Forever In Hell

Chapter 5- pp 44-50

2011-06-20T14:05:00.003-04:00

Properly posted here. Sorry for any confusion.

My Lips Are a Veritable Cesspool

2011-06-18T06:55:00.000-04:00

What is the most important thing about me? Is it my generosity, my kindness, my intelligence, my patience, my sense of humor?

What is the greatest gift of myself I could give another person? My time, my loyalty, my love?

I actually called my husband and asked him these questions. He declined to pick any one thing out of the first list (that is kind of a minefield of a question), but for greatest gift he listened to the three options and said, "Yes."

So then I asked him if my first kiss, had I not recklessly squandered it at age 15 on a boy named Jake, would have been better.

His reply: "Will you stop reading those fucking fundy blogs? A kiss lasts, what, five minutes if you're really pushing it, you've been with me for how long? Going on 14 years now? I'd say putting up with me for that long is better than some kiss!" long pause "Not that you're bad kisser or anything. Your kisses are great! I gotta go." click

His greatest gift to me is probably putting up with those sorts of phone calls, but I digress.

What my husband values most about me are not physical qualities. Which is a damn good thing, because let me tell you, the view from 35 is getting a bit wrinkly.

So why is it that the fundamentalists, who are so much more moral than you and I, value most the physical? Why is the most important thing about a woman whether or not her lips have ever touched another's? Why is that the greatest gift?

I have kept my lips pure. I have never kissed another guy – besides my dad and brothers (and those are only on the cheek :) – and I don’t plan to, either…until that special moment at the altar. After we say ‘I do’…after the pastor says ‘You may kiss your bride’…and after my husband raises my veil. Then, and only then, am I going to give that man one of the greatest gifts I have.

Honey, that's really sad. I know I heartlessly mocked your "fictional", but you have so much more to offer than your "pure" lips. You are a person, with ideas and dreams and qualities so much more valuable than that one moment your lips become diseased, polluted cesspools of impurity. (Might I suggest Victoria's Secret Beauty Rush lip gloss in Mega Melon to deal with the disgusting lips you will have after that? During the Semi Annual Sale, it's only $1.75!*)

I just . . . sweetie . . . there is so much more to you than whether or not your lips have contacted a man's lips. I find you thoroughly obnoxious and I can see that. Why can't you?

I would encourage you to remember – and I guarantee this! – that your husband will delight in your kiss even more, knowing that no other man has touched your lips. That he is the only one who has known the delight of your kiss. And that he is the only one who will ever have that privilege.

Well, she guaranteed . . . I called my husband back and asked him if he would have delighted in being the only one who had ever delighted in my kiss (wow, she is a terrible writer) and after he got done working that one out, he said, "No, what do I care what you did before you met me?" So, Raquel, what do I get? Your guarantee was invalid for spouses equal to mine, so what now?

If I was part of the ‘dating scene’ – always having a new boyfriend, not having my parents involved in my relationship(s) and letting my boyfriend have too much freedom in touching me – what would happen to the sweetness of keeping myself for my husband? It would be…hurtful…sad…and could even lead to marriage problems. The same goes for him. If he and his girlfriend took too much freedom in expressing their ‘like’ for each other, how would that make me feel? Put yourself in that story…

Well, for values of spouses equal to my husband and me, the story's okay. But thanks for assuming that our relationship is a morass of pain and problems due my rank, tainted, revolting lips. 14 years in August, honey, call me back when you've been married that long.

*That comes off like I'm getting paid, but no, I'm just really excited about getting great lip gloss for less than $2.

I Am Big Time!

2011-06-16T15:46:00.003-04:00

Thanks to some generous donations, I am now the owner of my very own website. With a url. That doesn’t include “.blogger”:

http://foreverinhell.com/

How fucking cool is that? (EDIT: foreverinhell.com now works. You may notice that foreverinhell.com by itself doesn't actually do anything. Yeah, I need to figure that out.)

I am insanely busy at work right now, but I am hoping to do another Elsie Dinsmore Deconstruction post tomorrow or Saturday. (I’m thinking of doing ED posts on Tuesdays and Saturdays. Too much? Too little? Comment and let’s see if that’s working!)

I need to figure out a way to either migrate my archives or link to them. I’d like my own banner thing, across the top, you know, something that really says “forever” and “hell”. I think I can have a separate “About Me” page, which may also mean I can move my book (looking like a trilogy at this point) onto a page within this site, which would be much more convenient- for me, anyway. Any suggestions and help would be much appreciated.

So, anyway, please change your links. I don’t want to lose anyone in the move. I have no idea how to do a blogroll on WordPress, but I will have one. If you’d like to be on it, let me know. I will continue to to at least put up a link to each post at the old site, so no pressure.

Um, you know, I am a dreamer. I do believe, underneath the cynicism and sarcasm I protect myself with, that there are better possibilities and that I might just be one of those people lucky and talented enough to achieve them.

This website, my very own url, it probably sounds stupid to you, but it’s a big deal to me. Thank you. Without you, I’m just a cranky atheist talking to myself.

I Don't Even Want to Know Where This Is Going

2011-06-16T08:48:00.003-04:00

I just noticed something, at about 10:30 last night, that conservatives seem to have a very disturbing plan. I can't figure out what it is, but I'm sure it's not good. Let's review conservative goals as shown through activism and (proposed) legislation:

no birth control
no abortion
no WIC
no food stamps
no welfare
no education*
no art/music*
no unions
no healthcare
no social security
no euthanasia

Birth to death in a neat little list and I can't quite figure what it means. I can see the results, more babies to more women who can't afford to feed them. Those children will grow up hungry and ignorant. They will have low paying jobs with little protection and if they get sick, they will die. They will work until they die and they'd better hope it's quick, because they won't have the option of cutting a painful, lingering death short.

Oh.

I guess the Confederacy lost, but the dream of owning slaves is still very much alive.

*Schools have become nothing but centers for teaching to the test. My niece is going into middle school next year, at which point she will have music as a class for the first time. She won't get art until high school, assuming they don't cut it before then. She gets science half the year. That's not an education.

The Plan Is Now Live

2011-06-15T16:07:00.001-04:00

I forgot to add:

anonymous, the hacker group, is attempting to end the plutocracy. as of right now, they are demanding the resignation of ben bernanke. they have made it clear they are devoted to nonviolence civil disobedience (hacking, i suppose), but they're sick of the poor getting curb stomped by the rich.

so am I.

I just snapped when I saw the GOP presidential primary debate and watched those fucks play the limbo with corporate tax rates. then it gets to Bachmann and she's all "not only will i get corporate tax rates down to 9%, i'll make sure that the 47% of citizens that don't pay taxes at all pay 10% across the board."

That's me. Bitch thinks i can do without 10% of my income while walmart need give up only 9% of theirs. that night, i pretended i wasn't that hungry so there would be enough dinner for me and my husband and his mom.

i am done.

Elsie Dinsmore Deconstruction: The Readers Have Spoken!

2011-06-15T08:27:00.001-04:00

This picture came 140 years too late for Elsie.

(note: I am copying and pasting text from the Project Gutenburg ereader. For some reason, that turns off the text wrap, and while editing a post, I can't tell where the side elements of my blog are. I think I've got it fixed, at least viewing through firefox, but if not, please email me at personalfailure[at]ymail.com and let me know. If you know how to turn text wrap back on in blogger, pleasepleaseplease email me. I really do try to provide you guys with the best blog I can, I'm just working from a place of ignorance.)

Alright, you asked for it and here it is: The Deconstruction of Elsie Dinsmore. Thanks to Project Gutenberg (not Gutenburg, as original typoed), I can read this book for free online, and so can you! (You can also download for ereader if you are so inclined.)

So, a little background. The first book in the series was written by Martha Finley in 1867. That's right, the Reconstruction, that lovely period in American history when we were busy mopping up the mess of the Civil War and ensuring that newly emancipated and enfranchised slaves were sufficiently oppressed. (Ending slavery didn't do as much for the average person of color as you might think.) So don't be surprised when persons of color in the book are referred to as n***ers. Don't be surprised by the way people of color talk in the book or the way white people in the book talk about people of color. It will make me wildly uncomfortable, but I will do my best to address these issues.

Don't be surprised by the rigidly enforced gender roles, the misogyny or the use of the word "fondle" to mean a kind touch not applied by a pedophile. And while I'll explain it in more detail when it comes up, the (platonic until later) romance between 8-year-old Elsie and her father's 30-year-old friend would not have been viewed as alarming when the book was published.

Also, I am by no means an expert in this period of American history, nor in literature of the time period. I do have some knowledge gleaned from an enjoyment of (other) literature of the time, but if you do have knowledge about this, please feel free to comment and let me know what I missed or got wrong.

Now, the deconstruction!

 "I never saw an eye so bright,
And yet so soft as hers;
It sometimes swam in liquid light,
And sometimes swam in tears;
It seemed a beauty set apart
For softness and for sighs."
--MRS. WELBY.

That's how the book begins. Already, we know Elsie is the
urMary Sue. Over 110 years  before a Star Trek fanfic writer
ever introduced us to the world's most perfectist
character, Ms. Finley created Elsie, she of the incomparable
beauty and the world's kindest soul. She is so amazing, random
characters write bad poetry about her eyes.

Gag.

The story proper begins with the children of Roselands being taught by
their nanny, Ms. Day, who is the worst teacher ever.

Within this pleasant apartment sat Miss Day with her pupils,
six in number. She was giving a lesson to Enna, the youngest,
the spoiled darling of the family, the pet and plaything of
both father and mother. It was always a trying task to both
teacher and scholar, for Enna was very wilful, and her
teacher's patience by no means inexhaustible.

"There!" exclaimed Miss Day, shutting the book and giving it
an impatient toss on to the desk; "go, for I might as well
try to teach old Bruno. I presume he would learn about as fast."



Fuck you, Enna, I may as well go teach the dog. Enna threatens to
tell her mother, and that is treated as more proof of Enna's wicked
ways, but she ought to. Enna's willful, but she's not developmentally
disabled. If I were her mother, I'd be righteously pissed that I
was paying a teacher to give up on teaching.

Then, Miss Day decides that she doesn't want to teach any of them,
she'd rather take them riding. So she announces that everyone who
is done with their work at the end of the hour gets to go riding
with her. She leaves 6 children in a room by themselves
for an hour, expecting them to do schoolwork. Either
Miss Day is an idiot or she's a sadist. (More on that later.)

Now we are introduced to Elsie, and right away we know she's the Sue.
We know, because not only does she get the most description, but
she's the only one who gets a mention of eye color, and it's an unusual
color. (That trope is much older than I thought.)

"Yes, ma'am," said the child meekly, raising a pair of large soft
eyes of the darkest hazel for an instant to her teacher's face,
and then dropping them again upon her slate.

Yup, that's the Sue.

It's now page 2 of this fine, 28 volume set, and already we see a
pattern. Every person who is not a Real True Christian is a complete
and utter jerk. The governess is impatient and can't be bothered
to do her job. Enna is uncontrollable. Arthur- a mischief loving boy
of ten- is a bully. Meanwhile, Elsie of the darkest hazel eyes is a
whiney pushover. Well, I'm sure Finley meant for Elsie to be the best
sort of meek-will-inherit-the-earth, turn-the-other-cheek
Christian, but really, she's whiney.

Arthur stole on tiptoe across the room, and coming up behind
Elsie, tickled the back of her neck with a feather.

She started, saying in a pleading tone, "Please, Arthur, don't."
"It pleases me to do," he said, repeating the experiment.

Elsie changed her position, saying in the same gentle,
persuasive tone, "O Arthur! _please_ let me alone, or
I never shall be able to do this example."

"What! all this time on one example! you ought to be ashamed. Why,
I could have done it half a dozen times over."


So, Arthur, left to his own devices, decides to tease Elsie. Is anyone
surprised? This sort of behavior is totally normal between 8 and
10-year-old siblings*. I can't believe this is the first time Arthur
has done this to Elsie. I have two older siblings myself. I'm fairly
certain they spent two years actively trying to kill me, and they admit
to regularly taking delight in scaring me senseless. My
sister and brother aren't bad people. That's just what siblings do.

What Arthur is doing is mild. He's tickling Elsie. Her response is
bizarre. One could argue that girls were probably expected to be docile
in the time period, but the 12 and 14-year-old girls' behavior is
completely different from Elsie's, so that's not it. Elsie is the Sue.
Elsie is perfect. Clearly, this is what Finley is promoting as perfect,
Christian behavior: complete docility, even to the point of not
defending oneself from attackers.

Remember why I started this deconstruction? Elsie Dinsmore is the
favorite of fundymommys everywhere. These books are the gold
standard of Christian entertainment for little girls. Often,
these are the only books other than the Bible fundymommys
will allow their girls to read. Elsie is held up as the only
heroine acceptable for little girls to model themselves after.

Elsie Dinsmore is perfect. Perfectly docile. Perfectly
uncomplaining. The perfect victim.

It's even more disturbing when you consider how nonChristians
are presented in this book: evil, cruel, sadistic, monstrous
ravening wolves. That's not an exaggeration of how fundy
Christians see the rest of us. If that's how you saw the world,
would you arm your children with strength and knowledge,
or make your children too docile and beaten down to fight?

Assuming you like your children, of course.

Page 3 of book 1 and shit's already gotten seriously creepy.





*The other five children, including Arthur and Enna, are siblings.
Elsie is their cousin. However, Elsie has always been raised in
this family. You'll get the backstory later, but effectively Elsie
is the sixth sibling.

I Can Has Deconstruction?

2011-06-14T11:58:00.003-04:00

Trust me, it's worse than it looks. Much, much worse.

I keep a lot of fundymommy blogs in my reader and, for the most part, they are deliriously boring. There's only so much you can say about modesty/cooking/housekeeping/pregnancy/nursing, though they don't seem to mind repeating themselves. Or plagiarism.

Every single one of these blogs has one more subject in common: the Elsie Dinsmore books. Other than the Bible, this is the most recommended book for children in fundydom. I cannot stress this enough (it will be very important later): if you are a fundy in America, you are either reading the Elsie Dinsmore books or you are giving them to your children to read.

So, after the 10,000th mention of Elsie Dinsmore as the book for young Christians, I had a thought: deconstruction. All the cool kids are doing it. I haven't seen another deconstruction of Elsie Dinsmore. I can get the books online for free. I've even read a few chapters of the first book. (Seriously, seriously dreadful.)

So, would you like to read my deconstruction of Elsie Dinsmore? I plan on deconstructing the first book (there are 28, I think) and, if that goes well, several of the later books, maybe the book in which she gets married and book dealing with Elsie and her children. I would appreciate it if you would let me know either way, because the books are just so brain-searingly awful that I don't want to subject myself to them if no one else is interested in the idea.

Just let me know, please. I was going to add a poll, but I couldn't figure out how, so comments it is. Sorry.

Leviticus Is Just Good Science

2011-06-14T09:03:00.004-04:00

Over and over again I hear that the Bible must be the inspired word of God because the rules in Leviticus are so scientific and sane, we should all be following them just for our health.

Bullshit.

For example, this is what passes as scientific in this crowd:

the Law states we are not to eat pork. God will not punsih us if we do. BUT do you know that science has backed up God? pigs are the only animal that doesn't sweat, releasing it's toxins. so when you eat pork you are eating toxins! same goes for the catfish that God warned us against eating. they are the trash eaters of the water. why would you want to eat trash?

Sweating is not how you "release toxins". Sweating is how you modulate body temperature and it's not even that efficient a means of doing so. You do have a way of dealing with harmful substances in your body, it's called your liver. Your liver does not make you sweat.

Also, if eating catfish is eating trash, then eating a cow is eating grass, eating grass is eating sunshine and you should be able to live off of nothing but sitting out in the sun for several hours a day.

Continuing on, I guess this person doesn't get any international news, because all the people that were sickened, seriously injured or killed in Germany due to food poisoning? That was e coli. E coli is not found in pigs. Most outbreaks that don't come from people come from cows. When was the last time you heard about a trichinosis outbreak? (That's an actual disease you can get from pigs.) Never, I would imagine. E coli outbreaks, on the other hand, are common.

Let's examine some other sciencey stuff found in Leviticus:

Don't wear clothes made of more than one fabric (Leviticus 19:19) You know, because . . . yeah, I got nothing.
If a man has sex with a woman on her period, they are both to be "cut off from their people" (Leviticus 20:18) Scientifically speaking . . . no idea.
Don't let cattle graze with other kinds of Cattle (Leviticus 19:19) Because . . . well . . . I dunno.

Then there's this wtfuckery:

"And the man whose hair is fallen off his head, he is bald; yet is he clean." 13:40
"And he that hath his hair fallen off from the part of his head toward his face, he is forehead bald: yet is he clean." 13:41

Well, gee, I'm glad we cleared that up.

I Think I Finally Get It

2011-06-13T13:56:00.000-04:00

If you're an atheist, you probably hear this a lot: You hate God. It's not that you don't believe in God, it's that you totally hate him. Probably because your relationship with your father was bad. But you totally believe in him.

This argument is, of course, wildly frustrating. You're inside your own brain. You know what you think and believe and for someone else to tell you different is, at best, rude. Plus, how do you argue with someone who thinks they know you better than you know you? There's really nowhere to go with that.

I love music. I have always loved music. When I was five, my favorite record* was by the Tijuana Brass. I would play it endlessly and dance to it. (I was never into kids' music at all.) I played clarinet for six years. The last two years, I was playing several hours a day (up to six on weekends) and earned a scholarship to study music. Nerve damage to my right hand ended that dream, but music is still as important to me as food.

That's not true. I have chosen to spend money on music instead of food. Music is more important to me than food.

Anyway, last week, my brother-in-law (hereinafter "BIL") was at the house at the height of my husband's mixing marathon (he sent the album for mastering Wednesday). We don't have soundproofing, so you can hear the music fairly clearly on the first floor. My BIL asked me if that drove me crazy, because it would drive him crazy to hear that all the time.

I was flabbergasted.

The Awkward Out (album name) has been the background to everything I have done in the last year: cleaning, bathing, gaming, watching TV, if my husband was awake and not in the room with me, that's what I was listening to. And I love it. I've been bereft since the album went for mastering and my husband, burnt out after two weeks of 16 hour days, hasn't been writing/recording.

It turns out that my BIL doesn't like music. He doesn't like any music at all. Music is as irrelevant to him as God is to me.

That seriously freaks me out. I don't understand it. At first, I thought my BIL just doesn't like Skull Has a Secret's (band name) style of music. I don't judge anyone's taste in music. I like some weird stuff myself, so I'm not judgey about anyone else's taste.

