If your husband told you to jump off a cliff, would you do it?

Salto sobrius: Jim Benton on Fundies vs. Gay Marriage

A very interesting article on why gay marriage upsets the fundie applecart. Turns out said apple cart is hauling horseapples anyhow - the rationale for opposing gay marriage hinges on the despicable abomination of a man submitting to another man.

a heterosexual marriage that deviates from "God's plan" can be condemned as such, and there is always hope that through "good Christian example" teaching, preaching, and prayer, these "misguided sinners" can be shown the proper path. (And the true dominionists can hope they will have the power of the state at least to teach students properly, and even have laws that will correct the poor, deluded "equalitarians".)

But there is no way that a gay couple can choose to conform to these teachings. The roles, in the minds of the radical Christians are biologically and theologically based. The question of which gender should be submissive is not a matter of choice. It is rooted in the idea that "man was created first and woman sinned first" in Eden. Yes, a woman may (and should, according to voices like Stormy Omartian's) freely choose to submit to her husband and act according to God's plan. But that is because she is a woman. A man who should choose to submit to his wife, in the same way, would be an unnatural abomination.

And, obviously, same-sex marriages either do not have a woman to "willingly submit to whomever it is we need to be submitted to", or they lack a man to be submitted to. No amount of preaching can change this, no amount of Christian example will change this. Any gay marriage, by existing, challenges this idea of a proper, "traditional" marriage.

Well, you know MY methods, Watson. Not only should gay marriage of all sorts be recognized - to the extent that I admit that the state has any business recognizing any relationship at all - but more heterosexual couples should make a point of giving the horselaugh to this nonsense:

For a similar view let's look at the Southern Baptists. In an article on subjugation of women in that denomination, Dr. Bruce Prescott & Dr. Rick McClatchy (who have become "Mainstream Baptists", a group which split from the Southern Baptists as a protest against the emergence of extreme and rigid conservatism in the older group) write in Baptist Faith and Message, a Baptist "Confession of faith"):

"subjugation of women extended to the privacy of Baptist homes when a statement on the family was added to the BF&M. In line with the chain of command made explicit in the 1984 resolution, the 1998 family amendment advised wives that they must ‘graciously submit' to their husbands."

"The unconditional nature of the wife's subjugation became clear at the official press conference following the statement's adoption. Dorothy Patterson, wife of Paige Patterson and a member of the committee that drafted the family statement, said, ‘When it comes to submitting to my husband even when he is wrong, I just do it. He is accountable to God.'"

But these groups are relatively liberal. I could go on and on -- oh, you've noticed -- but I'll end this by requoting Tedd Tripp, from my article on baby beating.

"You must provide examples of submission for your children. Dads can do this through biblical authority over their wives, and Moms through biblical submission to their husbands." p. 142

"Don't waste time trying to sugarcoat submission to make it palatable. Obeying when you see the sense in it is not submission; it is agreement. Submission necessarily means doing what you do not wish to do. It is never easy or painless." p. 145

"Your children [and by implication, your wife] must understand that when you speak for the first time, you have spoken for the last time." p. 151

Yep. Funnymentalism; the last refuge of the bull asshole - and those to weak and stupid to lead a household without violence. But nonetheless, I support the right of those who wish such relationships and are above the age of consent to enter into them.

However, raising children to behave this way is, I think, child abuse. Not to put too fine a point on it, I think that the widespread abuse of children by people who loudly adhere to such beliefs is all the force this argument against it being either Christian OR American needs.

Lets go Gunch in the name of Scrunt...

Vaughn Bode' said it years and years ago....

...a billion years ago, across the winter blue past, there is a ugly mountain standing in the cold afternoon wind. It is the first place to look for the roots of western sanity...

When someone hands you a gun and tells you to go kill "those evil people over there," it's best to remember that "evil" tends to want to be the guy with all the guns to hand out. This doesn't preclude there being another guy handing out guns - but most likely the Plan is to get you to shoot his guys and his guys to shoot your guys so that nobody will actually have the time to wonder just who all this "evil fighting" really benefits.

