"An Unforced and Serious Error"
Or not...
You might remember that I wrote a couple of pieces on the Satanic Temple of Iowa erecting a statue of the occult figure Baphomet in the Iowa Capitol.
The second piece, titled “Our Liberties We Prize and Our Rights We Will Maintain, Declare Iowa Satanists,” drew a reaction from a respected acquaintance and scholar I’m going to call Mr. X:
Sorry, Bob. Your post today was an unforced and very serious error. This is Iowa…not New Orleans!
Please delete XXXXXXXXX (Mr. X’s substack) from your Substack recommendations!
I wish you all the best in your new career, whatever that might be.
I was stunned.
I don’t know why I do this, but whenever something like this happens, I immediately think I’m in the wrong, and that I have made a mistake. And I shudder a little.
Here I identify with Taylor Swift in her song “Anti-Hero”:
It's me, hi, I'm the problem, it's me.
I can relate. Every time I hear the song that line hits me like a lyrical brick.
I didn’t respond to his email, and probably won’t. I probably won’t send this to him either. But I thought it might be useful for me to share with the rest of you why I write about some of the things I write about—including the Satanic display.
I write to learn. Sometimes I don’t really know my opinion about something until I tease it out through the writing process. Every writer I know will likely tell you the same thing.
I also write to change the world in both small and significant ways. So does every other writer. Most of us—like every member of the Iowa Writers Collaborative—write to make the world a better place. Not everyone does, e.g., the scoundrels at Fox “News.”
I’m an anthropologist. My friend and fellow anthropologist Marcel Harmon often reminds the readers of his Substack Dispatches from Oz that as the great anthropologist Ruth Benedict wrote, “The purpose of anthropology is to make the world safe for human differences.”
So, Mr. X, I interviewed members of the Satanic Temple of Iowa to try to understand them. To seek to know who they are. To learn about them. This is part of making the world safe for human differences.
I don’t see my writing about them as an “unforced and serious error”. Or an error at all. In fact, writing about people like the Satanists is an anthropological mandate. This is what I am supposed to do as an anthropologist and a reporter. As part of me, I am drawn to people unlike me. Whoever they are, I seek to understand them and find common ground if possible. To learn.
Dozens of media outlets covered the story at one time or another. Every story I read about them was a straight news story, and all of them were good in my opinion. So why was me writing about them an “unforced error” and others not? Was it that I write differently? That my story elevated their message?
And you didn’t like that? Would you prefer me to lie and say they are bad or evil when they aren’t? Would you be more comfortable with that?
Or maybe you don’t want them to be covered at all? Maybe you want them to be invisible, like Republican leaders across the land want to do with LGBTQ+ people and other minorities? Demonize them, and erase them and their contributions from the history books? To marginalize them and drive them into hiding to rationalize the power structure?
Mr. X, people like you and me have been denying people like this their voices and worse for hundreds of years if not millennia.
I won’t be a part of it. I want to learn and help make the world safe for human differences.
You say:
This is Iowa…not New Orleans!
So what? You believe that I should be constrained with what and how I write because we are in Iowa? And what’s wrong with New Orleans? I’ve only been there once, but it was a fun, diverse and welcoming place. Maybe Iowa should try to be more like New Orleans. I’m not going to write what I’m really thinking about this statement of yours, but I know that if I had written it, and someone had called me out on it, I would be taking some time to unpack my prejudices. Think about it. Now think about it again.
You say:
Please delete XXXXXXXXX (Mr. X’s substack) from your Substack recommendations!
Wow. I would understand it if you wanted to unsubscribe because you didn’t like what I wrote. You would be the third person to have done that since I started this newsletter a year ago in July. But to ask that I not even tell my subscribers that I find your Substack newsletter valuable seems a little harsh. But that’s OK. I removed that recommendation. It’s almost like you feel that I am so “unclean” that you can’t engage with me in any way at all. That I’m untouchable.
Now in some small way you have marginalized me. Made me invisible despite all we have in common and my respect for your work. And you are just one person. What if it were Republican leadership across the land doing it? How would I feel?
