How Religion Widens the Political Divide

How religion widens the partisan divide - Erie News Now | WICU and WSEE in Erie, PA

So at last we get to the reality; why Trump voters -do not- accept fact and truth. Typically, I would expect some of them to adbicate the party and abandon this president, but since the primary coalition of the republicants is composed of religious zealots who believe in magickal sky men and their emissaries, I find it easy to understand how they believe nothing about this president is true.

The groups diverge in their assessment of every element of Trump's performance. Three-fourths of the unaffiliated say Trump has encouraged white supremacy; 70% of white evangelicals say he has not. Four-fifths of the unaffiliated disapprove of Trump's job performance; more than three-fourths of the evangelicals approve. More than three-fifths of the unaffiliated support Trump's impeachment and removal; nearly 9 in 10 evangelicals oppose it.



White evangelicals stand out for their staunchly conservative positions on virtually every aspect of demographic and cultural change. Other white Christians appear more conflicted, though on balance they also lean slightly toward the right.



A majority of both white mainline Protestants and white Catholics did reject the ideas that society is too soft and feminine, that it punishes men and that immigrants are "invading" America. But a narrow majority of each say socialists have taken over the Democratic Party. A solid majority also reject the notion that racists have captured the GOP, and majorities support an array of Trump-style policies on immigration, including reducing legal immigration, building his proposed wall across the Southern border and temporarily banning immigration from Muslim countries. Nearly three-fifths of white Catholics and just over half of white Protestants also believe discrimination against whites is as much a problem as discrimination against minorities.

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So we have a minority of voters who structure their lives around religious mythologies commandeering the party apparatus for the Republicans and absolutely defying the seperation of church and state, believing in right wing fairy tales and embracing non-fact as truth; somehting they ae very good at given their religious beliefs.

The GOP is composed of a dying voter bloc. Unless they change inevitably the tide will turn against them and all the damage that is being done to this country will be repaired. But until then, the GOP will continue to be composed of voters we cannot expect to embrace facts. They live their lives by the code of long dead middle easterners and the imaginary words of a sand djinni.

The trend of white Christians to align with the GOP predates Trump, but try telling that to someone whose TDS is so crippling he inserts Trump into a study that does not in fact mention his name.

The intense, almost xenophobic hatred Obscurity has for for Christians and anyone on the other political side is also ironically offputting, seeing as it presents in a thread about how cultural and religious differences are polarizing the country. Glad to see you're pulling your weight - and then some, Obscurity.

eman623 said:

The trend of white Christians to align with the GOP predates Trump, but try telling that to someone whose TDS is so crippling he inserts Trump into a study that does not in fact mention his name.

The intense, almost xenophobic hatred Obscurity has for for Christians and anyone on the other political side is also ironically offputting, seeing as it presents in a thread about how cultural and religious differences are polarizing the country. Glad to see you're pulling your weight - and then some, Obscurity.

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I don't think he realizes that by this being forced into some horribly narrow decision for they republican's nature, or how the article wants to frame it.

Anyone can now take any indication of how the left, or progressive groups in general. Are trying to make decisions based solely on their own moral delinquency, vitriolic nature and their propensity for sexual deviancy.

I for one can point out several instances of the left pushing increased equalization of children and forced intersexual relationships.

I mean, it would just be playing by their own rules at this point.

Oborosen said:

I don't think he realizes that by this being forced into some horribly narrow decision for they republican's nature, or how the article wants to frame it.

Anyone can now take any indication of how the left, or progressive groups in general. Are trying to make decisions based solely on their own moral delinquency, vitriolic nature and their propensity for sexual deviancy.

I for one can point out several instances of the left pushing increased equalization of children and forced intersexual relationships.

I mean, it would just be playing by their own rules at this point.

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Please provide the evidence to support your claims:

The left/progressives make decisions solely on moral delinquency and what that delinquency is, and on their vitriolic nature and what evidence of vitriolic nature, and evidence of forced intersexual relationships.

Of the several instances of the left pushing increased equalization of children (including definition thereof) and forced intersexual relationships.

Being the claim-maker, the burden of proof is on you to support what you say. Otherwise, your claims are unfounded and dismissed.

