American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America
Encyclopedia
American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America is a non-fiction book by American author Chris Hedges
, published in January 2007. Hedges is a former seminary
student with a master's degree
in divinity
from Harvard and was a long-time foreign correspondent for The New York Times
. He had previously criticized the Christian right
in articles such as his cover story in the May 2005 issue of Harper's magazine
called "Soldiers of Christ".
professor, James Luther Adams
, who 25 years earlier had warned his students that they would all be fighting the "Christian
fascists". Hedges argues that this prediction has come true in that extreme forms of American Christianity now share many features with totalitarian movements, including suppression of individuality, a belief in magic, a shifting ideology, a "binary" good-or-evil view of the world, and a deep intolerance of people outside the movement. He writes that "Christian radicals" are often so consumed with power and wealth they are no longer practicing Christianity in its traditional sense, as a religion focused on compassion and caring for the downtrodden.
He contrasts the fundamentalist understanding with that of his own, where the Bible
is recognized to have contradictory, and even hateful passages, and scientifically, is simply limited to what people knew at the time. For example, according to Hedges, ‘Genesis was not written to explain the process of creation, of which these writers knew nothing. It was written to help explain the purpose of creation...to help us grasp a spiritual truth, not a scientific or historical fact.’ Hedges says that doubt and belief are not, as biblical literalists
claim, incompatible…and those who act without any doubt are frightening.
He starts out the book with a definition of fascism and a discussion of its characteristics from Umberto Eco
entitled Eternal Fascism:Fourteen ways of Looking at a Blackshirt. These fourteen characteristics of fascism
are as follows;
The Cult of Tradition,
The Rejection of Modernism,
The Cult of Action for Action’s Sake,
Disagreement as Treason,
Fear of Difference,
The Main Privilege is to Be Born in the Same Country,
The Followers Must be Humiliated by the Wealth and Force of their Enemies,
Life is Lived For Struggle,
Contempt For the Weak,
Everybody is Educated to Become a Hero,
Disdain for Women and Condemnation for Non Standard Sexuality,
Respect for the Majority and Disdain for Individualism,
Respect for Impoverished Vocabulary and Elementary Syntax in Order to Limit Complex and Critical Reasoning.
Hedges states that the "American Fascists"... ’ask us to hand over moral choice and responsibility to them. They will tell us what is right and wrong in the eyes of God. They tell us how to act, how to live, and in this process they elevate themselves above us. They remove the anxiety of moral choice, the fundamental anxiety of human existence. This is part of their attraction.’
He talks about ‘Dominionism’ which, he says, is central to their belief system. According to Hedges, Dominionism states that God gave human beings total dominion over all of creation. It stems from Genesis 1:26-31. The Dominionists, Hedges says, state that there is ‘only one way to be a Christian and only one way to be an American.’ He states that ‘Dominionism seeks to politicize faith’. and to promote ‘leadership adulation’. and a ‘call for moral and physical supremacy of a master race, in this case American Christians’ . He continues to say that Dominionists control, ‘at least six national television networks, {wherein} each reach tens of millions of homes, and virtually all of the nations more than 2,000 religious radio stations, as well as the Southern Baptist Convention.’ .
Hedges states that Dominionism
‘teaches that American Christians have been mandated by God to make America a Christian state.’ .
They oppose labor unions, and public schools. They believe that women should be removed from the workforce and that the federal government should be ‘reduced to the protection of property rights and home land security.’ They oppose homosexuality. They oppose the teaching of evolution. They oppose [multiculturalism] and secular humanism
and abortion. They dismiss the threats of global warming and overpopulation. Their opponents are portrayed to be agents of satan.
He states that the current movement draws significantly from Calvin
's Institutes of the Christian Religion
. He states that The Institutes of Biblical Law by R. J. Rushdoony has been a more recent source of inspiration for the Dominionists.