BTW, simulations that label non-evangelicals as "evil," worthy of conversion or the sword - that would be a pretty obvious evil to the casual, non-brainwashed person, Christian or otherwise.

clipped from www.talk2action.org

Imagine: you are a foot soldier in a paramilitary group whose purpose is to remake America as a Christian theocracy, and establish its worldly vision of the dominion of Christ over all aspects of life. You are issued high-tech military weaponry, and instructed to engage the infidel on the streets of New York City. You are on a mission - both a religious mission and a military mission -- to convert or kill Catholics, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, gays, and anyone who advocates the separation of church and state - especially moderate, mainstream Christians. Your mission is "to conduct physical and spiritual warfare"; all who resist must be taken out with extreme prejudice. You have never felt so powerful, so driven by a purpose: you are 13 years old. You are playing a real-time strategy video game whose creators are linked to the empire of mega-church pastor Rick Warren, best selling author of The Purpose Driven Life.

Theocracy; The worst of Socialism and Facism with none of the freedoms.

When Jesus said "feed my sheep," it was within a culture quite used to tripping over the damn things. Sheep are harmless unless they fall on you, inoffensive and have an amazing capacity for innocently wandering into death traps, stepping on feet and crapping indiscriminately. Furthermore, if not taken to where they are literally up to their ankles in food, they will helplessly starve while bleating pathetically. Jesus was a realist, and he was not complementing the flock, nor conveying power with out duty.

"Feeding the sheep" is a chore. A duty. An obligation of those capable of recognizing that for one reason or another, praise Goddess, they are NOT sheep.

I use the word Goddess to underline the fact that the duty is inescapable by simply choosing to become something other than Christian. Indeed, from my perspective, the ethics of the matter are clear enough that I'd be saying the same thing as an atheist.

Government is wholesale. Religion - and it's secular equivalents - are retail. By seeking to become major secular powers, influencing governments and dictating to people in wholesale lots, the various churches have both currently and historically become whores TO government, or become governments themselves.

But the shepherd does not get to choose which sheep they have a duty toward - they run after any sheep in trouble . The dogs may attend to the flock as a whole. And yes, we may indeed use that as a metaphor for Law.

The law is implacable, and for that reason alone it must be as minimal a restriction on individual liberty as possible, so that it does not interfere with our individual rights and responsibilities.

For instance, while it's Unconstitutional (a fact, though it's an often inconvenient fact in the face of the utter failure of our churches to do their rightful tasks) to forcibly take money from Peter to feed Paul, I see no constitutional impediment to it establishing mechanisms whereby Paul can choose to feed Peter.

It would certainly be Constitutional for it to invest in a universal insurance scheme that did not depend on borrowing from the future. Better yet, it could simply serve as a conduit for such schemes, to amortize risk, minimize overhead and serve to ensure that such services did not become schemes for profit or power.

No government - nor for that matter, religion - is truly wise and all-seeing enough to truly know what any of us need to meet our responsibilities, or even directly determine what our needs are and meet them. Were it possible to know, such knowledge would be so totally invasive as to completely strip us of all human dignity.

Therefore, state and church exist in separate, immiscible capacities to advise, and with our consent, provide information, resources and human contacts to help with those most personal and non-transferable duties. Nor may any entity, person, religion, corporation or government claim to be wise enough to know for certain that in the face of a poor outcome, their choices would have been better on behalf of any particular individual.

First attempt define what "better" would be for every single affected person with inarguable accuracy first, with absolute reliability from the viewpoint of those in need and you will see my point. Even the most obvious-seeming judgments rely on assumptions based on your informed guess as to what would be best for most people, with "most" being ultimately defined as "people you know."

Therefore, "judge not, lest you be judged also." It's not a prediction of future consequence, it's an observation of very immediate human reaction. The moment you make assumptions about individuals based on your assumptions about what people "should" do or be able to do, you reveal your own personal inability to accept realities and people outside of your understanding.

To you Christians out there who nonetheless refuse to feed Paul for various transparently false rationalizations - the Bible says that if someone comes to your town and is hungry, and he is not fed, clothed and given refuge, then they may take what he needs from the altar of the Temple. As I recall, it would ordinarily be a lesser offense under the Levitical Code you are all so fond of for them to steal from you.

The Constitution will not force you to act morally, ethically or even responsibly. It does not demand that you "hold up your end," nor will it force others to compensate for your lack. It will not protect you from the consequences of pretending you are when you are not. Nor is there any legitimate religion, system of ethics or morality that will pretend otherwise. Not even Satanism. What the Constitution does is to attempt to limit Government from interfering with your rights - and empowering it to protect your individual rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness from the encroachment of others.

