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The Double Edged Sword of Wedge Issues

Do we reap what we sow? If we live by the sword do we die by the sword? If we use the issue of gay marriage as a political tool of hatred and intolerance to manipulate people into voting without thinking, do we lose our souls in the process?

This week yet another member of the religious right, Pastor Ted Haggard, is at the receiving end of the world of intolerance he helped create. While the living was easy, he basked in the limelight of power, raked in the money, and lived the kind of life in private he condemned in public.

The Republicans created the anti-gay marriage issue as a wedge of hate to leverage votes and money, but God will not be mocked. The wedge has turned around to split the Republican party and the lives of those like Foley and Haggard who forged the sword of public opinion.

What exactly is Pastor Ted Haggard’s theology of sexuality? One parishioner describes the evangelical view of homosexuality:

The life of the gay man, in the evangelical imagination, seems to be an endless succession of orgasms, interrupted only by jocular episodes of male bonhomie. The gay man promises Christian men a guilt-free existence, the garden before Eve. As such, he is not just tempting but temptation embodied; “the Enemy”…

Haggard’s evangelical view of marriage, described at his son’s wedding servcie, is equally bleak:

Earlier in the week, at a staff meeting, he had announced that he would use the wedding as an illustration, and to that end he delivered a lengthy prenuptial presentation with slides, in which he laid out a fractal-like repeating pattern of relations, shrinking and expanding: that of God to man, reflected in that of man to wife, which is in turn a model for a godly society. Just as we conform ourselves to God’s will, so, said Ted, must “the Woman.” The Woman must take on her man’s calling, her man’s desire…

In return, Pastor Ted continued, the Woman gets the Man’s love; authority just wants to serve. “Total surrender!” he called. “True or false?”

“TRUE!” answered the 8,000 assembled.

The Man is the Christ; the Woman is the Body. He is coming; she is the church; she must open her doors. United, they are the Kingdom, ready for battle. “The Christian home,” preached Pastor Ted, “is to be in a constant state of war.”

There’s a lot of really weird stuff going on here. But what?

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Date: November 3, 2006

Author: Alan

Categories: general

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(389 votes, average: 2.89 out of 5)

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• 

  Alan

  in November 5th, 2006 @ 10:25

  Oooh, nobody likes this one. Is it the anti-gay crowd, or what?

  Okay, here’s why I posted it and what struck me. First the photograph. I saw this church marquee in the rain while I was trying to finish a roll of film and it somehow struck me as being hilarious. Not that I flirt with any devils, of course.

  Then, if you follow the link there’s a lengthy piece about Haggard in Harpers, written before his public demise. It describes his early days in town trying to start his church and going around to gay bars trying to ‘rescue’ people. Is he really trying to rescue himself? A shrink could have a lot of fun with the self-loathing aspect of this ministry. And what about all the manly-man art in the “prayer center”?

  Then, looking at the statements by Haggard and his followers about sexuality here’s what jumps out at me:
  -The true meaning of the Garden of Eden fable is the lure of homosexuality.
  -Exaggerated and cartoon-like sex role sterotypes–the proper role of the woman in heterosexual marriage is to shut up and blindly obey.
  -The mixing of sexual and war metaphors describing marriage in the same sentence (Orwell’s junior anti-sex league?).

  I find the virulent anti-gay message of the religious right puzzling at best. I’m not sure if the Harpers article makes it more, or less murky.

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• 

  Scott

  in November 5th, 2006 @ 12:02

  I liked it. I rated it 5 stars.

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• 

  Ralph

  in November 5th, 2006 @ 13:29

  That a closeted gay man would struggle so hard against homosexuality doesn’t surprise me.

  Studies have demonstrated that gay bashers are more likely to be aroused by gay porn. Why not those who attack gays with religious rhetoric rather than baseball bats? Makes sense.

  As a married straight man, I have never considered my home to be a fortress in a state of perpetual war against homosexuality. Why would you, unless you were gay?

  I recall something Julia said in 1984: That as long as you do things like get up and scream at the two minute hate, and enthusiastically disseminate Youth Anti-Sex League propaganda out on the street, you can get away with whatever you want in private. Her assumption was that the official mythology was such ludicrous theater that no individual actually believed it in their heart of hearts, although people played along with it in public because power was at stake.

  What Julia underestimated was the mechanism behind the Stockholm syndrome–in order to survive, people tend to internalize values imposed on them through power. In 1984, the people in power know this and take advantage of it. Winston is tortured not until he SAYS he sees three lights instead of two, but until he internalizes the beliefs enforced on him through force and SEES them.

