Enjoyed reading this. Don't have time for a long response (and I doubt you want to read one). I would push back (?) and say that, if your hypothesis is right and today's self-professed Christians who are still enthusiastically supporting Trump are doing so for roughly the same reasons you outline in the piece, then they have merely substituted Nietzschean will-to-power for Christ crucified. That would not be "Christianity... deformed into something almost entirely unrecognizable" but something hostile to Christianity altogether. Maybe Linker argued that in his piece. I tried to read it but I haven't subscribed to his Stack just yet.
I'm a little grumpy about all of this though because I was raised Baptist/evangelical and my father, who raised me as such and was active duty in the military while I was growing up, has completely turned into a Fox News-obsessed Trump supporter, complete with the hat and a mug in his office that boasts of drinking "liberal tears." It's hard to read an attempt at dispassionate analysis of people you grew up around and used to respect when you're now bitterly cynical about it all.
There’s a lot here that is correct. However, the Trump Movement isn’t just Nietzchean Alpha Males making the world in their own image. It is also (and maybe even more so) a movement of subservience, conspicuous humiliation, a disgusting level of toadyism I could never imagine engaging in…as a liberal.
Well, you can't have (self-styled) alphas without hordes of (toadying) betas, right?
Indeed, I think part of the deal being offered those toadying betas is that they get to participate in greatness vicariously; moreover, they can tell themselves that over on Team Blue the stanning is even more pathetic and vacuous since its objects are so pathetically mediocre.
I think we cannot help but notice that the most fervent Trump men are those that (historically) everyone from the center-right to far-left would consider pathetic losers. They aren’t (to repurpose a phrase) our “best and brightest.” They aren’t actually great with women nor do they possess skills that society remunerates well. Many have taken flight from the empirical world. Trump’s flaunting of rules and norms (and laws) is the point because MAGA men cannot succeed under these rules. All this is to say, you’re right, a lot of vicarious satisfaction drives these people.
Evangelical Christians' concern for the reestablishment of manliness strikes me as essentially prevarication, which you rightly suggested above. Re-enshrining historic, masculine virtues doesn't seem a wholly bad project in its proper place (it was the Apostle Paul who said to "act like men"). Lifting weights, firearm training, what have you, are certainly all fun. But these are not Christian first principles. I'm not sure they're secondary principles, either. It was Paul who counseled the Corinthians to the "more excellent way" -- the way of agapeic love. That extends up to and including enemies.
I think this is right. Every time Trump announces a cabinet pick I think of a socialist colleague in grad school, participating in the Battle of Seattle, who enthusiastically quoted Fight Club to the effect that their goal was to "fuck shit up". Fucking shit up (from the opposite ideological perspective) is clearly the goal of Trump's cabinet selections... and the view of masculinity attached to it all seems very Fight Club in general.
Very well done and compelling. Since you're right in saying that there's not much to be done about all of this from the outside even if we wanted to (aside from taking away important questions and insights, which you provoked), I am really interested in how such an inquiry might help shape the conversation on the Dem side: how we have allowed such a "for thee but not for me" situation to flourish, and for so long. Is it because we (a very undefined "we") feel that the high ground is, itself, so egoically satisfying? Are we or are we not the controlling, thought-policing, self-righteous, central-planning moralists they take us for? What in there is true and what in there is just fodder for the right and we're just taking the bait? In lieu of reading Manufacturing Consent, which is on my very long list, I am listening to the Chomsky Massey lectures and getting a pretty strong dose of "everyone's full of shit." Hard to know what to do with all that.
Have you read Kristin Du Mez’s “Jesus and John Wayne”? Similar arguments, very resonant with what you have here and she gives some fascinating historical analysis on the role of this type of “masculinity” in evangelical Christianity. Thank you for writing.
Class of '85 here. IB History teacher, news/politics junkie (for my sins). I think Noah's dead on, but based on my Gen X white guy experience, I think there's a level underlying both his and Linker's arguments (Linker's Substack, BTW: SO good):
Anecdotal, obviously, but- in the 80s we learned to go make money. At least, those of us in the white/urban/suburban/middleish class did. That was the function of education, and really, of life: make money, everything else will work itself out. (For better and worse, I didn't quite learn the lesson, but that's irrelevant.)
