By Mikale Olson, Op-ed contributor
If you ask the average American why the country feels so different than it did 20 or 30 years ago, you’ll probably get a hundred different answers.
Some will point to partisan politics. Others will blame social media. Some will say it’s the economy. Others will blame Hollywood, universities, or the news. Many, all the above.
Most people can feel that something fundamental has changed. What many struggle to explain is how it happened.
The answer is that these changes were not random. Much of what we’re experiencing today was the result of a long-term strategy.
For decades, activists on the radical Left understood something many conservatives ignored. If you want to change a nation, you don’t begin by winning elections. You begin by shaping the institutions that shape the people.
Karl Marx believed revolution would come through economics. His famous call to seize the means of production centered on factories, businesses, and economic power. He expected the working class to revolt against wealthy elites and overthrow capitalism.
But that prediction largely failed in the West.
Unlike 19th-century Eastern Europe, countries like the United States developed large, stable middle classes. Millions of ordinary people owned homes, raised families, attended church, started businesses, and generally believed, correctly, that their children would have better lives than they did. They weren’t interested in burning the whole system down because, despite its flaws, the system was working for them.
Later Marxist thinkers realized this.
Figures like Antonio Gramsci argued that before political revolution could happen, there first had to be cultural revolution. The existing culture, especially Christianity, the family, education, and national identity, had to lose its influence. Thinkers associated with the Frankfurt School, who migrated to America during WWII, expanded these ideas even further, shifting the focus away from economics alone and toward culture itself.
Instead of dividing society primarily by wealth, they began dividing it by identity.
Race. Sex. Gender. Religion. Oppressor versus oppressed.
Today this broader application is commonly referred to as Cultural Marxism. Whatever label someone prefers, the basic strategy is difficult to miss. The goal became changing the values of society by changing the institutions that produce those values.
Gramsci understood that schools, universities, media, churches, entertainment, government, and other influential institutions shape how people think long before they cast a vote. If those institutions could be transformed, the culture would eventually follow, and Marx’s global revolution could finally take root.
This strategy later became known as the “Long March through the Institutions.”
Looking around today, it’s hard to deny its success.
Universities increasingly teach violent activism instead of scholarship. Major corporations devote enormous resources to “diversity initiatives” and ideological training. Entertainment companies regularly push progressive meta-narratives. News organizations do the same. Even professional sports leagues openly trot out “intersectional” political messaging. Even medicine and scientific institutions have increasingly found themselves pulled into this ideological frenzy (see “gender affirming care” for one example).
The Church has not been immune either.
Progressive theology, identity politics, intersectionality, and “social justice” frameworks found their way into many evangelical institutions long before most Christians realized what was happening (again, this was intentional). The debates surrounding Black Lives Matter within the church, LGBT ideology, feminism, and DEI were not isolated controversies. They reflected years of ideological influence working its way into trusted religious organizations.
The damage has been real.
Repairing it will likely take decades because building institutions takes time. Capturing them took decades. Recovering them will too.
But there is another danger many conservatives still refuse to confront: Conservatives have spent years criticizing Critical Race Theory (cultural Marxism), and rightly so. Yet in recent years, portions of the “Right” have begun embracing remarkably similar ways of thinking. The targets have changed, but the framework remains the same.
Instead of dividing society into oppressed racial minorities (Black, Latino, etc.) and oppressive “white” majorities, a growing movement divides society between ordinary white Americans and an alleged Jewish ruling class said to secretly control nearly every institution (example: Candace Owens regularly accusing local pastors of being undercover Mossad agents).
This phenomenon has increasingly been called the Woke Right.
The names involved vary, and they differ significantly from one another, but figures such as Tucker Carlson, Nick Fuentes, Dan Bilzerian, Candace Owens, Alex Jones, and Shawn Ryan have all, to varying degrees, promoted narratives that place this extraordinary CRT weight on “Jewish influence.”
The pattern should sound familiar.
One all-encompassing oppressor?
One explanation for nearly every societal problem?
One identity group cast as the primary source of cultural corruption?
It is the mirror image of the same critical framework conservatives rightly rejected on the Left. It is Critical Race Theory all the same. This must be understood clearly.
And just like how cultural Marxists on the Left seek to capture beloved phraseology and language (example: the slogan Black Lives Matter) in order to force their warped ideology into broader society, this “Right-wing” mirror image movement does the same: This movement within evangelical spaces commonly calls itself “Christian Nationalism.”
An important caveat that I’ll circle back to later: The issue is not patriotism or Christians participating in politics. Christians should influence society. Scripture plainly teaches that. Rather, the concern here is the methods and ideas being imported under the veneer of Christian patriotism.
