Supernatural's Reactionary Road Trip
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
Issue 22 - 2013 ISSN 2044-8031 "All I saw was evil": Supernatural's Reactionary Road Trip Also in this issue Enlightened Independence and the Origins of its American Radicalization Letter from New York: A Victory in the Culture Wars? In this year’s issue Enlightened "All I saw was 3 Independence 14 evil": and the Origins Supernatural's of its American Reactionary Radicalization Road Trip By Joel Wilson, Florida by Dr. Brian Ireland, Senior Lecturer Atlantic University in History, University of Glamorgan is the official journal of the Ameri- can Studies Resource Centre, The Joel Wilson argues that Aldham Robarts Library, Liverpool America, as a nation and John Moores University, Liverpool idea, could not ever have fully L1 9DE accepted the European model of Enlightenment articulated Tel: +44 (0)151-231 3241 by Emmanuel Kant and e-mail: [email protected] others. web site: www.americansc.org.uk Supernatural debuted in 2005 Editor-in-Chief: Dr Bella Adams Letter from New on the Warner Brothers Editor: David Forster York: 13 network in the US. Creator Editorial assistants: Rebecca Eric Kripke envisaged the Fielding, Victoria Hoffman, Gemma A Victory in the story as a mythic road trip Jones, Marcus Munroe, Siju Sa- Culture Wars? across America, with two dare brothers travelling through by Lenny Quart Layout and graphics: David Forster small-town America, fighting evil and righting wrongs. The views expressed are those of Although the brothers' iconic the contributors, and not neces- On a range of issues from gay car and the road genre sarily those of the centre or the marriage and gun control to university. template establish immigration, as the Supernatural as a distinctly © 2013, Liverpool John Moores demographics of the US American production, the University and the Contributors. changes, conservative values thematic fight between good Articles in this journal may be seem to be in retreat, but can and evil has attracted a wide freely reproduced for use in sub- Obama capitalise on this so international audience. This scribing institutions only, provided long as Republicans remain in article places these themes in that the source is acknowledged. control of the Congress? the context of post-9/11 America. Book reviews Cover illustration © Olly Muxworthy. See more at Culture Follow the ASRC on Twitter 20 @AStudies http://www.flickr.com/photos/ ollymuxworthy/ Environment 25 History 25 or Facebook. http://www.facebook.com/AmStuds Literature 28 Politics 35 Race and ethnicity 35 2 Enlightened Independence and the Origins of its American Radicalization By Joel Wilson, Florida Atlantic University Through a thematic comparison of the notion of the United Nations or the interna- tional community at large. On a independence found in Immanuel Kant's seminal more domestic level, the recent essay, "What is Enlightenment?" and various matter of obligatory healthcare in- texts of the Radical American Enlightenment, Joel surance and whether or not its man- date infringes on the rights of free Wilson argues that America, as nation and idea, citizens as well as the more perni- could not ever have fully accepted the European cious issue of gun control after the model of Enlightenment articulated by Kant and series of tragic mass shootings in 2012 has proved controversial to others. Americans’ sense of individual inde- pendence. Truly, the “fierce spirit of Il y a en effet une passion mâle et légitime pour l’égalité qui excite les independence,” to use Irish states- hommes à vouloir être tous fort et estimés. … mais il se rencontre man Edmund Burke’s eighteenth aussi dans le cœur humain un goût dépravé pour l’égalité … qui century description, that pervades réduit les hommes à préférer l’égalité dans la servitude à l’inégalité American society must have tracea- dans la liberté. ble roots (Burke 237). It is my pur- pose in this article to delineate one “There is in effect a manly and legitimate passion for equality which root, specifically the radical Ameri- excites men to all want to be strong and esteemed … but in the can Enlightenment, by which I refer human heart, there exists also a depraved taste for equality … which to a catalog of diverse ideologies reduces men to prefer equality in servitude than inequality with found objectionable by the main- liberty.” stream Enlightenment, including the belief in fundamental rights en- --Alexis de Tocqueville, De la démocratie en Amérique, I.iii dowed by a Creator and not birth, limited to no government, uninhibit- he spirit of America is the spirit ty, is, in itself, a manner of demon- ed freedom of speech, an insistence T of independence. Roll your strating the spirit of independence on one’s individual prerogative over eyes, scoff at my presumptuous- as manifested in the rhetoric fos- communal benefit, and individual ness—but do not make the mistake tered by the United States and not- access to providence instead of of dismissing it as nationalistic hys- ed by de Tocqueville almost two