Happy Labor Day folks. Take it easy, but take it.
• Rod Dreher's going on again about how the atheists are persecuting the Christians. (The casus bellow this time is, two years ago Vanderbilt University kicked a Christian student org off-campus because they wouldn't sign a non-discrimination agreement.) This is from Dreher's gloss on some other Jesus freak:
He goes on to say that Christians — the untame ones – need to learn how to deal with the coming scorn with “a disregard which quickly turns the pathetic instruments of stigmatization into jewelry and art.” Why were the martyrs joyful? Because they were confident that from their suffering, new life would emerge. So too should we be...Dreher, as you may know, lives off writing and royalties and is always fucking off to Paris. Some martyr! When they send the lions after Dreher I can see him trying to throw them off the scent with a coq au vin. "But it's free range" will be his last words.
“Blessed are you when they persecute you and speak all manner of evil against you.” What if we lived as if that were true?
Believe it or not, though, there's someone worse on this subject. Well, we can't be too surprised, it's Erick Erickson in the tertiary stage of whatever's wrong with him:
A lot of Christians have long thought they could sit on the sidelines. Only the icky evangelicals they don’t much care for and the creepily committed Catholics would have to deal with these issues and the people who hate those deeply committed to their faith. They, on the other hand, could sit on the sidelines, roll their eyes, and tell everyone that they didn’t think it was that big a deal. They were, after all, on birth control or watching whatever trendy HBO series is on or having a cocktail or perfectly willing to bake a cake for a gay wedding.Do conservatives never drink cocktails? Or are my cheap beers now rendered "cocktails" just because I, a filthy liberal, am drinking them? Well, I always suspected P.J. O'Rourke was full of shit.
...You may think you can sit on the sidelines. You may think you can opt-out of the culture war. You may think you can hide behind your trendy naked Leena Dunham t-shirt while you sip trendy drinks talking about trendy shows and writing columns demanding Christians be forced by the state to bake cakes, provide flowers and farms, and offer up photographs of gay weddings. But not only will you one day be called to account to your God...Yeesh. Here's a serious question: Does this sound like a spiel you'd expect from a movement that was gaining adherents? (Also: Did someone actually show Erickson this shirt? Well, at least his friends have a sense of humor.)
UPDATE. In comments, right out of the gate, (the good) Roger Ailes: "I think Eerick Eerikson could pull off a trendy naked Leena [sic] Dunham tee-shirt. And by pull off, I mean masturbate into."
• But I thought conservatives loved it when businesses got tax breaks to promote job growth... oh, it's communist TV shows, nevermind. Key phrases from Dennis Saffran's City Journal article: "contemporary progressivism is an upper-middle-class movement that caters to the social libertarianism of coastal elites," "crony capitalism," "corporate welfare," etc. Key missing phrase from his article: "trickle-down."
I think Eerick Eerikson could pull off a trendy naked Leena [sic] Dunham tee-shirt. And by pull off, I mean masturbate into.
ReplyDeleteIt strikes me that those cartoon shapes of Lena Dunham in Roy's link look amazingly like the sexy New Yorker cartoons of the 40s and 50s, the ones in which zaftig women are being ogled by elderly mustachioed and top hatted lotharios. Alas that modern standards have fallen to such an extent that EE can't get his rocks off with her.
ReplyDeleteAlso, and what I really came here to say, is that I can't even with these assholes. But at least the thought of Rod Dreher being devoured alongside his coq au vin was good for a laugh.
ReplyDeleteLena is the new Hilda (slightly NSFW).
ReplyDelete“Blessed are you when they persecute you and speak all manner of evil against you.” What if we lived as if that were true? Yeah Rod, What if? I don't think Rod will ever find out, because he'll be too busy freaking out the next time someone wished him a happy holidays.
ReplyDelete"But not only will you one day be called to account to your God..."
ReplyDeleteYeah, God's going to throw you into Hell for the abomination of watching and talking about a popular TV show.
"But not only will you one day be called to account to your God"
ReplyDeleteI'm now imagining Black Jesus meeting Ewick at the pearly gates and pimp-slapping him into the next goddamn *galaxy*.
“Blessed are you when they persecute you and speak all manner of evil against you.” What if we lived as if that were true?
ReplyDeleteWhat if we lived as if we weren't whiny paranoid adolescents? What if we lived as if we weren't fundamentally intellectually dishonest and entirely full of shit? What if we lived as if the purpose of our ostensible religious piety weren't to use it as a cudgel against a world that we feel doesn't appreciate us enough? HA HA. JK!
Do conservatives never drink cocktails?
ReplyDeleteWell, I happen to have my 2008 Elitism Index laying around here somewhere. Maybe that has something. Let's see...
Alcohol - Spirits
While the risk of liberal elitism when consuming spirits is greater than with beer, it is still acceptable for conservatives providing they follow certain standards of conduct. First, one must never consume liquor that costs more than $17 / quart (your local liquor vendor will help you convert from the heretical metric system favored by many distillers). Second, if you plan to combine it with a non-alcoholic mixer (a compound known as a "cocktail"), be wary - many combinations are innately liberal. To be safe, never use anything but cola or orange juice, which are less likely to form elitist compounds. If you find yourself desiring more cocktails after your first one, or if your taste for beer begins to fade, report to your local elitism detox (Index F) for an immediate analysis.