No, he just doesn't like music. I find this very hard to comprehend. So I think I get where believers are coming from in refusing to believe I don't believe in God.

However, no matter how bizarre a statement I may find "I don't like music" to be, I trust that my BIL knows how he feels on this subject. I don't argue with him when he says he likes to watch Nascar. That's five hours of left turn, but if he says he likes it, he does. And if he says he doesn't like music, he doesn't.

And when I say I don't believe in God, I don't. Trust me on this one.

*Yes, I am totally that old.

My Brain Is Freaking Me Out Again

2011-06-13T08:25:00.003-04:00

I have a cold. Actually, I'm at the end of the cold, the part where you have a ton of congestion. For all the creationists out there that assert something cannot come from nothing, my sinuses are disproving that right now. Seriously, where does all the mucus come from? And why can't I run out?

Anyway, I'm a little freaked out by my brain right now. Apparently, my brain, or at least the part that I don't control, is completely unaware I can breathe through my mouth. 35 years out of the womb and my brain still doesn't know this.

Which it made abundantly clear by switching me to nose breathing as soon as I fell asleep, depriving me of oxygen until I woke up gasping for air.

I am not kidding you, this is what happened last night:

My brain: So, the nose is all clogged up. Can't breathe out of that. Hmmm . . . is there some other way of getting oxygen to the lungs? Something else I can breathe through? Nope, guess we'll just have to suffocate.

Me: The mouth! I went to sleep breathing through my mouth! Just go with that!

My brain: I have no knowledge of this "mouth" of which you speak.

Me: Look! I'm breathing through it right now!

My brain: I can't heeeeaaaar you.

Me: Fuck you.

My brain: Try going to sleep again. I dare you.

So, yeah, that was my weekend.

The End of Days: Indistinguishable From All Other Days

2011-06-12T06:46:00.000-04:00

Okay, so at the End of Times there will be: earthquakes, floods, storms, wars and rumors of wars.

So, you know, business as usual on the planet Earth.

As far as prophecy goes, that's like predicting that there will be people, eating food and drinking beverages. Somewhere. In the vicinity of the prophecied activity.

But these signs- they are now! (Well, sure, they are always.)

This is just another strange event...I am constantly in awe by the pure reluctant acceptance of the general populace to the signs around us. I have discussed the earthquakes, volcanoes, hurricanes, pestilences, turmoil in the Middle East and the state of Israel to just about anyone who will talk to me about it and it seems they always come back with the same answer.... It has always been like this! We just didn't have the technology to realize it. It makes me sad that people are just so blind to what is happening. I want people to get right with God to turn back to him. However, it seems that the ME society has finally taken over and they have no room for our Creator! I wish I knew the magic words to open their eyes.....Come Lord Jesus Come!

Psst! You, yeah, you. C'mere. Generally speaking, when you're the only person who can see a thing, that's because it's not actually there. I mean, I suppose it's possible that white horse in the garden is a unicorn, but more than likely, you are delusional.

Seriously, has there ever been a time when there weren't earthquakes, volcanoes, hurricanes, pestilences, and turmoil in the Middle East (and everywhere else)? Go get a history book, read it and then get back to me.

I wish I knew the magic words too

Me, too! That's be sweet! Oh, you mean to convince me that earthquakes are highly unusual events. Never mind.

I found a correlation to these times at work the other day. My coworker Leslie spoke over the loudspeakers to warn customers that the store would be closing in 10 minutes, and people kept on shopping, some came to the front. She then warned that the store would be closing in five minutes. People started coming to the front then.

I realized that on a much wider and less petty scale, this is what the Lord has been doing since 1948. The store is closing, but people are still doing their shopping while those who are listening have gone to the checkout. Soon the store will close and people who didn't listen will be trapped overnight.

Um, wut? What does "correlation" mean again? Do you warn your customers that the store is closing by setting the displays on fire? I . . . wut?

Great Analogy! I could not agree more! It just saddens me to see the blind walking everywhere!

Damn blind people! Stick to your . . . blind . . . places.

Remember hurricane Katrina. Weren't the people being warned four or five days ahead of expected landfall. Many didn't heed the warning and the landfall and the breaking of the levee caused a lot more damage and loss of life than anyone anticipated or could have imagined.

Oh, you mean the poor people who had no way to get out of town and nowhere to go even if they did get out? That makes this analogy . . . interesting.

I'll end with the most disturbing thing I've ever read (and I've read the Bible):

With fish and game comissions trying to rid the US of invasive-destructive species,

starlings have always been a scourge, and remember the snake head fish infestation, should we be surprised when this kind of thing happens?

With toxic spills and weather system changes, fish will suffer very quickly.

All we need is some massive land animal die-offs.

Certianly these events need investigation, cause identification, as there may be a serious health threat to humans.

But This isn't God's handiwork. God would kill every starling on the face of the earth. God's signs leave no doubt.

satan on the other hand, loves to play games, and if these occurances get lots of christians proclaiming "signs of the times"

Well, that will be fuel for scoffers wouldn't it. "So where is your long expected Jesus?"

But then that is real Prophecy coming to fruition, isn't it?

No one knows the day, but act like the time is short - be busy until He sounds the Quitting Time Whistle.

You'll know it's god by the incredible scale of death and suffering. Um, yeah. I'm sure the Egyptians, looking at their dead first born children would agree.

Guess the Century!

2011-06-11T06:10:00.000-04:00

Time for a new game here in Hell in which I give you a quote and you guess which century this quote was written in. It'll be fun!

Here's the quote (no cheating, click after if you want to verify):

So why do I want a clean home?
Well like I said above to be able to practice hospitality, and also so that I am able to show appreciation to my husband for providing me with a roof above my head. I want to show him how much I appreciate him by taking care of my home so that he doesn't have to dread walking through the door and seeing clutter, and dust everywhere! I want a clean home for our children, and a safe environment for them to grow up in. I want to be able to practice what I preach, and glorify the Lord with the home that He has provided for us using it to serve Him.

Hmmm. . . in English, references a time when women did not equally own marital property so . . . 18th Century? 17th Century?

Nope. That was written yesterday. That's right, kids, 2011!

Look, Amber, darling, that house, it's also your house! I know, it's totally amazing. And your husband, should he truly approach dust and clutter with dread, is perfectly capable of using his hands (I'm assuming he has hands) to pick things up and run a duster over things. It is totally within his capabilities. Contrary to your promotion of a book about cleaning (not making this up), cleaning is not actually rocket science. I'm not saying cleaning isn't work. I'm not saying cleaning isn't time consuming. I'm not saying cleaning isn't a pain in my ass. Your husband can totally handle it.

And please stop thanking your husband for the home you both live in. That's what marriage is. Sharing things. It's both of your houses. It's both of your children. It's both of your responsibilities.

Sigh.

I May, in Fact, Be Mocking Armless Children

2011-06-10T13:27:00.003-04:00

You know, I'm not opposed to people raising their children within their belief systems, even if those belief systems are seriously whacky. (Really, I don't see how you could avoid it.) I do have a problem with people raising their children in a way that's going to seriously handicap them if they ever, you know, grow up and have to interact with the rest of us. That's just mean.

For example:

my girls are being taught to EXPECT the boy to open the door ( and likewise my boys are being taught to open the door).

Wow. Yeah, see, that's not going to work out well if they ever have to visit pretty much anywhere. I mean, if I refused to open a door myself and just waited around for someone with a penis to do so for me, I'd never get into my own house.

Are these children armless? Because otherwise, that's just atrocious. Think of the message being sent here: Honey, yes, boys can go anywhere they want to go, but girls can only go somewhere with a boy, because she can't open doors. Yes, I know you have arms, but you are not supposed to use them. What? Because you have a vagina, that's why! Stop questioning mommy and stand out here in the hail until some man comes by to open the door for us.

srsly.

although the following comment to the post may actually be the holy grail of what the fuckery unrelated to trolling:

To think that for all of history women wore long dresses until about the 1920s. They didn't shave. I've met women who have had problems due to shaving. One women told me she needed surgery due to shaving the underarms(ingrown hairs) and a doctor told me he had a patient who died due to a cyst infection from shaving(his nurse said an old razor was probably used). I was watching an old silent movie on tv(if it was up to me we wouldn't have one-I should have listened to Mary Pride and David Wilkerson years ago). Anyway,in the silent movie the older women wore dresses that covered the ankles and the younger women wore dresses that were just above the ankles. Then I did a study a few years ago, on the fashion industry and when women started wearing pants(Hollywood was involved again). All I know is the law says I have to register my sons 30 days after their 18th birthday for the Selective Service(the Post Office has the paperwork)-women are now taxpayers,I hope they won't have to register in the future. I tell my daughters-in-law and daughter to please let my granddaughters have long hair,as well.

So, to translate:

1. shaving is prevented by long dresses
2. shaving kills
3. ankles
4. pants
5. THE LAW
6. taxes
7. women need long hair.

I . . . well . . . somehow I don't think it's the misogyny that's the problem for that woman's children.

Great, God Just Glorified Himself All Over My Rug

2011-06-10T09:30:00.000-04:00

God won't give you more than you can handle.

People used to spout that at me and I would seethe- at the age of 6. The implication is, of course, that if you fail to handle something, it's because you're lazy, not because it's too much for you. After all, god wouldn't do that to you. God is love. And killing Egyptians.

That is, of course, bullshit. Things happen because they do. Or because we cause them to. Or because somebody else caused them to.

This explanation, however, raises the level of horrifying:

God knows exactly how much I can handle, but oftentimes He chooses to display His glory by placing me in situations far above my ability to handle them so that He can come in and show Himself. Sometimes, He has to bring me to a point where I realize that I just can't do it on my own. It is when I confess, "I need you, Lord!" that He is glorified and freely pours out His grace.

I have taught a child to swim. At first, I supported her in water up to my waist for my own convenience, and well above her head, by holding her up with my hands on her stomach, so she could learn the movements of swimming without having to be able to float. Then we moved to the very shallow end of the pool and learned how to float. I chose the shallow end so that if she sank, she could just put her feet down and have her head above the water. Then we combined the floating and the swimming, with me intervening immediately as soon as I felt she might possibly be starting to have trouble. (Cuz drowning other people's children just isn't cool.)

The point is, were I god, according to this person's logic, I would have thrown this child into the deep end and only saved her if she clearly articulated that I was far better at swimming than her and she really needed help.

So, how many of you would pat me on the back and call me a responsible adult if I did that? And how many of you would hold my head under the water until I stopped arguing about it? Yeah, I'd do that, too.

But I should totally get down on my knees and thank the lord for allowing me to drown until I specifically told him how fantastic he is.

Porn for Women (SFW, Don't Worry)

2011-06-09T14:26:00.003-04:00

Fannie, who is Teh Awesome, made a comment on my last post about something called Porn for Women, which involves pictures of men doing housework.

Of course, I had to look.

The first thing I found doing a google search for "porn for women housework" is this. (see above) It's a book containing pictures of mostly clothed men vacuuming and such.

I think I just rolled my eyes so hard I sprained them.

This is not pornography. I don't even think the most modesty obsessed fundys I stalk would consider that pornography. Unseemly, perhaps, but only in that their wives ought to be doing the housework.

I find this disturbing on two levels.

1. "As soon as I'm done with the laundry, I'll do the grocery shopping and take the kids with me so you can relax" is not erotica. This is erotica*. Honestly rather mild erotica that kinda flirts with kinky. But it's erotica.

"I'm going to do some chores and spend time with my children" should just be normal communication between partners. (Also, I am seriously uncomfortable with mentions of children and erotica in the same place.) That that is eroticized is disturbing. I find it unbelievable that I am so outside normal gender roles and interplay that I am experiencing erotica on a regular basis and not recognizing it.

Seriously, really, honestly, truly this sort of thing is so rare in the average marriage that it counts as erotica? My husband is no great shakes in the participating in the maintaining our property department, and he says something like this to me all the time. (Obviously, not involving kids.)

"Hey, I had some time waiting for the sauce to reduce, so I loaded the dishwasher."

"I noticed you had laundry left in the dryer, so I folded it and brought it upstairs."

"I spilled salt all over the kitchen floor, so I figured I might as well sweep the entire downstairs while I was at it."

Yes, I do thank him. He also compliments me on a job well done every time I clean the kitchen and every time he finds just the t-shirt he wanted, already clean, in his drawer**.

This does not arouse me. I do not fantasize about this. I'm not telling you you shouldn't be aroused by this sort of thing because I don't care what gets you off, but, c'mon, really?

Men want to fuck, women want to . . . sit around eating bon bons? This is a view of male/female relations stuck somewhere in a mythical, TV 1950s, then turned into a joke that isn't funny. Women, they do all the housework and- hahahahaha!- it's housework that turns them on. If men do it.

2. This enforces so many gender stereotypes I don't know where to start. and, it plays them off as a hilarious joke so that I'm just a meany mean feminazi with no sense of humor for complaining about it.

Let's see if I can list all the gender stereotypes at work here:

housework is women's work. If men do it, it's superspecial.
childcare is women's work. if men do it, it's superspecial.
fucking is what men want. women don't really like to fuck. women consent to fucking.
women consent to fucking in order to please men.
what women really like to to is get a break from women's work.
women are not turned on by depictions or descriptions of sex. that is for men.

I probably missed a few. And no, it's not fucking funny. This is not pornography. It's also not a joke. It's just another slap in the face of women as mature adults with actual sexual feelings.

*C'mon, you knew there was Jägererotica, Rule 34 demands it. And if you didn't think I knew where it was, you just don't know me.

**The man is incapable of putting dirty clothes in a hamper, so simply finding his dirty clothes is like Indiana Jones in my house. He should compliment me.

Kelley Wants Me to Comment on Sexy Greek Shipping Magnates

2011-06-09T08:57:00.000-04:00

The google image search for "romance novel" yields hilarious results.

Kelley asked me to check this out. Kelley either really values my opinion or is engaged in psychological warfare to destroy me. Given what zie linked to, it's a little hard to tell. ;)

The question at hand is Is Chick Lit Emotional Porn.

Well, I think-

No, fuck that. The title alone is too much to gloss over.

a. Chick Lit.

Allow me to spare you at least 9 hours towards a degree in English literature: books written by men are literature, books written by women using male pseudonyms or androgynous names may also be literature, books written by women using an obviously female name are chick lit. Because while men are human beings and male experiences and male feelings are universal, women and their experiences and feelings are only suitable for a ghetto decorated in pink, lace and stiletto shoes. (Seriously, check out the covers of books written by women.)

b. Emotional Porn.

Fuck if I know what that means. Okay, I know what porn is. I worked at a porn website (well, actually we ran 30 of them) way back when people paid for porn online. Yes, children, I'm ancient. Emotional porn? I . . . um . . . now I'm picturing someone furiously fapping to pictures of people experiencing emotions.

Inside my head is a scary place.

So, okay, before we get into the article proper (are you happy, yet, Kelley? are you entertained? THIS IS . . . never mind.), full disclosure time: my mother wrote romance novels for over 30 years. She was reasonably popular at one point, and at her height was writing three in a year. My mother has, btw, a master's degree in English literature. Romance novels were the reading equivalent of snacks to her, to be consumed between Tolstoy and Orwell. A palate cleanser, if you will.

Once she had children, she no longer had the time to devote to such heavy reading and fell back entirely on romance novels for entertainment. She got so sick of the plot driven characters and other such crimes of writing that she started writing her own. Thus was a career born.

So, do I think romance novels are literature? Eh. Does everything have to be deeply meaningful all the damn time? Is there no room for movies in which shit blows up and that's the plot? I guess it depends upon who's answering the question. Sometimes I want to to experience illumination, sometimes I just want to read how Harry and Sally got to the fucking.

Okay, full, full disclosure: I'm not into visual porn, but I am into written porn. So, there you have that.

So, anyway, what was I- oh yeah, the article. Here, I'll link it again.

On the nightstand of a woman you know, there’s a Christian romance novel and a Bible. Does that matter?

[>_<]

Matter to whom? Also, read that in Phil Hartmann's Troy McClure voice and tell me that ain't hilarious.

A new book by Boston University researchers Ogi Ogas and Sai Gaddam, A Billion Wicked Thoughts, offers a disturbing look at how Internet search engines reveal much about the sexual and emotional desires of men and women, and how they differ. The research confirms in some ways what almost everyone knows: men are visually engaged, attracted to youth and sexual novelty, and are thus vulnerable to visual pornography.

The research explores further what the commercialized romance industry tells us about what it means to be a woman (at least in a fallen world). Women are much less likely to be drawn to visual pornography (although more do so than one might think), but are quite likely to be involved in such media as Internet romantic fiction or the old-fashioned romance novel.

The romance novel follows, the researchers argue, a typical pattern. The hero is almost never, they say, a blue collar worker, a bureaucrat, or someone in the traditionally feminine occupations (hairdresser, kindergarten teacher, etc.). He is competent, confident and usually wealthy. He is, in short, an alpha male.

But, they argue, this alpha male is typically a rough character who learns to be tamed into kindness—kindness to her. Thus, you wind up with not only the strong silent cowboys with the soft interior life, but also vampires and werewolves and Vikings.

And all of this is moving toward the climax of the romance story: the “happily-ever-after.”

Okay . . . so romance novels are female porn because women consume, or admit to consuming, more romance novels than porn. I . . . what?

Let me try again. Romance novels tell you the true psyche of a woman because the protagonists are wealthy Greek shipping magnates (this actually does come up a lot in Harlequins. you'd think Greece is entirely populated by wealthy shipping magnates. sexy wealthy shipping magnates. with secret hearts of gold!) and vampires instead of guys you meet in line at Walmart.

Here, let me tell you a little secret about writing: nobody wants to read boring shit. There's a reason writers don't include every detail of opening every door or a description of every breath the protagonists take: because it's boring. If I want boring shit, I'll just live my life. I'm not going to pay to read it.

Heroes are sexy, powerful and wealthy because that's exciting. Following construction worker Joe throughout his day as he runs errands and cares for his lawn, not so much. I've got a demon assisting a nephalim in stopping the apocalypse in my book, fighting archangels and the Horsemen of the Apocalypse and the Messiah! That's exciting right there! (pro tip: if you run out of plot, blow some shit up. that's what i'll be doing.)

Look, the Romance Novel Panic(tm) is not new. My mother tells people about her writing with a note of defiance because she's gotten so much shit* for writing romance novels. The argument is basically this: women who read romance novels will develop a skewed vision of love that will cause problems in their marriages because real relationships are nothing like what is portrayed in romance novels.

Because women are so fucking stupid they can't tell the difference between fiction and reality. Our pretty little heads just don't contain the necessary grey matter to make the distinction. We need to be protected from our own childlike naivete.

