And Then There Was One

Well it couldn't happen to a nicer guy.

The situation got even worse last fall, when Focus was forced to lay off another 200 employees. One of the reasons for the organization's troubles has been its failure to effectively appeal to the next generation of Christians.
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Oh Amy, you've warmed my cold black liberal heart.

Could it be that the flock has tired of following shepherds who coldly use them for political or monetary gain but then fail to deliver on empty promises?

Good riddance to the hatemonger!

But on the up side Amy thinks James Dobson is 'scary smart'.

The Religious Right is very much still around--but the era in which it dominated political and cultural discussions has come to an end.
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When did the Religious Right ever dominate political and cultural discussions, except in the Village?
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And who decided that this "dominance" has come to an end?
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You're treating this episode as if it were some natural phenomenon like the summer becoming fall, un-associated with real people and decisions, Amy Sullivan.
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Somehow, all by itself, Meet The Press had David Brody of Pat Robertson's Christian Broadcasting Network as a regular round-table participant. Somehow, independent of anybody's deliberate intentions, Democracy Now's Amy Goodman never gets a seat at that Sunday morning "discussion".
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Today's young Christians, however, know Dobson best as a divisive, controversial political figure. And they haven't been lining up behind him.
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How do you know this, Amy Sullivan?
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Is this just wishful thinking on your part, or do you have polling data to back up your claims about what these fine young people think and believe?

Is it because he's too much of a nasty, hatemongering bigot or not enough of a nasty, hatemongering bigot?
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Sheesh. That's actually a legitimate question.

Hi, Amy. This is just to say that I enjoy your pieces along these lines--I'm at Yale Divinity School thinking about how evangelical culture relates to the rest of the country. (Apparently I'm more sympathetic than your other commenters.) I've just added your book to my Amazon cart and look forward to reading it.

I find it interesting - and revealing on a number of levels - that AS discusses Dobson and Focus as a social and political phenomenon rather than a religious one. The weakness of Focus on the Family is and always has been its willingess to ignore Christ whenever Christ is in opposition to its social agenda.
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[T]he relatively anodyne Focus on the Family inserts that appeared in my church bulletins in the early nineties were already male-dominated, white-centric house codes whose purpose was to shield children from all exposure to other cultures and religions and, above all, to reinforce the authority of the father over the mother and "the church" above all else.
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Add in a whiff of the profit motive, and the rest is, as they say, history.
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I don't find Focus's inability to recruit young evangelicals puzzling at all. The only thing it offers is a chance to "move up" in a power structure that is visibly rotten and shamefully irrelevant to feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, and healing the sick.
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It's worthwhile for Christians to reflect, from time to time, that the Son of the One True God died on the cross as punishment for opposing the ruling class, not in bed of a heart attack from eating too much rich food in a an overheated palace.

Speaking as one of those "young Christians" who don't line up behind Dobson: What drove a lot of us away was having parents who read his books and did all sorts of loveless authoritarian stuff to us. If you're gonna raise kids—and if you're gonna be a Christian, for that matter—you need to do it with some degree of compassion. We didn't see it in our parents, and we rarely see it in Dobson. There's too much "This is bad" and not enough "Let me help."

I agree with what kwleslie wrote. Dobson's parenting advice, with its focus on physical discipline of children (hitting them with belts, etc.) is an outdated, barbaric form of disciplining children that is seen by sane, well-informed members of today's society as a form of child abuse. Dobson's "Focus on the Family" would be better named "Focus on Punishment." For years, Dobson thought he could punish politicians (and control their behaviors and words) by influencing his base of supporters against politicians who did not do (or say) what Dobson wanted. In this year's election, McCain over-estimated Dobson's political power and made the fatal mistake of trying to please the "I Heart Dobson, Huckabee, and Palin" crowd by choosing Palin as his running-mate. Clearly, Dobson and Dobson-ites do not have the political clout and influence they may have had at one time. As long as the Republican party continues to align themselves with Dobson's brand of "tough love" (which is not really love at all), they will continue to lose elections and political power. Republicans can rant and rave all they wish, but until Republicans wake up and boldly denounce the hate-mongering, punishing brand of Christianity that Dobson stands for and realize that such views are becoming increasingly irrelevant and intolerable in our society, they will continue to lose elections and political power. Dobson stepping down as chair of Focus on the Family is an encouraging sign of the times. I predict that the comprehensive folding of organizations like Focus on the Family won't be far behind.

that has nothing to do with "tough love" or with "love" at all. In fact, most young parents today understand that the form of punishment Dobson advocated in his parenting books is actually a form of abuse. Dobson's focus on punishment in general that many, if not most, young parents now view as child abuse.

The Religious Right seeded their own failures by marching lock step hand in hand with leaders who tortured, lied, spewed message of hate, preyed on the weak, corrupted our financial systems and served their one true God, the all mighty dollar bill. Those of the faith have started comparing actions and deeds to their religious teachings and found those leaders lacking in humanity. The era of the super churches and radical rightwing religious movements is nearing an end and it did not take the second coming to do it.

