Blake Callens: The Case Against Christian Nationalism DMW #179

Exploring theology, doctrine, and all of the fascinating subjects in between, broadcasting from an undisclosed location, Dead Men Walking starts now. Well hello everyone, welcome back to another episode of Dead Men Walking Podcast.

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Usually I ramble on a bit, but if you're watching you see that I have another body in the studio with me here, which we usually do a lot of our stuff over Zoom. If we can have a guest in studio, we absolutely love it.

Introducing Blake Callens and the Book on Christian Nationalism

It's Blake, Blake Kalins. How are you doing? How are you man? Good. Full disclosure, Blake is families, my cousin's husband. We've been talking back and forth on text and, you know, Twitter and all the places that you can, isn't it crazy you can connect like 17 different ways now?

Especially when I talk to a client, I'm like, do I text you? Do I Facebook message you? Do I DM you? You know, do I signal? But there's so many ways to connect, but we've been talking and, you know, had some really interesting conversations.

I know that you're researching for a book that you're writing right now. Do you have a title yet? It has a working title. I just finished it. You want to share it or can you share it? The working title is The Case Against the Case for Christian Nationalism.

Interesting. So this is going to be a fun episode for a lot of the listeners too, because we've had some Christian nationalists, pro-Christian nationalists people on or just people who wanted to try to explain it like Joel Webben's been on talking about it.

Joseph Spurgeon's been on talking about it. I know who else we had AD on who you've had interaction with back and forth on Twitter. So I think this is going to be a new perspective, not that they all lined up, but they were all pretty much pro.

And I'm not saying you're necessarily con, but I think you want to get into the really the undertones of the movement, kind of the the minutia and the mud that no one else really gets into. You really like get down in there and you're seeing where the connections and what are the motivations and things like that.

And I thought it'd be interesting to have you on. You just happen to be up from South South Carolina, South Carolina, because you went from North to South Carolina, right? I escaped. So you're a kid. Yeah, you're one of them Carolina boys down there up, up back it, but you didn't grow up down there.

No, I grew up in LA Hollywood, Hollywood. Wait a minute. Is that did we just think of a new nickname for you? Is your name just not Hollywood now? What's up, Hollywood? As long as it's more like Hollywood.

Oh, yeah, that's our man. I need my I should have armed my pad here. We got all kinds of drops. I don't know. We're gonna have to use one on you. Well, I don't have them in there. But so I thought we just have a conversation, man.

Because you're in town, your family, we talk about this stuff all the time. I know you and I are trading sources back and forth for theology and stuff like that. I really appreciate you. So first of all, tell me a little bit about the research you're doing on your book.

Yeah. Do you expect that out? What next year? You think? I don't know. I mean, I've never written a book. Get right up on that mic for me, too. So yeah, I'm gonna be able to hear you right on it. I'll eat.

Yeah, there you go. Okay. So well, the research really, I have kind of always been a history nut. Okay. And when I got out of the Army, started going back to school in the GI Bill, I thought for a while like maybe I want to be a history professor.

And I dropped that real quick to be a software engineer. And that's what I've been doing for 15 years. But I just keep reading history books all the time. And until about, I don't know, eight years ago.

Totalitarianism, the Milgram Experiment, and COVID as a Test Case

Yeah, about 2015 or so. Yeah. I started reading about the history and philosophy and of totalitarianism. I really got into it. I think I got into it with what everybody else gets into it with, which is the Gulag archipelago.

Okay. And then, you know, I kind of just kept going with that, mostly focused on left wing stuff of it, you know, okay. At least at first, read about maybe like five books a year on the subject, but it became my main history interest.

And then 2020 happened. Okay. Yeah. And what happened in 2020? Wait, what? So I mean, my interest in the subject grew exponentially. Okay. Yeah. Did you start to see some of those streams of the stuff you've been studying kind of take place?

Like tactics, kind of? Absolutely. I mean, when you looked at the way that COVID was handled. Yeah. Right. The second they started saying we're going to do vaccines passes, the first thing that comes to my head is Gesundheit pass.

