I am the descendant of Southerners who fought for the Union during the Civil War, and unlike most contemporary Southern Republicans, we have identified with that party since Lincoln. Perhaps you can give me some insight into certain things I have been asking for a long time.
I can understand the Black community's obsession with matters of social/racial justice and poverty. What I cannot understand, and what I have never been able to understand, is its total lack of any concern whatsoever on moral issues.
The American Black community is one large split personality: it is Billy Sunday and Karl Marx simultaneously. Theologically it behaves as if it were to the Right of Jerry Falwell, but politically it makes Mao Tse-tung look moderate. How do you explain this? Can it even be explained?
Back in the heyday of the civil rights movement such issues as "gay marriage" and legal abortion on demand weren't even blips on the radar screen. But the Black community behaves as if those issues still didn't exist. It's as if it were forever 1954. I simply don't get this.
Do you think all Republicans are rich? I am what is popularly known as "poor white trash." My ancestors have all been poor. They were Republicans because of the Civil War and the evil of the Democrat party they had to live with. In fact, liberals can't seem to make up their minds as to whether their ultimate enemy is the plutocratic "malefactor of great wealth" or the inbred, retarded trailer park dweller. Surely they don't confuse the two?
I am not a social Darwinist or a Randian. I have remained loyal to the Republican party in part for ancestral reasons but mostly because of its stands on the moral issues that anyone of any income (or no income) can agree on. Yet I note that everyone regards these social issues, which unite people of various ideologies, as "divisive" and as things we'd be better off not thinking about. Even you, in your letter, say that "social issues" are a "distraction." Excuse me? Social conservatives are the least "heartless" and social Darwinistic members of the conservative movement. Would you and their other critics prefer they left the field altogether so that the entire political discourse of the country were limited to economics? Why in the world do you suppose only economics matters?
This highlights another "schizophrenic" (I know, that's not what it means but I use it for the private associations of the term) aspect of the American Black community: on the one hand it is proud of its "non-Western," African heritage; on the other, its philosophy is totally European. For what else are rationalism, humanism, materialism, and their ultimate expression political Leftism, but European to the core? They all originate in the eighteenth century European "enlightenment" and the materialistic philosophies of nineteenth century Europe. Voltaire was not from the "third world." Neither were Comte, Hegel, Marx, Darwin, Wellhausen, or Antonio Gramsci. Yet this is the source of "Black" political philosophy in the United States. What are Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton but Voltaire transferred to 21st century America? What is Jackson's opposition to "Western hegemony" but one gigantic lie? Just what is "African" about any of this? Even Robert Mugabe opposes "gay rights!" Is he a race traitor or an "uncle Tom?" Maybe the "rednecks" got a-hold of him and poisoned his mind?
I just don't understand any of this.
As I said earlier, I am not a social Darwinist. I would be more than happy (and so would many other social conservatives) to compromise on or mitigate the harsher positions of dog-eat-dog capitalism. (Believe it or not, even with our "white skin privelege" poor crackers can be in really desperate financial situations, I assure you; I've been there!) But there is never any offer of dialogue. There is only unremitting hostility from the Black community which goes on praying like Jimmy Swaggert and voting like Kim Il Sung. In fact, the late Ralph David Abernathy has been disowned by the "civil rights" establishment because in later life he joined the Moral Majority. I have read attacks on him that told how he had "changed." Excuse me? Just what in Moral Majority's positions conflicted with his earlier stances? There was no "jim crow" in their platform, or even much of an economic nature at all that I know of, but because he didn't "evolve" to accept abortion and "gay marriage" he's accused of having "changed?" He's an "uncle Tom" now???
All my life I have excused Black political behavior, but I always thought there would come a time when the Left would finally take a position that Blacks (especially church-going Blacks) would refuse to accept. That time has long since come and gone and church-going Blacks are still going along with everything. I have given up. I no longer expect any change of heart.
