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Get out the vote means encountering bigotry. Sigh. [1]

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Date: 2022-10-23

Buck up- we can do this!

In a zoom session for voter outreach by texting, a disappointing reminder on the pervasiveness of Christian Nationalism popped up early on.

As our group of volunteers was getting set up with lists of phone numbers to text in the community for our US House election, several of us stayed online to become familiar with the process. Campaign staff wanted us to be comfortable with the tasks, procedures, and expectations.

Different volunteers shared the kinds of issues they were encountering to help problem solve and work through some standard replies that might best reflect the candidate’s positions.

One of the volunteers shared the question from a voter who texted the reply, “Is he Christian?”

The volunteer immediately recognized the bigotry for what it was and suggested moving this voter into one of the ‘do not contact’ categories. (Either as ‘voting Republican’ or just to remove the person from the list).

Others on the call did not seem that surprised at this blatant Christian Nationalism, and were trying to give the voter the benefit of the doubt (this is the central Midwest - lots of evangelicals). People in the meeting briefly struggled with the idea that being unaware might to some extent mitigate the bigotry behind the “I will only vote for a Christian.” I believe (although I was still getting over the shock so maybe don’t have a full picture of all that transpired) that ultimately people agreed with the suggestion by the volunteer.

While I understand it would be pointless to try and engage someone in this situation, I was dismayed that this is where we are. That people are so emboldened as to just jump, right out of the gate, with their “No Jews allowed.” Wow.

I am curious about where on the bigotry spectrum this questioner and their motivation falls.

At the far end is the “Jews will not replace us” hatred. This moves along to the still insidious, but quieter, microaggressions end of the scale. These are notions that result more from ignorance than hate but nevertheless limit people to only accepting ideas that are just like theirs, to people who are exactly like them. Anything else they just won’t abide.

Of course, the voter wasn’t singling out Jews. The ‘need not apply’ category includes anyone who is Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, Atheist, etc.

The question about the position on the bigotry spectrum is relevant for determining if meaningful dialogue is possible. Very few of us will try to engage someone who is too far gone because it seems like it would be wasted time and effort, but there might be a grey area.

There is almost zero chance that a substantive conversation on this issue could be had by text. Regardless of how the question comes up of what people want from the candidates they support, once Christian Nationalism or any other type of bigotry appears, managing the conversation will take some care - by someone more skilled than I.

It is possible that the voter isn’t intentionally a Christian Nationalist. Perhaps merely pointing out the problem with the idea of “All people in government should be Christians and only Christians should be elected” would open their eyes to accepting that good representation isn’t a function of the religion of an elected official and that we have been, and will continue to be, well served by people bringing different perspectives to their jobs.

People who have encountered similar situations recognize the common defensive response by the commenter, “That’s not what I meant!” The response is inaccurate, but standard. It is what was meant. But they take offense anyway, because they want to pretend they aren’t really saying “No Jews allowed” or “No (fill-in-the-blank) allowed!” even though they are. They want to pretend that because they didn’t say those exact words, that isn’t what they were saying. Saying ‘I will only vote for a Christian’ is exactly that, despite their efforts to twist themselves into knots denying it.

Maybe she is just a Republican and her Christian Nationalism can’t be separated out. All Christian Nationalists (who vote) vote Republican, but not all Christians are Christian Nationalists.

So where does that leave us? Some Christian Nationalists will acknowledge that their beliefs are indeed Christian Nationalist but they are uncomfortable with the label and would prefer to not have this pointed out to them. Others are just openly and proudly bigoted.

So great, we have some number of people who would like to classify themselves as reluctant nationalists or pretend that the label shouldn’t apply to them because they dislike the label - but are fine with the behavior. We see this with racism and homophobia: “I don’t want to have to serve everyone but it isn’t discrimination.” Uh, wrong. It most certainly is. Just because you don’t want to call it discriminatory doesn’t change the fact that it is.

The danger is still clear, the threat to democracy still real.

How do we figure out if there are people who might be reachable? Can any of the evangelicals be rescued from this destructive path that maybe they wouldn’t be on with just even the tiniest bit of reflection?

[END]
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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/10/23/2130783/-Get-out-the-vote-means-encountering-bigotry-Sigh

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