The above indicates- not genius stuff, here- an erosion of values and a codification of priorities emerging from that erosion. Now overlay that with Noah's analysis and I think we're in a goddamn dangerous place. And that we've been heading there for a long time.
(As a teacher, I also happen to think that education can respond to this kind of challenge. At least somewhat. FWIW.)
Yeah. To belabor your point, in so doing - and this is inevitable, given the way that socioeconomic systems accrete themselves around dominant beliefs - we created a society in which *this became true*. If you make money, everything else pretty much works itself out. Conversely, if you don't, it's pretty damn difficult to live a life with meaning and fulfillment.
If I sound bitter, it's because I am. I left teaching because I couldn't make enough money in that profession to have a family while living near my extended family. (Admittedly in a HCOL region, but that someone reading this will predictably point this out only underscores my point.) I love my family; I'm glad I gave up teaching for a morally-meaningless (and arguably socially-destructive) "money job"; I hate the system that imposed that Hobsen's choice upon me.
Well, count me as an old white guy, evangelical Christian who has voted for Trump three times, and I answer this "One of the puzzles of the Trump era has been the enthusiasm with which Evangelical Christians have embraced such an obviously irreligious and (by their own historic lights) morally-reprehensible figure" . . . by saying, yeah, but compared to what was on offer on the other side, the party of Moloch.
"The man who cannot master himself is not fit to be master of others".
That is not some namby-pamby sentiment devised by Victorian Christians. It goes all the way back to the ancient Greeks and the very era when "manliness" and "virtue" were synonymous. You can find similar sentiments in other ancient moralists in other ancient cultures-- all of whom were of course men.
Trumpian "manliness" is something Plato, Aristotle, Confucius etc. would see as debased and corrupt, the result of slavery to one's base animalistic self. Compare Trump to Alexander the Great or Julius Caesar. Those guys also had their vices (Alexander was a boozehound; Caesar a bed-hopper) but both were "megathymos"-- Great-souled. No one would ever say that of Donald Trump and his circle. Heck, compare them to George Washington and Abraham, Lincoln! We are going to be ruled not by great men, but by Thersites (see: the Iliad) and Cataline.
It seems that you're working very hard to find another view when the effort is not necessary. I repeatedly told one of my kids, "Do the right thing just because it is the right thing to do." Issues can be complicated by circumstances, but right and wrong do exist and are generally not hard to recognize.
You are forgetting that the Abrahamic religions are:
1) religions with asterisks. They set forth a moral/ethical code, and then proceed to devise an ever-expanding list of exceptions to that code. In this way, Christians can support a person who behaves in a frequently un-Christian manner.
2) are religions of identity (politics). Having invested in the idea that there is a self, these religions must then formulate a list of qualities that define that self. As above in #1, a plethora of asterisks will be attached to denote those aspects of "manliness" (to pick one identity), which may, or may not, be present when the claim of "manliness" is made.
Virtue now becomes a matter of manifesting the qualities of various identities (or at least enough of the qualities to be able to claim a particular identity). That manifesting those qualities may result in harm/suffering to others/self, is of secondary importance at best.
You note that this "moral transformation has been in process for a long time." You are correct. It has been in process since humans made the mistake of positing the concept of an intrinsic self. Fortunately, the antidote of Buddhism exists to correct the error.
Buddhism is hardly free of such things. It had monasteries which kept armies and oppressed their peasant tenant farmers, supported some pretty nasty rulers, and winked at grave atrocities. This is a universal human tendency, to use one's morality as a cudgel against one's rivals while turning a blind eye to your own guys' misdeeds.
