Imprecator Steven L. Anderson Back in the News
Frederick Clarkson printable version print page     Bookmark and Share
Fri Dec 03, 2010 at 10:39:58 PM EST
Rev. Steven L. Anderson is back in the news. Readers may remember that last year Anderson collaborated with a parishioner who protested an appearance by president Obama by openly carrying guns.  Prior to Obama's arrival in town, Anderson devoted his Sunday sermon to denouncing Obama for his views on abortion and homosexuality and prayed for his death.

This time, controversy broke out following news that Anderson and his Word of Faith Baptist Church had made the Southern Poverty Law Center's recent list of antigay hate groups. In a radio interview Anderson agreed that he hates gay people, thinks they should be executed, and that vigilante machine gunning might be ok:

Signorile:  You want all gay people to be executed, correct?
Anderson:  That is correct.
Signorile:  Yes.  And that, you would like to see as the law of the land.  So, under the American law right now, if somebody were to go out with a machine gun and spray down a crowd of gay and lesbian people, would you think that was okay?
Anderson:  No, I would not think it's okay because I believe in due process.
Signorile:  Would that person be a murderer?
Anderson:  I would not judge them as a murderer, no.

All this is well presented in a diary at Daily Kos. All, except for all the other stuff.

As good as that diary is in detailing Anderson's anti-gay extremism, it misses the wider context of Anderson's comprehensive world view -- on everything from the need to pray for the death of president Obama because he is prochoice to his involvement in the theocratic Constitution Party and his claim to be a gun dealer operating in several states. Anderson like many of his Constitution Party colleagues becomes quite unhinged when preaching against not only homosexuality, but abortion.  He is also passionate about guns and immigration, having involved himself in border vigilantism. It is in this sense that Anderson's antigay politics are part of a comprehensive worldview that unifies and informs his attitudes and actions on a wide range of things.

Single issue politics can provide an intense and laser like focus on people, events and ideas that merit exposure. But sometimes, such intensive focus can obscure things that also urgently need to be known about someone like Anderson, whose significance extends far beyond his antigay views.

I wrote last year:

   

The night before Broughton's fifteen minutes of fame, he attended a fiery Sunday sermon by his pastor, Rev. Steven L. Anderson, at Faithful Word Baptist Church in Tempe, Arizona. Rev. Anderson, also 28, explained not only "Why I Hate Barack Obama," but also why he and God both want the president dead. "When I go to bed tonight," Broughton's pastor declared, "Steven L. Anderson is going to pray for Barack Obama to die and go to hell." He even goes so far as to claim that:

    "God appointed [Obama] to destroy this country for the wickedness of the United States of America. God appointed him because that's what our country has turned into. That's who we deserve as a president."

    At a teabagger rally in Arizona, Anderson denounced both the Republican and Democratic Parties, declaring without a hint of irony that Obama, the "worst president" in American history, is "selling us into slavery and serfdom." Further research revealed Anderson's involvement in the Constitution Party, the third largest "third party" in the U.S. In a June speech to the state convention of the Arizona Constitution Party he introduced himself (in addition to being pastor of ) as owner of a "firearms business" operating in "several states" and closed with a plea for an American government based on God's laws as set out in the Biblical book of Deuteronomy.

    The Constitution Party, which has tended to be the political home for people with views strikingly similar to Anderson's, is frequently dismissed as a fringe party of little electoral consequence, even though its significance lies elsewhere. It is in fact a steaming hotbed of far right factions with theocratic, vigilante, and sometimes revolutionary ideas whose like-minded members get together to make their plans, just like any other organized faction in American public life. The party says it is 100% pro-life and pro-gun.

    Many of the party's early leaders were Christian Reconstructionists, or heavily influenced by Reconstructionism, including party founder and three-time presidential candidate Howard Phillips. Reconstructionism is a theocratic systematic theology whose seminal thinker, the late R.J. Rushdoony, spoke at the Constitution Party's founding convention and was a longtime advisor to Phillips. Reconstructionism was one of the significant theological catalysts for the modern Religious Right--a movement, like other social and political movements throughout history, that has transcended party identification.

    The Constitution Party has also been a political home to a wide array of militia proponents, including one of the movement's leading theorists, Larry Pratt, head of Gun Owners of America, Rev. Matthew Trewhella, founder of Missionaries to the Preborn who has urged parents to buy each of their children "an SKS rifle and 500 rounds of ammunition" for their church militia; Operation Rescue founder Randall Terry, (who ran as a Constitution Party candidate for Congress in 1998, but who has since become a Republican); and even Rev. Michael Bray, a convicted felon and longtime leader in the Army of God.