Obscurity said:

How religion widens the partisan divide - Erie News Now | WICU and WSEE in Erie, PA

So at last we get to the reality; why Trump voters -do not- accept fact and truth. Typically, I would expect some of them to adbicate the party and abandon this president, but since the primary coalition of the republicants is composed of religious zealots who believe in magickal sky men and their emissaries, I find it easy to understand how they believe nothing about this president is true.



So we have a minority of voters who structure their lives around religious mythologies commandeering the party apparatus for the Republicans and absolutely defying the seperation of church and state, believing in right wing fairy tales and embracing non-fact as truth; somehting they ae very good at given their religious beliefs.

The GOP is composed of a dying voter bloc. Unless they change inevitably the tide will turn against them and all the damage that is being done to this country will be repaired. But until then, the GOP will continue to be composed of voters we cannot expect to embrace facts. They live their lives by the code of long dead middle easterners and the imaginary words of a sand djinni.

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"The GOP is composed of a dying voter bloc."

2016 was their last-gasp at MAWA. The Trumpster types were incensed over the previous 8 yrs having a black man in the White House. At least he entered through the back door.

Now we begin to see the true genius in those who got together and thought out the Bill of Rights amending the original Constitution.

Also why such men, many of whom were Deists and did not believe in organized "religious revelation," agreed to include protection of the right to practice religion in the very First Amendment.

It is so easy for those on the Left to dismiss religious belief, failing to realize that their own anti-religious dogma is a form of religious belief. :coffeepap:

eman623 said:

The trend of white Christians to align with the GOP predates Trump, but try telling that to someone whose TDS is so crippling he inserts Trump into a study that does not in fact mention his name.

The intense, almost xenophobic hatred Obscurity has for for Christians and anyone on the other political side is also ironically offputting, seeing as it presents in a thread about how cultural and religious differences are polarizing the country. Glad to see you're pulling your weight - and then some, Obscurity.

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Ah, the perpetual eye rolling victimology of the American christian - everyone who dares question the supremacy of their edicts is a bigot who hates them personally and wants to see them destroyed, on a personal level.

The article exposes the truth; the GOP voter bloc is composed of a supermajority of people who take the word of long dead middle easterners as the moral, ethical, and spiritual foundation of all things relative to life; these people accept with no evidence that a god issues edicts from on high and they live their life by this code.

As a member of the "majority", it blatantly exposes the truth; that these individuals cannot be trusted to believe in truth or facts, when they abdicate and suspend disbelief for a wilful embrace of unproven rantings from 2,000 years ago.

It exposes the corrupt heart of the GOP is composed of these people, folks who embrace a book that COMMANDS genocide, that excuses stoning gay folks to death.

This dwindling minority is hell bent on spreading its tentacles into as many apparatus of the federal government, commandeering its power to make up for their own diminishment.

They are pathetic. I love all people; I hope they break free from the bondage of their faith and embrace other americans as brothers and sisters; it seems, no matter the will, they are hell bent on ensuring their primacy even in their waning breaths.

Captain Adverse said:

Now we begin to see the true genius in those who got together and thought out the Bill of Rights amending the original Constitution.

Also why such men, many of whom were Deists and did not believe in organized "religious revelation," agreed to include protection of the right to practice religion in the very First Amendment.

It is so easy for those on the Left to dismiss religious belief, failing to realize that their own anti-religious dogma is a form of religious belief. :coffeepap:

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Personally I have ZERO problem with people believing whatever they want and practicing whatever they want. Anti-religious dogma? No, it's not the same as religious belief. Exposing the core of the GOP for the religious zealots they are is in no way "anti-religion." It simply explains their inability to embrace truth and facts, since they lead their lives in defiance of both.

But I digress; I fully support the protections of the religious; I also fully support the separation of church and state, and will fully stand against any attempt to legislate religious faith into law, which is something you and I both know radical right wingers do indeed want, and there is no denying it.

I am dismissive of religious belief since it is no longer useful. It is my right to have that opinion, so while you wax concerned with your coffee cup emoji, you'd try and use my rights as a bludgeon against itself. An iconoclast you are not.

