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I understood Americans much better once I understood Calvinism. The very belief that a core group of the first settlers brought to America which is that there

I understood Americans much better once I understood Calvinism. The very belief that a core group of the first settlers brought to America which is that there exist not just fundamentally good and bad people, but that God would reward good people with success and money and bad people with poverty. From which follows that rich people must have been good and poor people must have been bad. From which follows, that good people need to be rewarded further and bad people punished more. If you look through every single aspect of the U.S. judicial, education, legislation [,...] systems — even Hollywood movies — you will find clues that point back to this core belief. Not judging, just noticing since someone told me "in order to understand Americans, you need to understand Calvinism".

dicknuckle 5y ago
You're spot on, although many of us are actively rejecting that idea. It's going to be a majority for many decades to come.
rdevsrex 5y ago
I totally agree. You get your more charismatic varieties of this same thinking. For example, the name-it-and-claim-it churches basically teach if you are God's favorite you will be blessed, and if you aren't, you just don't have enough faith. That's not predestination, but it comes down to the same kind of thing. In general, I think all forms of justice in the west are based on free will being true. If some form of determinism is true, then "punishment" doesn't make sense.
- pharke 5y ago
  > In general, I think all forms of justice in the west are based on free will being true. If some form of determinism is true, then "punishment" doesn't make sense. Isn't that backwards? Believing that someone is inherently bad is effectively equal to them having no free will and their fate being determined. You can swap out "born with an evil soul" for "genetic predisposition and early environmental factors". If you really did replace the judicial system with one based on the view that free will does not exist, would the solution to habitual criminals be to simply separate them from the rest of society for life since they have no ability to determine their own actions? If instead you think they can be externally influenced by rehabilitation then how is this different from having a compassionate view of criminal behaviour that could include free will? Having free will doesn't mean that a person will always make the correct choice or even the moral choice, we're limited and imperfect after all.
  - birktj 5y ago
    I would say that it doesn't mean that someone is inherently bad, just that there are factors out of their control leading to them doing something that is unwanted by society as a whole. From this it follows that it would be unethical to "punish" people for such acts and the more ethical approach of society should be to try minimize the occurrence of these factors.
    - pharke 5y ago
      I still think the two are equivalent. The only difference is in the baggage attached to the terms "bad" or "evil". The same solutions are applied in both cases. If someone is an immediate threat to others they are removed from society. Rehabilitation is attempted in order to prevent further commission of crimes. Some signal (punishment) is provided to the person who committed the crime in order to deter them and others from repeating the offence (fines, community service, probation, length of incarceration). The problem is in the execution of those strategies, it's a mess because there are a lot of perverse incentives both monetary and based on personal beliefs. There is also a lack of and/or a misdirection of funding. I don't think removing punishment is a cure for this. Excessive, cruel or needless punishments should not be applied but you do need to impose some cost as a consequence. Human beings are capable of learning and both reward and penalty are necessary for that to happen. If we are going to push a lever it should be focused on effective rehabilitation, which would involve a complete overhaul of and a lot of investment in prisons so they can address the needs of every inmate.
- jerf 5y ago
  "If some form of determinism is true, then "punishment" doesn't make sense." That doesn't really follow. If you know you are going to receive punishment for some action, or that you have been punished for some action in the past, you can completely deterministically "decide" not to do something you would otherwise have done. I mean, we build AIs that nobody would claim have "free will" and are entirely deterministic based on their algorithms and input based on the same principle. Some sort of ineffable moral element of somehow making your free-willed self a "better" free-willed self may be removed, but the sheer brutal pragmatics of "other entities want your behavior to be thus, and by applying punishment can increase compliance" works just fine in a deterministic regime. And to my eye, our ruling elites are in practice very, very concerned about the latter and do not give the slightest rip about the former, whatever their beliefs about "free will" may be.
bsiemon 5y ago