I suspect that further digging would turn up much more eyebrow, if not hair raising material about Anderson that would help us to understand how to best understand his antigay views, along with all the rest of his demagogic approaches to the hot button issues of the day.

Conversely, the same kind of exclusionary focus happens on all of the concerns on Anderson's list from abortion, to immigration to separation of church and state.  In my experience, this missing the forest of context for the trees of single issue politics can pose obstacles to effective activism, excellent reporting and sound scholarship about the Religious Right writ large, and its various subsidiary issues, personalities, institutions and organizations.




Display:
"this missing the forest of context for the trees of single issue politics can pose obstacles to effective activism, excellent reporting and sound scholarship"

VERY accurate.  I haven't heard it put so well before.

This describes what I've heard and observed SO well.  It riles me when I encounter people who think everything is Gay Rights, or Abortion/woman's rights, or whatever.  It's gotten to the point at times where the speaker denigrates the issues from other groups, such as I've experienced a couple of times by Gay Rights activists who have told me our racial issues are in the past and thus not immediate (like their fight for rights was to the speaker).  In those cases, they backed off after hearing a couple of things we've personally been put through (in recent years).  In essence, I think selfishness is at the root of that attitude of looking at the trees of single-issue politics.  They're concerned about what only impacts them personally.  They don't see the forest for their own particular tree.

Things like we find with Anderson and others of his ilk are all part of a package.   A very ugly, scary package.  You have to try to grasp ALL of their ideology to begin to get an idea of what they actually think about the separate issues.  At the risk of having "Godwin's law" thrown in my face, I will say that trying to grasp the entire ideology of the Nazis helps one to understand the attitude of "Good Germans" (of the time) towards Jews... a "Good German" could and often would get ill just at the idea of being kind or nice to a Jew.

That's almost incomprehensible unless you try to look at their entire worldview.

I think people like Anderson are on the same path.  I would not be a bit surprised if he would get ill just at the idea of being kind to a GLBT person.  And that dehumanizing is probably spreading to other groups as well.

by ArchaeoBob on Sat Dec 04, 2010 at 10:16:29 AM EST


I hear this all the time here in the Bible Belt. It's funny, but they can't seem to see the irony.

by phatkhat on Sat Dec 04, 2010 at 11:58:05 PM EST
Let's not drag gun control into the conversation.  Many liberals (including myself) strenuously oppose it and for good reasons.

It's also not appropriate for this thread.

by ArchaeoBob on Mon Dec 06, 2010 at 09:21:45 AM EST
Parent



"The party is 100% pro-life and pro-gun."

Presumably they say that with a straight face.

by Raksha on Mon Dec 06, 2010 at 12:08:48 AM EST



WWW Talk To Action


Cognitive Dissonance & Dominionism Denial
There is new research on why people are averse to hearing or learning about the views of ideological opponents. Based on evaluation of five......
By Frederick Clarkson (374 comments)
Will the Air Force Do Anything To Rein In Its Dynamic Duo of Gay-Bashing, Misogynistic Bloggers?
"I always get nervous when I see female pastors/chaplains. Here is why everyone should as well: "First, women are not called to be pastors,......
By Chris Rodda (195 comments)
The Legacy of Big Oil
The media is ablaze with the upcoming publication of David Grann's book, Killers of the Flower Moon. The shocking non fiction account of the......
By wilkyjr (110 comments)
Gimme That Old Time Dominionism Denial
Over the years, I have written a great deal here and in other venues about the explicitly theocratic movement called dominionism -- which has......
By Frederick Clarkson (101 comments)
History Advisor to Members of Congress Completely Twists Jefferson's Words to Support Muslim Ban
Pseudo-historian David Barton, best known for his misquoting of our country's founders to promote the notion that America was founded as a Christian nation,......
By Chris Rodda (113 comments)
"Christian Fighter Pilot" Calls First Lesbian Air Force Academy Commandant a Liar
In a new post on his "Christian Fighter Pilot" blog titled "BGen Kristin Goodwin and the USAFA Honor Code," Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan......
By Chris Rodda (144 comments)
Catholic Right Leader Unapologetic about Call for 'Death to Liberal Professors' -- UPDATED
Today, Donald Trump appointed C-FAM Executive Vice President Lisa Correnti to the US Delegation To UN Commission On Status Of Women. (C-FAM is a......
By Frederick Clarkson (126 comments)
Controlling Information
     Yesterday I listened to Russ Limbaugh.  Rush advised listeners it would be best that they not listen to CNN,MSNBC, ABC, CBS and......
By wilkyjr (118 comments)
Is Bannon Fifth-Columning the Pope?
In December 2016 I wrote about how White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, who likes to flash his Catholic credentials when it comes to......
By Frank Cocozzelli (250 comments)
Ross Douthat's Hackery on the Seemingly Incongruous Alliance of Bannon & Burke
Conservative Catholic writer Ross Douthat has dissembled again. This time, in a February 15, 2017 New York Times op-ed titled The Trump Era's Catholic......
By Frank Cocozzelli (64 comments)
`So-Called Patriots' Attack The Rule Of Law
Every so often, right-wing commentator Pat Buchanan lurches out of the far-right fever swamp where he has resided for the past 50 years to......
By Rob Boston (161 comments)
Bad Faith from Focus on the Family
Here is one from the archives, Feb 12, 2011, that serves as a reminder of how deeply disingenuous people can be. Appeals to seek......
By Frederick Clarkson (176 comments)
The Legacy of George Wallace
"One need not accept any of those views to agree that they had appealed to real concerns of real people, not to mindless, unreasoning......
By wilkyjr (70 comments)
Betsy DeVos's Mudsill View of Public Education
My Talk to Action colleague Rachel Tabachnick has been doing yeoman's work in explaining Betsy DeVos's long-term strategy for decimating universal public education. If......
By Frank Cocozzelli (80 comments)
Prince and DeVos Families at Intersection of Radical Free Market Privatizers and Religious Right
This post from 2011 surfaces important information about President-Elect Trump's nominee for Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos. -- FC Erik Prince, Brother of Betsy......
By Rachel Tabachnick (218 comments)