Fuck off.

Wait, holy fuck, those researchers are relating romance novels to evo psych. Apparently, sexy Greek shipping magnates with secret hearts of gold represent Darwinian [mumblemumblesputter]. Wow.

Fuck off on that, too.

*apparently, that's my word for today.

Fuck You, Glamor!

2011-06-08T13:40:00.000-04:00

For some reason I cannot identify, I have an unending subscription to Glamor that I never have to pay for. It's very odd.

Anyway, Glamor might make me crazier than Cosmo, in that Glamor likes to position themselves as the urfeminist fashion magazine. You read that right. Urfeminist fashion magazine. It's obnoxious. It is simply hateful to see "You're all right just the way you are" articles interspersed with this crap (gee, I wish I could move pictures around while editing blogger in Firefox):

1. See the first picture? This is in answer to a question about going grey at 28. (Welcome to the club, people.) If you don't feel like clicking on it to enlarge, the caption says that models were deliberately greyed at a fashion show. Is that hair grey? No, it fucking isn't. That hair is not grey, not at all. If you're going to tell me grey is the new blonde, accompany it with a picture of actual grey hair.

2. See the second picture? Those two models represent (top) a "leggy" body type and (bottom) a "plus size" body type. Can you tell a difference? Because I can't. Neither one of those women is plus sized. In fact, given that the average size for American women is a size 12, that "plus size" woman isn't even close to average, let alone plus average. In fact, that's what I look like naked.

I AM A SIZE 2.

I cannot shop in department stores, their smallest size is a 6. I buy a lot of my clothes in the junior's section.

I AM UNDERWEIGHT. IT IS NOT HEALTHY. Stomach bugs put me in the hospital because my body has nothing to fall back on when I can't eat. I am cold 8 months of the year. My kitchen chairs have cushions rather than hard seats because I don't have natural cushioning to sit on, so if I sit on a hard chair for any period of time, I cut off the nerves in my rear and my legs go numb. Do you know how much well cushioned dining room chairs cost? I do.

That "plus size" model looks exactly like the underweight, size 2 wearing woman on the other end of your computer screen.

Feeling bad about yourself? Don't. You couldn't possibly have any idea what healthy or average or normal even looks like because of this shit. You couldn't even get close. And Glamor is at least part of the reason why.

Fuck you, Glamor!

The Future Is the Past

2011-06-08T08:52:00.003-04:00

New York City circa 1965? Nope. Tehran. Yes, that Tehran.

[Note, this post inspired by the latest Cosmocking by Holly Pervocracy. Express written consent was given. Read it! Cosmocking is something that, when I see the link for it, I squeal! It's that good! ]

Rowdy has a theory that this "it's normal and funny to despise all exes" attitude comes from a particularly limited view of monogamy, in which it isn't enough to only love one person--you have to only love one person ever. In order to maintain retroactive monogamy, you must declare that all previous relationships were false loves, and thus despicable.

My own theory is different. My theory is that a breakup hurts, so (if you're a little perspective-deficient) you see the person who broke up with you as an attacker causing you pain. Never mind that the only way to avoid this pain is to date one person your entire life--they're still a jerkface for making you unhappy, and concepts of "painful for him too" or "painful but necessary" don't enter into it.

I actually think Holly and Rowdy are both right about exes.

If your breakup was one sided or, for whatever reason, turned especially ugly, it colors the entirety of the relationship.

If the breakup was mutual and not based in angry feelings, then you may simply be telling your new partner "Oh, I never felt this way before!" to make them feel special.

Part of it is the emotional distance of memory, as well. If I ask you about a pain you are feeling right now, you'll give me adjectives aplenty: searing, fiery, electrical, tearing, ripping, broken, etc. If I ask you about a pain you felt one year ago, I'll get "it really hurt". Memory provides distance.

It's the same for love. If I ask you about the love you feel at the moment, I could be listening to your reply for an hour. If I ask you about the love you felt a decade ago, I'm likely to get "Oh, I loved zie with all my heart" delivered in a rather neutral tone of voice. So today's love, by virtue of its immediacy, might very well feel like the specialest love ever.

But the thing is, the way monogamy is set up in our culture for women, it's risky to tell men your real "number", and it's risky to tell men you every really enjoyed sex before them or that you were ever really in love because orgasms and love are for one man and one man alone. And if you don't believe me, watch movies (Twilight), read books (fucking Twilight) and watch some TV. I love you, I have always loved you, I have loved no one other than you as if love were oil rather than wind energy.

Which is funny, because my mother, back in the 80s, used to write for Harlequin's Second Chance at Love line, which were romance novels in which both protagonists had been in love and married before, happily, at least for a period of time. The stories were about people finding love again, presented in a natural "of course you can love more than one person in a lifetime" tone.

And prior to Prop 8, I don't really remember such open frothing rage about gay people. I'm not saying everyone in the country was attending gay pride events, but it definitely seems more out in the open now.

And this abstinence only thing? I got comprehensive sex ed in high school. I was forced to put a condom on a banana more than once. Meanwhile, all of my nieces and nephews got religiously motivated speeches about crumbled up cookies and licked lollipops delivered rather pointedly at the girls in the room.

Abortion was a given when I was in high school and college. It was a right. You didn't send out abortion party invitations, but nobody questioned that it was an option. These days they're trying to defund Planned Parenthood.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, that though nobody seems to be noticing, we are, as a society, getting more conservative, in a religiously motivated way. The numbers of atheists and nonchristians might be growing in our country, but the fundamentalists are, to a large degree, winning. They're shaping the culture and shaping our minds. To such a point where admitting your have loved before, truly and deeply, is a dangerous admission to make.

And before you dismiss my concerns, consider one thing: Prior to 1979, Iran was a forward thinking, happening place. It's a little different there now.

A Conversational Guide to the Ladies

2011-06-07T13:55:00.000-04:00

I keep hearing a lot about pick up artists* (hereinafter "PUA") and negging. I wasn't exactly certain what negging was, so I looked it up.

It's appalling.

Remember that a neg-hit is a remark, sometimes humorous, used to point out a woman’s flaws.

a) A neg-hit IS used to penetrate a woman’s bitch shield.

b) A neg-hit IS used to bring a woman down off her self-imposed pedestal.

c) A neg-hit is SINCERE. Women can spot phony a mile away.

d) And most importantly, a neg-hit IS used to bring a woman’s self perception more into line with reality.

a) the "bitch shield".

Oh, I know what he's talking about. You know what being a woman is like? Imagine that when you talk to a man, you say "I need a cordless drill" and what he hears is "I'm a stupid woman. Even though I asked you for the drill, you should address all remarks concerning said drill to the man standing next to me, whom I may or may not know."

Imagine that when you talk to a man, you say "Do you know if the bus left yet?" and he hears "I would love to give you a blowjob."

Imagine that when you say nothing at all, a man hears "Please, comment on my body/ask me out/request sexual activity".

Every fucking day, people. Every fucking day.

Now imagine that is what happens to you every day, imagine that you are completely aware that at any moment, a man may abduct you, rape you, drug you, rape you, rape you, rape you and it will be you fault because (pick any two) you made eye contact, you smiled at him, you wore clothes, you have a vagina.

Imagine not having a "bitch shield" if that was your everyday life. I need that shield asshole.

b) self imposed pedestal.

Oh, noez! Ai has self esteemz! I should not. I should be pathetically happy for any scrap of attention any man gives me because he's man, damnit! How dare I not find him to be attractive/desireable/funny/awesome! How dare I not respond to his attentions! I need to be knocked off my pedestal right this instant!

c) sincere?

srsly? Let's be honest here, fellas: if you are insulting me, I don't give a shit whether you really think my breasts could be better or not, you're still insulting me. fuck off. you don't like my breasts? go find someone whose breasts you do like.

i really just can't get over that it's the sincerity of the insults that is supposed to be the issue. that's like being stabbed and then told, "don't worry, I used a Ginsu, that's the good stuff!"

d) a neg-hit IS used to bring a woman’s self perception more into line with reality

Because it's men who determine reality, you see. I am just a woman, I cannot accurately determine my own worth. I need men to tell me what the worth is, and enforce that estimation of worth if my estimation is different.

You think that's just the PUA culture? Ha! Welcome to reality, dude. How do I know you're a dude if you think that? Simple. If you're a woman, you know that your worth is always determined by men. You know that your worth is always in relation to what men can get from you. You know that default human beings are men, the default human experience is male and "he" is a perfectly adequate word to discuss human beings in general.

Because human beings are men.

V.S. Naipul is causing yet another stir by claiming that female writers just aren't as good as male writers. They aren't. Because they write from the female perspective, you see. And even though women are 50% of the population of the Earth, the female perspective is not a universal perspective.

When men write books from the male perspective about men doing man things, it's literature. Even though the male perspective only applies to 50% of the population, their stories are universal and represent the "human" experience, perhaps even the "triumph of the human soul." These books are marketed to everyone everywhere.

When women write books from the female perspective about women doing woman things, it's chick lit. These books will have silly, frilly covers including at least one pink item, cutesy clever titles (writers do NOT pick their books' titles) and will be marketed exclusively to women and the word "human" will not be used at all. You're lucky if they're using "women" instead of "girls".

So as disgusting as I find PUAs, they're not the disease. They're just the hard to ignore symptom of how our culture regards women.

Including me.

*Christopher Walken's finest moment: One can be an artist in anything. Creasy's art is death. But it could use a little more cowbell.

The Obvious End Result

2011-06-07T09:04:00.000-04:00

If you've never heard of 7xsunday, it's a website that makes Rapture Ready look mainstream. It's message boards are populated primarily by people raised in the Quiverfull lifestyle, people who were homeschooled, attended home churches, whose every waking moment was controlled by their parents. People who accept as being perfectly normal extreme notions of modesty, courtship rather than dating and marrying a person without ever having held their hand. Yeah.

It's a busy site, because there are lots of them. Oh, and the abstinence only crowd is only a half step removed from them, so don't think this isn't relevant.

We talk a lot about modesty here in Hell, so I thought I'd show you the natural result of being raised with such beliefs:

Its got to do with love making. I hope i dont offend anyone by being blunt but id rather get to the point rather than not stating properly what i have on my mind. Ill start at the beginning. During my teen years i started to develop strong attractions for the opposite sex and my mom told me thats normal and taught me on saving myself for the man God had for me.

I am not going to mock her use of English. It's painful to me, but she was homeschooled for the purposes of pushing out as many babies as she can while keeping the house clean and her husband fed, nothing more. It's not her fault.

I found this very hard as i felt myself getting 'turned on' easily if i saw a handsome man that i fancied or got very aroused if a boy i liked touched my hand - eek i said it- However i kept pure and trained my thoughts with the Holy Spirits help to be pure and not think those things even though i struggled many times. Fast forward a few years, i got married young but by that point my struggle to not think impure thoughts about men had vanished. I thought oh when i get married i can finally think of my husband in that way.

You know where this is going, right?

Well, the strange thing is, i feel nothing. I mean i am very much attracted to and in love with my husband but -embrassed to say this- i feel NOTHING physically during love making. This was a shock to me because i was so easily turned on before. I no my hormones were crazy then because of puberty but still. I read a book 'The act of marriage' before getting married which explained how women get aroused etc but i dont no whats wrong with me. Im not on any medication, pills, my diet is good, no health problem because i checked that out already. I have only been married for a year but i can tell things are not looking good for us. I am extremely sad because we have such an amazing relationship and im trying to be the best helpmeet i can for my dear husband except for this one vital area. When it comes to love making i dont feel any pleasure, its not painful or anything and i can do the act just feel no pleasure. Its frustrating me so much because i cant O.... and my DH because he feels its one sided. Is this normal or what? Everyone told me once im allowed to have sex, it will be amazing and id be doing it non stop but to be honest i feel that i can easily live without sex since i feel nothing. Urgh i am so sad

Oh, honey. You trained yourself, no doubt with great effort and difficulty, to never think a sexual thing about another person and now you're surprised that you can't? *sigh* Of course you can't think sexual thoughts. The mind gets very good at whatever it practices. If you practiced adding large numbers in your head, you'd get good at that, too. Unfortunately, you practiced turning your brain into a Ken doll.

See, you can't turn off your sexy thoughts and then assume you can just turn them back on when you want to. And, there's the fact that the only reason you would turn off your sexy thoughts is because you were led to believe they were bad. It's ridiculous that people told her that as soon as she was married, she'd just love sex and be thinking sexy thoughts nonstop and having neighbor-scaring, bed-shattering fuckfests 24/7.

I think there is another issue at work here, as well. There is such a thing as chemistry. See, I never restrained my sexy thoughts. I also wore miniskirts and dated and had- gasp- premarital sex. It didn't take me long to learn that my body likes some people and doesn't like others, and it's not always related to how my brain feels about those people. I can like a man, find him intelligent and funny, find being around him an absolute joy and feel not an iota of sexual interest in him. I can also find a man to be an arrogant prick and my body is raring to go. If your relationship is going to include sex (I'm not saying relationships have to, asexual people need love, too), you need to be in a relationship with someone you are physically attracted to.

Unfortunately, this poor woman turned off her sexual attraction, so she would have no way of knowing whether or not she was attracted to her husband. Maybe she isn't. If she's not, not matter how hard she tries, she's never going to be into sex with him.

This is, btw, why I'm terribly leery of expecting teenagers to simply turn off their sexual urges instead of teaching them about safer sex. Evidence says that most of them can't turn off their sexual urges, and now we can see the price of actually doing so. Poor woman.

A Boy in a Dress

2011-06-06T12:54:00.002-04:00

This was sent to me by [redacted], who seems to think I need more to be disturbed by. This is in reaction to the famed "genderless child", Storm.

Back to make one last comment .....
As I have previously stated, I am in complete disagreement with the decisions that you have and are making regarding your children. I had to come back to make something very clear. I am a long time Junction resident and I can honestly say that I am thankful that my Son is not the same age as any of your children. Simply because I would not want my Son to be playing with a boy who is wearing a dress. I have chosen to rear my Son in a normal way. I don't think society needs to be exposed to you and your absurd ideologies, or your experiments. Just saying ........

First of all, have you considered going back to school. One does not have decisions, one makes decisions. One has beliefs, which might be what you're going for there.

Secondly, unless your son is the Messiah, you do not capitalize "son".

Thirdly, they're raising the child to be genderless, so why did you go straight to "boy in a dress"? That's . . . odd of you.

Thirdly, what do you suppose would happen if your SON played with a boy in a dress? I mean, I'm trying, but I can't quite . . . hmmm . . . .

1. SON plays with boy in dress

2. ?????

3. SON grows up to be a liberal gay atheoislamo terrorist.

I mean, I've spent some time with men who enjoy wearing women's clothing (women wearing men's clothing? totally normal! you may be doing it right now!) and I swear to you, nothing happened. Nothing at all. I did not become gay, I did not feel an urge to blow up any skyscrapers, I did not come down with a terrible dis- wait a minute. That was right before the porphyria kicked in.

Holy fuck, male transvestites cause porphyria! Lock up the children!

Wait, what's that? Oh, right, genetics. My bad. Transvestites do not actually have the power to change my DNA. They are not, in fact, radioactive.

Well, then, I just have nothing. Other than the fact that once you spend a little time around a person different from you, you realize that people are people and it becomes harder and harder to hate based on small differences. And you wouldn't want that for your SON.

Anyway, enjoy this video. It is the story of an elephant and a dog who are best friends. Then think very, very hard about why humans can't get along with other groups of humans, but an elephant and a dog can be the best of friends.

The Bible Is Really Poorly Written

2011-06-06T08:29:00.003-04:00

This. The creator of the universe couldn't handle this. Now go look at your car and think about a few things.

I got a lot of writing done this weekend and ended up surprising myself. (Twice, actually. The surprise twist surprised even me!) If nothing else, writing Avoiding the Apocalypse has allowed me to see that the Bible is really poorly written.

Here's the thing. When I told my husband the broad outlines of my book*, his immediate question was, "How is that going to work? God's omnipotent, Satan's basically omnipotent, how do have an interesting story involving people that can snap their fingers and make anything happen?"

"So, darling, have you ever read the Bible . . . "

Really. I had to seriously scale back both Yhwh and Satan in order to make them, well, writable. Is Yhwh capable of ending his own creation? Absolutely- within the confines of the system he himself set up**. Is Satan the most powerful character other than Yhwh? Sure, but he is by no means omnipotent, and while even the most powerful demon couldn't take him one on one, a number of demons working together could.

But see, I put a lot of thought into this. I've read books that contained virtually omnipotent characters. They sucked. Either there was no conflict, or the character was constantly "forgetting" his abilities or getting taken out of the action in improbable ways, or omnipotence became impotence whenever it was convenient with no explanation at all.

You know, like in the Bible. Omnipotent God makes absolute everything, but in Judges 1:19 omnipotent God is thwarted by, of all things, iron chariots.

"And the LORD was with Judah; and he drave out the inhabitants of the mountain; but could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron."

The worst part is, I can't even use that in my book! If Yhwh can be defeated by iron chariots, then all my protagonists would have to do is sneak into heaven with an M15, or a couple of AA12s. I couldn't possibly stretch that more than a few chapters, even if I described every building and angel individually and in great detail. (Lookin' at you, Jonathon Kellerman.)

A lot of people propose that everyone should have to read the Bible because it is such good literature. Um, no. It's an inconsistent translation of a translation of very old documents written by people who had no ethical issues with raping women and killing babies. And it's not even good writing.

Yeesh.

*It's only fair. He shows me his songs when they're nothing more than a drum beat or a chord sequence.

**Can a nuclear power plant be shut down? Sure, using the shutdown procedures. Try anything else and you've got quite the mess.

Sugar and Spice Is a Metaphor

2011-06-05T07:52:00.001-04:00

You remember that poem about what girls and boys are made of? Girls are made of sugar and spice and everything nice, boys are made of snails and puppy dog tails, that one?

Yeah, apparently, someone takes that literally.

As women, we are not made up of the same things men are made of; therefore it is nearly (but not completely) impossible for us to raise boys to be men. I'm afraid that's why we have so many sissy boys today.

I checked. Human males and human females are indeed made of the same things. Those things are not sugar and spice and snails and tails.

This post also includes a list of characteristics of men (not sissy boys!) that's a little . . . um . . . odd.

WANTED- A boy who stands straight, sits straight, acts straight and talks straight;

Queers need not apply, I suppose.

A boy whose fingernails are not in mourning, whose ears are clean, whose shoes are polished, whose clothes are brushed, whose hair is combed, and whose teeth are well cared for;

Actually, I'm okay with that, although I'm not sure what fingernails look like in mourning.