I suspect that what happened to Dobson, Falwell, Roberts, et al was simply that they became addicted to the influence that they wielded within the Republican party. In the stridency of Dobson's public statements throughout the last election cycle (especially the despicable Letter from 2012) I could hear one thing most prominently: rage at the prospect that his influence was coming to an end. It was as sad, pathetic, and anti-Christ as anything I could imagine.

There's too much "This is bad" and not enough "Let me help."
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Well said.
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As a Christian, I have to also remark that it's not just Dobson's politics that are wrong --his theology's really wrong, too.
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It seems his kind want to set up a tribe with its own list of Levitican proscriptions as the basis for membership.
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Paul's letter to the Romans (I know, I'm back to that again) is the clearest expression of how idiotic --how regressive, how anti-Christian-- that "bible-based" hucksterism is.
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The whole point is for us to be given the gift of grace through Christ's blood without regard to which version of the law our culture compels us to follow. We're not supposed to care about whether or not somebody's circumcised, nor whether somebody has different rules for fornication than we do. We're all Christians because of the grace of God, not some "focus" on adherence to old testament family structures. Why don't these people get it? Why aren't they reading Paul's scriptures properly?
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What kind of church teaches this stuff?
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And, by the way, I've never found James Dobson's stuff littering my church's pews...

Ah hell, I end my self-imposed ban from Amy's posts. Only to engage with my colleagues, not to validate the work of Godhead. When did Rosen write that Stu? Excellent. And even more apropos to Joe's recent fo-po(sts). Anyway, I always knew I was a deviant--as for this connotation, I can be proud:
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"In the sphere of deviance we find 'political actors and views which journalists and the political mainstream of society reject as unworthy of being heard.' As in the sphere of consensus, neutrality isn't the watchword here; journalists maintain order by either keeping the deviant out of the news entirely or identifying it within the news frame as unacceptable, radical, or just plain impossible. The press 'plays the role of exposing, condemning, or excluding from the public agenda' the deviant view, says Hallin. It 'marks out and defends the limits of acceptable political conduct.'"

If there was money to be made and political relevance to be had in cooking then Dobson would have had a cooking show. Religion was his means not his end.

Could the reason be that young Christians turn away from the likes of Dobson and his teachings is that they are bombarded by a anti Christianity press?

Ah, Pinto: "Religion was his means not his end."
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I think a slight tweak and we could apply the same analysis to must of our leadership in Washington.

lawnjockey--It's more likely that young Christians turn away from the likes of Dobson and his teachings because many young Christians today actually do see a problem with beating children. Also, many young Christians today really do believe that it's okay to THINK for themselves. Ding, ding, ding! Stuart--"we're all Christians because of the grace of God." Hmmmm....and God doesn't extend this grace to everyone because....? Oh yes, we can't all be chosen for the "special" class, can we? I think the last thing people need to do is to pay attention to the writings of Paul, the very guy who wrote in Romans 9 that God has every right to create some people as objects of his wrath. Let me guess, are you one of those religious types who can use phrases like "elect infants" and "reprobate infants" with a straight face? Dobson's fundamentalist version of Christianity is disgusting. However, equally disgusting--if not downright perverse--is the belief that a "loving God" creates some people as objects of his wrath.

Paul--Religion is always the means and not the end.

Darcy

Read all of Romans 9. The point that Paul is trying to get across is that Israel still qualifies as the chosen people even though they behaved like the Dobson crowd. Paul's talking about a "what if" hypothetical to support his argument.
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Taking verses out of context will lead you into a hole just as deep as the fundies have dug for themselves. Grace is for everybody, period, no asterisks.

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lawnjockeypresident: Could the reason be that young Christians turn away from the likes of Dobson and his teachings is that they are bombarded by a anti Christianity press?
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No.
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Nice handle you've chosen, by-the-way. Your friends at the Klan rallies must think it's just hilarious.

Focus on the Family isn't appealing to the next generation of christians. Can this be the proof that "No Child Left Behind" might actually be working? Are today's young christians smarter than their parents? Or unlike their parents, might they truly be taking christianity as the gospel?

Is your application on their desk, Amy?

While visiting Taiwan weeks ago, I attended a Baptist Church service and found Mr. Dobson's Chinese translated essay in the church brochure. It advocated active condemning of unfaithful partner in a marriage, rather than the Love conquers all mantra. Yes, J.D. still has audiences at far reach of the earth.

I was a young evangelical Christian once, and J.D./Focus on Family was well entrenched in my church's theological pathos. I since outgrew the "evangelical" part of the 2-word denomination, and found Mr. Dobson's single minded political activism in Christ's name offensive. Funny FOF now serves as the Scarlet Letter rather than the shining beacon on my own parenthood.