I think it is easy to write people off as irrational or unhinged when they engage in conspiracy theories, but if we ask what conspiracy theories do in the context of the religious right, we arrive at a kind of power analysis.
This is a group that is used to having an enormous amount of privilege and influence over American politics, culture and economics, and over the last 60 years, they have increasingly felt as if that power has been slipping away. In my mind, conspiracy theories are a very effective way to mobilize one’s community and to leverage what is actually real and true in the public square, even if you don’t have the evidence or data to back it up. For the religious right, conspiracy is a reaction to not having unilateral decision-making power over what is accepted as true and unreal in the American public square. In many senses, conspiracy is a revenge fantasy — it’s an expression of resentment that says, “We are the ones who decide what is fact, we’re the ones who decide what is real, and we are going to push that vision on the public square even if you continue to tell us that there is no actual evidentiary basis for it.”
A former evangelical tracks the rise of white Christian nationalism — and looks ahead to where the movement goes next.
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