American Politics: Whatever Happened to Class?

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There’s a song in the musical Chicago called “Class.” It’s a comedic lamentation performed in earnest by the characters, Velma Kelly and Matron “Mama” Morton bemoaning society’s loss of decorum and manners.

 

The fact that Velma is in jail for murder and “Mama” is the warden who will scratch your back if you scratch hers makes the song even funnier.

 

These are not paragons of society. They are a murderer and an extortionist, respectively. Yet there they are singing:

“Whatever happened to fair dealing? And pure ethics? And nice manners?”

This musical’s story was originally set in the 1920s, but truly, the action could be any time. The lack of respect for others and the deplorable behavior that these two characters are lamenting has never been timelier than right now.

 

In the current political reality show that is American politics—more tragedy than comedy—there is no class on the side of the Republican Party. Most of its members have crossed over to the dark side and should consider renaming themselves the MAGA Party. But I’ll just call them MAGA Republicans for now.

 

The de facto leader of the MAGA Republicans, those Fox-News-watching conservatives, most of whom also consider themselves Christians, is the wolf in sheep’s clothing that my Sunday School teacher warned me about.

He masquerades as a conservative man, a Christian, a savior trying to Make America Great Again, all while stoking the fears associated with Other and Different. He’s a dangerous man. Willing, without compunction, to lie to his followers in order to incite the desired reactions: fear and anger. He’s a revenge-threatening bully; a narcissist with hateful tendencies as ugly as his combover. And the speeches he gives at his rallies and press conferences often make no sense. There isn’t enough money in the Federal Reserve to buy this man class.

 

He has no desire to be courteous. His followers wouldn’t stand for it anyway. He, and they, only want him to be as nasty and politically incorrect as he can. The MAGA Republicans thrive on meals of mockery and disrespect, leaving the table satiated with ignorance. And blissfully happy. They have no desire to seek the truth, believing without hesitation—unquestioning—just as I was taught to do in the pews of the Baptist churches of my childhood. And if they happen to discover the lies aren’t true, they don't apologize for sharing and promoting the lies. Nor do they share the actual truth.

I recently watched John McCain’s concession speech from when he lost the presidential election to Barack Obama in 2008. The man held up his hands to stop those who supported him, disappointed by his loss, from booing as he began the speech. He didn’t speak negatively against Barack Obama. He commended him for “his ability and perseverance.” And admired him for “inspiring the hopes of so many millions of Americans.” He acknowledged the two had differences and that those differences would probably remain, but he pledged his support for the newly elected president and encouraged his supporters to do so as well.

 

A speech that started with booing ended in applause. It was a time when it seems Republicans and Democrats could negotiate their differences, find a compromise, shake hands across the aisle, work together.

That was 2008.

Now we have a fool that purposefully mispronounces the name of the woman running against him for the office of president. And his MAGA followers eat it up.

Sixteen years later, we are in the shadow of a would-be dictator. In two Obama terms and their subsequent years, how did we get here? In sixteen years, how did decades of political civility turn into January 6, 2020? How did it turn into the least productive Congress in our country’s history? How did it turn into name calling and demands for loyalty? How did it turn into such a deeply divided Us vs Them?

A friend once told me that Newt Gingrich, as Speaker of the House, was the man who used his power to inject divisive division into the Party line, cracking it by telling his Republican colleagues to treat their Democrat co-workers as the enemy and to have no dealings with them outside of work. Did it start there in the late 90s? How was that good for the country? For the People?

Back to the grifting shyster who has risen to power as the leader of the MAGA Republicans. He likes to hurl accusatory barbs at the other side, accusing them—us—of doing the very things that he and his followers are actually doing. He demonizes Democrats, Black people, Hispanic people, science, women, democracy, facts, truth. And let’s not forget how he mocked the disabled and veterans. He is concerned with his own power, not with the good of the country.

As for the elected officials who have brown on their faces because their heads are so far up his ass—Marjorie Taylor-Greene, Lauren Boebert, Matt Gaetz, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Tom Cotton, Josh Hawley, Lindsey Graham (to name a few)—they worship at his feet, forgetting all about the first of the Ten Commandments in the Holy Bible, a book they claim to revere above all others: “Thou Shalt Have No Other Gods Before Me.”

I don’t get it. I’m dumbfounded that we are here. I shake my head in disbelief. I continue to wonder how this happened. I no longer trust an American populace that could and would elect Donald Trump. Or any of the above mentioned senators and representatives. They are fucking with too many lives. For what? So women can’t get abortions? So gay people can’t get married? So trans people can’t get the medical care they need or use the goddamn bathroom that goes with their gender identity?

(Side note: No one is coming for their churches. Their right to pray. Or their Bible. Although in the 2024, maybe the Bible should be the top challenged book to be banned instead of Gender Queer: A Memoir by Maia Kobabe. But I digress.)

I leave the last word to “Mama”:

“Jesus Christ, ain’t there no decency left?”

Being Woke Is Simple, But Tell That To The Conservative American Christian

 

To be woke, as defined by dictionary.com, is “having or marked by an active awareness of systemic injustices and prejudices, especially those involving the treatment of ethnic, racial, or sexual minorities.”

Isn’t that a good thing? Shouldn’t we embrace a positive reaction to our historical and present-day negative actions? 

Wouldn’t you think those who profess to be Christians would be at the forefront of this movement—more woke than anyone else?

