Weekly Roundup: Biden Takes Office While MAGA Nation Wonders What's Next
Brad and Dan discuss the inauguration, including the theological aspects of Biden's speech and the civil religiosity of Biden's approach.
They then transition to how key members on the Right, including Tucker Carlson and Rand Paul, were "offended" by Biden's call to dismantle White Supremacy and what it means going forward.
Dan explains the troubling aspects of the 1776 Report. Brad explains why QAnon and the Proud Boys are in a moment of transition.
They wrap up by discussing how to have empathy for individuals, but persist with unflinching criticism of institutions and movements--especially when it comes to MAGA Nation.
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AXIS MUNDY AXIS MUNDY Welcome to Straight White American Jesus.
My name is Brad Onishi, faculty in Religious Studies at Skidmore College.
Our show is hosted in partnership with the Kapp Center at the University of California Santa Barbara, and I'm here today with my co-host.
I'm Dan Miller, Associate Professor of Religion and Social Thought at Landmark College.
Good to see you, Brad.
Once again, a couple things have happened in the last week or so since we talked.
People have pointed this out, but we've had three Wednesdays in January.
One was the insurrection, the other was impeachment, and now we have the inauguration.
I wanted just to start today, Dan, with a couple comments on the inauguration.
I watched, I cried, I did a lot of things.
I have some thoughts, but you go first.
What do you got?
What did you think on this inauguration day?
Like you, a lot of thoughts.
It was a speech that, in another time, would have felt really vanilla, right?
We'll talk about that.
Lots of pretty tried-and-true America, the great themes, unity, and so on and so forth.
But I honestly have to say, as cynical as I can be, it was really refreshing after five years of lighting the country on fire with Donald Trump.
Some issues with it, obviously, still.
But I'd say, and I think there has to be a shout out to Amanda Gorman, who read that poem.
I think I can be alone in noting that, but it was really amazing and refreshing.
I think Biden had to try to do a lot of things and was pretty effective at Doing that he kind of ran on this candidacy of like returning to normalcy and so forth.
I do think he also called some things out that needed to be called out, but also some really complex things with like appeals to religion and kind of a Christian America thing, which I think is even more complicated with the racial dimension and how that plays out for different groups.
So I think we're going to talk about some of that, but those are some of my sort of quick hit, you know, sort of things that stood out as big issues related to the inauguration.
Yeah, I want to get into the speech a little bit more.
I don't want to miss the fact that we have now our second Catholic president.
You know, in the kind of current environment, just with everything going on, it's easy to miss that.
And it may not be that big a deal.
Some of you are saying, hey, you know, he's still a white Christian guy.
And you're right.
That is true.
But look, if you know anything about the history of John F. Kennedy's presidency and his candidacy for president, This is a big deal.
If you know anything about anti-Catholic bias in the history of this country, it's a big deal.
An even more big deal, I think, to many of you will be the fact that the vice president was sworn in and she is a black Asian woman.
And she is now our vice president.
And some pictures of her fist bumping Obama and others were really, really pretty poignant.
Her I want to just point this out, too.
Her husband is Jewish, and he is now the second gentleman.
There's been some pretty nasty comments on Twitter and other places about how it's so emasculating to be the first second gentleman.
I'm not going to go on this at length today, Dan, but I'll just say we just got to get over this.
These toxic forms of masculinity are just Juvenile and hurtful.
And so the idea that one would be the supportive partner to the first female vice president who's a woman of color, and that somehow makes you less of a man, we're really just in a bad way if that's what we think it means to be masculine.
So later on, on Wednesday, Dan, the vice president, who I just mentioned, Kamala Harris, swore in three new senators, one of them is a black man from Georgia, the other is a Jewish man from Georgia, and the other is a Latino man from California.
So that in itself is pretty monumental when you think about the history of the Senate and the history of this country.
I want to get into the speech a little bit more.
I agree with you that in past days, this would have been like a very cliche kind of speech, right?
Like, come on, Biden.
And I think, you know, Dan, one of the things that's true about Biden is he's kind of one of those guys that is good at cliches.
Like if anybody's watched Ted Lasso, right?
Like Ted Lasso has this contagious energy that just makes you smile even on the days you don't want to.
And, you know, look.
Love or hate Joe Biden or whatever you feel about him, he's got kind of some of that Ted Lasso energy.
Kind of that guy who's happy, he's fist bumping, he's shaking hands, he's talking to kids, he's running over to Al Roker.
And so, you know, in some ways, Dan, I think part of the reason the cliches work for Biden is he's just sort of got that kind of vibe to him.
The other reason, though, is, as you said, four years ago, Trump got up there and said, this American carnage stops now.
OK?
Well, what did Biden say?
He says, we will press forward with speed and urgency for we have much to do in this winter of peril and possibility, much to repair, much to restore, much to heal, much to build and much to gain.
And he's both recognizing the difficulty of the moment, and then providing a tone of hope and saying, we're going to restore and heal and build.
This country in a way that it works for everyone.
That's just drastically different in tone and in scope from four years ago.
So I found that to be interesting.
Dan, from the religion standpoint, he had some biblical references.
He also cited St.
Augustine, which many people noted.
And in talking about you can judge a society or know a society by that which it loves.
And so there was much religion there.
There was much faith there.
And yet in ways that are all too predictable, Many folks on the right said, oh, look at this godless communist takeover.
The cognitive dissonance and that kind of stuff to me is incredible, Dan.
Anyway, I got one or two more things to say about Biden's inauguration and speech, but throw it back to you.
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