Since I have talked about moderation, making an argument for moderation and for a middle path, it since this discussion caused such controversy, I thought it best I attempt to come to grips with extremism. After all, if there are two extremes, there will always be a middle. Perhaps understanding extremism and its symptoms will make it easier to understand why I advocate for a moderate, centrist approach.

First and foremost, extremism can come from any number of sources and it can have any number of causes. We know that particular religious views can contribute to right-wing political extremism. So can racism and ethnocentrism. And studies in the 60’s showed that “status inconsistency”, having to do with a person’s rank in the status hierarchy could generate right-wing political extremism.[1] And extremism is not the only response: another might be political liberalism. But as Durheim cautions, “liberal democratic contents may be as dogmatic as totalitarian contents.”[2] This latter is my point exactly: not that one form of extremism is undesirable but that all forms of extremism are undesirable, irrespective of their source or direction. A moderate approach is best. It is the approach our polytheistic ancestors advocated and it is the point of view that, in my opinion, today’s Pagans should embrace.[3]

In discussing religious extremism in a monotheistic context, Charles S. Liebman contends that extremism is the norm:

Relying on impressions from contemporary Judaism, extremism is defined here as the desire to expand the scope, detail and strictness of religious law; social isolation; and the rejection of the surrounding culture. Religious extremism is an impulse or an orientation which, when objectified in persons and institutions, is invariably moderated.[4]

This is an interesting perspective. And I agree that it is generally true of monotheism and to be fair, Liebman is directing his attention specifically to Judaism. Care should be taken in imagining that this is in any way an accurate summation of the pre-monotheistic religious landscape. For one thing, Liebman’s definition has as a pre-requisite the idea of religious law; in Judaism, the law was actually dictated to Moses by a god. Secondly, as Jan Assmann has demonstrated, polytheism is a means of translation between cultures. It does not reject cultures or divide them, but bridges them. This rejection, this “invention of Paganism” is the work of monotheism, which Jan Assmann labels as “counter religion.” Assmann argues that “The great achievement of polytheism is the articulation of a common semantic universe.”[5] In cosmotheism, as Assmann calls it, religion and ethnocentrism are eliminated as source of extremism because religion and ethnocentrism no longer divide, but are bridged.

We have to be careful to consider context in our search for definitions. Religion in the modern, largely monotheistic world is not understood as religion was in the days before monotheism, when it was centered not on doctrine, or theology, but on cultic acts. Polytheistic cultures did not to impose their own religion on their neighbors. There was no need. Different cultures had gods in common and it did not matter by what rites these gods were worshiped or by what names they were known.

People are naturally sensitive to how terms are used and how definitions are applied. A letter to the editor of Science magazine objects to the use of the word “extremist” calling it “morally loaded, pejorative adjective”. Speaking specifically of animal rights, this letter writer argues that the groups in question be called “activist” and that it is best left to he reader to make the determination of extremism.[6]

And it is true that perceived extremism can be exaggerated.[7] Certainly there is a tendency to see the opposing side as extreme in their views, thus apparently rendering the extremism a subjective point of view. Corporate interests might label lobbyists or activists who oppose their aims as extremists while the activists might see the corporations as the extremists. It is entirely possible that they are both extremists and simply cannot recognize that. Extremists do not generally see themselves as extremists.

But surely we must have some idea of what we are talking about when we use the term “extremism.” The subjectivist stance is problematic. There is a tendency to claim that we really can know nothing at all, but surely this cannot be true. Otherwise, how can we possibly hope to understand each other and the world around us? Even if extremism can at times to be a matter of perspective, surely we can agree that there are extremist points that always apply. When I took my first philosophy class in college, my professor suggested that the best way to determine the worth of an argument is to take it to its extreme; if it still made sense, the argument was sound. If not, you could dismiss it. But if we cannot say that the word “extreme” has any objective value at all, then where are we? Discourse becomes impossible.

G.B. Rush, for example, in an attempt to define the extreme right defends the use of the term “extreme” over “radical”.[8] Clearly, he thinks he knows what he is talking about when he uses these terms. The importance of definitions cannot be understated. Rush cites Cohen and Nagel in this regard:

Logically, definitions aim to lay bare the principal features or structure of a concept, partly in order to make it definite, to delimit it from other concepts, and partly in order to make possible a systematic exploration of the subject matter with which it deals.[9]

I would argue that we can certainly hope to identify extreme behavior and extreme beliefs. The scholarship on the subject is quite clear and unequivocal insofar as extremist behaviors and attitudes are concerned.