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis
deleted 5y ago
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denton-scratch 5y ago
Isn't the distinctive teaching of Calvinism that those who are saved and those who are not are known to The Boss at birth? That there's nothing you can do to redeem yourself? I've met quite a few people who's attitude is that "bad" people are irredeemable. Not all of these people were from the USA; but it seems to be an attitude that is particularly prevalent in the USA. This is a bit odd, because most USAians aren't Calvinists. It's as if there's a thread of Calvinism running through evangelicalism - but most evangelical traditions don't inherit from Calvinism, or so I thought.
- mjmahone17 5y ago
  Well the US every hundred years or so has a tradition of revivalist movements (starting back in the 1740s), basically where some evangelical preachers preach some common message across denominational lines. So there’s a lot of cross-breeding between American Christian churches: Calvinist ideas were broadly disseminated as part of some of those early revivals.
kbd 5y ago
FWIW as a former Calvinist I think your your assessment of Calvinism is wrong on multiple points. Because it was the presupposition of his hearers, dispelling the notion that “The rich must have been good in this life and the poor must be getting what they deserve” is the whole point of Jesus’ rich man and Lazarus parable. And the concept of “fundamentally good vs bad people” is also out-of-nowhere for Calvinist doctrine as they hold to “total depravity”, that all people are sinful and under God’s judgement.
- jetrink 5y ago
  I grew up in a Calvinist church and in addition to being inconsistent with doctrine, that comment also doesn't fit with the cultural attitudes that I encountered. Money was seen as dangerous and worldly. Like sex, we were taught that it was important part of life, but also something that could lead us away from God. Being rich was embarrassing. We had wealthy people at our church, but I only found out when I was older, since they drove old minivans like everyone else.
- mabbo 5y ago
  It depends on your interpretation of Calvinism. The specific concept the parent post is talking about, I think, is Double Predestination. > Double predestination is the idea that not only does God choose some to be saved, he also creates some people who will be damned.[0] Even setting aside whether that's a mainstream Calvinist belief or not, the idea of "Good people" and "Bad people" is deeply ingrained in American Culture. "The only thing that can stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun"- that very phrase presupposes the existence of two groups of people, one Good and one Bad, setting aside the whole 'right to bear arms' thing. And just as deeply ingrained in American culture is a lack of sympathy for "Bad people". You can make prisons a living hell, keep people in there for life after "3 strikes", remove their ability to find jobs if they ever get out- because they're Bad people and helping Bad people is wrong. It's morally superior to punish Bad people more, since they are Bad. Politicians get elected on that, calling it 'tough on crime'. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predestination_in_Calvinism#Double_predestination https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predestination_in_Calvinism#Do...
  - 5y ago
alecst 5y ago
I don't remember hearing much about wealth when I read about Calvinism in college. I remember that the elect were predestined to do good works and go to heaven, and that's it. The intriguing thing for me about the philosophy was that, yea, you're predestined so you in theory could do whatever you want, but if you're not doing good works, you're probably not one of the elect. Where did you read that Calvinists believe that the elect were also bestowed wealth? Was this a widespread belief? I'm genuinely interested, this is new to me.
watwut 5y ago
> The very belief that a core group of the first settlers brought to America The way America was settled historically was way more complicated. Simplification that boils it down to the "core group of the first settlers" with far reaching consequences up to now is bound to be wrong.
luckycharms810 5y ago
"We find it difficult to accept the threats to our "happiness" with a serenity which transcends happiness and sorrow. We are also offended by the contumely of allies as well as foes, who refuse to regard our prosperity as fruit and proof of our virtue but suggest that it may be the consequence of our vulgar Philistinism. We are therefore confronted for the first time in our life with the questions: - whether there is a simple coordination between virtue and prosperity; and whether the attainment of happiness, either through material prosperity or social peace is a simple possibility for man, whatever may be his scientific and social achievements" - Reinhold Niebuhr
ljm 5y ago
