HOLY S*%T! Interview about "The Family"

[PostMortem]

Bill Maher interviews Jeff Sharlet, author of The Family: Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power. (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0060560053/ref=cm_rdp_product)

Bill Maher is actually left speechless at one point. Scary, scary stuff!

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[Daydream]

SHIT! :wtf:

[Goodchild]

And then people complain about the 'militant atheists' who are trying to prevent the shit that he talks about.

Every day seems to give me more and more reason to despise religion.

[willynilly]

I get HBO pulled it so I went looking for info. Here is an interview by a blogger with the author.

http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/11164

[PostMortem]

I get HBO pulled it so I went looking for info. Here is an interview by a blogger with the author.

http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/11164

Well SHIT!

Here's another link to the same video in the OP, we'll see how long it lasts. (A nice Mod might want to change the YouTube link in the OP to this, PLEASE)

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Oh, and WillyNilly thanks for the other link.

[HinduWoman]

You sure the book is not partly influenced by Ludlum's Icarus Agenda?

[B.H.]

I was raised Church of Christ and I heard straight from the horses mouth from two preachers that if a Church of Christ member ever came to political power and had the ability to do so, it would be his duty to God to actually outlaw other denominations and religions because only the Church of Christ had the truth. Their reasoning was that if it is sinful (and therefore should be illegal) for people to sell fake medicines and con people in other ways it should be illegal for Baptist preachers, Methodist preachers, and Muslim Imams and others to con people with their false religion.


People think I am crazy when I say I heard this but I am telling the truth. It's one reason I left the Church of Christ. Now, I do grant these two preachers were preachers for the most strict CoC, those who believed the congregation had to drink from one cup for communion and you couldn't have Sunday School--but----I asked my more mainline CoC preacher what he thought and he basically danced around the issue by saying "Coercion isn't the best way to change people's hearts" but even he under pressure admitted what those two preachers said was not "false" and that if "other means did not stop other denominations from teaching their doctrines" as a last resort the Church of Christ member could use force against them to silence "false doctrine".

[David B]

Jeez!

David

[Monad]

I thought "The Family" was a cult led by Charles Manson.

Now it seems where Manson's cult failed, this cult has succeeded.

[sohy]

There's been several news stories about this lately. A few came out after the SC gov resigned. Until I watched Maher, I didn't realize this has been going on for fifty years. It's just so sick.

[willynilly]

I shouldn't be but am surprised this hasn't gotten more attention.

[PostMortem]

HBO has invoked 'copyright' AGAIN! So here's another link to the video, hopefully it will last a little longer this time.

Again can a nice Mod fix the YouTube link in the OP to match this one, please?

Someone really needs to upload this to 'Live Leak' or 'Meta Cafe', they seem less likely to remove stuff.


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[Christina]

I'll change it again if this latest one lasts longer than an hour or so. It seems pretty clear that they're getting deleted as soon as they find one. PM me if it's still there in an hour : )

[Seeker630]

The scariest part is the bit about building mega-churches on military bases.:eek:

[openeyes]

I haven't been able to watch the links, but I have been hearing Sharlet speak on The Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC several times over the past couple of weeks.

My significant other and I both read his book a year or so ago. Sharlet was a featured speaker at the Freedom From Religion Foundation convention last fall in Chicago. Since we both liked his book, we asked him to lunch, and since apparently he didn't have any other offers, he joined us! We were also joined by another FFRF member from Massachusetts, I think it was. A very interesting lunch.

I think the most ominous part of "The Family" is its secretiveness and behind the scene string-pulling.

P.S. The last link did work so I did get to watch the Maher segment

[Christina]

I changed the first link again since the latest version is still there.

[PostMortem]

Thanks for changing the link again! I hope it continues to work. At least the person who uploaded it to YouTube was smart enough not to include Bill Maher's name or the name of the show in the title, so that may make it harder for HBO to track it down and pull it.

[LoneWolf]

The scariest part is the bit about building mega-churches on military bases.:eek:

I’m not too concerned about that. I have seen more and more of the little chapels on bases getting shut down due to lack of use. But it is the intent behind the idea that scares me.

[Ray Moscow]

Pharyngula (http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/08/a_book_to_give_us_all_nightmar.php) has it linked, too.

[tjakey]

It will be interesting to see what happens now that a little sunlight has been shed on these cockroaches.

[sohy]

I was wrong. This has been going on for 74 years.

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2009/07/21/c_street/print.html


The Family likes to call itself a "Christian Mafia," but it began 74 years ago as an anti-New Deal coalition of businessmen convinced that organized labor was under the sway of Satan. The Great Depression, they believed, was a punishment from God for what they viewed as FDR's socialism. The Family's goal was the "consecration" of America to God, first through the repeal of New Deal reforms, then through the aggressive expansion of American power during the Cold War. They called this a "Worldwide Spiritual Offensive," but in Washington, it amounted to the nation's first fundamentalist lobby. Early participants included Southern Sens. Strom Thurmond, Herman Talmadge and Absalom Willis Robertson -- Pat Robertson's father. Membership lists stored in the Family's archive at the Billy Graham Center at evangelical Wheaton College in Illinois show active participation at any given time over the years by dozens of congressmen.

I guess the fact that they have been so secretive has helped keep them out of the news until now.

[Notta]

The fundamentalists had a lot of power in the Air Force Academy, too, where new plebes (?) were forced to attend prayer meetings and church services.

[tjakey]

Notta, if I were KFAD (king for a day) I would close the Air Force Academy effective TOMORROW! That place is fucked up even for the military.