  I think something different is happening here, though. It’s got to do with the Karl Rove-style seizure and corruption of power through democracy as a feedback mechanism. In the Rove style model, you pick up the values people already have, amplify them with taxpayer faith-based initiatives money, and feed them back to the people. The rhetoric gets amplified and distorted into the “religious right” social phenomenon we have today–Christianity blasted through a feedback loop of corrupt politics. That provides cover for some of the more distorted forms of Christianity out there; the ones who already have some kind of weird feedback going in their struggle against reality. Sooner or later, though, ideologies of power demand that the values they instill become more than just window dressing. They demand that people actually believe them, and the more bizarre they have become due to the distortions of corrupt power, the more abrupt their impact with demands on real people for authenticity.

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• 

  Alan

  in November 5th, 2006 @ 22:00

  If Scott liked it, that’s all I need. Everyone else can go take a flying leap. If it inspires Ralph to further insights, that’s even better and more frosting on the cake. If a motley crew of ungodly proslytizers has not come out of the woodwork to offer some obscure atheist argument against it, well, I’ll just have to manage to live without that somehow.

  The bashing of gays by closet gays reminds me also of the anti-semitic crowd. Hitler was said to have a jewish grandparent. How much of hatred is really some struggle with a part of the individual’s identity they have a hard time coming to terms with?

  In 1984, Winston continues to be tortured even after he sees the three or two fingers, the problem being his loyalty for Julia instead of Big Brother. The torture stops when he renounces Julia. The book makes the point that no one cares about controlling the sexuality of the proles; the lower classes are left alone. The same with party members having a clandestine but purely physical encounter with someone in the lower class. It is only when party member has affair with another party member the power structure is threatened enough to go into action.

  It seems like we have the opposite situation here with Rove and the faith based initiative payoffs. These preachers used to be on the lunatic fringe. They were the shouters everyone made fun of that you only heard on the radio late at night driving cross-country. Correct me if I’m wrong here, but aren’t these the preachers of the Proles? who don’t vote and will never have any power? Even if Rove and company make fun of them behind their backs, and some people will always recognize them as lunative fringe, they have now had a measure of respectability conferred on them by the ruling order. I am hoping of course for the backlash when someone will say the emperor isn’t wearing any clothes.

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• 

  Ralph

  in November 6th, 2006 @ 18:40

  America is different from the civilization in Orwell’s 1984.

  Haggard was an elite whose job it was to create and disseminate propaganda for working class Christians. Until recently, there was an unwritten rule that American elites could do what they wanted in private (sex, drugs, etc.), as long as they towed the line in public.

  Outing Haggard broke that unwritten rule. It’s blowback.

  There were always fundamentalist Muslims, but there was no Taliban or Al Qaeda until money, training, and organizational assistance was funneled to the fundamentalists. Likewise, there were always fundamentalist Christians, but there was no Religious Right until money, training and organizational assistance was funneled to the fundamentalists.

  One is a terrorist network and the other is a political machine, but there are some interesting parallels. Both were nurtured by outsiders and served their interests for a while. But they have their own agendas.

  Now, after America and the Neocons have been pumping resources into creating Christian and Islamic fundamentalists on steroids, Bush suddenly declares war on ideological extremism?

  It’s too late. It’s blowback, and it’s out of control.

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• 

  Scott

  in November 6th, 2006 @ 22:28

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wkUi6dhwWx0
  Hi Alan,
  I just found this great video. I considered putting in the discussion of my creationism post, but thought it would fit better under a discussion of Haggard.

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• 

  Alan

  in November 8th, 2006 @ 02:10

  I can see why you’re not sure if it’s about creationism. Here’s a transcript of that part:

  Richard Dawkins (narrating): But my biggest concern is that evangelicals like Haggard are foisting falsehoods on their flock. Evangelicals are denying scientific evidence just to support Bronze Age myths.

  Ted Haggard: We fully embrace the scientific method as American evangelicals, and we think as time goes along as we discover more and more facts that we’ll learn more an more about how god created the heaven and the earth.

  RD: The scientific method clearly demonstrates the world is 4 ½ billion years old, do you accept that?
  Haggard: You know what you’re doing is you are, you are accepting some of the views that are accepted in some portions of the scientific community as fact, where in fact your grandchildren might listen to the tape of you saying that and laugh at you, you want to bet? Sometimes it’s hard for a human being to study the ear or study the eye and think that that happened by accident.
  RD: I beg your pardon, did you say by accident?
  Haggard:Yeah
  RD: What did you mean, by accident?
  Haggard: The eye just formed itself, somehow.
  RD: Who says it did?
  Haggard: Some evolutionists say it.
  RD: Not a single one that I’ve ever met.
  Haggard: (sarcasm) Really?
  RD: (sarcasm) Really.
  Haggard: Oh?
  RD: You obviously know nothing about the subject.
  Haggard: Or maybe you haven’t met the people I have.
  Ha.Ha.
  But you see, you do understand, you do understand that this issue right here of intellectual arrogance is the reason why people like you have a difficult problem with people of faith. I don’t communicate an air of superiority over the people because I know so much more, and if you only read the books I know and if you only know the scientists I knew, then you would be great like me.
  Well.
  Sir.
  There could be many things that you know well, there are other things that you don’t know well. As you age you’ll find yourself wrong on some things right on some other things, but please in the process of it, don’t be arrogant.

