First:
In light of tax day, I just wanted to send out mad props to Kent Hovind, the national mascot for taxes.
Second:
Get out your fives, dust 'em off, and raise 'em high, because tomorrow (Thursday) is National High Five Day once more.
Third:
Darwinia is an awesome game and you should download and play the free demo. It presents a whole self-contained level taking place generations after the actual game and can really give you a feel for how the game works.
Fourth:
I've been reading the Book of Mormon and it's awesomely bad. Like seriously. This Mormon cat came over to my house the other night and was like: "It's such an amazing book that a man couldn't have written it." My thought was How could the person behind the book actually be considered a writer? This stuff is worse than The Lovely Bones. Silly Mormons. That probably sounds mean to you. But that's only because you haven't read this thing. Maybe I'll devote a post to the thing but here's a taste.
Beyond the clownishly overwrought impersonation of Elizabethan English (written 200 years after Elizabethan English was the pops), the book features expressions such as Hosanna (3 Nephi 11) and I am the Alpha and Omega (3 Nephi 9:18) and Mammon (3 Nephi 13:24). Keep in mind that this book is written (between 600 BC and AD 400) in some fantasy language called Reformed Egyptian (like Quenya but senseless). This particular section of anachronisms occurs after the resurrection of Christ and so terms like Hosanna (a Hebrew term) and Alpha/Omega (Greek letters) would be gibberish to both audience and author (none of whom speak Hebrew or Greek). That their Jesus would come to Native Americans and introduce himself as the Alpha and Omega kinda lends to the picture that their Jesus is kind of dumb in the head.
If pop-Christianity is marked by anything here in the late-Aughts, it's the theme of Culture War. We hear it time and again that there is a culture war raging between, what, liberal America (?) and Christianity. Battle lines, we are told, have been drawn between the sides of such issues as abortion, gay marriage, feminism, et and cetera. And as is common in times of war, we hear charismatic speeches, rallying cries, and soul-soothing lilt of propagandists in their variety of shapes and forms.
There is a war at hand. Or at least, so some would have you believe.
No, the truth is, there is no war. And there never was. At least not between Christianity and American society. That war of culture is one built of myth and fancy and, like we should come to expect, is more a product of the politics of niche cultures than anything so real as an actual war.
Let me interject here that clashes between cultures are frequent. When Jazz came on the scene, the grumpy old whiteys didn't take to it and branded it an evil, sordid thing. When rock 'n roll came on the scene, the grumpy old whiteys didn't take to it and branded it an evil, sordid thing. When punk came on the scene, the grumpy old whiteys didn't take to it and branded it an evil, sordid thing. Et and cetera.
Let me further interject that the church is alien and the foreignness of its culture is indelible. Christianity cannot be changed or understood by the world in which it presently sits. It is, in fact, so entirely other that there can be no nurturing of the church on the food of the world and no nurturing of the world on the food of the church.
And yet, despite the fact that there are indeed battles between cultures and the fact that Christianity is fundamentally at odds with the world around, there is no culture war involving Christianity.
One more interjection. I think it safe to say that the sub-cultures that Christians involve themselves in may indeed be at war with various other cultures or sub-cultures. Those who find themselves deeply embedded in the culture of Chuck Colson may indeed find themselves at war with the cultural ideologies forwarded by the Democratic Party. Those who find themselves swallowed up in the culture of Evangelical Christianity might find themselves at war with those of the culture of social liberalism. Those who cherish their culture of moral integrity might find themselves taking arms against those who forward the agendas of Hollywood. Et and cetera. There's just one thing...
None of that has to do with Christianity.
The church is not interested in affecting culture; it has better things to do. There is no war between Christianity and the culture of the world in which it sits as an outsider. Even should the culture outside of the church choose to war on the church, there is no cultural war for the Christian to engage. Why? Because wars are about ground gained and lost, the destruction of enemies. Christianity is an all or nothing venture. A person is not an almost Christian or mostly redeemed. A person is of this world and its culture or of the next world and its culture. And Christianity isn't about the destruction of the enemy because all Christians know that such a resounding and climactic defeat as that has nothing to do with us but is wholly a victory earned and sealed by the Son of God himself.
Let's put it this way. If John and Mark are not only unable to marry but are shunned by society for expressing their carnal desire for each other, is the cause of Christ forwarded? Nope. If those who would dare to abort a child are imprisoned and perhaps even sentenced to execution, is the promise of the Gospel ennobled? Not really. If prayer is in schools, God in the Pledge, profanity out of Hollywood, morality in rap music, and justice in the courts, then is Christianity on the rise? Nuh-uh.
This cultural stuff has nothing to do with Christianity. Though Christians are at liberty to engage in any number of hobbies (culture wars being little more than a hobby), such individuals should not make the mistake of thinking their interest in such things is "Christian" or that their involvement in "making the world a better place" forwards the cause of Christ.
While culture wars may exist, they have nothing to do with Christianity and anyone who sells you on the idea of a culture war between the church and the world is, well, selling you something. And you should always beware of those who try to sell you something without telling you that they are actually selling. Those people are sneaks and liars, whatever their cause.
One of the currently popular hobby horses of American pop-Christianity is the so-called feminization of our culture. This comes up all the time. I was most recently reminded of our society's effeminacy and its detrimental effect on the world as we know it by a CAPC-commenter's thoughts on an article on violence and mixed martial arts.
The proposition forwarded by so many is that there is an ideal level of masculinity toward which men in society should strive and an ideal level of femininity toward which women in society should strive. And further, many of the problems evident in our current culture are seen to be a result of a reversal of this standard—where men are increasingly feminized and women are becoming more and more masculine.
In discussing this concept today, we will come to the conclusion that such talk is moron's talk. And that those who forward such ideals in the month of April are prime examples of April Fools.