If you happen to live in a liberal neighborhood (Index B-II), you may occasionally be invited to a social gathering at which cocktails are prepared and served. These "cocktail parties" are the primary means of communication among liberals, surpassing even the telephone, email and the CBS Evening News. While you may be tempted to turn down such an invitation for fear of elevating your elitism levels, don't fear - these events are wonderful opportunities to destroy liberals with your superior conservative wit. See Clothing - Social Functions for further advice on preparing for your endeavor and Technology - Internet - Blogs to learn how to disseminate true tales of your victory.
Well, I thought I could opt out of the culture war by wearing slacks and a button-down and drinking a gin & tonic and insisting on the separation of church and state. But somehow that doesn't get pantysniffing busybodies like Dreher and Erickson to piss off, either.
ReplyDeleteIn which Rod discovers that religion just doesn't get his rocks off if nobody believes him when he say they're all gonna get their when when the time comes.
ReplyDeleteWho at all could have guessed?
They were, after all, on birth control...
ReplyDeleteJust how many children has Erick son of Erick sired by now?
~
I want to purchase a t-shirt with cartoon naked versions of this comment.
ReplyDeleteshorter erickson: i like showtime.
ReplyDeleteGod, don't give him any ideas.
ReplyDeleteIt's amusing that in Erickson's theological worldview, Evangelicals and Catholics are the good guys, and the Mainline Protestants are the bad guys. Quite the reversal from the Jack Chick Tract days of my youth. But, I suppose, keeping women and queers in check makes strange bedfellows.
ReplyDelete“Blessed are you when they persecute you and speak all manner of evil against you.” What if we lived as if that were true?
ReplyDeleteI guess all the gay people, atheists, and believers in evolution that they endlessly lie about are the most blessed on Earth.
"Blessed are you when thine body of higher learning requires your organization to admit all your fellow students as a prerequisite to opening thy booth at the recruitment fair."
ReplyDeleteDoesn't have quite the same poetry to it, huh?
He likes "tell time" even better.
ReplyDeleteOf course they were always condescending- they all believe that their beliefs are better than others' beliefs, if they weren't condescending, they wouldn't be missionaries in the first place.
ReplyDeleteWhy were the martyrs joyful?Because they were actually being persecuted for their authentic deeply-held beliefs? I mean, sure, that's kinda weird, but you even quote one the passages they were presumably basing their reaction on, and it doesn't read:
ReplyDelete“Blessed are you when they slightly inconvenience you and fail to use the power of the state to enforce your personal religious beliefs on others.”
Though you clowns sure seem to live as if that were true.
Also also, while we're on the subject, fuck you in the face, Dreher. Now we get to hear from the Sermon on the Mount? Helpful hint for the day: There are a lot more lines in it. Maybe you and your Jeebus posse could take an occasional break from wiping your incontinent asses with them.
I only want one if the nakedness in question is also trendy.
ReplyDeleteAt the invitation of a Cristian friend, I have attended her church several times (she worries about my soul). The theme of persecution is very prominent, especially the "speak all manner of evil against you" part. I've told her that I'm not going anymore. She prays for me, so I've got that going for me, which is nice.
ReplyDeleteTo review -
ReplyDeleteTrashing God's creation - Big deal, only liberuls care about that shit!
Failing to stomp on gay people and using birth control - Yer goin' to 4377!
I for one would like to see EE takeshis message of dope on the road. I think EE would make a fine minister of a mega-church. But I know this is just more lazy shit from a lazy sack of same because really, who the fuck is he talking to?
Christians who aren't narrow-minded morons but who will also be swayed by EE's Letter to the Effete-ians? No. This is the latest iteration of "One day while at a dinner party a liberal I did meet." However, he lacks the energy to make up a straying Christian and the dialogue in which EE rams a Come to Jesus moment down the lost soul's throat. Instead, the best this asswipe can do to impress his audience is the equivalent of grumbling at characters on TV.
The thing about Rod (and the reason he is my Favorite Wingnut) is that there's this eternal tension where he's constantly fantasizing about the good moral people retreating from this fallen, secular world into self-sustaining communities in the hinterlands and at the same time just unabashedly naked in his craving for acceptance and legitimacy from the mob so he has no other recourse than to crank out piece after piece that are spiritually and intellectually identical to an eight-year old announcing that he's really running away this time.
ReplyDeleteHow does he feel about prolixy bigots who converted to Orthodoxy because they thought it looked hip?
ReplyDeleteAm I still on Disqus' shitlist?
ReplyDeleteand the people who hate those deeply committed to their faithPsst, Erick. Crazily enough, I know plenty of non-vicious, non-stupid, non-whackaloon religious people, especially of the Judeo- pursuasion of that Judeo-Christian group you invoke when your ilk are clumsily trying to pretend you're not deranged theocratic bigots. Many of them seem deeply committed to their faith. And everything else in what you wrote displays a mouth-frothing hatred for all of them. So why don't you consider carefully the message of the Gospels about motes and beams, then shove a pointed stick into your eye?