A boy who listens carefully when he is spoken to, who asks questions when he does not understand, and does not ask questions about things that are none of his business;

Well, okay.

A boy who moves quickly and makes as little noise about it as possible;

wut?

A boy who whistles in the street, but does not whistle where he ought to keep still;

um, okay.

A boy who looks cheerful, has a ready smile for everybody, and never sulks;

A human being who likes everyone and never has a bad day? A human being, you say?

A boy who is polite to every man and respectful to every woman and girl;

Yes, because you know you can't just be polite and respectful to both males and females that is too much. Too much, I tell you!

A boy who does not smoke cigarettes and has no desire to learn how;

Inhale, exhale. It's not hard.

A boy who is more eager to know how to speak good English than to talk slang;

I dig it, daddio!

A boy who neither bullies other boys nor allows other boys to bully him;

Yes, because it is up to children to stop bullying. Stop bothering the adults, dear, we're busy making inane lists and making fun of fa**ots.

A boy who, when he does not know a thing, says, "I don't know, "and when he has made a mistake says, "I'm sorry," and when he is asked to do a thing says, "I'll try";

*rolls eyes*

A boy who looks you right in the eye and tells the truth every time;

You know what? Do not tell me the truth about what my butt looks like in this skirt. Nobody anywhere wants the unvarnished truth every time.

A boy who is eager to read good books;

Define "good". I bet your definition is different from mine.

A boy who would rather put in his spare time at the YMCA gymnasium than gamble for pennies in a back room;

Good science, when was this written? Anyway, my husband really enjoys blackjack and poker. They are games of skill it takes a certain talent and dedication to play. While I do agree, as does he, that one shouldn't gamble with money one can't afford to flush down the toilet, I don't really see the problem with exercising one's mind as well as one's body.

A boy who does not want to be "smart" or in any wise to attract attention;

Sit down and act stupid! And read good books!

A boy who would rather lose his job or be expelled from school than tell a lie or be a cad;

Yeah, because grocery stores accept morals as well as VISA.

A boy whom other boys like;

I thought we were against gays?

A boy who is at ease in the company of girls;

No, really, are we against gays or not?

A boy who is not sorry for himself, and not forever thinking and talking about himself;

Okay.

A boy who is friendly with his mother, and more intimate with her than anyone else;

O.o
O.O
o.O

A boy who makes you feel good when he is around;

A boy they call Doctor Feelgood?

A boy who is not goody-goody, a prig, or a little pharisee, but just healthy, happy, and full of life.

Okay, did you read the enormous list that preceeded this? There is no way to be all that and not be a little prig. So pick one, lady.

This boy is wanted everywhere. The family wants him, the school wants him, the office wants him, the boys want him, the girls want him, all creation wants him.

And now it's a porno. I don't know what to think.

Rings and Surthings

2011-06-04T06:41:00.000-04:00

I had the weirdest conversation with The Princess*, my new sister-in-law, when she was in town for my husband's birthday. It's taken me this long to write about because I just wasn't sure how to process it. Translation: I don't know her well enough to know if she was deliberately being rude or if she is just really clueless. I'm erring on the side of clueless, though deliberately rude is a definite possibility.

Anyway, she and my brother-in-law have been married less than a year. I generally hate talking to newlyweds, for a lot of reasons**, and she hit two of them in less than five minutes:

Why don't you guys wear wedding rings? Don't you want people to know you're married?

Why didn't you change your last name? Is this some kind of feminist thing?

So, here's my reply to those questions, feel free to borrow whatever is applicable to you any time you'd like.

1. Wedding rings:

Does anybody even know what the point of wedding rings is, anyway? I guess to show people I'm married, but why does every random stranger need to know my marital status? An unmarried person could buy a wedding ring. It's not like jewelry stores require proof of marriage. A married person with a wedding ring could simply take it off. And I'm still not sure why everyone I meet needs to know whether or not I'm married.

I've been told that my husband will cheat on me if I don't require him to wear a wedding ring. I told them I had no idea circles of metal had such amazing powers.

I've been told our refusal to wear wedding rings means we're not serious about one another. I've been known to say "fuck off". Seriously, seriously fuck off. We've stuck together through both of our chronic illnesses, poverty, and other stuff I don't talk about here, and you're telling me that the ring is what denotes serious commitment? C'mere, I wanna show you something. It won't hurt for long.

So why don't we wear wedding rings? Neither one of us likes the tactile sensation of rings. My husband won't wear any jewelry at all, not even a watch. I regularly wear earrings, bracelets, and necklaces (I'm actually rarely without all three), but rings bother me. I can't really see how "Hey, I know wearing a ring makes you wildly uncomfortable, but you must wear one every day for the rest of your life" means love.

2. Taking my husband's surname.

This is not a feminist thing. Well, actually, some feminists do promote this as a feminist thing, but it has nothing to do with feminism for me. I'd like to say it does. I'd like to claim to be a feminist warrior, changing the world through my bold refusal to change my name, but Hell is all about the honesty***.

I didn't change my last name because I didn't really care about it and I'm lazy about things I don't care about. Actually, thinking about it, I had just spent a very frustrating six weeks getting a new social security card so I could switch jobs and the thought of doing that all over again to change my name was just too much at the time, so I put it off. After a few years went by, I asked my husband if he cared that I didn't use his name and he said, quite reasonably, that while I was welcome to use his name, he didn't see why I should. I didn't become a different person when I married him, why should I have a different name? And, it bothers him to see men stay Mr. John Doe, but women become Mrs. John Doe as if she had to marry John Doe because her parents named her Mrs. John Doe. What if she wanted to marry Frank Doe? It would be tragic!

Yeah, he's as weird as I am.

I've been told that this means I don't love him. I've been told this means he'll leave me, cheat on me, be heartbroken. I've been told feminists are ridiculous, that I hate men and that I'm a bad wife.

People seriously froth at the mouth about this one, more so than the rings.

Multiple people have suggested a "compromise" as if we were fighting about it: hyphenate our names. First of all, this always means I change my name to the hyphenate and he does nothing. Secondly, I have a four syllable Scots/Irish name and he has a three syllable Italian name. Can you imagine?

Mrs. Faith O'Hannigan-Agnoli****.

That's better than Faith O'Hannigan?

People often ask what name our children (will) have. My husband agrees that in the highly unlikely event that we do have a child, they will have my name because I'll be the one doing all the work. This upsets people so much that I've suggested we simply combine our names into one unhyphenated, bizarre Iritalian mix. O'Hannoli, perhaps. Nobody finds that funny, other than my husband.

Anyway, I really want to know why are either of these things anyone else's business? Why does anyone at all care whether or not we wear wedding rings or whether or not I change my name? I have asked people that, but apparently, I'm the rude one for asking.

*No, I really don't like her all that much.

**Hey, you're happy, good for you. Stop pretending you know anything about marriage. Call me back in ten years and then we'll talk all about it.

***Carefully edited honesty.

****Not our real names. Our real names would be even worse. And longer. Much longer.

I'm Filled with Squishy Organs (Atheist Bashing)

2011-06-03T08:47:00.001-04:00

That's me: big, hairy and poorly dressed. Oh, and rampaging.

I hate this kind of casual smack at atheists. I really do. It just makes me tired. And it so common.

Don’t be afraid to be pious.

We lose nothing in being devout and we gain ineffable benefits.

Do not be afraid to bend yourself down before God especially and also to the angels and saints our intercessors and patrons and be simply pious. Man was made to be pious. This is the essence of religion, without which we are empty shells: to give due reverence to God. The sin of our first parents came from trying to be the opposite of pious: self-sufficient self-gods. That was defiance of due piety. But people can drift into the same emptiness of life by neglect of piety and devotion, neglect of fostering the habits of devotion.

Consider the benefits of devotion for a moment, and then consider the downside of being – not impious, in the sense of being wicked – but slothful and haphazard and lukewarm.
[emphasis mine]

I am an atheist and I am not an empty shell. I am not empty at all.

I am an atheist and I am not slothful, haphazard or lukewarm.

I am an atheist and I am human, too.

I am an atheist and I am not less than you, John Zuhlsdorf.

I am an atheist and I have feelings and they can be hurt.

I am an atheist and if you prick me, I will bleed.

I am an atheist and you hate me.

I am an atheist and you've never met me.

I am an atheist and I'm done apologizing.

I am an atheist and I'm done asking.

I am an atheist and I will make you listen.

I am an atheist and I've come here to demand your respect.

I am an atheist and I'm not leaving until I've got it.

Lewisian Apologetics for Beginners

2011-06-02T13:27:00.000-04:00

That's either CS Lewis or Tony Soprano.

Okay, so I hate CS Lewis. I always have. I hated CS Lewis when I was 5 and my mother was so excited to share one of her favorite authors with me* and I still hate him. First of all, I don't think he was much of a writer. I think his writing was clunky at best. It's not that I dislike British authors of that era. I like Tolkein and Orwell, two of his contemporaries, but Lewis' writing is like a clumsy elephant with an inner ear infection to me.

I get allegory, I really do. I like allegory. I write allegory myself. It's a proud tradition. However, with CS Lewis, I feel like a British intellectual is beating me over the head with a Bible while shouting I. AM. A. CHRISTIAN. YOU. SHOULD. BE. ONE. TOO. Subtlety, dude. You Brits are supposed to own that shit.

Which brings me to Lewis' ~~Christian propaganda~~ lesser known series , the Space Trilogy. This time, Lewis does scifi! I like early scifi . The first thing I did when I received a Kindle was load HG Wells' The Time Machine. That is good stuff. But Lewis takes Martians and Venusians and, well, humans, we're sinful. And wicked. And it's our fault. Oh, and in the third book, the part of evil is played by scientists and lesbians. How . . . nice.

What struck me most about the series is in the second book, Perelandra. In this book, our hero, Ransom (yes, the name is meaningful, and no, I am not opposed to meaningful names) is sent to Venus to stop the Devil from tempting the Venusian Eve.

First of all, this is how we know Venus is the new Eden:

The rafts or floating islands are indeed Paradise, not only in the sense that they provide a pleasant and care-free life (until the arrival of Weston) but also in the sense that Ransom is for weeks and months naked in the presence of a beautiful naked woman without once lusting after her or being tempted to seduce her.

Lewis, dude, get a grip. The Chronicles of Narnia end with the preteen protagonists dying in a train crash, which is good because it means they'll never be adults and have the sexy feelings. I am not kidding you. To Lewis, desire was the ultimate evil and better to die at the age of 12 then ever feel lust. The man probably danced at the funerals of stillborn babies.

You know how I know that my health has taken a turn for the worse? I stop having any interest in sex. Even on days when I'm in too much pain for sex to be achievable, I'm still interested in it, I still fantasize about it, I still find people sexually attractive. It's only when I'm a few hours away from an ER visit that I stop having any interest in sex at all.

Admittedly, I might very well be set to high when it comes to all things lusty, but sexual desire is normal**. It is human to feel desire, to think about sex, to fantasize about sex. Christianity twists this normal human condition around until it is the greatest of evils, and the greatest of good can be characterized by its lack.

It's not really Lewis, it's Christianity. Thinking about sex with a person other than your spouse is the same as actually fucking someone other than your spouse. It's right there in the Bible. Lewis just carried the idea out to its natural, and very disturbing, conclusion.

Then there is the dramatic ending to the book, in which Ransom punches the Devil. You see, Satan is gifted with the rhetoric and spends a good portion of Perelandra attempting to convince Eve to sin. Ransom tries to win with rhetoric, but he can't. So he punches Satan instead.

Stop and think about that for a second. God's champion, a well educated Brit, couldn't win in a rhetoric contest being judged by a woman who had never even met another person besides Adam. That's like trying to convince a small child of something. My mother once not only convinced a 3 year old that she had 3 legs, she had the girl looking for her third shoe***.

Satan is trying to convince Eve that she should go ahead and sleep in the place she is forbidden from sleeping. It's the only solid land on the planet. So tell her it's covered in spiders. Tell her the truth: that sleeping on bare rock sucks and she'll wake up sore. Tell her you'll buy her a pony if she doesn't. Or, better yet, tell her what happened to the humans on Earth when their own Eve made the mistake she is contemplating.

But no, God tells Ransom to punch out the Devil. I'm not kidding you. Might makes right, apparently. Or, rather, might makes truth. If you can beat the snot out of somebody, they must be wrong about things. Obviously. That, my dears, must be pure Lewis, because I don't recall Jesus going Rambo on the Morningstar.

So the next time someone throws some Lewisian apologetics at you, ask them if they'll accept atheism if you can beat them bloody. It's a CS Lewis approved argumentation technique, after all!

*Don't tell my mom. She's a really great person and she was so excited about it, so I read every Narnia book and told her I loved them all.

**Asexuality is also totally normal for people who are asexual.

***I can't imagine where I get my sense of humor from.

However Do We Get the Poor to Save Money?

2011-06-02T08:51:00.002-04:00

Look, the title of this Slate piece alone sent me into a rage. I'm surprised I didn't turn green, tear out of my clothes and go rampaging through Pennsylvania screaming "Faith MAD!" (Good thing, too, I don't have the insurance to cover that.)

I May Be Poor Now, but Wait Until I'm 65 ...

Is there a way to get the poor to save for retirement?

Um, no, really. Here's why:

Is there a way to get the poor to save for retirement?

THE POOR ARE POOR BECAUSE THEY DON'T HAVE MONEY!

I know I'm not with the Heritage Foundation or the Tax Policy Center, nor am I an economist, but I do have one qualification the asshat who wrote this piece doesn't: I'm poor! See, I can tell you why poor people do what we do, because I'm just telling you what I do.

What do I have saved for retirement? Zilch. My retirement plan is dying before I get too disabled or old to work. Seriously. I'm not being snarky, that's the plan.

Why haven't I saved for retirement? Well, I wrote this yesterday, Wednesday, and on Wednesday, I had $5 until payday on Friday. The bus costs $1.25 per trip. So, I have exactly enough money to get to and from work. That's it.

Why? Because I'm fucking poor, that's why. That's what being poor means. I got paid Friday, cashed my check at the pawn shop ($8 fee), paid bills (what I could anyway, paid $1 per money order), bought food and then I need a prescription. That was $15. The next day I went to feed the dog breakfast and realized I only had enough to feed him half of breakfast (he eats 2 cups of food twice a day), so I needed to buy dog food. Then my husband says to me that he needs CDs to burn his mixes to so he can check them on various sound systems*, so I bought CDs.

Then I had no money left.

Seriously, I hope I don't get my period before Friday. I hope I don't need any food or medicine or anything at all, because if so, it'll suck to be me. I had to steal toothpaste samples from my boss' office** to get to Friday.

Does anyone think that there is a way of getting me to save for retirement without giving me more money?

Apparently, economists do. Apparently, if they just convince me of the benefits of a 401(k) I'll rush right out and fill one up!

Through automatic savings . . . By simply switching the default—requiring people to opt out of a savings program, rather than asking them to opt in—the savings rate could shift significantly.

Seriously, that's the answer. Just take money I need to buy toothpaste out of my check automatically, and everything will be fine. Because it's not like I need every penny of my check or anything. And I love explaining things like that to the woman in charge of payroll. It was awesome explaining to her why direct deposit is not for me. (There are so many judgments against me, if I ever deposit any money into a bank account, I'll never see it again.)

Some have advocated making a retirement-savings tax credit refundable, which means that if the value of the credit exceeds the worker's tax bill, the government would actually deliver a check for the difference. In effect, the working poor could pay a negative tax.

That's not so bad, but keep in mind, I don't need toothpaste next March, I need it yesterday. That's what being poor is about. A person with money notices that their stove is acting funny and shops the sales to replace it. A poor person notices that their stove is acting up and does nothing, because they don't have the money to do anything, and then when the stove completely stops working, they stop cooking or they ask around to see if a friend has one. If you give this person the option of $200 now or $200 six months from now, what do you think they'll do? In fact, they'll take the $200 now even if the figure six months from now is $1,000, because they need a stove now. Which brings me to the last suggested solution:

A few think the only way to really pump up savings among the poor is to offer a matching program, similar to the way some companies match employee contributions to 401(k) accounts. Uncle Sam would pitch in $2 for every $1 a low-wage earner contributes, and he would match middle-class contributions dollar-for-dollar. The rich would be on their own.

Again, if you have money to pay bills and buy food and deal with broken appliances, then that probably seems like a great deal. But if you really, really need $200 today, $600 30 years from now is not much of an incentive to wait, now is it?

*Please say you'll participate in the release of The Cheat Code's first album! The songs are so good they may actually cure cancer!

**Once I borrowed on from him before a dentist appointment and he told me to take one any time I wanted, so it's not technically stealing. Poverty turns one into quite the ethicist.

It's Mishie Time!

2011-06-02T07:01:00.000-04:00

Mishies need love, too.

It's summer, that magical time of year filled with cookouts and pool parties and sugared up kids driving their parents insane- and Mormon Missionaries* (hereinafter "mishies").

Look, I know mishie visits can be a bit obnoxious. Here you are, innocently enjoying your day, debating whether or not you can put off mowing the lawn another day (in my case, no), and two earnest young men in distinctive clothing** ring your doorbell, eager to tell you why you're going to Hell.

It's just not a conversation you want to have right now, I get it. What you really want to do is slam the door in their faces or curse at them. Maybe you're more like me and you really want to mess with them, answer the door naked covered in ketchup and invite them to join the ceremony.

Don't do it.

Mishies are just doing what they were raised to do. It is the single most important thing they can do in the Mormon Church, and if they don't do it they will be ostracized by their community, friends and family. Many mishies spend 2 years simultaneously questioning their faith and spreading it.

Mishies are frequently treated poorly by the mission, and here, and here, including not being given enough to eat.

Mishies are treated poorly by the people they attempt to convert, all day, every day for 2 years.

Don't add to the burden. If you came across man lying in the street, visibly having suffered a beating, would you kick him? If not, don't do the same to the mishies. (If so, drown yourself.)

What should you do? If you have the time, and you're not alone in your home, invite them inside to enjoy a nice cold, nonalcoholic, uncaffeinated beverage***. Tell them you were just about to eat lunch/dinner, would they like to join in? Press some leftovers on them. Tell them you would just throw them away, or that your Italian heritage would be forever insulted if they didn't take your food.

If you don't have the time, give them a bottle of water to take with them, maybe some prepackaged snacks (I keep both around in the summer for just this purpose, you can get peanut butter crackers cheap at Walmart), and politely explain that you are busy, but thank you for stopping by.

You don't have to convert to their religion or adopt the mishies, but a kind word and a bottle of water is quick, easy and possibly worth more than you know to a lonely kid facing 2 years of rejection and verbal abuse.

