Noam Chomsky & David Brooks Agree – This is a recipe for societal collapse!

A MAGA-Christian Beattitudes

Now when MAGA-Jesus saw the crowds, he went up on a mountainside and sat down. His MAGA disciples came to him, and he began to teach them, saying:

Wait….What? Doctors are not providing pre-natal care to women if they aren’t married?

Tennessee Approves Refusing Healthcare Based on the Patient’s Lifestyle

Yep…there is a new agenda in Christian Nationalist ideology that has emerged in Tennessee that legislates nonsense. But we know that the CN bill mill will eventually replicate this morally compromised legislation in every red state in the nation. (Iowans be on watch) Christian Nationalist politicians have reached a new low in the state of Tennessee.

Instead of “suffer the little ones to come unto me” it is now, let the little ones suffer. Yes, doctors in Tennessee now have a green light to deny care and service to women who do not conform to their “deeply held religious beliefs” regarding marriage. Unborn children be damned.

If you are an unmarried woman found to be pregnant in the state of Tennessee, you are now at the mercy of the “conscience” of any doctor who judges you by their personal morality and determines that you are not worthy of medical care.

Here are the details behind this story.

In Jonesborough, Tennessee, earlier this year, a woman, who requested anonymity out of fear of retaliation, shared that her doctor objected to her marital status, despite her having been with her partner for 15 years. She said the doctor refused to treat her, citing the Medical Ethics Defense Act, signed in February, stating that it “goes against their Christian values.”

The unnamed unmarried woman had this to say:

“I’m lucky enough to live in a part of the state where I can seek care across state lines and that’s what I’m doing — traveling to Virginia for my prenatal care, scared out of my mind that I will go into labor and … have to deliver in this state with a provider who feels that that child is more valuable than mine.”

The Moral Hypocrisy of Christian Nationalism

Just like that, the so-called “pro-life” people are no longer interested in an unborn child if the mother is a single woman and living in “sin” as they would describe it.

Being pro-life is only applicable to the fetus of women who are married. Are the fetuses of married women the only ones created in God’s image? The woman in this story wants the unborn child and already has an older child who she is successfully parenting. Why won’t the doctor provide pre-natal care for this child?

Short answer? Christian Nationalism.

There is no surprise who is behind this bill. The raging Christian Nationalist legal advocacy group called Alliance Defending Freedom has pushed for this morally bankrupt legislation. Erica Steinmiller-Perdomo, an attorney with religious conservative legal advocacy group championed the act, stating that it would “protect healthcare professionals who refuse to participate in procedures such as voluntary abortions.”

“The cornerstone of healthcare should be the patient-provider relationship. Patients and providers have rights. Providers should not give up their rights to best serve their patients. Patients need to know that our doctors are advocating for them with a clear conscience.”

The hypocrisy is plain. The alleged “cornerstone” is the patient-provider relationship, well, until it comes to abortion. Or in the Tennessee case, when it comes to an unmarried pregnant woman. The real “cornerstone” is the provider’s personal morality. The personal morality of the provider or worse, the state, trumps the needs of the patient.

This is a recipe for societal moral collapse

Let’s take this bill to its logical extreme….Under the Tennessee Medical Ethics Defense Act, what would prevent a healthcare provider from denying care to a woman who has been divorced and remarried, in clear violation of the Christian scripture? The question becomes, why don’t they deny care to women who are divorced?

Or could a physician decide that a woman was guilty of fraud or stealing, clearly in violation of the Ten Commandments, and deny her care because of “deeply held religious principles?” Why is it just the unmarried woman? Why is that the worst “sin” in the minds of these religious bigots?

There are lots of sins.

How about the sins of pride, jealousy, bitterness, lying or other actions? Why wouldn’t those fall under that “deeply held list” of important Christian values? There are plenty of scriptures that talk about these vices. Maybe a doctor should deny medical care for these sinners.