Oh, you're gonna Germany 1934 me. Okay, yeah, I see what we're doing. Right. And so I started writing about that quite a bit. Most of the stuff that, you know, even though what I'm writing about now. Where are you putting it out?

You got a website or something? Or what do you do? I do. I have to the one for the Christian nationalism stuff, which I think most people are going to be interested in is Christian nationalism notes .com.

Okay. And then I have another one that I don't know why I named it, but I named it on peaceful non compliance. Okay. Dot substack .com. And that's where like most of the early my earlier writings, which you're going to see, I'm, you know, COVID was more of a left wing authoritarian thing.

Okay. At least in the way they tried, most folks tried to handle it. And I've written extensively about that while that was going down. Okay. Especially while the the mandates were coming down, how similar that was to that's pretty crazy, the subject you're really interested in, you see almost a once in a lifetime, like situation where it really kind of plays out to where you can study it, see it, see reactions.

Yeah. See tactics, the one that blew my mind, right in that sense was, you know, there's something called the Milgram experiment. I'm not familiar. Okay. This is really interesting. So early 60s, they decide they want to study why did people go along with the Nazis.

And so they do this experiment where a guy comes in to a room with a doctor, and he's put in front of a series of dials. And there's talking to somebody on a microphone that he can't see. Okay. And the whole thing is the doctor is going to ask, or actually I think the person asks the person that he can't see a question.

And if the answer is wrong, he's supposed to give the guy an electric shock. Okay. And the doctor says how many like how about the voltage of the shock is as it goes up? Okay. And is the person giving a shock to in the room with him?

No, he can't see him. Okay. Just by audio. Okay. And the voltage keeps going up and up and up. And there's areas in this dial that clearly mark like this is dangerous. Don't write do this. And the thing is the the person with the dial is told the experiment is how the effect of the shocks will and stress will change the way they answer.

But really, that's not the experiment. I think I've heard I think I have heard of this. And they're seeing how far that person will go from an authority figure exactly possible harm or death of the person.

Yeah, fictitious person on the other side of the dial. Yeah. And the conclusion was two thirds of people will basically do whatever a person of authority tells them to do. And it's nuts. Now here's the thing.

I always think like, because I have a real problem with authority, the Lord's working with me on it. As I joke, I like it got a rebellious streak. Sometimes it is good to defy tyrants and obey God. Other times it is good to submit and understand submission.

I had a real problem with COVID for those kind of authoritarian reasons. And I would always like to think, I'm one of those people, I think that would stand up. But I've looked back in my life. And there's been certain times where I probably have done something that was maybe against my moral principle or principles or morals, because there was not only authority, but maybe there was a pressure because there was multiple people of authority there.

And I was in the minority. Not very many times. But my point of saying that is two thirds of people. I mean, that is a huge subset. That's the majority. 66 of people, if you're an authority figure, will do it.

And we saw that kind of play out. I mean, it, it took, I saw COVID take what I thought were sane people and turn them almost insane with you have to do this, you're going to kill people, you're gonna, and you're like, Well, hold on.

I mean, have you have you read the data and the science behind and things like that. So I think we saw that experiment kind of play out firsthand and in COVID, not only in the United States, but globally.

We, we did. And you know, I wrote a piece on the weirdly named substack that was about that happening in my town, because we lived in a, the town I think has like the fourth highest amount per capita of people with PhDs.

Really? Yeah. Okay. And you know, it's kind of like the Silicon Valley of the South, me being a software guy, when we moved a long time ago, that was a place to be. Now I can be anywhere. Yeah. And, you know, in based off of like, I, you know, people I talked to, I, you know, it was kind of known that I was, look, it wasn't about the vaccine for me.

Yeah, right. It was it was about, I'm not going to give you my medical information, really, the stand that I decided to take. And I lost my job over it. Because I was working for a federal contractor at the time.

Wow. Or a company that had federal contracts. It wasn't a direct federal contractor. And that was a do not pass go do not collect $200. No testing option, you're going to, you know, get in there. Yeah.

