{"id":16503,"date":"2013-07-24T16:53:56","date_gmt":"2013-07-24T20:53:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/?p=16503"},"modified":"2013-07-24T16:52:12","modified_gmt":"2013-07-24T20:52:12","slug":"bryan-fischer-is-very-brave-when-confronting-imaginary-monsters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2013\/07\/24\/bryan-fischer-is-very-brave-when-confronting-imaginary-monsters\/","title":{"rendered":"Bryan Fischer is very brave when confronting imaginary monsters"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Like many small children, when I was a little kid I was worried that there might be \u2026 something<\/em> in my bedroom closet \u2014 something that lurked there, hidden, waiting until after dark to creep out and do me harm.<\/p>\n

$\"\"$ <\/a>My dad was pretty terrific about that. I don\u2019t remember many things from when I was that young, but I remember when he came in with a flashlight and we searched all through the closet to see that nothing was there.<\/p>\n

And all the while he was telling me about when he<\/em> was a little kid and he was worried that there was a monster in the crawlspace under their house until his<\/em> dad took him under there with a flashlight. So I wound up not scared of either the imaginary monster in the closet or of the fear that I was weird for being afraid of the imaginary monster in the closet.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s what being a good dad looks like.<\/p>\n

Religious right spokesman Bryan Fischer<\/a> offers an alternative response to childhood fears:<\/p>\n<\/iframe>\n<p>\u201cI would ask them if they\u2019d experienced any demonic presences in their room,\u201d Fischer says. And then, when the children respond to this encouragement by saying yes, yes they <em>have<\/em> \u201cexperienced demonic presences in their room,\u201d Fischer touts this as evidence of his finely honed spiritual discernment.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOnce we dealt with the demonic spirits, and took authority over them,\u201d Fischer says, \u201cthen that problem was resolved and it went away.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s just <em>terrible<\/em> parenting. It reminds me of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.fredrogers.org\/FRC\/par-fears.html\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">this bit of advice from Mister Rogers<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Some families give their children a spray bottles with water as \u201cmonster spray,\u201d or put a sign on the door \u201cNo monsters allowed.\u201d\u00a0 That may seem to work in the short term because children are so trusting of us adults and so willing to believe the fantasy \u2014 but what it could say to them is that their parents, too, think that monsters are real, and that the monsters might actually be there.\u00a0 In the long term, we want them to know that monsters aren\u2019t real and they really are not there.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>That describes exactly what Fischer is doing with\/to these children. He\u2019s giving them imaginary \u201cmonster spray\u201d that doesn\u2019t really do anything except confirm in their minds that \u201cmonsters are real, and that the monsters might actually be there.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Fischer doesn\u2019t mind that he\u2019s teaching children that monsters are real because he believes that monsters are real himself. Gay monsters. Feminist monsters. Baby-killing monsters. Muslim, atheist and liberal monsters.<\/p>\n<p>And also actual <em>monster<\/em> monsters. Like from scary movies. <em>Exactly<\/em> like from scary movies because that is where Fischer\u2019s ideas about such monsters comes from, even though he\u2019s convinced himself that he got his ideas about them from the Bible.<\/p>\n<p>Witchfinder General Bryan Fischer really believes in the witches he is hunting:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>There are covens. These are clusters of witches that meet. They\u2019ll start meeting at midnight, they\u2019ll break up a 2:00, 3:00 in the morning, and they will send demonic spirits out on assignments against their chosen targets. One night, 2:00 in the morning, I\u2019m awakened by something grabbing my ankle. \u2026 Something grabbed my ankle and was trying to pull me out of the bed.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Fortunately, Fischer says, he knew the counter-spell. He said \u201cJesus\u201d and \u201cit went away.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>This calls to mind something else <a href=\"http:\/\/www.fredrogers.org\/FRC\/par-fears.html\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Fred Rogers said<\/a> about the fears of small children:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Fears might also grow out of children\u2019s struggles with their own angry feelings at their parents for making rules and setting limits, paying more attention to a new baby than to them, or for not giving them something they really want. Children can be afraid of getting too angry at their parents because they wonder if maybe their anger could result in losing their parent\u2019s love, and that would be devastating. They sometimes project those angry feelings onto some outside thing \u2014 a dog, a tiger, a vacuum cleaner or a toilet drain \u2014 and then they fear that the very angry thing may just destroy them.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>I think what Mister Rogers says there explains a great deal about Bryan Fischer and his followers.<\/p>\n<p>But on the other hand, it\u2019s possible I\u2019m getting things backwards. It may be that Bryan Fischer isn\u2019t frightening small children by helping to convince them that monsters are real. It may be that the child in his story was frightening Bryan Fischer by helping to convince <em>him<\/em> of that.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat brought me into the conversation,\u201d with the children he talks about, Fischer says, is that these kids \u201cwere very disobedient, very rebellious to their parents.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Consider for a moment the kind of church and the kind of family in which it makes sense to the parents to invite someone like <em>Bryan Fischer<\/em> into their home to speak to their children about proper discipline. The threshold for what such parents regard as \u201cvery disobedient, very rebellious\u201d is probably not very high.