Theocratic States of America?
Matt Walsh & Other American Terrorists
Christian Nationalism is fundamentally anti-American and should be treated like any other extremism.
One of the questions on the U.S. Citizenship test is: “What is one reason colonists came to America?”
Three of the six acceptable correct answers are: 1.) religious freedom, 2.) practice their religion, and 3.) escape persecution.
This fact, and inspiration from the Magna Carta, led to an important aspect of the First Amendment of the United States Constitution:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.
It's actually the first part of the First Amendment, coming even before freedom of speech. I recently wrote about the importance of freedom of speech and the right of the people to peaceably assemble. Freedom of religion, appearing before both of these aspects of the First Amendment, is also under attack by some people in the U.S. today.
Some Christians today somehow twist history into thinking that the United States should be a Christian Nation. Rather than recognizing the history of the Christian (i.e., Protestant) immigrants that left Europe to seek freedom, these Christian Nationalists believe that “escaping religious persecution” means no other religions should exist. The existence and tolerance of other religions somehow threatens their faith and freedom. In a twisted logic that should only apply to fringe terrorist groups like the Ku Klux Klan (KKK), the Taliban, or Boko Haram, freedom means dominance and the only way for my religion to not be prosecuted is to prosecute every other religion. It reveals a deep insecurity and an ironic lack of faith. A faithful belief would be more confident.
To be clear, maybe I shouldn't label these terrorist groups as “fringe”. Throughout U.S. history, the KKK has had rising and falling degrees of power and influence over the country. In 2021, The Taliban took control of Afghanistan's government and declared it an Islamic Emirate. That same year, the first democratically elected government in Myanmar was overthrown by a military coup—influenced in large part by religious tensions between the majority Buddhists and minority Rohingya Muslims.
The name for a government ruled by religion is a Theocracy. The word comes from Greek to mean, basically, “Government by God”.
Theocracy (noun) - government of a state by immediate divine guidance or by officials who are regarded as divinely guided
—Merriam-Webster
Some contemporary examples of theocracies include: Afghanistan (under Taliban rule), Saudi Arabia, Iran, Vatican City (duh), and Egypt. Will the United States be added to this list in the near future? Matt Walsh is one media personality (or whatever you call people like this) who sure hopes so.
Here’s a video of Matt Walsh calling himself a “theocratic fascist”.
According to anyone in the U.S. with common sense and a desire for freedom, Matt Walsh should be considered an Anti-American terrorist. He already has a page dedicated to him on the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) website, a nonprofit with a history of tracking hate and extremist groups while supporting civil rights legal cases against them.
Okay, I get it. You can tell by the video above that he is being sarcastic and trying to joke around about claims that others have made about him. However, there is not much difference between his attempts at irony and his attempts at sincerity. So, how is anyone to know what he really believes? He’s not really playing a character. He’s not satirizing someone else’s views. He’s satirizing . . . himself? I feel ridiculous writing it out because it’s a ridiculous thing that he’s doing. Maybe the effect he has in the real world is all that matters. Here’s how the SPLC website explains it:
Walsh sometimes suggests his most extreme comments are satirical or in jest, as when he explained why he describes himself as a theocratic fascist. However, his comments regularly reflect male and white supremacy and transphobia and are often used by radical right-wing extremists against marginalized communities. Walsh hosts “The Matt Walsh Show” on the Daily Wire and has written several books that promote anti-transgender pseudoscience and conspiracy theories. Walsh has advocated political violence and violence against transgender people and medical providers that give gender-affirming care. Some of these facilities have received bomb threats and have faced the suspension of care and increased security measures.
In a simple simile, one of the top comments under this video on YouTube reads:
This video is pretty much the same as Bill Cosby telling a rape joke.
I do get that he is joking. But, the joke comes from somewhere real. I know because I do the same thing. People who know me have heard me say “When I become President, anyone who doesn’t use their blinker will get the death penalty.” It’s an exaggeration to emphasize how much I dislike when drivers fail to use their turn signal before changing lanes or making a turn. When I’m on a road trip with my wife and someone cuts in front of us without using their blinker, one of us will yell out “death penalty!”.
I use this comparison because I don’t actually believe failure to signal should warrant the death penalty. I am not spending time and energy in real life to lobby for changing the laws in our country. I do not want to be President someday. However, the joke comes from the very real fact that I hate when people don’t use their blinker. Legally speaking, I do sincerely believe we should have higher standards for earning and keeping a driver’s license because it is a dangerous responsibility. This is a topic for a different essay.