But I could have filed for the religious exemption. Right. And would have gotten it. But my thought process was, if I do that, yeah, by proxy, I am condoning the stripping of the rights of consent from people who are not believers.

Right. And I could not say, Hey, I'm a follower of Christ. That went along with that. Yeah. And you're looking at it in the broader sense of just the the actual act of taking someone's rights away was immoral.

And it was a crazy time. I mean, like November of 2021. Noam Chomsky was saying, you know, you should you should like kick all the vaccinated out of society and finding food is their problem. Yeah, you know, Jacinda Ardern.

Yeah, former former poster child of the leftist hippie. And yet he wants to. Yeah, yeah. Well, she she, you know, former I think she I don't know if she's finally out. But she's not running again. The Prime Minister of New Zealand, okay, who was the former president of the international socialist socialist youth, you know, is on camera saying, Yeah, I'm going to create a two tier society.

You know, it was a crazy time. And people really lost their minds. It really was. And here's the thing that really bothers me is everyone who kind of stood up. It sounds like you and I and other people just said, No, we're not going to go along with the clown show.

I found most of those people, not all of them, but most of them in our ilk pretty reasonable. I was just having a discussion with Jennifer, your wife and a couple days ago and said, Look at I was pretty annoyed.

I wasn't wearing a mask. In my car by myself. I wasn't going to take your vaccine. But before COVID it was like you had cough or you felt weird. We didn't go to grandma's house. We warned other people.

We were generally Hey, let's let's be you know, cognizant of other people when we're sick and try not to spread. So it was this weird thing where most people were like that, but then they were almost being ostracized and put into this thing of like, Oh, they're just these crazy people that don't care if they kill people with their virus and this and what real what really irked me was even after we had hard data.

I'm a data guy. You're probably a data guy you like, right? I do happen to write a piece of software that went through the VAERS database. Well, there you go. Even after we had that hard data. I mean, that was eight months, nine months after not only on the vaccine, but I'm just saying in general what the the the COVID SARS, you know, family of this virus did, we still push forward with a very specific narrative that was that was anti data.

And I just went, you know, you just stand there to go, Am I, am I crazy? Am I crazy person? Why is the majority of the globe jumping on this? And in something that seems so data wise felt so plain and out in the open, and we're doing the exact opposite.

I mean, it's almost like the whole world got mob mentality. It's like, I don't I don't know it. Or it may be you can explain it as someone who studies, you know, authoritarianism and things like that.

Is that a tactic? Or is that part of it? Where once some people get on board, then it's like, everyone just kind of follows and falls. You know, there is the Milgram experiment aspect of it. I think what I saw, and what really, really shook me was, you know, the highly educated town I lived in was very agnostic atheist.

And I saw the existential dread. Yeah, take over people who had no belief that there was anything else. Yeah, right. And if your whole existence is maximizing your life, and that's the majority of the world, right?

Yeah. And, and that idea of like, Oh, you got to think about like, March 2020, we got these videos of people collapsing in the street in China, right? Right. You know, I think so much of that was just driven by like, if I catch this thing, and I just happen to be the statistic, poof, I'm gone.

Yeah, nothing. And I think that took over, you know, a lot of people's minds, even, even some Christians minds, you know, Oh, 100%. Yeah, yeah. So we weren't gonna make this a COVID episode. But I think there's some parallels here, what we're talking about to have, like, kind of falling in line, maybe not quite understanding definitionally, what it is that we're following.

Defining Christian Nationalism and Its Competing Versions

Yeah. Because I'm not all in on on Christian nationalism. And here's the thing. It's so tough for me. Because there's like 10 different definitions of Christian nationalism. And I know some groups are trying to define it.

So here's the, you know, you got the the g3 guys defining it, you got Joel Webben and his guys kind of, you know, saying no, this is what it is. You've got the secular leftist version of it, you got the far right version of it.

So what even when I say that, it's like when I say evangelical, like, what does that even mean anymore? Anymore? It's such a wide variety of definitions underneath that. But I mean, I've said before, I'm Presbyterian in my denomination, I'm reformed in my faith, I hold to the Westminster, I'm probably a general equity guy.