Just like many LGBTQ+ and other minorities feel now I suspect. Oppressed. And maybe defiant.
I’ll try to remember not to shake your hand or engage with you in any way should we meet again so as not to embarrass you in public.
But hey, I got your most recent post today, and it was good. Thanks.
You close with:
I wish you all the best in your new career, whatever that might be.
I find it hard to understand the motivation behind this statement, although you wishing me “all the best” in my new career seems insincere after your previous statements. Maybe you thought it was “clever” but you actually make a good point. There is no reason for you to have known that I have retired, but much of my writing now happens because I don’t have to answer to conservative bosses or owners. As I wrote here, most of us in the media have to treat elected Republicans in the state with kid gloves because if we write things they don’t like we could lose access, and for many of us, losing access means losing our jobs.
As brave as we might be, we love our jobs and have to eat.
So what did I learn?
Above is a video I shot of them. Please watch it if so inclined. My words don’t do it justice.
What I learned about them is that they share the values most of us do. They are good Iowans.
They want individuals be judged by their actions, holding on to what is demonstrably true. They speak of personal sovereignty, mercy, their inclusive community, compassion, wisdom, having open hearts, being enlightened, for justice.
Through the darkness of tyrrany and oppression, we commit to our illumination. We shed light on those who would deceive us, and burn the bridges leading to ignorance and apathy. We hold a mirror to those who harm the innocent and the marginalized, even as they defend the rich, the powerful and the corrupt. When they threaten the personal sovereignty of one of us, they threaten the sovereignty of all of us.
OUR LIBERTIES WE PRIZE AND OUR RIGHTS WE WILL MAINTAIN!
Now contrast what Iowa Republicans have done. Dividing us by demonizing LGBTQ+ kids, teachers, librarians, our public schools, letting kids go hungry, reducing SNAP benefits, playing lip service to water quality, siphoning public money to private interests with no accountability, passing reckless gun laws, taking the bodily autonomy of women away, not passing significant mental health care legislation, privatizing Medicaid, getting rid of mental health beds, allowing kids to work more hours in dangerous conditions, tax breaks for the wealthy.
And I could go on and on.
So, whenever the Satanists “hold a mirror to those who harm the innocent and the marginalized, even as they defend the rich, the powerful and the corrupt,” I say more power to them.
We should do the same.
Speaking of the the exact center of the Venn diagram of rich, powerful and corrupt, Laura Belin and I spent much of Saturday at the Trump rally in Newton. Laura and I aren’t sure if we will write about it or not, but we were happy to spend some time with our friends Ty Rushing with the Iowa Starting Line and Christopher Braunschweig with the Newton Daily News. I’m sure they will have great coverage. Please consider supporting their work. I do.
Are you a writer? Do you want to write? Or are you a reader who wants to learn more about writing and meet with some of the best writers in the country? If so, please consider enrolling in Julie Gammack’s Okoboji Writers Retreat this coming September.
It’s a wonderful and supportive environment—some call it a “summer camp for nerds.” I love it, and it would be great to see you there. It is a wonderful time, and you will remember it forever. I love it so much and if you want to learn more, I hope you will read this letter I wrote to Julie after this past session here.
Below is a list of the members of the Iowa Writers’ Collaborative. Please support their work by sharing and subscribing.
I don’t know the politics of Mr. X but this column reminds me of what I’ve often felt is one of the main differences between liberals and conservatives. Liberals are open to other viewpoints, want to understand how and why others think differently than we do, and are comfortable letting those different folks live whatever kind of lives they want to lead. Conservatives often feel theirs is the only right way and they want to restrict the beliefs and actions of those who believe differently. I realize that is a generality, but when you look at recent actions in our state regarding reproductive rights, book banning and LGBTQ rights, I rest my case. Keep exploring and seeking to understand, Bob.
When you believe in freedom of the press, freedom of speech, and freedom of religion only when it's easy or only when it's your team (tribe), then you really don't believe in it.