Scholar Perspectives

“Hate and Hope” by Lynn S. Neal

In the twenty-first century, one would like to imagine given our increasingly diverse society and the protections afforded by the U.S. Constitution that religious intolerance and religious violence have ceased to be central issues in our society. Unfortunately, despite living in a culture governed by political correctness and the ideals of democracy, this is not the case. Research by the Uniform Crime Reporting Program, a division of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, reveals that religiously motivated hate crimes ranked second only to racially motivated hate crimes in 2005. Of the crimes committed against religious persons or religious property, 68.5 percent were anti-Semitic, 11.1 percent were anti-Islamic, and 4.6 percent were anti-Catholic (citation). Religious extremism, whether intolerant or violent actions, has not disappeared, rather it seems to be growing. In addition, the explosion of web usage and internet technology provides religiously motivated hate groups with a vehicle to spread their message with greater effectiveness and ease. So, while many imagine the previous and present centuries in terms of progress, we must examine the ample evidence to the contrary. The twentieth century was the most anti-Semitic in U.S. history and today religious intolerance toward homosexuals, pro-choice supporters, and new or “alternative” religions remains unabated.

However, while many remain unaware of the scope of contemporary religious intolerance, even more fail to realize that it has been a persistent theme in U.S. history. From the very start of European settlement, religious groups—Catholics, Native Americans, and Pilgrims—viewed the world in different ways, which led to forced conversions, if not religiously “justified” conquering and killing. Similarly, many laud the Puritans as the epitome of religious freedom—they left the Netherlands and England to avoid religious persecution and built what is now the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. However, many neglect to consider how the Puritans built a religiously intolerant society—they banished religious dissenters like Anne Hutchinson and they hanged Quakers like Mary Dwyer. Religious freedom for the Puritans meant the freedom to be a Puritan. Failure to understand this dimension of American religious history makes it difficult for people to understand the present vitality of religious intolerance. It then becomes easy to write off acts of religious violence as aberrant and random, rather than as constituent parts of a larger historical trajectory. Consequently, this gap in our historical knowledge fuels apathy about the protection of religious rights and an inability or unwillingness to talk about religious violence. If we do not begin to learn about this unsavory part of our history, little or no substantive change will occur to promote greater peace between religions and increased tolerance of religious difference.

Given this lack of knowledge and awareness, this spring (2008) a group of nineteen students in my class, “Religious Intolerance in the United States,” undertook the creation of a web-site designed to educate people about the history of religious intolerance in the United States through images of religious hatred. Together the students collected the resources, conceived of the site, and created the content for this venture. Portraits of Hate, Lessons of Hope provided the class with a way to put their learning and commitments into action—to bridge our classroom learning and our cultural problems in a positive way. As a learning community, we believe in the power of education and discussion to create positive social change. In her preface to The New White Nationalism in America, Carol M. Swain writes, “White nationalism thrives by its willingness to address many contemporary issues and developments that mainstream politicians and media sources either ignore entirely or fail to address with any degree of openness or candor” (xv). So, too, does religious intolerance thrive on our unwillingness to acknowledge its present and historical reality. This site is our attempt to fight religious intolerance. We must begin to educate ourselves and others about religious intolerance, provide conceptual tools for thinking about it, and establish forums for discussing it. Hate groups already have web-sites advocating for their causes, as responsible citizens can we do any less?

Student Perspectives

“Re-Membering” by MatthewTriplett

“Someday you be walking down the road and you hear something or see something going on. So clear. And you think it’s you thinking it up. A thought picture. But no. It’s when you bump into a rememory that belongs to someone else. Where I was before I came here, that place is real. It’s never going away. Even if the whole farm–every tree and grass blade of it dies. The picture is still there and what’s more, if you go there–you who was never there–if you go there and stand in the place where it was, it will happen again; it will be there for you, waiting for you.” ~ Toni Morrison, Beloved.

History is the treasure box of the past. In the textbooks of our children, in the minds of our parents and grandparents, and in the very hills and valleys that make up our nation, memories and ghosts of the past flood our culture from every angle. Although what is usually a delightful reminder of days gone by, historical study can just as easily turn into a somber remembrance of atrocities buried under the weight of collective amnesia. As Morrison reminds us, however, past wrongs are best aired out, and there is probably no easier way to go about doing that than through a careful examination of America’s well-documented history of religious intolerance. In fact, lying in the discarded periodicals, books, and posters of our past is a frighteningly large arsenal of hatred in the form of cartoons, photographs, and pieces of art devoted to the dissemination of bigotry and intolerance. A careful survey of these images, serves as documentation of our past in relation to religious intolerance, debunking the myth that the United States is a sacred place, located far away from discrimination and hate. This study also equips us to better recognize the surprisingly large vestiges of intolerance that still pervade our society today, often in startlingly prominent places like newspapers and magazines. This web-site, therefore, should be viewed as a visual essay documenting America’s hatred, past and present. The images should ignite in each of us our own process of “rememory” – a vivid remembrance of our past as a nation and a commitment to prevent the vicious cycle of repetitious history.

“Power, Domination, and the Dangerous Other” by Ryan Niland

Americans have an uneasy relationship with the concept of power. Many understand their nation’s founding as a revolt against the tyranny of autocracy and their government’s structure as a safeguard against the danger of concentrating power in one center. From anti-trust legislation to “separation of powers” and “checks and balances,” Americans engage in an unrelenting quest to limit the influence of any force that might endanger their interests. This preoccupation with the perception of power also plays out in the religious sphere. Americans have often proved suspicious of religious traditions that differ from their own. Too often, this suspicion equates that which is different with that which is dangerous, morphing what previously had been cultural and spiritual diversity into the opposition of competing factions. Competition necessarily engenders a fear of domination in those who subscribe to the view that different religious groups wield influence over one another; any power the enemy wields is a danger to my well-being. Thus, religious diversity turns into a power struggle between competing groups. From the expulsion of Mormons from Nauvoo, Illinois to accusations of Jewish cabals controlling American government and media, the history of religious intolerance in the United States is a history of power struggles.