And, you know, it clearly says not every law is for the new covenant. But we will take the general equity from it thereof and use it. Yeah, if there was an old, you know, so I don't know if that relates to Christian nationalism in a third authoritarian kind of every single municipality, state and federal government has to be Christian and, and, you know, function under the mosaic law.

I know this sounds like a non answer when we're talking about Christian nationalism. But I go, man, the the founding principles in the Bill of Rights of the Constitution is pretty darn close to what I say you could get to, as a Christian nation that isn't implementing mosaic law, but but under a covenant of grace, that would be pretty close to that.

Now, obviously, you'd have people, well, there was still slavery, and there was still, you know, women's suffrage. And I get that I'm saying, we've made some strides towards that. But I'm saying that what it said in word, in the founding documents was was pretty darn close.

And people go, it's a cop out, you just sound like one of those 1776 conservatives, you know, let's go back to the founding fathers. I'm saying, I think the founding documents could be explored a little bit differently than we've explored them.

We've had, you know, huge federal expansions and all this stuff that's really harmed kind of the uniqueness of the Constitution. But that's where I'm at right now. You were you were you at on the Christian nationalist movement.

So so the listeners can kind of understand where you're coming from. So well, first, you got to separate what you talked about, which has kind of a theonomy side to it. Yeah, from and even what like the G3 guys are doing.

And even I would say even what like Joel Webbins talking about, you have to put Stephen Wolf's theory like way out here. Okay, it's something completely different. Right? Okay. Stephen Wolf is not a he's not a theologian.

Yeah, he's a political, political theorist. He has a PhD in political theory. He wrote a book of political theory, which I think confused a lot of people because he was published under Canon Press with the Doug Wilson guys in in the theonomy thought and the general equity thing.

And it was like, Oh, here, this is something we kind of promote and endorse. And I think that's what I'm just interjecting. But keep. Yeah, no, but it was confusing because it's like, Oh, so this is kind of what Doug must be talking about.

Or this is what you know, and the people that reviewed it. I mean, the reason I'm sitting here with you, I don't want to be here. Like, I never wanted to write this book. I mean, I do. I love seeing you.

But like, but like, I didn't want to write this book. Yeah, right. But the reviewers, you know, they didn't get that either. And they're reviewing, you know, Stephen Wolf's book starts out with this kind of weird unscriptural, if you ask me, you know, I'm not a theologian, but I've run it by some.

And actually, that's what the theologians focused on in the reviews. This theory of you don't have to be a theologian to know if something's unscriptural, though. I mean, that's a logical fallacy, right?

It's argument from authority that I hate that stuff where it's like, Well, you're not a well, look at I can read fair. And actually, actually, I have described his theory to people who don't even really think about it.

And they're like, Wait, how would that work? It's that kind of broken, right? His, you know, pre fall prelapsarian theory on how man, if Adam had never taken of the fruit would repopulate the earth, and they would have distinct ethnicities that would potentially war against each other.

And it's like, Well, if I hold hate for another person in my heart, that's a sin. And therefore, we're not prelapsarian anymore. Right, right. So it doesn't really work in that sense. And that's what guys like Kevin Young.

Stephen Wolfe, theonomy, and the Charge of Fascism

Okay, now, right. But if you read his book, and if for me, for me, it just set off alarm bells and all in my head, because it's just littered with classic authoritarian and ethno nationalist talking points.

And he does a good job of sprinkling them about and kind of maybe sometimes slightly obfuscating them, some of them are just dead in there. Yeah, if somebody like a Neil Shimbey, who, like me, stem guy, but he's really read up on critical theory reads a book, a woke church book, he's going to know that the lingo, he's going to pick up on things.

And that's what Stephen Wolf's book did for me, for right wing authoritarian nationalism, okay, it's like, it's all in there. And if you don't know it, and you don't study it, you don't necessarily pick up on it.

And so I like to say that Stephen Wolf's book is it's not a Christian book. It is a book of mostly secular, styled, authoritarian and ethno nationalism, very early 20th century style and ideas, wrapped in Calvin's two kingdoms theology, okay, that it could be laundered to a Christian audience.

