APOCALYPSE NOW
‘Mayday’ March issue
Imagine a world in which labour unions, civil rights and public schools have been banished, where women have been removed from the labour force, where biblical law has replaced the secular code, and where a monistic totalitarian ideology has supplanted democratic pluralism. Imagine a world where being gay is punishable by death, where anti-intellectualism, anti-rationalism, and blind obedience to a cult of authority are wedded to a primitive, infantile, dependent individual mentality. Imagine, further, a world in which an unrestrained, rapacious corporatism is inextricably commingled with, and sanctioned by, divine law, and where, finally, a blood-drenched aesthetic of global apocalyptic violence and doom is not merely the national obsession – but the national goal.
Such is the portrait of a not-so-distant world painted for us by Chris Hedge’s in ‘American Fascists: The Christian Right And The War On America’. [Free Press, 2006].
Now, I’m not normally given to writing reviews of books, but in this case I simply couldn’t resist. Having previously investigated only small parts of the animal myself (see Issue #6, ‘A Contest of One’), I recognized at once that Hedges has accomplished what every writer both admires and envies: He has scooped the field with an exhilarating and exhaustive investigation of the subject. Damn. Nothing left, as they say, but to report back.
‘Fascism’
Though the term ‘fascist’ is often tossed out as a ‘mere’ epithet by those critical of right-wingers and their elitist policies, it is crucial to note that Hedges employs the term in its strict usage. When he says that certain elements of the Christian Right – the ‘Dominionist’ movement – are out-and-out fascists, he means it not as a slur, but as a technical description. Indeed, so intent is the author in establishing the fascist credentials of this ostensibly ‘Christian’ religious order, that he devotes a six page preface to a definition (taken from Umberto Eco) of the subject. And this is where I proffer the only quibble I have with the book, for, in truth, there are more concise, more cogent definitions available. I’ll advance one of these (care of Michael Parenti) alongside his.
While many writers (including Hedges) concentrate on the irrational, emotional elements of fascism it is important to recognize that fascism has always, first and foremost, served a rational political-economic function. “In fact”, as Parenti says, “if fascism means anything it means all-out government support of business and severe repression of anti-business, pro-labour forces.” To this end are irrational symbols manipulated by rational means. These core symbols include:
“The cult of the leader and authoritarian rule” whereby a supreme leader or leaders are worshipped as semi-divine entities and where all decision making, and indeed thinking, is done by the leader; this resulting in the infantilization of the followers.
“Monistic values”. In Nazism these included ein (one) Volk, ein Reich and ein Fuhrer. Class divisions are hidden and, in fact, abolished by fiat. Individuality is submerged in an homogenized national mass entity, the ‘People’.
“Atavistic appeals to mythical roots”. For Hitler it was the ancient Volk. For Mussolini it was ancient Rome.
“Patriarchy and Pseudo-Revolution”. As Parenti notes, “What distinguishes fascism from ordinary right-wing authoritarianism is the way it attempts to cultivate a revolutionary aura. Fascism offers a beguiling mix of revolutionary-sounding mass appeals and reactionary class politics…Fascism is a false revolution….It propagates a ‘New Order’ while serving the same old moneyed interests.” At the same time, a rigid patriarchal hierarchy deliberately sows the seeds of racism, chauvinism, sexism, and homophobia as devices both to divert legitimate grievances and to create convenient, compensatory scapegoats.
Hedges’ accounting runs through a slightly different, if overlapping, set of characteristics of which I’ll note only: an impoverished vocabulary by way of limiting critical thought and reasoning; an Armageddon complex signifying a state of permanent warfare against trumped-up enemies; an obsession with plot and xenophobia; and, finally, the appeal to a frustrated and threatened middle class.
It is this last feature which should first prick our interest, for in every instance of its ascendance (i.e. Nazi Germany, Mussolini’s Italy, Franco’s Spain), fascism has been associated with, and followed shortly upon, a dramatic economic dislocation, this sometimes combined with revolutionary activity by the ‘lower’ classes. The frightened middle class has then thrown in their lot both with big business and a ruthless cadre of militaristic demagogues in a desperate, misguided and ultimately tragic attempt to maintain their tenuous socio-economic standing.
It is Hedges contention that roughly similar conditions are now rife throughout the heartland of America.
