Weekly Roundup: Disney World: The Wokest Place on Earth
It's a small world after all. So small we can go from Florida to Alaska to Arizona to California in one episode. A magically tragic journey through American politics and history.
Brad and Dan begin the road trop in Florida, where Uncle Ron DeSantis has labeled Disney the wokest place on earth due to its opposition for the Don't Say Gay bill. Marjorie Taylor Greene stated that Disney wants to indoctrinate children with sexual filth. While it's laughable to think of Disney as "woke," the absolute temper tantrum GOP leaders have thrown over this matter is reflective of how extremism has become the only virtue in GOP politics.
In order to understand how this works and where it came from, Brad and Dan turn to the news that Sarah Palin is running for Congress in Alaska. While this may not seem like big news nationally, it opens a window into the "Palinization" of politics over the last fifteen years. Brad and Dan recall how and why John McCain chose Palin as his running mate and what this unleashed in the Republican party: Birtherism, the Tea Party, obstructionism, xenophobia, and so on.
From an examination of McCain, they look to his predecessor in the Senate, Barry Goldwater, who also ran for president and courted radical White Christians in order to get ahead in the polls. What emerges from this picture is a look at American politics that shows how for 65 years Republicans have tried to use extremists for political gain, only to unleash a disease on the American body politic.
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Link to Satanic Panic Episode: https://getpodcast.com/podcast/straight-white-american-jesus/satanic-panic-then-and-now_1c0f630e61
Link to the Graham and Dias article at NYT: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/06/us/christian-right-wing-politics.html
Link to Goldwater's remarks on regretting alliance with White Christian nationalists: https://www.nytimes.com/1981/09/16/us/excerpts-from-goldwater-remarks.html
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Axis Mundi Welcome to Straight White American Jesus.
My name is Brad Onishi, faculty at the University of San Francisco.
Our show is sponsored in partnership with the Kapp Center at UCSB.
I'm here today with my co-host.
Dan Miller, associate professor of religion and social thought at Landmark College.
Always good to be with you, Brad.
A couple other things that we want to just mention is that we are both also trauma resolution practitioners with the Center for Trauma Resolution and Recovery.
We value the work that they do.
Been supporters of us for a while and for those who we know we get a lot of people who reach out trying to do faith deconstruction and figure out where to go from here and overcoming really complex legacies of religion that maybe go beyond the kinds of things that we do on the podcast.
Just want people to know about that resource.
I also want to thank you for your support this week.
I've got two things.
One is pretty minor.
I've got the first head cold I've had in like two years.
I did test negative for COVID on a quick test, like an itchy sore throat.
I'm like, quick, I better test for COVID.
So I've got that.
But some people know, some listeners will know, I unexpectedly lost my brother this last week.
So, thank you, Brad, for your support with that.
I know that there are people who listen to this who know me and who've been in touch about that and just everybody there.
His name was Chris.
We loved him and he'll be missed.
So, thanks for helping me take the load this week.
Yeah, well, just...
Obviously, thinking of you, Dan, and your family, you know, all the people who were affected by Chris's passing.
And anyway, it is for me, you know, these things are always a good reminder.
I'm also traveling on the one-year anniversary of a friend who died by suicide.
And I think for, you know, just thinking about all these things this week, it's like, for me, it's a reminder of what happens at the Center for Trauma Resolution Recovery.
And that is to say, just a place where if you feel like there's just You don't know where to talk to someone about really hard stuff.
You know, just reach out and, and, and see, because it's, it is worth it.
It's always worth it to talk to somebody about, about what's going on.
So we'll leave it there.
And, um, just one more announcement before we get going, friends.
A lot of, you know, we have Sarah Mosliner's Purity, Culture, Race, and Embodiment seminar coming up in May.
And we're excited about it.
We have some spots left, but I will tell you spots are kind of going every day.
We get somebody signed up.
And so I think here in the next couple of weeks, we're going to.
Be tilting towards full.
So if you are interested, I would say sign up as soon as you can.
If you have questions, just reach out and definitely we'll clear anything up that you need to know.
We're working on our Swag Apparel, I promise.
And we're also working on another seminar that we're hopefully going to announce in the next couple of weeks.
So we'll have that soon.
Sorry Brad, just wanted to jump in real quick.
I said this in my series as well, but about Sarah's work.
Sarah was the one who, a number of years ago now, through her work, I didn't know her personally then, really introduced me to and kind of opened my eyes to the racial dimensions of purity culture at a time when I think I still didn't really fully see that.
So just really, I find her work groundbreaking and we're fortunate to have her and really excited to have it.
So people who are interested in that, I think you'll really be rewarded by it.
That's well said.
Absolutely well said.
And so, all right, Dan, I want to start with a quote today.
Friends, this is today.
We're going to do a fun episode of a little bit of like murder mystery theater, a little bit of like winding journey across America.
We're going to go from Florida to Alaska to California.
It's going to be a really fun trip.
It's going to be like one of those, you know, old Chevy chase movies where everyone's on vacation in the station wagon.
It's going to be really good.
Okay.
Instead of Wally World, it'll feature lots of Disney.
There's a lot of Disney.
That's it.
There it is, Dan.
You're giving away spoilers already.
So, here we go.
Let's talk a quote.
Here it is, Dan.
Some of you are going to know the quote.
If you know the quote, just keep it to yourself.
No need to be shouting.
Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice.
Moderation and pursuit of justice is no virtue.
All right?
So if I was in class, I'd say, all right, write that down.
Extremism and defense of liberty is not a vice and moderation is not a virtue.
All right, we're going to come back to that quote, Dan, at the end in a little bit.
But before that, Let's start our winding journey in Florida.
So, some of you have kept up on the news, some of you haven't, but the Don't Say Gay Bill, as it has come to be known, has passed in Florida and right at the end there, there was a push by Disney to kind of oppose the bill after so many employees came out and said, this cannot stand.
Now, it really was, and if you see it differently, I'm open to your interpretation, Dan, but it really, to me, just looked like corporate waffling, like where are the winds going on this, and we'll just take whatever side seems to be more popular.
However, since Disney has really come out in opposition to the bill and law, Uncle Ron DeSantis and others like Marjorie Taylor Greene and many in Florida have used this as a way to target Disney as somehow, and this is what Disney's being called now, it is now being called the wokest place on earth.
So here's what DeSantis said recently.
I think you have companies like Disney that are going to say and criticize parents' rights.
They're going to criticize the fact that we don't want transgenderism in kindergarten and first grade classrooms.
If that's the hill they're going to die on, then how do they possibly explain lining their pockets with their relationship from Communist Party of China?
Because that's what they do and they make a fortune and they don't say a word about the really brutal practices that you see over there at the hands of the CCP.
And so in Florida, our policy is going to Going to be based on the best interests of Florida citizens, not the musings of woke corporations.
So, this is a really astounding statement, Dan.
Like, Uncle Ron is a pro.
He got in here words like parents' rights, which is the new buzzword for the Don't Say Gay Bill in Florida.
It's all about parents' rights, right?
I mean, and that's just a classic way, a very effective way to spin this.
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