#1533 How Theocracies Begin and End (Rise of the Far-Right + Demanding Women's Rights in Iran)
Best of the Left - Leftist Perspectives on Progressive Politics, News, Culture, Economics and Democracy
Jay Tomlinson
4.5 • 3.4K Ratings
🗓️ 24 December 2022
⏱️ 63 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Air Date 12/24/2022
Today, we compare the far-right religious extremists who are fighting to gain power in the US with the protests against the theocratic regime in Iran supporting women's rights in the country.
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SHOW NOTES
Ch. 1: How a new Christian right is changing US politics - BBC News - Air Date 11-28-22
A new battle of faith is being driven by some pastors and politicians in the United States. Their central message is that the country's conservative Christian way of life is under threat, and American society is moving in the wrong direction.
"Iranians voted multiple times for over two decades for some process of reform … but the state has not given in to those demands," she says. "What we're seeing now is the result." Tahmasebi is the director of FEMENA
Ch. 3: The Taliban’s Far-Right Fan Base - VICE - Air Date 10-18-21
In chat rooms and message boards on the darker corners of the web - far-right groups have been praising the Taliban’s takeover, lauding their religious fundamentalism, execution of opponents, and hatred of so-called liberalism.
"Today's movement is not calling for reform. Today's movement is calling for a new vision of politics … with women at the helm of it," says Narges Bajoghli, professor of anthropology and Middle East studies at Johns Hopkins University
Far Right, Anti-Democratic Extremist groups are not slowing down. Some even have connections with ‘mainstream’ Republican politicians. Peter Montgomery joins Thom Hartmann to discuss the threat the far right still poses.
Sam and Emma host Nahid Siamdoust, Assistant Professor of Middle East and Media Studies at the University of Texas at Austin, to discuss the recent political protests in Iran.
Rachel Maddow shares some of the fringe perspectives of the racist, Christian fascist who Donald Trump hosted for dinner at Mar-a-Lago
MEMBERS-ONLY BONUS CLIP(S)
Joseph Kennedy, a football coach, pressured his students to pray with him. He was asked not pressure students into religion during Public School activities. but he refused. Rachel Laser joined Thom to discuss the case and the pressure on students.
“Because the conservative majority has tossed away all pretense of being anything other than, essentially, a high council of Fox News viewers, they decided her case should be heard before the Supreme Court,” says Chris Hayes
FINAL COMMENTS
Ch. 12: Final comments on why Christian Nationalists would be better off not installing a dictatorship
MUSIC (Blue Dot Sessions)
Produced by Jay! Tomlinson
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | In case you're still looking for last minute gift ideas, we've collected into one place |
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| 0:23.3 | We appreciate the sport. |
| 0:24.3 | Again that's bestofalleft.com slash holiday. |
| 0:27.4 | Now, welcome to this episode of the award-winning Best of the Left podcast with which we shall |
| 0:32.6 | get you into the Christmas spirit by comparing the Christian nationalists fighting the |
| 0:37.0 | gain power in the US with the protests against the theocratic regime in Iran supporting women's |
| 0:42.9 | rights in the country. |
| 0:44.7 | Clips today are from a BBC News documentary, Democracy Now, The Tom Hartman program, The |
| 0:50.3 | Rachel Maddo Show, The Majority Report, and Vice News with additional members only clips |
| 0:55.4 | from the Tom Hartman program and all in with Chris Hayes. |
| 1:05.3 | So Christian nationalism is a new term for a very old phenomenon. |
| 1:10.5 | So it privileges a religious identity with citizenship in its most virulent form. |
| 1:17.5 | It turns out to also have an ethnic or racial component to it. |
| 1:21.7 | In the US that component has been around European descent or whiteness really as it has developed |
| 1:27.5 | in the country. |
| 1:28.5 | So when I talk about Christian nationalism in the US I usually talk about white Christian |
| 1:33.5 | nationalism. |
| 1:35.2 | Donald Trump was seen as defending their cause when he entered the White House. |
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