Intersectional and identity politics, not Westmont, is exclusive
March 24, 2020
In the week preceding spring break, it became evident that our campus community is split in two. Westmont’s division is not unique. This is a nationwide conflict between conservatism and liberalism; the battleground is intersectionality and identity politics.
The phenomenon of intersectional identity politics is not timeless; it is very much of our times. Yet our embrace of this modern liberal ideology has hastened our abandonment of long-held Christian views on political issues. Specifically, we have refused to acknowledge homosexuality as a sin, we have assented to the mass genocide of the unborn, and we have allowed a spirit of accusation and intimidation to define racial issues. Worse, we wrap our defense of these practices in language of biblical justice. But make no mistake, our doctrine is being guided by our politics, not the other way around.
We are meant to find our mutual identity in Christ, for in Him there is “neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male or female” (Gal 3:28). Yet adherents to intersectionality find their identity in race, gender, sexuality, and other markers. They supposedly focus on linkages, but they demonize those who are too high up their ladder of privilege. Intersectionality is anti-white, anti-male, anti-cisgender, anti-heterosexual, and anti-wealthy. Christ is radically inclusive. Intersectionality is inherently exclusive.
Following the religion of intersectionality, we have silently entertained a spirit of destruction at Westmont. We have seen students seek to tear down an innocuous image of Christ, disrupt our chapel community time in protest, attack administration as participating in racism and sexism, and attack fellow students with the same charge. They offer slogans and generalities as a justification (Jesus wasn’t white! Students of Color are not safe! We are being silenced!), but specifics are conspicuously absent. Why?
The bottom line is this: the facts are not on their side. There is a dichotomy between what students say about Westmont and what Westmont is. Those who protested can claim that they are being silenced, but most of our recent community life events have given voice to the “voiceless” (Voices; Race, Faith, and your Clark RA’s; Race, Memory, and Monuments after Charlottesville, Global Focus Week, etc.). In response to a man not remotely affiliated with Westmont, we spent 30 minutes of chapel proving our anti-racist credentials through virtue-signalling apologies and condemnations. Our administration apologized for enforcing campus poster policy because minority students were upset. Based on my count, nine of the 15 guest speakers in chapel thus far this semester have been a woman or a person of color. Four of the remaining five guest speakers who were scheduled in chapel (prior to the COVID-19 outbreak) also would have fit this bill.
But Westmont is silencing underrepresented voices?
Part of the problem is Intercultural Programs (ICP). They claim to want unity, but unity requires a mutually agreed-upon common ground where disagreements can be handled maturely. At Westmont, that common ground is supposed to be the Community Life Statement (CLS). We all signed the CLS and agreed to abide by it, yet ICP has made it clear that the CLS is an ironic joke to them. When they protest the upholding of campus policy, they protest their own signatures. They disrespect their commitment to their word and to the community at Westmont.
ICP demands humility and submission from others in the spirit of Christ. Yet they display none of that humility or submission themselves. We need to stop uncritically assuming that they are acting with full Christian clarity, wisdom, and virtue.
I do not want to sound callous. I see that students of color are suffering. They experience the culture shock, isolation, loneliness, difficulty, and fear that too often defines college life, regardless of socioeconomic and cultural background. When we suffer like this, we lose sight of our own strength and purpose. We need friends who can strengthen us and remind us that our purpose is found in Christ. ICP ought to be that voice for students of color. But instead, all I have seen is an advocacy group for intersectional politics disguised as prophetic justice.
We must not be deceived. There is no healing to be found in intersectional identity politics, no remedy to suffering. It is a malicious ideology built upon the foundation of exclusion. Intersectional identity politics infect us, warping our relationships until all we can see is a power dynamic instead of love. That is why we celebrate every apology from administration as a concession (or reject it out of anger) instead of accepting it with humility and grace.
The administration is not an opponent to be beaten. Our neighbor is not an oppressor to be overcome. Whatever suffering we may face, and we are in the midst of suffering, I know that it is only compounded by our division.
NOTE: In op-ed pieces, it is common to refrain from using phrases like “I think” or “in my opinion”, simply because an article’s presence in an op-ed section already denotes this claim. All expressions above should be taken in this context unless expressed otherwise.
Opinions published in The Horizon do not reflect the official position of The Horizon or its staff members.
There is a lot factually wrong with your claims, and while I’m not an expert I think I’m at least equipped enough, as a history minor, to address one of the first ones you make, that the conversation about intersectional identity is new to our time, which is just flagrantly inaccurate. While it may appear to be a new conversation, and something that is innately anti-Christian, it is closer to the opposite, in fact it’s exactly Christianity and religion where we see its presence throughout history.