An extremist, for example, is more likely to see things in black and white. There are no shades of gray for an extremist, only right and wrong. Michael Gaddis cites Mary Douglas’ definition of “sectarian” as helpful: “Sectarian bias,” Douglas says, means “polarized arguments, persons shown in black and white contrasts, evil and good, and nothing in between.” She says “The remedies most easily proposed in such organizations are to refuse to compromise with evil and to root it out, accompanied by a tendency toward intolerance and drastic solutions.”[10]

In other words, for example, people who eat meat become morally inferior or ethically challenged, and because eating meat is seen in this light, the eating of meat should be banned altogether. This is a classic example of extremism in action. One we have recently seen elucidated here.

One of these “drastic solutions” that extremists often embrace is the claim that they have a right and an obligation to impose their truths on others. Extremists, as noted, tend to be intolerant of dissenting views and this is true of political as well as religious extremism, as the 20th century experience of Communism and Nazism have shown. Extremists demonize the other side – monotheism creating the “Other” – and most extremist positions declare the other side to be somehow morally, intellectually, or physically inferior. Extremists do not compromise. Compromise is impossible if you have an unassailable hold on the truth, after all.

An example of the failure of compromise where extremist positions are concerned is that of Constantine’s effort to offer an alternative to the contentious Nicene Creed. Nicene leaders denounced Constantine’s efforts as “persecution”! What we are left with – and I can speak from personal experience – is that anyone who disagrees can be labeled a persecutor. A person can claim persecution by simply having to live in a society that allows homosexuals to get married, or Pagans or witches to live, or people to eat meat, etc. The absurdity of such claims is lost on extremists themselves, but it is quite clear to the rest of us.

And finally, both extremes seek to undermine the center.[11] Wintrobe offers a rough outline of extremism’s properties:

[P]ersons or movements may be called extreme because their views are so far out of the mainstream on some issue, or because they use violence to further their goals, or because they are rigid and intolerant of other points of view. A group can be extremist if it has only one of these features. Some movements…have all of them.[12]

I do not think this is at all a difficult summation to arrive at. We can indeed identify extremist positions and we can know what we are talking about when we do so. It is not merely a matter of value judgments or pejorative adjectives. Since the extreme will never acknowledge the center’s position, and almost universally fails to see itself as extreme, it is no wonder they will dismiss any objective use of the term. Worse, as Gaddis observes, “Extremists can answer any questioning of their tactics with the simple retort: Whose side are you on?”[13]

An extremist might demand justice or insist that you engage in a dialogue with them but that is quite often not what they want. As polytheists noted in the Roman Empire, and as I have experienced personally, “Extremists deeds served to enact the truth of their worldview, e.g. by provoking retaliation and therefore forcing the state to act brutally, exposing its ‘true’ violent nature.”[14] If we substitute “blogger” for “state” this example works not only on the national level but the very microcosmic scale of the blogosphere. Here, I will attack you on your blog for your intolerant position and prosecutorial stance (intolerant because you disagree with me) and I will continue to do so until you are forced to take action (by prohibiting me from making further comments on your blog) which in turn only goes to prove my original point that you are intolerant and that you are persecuting me.

For those who wonder, this was exactly the tactic used by wannabe martyrs in the Pagan Roman Empire.

For Michael Gaddis, extremism is “Any ideology taken to its extreme, interpreted and enacted in an absolute sense that allowed no compromise with practical considerations or accommodation with the world.” He goes on to say that “Extremist discourse, in religion and in other contexts, valued above all zeal and authenticity in the pursuit of its cause, and strove for the total and perfect expression of its values.”[15]

A middle position avoids extremes and thus does not embrace this tendency. A more nuanced understanding of the situation in invoked and a there is a tendency to adopt a laissez faire attitude. Live and let live seems to be the cry of the middle position, of moderation. When Solon famously said, “Nothing in excess” he was advocating a middle position, an avoidance of extremes.