ReplyDeleteEvangelicals and Catholics are the good guys, and the Mainline Protestants are the bad guys.Therein lies the fount of all the political shit in which the US has been drowning, lo these thirty-odd years.
ReplyDeleteWhy, this is Disqus' shitlist, nor are we off of it.
ReplyDeleteReally? The only tension I ever manage to find in his writing is how long he can hold out before returning to his eternal touchstone: Rod Dreher's self-pity. He doesn't worry about the world his daughters (and everyone else) have to live in--it's "how will I raise my daughters in this filthy apostate world?" He's the embodied example of I didn't leave the church, the church left me, and he'd like to roll around in the pity-puddle for another three hundred words.
ReplyDeleteReally, it makes me marvel at the advances our civilization has made in persecution. Even when the Pharisees and Sadducees and the Romans all pulled together, they still only managed to nail Jesus to the cross once.
> or perfectly willing to bake a cake for a gay wedding.
ReplyDeleteGood people don't mix their eggs, flour, sugar and water for those kinds.
> But not only will you one day be called to account to your God...
Baked cakes for gay weddings, that's an infinity in Hell.
But not only will you one day be called to account to your God...
ReplyDeleteJust you wait 'til Our Father gets home! You'll be sorry then!
Sheesh! Shut the fuck up, already. People just like you have been nattering on about the coming divine retribution for all the non-believers since before the Gilgamesh.
This comment should be tormented with ten thousand upvotes. Alas, I have but one.
ReplyDeleteDoes this sound like a spiel you'd expect from a movement that was gaining adherents?
ReplyDeleteIt's a spiel I'd expect from someone who got a lot of blowback a few days ago for a post scolding his readers for actual un-Christian behavior (wanting to send immigrant children to their deaths, yadda yadda...you know, the usual). It was so unexpected it even got a recommended diary on Kos.
Well, glad to see he nipped that shit in the bud.
Sounds ... mucky.
ReplyDeleteI' always a bit amazed at what a completely arbitrary and petty God these guys seem to be so devoted to. Nearly as petty as they themselves are; it is a puzzlement.
ReplyDeleteWell, don't forget Rod's other touchstone: Teh Gheys. And boy-howdy does he love to touch that. And caress it. And rub it. And note how hard and smooth that touchstone is . . . hard like a rock . . .
ReplyDeleteWhat was I typing again?
Watch yourself, young lady! Don't make God make you stand in a corner for an eon or two!
ReplyDeleteYep. Speaking as one of such folks of the Judeo-persuasion, if I were a baker, I would be perfectly happy with baking a cake for a gay marriage. Just don't ask me to use any lard in place of oil: I don't believe I'd go to hell for baking cakes for gay weddings, but Hashem certainly would call me on putting a pork product in said cakes!
ReplyDeleteUtterly Off Topic but I was able to torment a co-worker who worshiped at the altar of Sinead O'connor with the notion that a reworking of "The Emperor's New Clothes" in the style of "Our Lips Are Sealed" would simply be the ginchiest.
ReplyDelete...You may think you can sit on the sidelines. You may think you can opt-out of the culture war. You may think you can hide behind your trendy naked Leena Dunham t-shirt while you sip trendy drinks talking about trendy shows and writing columns demanding Christians be forced by the state to bake cakes, provide flowers and farms, and offer up photographs of gay weddings.
ReplyDeleteWait. I thought that was, in Cultural Wars terms, "being on the other side". It's not actually sitting on the sidelines when you actively oppose the idiotic, sour faux morality of a bunch of pissy little busybodies. It's not "opting-out". It's called winning, you shithead.
Now, now--be fair to Rod. Inconvenience is torture for him. His pain threshold is so low that a hemorrhoid could put him into a coma.
ReplyDeleteI don't think it's possible to get a gym sock pregnant.
ReplyDelete"YOU'RE EITHER WITH US OR AGAINST US!! SO ARE YOU WITH US?"
ReplyDelete"Nope."
"WAAAAH! NO FAIR!!!"
But not only will you one day be called to account to your God...
ReplyDeleteBy "your God", Erick means "my God". I've never seen a more impotent "threat".
Oh my - what happened to Roy? His update just...ended. Did keeping a gimleted weather eye on these goobers finally break his brain?
ReplyDelete(frantic Lovecraftan journaling) I haven't much time. I need to warn the world! Still I hear them clawing, scratching, gnawing at the wainscoting. They're coming AIEEEEEEE!
Yeah, he can't mean your because the people he is supposedly addressing don't believe in a God who gets off on oppressing other human beings. Some of them believe in a God who thinks shitting up the environment is a sin.
ReplyDeleteBut mainly he is a pompous pustule.
Oh, I expect Rod will self-deport for someplace more...exclusive once he sees all the riffraff that made it in before he did.
ReplyDeleteHe bought those naked Lena Dunham gym socks for nothing.
ReplyDeleteShe's zoftig!
ReplyDeleteConsidering all the religious garbage I had shoved on me as a kid, I really should hate all Christians with the power of a gigaton of suns, but I don't, honest. However I do make it a point to avoid them like the intellectual plague that they are, and I'm totally hip to their "look at me, I'm God's perfect little martyr, LOOK AT ME DAMMIT" BS.
