Religious law for some

There is a lot of talk on the right, often the American right, about how European states are allowing various aspects of Muslim religious law to be used by Muslim citizens in contravention of national laws - the dreaded Sharia. Criticism is also coming increasingly from the secular left (particularly British-based Iranian communists it would seem!) and the avowedly atheistic. But those who argue that there is a place for such parallel systems in society often cite Beth Din - Jewish law in the UK as a precedent. People argue whether this is a good parallel or not, but listening to From Our Own Correspondent at the weekend, they seemed to demonstrate an alternative parallel - polygamist Mormons in the US.

I watched a few episodes of Big Love when it started, but found it a bit boring - but I presumed that it was stretching fact to make good fiction. The only polygamists I had heard about were the really crazy ones like Warren Jeffs who married 80 women, lived in a 'compound' and was wanted by the Feds (he got caught and got 10 to life). But FOOC went to Utah (and watch the film clip at the top) where possibly 40,000 people are living in polygamist families. And they're not in the slightest bit shy about explaining how and why they break the law. Nor does the law seem very bothered about trying to stop them, seeming to take the position that there are simply too many of them to prosecute (it hasn't ever stopped the US govt. from trying to prosecute, say, drug users). The polygamists are campaigning to have polygamy legalised - FOOC quotes one sympathetic politician, Ric Cantrell (who appears to be "Chief Deputy of the Utah State Senate"), a Republican, saying:

"Your patriotism is unquestionable"... "and your faith inspiring. You have no hesitation to put God's law above the law of the state with a propensity toward civil disobedience and I find that very American."

Would it be so American if they were Muslim or Sikh or Jewish?

The Religious Right

"Fresh Air" from NPR has been doing a series of programmes over the last week all on the theme of presidential politics, in anticipation of the upcoming Democrat and Republican party conventions. One very interesting interview they re-broadcast was with Randall Balmer, a priest and researcher who is author of the Encyclopedia of Evangelicalism and editor-at-large of Christianity Today. Balmer has written a book called God in the White House, which studies the surprisingly recent overt 'religionization' of American politics. I heard the interview when it was first broadcast in earlier this year, but was perhaps listening more carefully this time.

What really struck me was the somewhat bizarre nature of event that Balmer credits as the catalyst for the formation of what we now know of as the "Religious Right". Most presume it was Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court ruling that made abortion legal in the US. But that was in 1973 and, as Balmer points out, in 1974 the Southern Baptist Convention, one of the most conservative mainstream religious major organisations, actually passed a resolution supporting the right to legal abortions. Rather, Balmer argues, it was the rescinding of the tax exempt status of the evangelical Bob Jones University for its overt racism that led to the organization of the Religious Right. This was a drawn out legal process that was fought through the late 1970s and culminated in a Supreme Court decision in 1983 that supported the IRS's position against the university - basically that a racist organization could not be classified as "charitable" and therefore it could not qualify for tax-exemption as charities do. The Federal Government seen to be attacking a religious organisation, was the spark that lit the fire on right, bringing the evangelicals back into American politics for the first time since their defeat at the Scopes Trial in 1925, although he notes that it was actually the presidency of the born-again Jimmy Carter that actually set the wider stage for the reintroduction of overt religious language in American politics.

The university rescinded its ban on inter-racial dating only in 2000. It maintains a ban on homosexuality and has never re-applied for tax exemption.

How to sue God

Foreign Policy Magazine has an odd little story on its website about a Nebraska legislator who is trying to sue God for, well, all those "acts of God" which he sees as terrorism. Read a bit more here, and below is some of the papers filed with the court.

Road to Zion

Jody (back in autumnal black-powerstretch-ninja-mode) does the second ascent of "Road to Zion" (VS 4c/5a).

I haven't done a climbing post for ages, so here's one. I climbed a new route yesterday at Haukkakallio. I had tried to climb it onsight last weekend, but it had been too dirty and the crack that the route follows too choked with mud, so I cleaned it on abseil but didn't have time to try leading it, hence I was dead keen to return to this weekend. The actual climbing went well, it was hard enough to be interesting but not so hard that I couldn't do it.

Anni through the quickdraws on "The Constant Gardener" (HS 4b).

For any non-climbers reading: once you have done a first ascent, you can name the climb - so I had to think of a name. I'm off to Israel in a few days, so I thought that something Biblical would be good - in future years it will help me remember when I did the climb. There are many, many climbs in the UK of a certain age - normally from the 1950s and earlier - that have biblical or classically inspired names. They point to both a higher level of church going, and of a more classical education of those times. I'm rather embarrassed that when I did routes like Agag's Groove in Glencoe, or Via Dolorosa at the Roaches, that I didn't even get the Biblical references in their names. If you are a mid-grade climber (most routes of that grade had been done by the 1960s) in Britain and you actually check on Wikipedia where the name of the climbs you have done, come from it will teach you many things that perhaps we should have learned in Sunday School or English literature lessons.