To start with, we'll have to presume both that there is such a thing as masculinity and femininity and that there is a level of each to which each sex should aim, neither exceeding nor falling short of such marks. But wait! Why should we presume such things? Let's start apart from the presuppositions and only then come to evaluate the argument from the realm of pure hypotheticals.
In the first place, while there are certain characteristics that we tend to assign to the descriptions masculine and feminine, I tend to think that those descriptors have no connection more necessary to the sex with which we've tied them than pof and hil do (that is, masculinity and femininity might as well be random terms for all they relate to the sexes). The typically admirable traits associated with masculinity (courage, honour, bravery, strength, charisma, leadership, decisiveness) are as lauded in females as they are males, and probably no less present. Contrawise, the negative traits associated with masculinity (anger, violence, laziness, heartlessness, aggression) are as loathed in females as they are in males, and probably no less present.* Similarly, the typically admirable traits commonly associated with femininity (compassion, sensitivity, romance, nurture, domestic prowess) are lauded in men while the negative traits (cattiness, over-sensitivity, moodiness, menstruation) are loathed in men as well as they are in women.**
Masculinity and maleness are two entirely separate descriptions and intersect about as frequently as masculinity and femaleness.*** Question: Are men brave or are women brave? Answer: Men and women are brave. Fact: Both men and women are capable of bravery and prone to cowardice. Question: Are women compassionate or are men compassionate? Answer: Women and men are compassionate. Fact: Both women and men are capable of compassion and both are prone to callousness.
And then what if there was some testable difference between men and women? What if it wasn't merely anecdotal? What if 60% of men were brave and only 20% of women were? What if 75% of women showed compassion while only 13% of men bore the trait? How would it be that we could tell whether the distinction was something natural to the sexes or whether it was merely just the cultural hegemony showing its colours and influences.
And with how fuzzy our understanding is of whether femininity and masculinity even exist, how on earth can we responsibly make it a moral thing? How can we say that men should aim to be, quote-unquote, masculine (with all that entails) and women should be, quote-unquote, feminine (with all that entails)? How can we honestly do that? Answer: because people are clowns. We are. We're ridiculous and we like to make rules to govern things whether those rules are at all realistic.
So wait, let's go back. Let's pretend that there really is some such thing as this Platonic form of masculinity and another of femininity. Let's pretend that there really is this objective standard. And let's further pretend that we, as men and women, are supposed to strive toward our respective gendered standards. Let's pretend that I and all American men should be striving for True Masculinity. And even more, let's pretend that if we don't, as a society, meet that standard (and that the women don't meet theirs)—let's pretend that if we are truly negligent here that society will get all screwed up. That all sorts of horrible things will happen. That kids will stop learning well. That we won't have prayer in schools. That incidents of homosexuality will rise. That Bush will attack Iran and kill more people who are not white enough to care about. That teenage boys will start wearing women's pants that are too small for women their size. That the rest of society will follow suit, crumbling around our ankles.
Let's pretend all that will happen if we don't get the masculinity/femininity thing right.
OMG We ares doomulnated!!! No really. If the health of society rests at all upon us getting the masculinity/femininity distinction correct, we are without hope. We are so doomed that even the doomed will feel safe, happy, and well-cared for by comparison. And why is this?
Because we have no freakin' standard to look to!
Not even a hint.
There is nothing we can reliably look at, point to, and say, "Behold! Femininity!" There is no example of what true masculinity might look like if it were to actually exist. Even if there is this fabled objective standard, we, the people of earth, have no possible way of discerning it. Well, unless God decides that it's important enough for us to know that he sends a third testament to explain it. Maybe it's in the Book of Mormon, I don't know. What I do know for a certainty is that such a standard is very much not found in the Bible as delivered to the saints in ages past.
No, everything we know to be masculinity and femininity is made up. Which is part of the reason we see such vast differences in the so-called gendered traits from culture to culture. So knock it off already.
Incidentally, what really kills me about the kind of ideology Hooser (the CAPC commenter) forwards is how common it is in certain segments of Christendom. The Monk recently regaled me with tales of how in her own college town, there was a big movement**** toward letting boys reclaim their masculinity by letting children fight it out. Instead of quashing fights before they could get out of hand and before lips were bloodied and teeth were lost and ears were punched, boys would be allowed to duke it out, presumably to make mens out of 'em. Part of the justification was that we should be encouraging boys to be boys.
Somehow I doubt that the Christians in this particular town really followed through on their own line of thought, because heck if you're gonna let boys be boys, there is nothing so immediately boyish than teenage boys doing anything within their power to engage the fairer sex in a little first base, second base, third base, GRAND SLAM! Really, more than fighting, boys seem to be all about the dream of fornication—though I doubt if they would ever term it as anything so vulgur as "fornication."
Example. I am in eighth grade. I have a water bed. I have also just purchased a small colour television set (back in the day when you could still get a black-and-white). To which I have connected my NES. The NES being the current Rad Thing, neighbourhood kids would come by, hoping to taste the finest cuisine proffered by the Japanese technation. So me and three other kids sit on my bed and the following conversation takes place:
DRAMATIS PERSONAE: Tubby Little Fifth Grader played by BOB Tubby's Younger Brother played by IAN World-Wise Beanpole played by WEE DANE Cynical Classmate of Beanpole played by JUSTIN
JUSTIN:
Crap. Lost again.
WEE DANE:
I hate this level.
BOB:
Dude. You water bed is awesome.
WEE DANE:
Uhm.
BOB:
I'll bet this is just like humping a girl.
IAN:
Woah! Cool!
WEE DANE:
[Realizing that girls don't look like anamorphic blobs
and so probably don't feel anything like a water bed...]
Wow. I, uh, sincerely doubt it.
BOB:
Huh. Still...
