Not by Politics Alone: The Enduring Influence of the Christian Right

by Sara Diamond

Book Overview

In this incisive work, Sara Diamond expands our understanding of the Christian Right beyond what is commonly known about its electoral clout, shedding light on the rarely seen boundaries and... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1572304944
• ISBN13: 9781572304949
• Release Date: February 2000
• Publisher: Guilford Publications
• Length: 280 Pages
• Weight: 0.80 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.0" x 8.9"

Customer Reviews

Very valuable source of insight and information

I'm not sure whether the other reviewers have actually read the book or are simply engaging in political arguments. Like the blurb says, she allows the Christian Right to speak for itself (and to call her 'uninformed' is just ignorant - she has a massive array of sources and factual information). Enjoy.

The Christian Right is alive and clutching our throats!

This book does a good job of exposing one of the most insidious power grabs in history! Fundamentalists of any religion are pretty darn scary because they are so sure they are right. For example, I once talked to a woman who was distributing anti-abortion literature. I pointed out that Ronald Reagan's cuts to social service programs caused the US to go from the fourth highest infant mortality in the FIRST world to the highest in just 4 years and that this killed more babies than abortions. The woman looked upset and said, I don't know, I voted for him because my pastor told me to. The "Christian" right has tried to pass "pro-family" referenda in Colorado that would have prevented the state from interfering when a father sexually abused his children. I grew up in a southern Baptist church in a very small town. I got tired of being told I should obey the men and that men were smarter than women. By the way, the governer of one state is a leading Southern Baptist. His son and another Boy Scout, tortured a dog to death a few years ago. These boy scouts were never prosecuted. At the local evangelical church, cards are passed out telling people how to vote! Federal family planning funds are being given to "faith-based" groups who preach abstinence. The head of the US Baptist church this last fall said that the US should attack Iraq. IF that's not wielding right-wing power, I don't know what is. The wife of the head of the Southern Baptist convention said that she always defers to her husband if they cannot agree on an issue--then she goes out and buys a new hat! I got all of this out of the mainstream, not the liberal press. Remember, Hitler was a Christian. His first successful campaign slogan was "Kinder, Kirchen, Kuchen." In the early 1920's, he began his rise to power being against women's rights--women should only care for children (Kinder) and stay in the church (Kirchen) and kitchen (Kuchen). The main reason fundamentalists in this country complain that they have no power is that they, so far, can't have everything their own way. They have no idea about give and take and the possibility that they might be wrong. They want to punish evil--but we are all evil and good. I read the New Testament a lot, it sustains me in this world of violent religious people. "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone." "As ye have done to the least of my brethren, so have ye done to me." I have had fundamentalist neighbors tell me that it is all right to destroy the environment because God put all this here for humans to use. I can't imagine what we are going to say to God when we stand before him and explain why we destroyed so many parts of his beautiful creation.