Right and Wrong | Maggie Dowling

July 1, 2022

Right and Wrong

America's moral and political priorities are out of whack.

America is in a moral crisis.

72% of Americans say our country’s moral compass is pointed in the wrong direction. Half describe our moral values as “poor” – an all-time high since the Gallup poll was started in 2002. And we aren’t optimistic about the future; 77% say the state of morality in America is only getting worse.

Many of us blame the other side for our nation’s moral decay. 55% of Republicans and 47% of Democrats say the other side is “more immoral” than the average person. Nearly 9-in-10 Americans describe the other side as “hateful,” while 1-in-5 consider them straight up “evil.” Yikes.

Evangelical leaders have been particularly vocal in denouncing the other side. Tennessee megachurch pastor Greg Locke said just this month that "you cannot be a Christian and vote Democrat in this nation." Another pastor called Senate candidate Raphael Warnock “demonically possessed.” According to unhinged GOP politician Lauren Boebert, Ilhan Omar is “blackhearted and evil.” Marjorie Taylor Greene says "the Left hates America and they hate God."

It’s important we talk about the state of morality in America, because the question of what’s moral – what’s right and wrong – shapes our political priorities and daily lives in profound ways. If we think it’s a moral priority to help poor people, we’ll create policies that help poor people. If we think it’s a moral priority to generate wealth, we’ll create policies that support Business. If we think it’s a moral priority to protect American lives, we’ll create policies that ensure they can afford life-saving medications.

I agree with the 72% of Americans who sense that our moral compass, and attendant political priorities, are out of whack right now. But I don’t think our moral crisis is about us being immoral people; I truly believe people are good. It’s about the coordinated effort of a power-hungry political organization, dating all the way back to the 1970s, that irrevocably warped Americans’ moral sensibilities by preying on our greatest anxieties. The message and ideology of this organization, known as the Moral Majority, has infected conservative politics and remains the cornerstone of it today. It is also the cornerstone of our moral crisis.

So let’s unpack the origins of the modern Right’s moral and political priorities. Let’s explore how their emptiness – their lack of moral mettle or basic compassion – is driving the moral crisis America’s facing today. And then let’s remember there’s another way; we just have to be willing to fight for it.

Meet the Moral Majority

To understand conservative morality today, we have to travel back to the 70s.

The 1970s were a tough, scary decade for America. After thirty years of unprecedented postwar economic growth that created incredible wealth for our country, the fun came to an end. Our economy finally stalled out – for many reasons, from the Arab Oil Embargo to the simple fact that growth can’t last forever – culminating in a mid-decade recession. It was a jarring reality for the world’s new superpower. And it wasn’t just an economic downturn that left Americans demoralized; the decade was characterized by a trifecta of terrors that had us feeling powerless and vulnerable for the first time in a long time. The 70s saw the first resignation of a US president. Our famed military lost a war to a bunch of ragtag militants in Vietnam. Then came the cherry on top, the Iranian Hostage Crisis in which fifty Americans were held hostage for 444 days. These things shocked our national psyche. Especially in the wake of the “brash, bruising, blockbuster” 60s – a decade marked by “manic excitements" and “radical protest." The 60s saw the Civil Rights Movement, Student Movement, Women's Movement, and to close out the decade, the Gay Rights Movement. Roe vs. Wade and the Equal Rights Amendment were passed. Times were a-changing, and now all of a sudden the ground was feeling shaky beneath our feet.

What happens when people are feeling unsure and anxious? They become vulnerable to charlatans. When we don’t feel in control of our lives, we want to cede control to others – some authority who will take control for us. Someone who will give us the answer to our problems.

Enter the Moral Majority.

The Moral Majority was a political organization formed in 1979, “made up of evangelical Christians that sought to influence public policy in America.” Scholars describe them as “a group that wield considerable influence in American politics,” who have been “more successful in mobilizing conservative Christians” than any other Christian organization in our history.

Their message was simple: that America’s moral decay was the cause of our downfall. Their leaders said that in order to prosper again, we must fight the growing perversion in our society. To them, ‘perversion’ meant shifting social norms – the recent legalization of abortion, growing acceptance of homosexuality, expansion of civil rights and welfare programs, and the perceived weakening of our military (“a strong defense system was a divine mandate, they argued, because God wanted the US to protect itself”). They packaged these previously-separate issues under the umbrella of preserving traditional family values. They said these issues, this perversion, threatened the well-being – physical, spiritual, and financial – of the American family.

