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I was fascinated to read a post by fundamentalists theme park manager, Ken Ham, entitled "When it comes to Genesis can we be dogmatic?" and dated 3rd March. This is what Ken is advising us in this post:
Those who make these kinds of comments on my social media feed seem unable to understand that whatever position you hold, you dogmatically hold to that position. To say you allow other views is a dogmatic position that, in essence, claims that someone like me can’t say I have the correct view as that means the other views are wrong.
Actually, dogmatism isn't the problem. There's nothing wrong with being dogmatic about something one believes in: Ken really believes that the huge cosmos is a cosy 6000 years old and therefore one expects him to be dogmatic, especially as he has such large material stakes in this literalist interpretation. But more about the real problem later.
Above Ken is using the self-referencing gambit here and in his usual ham-fisted way has muffed it again. Someone accuses Ken of X and he responds by suggesting that in the very act of accusing him of X the accusers stand guilty of the same flaw. But in this case it doesn't work: Ken's accusers may well be justifiably dogmatic in accusing Ken of being dogmatic about something one can't actually be dogmatic about. After all, there were no eyewitness to the act of Creation mythologised in the Genesis 1 account (Unless we have a very anthropomorphized picture of a God with eyes!). Many Christians believe that interpreting the Genesis-Day as literally 864,000 seconds long is not justified by the Genesis 1 text which talks of events beyond human witness and quite possibly beyond human understanding. In fact, the vociferous dogmatism of a theme park manager with a career at the head of a multi-million-dollar business-empire whose products rest on the assertion that the Genesis 1 days are 864,000 second long lends little credibility to his emphatic literalist view. Self-praise is no recommendation.
Ken is wrong to say that whatever position you hold, you dogmatically hold to that position. That doesn't take into account that dogmatism comes in shades of grey: There's "dogmatic", there's "very dogmatic", there's "not very dogmatic" and no doubt all the states in-between. Some beliefs we hold are less dogmatically held than others: For example, I'm pretty dogmatic about the reality of my conscious thought life (See footnote *). In contrast I'm a lot less dogmatic about a very important aspect of my life; namely my Christain faith: Well, some spiritual ultras will probably think that's evidence of a deep spiritual flaw: That may well be, but it helps to be reminded that in reply to Jesus question "Are you also wishing to go away?" (John 6:67) Peter responded with the minimalist "To whom shall we go? " and then more positively "You have the words of everlasting life" (John 6:68). My reliance is not on my own faith, but the thought God the Father is holding onto me much better than I'm holding on to Him (John 6:44, Romans 8:15). Yes, Truth itself comes in binary on or off states but belief, faith and one's approximations to truth do not. One's dogmatism level varies, so Ken can't assume that people who politely criticize him as "too dogmatic" (whatever that actually means) have the same bigoted attitudes toward the subject in question as he has.
In the simplified world of Ken Ham, the world is cast into a mold of contrasting states of extreme belief or extreme disbelief; a world of fundamentalist tribal loyalties vs potentially demonic affiliation, a world of sheep vs. wolves, a world where one is a sold-out cheer leader for Ken & company or a hardened, perhaps evil, nay-sayer. Ken thinks everyone in the world must be like him: bigoted and prejudiced in their expression of belief. This is a very similar to the perspective painted by American evangelicalism's Political Pied Piper Donald Trump, (and a man who Ken very likely voted for), a man whose ego naturally polarizes the world into those for him and those against him. Let's also recall here Ken's implicit support for the QAnon mythology surrounding Trump. The irony is that in believing this polarized picture of the world Ken and Trump have guaranteed it.
We find out just how Ken's "dogmatism" manifests itself when he condemns those Christians who don't believe his young earthist message. He might try to soft-focus his cultish-attitudes by claiming that young earthism doesn't disqualify one's faith but in practice this claim is not true and Ken all but "excommunicates" from the faith those who don't hold his views. See here for more on how Ken treats those he thinks of as antagonists. Ken, of course, has a perfect right to believe his young earthism, even believe it dogmatically; I wish to God it was mere dogmatism. But to call Ken "dogmatic" is actually to give the word "dogmatic" a bad name: In fact, I'm not sure that Ken's accusers were actually talking about beliefs that Ken has a perfect right to be dogmatic about....For far worse than mere dogmatism, Ken treads the very borders of a cult version of Christianity, a version where any challenge to the party line brings down the most extreme accusations of sins and threats of divine wrath. This intimidatory language is the stuff that the spiritual abuse found in the cults is made of: It is the latter, I suspect, which Ken mistakes for mere "dogmatism"!. Ken also mistakes tolerance with relativism. Viz:
To say you allow other views is a dogmatic position that, in essence, claims that someone like me can’t say I have the correct view as that means the other views are wrong.
