I agree that 'this is a rescue mission' sounds a little wankypresumptious, but I think there's still a fair degree of mileage in 'make friends with them until they beg for mercy', overstated as it is.
As some of you will recall, I had a major run-in with my Baptist aunt shortly after 9/11, because a) I was moving to London, and b) I came out to her as gay. I wrote about it here. She compared my sexuality with the act of murder, a comparison which utterly shocked me at the time, and which became a great impasse in our relationship. Unable to convince my aunt that it was about love rather than "sin", I began exploring a number of Christian message-boards in an attempt to discover more about a mindset I'd never directly encountered before. That exploratory period's run its course, but I think it's yielded at least some insights about how best to interact with certain shades of religious extremism.
(I 'reported back' about some of that stuff here. Thinking of returning to that thread and mining it for possible insights.)
Going into Christian boards with a 'rescue mission' attitude was, generally speaking, a dead end - at least partly because much of the language of 'rescue' has been appropriated for religious purposes (saving souls from the brink of Hell). Also, entering a religious board with an overt 'mission' taps directly into the more paranoia-tinged myths of a widespread Homosexual Agenda in which inverts like myself set out as 'recruiters' to swell our numbers and, ultimately, Destroy The Family.
So no, the 'rescue mission' stuff doesn't really work.
'Make friends until they beg for mercy', on the other hand, is a useful approach - and even a means of effecting positive change. Making friends need not involve compromise of one's own core beliefs, just a willingness to enter into dialogue and stick it out - for at least as long as it takes to get to know some of the personalities, the people behind the avatars. On CBBS, on CF, on BibleVoice, I adopted a position of being resolutely unapologic about my homosexuality (and refusing to recognise the concept of victimless/Biblical "sin") but actively contributing to threads other than the hot-button stuff. Being warm, approachable, helpful, funny (and, let's face it, it's not hard to be the devastatingly witty enfant terrible of a Christian board), human. After a while, they begin to respect the fact that you're still there - even while you're arguing against literalism or for abortion, or pointing out (repeatedly) the difference between sex between men and sex with a child. There's absolutely nothing wrong with being angry, scathing, sarcastic - but attacking the argument rather than the arguer, and actively searching for common ground, however trivial, pays dividends.
Of course, what worked for me may not necessarily work for everyone. I found, particularly, that my medical/psychiatric background was useful, both in flamey arguments (and, as with "liberal", "debate" seems to have negative connotations in the US) and more conciliatory advice/soothing threads.
Naturally, you can't befriend all of the people all of the time. There were those I never got close to, and those who apparently hated me (or, at least, my online input). In one notable instance, I was banned from a board (for quoting Philip Larkin and asterisking "f*ck"!). The latter proved constructive, however, in that it appeared to mobilise a group of more moderate posters to start their own mixed-faith community, and it's still going strong.
So... I'd argue that 'make friends until they beg for mercy' is more than a snappy soundbite. Applied with committment, I've found it's an extremely valuable mode of interaction.
I mean, what are the viable alternatives? |