The power that evangelicals have is significant because ‘there are at least 70 million evangelicals in the United States’. and polls indicate that as many as 100 million Americans believe ‘in the Bible
as the actual word of God.’ Tyson Foods, Wal-Mart, and Sam’s Wholesale are strong backers of the movement.’ and he states that Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia
is ‘steeped in this ideology’.
Additionally, ‘Christian fundamentalists now hold a majority of seats in 36 percent of all Republican Party state committees’ and ‘Forty-five senators and 186 members of the House of Representatives’. earned high approval ratings from the Christian Coalition, the Eagle Forum
, and the Family Resource Council.
‘They preach that at the end of history Christians will dominate the earth and that all nonbelievers, including those who are not sufficiently Christian will be cast into torment and outer darkness. They call for the destruction of whole cultures, nations, and religions, those they have defined as the enemies of God. ’
Hedges writes that many of the followers are victims of what he calls "The Culture of despair" resulting from dislocation and an economic disparity that has hit the American working class
especially hard. In some parts of the country, Hedges writes, radical churches offer people a sense of belonging that was once found in the greater community. New converts are surrounded by new friends, he writes, but also live under a rigid set of rules that require unquestioning submission.
The book describes various places and events of the Christian right that Hedges has researched. They include; the 50000 square feet (4,645.2 m²) Creation Museum
in Petersburg, Kentucky
; a Love Won Out
conference in Boston
sponsored by Focus on the Family
; an Evangelism Explosion seminar he attended; a speaking event held by Rod Parsley
in Washington; a conference he attended at the Gilead Baptist Church; the National Religious Broadcasters
annual convention in Anaheim; and Trinity Broadcasting Network
's lavish headquarters in Costa Mesa, California
.
He discusses the significance of the Left Behind
books written by Timothy LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins.
of the New York Times writes "Of course there are Christian fascists in America. How else to describe, say, the administrator of a faith-based drug treatment program who bound and beat a resident, then subjected her to 32 straight hours of recorded sermons?" Perlstein believes that this book, however, "is not a worthy attempt ... [Hedges] writes on this subject as a neophyte, and pads out his dispatches with ungrounded theorizing, unconvincing speculation and examples that fall far short of bearing out his thesis ... Hedges is worst when he makes the supposed imminence of mass violence the reason the rest of us should be fighting for the open society... The problem is that he can't point to any actual existing violence among the people he's reporting on"
Joe Bailey of the Oregon Daily Emerald
wrote that Hedges "confuses political activism with totalitarian violence. ... Like all Americans, conservative Christians have the right to pursue their political objectives through peaceful and democratic
means. Which is precisely what they have done. Despite the peaceful and democratic nature of their activism, Hedges attacks conservative Christians with the nastiest of slurs, revealing a frightening ignorance. ... The old guard of the Christian Right is stuck in the culture war
mentality that originated in the 1960s. When liberals like Hedges adopt a similar culture war mentality, they only fortify the divide and lend ammunition to their adversaries."
wrote of the book: "As a Harvard Divinity School graduate, his investigation of the Christian Right agenda is even more alarming given its lucidity. Citing the psychology
and sociology of fascism and cult
s, including the work of German
historian Fritz Stern
, Hedges draws striking parallels between 20th-century totalitarian movements and the highly organized, well-funded "dominionist
movement," an influential theocratic
sect within the country's huge evangelical
population. Rooted in a radical Calvinism
, and wrapping its apocalyptic, vehemently militant, sexist and homophobic
vision in patriotic and religious rhetoric, dominionism seeks absolute power
in a Christian state. Hedges's reportage profiles both former members and true believers, evoking the particular characteristics of this American variant of fascism. His argument against what he sees as a democratic society's suicidal
tolerance for intolerant movements has its own paradoxes. But this urgent book forcefully illuminates what many across the political spectrum will recognize as a serious and growing threat to the very concept and practice of an open society."
Chris Hedges
Christopher Lynn Hedges is an American journalist, author, and war correspondent, specializing in American and Middle Eastern politics and societies...
