Okay, so my prevailing mood in the immediate aftermath of Bush's win was one of angry isolationism - 'go fuck yourselves, theocratic nutjob bigots' - but I've since been reconsidering that view, in the light of the various discussions of What The Left Should Do Now. This thread is, in part, an expansion of my post here. It relates mainly to online outreach/activism, but it seems to me that most, if not all, of these points might readily apply in Real Life too.
I suppose I'm coming down from post-election shock/rage, and thinking about the huge Christian Right bloc which was successfully mobilised by appealling to "moral values" - which appears to be shorthand for gays, guns, abortion and and something along the lines of "taking God out of the Constitution" - and I'm thinking specifically about my own experience of people who might fall within that group. Living in the UK, the vast majority of my own encounters with right-wing Christians have been Internet-based, typically via Christian message-boards.
I first began exploring Christian message-boards three years ago, following a rather traumatic clash with a Baptist aunt to whom I revealed my homosexuality. Finding myself completely unable, afterwards, to have a civil discussion with her, I took to the message-boards partly in an attempt to understand her mindset, partly as cathartic displacement, and partly because I am, by nature, something of a 'compromise junkie' - and I'd been unable to reach a compromise with my aunt.
In the beginning, the Christian boards were hard work; I posted about some of my early experiences here. To summarise, the first few forays into the likes of CBBS were very much trial-and-error; I made mistakes (chiefly, making the assumption that the larger boards would follow a bell-curve distribution of extremism, with more moderates than fundamentalists - this is not the case) but I learned quickly. I attracted lots of opprobrium, but I also made plenty of friends - and, pleasingly, my presence seemed to coax a fair number of more moderate posters out of the woodwork. Once I'd sussed out the ground rules (the unspoken ones as well as the explicit Terms & Conditions) and managed to get the balance right, it was possible to engage in quite impassioned debate yet remain 'friends' with even the most right-wing.
In retrospect, I think my input to these online communities - as a 'fuzzily agnostic' gay man - did change things, however slightly. My presence altered the range of views being expressed, gave some tentative moderates the confidence to be moderate, and, ultimately, shifted the equilibrium a little. There's a significant proportion of Christians who aren't themselves strongly anti-gay or anti-abortion, but come to online message-boards for the sense of shared community; often, they simply lack exposure to alternative viewpoints expressed calmly and politely (and wittily - it's easy to build up a Haus-type reputation for Wildean funmeistery) with a minimum of flamey hectoring. I don't think it's too much gradualist wishful thinking to speculate that those individuals shift their worldview slightly as a result. Calling it 'outreach' is a bit wanky and presumptious, but if enough of us can dispel at least a little ignorance (and my own specialist subject is The Homosexual Lifestyle), it'd be worthwhile.
So... what I'm proposing is that those of us who feel motivated and able to do so seriously consider registering on Christian message-boards and starting to post. There're right and wrong ways to do this, though; here's some of what I've learned (often the hard way):
- Christian message-boards are the online equivalent of gated communities; most occupy a slightly strange ground between 'safe space' and 'debating hall', typically with a plethora of rules specifying what can be talked about where. Read the Terms of Service, and stick to them; it's possible to challenge some of the more nebulous guidelines ('no promotion of homosexuality' being a particular favourite of mine) but not until one has spent a while getting to know the place. Think about how we respond to newbies' criticisms of Barbelith, and multiply that by ten.
- Think 'long haul'. As with any community, one is more likely to be listened to if one is respected, and one is more likely to be respected if one has been around for a while, actively contributing. And, fuck knows, we've got four years...
- Make friends. Not necessarily until they beg for mercy, but contribute to threads other than your favourite hot topics. You don't need to compromise your own values - on the contrary, be assiduous in correcting wrong assumptions and sweeping generalisations - but try also to find common ground. Joke, advise, sympathise, make connections. Show that you're not just there to proselytise.
- Occupy the moral high ground, at least in terms of posting. Be extra-careful to attack arguments rather than individuals, thank posters for their input (even when you disagree vehemently with what they're saying).
So... once I've got a little more bile out of my system here, I'm thinking about heading back into the fray. Is anyone else interested? |
My partner's cousin is a hard-core, evangelical, fundamentalist Bush supporter. It'll be hard enough to be civil to her, any tips? Basically my strategy so far is that I'm not going to engange in any discussions about politics or religion with her in case I lose my self-control completely and end up in a screaming match. The worst part of it is I really want to.