But just what is it about moral conservatism that Blacks are so opposed to? We're not talking economic, root-hog-or-die, or jim crow. We're talking our alleged "common morality." Do we even share one? Are the masses of Black America, even in the Bible-belt, really such moral nihilists? If so, how long have they been this way? Did they pass their time in the cotton fields having intellectual discussions about the dialectic?
As an Old Southern Republican (and not any Dixiecrat convert from 1964) I used to look up to the American Black community. My positive stereotype was as great as any liberal's. But I must confess to you that that admiration died a long time ago. I honestly believe that if John Brown himself could see the political alliances of his beloved Blacks, he would be a Dixiecrat himself!
Let me close by asking one final question--and do please consider it before simply dismissing me as a "racist crank" (I didn't used to be, believe me). Would any Blacks be open to the idea of a new party that mixed economic liberalism with moral conservatism? This would, after all, negate all the "heartless capitalist" rhetoric one hears as an excuse to remain in the party of Hell. I'm serious! You think such a party couldn't exist? What do you think the Democrat party of Harry Truman was? Or for that matter of William Jennings Bryan? Or look at conservatism outside the United States, especially in traditionally Catholic cultures. It is very different from American market libertarianism. There is no need to insist that economic liberalism and moral conservatism could never work together. That is just an excuse.
The only reason for maintaining this fiction is that one is opposed to moral conservatism in and of itself. Perhaps that's what it is. Perhaps the economic arguments are just a fig leaf, an excuse to keep supporting depravity and nihilism. If that is so, there are penalties to be paid for such attitudes and behaviors . . . and the penalties won't be executed by any "Bible-banging crackers." As surely as G-d exists He will not allow such behavior to continue forever without punishment. If Black America doesn't amend its moral positions it will pay severely one day, and not by any "white backlash" but from G-d Himself--the same G-d so many Blacks worship in a way little different from snake-handling "hillbillies" in West Virginia.
Is there hope for an end to total alliance with moral nihilism? I sincerely hope so. If not, then the die is cast and it's too late to do anything about it.
It is an unfortunate fact that past behaviors by religious people seems to led to the idea among certain segments of the population that they can only be truly safe in a sewer. Those who have wished for such a thing may get it . . . and it's not going to be the nirvana they hoped for. It's going to be Hell.
I think you raise some excellent questions. I actually believe that one of the reasons that the Democratic Party power structure fell in line so quickly behind Barack Obama in the primary against Hillary Clinton was to head off any potential split between black Americans and the Party over any number of growing conflicts, including between black parents and teacher’s unions, black job seekers and global warming extremists, and most maybe most importantly, black church-goers and gay activists.
The election of Barack Obama quashed any chance that any of those conflicts would have any effect in the big picture any time soon. The bond between blacks and the Democratic Party had been welded even further, and there’s very little that the Party could do platform and policy wise that would significantly change that, short of advocating a return to slavery.
So the simple answer to your question of how it is that blacks manage to reconcile very conservative religious beliefs and very liberal politics is race: the great majority of blacks vote on the basis of race, and they perceive that the Democratic Party is for their race, while the Republican Party is against it. It’s really as simple as that. There is a small minority (probably 10-20%) that actually votes based on the actual platforms and agendas of the two parties, but even if half of them agree and vote with the Republican Party, that still leaves just a 5-10% share of the total, which is about what the GOP has gotten over the last several cycles.
Unfortunately, all of the philosophical contradictions that you point out matter not in the least to the average black person who has been taught and strongly believes in one simple rule of politics: Democrats like black people, and Republicans don’t. It’s not rational, or principled, and I’d certainly argue that it’s not a wise posture to adopt, and I’d also argue that it’s at odds with history, and with the facts on the ground, but again, none of that matters either. People believe this to be so, so for all intents and purposes, it is so.
