Full Version: Culture Wars
Culture War issues encompass issues such as abortion, gun rights, homosexuality, death penalty, religion and so on.
Regardless of how you feel towards those specific issues:
1) Would you say that Culture Wars make up the fabric of American society today? Or would you say that they're outdated issues? or as Barack Obama put it, they're "just so ninties."
2) Would you consider these issues to be the cause of most divisiveness and turmoil in this country?
Regardless of how you feel towards those specific issues:
1) Would you say that Culture Wars make up the fabric of American society today? Or would you say that they're outdated issues? or as Barack Obama put it, they're "just so ninties."
2) Would you consider these issues to be the cause of most divisiveness and turmoil in this country?
The so-called "Culture Wars" are merely another iteration of the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy. The Culture Wars are outdated in that they are a struggle between religious and secular values and should have been rightfully put to rest when official state religions were abolished, but we're still left with the residue of dominionism in our society. The Evangelical and Fundamentalist movements are actually a relatively recent invention with the collection of theological essays known as The Fundamentals being published in 1910. This movement has gone through numerous iterations since its inception. The 1980s saw probably the biggest resurgence of the religious right as a counter to '60s counter-culture, with Reagan marking the beginning of the absorption of the religious right into what would become the neoconservative movement. This is when the Charismatic Movement really took hold. These days, those who don't want to come off as too overtly religious like to use the term "family values," newspeak for enforcing Christian morality.
It's been half a century since the free love of the hippies and we're still arguing over what people can do in the bedroom. It's been nearly a century since the Scopes Trial and we're still arguing over evolution in the classroom. It's been over two hundred years since the First Amendment was added to the Constitution and we're still arguing over the acceptability of basing legislation on Christian morality. Yes, the Culture Wars are still relevant. Despite this, the religiosity of Americans is trending downward. Creationism and its reincarnation, intelligent design, got slapped down by the Supreme Court multiple times. Gay marriage is becoming more acceptable. The imposition of Christian morality is dying off, and some people are very afraid of that.
It's been half a century since the free love of the hippies and we're still arguing over what people can do in the bedroom. It's been nearly a century since the Scopes Trial and we're still arguing over evolution in the classroom. It's been over two hundred years since the First Amendment was added to the Constitution and we're still arguing over the acceptability of basing legislation on Christian morality. Yes, the Culture Wars are still relevant. Despite this, the religiosity of Americans is trending downward. Creationism and its reincarnation, intelligent design, got slapped down by the Supreme Court multiple times. Gay marriage is becoming more acceptable. The imposition of Christian morality is dying off, and some people are very afraid of that.
QUOTE(WinePusher @ Nov 4 2010, 10:52 PM) 
Culture War issues encompass issues such as abortion, gun rights, homosexuality, death penalty, religion and so on.
Regardless of how you feel towards those specific issues:
1) Would you say that Culture Wars make up the fabric of American society today? Or would you say that they're outdated issues? or as Barack Obama put it, they're "just so ninties."
It's funny when I look at the enumerated issues above I instantly think right wing. And yet from my experience those I know who would meet those criteria I am just as likely to be friends with as those on the left. These matters are wound up with people's identities. If those identities are threatened then people tend to become activated. You really have to go into the mysteries of the human mind. We have evolved certain modes of thinking and feeling that we still don't fully understand.
2) Would you consider these issues to be the cause of most divisiveness and turmoil in this country?
No, not in an underlying sense. I'm inclined to be Malthusian. I think we are suffering from a case of musical chairs and in each one's little paranoid world we seek out what works best psychologically from the range of available narratives and then personally fill in the rest. Different personalities and differing legacies inevitably produce clashes but it is still bottom line ape vs. ape struggling to secure "enough" resources for oneself and one's family.
That's why with most issues, like environmental destruction, I start with npg as the center piece to a solution.
QUOTE(Belshazzar @ Nov 5 2010, 09:45 PM)
The so-called "Culture Wars" are merely another iteration of the Fundamentalist-Modernist Controversy.
Speaking of culture wars and the reiteration of certain themes, how about Hollywood predicting the tea party back in the 50s. Remember 'A Face in the Crowd'?
QUOTE
To understand what has happened in the mid-term elections, the best guide lies in an unexpected place - the dusty vaults of Hollywood. In 1957, Elia Kazan directed a film called ‘A Face In The Crowd' that read the tea-leaves of the Tea Party back when Sarah Palin was merely a frosty zygote. One morning a poor wandering Arkansas chancer named Larry ‘Lonesome' Rhodes is lying passed out on a jail cell where the local sheriff has detained him overnight. A pretty young radio producer arrives and asks if he'd like to tell her a story to be played on her show where ordinary folks speak to ordinary folks. He sings and rambles and offers corn-poke homilies. The clip is a huge hit - and he is soon given his own show, filled with country music and country wisdom which then shoots off into the stratosphere.
When Lonesome Rhodes becomes one of the biggest stars on US television, he starts receiving offers. Advertisers say that if he endorses their lousy products, they'll shower him with millions. He knows how to sell to ordinary people - and he is pushed to go further. They ask him to sell the political causes that will make them richer too. He starts railing against social security and the old age pension and anything that taxes the rich to help the rest. He uses the tunes and slanguage of working class Americans to get them to emotionally identify with the people who are screwing them over. He's brilliant at it - a gurning hyperactive huckster, saying that support and security for ordinary Americans is a betrayal of America. He makes himself rich by lying to the people he came from.
When Lonesome Rhodes becomes one of the biggest stars on US television, he starts receiving offers. Advertisers say that if he endorses their lousy products, they'll shower him with millions. He knows how to sell to ordinary people - and he is pushed to go further. They ask him to sell the political causes that will make them richer too. He starts railing against social security and the old age pension and anything that taxes the rich to help the rest. He uses the tunes and slanguage of working class Americans to get them to emotionally identify with the people who are screwing them over. He's brilliant at it - a gurning hyperactive huckster, saying that support and security for ordinary Americans is a betrayal of America. He makes himself rich by lying to the people he came from.
1) Would you say that Culture Wars make up the fabric of American society today? Or would you say that they're outdated issues? or as Barack Obama put it, they're "just so ninties."
I have not seen where President Obama said any such thing, so a link would help convince me that this quote isn't just another make-believe thing from the right-wing echo chamber. Not just any old link either, but the actual transcription of the speech in which he said culture wars are just so nineties.
Culture wars are used to divide and conquer. It's a trick to keep people from seeing the realities that very powerful people don't want us to see.
Culture wars are diversions from real issues to those that mean very little. Let's get all upset because the big bad somebodies want to do nasty things to us, like keep religious symbols off the courthouse lawn. Never you mind about what's going on inside the courthouse walls.
2) Would you consider these issues to be the cause of most divisiveness and turmoil in this country?
Seems that way. I'm sure the tactic will be put into use for the 2012 campaigns and will work again.
I have not seen where President Obama said any such thing, so a link would help convince me that this quote isn't just another make-believe thing from the right-wing echo chamber. Not just any old link either, but the actual transcription of the speech in which he said culture wars are just so nineties.
Culture wars are used to divide and conquer. It's a trick to keep people from seeing the realities that very powerful people don't want us to see.
Culture wars are diversions from real issues to those that mean very little. Let's get all upset because the big bad somebodies want to do nasty things to us, like keep religious symbols off the courthouse lawn. Never you mind about what's going on inside the courthouse walls.
2) Would you consider these issues to be the cause of most divisiveness and turmoil in this country?
Seems that way. I'm sure the tactic will be put into use for the 2012 campaigns and will work again.
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