JUSTIN:
Dude. Stop humping his bed. That's... just. Dude.
[BOB stops, feeling what one would hope to be something akin to shame.]
Now, neither Bob nor Ian were particularly aberrant.***** They were just average boys from an evangelical Christian home who had what might be considered something nearbouts the normal level of sexual curiosity. They just really wanted to fornicate their little brains out. A fifth grader and a something like a second or third grader. But hey, after all, boys will be boys.
NOTES:
*I believe a case can be made that the presence of testosterone in males can cause heightened and sustained aggression, surpassing that normally found in females. This would be a part of the male chemical environment.
**I only included menstruation to see if you were paying attention.
***The rate of intersection differs based upon cultural influences.
****I actually made up the "big" part and have no idea exactly how prevalent the "movement" really was.
*****They did still like Michael Jackson in 1988, but what did they know...
Ever since high school, I've found it troubling both the freedom and adamance with which believers choose to describe God as being "outside of time." Think of it. Two things we really don't understand very much at all: the nature of God's eternality and the nature of time. And yet, the frequency with which we hear "God is outside of time" is awestriking. I even got into an argument with a teenage girl last week at the mall* who demanded that God not be in time.
Look, people are allowed their pet philosophies, I suppose. But come on, how can we be dogmatic about something developed wholly apart from the revelation of Scripture? Further, does anyone even know what is meant by the turn "outside of time"? It sounds more like a bedtime story to make people comfortable with things beyond their ken than anything else.
So what's the reason people feel the need to say God is outside of time anyway? I suspect it has to do with the groundless assertion that time was created when God created the universe, the idea being, I suppose that time is a property of matter. But isn't it just as sensible (or perhaps even more...) to guess that time is more properly a property of being? Angels, after all, are plausibly immaterial and I presume that they experience time, right? There is certainly some sense of history to them (creation, rebellion, judgment, etc.).
I imagine that it makes perfect sense for temporality to be one of the attributes of God, since existence is an attribute of God and temporality is maybe an attribute of existence. The Monk suggested that one fear outside-time believers might have is that "stripping" God of his apart from time quality limits him and opens the door to open theism. I'll admit that such a fear may be behind some of the dogmatism but I'll also admit that its an unreasonable fear.
Think of it this way. God is omniscient and ubiquitous and omnipotent. He has a plan and knows exactly what to do to effect that plan. And more, he has both the power and the presence to do everything he wants to in any moment. So really, what does it matter to such a being if he is in time or not. Everything still happens as he plans and when he plans.
And it removes artificial philosophical constructs. Constructs like "outside of time."
Now pay attention. I'm not saying that God isn't outside of time. Even though I'm saying it's reasonable to guess that he might be inside of time (whatever that means). At the end of the day, I'm just saying that we can't really state positively one way or another because there's no biblical support for the theory of outsidedness and even the philosophy is based on an understanding of time that is wholly deficient. So believe he's outside of time if you like, but don't ever use outsidedness as a premise supporting a conclusion you hope to rest anything important on. And don't expect me to jump on your applecart and ride to the faire towne of Ex Temporalis with you. Fair enough?
NOTES:
* It wasn't really at the mall. Who would have that kind of conversation at the mall?
Pope names are rad. You become Pope and get to choose your new identity. Popes often choose names based on, I presume, wishful thinking. Innocent? Pius? Come on, who's kidding who here? Benedict is marginally better, seeing as how the Pope merely has to be a good public speaker to merit his name.
But then, what if Pope names are really just power-fantasy and wish-fulfillment? Who am I to rain on their funny-hatted parade? I say, if you can't beat 'em (and with all that security, a sound beating is likely the last thing you'll be able to give a Pope), join 'em. So then, let's jump on that fun!
What Pope name would you choose for yourself? Some of my favourite choices follow abruptly --
Valerie the Curious quotes a curious piece by someone she calls Debbie Maken:
Women by their very nature and design instinctively know that they are made for the man. During the Reformation, there was a strain of thought that suggested that women could never have been called to remain single because they were "made for the man," (I. Cor. 11:9) and because all five characters in the Bible with lifelong celibacy produced singleness were all male. There is a loneliness, a floundering, an unexpressed longing to be whole, that is more acutely felt by women than men remaining single. Single women experience purposelessness....
Now every time I hear someone describing The Way It Is and they open with something along the lines of "by their very design and purpose," I start to get a little nervous. Certainly, there are appropriate appropriations of this kind of argument (e.g., people, by their very design, are meant to process oxygen), but those are rarely the kinds we see enter into this sort of discussion—a discussion of what women are like or what men are like. I'm not saying that every reference to design in reference to the sexes is offbase or inappropriate, but it's a pretty big warning sign that there's a rusty ol' hook in that shiny lure we're about to snap into our jaws.
And Maken doesn't disappoint.
It may be a presumption (as she doesn't state explicitly), but she seems to lean pretty heavily on a "strain of thought" from the Reformation era that seems less to do with anything actually thought out and more to do with whimsy and prejudgment. The idea that women cannot fulfill their purpose by remaining single is interesting and may bear scrutiny; but to ground a positive appraisal of the theory on gaunt evidences such as mentioned here is eyebrow-raising for sure. To say that women cannot be fulfilled in their singleness because they were "made for man" is as silly as implying that a man cannot be fulfilled in his singleness because God saw that he needed a helper and created woman to fulfill his need. If anything, the passages demonstrate that men have a greater need for women than women have for men.
And as if the author realized how much weaker the second proof is, but felt that any decent argument needs at least two evidence, she includes (trailing in arrears, as if ashamed to even be present, knowing full-well of its inadequacies) the sad, sad note that "all five characters in the Bible with lifelong celibacy-produced singleness were all male." Now let's ignore the fact that the purpose of the biblical narrative is nowhere to point out all the proper and acceptable life-paths for men and women... No nevermind. Let's not ignore that. Let's also not ignore that fact that women so rarely figure into the purpose of biblical narrative that a large majority of the time, their raison d'etre in the story is wholly (or maybe just primarily) due to their reproductive mechanic.