Jody storming the "Battlements" (VS 4c). English Tony looks on.

So I was trying to think of a good Israel-connected name; I like the word Zion, very classical - lots of poetic and literary resonance, but alone it seemed a bit to short. The phrase "Road to Zion" came to mind, although I couldn't remember why - maybe because it sounded like the movie "Road to Perdition" which I enjoyed. So when I got home I googled the phrase and the first thing that comes up is the Damian Marley song of the same name, which must be the reason the phrase was first in my head. As Damian's father, Bob, wrote the most famous song ever about climbing cracks (we're jammin', we're jammin', we hope you like jammin' too... of course its about climbing!) this was a good start, but when I saw that "Road to Zion" is from an album called called - wait for it - "Welcome to Jamrock" I had found the perfect name.

The song is 'politically conscious', as it is called in the genre, as well - attacking Mugabe. Zimbabwe has been on my mind recently. Mugabe might be evil, but I've never heard him called stupid - yet even with just an A-level in economics, I can tell he simply doesn't get supply and demand - hence an economy running at nearly 10,000% inflation. So dissing Mugabe just makes the song better. Check it out below.

"He who lives by the swordfish shall die by the swordfish!"

Suddenly everyone seems to be talking about that Shark. Here's one random blogger's (apologies to the blogger concerned - to your family and friends I'm sure you're not random at all!) great take on it:

Here's what happens next: nobody'll hear anything from the Baby Shark for about 30 years. Then the Shark'll become big news again, turning over coral reefs and reprimanding the "Phari-seas" et al. and teaching sharks about loving thy neighbor and turning the other fin and anti-materialism. Read on....

Hat tip to Am Fear Liath Mor on UKC for finding this gem.

A new extreme right: Dinesh D'Souza and the theocons

It's an old cliché that when the extremes go far enough to the political right or left, they end up meeting around the back. How really different were Nazism and Stalinism? Or indeed your skinhead neo-fascist football hooligan and the masked, Starbucks-smashing, anti-globalisation anarchist? But Andrew Sullivan, reviewing The Enemy at Home: The Cultural Left and Its Responsibility for 9/11 by Dinesh D'Souza in The New Republic, demonstrates a new version of this - where the American (and this is predominantly an American phenomenon) religious right, the theocons, have fetishized their social conservatism to such a degree that they starts to see the up-side in the fundamentalist Islam of the Saudi Wahhabis or international Islamists more generally.

Sullivan argues that D'Souza is, like the Islamists, actually more interested in the earthly, political structures that he feels his religion requires, than in the actual religion itself.

In the goal of maintaining patriarchy, banning divorce, outlawing homosexuality, and policing blasphemy, any orthodoxy will do. D'Souza's religion, in a sense, is social conservatism. He is not going to let a minor matter such as the meanings of God get in the way of his religion.

Sullivan accuses D'Souza of then cynically sugaring the Islamism-isn't-all-bad pill for his fellow conservatives by saying that it was the actions of American liberals/progressives/lefties/what-have-yous who are responsible for making the Jihadis hate America by producing an ugly, morally repugnant and vacuous culture, and therefore bear ultimate responsibility for the attacks.

It would be comforting to say that D'Souza is just plainly f**king nuts. But he isn't. Nor is he stupid. He does though have a very, very weird outlook on the world. It would also be comforting to call him a marginalised extremist, but this doesn't appear to be true either. Although the book has taken some stick from many conservatives, other serious conservative figures have defended him and it has serious publisher and D'Souza himself is all over the media. Sullivan lists D'Souza's recent speaking invitations, and the one that jumped out to me was the U.S. Air Force Academy. For those who take an interest in the Christian Right in the US, that the Air Force Academy had invited D'Souza might not come as any great surprise after the scandals of recent years where cadets who weren't fundamentalist Christians claim to have been made to feel unwelcome by other students and members of the faculty. Nevertheless it's seems slightly alarming that an extremist like D'Souza gets to lecture the future guardians of the US nuclear forces.

