For all their support of the teaching of creationism or intelligent design in school science curricula the political Right are fiercer Darwinists than the Left. Social Darwinists. To the cultural Right cultural differences in society are resolved by the mistaken notion of the “survival of the fittest.” Such a worldview does not leave much room for accommodation; things are more dual, good or bad, right or wrong. Since the incursion of religious fundamentalism into the political Right’s their rigid, and simplistic perspective of political and social differences has become even less conciliatory. Bad things, like taxes, regulation, secularism, separation of church and state, women’s choice, gay rights, immigration, and multiculturalism, among some others, are not things to be woven into the fabric of America’s culture, but to be defeated and expunged. In that regard one is either “with us or against us,” there is no middle ground. For the cultural Right the events of 9-11 only seemed to confirm this thesis; survival , a word employed often in the rhetoric of the Right’s response to 9-11 was now clearly, and simplistically, posed as a matter of cultural domination, not only on a national, but also a global scale. Moreover, that this struggle is seen by many as one between two great faiths, the differences relating to religion between the American cultural Right and cultural Left have been cast in greater relief.
Take the matter of the separation of church and state. The Right wants, say, prayer in schools (really Christian prayer in schools). Okay, say a little prayer if you want to, just keep it between you and Jesus (silent prayer could also be between you and Allah or Yahweh, or Buddha). No, they want “public” praying in school (and they don’t mean that some kid should put down a prayer rug and kneel toward Mecca). Take the matter of religious symbols in and on public buildings and grounds. It matters little that the First Amendment already protects people wearing religious clothing, [1] putting crosses and crucifixes on the homes, churches and businesses, Christmas crèches on their lawns, virtually anywhere other than public buildings. [2] But that is not enough, religion –and we are still talking about Christian religion, here – must be mixed with public function at every opportunity or the hue will go up that the godless Left is out to deliver America to the Devil. The co-mingling of religious and political views often ends up with the posing of public policy as “good” and “evil,” and policies as “crusades.”
The Left wing of the culture tends to regard Social Darwinism not only as a misinterpretation of the way in which Darwinian evolution actually works, but also as a way of resolving political and social differences that eventually leads to the ends justifying the means as well. Social choices are a form of evolution that must reach an accommodation with one’s environment. This is perhaps most evident in differing views about the natural environment itself; the Right insisting upon the biblical injunction to “multiply and subdue the earth,” and the Left claiming that to be the most certain road to self-extinction.
Left thinking leans to “cultural relativism,” a view that that recognizes that were any of us to have been born in another culture we would see the world through that culture. Moreover, societies “evolve” normatively, throughself-study, planning, through and regulation and legislation toward socially desirable and progressive conditions and consistent self-evaluation.[3] The “cultural absolutism” of the cultural Right elevates its version of Americanism to an exalted, culturally exceptional position, a notion that worries about being diluted or compromised by immigrants, faiths and ideas that do not conform to that notion, but is a veneer over more deep-seated concerns that harbor racism, ethnic superiority, and religious supremacy. The cultural absolutists vacillate between complaining that immigrants “don’t want to fit in” and homogenize, to wanting them to “keeping in their place.”
Perhaps the prime example of this difference is in the matter of social integration, particularly racial integration. The resistance of the Right to school integration, affirmative action, and social programs and various civil rights legislation has been part of the so-called “conservative” agenda that seems more interested in conserving the Republican party’s “southern strategy” than in advancing rights that are putatively guaranteed by our Constitution. [4] Advancement of the rights of minorities are often presented as being “hydraulic” in their relationship to the rest of society; that is, the Right likes to pose minority social advancement as something that will reduce the social advantages of the rest of society. The Left is more likely to see such advancements as contributory to economic growth and cultural richness.
This dimension of America’s culture wars is, then, one between a mono-culture and a poly-culture . It is between a society of one dominant religion that seeks to erase the line between church and state in order to consolidate their political influence, and a society that retains that division between what should be the private and the public spheres of society. It is between a culture in which political debate might be cleansed of references to matters of faith, and one that conflates faith, rather one faith, with being truly American, to be patriotic. It is between the culture of “us” and the culture of “us” and “them”. It is between a culture of integrity, that refuses to condone torture, illegal detention, and any degree of collateral damage as policies relevant to its cause, and a culture where the ends justify any means and any criticism is labeled giving “aid and comfort to the enemy.” It is between a political culture of that values self-reflection and critique, and one that values “staying the course” over efficacy and common sense.
If anything, recent years of political debate in America have proven that it is easier to divide Americans that bring them together, and that the consistent fanning of the fires of fear abet a culture of and exclusiveness over inclusiveness. The cultural Left has a more difficult job of stating its case; its relativity is portrayed buy the cultural Right as weak and waffling in the face of determined enemies and dangerous circumstances. Its pluralism is depicted as arriving a polity that is paralyzed by indecision and placation fractious interests. The easy dualisms of the cultural Right have an easier time of it. It is a far more simple task, especially when contemporary circumstances and the zeitgeist appear to confirm it, to portray the world as battlefield of Social Darwinism. It has all the certainty that a Tyrannosaurus Rex must have felt, even when the temperature was dropping, and furry little mammals were scurrying between its feet.
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©.2006, James A. Clapp (UrbisMedia Ltd. Pub. 1.3.2006)
[1] What would the political Right have to say about those “cowardly, anti-American French” outlawing Muslim schoolgirls from wearing their scarves to school? They shoulopd be sorry about that “Freedon Fries” business.
[2] See, “The Blancocruxians,” DCJournal
[3] For all of its worshipping of laissez-faire -ism by the Right, they would choose to regulate what women do with their own bodies, what we are able to watch in the media, limit the rights of gays and lesbians, and that we must accept faith as fact in school science curricula. In other words, even laissez-faire needs to be planned and regulated
[4] More will be said of this in a future Culture Wars piece in these pages.