, published in January 2007. Hedges is a former seminary
Seminary
A seminary, theological college, or divinity school is an institution of secondary or post-secondary education for educating students in theology, generally to prepare them for ordination as clergy or for other ministry...
student with a master's degree
Master's degree
A master's is an academic degree granted to individuals who have undergone study demonstrating a mastery or high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice...
in divinity
Divinity
Divinity and divine are broadly applied but loosely defined terms, used variously within different faiths and belief systems — and even by different individuals within a given faith — to refer to some transcendent or transcendental power or deity, or its attributes or manifestations in...
from Harvard and was a long-time foreign correspondent for The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
. He had previously criticized the Christian right
Christian right
Christian right is a term used predominantly in the United States to describe "right-wing" Christian political groups that are characterized by their strong support of socially conservative policies...
in articles such as his cover story in the May 2005 issue of Harper's magazine
Harper's Magazine
Harper's Magazine is a monthly magazine of literature, politics, culture, finance, and the arts, with a generally left-wing perspective. It is the second-oldest continuously published monthly magazine in the U.S. . The current editor is Ellen Rosenbush, who replaced Roger Hodge in January 2010...
called "Soldiers of Christ".
Summary
Hedges' title comes from a prediction by his Harvard ethicsEthics
Ethics, also known as moral philosophy, is a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality—that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc.Major branches of ethics include:...
professor, James Luther Adams
James Luther Adams
James Luther Adams , an American professor at Harvard Divinity School, Andover Newton Theological School, and Meadville Lombard Theological School, and a Unitarian parish minister, was the most influential theologian among American Unitarian Universalists in the 20th century.Adams was born in...
, who 25 years earlier had warned his students that they would all be fighting the "Christian
Christian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
fascists". Hedges argues that this prediction has come true in that extreme forms of American Christianity now share many features with totalitarian movements, including suppression of individuality, a belief in magic, a shifting ideology, a "binary" good-or-evil view of the world, and a deep intolerance of people outside the movement. He writes that "Christian radicals" are often so consumed with power and wealth they are no longer practicing Christianity in its traditional sense, as a religion focused on compassion and caring for the downtrodden.
He contrasts the fundamentalist understanding with that of his own, where the Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
is recognized to have contradictory, and even hateful passages, and scientifically, is simply limited to what people knew at the time. For example, according to Hedges, ‘Genesis was not written to explain the process of creation, of which these writers knew nothing. It was written to help explain the purpose of creation...to help us grasp a spiritual truth, not a scientific or historical fact.’ Hedges says that doubt and belief are not, as biblical literalists
Biblical literalism
Biblical literalism is the interpretation or translation of the explicit and primary sense of words in the Bible. A literal Biblical interpretation is associated with the fundamentalist and evangelical hermeneutical approach to Scripture, and is used almost exclusively by conservative Christians...
claim, incompatible…and those who act without any doubt are frightening.
He starts out the book with a definition of fascism and a discussion of its characteristics from Umberto Eco
Umberto Eco
Umberto Eco Knight Grand Cross is an Italian semiotician, essayist, philosopher, literary critic, and novelist, best known for his novel The Name of the Rose , an intellectual mystery combining semiotics in fiction, biblical analysis, medieval studies and literary theory...
entitled Eternal Fascism:Fourteen ways of Looking at a Blackshirt. These fourteen characteristics of fascism
Fascism
Fascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to rejuvenate their nation based on commitment to the national community as an organic entity, in which individuals are bound together in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture, and blood...
are as follows;
The Cult of Tradition,
The Rejection of Modernism,
The Cult of Action for Action’s Sake,
Disagreement as Treason,
Fear of Difference,
The Main Privilege is to Be Born in the Same Country,
The Followers Must be Humiliated by the Wealth and Force of their Enemies,
Life is Lived For Struggle,
Contempt For the Weak,
Everybody is Educated to Become a Hero,
Disdain for Women and Condemnation for Non Standard Sexuality,
Respect for the Majority and Disdain for Individualism,
Respect for Impoverished Vocabulary and Elementary Syntax in Order to Limit Complex and Critical Reasoning.