If the government ever said it would outlaw the practice of christianity, I would arm myself and march in defiance of tyranny with my christian brothers and sisters against such malfeasance. I cannot be sure they would do the same, if the government came out and outlawed being an atheist or a muslim or any other type of religious belief. THAT is the actual problem.

Obscurity said:

How religion widens the partisan divide - Erie News Now | WICU and WSEE in Erie, PA

So at last we get to the reality; why Trump voters -do not- accept fact and truth. Typically, I would expect some of them to adbicate the party and abandon this president, but since the primary coalition of the republicants is composed of religious zealots who believe in magickal sky men and their emissaries, I find it easy to understand how they believe nothing about this president is true.



So we have a minority of voters who structure their lives around religious mythologies commandeering the party apparatus for the Republicans and absolutely defying the seperation of church and state, believing in right wing fairy tales and embracing non-fact as truth; somehting they ae very good at given their religious beliefs.

The GOP is composed of a dying voter bloc. Unless they change inevitably the tide will turn against them and all the damage that is being done to this country will be repaired. But until then, the GOP will continue to be composed of voters we cannot expect to embrace facts. They live their lives by the code of long dead middle easterners and the imaginary words of a sand djinni.

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So the solution is for everyone to be religious. Thanks for the post.

The article misses the point, and in some regards is intellectual laziness.

Any ideology in the extreme runs the risk of causing divisions with those who do not agree with those ideas, and in any majority condition that intentionally marginalizes the minority position they to not agree with. History is littered with this fact.

The point is any ideology that is in a position of power (directly as decision makers or indirectly as influencers for decision makers) tends to do things that impact society, economy, governance, law and order, etc. in a way that satisfies the goals of that ideology no matter if that conflicts with another viewpoint or not.

It does not matter if the majority influences to that ideology over the minority are rooted in Christianity vs. modern liberalism, Islam vs. Christianity, Classical Liberalism vs. Modern Conservatism, the inverse of any of those examples, etc.

The end result is what we sometimes refer to as "tyranny of the majority," but the other consequence is ignoring (if not blind acceptance of) the shortcomings of those in power we ideologically align to whereas in other circumstances would probably return harsh scrutiny. We see this type of hypocrisy all the time as the going assumption is those we agree with in power give better results than those we disagree with even if they are all pieces of **** themselves.

That mechanism is how some can support Trump, but how others can support Hillary.

There are endless examples of this behavior in action, and it is outright intellectual dishonesty to rest your hat on "religion widens the partisan divide" then pretend gold was found.

No, any ideology that empowers situational ethics and slide rule moral standards to support that ideology widens partisan divide. Because that is how cults work, no matter if rooted in a set of religious principles or political principles (or some terrible combination of the two.)

Moderate Right said:

So the solution is for everyone to be religious. Thanks for the post.

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That's not the premise, unless you want everyone to have the same exact ideals and to eradicate the "left" perspective, I suppose. If that's what you advocate for, more power to you.

America is diverse and white evangelicals have driven everyone other than themselves from the pews. That's the real tragedy here; that the Falwellian injection of right wing politics into "faith" has created a class of vitriolic, bigoted voters who abdicate truth and fact for faith and mythology.

Obscurity said:

That's not the premise, unless you want everyone to have the same exact ideals and to eradicate the "left" perspective, I suppose. If that's what you advocate for, more power to you.

America is diverse and white evangelicals have driven everyone other than themselves from the pews. That's the real tragedy here; that the Falwellian injection of right wing politics into "faith" has created a class of vitriolic, bigoted voters who abdicate truth and fact for faith and mythology.

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Our country was based on religious freedom from the getgo so implying that we would all just be better off if we dropped religion is utter nonsense.

Moderate Right said:

Our country was based on religious freedom from the getgo so implying that we would all just be better off if we dropped religion is utter nonsense.

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I didn't say that and you're missing the point.

The religious should drop the mixing of POLITICS and get back to their FAITH, and start adhering with its tenets. Hard to grasp, really, but religion and spirituality are supposed to be a relief from all other things; not a floodgate for it.

Obscurity said:

Ah, the perpetual eye rolling victimology of the American christian - everyone who dares question the supremacy of their edicts is a bigot who hates them personally and wants to see them destroyed, on a personal level.

