What does 'AMERICAN CHRISTIANITY HAS BEEN CO-OPTED BY COMMUNISM,' mean?

[solidkoala]

'
'American Christianity has been co-opted by communism' is something I heard from a British public speaker called Trevor Loudon. What exactly does this person mean in the sentence? For that matter, what does co-opt mean in this sentence? Could it be the person doesn't know what co-opt means?

 

[SoothingDave]

You really would have to ask him.

 

[probus]

You really would have to ask him.

True enough, but don't count on getting a coherent comprehensible answer. My sense is that Loudon is a crackpot.

 

[Skrej]

There's nothing (grammatically) wrong with his use of 'co-opt'. He's using the term in the sense of definitions 2A and 2B. Taken at face value, the sentence should be easily understood.

Now as to how he chooses to support that statement with specific examples or proof - that's likely going to be the difficult to understand part....

 

[jutfrank]

The verb co-opt seems to me to have become quite trendy in the last few years. People are using it generally to mean something loosely like 'take over'. I've noticed it's used quite often in discourse related to social and cultural politics.