How About Religion?

 Utterly NOT-remarkable essay excerpted at Ace's place.

... the Iranian Revolution of 1979 posed a challenge even more unsettling to modern assumptions. It had become a modernizing state that many believed was steadily moving toward secular development, given Peter Burger’s at that time on the secularization thesis, which he later rejected. It argued that as societies modernize, religion gradually loses social, political, and cultural influence.

Yet, suddenly, Iran produced a theocratic government led by clerics. For many scholars and policymakers, the outcome seemed almost inconceivable beforehand, given its shift to a more secularized government. The shock was not simply political; it was intellectual as well. The Iranian Revolution revealed a blind spot in modern political theory: the enduring political power of religion.


Prior to the revolution of 1979, most academic work, led by Burger, which was built upon the work of Max Weber and Émile Durkheim, assumed that modernization caused religion to retreat from politics as secular regimes rose to power. Industrialization, urbanization, and advances in education pushed religion away from the public sphere and toward private life. Indeed, Iran appeared to be heading in this direction under the rule of Mohammad Reza Shah, whose regime was committed to economic modernization and an alliance with the West. . .

...Much of the continuing Western misinterpretation of Iran reflects the lingering influence of secularization theory. Many policymakers still assume that economic development, generational change, or deeper integration into global markets will gradually normalize Iran’s political system. Yet the revolution itself suggested otherwise. In Iran, modernization strengthened the social networks through which religious leaders organized political resistance. The Islamic Republic therefore represents not simply a temporary deviation from secular modernity but a different model of political modernity in which religious authority remains central.

The Iranian Revolution ultimately forces a broader reconsideration of how political change unfolds in the modern world. Revolutions do not inevitably produce secular or liberal outcomes. Instead, they reveal which institutions command the deepest trust within a society....

We have OFTEN stated on this blog that the Bush-ites and the Clinton-ites, and the CIA-ites, and the State Department twits (inter alia) were making a serious error by ignoring religion in their pursuit of Eden--which they wanted to effect through "regime change"--in the Middle East.  None of them understood religion, except the religion of Mammon.

We are happy to have been proven correct, except for this damned "war" thing.

Of course, this has implications in the US.  The same gang of ignorami stulti, reading the Weber/Durkheim/Burger 'bible,' are having trouble governing the US because they thought (and still hold) that the US will turn into a thoroughly modern secular State.  Thus the shock they experienced when Trump came to power.  Trump One's campaign openly played to Christian sensibilities and themes, when all the Right People knew that only fools actually believed all that stuff.  

The Right People were wrong.  

So they...........ahhh..........."fortified" the '20 and jailed hundreds of US citizens who protested their blatant election fraud, thinking that those Court of Star Chamber trials and imprisonments would deter the masses, and with their chosen idiot Charlie McCarthy sitting on the lap of  Edgar Bergen the Deep State, they continued with not-at-all subtle hints about their power, using "CoVid 19" as their excuse for ripping the Constitution to shreds, killing grannies, forcing home-confinement on most of the population, and openly threatening their jobs and livelihood for failure to obey.

That failed, too--and Trump returned.

But the Weber/Durkheim/Burger Theory of "regime change" comes back, because Trump swallowed the bait of campaign funding and the hook is sunk deep in his craw.  For those of you who thought Trump was really the 'believer' (as he had campaigned way back when) this is a shock.  He now believes in the Burger theory and turns out to be exactly what he is:  a New York secularist Real Estate Developer.  

Fortunately for him, a large segment of Americans are perfectly happy to see Armageddon in their day, believing their ascent to Heaven will follow immediately, and they not only voted for him again, but they loudly support his action in Iran.  By the way, those Christians understand that the Weber/Durkheim/Burger theory was wrong, which is exactly why they support the assault on Iran.

Irony abounds, no?