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naraburns  nihil supernum  2yr ago (text post)   32430 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 31, 2022

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Apologies if this is too culture war-y

If I told you that public servants in a Western country were forced (by social pressure) to pray at the beginning of meetings, what kind of prayers do you think they were and what side of the political spectrum would the social pressure come from?

In the US context, one would assume I was referring to right-wing Christianity, but here in New Zealand it is becoming more and more expected to pray in Maori before meetings. Many of these prayers refer to Jesus or the Christian god, or the pre-contact Maori deities.

The stranger part to US ears (perhaps) is that this is mainly pushed by the more left/woke type of people. While I know that other Anglo countries do like to integrate indigenous spirituality into land acknowledgements etc, I believe only the NZ public service has gone out to this extent.

Since land acknowledgements have already spread around the Anglo world, I wonder if this forced spirituality will also spread. Certainly Australians I have spoken to (at least liberal Australians) talk about the integration of indigenous spirituality as a desirable outcome.

I think it makes sense, and it's not an indication of a trend towards sincere spirituality. I see it as a two-birds-one-stone move: (1) elevate indigenous people and secure their loyalty, (2) shame and humiliate your conservative opponents by covering yourself in sacredness (while not changing what you want to accomplish).

If indigenous religion were in any way a powerful force in NZ culture, it would be castigated, not adopted by the left.

The stranger part to US ears (perhaps) is that this is mainly pushed by the more left/woke type of people. While I know that other Anglo countries do like to integrate indigenous spirituality into land acknowledgements etc, I believe only the NZ public service has gone out to this extent.

The key asymmetry, as with Islam, is that people on the left tend to see indigenous spirituality as non-threatening, whereas the threat of a return to the dark ages of white Christianity (like the 1950s) is still a big fear, especially in the US. Of course, very liberal Christianity and black Christianity of any kind doesn't attract the same fear, because they are either liberal, seen as not a threat (and likely to change their minds as they progress anyway) or both.

The word prayer is fairly apt, for the 'acknowledgement of country' that's made at the start of many Australian meetings, lectures and public events. There are even theological disputes!

Per NSW university:

“I would like to show my respects and acknowledge the Bedegal people who are the Traditional Custodians of the Land on which this meeting takes place, and to Elders past and present”.

“I would like to acknowledge the Bedegal people that are the Traditional Custodians of this land. I would also like to pay my respects to the Elders both past and present and extend that respect to other Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders who are present here today.”

The more recent practice of acknowledging “emerging leaders” or “Elders past, present, and emerging” is generally not accepted practice in the Indigenous community and should not be used.

Apparently we have moved on from 'emerging elders' since nobody knows who is an emerging elder. 'First Australians' is also out since many don't identify as Australian.

If you want to stress how woke you are, you can also go for 'sovereignty was never ceded'. This is what the NGOs are promulgating: https://acij.org.au/about-us/acknowledgement-of-country/

We acknowledge the Traditional Owners and Custodians of the lands on which we work and pay our respects to Indigenous Elders past, present and emerging. Sovereignty has never been ceded. It always was and always will be, Aboriginal land.

We recognise the past atrocities against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples of this land and that Australia was founded on the genocide and dispossession of First Nations people. We acknowledge that colonial structures and policies remain in place today and recognise the ongoing struggles of First Nations people in dismantling those structures. The struggle to seek justice, to remember and address this nation’s past is ongoing and is a necessary requirement for individual and collective healing process.

Of course, sovereignty was ceded, as is obvious from observing who controls the country and who is internationally recognized to control the country. These are legal terms, you can't just say that sovereignty resides somewhere it doesn't.

The US had this fight over prayer in schools, etc. It was thoroughly resolved in favor of separating church and state.

I'd be truly shocked to see it happen again on a larger-than-county scale. Both teams are hypersensitive to the topic, or were 20 years ago.

But then again, I have yet to witness a land acknowledgment in person, despite attending school in Oklahoma. So perhaps I don't have any perspective for what people are willing to do.

It is already happening. Just quietly enough for the people claiming it's not happening to switch to "and it was good" before they're ever confronted about it.