I do believe that blacks by and large are social conservatives. They do go to church, and they do hear conservative religious messages, and they do believe them. But the fact of their racial identity is more important in terms of how they behave politically.
I will confess that in my email to my father in law, I may have downplayed the importance of social issues more so than my actual feelings. This is because all leftists believe very strongly in the argument that Republicans use social issues to convince ignorant poor white people to “vote against their own interests” in supporting the GOP. It strikes at the core of their belief system to point out the obvious fact that it was Democrats who used social issues to distract voters from economic issues in this election.
I do have mixed feelings, however, on social issues as a basis for voting. If there’s a general principle that I subscribe to, it’s that consenting adults should be able to do what they want in a free country so long as it doesn’t directly affect anyone else, but once their “liberties” begin to impact upon the life or liberty of others, there’s a role for the state to step in. With gay marriage you have two consenting adults, and their getting married does not directly affect anyone else. With abortion, you have an innocent victim who cannot defend or speak for itself. They may be equally abhorrent in the eyes of the Church, but in the view of government and morality, I would look at them differently.
I do believe in religious freedom, however, including the right not be forced to provide contraceptives, abortions, gay adoptions, etc., and so there’s another place that I would draw a line that would put me on the side of social conservatives. But for me personally, I just don’t really care what people do with each other sexually so long as it doesn’t affect me personally, and if they want to consummate that activity in state-recognized marriage, again, it doesn’t affect me. In fact, I’d really prefer not to even think about it, to the extent that it involves things that are sexually repulsive to me, and so elevating it as a political issue . . . um, no.
But no I don’t wish for social conservatives to be expelled from the GOP. With the exception of abortion and religious freedom, as stated above, I’d probably be comfortable with the “truce” suggested by Mitch Daniels, including a “punt” on most issues back to the states under principles of federalism. I think the best solution might ultimately be for us to celebrate instead of fight against the fact that federalism allows for there to be some places with very strict social mores encoded into local and state laws, and other places that are far more liberal.
I’m not sure that I would support a socially conservative economically liberal party. I think that combination has traditionally been organized under the banner of “Populism”, which I have a couple of problems with: as noted above, I have a libertarian streak that competes with my social conservatism, and while I believe that government should provide a safety net, I also believe that freer markets = greater total prosperity, which benefits everyone. Again, I’d probably vote for a more federalist approach, where some states would be heavily regulated with generous social programs, other states more free, and then let people “vote with their feet” for what they prefer.
That's not an uncommon response by minority groups: promoting a firm standard of morality within the group, while weakening efforts of the majority to impose standards on the minority.
I doubt it's part of a conscious strategy now. It's something that's so ingrained it's hard to shake. Some people in a minority group can make common cause with their counterparts in other groups, but for others, the opposition between groups is too strong to overcome.
What are Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton but Voltaire transferred to 21st century America? What is Jackson's opposition to "Western hegemony" but one gigantic lie? Just what is "African" about any of this?
Uh, the answers would be ... A) just about anything, B) interest group politics, and C) nothing.
What you're talking about is interest group politics, advancing what one takes to be the interest of one's group. There's a lot of religious rhetoric thrown into the mix, but I don't see any Voltaire or Comte in Jackson or Sharpton.
In the second example, Jesse Jackson and "western hegemony," if he used the phrase it probably didn't come naturally. His opposition to a "Western Civilization" curriculum had to do with getting attention and publicity, and the general philosophy of "more for us."
This isn't so very different from how other groups function. Groups struggle with each other for recognition and respect and use what they have to get it. If you have the Bible or Tolstoi you use that. Otherwise you make do with Rigoberta Menchu.
If you get that 1) it's not about some alien atheistic philosophy but about group striving for advantage, power, and position, and 2) that the policies supported don't always bring the advantages and well-being that they are supposed to, things don't look quite as bleak as you think.
Eventually some people either find different ways to play the game of group competition, or recognize that the game works to their disadvantage and the really important things have to be secured in other ways.