Chapter 7: Power-Hungry Oppressors
The view from Secular Social Justice Activists
-questionable sociological, psychological, and political theories are making their way into the church under the label “social justice”
-mixing social justice and the gospel on positions on race, gender, sexuality, and the culture’s ideas of social justice
***we do not fear gay people, transgender people, black people, brown people, or Muslims
Social Justice questions:
-What does being white have to do with views being right or wrong?
-What does it mean to secure the “privilege” of Christianity?
-Why is there an assumption that Christians want to hoard power?
-Why would biblical positions on race, gender, and sexuality imply to anyone that Christians want to “resist equality, curb diversity, and keep marginalized people where they are?”
-popular secular social justice thinking is rooted in a philosophy called critical theory
-Christian views of justice are wrong
-Christians are seen as oppressors who use power to keep marginalized people down
***there are a lot of injustices in the world, and humans have a responsibility to do something about it
Injustice:
-bottom line is the world is a desperately broken place
-bottom line is the world is indeed full of injustice
Bible:
-agrees that many injustices exist
-agrees that many of those injustices don’t have to exist because humans have the ability to make things better
-agrees that human lives matter because every human is made in the image of God
-agrees that God cares about the just functioning of societies, so when injustices exist humans can do something about them
Proverbs 31: 8-9
“Open your mouth for the mute, for the rights of all who are destitute. Open your mouth, judge righteously, defend the rights of the poor and needy.”
Jeremiah 22:3
“Thus says the Lord: Do justice and righteousness, and deliver from the hand of the oppressor him who has been robbed. And do no wrong or violence to the resident alien, the fatherless, and the widow, nor shed innocent blood in this place.”
Mich 6:8
“He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?”
Matthew 23:23
“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others.”
-everyone agrees injustice exists and we can do something about it, but we disagree on how to define injustice and what to do about it once we define it
Defining Injustice:
-justice is making right that which is wrong
-right and wrong are moral categories requiring a standard
-Christians and secular social justice activists have such divergent views on justice
-as Christians, we look to God’s perfect character is the objective standard for determining what is right and wrong
-His standards should be used to identify the wrongs that should be made right and direct how we should work for biblically accurate notions of justice
***If you use any standards other than God’s to define what’s just or unjust, you’re going to get justice wrong
Injustice: Neo-Marxist standards
-Christians and secular social justice activists have different understandings of justice because we use different standards for defining the wrongs that should be made right
-important to note the nature of the standard used by culture
-culture sees Christians not only as wrong but as power hungry oppressors
-reminder, that secular social justice thinking is rooted in a philosophy called critical race theory
-CRT is usually known in academic and activist circles
-BLM (Black Lives Matter) was propelled into popularity through the use of CRT
-BLM put into practice the CRT social justice propaganda
***CRT=Cultural outrage toward Christians
***CRT=new political order where socialists define the notion of equity
***CRT=standard of injustice
CRT:
-critical theory-based justice fundamentally differs from biblical notions of justice
-critical theory’s framework leads to cultural outrage toward Christians
-critical theory is an academic discipline that grew out of Marxism in the mid-1800s
-Karl Marx argued that all of history had been one long economic class struggle between oppressed and oppressor groups
-the oppressed (proletariat) labored to produce goods while the oppressors (bourgeoisie) controlled the means of production
-oppression is the result of this problematic social structure
-the oppressed must be liberated by overthrowing the system in a revolution
-the revolutionaries would create a new political order based on socialist-defined notion of equality = equal outcome for all; not equal opportunity for all, but equal outcome for all
-1930’s, intellectuals at the Frankfurt School in Germany took Marx’s binary way of looking at the world through oppressor and oppressed categories and began extending it beyond economics
-the framework added identity markers such as race, gender, sexuality, and several other identity markers
-marker: working class in Marx’s analysis are people of color, women, and those in the LGBTQ community
-these society classes are identified as victims of social structures that kept them oppressed by those in power
-they are considered oppressed because dominant groups were imposing their norms, values, and expectations on them
***neo-Marxist analysis is a “social binary” in which everyone fits into one of two groups-oppressor and oppressed based on each of their identity markers
-any given individual may fall into both the oppressor and oppressed groups depending on their unique mix of identity characteristics
Intersectionality: people experience distinct forms of oppression based on their specific mix of memberships in oppressed groups (the interaction of these oppressions)
-it is important to understand that from the perspective of critical theory that individuals don’t have to experience anything in particular to be considered oppressed
-the oppressed-oppressor binary is a social group phenomenon based on presumed power dynamics in society
Oppress: is to hold down, to press, and deny a social group full access and potential in a given society
Oppression: occurs when one group is able to enforce its prejudice and discrimination throughout society because it controls its institutions