ReplyDeleteMulti-E Erik is of the pouty, pissed off variety, and judging from the upward trend in the vitriol of his hate-speech, I'd suspect he's currently careening towards his own grassy knoll moment. All for the glory of Jeebus of course.
And from what I've gathered, God is not all that approving of the whole patriotism thing that wingers are always crowing about.
ReplyDelete"Erick Erickson says I'm going to hell for drinking gin and tonics and watching a mildly racy TV show... might as well go to that Molly-fueled gay BDSM orgy!"
ReplyDeleteDidn't some of the early Christian groups as well as certain medieval heretics essentially take the point of view that since we are all sinners anyway, we might as well really, really sin and have a lot of fun doing so?
ReplyDeleteHe's a god reason why a lot of people dislike Christians, I mean, persecute them. Most Christians are not assholes, but it's assholes who grab all the attention. A bunch of obnoxious loudmouths.
ReplyDelete"Tho' I've belted you an' flayed you,
ReplyDeleteBy the livin' Gawd that made you,
You're a better man than I am, Gunga Eric!"
Oh, man, if only there WERE a just and merciful god.
ReplyDeleteOr, "What's the point of forgiveness if you have no sins?"
ReplyDelete"Made in his own image" and all that.
ReplyDelete"Blessed are those who are unmercifully mocked on Twitter, for they shall be rewarded with a gig at The American Conservative."
ReplyDeleteAgain the weird worldview of conservatives like Erick, Son of Erick. Always the angry, frothing obsession about some made-up thing "liberals" are doing. What the hell is a "trendy cocktail" anyway? Appletinis? Sorry, Erick, those are for sorority girls and bachelorette parties, not "liberals."
ReplyDeleteBesides which, what's his stupid tantrum even focused on? Let's see, what are some key words he uses in his spittle-flecked rant? Sipping. Trendy. Gay. HBO.
Ah. Okay. I think I get the picture. It's a standard-issue rant against The Other, conservative MadLibs style. Insert some random right-wing conjuring words to tickle the lizard brain of the reader. The fact that it's bizarre, incoherent, and inconsistent won't bother the target audience at all.
Waitress, send this comment another chardonnay...
ReplyDeleteAlso, we could blow his mind by letting him know that many liberals actually like beer. Sure, some of it is craft beer (SKREEEEE! LIBERAL!), but still.
ReplyDeleteOh yeah!
ReplyDelete"When they send the lions after Dreher I can see him trying to throw them
ReplyDeleteoff the scent with a coq au vin. "But it's free range" will be his last
words."
Lion: "So are you!"
"Might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb."
ReplyDeleteIf that's not in Blackstone's "Commentaries on the Laws of England", it should be.
I'm pretty sure the era of 'Trendy Cocktails' ended when Sex and the City was cancelled, circa 2004.
ReplyDeleteBut yeah, the only key word term Erick "Erick" Erickson left out was "San Francisco." The bastard left me one trope short of filling my Bingo card.
Only if its "trendy".
ReplyDeleteAny movement led by Rod to establish a pure, self sustaining community in the hinterlands, would go full Jonestown before the bus left the station.
ReplyDelete“Blessed are you when they persecute you and speak all manner of evil against you.” What if we lived as if that were true?
ReplyDeleteTry it. I won't hold my breath.
But not only will you one day be called to account to your God...
It would be worth it to see your face when you found out all that last/first, sheep/goat stuff wasn't bullshit.
Likewise, "What's the point of being virtuous if you only get that way by being threatened with eternal damnation?"
ReplyDeletewhat a completely arbitrary and petty God these guys are so devoted to
ReplyDeleteSo you've never read the old testament? Because petty and arbitrary are to Yahweh what wisdom and battle are to Athena.
Dreher missed the irony of escaping to France which since the Second Republic has been secular (even anti-theist) in the extreme.
ReplyDeleteYeah, my sipping a trendy drink is just a giant eff you to Erik son of Erik. Think I'll have another. Culture warring is hard work.
ReplyDeleteThat's really all we have to do — live like normal people. Time was a Republican liked Scotch. This dink is telling that guy he's a big ol' nancy.
ReplyDeleteNot only that, you can get the State to "offer up photographs of gay weddings," yea, verily, even as a sacrifice, for a two-shot of Adam and Steve sharing a hunk of State-mandated cake is a pleasing sight unto the Lord.
ReplyDeleteWhat if solving global warming eliminates the gay menace and Christians no longer have to give them cakes, photographs and farms? Will Erickson's fat head explode a la "Scanners" (a liberal Hollywood movie from 1981 directed by immigrant David Cronenberg)? These are questions I ask during my daily prayer session in my bunker.
ReplyDeleteThe fact that so many churches have left him certainly speaks well for churches.
ReplyDeleteWouldn' t the Good Samaritan have been willing to bake a cake for the geyz in the updated gospels according to Adam and Steve?
ReplyDeleteNo, no it's for MUCH worse than that - raising wheat that might be used to bake a ghey wedding cake is a mortal sin that no amount of penitence can absolve. That's the only thing I can think of when Roddy includes "our farms" in the whole whine. Either that, or farmers that let gay weddings be performed on their acreages, which happens not a lot.