Throughout the majority of history, religion and nation have been very closely tied together to the point that they were borderline indistinguishable. While there were a few exceptions to this rule, none of which being nations with much Christian influence, the latest this conversation could be argued to begin was the moment a particular sheet of paper was nailed to a particular door in Wittenburg 1517. When Martin Luther challenged the Catholic Church questions about religion’s intersection with nationality began. I make this claim because it was at this time a massive number of nations throughout all of Europe began stepping away from the Catholic church and encouraging new interpretations of the Bible. That makes this very conversation the very birthplace of the evangelical Christianity that Westmont subscribes to, which may not be the exact use of the intersectionality and identity politics that you’re thinking of, but that is only the natural progression of the very same conversation that was core to the reformation. We can easily trace that religious reformation into heavily impacting the renaissance, which drastically shifted philosophical way of thought, and subsequently played a huge role in the formation of America, with some of the initial immigrants being some form of religious refugees making their claim on the conversation by allowing all religions and declaring “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness” (Declaration of Independence). Now that we’ve gotten to the formation of America we can continue to trace this conversation down any number of lines, but most importantly through the question of slavery. Where in this exact quote it talks about “all men,” and from there we eventually get to the civil war, Jim Crow era, and eventually the Civil Rights Movement lead by MLK. During this period we get the first two waves of feminism, which gives women the right to vote, and as all of these are limited to only one group at a time it is a claim itself about intersectionality. In short, you are completely inaccurate in saying that the conversation of intersectionality is new to our time, I only went from the clearest example that I could think of. Yet I think you could find some claims made on it going all the way back to the foundations of civilization. But I’d have a bit less to work with from there.
The reason I think this is important also ties back directly to what you were saying later with “But make no mistake, our doctrine is being guided by our politics, not the other way around.” Is the exact claim that was being made to shut down the very religion that you yourself likely practice as it is the one Westmont pushes, so to say that this is a new conversation would overtly reject the foundational period of all protestant Christianity, as well as the basis for the western world that is the renaissance.
TLDR: We do have a history of intersectional politics as such:
Religion + Nationality (reformation) -> Religion + Nationality (Puritans + Formation of America) -> Race + Humanity (Slavery), as well as Women + Humanity (suffrage movements) -> Race + Equality (MLK) -> Current conversation.
Also I would like to address your final comments, as a White man. Division isn’t the problem with Westmont, in fact I would argue that some sort of division is necessary within any society. Yes we are all part of one body, no one is challenging that. I have spoken with a number of the ICP leaders and I’m pretty sure they aren’t rejecting their faith, instead they’re expressing that Westmont students have had certain roles and expectations pushed onto them that do not ring true to a large portion of the community and as such they should change. To continue the example of being a part of one body I see it as ICP claiming to be an ear while being told to act like a hand. The division comes not when the ear says “I cannot” but when the actual hand decides to cut it off because it isn’t doing as it is told.
As a senior religious studies major, I’m going to try and limit my comment to one element of this article, and that is the usage of Galatians 3.28.
If I’m understanding the logical flow of how the article employs the passage, it’s as follows: From Galatians 3.28 we can infer that all Christians ought to find their mutual identity in Christ. However, “adherents to intersectionality find their identity in race, gender, sexuality, and other markers” ∴ in this respect they are being theological deviant. The substance of the argument is that we are called to unity and these other markers of identity have consequently proved themselves divisive.
Let us briefly step back and put this verse into its context. Paul is addressing Christian institution malpractice within the churches of Galatia. Specifically, that there were certain Jewish Christians attempting to persuade male followers of Christ that they must be circumcised in order to be true Christians. Paul refutes this by presenting them with the gospel of Christ in a way that sheds light on how Christ creates a new kind of society of inclusion that is not predicated on these prior markers of Jewish identity.
Identity in Christ is what it means to be grafted into God’s blessing to all people through Abraham (Gen. 12.3b). However, if we are to claim this identity in Christ, as a community or institution, and wear a badge of Christianity, there ought to be defining actions that correlate with that badge. In Galatians we see an example in which the actions of these specific Jewish Christians do not match the badge of which they claim; as they attempt to impose their views systematically on the local church. Paul’s rebuke here was written to the Christian institution in Galatia (Gal. 1.2). He is writing on behalf of this estranged multicultural & multiethnic family, the “intersectionality” of these peoples as we would call it today. Paul is writing on behalf of those feeling alienated.