It's summer, be nice to the mishies.

*After many years typing legal documents, I am no longer certain what gets capitalized and what doesn't. As far as I can tell, when typing filings for Court, just go with German capitalization rules: every noun starts with a capital letter.

**You can tell mishies from other proselytizers two ways: 1) mishies are almost always two men, 18 - 20 years old, and 2) they wear black pants, white button down shirts and ties.

***Mormonism's version of kosher forbids both caffeine and alcohol. So Coke or Pepsi would be out, but Sprite's okay.

#ThankingGod

2011-06-01T13:10:00.002-04:00

I have got to stop clicking on twitter's trending topics. I just have to stop, if only for the sake of my blood pressure. But, in the waning moments before my heart explodes, I give you #ThankingGod:

Thanking God for another day!! BE GREAT TODAY PEOPLE!!!!

I'm thanking God for letting me wake up to see another beautiful day :)

Thanking God For Waking Me Up To See Another Day!!!!

Yes, there is no explanation for the world continuing to turn and the sun continuing to shine. Oh, look, it's another minute of existence- Thank you God! Honestly, some people have unbelievably low standards.

Thanking God for everything.

Ebola, AIDS, tornadoes, hurricanes, nuclear power reactor meltdowns, WWII, atomic weapons, cancer, child molestation, you know, everything.

Thanking God that Thanking God is trending again!!!

How meta.

Ha! I was just "thanking God" for my (awesome) job too. Literally.

I have literally no idea what literally means in that sentence.

Thanking God, for sight. #GodBlessTheBlind

Wow, nothing like combining your Pharisee-esque public devotion to god with outrageous ablism. Fantastic!

Thanking God for sendin this phone so fast! #TEAMBLACKBERRY

Oh, so that's what God was doing instead of protecting people from tornadoes. Okay, then.

God is Thanking God that most people who believe in him don't read the bible

lulz!

I just gave a homeless man my last. Then cried thanking God that I have a full tank of gas. God is so good

So, first we have a Christian thanking god that she isn't blind, now we have a Christian thanking god she isn't homeless like that guy she just ran into. Wow.

Thanking God, for unbelievers, cuz it strengthens me to be able to change their destiny.

And if you fail or just don't reach in time, we burn forever in hell! But that's okay, at least we strengthened you! Don't mind us, we'll just be screaming our lungs out for the next eternity for your sake.

Honestly.

Unintended Consequences

2011-06-01T08:30:00.004-04:00

Yeah, that's not weird.

And that? Not alarming at all.

denelian, in the spirit of sharing, wrote a comment that made my vagina lock up so tight I may never have sex again (thanks!), including something I thought was just me:

THEN the doc told me i'd be a fascinating case study on how treating a person's pain like it didn't matter produced a person who ignored their body's warnings [pain] until their body just QUIT.

That's not just you, denelian. I do that, too. I end up in the hospital with kidney infections, or a spleen the size of Nebraska, or severely dehydrated, or with a fever so high I'm risking brain damage or an ear infection that's spreading to the bone. Each and every time, the ER doctor scolds me. How could I let it go that long? Why didn't I call my doctor earlier- like a week earlier? You almost died, don't you care what happens to yourself?

Of course I care what happens to myself, I just don't pay much attention to my body. I used to. I used to call the doctor every time something weird happened, which is pretty much every day. I've had two doctors dump me for doing just that. So I stopped paying attention to my body. Pain? That's not important. It must not be, nobody cares about it. So why would I pay any more attention to the pain in my left flank than I do to the far worse pain in my knees- until I start peeing blood, that is.

I tried to tell doctors about the tachycardia and palpitations. They did a couple of tests and politely told me to fuck off. So I stopped paying attention to my heart racing so fast I couldn't count it- until I passed out at Dunkin Donuts.

Honestly, I can never tell if I have a fever. I frequently feel like I do when I don't. I'll be miserably hot when it's 20F (-7C) outside, or shivering when it's 85F (29C) and it's no indication of what my internal temperature is. I've mentioned it to doctors and basically been told to stop being melodramatic. So, no, I didn't bother to check my temperature when I had a fever of over 104F (40C)- until I started hallucinating, that is.

Then I get to have an argument with an ER doctor because it's all my fault. I must be psychologically disturbed. The fact that my problem is a direct result of substandard care. Actually, my real problem is that this care is not considered substandard. Undertreating pain is the goal of modern medicine as far as I can tell. And me? I still have to get through my day, so I just ignore my body. I pay no attention to the most alarming things until my body starts to shut itself down.

I recently went to the doctor because my toes keep turning a dark greyish purple. It's really an alarming color on your skin. It's not related to cold or much of anything else that I can figure out, and here's what the doctor said to me: Does it hurt? No, there's no additional pain when my toes turn purple. Well, then, it's really just cosmetic, isn't it?

Yeah, I'm betting it's not just cosmetic. I'm betting I end up in the ER, again, suffering from something horrible. Again.

The above list isn't everything that's sent me to the hospital in the last 10 years. Not even close. The issue isn't infections or dehydration or fevers, the issue is that I push myself to the limit every day. Some days, with the pain, walking five steps is the limit and I have to go way past that. I don't sleep more than five hours a night because of the pain and no more than two hours are uninterrupted sleep. I frequently don't eat because of the pain. I'm not surprised when my body shuts down. And I can't really figure out why doctors act all shocked and appalled by it. Or why that's my fault.

Men Stopped Snoring and Now America is Over

2011-05-31T11:05:00.004-04:00

How did I miss Simcha Fisher until now? She is just a treasure trove of snark material!

Her latest bit of snarkalicious wonderment is entitled Masculinity Reduction Surgery, which made me think that the New York Times had managed to find two hipsters trying to start the antitrend of penis size reduction, but alas, no.

It is far more sinister than that! It is the end of men and the end of America itself!!1!!eleventy!!!

Men are- I can hardly bear to type these words- getting plastic surgery. This is the end, my friends, the very end.

Look, I'm not really comfortable plastic surgery, unless it is reconstructive. If an accident or illness has left you looking significantly different than you used to, and this bothers you, reconstructive surgery all the way, baby! Otherwise . . . I dunno. I used to be totally opposed to plastic surgery, but then I noticed that my upper eyelids are drooping with age, as in actual overlap happening, and suddenly I think plastic surgery might be just the thing. So, I'm not judgey about plastic surgery, and I don't hold different standards for men and women on the subject, I'm just not comfortable with it. Probably because the results frequently look really odd, for one thing, and I also suspect that if we'd stop airbrushing and cutting up people showing the slightest hint of age, I might not feel quite so bad about a normal part of being 35.

Anyway, Simcha doesn't have these thoughts about plastic surgery, or at least she doesn't share them if she does. What she feels is, well:

What I mean to say is, didn’t there used to be men in this country? Men have always been vain, certainly, but one of their most endearing features has always been that most men will be vain for no particular reason. Haven’t you seen one of those 60-year-old behemoths on the beach, proceeding imperially down the shoreline like a glorious Adonis, even though his rock-hard, hairy, sunburned, hassock-sized belly alone takes up more property than the typical starter home? But he doesn’t care! He is
who he is, and he’s going to strut his stuff.

I’m not even kidding: That is what I like about men. They don’t give a damn. Their neck bulges over the back of their collar? So what? Their ears are hairy, their hands are rough, they snore and make noise and take up lots of space. That is what men are supposed to be like, and if they are going to start frowning into the magnifying mirror and getting all teary when bathing suit season comes around, then we might as well just call it a day. Good night, America. Sorry, Ben Franklin. It was a pretty good country, but it’s over now.

Ah, gender stereotypes. Girls like pink and don't know how to use power tools and men think their beer bellies and ear hair are hawt! And any man or woman not fitting into those stereotypes are destroying Western civilization!

First of all, fuck off. Men aren't "supposed to be" anything but themselves and men shouldn't have to pretend to be what you think men are supposed to be just so you can feel comfortable. Sorry, Simcha, you're not god.

Secondly, it's total bullshit. My husband's weight ranges from obese to morbidly obese. I don't care, but he does and he always has. He has never been proud of the amount of space he takes up or oblivious to how other people see him. My husband has eyes, Simcha. He can see all the movie stars and models and he can see that what's in the mirror doesn't look like that. And it doesn't make him feel good.

Yes, Simcha, men have feelings. (And soft hands. I can't imagine why a musician/recording engineer would have rough hands, but I guess that makes my husband a woman.)

I'm glad you like hairy ears and farts and snoring and neck bulges, but that doesn't make any woman who doesn't not a woman, or any man who doesn't want to be hairy-eared, farty and bulgey less of a man. And it's unbelievably arrogant of you to think that you can determine what men are, and declare that all men who don't fall into your categories aren't really men. Who the hell do you think you are, Simcha?

Oh, wait, I see, it's vascetomies. Men who have had them ARE NOT MEN.

How did we get here? In my entirely unscientific opinion, something else happened in the ‘50s, when men started making appointments with their doctors for a different procedure. And once it became common, there was no particular reason for men to look like men. One word, and I’ll give you a hint: It starts with “v-a-s.”
Ooh, sorry, neutered guys, did that hurt your widdle feelings? THAT’S BECAUSE YOU’RE NOT A MAN.

Hey, done with fathering children? YOU ARE NOT A MAN! Incapable of fathering children? YOU ARE NOT A MAN! Testicular cancer require the removal of your testicles? YOU ARE NOT A MAN.

SIMCHA SAID SO*.

And you ruined America, you thoughtless unmale bastard. Now think about what you've done!

*Simcha only wrote that choosing sterility makes one NOT A MAN, but what's the difference? If sterility means you are not a man, it shouldn't make any difference whether one is sterile by choice or not.

Now That's Just Mean!

2011-05-31T08:49:00.003-04:00

I never stopped to consider this question:

The reason, according to Genesis, that humans have pain and suffering is that Yhwh cursed all humanity because the first two humans made a rather understandable mistake. Now, of course, I have considered how absurdly, breathtakingly cruel it would be to punish all humanity for the mistakes of two humans, but I never considered why we are still being punished. After all, Jesus died for our sins, right? That definitely includes Original Sin. So why do we still live under the curse of original sin?

My answer is that there is no god, no Adam and Eve, no original Sin and no curse. Bad stuff happens because it does. People grow old and die because entropy always wins.

Christians, however, have to come up with some other reason, and it is as breathtakingly cruel as the curse itself:

We know that the curse is the result of man's sin. And why then are we, who are forgiven of sin, still living the curse?

Because the curse is a constant reminder that we are in desperate need of salvation. It was designed with a purpose--put there for our good—so that we might understand our need for a saviour.

Wow. That's . . . indescribable. Imagine that your great great great great great great great great grandfather murdered someone, was tried, convicted and spent the remainder of life in prison. Would you find it fair for you to be in prison for his crime? Of course not. Your grandparents weren't alive when the crime was committed, why should you be punished for it? Your grandfather already paid his debt to society, why should you have to do it again?

What if the answer to that question was "yes, the bet is paid, but we're going to imprison every member of your family forever to show everyone else that we take murder very seriously"?

Apparently, if you're Christian, you think that's love.

Words Have Meanings: Unique

2011-05-28T07:47:00.002-04:00

This is the most joyous creature on earth. Starting now, I am the founder of a religion that promises each truly true believer their own sloth.

Unique: Characteristic of a particular category, condition, or locality: a problem unique to coastal areas.

In fairness, the above is the third definition of unique, because that is the way it is being used in the post I am snarking on. I am all about the fairness.

As used above, "unique" denotes something that can only be applied to the thing in question. Hurricanes are problems unique to coastal regions. Hurricanes don't form over land, so you won't see hurricanes in Indiana or Iowa, for example. (Um, Germany?, for the Europeans.) This is important, because if you say certain characteristics are unique to a specific group or place, you can't use characteristics that can apply to anyone or anywhere. If you do, I can only assume that either you don't know what "unique" means, or that you have a rather odd view of other groups. I'm going with the latter.

The Unique Characteristics of a Godly Woman:

Here are some characteristics of a godly woman--check off the ones that describe you:

Gracious

I'm an atheist and I'm gracious! [checks definition of "gracious"] Well, at least some of the time. We'll give that one a half check.

Virtuous

No. I'm not that, not by the stretch of anyone's imagination.

Sober

Yes, actually. Drinking alcohol while taking Vicodin is a good way to end up with liver failure.

Chaste

BWAHAHAHAHA- um, no.

Prudent

I am probably the most practical person you know. In fact, that is why I did not major in philosophy. I love philosophy, but I am simply too practical to really engage a discussion of whether or not the real world is the really real world.

Discreet

Well, it's not like I have sex in public, except that one time, in the park . . . okay, no.

Peaceable

Fuck yeah! Seriously, I think pacifism is the solution to a lot of humanity's problems. I'm just too practical to think it's a workable solution.

Patient

That I most definitely am.

Kind

Yes. I am kind.

Faithful

To what? God? No. My friends, my beliefs, my principals, few as they are? Yes.

Joyful

Overall, yes.

Good

Now I'm getting all kinds of offended. Only Christian women are good? How rude!

Merciful

I haven't set anyone on fire yet. Considering the provocations, that's damn merciful.

Pleasant

That's really a question for people who interact with me.

Ready

O.o

Honorable

Yes. I'm not sure the writer would accept my personal sense of honor as such, but she didn't define "honor" for me, so I'm giving this one a check.

Benevolent

You know, that's an odd word to describe a person with. Usually you see "benevolent" used to describe dictators or gods.

Keeper at Home

Typing this at work, so, no.

In Subjection

To what?

Quiet Spirit

If my spirit were any louder, you'd all be deaf.

Modest

What definition? How she is no doubt defining "modesty", purely on the basis of skirt lengths and such, no, but what about the real definition of "modest"? I had a heck of a time saying "yes" to any of this stuff, and it's all positive, or meant to be, so . . . another half check.

Obedient

To what? The laws of the US? Yes.

Loves husband and children

Who the fuck doesn't love at least their children? That's got to be the most insulting thing I've ever read. Only Christian women love their husbands and children? Fuck you!

Teaching the younger women

Doing so right now, asshat. As we speak. So, ha!

I Am the Queen of All Landinia

2011-05-27T08:26:00.002-04:00

Love the sinner, hate the sin. How many times have you heard that one? It's always being delivered by some hateful asshat after they've been called on the essential hypocrisy of claiming to follow a person who said that the greatest of these is love and then spewing vile hatred at people different from them.

Now, I could explore the idea that one can separate a person from their actions, which is problematic at best. (Pro tip: if zie tells you zie loves you and continually treats you badly, it doesn't matter whether or not zie loves you, you're still being treated badly.) I could also ask how one could feel hatred for a person's actions without any of that hatred rubbing off on to how you feel about the person themselves.

I could do those things, but it would be a lot easier to simply show you how love the sinner, hate the sin actually works in the really real world.

The below all relates to the commercial above. If you can't watch the commercial, it's from the NBA. It shows basketball players trash talking each other until one of them uses "gay" as a pejorative, at which point various NBA stars unequivocally state that using "gay" as an insult is unacceptable and hurtful. It's quite well done.

Of course the evangelical Christians, who are, at this point, an organization solely devoted to oppressing gays and women, cannot handle this at all.

Watching the NBA semis and I cant believe I'm watching a commercial about not using the word "gay" because it's offensive to gays.

Wow

I can't believe how stupid you are. It is stated in the commercial, out loud, in words, small words, that it is using "gay" as an insult that is unacceptable. Using "gay" as a descriptive is still acceptable. You idiot.

The word "gay" actually originally meant "to be happy". Not sure how the word "gay" began to be used to describe homosexuals. But either way, forget the commercial's message. The gays and lesbians have to be told flat out that their behavior is sin, regardless of what the world says.

Actually, the word "gay" originally meant really, really (hetero)sexually active. So, word origin fail. As to the idea that gays need to be told that their behavior is a sin, (a) I'm sure they all know how you feel about it by now, and (b) I'm sure you'll be fine with me stopping by your house once a day to point out all of your sins, and, oh yeah, (c) not a sin. Get over yourself.

You can hardly watch any shows anymore where there is blatant display of gay talk and behavior. Is not like before where one guy just played to be gay for the funny part of it (the feminist acting that looked awkward funny in a guy) but now is about relationships, kissing, and beyond. And I am talking about just regular channels, not cable.

I have started watching shows where I thought they were really good but had to stop because I saw the direction they were going with.

Sigh....

It was totally okay to have gay people in public as long as they were the punchline of a joke, but gay people as real people doing what real people do? outrageous!

No gays? well we can go back to the word we used as kids - bundle of sticks.

Homosexuals are trying to whitewash our language so as to make their conduct "normal".

It will not work. Yes we can live peaceably with homosexuals. They are sinners just like us - in need of love and redemption.

But sin is still sin. And men will label it what they will. Even if they do not acknowledge the One who defines it.

I'm fairly certain one cannot live peacefully with someone who throws a temper tantrum when they can't call you names. I get the impression this entire group has a list of acceptable insults, starting with "n***er" and ending in "slut", and they cry every time they have to cross out a word.

If someone's named "Gay" can you still call her by her name?

Well, "John" is also a slang term for a prostitute's client and a toilet, can you still call someone named John, John? Clever: ur doin it rong.

Why is it wrong for NBA players to use gay slurs (and get heavily fined for doing so) because they are so worried about offending homosexuals, but its ok to blaspheme God regularly? I cringe every time I hear God's name used in vain. And I have heard players say it and seen them mouth it. I as a Christian am offended. Will the NBA make the players stop?

How backwards is that? When people are more worried about offending gays than God we are in deep trouble folks.

Maybe because the people using "Jesus Christ" as an expletive- assuming this is even true- are Christians themselves expressing frustration, not heterosexuals enforcing second class citizenship on homosexuals? Just a thought.

So if we are not supposed to refer to 'gays' as gays or homosexuals, what?? Surely they aren't advocating going back to the 'q " word, are they? I really hate using the word 'gay' for them because when I grew up 'gay' was a good, 'happy' word. My sister's middle name is Gay, and I had a friend whose first name was Gay. Anyway, just commenting.

You know what word would solve your problem? None. Just refer to people by their names, like you would anyone else. Solves the whole problem.

Okay, I have the solution - let's call them what G-d calls them . . . ABOMINATION

Yeah, that same god called dashing infant's heads against rocks a good thing.

You know, I realized why I'm having trouble writing my book. The main character is supposed to stop the Apocalypse and save mankind. Quite frankly, the more of this sort of thing I read, the more I think, "Let it all burn." Then I read this, from Charles Barkley, and I feel better.