Ex. sexism, racism, classism, ableism, heterosexism are specific forms of oppression
Critical theory-based justice:
-the standard for identifying where the injustice of oppression lies in the dividing line of the social binary
-identity groups that hold the power in society (the oppressors)
-oppressors are the perpetrators of injustice
-identity groups with less power in society (the oppressed)
-the oppressed are the victims of injustice
-secular social justice advocates are working to right injustices that aren’t truly injustices
-they have started with the false standard of neo-Marxist social binary
-Chistians work for social outcomes in conflict with those deemed “just” according to critical their
-Therefore, Christians are despised for their “oppressive” views
***the only accurate standard for identifying justice and injustice is God’s standard because God’s standard isn’t based on who does or doesn’t hold power in society; it’s based on His perfect moral character
Critical Race Theory: Example 1
-CRT is a branch of critical theory that deals specifically with race-based oppression in society
-white people are the oppressors and people of color are the oppressed
-white people use their social privilege and power to impose whiteness on everyone else
***whiteness is not about skin color as some may suggest, but it’s the culture of white people that is problematically imposed on everyone else
“Whitness refers to the ways white people and their traditions, attitudes, and ways of life have been normalized over this and are now considered standard practices in the United States. And since white people still hold most of the institutional power in America, we have all internalized some aspects of white culture–including people of color” (Smithsonian National Museum of African American History).
-this definition assumptions of Whiteness in the United States
-there are dozens of alleged examples of whiteness:
-such as believing in the nuclear family as an ideal social unit
-any of the Judeo-Christian traditions or Christian holiday norms now labeled “Christian”
-belief in hard work is the key to success
-respect for authority
-being polite
-preference for bland foods like steak and potatoes
**many ot the examples of presumably problematic whiteness are not actually problematic
-therein lies the issue
***Critical theory starts from a belief that it’s inherently unjust for a dominant group to impose norms, values and expectations on minority groups but never considers where those norms, values, and expectations might be objectively good
Ex God’s ideal social unity is the nuclear family
-Biblically, the perspective of racial injustice cannot be identified by the dividing line of CRT’s social binary because no group is an oppressor or guilty of sin due solely to their skin color
-people are guilty when they transgress God’s moral law
-Christians who reject CRT-based categories of justice are viewed as not just merely wrong in their views, but are evil racial oppressors
-Christians will be treated with great grave moral indignation
***Objective thinking is listed as a trait of whiteness
***anything objective Christian worldview is oppressive
-the resented concept of whiteness is closely associated with Christianity itself because America’s predominantly white European heritage was also predominantly Christian
-many norms, values, expectations associated with white people in America are basically objectively good yet are seen to be oppressive
Ex. the nuclear family is part of God’s objective design for human flourishing and has historically been an American norm given America’s Christian heritage
Queer Theory: Example 2
-queer theory is the branch of critical theory that deals with gender identity and sexual oppression in society
-in queer theory, cisgender and heterosexual people are the oppressors (cisgenders refers to people whose gender identity corresponds with their biological sex)
-those in the LGBTQ+ community are the oppressed
-in CRT, oppressors impose witness on the oppressed
-in queer theory, oppressors impose cisheteronormativity on the oppressed (cisheteronormativity refers to the idea that groups in power have arbitrarily made being cisgender and heterosexual the norms in society so oppress those who deviate from the norms)
***queer theorists claim that categories of gender (male and female) and sexuality (heterosexual and homosexual) are merely social constructs
-ideas created by society rather than ideas reflecting any essential truth independent of society’s beliefs
-anything heralded as “normal” identity is therefore oppressive to those who have a different way of “being”
***to be queer is to resist these normative power structures
-queer theory activists ultimately seek to rid society of its “oppressive” gender binary
-queer theory sets out to have ultimate influence on the next generation through the k-12 public education systems nationwide
***queer theory has infiltrated the educational system through supportive school district policies, formal teacher trainings, and gender and sexual clubs
-gender binary has created an unjust society and must be dismantled
-the cisheteronormativity that oppresses gender and sexual minorities must be destroyed
Change the language:
-there has been a promotion of linguistic revolution
Ex. calling men “people with a penis,” and women “people with a vulva”
Changes in strategy:
-facilitating student gender transitions without parental consent
-encouraging boundless sexual experimentation all in the name of justice
-the false standard of social binary incorrectly identifies racial oppression and incorrectly identifies gender and sexual oppression
***it is not oppressive for society to have norms around gender and sexuality if those norms reflect God’s design for humanity
-Scripture is clear that both the gender binary and heterosexual marital unions are indeed God’s design
Genesis 1:27
“So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.”