Let's also not ignore the fact that there are women in Scripture who have little problem fulfilling their Scriptural purpose apart from any marital interest. Deborah held a pivotal role in one aspect of the narrative and we know nothing about her marital state. Obviously, Scripture wasn't all that concerned with it.
If anything, the fact that five men in scripture led lifelong lives of good celibacy proves that women can as well (seeing as how men seem to need women as much or more than women need men, biblically speaking anyway).
Then in a classic statement of self-prioritization Maken states what she could not possibly know: "There is a loneliness, a floundering, an unexpressed longing to be whole, that is more acutely felt by women than men remaining single." While I'm sure all the single men who are pained by their bachelor state are ecstatic to be so duly dismissed by someone who could not possibly be an authority on their emotional state, I can happily report to men and women everywhere that Maken is makin' things up to suit her woeful purpose.
Then, surprisingly, Maken actually says something true: "Single women experience purposelessness." I cannot argue with this. I might however add a number of other equally true statements. Statements like Single men experience purposelessness or Married couples experience purposelessness. Or even less exclusive: People experience purposelessness. One might even be inclined to make equally true statements like Single women experience purpose or People experience purpose. All of these are true. People, both men and women, whatever their states, experience a range of things and among those things are either purpose or a lack of purpose or sometimes both simultaneously—which leads to the most common of human experiences: conflict.
Maken's real problem becomes here evident. She wants the pained single woman so badly to be special that she creates an exclusive club, an elite pity party that rivals the Mason's for the secrets it guards—secrets like dissatisfaction with life circumstances, a type of handshake that no other club can ever bear.
In the end, Valerie summarizes: "A woman without a man isn't like a fish without a bicycle; she's like a man without a job." To which I say, I would be stoked to be able to live without a job. I can't begin to tell you the number of things that a job keeps me from accomplishing. I think a better pithy saying (or at least more accurate, if not particularly pithy) would be: "A woman without a man is like a man without a woman; or even more likely, like a woman without a man."
Emeth recently linked to an article by Peej on something or other. I think it was one of those ones that points out how much useless stuff you know and how much quote-unquote valuable stuff you don't know and then tries to make you feel bad for that. It might not have been that at all. I confess that once I got that flavour from the article, I had little interest in seeing where he was going with it (having been there and done that numerous times in the past).
So I just skimmed it, reading a paragraph here. A sentence there. All pretty divorced from context and any sense of thought-progression. All this is to simply say that I'll be interacting with a specific portion of the article without concern for the rest.
Psalms v. popular music: God gave us a song book in order to sing it, but how many Psalms do you know by heart? If you were to tally up the number of pop songs you can sing along to, and then the number of Psalms you can sing along to, which list would be longer? And, given the power and importance of music in education (something known to the Bible as much as to Plato and Aristotle), how much of a Christian education do you have if you can't sing the Psalms? You need the church to do that, a church that will surround you with Psalm-singing, and will make those Psalms more a part of you than any other music.
Now this paragraph doesn't exactly strike me as being in any way a fair treatment of people and the songs they do know. Personally, I can't single along with more than a few words of the choruses of many songs. The one's I can sing along with are such because I do sing along with them. And the reason I do sing along has, generally, little to do with lyrical content and far more to do with my enjoyment of the music itself and the degree of enjoyment I get out of the kind of singing I'm doing to keep up with the song in question.
Fact: I don't sing along with songs I don't enjoy. Fact: my enjoyment of a song stems directly from the degree to which I enjoy the music. Fact: if I don't enjoy the music, I will not sing a song (save from social duress). Fact: if I don't sing a song, it's pretty rare that I'll be able to tell you what the lyrics are.
So what does this have to do with my judgment that psalms vs. popular music is an unfair comparison? Well, everything actually.
The fact of the matter is that I have heard very few psalms put to music that I find listenable or enjoyable. Therefore psalms and popular music (for the sake of argument, we'll just call this the music I like, the music that is popular within my community of one) are not really comparable. A far more apt comparison would be something like:
Psalms vs. Country Western!!
I don't like country western music. Therefore I don't sing along with country western music. Therefore I don't know any country western lyrics. I couldn't quote anything beyond "All my exes live in Texas"—which I may not have ever actually heard bu have simply acquired through a broad cultural consciousness. The fact is, though I don't sing either country western songs or psalms, I know far more words to Psalms than I do country western songs (though they be popular in some sub-cultures).
Should I feel at all bad about being able to sing most of the lyrics to "Re Your Brains" or "El Scorcho" but could not sing even a few bars of Psalm 119 or 76 or 138 or 2? I don't think so. Peej asks how much of a Christian education I can have if I can't sing the Psalms. I know he's asking rhetorically, hoping that we'll shrug our shoulders, sigh deeply, realize that we know nothing, and humbly submit to the conviction that dadgummit we needs to be a-singing more of dem Psalms... but I think the question actually deserves an answer rather than the perhaps-expected silence of consent.
So then, question: How much of a Christian education I can have if I can't sing the Psalms?
Answer: A heckuva great Christian eduaction! I find myself to be continually fortunate in that the grace of God in educating my soul to the way of everlasting is gratuitous in its sufficiency, never ceasing to teach me and cause my wisdom and understanding to fall apart and be reshapen into a wisdom and understanding that ever closer resembles that which he would have me to be. I would be overjoyed to be introduced to some music that would make the singing of Psalms more than an academic exercise while I concentrate so greatly on the words in order to blot out the musical offense being perpetrated upon my ears. That would be wonderful. But what kind of screwed up law would I have to place myself under to believe that such singing would actually govern the education of faith rather than simply compliment it?