"First of all, every player has played with gay guys," Barkley said. "It bothers me when I hear these reporters and jocks get on TV and say: ‘Oh, no guy can come out in a team sport. These guys would go crazy.’ First of all, quit telling me what I think. I’d rather have a gay guy who can play than a straight guy who can’t play.”

Barkley went on to say that he believes every professional athlete has had a gay teammate.

“Any professional athlete who gets on TV or radio and says he never played with a gay guy is a stone-freakin’ idiot,” he said. “I would even say the same thing in college. Every college player, every pro player in any sport has probably played with a gay person."

It was revealed on Monday that former Villanova basketball player Will Sheridan told his teammates that he was gay during his career.

Barkley told Wise that gay players pose no problem and said, "we need to outlaw guys who suck at sports.”

Thank you, Mr. Barkley. I needed that.

How to Tell You Are Not a Feminist

2011-05-26T08:42:00.000-04:00

I've seen 1,000 word explanations of feminism, but as the Princess of Pithy, I can boil that down for you into one sentence: Feminism is the belief that men and women are equal.

That's simple, right? Men and women, we are equal. Anything else associated with feminism- control over fertility, criticism of media treatment, concerns about representation in power structures- flows from that simple, defining belief.

Determining whether or not you are a feminist or whether an organization is inherently feminist, is equally simple. Do you promote actions or ideas that treat women and men equally? Does the organization act in a way that results in women and men being treated equally?

If not, neither you nor the organization are feminist. You may wish to be a feminist, but if you don't hold to that belief, you are not. Go find another word. This is not to say that feminism is a monolith and that all feminists believe all the same things. I've heard equally good arguments for and against pornography and sex work from feminists I admire equally. I've heard some fairly silly arguments regarding subjects like wearing colours and skirts* from feminists I otherwise admire. However, even those arguments are within the framework of equality for all sexes**.

For example, is the Catholic Church feminist? The short answer is "no, what the hell is wrong with you?", but you probably didn't stop by for the short answer, and I'm stumped on what happens next in my book, so I'll ramble on a bit.

If you're not familiar with the Catholic Church (hereinafter "RCC"), even a cursory examination of the structure and teachings of the RCC is enough to show it is inherently misogynistic. Men rule the RCC. From priest to cardinal to bishop to pope, the entire power structure is exclusively male. Only men can lead worship services, only men can make policy decisions, only men speak for God. Women have two roles, and both those roles are in service to men: wife/mother and nun.

This is not feminism.

The policies of the RCC flow directly from this misogyny. Women are not allowed control over their bodies, and are fully expected to die in difficult pregnancies and to bear the child of their rapist, even if that rapist is their father, even if they are 9 years old. Women are fully expected to give up any possibility of a career and to bear one child after another until they no longer can. That is the role of women in the RCC and it will never change, because the policy makers will never be women.

This is not feminism.

Having established that, is it possible for a Catholic to be feminist, or for a feminist to be Catholic in good standing holding to the accepted teachings of the RCC? No. Logically, one could not embrace the above and be a feminist, simply because the beliefs of the RCC and feminism are mutually exclusive.

Now here's the thing about feminism: feminism does not promise you a rose garden. Even if feminism overcame all misogyny tomorrow, that doesn't mean every individual woman's life would automatically be perfect. Feminism seeks to remove artificial societal barriers keeping women lesser than men. Feminism does not require that each woman become a doctor or limit herself to two children or abort her rapist's baby. Feminism merely seeks to make those choices available to you. You are more than welcome to choose to be a stay at home mother, to have eleven children and to continue any pregnancy you wish, even if that means risking your own life in the process. I would not make those choices, personally, but I'm not you and I will support your right to make choices, even if I might personally find them bizarre or ill advised.

Basically, in the linked article above (and here, why make you scroll?) Simcha Fisher argues that because she takes advantage of certain advances earned by feminists, she is a feminist. Just soak that in for a minute.

What if I had to argue with the auto parts clerk to buy a headlight bulb, even though I was the one replacing it? What if the bank required me to get my husband’s permission for this and that? And what if I wore skirts because I’d be shunned if I didn’t, and not because I felt like wearing them?

Yeah, that would totally suck, right? That's the world many feminists lived in and worked so hard to improve. When my mother was in college, that was the world. Married women couldn't get credit in their own name, so she didn't. Female college students couldn't attend classes in pants. If you showed up to class in pants, you would be escorted out of the building. My mother is not 1,000 years old. This is very recent history.

So here's Simcha, aware of that history, grateful it is history and is simultaneously patting herself on the back for supporting an organization that is deeply misogynistic.

So what makes me a feminist? Some would say that all faithful Catholics are feminists, because the Church is the most pro-woman organization around: The Church honors and values the particular gifts of women, and demands that men treat women with dignity and even a little bit of fear. John Paul II famously called himself a “feminist pope”; and in practical terms, the Church has probably done more for the physical well-being of women around the world than any other charitable organization.

Catholics who are feminists recognize that, while so many true wrongs have been righted in the last 50 years, the poor treatment of women in America has just been displaced, not eradicated. So now, instead of corsets and disenfranchisement, we have widespread pornography, abortion, and abandonment of every kind. We have gained some necessary ground, but lost so much else that is valuable in the process. Most of my Catholic friends see the world this way.

Yes, pornography and abortion didn't exist until 1964, Simcha. JPII could have called himself a pink unicorn if he had wanted to, that wouldn't make it true. And you know what? I don't care what the RCC has done for women worldwide (health care missionaries? I'm not sure), as long as women are not allowed in the halls of power simply because they are women, the RCC is not feminist, and neither are you.

Find another word. "Feminist" is already taken.

*Admittedly, I wear skirts almost exclusively because I find them to be significantly more comfortable than pants, so maybe I just don't want to hear a feminist argument against skirts. Then again, I'm in favor of men having the option of wearing skirts (you'd think, given the, um, dangly nature of male genitals, that skirts would be the automatic male preference) as well, so I think I'm still falling within the equality test.

**We need to have a discussion about how limiting and exclusionary it is to discuss sex as if it is only male and female. There are those who fall outside the XX/XY paradigm, and it's hurtful to them to be constantly excluded from, quite literally, everything.

What Planet Do You Live On, and What's the Weather Like There?

2011-05-25T09:09:00.005-04:00

[Note: I can't log into blogger using Google Chrome, so I'm stuck using Explorer. Blech! Anyway, I'm used to blogger spellchecking as I write the same way MSWord does, and as far as I can tell, I'm going to have to copy/paste this post into Word, do the spellcheck and then copy/paste it back. Charmingly, running the spellcheck in blogger while in Explorer just highlights the misspelled words, and if I knew how to spell them, I wouldn't have misspelled them in the first place. Anyway, fucking blogger.]

Every now and then, I come across a post from a fundy so removed from reality as I experience it that I have to ask, "What planet do you live on and what's the weather like there?"

Now, I could rip apart every word of this post, I mean, she refers to homosexuals as "sodomites"*, but what made me wonder if the internet now extends to alternate realities was this:

First, God reveals Himself to all mankind. We are all born with a knowledge of
God and a desire to seek and to serve Him. This is why it is so easy to guide a
child into a saving knowledge of God and a life of service to God. This is the
desire God puts into a child. However, the first step one takes down this road
is rejecting God. This is compounded when parents place their children into a
sociological morass called the public school. In the public school, Christ is
only mentioned as a part of a swear word, as a study of mythology or when the
Catholic persecutions are purported to be in the name of Christ (Christ never
encouraged anyone to convert another by force or at the edge of a sword).
Christianity is, in many schools, mocked and ridiculed by the evangelistic
secular humanist and her religion: evolution.

"Sociological morass?" I can't decide if the author, Randy Ross, is referring to all those brown kids rubbing up against his kids' delicate white skin, or maybe all the poor people spreading poor cooties or what. (If you've started with the word "sodomite" I'm just going to ahead and assume that you're a racist as well.) I mean, really, children being expected to interact with other members of society who may be the slightest bit different from them. It's outrageous!

As for Christ only being mentioned as part of a swear word, can you imagine? I can't. I have no idea what, exactly, Randy thinks goes on in public schools, but I can assure you public school teachers are not instructing students in new, blasphemous swear words. Honestly. It's so utterly ridiculous, I can't help but laugh, but I think he may sincerely believe this to be true. He really may believe that if he sent his kids to a public school, they would come home with a spelling list that included "fuck" and "Jesus H. Tap-Dancing Christ!".

That's what actual people in America actually believe about America. They live right next door to you and they vote.

My work will never be done, will it?

*It's Christian love, baby!

**I'd probably be a bit more successful in life if I channeled my talents into marketable avenues.

Too Serious for Numbers

2011-05-24T13:24:00.001-04:00

Hyperbole and a Half has clearly been there.

I'm not entirely certain why Christians, specifically Catholics, tend to be so against euthanasia. I didn't understand it while I was Catholic, and I don't understand it now.

Here, allow me to elucidate what euthanasia means to me. Saturday we celebrated my husband's birthday by going to the casino. He loves playing poker and he's good at it, we just don't generally have the $200 necessary to play at the casino. So his brother's birthday present was the $200 stake and his company at the tables. Initially, they were going to enter a tournament starting at 7pm, so we were going to go down at 5, hang out for 2 hours, then the rest of us would leave when they started the tournament. Through an unfortunate series of events, we didn't get there until 9pm, and I didn't get home until 3am. (He came home at 7am, enough up to pay for mastering his album, which is being released the second week of June. I do expect class participation in this project.)

After 6 hours spent on my feet at the casino (they don't have chairs for people not spending money), being up 5 hours past my usual bedtime and getting 4 hours of sleep after that, this was my week:

Sunday: I managed to get from the bed to the couch. I don't really remember Sunday except as a haze of pain.

Monday: The pain was worse, but I was more mobile and managed to take a shower. Mostly, I remember nausea and pain. And everything smelled funny for some reason.

Tuesday: The pain was somewhat better, but my skin felt like it was on wrong.

Wednesday: Delighted to discover my skin was back on right, not so concerned about the pain anymore.

Thursday: Back to a normal level of pain for me. Actually, I think I'm at the level of pain that had me calling the doctor for an emergency appointment, but after the preceding four days, it doesn't seem so bad anymore.

That's my life. What might be a little soreness and exhaustion for anyone else is a sojourn in hell for me. You know what keeps me going? I know that it will end. I know what the typical rebound time for me is. Well, typical rebound used to be one day of feeling not so bad, followed by two days in hell, but it's been years since I tried anything like that. But it does end, eventually. Even in the midst of pain so severe, I was left unable to really care for myself, I knew it would end. By "unable to really care for myself", I mean my husband was carrying me to the bathroom every so often because I couldn't form the proper intent to get there on my own.

If that were my everyday life with no end in sight, you'd better believe I would kill myself. Without hesitation and without apology. I love life, but that's not life to me. As much of an endurance challenge as formerly easy things can be to me anymore, there is still beauty and wonder in this universe for me, but not when I'm in that kind of pain. That kind of pain reduces the world to nothing more than screaming nerves and an overwhelmed brain that's not meant to take that kind of abuse. Imagine walking through a fog so thick you can't see your hand in front of your face. Now imagine that the fog is pain and you are pain and time is pain and the world is pain. Now imagine that is all that is left for you and then imagine what you would do.

If that sounds unreasonable to you, well, you haven't been there. I know Red Cardigan hasn't been there, because this is how she responds to quality of life concerns:

I first saw this article at a news site which allows comments, and the
comments were overwhelmingly in favor of suicide for the terminally ill, the
elderly, the handicapped, and anyone else who no longer enjoys "quality of
life," which is apparently defined by the ability to maintain a trendy home,
dash off on destination vacations, work long hours for the right sort of people,
and shop for cool toys and couture fashion at America's most
religiously-attended structures, otherwise known as shopping centers, malls,
strip malls, or misleadingly named "town squares"
(and this is off-topic, but the couple of times I've had the misfortune of
actually setting foot in that place linked to I have honestly felt like the
whole thing is frighteningly unreal in a rather evil way; but then, I'm a
writer, and thus prone to fits of imagination).

A part of me laughs. She is clearly more concerned with some [follows link] shopping center than she is with another person's screaming agony. On the one hand, most of us, including me, are more concerned with what affects us than with what affects another person we've never met. On the other hand, does she really think that people are stuffing a bag over grandma's head because she can't shop at Coach anymore?

A part of me screams with a rage that has few words. That part of me is still quaking in fear that last week will come back for me, that the all-encompassing pain will return and never leave and it will kill me before I stop breathing, and she's yapping on about shopping centers and being a writer?

Does anyone have words for that? What kind of monster are you, Red Cardigan, that you call a shopping center "unreal" and "evil" when there is suffering in this world, all around you, suffering with no release, not even a pause, suffering ended only by death? You ignore this and call it morality.

I don't even know what to say.

There Is No Why

2011-05-24T08:44:00.001-04:00

As soon as I saw what Stephen Hawking had to say about Heaven, I knew my reader would explode with articles denouncing, and completely misunderstanding, his words. For some reason, a large portion of Christians seem to think Hawking is the High Priest of Atheism and they must! denounce! him!

My reader did not disappoint. I could blog about nothing but theistic reactions to Hawking's thoughts from now until doomsday (December, 2012). I'll spare you the stoopid (see how nice I am?) and give you this one representative reaction:

I'm not the brightest bulb in the pack, but I missed something here. Hawking was asked about the value of knowing WHY we are here, and responded above about societies, survival, Darwin, yada yada. But what I'd like to know if, as he says, our very existence is "pure chance", WHY ARE WE HERE? Why should I care to seek the "greatest value of our action"? Why should my personal goals include the consideration of "our" anyway? And what if I belong to a society that isn't fittest? Wouldn't natural selection wipe out my goals, my greatest value of action anyway? I'm not being facetious here, either. If anyone out there wants to take a stab at WHY, from a Darwinian and atheistic point of view we're here, I'd like to know. It's only fair. I asked believers why doesn't God heal amputees. It's the nonbelievers turn.

Here's the answer: There is no why. That's it, really. There is no reason, no grand design, no plan, nothing. We are because we could be, and all things that could happen do happen at least once.

I know, right? It's so fucking mindblowing that we are not the center of the universe. We're just a speck of dust in the vastness of infinity and in the grand scheme of things, we matter not at all, except to ourselves. We could disappear off the face of the Earth right now and the vast majority of the universe wouldn't notice a thing.

It's okay. Just breathe. You'll be alright, I promise. I didn't say you didn't matter to anyone at all. I'm sure you do. And that's why you should seek out the "greatest value of [your] actions". Because to other humans, it does matter, and each other is all we have. There is no god to save us, no Armageddon to wipe the slate clean, so salvation and no glory. If you want good, you'll have to make it happen. Just you. And me.

We'll be okay. We always have been. You see, it's been this way the whole time. There was never a time when it wasn't just you and me. You may not have known it, but this is the way it always was and you got along just fine.

So take a deep breath and carry on with whatever it is you do.

Keeping the Boot on Your Throat, One Policy at a Time

2011-05-23T13:06:00.003-04:00

Capitalism: It's like this, only with more screaming.

Today, I would like to discuss credit checks during job applications. I don't bother to check my credit. Whatever the lowest score is, I've earned it. I've earned it, not through irresponsibility, most people don't, but through misfortune: illness, job loss, circumstance. I tried to pay my bills, I just couldn't. Because no matter what the finger waggers like to say, anyone faced with the choice of paying the credit card bill and eating will choose to eat. Unless you've starved yourself to death to pay off your student loans, don't lecture me.

The reason I got my present job through a temp agency is that temp agencies, at least around here, don't do background checks. Everyone else does. I applied for a bank teller position and was told that my credit score was the only thing preventing me from getting the job. Then I had the humiliating experience of explaining each and every entry to the interviewer, in detail. That was so much fun.

Good credit scores are for the wealthy, the healthy and the lucky. If you're poor, you don't have a good credit score. You couldn't. You will pay your bills late, and if you've been poor more than 6 months, you know exactly how long each utility will wait before shutting you off- and you pay your bills accordingly. I've heard the advice not to get a credit card, but that's just the tip of the iceberg. Gas has gone up, electricity has gone up, water has gone up, food prices have skyrocketed, but you know what hasn't gone up? Wages.

More and more people are living one paycheck away from absolute ruin and part of the problem is credit scores. It wouldn't do me much good to finish college, because I couldn't pass a credit check anyway.

And what's the logic? I have no idea. There's no correlation that I could find between poor job performance and poor credit, and what sort of people do they think are desperate to get a bank teller position paying a little over minimum wage?

It's just another way to keep the boot of the plutocracy to my throat and make sure I, and millions more like me, don't ever climb one rung up the ladder. The more of the pie I have, the less they have, and if you have to go through life with only three gold-plated yachts, what's the point, really?

Heads I Win, Tails You Lose

2011-05-23T08:39:00.003-04:00

At 6:01 on Saturday, May 21, my husband turned to me and said, "Well, we'll be seeing a lot of new atheists soon."

He's wrong. He's not totally wrong. I think the children of those who believed Camping and watched their parents lose everything to a rapture that never happened may end up questioning their faith, but the adults? No. For one thing, they're too invested in their belief. Once you've sold your home, quit your job and put down your dog for your beliefs, you're not backing down. For another, the Bible provides the perfect out for these people: Deuteronomy 18:20-22.

“But if any prophet presumes to speak anything in my name that I have not authorized him to speak, or speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet must die. 18:21 Now if you say to yourselves, ‘How can we tell that a message is not from the Lord?’ – 18:22 whenever a prophet speaks in my name and the prediction is not fulfilled, then I have not spoken it; the prophet has presumed to speak it, so you need not fear him.”

So, let me get this straight, predictions that do come true are from Yhwh, predictions that do not come true are not from Yhwh. Heads, I win, tails, you lose.

It's almost like the writer of Deuteronomy knew these sorts of things would happen- over and over again. Funny, that.

So don't expect that Camping's devotees will lose their faith along with their homes and jobs. They might, might mind you, stop listening to Camping, but their belief in god will remain unaffected.

Bonus Saturday Logic Fail

2011-05-21T08:14:00.001-04:00

From Rapture Ready, regarding rapture parties (we're having one tonight at 7. Homemade bruschetta and mussels in white wine sauce. Om nom nom nom!):

quote:

I am a little confused by what they are saying here. i read this article yesterday and couldn't help but to wonder certain things about what they are saying. First, they claim this is a win-win situation for them. That if we are raptured ,then they as athiests are not going? I don't know if they seem totally athiest or not. I mean they would have to believe it was possible for the rapture to happen first, before admitting they know they're not going. And if it does happen its like a new lottery winning for them. Does any one else find that weird or is it just me?