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• 

  Alan

  in November 8th, 2006 @ 02:31

  The congregation does not look working class, with the neckties and the nice vehicles, they look like the “suburban sprawl” types that escaped the inner city when it went downhill so they wouldn’t have to send their children to school with blacks.

  Clearly Haggard is clueless about origin of species.

  He sure does have some facial twitches, though. I know some people who watched the Monica Lewinsky interview not to hear what she was saying, but they kept staring at her mouth thinking about what she could do with it. In the same way Haggard is fascinating to watch; he also does some bizarre, almost simian things with curling his lip and showing his teeth.

  There is also a disconnect between what Haggard says and how he says it, just like Foley. The facial expression doesn’t match the content. I don’t know a better way to describe it. cognitive dissonance? Is that how gaydar works?

  ---

• 

  Ralph

  in November 8th, 2006 @ 13:12

  Haggard is not only clueless about the origin of species, he’s anti-intellectual. Not knowing anything about it, he assumes that smart people are confident about the theory of natural selection as a mechanism of evolution because–they are arrogant. If he’s successful in preaching that, there will be a permanent gap between the scientifically literate and the scientifically illiterate in this country.

  He’s participating in the establishment of two modes of consciousness for two different classes in America: An elite with an understanding of science, ideas, and how the world works; and an underclass whose consciousness is rooted in junk science and Bronze Age mythology.

  It would be interesting to see how many of these high profile preachers and Neoconservative intellectuals are sending their children to elite private schools where they learn about evolution, even while they push to get creation (oh, excuse me, “intelligent design theory”) taught in public school.

  In Huxley’s Brave New World, the permanent underclass was grown in jars, to which just the right amount of poison was regularly added to stunt the growth of their brains.

  Some very devout people are being manipulated into creating a permanent underclass with a medieval education and a Pavlovian response to symbols. Now, why would the Neocon elite want a thing like that?

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• 

  Scott

  in November 8th, 2006 @ 14:11

  Thanks for going to the trouble of transcribing Alan, but I realized it’s about creationism v. evolution. I popped under this discussion because I thought that it was more telling regarding Haggard’s mindset than it was about creationism.
  Interesting observation Ralph. Do you really suspect some of the Evangelical Elite of being disingenous? I’d always just assumed that folks like Haggard were sincere, and any harm that they did was not intentional.
  Further, I find it interesting that Haggard is caling the scientist intllectually arrogant. The scientist is willing to admit that he is wrong in the pursuit of further truth, whereas Haggard is not willng to admit the possibility that he might be wrong regardless of how much evidence is stacked against him.
  (in the above paragraph I use the nondescript “the scientist” instead of referring to Dawkins because if I described Dawkins as humble I’d be shot down in a barrage of laughter.)

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• 

  Alan

  in November 8th, 2006 @ 16:04

  Actually I transcribed this whole thing last night. For some reason reading it was different from listening to it, and I got more out of reading it. There are different levels of messages hard to sort out when you listen, and yes I think the main message is about fundamentalism, not creationism, and the difference between the emotional (Nuremburg Rally) message and the intellectual message. So here is the rest of the thing:

  http://irregulartimes.com/diaries/2006/11/transcript-of-richard-dawkinsted-haggard-video/

  But Ralph, and I always enjoy how you tie everything up in such neat little packages, especially conspiracy theories, but do you suppose that junk science is just an evolutionary branch of intellectualism struggling to find a niche, and that Haggard’s outing just represents the unsuccessful conclusion of nature’s latest little Darwinian political prank? :~)

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• 

  Ralph

  in November 8th, 2006 @ 17:36

  Why do we give the Religious Right a pass by automatically assuming they are sincere?

  Of course, I suspect a significant portion of any elite of being dishonest. Don’t you?

  The alliance of economic and religious elites under the umbrella of righ wing Republicanism in the United States is a fundamentally corrupt one. Economic elites know THEIR children won’t be taught medieval science in public school, because their children will never set foot in a public school. So they’re willing to funnel some faith-based tax money into fundamentalist Christian efforts to force junk science into public schools. In exchange, the religious elites have been willing to abandon the middle class and the poor.

