The Devil Made Me Do It

[Guest guest]

http://www.zeppscommentaries.com/Religious/devil.htm

 

The Devil Made Me Do It

How the Religious Right get led around by their noses

by Bryan Zepp Jamieson

11/07/02

http://www.zeppscommentaries.com/Religious/devil.htm

 

" You know the peace symbol? " she asked.

 

I reckoned I did. It was a major part of my life in

the late sixties and early seventies, and as Putsch

careens the nation toward a war in Iraq, it’s starting

to become a prominent part of the American psychic

landscape once again.

 

" Sure. What about it? "

 

" It’s Satanic. "

 

" Say what? "

 

" It’s a broken cross. It’s the sign of devil worship. "

 

I just barely managed to avoid asking who stuffed such

a stupid notion in her head. Instead, I explained that

the symbol was a stylized combination of the semaphore

signals for the letters " N " and " D " and that

originally, back in the early 50s, it had stood for

Nuclear Disarmament.

 

She looked startled, and then shrugged. " Well, " she

said, " You learn something new every day. " I wondered

how she was going to handle it the next time one of

her co-religionists repeated the rumor to her, and

decided not to pursue the matter. Under the best case

scenario, she would do a Google search and find out

that I was telling her the truth. At worst, she would

write it off as the disinformation of a liberal

atheist, and go right on repeating the silly story.

 

Church gossip has always been susceptible to even more

silliness than your run-of-the-mill social gossip. For

years, up to this very day, frightened Christians have

repeated to each other the canard that the Proctor and

Gamble logo is satanic, even has a picture of the

devil on it. Southern Baptists mutter darkly about the

hellish influence that lies behind the Harry Potter

movies (and we’ll see a fresh tide of that as the

second movie comes out) and Dungeons and Dragons.

Baptists in particular are notorious for seeing Satan

behind every rock and tree and under every bed, and

directly responsible for anything they disapprove of,

ranging from dancing and music to Mormonism.

Disparaging the constant Satan watch is the worst

possible thing, in their eyes. Disbelief in Satan is

definitive proof that Satan has seized complete

control of you, and you are on the greased pig to

hell.

 

If Satan controls your adversaries, you never ever

have to ask why the adversaries think and act

differently, because, obviously, they are in the

clutches of evil, and no decent person would or should

inquire into what makes heathens and Democrats

heathens and Democrats.

 

It’s a great philosophy for people who can’t think,

won’t think, don’t think

 

It’s tailor-made for politicians who want obedient and

predictable followers.

 

The Republicans started pandering to the

televangelists back in the late 60s, which worked so

well to their mutual benefit that theirs has become a

symbiotic relationship; each utterly dependent on the

other for its survival. Given that in any culture,

between 20 and 30 percent of the population suffers

from the mental dysfunction known as religious

fundamentalism, that makes for a massive voting bloc,

one that marches pretty much in lockstep and never

questions its leaders.

 

You can see that whenever you talk to a religious

right follower about Clinton. He’ll tell you, with the

unceasing shock and moral outrage of the terminally

virginal, that the Clinton administration was the most

corrupt and criminal in the history of America. He

believes this to be true because right wingers got

some of the trashier churches to start distributing an

unbelievably ugly smear job videotape called " The

Clinton Chronicles " which served as a bedrock for all

the other accusations they made, and which were

clucked over as if gospel truth by pastors and

televangelists.

 

If you point out that the Clinton administration was

actually the cleanest of the 20th century and may well

have been the cleanest administration in American

history, the born-again right-winger won’t believe

you. If you PROVE it, by running down the lists of

convictions and indictments members of various

administrations received (Reagan’s, which really was

the most corrupt, is a fun one, since Ronbo’s boys

often racked up more indictments and convictions in a

single afternoon than Clinton’s people did in eight

years) they’ll mumble about how librul judges and the

media let them off the hook. (You all remember how the

librul media and Heritage Foundation judges covered up

that Monica what’s her name thing, right?). When you

point out that all but a couple of the more minor

accusations against Clinton were found to be

groundless, they’ll shake their head in disgust and

walk away, convinced that Satan has seized your brain

and is making you tell such terrible lies.

 

They’re easy to lead. They wear their religion like a

ring through the nose. It’s a personality disorder,

but it’s one tailor-made for unscrupulous demagogues

because they form groups and are very authority

responsive, especially the religions that claim to be

non-authoritative and where each congregation is

supposedly autonomous.

 

One big problem is that America and the Bible don’t

have much in common. America is based on individual

rights and liberties, and the notion that the people

have sovereignty and form the government. The bible

preaches submission to authority, both religious and

governmental, and nowhere does the concept of personal

liberties and rights appear. Even the " justice "

discussed in the bible is nothing more than

retribution, and the words " presumption of innocence "

do not appear. Some of the laws are pretty ludicrous.

For example, if you hit a man in the head with a

shovel, you can be fined. Unless said man is able to

get up and walk around by sundown of the following

day. Then it’s considered a free whack.

 

The Constitution can’t really merge well with

something that stipulates that heating your home on

the Sabbath is a crime. Or that all images of people

are illegal.

 

But Fundamentalists don’t think. They have Truth, and

Truth means you don’t have to think. If some

incongruity or disparity puzzles and perplexes a

fundie, he’s expect to seek counsel from his fellow

fundies, and follow their advice that God moves in

mysterious ways.

 

Thus all a demagogue has to do is wave a flag in front

of these people and tell them that God loves America,

and thus anything they do in the name of good is to

the betterment of America. If this means stomping on

the rights of others, lying deliberately about

opponents, and repeating truly fatuous nonsense like

the peace symbol being satanic, then so be it. These

people don’t believe you can be a good American unless

you serve God in such vile ways, and all the

principles and freedoms that make America America are

secondary.

 

In thousands of plain little clapboard churches across

the country, they were jubilent over the election,

because the forces of evil–Democrats, liberals, and

Americans–had been defeated, and now, in the name of

love, justice and America, Putsch was free to massacre

millions in the middle east, stomp on rights in

America, and practice hatred against free people in

the name of God’s love. They voted for the people who

waved flags and told them that religious intolerance

was ok in the name of patriotism, and are convinced

that it was God’s way of fighting Satan.

 

I wonder how long it will be before they decide that

people like me, or anyone else who isn’t a

fundamentalist Christian, is an intolerable affront

before God, and must be " dealt with. " History suggests

that it won’t be long. No theocracy in history has

been prosperous and free, and the fact that the

leaders of the theocracy would be irreligious (the

leaders of most religious movements are irreligious)

makes no difference at all.

 

Free Americans have to take a stand against this

movement. People are free to believe as they wish, but

when they try to make those beliefs the law of the

land, and it is in ways the Constitution never

intended, then they are wrong. They are not " for "

America, no matter what they think. They are against

it.

 

They are traitors in the name of God.