My late father never described himself as a “Christian Nationalist”, mostly because the term wasn’t in widespread use in his lifetime. But he totally fit the label. And despite his many faults, I don’t think that racism was one of them.
The reason they decided that they didn’t like being Dutch was because the Dutch allowed freedom of religion, and they found the existence of any other religion being permitted to be offensive to them. They absolutely were what we would call “Christian Nationalists”.
The Puritans were the reason Rhode Island exists, as a refuge for those who wouldn’t conform to Puritan state religion. (The Puritans clearly took the wrong lesson from their own experience with the Church of England.)
It was far too complete, and too good, to be unintentional. But @slicedalone rarely writes clever double entendres. So it seemed to me to be out of character for his 'Dope persona.
Had me guessing a bit too. In the end Door #1 won out for me.
In general, DeSantis seems to target making headlines more than he targets effectiveness, but he seems smart enough to target effectiveness if he had wanted.
That would seem to say that accomplishing the end-goal isn’t really his primary interest.
And perhaps, from that perspective, the difference between a white nationalist and a Christian nationalist doesn’t matter all that much but I’d note that it seems very common for most MAGA and Fundamentalist types to play the martyr as often as possible, cry censorship, cry persecution, cry propaganda, and so on.
Calling a group of people racist, who don’t view themselves as racist, seems like an unnecessary piece of ammunition to put in their hands. It gives reasonable and honest evidence to the idea that you’re a liar, who will maliciously slander people just to avoid having to back your arguments. That ammunition allows them to avoid critiques which are accurate and well-founded. After all, if you’re acting in bad faith then why should they?
And, personally, I would agree with that view. The sort of person who can’t slow down enough to really look at someone else’s positions, and the arguments behind them, is also the sort of person who hasn’t slowed down enough to properly think through their own position and make sure that they understand its underpinnings, and that they agree with those ideas. Or, alternately, social ostracism is felt as a large enough risk for most people that they simply can’t afford to take a look at the popular belief system in their neck of the woods. Most people are probably afraid to question the ideas that they’re going onto the Internet to propagate. In either case, being the equal partner of your opponent is pretty well just as bad. To the extent that you’ve got a better world view, that’s just a happenstance of geography.
If you can’t take a good hard look at your enemy and properly understand what they are and what they aren’t, then probably you shouldn’t be an advocate for your own side and probably you shouldn’t hold a strong position against your “enemy”. Let someone else do that.
White supremacism is most certainly racism. What she does not like is not being racist, saying racist things, and doing racist things, but rather being called racist.
Most people don’t consider themselves racist. “Oh, I’m not racist; I just recognize fundamental biological facts.”. “Oh, I’m not racist; I think that blacks should only associate with other blacks, AND whites should only associate with other whites, and that’s the same for both races.”. “Oh, I’m not racist; black people are fine. It’s just black culture that’s the problem.”. “Oh, I’m not racist; I just want what’s best for black people, and really, they were so much better off as slaves, weren’t they?”.
Are we making a distinction between Christian nationalists and Christian fundamentalists? Because there are plenty of non-white fundamentalists. Hispanics especially, but also lots of Asians, especially Koreans.
Yes, because they accept that racism is bad, which is pretty good starting point to have them at. So if they’re doing and saying things that you interpret as racist:
a) There’s every chance that they’re ignorant of what they’re doing and have no way to understand your criticism. It’s like faulting Jimmy for not fnorking the wimble, when he doesn’t know how to fnork and he doesn’t know what a wimble is, either. (Fuck you, Jimmy. You know what you did.) Denouncing them as a racist doesn’t really do anything positive for the world, compared to talking the matter through.
b) There’s also every chance that they’re a different person than you, with different and possibly arguably reasonable views. Say that a group of multinational/multicultural friends like to mock each other with stereotypes. “Got your papers, yet, Garcia?” “Damn, you’re so white. Stop even trying to dance, you’re embarrassing me.” Are they racist? Or, are they taking racist tropes down a peg by bringing them up and then tossing them aside as fake? Racism takes a lot of forms but so does non-racism and it’s on you to prove that your definition of what is and isn’t racist is absolutely, and unequivocally, the beginning and end of the matter. But, if you both have the desire to be non-racist then, if nothing else, you should be able to agree to disagree on where that boundary lies - short of the person saying that we need to “gas all them lemurs”. (Where lemurs = some racial profile.) There is, obviously, some point where it’s clear that they’re either nuts or playing you, and it’s not worth continuing the conversation but you should get to that realization, naturally, and not by taking for granted that that will be the outcome.
Yes, exactly. A considerable number of Asian and Hispanic Christians - especially, the first-generation immigrant Asian Christians - hold views that are pretty much theocratical. They may not be fans of white supremacy, but they yearn for something similar to Old Testament Israel being enacted in a modern government.
I haven’t heard things like this in decades. No doubt there are some that feel this way but I seriously doubt they are significant in numbers. The media would have you believe this is an accepted way of thinking for most Christians.
At the risk of derailing the thread, such statements aren’t necessarily racist.
I used to be a teacher - albeit, for only a couple of AmeriCorps summer terms. The best and worst students at the school were black. The difference was that the high-achieving black students had immigrated directly from Africa, whereas the low-achieving black students were born in America. Same race, just different culture.
But anyway, getting back to the OP, one only needs to look at examples of non-white nations in which there are still Christian nationalists, to see that white supremacy and Christian nationalism don’t need to be the same thing at all. AIUI, there are a great deal of Christian nationalists in Brazil these days, especially in the Bolsonaro era.
Not certain, but I think he’s essentially both, except that he suppresses the white supremacist part because he has a large Cuban support block. I’ve been waiting to see how he pivots from a rightist pro-Cuban position in Florida to a rightist anti-color position in a presidential run. And I’m not talking about what he feels in his heart, which is impossible for us to tell and doesn’t actually matter anyway. I’m talking about what he chooses to say and do. After all, if he only pretends to disdain people of color, for the sake of Republican votes, that’s still racist, for the impact if not for animus.
But this is just what I think. I’m not certain and don’t feel like I’ve figured him out well. Which may be fine, as if he fails to execute this pivot, or otherwise flounders, he won’t matter so much.