Wonder and responsibility speak to me as Sunlit Summer speeds by.  As Naturalistic Pagans, our focus is on this real world – giving us both the awe of the world we live in and the commitment to build a better world to help future generations.  Hurricane Beryl reminds me of the importance of truth in helping both our world and our own lives.

Why Hurricane Beryl?

The obvious reason many may have guessed is that hurricane Beryl broke the record for an early, strong hurricane – well before the main hurricane season starts (or, well, at least “used to start” in the previous climate we grew up in, which we’ll never see again).  But for me, no, that’s not the reason, or at least not the main reason.  It’s because with our new climate, which is more dangerous every year, hurricane Beryl reached me here in (formerly hurricane safe) Michigan (as a tropical depression), dropping massive and historical amounts of rain here in the Great Lakes State.  The local lake, of course, gained water, and in the discussions about the water level, the actual data has been very valuable (as a data nerd, I have data going back to early 2021).  As in most discussions, sticking to the data makes agreement much more likely, and focuses the discussion on reality instead of on fantasies from either side (and evolution has guaranteed that we’ll often unknowingly make fantasies to achieve our goals).  This yet again showed me how important sticking to the facts is when discussing something with other humans.

Truth Matters

That’s a very good reason in itself. Yet, now, an even more pressing reason looms.  That reason to pay attention to the truth is that lies are very often used to control and hurt others, as shown time and again throughout the history of authoritarian despots and dictators.  But, like me up in Michigan (and “safe” from hurricanes, right?), we in the US and much of the world are safe from authoritarian dictators, right?
No.  So often we’ve seen that comparative peace shattered.  One example of many is Iran in the ’70s as compared to the ’80s, which some of us were alive to see.  In the 1970’s Iran had a secular democracy (far from perfect, of course, but that’s beyond the scope here).  In 1979, an authoritarian theocracy was able to take over, with the expected loss of freedom and often safety.  We here in the United States are by no means safe from a similar thing happening here.  There are of course many different factors that lead to authoritarian takeovers, but a major factor is the control of vast swaths of the population through propaganda and misinformation, which is what I’m focusing on here.  We’ve already seen the spread of lies used to foment a literal attack on our democracy on January 6th, and many more recent examples of lies being used to advance nationalism and hatred to bolster the march toward authoritarianism, both here in the United States and in many Western Democracies.  The United States presidential election is only ~80 days away, and we are seeing a growing wave of misinformation and lies swelling towards us from many directions already.  As Naturalistic Pagans, we already know that fact checking is vitally important – all the time, and especially now.  There are too many examples of this (such as the constant stream of lies from Trump himself), but here are a few prominent examples.

Republicans using Delusions to Stir Hatred

Both history – such as Hitler’s constant attacks on the “lugenpresse” (the “lying newspapers”) – and Trumps current attacks on the fact checkers who point out his lies, show that open lies are a favorite way of authoritarian leaders to stir up hatred.  Trump has gotten the Republican party to join in even more than in the past, such as when the current speaker (Mike Johnson) peddled a book filled with wild conspiracy fantasies (and of course the standard homophobic and racist slurs), and many more examples which would be depressing to fill this blog with.  This source of a constant stream of harmful lies is one of many.  Another is the active dissemination of lies to Americans by Russia.

Russians Routing Hatred to American News Sources

In addition to internal sources of lies, many of those who are fully enmeshed in the American hate echo chamber are unaware that some of that hate is coming straight from Russia troll farms – which provide a pipeline of Kremlin lies to both American social media as well as major right wing “news” outlets, like One America News Network.  These farms are increasingly sophisticated and now supercharged with generative AI, allowing deepfake photos and even videos to be made of Harris, Walz, and whatever they want them to say or do.  This capability in general is just now becoming more widely known, and could be a significant factor in an election which will likely come to down to a few percent or less of the vote.

Christianity Teaches Gullibility

This topic deserves a whole post at least, but is very relevant here.  With a majority of the United States revering a book that teaches both authoritarianism and, by shutting down critical thinking, gullibility (and it’s of course not limited to the United States), the influence of the bibles and Christianity is especially important to the misinformation topic.  One example of many is the well known and often joked about fact that Christians are an easy mark for Multi-Level Marketing (MLM) scams, where the dupe is fooled into getting additional dupes by recruiting friends and family – or, often, fellow congregants.  This is because the churches work hard to shut down critical thinking, and by doing so, make their congregants into easy targets for these and many other scams.  Similarly, Christians are significantly more likely to embrace a wide range of conspiracy fantasies.  Of the many reasons for this, one is the same shutting down of critical thinking.  This gives those using conspiracy fantasies to drive hatred, authoritarianism, and election results have an open and easy back door into the minds of most Americans – one that they are increasingly using.  Speaking of the fact that the bibles teach authoritarianism from Genesis through Revelation, we can’t be all that surprised at their politics as a result – which is the opposite of Paganism, as investigated in this ongoing series.  The correlation between a wide range of conspiracy fantasies and Christianity makes it no surprise that Christianity also correlates well with one of the most harmful conspiracy fantasies – QAnon.  Another topic that correlates with QAnon belief might be a bit of a surprise, however.