The article exposes the truth; the GOP voter bloc is composed of a supermajority of people who take the word of long dead middle easterners as the moral, ethical, and spiritual foundation of all things relative to life; these people accept with no evidence that a god issues edicts from on high and they live their life by this code.

As a member of the "majority", it blatantly exposes the truth; that these individuals cannot be trusted to believe in truth or facts, when they abdicate and suspend disbelief for a wilful embrace of unproven rantings from 2,000 years ago.

It exposes the corrupt heart of the GOP is composed of these people, folks who embrace a book that COMMANDS genocide, that excuses stoning gay folks to death.

This dwindling minority is hell bent on spreading its tentacles into as many apparatus of the federal government, commandeering its power to make up for their own diminishment.

They are pathetic. I love all people; I hope they break free from the bondage of their faith and embrace other americans as brothers and sisters; it seems, no matter the will, they are hell bent on ensuring their primacy even in their waning breaths.

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Thanks. I'm not actually a Christian, nor a Trump voter. And your contempt for Christians and Trump voters (increasingly the same thing) is palpable. You love everyone, including the good liberal racial minority monolithic voting bloc and the evil superstitious white Christian majority monolithic voting bloc. Good to know.

This thread reminds me of another one that asked why blacks support the Dem party by a 90-10% majority. The conservatives insultingly called blacks deluded and still living on the plantation and the blacks asked what has the GOP ever done for them? So I gotta ask - what has the Dem party done for white Christians lately? Do you have a plan for winning them over, or are you just hoping they will die quickly and your ideology can reclaim its rightful place as the dominant one in American politics. That might not be a bad strategy, but its not a great one either.

A big tent policy is generally preferable to a divide and conquer one. And Trump may be one-of-a-kind but populism is a recurring theme in American politics. By leaving half the country behind and demonizing them as magical sky-men believers, you open the door to more Trump-like candidates. Just saying.

Obscurity said:

How religion widens the partisan divide - Erie News Now | WICU and WSEE in Erie, PA

So at last we get to the reality; why Trump voters -do not- accept fact and truth. Typically, I would expect some of them to adbicate the party and abandon this president, but since the primary coalition of the republicants is composed of religious zealots who believe in magickal sky men and their emissaries, I find it easy to understand how they believe nothing about this president is true.



So we have a minority of voters who structure their lives around religious mythologies commandeering the party apparatus for the Republicans and absolutely defying the seperation of church and state, believing in right wing fairy tales and embracing non-fact as truth; somehting they ae very good at given their religious beliefs.

The GOP is composed of a dying voter bloc. Unless they change inevitably the tide will turn against them and all the damage that is being done to this country will be repaired. But until then, the GOP will continue to be composed of voters we cannot expect to embrace facts. They live their lives by the code of long dead middle easterners and the imaginary words of a sand djinni.

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Once again, I agree with you and most other Democrats on this forum that no religious person, particularly Christians, have any place in the Democratic Party and should vote straight Republican in every election for every office. We both agree that all religious people should be completely purged from the new corporate-fascist atheist Democratic Party - the political party of war, death, racism, bigotry, hate and fear.

:shrug:

**** the religious right. They aren't doing anything they haven't been doing for centuries. Religion has always been the crutch they leaned on to justify their hatred and bigotry of minorities, gays, and immigrants.

Obscurity said:

I didn't say that and you're missing the point.

The religious should drop the mixing of POLITICS and get back to their FAITH, and start adhering with its tenets. Hard to grasp, really, but religion and spirituality are supposed to be a relief from all other things; not a floodgate for it.

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People vote their values. You vote your values, why shouldn't they?

If you honestly believed abortion was murder, then why wouldn't you oppose it at the ballot box? Who thinks murder should be legal?

joko104 said:

We both agree that all religious people should be completely purged from the new corporate-fascist atheist Democratic Party - the political party of war, death, racism, bigotry, hate and fear.

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Not Muslims.

Leftists luv Islam. Throwing gay people off of buildings, female genital mutilation, inbreeding, wife-beatings, etc,... it's a very progressive religion.

eman623 said:

People vote their values. You vote your values, why shouldn't they?

If you honestly believed abortion was murder, then why wouldn't you oppose it at the ballot box? Who thinks murder should be legal?