Respect for Others? or Political Correctness?
The term "political correctness" as used by Conservatives and Republicans has often puzzled me: what exactly do they mean by it? After reading Chip Berlin's piece here-- http://www.talk2action.org/story/2016/7/21/04356/9417 I thought about what he explained......
MTOLincoln (253 comments)
Fear
What I'm feeling now is fear.  I swear that it seems my nightmares are coming true with this new "president".  I'm also frustrated because so many people are not connecting all the dots! I've......
ArchaeoBob (107 comments)
"America - love it or LEAVE!"
I've been hearing that and similar sentiments fairly frequently in the last few days - far FAR more often than ever before.  Hearing about "consequences for burning the flag (actions) from Trump is chilling!......
ArchaeoBob (211 comments)
"Faked!" Meme
Keep your eyes and ears open for a possible move to try to discredit the people openly opposing Trump and the bigots, especially people who have experienced terrorism from the "Right"  (Christian Terrorism is......
ArchaeoBob (165 comments)
More aggressive proselytizing
My wife told me today of an experience she had this last week, where she was proselytized by a McDonald's employee while in the store. ......
ArchaeoBob (163 comments)
See if you recognize names on this list
This comes from the local newspaper, which was conservative before and took a hard right turn after it was sold. Hint: Sarah Palin's name is on it!  (It's also connected to Trump.) ......
ArchaeoBob (169 comments)
Unions: A Labor Day Discussion
This is a revision of an article which I posted on my personal board and also on Dailykos. I had an interesting discussion on a discussion board concerning Unions. I tried to piece it......
Xulon (156 comments)
Extremely obnoxious protesters at WitchsFest NYC: connected to NAR?
In July of this year, some extremely loud, obnoxious Christian-identified protesters showed up at WitchsFest, an annual Pagan street fair here in NYC.  Here's an account of the protest by Pagan writer Heather Greene......
Diane Vera (130 comments)
Capitalism and the Attack on the Imago Dei
I joined this site today, having been linked here by Crooksandliars' Blog Roundup. I thought I'd put up something I put up previously on my Wordpress blog and also at the DailyKos. As will......
Xulon (329 comments)
History of attitudes towards poverty and the churches.
Jesus is said to have stated that "The Poor will always be with you" and some Christians have used that to refuse to try to help the poor, because "they will always be with......
ArchaeoBob (148 comments)
Alternate economy medical treatment
Dogemperor wrote several times about the alternate economy structure that dominionists have built.  Well, it's actually made the news.  Pretty good article, although it doesn't get into how bad people could be (have been)......
ArchaeoBob (90 comments)
Evidence violence is more common than believed
Think I've been making things up about experiencing Christian Terrorism or exaggerating, or that it was an isolated incident?  I suggest you read this article (linked below in body), which is about our great......
ArchaeoBob (214 comments)

More Diaries...




All trademarks and copyrights on this page are owned by their respective companies. Comments, posts, stories, and all other content are owned by the authors. Everything else © 2005 Talk to Action, LLC.