More power for women would pervert the routine and structure of the home, it would cause friction with their husbands, it would mean choosier women and fewer cute babies. No good for the family. More homosexuality meant less procreation, but more than that it meant more perversion – in the words of Moral Majority founder Jerry Falwell, “though they claim to be another poorly treated minority, homosexuals are involved in open immorality as they practice perversion. They are not a minority any more than murderers, rapists, or other sinners are a ‘minority.’ Homosexuals often prey on the young. Since they can’t reproduce, they proselyte.” (In Falwell’s defense, the NIH hadn’t yet released their report that the ratio of heterosexual to homosexual pedophiles is 11:1). Fallwell called the Equal Rights Amendment “a satanic attempt to destroy the biblical concept of the Christian home.” He viewed welfare programs as “cutting out the very heart of the business community,” and in turn the heart of the home.

Many Americans, desperate for a solution to their woes, found this assault-on-the-family argument to be a tidy, plausible explanation. It made sense timing-wise: we finally give more rights to women, minorities and the marginalized (people who we still don’t trust all that much)... and now all of a sudden America is in a state of terror and impoverishment. Professor Banwart Doug writes, “the growth of the Moral Majority movement can be mainly attributed to the conservative backlash against the upheavals of the 1960s, but the 1970s provided the main issue, the legalization of abortion, that stoked the movement’s grassroots activism.”

And it wasn’t a hard sell psychologically – people like to believe their problems are someone else’s fault, they like to believe they’re morally superior, and they especially like to believe God can set things to right (it absolves one of having to do any hard work or introspection). And perhaps the most salient message, though many wouldn’t admit it, was the promised economic payoff. The postwar generation had been “the wealthiest in U.S. history,” and they were tired of feeling poor. Being told ‘if you just reverse these few things, if we just go back to before, we’ll prosper again’ didn’t sound too bad.

“We’re fighting a holy war,” Falwell proclaimed. “What’s happened to America is that the wicked are bearing rule. We have to lead the nation back to the moral stance that made America great.”

“We’re not here to hurt anybody. We’re just trying to bring the country back to moral sanity.”

Present Day

Does any of this rhetoric sound familiar?

It should. Because Falwell’s “blend of faith, patriotism, and conservative politics” – the Moral Majority’s family values message – remains the moral touchstone of the Right today. Georgetown Dean Clyde Wilcox writes, “the New Christian Right is merely the latest manifestation of right-wing fundamentalism and evangelical political activity in the late 1900s.”

It’s seen in both the moral rhetoric and political priorities of the modern Republican party. Top conservative commentator Ben Shapiro’s latest book argues that the abandonment of our “Judeo-Christian roots” is the driver behind our moral crisis and unhappiness. To this day, the conservative political agenda revolves around the regulation of social norms and the de-regulation of Business – manipulating the Courts [link to SCOTUS article] to challenge abortion and roll back civil rights, insisting on obscene tax cuts (that according to the CBO “primarily benefited the wealthy and corporations" and that “harm our economy in the long-run"), and demanding unlimited funds for military programs that “that reflect sheer excess, not to mention a huge source of unjustified profits for weapons contractors.”

This is the reason for our moral crisis.

A political party that represents nearly half our country is prioritizing things that have nothing to do with true morality, that do not in any way uplift the families they claim to care about. Rather than empowering and investing in everyday families, they choose to police families. And it’s caused the American family, the very people they claim to care about, to suffer…

The Parental Happiness Gap (the difference in happiness between a country’s parents and non-parents) is higher in America than any other country. Likely because we aren’t actually supporting families; a recent UNICEF study found that “the US ranks last for family-friendly policies.” We’re the only OECD country not to guarantee parental leave – critical to growing a happy, connected family – and one of the only ones without a universal childcare program, resulting in 6-in-10 parents having a “serious problem” with finding affordable, quality childcare. 1-in-3 US families wouldn’t be able to handle a $400 emergency expense, while 1-in-4 regularly skip necessary medical care because they can’t afford it. Working families own a smaller share of US wealth than ever, while corporate profits are higher than ever (not an accident, read my article here).

These are the things that actually impact the well-being of families. Their ability to provide, to move up the ladder, to be healthy. These are family values. These are the things we should be prioritizing… but instead, the Right demonizes these programs as 'evil socialism' and fights them at every turn.

The more we focus on things that don’t matter – like abortion or sexual orientation or birth control – the less we focus on the things that actually do. The more people suffer, and the more our morals ring hollow.

Being gay isn’t bad for the family. Research shows that “children from same-sex families scored about 6% higher on general health and family cohesion.” Abortion isn’t either; 96% of women say that getting an abortion was the right decision for them and their families. Nor is transgenderism; only 1% of people who go under a gender-reaffirming surgery regret the decision. Nor is expanding civil rights; the NIH found that “public health depends not only on the existence of civil rights and regulations, but on their implementation and enforcement.” And neither is curtailing our corrupt military budget, which currently accounts for half of total US discretionary spending and takes away from the things that actually help families (e.g., Health, Education and Training, Transportation, Community Development, Income Security, Housing, etc.).