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Ah, and yet, another person just continues to excuse the religious cannibalism and ignores the vapid insanity it entails. The religious created this problem, I've offered a solution. Take it, or continue to diminish into nothingness.

Obscurity said:

Ah, and yet, another person just continues to excuse the religious cannibalism and ignores the vapid insanity it entails. The religious created this problem, I've offered a solution. Take it, or continue to diminish into nothingness.

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Whoosh. They don't see it as a problem. In fact, the only one here who has a problem with the way other people run their value systems is you.

eman623 said:

Whoosh. They don't see it as a problem. In fact, the only one here who has a problem with the way other people run their value systems is you.

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Their value system would infringe the rights of every non-christian in this country due to the undue blending of politics with faith.

Captain Adverse said:

Now we begin to see the true genius in those who got together and thought out the Bill of Rights amending the original Constitution.

Also why such men, many of whom were Deists and did not believe in organized "religious revelation," agreed to include protection of the right to practice religion in the very First Amendment.

It is so easy for those on the Left to dismiss religious belief, failing to realize that their own anti-religious dogma is a form of religious belief. :coffeepap:

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It is not anti religious dogma, it is anti religion mixing with government.

We see what happens when religion is merged with government in the middle east. Not good.

eman623 said:

The trend of white Christians to align with the GOP predates Trump,

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Correct, it started with Richard Nixon when he used his "Southern Strategy" to specifically target racist white southern Christians. Maybe you'll recall, but Nixon would have been impeached had he not resigned too. Just because crazy right wing religious people predate Trump doesn't mean they're anything but Crazy Religious people. For years the republican party has relied on this voting block to get elected while managing to send a more polished clean cut business man or some kind of war hero up in the General election as a figurehead.

But liberals have been saying for a long time now that that bulk of the Republican party is made up of Racist Religious Zealots and gun toting morons. Trump's election and the subsequent denial of his base proves that we have been 100% correct for over 5 decades now.

eman623 said:

The intense, almost xenophobic hatred Obscurity has for Christians

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You should learn what xenophobic means before you use the term. Xenophobia is a hatred of people from other countries. The term you're looking for would likely be Theiophobia. Fear of theists. But given that 85% of the United States is still made up of Christians who have the power to do very real harm there is significantly more justification in that type of phobia than there is in most others.

Obscurity said:

That's not the premise, unless you want everyone to have the same exact ideals and to eradicate the "left" perspective, I suppose. If that's what you advocate for, more power to you.

America is diverse and white evangelicals have driven everyone other than themselves from the pews. That's the real tragedy here; that the Falwellian injection of right wing politics into "faith" has created a class of vitriolic, bigoted voters who abdicate truth and fact for faith and mythology.

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I recently had the pleasure of seeing Neil deGrasse Tyson in person on a "book talk". At one point, he talked about personal truth, and objectively true. Here is a good example of what he said:

“You can have your own personal truth. What might a personal truth be? A personal truth might be that Jesus is your savior. In a free society, no one can, will or should take that away from you. You can stick with that to any extreme you want, provided you don’t subtract from the freedoms of someone else.

“The difference now is, if someone else has a personal truth that says Muhammed is the last prophet and no prophets will come after him, you’re going to have a hard time convincing that person that Jesus is the one and only true savior. It might even be impossible to do so without threat of violence, which is how some of the most horrific religious wars have unfolded over the last two millennia.

“But again, we’re in a free country, so you practice whatever you want. But if you now run for office and it’s time to enact legislation or a law, it seems to me you should base that on what is objectively true rather than on a personal truth that you’ve carried in. When you pass a law, that applies to everyone. And in a pluralistic country, where people not only have but are encouraged to have diversity of view and religion and skin colors and sexual preference and all of these freedoms, then if you bring your personal truth onto the level of legislative truth, then that is the beginning of the end of a free democracy, because you will then be constraining the freedoms of people who are different from you, and it is no longer a celebration of those differences, it ends up being a force that constricts it.

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MrWonka said:

But given that 85% of the United States is still made up of Christians who have the power to do very real harm there is significantly more justification in that type of phobia than there is in most others.

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Yes, "very real harm" like refusing to bake a cake for someone.

Scary stuff.