ReplyDeleteWell, the religion EE claims to follow has a lot to say about not judging other people and even embracing outcasts and not being a greedy fuckwad and never flaunting one's religion and his cranium is still intact, so I'm afraid not.
ReplyDeleteMaybe he was thinking of Woodstock.
ReplyDelete"Offer up photographs..." is also bizarre. Like the photographer was forced to hand over pictures of the wedding.
No, no, no. He means HATE. As in not doing everything his way and laughing at or ignoring his tantrums.
ReplyDeleteBut gay = awful is so central to the Bible! I mean it's condemned almost as often as shaving.
ReplyDeleteYeah, just look at the first four commandments: ME, ME, ME, ME!
ReplyDeleteSelfish dick.
"Wainscoting... wainscoting... wainscoting. It's a good, woody word. Not at all tinny."
ReplyDelete*shrill shrieks of horror and dismay*
Or, in the words of Jim Morrison, "I want to get my kicks before the whole shit-house goes up in flames."
ReplyDeleteHey, looks like you get a farm, too. Now you can grow arugula.
ReplyDeleteThe famed Church Father, St. Augustine of Hippo, is famous for his prayer: "Grant me chastity and continence, but not yet!"
ReplyDeleteSpeak for yourself, beer snob. PBR going down my gullet in 3-2-1...****belch***** (ahhhhh)
ReplyDeleteUpvoted for "Letter to the Effete-ians". That casts a Paul over this thread.
ReplyDeleteThat is a Xian scam: http://goo.gl/bMkotJ
ReplyDeleteRasputin used that line as a way to pick up chicks.
ReplyDeleteI think it's the latter. I remember an article recently about some guy in NY State who rents his farm out for weddings who refused to let a gay couple have their wedding there. He was either burned alive or fined or beheaded or something for the violation. I forget which and I don't feel like looking it up..
ReplyDeleteAir-Wick, Son of Air-Wick is in the tertiary stage of bitter clinger-ism, & seems to have turned troll as well.
ReplyDeleteHis political effectiveness, once measured in bags of rock salt he could convince his minions to send to a gummint lib's office is reduced to threatening "(Your) God will get you for that," Maude-style.
Objecting to pork is a sign of coming sharia dhimitude!
ReplyDeleteThere must be a god of hemorrhoids to whom something could be sacrificed, that this should come to pass.
ReplyDeleteI am certain each one of 'em offered up a heartfelt "thank you" to the Lord when Rod announced he wouldn't be back.
ReplyDeleteWell, if we go back to the Romans, there's always Cloacus Optimus Maximus**, a long-standing deity.
ReplyDeletethat this should come to pass.Cloacus sees what you did there.
Uh-oh. Don't turn your back one someone who says they're praying for you.
ReplyDeleteNow you can grow arugula.IYKWIMAITYD.
ReplyDeleteThese are questions I ask during my daily prayer session in my bunker.IYKWIMAITYD.
ReplyDeletehis cranium is still intactObjection! Presumes facts not in evidence.
ReplyDeleteAppletinis are definitely a thing for them, I seem to remember when Breitbart would refer to Alex Pareene exclusively as "appletini party boy" on twitter.
ReplyDeleteDhimitude? Oh yeah, I want some of that in my cocktail. Couple of drops and "good night"!
ReplyDeleteIntended as just a Biblical phrase/reference. But intentionalism is for suckers, so ...
ReplyDeleteDuh, of course you should. You're going to die anyway some time. Didn't Erick establish his hedonist position-- what was that?-- yesterday?
ReplyDeleteI would like to nibble this comment's croquet hoops.
ReplyDeleteGimlet? No thanks. Double Alinsky for me. And make sure it's agitated. Also, that red haired guy is picking up the tab. If he refuses call the State.
ReplyDeleteYou got some rocket in your pocket or are just happy to see me?
ReplyDeleteWell finally! Now you can all go back to the last thread and maybe see the super hilarious comment I posted that Disqus cockblocked.
ReplyDeleteMy suspicion is that "trendy drink" is anything with three or more ingredients and probably some kind of garnish. You have to remember that certain conservatives have latched on to this 60's-era Upper West Side yuppie weekend engagement as the pinnacle of liberal social discourse. They never consider Pabst, even though that's what's popular at most of the trendy places in my own hipster liberal neighborhood. Hell, even the overpriced "gastropubs" around here serve as much cheap beer as they do $10 martinis.
ReplyDeleteSadly, my upvote has been buried under notifications for every post I've ever made.
ReplyDeleteOk, no, Disqus eated it. Basically, it was that that White dude should have pushed the envelope, and gone with the 10 worst movies of all time as reviewed by Ezra Pound over Italian radio, and essentially, they were mostly one or two word reviews, with one of the words in each being "filth".
ReplyDeleteIt was funnier in the original comment.
As I recall, he wasn't even going after a lib, but right-of-center Olympia Smow: "Rock salt melts Snow!" Or some such bullshit.
ReplyDeleteThey have always been at war with "Sex and the City".
ReplyDeleteIf I'd known being a Culture Warrior was this easy, I'd've started drinking first thing in the morning, rather than waiting until the cocktail hour.