Let me begin by exclaiming: Romantic Spanking Fiction?!?
Okay, so now that I've got that out of the system, I should let you know that somehow—through arts both arcane and implausible—I was directed to the most amazing website in the world. I couldn't believe my good fortune upon arriving at said site for it cured me for days of any potential blues that might have even threatened to overtake me. After all, who could feel bad or gloomy after finding that a site like Chirsitan Domestic Discipline dot Com exists.
I know I couldn't.
Boasting a plethora of material that is certain to enhance one's traditional marriage, you'd think that I wouldn't be particularly interested. And I thought the same after reading that description. But then I remembered the name of the site and knew there had to be something to it (marriage enhancements vs. domestic discipline initially sounded too disparate to be referring to the same thing). And that's when I noticed the banner that appears on every page of the site: Loving wife spanking in a Christian Marriage.
And while I'm certain there should be some sort of hyphenation in there (along with some capitalization help), I knew instinctively that I was on the trail to greatness. If only I would hang in there.
So hang in there, I did.
Christian Domestic Discipline dot Com is, in itself an amazing experience and I have yet to experience firsthand a single one of their products. The site, put together by a woman, is dedicated to corporal punishment of unsubmissive wives (and sexy pantaloons and healing herbal remedies). One of the chief products offered is a workbook by the site's founder on the matter of Consensual Christian Domestic Discipline. Let's listen in, shall we?
Just as a parent would never stop to ask permission to chastise his child, a husband should not have to obtain consent to discipline his wife; however, our legal system has put him in the position of having to do so. Just as our culture is turned upside down in so many other things, the traditional Christian marriage is no exception.
Some of the workbook's chapter headings are amusingly awkward and thrill the imagination. Especially helpful is the chapter on aftercare. Aftercare? Man, I got spanked a lot when I was a kid and I never once needed any sort of special care for the keister. Makes you wonder exactly what kind of knives are being used to spank these willful, strong-headed women? One of the last chapters is called, "Wife's Means of Voicing Opinions." I would imagine that the workbook doesn't suggest this be done through a duly-appointed attorney, so my curiosity is certainly piqued.
But speaking of aftercare, the site offers aftercare herbal remedies that make a good, sound thrashing seem almost worth seeking! "A satiny mixture of cooling aloe vera, conditioning glycerin, and healing arnica tincture, lightly scented with soothing cucumber mint, this breezy gel feels wonderful on your skin!" The instructions for the "Aftercare Cooling Gel," however, do include instructions that curdle my milk:
FOR EXTERNAL USE ONLY. DO NOT USE ON BROKEN OR NON-INTACT SKIN. DISCONTINUE USE IF REDNESS OR IRRITATION OCCURS
Non-intact skin? I guess that goes along with the idea of spanking with knives, but really—it's hard not to be aghast. It's additionally amusing that the instruction go in to specify that "this product makes no medical claims." You know, just in case you thought that they might offer something to stem the pain wrought by your well-earned and festering wounds. That would take all the fun out of beati-- er, disciplining one's wife.
But you know? I still haven't gotten to the real gem found in this virtual mine. Romantic spanking fiction.
It's true, I speak no lie. In her Books for Download section, Leah Kelley offers a couple non-fiction offering (presumably tutorial in nature, educating disciplinarians of, amongst other apropos topics, the best grip to use on one's hole-riddled paddle and/or flanged mace), but the real emphasis seems to center on novels, novellas, and short stories that work as tracts for Consensual Christian Domestic Discipline. These pedagogical devices are deemed "romantic spanking fiction" and seem to feature husbands with disobedient wives who then submit (willingly or not) to the rightful relationship between hand and heinie.
Here are some of my favourite book descriptions:
The Arrangement: A harried head of household learns that if he's to have peace in his home, he must discipline not only his wife but his widowed mother-in-law as well.
The Check: Clay left work early to surprise his wife with a nice evening out, but when he discovers an unusual piece of mail he may have to surprise her with a spanking instead.
To Train Up a Wife: Jason is tired of living in filth and eating fast food while his wife spends all her time volunteering at the church. When he accidentally witnesses his neighbor's method of training a wife, will he learn the secret of marital bliss?
And a wonderful excerpt from Bringing up Jenny:
Jenny's breath quickened, her eyes fastened to the strap. At least two feet long, it looked to be made of heavy rawhide. A quick glance around her showed she wasn't the only student imagining that strap wrapped painfully around their bottom. The room was almost ominously quiet as twenty-three pairs of somber adolescent eyes now faced the front.
And a breath-taking piece of work from God's Design:
Nikki tried to get up, but he held her close to him. "Mason, how can you say that you're not going to hurt me? Spankings hurt!"
"I'm not going to hurt you. I'm going to spank you and there is a difference between the two. Your spanking will be on your bottom, which is one of the things God designed it for. Yes, it will hurt, but it will be temporary and hopefully prevent long-term hurt from coming to our relationship. Now, I am going to take down your panties and you are going to put yourself over my lap where I am going to give you a very sound spanking."
Nikki began to plead. "Please, Mason! Honey, I don't want a spanking."
"I know you don't, but I am a man of my word and whether you want to admit or not, we both know that you have needed this for quite awhile now."
Mason pulled Nikki to her feet and stood her in front of him. He began to reach under the hem of her black, knee-length skirt. His hands were sure and steady as he reached for the waistband of her panties. Frantically, Nikki began trying to push his hands away.
"Mason, pllllllleeeeaaassseee, don't pull them down. I don't want you to spank me. You can't!"
"Nicole! Listen to me. You ARE getting spanked and if you don't stop fighting me you will be feeling the back of that hairbrush on the table on your backside instead of my hand."
