Marianne Williamson, New Agey author, guru, and peddler of "A Course in Miracles" was certainly the most interesting announced Dem candidate overall in 2020, as I said in a blog post about her campaign then. (This time around, depending on how one uses the word "interesting," it's most likely RFK Jr.)
And, she does "walk the walk" on the woo. She did then, and as ar as I know, hasn't changed since then. Her campaign contributions do NOT include the Green Party, but do include the Natural Law Party. Nuff ced. (As I noted in 2020, it would have been fun to see her and Tulsi Gabbard land in Fairfield, Iowa at the same time on the campaign trail. Tulsi's already been there on a recent trip.)
That said, beyond the Natural Law Party, some of her campaign contributions were to ConservaDems in the past. I don't think she's explained that away any more successfully than the woo factor that she still holds.
And, with that, I've decided to do an entirely new post, overhauling that old one. Why?
Yesterday, I appear to have ensnared a true believer who says that Williamson doesn't believe in "manifesting."
That person was responding to this snark on Twitter:
If "A Course in Miracles" is so powerful, why didn't Marianne Williamson just "manifest" a 2020 presidential election victory for herself?#AskingForAFriend #NewAge
— TheRealSocraticGadfly (@real_gadfly) June 20, 2023
Sure she does, for both good and bad,
as "A Return to Love," her catechism of "A Course in Miracles," makes
clear, per Wiki bullet points:
• "A friend of mine told me that we're not punished for our sins, but by our sins. Sickness is not a sign of God’s judgment on us, but of our judgment on ourselves. If we were to think that God created our sickness, how could we turn to Him for healing? As we’ve already established, God is all that is good. He creates only love, therefore he did not create sickness. Sickness is an illusion and does not actually exist. It is part of our worldly dream, our self-created nightmare. Our prayer to God is that He awaken us from the dream."
• “Healing results from transformed perception of our relationships to illness, one in which we respond to the problem with love instead of fear. When a child presents a cut finger to his or her mother, the woman doesn’t say, 'Bad cut.' Rather, she kisses the finger, showers it with love in an unconscious, instinctive activation of the healing process. Why should we think differently about critical illness? Cancer and AIDS and other serious illnesses are physical manifestations of a psychic scream and their message is not 'hate me, but 'Love me.'"
• “In the traditional Western medical model, a healer’s job is to attack disease. But if the consciousness of attack is the ultimate problem, how could it be the ultimate answer? A miracle worker’s job is not to attack illness, but rather to stimulate the natural forces of healing. We turn our eyes away from sickness to the love that lies beyond it. No sickness can diminish our capacity to love. Does that mean that it is a mistake to take medicine? Absolutely not."
• "When the cure for AIDS is finally found, we will give prizes to a few scientists, but many of us will know that millions and millions of prayers helped it happen."
There you go. As I told
said Twit, this is everything that Barbara Ehrenreich ever called out in her book "Bright Sided"
about "positivity" based psychic healing. It's disgusting and revolting. (Ehrenreich expands on some of these ideas in "Natural Causes.")
Beyond that, from all I know, she's not moved beyond her previous stances on some other issues.
In 2020, Google said, per Orac, that, to use something I've used as a term before, she's an antivaxxer-lite. Or, to rephrase, per an issue where Greens, and lowercase greens, say "Follow the science"? She's a vaccines "skeptic," which is parallel to being a climate change "skeptic," as I see it. That said, contra one Orac commenter, I can be skeptical about the pharmaceutical industry in some areas, yet, unlike Williamson, have no problem with accepting the current vaccine schedule.
After a brief Twitter spat, I'll note she remained antivaxxer, per Science Based Medicine, even after allegedly (with loopholes!) apologizing for old antivaxxer statements. (Sadly, but, not surprisingly, given its hit and miss record on current affairs, Wikipedia semi-whitewashes her.)
Also per the big picture, she's never apologized for the New Ageism
that's led her down these and other rabbit holes, in part.
Per another Orac,
she's also apparently anti-GMOs. (That said, many libertarians are
antivaxxer, too, and anti-GMOism also runs a spectrum, but Greens, as
opposed to the duopoly, are officially anti-GMO.)
On the ground? She, like most Gang Green environmental orgs, has a record of not being friendly to unionization — in her case,
at the Project Angel Food she founded in the late 1980s. (As for how
beneficial it may have been to the homeless? What, you can't help the
homeless and still be OK with a unionization effort? Whataboutism. As
well as ignoring the whataboutism in the cult of Marianne that was
happening at that time.) More on the project's unionization issues and other such things at Wiki.
On foreign policy, in 2020 her woo
extends to the Middle East, calling for "love" and the "heart" on
Israel-Palestine and warning about karma in selling arms to the Saudis
for Yemen's civil war.
That said, at one point in life, I actually owned a copy of "A Course in
Miracles." I tried actually getting into it. But, I couldn't ... not in
it in specific, and I eventually dropped both it and the attempt to be
spiritual but not religious.
In specific, as I've said elsewhere, I find the concept of karma,
whether in its New Agey sweetness and light lies (and yes, lies,
compared to its origin in full fury) or its Hindu-Buddhist roots to be even more offensive
than the traditional (post-Augustine Catholic and Protestant
"traditional," that is — it ain't in the Bible) Christian doctrine of
original sin.
Per the header? I'm still waiting for "Healing the Soul of America," as I was three years ago.
Didn't the New Agey flow or whatever have enough power to already start
making this happen?
My snark aside, it's too bad, because, when she doesn't go down the woo
road, she talks a lot about problems with capitalism and income
inequality. But ... why doesn't she, like many fellow woo masters, talk
about how people need to "manifest" more? After all, that's a core
principle of "A Course in Miracles."
And, while I'm being snarky, I'm also being serious. Just as serious as
if a GOP presidential candidate belonged to a church that officially
preached the "success gospel." Even more, if a GOP presidential
candidate, for a more exact parallel, were a minister of such a church.
Nor am I going to wade through a 70-minute ACIM-based podcast for the claim that it doesn't teach manifestation. Per Williamson's midrash, it does.
That said, per the quote "our thoughts create our reality and that we can use our thoughts to manifest the things we desire" on Google, it's clear that it's not just Williamson who thinks ACIM is in part about manifestation.
And, per Wiki, her own bibliography indicates her belief in manifestation, or closely related New Age ideas by other names. Titles like "The Law of Divine Compensation: On Work, Money and Miracles" and "A Course in Weight Loss: 21 Spiritual Lessons for Surrendering Your Weight Forever" make that clear.
And, she's asking me for money via email. Ain't happening. (And, why can't she "manifest" campaign contributions, as her campaign's debt soars? And, it seems true that her "campaign" is actually a move to goose sales of an upcoming new book.)
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