I don't follow.

Is that supposed to refer to me? Because I'm firmly disestablishmentarian, with no intention of switching.

Where is this already happening?

The US had this fight over prayer in schools, etc. It was thoroughly resolved in favor of separating church and state.

This is, by the way, one of those decisions that would seem completely absurd to the founders of the country. They very much did not believe that US constitution demanded separation of church and state (even if they personally believed it would be desirable). For example, when the US Constitution was passed, Massachusetts literally had state religion. From Massachusetts constitution of 1780:

Art. III. As the happiness of a people and the good order and preservation of civil government essentially depend upon piety, religion, and morality, and as these cannot be generally diffcused through a community but by the institution of the public worship of God and of the public instructions in piety, religion, and morality: Therefore, To promote their happiness and to secure the good order and preservation of their government, the people of this commonwealth have a right to invest their legislature with power to authorize and require, and the legislature shall, from time to time, authorize and require, the several towns, parishes, precincts, and other bodies-politic or religious societies to make suitable provision, at their own expense, for the institution of the public worship of God and for the support and maintenance of public Protestant teachers of piety, religion, and morality in all cases where such provision shall not be made voluntarily.

Not only requiring prayer in school was allowed in Massachusetts, in fact in 1791 Massachusetts passed a law that literally required Sunday church attendance (to be fair, this was never enforced). There was really no question about the constitutionality of this: at the time, the bill of rights was understood to apply mostly to federal, not state governments. The current jurisprudence is very much dependent on 14th amendment, and the incorporation doctrine.

Well, yeah. Add it to the long list of reasons why I'm not an originalist.

The decision would only seem absurd to the founders because they didn't have the 14th. Given that we added it, incorporation is legally sound. I'm sure some founders would object to it as federal overreach, but that's a values disagreement, not a sign of incoherence.

Yes, I did not mean to imply that the current doctrine is incoherent or is standing on the shaky basis (as did, for example, Roe v Wade decision, or still does most of the federal regulatory apparatus based on the unintended interpretation of interstate commerce clause). My point was simply that separation of church and state, contrary to what many people seem to believe, has not been one of the founding principle of this country, and in many states, quite the contrary.

I'd say current Establishment Clause doctrine is approximately as foundationless as RvW and other misadventures, though at least Lemon is now actually dead rather than zombie-doctrine. Properly speaking, the Establishment Clause ought to be a dead letter in practical terms, though technically existing in a legal sense. It's also one of the clauses that makes no coherent sense to apply to the states via 14th Amendment incorporation (unlike much of the rest of the Bill of Rights).

Per the original sense of the phrase and, you know, its actual words, the Establishment Clause stood for two things: first, the federal government was specifically barred from recognizing an established national church; and second, the federal government was barred from interfering--pro or con--in the decision of any state to recognize an established state church, or de-recognizing an established state church. Everything else hung on the Establishment Clause is without a legitimate foundation. Yes, the Supreme Court disagrees with me; it is wrong.

It's practically speaking a dead letter now because the state practice of recognizing a state church--though widespread at the Founding--fell out of favor over the next few decades. No state has had an established church for about 200 years, and the practice is well well outside the Overton Window everywhere in America (and properly so, sorry British people).

That is strange. Does NZ have a separation of church and state?

We do not! For example, Christian religious education still occurs in public schools, with an opt-out process. Officially, we have a constitutional monarchy that is still integrated with the Anglican church.

With that said, it's worth noting that the karakia that are being said before meetings are not always Christian and, in fact, need not refer to any specific God or denomination. For example, this document (Warning: PDF) on Māori Culture and Tikanga for the Workplace suggests a karakia that it translates as follows:

I summon from above, below, within, from the outside environment, to calm and settle the vital inner essence, the well-being of everyone. Be joined, together, united!

Bit of a clumsy translation, it's probably more elegant in the original language. As you can see, this is sort of vaguely spiritual without committing to any specific religion.

Seems like a nice sentiment. I have trouble getting upset over godless modern folks desperately grasping for some sort of spiritual relevance. Not believing in a higher power gets pretty tough, it ain’t easy being godless!

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