ReplyDeleteYou seem to be cool now.
ReplyDeleteGunga Derp.
ReplyDelete"'But it's free range' will be his last words."
ReplyDelete"— But I'm full of toxins!!" (No, I don't think that would work.)
He doesn't like to think of it as masturbating. He likes to think of it as contemplatively cloistering his penis in the palm of his hand, in the best Poor Dears of Perpetual Masturbation tradition.
ReplyDeleteWell the fish bladder thing certainly got my attention.
ReplyDeleteIn the sense of 'they got nuthin', that is.
A nitpick: Scanners was a Canadian movie, so .. I dunno ... socialism or something?
ReplyDeleteI can't believe Judas said that.
ReplyDeleteCripes, that Dreher story annoyed the living heck out of me; Warren (The Vanderbilt student in question) goes on and one about how important it is to have a plurality of ideas, and lots of religious diversity.
ReplyDeleteMeanwhile, her organization left because they couldn't demand that members vow to have certain religious beliefs. In other words, she sees religious liberty and plurality as existential threats to her organization, but still spends a lot of time talking about how other people should love those ideas.
I really, really hate the "You're discriminating against my right to discriminate!" schtick Christians in this country sometimes use.
You been talking up guillotines again?
ReplyDeleteTotally coolio.
ReplyDeleteI've actually gotten a lot of WRITING done in the past month by not spending time commenting on blogs. But if feels like when you were little and your mom sent you to bed because all the grownups were coming over for a party. You know there's some fun shit going on but you can't join in.
see also Racists, Gay-Haters, Pro-Lifers....
ReplyDeleteDreher, as you may know, lives off writing and royalties
ReplyDeleteDon't try this at home, kids.
I read the whole damned thing when I was 12, old and new testament. I'll admit to getting fairly bored with all the "begats" in the former and started flipping pages, but the multiple-versions-of-the-same-story in the latter is what really sent my adolescent BS detector into overdrive.
ReplyDeleteTry it in Paris! Ooh la la, mon cherie!
ReplyDeleteI'm reminded of Ignatius Reilly: "At one time he had almost developed it into an art form, practicing the hobby with the skill and fervor of an artist and philosopher, a scholar and gentleman."
ReplyDeleteI was going to offer a preparation of healing ointment to Uranus.
ReplyDeleteand the people who hate those deeply committed to their faith
ReplyDeleteOdd how simply not believing the same thing he does equals "hating those deeply committed to their faith." It seems that anything short of self-sacrificing devotion to whatever notional faith the speaker espouses equals "hating" that faith and that speaker.
No wonder these idiots are so terrified of atheists.
I know he's no longer catholic, but I am reminded of the joke I learned when I was still a catholic. St. Peter is giving the new soul in heaven a tour. They pass by a church resounding with gospel music. "Who's that?" the new soul inquires. "Those are the Baptists" Peter replies. They pass another church; the swelling sounds of a graceful hymn surround them. "Those are the Episcopalians" says Peter. Then they pass a church with tightly shut doors; no sound can be heard through the thick panels. "Shhh" Peter says, motioning the new soul to tiptoe past it quietly. "Those are the Catholics. They think they're the only ones here."
ReplyDeleteGood point. Maybe "condescending" isn't quite what I wanted. Something to describe the contrast between, say, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" and "People Wearing Lena Dunham T-Shirts in the Hands of Pissy Evangelicals."
ReplyDelete"To be safe, never use anything but cola or orange juice, which are less likely to form elitist compounds."
ReplyDeleteMountain Dew is always safe. Mountain Dew comes preloaded with extra lowliness points.
Clearly, EE needs to parousia the text more closely in the future.
ReplyDeleteThe salient sentence, of course, is: "In 1997 the FBI labeled Crouch 'an anti-semitic, white supremacist' --
ReplyDeletebut once they identified him as a religious figure they "conducted no
further investigation."
So, religion really is a racket, in the original organized crime sense of the word, but, the FBI thinks it's a Constitutionally-protected racket.
Which reminds me of that great line in "Hopscotch": "Sorry, Meyerson, I couldn't find any bourbon and coke."
ReplyDeleteThis is such a fundamental misunderstanding of "rights." Campus clubs and organizations generally receive some funding from fees collected from all students. The religious group wants the benefits of being a recognized campus group - to advertise their group to the community, have a place to meet, heck, to have a cafeteria where they can get cheap cookies for their meetings - but not to act as part of the community. If you want to have an exclusive club, go for it, but don't expect help from the people you're going to exclude. Also, while it's been a long time since I was part of a religious group, as I recall, welcoming the curious non-believer was de rigueur.
ReplyDeleteSoon it will Peter out.
ReplyDeleteIndeed, but this is part and parcel of the persecution mythology. The logic behind it is wholly solipsistic, but, when the Gospels say go forth and spread The Word, why, anyone not interested in The Word is persecuting the person of faith with the mandate to spread The Word.
ReplyDeleteYeah, it just goes around and around and around, and there's nothing much one can do about that. What I find so interesting about it is that, even though all believers are encouraged, in one way or another, to test their faith, the mere existence of someone that doesn't share their beliefs gives them a roaring case of the heebie-jeebies, and the firm conviction that civilization is being destroyed as we speak.