What are some things I don't want to go into a full review of his book? What are some of the things in there off the top of your head that if you could remember some things where you see authoritarianism or you know that that secular authoritarianism kind of taking hold in the book, the big one right at the top of the book is how he defines nationalism.

Okay, right. The first thing he says is nationalism, and then he builds on to it to Christian nationalism. There's a phrase, it's a totality of national action. Now, if you study totalitarianism, the word total, any derivative of the word total sticks in your mind.

And the first person to use the word totalitarian was Mussolini in a positive context. Okay, the Italian fascist philosopher Giovanni Gentile, used the word total throughout his writings specifically to convey this, what we think of a totalitarian, this entire overarching government running everything, what Mussolini would say, you know, everything within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state.

And so he starts with that. So the first time somebody says, my definition of nationalism is a totality of national action, alarm bells are going to go off in my head. And then in that area, he comes around and he says, this totality of national action creates a redundant web of obligations that orders everything to the national good.

That is the textbook definition of fascism. Like, it's, I know that's a word that has become practically useless in our society, but it has a definition. And the definition of fascism is this. We think about our liberal democracy.

Okay. The liberal democracy is the society for the individual, the sovereignty of the individual, we would prefer 100 guilty men go free so that one innocent man doesn't spend his life in prison, right.

And fascism, by its core definition, inverts that relationship, and says, it's not society for the individual, it's the individual for society, it's right wing collectivism, everything goes up, and you are part of this collective and everything you do must be ordered to the ultimate national good, which is everything that we put our effort into.

Sure. And I mean, it's, it's not even obfuscated. Like, that is, I, a lot of people don't necessarily get that because we don't talk about what the definition of fascism is. Yeah. Just a little anecdote was like, I was talking with Chris Rose, bro on Twitter, fighting for the faith, who does study fascism, I was surprised to learn, happy to learn.

And we're talking about I showed him I was talking about like, Oh, yeah, here's what Stephen Wolf says. And his response was, Oh, yeah, that's fascism. Right. That very section I just talked about. Yeah.

It's that straightforward. But most people don't. You know, I think you think of like the Big Lebowski, and he throws the mug at the cop and goes, you fascist. That's what people think fascism, right?

Or I've heard it so overused on the left of everything. Yeah, someone who says I, you know, I, who's pro life or an abolitionist, you fascist, and you go, yeah, we connect the two. It's an author. It's somebody who's doing something I don't like.

So what's your definition of nationalism? Let's take Christian out of it. What's the correct idea if we're just thinking of secular nationalism, and then we'll throw the adjective in front of it Christian?

So is nationalism a is it patriotic? Is it like a thought? Is it a feeling? Is it a movement? Like, what I'm really asking, because I've heard so many definitions of it. And I'm not really sure. When someone says nationalism, is it close to fascism?

Because it sounds like it is, is it is a it is. I mean, it depends on whether you want to take it down to the definition of what is a nation state. Right. Okay. And so is it a collective of people, whether under, as Stephen Wolfe would argue, all the best governments are based off of a common ethnicity, and we're kind of like a tribal people that has grown into a larger nation?

Or is it like our nation is more based upon a nation of ideals, right? There's a unifying common factor amongst a people that makes them decide, yeah, we're going to be a collective under this banner.

Yeah, throughout history, it usually was the the ethnicity of the people, though, wasn't it? That's usually what did, yes, create nations. And like you said, we're a nation of ideals, more melting pot.

So, so is nationalism just pride in that tribe in that national tribe? Like, that's what I'm trying to get to ism. Yeah, you know, I mean, I don't think it has to be no, like, like, I mean, I think that's maybe more of a byproduct.

Yeah, right. Then the core of it. Yeah. The core, I think the core of nationalism is we want to come together under this collective banner, you can, you know, you can have nationalism for a city state.

Right, right. It doesn't have to be a giant country like ours doesn't have to be a federal system like ours. Yeah, it is at its core, I is believing, you know, counter it to anarchy. Yeah, it is the idea that we're going to come together, have a system that is our collective, whatever our collective identity is, whether it be our ethnicity or our ideals.

