Radical and Back Again, Part III
One woman's journey from woke to awake
In the final part of this three-part series (Part One here), Talia Bongolan-Schwartz describes where she is now on the political spectrum, microaggressions and how we as a nation can talk to each other.
This is the inside story of how people go woke, a confession from the front lines by one of the movement’s very own. But it’s also a story of self-discovery and of one person’s intellectual odyssey through political seas in which we all now sail.
Really appreciated this conversation - very thoughtful. Thank you Talia for your willingness to share your experience and journey. I was a bit saddened by the apparent need to generalize about Christians toward the end of the conversation. I suppose every conversation needs a foil, and Christians here seem to serve as the foil for the ignorant right. But I know you both know there is tremendous political diversity within Christianity. Within group differences are huge and this is a huge group.....
I listened to the conversation again because I wanted to make sure that I did not mishear or misjudge the comment about Christians at the end. I'll come to that in a minute, but first I just want to say that I was struck again by how thoughtful and insightful the conversation was. I also wanted to point out that the great sociologist Max Weber would entirely agree with the point about material interests in ideological organizations. He argued against a reductive Marxist interpretation of this point, in that he thought ideas and what he called "ideal interests" really matter, but he repeatedly emphasized the ways in which the material interests of organizations can dictate the directions in which they go. This is just to say - excellent point, Talia, entirely agree, and you have a great sociologist on your side, albeit a sociologist who was rather ambivalent about the sociology of his time.
To return to the comment about Christianity. In listening again, I do not think I was wrong to hear a negatively stereotypical comment about Christians, although interestingly there is some ambiguity about whether the point is political or theological.
Taking on board the overall point of the whole discussion about "microaggressions", I can choose whether to take offense at this, and I won't. I recognize that there are dangers in Jews and Christians trying to have discussions about Biblical interpretation, and I recently learned that to my chagrin with one of my closest friends from grad school. This may have been part of your point, David.
But, like Jews, Christians span a huge range in their attitudes toward Biblical interpretation, so the implicit assumption that all Christians (even all conservative, "evangelical" Christians) are narrow-minded Biblical literalists is an inaccurate stereotype. Perhaps one lesson here is that it would actually be good if Christians and Jews talked to each other more, including about our understandings of the Bible (as risky as that can be), so that we might have a better understanding of each other.....
The context for the comment is a discussion of the value in engaging with others' ideas, even when you disagree, and the fact that the most effective arguments work with an understanding of the other side. The overall context is one in which right-leaning political ideas are being discussed. The immediate context is one in which the discussion has been about conspiracy theories.
At recording – about 3.15 minutes left
David says – “If you’re going to engage a Christian with the intention of persuading them of some point – which I don’t know how advisable that is – but if you did you would want to argue it from the theology in the Bible. You would not want to sort of say, well the Bible is nonsense, and let me now try to convince you what I think about God. You have to speak their language in order to – not open their minds, but access their minds with the language that they understand….You come at the left from the left, the right from the right…..”
Talia agrees, and says it should be in good faith.