Claiming persecution is a buffer from criticism

A few days ago I heard on the NPR program Fresh Air host Tonya Mosley spoke to Michele Norris, a former NPR host and now author. Norris wanted to explore what Americans really think about race. In 2010 she came up with the Race Card Project. She put postcards in public places which asked people to put down their thoughts on race in six words. Over the years she got a half million responses. People are hungry for this conversation. From the responses she created the book Our Hidden Conversations: What Americans Really Think About Race And Identity. The audio is 37 minutes. At the top of the show were some examples of six words as they were included in the audiobook. A couple of them:

Mom's racism took my love away. My dad's prejudices live in me.

Here are parts of the conversation between Mosley and Norris: Mosley asked why were a majority of responses from white people. Norris answered:

Well, I think we have this presumption, this assumption, that white people aren't invited to the party when it comes to a conversation about race. So there's no room for them in this conversation. That most of our conversations about race are centered on people of color. And usually, if we're going to have a conversation about race, there's an expectation that it's going to be by or for or about Black people. And to the extent white people are involved, they're bystanders. They're watching over - you know, over our shoulders, saying this is a person of color. They're not expected to lead the conversation and maybe not even be in the conversation. And when we started, I think the website was key because we were gathering stories, but we were also presenting them.

I heard that and thought racism is because of the attitudes of white people and the institutions white people created to enforce the oppression of black people. Yet, white people didn’t think there was room for them in the conversation about race. There’s some strong irony right there. Norris praised the honesty of many of the responses. At least the submitters are grappling with the issue. One example is this woman who starts with the six words, then explains her reasoning.

I'm relieved my son looks white. Michelle Welsh. Severna Park, Md. I'm biracial - white and Pakistani. I look Pakistani. My husband is white. My son is a big, blond, fair-skinned, blue-eyed toddler. We live in an affluent, largely white town. I'm grateful he will never be asked his nationality, be the diversity hire or live with an identity crisis. Is that wrong to want life to be easier for your children, even if it seems like a step backward?

Norris discussed a defender of white privilege. She said many people think some aspects of race just happen – the boardroom is all white because it just happened. People don’t talk about the politics, the assumptions, the decisions that go into who sits in the boardroom. Mosley and Norris turn to another book by Norris, The Grace of Silence. DNA testing is uncovering family secrets, such as racial mixing that was not talked about because descendants could pass as white. Her father was shot by white police officers. He decided to not tell the family about so he wasn’t weighing down his children with his pain. They were giving their descendants the grace of silence. Norris, who is black, told the story of her grandmother who worked as a traveling Aunt Jemima in the late ‘40s and early ‘50s. When pancake mix was new these women, portraying the slave cook Aunt Jemima, would travel the country demonstrating how these new convenience products worked. The job paid pretty well. But the portrayal was beginning to conflict with the aspirations of black people in America. The grandmother was part of the shift, even as Aunt Jemima. The company had a script she was to use that had her speaking in slave patois. She ignored it and spoke using the diction for which she had won awards. She showed the people she was educated. But Norris didn’t learn of this from her grandmother, she learned of it doing research. The racial unrest around the death of George Floyd prompted the removal of Aunt Jemima from all packaging. Matthew 5:11-12 in the Bible is part of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, in particular the end of the Beatitudes:

Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

For a long time, though especially recently, I interpret that to mean Jesus blessing those who were persecuted because they subverted the social hierarchy and brought down the wrath of those at the top who didn’t like their oppression of others disrupted. I see the central part of Jesus’ message is to care for those at the bottom who are oppressed by those higher in the hierarchy and to do what one can to disrupt that oppression. Of course, I’m not at all surprised that the oppressors turn that understanding upside down. Sarah McCammon of NPR spoke to Candida Moss, professor of theology at the University of Birmingham and author of the book The Myth of Persecution. They talked about nasty guy’s use of the word, one he uses when things aren’t going his way. Moss said:

Being persecuted in Christianity - because Jesus died in this unjust way, because the martyrs were executed - just being persecuted is a sign that what you are doing is right and good and that you have the support of God. And that means that this is a very powerful rhetorical claim. If Christians are succeeding politically, commercially, practically in their lives, then that's because God loves them and supports them. But if Christians are being criticized, if they're being unsuccessful, if people disagree with them, then that's also a sign that they're in the right. Because if they can claim that as persecution, that's a sign that God is on their side. And the problem with that and the way that that functions in Christianity as opposed to other groups is that a powerful Christian group that claims that it's being persecuted can never fully be disagreed with about anything because disagreement is then understood to be a full-blown attack, a kind of religious war. Yeah, it's absolutely a win-win state of affairs. It really is sort of part of the genius of Christianity.