Why is it only an unmarried pregnant woman who is the target? Or, LGBTQ individuals?

The Medical Ethics Defense Act opens the proverbial can of worms that would foster countless situations where someone’s “deeply held Christian values” goes against their conscience. Where would this end?

This Act represents a complete collapse of social and public virtue. Christian Nationalism results in an individualized moral ethic that is dangerous to society. Every individual is a king and decides the fate of others based on their personal morality.

Pushback To The Individualization of Morality

The Tennessee act was filed for introduction on Feb. 5 and was sponsored by Sen. Ferrell Haile (R-Gallatin) and Rep. Bryan Terry (R-Murfreesboro), a physician. The Tennessean newspaper reported the pushback by another physician, Dr. Amy Gordon Bono. The paper reported:

Bono, a Middle Tennessee primary care physician, said in a House Health Committee that the bill was “excessively broad” and could lead to “unintended consequences,” including allowing providers to opt out of delivering necessary medical care.

She argued that the bill does not put patients first.

“When legislation is not patient-centered, it’s morally compromised to begin with. I worry this bill will lead to more patients not trusting their medical caregivers to provide the care they need.”

Bono argued that, contrary to Terry’s claim that the bill would help address the medical professional shortage, actions taken by the Tennessee legislature could instead drive healthcare workers out of the state, or out of the profession entirely.

Tennessean News, July 23, 2025

“Unintended consequences” indeed! These are completely predictable. This case proves the point. It is “morally compromised” according to Dr. Bono, and that brings up a broader cultural issue.

This case and its corallary Christian nationalist interpretation of “freedom” brings up a crucial societal problem. Individualizing morality in the public square undercuts public morality, social ethics, and the moral foundations of a functioning society.

When the law allows individuals to determine, in situations that affect the lives of people, what is right or wrong, there is a compromise of public morality or what the constitutional founders called public virtue.

Let’s talk about public virtue…it is very important in this context.

Founding Fathers Promoted Public Virtue

The Founding Fathers of the United States held the concept of “public virtue” as a central pillar in the success of a free and self-governing republic. It is not just a personal moral quality nor is it essentially a religious ethic, but it is a civic ethic, a set of values and behaviors expected from citizens to maintain liberty and prevent the tyranny of individual conscience.

In a 1776 letter from John Adams to Percy Warren, Adams stated:

There must be a positive passion for the public good, the public interest, honour, power and glory, established in the minds of the people, or there can be no republican government, nor any real liberty: and this public passion must be superiour to all private passions.

(emphasis mine)

Here is the key point: Public virtue refers to the willingness of individuals to put the common good above their own private interests for the sake of the republic. It was seen as essential for democracy to function.

Those who serve the public are obligated to do what is in the best interest of those they serve, not themselves. If we compromise this principle, then anything goes, including neglecting the pre-natal care of an unborn child.

Public virtue plays out not just in politics, but in all arenas of public life.

Reflecting back on my years as a teacher, what if I had been allowed to refuse to educate certain students because I objected to the lifestyle of their parent(s)? What if, based on my “deeply held religious beliefs,” I refused to help a student because their mother was a single parent who was never married?

The individualization of public morality compromises the social contract of a democratic society and, specifically, the professional commitment I made as an educator to teach all students regardless of who their parent(s) are.

More directly, what if I had a gay student? An unmarried teen student who is pregnant? Or, what if I had a student who I knew was a thief or a fraud? Could I refuse services to any of those students simply because my personal religious beliefs are opposed to their lifestyles?

Of course not, it would be a breach of my professional commitment. My personal beliefs, religious or otherwise, become secondary to the needs of the culture. I can still retain my personal beliefs and apply them to my life, but in public practice, I cannot deny life-saving or life-giving services to any human being.

When a natural disaster hits, no one ever stops to ask about the lifestyle of those who are in harms way. But the logical extension of this individual moral principle could result in someone saying to a drowning victim, “so sorry, my personal religious convictions won’t allow me to help you because you are a gay person.”