If you are genuinely unable by temperament, mental state, or circumstances to act responsibly in all things, then it is your responsibility to seek out help, just as it is your duty to help when called on by those in genuine need. There is a reciprocal responsibility to be helpful, and where government can legitimately make help from over here available over there it must - as our designated agent and adviser.

It's just that simple, and no, you really don't get to pick and choose between the "deserving and undeserving;" not as a Christian, and certainly not as a Deist, a Humanist or indeed, an irreligious, self-centered couch-potato. Refusing to recognize an ethical necessity does not make it go away.

As I study the Constitution, I realize more and more that it deliberately denies the People the comfortable apathy of a state that exists to "take care" of them. Even the sheep have the the minimum responsibility of finding a trustworthy shepherd. Those of you claiming to be shepherds, but who are but shills for the slaughterhouse - well, sooner or later the smell of blood will betray you.

Aint' that right, Messers. Bush and Haggard?

With such examples of "Christianity" in positions of power, it is deeply and damnably ironic to hear comparable asshats intone that "This Is A Christian Nation."

Note: This is a slightly edited excerpt from an earlier post. When I saw the Blog Against Theocracy alert, I realize that this chunk could stand on it's own, even though it's part of a larger post about our personal responsibility to act ethically toward others with the unique skills, talents and insights that we actually have - and that responsibility is something government cannot really absolve us of, nor can religion limit for the sake of our personal comfort.

Spoko observes:

Spocko is a stumbleupon buddy o' mine; it's a great way for bloggers to inflict - I mean share stories and links with a bit of explanation. I had to laugh out loud at this - and I'm far from being an athiest! But it does help to be able to think outside of the "big box church!"

StumbleUpon » Spocko's web site reviews and blog:

"Top Ten Signs You're a Fundamentalist Christian

10 - You vigorously deny the existence of thousands of gods claimed by other religions, but feel outraged when someone denies the existence of yours.

9 - You feel insulted and 'dehumanized' when scientists say that people evolved from other life forms, but you have no problem with the Biblical claim that we were created from dirt.

8 - You laugh at polytheists, but you have no problem believing in a Triune God.

7 - Your face turns purple when you hear of the 'atrocities' attributed to Allah, but you don't even flinch when hearing about how God/Jehovah slaughtered all the babies of Egypt in 'Exodus' and ordered the elimination of entire ethnic groups in 'Joshua' including women, children, and trees!

6 - You laugh at Hindu beliefs that deify humans, and Greek claims about gods sleeping with women, but you have no problem believing that the Holy Spirit impregnated Mary, who then gave birth to a man-god who got killed, came back to life and then ascended into the sky.

5 - You are willing to spend your life looking for little loopholes in the scientifically established age of Earth (few billion years), but you find nothing wrong with believing dates recorded by Bronze Age tribesmen sitting in their tents and guessing that Earth is a few generations old.

4 - You believe that the entire population of this planet with the exception of those who share your beliefs -- though excluding those in all rival sects - will spend Eternity in an infinite Hell of Suffering. And yet consider your religion the most "tolerant" and "loving."

3 - While modern science, history, geology, biology, and physics have failed to convince you otherwise, some idiot rolling around on the floor speaking in "tongues" may be all the evidence you need to "prove" Christianity.

2 - You define 0.01% as a "high success rate" when it comes to answered prayers. You consider that to be evidence that prayer works. And you think that the remaining 99.99% FAILURE was simply the will of God.

1 - You actually know a lot less than many atheists and agnostics do about the Bible, Christianity, and church history - but still call yourself a Christian.

Oh, I have a couple-three nits to pick, here and there. I believe in prayer (theurgy) as well as magic, (thaumaturgy) and I do not think 0.001% is a plausible success rate. Regarding both phenomonae; aboriginal people did not have food to waste on useless individuals - and a shaman can be pretty damn useless in any respect other than shamanism. Same for Priests and Magicians. Now, all sorts are notorious for putting a thumb on the scale of public opinion - but you just can't fool all of the people, all of the time.

But none of the intuitive arts - and in "intuitive arts" I also include such disciplines as "teacher" and "psycologist" - can ever aspire to truly reproducable results, actually falsifiable theories or indeed, immunity from skeptical derision.

