#ImWithJoy also. Know what rankles the right wing most about @JoyAnnReid? She outgrew biases she was raised with, by experience and empathy. They can't grasp why progressives don't hate her for changing. Heads up GOPs: liberals believe in positive change. That's why we're Dems.
Watching straight allies in the LGBT marriage equality movement struggle past their own biases helped me address internal racist biases that I thought I didn't have. Growth requires one to accept they are not already flawless. That change is needed. Not just "can," but "should."
Current right-wing-politics-inflected Christianity has two main branches, both deeply opposed to such personal growth and change. "B b but," you say, "isn't it about redemption? And God's love? And all that? Wouldn't that support change?" No, dear, that's Jesus. Not Christianity.
First branch is the kind televangelists flack. I'd call it "altar-call-ism." Grace is all you need, no change in your life is required. Keep lying, cheating, stealing, wife-and-child-beating, and as long as you fill your pew on Sunday and put money in the basket, all is forgiven.
In altar-call-ism, you find "prosperity gospel" charlatans, who sell you a form of cargo cult. "Send me money, and money will come to you." It's got a lot of theater surrounding it, but it's cargo cult at heart. And it does work - it makes televangelists very prosperous. Not us.
Second branch is fundamentalism, grown out of Calvinism, and sub-divided into as many cults as there are sociopathic men (and a few women) to lead them. Fundamentalism and altar-call-ism are opposites. In altar-call-ism, you're always OK. In fundamentalism, you never are OK.
For fundamentalists, life is a process of proving you are utterly flawless so that you can deserve God's love. It is posited that only a few are deserving or "chosen," and if you have one tiny speck of Satan in your life, you've offended God and he won't choose you. Perfection.
So although altar-call-ism and fundamentalism are opposites, they're two sides of the same coin - STATIC view of life. The first strips ppl of any negative incentive for change, and the second strips any positive incentive. Either we always have grace, or we're never good enough.
It's easy to see how religions with static life philosophy meshed w/US right wing's slide into fascism over past decades. Monarchism and its feudalist caste systems used a combo of both. The ruling classes were chosen by God, and could always purchase his grace.
Likewise, both branches are being utilized by the US fascist movement, whether overtly white-supremacist or the Koch branch (which pursues pure greed.) Fundie "chosen" thinking enables designating certain groups as "not chosen." Altar-call applies only to the chosen group.
Using both philosophy & raw politics, the US fascist right has solidified around the central principle that outgroups are never good enough to be chosen for leadership, and ingroups are so graced by God that they never have to live up to their role. White male priv in a nutshell.
So yeah, the idea that someone like Joy Reid used to share some of their beliefs, but has now changed, grown, and become more progressive - it deeply disturbs the US right wing. It suggests that they, themselves, are not the ultimate but the neonate form of humanity.
Right wingers think: "We're the ones who are enlightened, because we see the truth behind all the biases. If liberal Dems were truly awake, they'd become like us." But deep inside, they fear that's not true. It's just too convenient for those born into privilege, isn't it?
And that's one reason they think of "elite" as a slur. We Dems, libs, progs are dubbed "elite" because we believe that all humans have potential for goodness, that government of the people can and should help us get there, and that life is a process, not an achievement.
In other words, we believe that the concept of "good" is an achievable goal, regardless of how far we may be from it at present. Neither branch of right wing religion strives toward good in a dynamic way. It chooses certain ppl and pretends they're born with it, demonizes others.
This is why America seems to be morally lost. A significant portion of the voting citizenry has abandoned the quest for good. It is grab what you can, fuck everyone else, I've got mine. It has no place for a person whose life demonstrates that they strove to better themselves.
And then strove to share that with others. Well, I didn't mean to go on so long. Sometimes it seems like the morning sermon and not the morning tweetstorm. I hope to grow a bit every day, and when I look back 10 years from now, to see and own my mistakes.