Enjoyed reading this. Don't have time for a long response (and I doubt you want to read one). I would push back (?) and say that, if your hypothesis is right and today's self-professed Christians who are still enthusiastically supporting Trump are doing so for roughly the same reasons you outline in the piece, then they have merely substituted Nietzschean will-to-power for Christ crucified. That would not be "Christianity... deformed into something almost entirely unrecognizable" but something hostile to Christianity altogether. Maybe Linker argued that in his piece. I tried to read it but I haven't subscribed to his Stack just yet.
I'm a little grumpy about all of this though because I was raised Baptist/evangelical and my father, who raised me as such and was active duty in the military while I was growing up, has completely turned into a Fox News-obsessed Trump supporter, complete with the hat and a mug in his office that boasts of drinking "liberal tears." It's hard to read an attempt at dispassionate analysis of people you grew up around and used to respect when you're now bitterly cynical about it all.
Thank you for sharing as always.
Your dad and my mom. Totally hear you.
There’s a lot here that is correct. However, the Trump Movement isn’t just Nietzchean Alpha Males making the world in their own image. It is also (and maybe even more so) a movement of subservience, conspicuous humiliation, a disgusting level of toadyism I could never imagine engaging in…as a liberal.
Well, you can't have (self-styled) alphas without hordes of (toadying) betas, right?
Indeed, I think part of the deal being offered those toadying betas is that they get to participate in greatness vicariously; moreover, they can tell themselves that over on Team Blue the stanning is even more pathetic and vacuous since its objects are so pathetically mediocre.
I think we cannot help but notice that the most fervent Trump men are those that (historically) everyone from the center-right to far-left would consider pathetic losers. They aren’t (to repurpose a phrase) our “best and brightest.” They aren’t actually great with women nor do they possess skills that society remunerates well. Many have taken flight from the empirical world. Trump’s flaunting of rules and norms (and laws) is the point because MAGA men cannot succeed under these rules. All this is to say, you’re right, a lot of vicarious satisfaction drives these people.
Evangelical Christians' concern for the reestablishment of manliness strikes me as essentially prevarication, which you rightly suggested above. Re-enshrining historic, masculine virtues doesn't seem a wholly bad project in its proper place (it was the Apostle Paul who said to "act like men"). Lifting weights, firearm training, what have you, are certainly all fun. But these are not Christian first principles. I'm not sure they're secondary principles, either. It was Paul who counseled the Corinthians to the "more excellent way" -- the way of agapeic love. That extends up to and including enemies.
I think this is right. Every time Trump announces a cabinet pick I think of a socialist colleague in grad school, participating in the Battle of Seattle, who enthusiastically quoted Fight Club to the effect that their goal was to "fuck shit up". Fucking shit up (from the opposite ideological perspective) is clearly the goal of Trump's cabinet selections... and the view of masculinity attached to it all seems very Fight Club in general.
Very well done and compelling. Since you're right in saying that there's not much to be done about all of this from the outside even if we wanted to (aside from taking away important questions and insights, which you provoked), I am really interested in how such an inquiry might help shape the conversation on the Dem side: how we have allowed such a "for thee but not for me" situation to flourish, and for so long. Is it because we (a very undefined "we") feel that the high ground is, itself, so egoically satisfying? Are we or are we not the controlling, thought-policing, self-righteous, central-planning moralists they take us for? What in there is true and what in there is just fodder for the right and we're just taking the bait? In lieu of reading Manufacturing Consent, which is on my very long list, I am listening to the Chomsky Massey lectures and getting a pretty strong dose of "everyone's full of shit." Hard to know what to do with all that.
Have you read Kristin Du Mez’s “Jesus and John Wayne”? Similar arguments, very resonant with what you have here and she gives some fascinating historical analysis on the role of this type of “masculinity” in evangelical Christianity. Thank you for writing.
I have not -- thanks for the recommendation! I'll check it out.
Class of '85 here. IB History teacher, news/politics junkie (for my sins). I think Noah's dead on, but based on my Gen X white guy experience, I think there's a level underlying both his and Linker's arguments (Linker's Substack, BTW: SO good):
Anecdotal, obviously, but- in the 80s we learned to go make money. At least, those of us in the white/urban/suburban/middleish class did. That was the function of education, and really, of life: make money, everything else will work itself out. (For better and worse, I didn't quite learn the lesson, but that's irrelevant.)