Back to the point here—Matt Walsh jokes about being a theocratic fascist because he does hate other religions. The bigger problem is that he actually uses his platform to lobby for theocratically fascist ideals and legislation for our country. He might even want to be President someday! (God forbid)
Whether it’s a joke or not, it points to a bigger problem in the country which is very real. It's not just Matt Walsh alone on the fringes. There are many others.
According to a 2023 study done by the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI)— a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to conducting independent research at the intersection of religion, culture, and public policy — :
Three in ten Americans qualify as Christian nationalism Adherents (10%) or Sympathizers (20%), compared with two-thirds who qualify as Skeptics (37%) or Rejecters (30%).
These should be disturbing numbers in the 21st Century. Here are some research procedures that clarify how they got to these statistics. The survey used for the study tested:
a sample of more than 5,000 Americans. Respondents in our American Values Atlas were asked whether they completely agree, mostly agree, mostly disagree, or completely disagree with each of the following statements:
The U.S. government should declare America a Christian nation.
U.S. laws should be based on Christian values.
If the U.S. moves away from our Christian foundations, we will not have a country anymore.
Being Christian is an important part of being truly American.
God has called Christians to exercise dominion over all areas of American society.
Do you agree with any of the statements above? If you do, you should really do some introspection and consider the implications. If you agree with any of these statements and also claim that you care about freedom, the U.S. Constitution, and the First Amendment—you are wrong about yourself. Those things can’t be true at the same time.
If you care about the success of the United States as a country built on religious freedom and escaping persecution, you categorically cannot agree with any of the statements above. It’s a paradox. Claiming that you must be Christian to be American is a fundamental paradox, if being “American” truly means anything. Christian Nationalists place themselves in opposition to the founding principles of the United States and actively threaten the integrity of the U.S. Constitution—still the longest surviving political document laying the law of the land. I believe it’s still worth fighting to keep the Constitution alive. Its staying power is due in large part to the fact that it can be changed and developed through the ratification of new amendments. In my humble opinion, the First Amendment is important, fundamental, and should not be changed.
Back to the study results from the PRRI, here are some more specific details about where in the U.S. this is more prevalent:
There are five states in which more than 45% of residents are Christian nationalism Adherents or Sympathizers: North Dakota (50%), Mississippi (50%), Alabama (47%), West Virginia (47%), and Louisiana (46%).
Not surprisingly, Christian Nationalism is much more common in Red states. However, I live in a very Blue state and have seen plenty of bumper stickers that more people should be disturbed by considering how many people display them so proudly. There is a whole market of decorations that blend the U.S. flag with the Christian cross and other iconography related to Jesus.
If being disturbed is too dramatic for you, these images should be considered absurd at the least. Mixing the idea of your country with the idea of your religion should give you bad feelings because it will inevitably reduce the freedoms in your country and reduce the meaningfulness of your faith. Do you want your religious faith in the hands of politicians? They will use it and bend it however they can to make you think and act in the ways they want you to. Do you want the Government to have a say over how you can practice your faith? At my most generous, I can only say that these bumper stickers are nonsensical, random, or silly. At the worst though, they imply threats to U.S. democracy.
I guess I should make a distinction here between ideology and action as I'm essentially labelling a bunch of people terrorists based on a survey and some bumper stickers, but wait until you read this next part. Of course I'm trying to be provocative with my title, but here is a genuinely disturbing fact about their belief in political violence:
Christian nationalists are about twice as likely as other Americans to believe political violence may be justified. Nearly four in ten Christian nationalism Adherents (38%) and one-third of Sympathizers (33%) agree that “because things have gotten so far off track, true American patriots may have to resort to violence to save the country,” compared with only 17% of Skeptics and 7% of Rejecters.
The thing is: these are not “true American patriots”. These are Anti-American terrorists (or at least leaning toward radicalization in that direction) that have deluded themselves—or have been deceived—into thinking that they need to take over the country through violence to remove others’ freedoms and establish a totalitarian theocratic regime.
There was violence during the American Revolution of course. But, it was in the name of freedom and the desire to avoid kings and queens who claim to derive their power from God. Our continued duty since revolutionary times has been to uphold the Constitution while increasing individual freedoms and protecting ourselves and our communities from the tyranny of politicians who only derive power from the consent of the governed.
You must ask yourself: Do you want to live in The Theocratic States of America? Or, do you value the First Amendment and the individual freedoms it protects?
Personally, I think the USA sounds better than the TSA. What would we call the security workers at the airport?