And telling them to chill out doesn't help. It just makes things worse.
The Pabst Beertini! Available garnished with either a Funyun or an entire jar of green olives, and served in a Mason jar after being shaken and stirred.
ReplyDeleteJust contemplating "made in His image," at the moment. Gawd as a chubby Southern right-wing redneck lawyer with a streak of grandiose megalomania is definitely a delightful notion to contemplate.
ReplyDeleteIs that PBR with a dash of vermouth or gin with a dash of PBR? (I'm too lazy to experiment.)
ReplyDeleteAlong the same lines, until churches have to pay taxes, they need to shut the fuck up about politics.
ReplyDeleteJupiterdamnit, that's a much better joke.
ReplyDeleteYeah, that's what usually happens once the cock crows three times.
ReplyDeleteEver since the IRS determination that Bob Jones University could not discriminate and have tax-exempt status, too, Falwell and others made politics their primary mission in life. It's an interesting story of American history how the Moral Majority became the most visible culture warrior on a host of issues, but never openly addressed the underlying reason for its existence--the desire to have segregated churches while continuing to receive government endorsement of them through the tax exemption statutes, to effectively undo the Civil Rights Act insofar as churches were concerned.
ReplyDeleteThat the subterranean pretext for the culture wars is racism is not that remarkable, given the players involved, but the political wars that grew out of the religious right wing's culture wars are noteworthy, especially as those political wars seem to culminate in the RFRA--introduced, oddly, by a northeastern Democrat--which has effectively prevented the IRS from doing its job by protecting all manner of nonsense in the name of religious freedom.
Jesus wept.
ReplyDeleteI thought that was Foghorn Leghorn. Come to think of it, Foghorn Leghorn as God would definitely be preferable.
ReplyDelete"the desire to have segregated churches while continuing to receive
ReplyDeletegovernment endorsement of them through the tax exemption statutes keep all their money and pay nothing for the benefits of government"
FTFY.
Oh man, THERE was a cat that really was gone.
ReplyDeleteI dunno, I thought "long-standing" was especially good.
ReplyDeleteThis might explain John Boehner and his well-known fondness for Cocktail Hour.
ReplyDeleteThat's asparagus, baby!
ReplyDelete"But I'm full of parasites" might work (although Rod is a parasite).
ReplyDelete"Bigger fleas have little fleas
ReplyDeleteupon their backs that bite 'em,
and all those fleas have smaller fleas
and so ad infinitum."
It also might explain why he's a wine man...that way he gets to dodge the whole issue.
ReplyDelete(No puns intended.)
"So you're looking for the white Santa Claus God? Then you're in luck — 'cuz he' right over there {WHOMPP}"
ReplyDeleteHe can quote John 15:19, but I think if Jesus recognized Erick Erickson it would be as one of the money changers he zambonied out of the temple.
ReplyDeleteHis pain threshold is so low that a hemorrhoid could put him into a coma.
ReplyDeleteIt would be throbbing right next to his head, after all.
Book of Luke, Sophocles; Six of one, half a dozen of the other.
ReplyDeleteThis isn't the first time I've heard about the trendiness of PBR. Does it mean that Frank Booth was a Williamsburg hipster avant le lettre?
ReplyDeleteTechnically it was a liberal Toronto movie, but I'm sure that's not considered any better.
ReplyDeleteIt's an open-and-shut case.
ReplyDeleteAnd it's no small irony that Erick is one of the cheerleaders for the Catholic Cabal on the Supreme Court that decided that the money changers can be the temple.
ReplyDeletePlus Vanderbilt is a private university. I'd think that would give it more leeway than a public university as to what it will and will not allow its student clubs to do.
ReplyDeletePBR with tomato juice. It's not a "red beer"; it's now a Beertini.
ReplyDelete-----"Rod Dreher's going on again about how the atheists are persecuting the Christians. (The casus bellow this time is, two years ago Vanderbilt University kicked a Christian student org off-campus because they wouldn't sign a non-discrimination agreement.)"
ReplyDelete------Except that the Christian groups are NOT even kicked off campus for refusing to sign the agreement. Rather, they become unofficial, non registered groups. And, from the link, this is the policy towards such groups:
------"Student groups that are not registered are welcome to meet on campus informally or to rent spaces through the Office of Reservations and Events. Also, non-registered student groups may also communicate with students via email (including University email), social media (e.g., Facebook), and certain bulletin boards and kiosks on campus."
---------So, what do they lose, by not registering?
-------------"...use of the Vanderbilt University name to signify their institutional affiliation; eligibility to apply for funding from various sources; participation in the University-sponsored student organization recruitment fair; use of listservs, group mail, and URLs administered by the University...."
-----In other words, the University merely wants to prevent the official association of itself with the discriminatory groups. They don't seek to kick them off campus, or to discourage membership, and the groups are even allowed to use certain resources that arguably make the University complicit in their actions.