I can't comment on Calvinism, but I don't believe that the US has ever really escaped from its dependency on slavery, which is another thing that goes right back to its earliest days. What's changed is that you're not allowed to ship black people from Africa now, but when you look at articles like the one that was posted, and mass incarceration and prison labour, and basically living as if your employer did you a favour by hiring you...the pattern remains constant even as the implementation changes. And there are still those puritanical underpinnings about 'bad' people deserving the bad treatment they get from 'good' people. Many countries in the world have moved on from that system. Obviously not all of them, but it's still rather shocking that a first world country still actively encourages a system where you can lose all of your agency as a person.
- pram 5y ago
  It's intentional, the 13th amendment explicitly allows involuntary labor for criminals.
- fallingknife 5y ago
  No 1st world country has escaped from its dependence on slavery. It's just been outsourced.
  - rflec028 5y ago
    Many countries out there today have much more literal intersocietal slavery. It would be amazing to break these bonds, but it would completely destroy globalism and dramatically alter 'quality of life' in the west, which is why it's not happened already.
rsynnott 5y ago
In psychology this is the Just World Fallacy. Somewhat common in religions, and it’s an idea that people tend to find easy to subconsciously accept, despite being nonsensical if you stop and think about it. You get it everywhere to some extent, but… maybe it’s more of a thing in the US? At the extreme, some US Protestant sects like to blame the likes of natural disasters on the presence of what they think of as sin (often gay people); while this idea is obviously not a majority view, it doesn’t really show up _at all_ in European Christianity or most other religions.
da_chicken 5y ago
I agree, it's not Calvinism. It's American Conservatism. American conservatives fundamentally buy into the just-world hypothesis [0]. They believe that the world is so strongly a meritocracy (itself a dubious assertion) that it affects basically all aspects of life. It's why conservatives often champion "personal responsibility," while simultaneously excusing their own irresponsibility. They believe that when bad things happen to others, it's because they deserve it so they should be responsible for what they did. When bad things happen to them, it's just bad luck. That leads to cliches like "the only moral abortion is my abortion" and other such hypocritical nonsense. I'm sure you can trace this idea back to one of the series of evangelical or fundamentalist movements in the United States, but personally I believe that it's almost always tied to the simple fact that many people manage to reach middle-age without having failed or suffered due to circumstances beyond their control while absorbing pro-American propaganda all their lives. It leads you to a mistaken understanding about how much power and control you have over your own life and about what the real causes of success are. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis
Gibbon1 5y ago
I read a minor heretic economist that said modern Economics is basically Calvinism with Math.
harimau777 5y ago
I think that you may be somewhat combining Calvinism and the Prosperity Gospel. Calvinism teaches that, although salvation is freely available to everyone, human nature is such that no one would choose salvation on their own. Therefore, God chooses to intervene to cause some people to accept salvation. The Prosperity Gospel teaches that God rewards faith and/or good deeds with worldly blessings like wealth and good health. I actually think that some of the problems that America faces are due to an overreaction by Calvinists (and other conservative Christians) to the Prosperity Gospel. That is, in their eagerness to avoid the Prosperity Gospel they overcorrect and deemphasize the parts of the Bible that teach that God cares about the poor and meeting people's physical needs.
deleted 5y ago
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Lord_Baltimore 5y ago
As a "Calvinist" (I prefer label reformed Christian) it appears as though you have totally misunderstood Calvinism. One of the bedrocks of Calvinism is that every person in his natural state is fundamentally bad and any spiritual/material blessing is undeserved so how could we could we boast? Commentary from John Calvin on Luke 13:4 where Jesus comments on whether the 18 people killed by a falling tower were bad people because they suffered this fate: "This passage is highly useful, were it for no other reason than that this disease is almost natural to us, to be too rigorous and severe in judging of others, and too much disposed to flatter our own faults. The consequence is, that we not only censure with excessive severity the offenses of our brethren; but whenever they meet with any calamity, we condemn them as wicked and reprobate persons. On the other hand, every man that is not sorely pressed by the hand of God slumbers at ease in the midst of his sins, as if God were favorable and reconciled to him. This involves a double fault; for when God chastises any one before our eyes, he warns us of his judgments, that each of us may examine himself, and consider what he deserves. If he spares us for a time, we are so far from having a right to take such kindness and forbearance as an opportunity for slumber, that we ought to regard it as an invitation to repentance."