Joel Webbon, a rising online “star” in this space, openly describes himself as “racially conscious” (CRT) and has defended forms of “race realism.” Dale Partridge has helped “normalize” many of these broader ideological currents (like ethno-nationalism and “kinism”) within conservative (and Reformed) evangelical circles. Writers connected to the publication American Reformer have argued that Christians should adopt aspects of Critical Theory in order to defeat the Left. Andrew Isker and C. Jay Engel (of New Founding) have openly spoken favorably of Machiavellian political strategy and Karl Marx, including deception as a legitimate tool for gaining power.
Different personalities emphasize different angles, but together they reflect a larger trend. Just as progressives slowly worked their way into evangelical institutions from one direction, these activists are attempting to move into those same institutions from the other.
The problem I’m noticing is, right now conservatives often dismiss concerns about this movement with a familiar argument that goes something like this: “Why worry about them when the progressive Left still controls so many institutions?”
It’s a fair question.
It’s also the same mistake conservatives made 20 years ago.
Back then, many assumed progressive activists posed little threat because they lacked institutional power. They were considered fringe voices. They were dismissed as unimportant. While conservatives looked elsewhere, those activists steadily gained influence inside universities, corporations, media organizations, denominations, and cultural institutions. By the time many people finally recognized the problem, enormous amounts of ground had already been lost. And the lesson learned the hard way was that cancer is easiest to remove while it is still small. Ignoring it because it hasn’t spread yet is exactly how it spreads.
If conservatives truly believe cultural Marxism is dangerous because it captures institutions and reshapes society from within, then moral (and pragmatic) consistency demands opposing it regardless of which political tribe happens to be using it.
The framework does not become tolerable because it wears a MAGA hat or a cross instead of a rainbow flag. Christians cannot spend years warning about identity politics (Critical Theory/Cultural Marxism) only to embrace a different version when it benefits their side.
We have to get this right this time: The answer is not choosing between a woke Left and a woke Right. The answer is rejecting both.
The same biblical worldview that exposes the errors of progressive activism also exposes the errors of racial essentialism, conspiratorial identity politics (Critical Theory), and Machiavellian strategies.
If Christians are serious about reclaiming our institutions, then we must begin by refusing to allow corruption into our own ranks, lest we become what we claim to fight.
History has already shown us what happens when ideological movements quietly capture trusted institutions over time.
We should not make the mistake of watching it happen twice.
One final appeal to conservative pastors, ministry leaders, seminary presidents, conference speakers, and anyone with the ear of the evangelical church: Please, in the strongest of terms, speak clearly about this.
Yes, Left has spent years weaponizing the term “Christian nationalism” as a political slur. They have used it to caricature ordinary conservative Christians as extremists in order to discourage faithful believers (the largest voting block in the country) from engaging in politics, government, education, and other influential institutions. And sadly, it’s worked. Tens of millions of evangelicals have notoriously sat out of recent elections, handing further victory to the radical Left.
Yes, Christians in response should not be intimidated by that tactic. We should not retreat from the public square because we’re falsely labeled. Those accusations are just that: false.
But neither should we pretend there isn’t a real movement emerging that is giving that caricature credibility.
Again, I must emphasize: there are voices today proudly calling themselves “Christian nationalists” who are importing racial identity politics, antisemitic conspiracy theories, ethnic partiality, and power-first political thinking into the evangelical world. And many of those criticizing these figures are not Leftists dishonestly weaponizing the label against Christian patriotism. Dismissing most criticism of “Christian nationalism” as nothing more than a Left-wing smear only provides cover for the very radicals seeking influence. It gives them a convenient scapegoat while allowing them to advance unchecked.
This is why silence is not an option.
The shepherds of Christ’s church should not only expose the errors of progressive Critical Theory (disciple Christians on how to handle that wicked philosophy) but also condemn its counterfeit on the Right with equal clarity. If we only confront Cultural Marxism when it comes wrapped in progressive language when it’s gained damning institutional power, while ignoring it when it arrives dressed in conservative rhetoric because it’s in its infancy, we have abandoned the very principle we claim to champion and paradoxically delay the inevitable. The “Christian nationalists” want people to believe that any criticism of them is merely criticism of honorable patriotism. It’s not.
Again, if we have learned anything from the last several decades, it is this: destructive ideas are easiest to stop before they become entrenched. Let’s not make the mistake of waiting until this movement has captured our institutions before deciding it’s finally worth confronting.
Confront it today. Their long march is well underway.
Mikale Olson is a contributor at The Federalist and a writer at Not the Bee, specializing in commentary on Christian theology and conservative politics. As a podcaster, YouTuber, and seasoned commentator, Mikale engages audiences with insightful analysis on faith, culture, and the public square.