The Right only seems to understand "family" on a primal, evolutionary level, when we were a species singlemindedly focused on our tribe's survival and passing on our genes. But we as humans have evolved, and so has the family. Family is about empathy, hearing each other, looking after each other. Being bound by shared commitments grounded in genuine, generous love. It's not about – as the Right frames it – cranking out kids and freaking out at anyone who doesn't conform to that goal. It's about connection, support, and helping your people thrive. That’s what’s right.

And the Right’s own religious leaders agree their moral compass is off. The Pope himself said “it's not necessary to talk about these issues [abortion, LGBT rights, etc.] all the time... we must find a new balance. Otherwise the freshness of the church will fall." The Presbyterian Church says “as we look throughout the Scriptures, we see Jesus talking about how you have some people being greedy and taking advantage of women, taking advantage of the poor and how that wasn’t right. We have to talk about the effects of that, of taking advantage of the poor and marginalized… as we are in community with folks we have to speak to the issues that they live with.”

Even Jesus, the most influential moral figure in America, doesn’t share their priorities or believe in their moral mettle.

Jesus didn’t talk about abortion. There is literally one passage on it in the entire Bible. Barely. But pro-lifers act as though it’s some trump card:

“If people are fighting and hit a pregnant woman and she gives birth prematurely but there is no serious injury, the offender must be fined whatever the woman’s husband demands and the court allows. But if there is serious injury, you are to take life for life.”

The Bible is thousands of pages long; if abortion was a priority, it would get more than one vague, tenuous mention. And it’s not like abortion wasn’t around back then, it dates back thousands of years. In fact, the NIH writes that “in the early Roman Catholic church, abortion was permitted for fetuses [up to 90 days].”

Jesus didn’t care much about being gay either. Maybe the Old Testament did. But Jesus – the touchstone of the Christianity – didn’t mention it once. He was focused on bigger things (see verses below). If Jesus himself doesn’t talk about it, in the same way he doesn’t talk about abortion or transgenderism, or endorse curtailing civil rights, it’s probably not a priority.

What Jesus did care about was economic and social justice, about meeting the material needs of families so that they could live with dignity. There’s a near-infinite number of verses from him on the subject…

"Be shepherds of God's flock; watch over them not because you must, but because you are willing, as God wants you to be"

"Whoever has two coats must share with he who has none"

"Whoever is kind to those in need lends to the Lord, and he will reward them”

“The mark of the true Christian [is to] extend hospitality to strangers”

“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged”

This is what is driving our moral desolation: shaping our moral and political priorities around the wrong things – things that don’t help people or show any basic compassion. Cherry-picking a handful of obscure verses written thousands of years ago to wield as a moral cudgel, as opposed to making any attempt to help people today. Railing against the cost of welfare programs – that help the very people Jesus prioritized – while gleefully spending $6 trillion on corporations and the rich. We can pretend we aren’t doing these things, but deep down in our hearts and according to Pew Research, we know we’re morally adrift. We’re hollowed out.

But there’s another way.

A New Normal: New Deal Morality

In 1944, President FDR (universally ranked one of our greatest presidents) proposed something called the 2nd Bill of Rights. In its introductory speech, he proclaimed:

“It is our duty to lay the plans for the establishment of an American standard of living higher than ever known. We cannot be content, no matter how high our standard of living may be, if some fraction of our people – whether it be one-third or one-fifth or one-tenth – is ill-fed, ill-clothed, ill-housed, and insecure.”

Our First Bill of Rights, enshrined in the Constitution, was designed to protect the people's political interests. To keep the powerful from subverting our political interests. The 2nd Bill was designed to protect the people's wellbeing. To keep the powerful from taking advantage of us. The Bill said “every American has the right to:

A job
An adequate wage and decent living
A decent home
Medical care
Economic protection during sickness, old age and unemployment, and
A good education

This is the morality we could lead with, and insist on, in our politics today.

The core tenets of Jesus’ message were love, acceptance, and justice – not judgment, regulation, and suspicion. What makes a family thrive is empowering them, not policing them. If we orient ourselves around the important things once again, we’ll feel morally fulfilled once again. We’ll be able to take pride, deep down on an elemental level, knowing we’re doing the right thing.

Mobilizing Morality

Bernie Sanders gave a famous speech in 2019 with a famous refrain: "Are you willing to fight for someone you don't know?" I loved those words. I want to believe I'm a person who would do that, and I want to believe my fellow Americans are too.

But that means actually doing what's right. Fighting the good fight, shedding our apathy and replacing it with genuine, active caring. Standing up to bullies, denouncing their naked desire to control others as opposed to actually helping them. Setting and supporting a political agenda that prioritizes human dignity and justice – and demanding of our leaders that measures be taken to advance those moral priorities.

[Final lines]