dicknuckle 5y ago

You're spot on, although many of us are actively rejecting that idea. It's going to be a majority for many decades to come.

rdevsrex 5y ago

I totally agree. You get your more charismatic varieties of this same thinking. For example, the name-it-and-claim-it churches basically teach if you are God's favorite you will be blessed, and if you aren't, you just don't have enough faith. That's not predestination, but it comes down to the same kind of thing. In general, I think all forms of justice in the west are based on free will being true. If some form of determinism is true, then "punishment" doesn't make sense.

pharke 5y ago
> In general, I think all forms of justice in the west are based on free will being true. If some form of determinism is true, then "punishment" doesn't make sense. Isn't that backwards? Believing that someone is inherently bad is effectively equal to them having no free will and their fate being determined. You can swap out "born with an evil soul" for "genetic predisposition and early environmental factors". If you really did replace the judicial system with one based on the view that free will does not exist, would the solution to habitual criminals be to simply separate them from the rest of society for life since they have no ability to determine their own actions? If instead you think they can be externally influenced by rehabilitation then how is this different from having a compassionate view of criminal behaviour that could include free will? Having free will doesn't mean that a person will always make the correct choice or even the moral choice, we're limited and imperfect after all.
- birktj 5y ago
  I would say that it doesn't mean that someone is inherently bad, just that there are factors out of their control leading to them doing something that is unwanted by society as a whole. From this it follows that it would be unethical to "punish" people for such acts and the more ethical approach of society should be to try minimize the occurrence of these factors.
  - pharke 5y ago
    I still think the two are equivalent. The only difference is in the baggage attached to the terms "bad" or "evil". The same solutions are applied in both cases. If someone is an immediate threat to others they are removed from society. Rehabilitation is attempted in order to prevent further commission of crimes. Some signal (punishment) is provided to the person who committed the crime in order to deter them and others from repeating the offence (fines, community service, probation, length of incarceration). The problem is in the execution of those strategies, it's a mess because there are a lot of perverse incentives both monetary and based on personal beliefs. There is also a lack of and/or a misdirection of funding. I don't think removing punishment is a cure for this. Excessive, cruel or needless punishments should not be applied but you do need to impose some cost as a consequence. Human beings are capable of learning and both reward and penalty are necessary for that to happen. If we are going to push a lever it should be focused on effective rehabilitation, which would involve a complete overhaul of and a lot of investment in prisons so they can address the needs of every inmate.
jerf 5y ago
"If some form of determinism is true, then "punishment" doesn't make sense." That doesn't really follow. If you know you are going to receive punishment for some action, or that you have been punished for some action in the past, you can completely deterministically "decide" not to do something you would otherwise have done. I mean, we build AIs that nobody would claim have "free will" and are entirely deterministic based on their algorithms and input based on the same principle. Some sort of ineffable moral element of somehow making your free-willed self a "better" free-willed self may be removed, but the sheer brutal pragmatics of "other entities want your behavior to be thus, and by applying punishment can increase compliance" works just fine in a deterministic regime. And to my eye, our ruling elites are in practice very, very concerned about the latter and do not give the slightest rip about the former, whatever their beliefs about "free will" may be.

bsiemon 5y ago

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

denton-scratch 5y ago

Isn't the distinctive teaching of Calvinism that those who are saved and those who are not are known to The Boss at birth? That there's nothing you can do to redeem yourself? I've met quite a few people who's attitude is that "bad" people are irredeemable. Not all of these people were from the USA; but it seems to be an attitude that is particularly prevalent in the USA. This is a bit odd, because most USAians aren't Calvinists. It's as if there's a thread of Calvinism running through evangelicalism - but most evangelical traditions don't inherit from Calvinism, or so I thought.

