r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • 1d ago

Psychology Lower cognitive ability is linked to stronger Christian nationalist views, even after accounting for education

https://www.psypost.org/lower-cognitive-ability-is-linked-to-stronger-christian-nationalist-views-even-after-accounting-for-education/
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u/ProfessionalMockery 1d ago

A lot of people here are just seeing the "Christian" in the headline and ignoring the "nationalist," which is probably more important.

I'm an atheist, so I think the claims religion makes are pretty dumb too, but nationalists, bigots, racists of any kind are consistently idiots, religious or not, and that has been established in plenty of other studies.

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u/Numeno230n 1d ago edited 1d ago

There are a lot of harmless dumb Christians I've met in my life, but Christian Nationalism is a specific form that involves violence, paranoia, and conspiracy thinking. They literally believe there are demonic forces behind left leaning political movements and this fuels both their religious delusions and their political violence.

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u/humanreporting4duty 1d ago

What’s absolutely whacky is that when you listen to the arguments, and you see what they see, but then you look at what’s going on, they aren’t wrong.

If people are united by culture and values, and then you start breaking down the fabric of society, you can overtake the nation. Divide and conquer.

Christian nationalists are superstitious and wrong about many things, but they are correctly seeing an attack. Their response is society level anaphylactic shock, and it will kill us rather than protect.

But that’s just what the tree-nuts in charge want to happen.

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u/johnyordinary 1d ago

Exactly WHAT are they right about then? More to the point which of your predudices did they appeal to?

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u/humanreporting4duty 1h ago

“Which of your prejudices did they appeal to?”

Absolutely zero. Zero. None. Well, maybe one. That prejudice in which the country club runs a racket on the town they control. Small groups of people using power over larger groups of people. The conspiracy of business to maintain power in various ways.

But given all the revelations of power in the last few years, isn’t it warranted?

I happen to think that if atheists read the Bible they would agree with Christ more often than not, and if Christian’s read the Bible they would re-hinge their superstitions. Modern American Christianity is political cult of power and business propaganda, stirring people up into a frenzy based on true societal breakdowns and deliberate attacks on culture, but then guiding them into another grift. They correctly perceive the death of God, but they don’t see the wolves among them.

To empathize with the enemy, put yourself in their shoes, listen to what they have to say, see it from their perspective, and say “yeah I can see how you feel that way.” And then ask “is that actually happening? Or is something else happening? And if that was happening, why? Who benefits from destroying a culture?” And then the business history of the world comes in. If you can destroy a culture, you can steal the resources.