I guess what I am asking is, they don't really seem to completely reject the idea of the rapture, or God's existence, or anything? Just seem to be happy with their lives in sin and wanna make it easier for themselves after we're gone? And if they're not completely rejecting the idea of all this being possible there may be hope for them yet. I just found it weird. I apologize if how I described this didn't make much sense.

/quote

I assume this person can draw a unicorn or a dragon, right? well, I guess they believe such things exist, then. Mah brane, it hurts.

Wait, Is This Standard with Mail Deliveries?

2011-05-21T07:11:00.000-04:00

Cuz that would be awesome!

The Next Generation

2011-05-20T07:38:00.001-04:00

(posting from an iPod is a pain in my ass. also, autocorrect seems to want to make me antisemitic lately. the first stage of the AI's war against us is moderate social embarrassment, it seems.)

ugly link:

http://god-sdaughter.blogspot.com/2011/05/from-guys-viewpointjoshua-p.html

this is from a series the blogger is doing on modesty, asking young fundamentalist men she knows how they feel about modesty and women in general. this one is revealing of the rampant misogyny in the Christian fundamentalist culture.

quote:

When I see a girl who dresses a way that shows that she could care less about how she looks, I wonder to myself… “If she doesn’t care about the way she represents herself…what other areas is she purposefully lacking in…?”
But typically girls do worry too much…And it’s not their fault - they are built that way. A lot of times when a girl is nervous about the way she looks, she usually looks great! But she just needs confirmation from others.

/quote

yes, it has nothing to do with the culture we live in or the knowledge that asshats like you are judging our every lump, ripple and bulge. our tiny little minds are just wired for shoes!

quote:

8) What do you consider flirting and what do you think of a girl when she flirts with you?

For the most part, I find it sad; because I can’t fulfill her wishes of liking her. And I want her to be happy.

/quote

you can't like her because, um, gay? oh, no, that's not it. you'll see. he just can't like slutty sluts who flirt.

quote:

12) What is your view on college for girls?

If the girl intends to be a home schooling mom, I think the money could be used in a more wise way. House payment? Her kids college? First car?

/quote

yes, why would educating the person who will be educating your children be nearly as important as a car ?

quote:

16) A lot of guys like using sarcasm around girls…do you know why that is?

Because they have not matured yet. It’s a foolish thing to do, and will one day get them in trouble.

/quote

wut? oh, right if women are exposed to sarcasm after midnight, we turn into gremlins.

quote:

17) Do guys like it when girls are tomboyish or more girlie?

If I wanted a tomboyish wife…I could just be gay…it would be easier. Hahaha
Most defiantly a girlie girl; one who lets me open her door, loves twirling in a dress (P.S. I am fine with pants too) and loves being a lady.

/quote

yes, that's right kids, a woman who opens her own doors and doesn't twirl may as well have a penis. my husband, married to a woman who mows the lawn and uses power tools as often as possible is gay- and that is very bad.

in fact, fucking a person of the sex you aren't even attracted to would be "easier" than being with a woman who opens her own doors.

quote:

24) What is one thing that girls do that you hate?

There isn’t anything I could say that I hate, because even things like overeating too much are part of being human, and I do that too. So I am not the one to be judging.

/quote

of course he went straight for fatties. where else could he go?

this is the future of fundamentalist Christianity, folks. lovely, ain't it?

Kirk Cameron: You Only Love Hawking Because You Have To

2011-05-19T08:01:00.001-04:00

(I really just need to pay for the full apple blogger app, but for right now, I'm unable to link or format.)

You may have heard that Stephen Hawking has come right out and said that heaven is a fairy tale for people afraid of death. I, for one, wasn't surprised.

Kirk Cameron, of course, was and this is his response, the relevant portion, anyway:

quote

To say anything negative about Stephen Hawking is like bullying a blind man. He has an unfair disadvantage, and that gives him a free pass on some of his absurd ideas.

end quote

Isn't it fun being disabled? all the barriers and frustrations and even if you are the smartest man alive- possibly ever- people will reduce you to your disability and dismiss you as such.

Hey, Kirk! FUCK YOU. Stephen Hawking isn't a world reknowned physicist because we all chose to give the poor guy something to make up for being all weird and weak, but because he is smart and hard working. Unlike a certain failed sitcom actor whose big talent is having pretty blue eyes.

You asshole.

I Are Smart- and Edumacated!

2011-05-18T08:21:00.000-04:00

Sir Isaac Newton: I don't think he lived anytime recently. Or he was the bassist for a hair metal band.

I'd like to start this off with some facts. You may have heard of them, facts. They are things about which one cannot have an opinion. You may not like the facts, but they are as they are, how you feel about them doesn't change them.

Generally speaking, the more fundamentalist one is, the less educated one is and vice versa. It's a direct correlation: christian fundamentalism=low levels of education. This is no doubt the result of a complex interaction between the traits that create fundamentalism and the traits that prevent secondary education. Is this true for every fundamentalist? Of course not. Nothing ever holds true for every single individual. Well, okay, nobody can breathe in a vacuum. Other than that, of course there will be exceptions. However, it is not out of line to assume that a fundamentalist is poorly educated.

Generally speaking, as far as I can tell, there is some sort of correlation between being a christian fundamentalist and having a lower IQ. (That same research shows that the really smart people choose Shintoism, in case you were wondering.) Again, does this mean fundamentalist christianity causes IQ loss? No. It means that if you unquestioningly accept the literal truth of a book that starts with a talking, legged snake, you might not have the necessary reasoning capacity to see why that's a problem. It also does not mean that being a fundamentalist christian automatically means you have a low IQ. Again, on average. Some people fall outside of average.

So, why do I bring this up? Well, for one thing, if you're considering entering the wonderful wide world of Ponzi schemes, you need to know your target audience . . . no, wait, the Rapture Ready folks are all kinds of offended I think they're kind of gullible*.

Hi all. After reading some of the negative e mails posted in the interesting e mails section , I seem to see a common theme among those who are critical of christians, and what we believe. They seem to always assume that we are uneducated, easily manipulated people. This is a myth that we christians need to try and dispel.

Well, you could start by not saying jackass stupid shit about global warming and homosexuals. How about that?

Sir Isaac Newton, one of the most brilliant minds ever, was a pre trib , prophecy believing christian.

No, Newton would not have hung out at Rapture Ready. He lived in a slightly different time than we do now. Not that I think he really was a pretrib Christian. This pretrib stuff is relatively recent.

I met 4 people at an event this week, all avid christians, all with PHDs.

Pics or it didn't happen! Really, what was the event? Church? Doctors' Night at the local church? I can't even imagine what "avid" means in that context.

Although I myself am no genius, and I don't want to sound arrogant, let me state some of my accomplishments.

I don't mean to sound racist, but . . .

I have a BS in accounting, am an instrument rated pilot, an advanced open water diver, I had two scholarships in college, one academic, the other athletic (golf) and years later still carry a zero handicap.

What does your golf handicap have to do with your intelligence or understanding of science?

I became a christian after reading Hal Lindsey's Late Great Planet Earth, which led to a life long study of Bible prophecy. The liberal media seems to always portray christians as uneducated kooks. The bible states clearly that in the last days, the wise would be called fools, and fools would think themselves wise.

Oh, well if the Bible says it . . . the Bible says bats are birds.

The idea that you can dispel a myth from the mind of a fool is a lovely notion but the fact that they knowingly choose to do that which is not convenient tells us they already know it's a myth before they speak it.

Wut? Okay, I'll try again. We'll remove everything before the "but"

~~The idea that you can dispel a myth from the mind of a fool is a lovely notion~~ but the fact that they knowingly choose to do that which is not convenient tells us they already know it's a myth before they speak it.

The fact that they knowingly choose to do that which is not convenient?

Okay, we'll remove the "not convenient" and replace it with "inconvenient", maybe that will help.

~~The idea that you can dispel a myth from the mind of a fool is a lovely notion~~ but the fact that they knowingly choose to do that which is ~~not convenient~~ inconvenient tells us they already know it's a myth before they speak it.

Nope. There is no way to make heads or tails of that.

There are a great many very accomplished true believers. In the end, the world will mock us because it hates us. There are probably many true believers out there who were never able to go to school and are dirt poor, but none-the-less are significant in God's eyes, and probably in the eyes of anyone they offer assistance to during the course of their lives. We Children of God are very very fortunate, no matter how the world treats us.

I would imagine, being a case in point, that there were just as many, if not more, dirt poor nonbelievers without access to education.

I used to scuba dive when I was younger and single. Besides a few cold murky lakes and underwater caves, I've dived in the Mediterranean, all around the Island of Okinawa Japan, Guam, and the waters off of Florida.

Again, I fail to see what your leisure time activities have to do with your intelligence, though I am jealous of your travels.

I passed the MENSA entrance test when I was 16. Technically that makes me a 'genius'.

Personally, I think it just means Im good at taking tests. That skill does occasionally come in handy though.

Okay, I'll give you high scores for intelligence, though not for passing the MENSA test. A good many people don't seem to realize that intelligence tests aren't the best measure of intelligence.

these same people that mock Christians, media, movie "stars" and "movers and shakers" are heavily into Scientology. I mean, come on!

This "religion" was started by a guy who said he was going to start his own religion. And died in prison for his stupid worldly crimes. And the rules and regulations would rival the most superstitious of any pagan/space cult belief.

And don't even get me started on atheists! They think that they are their own god and they put their faith in people. People they know are weak and going to fail them, a lot. People whose moral center depends on that person's "moral standards" are. Which changes with the wind or flavor of the month.

All I am saying is, who is the ignorant one?!!!

Yes, last month I was totally into setting puppies on fire, this month I'm vegan. C'mon now.

Related to the OP there is the myth that Christians are weak and need a crutch to get through this life. When I hear this I just mention that Chuck Norris and Albert Pujols are Christians. Pretty much blows that theory out of the water.

Um, you do know those "facts" about Chuck Norris aren't actually true, right?**

I am a Christian and a lawyer

[insert lawyer joke here]

so I am no dummy, but that does not contribute in any way towards my salvation. Intelligence is just a gift from God much like any other talent, and as the others pointed out, it is no guarantee of wisdom or maturity. To me, atheists come across as whiny, boastful, and obnoxious, and they really don't tend to "play well with others."

If the Father has bestowed some talent upon you, then you ought to use it to glorify Him and not your own ego or theory of the universe.

But what if my talent is being whiny, boastful and obnoxious?

Also, sometimes I think that people who are atheists have just consistently gotten the dirty end of the stick all through life and never had anyone who really cared for them. So, I guess it is all the harder for them to understand how great the love of the Father is for them. Maybe that is why they are so unduly negative about everything. Just a guess.

Or maybe, just maybe, people aren't too friendly and perky after you call them whiny, boastful and obnoxious. Just a thought.

I have a BS Physics and am working on my MS Geophysics. Everything I studied in physics only supported or furthered my faith. I will admit, however, that I did have a crisis of faith when I started my geo courses. However, after some careful study of Genesis, I don't really see conflict between the Bible and geology either.

Translation: I had some cognitive dissonance and I couldn't handle it, so I changed how I interpreted the Bible until it went away.

I know for certain that a few of our physics faculty are Christians, as well a large portion of our science students.

You mean like most of the US? Shocking!

To assume that Christians are all stupid and uneducated is just stupid and uneducated.

Yes, however, see facts above.

Anyway, I've found that those who are atheists (or even just non-believers in general) are the same type of people who believe in spending borrowed money to get out of debt. Not exactly smart.

I . . . wut?

The OP noted that people bash Christians by saying that we are uneducated, easily manipulated people. Perhaps I'm reading too much into this (or simply substituting my own understanding of certain kinds of bashers), but I equate this with saying that Christians are of low intelligence, so hopelessly stupid that we just don't "get it" that Christianity is all a baseless pack of fables and lies.

When they say such things, they are actually insulting not Christians but all uneducated, easily manipulated people and/or people of low intelligence (not just those who are Christian). It's obvious that the bashers have an underlying hatred of Christianity, an a priori belief that Christianity is bad, or at least worthless. So, by associating those of lesser intelligence with Christianity they are really revealing that they are contemptuous of people who are not educated and/or not very intelligent.

Actually, that's not what I, or anyone I've seen make this argument in good faith, means. What we mean is simpler than that. I don't hate people who are less intelligent. I am not contemptuous of them, either. However, what I'd like to ask this person is, when you choose a doctor, are you hoping for the doctor who got straight As in medical school, or the person who skated by with the lowest possible score zie could graduate with?

Is this because you are contemptuous of people who are less intelligent? No, it's because you are putting your life in their hands and you want to put your life in the most qualified hands possible. Well, the same goes with choosing whom to believe about religion. Do I trust the person who can't tell the Colbert Report is satire or Steven Hawking? Does that mean I hate people who can't understand irony and satire? No. I'm still not going to spend my time fearing hell on their say so.

*I think I could sell them 4 armed sweaters on the basis of the fact that you get twice as many arms for 200% the price!

**My favorite: When Chuck Norris jumps into a lake, he doesn't get wet, the water gets Norrised.

On Accomodation

2011-05-17T08:23:00.003-04:00

Unless you're new here (welcome!) you've probably seen me whine about my horrible boss. He redefines asshole for a new millenium, but he is a family man. So, even though he's cut sick days completely and is forcing me to work 2.5 hours per week for free, he does make allowances for parents in the office.

Specifically, there are two secretaries that have children of school age and both are given what I would call accommodations. One is allowed to leave early to attend her daughter's sports games, the other leaves at 3:00 every day to pick up her children from school.

Some people in the office complain, rather bitterly, that these two are "special" and get "privileges". I don't see it that way. They have children. Those children require certain things of their parents, my boss is allowing the parents to provide those things. I don't need to leave early and when I do go home, nobody's clutching at my leg and wailing or asking me for $20 after telling me they hate me. (Children, they're awesome!)

This is how I see all forms of accommodation. Sure, people with handicapped tags get the cool parking spaces. You get to walk. I guarantee you you wouldn't trade for all the best parking spaces on Earth. Hey, Christians, do your Muslim coworkers get to take several breaks to pray*? Well, you get all your important holidays off without even having to ask! How cool is that?

Look, here's the thing about accommodation: yes, the person being accommodated is getting something awesome that you are not, but it's in exchange for their life being significantly more difficult in some way than yours. Persons with blindness get to bring puppies into restaurants- they also can't see the restaurant. Persons of colour can get into college with lower test scores**- and nobody ever assumed you were in a gang simply because of the colour of your skin.

Does that help any at all? I realize the analogy isn't perfect, but just a bit? Maybe?

*I have seen this complaint. As if anyone's having fun while they pray.

**I could write a book on why those test scores are lower, but I'm just going to say Racism, it's endemic! and leave it at that.

Inside a Man's Mind: Modesty, Part II

2011-05-16T07:49:00.002-04:00

Taken from here. Part I of my fisk here.

In my last post I described how I went from being completely oblivious to the issue of modesty to completely awestruck with how significant of a principle it is. I was "awestruck" for a number of reasons.

QUOTATION MARKS ARE NOT DECORATIONS.

First of all, I wondered how I could have lived 21 years of my life without once considering whether or not there was a right and wrong when it came to dress.

No, you did not. I imagine you knew that some items of clothing are considered appropriate to some situations where others are not. Stop lying.

Secondly, I was amazed by the beauty of it all.

Can we say "fetish", children?

As you may recall, in my last post I recounted my first encounter with my future wife and her sister sitting across the room from me at a scripture study and what my initial reaction was to their appearance. In my ignorance, I could not conceive of any rational reason that would drive two young ladies to show up to a college scripture study in ankle length, floral pattern jumpers.

Neither can I. There are so many ways to be modest without resorting to something that hideous, if the Muslim women in my area are any guide.

Not only had I never seen anyone don such apparel,

or "wear jumpers"

I honestly didn't know if I ever cared to see it again - not because it was displeasing to my eye, but because it was displeasing to my heart. Why you ask?

I just assumed it was because jumpers are tragic.

Look, I went to Catholic schools growing up. I wore jumpers in blue plaid, jumpers in grey plaid, jumpers in brown plaid and jumpers in green plaid. They're horrid items of clothing, uncomfortable and unflattering. If there is a dress code in hell (assuming hell exists, of course) it involves jumpers.

Seeing them "set apart" in their dress made me uncomfortable - more uncomfortable that I cared to admit at the time. I was used to the short shorts, the tight tops, and the form fitting everything else. I had become much too well acquainted with this sort of revealing dress and if I would have been honest with myself, I would have confessed that it had done nothing but aid in the development of many of the vile affections that then abided in my heart.

Bitches always tempting me! I am a man, I should not be held responsible for my thoughts, feelings and actions, damnit!

Scanning the room that night, my eyes came into contact with something that absolutely shook the foundations of my pitiable understanding concerning the issue of dress.

I can just imagine that moment. Don't you feel like this is what happens when Tim Gunn sees the perfect dress made of garbage bags and dead sewer rats? ("This week, you'll be making a business suit using only broken dreams and empty promises.")

As it was, however, I quickly took shelter in counsel of my heart (not the safest place to be) and reemerged from this cellar like nothing had ever happened.

Dude, you know, I love me some clothes, but wtf is wrong with you? I've seen less overwrought descriptions of visions of Hell.

To be sure, I could not deny that there had been an earthquake, but it hadn't phased me. Strange that it even shook me at all. And so, I settled myself by allowing a single word to characterize what I had seen - weird. Case closed. Back to the real world.

It was strange that an earthquake shook you?

Fast forward almost a year later and I was to discover that this earthquake had aftershocks like you wouldn't believe. Passing through the room of this same scripture study, I spotted one of these young ladies (Caroline in this instance) sitting meekly in the corner and the words came to my mind so clearly, "That is the sort of woman you ought to marry."

Meek: Easily imposed on; submissive. Yeah, aren't you just a pleasant fellow.

I had come a looooong way - from "weird" to to wedlock. Now, what I would have you to understand is that I wasn't contemplating marriage on account of what Caroline was wearing, but how she wore it. Her clothing was modest, yes, but more importantly, she was modest. This was what I had but dimly apprehended at the first. My wife was not wearing jumpers because she liked them (she didn't and still does not)

That is so sad. I can understand having standards of dress. I can understand having difficulty finding clothes you like, or that fit or that you can afford. But to where clothes you hate when you could be wearing clothes that make you happy- it's like eating only cream of wheat and never anything with flavor, on purpose.

or because she believed them to be particularly fashionable (they passed out of vogue, oh, some 30 years ago), but because she felt that they were accessory to a modest spirit (that, and they were all her mother could sew at the time, it being very difficult to find anything in the department store agreeable to modest deportment.)