Hedges states that the "American Fascists"... ’ask us to hand over moral choice and responsibility to them. They will tell us what is right and wrong in the eyes of God. They tell us how to act, how to live, and in this process they elevate themselves above us. They remove the anxiety of moral choice, the fundamental anxiety of human existence. This is part of their attraction.’
He talks about ‘Dominionism’ which, he says, is central to their belief system. According to Hedges, Dominionism states that God gave human beings total dominion over all of creation. It stems from Genesis 1:26-31. The Dominionists, Hedges says, state that there is ‘only one way to be a Christian and only one way to be an American.’ He states that ‘Dominionism seeks to politicize faith’. and to promote ‘leadership adulation’. and a ‘call for moral and physical supremacy of a master race, in this case American Christians’ . He continues to say that Dominionists control, ‘at least six national television networks, {wherein} each reach tens of millions of homes, and virtually all of the nations more than 2,000 religious radio stations, as well as the Southern Baptist Convention.’ .
Hedges states that Dominionism
Dominionism
Dominionism is a term used to describe politically active conservative Christians that are believed to conspire and seek influence or control over secular civil government through political action, especially in the United States, with the goal of either a nation governed by Christians, or a nation...
‘teaches that American Christians have been mandated by God to make America a Christian state.’ .
They oppose labor unions, and public schools. They believe that women should be removed from the workforce and that the federal government should be ‘reduced to the protection of property rights and home land security.’ They oppose homosexuality. They oppose the teaching of evolution. They oppose [multiculturalism] and secular humanism
Secular humanism
Secular Humanism, alternatively known as Humanism , is a secular philosophy that embraces human reason, ethics, justice, and the search for human fulfillment...
and abortion. They dismiss the threats of global warming and overpopulation. Their opponents are portrayed to be agents of satan.
He states that the current movement draws significantly from Calvin
John Calvin
John Calvin was an influential French theologian and pastor during the Protestant Reformation. He was a principal figure in the development of the system of Christian theology later called Calvinism. Originally trained as a humanist lawyer, he broke from the Roman Catholic Church around 1530...
's Institutes of the Christian Religion
Institutes of the Christian Religion
The Institutes of the Christian Religion is John Calvin's seminal work on Protestant systematic theology...
. He states that The Institutes of Biblical Law by R. J. Rushdoony has been a more recent source of inspiration for the Dominionists.
The power that evangelicals have is significant because ‘there are at least 70 million evangelicals in the United States’. and polls indicate that as many as 100 million Americans believe ‘in the Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
as the actual word of God.’ Tyson Foods, Wal-Mart, and Sam’s Wholesale are strong backers of the movement.’ and he states that Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia
Antonin Scalia
Antonin Gregory Scalia is an American jurist who serves as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. As the longest-serving justice on the Court, Scalia is the Senior Associate Justice...
is ‘steeped in this ideology’.
Additionally, ‘Christian fundamentalists now hold a majority of seats in 36 percent of all Republican Party state committees’ and ‘Forty-five senators and 186 members of the House of Representatives’. earned high approval ratings from the Christian Coalition, the Eagle Forum
Eagle Forum
Eagle Forum is a conservative interest group in the United States founded by Phyllis Schlafly in 1972 and is the parent organization that also includes the Eagle Forum Education and Legal Defense Fund and the Eagle Forum PAC. The Eagle Forum has been primarily focused on social issues; it describes...
, and the Family Resource Council.