Attempting to force points of view on others is wrong. Now you might say, as Pope Benedict XVI does, and has Christians have for twenty centuries, that in having the truth you have an obligation to share it, and further, as a logical extension of this position, that you have the right to impose what you know on others. You have, after all, a morally unassailable position. Or so you think. It really matters very little to the victims of this intolerance if what is being imposed is religion or diet or some other thing. The simple fact is that forcing your view on others stands against everything the Enlightenment stands for. The Enlightenment was a rejection of such impositions. The Rights of Man would become an empty slogan if we accepted the right of every group or individual to impose their understanding of what is morally correct on the rest of humankind. We would, in fact, have no rights at all, but would be perpetual victims to ever-changing understandings or permutations of the whatever position is being imposed.

How this is a morally sustainable position is beyond me. Are we to say it is morally wrong to eat animals, but it is morally acceptable to force everyone to do what you think they should do? This would seem to me to put humans on an inferior footing with animals. And what if it should be determined at some time that eating vegetables is morally objectionable? Are we then to accede to this new demand, and become victims again?

Extreme views are not all that difficult to identify. Believing technology is dangerous or does not have a uniformly positive impact on culture or people is not an extreme view, but extending this to the rejection and destruction of all technology is an extreme view. By rejecting all technology, you throw out the baby with the bathwater. It won’t hurt anyone else at least if you limit this revelation to yourself – a morally sustainable position – but if you seek to impose it on others, how is this a morally sustainable position?

Polytheism – Assmann’s cosmotheism, is the antithesis of extremism. Extremism can bridge no divides, but that is the very essence of polytheism’s diversity and pluralism. A basic objection to monotheism is that it purports to have sole possession of the capital-T Truth and that it has the right and the duty to impose this truth on the rest of us. Absolute truths are the property of monotheism but polytheism recognizes that there are truths that are true only for you, or for your particular culture or religion. If we, as polytheists, then decide that part of polytheism is a radical vegetarianism, a radical feminism, a radical this and a radical that, the ability to bridge divides, to translate, is destroyed. And how then are we being anything but hypocrites if we complain about what Christianity has done to polytheism? We are getting into absurdities of behavior at this point, not to say thought. And we will have destroyed what at least one scholar recognizes as our form of religion’s greatest accomplishment.

Notes:

[1] Gary B. Rush, “Status Consistency and Right-Wing Extremism,” American Sociological Review, Vol. 32, No. 1 (Feb., 1967), pp. 86-92

[2] Kevin Durheim, “Theoretical Conundrum: The Politics and Science of Theorizing Authoritarian Cognition,” Political Psychology 18 (1997), 625-647.

[3] An excellent example might be the French government’s response to Muslim dress. This is a liberal response to conservative religious demands. But is it the best response?

[4] Charles S. Liebman, “Extremism as a Religious Norm,” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 22 (1983), 75-86.

[5] Jan Assmann, Moses the Egyptian.The Memory of Egypt in Western Monotheism (Harvard University Press, 1997).

[6] Peter Spargo and Robert Koenig, “Activism and Extremism,” Science 285 (1999), 337.

[7] Dacher Keltner and Robert J. Robinson, “Extremism, Power, and the Imagined Basis for Social Conflict,” Current Directions in Psychological Science 5 (1996), 101-105.

[8] G.B. Rush, “Toward a Definition of the Extreme Right,” The Pacific Sociological Review 6 (1963), 64-73.

[9] Morris Cohen and Ernest Nagel, An Introduction to Logic and Scientific Method, New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1934, pp. 231-232.

[10] Michael Gaddis, There Is No Crime For Those Who Have Christ. Religious Viiolence in the Roman Empire (University of California Press, 2005), 238, citing Mary Douglas. Natural Symbols: Explorations in Cosmology (London 1996), xix-xx and Mary Dougles and Aaron Wildavsky, Risk and Culture: An Eassay on the Selection of Technological and Environmental Dangers (Berkeley 1982), 10-11.

[11] Ronald Wintrobe, Rational Extremism: The Political Enemy of Radicalism (Cambridge University Press, 2006), 5.

[12] Wintrobe, 6.

[13] Gaddis (2005), 195.

[14] Gaddis (2005), 113 n 44. As Gaddis remarks elsewhere, this reaction by the provoked only serves to “confirm the zealots’ darkest suspicions” (6).

[15] Gaddis (2005), 5-6.