  It absolutely is a class thing–the economic elites know that as long as they have money, they won’t have to live in the medieval world that’s generated as a byproduct of keeping their taxes low. Roe v. Wade means nothing to them, because their daughter will be taught about birth control early, and they’ll always have enough money to whisk her away to Europe for an abortion. Religious crusades won’t affect them or their families personally, because the soldiers that fight them will only come from the underclass. Social unrest resulting from extreme poverty will not spill into their gated communities.

  So yes, a corrupt conspiracy between religious and financial elites is leading to the bifurcation of the American public into a 21st century elite and a medieval peasantry. That’s clearly happening. What’s less clear is that any one person or group of people is behind it all, planning everything and pulling all the strings. I could be wrong, but I don’t think even Karl Rove and the Neocon intellectuals are controlling all aspects of this. If they were, they would have gotten to the gay gigolo before he outed Haggard.

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  Alan

  in November 8th, 2006 @ 22:35

  Now, now, Ralph, you just told us how 1984′s Julia underestimated the need to internalize the values made necessary by power. Now you are saying the elites are conscious of choosing a deliberately ridicuous science/religious stance, not because they want to be reunited with mom and dad and junior in the hereafter, or becasue they were raised that way and don’t know any better, but to pad their bank accounts in the present.

  Not only is it conscious and deliberate (Intelligent Design!), but it’s also a zero sum game. In other words, they can’t make money themselves without impoverishing an entire previously comfortable social class. I notice your social classes are getting down to two. We used to have three classes in this country. Most people considered themselves in the middle class, and the middle class was considered the largest. In latin America there have been two classes, the very poor, which contitute 99% of the population and the upper class, where 98% of the wealth is concentrated in 2% of the population. According to international urban legend, the unofficial policy of the U.S. in its aid program has been to encourage development of the middle classes in other countries.

  You can’t say having so many people in an economic bottom rung has worked out in latin america either. The wealthy and their children are subject to kidnappings from drug bandits and are virtual prisoners in their mansions behind barbed wire. So if America’s neocon elite has no short term motives for enacting law to benefit the middle class, in the long term preserving the middle class should be in their best interest.

  Does anyone know if the middle class in the U.S. is actually disappearing? Certainly there has been a major shift away from union-type manufacturing jobs.

  There was a senator outed by DC queens some time ago, maybe in the 80′s. Don’t remember the name–I once picked up a copy of christopher street at someone’s house and got hooked on the story. Supposedly the code of the queens with regard to politicians is privacy…until the politicians become openly anti-gay and start advocating anti-gay legislation. A bit different from Allen Drury’s story in ‘Advise and Consent’ (60′s?)where the gay married character commits suicide rather than be outed.

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  Ralph

  in November 9th, 2006 @ 12:08

  I think there’s an interesting parallel between Julia in 1984 and Haggard in 2006. Both thought that a public show of ideological correctness and sexual purity was adequate cover for doing whatever they wanted in private. They misunderstood their unspoken social contracts.

  In 1984, the elites have to be pressured into doublethink–knowing the system is corrupt so they can work to make it more corrupt on the one hand, and believing (or at least accepting) the propaganda they create on the other hand.

  With Haggard, it’s different. He was caught between two contradictory demands on authenticity–gay and fundamentalist Christian. I don’t think the financial and political elites that are manipulating fundamentalist Christianity have been able to exempt the elites from demands of genuineness.

  The “middle class” is nothing more than the working class with a successful union movement, pandered to by politicians.

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• 

  Alan

  in November 12th, 2006 @ 19:14

  Haggard was not outed by one of the elites. He was outed by one of the underclass, who was being told he was unacceptable in public, but acceptable in private.The guy even made some kind of statement to that effect about his motives, that Haggard was acting like a hetero lifestyle made him morally superior–a double standard.

  The remark about authenticiy reminds me of the “Left Behind” series that envisions the Rapture at the Endtimes when the Chosen are wafted up to heaven, leaving airplanes to fly themselves, parents without their children, no taxis, etc. The guys have written how many? fourteen books in the series? They’re awful too, I can’t get past a hundred pages because the plotline is so lame. But have these guys given away their riches to the poor in order to be prepared for the coming judgment? Nope. What would Haggard be without evangelism? Probably not rich. The price of the elite lifestyle is an ingenuine life.

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  Ralph

  in November 13th, 2006 @ 12:19

  I agree, there are class issues as well as gender orientation issues with this outing.

  It’s a dramatic reversal that a prostitute demonstrates more integrity than a prominent preacher.

  It’s interesting how the intellectual elites in this country are almost universally despised, but the economic and religious elites are still revered.

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• 

  Alan

  in November 13th, 2006 @ 18:54

  Who do you consider to be a member of the intellectual elite? Surely not Kerry, although he comes off as stuffy. Maybe Obama. Moyers? I don’t personally see much reverence for the Falwells and Robertsons of this world, in fact I hear a lot about god’s retribution in the form of hurricanes.

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