The Culture of Despair
Despite all the triumphalist blather in the press about a ‘sound basis’ it is evident to all those who have eyes to see with that the American economy is little more than a house of cards perched precariously upon a system of global (‘dollar hegemony’) tribute, debt-leverage imperialism, and fictional financial sleight of hand (I’ll expand on these in the April issue). Thus, from the early 1970’s on, global capitalism has experienced a crisis of profitability which it has sought to remedy through an array of tactics of which ‘globalization’ (read ‘economic imperialism’), assaults on labour, the slashing of social programs, and the gutting of domestic manufacturing are among its leading ‘success’ stories. In the United States, for instance, manufacturing jobs accounted for 53% of jobs in 1965 and only 9% by 2004. This economic catastrophe has been accompanied by a simultaneous shredding of federal and state assistance programs. The result, as Hedges so poignantly describes, is a cauldron of poverty, alienation, disconnectedness and despair evident across wide swaths of the American middle class.
And it is from these wells of despair that have sprung the legions of converts to a fundamentalist religious fanaticism known as Dominionism.
That Old Time Religion
In truth, as Hedges is quick to remark, the Dominionist movement is not in any way identical to traditional evangelism with its emphasis on personal salvation. Dominionism is, he says, hell-bent not on personal salvation, but on political power. Deriving from a theology known as Christian reconstructionism (which seeks to politicize faith) and with even earlier roots in a radical Calvinism, its explicit goals include the abolishment of the line between state and church, and the establishment of a Christian theocracy. The likely consequences of that are outlined in my opening intro; a (very partial) litany of horrors which may seem sensationalist, but which Hedges assures us are anything but.
But then, you may ask, what have we to fear from a bunch of whacked-out religious nuts who believe they are one day going to be wafted right out of their clothes straight unto Heaven (the ‘Rapture’ – no where found in the Bible) with the rest of us left behind to face a vengeful God and global cataclysm?
According to Hedges, actually quite a lot.
The grim fact of the matter is that though Dominionists only comprise between 7 and 12 percent of the US population (still a sizable number) they nonetheless have the sympathy of the 70 million strong evangelist congregation; a congregation which votes as a block and is considered the core constituency of the Bush Administration and of the Republican Party generally. This militant core is, moreover, both highly organized and backed by a number of major American corporations including Wal Mart, Tyson Foods, Purdue, and Sam’s Wholsale. Dominionists also control at least six national television networks and most of the nation’s 2000 religious radio stations which reach an estimated 140 million Americans every day. They hold roughly 50% of the chaplaincy appointments in the armed services and training academies. Christian radicals have similarly penetrated the Congress, Senate, executive and judiciary. In addition, the Bush Administration has steadily diverted government funds away from social programs and towards private faith-based organizations.
In education the trend is ominous: anywhere between 1.1 million and 2.1 million children, nearly all evangelicals, are now being home schooled. And what are they learning? Here, Hedges’ description of the Creationist museums now proliferating across the land would be humorous if it weren’t so tragic: Noah’s Arks stuffed with dinosaurs and buck-skinned clad humans etc. More to the point, according to Hedges, is that, “The danger of creationism is not that it allows followers to retreat into a world of certainty and magic – which it does – but that it allows facts to be accepted or discarded according to the dictates of a preordained ideology.” And this, he emphasizes, is tantamount to nothing less than a war on truth.
Even more ominous yet is the fact that the movement is deeply involved in building America’s first mercenary army. Thus, Erik Prince, a Dominionist, is the founder of Blackwater, a private ‘security firm’ which operates not only effectively, but technically, outside the law (as witnessed recently in Iraq). As Hedges remarks, “The creation of this mercenary force, empowered by the apocalyptic rhetoric of the Christian Right, is giving rise to a Praetorian Guard.” Indeed, the parallels between these Christian blackshirts (they are dressed all in black) and the Nazi brownshirts are striking.
In short, the radical Christian Right is surprisingly far along the path in the creation of an essentially separate socio-political-military structure within the US body politic; which leads us back to our original question of, ‘well, so what’?
The Twilight of Democracy
No trend within the US political firmament over the past eight years is more clear than the extreme concentration of power within the executive branch of the government. This combined with a steady and substantive erosion of civil liberties has left American democracy, such as it ever was, in a critically weakened condition. Hedges’ contention is that, given a sudden political crisis or a prolonged economic upset, the Christian Right would be poised not only to win converts from the newly disaffected, but also to either win - or simply take – control of the state. He reminds us (as if we needed it) that the Nazis were a minority party right up until they seized control. In fact, much like the Dominionists, they were considered by ‘genteel’ society to be somewhat buffoonish and were not taken seriously.
And here is where Hedges offers us a stern warning when he remarks that ‘liberal’ America, confounded by the paradox of the philosophy of tolerance vis a vis a totalitarian and completely intolerant ideology, is ready to be ‘shorn like sheep’. “If this movement succeeds”, he says, it will do so…because of the moral failure of those…who understand the intent of the radicals yet fail to confront them, those who treat this movement as if it were another legitimate player in an open society.”
“Tolerance”, he concludes, is a virtue, but tolerance coupled with passivity is a vice.”