I've often wondered what some on the politically active, religious right really have against Islamism. If we ignore bin Laden and co. and their violence aimed at the US, the more politically-inclined Islamists, be they the pro-monarchy Wahhabi sheiks of Saudi Arabia, or the more televisual Aljaazera imams of the Muslim Brotherhood, seem to be on the same wavelength when it comes to social policy. For example, the American politicization of homosexuality is particularly striking to Europeans; many argue that gay marriage was the issue that swung the 2004 presidential elections. D'Souza is with the Islamists on this issue; Sullivan's argues that D'Souza is unique only in having both the balls and gall to openly admit it. I've mentioned Ted Haggard on this blog before, and D'Souza thanks Haggard in the book (I wonder if it had gone to print before Haggard's gay-prostitute-crystal-meth-party fall-from-grace had hit the headlines?), but in an interesting radio show last autumn on Haggard's scandal, the journalist Jeff Sharlet noted:

Now the other villain, of course, for most of twentieth century evangelicalism was the communist…And then in 1992, in the early 1990s, the communist very quickly disappeared as a viable enemy…I noticed that a lot of these chastity organizations had all started, in fact, in 1992. And then as I started talking to them, they were quite plain that they felt that with the Cold War over, there was now room to focus on sexual issues. And, at the same time they felt that gay liberation had had some success and so they felt like suddenly, the gay man, and I always say the gay man singular, sort of an archetype, because they’re not really talking about real people…The gay man sort of rose as this looming figure who could be anywhere, just like a communist. Looks like us, moves among us, is in our schools…And so it’s an omnipresent threat that you have to be constantly on vigilance for. And this is a great organizing tactic, this is the ultimate fear tactic.

Sharlet went on to note that there is actually discussion within certain parts of the religious right, post-9/11, as to whether Muslims or gays are more dangerous for America. D'Souza appears to have taken a very public stand on this issue and is clearly more scared of gays.

Sometimes you are just left shaking your head at the utter weirdness of all.

(See also this earlier post.)

Casual references to genocide

Akinoluna's blog has a depressing post about the attitudes expressed by her fellow marines about Somali protesters outside the embassy where she works. You read the same type of attitudes expressed in the comments sections of many right-wing US blogs, where you can bet on someone suggesting the US "should nuke Mecca" within about ten readers' comments following any post on terrorism/jihad/Middle East wars/etc. It is the post-9/11 version of "Godwin's Law" and a good reason to avoid blogs like Little Green Footballs. But clearly this discourse - propagated via the internet, talk radio and the like - has an effect. Normally you just have to ignore it, thinking that there are ignorant bigots all around the world and probably always will be, and that people who make casual references to genocide can't really be all that serious. But then you remember that it is men with guns and maybe attitudes like these who end up in places like Haditha.

Pentecostals, Episcopalians and Ali G in da' house

I seem to be being followed around by fundamentalist Christians today, not literally mind, but still enough to be a bit spooky. Firstly I'm still ploughing through the Economist Christmas double edition that has lots of long special articles including one on the rise and rise of Pentecostalism. The article is here but I'm afraid you need a subscription to read it. I had heard before that the Catholic church in Latin America was in competition with various protestant sects, I just hadn't realised how big a phenomenon Pentecostalism has become - in Guatamala for example its now thought a third of the country is Pentecostal.

Then I read on Phil's blog, Finland for Thought, that 25 percent of Americans think the second coming will happen this year. This can't be true... can it?

On the bus home I read another Economist article about the splits in the Episcopal (American Anglican) church, with some of the oldest influential churches looking to leave their current dioceses and get a new Archbishop, probably in Nigeria. Why? It's all about that great threat to civilisations once again - boys kissing.

"The schismatic parishes included two of the oldest and richest in the country—Truro Church in Fairfax and The Falls Church in the town of that name—which occupy property worth a combined $25m. The Falls Church once numbered George Washington among its vestrymen. It is now the church-of-choice to Washington's conservative power elite, including Michael Gerson, George Bush's former speechwriter, Porter Goss, a former head of the CIA, and Fred Barnes, the executive editor of the Weekly Standard .

The breakaway congregations are putting themselves up for adoption by Anglican archbishoprics in the developing world. One would-be parent is a Nigerian bishop, Peter Akinola, who runs the largest province in the Anglican communion, and who has pronounced views on homosexuality: he supports legislation that would make it illegal for gays to form associations, read gay literature or even eat together."

And then finally back to the Pentecostals. On NPR's Fresh Air they had an interview with Sacha Baron Cohen on the making of "Borat - the Movie". It's the first interview I've heard with Baron Cohen not in character either as Borat or as Ali G and very interesting. But he mentions part of the film where Borat goes to a Pentecostal Church in the US and they try to "save" him. He recounts it as being a very over-awing experience but notes that just in case you don't go with the experience quite enough, you are held down by strong men as part of the ceremony and they shake you vigorously and this is what gives rise to the phenomenon of people supposedly writhing on the floor as the demonic possession (or whatever) leaves them. He also recounts another rather scary sounding experience of 60,000 Alabama American football fans yelling "faggot" at him. Perhaps the actions of the churches in Falls Church and Fairfax are just politer versions of the football fans' directness.