Society cannot sustain such an immoral personal morality.

Without this foundational concept of the public good and virtue, society fractures into millions of individual consciences all doing harm to people. And the ultimate question is:

“What kind of personal ethic or morality is it when it allows you to let people suffer?”

This is Where David Brooks and Noam Chomsky Agree

Even writers who are political polar opposites have observed the impending collapse of our society based on the complete individualization of morality. There is no longer any community sense of what is right or wrong. It is up to the individual. It doesn’t matter if you justify your cruel interpretation of morality with Christian nationalism or atheism, the result is the same. People will be harmed. Public virtue dies…society crumbles.

Let me explain…

Brooks and Chomsky come from very opposite intellectual and political traditions—Brooks from a center-right, communitarian-conservative background, and Chomsky from a libertarian-socialist, anarchist, and radical leftist tradition.

Despite their divergent worldviews, they share surprising commonalities in their critiques of modern culture and their calls for a deeper, more ethically grounded public life.

David Brooks, a conservative New York Times columnist and author, emphasizes that individuals become morally mature through relationships, communities, and institutions (e.g., families, religious organizations, schools).

In his book The Road To Character, Brooks states that “We’ve become too obsessed with the self and not enough with moral formation.”

Noam Chomsky, a linguist, philosopher, and political activist, approaches morality through a radical critique of power structures and institutions. Focusing on institutional corruption, he stated that “Any institution that is not structurally accountable to the public will eventually act in ways that benefit itself at the expense of the public.”

Chomsky also believes in moral universalism that everyone understands. He stated, “There is a universal moral grammar—basic principles of justice and fairness—that most people intuitively understand, even if societies often violate them.”

Brooks and Chomsky arrive at the same conclusion even if they approach it from two different starting points.

If the healthcare system as an institution individualizes moral judgments on the “worthiness” of a patient to receive care, the whole system is compromised and collapses. It doesn’t matter whether you are a conservative or liberal.

The Tennessee law is a case in point. If each doctor is left to determine who is “worthy” of medical attention or healthcare based on their personal version of morality, and not a societal wide view of the public good, then single women who are pregnant are subject to inhumane neglect and lack of treatment. Children are harmed.

The healthcare system collapses under the weight of such individualistic moral judgment; so would education, finance, business, or any other institution that serves the public.

Chomsky and Brooks agree that there has been a collapse of public morality. Chomsky said, “We should be asking ourselves not what is expedient, but what is right—not just what works for us, but what serves humanity.”

Brooks agrees, he said, “We live in a culture that teaches us to be self-promoters… but there’s a different moral ecology that promotes humility, empathy, and community.”

Brooks and Chomsky inhabit different political universes, yet they share a conviction that a morally impoverished society is dangerous. Brooks looks inward—toward character, inner virtue, and communal obligation—while Chomsky looks outward—toward structures of injustice, propaganda, and domination.

Both are correct.

A Call To Rebuild Public Virtue

What unites them is their call for a more morally serious culture that resists nihilism, selfishness, and complacency in the face of moral failure….such as the Tennessee law.

The Tennessee law represents the danger of the Christian Nationalist emphasis on personal morality in the public sphere. Because of their absolutist beliefs in the Bible and God, they believe their personal judgments carry social and public mandate and allows them to put their judgments above the well-being of others.

However, the individualization of morality reflects a broader cultural shift—from external, shared frameworks to internal, subjective ones such as we see in the Tennessee law. While this shift has liberated many from oppressive norms and allowed for greater moral diversity, it has also weakened the moral glue that holds societies together.

The challenge for the 21st century is to rebuild a sense of common good, not by reviving rigid hierarchies or imposing dogma, but by forging new forms of shared social and ethical responsibility rooted in pluralism, empathy, common humanity, and justice.

Christian Nationalism will be of no help in this effort.