The “genius” of Christianity? To me that all sounds like a perversion of what Jesus the Christ taught. Setting themselves up to say criticism of me means God is with me means there is never a time they think about whether their thoughts actually align with God, there is never any thinking that maybe I’m wrong, never any humility. Also, that bit about succeeding as a sign that God loves them is another perversion of what Jesus taught. This perversion began about 300 years after the time of Jesus, when Constantine was Caesar and made Christianity the state religion. It became baked into Christian theology. And into American identity. And the secularization of America that began in the 1960s and has accelerated since along with all the social progress of that time are considered attacks on Christianity.

When they hear Trump talk about how he's persecuted, if they're already supporters of his, it's a familiar cry - one they've heard from the pulpit on Sundays. They identify with him because of it, and they start interpreting criticisms of Trump through that framework. And that means, for example, that when he gets indicted, as he has been, that just serves as evidence that he is being persecuted. So it's win-win for him. It's like a dog whistle. They hear him say that he's persecuted. They know what that means. They know how unjust it is. However legally justified any of these cases are, there is a substantial proportion of his supporters who will believe that this is nothing other than a crime against justice. For Trump supporters, these indictments are crimes. They are crimes of persecution. It remains a really valuable weapon in the rhetorical toolbox that you can bring out if you're being disagreed with. ... And you can continue to use it as a way to kind of buffer yourself from any criticism, regardless of how powerful you are.

Today I heard on a news report (perhaps on the Canadian station I listen to for part of the day) that the average world temperature has risen 1.5C from the baseline and has done so for the last eight months. That 1.5C level is considered the threshold, above which the climate will turn really nasty. It’s also the level that the countries at a climate conference (the one in Paris?) vowed to make sure we wouldn’t pass. Now we’re unlikely to stop global warming from hitting 2.5C. I write this on a day that temperatures in Detroit hit 57F and are likely to top 60F tomorrow. That is (or used to be) quite rare in Detroit in February. Meteor Blades, in an Earth Matters column for Daily Kos, noted before 2020 Democrats were reluctant to talk about the climate because that was considered a turnoff to votes. In 2020 Biden emphasized the climate. Matthew Burgess, C-SEF director, said climate conscious voters gave Biden enough of an edge that he won. Now research is being done to determine the best environmental message. The Inflation Reduction Act emphasizes the jobs being created in the shift to a greener economy. Lisa Friedman reported in the New York Times:

One of the biggest climate marketing studies of its kind, a public opinion poll across the United States and 18 other countries that was conducted last summer, found that “protecting the planet for the next generation” overwhelmingly beats out other arguments for taking climate action. Researchers found the so-called “urgent generational message” was 12 times more popular than the promise of creating jobs. “At the heart of this is love,” said Anthony Leiserowitz, director of the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication, which conducted the study with other nonprofit groups including Potential Energy Coalition, the Meliore Foundation and Zero Ideas. “People love particular people, places and things,” Mr. Leiserowitz said. “And those people, places and things are being threatened.”

Now candidates need to develop a succinct and consistent message. One of the books I read recently was put out by the Climate Mobilization Project. They suggest asking candidates whether they are willing to declare a climate emergency, opening up the federal government’s resources for dealing with emergencies. So I did. Michigan will have an open Senate seat in November. There are three Democrats running for the seat (yeah, there are Republicans running for the seat, but no). One is well known, the other two I don’t remember hearing about. I sent a message to all three saying if they are willing to declare a climate emergency I’m willing to donate to their campaign. So far I haven’t heard from any of them, but it’s been only three days. Of the three candidates only one, and not the famous one, said anything about climate on their campaign website. Even if I don’t donate, that’s the one I’ll vote for in the primary (and whichever Democrat in the general).