Fundamentalism
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==Insignificant fundamentalists== | ==Insignificant fundamentalists== | ||
* [[Mike Huckabee]] | * [[Mike Huckabee]] | ||
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* Any fundamentalist [[sect]] leader with fewer than fifty adherents who doesn't successfully lead them all into mass suicide. | * Any fundamentalist [[sect]] leader with fewer than fifty adherents who doesn't successfully lead them all into mass suicide. | ||
Revision as of 23:40, 11 September 2008
Fundamentalism is a reactionary tendency exhibited by significant minorities within most major religions. Fundamentalists seek to recapture a supposed ideological "purity," often by reasserting the primacy of their own idiosyncratic interpretation of religious texts over centuries of acquired knowledge and practice. This puts them at odds not only with the secular world and members of other religions, but also with their less zealous brethren.
Christianity contains within it an actual movement called "fundamentalism", founded around the time of the First World War.
Fundamentalists are sometimes nicknamed "fundies" or "Fundy loons".
Contents |
Introduction
Fundamentalist rhetoric is frequently apocalyptic in order to provide their crusade with a driving theological imperative. Typically: the secular world has become decadent and corrupt; their co-religionists have become tainted by it; and [insert deity of choice] is but a short time away from unleashing its loving Wrath upon the whole sorry mess. Only those who attain their stipulated degree of "purity" will be saved. In more extreme cases, only the 'elect', or those chosen before birth for salvation, have the opportunity for salvation, and those less fortunate, no matter how saintly, are doomed to damnation by a fickle and capricious deity.
Although such rhetoric may serve to recruit wavering co-religionists to the cause, it also serves as a natural limiting factor on how successful fundamentalist thought can be outside of these circles. Put simply, the majority of people respond very poorly to such a relentlessly negative message. That they then champion 1000+ year old texts over the explanatory width and depth of modern science leaves the widespread acceptance of fundamentalist thought utterly hamstrung. After said date of apocalyptic fury, you'd expect for there to be apologies to those who believed. Instead, however, a new date is often set. This can get boring and lead to de-conversions after the fifth time someone has given away all their worldly goods in anticipation of the apocalypse. Thus fundamentalism is often doing harm to its own cause.
Etymology
There is some debate as to the origin of the term. The two main ideas are referred to as the bottom up hypothesis and the top down hypothesis
- Bottom up: says that the term is derived from the word fundament, which is a polite word for asshole. Support for this contention is to be found amongst the rank and file fundamentalists.
- Top down: suggests that the term is derived from an amalgamation of the words fund a mental. Support for this idea is to be found in the leaders of the fundamentalist organisations and their pre-occupation with people sending them money in spite of their obvious less-than-stellar intellect.
So far the evidence for each hypothesis is equally balanced and no firm conclusion may be drawn. However, a recent idea suggests that this may be a case of convergent etymology, where the same word has been applied to different things that have over the years formed some sort of symbiotic relationship, so that the same word now applies to the almost indistinguisable amalgum of the two groups. Support for this hypothesis is found amongst the fundamentalist leaders who are also assholes, and the number of rank and file fundamentalists who have a pre-occupation with money and clear signs of a less than robust intellect.
Characteristics of Fundamentalists
- Religious idealism is basis for personal and communal identity;
- Fundamentalists understand truth to be revealed and unified;
- It is intentionally scandalous (outsiders cannot understand it and will always be outsiders);
- Fundamentalists envision themselves as part of a cosmic struggle;
- They seize on historical moments and reinterpret them in light of this cosmic struggle;
- They demonize their opposition and are reactionary;
- Fundamentalists are selective in what parts of their tradition and heritage they stress;
- They are primarily led by a narrow demographic (e.g. white males);
- They envy modernist cultural hegemony and try to overturn the distribution of power.[1]
Significant fundamentalists
- George W. Bush
- Osama Bin Laden
- Ayatollah Khomeni
- Meir Kahane
- A bunch of convicts who used to be "famous".
Insignificant fundamentalists
- Mike Huckabee
- Sarah Palin
- Any fundamentalist sect leader with fewer than fifty adherents who doesn't successfully lead them all into mass suicide.
Really insignificant fundamentalists
Religious Fundamentalism and Education
One of the tenets of religious fundamentalism is how easy it is for the "pure" to be spoiled, which leads to a desire for as much of life as possible to be lived outside of mainstream society. Obviously the unrestrained contact with others of different opinions/beliefs is dangerous to the young fundamentalist, and avoiding such opportunities may be acheived by homeschooling, or in whole institutions dedicated to mainitaing the purity of the schooled, with the added advantage of captive audiences who are more easily indoctrinated. See Pensacola Christian College for a prime example.
External Links
All Fundamentalists Believe The Same Things
How To Think Like a Fundamentalist
Fundies Say the Darndest things!