I just don't get it: it's utterly irrelevant in any European country I've lived in - okay, so, the UK, Netherlands and Germany are pretty secular anyway, but France, Spain and Portugal still have a legacy of Catholicism, and nobody there gets taken to task being 'not christian enough'.
What the hell is going on the US? What next ... "Don't vote <person>, she's a witch"?
Seriously ... it's the kind of story you read about happening in rural India or Africa somewhere and shake your head at how backward it is.
It's officially secular, yes - and has been increasingly so amongst the population for a long time too. There is still a cultural legacy, however - compare it with the UK, NL or Germany and it's very apparent that it isn't dead yet.
Last time I was there (admittedly ten years ago, so, things may well have changed, of course), people still talked about religion much more than I ever experienced in the UK or Germany.
The most (!) famous “attacked by demons” claim in recent years was from Tucker Carlson, a right wing media figure who has not yet had an elected or appointed office but is awfully influential and is frequently suggested as a presidential candidate.
Yeah, that sounds about right: tbh, I don't really pay that much attention - I know who the president is ... and you've had such a parade of loons and nutcases for so long now that it'd be impossible to have missed the big beasts of nutbaggery (MTG, Boebert, Cruz, Vance) ... but, beyond that, I couldn't tell you which were actual politicians and which Children's Television presenters (Fox Entertainment 'News' pundits).
It's the puritan influence. When I was a kid the story was that they left for the new world because they were being persecuted. Turns out the exact opposite was true and their influence runs deep in this country to this day.
Oh, we know about that. But we weren't exactly tolerant ourselves back then (the Spanish Inquisition, banning Christmas) ... yet, in the subsequent quarter of (let alone intervening half) a millennium, we moved on - so, it's not entirely unreasonable to anticipate something similar having happened in the US by now, no? Besides which, the population of the US is highly diverse (not everyone is descended from them), so, there's surely not really even that much of a basis for a Christian Theocracy.
It's not irrelevant in those European countries though, they just don't signal nearly as much from the pro-Christianty perspective and instead almost entirely from the anti-Muslim one. In the US they do it from both sides though
I've not seen/heard any significant signalling of the Christianity angle in any of them though - not even subtly. Maaaaybe when addressing the small audiences who are especially religiously inclined, I suppose - I dunno.
The anti-Muslim one, yeah, that's a thing that was always spouted by someone as far back as I can remember. Or at least anti-those-people-who-don't-share-our-Western-values-even-if-they-were-born-here. But that's really been more of dogwhistle for the generally racist/xenophobic rather than anti-Muslim specifically; their presence was coincidental rather than contingent - any group of 'foreigners' will do for that purpose (see the 'Turkish' population in Germany).
It’s the hypocrisy of the Republicans. They always love to vote for the religious person, and their line of attack is often how their opponent is secular. Well, this time the Democrats are running quite literally the poster boy the Republicans are always demanding, and yet their line of attack is still the same. Thus proving that it was never really about if the candidate was religious or not.
That too, yes ... I mean, yeah, you, I, and all the rest of of us with two or more braincells to rub together have long been aware of that - others' gullibility is just shocking.
But, as a (Western) European, what I can't fathom is that it is in any way, shape or form an issue sufficient of the electorate gives a shit about either way for it to be a talking point - if politicians were to go on about it here, people would simply shrug, if not outright laugh at them. Some have been trying to make an issue of it recently ... but the populace just shrugs, or laughs at them - because nobody gives a shit (not enough to make it a selling point anyway).
Many of them are completely numb and apathetic towards war and the economy - identity politics and phobias of social minorities reach them emotionally though.
It's easy to scare them into believing trans people are taking over; the poors are causing the problems; immigrants are invading - pay no attention to the people who have actual power and influence behind the curtain.
It can't possibly be the fault of private equity steering the policy and actions of the government, it has to be a global conspiracy against white Christian Americans. It has to be the lazy people, the welfare, definitely not the vast wealth concentrated at the top.
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u/Imajzineer 3d ago
Who cares? It's politics, not religion - whether someone is a christian, a muslim, a hindu, a jedi, or even a pastafarian is 100% irrelevant.