Social Progress:Identifying the Inhibitors
This is an essay I did from the 1989- 1991 time frame. I was approx. 27 years old. This one is of the satirical bent I have so much fun with. Though, while it was “outrageous” and “absurd”, said a professor who later read it … now it’s par for the course, sadly, but expectedly .
Hopefully you can make it to the end where I deliver the knock-out punch line.
(heh… i just noticed perusing it, that I put the date 25th of December …. I guess anticipating the day we are now in where acts of infamy and blasphemy and outrage …. are meted out on once cherished dates…) Bro T.
We’ve come a long way since the days of African slavery and “Wives submit unto your husbands.” (Colossians 3:18). Yet for many the fight for emancipation has only just begun. Consider the gay and animal rights movements. Every day new factions of society’s oppressed are rising up to demand equal rights and mainstream integration. Haven’t we reached the point in our evolution when we can unabashedly demand that social blights such as racism, sexism, homophobia and ‘eco-cide’ be eradicated once and for all!? Moral conscience begs us into action! Let reactionary intolerance beware… . For surely as the New Age dawns, “Neanderthals” must perish.
Unfortunately, today’s thwarters of social progress are not quite as conspicuous as were the club-swinging, cave-men of old. But if we are serious about ending discrimination we must locate the belief systems which perpetuate its hideous existence. And it may be time to identify the perpetrators themselves and thus neutralize their damning influence. The purpose of this essay is to determine who they are and suggest a method for their neutralization.
We are speaking in terms of liberating the oppressed. And where there are the oppressed there are the oppressors. Who are the oppressors? A good place to start the inquest might be with the power structure itself. Here we can find some definite, discernible trends.
The people who established the cultural bias at the beginning of this nation’s founding were not Navajo Indians. They were not Oriental coolies and they were not African slaves. Neither were they were women. They were white, Anglo-Saxon males. And while there was much talk of “freedom”, “equality” and “inalienable rights”, these concepts seemed only to be selectively applied.
This allegation may disturb some and infuriate others but it cannot be denied in clear conscience. Native Americans were meted genocide; the blacks, insufferable bondage; and women were not allowed to vote (among many other things.) The Founding Fathers’ penchant for bigotry may be seen as nothing more than the prejudices of those particular men at that particular time; and in light of the positive contributions they made could be dismissed as an historical aberration. The issue, however, cannot be so easily dismissed. The power structure is still made up primarily of white males! Two-hundred-plus years later and we’ve seen neither a woman nor a black (let alone an Oriental or Native American) hold the office of presidency. Yes, some laws have been passed designed to address the historical oppression of various minorities; but the symbolism of this omission makes a practical mockery of such redress. So long as political power persists in this country as an unbroken chain of white-male dynasticism, the link survives to a despotic, Colonial past.
That racism and sexism derive from white, European elitism is nothing new. What is new is recognizing a broad range of damage wrought by the forces of Western Civilization.
As reported in the March 1991 issue of Religion and Democracy, the National Council of Churches is recognizing this in a current resolution which addresses the 500th anniversary of Christopher Columbus’ voyage to the new world. “The resolution declares 1992 to be a year of ‘reflection and repentance’. Columbus’ discovery was actually an ‘invasion’ and a ‘historical tragedy’. The resolution holds Columbus and his successors responsible for such atrocities as slavery, ‘eco-cide’, legalized occupation, exploitation, rape, theft and racism… . The descendants of Columbus and his fellow ‘conquerors’ have suffered with the legacy of perpetual ‘paternalism and racism that is at the root of American culture as we know it.’”
The consensus appears to be growing that Western Judeo-Christian culture rests on an historic foundation of chauvinism. The bible is rift with male chauvinist symbolism… .
“The God of Israel was a chauvinistic deity who forbade intermingling between his people and those of other faiths… . The Judeo-Christian tradition resonates with maleness: ‘God the Father’, the ‘Fellowship of Man’, the ‘brotherhood of clergy’ … .From Genesis [women are told]: ‘In sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.’ … .Woman was responsible for the Fall.”(Lenz and Myerhoff 140-141)
While the core of feminist thinking has for some time recognized that much of modern day sexism is rooted in the patriarchal heritage of Christianity, the idea has gained credibility to the point of being a basic premise for Women’s Studies in universities nationwide.
Racism too finds early expression in biblical thought. “Converting the heathen” was often the pretext used when brutality towards people of color needed to be justified. According to the Bible when Cain murdered Abel he was “marked” with color. White supremacist ideology is based on this crude doctrine. It may be that the Founding Fathers held a similar opinion when they deemed “negroes” as only partially human and therefore unworthy of full citizenship.
Homophobia is also clearly the result of longstanding biblical indoctrination. Will “hate crimes” against gays and lesbians ever cease as long as their behavior is condemned by some as being a “sin against Nature” and “against God?”
And if these were not enough victims, the very earth itself is not safe from the Christian world view. This point was succinctly addressed back in 1966, when the environmentalist movement was first gaining steam. Lynn White Jr., a UCLA historian delivered a speech to the American Association for the Advancement of Science in which he determined that, “The historical roots of our ecological crises…are rooted in the Judeo-Christian religious tradition. Western civilization is wreaking havoc around the globe because… Western man has been taught that he was apart from and superior to other things, that the world has been created for his benefit,” (Chase 24).
“Species Chauvinism”, a term coined by the animal liberation movement refers to this same notion wherein man sees himself as the beneficiary for which all creatures were made.
The evidence mounts and increasingly it convicts. Western Judeo-Christian traditionalism is a poisoned well from which springs many, if not most, of today’s most pressing social and ecological dilemmas. As our modern society grows more culturally diverse and inclusive of various alternative lifestyles, a more progressive, pluralistic philosophy must be adopted by all. Tolerance and open-mindedness must replace the superstitions and bias’s of the past.
This transition towards a new social reality is bound to be somewhat tumultuous. Old orders do not die quietly. Those individuals who have a vested interest in the status quo may resort increasingly to subversive and malicious tricks to maintain their superior cultural advantage. But if we are serious about these changes we must insist that reactionary intolerance be swiftly exposed. Otherwise it will persist like a cancer, just below the surface, undermining positive change.
We have identified the power structure, which is the white, male-dominated government dynasty; and we’ve located its ideological support—the Western Judeo-Christian tradition. Taken together these two forces yield a widely recognized symbol of oppression: the White Christian Male.
In ancient Greece the practice of ostracism was employed to ferret out and inhibit social members who were considered dangerous to the whole. A gesture of ostracism may be appropriate in our case as well. A criminal who is clearly marked as such is going to be less able to commit another crime since people will see him coming and beware. The White Christian Male would likewise be less able to perpetuate his detrimental activities (racism, sexism, homophobia, ‘eco-cide’) if he were clearly identified.
So, beginning December 25th, 1992, all White Christian Males will be issued cross-emblazoned arm-bands. The bands are to be worn in public at all times. Compliance is mandatory.
Thomas R. Larsen
Executive Director
United States Department of Social Fairness
A Division of:
United Nations Ministry Of Past Wrongs Reparations
Works Cited
Religion And Democracy Editorial. March 1991: 12.
Lenz, Elinor, and Barbara Myerhoff, The Feminization Of America New York: 140-141.
Chase, Alston. “Deep Ecology” Rolling Stone April 1987:24
BROTHER THOMAS