I would think so. But no. I would be wrong.

American Christians, most of whom are conservatives, use woke as a negative term and fight hard against changes in the world being made by those who recognize the movement's eyes-wide-open benefits.

The Woke Movement isn’t new. It’s been around since the early 1900s when Black Americans coined the term for use in the racial justice movement. It simply meant that a person was “informed, educated and conscious of social injustice and racial inequality,” according to Merriam-Webster Dictionary. I had never heard the term woke until recent years when the 24-hour news cycle and social media brought it to my attention because conservative American Christians were using it as a double-edged sword against those striving for progress and change.

I was discussing the definition of woke recently with a friend who said that Christians don’t see that there is a problem. Or that there ever has been a problem. He added that Christians view wokeness as an attack on them.

Investigating further, I read a post from a Reddit thread from a couple of years ago. The original poster believes woke means being sensitive to injustice and having compassion for the marginalized and minority groups, adding that conservatives mock “bleeding heart liberals” who understand movement and try to implement its intended change. A responder to that post spoke of the perceived toxic environment created by the Woke Movement, opining that when one doesn’t follow the rules perfectly as laid out by those in charge then one is reprimanded. (Who’s in charge?) Further into the thread, responses of “simply having respect” and “wokeness demands repentance but offers no forgivenesses” caught my attention.

Why is there no forgiveness? Why aren’t Christians the ones with bleeding hearts? Why does respecting another person’s color, sexuality, gender, gender identity, religious beliefs (or none), etc., cause such fear-based outrage?

I can’t answer these questions.

From what I remember in my nearly 18 years of going to Sunday school and Baptist worship services three times a week, this man Jesus was supposedly a kind, generous, loving person. He is characterized as a man who opened his heart and his arms to the sick and the poor, to kings and outcasts alike. And he supposedly taught lessons of acceptance and forgiveness.

As a queer from a small town in the red state of Kentucky, I sure know what it means to feel, and be, different. I know what learned fear feels like from the repeated warnings of a fire-and-brimstone preacher as he spoke of a God who would punish me for my sins, turn his back on me if I failed to heed his attempts to convict my heart to turn toward him, and send me to Hell for being gay. 

Side note: if we are all created in the image of this God of the Bible, then that means my non-binary, gay, queer, femme-ass self was made in the image of that God too. And I would suggest that you stop thinking of this God as some white-haired, white-bearded, white man who resides somewhere above the clouds. I suggest instead that you think of this God as an entity that posses both sexes, all colors, and every race. This God would be trans and bi and poly and glorious and glittering in his various shades of life. But I digress.

We all know this biblical God of the White Right, don’t we? And so, too, this man Jesus. (If either of them even exist.) But if this God does exists then he’s clearly a man with a penis. As is this man Jesus. That’s the only option for most American Christians. And the God of the American Christian doesn’t seem to want his followers to embrace trans people or queer people or gay people. No. This God wants his followers to close their eyes to the injustices perpetrated on these communities. They’re angry all the time and righteous as they point out how threatening we are. Their God wants his followers to speak with nasty vitriol and in some cases even perpetuate the injustices with violence. He doesn’t want those dirty fucking trannies to live happy lives. And we shouldn’t even speak of how he seems to feel about the nasty gays and their disgusting sexual habits. Not in His America. Hell no. 

Of course none of that is true. If there is a God how could this entity want anything but happiness and love and full lives for all of its creations? Human beings are the ones who don’t want that. Human beings live in fear of what we don’t understand. Human beings have decided they can speak for this God.

Let’s look specifically at two words in the above mentioned definition of woke: active awareness. That’s it, right there. To be woke is to have an active awareness. Of what? Well, of racism, homophobia, transphobia, misogyny, to name just a few. And with an active awareness, a person can actively work against these negatives. 

So why are so many Christians actively working against being woke? To simply respect and support other people seems like something this man Jesus would do, something very Christlike.

This feels like the perfect time to bring up the word “agenda.” I am aware that many American Christians think anything different, or new, is part of someone’s “agenda.” They love to say these “agendas” are being shoved down their throats. We’ve all heard of the Gay Agenda. Of course now there’s the Trans Agenda. And we can’t forget that old stalwart, the Black Lives Matter Agenda.

Agenda is not a bad word. It’s a plan. And the agenda for any of these movements is to shine a light on the disparities and the prejudices and the treatment of people in these communities. But these “agendas” sure rile people up, don’t they?

It’s American Christian who have the biggest “agenda.” Example: you may be a person that’s against abortion. And that’s fine. You can be against abortion. To me, that means you’re not going to have an abortion.

But many Christians rejoiced when the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, even though that meant millions of women most of who these Christians will never know, lost access to safe and legal abortion. Tell me Christians don’t have an agenda. And theirs is the Agenda being shoved down the throats of too many Americans on a daily basis.

What about your Ten Commandments? What about the Golden Rule? What about “Judge not lest ye be judged?”

Woke merely means I see you. I acknowledge your struggle. I recognize your community hasn’t been treated well. I want to understand. I want to help. I have empathy. I include you.

If I seem frustrated, maybe even a little angry, (and a bit more than anti-Christian) you’re not wrong (and, yes, I am). The truths is I, too, struggle with being woke. But it ain’t that deep. And it sure as hell isn’t something that conservative American Christians should be getting their panties in a twist over.