<\/p>\n<p>So these kids are in trouble with mom and dad \u2014 <em>big<\/em> trouble, so big that their parents have called in the Witchfinder General to talk to them. But with his very first question, he provides them with an escape hatch: \u201cI would ask them if they\u2019d experienced any demonic presences in their room.\u201d There\u2019s no need to take the blame themselves \u2014 Fischer is practically pleading with them to pull a Flip Wilson and say the devil made them do it.<\/p>\n<p>So they tell Fischer what he wants to hear:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>These demonic presences would tell them, \u201cLook, if you don\u2019t disobey your parents, I\u2019m gonna hurt them. If you don\u2019t disobey your parents, I\u2019m gonna kill them.\u201d And so the girl was frightened then, out of her love for her parents, wanted to protect them, frightened into disobeying them.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>And <em>he swallowed it.<\/em>\u00a0No getting grounded or spanked or forced to copy pages out of 2 Chronicles longhand or whatever else passes for punishment in such households. All the kid has to do is nod earnestly as Fischer prays for her, then he goes off to tell their parents that the kid was just acting out of love for them because they\u2019d been threatened by the scary monster under her bed.<\/p>\n<p>If that\u2019s what happened here, then I\u2019m impressed with this kid. And I hope that <em>is<\/em> what happened, because the other possibility is too depressing to contemplate.<\/p>\n<p>Either way, though, thanks to Bryan Fischer\u2019s hard work it\u2019s 10-to-1 odds that this kid will be an atheist by age 19.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>“Fears might also grow out of children’s struggles with their own angry feelings,” Mister Rogers said. “They sometimes project those angry feelings onto some outside thing … and then they fear that the very angry thing may just destroy them.” And that, I think, explains all you need to know about religious right spokesman Bryan Fischer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":141,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[28,29],"class_list":["post-16503","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-evangelicals","tag-religious-right","tag-satanic-baby-killers"],"yoast_head":"\n<title>Bryan Fischer is very brave when confronting imaginary monsters<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\""Fears might also grow out of children's struggles with their own angry feelings," Mister Rogers said. "They sometimes project those angry feelings onto some outside thing ... and then they fear that the very angry thing may just destroy them." And that, I think, explains all you need to know about religious right spokesman Bryan Fischer.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2013\/07\/24\/bryan-fischer-is-very-brave-when-confronting-imaginary-monsters\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Bryan Fischer is very brave when confronting imaginary monsters\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\""Fears might also grow out of children's struggles with their own angry feelings," Mister Rogers said. "They sometimes project those angry feelings onto some outside thing ... and then they fear that the very angry thing may just destroy them." And that, I think, explains all you need to know about religious right spokesman Bryan Fischer.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2013\/07\/24\/bryan-fischer-is-very-brave-when-confronting-imaginary-monsters\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"slacktivist\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-07-24T20:53:56+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2013-07-24T20:52:12+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/wp.patheos.com.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/files\/2013\/07\/CurryPenny-300x284.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Fred Clark\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Fred Clark\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2013\/07\/24\/bryan-fischer-is-very-brave-when-confronting-imaginary-monsters\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2013\/07\/24\/bryan-fischer-is-very-brave-when-confronting-imaginary-monsters\/\",\"name\":\"Bryan Fischer is very brave when confronting imaginary monsters\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2013-07-24T20:53:56+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2013-07-24T20:52:12+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/32666545e535b697afb93d9848dcfc47\"},\"description\":\"\\\"Fears might also grow out of children's struggles with their own angry feelings,\\\" Mister Rogers said. \\\"They sometimes project those angry feelings onto some outside thing ... and then they fear that the very angry thing may just destroy them.\\\" And that, I think, explains all you need to know about religious right spokesman Bryan Fischer.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2013\/07\/24\/bryan-fischer-is-very-brave-when-confronting-imaginary-monsters\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2013\/07\/24\/bryan-fischer-is-very-brave-when-confronting-imaginary-monsters\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2013\/07\/24\/bryan-fischer-is-very-brave-when-confronting-imaginary-monsters\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Bryan Fischer is very brave when confronting imaginary monsters\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/\",\"name\":\"slacktivist\",\"description\":\""Test everything; hold fast to what is good."