Well, here we are.

Let’s just dispense with introductory sentences.

Trump won re-election this week.

For the third time, white evangelicals voted for Donald Trump in an overwhelming majority. (Plenty of other demographics also voted for him, but come on, this is called The Post-Evangelical Post, and I publish a podcast called Exvangelical. Who do you think I’m going to focus on to start?)

His criminal record, for 34 felonies regarding hush money as well as another conviction for sexual abuse, were not enough to sway white evangelicals from their steadfast support. We’re far beyond offering the litany of offenses that he and those in his orbit have done, and far beyond it mattering.

The fact is that for three election cycles, this particular voting bloc has looked at Trump approvingly and offered him their votes. No matter what well-meaning Christians did or said to convince their siblings in faith to dissuade them from supporting this particular candidate.

And Trump has a strong voting base among Catholics and other Protestants, as well. According to RNS:

“Trump also won the Christian vote overall: 58% of all Catholics voted for him and 63% of Protestants, according to the early exit polls. If the early exit poll numbers hold steady, that will prove to be a jump in Catholic support for Trump compared with 2020, when 50% of Catholics voted for him.”

It didn’t matter how many seminars and workshops were done on Christian nationalism or depolarization.¹ There was no changing the minds of 19-20% of white evangelicals.

But the story this time around seems to be around media’s role in how the election turned out.

If you want to start to understand that, you’re in luck: my book covers that.

If you’re new here

I went substack-viral (as much as I ever have) this week with this note:

Over 100 folks signed up for free, which for me, is a significant bump, so that’s why you might be reading this.

So here’s the intro: I’m not new at this. I’ve been producing the Exvangelical podcast since 2016, where I talk to people who’ve been harmed by (predominantly white/white-led) evangelicalism. Here’s the latest episode:

I wrote the book Exvangelical & Beyond: How American Christianity Went Radical and the Movement That’s Fighting Back, which received a starred Kirkus review.

Here on Substack I write about religion & society, books, and how people change their minds. I donate 25% of net revenue from paid subs as a form of reparative economics to the Religious Exemption Accountability Project and White Homework. I’m on track to earn less than $4k this year from paid subscriptions here—which is not nothing, but not enough to do this anywhere close to full-time—so I can’t produce ‘full-time’ level content. You can read all about that and the other ways to support me here:

Support The Post-Evangelical Post

If you haven’t already, subscribe:

Ok, back to non-business business.

The Media Game

There’s a lot of talk about how the right is better at messaging, and even more so at “populist” (or just popular) podcasting and other forms of social media. Here’s a Fast Company piece about it. And one from Slate. And another from Poynter. You get it.

This is what “flooding the zone” looks like. (The full phrase is “flooding the zone with shit,” but I want you to listen to me instead of writing me off, even though Steve Bannon said it, not me and if you think I’m calling right-wing stuff “shit,” you might.)

Plainly put, the DNC wasn’t aware enough of the role media plays in the formation of people’s belief and how that spurs political action. That’s going to be a hard game to catch up on, especially when most of the media platforms are owned and operated by libertarian tech-bros, billionaires that obey in advance, or outright political actors cavalierly breaking campaign laws and putting the thumb on the scale of their dying social network like Elon Musk.

Takes Worth Your Time

Here’s a few takes worth your time.

First up,

Chrissy Stroop

has a post from

The Bugbear Dispatch

:

How Right-Wing Christians Brought Us the Tech Bro Dystopia

Next,

Kristin Du Mez

wrote a piece that lays it out in the title:

This time is worse

Finally, this piece from Melissa Florer-Bixler will have me thinking for a long time about how Christian institutions that will seek oppose Trump administration policies might act, and the warning that the failed Confessing Churches has for us:

Learning from the failed Confessing Churches

I’m tired. I spent some time playing video games and relaxing this weekend. My game of choice, Dragon Age: Veilguard, requires you to go around the world cleaning up “the blight,” a corrupting source of power that was unleashed by beings worshipped as gods that had been corrupted themselves. There’s a metaphor there.

I’ll be back to talk more about books, etc. very soon. In the meantime, be kind to those in your life and your fellow humans.

1. The comment section to my latest RNS editorial, published on Election Day, was illustrative of how helpful the popularity of “Christian nationalism” was, with internet strangers stating that there is “no such thing” as Christian nationalism.)