Radical left, my ass

 

It really is impressive, the degree to which conservative propaganda has worked in this country.

 

We really do have people who believe that the Democrats are the “radical leftist socialist” party.

 

The Democrats aren’t radical. They aren’t socialist. They aren’t even leftist. They’re just less hard-right than the Republicans.

There’s nothing radical about any of the things that Democrats want us to work on. Other countries figured all this shit out decades ago and have left us far behind.

Other countries already figured out how to make sure everyone gets health care, every kid gets a decent education, every family can afford quality daycare, everyone who wants to go to college or trade school can. They already figured out how to keep bad guys from getting guns while still allowing good guys to hunt and to keep themselves and their families safe. They already figured out that criminalizing drugs doesn’t work but offering treatment for addiction does work. They already figured out how to improve on their infrastructure so that public transportation is cheaper and better than having a car. They already figured out that criminalizing abortion doesn’t reduce the rate of abortions, but making a society where a single mom can raise a kid does. They already figured out ways for businesses to be more eco-friendly while still being profitable.

None of that shit is new or radical. These are old, tried and tested ideas that have been working for the rest of the developed world since my parents were kids.

Meanwhile, our backwards asses are still using the infrastructure that our GRANDPARENTS built, instead of building new and better roads and train systems. Our backwards asses have the highest incarceration rate in the world, largely from drug policies that our great-grandparents could have told us were ineffective after trying Prohibition in the 1920s. Our backwards asses still have thousands of people go bankrupt paying their medical bills every year. Our backwards asses have millions of people working 60 hour weeks but still falling behind financially. Our backwards asses still have more gun violence than any place on Earth that isn’t an active war zone. Our backwards asses have people in their 40s still trying and failing to pay for the degree they got in their 20s. Our backwards asses still have lots of pregnant teens getting knocked up by grown-ass men (who practically never get arrested for that) and then the girls are having to jump through lots of hoops to get an abortion - but still don’t have any other realistic choice.

Hell, conservatives aren’t even bothering to CONSERVE anything anymore. They just try to force us into stagnation. A country is a living thing, and in an ever-changing world any living thing must adapt or die. The reactionary Republicans are choosing “die”, and dragging the rest of us down with them.

So, why talk about this in a blog that’s about atheism?

Because, ever since “Evangelical” and “Republican” became synonymous in this country, the long-standing and universal problem of religious conservatives standing in the way of making any change that would make the world a better place has gotten much worse. The people who think our country was made great by “God, guns, and guts” put all three of those things on the same pedestal, and have the same lack of evidence for either God or guns actually helping to make our country better. The same people who want to make abortion illegal fight tooth and nail against policies that would make it unnecessary. The same people who don’t want to spend any money on green energy infrastructure either don’t think that God would let global warming destroy the world, or think they will be raptured before it does. The same people who think that our current for-profit health care system is not only the best in the world, but the best possible, have the same level of evidence-free faith in free market capitalism to do the right thing as they do in their god to do the right thing.

And again, this isn’t new, or even unique to our country. Conservative Christians stood in the way of ending slavery, and later ending segregation. They stood in the way of women getting to vote, and later of non-white people getting to vote. They stood in the way of Galileo getting people to understand how the solar system ACTUALLY works. They stood in the way of EVERY attempt by anyone, ever, at making the world a better place, based on things that are true rather than the lies that conservative Christians tell themselves. It’s just gotten more pronounced, and more virulent, over the course of my lifetime in this country… culminating in their being so desperate to force conservative Christian values on everyone else, that they finally completely forsook the principles of both conservatism and Christianity.

THAT is where you'll find radicalism and extremism in this country - right-wing Christians.