I should also note that while this is a fairly accurate assessment of a certain sort of mean-spirited, judgemental, self-rightious idiot, that all the hallmarks of it are actually mocked and derided IN the Bible, by Jesus. Make of that what you will - and I notice there seems to be a similar dissonance between what the Koran says and what certain folk who call themselvs Islamic (or even Imam) would like to tell you it says.

SSDR.

Onward, Christian Soldiers...

The Blog | Max Blumenthal: Diary of a Christian Terrorist | The Huffington Post

Visitors to Mark David Uhl's Myspace page will quickly learn that Uhl is a student at Jerry Falwell's Liberty University, that he is a devoted Christian, that his name means "Mighty Warrior" -- and that he likes Will Smith's saccharine tear-up-the-club track, "Switch." Uhl reveals his career ambitions on his page as well: "I will join the Army as an officer after college." Already, Uhl was preparing in Liberty's ROTC program.

Uhl waited until he was offline, however, to reveal his plot to kill the family of itinerant Calvinist provocateur Fred Phelps (famous for their "Fag Troops" rallies outside soldiers' funerals). The Phelpses planned to protest Falwell's funeral, a bizarre stunt designed to highlight Falwell's somehow insufficiently draconian attitude towards homosexuals. Uhl made several bombs and allegedly told a family member he planned to use them to attack the Phelps family.

He was arrested soon after and charged with manufacturing explosives.

But there is a crucial difference between Uhl and Cho: while Cho's motives remain a source of intense debate, Uhl was an a devout evangelical Christian who advocated religious violence in the name of American nationalism. Uhl's blog, featured on his Myspace page, offers a window into the political underpinnings of his bomb plot. In one post, Uhl implores Christians to die on the battlefield for "Uncle Sam." He justifies his call to arms by quoting several Biblical passages and reminding his readers that the "gift of God" is eternal life.

There you will find him extolling fellow "Christians" to go kill and die for their country, which this young man seems to have confabulated with serving God. Seeing that Uhl is but one example of dozens of classes of ROTC grads prepared with this most damnable and unchristian teaching, I have to assume that, far from being a tragic exception, he was simply acting according to the things he had learned.

Of course, those teachings demand that actions such as Phelps' be punished, that they be sought out, hunted down and killed. That is the obvious conclusion from the doctrine that is taught at Liberty U. And if you were wondering "what sort of person could commit the Haditha Massacre - well, here's an example of the sort of person that could. He had napalm bombs. Not mere Molotov Cockails, mind you, but home-made napalm with explosives to spread it over a wide area, intended to wipe out not just Fred Phelps, but his entire family. I doubt the choice of man-made "hellfire" was accidental.

I do wonder where he learned to make such weapons? It's hard to say, but surely as an ROTC student, he'd have access to documents such as "The Flaming Sword: Napalm and its Effects" a riveting discussion of the use of Napalm by the military, it's political and psychological effects - and two rather simple recipes for "Napalm A and Napalm B."

Some have argued that the “fire bomb is primarily an antipersonnel weapon.”26 So, what kind of effect does napalm have on human beings? Napalm casualties result from heat related injuries and carbon monoxide poisoning. Napalm’s adhesive qualities and high temperature of combustion usually cause third degree-burns, often burning into the muscle tissue or even the bone. Particles from the white phosphorous burster tube may contaminate the wound. The particles will continue to burn within the victim and are very difficult to remove. In addition, napalm burns cause other injuries: dehydration, heat stroke, renal failure, and shock, which may precipitate death. Victims may also succumb to heatstroke from the ambient air without any direct contact with the attack.27 An explosive aerial bomb, on the other hand, causes wounds by way of the percussive force in the blast zone, shrapnel, or debris.

