Although there are many concerning trends in American politics today, the most alarming recent event was the selection of Speaker of the House Mike Johnson.
I will take a moment to concede on a personal level, he seems like a decent, relatively soft-spoken guy if you are talking to him about anything other than politics. However, his political views horrify me.
First of all, let me address his views regarding homosexuality. He has made statements calling homosexuality “sinful” and “destructive,” and has said such relationships are “harmful and costly for everyone.” I have failed to see how this is true – I recall no instances of someone being gay or lesbian causing harm or imposing costs on me or any other straight person. Rather, I can see how restricting their rights – just like restricting the rights of any people – can adversely impact their productivity and participation in society, thereby hurting the rest of us.
This, and a lot of his other views, stem from the fact he essentially views Christian doctrine as being on par with the Constitution, if not superseding it. In reference to being asked about how he evaluates any issue, he said “go pick up a Bible off your shelf and read it – that’s my worldview.”
However, as evidenced by the religion of yours truly (Hinduism), the United States is a secular country, not a Christian theocracy. That is not to say Christian values and views are bad, or that other religions are better – what that is saying is the United States government should not be run based on the text of the Bible. The Bible is for regulating one’s self on a personal level (or in my case, the Vedas, if I ever read them), not for imposing laws on a religiously and ethnically diverse population at the national level.
These beliefs have led him to certain wild conclusions. One example is the idea that teaching evolution leads to mass-shootings because the shooters will believe there is no right or wrong since evolution, unlike religious creationism, is an amoral process. Such a small worldview fails to explain why places with a predominance of religious schools continue to be violent while other secularly educated countries fail to have a single school shooting. (I will let you, dear reader, figure out what one plausible variable is correlated with the prevalence of school shootings in America and the lack thereof in other Western democracies).
Regarding another important crossroads between science and politics, he has willfully ignored evidence that shows climate change is a result of human activity (things like the relative ratios of oxygen isotopes in polar ice cores, or the historical/pre-historical rates at which warming naturally occurs, as well as other pieces of evidence from rocks, tree rings and more and more).
Most alarmingly to me, he has been and will likely continue to be a key force in the ongoing decay of democracy in this country. He has been described by many news outlets as a key “architect” in the effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election, helping create an amicus brief requesting the Supreme Court to overturn the election, objecting to the certification of Biden’s election win and promoting Fox’s lies regarding the supposed rigging of the election by software on Dominion voting machines (a lie that cost Fox $787.5 million if you recall).
The reason I view this area as the most dangerous part of his ideology is because even if most Americans are convinced his other beliefs are wrong, that would mean little in a malfunctioning democracy (and nothing in an autocracy).
Hence, Mike Johnson is truly the archetype of the nice-guy villain – undermining civil rights, science and the foundations of democracy in one fell swoop while playing the role of an amiable, reserved, god-fearing man.