In other words, a contextualized reading of the passage makes the exact opposite point the article attempts to make. So, when the passage is employed as such in the article, it is exactly what Paul is warning against in his argument by throwing it back on those who are being excluded by institutional malpractice. The article’s response to such events via scripture seems to be, were all Christians, shouldn’t that be enough. It is decisive, white-centric, and complacent with systematic injustice. The same logic has been used to keep people in slavery, and women in abusive marriages via scripture. Now I know this is extreme, but following out the reasoning accordingly shows where and how it is flawed.
It is clear from the rest of the article that the author doesn’t think the Christian institution of Westmont knowingly or otherwise displays malpractice in the ways that have been protested. Overall, the article has displayed a lack of engagement in the art of listening. I implore the readers here to take a look at the Westmont Alumni letter regarding recent events as it outlines many specific examples the article claims are non-existent. It seems significant as last I checked it had nearly 600 signatures. I urge the author and readers to reflect on the vast amount of faculty members who stood with the protesters and how that testifies to the validity of their concerns.
Lastly, I wanted to say that I am a living counterexample to the articles following claims as I adhere to intersectionality and identity politics, have found healing there, and I am white, I am male, I am cisgender, I am heterosexual, I am wealthy by the standards of this world, and I find my idenity in Christ. I believe you would find that to be true of many students who consider themselves an ally of protests on campus. My encouragement is towards an articulation of the gospel as the philosophy of the oppressed, as it provides us with socioethical content in which we can directly address human relations in the civic sphere.
In Christ, Kieran Clark
As a senior religious studies major, I’m going to try and limit my comment to one element of this article, and that is the usage of Galatians 3.28.
If I’m understanding the logical flow of how the article employs the passage, it’s as follows: From Galatians 3.28 we can infer that all Christians ought to find their mutual identity in Christ. However, “adherents to intersectionality find their identity in race, gender, sexuality, and other markers” ∴ in this respect they are being theological deviant. The substance of the argument is that we are called to unity and these other markers of identity have consequently proved themselves divisive.
Let us briefly step back and put this verse into its context. Paul is addressing Christian institution malpractice within the churches of Galatia. Specifically, that there were certain Jewish Christians attempting to persuade male followers of Christ that they must be circumcised in order to be true Christians. Paul refutes this by presenting them with the gospel of Christ in a way that sheds light on how Christ creates a new kind of society of inclusion that is not predicated on these prior markers of Jewish identity.
Identity in Christ is what it means to be grafted into God’s blessing to all people through Abraham (Gen. 12.3b). However, if we are to claim this identity in Christ, as a community or institution, and wear a badge of Christianity, there ought to be defining actions that correlate with that badge. In Galatians we see an example in which the actions of these specific Jewish Christians do not match the badge of which they claim; as they attempt to impose their views systematically on the local church. Paul’s rebuke here was written to the Christian institution in Galatia (Gal. 1.2). He is writing on behalf of this estranged multicultural & multiethnic family, the “intersectionality” of these peoples as we would call it today. Paul is writing on behalf of those feeling alienated.
In other words, a contextualized reading of the passage makes the exact opposite point the article attempts to make. So, when the passage is employed as such in the article, it is exactly what Paul is warning against in his argument by throwing it back on those who are being excluded by institutional malpractice. The article’s response to such events via scripture seems to be, were all Christians, shouldn’t that be enough. It is decisive, white-centric, and complacent with systematic injustice. The same logic has been used to keep people in slavery, and women in abusive marriages via scripture. Now I know this is extreme, but following out the reasoning accordingly shows where and how it is flawed.
It is clear from the rest of the article that the author doesn’t think the Christian institution of Westmont knowingly or otherwise displays malpractice in the ways that have been protested. Overall, the article has displayed a lack of engagement in the art of listening. I implore the readers here to take a look at the Westmont Alumni letter regarding recent events as it outlines many specific examples the article claims are non-existent. It seems significant as last I checked it had nearly 600 signatures. I urge the author and readers to reflect on the vast amount of faculty members who stood with the protesters and how that testifies to the validity of their concerns.
Lastly, I wanted to say that I am a living counterexample to the articles following claims as I adhere to intersectionality and identity politics, have found healing there, and I am white, I am male, I am cisgender, I am heterosexual, I am wealthy by the standards of this world, and I find my identity in Christ. I believe you would find that to be true of many students who consider themselves an ally of protests on campus. My encouragement is towards an articulation of the gospel as the philosophy of the oppressed, as it provides us with socioethical content in which we can directly address human relations in the civic sphere.
In Christ,
Kieran Clark