, they become obsessed with the possibility of being knocked off, and so try very hard to “deserve” to stay.
Try Pentacostals which seem to be all over the world.
You’re just noticing some of the more outspoken ones. And they also have in the past protested social injustice, the mistreatment of labor, slavery, war, using childern labor, ect.
It’s not as cut and dry as you believe.
Likewise fantatcism is not only found in religion. Try Mcarthyism, Nazism, and the goverments of Stalin and Mao if you want to find some lovely attrocities.
Wasn’t the library of Alexandria burned by the Moslems?
ricksummon, you don’t watch the news segments about the Middle East much, do you.
ricksummon, you don’t watch the news segments about the Middle East much, do you.
And, yes, the Library at Alexandria was burned by the Christians. During the Crusades, I believe.
Didn’t catch it in time…sorry 
You might check “The Refiner’s Fire” by John L. Brooke.
The book is ment to provide a background to the different fundamental movements that lay the foundation of thinking for Joseph Smith.
The first third covers the very conservative Protestant movements in Europe starting around 1644. This is not an easy read, but it covers the subject.
I’d say that fundamentalist, Protestant Christians can be found worldwide. IMHO, they are most noticeable in the U.S. because they have enough mumbers to make a “critical mass” and make news, influence politics, etc. Perhaps the movement seems to be very American because it provides so many speakers, books, activists, teaching materials, that fPC’s in other English-speaking nations would use.
It depends on the religious makeup in each country. In Italy, there would be fundamentalist Protestants, but due to the preponderance of Roman Catholics there, whenever you think of Italian Christians, you think Catholics by default.
According to one authoritative-sounding source I read somewhere or other, Fundamentalist Christians in countries other than the U.S. do not view the U.S.'s Founding Fathers or Constitution as being particularly Christian. (Even though many Fundamentalist groups within the U.S. do feel that “the country was built on Christian principles.”)
No, the Library at Alexandria was burned several times, and as far as i know, none of the major ones was by the Christians. The final burning was by Islamic FUNDAMENTALISTS.
Did you read my post about “wierd” christians & the Bell curve? Whenever you get enuf of any religion, the bell curve shows up, and the “ends” begin to have significant numbers. More Christians in America, more ends to the bell curve, more exremists.
Right before I posted 3 f***ing times I did a quick look-up on the net, just to make sure I wasn’t blowing hot air. I found a timeline someplace which stated that Alexandria was sacked for the last time by the Crusaders in…um…I think the 12th century. (Of course I can’t find it again, can I :rolleyes: ).
Then DITWD came along and told me I was wrong, so I did some more searching and found this,
this, this, this, and [this](http://pages.about.com/excelsior/AlexandriaGreatLibrary.htm#Legends and Recriminations). Most of these links (and about 20 others I found on Google) indicate that the library was demolished before the Muslims showed up.
And, honestly, the only reason I thought the Christians had sacked the library was because of what had happened to Hypatia.
Brittannica says
A couple of thoughts occur to me.
American Christian fundamentalists may appear “dominant” because, for the most part, you’re all in America. With a media that (I’ve been told) focusses more inwardly, US-based groups will always appear even louder. I don’t imagine that, say, French Christian fundamentalists command a lot of airtime in the US. Similarly, many of the issues American Christian fundamentalists raise will be uniquely American (or have a uniquely American spin, at least) – abortion is legal, so it becomes a point of contention for religious groups opposed to it. It’s easier to be a vocal religious group in a country that gives you the freedom and relative affluence to do so.
No Christian fundamentalism is not uniquely American.
In Canada, the American religious influence is just as powerful as the rest of America’s influence on our culture.
A former friend eventually accepted extreme fundamentalist after the influence of some “suspicious” youth ministers. The exclusionary edicts, the literalism, the selective ignorance, the preachy arrogance: It’s all the same up here as it is down there.
Ignorance knows no national borders.
OK, let’s see first about definitions:
I will assume we’re talking about a brand of Evangelical Protestantism characterized by a belief in: the literal absolute word-by-word truth of the Bible; the physical inminence of the Second Coming; the “Born Again” aka “Baptized by The Spirit” experience; hardline social conservatism, often tied in with right-wing politics; and (most annoyingly) the urgency of trying to save the rest of us from ourselves.
If so, then, the phenomenon is not uniquely American, but in current times its philosophical center, driving force, and prime source of manpower, financing and media has been, pretty clearly, among the USA’s Fundies.
Now, SOME socio-political manifestations associated with Christian Fundamentalism though not necessarily a part of it, do tend to seem particularly “American”. For instance, so-called “Creation Science” – maybe because the US is perhaps the only major nation that allows a board of laypeople elected at the county level to say what should be in the textbooks. Another one seems to be the idea that there’s some sort of actual plot by Gays, Feminists, Atheists and the Media, to destroy the family.
jrd
Yes, the Crusaders did attack the ports of Egypt in their latter expeditions, but by then it was just ordinary pillage.
Ah, yes, the linking of the destruction of the library with the mob lynching of Hyapatia. No less a figure than Carl Sagan vectored this connection to the TM in “Cosmos”. In the end, we come up with the Great Library being lost a little at a time through war, riot, and mismanagement, and no real “smoking scroll”.
Yeah, I found that out after DITWD called me on my reply.
:: staying out of GD from now on ::
The book to read is Karen Armstrong"s “The Battle for God”.
Obviously American fundamentalism is American. There are particular characteristics that are souly American. But fundamentalism is not exculisivly American or Christain.
The answer is no and no with a caveat, depending on how you wish to use the term.
The simple “no” is if you declare fundamentalism (little “f”) to be any religious movement where people have taken mystical context away from religious texts, took more literal approaches to following those texts as a result, and followed their God(s) in that manner. As has been shown again, there are many cases of this occurring in history way before there ever was an America, and this continues today - and in both cases, have to do with other religions aside from Protestant Christianity.
The “no” with a caveat is because Protestant Fundamentalism (big “F”) is a relatively new phenomenon, started right here in the USA in the last century. So it as a secific movement was born here and remains most prevalent here and as such is most identifiable as an American institution (like baseball <ironic aside> which also has fundamentalist followers! </ironic aside>).
However, since Christianity is a proselytizing faith, the branches of Fundamentalist Protestantism (as we know the term in the second example, big “F”) have reached the world over, and as such is no longer “uniquely American” as the OP suggests.
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