For the first time, Nikki noticed a large wooden hairbrush on the coffee table in front of them.
"Are you going to cooperate?" he asked gently.
And I'm barely scratching the surface here. This stuff is the work of diabolical genius. And fortunately, for both the squeamish and the fetishistic, each listed work features a warning, alerting potential readers of just how drastic the level of spanking is. Typical warning read: contains mild-to-moderate spanking; contains moderate spanking; contains severe spanking. You know, so you can find just the right level of corporal punishment you're comfortable with and see it modelled through thoroughly realistic dialogue and narrative. Or something.
I think the thing that really gets my goat is that these polemical tools are aimed squarely at a female audience. The goal is to convince women that they need a good spanking every so often to keep them on the straight and narrow. And as little as I appreciate the horrifying ideal that we should submit our women to regular disciplinary beatings, I'm even less enamoured with the unspoken idea that it's women who need to be convinced of this rather than men—as if the moment a wife comes around and says, "Honey, I'm convinced. You need to spank me when I'm bad," a husband will happily breathe a sigh of relief, pick up the strap of rawhide he's kept hidden in his sock drawn, and say, "Baby, you have no idea how long I've been hoping that you'd come around. Christ be praised!"
Blech. I hate what people do in the name of my faith.
Note: I have no idea what the title mentioning Alfalfa refers to now. I came up with the idea and the masthead a few weeks ago but didn't end up writing the post 'til this week and have just plain forgotten. Still, I like the title so I kept it. Cool points to the person who comes up with the best explanation for the title.
Ah, 'tis the season to be lenting. Fa la la la la, la la la lah. As remarked elsewhere, I'll be celebrating Lent this year by giving up Lent. I know, I know. It'll big a big sacrifice, but I like to think I'm up to the challenge. Last year, for Lent, I gave up not commenting on Scott's site while he gave up the internet for forty days. I almost made it too, but I got lazy near the end. Isn't that always the way with us Lenters.
When I was again considering what I find so deeply distasteful about Lent (and at root, unchristian), I thought of a number of issues related to the topic, but I won't share those. Well, not all of them anyway. I treated one aspect last year. Here's another.
Lenters announcing their fast strikes me as something quite akin to trumpeting one's prayer or offering. The Lookatme-Lookatme aspect is almost inescapable. Everybody is happy to announce what they are sacrificing oh-so-noblely this year. What are you giving up? Oh for me? The internet. For me? Chocolate! For me? Caffeine! For me? RSS Feeds! For me? Pornography! For me? Boasting in artifice!
Making time in one's schedule to contemplate with sobriety the life, obedience, death, justification, and ascension of Christ is a great thing. We should do it all the time. And constantly be reminding ourselves to think thusly. But so much of Lent-practice strikes me as Hey everybody! Look what a sacrifice I'm gonna make for Jesus!
Look. Our entire lives are to be a sacrifice. A living sacrifice. And we are to submit ourselves humbly before our God, neither parading our deeds nor trusting in our own covenants to merit us good. If you want to participate in Lent as a personal reminder to spend more time with and in the Word, than please do so. Only don't parade it. Don't lift it up as if it is some Holy Thing.
But! Just so you guys won't think I'm a total Grinch, here's a picture from a couple days ago on Ash Wednesday with a little Ash on my forehead:
If by any means I may provoke to emulation my flesh, and might save some of them. For if the casting away of them the reconciling of the world, what the receiving, but life from the dead? For if the firstfruits holy, the lump also: and if the root holy, so the branches.
So I know this guy. I run into him a time or three a week. And on rare occasions, while looking over his shoulder, I see into his Bible. (I know, huh. Such a Peeping Tom!) And this is where the funny begins.
Sure there's all kinds of highlighting, underlining, and marginalia (though I have yet to see a "man vs. nature" on the sidelines), but the real kicker is that every page is littered with words he has blotted out, stricken from the record. What began in a kind of mild shock (as in, "Wow, he must not have liked what Jesus said there!") has transformed into a giddy kind of amusement as the truth of the matter slowly has reached its dawning.
This guy I know, he's a big King James Version (KJV) fan. He may even be of the One True Bible (tm) fanclub, I'm not sure. In any case, those familiar with the KJV and its younger brother should know that both versions have a number of words italicized (or otherwise demarcated from the rest of the text - the BLB uses square brackets). This special notation is used (for reasons that escape me) to alert the English reader to the fact that the noted words do not appear literally in the original text but are only implied by the original text. It was a moment of high joy when it was discovered that these are the words that are blacked out.
It was even higher joy, a couple weeks ago, to hear him as he read from his Bible aloud. Skipping all the blacked-out words. Now the KJV is difficult enough for the contemporary ear to decipher when its grammatically sound. To hear the clipped staccato of this abridged version was more disorienting than watching the theatrical climax to James Cameron's The Abyss.
Now he's a nice guy and I imagine that what he's doing, he does with the best of intentions - being careful not to ad to the Word of God and all. But it also betrays a profound misunderstanding of the way foreign language translation works. It's pretty much a well-esteemed truth that an entirely literal translation of Scripture would be patently unreadable. This is because languages are not grammatical analogues of each other. This is why you'll hear twenty-three syllables on the Hong Kong crime drama you're watching and the subtitles will say something terse like, "I'm hungry!"
To use an example from one of the few foreign languages in which I possess a working vocabulary of more than thirty words, if i wish to translate, "No se" from Spanish, I'll simply say it means, "I don't know" or technically, "I do not know" (four words from two). If I were this guy, I would have to blot that down to something like, "Not know." Not only is this pretty inelegant, but as there's no attached pronoun, the statement is pretty ambiguous. Translation of something like "Me llamo El Dane" becomes more tricky. Though we would likely express the same sentiment in English by saying something like, "I am The Dane" or "My name is The Dane," a literal translation would run along the lines of, "I call myself The Dane." This guy's version would run: "Call myself The Dane." It's just too weird.