\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/32666545e535b697afb93d9848dcfc47\",\"name\":\"Fred Clark\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7083ccd514d4fb8d5043041756d766a0?s=96&d=identicon&r=pg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7083ccd514d4fb8d5043041756d766a0?s=96&d=identicon&r=pg\",\"caption\":\"Fred Clark\"},\"description\":\"Fred Clark is a graduate of Eastern Baptist Theological Seminary (now called Palmer Seminary), of Eastern College (now called Eastern University) and of the fundamentalist Timothy Christian High School (still fundamentalist and still called Timothy Christian High School, but not really thrilled to have a snarky, liberal, tree-hugging, pro-choice, pro-GLBT, peacenik, commie, evolutionist as such a vocal alumnus). A former managing editor of Prism magazine, Fred worked in the parachurch nonprofit world for a decade and then for a decade in the newspaper biz. He began blogging in 2002. In 2003 he began writing a review of the best-selling Left Behind series. Eight years later he still hasn\u2019t finished reviewing the second book of that series and the experience has left him a broken shell of a man. Fred knows the difference between the possessive \u201cits\u201d and the contraction \u201cit\u2019s,\u201d and he is acutely bothered when others mistakenly confuse the two, yet he himself just kind of instinctively types the apostrophe whether or not it belongs there. Some feel this is his greatest hypocrisy, but those who know him better know better. He\u2019s guilty of much greater hypocrisies. Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. You can reach him via email at slacktivist at hotmail dot com.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/author\/fredclark1\/\"}]}<\/script>\n","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Bryan Fischer is very brave when confronting imaginary monsters","description":"\"Fears might also grow out of children's struggles with their own angry feelings,\" Mister Rogers said. \"They sometimes project those angry feelings onto some outside thing ... and then they fear that the very angry thing may just destroy them.\" And that, I think, explains all you need to know about religious right spokesman Bryan Fischer.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2013\/07\/24\/bryan-fischer-is-very-brave-when-confronting-imaginary-monsters\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Bryan Fischer is very brave when confronting imaginary monsters","og_description":"\"Fears might also grow out of children's struggles with their own angry feelings,\" Mister Rogers said. \"They sometimes project those angry feelings onto some outside thing ... and then they fear that the very angry thing may just destroy them.\" And that, I think, explains all you need to know about religious right spokesman Bryan Fischer.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2013\/07\/24\/bryan-fischer-is-very-brave-when-confronting-imaginary-monsters\/","og_site_name":"slacktivist","article_published_time":"2013-07-24T20:53:56+00:00","article_modified_time":"2013-07-24T20:52:12+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/wp.patheos.com.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/files\/2013\/07\/CurryPenny-300x284.jpg"}],"author":"Fred Clark","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Fred Clark","Est. reading time":"5 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2013\/07\/24\/bryan-fischer-is-very-brave-when-confronting-imaginary-monsters\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2013\/07\/24\/bryan-fischer-is-very-brave-when-confronting-imaginary-monsters\/","name":"Bryan Fischer is very brave when confronting imaginary monsters","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#website"},"datePublished":"2013-07-24T20:53:56+00:00","dateModified":"2013-07-24T20:52:12+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/32666545e535b697afb93d9848dcfc47"},"description":"\"Fears might also grow out of children's struggles with their own angry feelings,\" Mister Rogers said. \"They sometimes project those angry feelings onto some outside thing ... and then they fear that the very angry thing may just destroy them.\" And that, I think, explains all you need to know about religious right spokesman Bryan Fischer.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2013\/07\/24\/bryan-fischer-is-very-brave-when-confronting-imaginary-monsters\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2013\/07\/24\/bryan-fischer-is-very-brave-when-confronting-imaginary-monsters\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2013\/07\/24\/bryan-fischer-is-very-brave-when-confronting-imaginary-monsters\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Bryan Fischer is very brave when confronting imaginary monsters"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/","name":"slacktivist","description":""Test everything; hold fast to what is good."","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/32666545e535b697afb93d9848dcfc47","name":"Fred Clark","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7083ccd514d4fb8d5043041756d766a0?s=96&d=identicon&r=pg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7083ccd514d4fb8d5043041756d766a0?s=96&d=identicon&r=pg","caption":"Fred Clark"},"description":"Fred Clark is a graduate of Eastern Baptist Theological Seminary (now called Palmer Seminary), of Eastern College (now called Eastern University) and of the fundamentalist Timothy Christian High School (still fundamentalist and still called Timothy Christian High School, but not really thrilled to have a snarky, liberal, tree-hugging, pro-choice, pro-GLBT, peacenik, commie, evolutionist as such a vocal alumnus). A former managing editor of Prism magazine, Fred worked in the parachurch nonprofit world for a decade and then for a decade in the newspaper biz. He began blogging in 2002. In 2003 he began writing a review of the best-selling Left Behind series. Eight years later he still hasn\u2019t finished reviewing the second book of that series and the experience has left him a broken shell of a man. Fred knows the difference between the possessive \u201cits\u201d and the contraction \u201cit\u2019s,\u201d and he is acutely bothered when others mistakenly confuse the two, yet he himself just kind of instinctively types the apostrophe whether or not it belongs there. Some feel this is his greatest hypocrisy, but those who know him better know better. He\u2019s guilty of much greater hypocrisies. Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. You can reach him via email at slacktivist at hotmail dot com.","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/author\/fredclark1\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16503","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/141"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16503"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16503\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}