All the Hub-Bub over the Golden Compass
Honzo December 29th, 2007
A little while ago a friend of mine asked me why Christians are always attempting to rally against films and other media that threaten their worldview. He said that he just did not understand what the hub-bub was all about; i) Christians are by far the majority in the US, ii)these pieces of media often are not direct threats, and iii) the actual impact of these media are quite small. However, to listen to some of the claims in Christian social circles and media it seems as through Chicken Little is running around pointing at the sky.
My friend asked me this over lunch, so I tried to give the best improv answer as I could. Here are the main points:
- Cultural Hegemony Since Christians have the dominate cultural position, anything that critiques or offers alternatives is seen as a threat to their hegemony and must be reacted against.
- Shining City on a Hill Through out American history, Christians have been eager to see America as the New Israel, God’s replacement chosen land for the replacement of Israel.
- Israel as a Template of US History Given that the US is the new Israel, people in the US should be weary of making the same mistakes that Israel did in the First Testament. If We start to allow ungodly elements into our culture, God will send punishments upon the US, just as She did to Israel.
- Sinner, Keep Thy Thoughts Pure Certain Christians see any media that deviates from the “biblical” worldview as a sort of pollution. The more and more pollution one takes in, the more polluted the person becomes and the greater the chance that the person will die from it.
- Persecution Syndrome Despite the fact that the US is a nation of Christians and that Christianity is the implicit national religion, Christians often see themselves as a minority stakeholder in US culture, one that is always being picked on by Secularism.
I am not trying to evaluate these ideas (I can, I have strong views on the acceptance or rejections of each one) just want to get a feel for how the Christians that get worked up over the latest threat. Do you all think these apply, or am I off base? Are there any that I am missing?
- Culture
- Comments(3)
Good grief, Honzo. What a smug and condescending list! I do think you missed one item: The knowledge that Pullman’s stated purpose behind the books is to destroy the Christian faith, coupled with the fact that these movies are marketed to our kids. That sort of thing pisses us off - it’s a direct assault on our families, and so we complain about it. For that we are to be branded as a bunch of theocrats?
Um… wow Oyarsa. I don’t think that the reaction to GC is what put visions of theocracies in Honzo’s mind (though he never used that word).
If you don’t think many conservative evangelicals (which Honzo and I both are) think either a) America used to be a theocracy (in the good way) and/or b) it needs to be that again, then you need to pay more attention.
And it’s not a ‘direct assault on our families’. Hollywood went out of its way to strip the movie of its religious overtones. I would think fundamentalists would be doing a little happy dance right now; big, bad, liberal, Jew-run Hollywood reacted POSITIVELY to Christians as their target demographic. But we’re such a culture of complainers that we can’t be satisfied with that.
A bloody, acontextual gorefest like the Passion of the Christ becomes one of largest moneymakers of all time just because Mel Gibson is a Christian (albeit a drunk and an anti-Semite, but who cares?), but we refuse even to watch Golden Compass because somewhere in its lineage there was an atheist. So clearly, it can offer nothing to us either as an artistic piece, an escapist fantasy OR a teacher of truth.
I think THIS is the attitude that Honzo is questioning, and rightly so.
Ad furthermore, even if it WERE an all out assault (let’s say the tagline was "Let’s Go Kill God, Because We’re All Gay, Liberal Clone-happy Baby Killers"), does that give Christians the right to react so cruelly and violently? No, it does not.
Wonders - I am not trying to be smug (far from it), just list out and understand what leads to Christians attempting mass boycott/protests against media pieces. I can give you the stated purpose thing (again, I did not say I am evaluating the motives, only trying to list them.), provided they are accurate quotes from the author. Gringo mentioned in passing the other day that he was being misquoted. However, I bet his overall aims are not that far off. What I do know is that other parts of the movie/books have been overstated by Christian media. My father in law, a pastor, went to see the movie with me and left wondering what the big deal was because the christian media hype did not match the content of the movie. His only real complaint is about how in the universe that Lyra lives in, the people’s souls live on the outside of their bodies and manifest themselves as animals called daemons. The word daemon is the only thing he can find in the movie that trips him up - and the author took the Greek idea of guardian spirits that had the same name and used them here - a cool idea, in and of itself, but the author is digging at Christians a bit with the similar sounds. But - that is it. That is all he could come up with to complain about and it is really just a use of word sounds.
I will say that the [movie -> book] issue in this case might warrant not seeing the movie. I am in the middle of the first book and I don’t think it is a book I would want my young children reading (Lyra gaining through lies and manipulation and her “uncle” brining out a chewed up severed head during a board meeting). However, I enjoyed the movie and am enjoying the book emmensely.
Now, even if bocotting this piece is justified, there are plenty of other media pieces that we have gotten up in arms about. Then there are claims about the evil cloud of secularism that is tearing apart this county and the kingdom of God. Dogma, Last Tempation of Christ, Joseph and the Technicolor Dreamcoat, anything with Dan Brown’s name on it (movie and book) - all of these things are seen in the Christian media and, as a consequent, in the minds of laypersons as the start towards the destruction of Christendom. I know the hype is there, I have seen it in the churches and on the faces of people I know. I am trying to explain it. I agree with some measure of it, I disagree with some measure of it. and I am asking for help in my understanding of what is going on.