When an Eclipse is Just an Eclipse

And other news from the fringe

Photo by Jongsun Lee on Unsplash

Tens of millions of us got to see a full or partial solar eclipse on Monday and, despite Marjorie Taylor Greene’s warning, it didn’t come with a message from God.

As you may or may not know, last week the extreme-Right Republican congresswoman from Georgia, who always looks for the spotlight, took to social media to announce, "God is sending America strong signs to tell us to repent. Earthquakes and eclipses and many more things to come. I pray that our country listens."

The earthquake happened on Friday, deep below the surface of the Earth, in a suburb 45 miles west of New York City.  It was felt from the Mid-Atlantic to New England, but caused no real damage. But still, the fact that it occurred so close to a place many extremists consider the epicenter of sin, and corruption, made the event irresistible to anyone who would hijack the Almighty to get some attention.

The eclipse offered Greene and others a similar opportunity. For example, the disgraced infotainer Alex Jones connected it to his usual alarm about a government plot to one day impose martial law and cancel our constitutional rights.  "All this is a dress rehearsal,” he said, explaining that the feds would use the eclipse to test methods for taking over local governments.  

With their nonsense, Greene and Jones tapped into age-old dynamics. First, they focused on natural phenomena that are a bit unnerving even when you know what’s going on. Second, they pointed to powerful forces like God and the government. Finally, they claimed outcomes that would be impossible to verify. I mean, who’s to say someone didn’t hear God’s warning or that government officials didn’t practice something nefarious while we were all focused on the sky? It’s all BS, but I challenge you to argue against these notions with someone who truly believes.                                                   

Last week also brought us the craziness of the young MAGA leader Charlie Kirk declaring that, contrary to the facts, birth control pills warp female minds. "It [the pill] creates very angry and bitter young ladies and young women," Kirk argued. "Then that bitterness then manifests into a political party that is the bitter party. I mean, the Democrat Party is all about 'bring us your bitterness and, you know, we’ll give you free stuff.'”

Kirk was, of course, trolling the “libs.” Indeed, if you want to see true political bitterness go to a Trump rally. But it’s important to note that his ideas about contraception can be heard in most precincts of MAGA world. It is consistent with the religious belief that regards every effort to prevent conception as an offense against God. If they could, these people would leave us only the so-called rhythm method (abstaining when a woman ovulates) which involves so much guesswork that about a quarter of women who use it, get pregnant within twelve months.    

Not content to call women crazy, Kirk also insinuated that women who prioritize things other than getting married and having children find themselves in the position where  “they get really upset because, they say, the boys don't want to date me anymore because they're not at their prime. And people get mad when I say that. Well, it's just true. If you're in your early thirties, I'm sorry, it's like you're not as attractive in the dating pool as you were in the early twenties, but again, you have your corporate job and your cat so I thought you, you know."

Nowhere in his talk did Kirk acknowledge that when they married, his wife was 32 years old and that she has worked throughout her adult life as a businesswoman, media personality, and political activist. You have to wonder how she feels about her husband announcing that women like her are not in their prime.

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Not to be outdone in the derangement department, a whole bunch of extremists are tying themselves in knots over the Daily Wire’s firing of political/cultural flamethrower Candace Owens.  (For those outside the MAGA bubble, The Daily Wire is an influential multimedia conglomerate that delivers slanted “news” and hyperbolic commentary to millions of people every day.) Owens says that liberals follow a “cultural Marxist” agenda and that Black rights protesters are “whiny toddlers.” She favors conspiracy theories (the moon landings were faked) and has mirrored the anti-Semitism of Kanye West as he said it was time to “go death con 3 on Jewish People.”

Most recently, Owens accused Israel of carrying out a genocide in its war against Hamas. When criticized by her boss Ben Shapiro, she answered with a statement that played on ancient tropes about Jews and money.   “No one can serve two masters. … You cannot serve both God and money.” Later she amended one of her online statements, adding the phrase, “Christ is king.” Make no mistake. Owens knew what she was doing. Shapiro did too, which is why he fired her.

Months later, the online debate over Owens rages on. MAGA extremist Nick Fuentes gave a speech in which he said the country should get  “rid of Jewish power” and that “America is a Christian nation” and not a “Jewish nation.”  The crowd responded with chants of “Christ Is King.”  

Not to be outdone, Owens added that Hollywood was subject to a  “sinister” crowd of Jews and she “liked” another’s post that targeted a famous rabbi, asking if he was, “drunk on Christian blood again.”

From the outside, it’s easy to see that Owens and others have revealed the anti-Semitism that extremists just can’t resist. They are saying the quiet part out loud.   

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PS:  Someone – not Greene herself – added community notes to her post with caveats that softened the crazy: "Monday’s eclipse was predicted hundreds of years ago; it will not have been caused by contemporary action” and "Earthquakes occur naturally and happen (on average) more than 30 times a day across the world, although many are too subtle to feel.”