Christian conservatives now justify discrimination via rights language rather than morality

Evidence

Political scientist Andrew Lewis has documented what he calls “the rights turn” in conservative Christian politics. Increasingly, over the course of several decades, Lewis shows, religious conservatives backed away from justifying opposition to sexual, gender, or ethnic minorities on explicitly moral or religious grounds. Those arguments don’t play so well anymore in a post-Christian society. Religious freedom is an important right. But some Christian conservatives now bend the language of “free speech,” or “religious freedom,” or “religious liberty” into a cudgel that can be used to deny minority grievances—and privilege their own. — Philip S. Gorski and Samuel L. Perry, The Flag and the Cross, 292

Categorization

• SEED: Article angle: how movements relabel moral claims as rights claims when the moral vocabulary loses cultural purchase.
• XREF: connects to: The Christian Right has long openly pursued suppression of rival voters — Philip S. Gorski and Samuel L. Perry, The Flag and the Cross: White Christian…, 311; Post-civil-rights conservatism reframed anti-discrimination remedies as reverse racism — Nikole Hannah-Jones et al., The 1619 Project: A New American Origin…, 1287; Racism was integral but rendered invisible in the Christian Right’s origins — Andrew L. Whitehead, American Idolatry, 533 (+2 more)

Broader Connections

• Religious Right leaders reframed racism as religious freedom to mask self-interest #corroborates (0.85) — Randall Balmer, Bad Faith, 110
• Racism was integral but rendered invisible in the Christian Right’s origins #expands (0.82) — Andrew L. Whitehead, American Idolatry, 533
• Post-civil-rights conservatism reframed anti-discrimination remedies as reverse racism #expands (0.80) — Nikole Hannah-Jones et al., The 1619 Project, 1287