And it does exactly what he's trying to avoid: it distorts the meaning of the text.
Kalinara brings up an interesting subject on her blog, Pretty, Fizzy Pair of Dice: Christians and their portrayal in the media - and specifically in comics. It seems she's responding to some articles she read at some point in which the authors were complaining about the lack of positive representation of their religion in comics. The main drive of her response is to point out that Christians in America aren't persecuted and should stop acting like they are. An old subject and one I've dealt with before, but maybe I can spin some fresh light onto the matter (mixaphorically speaking).
Help! I'm Persecuted and I Can't Get Up!
I think it's probably due to Christ's words to the effect that if a believer is truly acting like a believer, he will be persecuted, but the evangelical church in America has translated this to nearly fetishistic degree. Christians subconsciously want so badly to measure up, to be worthy of persecution that they become willing to see the slightest resistance, the smallest mockery or derision, as persecution.
Prayer out of schools? Ohnoes! Persecution! The excise of "under God"? Ohnoes! Persecution! The existence of the ACLU? Ohnoes! Persecution! Resistance to including ID in public school curricula? Ohnoes! Persecution!
The irony, of course, is that as much as they want persecution subconsciously, they'll voice their ire against it at the drop of a hat. They'll organize protests for unfair treatment. They'll vote to eliminate that persecution. It really is something of a mind-trip. The other irony is that all of these so-called persecutions come as reaction against the church involving itself in culture in a manner in which it was never intended to involve itself. (But that is another topic - and one you're probably tired of hearing me rail upon.)
The reality is that the church is persecuted today. Just not so much here in America. The church in Sudan? Yes. The church in China? Yes. The church in Afghanistan? Yes. The church in India? Yes. Even in Romania, my family experience some degree of genuine persecution. But here in America? Beyond occasional individuals with a mad-on against Christianity, there isn't much that will fall under the heading of persecution.
I mean what? Because I am a Christian, I may get portrayed as ignorant, intolerant, sexist, self-righteous, and any number of other distasteful adjectives. But that's not persecution. Sticks-and-stones, brutha.
Do You Do Caricatures?
This is not to say that I enjoy the way the church is portrayed in the arts. The stereotype is ingrained enough that when a Christian scene is portrayed, I actually anticipate a negative portrayal. When Daredevil attends a church in the "Redemption" storyline, we get a scene right out of Inherit the Wind. When Jessica Jones visits the local pastor in "Come Home," she gets an earful of wrathful diatribe that sounds like tiresome GodHatesFags lingo with mutants subbing in for homosexuals.
And then the other kind of Christian in the literary arts is the nominal one - and almost a reaction against the other kind. He's the average Joe who believes in God, but doesn't really evidence the life of a follower of Christ (save for a genuine morality or an occasional prayer on screen). His role is generally to act as a pacifier, offering, occasionally, sound and wise advice that sound remote and religious. I kind of think of the preacher from Kingdom Come who, when Dead-Man presumes he's preaching to the choir by speaking of the existence of God, corrects the garish figure, saying: "No. Frankly, I can't imagine any of this. Since seminary, I have been more philosopher than priest. In my church, I preached that God is not a person... but rather, a force with many names... one that motivates us to master our own fate."
Neither of these are Christians like I am a Christian. I don't see myself in them. I see Jerry Falwell and Martin Luther King Jr. in them. But not me. And not any real Christian I know. These characters are not representative of me, of my beliefs. So when I see them, I feel sorry for their authors - simply because the craft they are producing isn't as good as it could be. It's like they're writing black women who bob their heads and say, "Nuh uh, girlfriend!" Yes, there are black women who do that, and yes, there are so-called Christians who spit hateful rhetoric all day long. *shrug* But it'd be nice to see writing that surpasses those weaknesses.
What Me Worry?
A recent theme (spanning decades) in our victocratic culture is the demand for representation. Asian-Americans complain that there are not enough Asian actors getting premium roles in American cinema. Homosexual watchdog groups want better gay characters on television. Girls wonder why there aren't more Strong Female Characterstm in comics. And Christian worry about the lack of honest Christian representation in books and movies and newspapers and, well, everywhere.
The thing is: why? Why does should we care? Why does it matter that there is no one in a book with life experiences perfectly analogous to ours?
Look. I am a pale-faced, woman-oriented, male who believes Christ died to save the world from their sins. And you know what percent of characters represent me, my beliefs, the circumstances of my life? If you guessed 0%, then you're right.
I have yet to find a character whom I really identify with - at least on the basis of superficial things like sex, orientation, or ethnicity. Sure I can relate with Fone Bone's loyalty to those he holds near to his heart and Nausicaä's desire to preserve life, because those are transcendent themes. But Fone Bone's a vaguely masculine (no apparent genitalia), inhuman creature. And Nausicaä's a princess and wears funny hats. Most of my favourite characters are characters who do not resemble me at all.
Except for maybe in ways that count.
So really, should I be upset that none of my favourite comic book characters really resemble me in superficial ways? No. Really, I shouldn't. And neither should you.
I guess a valid question might be: Well, sure, things like sex, orientation, and ethnicity are all pretty superficial when it comes to storytelling, but what about religion? That's not so superficial, is it? After all, it's one of the most important things about me!
Fair enough, I say; still, by and large, in the majority of stories (save for those that deal expressly spiritual themes) religion is a superficiality no different in importance to ethnicity or sex. So really, I can't think of a single reason why I should need to see a character who represents me in sex, orientation, ethnicity, and religion? It's just not important. I have yet to see a character who really represents me. And you know what? That's fine because people should identify with characters via their thoughts and actions rather via the window-dressing.