‘They preach that at the end of history Christians will dominate the earth and that all nonbelievers, including those who are not sufficiently Christian will be cast into torment and outer darkness. They call for the destruction of whole cultures, nations, and religions, those they have defined as the enemies of God. ’
Hedges writes that many of the followers are victims of what he calls "The Culture of despair" resulting from dislocation and an economic disparity that has hit the American working class
Working class
Working class is a term used in the social sciences and in ordinary conversation to describe those employed in lower tier jobs , often extending to those in unemployment or otherwise possessing below-average incomes...
especially hard. In some parts of the country, Hedges writes, radical churches offer people a sense of belonging that was once found in the greater community. New converts are surrounded by new friends, he writes, but also live under a rigid set of rules that require unquestioning submission.
The book describes various places and events of the Christian right that Hedges has researched. They include; the 50000 square feet (4,645.2 m²) Creation Museum
Creation Museum
The Creation Museum is a museum near Petersburg, Kentucky that presents an account of the origins of the universe, life, mankind, and man's early history according to a literal reading of the Book of Genesis...
in Petersburg, Kentucky
Petersburg, Kentucky
Petersburg is an unincorporated community in Boone County, Kentucky, United States. The community was established about 1800, known at the time as Tanner's Station. The Bullittsburg Baptist Church was founded outside former hamlets of Utzinger and Gainesville/Idewild, east and north of Petersburg...
; a Love Won Out
Love Won Out
Love Won Out is an ex-gay ministry launched by Focus on the Family in 1998. It was founded by John Paulk. Its stated purpose is "to exhort and equip Christian churches to respond in a Christ-like way to the issue of homosexuality." Love Won Out was sold to a former affiliate Exodus International as...
conference in Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
sponsored by Focus on the Family
Focus on the Family
Focus on the Family is an American evangelical Christian tax-exempt non-profit organization founded in 1977 by psychologist James Dobson, and is based in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Focus on the Family is one of a number of evangelical parachurch organizations that rose to prominence in the 1980s...
; an Evangelism Explosion seminar he attended; a speaking event held by Rod Parsley
Rod Parsley
Rodney Lee Parsley is a prominent American Christian minister, author, television host and evangelist. He is senior pastor of World Harvest Church, a large Pentecostal church in Columbus, Ohio and founder and president of The Center for Moral Clarity, a right-wing Christian grassroots advocacy...
in Washington; a conference he attended at the Gilead Baptist Church; the National Religious Broadcasters
National Religious Broadcasters
National Religious Broadcasters is an American organization that represents Christian religious broadcasters on American television and radio, including several high-profile televangelists and Christian radio show hosts. It claims a membership of more than 1700 organizations...
annual convention in Anaheim; and Trinity Broadcasting Network
Trinity Broadcasting Network
The Trinity Broadcasting Network is a major American Christian television network. TBN is based in Costa Mesa, California, with auxiliary studio facilities in Irving, Texas; Hendersonville, Tennessee; Gadsden, Alabama; Decatur, Georgia; Miami, Florida; Tulsa, Oklahoma; Orlando, Florida; and New...
's lavish headquarters in Costa Mesa, California
Costa Mesa, California
Costa Mesa is a city in Orange County, California. The population was 109,960 at the 2010 census. Since its incorporation in 1953, the city has grown from a semi-rural farming community of 16,840 to a primarily suburban and "edge" city with an economy based on retail, commerce, and light...
.
He discusses the significance of the Left Behind
Left Behind
Left Behind is a series of 16 best-selling novels by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins, dealing with Christian dispensationalist End Times: pretribulation, premillennial, Christian eschatological viewpoint of the end of the world. The primary conflict of the series is the members of the Tribulation...
books written by Timothy LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins.