Couldn't she or her mother find another pattern, or visit another store? I see plenty of modestly dressed women during my day and not a one of them is dressed in a jumper. There's no reason for that other than to mark yourself out as being loudly modest.

Here follows a very long, very ignorant discourse on why jumpers are good, but hijab and plain are bad. If you can make heads or tails of it (other than "things I like are good, things I don't like are bad") please let me know.

Then comes this:

After meeting Caroline and her family, I was introduced to quite a few other ladies who were careful and considerate of their appearance - not too be revealing with the clothing they wore. Not all of them were modest. The one's that were the most modest in their dress were, in many instances, the least modest, if you follow me.

It's not enough to put on a jumper and assume you're good enough for me! You're going to have to work harder than that!

I could go on and on about why I think this is, but I shan't, for the Modest Mom says I should draw this post to a close.

When the meekly meekest meek woman tells you to shut the fuck up, you really need to shut the fuck up.

I hope you will not take my comments as license to dress like everyone else for they are in no way intended to encourage such a course, for although it is possible to be truly immodest while modestly dressed, it is impossible to be immodestly dressed and truly modest.

I think they may require some sort of chart to follow.

No, my post is intended to encourage the cultivation of a modest spirit and all that it implies - and yes, this process involves taking a good hard look at your standards of dress and adjusting them if necessary (whether you dress modestly or not).

So . . . if I'm dressing modestly, I need to adjust my manner of dress until I am modest? lolwut?

In the end, modest clothing does not the Modest Mom make, but they are an appendage unto her.

What kind of appendage? An arm, a leg, oooh! Is it a tail? Wing? Are wings appendages?

If it were merely modest clothing that adorned my wife when first I met her, I would have dismissed her taste in clothes as sadly misinformed by some obscure, puritanical interpretation of scripture. As it was, however, she wore a meek and quiet spirit which was, and is, of great price in the sight of God, and it had the blessed effect of drawing me nearer to my Savior.

Ugh. I would hope you found your wife special. You did marry her, after all.

Inside a Man's Mind: Modesty, Part I

2011-05-13T13:07:00.005-04:00

(sigh. I already wrote this post and then blogger killed it, so, you know.) A man's view of modesty:

I wanted to rehearse for you how I first became acquainted with the principle of modesty, how it radically altered my perspective concerning women in general, and how it has continued to shape my interaction with them.

"Rehearse"?

To be brief, my first exposure to modesty (not sure those two words are comfortable in the same sentence)

I SEE WHAT YOU DID THERE.

was upon seeing my future wife and her sister sitting across the room at a scripture study at college. I was 20 years old and I believe I can honestly say that the issue of modesty had never crossed my mind - ever. I hadn't, up to that moment, paused to consider if there was a right and a wrong when it came to dress, much less the behavior which endues our appearance with a particular spirit.

Really? You never considered if there were a right and a wrong when it came to dress? Not ever? So you felt perfectly free to wear saran wrap to a wedding, huh? C'mon now.

So, there they were, meekly

Get used to that word, "meek(ly)". He likes it. A lot.

seated across the room from me, completely separate in their attire from every other young lady in the room, very nearly glowing in their probity, and I had the thought come to me, "Those girls are just plain WEIRD."

". . . glowing in their probity"? You know, I have a permanent crick in my neck from looking sideways at this sort of writing, as if it might help to view them from a 45 degree angle. It doesn't.

Perhaps not the epiphany you were expecting. Something significant, though, had happened to me, something which set the stage for the cluster of revelations which were to come regarding this issue - I had actually seen modesty, and everything it implies, with my own eyes.

Dude, it's a woman in a jumper, not the Ark of the Covenant. Calm down.

Strange as it was to my carnal mind at the time, it was undeniable in its distinctiveness - that is, there were definite, purposeful motivations driving the young ladies to dress as they did, and in the nearly abandoned, certainly neglected center of my heart, I knew it.

Or they have no sense of style. Pick one.

It would take me another year or so to acknowledge this and summon the courage to ask at least one of the young ladies - WHY?

WHY ARE YOU SUCH A FREAK?!*

If I shared all of what transpired on this little journey of my mine, it would make for lengthy reading.

Considering the length of the two posts he wrote on the subject, I can only imagine what he considers length- long. Long is a fine word. I never met an adverb I didn't like and you're pissing me off.

Suffice it to say that only God could have arranged matters in such a way that a year later, I found myself the head of a small group study with a certain young lady assigned as one of my "students."

Yes, because in a small city with a limited number of people meeting your definition of Christianity it is absurd that you would run into her again. The odds were like, what, 95% that you would? Had to be god. Also, the sarcastiquotes around student make me uncomfortable. "Oh, yeah, she was quite a student, yes she was."

I expect it is rare when a teacher learns more from his student than she from him, but such was my experience over the course of the next few months.

No, this is a fairly common sentiment among teachers.

I am not ashamed to admit this, but I sat at my future wife's feet that semester and was schooled in the ways purity.

Is there any part of this story that isn't going to sound like poorly written BDSM erotica?

She never would have done this had I not been so inquisitive. By this time, the thought in my heart concerning her appearance had greatly matured from "strange" to "I absolutely must know why this lovely young lady dresses, no, more than dresses, IS the way she is! What scriptural exegetic is she tapping that drives her to live thus?!" I was transfixed by her "way of life" and I absolutely had to get to the "why" and "what for" behind it. Her answer came with a gentle and quiet confidence, "It's really quite simple..."

And it is, and always will be.

Look, I'm not going to question what attracts one person to another. You may look at a square-jawed, clean shaven GQ sort with neatly cut hair and think "Hot!" while I'm salivating over the guy with the stubble and the unkempt hair and the dirty jeans and that's okay. There's no right or wrong to it.

So I don't care that jumpers turn this guy on. More power to you, buddy. What does bother me, among other things, is this apparent assertion that his turn on is a commandment from god we should all be following.

You see, as I scheduled a curious number of group "discussions" that semester,

Was it 7? I've always thought that 7 was a particularly curious number.

I took the opportunity to probe Caroline

LOL!

concerning the decisions she had made concerning her walk with God. Nearly all of her decisions could be viewed as accessory to her decision for modesty.

So I guess she wasn't helping the poor or comforting the sick, huh?

In other words, her decision for modesty governed her decisions in many other areas of Christian import. Having said that, modesty itself is an appendage to femininity and femininity to godliness.

Hee! I'm so feminine, I'm lucky I haven't transmogrified into Barbie and I'm an immodest atheist. But thanks for the diesel dyke reference there.

Caroline never came right out and said this, (would never have even thought it) but what I kept hearing throughout our discussions was, "I am a woman, made in the image of God, and if you were a true man of God, you would treat me, with all dignity and honor, according to the rights and privileges afforded to me by my Creator."

The right to wear ugly clothes and the privilege to be submissive to men.

This was completely new to me. I just thought that, well, I'm not sure what I thought about women. With a few notable exceptions (my mother, grandmother, precious few church women) seeing women aspire to and attain unto every role men traditionally displaced was all that I had ever known.

Fucking bitches, thinking they can be doctors and lawyers and mow the lawn and fix the leaky toilet! How dare they? I have a penis, damnit, and I should get to be superior to half the population just by an accident of birth. Why should I have try at things and earn people's respect and praise? Whores!

Even most of the dwindling number of housewives in my experience looked and acted like feminine men with slightly longer hair.

Given that men and women are both human, what exactly is the difference other than that, really? I mean, what do you want? Oh, right, jumpers. Submission. Meek.

Yet here I was was talking with a woman who hadn't the slightest desire to look, act, or compete with, me. And bless God, it affected her appearance (for the better I might say ; ).

Hur! Ugly feminist lesbos, hur!

Side note: remove "or compete" and what he said was "look or act with me". Okay then. I can see why you wouldn't want me in the game with you. I'd trounce you in the first five seconds and spend the rest of the time making fun of your shirt.

That's really what it is, what all this boils down to, isn't it? He knows he's not the smartest person around, not the most accomplished, probably a bit lazy, and it just grates on him, all those women outshining him effortlessly. Don't they know he's better than they are? Don't they know that having a penis is supposed to be an automatic win? Sluts.

Now, hear me, I have no desire to disparage any of the other young ladies that I attended the scripture study with for I believed, and still believe them to be sincere in their devotion to Christ and they blessed me in many ways.

But they are ugly and probably lesbians.

When I think of my wife, however, in chastity, virtue, and yes, modesty, my heart can only borrow the words of King Lemuel's mother, "...but thou excellest them all." It was on account of these undeniable qualities which my eventual wife exhibited that completely captivated my heart, and I, with much trembling, resolved to win her.

It proved only to be the beginning.

Read that last line in movie guy voice. It's awesome.

Wait until I snift? no. fist? no. oh, fisk, that's right. Part two. Most of it is a bizarrely ignorant rant about Muslims and the Amish. Yes, the Amish.

*Sorry, I'm eating falafel in a pita as I type this, which apparently makes me a bit shouty. OM NOM NOM NOM.

I Had These Posts . . .

2011-05-13T13:04:00.001-04:00

They were fabulous! And now they are gone. As soon as I get over that, I may write something.

Women Can't Learn, but We'll Take Your Money Anyway

2011-05-11T12:40:00.003-04:00

I have the Maxwell's blog in my reader. They're . . . odd. They're a roving band of fundamentalist musicians. The men dress normally, in khakis and golf shirts and the women wear these hideous jumpers and long sleeved, high necked shirts. It is tragic. They do things like travel through Idaho into Canada in the beginning of April*, and then get all surprised when they run into every different description of trouble with the weather and their old tour bus, delightfully named Uriah- including sinking into the pavement in a small town in Canada.

Recently, one of the Maxwell boys has launched a new venture, ITonRamp.com. It didn't come up in my reader capitalized like that, so I read it as iTronramp** and thought, "Is there nothing Apple can't do?" (Imagine my disappointment.) What exactly ITonRamp is, I couldn't tell you.

I guess it has something to do with this:

Ponder the path of thy feet, and let all thy ways be established.
Proverbs 4:26

hmmm.

Well, how about this:

IT (computer-related) work has been a great blessing to our sons, giving them vocations that have allowed them the means to purchase their homes debt free. We are excited that ITonRamp will give other young people these same opportunities without having to leave home for their education.
Steve and Teri Maxwell
Titus2.com

Well, I guessed it was IT work, computer-related doncha know, but "without having to leave home" is very fundilicious. See, lots of secular training programs like to advertise "from the comfort of your own home!", so perhaps this strikes you as normal. No, no, no, This is a dog whistle and a half. This means "without having to go to a college and meet people with different beliefs and become a gay atheist prostitute muslim!"

So, they teach you computer stuff. Lots of people do that. What makes this specia- wow, look at that!

What makes ITonRamp unique? Instead of using just "instructors," we employ mentors. A mentor is someone with a verified skill-set in the area they are teaching. In addition, they have lives founded on the Lord Jesus Christ.

Instructors? Fuck your instructors! Ivy League white tower socialfasciislamoatheists, they are! And elite, they are elite! We have mentors. Mentors are just like instructors ~~without any kind of certification~~ and they love Jesus! Jeeeesus!

Because that's what's important when I want to learn computer stuff.

Actually, it's very important as demonstrated by the faq:

To teach computer skills, foundational and beyond
To equip for immediate income generation
To develop life skills
To prepare for service
To accomplish this in a Christ-centered learning environment without having to ingest humanistic, ungodly information in pursuit of a career or diploma.

Humanistic ungodly facts, yo! Don't ingest them!
And how will they prevent this ingestion of humanistic ungodly comestibles?

By furnishing carefully chosen curriculum that is consistent with Christian ideals and is conducive to learning. If that means tearing pages out of a textbook or writing new curriculum, we have and will do it.

This is an IT course, mind you. It's been a while since I took any computer courses, but I don't recall, well, anything that would require removal by a fundy. Are del tags an abomination before the lord? Honestly, purely in the field of IT, can anyone think of anything that would be offensive enough to a fundy that they would have to remove it from a textbook entirely?

What about the wimmenz? Can they learn computer stuff? Well, sorta.

Young women will also find ITonRamp courses useful. It can be a struggle to productively stay busy as young women wait on the Lord for a marriage partner. It is not our goal to provide a career as such for young women, but to help them be productive with their time as the Lord Jesus directs. IT work can give excellent opportunities to earn significant self-employed income in a safe, non-corporate environment and have skills that will facilitate a future marriage, especially if the future husband is self-employed.

Only in the sense that it might help you get married, honey. We wouldn't want you out there in the dangerous corporate world wearing pants or something.

How much does this cost? $200 for the Home Track course for the wimmenz and $1,000 for the A+ Track.

And for that you get . . . mentors. and ripped up books. and mentors. but wait!

Whoa, so some guy is going to be spending time on the phone with my twenty-one-year-old daughter “mentoring” her? I don't like the sound of that!
At this point we anticipate the mentors to be men. To enable propriety and no possibility of defrauding, direct phone conversations will be from a person of the same gender. Therefore, if there are ladies in a track, the phone call to them will be via a female mentor assistant. The mentor assistant will not have the technical experience that the mentor has, but she will provide the one-on-one personal encouragement that the mentor would have provided.

So, if you're a guy, you get a phone call from someone who actually (he says anyway) has the knowledge to help you. If you are a woman, you'll get a phone call from a woman who has no idea about computery stuff, but she is encouraging. Because why ask for knowledge when you can get "Jesus loves you!"? Is there some reason the mentor assistant can't ask an actual mentor the question and then relay the answer to the woman in question?

The question itself is, of course, amazing. So, my adult daughter will be ON THE PHONE with being "mentored"? Men can't even control themselves on the phone now? She can't hang up the phone if gets fresh? She can't enjoy him being fresh?

le sigh.

*For Idaho and Canada, April is still solidly winter.

**I finally saw the new Tron and loved it. LUH. I know it was panned, but the visual spectacle was outstanding, and what else are you expecting from Tron?

But It's Natural!

2011-05-11T08:38:00.003-04:00

I'd like to start with a quote from my mother on natural childbirth (she had four children, three of them without medication because she had serious reactions to the medications given to her during her first delivery): You don't see men singing the praises of natural heart surgery, do you*?

So I have a good background in being suspicious of the claim that "natural" means safer and more effective. (Arsenic is quite natural!) And, if you're chronically ill (sing it, denelian!), you get to spend a lot of your time hearing all about this natural thing and that natural thing that's going to make you all better. My eyes, they are still rolling from last time.

Natural Therapies for Allergies

full disclosure: I seem to have allergies for the first time ever this year. The pollen counts in Northeastern Pennsylvania are epic this year, and my husband, who always has allergies, is really suffering. He's never gotten any relief from Zyrtec or Claritin or any of that, so I'm coming from the perspective of someone who's never seen that anything works for allergies.

Dealing with allergy symptoms throughout the year can have a considerable impact on your life, making it hard to function at work and at play.
Allergy relief medications can help, but some have side effects such as drowsiness that may make it even harder to function. An alternative approach to allergies is to try natural therapies, including herbs, nasal rinses, and certain foods.

Keep the side effects thing in mind.

Natural remedies that help keep your allergies in check can empower you to take charge of your health, says Moshe Lewis, MD, chief of the division of physical medicine and rehabilitation at the California Pacific Medical Center, St. Luke's Campus in San Francisco.

Zyrtec: not empowering. Herbs: empowering. No particular reason, it just is.

However, some natural therapies, such as herbs, come with their own list of side effects, and they can be toxic if you take too much. “People can be deceived into believing that if it’s natural, it’s safe,” Dr. Lewis says. The goal is to take small amounts of herbs to get the effects you’re looking for.

So, herbs better why?

Lewis recommends consulting with a naturopath or a homeopathic physician if you plan to try herbs for allergy relief. It’s also vital to tell all of your doctors about the herbs you’re taking, because natural remedies could interfere with any drugs you’ve been prescribed, both for allergies and other conditions.

Feel free to also consult a brick wall, a shoe or my dog. They are all as much experts as a naturopath or a homeopath.

The first suggestion is nasal irrigation and a saline spray. That's good advice in my limited experience. Nasal irrigation works to some degree for my husband and I'm getting relief from the saline spray.

Butterbur. Extracts of butterbur are going head-to-head with antihistamine products on the market, Lewis says. In a study of 330 people who were given either butterbur extract, the antihistamine fexofenadine (Allegra), or a placebo, extracts of the herb worked as well as Allegra at relieving allergy symptoms. Another study found butterbur extract to have similar effects to the antihistamine cetirizine (Zyrtec).

The herb helps get rid of mucus and has been used to treat asthma and bronchitis. There’s some concern that if butterbur is from the same family of ragweed it could trigger allergies, but that’s only in theory, Lewis says. Butterbur does have side effects, including the possibility of drowsiness, headache, and an upset stomach. Lewis recommends taking butterbur in extract form.

Drowsiness, headache and an upset stomach are the side effects of most antihistamines, as well. So, basically, if butterbur actually does work as well as Zyrtec, it's the exact same thing. Same results, same side effects. At best, natural remedies are the same as "unnatural" medications.

Stinging nettle. The jury is still out on whether stinging nettle provides allergy relief. A small study found that it might help relieve symptoms, but more research needs to be done. If you try stinging nettle, be sure to consult your doctor before taking it. As with butterbur, Lewis recommends taking nettle leaf in extract form.

You shouldn’t take stinging nettle if you’re pregnant or give it to young children. And if you take a blood pressure medication, a blood thinner, or a diuretic, or you have diabetes, be sure to talk to your doctor before you take stinging nettle.

No proof that it works, more dangerous than Zyrtec. (The children's dose of Zyrtec is the same as the adult dose. So you can give Zyrtec to children.)

Quercetin. The flavanoid quercetin, which is the phytochemical that gives fruits and vegetables their color, has been found to block the release of histamine in test tube studies. Research hasn’t found definitively that quercetin can help with allergy symptoms in people. However, getting plenty of quercetin in your diet from apples, berries, grapes, squash, greens, and sweet potatoes certainly doesn’t hurt, Lewis says.

Yes, I agree that eating fruits and vegetables is good, but it's not doing anything for your allergies. Fruits and vegetables are basically all I eat.

Spicy foods. Turning up the heat of your food with horseradish and chili peppers can act as a decongestant and clear away the mucus that’s been building from allergies. If you like spicy food, this may be the most enjoyable approach to allergy relief.

Srsly? Soup has the same effect. So does a shower or swimming. This isn't allergy relief, this is a runny nose.

*If you think I'm snarky, my mother invented snark.