Type of bind: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 322.10973
Format: Bargain Price
Label: Free Press
Manufacturer: Free Press
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 272
Printing Date: January 09, 2007
Publishing house: Free Press
Sale Popularity Level: 289795
Studio: Free Press
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Twenty-five years ago, when Pat Robertson and other radio and televangelists very first spoke of the United States becoming a Christian nation that would build a global Christian empire, it was hard to take such hyperbolic rhetoric seriously. Today, such language no longer sounds like hyperbole but poses, instead, a very real threat to our freedom and our way of life. In American Fascists, Chris Hedges, veteran journalist and author of the National Book Award finalist War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning, challenges the Christian Right's religious legitimacy and argues that at its core it is a mass movement fueled by unbridled nationalism and a hatred for the open society.
Hedges, who grew up in rural parishes in upstate New York where his father was a Presbyterian pastor, attacks the movement as someone steeped in the Bible and Christian tradition. He points to the hundreds of senators and members of Congress who have earned between 80 and 100 percent approval ratings from the three most influential Christian Right advocacy groups as one of many signs that the movement is burrowing deep inside the American government to subvert it. The movement's call to dismantle the wall between church and state and the intolerance it preaches against all who do not conform to its warped vision of a Christian America are pumped into tens of millions of American homes through Christian television and radio stations, as well as reinforced through the curriculum in Christian schools. The movement's yearning for apocalyptic violence and its assault on dispassionate, intellectual inquiry are laying the foundation for a new, frightening America.
American Fascists, which includes interviews and coverage of events such as pro-life rallies and weeklong classes on conversion techniques, examines the movement's origins, its driving motivations and its dark ideological underpinnings. Hedges argues that the movement currently resembles the young fascist movements in Italy and Germany in the 1920s and '30s, movements that often masked the full extent of their drive for totalitarianism and were willing to make concessions until they achieved unrivaled power. The Christian Right, like these early fascist movements, does not openly call for dictatorship, nor does it use
physical violence to suppress opposition. In short, the movement is not yet revolutionary. But the ideological architecture of a Christian fascism is being cemented in place. The movement has roused its followers to a fever pitch of despair and fury. All it will take, Hedges writes, is one more national crisis on the order of September 11 for the Christian Right to make a concerted drive to destroy American democracy. The movement awaits a crisis. At that moment they will reveal themselves for what they truly are -- the American heirs to fascism. Hedges issues a potent, impassioned warning. We face an imminent threat. His book reminds us of the dangers liberal, democratic societies face when they tolerate the intolerant.
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Rated by buyers 
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Every American should read this book by Chris Hedges. As an avid reader of all types of literature, without a doubt, this is the best book I have ever read. Hedges explains to us what some of the underlining facts are of this group, and how they are effecting American government and society. It is amazing how the Christian Right have distorted true Christianity.
Rated by buyers 
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After seeing all the rave reviews here I borrowed a copy of this book. But scanning the very first chapter I found that Mr. Hedges apparently doesn't understand covenants or dispensations. To cite harsh Levitical law, outdated by the New Covenant of Christ, and judge it by today's standards - and by God's standard for yesterday - and use it to discredit the Bible is either ignorant or dishonest. If one thing is clear in the New Testament, it is that Christians are bound by the Spirit, not the letter, of the law.
Sorry, but this is not a valid foundation on which to build a case against the religious right. Unwilling to suffer through succeeding chapters of similar error, the book immediately went back to the library.
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My husband is reading it right now, he's loving it, I will read it next!
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Superbly written, highly informative and devastating exposé of the dominionist movement of the Christian right. Having experienced first-hand the deceptive tactics of these pious liars, I can say without the slightest hesitation that Hedges' analysis is right on the money. His description of the recruitment ploys, the psychological control mechanisms, and the exploitation of self-doubt, fear, guilt and shame in chapter 3 were as poignant as they were true to life of my own experiences as a believer many years ago. His account of attending a Dr. James Kennedy Evangelism Explosion seminar was riveting and brought back so many memories of my own ordeal.
Make no mistake, this movement is dangerous. The end game for them is theocracy and the death of democratic freedoms in America. To be replaced by biblical law as interpreted by the most extreme elements of the movement. The individuals I experienced while a believer were wonderful, decent, hardworking people. But I have no doubt that many of them would have no problem supporting a theocratic, bible-based government. To their mind it is the only way to save America from itself.
This book introduced terms like "love-bombing" and "thought terminating clichés" which gave concrete names to concepts that I had long ago abstracted in my own mind but did not have precise words for.
I am now reading the book for the second time and annotating it as I go. If you read this book and enjoy it, I highly recommend "What's the Matter With Kansas" by Thomas Frank. Also, there is a website by the Rockridge Institute (www.rockridgeinstitute.org) which I think gives great insight into some of the cognitive aspects of this movement. Particularly what they term as "contested concepts" which can be found by searching on "thinking points" on the Rockridge home page and clicking the link for chapter 6, "Fundamental Values".
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This is doubtless one of the most frightening but truest, most thought-provoking, most important books I have read this year, right alongside Al Gore's The Assault on Reason The Assault on Reason. It confirmed, with extensive citation and quotes from the very ones propagating this dangerous agenda, what I was already aware of, but try my best to assume more benevolence of. I have long been conscious of the intolerance of the Christian right of those who are different from themselves, who have differing beliefs or customs or backgrounds or desires. I had no idea how much political influence they had until the 2004 election; I was so sure that Kerry had it in the bag, when I heard how many people had gone out to vote, until I learned that the bulk of those unexpected voters were evangelists who cared more about making sure homosexuals were denied equal rights and eradicating the right to choice than protecting their own rights as workers and as citizens, protecting their own financial interests, ending a senseless and costly war. That election sent shivers down my spine, and indeed I left the country for a year and a half after that--for unrelated reasons, but it made me glad to leave.
Now I am back; a new election is underway, and I see the Christian Right's influence more and more every day. They are the largest special interest group in the country, and they seek to destroy American democracy and the Constitution in its very name. I am terrified that if McCain and his right-wing VP pick win, we will be making still more concessions to this group whose ultimate goal is the repression and eventual eradication of all people who are not among their ranks. Hedges does nothing to assuage my fears--indeed, he stokes them. I am more afraid than I have ever been. Reading the way Christian textbooks have rewritten history and science to make it agree with their narrow beliefs, the way they promote intolerance towards other countries and other religions--there could not be a more appropriate title for the book than the one it has. His comparison of the dominionists to other totalitarian movements, including Islamic fundamentalist movements, communism, Nazism, Mussolini-fascism, ring extremely true. The parallels are clear, and he supports his claims with quotes from the mouths and the literature of those in charge of these movements, as well as including plenty of insight into the minds of those following blindly in these movements that seek to subjugate them and remove their rights. They fight avidly for their own repression. It's incredible, yet true.
An excellent book. I highly recommend it to anyone. The fact that Hedges comes from a religious background himself--having completed Harvard Divinity seminary--makes it all the more credible; one cannot dismiss it as a mere attack on religion by an atheist fundamentalist. I myself am an atheist, but I have always respected the rights of others to practice their own religions, whether or not I feel they actually benefit society in any meaningful way when compared to their destructive force. Then again, equally repressive regimes have been built in opposition to religion, so I suppose it is human nature ultimately that makes man strive for his own subjugation and destruction.
A must-read...especially in these crucial times, when yet another President is about to be elected. I only wish it would be read more widely before November than it probably will be.
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