A Smattering of Leftist Delusions

 

 I cannot be accused of being prejudiced against the left; after all, I am left-handed. Still, my gauchist chum Xerxes let me down this week by writing nothing controversial. 

On the other hand, some of his correspondents made some typically silly port-side comments.

JM suggested that evangelical Christians worshipped Trump as sent from God, because he promised to fight abortion and pursue and anti-LGBT agenda.

Trump is not anti-LGBT. He appointed the first-ever openly gay cabinet member. His use of “YMCA,” redubbed “MAGA,” as his re-election campaign song illustrates an outreach to the LBTQ community; although the song itself, with the new lyrics, seems to have been a spontaneous campaign contribution from the gay community.  Many prominent members of which seem to have supported him. 

It is a persistent leftist myth, or delusion, or item of disinformation, that the religious in general care much of a flip about homosexuality. Abortion matters. The left seems to want to change the subject.

Our correspondent JM also says some odd things about QAnon. I am far from an expert on that group—it seems to get more attention from the left than the right, and I only hear about it from the left. Nor am I curious; life is too short. But she claims that QAnon is directed against the Jews, and accuses them generally of killing and eating babies. That’s a little too improbable for my tastes. It sounds like a conspiracy theory about a conspiracy theory. 

After all, QAnon is passionately supportive of Trump, aren’t they? And Trump has been the most pro-Israel president since Truman. Trump has a Jewish daughter, a Jewish son-in-law, Jewish grandchildren. 

So I checked the Wikipedia entry. I gather the charge of antisemitism against QAnon is based on no more than the fact that they accuse George Soros of being in part behind most of the things they do not like which include pedophilia. And, as it happens, Soros is Jewish.

By that logic, anyone who did not vote for Bernie Sanders in the primaries might also be called antisemitic.

On the left side of the political spectrum, antisemitism seems to be a growing problem. It seems rare on the right. Indeed, the left is its natural home: resentment of “rich capitalists” easily segues, as in the Nazi case, into resentment of the generally successful Jews.

TW, another commentator, mischaracterizes the philosophy Josh Hawley, and of Pelagius. He writes that, in an article for Christianity Today, “Mr. Hawley denounced Pelagius for teaching that human beings have the freedom to choose how they live their lives and that grace comes to those who do good things, as opposed to those who believe the right doctrines.”

Pelagius--17th century Calvinist print, with the original caption, "Accurst Pelagius, with what false pretence Durst thou excuse Man's foul Concupiscence, Or cry down Sin Originall, or that The Love of GOD did Man predestinate."

To begin with, Hawley denounced Pelagianism, not Pelagius. The ad hominem fallacy is entirely TW’s, not Hawley’s. And Pelagius did not teach what TW claims. The idea that salvation came or did not come from believing the right doctrines was, arguably, Martin Luther’s position, but not Pelagius’s. The Pelagian heresy, against which Hawley argues, was the denial of original sin: that humans were innately good, could achieve salvation and an ideal world on their own merits, and did not need divine assistance.

An entirely unrelated issue. And a position that is widespread in the modern USA. 

Especially on the left.