progressive and secular rationality. teria. I am no gun-toter; I am no hundred years ago. Through a thematic comparison neoconservative; I am no immigrant This spirit of independence to which between Immanuel Kant’s formative -hater—my opening statement is I refer can be traced throughout the essay, “What is Enlightenment?” grounded wholly in nonpolitical rhet- history of the United States—from and writings of the American found- oric, and it is precisely this kind of the very inception of the history of ing fathers, I will establish that from rhetoric of which I avail myself in this country and its ideals, as rec- the arrival of the first emigrants in order to gaily express myself both in orded in the rhetoric of Winthrope’s Massachusetts, Americans have public and in this article. The mere “City on a Hille,”2 to contemporary perceived themselves to be Enlight- fact that I, as an American, can rhetoric demanding an end to de- ened in a manner that would ulti- speak so audaciously while another pendence on foreign oil and sup- mately prevent the European mod- American can summarily dismiss porting America’s entitlement to act erate Enlightenment from taking my statement as rightwing orotundi- unilaterally, without the backing of root in the American mind. 3 Kant’s Enlightenment and rope’s progressive move towards sought to correct, was not their con- American Exceptionalism Enlightenment, America could never cern. The Puritan emigrants felt that be the realization thereof for at least genuine faith lacked in Europe, and three reasons. For one, colonial their deliverance proved that God history did not inspire an intimate purposed their establishment of the community; the colonies frequently scripturally foretold New Jerusalem. had more enmity with one another While a boon to their community’s than England, and more to the freedom of worship, the establish- point, each sought colonial interest ment of Puritan havens in the New instead of communal welfare. Addi- World did not bring about the kind of tionally, emigrants to the Americas enlightenment Kant and his contem- frequently transplanted themselves poraries would later seek. However, in the name of freedom and inde- the American Puritans, as a group, pendence. not a view to the amelio- believed themselves chosen as the ration of a community.5 Yet the most cornerstone of God’s recreation. As germane reason that America’s such, they were “answerable only to Early Republic could never have God and to his or her own con- adopted the principles of the moder- science” (Innes 116). On into the ate Enlightenment in the context of early 1700s, New World prosperity, this discussion of Kant’s “Sapere coupled with the subjugation of aude” is that both radical and mod- America’s natives and nature, fur- erate thinkers in colonial America ther nourished their spirit of Excep- Immanuel Kant freely accepted tutelage, to use one tionalism. New Englanders in partic- English translation of Kant’s Un- ular, enjoying a lifestyle equal to or mündigkeit, to a bygone era’s man- superior to many Europeans, con- Though Kant praised the American ner of thinking, stemming from the sidered themselves blessed for their Revolution3 and throughout his oeu- colonization of the New World: efforts to establish an enlightened, vre, extols independence as noble American Exceptionalism. 6 theocratic society. virtue, it is important to separate this term from its contemporary connota- The first leaders in America— tions. Kant’s usage did not predicate William Bradford, John Winthrop, “[direct] democracy; racial and sexu- among others—believed their indi- al equality; individual liberty of life- vidual church was synonymous with style; full freedom of thought, ex- the New Jerusalem prophesized in pression, and the press; eradication the Bible. These men believed they of religious authority from the legis- were delivered from heathen Eu- lative process and education; and rope by the mighty hand of God full separation of church and Himself, and though such providen- state” (Israel, Revolution vii-viii). tial deliverance led men like Brad- Such liberties are conspicuous in ford and Winthrop to be “what we the writings of, among others, would think of today as a civic- Thomas Paine and Thomas Jeffer- minded citizen[s],” they by no son—men who were Kant’s contem- means “believe[d] in democracy” or poraries, but not likeminded philoso- individual liberties beyond the right phers. Kant’s independence is far to worship as Puritan church lead- more subjective. In his celebrated ers saw fit (Söderlind 245). In 1754, essay from 1784, “What is Enlight- when Jonathan Mayhew writes that enment?” he outlines the overarch- America’s first emigrants were William Bradford ing goals of the on-going European “smitten with a Love of Liberty,” it Enlightenment.4 Yet from his first was not the kind championed by the Individualized Exceptional- few words, distinctions between Enlightenment’s leaders, including American radicalism and European Kant—it was not secular, nor was it ism moderateness are palpable.