No, Ken! To allow other views on Genesis, even if dogmatically expressed, even though one believes them to be wrong, doesn't mean one subscribes to a form of relativism: Rather it's about having respect for the conscience of those with differing opinions on the content of Genesis and not attempting to intimidate them with slanderous spiritual accusations. Cult leaders and cult followers just cannot believe that those who disagree with them do so for anything other than malign hidden reasons and underneath it have guilty consciences. They therefore have no compunction about slandering the motives antagonists. But if Ken persists in being a nasty spiritual bully...well, two can play at that game; so let me say this: Ken has wrongly mistaken his nasty bigoted mindset for mere "dogmatism".
Highly sectarian religionists have a tendency to think that other far less sectarian Christians think just like themselves and are really just another cult albeit cults in the bondage of severe error. One sectarian I had contact with confidently told me this.....
The bottom line is: Anglicans, Baptists, Methodists, Pentecostals and Presbyterians are ALL sects of Christianity; they might profess to be one, to love one another and be part of the Body of Christ; but secretly and behind closed doors: A. They don’t like each other and condemn one another. B. They all have their own slant and interpretation of scripture, for which their individual denomination is based...and C. They refuse to have deep, meaningful and spiritual fellowship.
That is a profoundly distorted view of mainstream Christianity and is evidence of the fantasy world the cult member is immersed in. The average cult member puts all their eggs in one basket and stakes all on a single manifestation of Christian community. Likewise Ken has staked his career on AiG and therefore he's under-pressure to not just make dogmatic statements about his beliefs but to intimidate those Christians who are not as sold-out and dogmatic as he is.
***
One thing I am pretty dogmatic about is this: Ken Ham has become cultish in his thinking, a Trump voting politico-religious bully prepared to call down hell and hamnation on his antagonists without compunction whether they be atheists or non-sectarian Christians (See here). And yet young earthist beliefs need not go together with this religious badgering: See for example here where Christian Hank Hanegraaph contrasts Ken's aggressively expressed dogmatism with young earthist Paul Nelson. Ergo, young earthism need not necessarily entail the high-sectarianism of Ken's spiritually intimidating hard-sell linked to the financial interests of the theme park he runs. Another fundamentalist who expresses himself similarly to Ken is Kent Hovind.
The Milwaukee independent article I have linked to at the head of this post is actually about political bullying, but many of its points port to the world of sectarian cult Christianity especially as in America nowadays large swathes of Christian evangelicalism are (too strongly) linked to the politics of hard nationalism. The methods of the Adolf Hitlers, the Vlad Putins, the Donald Trumps, and the Ken Hams of this world sharply divide people by exploiting a mix of confusion, grievance, alienation, disaffection, discontent and fear. These pundits are the "great simplifiers" of life as they paint a fantasy world that is sharply divided between good stock and evil stock, the latter being the whipping boys who are to blame for all that's wrong with the world and onto whom one's hatred and fears can be pinned.
Relevant Link
Views, News and Pews: Fundamentalist Publicity Sects. (viewsnewsandpews.blogspot.com
ADDENDUM 22/03/2022
In a post titled Should Christians Send their Kids to Public Schools?, (dated 21ts March) Ken clearly comes out in favour of a "No!" to this question. He doesn't actually say "No!" any more than he has said "Vote Trump" even though it's clear that he very likely voted Trump. This aversion to a state education further reinforces Ken's cult credentials: A cult needs as much time as possible to indoctrinate its young people and therefore Ken wants his young people out of state schools. The Jehovah's witnesses are also averse to the state school system and don't recommend that their young people attend university, probably because it takes them out of the cult context.
I was very interested to see this post on PZ Myers blog: It seems that the atheists have spotted Ken Ham's increasing extremism and his drift toward the far-right. In this connection I was particularly interested in the remarks about AiG's link to a far-right web publicist(s) who has gone under the names of "Harry F Sanders III" and "Emory Monagh". This person (or persons), it is alleged, has all but advocated right-wing violence and antisemitic conspiracy theories. This fits together well with Ken's implicit support of Trump and QAnon. Given these rather serious charges Ken has some explaining to do. (I'm not holding my breath waiting for it!)
Footnote
* There are those who believe any claim to a conscious first-person perspective is an illusion. I regard such an opinion as stupid and a result of being fooled by the linguistic imprecision of natural language, a language which can always be cast into a third person mode.
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