A Pipeline into QAnon, Homophobia & White Supremacy from…. . . . Health &Wellness?

But wait, isn’t the health and wellness community more to the left, progressive side of politics, and QAnon is far right?  Well, I looked for data, and found to my surprise that there isn’t any correlation between alternative medicine and political party.  Well…..   at least there wasn’t in 2019, when those data were taken.  But that was pre-covid, when so many things changed.  One of the biggest changes was the explosion of the anti-vaxxer movement, which drew heavily from (and ironically from) the “health and wellness” community, making a mockery of their name, and causing literally hundreds of thousands of fully preventable deaths.  This explosion was asymmetric politically, because the liar-in-chief had stoked his followers with anti-vax views.  As this asymmetry became widely known, in-group tribalism helped Democrats accept the life-saving vaccines while more and more Republicans saw being anti-vaxx as part of being Republican.  I’d be interested to see the same survey taken today, because there is a lot of overlap between anti-vaxxers and those who reject other parts of modern medicine.  This, coupled with the need to reject evidence to maintain the views of the health and wellness community, led to a stronger and stronger link between anti-vaxxers/health & wellness and other conspiracy fantasies.  With QAnon rapidly taking over more and more of the conspiracy fantasy space (and bringing along with it far-right views), the pipeline from health/wellness/anti-vaxx/homeopathy/ivermectin/HCQ/detox to homophobia, anti-science, sexism, climate denial, & white supremacy became more and more effective.  Of the many places where this can be seen (including, probably, members of your own family), the Qdropped podcast is a compelling and poignant source of story after story where a loved one has been sucked into QAnon and become a different person, starting with health and wellness, or Christianity, or both, and ending up at white supremacy.  Even if you don’t know anyone close to you taken by QAnon (yet…..), this podcast is worth a listen to be better equipped to live in the world around us today.  Do you have someone close to you who is into Health and Wellness?  It might be a good idea to gently check on them.

These, and more, all Contribute to the Tsunami of Misinformation

The harm of all these lies is hard to overestimate.  They ruin lives, they prey on the most vulnerable, and directly threaten our basic human rights in the months ahead.  What can we each do?  First, we can be aware of this threat and gently help when misinformation is spread (instead of just nodding and smiling).  Second, we can find ways to push back, whether that is through supporting podcasts like the Qdropped podcast, or helping loved ones learn critical thinking, and so on.  Also, there are other ways to help which will become apparent in your life now that we all know a little more about what to be aware of.  Lastly, we are just a few weeks away from when you can get a ballot and vote (depending on your state), as well as starting now in helping Harris’ campaign, volunteering, being active, talking with people, and more (additional info coming soon).  With Naturalistic Paganism (and indeed, any naturalistic religion) focused on this real world, political action is an important part of our spirituality for many of us.  For me, knowing I’m helping future generations makes this a fulfilling, enjoyable activity, even if doing what’s right isn’t always the same and doing what is easiest.

Starstuff, Contemplating by Jon Cleland Host

We are assemblages of ancient atoms forged in stars – atoms organized by history to the point of consciousness, now able to contemplate this sacred Universe of which we are a tiny, but wondrous, part.

Dr. Jon Cleland Host is a scientist who earned his PhD in materials science at Northwestern University & has conducted research at Hemlock Semiconductor and Dow Corning since 1997.  He holds eight patents and has authored over three dozen internal scientific papers and eleven papers for peer-reviewed scientific journals, including the journal Nature.  He has taught classes on biology, math, chemistry, physics and general science at Delta College and Saginaw Valley State University.  Jon grew up near Pontiac, and has been building a reality-based spirituality for over 30 years, first as a Catholic and now as a Unitarian Universalist, including collaborating with Michael Dowd and Connie Barlow to spread the awe and wonder of the Great Story of our Universe (see www.thegreatstory.org, and the blog at evolutionarytimes.org).  Jon and his wife have four sons, whom they embrace within a Universe-centered, Pagan, family spirituality.  He currently moderates the yahoo group Naturalistic Paganism.

See Starstuff, Contemplating posts.

See all of Dr. Jon Cleland Host’s posts.