Institutional Capture

Crows hold court. Institutional Capture is where ideology becomes policy which moves into implementation.

Here we compare institutions, identify recurring patterns, and document how systems shape the worlds we inhabit.

Institutional Capture from a Survivor’s Perspective

I am not an academic. I am a survivor.

I spent more than two decades immersed in fundamentalist and Christian nationalist environments and the broader systems, institutions, and belief structures that shaped them. Many of the organizations, ideas, and policy objectives examined throughout this series are not unfamiliar to me. They are part of a world I was once trapped inside.

This project has been one of the most difficult things that I have written. I cannot write this in my normal voice, the voice of a survivor. In order to present evidence that is unbiased and merely speaks for itself, I have to remove that hat. I can’t speak from a place of emotion, from a place of anger, a place of fear, or overwhelm. I say this so that you know that as a survivor, I am not coming at this from a place of no emotion, it’s there. I simply have realized that emotion alone cannot bring people to the conclusions we all realize, is clearly evident.

These systems took a great deal from me and from many people I care about. They influenced how we understood ourselves, our relationships, our place in society, and what was possible for our futures. Because of that, I want to expose the frameworks and mechanisms behind them and use evidence to bring visibility to structures that often blend into the background of American life.

Part of my goal is to help prevent others from being blindsided by systems they may not recognize until they are already affected by them. Another part is to name and document patterns that many survivors already see and understand, but often struggle to explain to people who have never lived inside these environments.

I care deeply about evidence. My goal is not to ask readers to accept my conclusions, but to provide documentation, context, and connections that allow the evidence to speak for itself. Whether readers ultimately agree with me or not, I want them to have the opportunity to see the systems, relationships, and influences being examined and evaluate them for themselves.

I write about these subjects as someone whose life was shaped and controlled by many of the systems, beliefs, and institutions examined throughout this series. I understand the fear, the loss, the confusion, and the sense of urgency that many survivors feel because I have lived it myself.

So, while writing and compiling Institutional Capture, I have to stand outside of myself. I need to realize that I can’t demand or expect everyone to just take me at my word. I need to prove my case, and that is exactly what I intend to do.

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