After an interesting run of comments on a particular post over at Memoirs of a Samurai Barber, it seems the comment system broke. And try as I might, I could not fix it. So, in a fit of sentimentality, I'm going to post a blog all old-school, like we did back in the day. For those of you who weren't traversing across the consolidated bloginalia in the year 2000, it was common for one blogger to write a post and for other bloggers to respond to that post on their own sites rather than in the original poster's comments. Since, well, blogs didn't have comments back then. And in light of technical difficulties, I'm going to do just that.
In his original question, Johnny T asks for clarification on the Christian ethic in times when one's government is, well, evil. He uses the example of Nazi Germany, but inevitably draws us back to the inadequacies of the current administration in America. He asks about actions such as assassination, sabotage, espionage, defection, and the hiding of Jews. I think his questions have merit and will briefly outline my outlook on matters before answering his final question (which was posted after the system broke and hence, is only visible to me).
So then, essentially, the believer's interaction with the government that rules over him is this:
Though we are to regularly submit to even the most oppressive government, I do believe we are to break laws that prohibit us from doing good so long as we are willing to accept the consequences. Conversely, I believe we cannot actively seek the dissolution, through illegal means, or harm of said government.
I do not think we are to actively prevent the government from doing evil by ourselves doing evil (a la assassination of evil leaders), for that would clearly go against our command to "honour the emperor." Pretty much everything on John's laundry list seems inappropriate to the believer with the exception of hiding Jews; only offering succour to the enemies of a government seems to break the law because it prevents one from doing good.
While Johnny expresses his frustration with the difficulty in balancing something like the Golden Rule with our mandate to accept the authority of the government that God has seen fit to place over us - for whatever reasons are his - I don't see as much difficulty in the question. To this, Johnny responds:
The conflict will be clearer if we consider other areans of life besides war.
Immigration: in some states harboring an immigrant has become a felony, yet there are many churches in those states that break the law in order to take care of the immigrants. The same can be said in our state, though it isn't a felony here. You have a white family so this doens't come up much for you, but with my Wife's Philipino family, there is a lot of family here illegally. Yet I feel like taking care of family and not betraying family is more important that obeying the law.
Contributing to Pro-Palistinian charities. Now, contributing to many of these charities can be considered contributing to Terrorism, even though the Palistinians are the ones being constantly terrorised. This can be serious stuff. The last thing you want to do these days is get the Feds looking at you as an illegal enemy combatant -- you'll land yourself in the most terrorising interigation system in the world. Yet the Palistinians are in grave need.
I could think of more examples, but I hope you are getting my point. Submission to the governing authorities and helping our fellow humans are often in conflict.
To go back to the war examples, why would sabatoge be wrong for the defector to do but not wrong for soldier to do? Both acts destroy and kill in an attempt to give victory to one side of the war. Why doesn't the soldier have to love his enemy? It would seem that if we took that commandment as an absolute, all soldiers would be in sin. I don't think many conservative Christians are going to be absolute on this one.
If I was a German in Nazi Germany and I loathed what the Nazis were doing, I don't think my concsience would greive me too much for blowing up a gas tank at the ammo depot, or sniping commanding officers off duty.
Do you think that is wrong? Becuase now that I say it, I guess I'm not totally sure I could do that in good concisence. But for sure, it would be a tough decision for me either way.
I can't speak to the laws of the states and of felonies and misdemeanors, but what I can say is that if you run across a man in need and you are able to help him and yet you do not, you are not a good person. If the punishment for feeding and clothing your fellow man is that you be locked up for two or three years, then you will be locked up for two or three years. You did not sin in violating a law that would prevent you from loving your neighbour or enemy as yourself.
While I think the view you present of the Palestinian plight here is vastly simplified and perhaps a little naive, I believe you are free to give charity as you see fit. This example doesn't exactly fit - as I don't believe that Palestinian charities are yet illegal, but regardless, if you are giving to Palestine, I would suggest doing it through the church or through some organization with which you have firsthand experience. Charities, after-all, may be far from what we would expect them to be.
As for the comment that submission to authorities and helping our fellow man are often in conflict, I guess I can only shrug and say, "So?" I don't see this as a problem, as I've outline above how I, personally, reconcile the difficulties.
When Johnny referenced my stance on war, he's referring to the fact that I believe that governments have the right to wage war - though individuals do not. I also believe that, as there is no suggestion to the soldiers in the tyrannical Roman army that they should cease their service post-conversion, that contemporary believers may join themselves to the military if they choose (though I would not recommend it). As agents of the governing authority, the operate with the authority of their government. Therefore, Christians may go ethically into battle and kill the enemy of their government should their government command it (again, I would not recommend military service as the killing of men must weigh heavily on the soul of the believer). Further, I state that as an operative of a government, one make engage in espionage and sabotage - and yet, that an individual who is not deputized by the government under which he sits, bears no such privilege.
At this point, Johnny asks Why doesn't a soldier have to love his enemy? My answer: he does. I don't see a conflict here (after all, we always hurt the ones we love *kidding*). Really, though I think the balancing act would probably weigh heavily on one's soul across the years, I do think its possible to love your enemy even while you kill him. I also believe that a Christian has the privilege of rejecting that deputization - so long as they are happy to engage the consequences.
Now you should be able to ascertain why I believe that it would be wrong for a German citizen and believer to snipe commanding officers while they are off-duty, yet acceptable for a British soldier to do so. Essentially it comes down to the authority with which they are vested.
I was reading Isaiah the other day and noticed in 1:22 that one of the great calamities that could befall Judah was the watering down of their wine. Puts Jesus' miracle in Cana in sharp perspective for those who believe that good wine was the watered down stuff, doesn't it?