The above indicates- not genius stuff, here- an erosion of values and a codification of priorities emerging from that erosion. Now overlay that with Noah's analysis and I think we're in a goddamn dangerous place. And that we've been heading there for a long time.
(As a teacher, I also happen to think that education can respond to this kind of challenge. At least somewhat. FWIW.)
Yeah. To belabor your point, in so doing - and this is inevitable, given the way that socioeconomic systems accrete themselves around dominant beliefs - we created a society in which *this became true*. If you make money, everything else pretty much works itself out. Conversely, if you don't, it's pretty damn difficult to live a life with meaning and fulfillment.
If I sound bitter, it's because I am. I left teaching because I couldn't make enough money in that profession to have a family while living near my extended family. (Admittedly in a HCOL region, but that someone reading this will predictably point this out only underscores my point.) I love my family; I'm glad I gave up teaching for a morally-meaningless (and arguably socially-destructive) "money job"; I hate the system that imposed that Hobsen's choice upon me.
Well, count me as an old white guy, evangelical Christian who has voted for Trump three times, and I answer this "One of the puzzles of the Trump era has been the enthusiasm with which Evangelical Christians have embraced such an obviously irreligious and (by their own historic lights) morally-reprehensible figure" . . . by saying, yeah, but compared to what was on offer on the other side, the party of Moloch.
You don't have to vote for either of them. I did not this election, nor is it the first time I have voted for another option.
"The man who cannot master himself is not fit to be master of others".
That is not some namby-pamby sentiment devised by Victorian Christians. It goes all the way back to the ancient Greeks and the very era when "manliness" and "virtue" were synonymous. You can find similar sentiments in other ancient moralists in other ancient cultures-- all of whom were of course men.
Trumpian "manliness" is something Plato, Aristotle, Confucius etc. would see as debased and corrupt, the result of slavery to one's base animalistic self. Compare Trump to Alexander the Great or Julius Caesar. Those guys also had their vices (Alexander was a boozehound; Caesar a bed-hopper) but both were "megathymos"-- Great-souled. No one would ever say that of Donald Trump and his circle. Heck, compare them to George Washington and Abraham, Lincoln! We are going to be ruled not by great men, but by Thersites (see: the Iliad) and Cataline.
It seems that you're working very hard to find another view when the effort is not necessary. I repeatedly told one of my kids, "Do the right thing just because it is the right thing to do." Issues can be complicated by circumstances, but right and wrong do exist and are generally not hard to recognize.
You can bet Hegseth's cowed by the prospect of *Trump's* disapproval
Highfalutin gibberish
You are forgetting that the Abrahamic religions are:
1) religions with asterisks. They set forth a moral/ethical code, and then proceed to devise an ever-expanding list of exceptions to that code. In this way, Christians can support a person who behaves in a frequently un-Christian manner.
2) are religions of identity (politics). Having invested in the idea that there is a self, these religions must then formulate a list of qualities that define that self. As above in #1, a plethora of asterisks will be attached to denote those aspects of "manliness" (to pick one identity), which may, or may not, be present when the claim of "manliness" is made.
Virtue now becomes a matter of manifesting the qualities of various identities (or at least enough of the qualities to be able to claim a particular identity). That manifesting those qualities may result in harm/suffering to others/self, is of secondary importance at best.
You note that this "moral transformation has been in process for a long time." You are correct. It has been in process since humans made the mistake of positing the concept of an intrinsic self. Fortunately, the antidote of Buddhism exists to correct the error.
Buddhism is hardly free of such things. It had monasteries which kept armies and oppressed their peasant tenant farmers, supported some pretty nasty rulers, and winked at grave atrocities. This is a universal human tendency, to use one's morality as a cudgel against one's rivals while turning a blind eye to your own guys' misdeeds.
Hey Jon!!!!
You know I am aware of such things. I have written in other places about the warrior monks of Mt. Hiei and what is going on in Myanmar.