mjmahone17 5y ago
Well the US every hundred years or so has a tradition of revivalist movements (starting back in the 1740s), basically where some evangelical preachers preach some common message across denominational lines. So there’s a lot of cross-breeding between American Christian churches: Calvinist ideas were broadly disseminated as part of some of those early revivals.

kbd 5y ago

FWIW as a former Calvinist I think your your assessment of Calvinism is wrong on multiple points. Because it was the presupposition of his hearers, dispelling the notion that “The rich must have been good in this life and the poor must be getting what they deserve” is the whole point of Jesus’ rich man and Lazarus parable. And the concept of “fundamentally good vs bad people” is also out-of-nowhere for Calvinist doctrine as they hold to “total depravity”, that all people are sinful and under God’s judgement.

jetrink 5y ago
I grew up in a Calvinist church and in addition to being inconsistent with doctrine, that comment also doesn't fit with the cultural attitudes that I encountered. Money was seen as dangerous and worldly. Like sex, we were taught that it was important part of life, but also something that could lead us away from God. Being rich was embarrassing. We had wealthy people at our church, but I only found out when I was older, since they drove old minivans like everyone else.
mabbo 5y ago
It depends on your interpretation of Calvinism. The specific concept the parent post is talking about, I think, is Double Predestination. > Double predestination is the idea that not only does God choose some to be saved, he also creates some people who will be damned.[0] Even setting aside whether that's a mainstream Calvinist belief or not, the idea of "Good people" and "Bad people" is deeply ingrained in American Culture. "The only thing that can stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun"- that very phrase presupposes the existence of two groups of people, one Good and one Bad, setting aside the whole 'right to bear arms' thing. And just as deeply ingrained in American culture is a lack of sympathy for "Bad people". You can make prisons a living hell, keep people in there for life after "3 strikes", remove their ability to find jobs if they ever get out- because they're Bad people and helping Bad people is wrong. It's morally superior to punish Bad people more, since they are Bad. Politicians get elected on that, calling it 'tough on crime'. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predestination_in_Calvinism#Double_predestination https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predestination_in_Calvinism#Do...
- 5y ago

alecst 5y ago

I don't remember hearing much about wealth when I read about Calvinism in college. I remember that the elect were predestined to do good works and go to heaven, and that's it. The intriguing thing for me about the philosophy was that, yea, you're predestined so you in theory could do whatever you want, but if you're not doing good works, you're probably not one of the elect. Where did you read that Calvinists believe that the elect were also bestowed wealth? Was this a widespread belief? I'm genuinely interested, this is new to me.

watwut 5y ago

> The very belief that a core group of the first settlers brought to America The way America was settled historically was way more complicated. Simplification that boils it down to the "core group of the first settlers" with far reaching consequences up to now is bound to be wrong.

luckycharms810 5y ago

"We find it difficult to accept the threats to our "happiness" with a serenity which transcends happiness and sorrow. We are also offended by the contumely of allies as well as foes, who refuse to regard our prosperity as fruit and proof of our virtue but suggest that it may be the consequence of our vulgar Philistinism. We are therefore confronted for the first time in our life with the questions: - whether there is a simple coordination between virtue and prosperity; and whether the attainment of happiness, either through material prosperity or social peace is a simple possibility for man, whatever may be his scientific and social achievements" - Reinhold Niebuhr

ljm 5y ago

I can't comment on Calvinism, but I don't believe that the US has ever really escaped from its dependency on slavery, which is another thing that goes right back to its earliest days. What's changed is that you're not allowed to ship black people from Africa now, but when you look at articles like the one that was posted, and mass incarceration and prison labour, and basically living as if your employer did you a favour by hiring you...the pattern remains constant even as the implementation changes. And there are still those puritanical underpinnings about 'bad' people deserving the bad treatment they get from 'good' people. Many countries in the world have moved on from that system. Obviously not all of them, but it's still rather shocking that a first world country still actively encourages a system where you can lose all of your agency as a person.

