http://blogcritics.org/ A sinister cabal of superior bloggers on music, books, film, popular culture, politics, and technology - updated continuously. en Copyright 2005 by the authors Sat, 30 Oct 2004 13:49:42 EDT http://backend.userland.com/rss Blogcritics.org custom software http://blogcritics.org/archives/2004/08/08/184619.php#comment-94717 The Amish don't need to proselytize to be influential. Their close-knit community life is an attractive force when most people in our mainstream culture feel lonely and isolated most of the time. Even the relatively shallow portrayal of the Amish way of life seen in the 1985 movie <i>Witness</i> made a strong impression on quite a few people I've talked to about it. While they don't necessarily want to become Amish themselves, seeing that strong community ethic seems to give many people a strong desire to experience some measure of that sense of belonging. So it's not at all surprising to me that the neighbors of the Amish would be even more strongly influenced. 94717@blogcritics.org Sat, 30 Oct 2004 13:49:42 EDT http://blogcritics.org/archives/2004/08/08/184619.php#comment-94682 The Amish are a private & closed society. I've never heard of the Amish proselytzing -- not like Jehovah's Witnesses, for instance. 94682@blogcritics.org Sat, 30 Oct 2004 09:58:15 EDT http://blogcritics.org/archives/2004/08/08/184619.php#comment-78773 Do they proselytize? 78773@blogcritics.org Mon, 9 Aug 2004 02:56:41 EDT http://blogcritics.org/archives/2004/08/08/184619.php#comment-78761 VERY Republican and conservative, although many Amish do not participate in the English's elections. See this timely story on CNN.com which outlines the Amish vote, including how wildly popular President Bush is with the Amish. http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/08/05/amish.vote.ap/ Anyway, looking specifically at the Amish answers only part of the question. Because a strong Amish influence tends to make the whole community around it very conservative. For instance, near any Amish settlement you have a lot of their more participative brethren, the Mennonites, who do vote. In addition to the Mennonites, you also have a large number of what I call the "half-Amish," which are people who at one time might have been Amish but have intermarried with non-Amish and fallen away from the faith, but who remain solid country people. These groups are pretty solid Republicans. The Amish's conservative influence spills over even to their rural, non-Amish neighbors. I'm not exactly sure why, but it does. 78761@blogcritics.org Mon, 9 Aug 2004 01:03:59 EDT http://blogcritics.org/archives/2004/08/08/184619.php#comment-78746 I wonder...are the Amish solidly Republican? Or are they more like the "prairie socialists" of Minnesota's DFL? 78746@blogcritics.org Mon, 9 Aug 2004 00:18:35 EDT