Yeah. So, really quick to just to go back before we go forward again. So what so where are you on Christian Christian nationalism in in general, as it's like I said, it's hard because you have a couple different definitions.

It sounds like the wolf, the wolf definition of Christian nationalism. No, it's a hard, it's a hard pass. Blake hard. I mean, it's a hard pass for the Andrew tour by Andrew isker version, too. It's not much better.

Okay. It's, and that would be why because we're seeing authoritarianism kind of inserted in that underlying of fascism, you're saying, or there's ethnic reasons as well. There's is explicitly ethno nationalists as well.

Right. Okay, so explain that for me and people listening ethno national ethno ethno nationalist. So they, there's three things that we could talk about, right? There's white nationalism, there's ethno nationalism, there's anti semitism, and they all don't have to be the same thing.

Okay, right. I can be a black anti Semite. Right, right. Right. I can be a black ethno nationalist. Right. White nationalism is a very specific subset of ethno nationalism, particularly characterized, well, you got to be white.

Otherwise, it's not white nationalism. Okay. And then, on top of that, very most often, pretty much all the time includes anti semitism. Okay, right. So, but I prefer to use the word ethno nationalism, because, frankly, I try to use language that hasn't been ruined by the left.

Right, right. And like, you go to Twitter, and you see people like, say, the slightest thing and someone's screaming white supremacist at them. Right. And so I don't want to use that language. Because if I start talking about white supremacy, or white nationalism, even though it might be that legitimately, you already have it in your mind of something because of the way it's been used the last five years.

And, you know, the same reason I don't bring up the Nazis once in my book, I focus on Italy and Spain for fascism. And I spoke focus on nativism in the clan for ethno stuff. Yeah. And because nobody's gonna listen if I start calling everybody a Nazi.

Yeah. So ethno nationalism is the term I like to use because it's kind of that it fits. It just fits. Okay. And so for the but I mean, to me, to me, that sounds like you're just saying a nation based on ethnicity, you could, and then we just say that most nations were based on that, if that's how we kind of congregate.

That's not technically what the the term would mean. Okay, it would mean. So like, black Hebrew Israelites are ethno nationalists. Okay, right. It ethno nationalism comes with a assumption of you superior.

Okay. All right. Okay. As opposed to we are a nation of Germans and we have an ethnicity. You wouldn't say Germany is an ethno state. Okay. Right. Okay. No, that's I'm glad you made that clarification.

I'm glad you asked. So but so Torba and Isker, Torba being the owner of GAB. Okay. Okay. Isker being a pastor, he used to be a CRC pastor, I believe, and I now I think he has an independent church. They co-wrote this book, it's about 60 pages of actual book long, called the Christian Nationalism.

Something about taking dominion and discipling nations. Okay. And their form of Christian nationalism, first of all, that book, like I said, it's only 60 pages long and devotes an entire chapter to denouncing Talmudic Judaism.

So if you've only given yourself 60 pages to describe your thesis, and you give a whole chapter to that, we know where your priorities are. Right. So, and Torba is known for being, you know, a hardcore anti-Semite, and a lot of people try to defend him.

But it's, you know, actually in the last day, Michael Young, local distance on Twitter, has been going at it with a lot of people, including Stephen Wolfe, about Torba's anti-Semitism and them defending it.

They're openly defending it. What kind of anti-Semitism stuff? Is it like statements against certain Jewish people? Yeah. The one of the ones that actually Michael Young pulled out was Torba saying that Jewish, negative, stereotypical Jewish traits are part of their phenotype.

Like, I mean, that's where we're getting, right? He's one of the ones that I always sticks with me as he says he's currently, today in 2023, fighting Judeo-Bolshevism. What does that mean? He means commies are Jews, and he's fighting them.

It's really like, yeah, I don't link academic linguistic obfuscation of that. Yeah, I don't know how you, how, why is he linking those two? Because he's an anti-Semite. But I mean, I mean, there has to be a basis somewhere.

