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I think sci-fi reflects that; 60s and 70s sci-fi, where it touches on religion as a threat at all, concentrates on cults. You start seeing fundie-christians-as-threat stuff, like Handmaid's Tale, a bit later.
EDIT: However. Honourable mention to Heinlein, who did this in _1940_: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%22If_This_Goes_On—%22 (played very straight; crazy preacher becomes US president in 2012, no elections thereafter) - possibly important context is that there had been a surge in televangelism in the 1930s.
But what is perhaps even more of a problem is the inability of the proverbial fish to notice the water they swim in. To summarize:
Every state is a confessional state.
and
Convention is not the same as normality.
Here, American society is governed by liberalism. It is, quite literally, the confession of the liberal state. Liberalism is not a "neutral" position (the very idea of neutrality doesn't make sense, except in a relative sense, i.e., as common denominator among disagreeing parties). Liberalism makes positive claims. It makes moral claims. It has its own philosophical anthropology. It is underpinned by definite presuppositions about such things as the nature of knowledge and the nature of freedom, as well as presuppositions of a distinctly theologically Protestant nature that would be rejected today if they were explicitly stated. It even has its own latent hyperindividualistic eschatology, entails by its anthropology.
If liberalism tolerates non-liberal views, it does so only to the degree that they conform to liberal expectation (this is visible when reading Rawls critically). And far from merely creating a space for incompatible or diverse worldviews to coexist in peace (including those that are given the name of "religion"), it demands and pressures those worldviews to concede to liberal expectations. People are pressured to accept the innovations of the liberal regime; those who refuse are harassed and chastised.
So, it's more than a little embarrassing, especially in this day and age, to continue to maintain the pretense of the "enlightenment" and "neutrality" of the liberal order as if it weren't itself a confession. It is a confession like any other, and because every state must have a shared confession to even function, it receives a privileged status in the liberal state, just as any confessional state grants privileged status, by definition, to the confession of the state, however tolerant that confession may be of other confessions. Whether liberalism is the true confession, that is a separate question (I claim that it is not), but what is irritating is the hypocritical pretense of it not being a confession, as if it does not need to be defended, because it is just obviously true. It isn't obviously true, and worse, it contains well-documented contradictions and errors [0]. It is to be expected that someone who grew up in such a regime, who has no real and deep exposure to anything else, who hasn't examined his own culture's presuppositions, will naturally be predisposed and habituated to find the liberal order the natural one, the correct one, the normal one, and so on. That doesn't ipso facto mean that that liberalism or any confession is wrong, only that sensibilities can be trained and molded to normalize what is, in fact, not normative at all.
[0] A nice, short, but lucid explanation of some of liberalism's most essential features and problems can be found in Feser's "Locke": https://a.co/d/ayXWIgD.
https://news.gallup.com/poll/642548/church-attendance-declin...
This sort of tedious, completely deluded hyperbole is becoming ridiculous, partly, it seems, as a result of Trump derangement syndrome. No, the U.S. is not a fundamentalist religious state or anything close to it and no, it's not sliding further in that direction now than was previously the case. I challenge you to name one damn piece of concrete evidence showing this nonsense to be the case.
It's almost amusing to see the kinds of stupidities many people blandly assert about the overall situation because something specific is going in a way they don't like.
I mean seriously, would you remotely, and with a straight face, compare the U.S. in terms of religious intolerance (an axiomatic requirement to being a fundamentalist religious state) with genuinely fundamentalist religious states like the multiple examples in the Islamic world, or say, 15th century European states?
Go read Project 2025. It is clearly a fundamentalist's religious agenda. And it isn't some conspiracy theory. It is public, you can go read it.
Iran had a secular liberal government before the Revolution. Why do you think it can't happen here? That was recent, not ancient history. That is the goal.
""This is really a battle between good and evil," evangelical TV preacher Hank Kunneman says of the slew of criminal charges facing Donald Trump. "There's something on President Trump that the enemy fears: It's called the anointing." The Nebraska pastor, who was speaking on cable news show "FlashPoint" last summer, is among several voices in Christian media pressing a message of Biblical proportions: The 2024 presidential race is a fight for America's soul, and a persecuted Trump has God's protection."
"The hand of God is on him and he cannot be stopped." 'SO GOD GAVE US TRUMP'
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/god-gave-us-trump-christian...
Old School business focused Republican's need to wake up to who they are in bed with.
Nobody is persecuting me for being an atheist, America hasn't and won't turn into a theocracy, no matter how much shit Trump talks. The election propaganda on both sides was way over-the-top, but the effect it had on people's psyches will wear off soon enough and a lot of people will be left feeling quite embarrassed for being sucked into it.
It's only a free country, until it isn't.
I want to agree. But it seems like the kind of reasoning people use when they are 'hoping' for the best. 'It wont be that bad'.
Sure. Maybe as an atheist, you are not feeling persecuted, today.
Ask a trans person if they are feeling any persecution. They are literally being beaten up, lives threatened. It's same old story, when they come for you, who will be left to help.
Women have less rights today than they had before Trump. That is a persecuted group. You can't say that isn't religiously motivated.
Second point: the doomsday scenarios about Trump ending democracy require several leaps of faith to believe. Even if we assume that "you'll never have to vote again" was an announcement of his intent to cancel future elections, rather than a plea to people who are usually reluctant to vote at all, believing it will actually happen requires believing that he's not lying, believing he actually has the ability to pull it off, and believing he actually has the spine. Revolutionaries are very rarely old men, he's already proven himself to be generally incompetent and broadly unable to pick loyal deputies, and he's an established liar. All of this points to him being a wet fart, not a serious threat to American democracy.
Third, concerning his previous insurrection attempt, the men he managed to mobilize were so incompetent they forgot to bring guns with them. Or maybe it actually was a protest and the insurrection narrative is hyperbole. Either way, I'm not scared of this man.
Fourth, with respect to trans people being beaten up... When haven't they been? I find it hard to take a plot line drawn between this point and theocracy seriously.
I agree with all that.
I tell myself that a lot.
Sorry. It is just cold comfort that the guy in charge, that is an autocrat, does all the things you outlined, and yet,,, our only hope is that he is incompetent? That is all that is stopping his agenda? That seems thin.
I have read the same thing happened with Hitler. He was mostly incompetent, and surrounded by incompetence, and ranks were based on loyalty. That if the Nazi's hadn't purged all the competent military leaders, they would have won easily with the technology/military they had.
Yes. All of the Bush Jesus talk had me just as fearful. Not sure about that, should I not be worried because Bush didn't usher in a theocracy, even with every increasing step in that direction?