pram 5y ago
It's intentional, the 13th amendment explicitly allows involuntary labor for criminals.
fallingknife 5y ago
No 1st world country has escaped from its dependence on slavery. It's just been outsourced.
- rflec028 5y ago
  Many countries out there today have much more literal intersocietal slavery. It would be amazing to break these bonds, but it would completely destroy globalism and dramatically alter 'quality of life' in the west, which is why it's not happened already.

rsynnott 5y ago

In psychology this is the Just World Fallacy. Somewhat common in religions, and it’s an idea that people tend to find easy to subconsciously accept, despite being nonsensical if you stop and think about it. You get it everywhere to some extent, but… maybe it’s more of a thing in the US? At the extreme, some US Protestant sects like to blame the likes of natural disasters on the presence of what they think of as sin (often gay people); while this idea is obviously not a majority view, it doesn’t really show up _at all_ in European Christianity or most other religions.

da_chicken 5y ago

I agree, it's not Calvinism. It's American Conservatism. American conservatives fundamentally buy into the just-world hypothesis [0]. They believe that the world is so strongly a meritocracy (itself a dubious assertion) that it affects basically all aspects of life. It's why conservatives often champion "personal responsibility," while simultaneously excusing their own irresponsibility. They believe that when bad things happen to others, it's because they deserve it so they should be responsible for what they did. When bad things happen to them, it's just bad luck. That leads to cliches like "the only moral abortion is my abortion" and other such hypocritical nonsense. I'm sure you can trace this idea back to one of the series of evangelical or fundamentalist movements in the United States, but personally I believe that it's almost always tied to the simple fact that many people manage to reach middle-age without having failed or suffered due to circumstances beyond their control while absorbing pro-American propaganda all their lives. It leads you to a mistaken understanding about how much power and control you have over your own life and about what the real causes of success are. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis

Gibbon1 5y ago

I read a minor heretic economist that said modern Economics is basically Calvinism with Math.

harimau777 5y ago

I think that you may be somewhat combining Calvinism and the Prosperity Gospel. Calvinism teaches that, although salvation is freely available to everyone, human nature is such that no one would choose salvation on their own. Therefore, God chooses to intervene to cause some people to accept salvation. The Prosperity Gospel teaches that God rewards faith and/or good deeds with worldly blessings like wealth and good health. I actually think that some of the problems that America faces are due to an overreaction by Calvinists (and other conservative Christians) to the Prosperity Gospel. That is, in their eagerness to avoid the Prosperity Gospel they overcorrect and deemphasize the parts of the Bible that teach that God cares about the poor and meeting people's physical needs.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

Lord_Baltimore 5y ago

As a "Calvinist" (I prefer label reformed Christian) it appears as though you have totally misunderstood Calvinism. One of the bedrocks of Calvinism is that every person in his natural state is fundamentally bad and any spiritual/material blessing is undeserved so how could we could we boast? Commentary from John Calvin on Luke 13:4 where Jesus comments on whether the 18 people killed by a falling tower were bad people because they suffered this fate: "This passage is highly useful, were it for no other reason than that this disease is almost natural to us, to be too rigorous and severe in judging of others, and too much disposed to flatter our own faults. The consequence is, that we not only censure with excessive severity the offenses of our brethren; but whenever they meet with any calamity, we condemn them as wicked and reprobate persons. On the other hand, every man that is not sorely pressed by the hand of God slumbers at ease in the midst of his sins, as if God were favorable and reconciled to him. This involves a double fault; for when God chastises any one before our eyes, he warns us of his judgments, that each of us may examine himself, and consider what he deserves. If he spares us for a time, we are so far from having a right to take such kindness and forbearance as an opportunity for slumber, that we ought to regard it as an invitation to repentance."