----The really outrageous thing is that Rod is all about what he calls, in his usual, half smart, lower middle brow, pretentious way, "The Benedict Option." In this model, Christians create institutions and whole communities in which uniformity of values are imposed. Needless to say, Rod supports the Hobby Lobby decision (and sees anything less than that as Stalinist suppression of freedom of exercise of religion). Similarly, in this case, Rod is all about the freedom of the student group to make its own rules, including rules that allow for discrimination. But, somehow, Vanderbilt University does not have similar rights. It may NOT, in Rod's views, make rules to govern its campus. It may NOT, in Rod's views, impose a uniform set of values on its sub groups.
-----Of course, beyond his ideological inconsistency, Rod gets the facts wrong too. No one is being kicked off campus. No one is even arguably being oppressed, much less "martyred," in any way. Not being able to use a University list serve is hardly the same as being eaten by lions!
I have heard (I haven't read it entire, so I don't know) that this is essentially the message of the letter to the Hebrews. I gather that some early Christians, converted from Judaism, got into their heads that since forgiveness of sins comes from Grace, and Grace is a good thing, then the best thing to do was to sin A LOT, thus providing God ample opportunity to bestow his forgiving Grace.
ReplyDeleteThe writer of the epistle (apparently probably not Paul) was trying to point out the flaws in this approach.
We libs are so saintly that a mere touch of our blessed lips transforms lousy cheap beer into fancy trendy cocktails, just like old J.C. and the water and the wine.
ReplyDeleteThis! Holy shit, how is it possible to come away from reading the New Testament thinking the Pharisees are the good guys?
ReplyDeleteHi to Mrs. Lurking Canadian, btw. I've been reading some pretty sad stuff over at Patheos on the blogs of recovering ex-homeschooler/feminists and one of the key things for evangelical misreadings of the bible is sometimes rendered as "Old testament for thee and New Testament for me" but it could also be phrased as "My good intent matters more than my bad actions, your bad actions matters more than your good intentions."
ReplyDeleteIt really gets my goat.
ReplyDeleteYou were missed, though.
ReplyDeleteI'm reading Bart Ehrmann's new book "Fraud" about fraudulent interpolations into the NT and the OT by later Christians. Its pretty interesting about this point.
ReplyDeleteHey, when you're dealing with assholes...
ReplyDeleteIts not something we do drink but its something we would drink, so its just as bad.
ReplyDeleteXians being persecuted again? Fuck, send 'em all to Antarctica, and in a week they'll be persecuted by the penguins. Why? Because they can't stand *not* being persecuted. It accounts for almost half their self-identity.
ReplyDeleteWhat's the most important thing about us? "We believe in Jesus!
What's the second most important thing? "Everybody is jealous and hates us for it!
Waht's the third? "Ummmm......"
Odd how simply not believing the same thing he does equals "hating those deeply committed to their faith."
ReplyDeleteAlso too odd how disliking him because he's an asshole equals "hating those deeply committed to their faith." Honey, no.
Sounds like it would be good for a hangover.
ReplyDelete"... New Testament for me"
ReplyDeleteOh, if only. These guys can't even manage to find Paul's better bits. Smugly declaring "I'm forgiven no matter what a vicious self-righteous asshole who kicks down I am," snagging a couple of Paul's most objectionable statements, then catapaulting straight into Revelation as if it were all about present-day politics? As far as a life philosophy, their actual Bible makes those little Gideon handouts look weighty.
Jupiterdamnit, that's a much better joke.
ReplyDelete"Good for a hangover" in the sense of making people give up drinking.
ReplyDeleteHoppingator™!
ReplyDeleteMrs LC says hello, and she misses you at The Other Place. And thanks for the Ehrman rec. I have enjoyed some of his stuff recently. I'll check out Fraud.
ReplyDeleteI miss her too! In re Ehrmann I think Fraud is not as good as Lost Christianities or Misquoting Jesus because its written down for a pretty non academic audience (or rather written down below the level I assign myself since I'm pretty sure that if the other books were written full on academician with nothing but the original Aramaic-Hebrew-Greek I wouldn't understand them either). Still, its interesting and its a quick read.
ReplyDeleteHey, thanks.
ReplyDeleteYou joke, but he is famous for having written Confessions, which could also easily function as a doorstop for 50 foot-tall lead-lined doors. The man knew from sin.
ReplyDeleteBeertini . . . red beer . . . or as its known in the King's English, ipecac.
ReplyDelete'Roll-up! Roll-up! for the Tragicall Historie Tour*, step right this way!!'
ReplyDelete*...or, 101 Damnations
A grandpa of mine ran a Bes Din (Jewish equivalent of a sharia court) in his dining-room; back then, anyone qui mal y pensait would have been takn for a rank bigot, instead of hoping to get elected by banning it.
ReplyDelete'...and a paddling.'
ReplyDeleteJesus was much closer theologically to the Pharisees than to the Sadducees; I've always just assumed that that was why greater venom was savd for them.
ReplyDeleteI'm guessing the way he does it is more of an act of penance than pleasure.
ReplyDeleteAlmost.
“Blessed are you when they persecute you and speak all manner of evil against you.”
ReplyDeleteUnless you're gay. Then you're not blessed, and you deserve it.
I recently heard "when grapes are in season" as a euphemism for hemorrhoids. So maybe Dionysus.
ReplyDelete