Matthew 19: 4-6
“For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife and the two will become one flesh. So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.”
Ephesians 5:32
“For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.”
***norms against which secular social justice activists rail are part of God’s objectively good design
-in the eyes of culture, Christians are guilty of upholding oppressive norms that perpetuate injustice and harm
-if we work to tear down gender and sexuality norms in the name of justice we are actually working against what God Himself wants for humanity
***our love for God and our love for others should lead us to actively work against queer theory’s manifestations in culture because falsehoods about gender and sexuality are what truly cause harm
Christianity is life-giving, not oppressive:
-truth is never oppressive
Lies:
-claims that objective truth are a disguised power play by dominant social groups who want to retain their privilege
-biblical views on race, gender, and sexuality resist equality, curb diversity, and keep marginalized people where they are
-motivated only by keeping marginalized social groups down
-doesn’t want all groups to be equal
-doesn’t value diversity because we want to keep benefiting from our dominant group’s social privilege
***CRT states you must define, defend, and seek justice in terms other than those corresponding with the standard of the social binary
***when culture wrongly accuses us with perpetuating oppression, injustice, and harm, it’s initially tempting to be shamed into silence
--no one likes to be on the receiving end of such alarming accusations
-we must stay resilient in the body of Christ as we face today’s moral condemnation
“When we work to make right that which is wrong in society as defined by God’s standards; therefore work against evil perpetrated in the name of justice as defined by culture’s standards–we embody life-giving truth for the common good. And truth is never oppressive. It’s what sets people free.”
Musts to Understand:
-Jesus cared about justice, but He didn’t define justice in the same way as many social justice advocates do today
-today’s culture, injustice is defined in terms of the power dynamics between entire social groups
Ex. men vs. women, white people vs. people of color
-the Bible defines justice based on God’s objective standards of right and wrong regardless of who holds power in society
-Jesus’s view of justice is often at odds with the view typically held by those labeled social justice warriors today
***CRT is not neutral
-critical theory is not just an analytical tool, so Christians opposing it are not just overreacting
-it is not accurate to say that those who embrace critical theory merely want everyone to analyze the world in the same way
-CRT wants to use the analysis to revolutionize the structure of society to achieve the ends that are at odds with a biblical understanding of justice
-critical theory’s analysis of society fundamentally differs with that of the Bible because its definition of oppression on the social binary rather than God’s objective standards of right and wrong
***queer theory portrays Christianity as oppressive
-the Bible teaches that every human is equally and inherently valuable and that Christians are to love everyone accordingly
-the Bible also teaches that God has a design for human gender and sexuality so when we sin we do harm to ourselves
-it’s not oppressive to disagree with someone else’s views on morality
Ex.if true then that would mean that the LGBTQ+ community is oppressive to Christians so oppressive works both ways
***CRT claims if Christians reject it then they are ignoring systemic racial oppression
-Christians do recognize the reality of racial oppression (they would not have fought a war to free the enslaved if they just wanted to keep racial oppression as the status quo)
-CRT prescribes a specific way of evaluating systemic racism through the lens of the social binary
-Christians who reject CRT are rejecting the methods of defining, identifying, and ending systemic racism
-Christian do not reject that systemic racism can exist or that Christians should work to abolish such racism when accurately identified according to God’s standards
***Christianity is not in isolation a “white man’s religion” nor therefore oppressive
-there is no doubt that throughout history people have committed all kinds of atrocities in the name of Christianity
-many people associate Christianity with white slaveholders or violent white European colonizers
-we have to recognize that there is a difference between the actions of people who claim the name of Christ and what the Bible actually teaches
***the truthfulness of Christianity doesn’t stand or fall on how people (of any race) have used or misused biblical teachings; it stand or falls on whether or not Jesus was raised from the dead
“And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith” (1 Corinthians 15: 14).
What to do:
-check organizations to see if they receive government funding because they are more likely subject to rules that enforce adherence to critical theory
-watch for trainings that promote CRT and queer theory
Ex. enforcement of desired transgender pronouns
-pray for, volunteer, and donate to Christian organizations dedicated to poverty and disaster relief around the world
-pray for, volunteer, and donate to Christian organizations dedicated to eliminating human trafficking and rehabilitating survivors
-pray for, volunteer, and donate to Christian organizations fighting religious persecution
-pray for, volunteer, and donate to gospel rescue missions
-provide a home to children temporarily or permanently separated from their birth family (foster care)
-help make it possible for low-income and single-parent families in our church community to choose homeschooling or Christian private schools
-find out more about and get involved in our church’s service opportunities