Criticism
Rick PerlsteinRick Perlstein
Eric S. "Rick" Perlstein is an American historian and journalist. He is a former writer for The Village Voice and The New Republic....
of the New York Times writes "Of course there are Christian fascists in America. How else to describe, say, the administrator of a faith-based drug treatment program who bound and beat a resident, then subjected her to 32 straight hours of recorded sermons?" Perlstein believes that this book, however, "is not a worthy attempt ... [Hedges] writes on this subject as a neophyte, and pads out his dispatches with ungrounded theorizing, unconvincing speculation and examples that fall far short of bearing out his thesis ... Hedges is worst when he makes the supposed imminence of mass violence the reason the rest of us should be fighting for the open society... The problem is that he can't point to any actual existing violence among the people he's reporting on"
Joe Bailey of the Oregon Daily Emerald
Oregon Daily Emerald
The Oregon Daily Emerald is an independent daily newspaper published at the University of Oregon in Eugene, Oregon, United States. The paper, which has been published for more than 100 years, has trained many now-prominent writers and journalists and has made important contributions to journalism...
wrote that Hedges "confuses political activism with totalitarian violence. ... Like all Americans, conservative Christians have the right to pursue their political objectives through peaceful and democratic
Democracy
Democracy is generally defined as a form of government in which all adult citizens have an equal say in the decisions that affect their lives. Ideally, this includes equal participation in the proposal, development and passage of legislation into law...
means. Which is precisely what they have done. Despite the peaceful and democratic nature of their activism, Hedges attacks conservative Christians with the nastiest of slurs, revealing a frightening ignorance. ... The old guard of the Christian Right is stuck in the culture war
Culture war
The culture war in American usage is a metaphor used to claim that political conflict is based on sets of conflicting cultural values. The term frequently implies a conflict between those values considered traditionalist or conservative and those considered progressive or liberal...
mentality that originated in the 1960s. When liberals like Hedges adopt a similar culture war mentality, they only fortify the divide and lend ammunition to their adversaries."
Praise
Publishers WeeklyPublishers Weekly
Publishers Weekly, aka PW, is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers and literary agents...
wrote of the book: "As a Harvard Divinity School graduate, his investigation of the Christian Right agenda is even more alarming given its lucidity. Citing the psychology
Psychology
Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...
and sociology of fascism and cult
Cult
The word cult in current popular usage usually refers to a group whose beliefs or practices are considered abnormal or bizarre. The word originally denoted a system of ritual practices...
s, including the work of German
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
historian Fritz Stern
Fritz Stern
Fritz Richard Stern is a German-born American historian of German history, Jewish history, and historiography. He is a University Professor Emeritus and a former provost at New York's Columbia University...
, Hedges draws striking parallels between 20th-century totalitarian movements and the highly organized, well-funded "dominionist
Dominionism
Dominionism is a term used to describe politically active conservative Christians that are believed to conspire and seek influence or control over secular civil government through political action, especially in the United States, with the goal of either a nation governed by Christians, or a nation...
movement," an influential theocratic
Theocracy
Theocracy is a form of organization in which the official policy is to be governed by immediate divine guidance or by officials who are regarded as divinely guided, or simply pursuant to the doctrine of a particular religious sect or religion....
sect within the country's huge evangelical
Evangelicalism
Evangelicalism is a Protestant Christian movement which began in Great Britain in the 1730s and gained popularity in the United States during the series of Great Awakenings of the 18th and 19th century.Its key commitments are:...
population. Rooted in a radical Calvinism
Calvinism
Calvinism is a Protestant theological system and an approach to the Christian life...
, and wrapping its apocalyptic, vehemently militant, sexist and homophobic
Homophobia
Homophobia is a term used to refer to a range of negative attitudes and feelings towards lesbian, gay and in some cases bisexual, transgender people and behavior, although these are usually covered under other terms such as biphobia and transphobia. Definitions refer to irrational fear, with the...
vision in patriotic and religious rhetoric, dominionism seeks absolute power
Absolute Power
Absolute Power may refer to:*Lord Acton's dictum, "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely"*The power held by the sovereign of an absolute monarchy*Omnipotence, unlimited power, as of a deity...
in a Christian state. Hedges's reportage profiles both former members and true believers, evoking the particular characteristics of this American variant of fascism. His argument against what he sees as a democratic society's suicidal
Suicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...
tolerance for intolerant movements has its own paradoxes. But this urgent book forcefully illuminates what many across the political spectrum will recognize as a serious and growing threat to the very concept and practice of an open society."