Why are you linking communists and Jews? So that's a long time. Is that just, that's a long time. Is it? Okay. See, I just don't know that. Yeah, because there were so many people in the original Bolshevik Revolution that were Jewish.

And so it's just, you know, it's like Stephen Wolfe's podcast co-host who had a secret white nationalist account, which maybe we can get into, you know, put out a whole thread where he said, like, all Antifa are Jews, right?

It's this kind of, this is, when they're out in the areas, like I've been watching, I'm an old internet guy, I've been watching how white nationalists operate and ethno-nationalists, like real white nationalists on social media for years.

And when they're out in the main spaces, there's all these, there's lingos, there's code words, there's things like that. And when you get to their places where they feel they're safe, they just come right out with it.

Right. Okay. So, and Torb is one of those guys that comes right out with it. And then maybe we'll delete the tweet before he thinks he's going to get banned. Right. Right. And so, and Isker, Isker on Twitter, who is 8th Century Woodchipper on Twitter, if you are familiar with that account, he straight out came and said one of the main policy points of Christian nationalism should be, what was it exactly?

I'm trying to, I want to be accurate here. He said that stopping the demographic replacement of the majority demographic in America, he says when you bring that up, a lot of people in Christian nationalism bristle, and that's a bad thing.

He's also said that, kind of alluded to, he was talking about training men, and he said, like, talked about turning young Christian men into stone cold killers. Like, it's crazy stuff, man. These guys are cuckoo bananas.

Ethno-Nationalism, White Supremacy, and the Movement's Overt Turn

So, why do you think there's, why do you think there is that vein of white supremacy or, as you're saying, ethno, what was the word? Ethno-nationalism. Ethno-nationalism. Think white nationalism, but just say ethno.

Yeah, ethno-nationalism in, in the Christian nationalist movement. You think those guys were always there, and they went, oh, this is our time. Let's seize, and we, we can advance stuff, or is it like, well, if there's going to be a national movement, we need to get on board with it, you know, because that's our ultimate goal anyway.

Like, or, I don't know. I mean, I'd. It's a yes hand. If you, if you really, if you really read through the Bible, you can't, you, you can't really pull any type of white nationalism, nationalism out of there.

You really have to do some misinterpretations and bad hermeneutics when you're talking, it's a book, book full of, you know, Jewish people and Middle Eastern people. So like, where, why do you think there's that, that vein within it?

Or, I mean, are, you're not, are you throwing the baby out with the bathwater too, and you're like, any form of Christian nationalism can't be done, can't be accomplished because we have these bad actors, or like, where are you on that too?

Get back to the subject we're supposed to be talking about. Yeah, I, I think, well, first of all, talk to a, a white nationalist, a non-supposed Christian with the Uganda flags in the bio on, on Twitter, and they'll tell you all why, you know, the Bible's cool with white nationalism.

They have their own set of, sure, you know, eisegesis that they do for that, but as far as where I am with Christian nationalism, look, I'm a Christian, right? So I would be a really bad Christian if I didn't think that my country's social mores should be ordered around Christian social mores.

Right, right, right. But, but I, I firmly believe that that is a product of the Great Commission. That is not a product of... What's a product of the Great Commission? Nations turning to God, or at least a majority of the nation turning to God, and in a representative democracy, we would naturally get the voting power, therefore we would naturally start, you know, orienting things, orientating things that way.

And what I think the, the New Testament is exceedingly clear about is that we are not to use violent methods to bring that about. Sure. You know, a, a government, and I'm going to get a little more enlightenment here, but I agree with this, I think, you know, enlightenment values at points can be natural law as well.

And, you know, a government is a collective individual on the, in the legal sense. Yeah. In the moral sense. And if you're going to have a Christian nation, then a Christian nation must follow the same social mores as the individual Christian.

And the individual Christian is told to leave blasphemers in peace, right? Yeah. The individual Christian is told not to use violence, but that our, you know, words are our weapons, right? Yeah. That we destroy lofty arguments, right?

It doesn't say, hey, when somebody says something bad about God, you know, punch him in the face. Right. Right. And so if you're going to organize a nation as a Christian nation, you've got to follow the same rules.