Very few of these injuries precipitate a quick death. Anthony Carthew reporting for the New Republic captured the essence of the weapon when he said “The most horrible thing about napalm and white phosphorous: though the body is virtually drowned in flame, the victim tends to live.”28

Most people have a limited understanding of the sensations. It is unlikely that many people have not suffered bullet wounds or shrapnel wounds from explosives, but most people have suffered from burns at some point in their life. Therefore, people can be empathetic to a napalm burn victim. The fear of burning, and consequently napalms, is cross-cultural. As stated earlier, fear of fire caused Japanese troops to break cover in World War II. During the French Indochina War, a Vietminh officer’s diary records his experience in a napalm attack:

Immense sheets of flames, extending over hundreds of meters, it seems to strike terror in the ranks of my soldiers…The men are now fleeing in all directions and I cannot hold them back.29

Napalm’s terrifying potential made it a potent military weapon, but also a political hazard. “Indeed one of the chief military values of napalm is its terrorizing effect on its victims.”30 [emphasis mine]

A perfect weapon, both symbolically and practically speaking for a Christian Terrorist. The literal fires of Hell.

The presumption that "good Christians" can and must judge others and execute judgment upon those they find wanting has been the cornerstone of fanatical evangelical teaching for decades now, and every once in a while, some impressionable person takes the rhetoric a little more seriously than the rhetoricians do. This is the comment I added to his blog entry about going and dying for Christ.

Thank you for clearly personifying and explaining for the world the theology and world-view of "Liberty University," and what sort of brainwashed fanatical killers they are producing for the Military in the name of Christ.

Fortunately, Penetantaries have good libraries and even Internet access. It won't be terribly hard for you to find an intellectual foundation to explain how suddenly the church leadership is suddenly denying any connection to your actions, even though you were following their clear leadership and intent.

Yes, my little Christian Soldier - you are what Falwell, Dobson, Robertson, Bin Ladin and Abu-Kazowie refer to as "an expendable asset."

Fortunately for you, you had people who did not consider your pink ass expendable and took steps to save you from yourself.

Regard the next few years as "grandmotherly kindness."

I regard this incident as strongly suggestive that Liberty U's ROTC program is intended to turn out exactly the sort of officers that get good men and women killed.

To quote Patton. "Nobody ever won a war by dying for his country. You win a war by making some other poor dumb sonofabitch die for HIS country." THAT is the attitude of a soldier - to live for the cause, not to die for it. The person who is willing to die; even eager to die for a cause is a terrorist, a living "smart bomb" waiting to be expended by whatever "Dear Leader" has their frequency.

Being led into battle by a religious fanatic against religious fanatics is not what our founders had in mind when they turned their backs on Europe where such nonsense was depressingly common. This is also why they sharply separated church and state.

So also concerns me that Falwell seems to have been preparing for Cultural Warfare on a far more literal level than most would like to believe - just as was Ted Haggard, with his church's unholy alliance with the Air Force Academy. I think they have been stockpiling brownshirts in case they need to stage a coup.

In other words, I see the "Religious Leaders" of the right covertly preparing for the sort of future predicted in the "Left Behind" books - and in that other "best seller" of the "right", The Turner Diaries.

If this seems like a great deal of gold to spin from one pile of straw, let me remind you this is far from the first pile. There have been many, many indicators of this sort of creeping intolerance over the last couple of decades; language that was once only found on the websites of neo-nazi and Klan sites is now uttered by folks such as Michelle Malkin, with no apparent sense of shame.
Nor has it been the first act of fanatic violence spawned by right-wing religious and secular intolerance - if the two may be separated at all. The tragedies of Oklahoma City and Waco had at their root intolerance of dissent and fear of a secular and tolerant civilization.

Let me close with one chilling thought; if it is reasonable to topple the leadership of Iran, to invade, to bomb and kill it's citizens simply because it is led by Islamic religious fanatics who WISH to have one or two nuclear weapons, what should therefore be done when we have a nation with many hundreds, if not thousands of nuclear weapons and reliable and unstoppable delivery technology in the hands of CHRISTIAN religious fanatics?

It's important to think of these matters.

It's a very tiny step from condemning all dissenters to hell - as Robertson does, Dobson does, and Falwell did, and igniting hellfire to light their way.

It's not just those likely to do something like this that are the issue; it's those that are clearly willing to contemplate the possibility and prepare a "fifth column" within our armed forces for "The Great Day of Armageddon."

All those of a prudent nature and certainly those who take their Christianity seriously need abandon the trivia of partisan political preference, wake up and smell the napalm.


See these links for interesting comment threads:
Mark David Uhl Makes Bombs Like Jesus Made ‘Em!
The christian fundamentalist extremist domestic terrorist
Diary of a Christian Terrorist


tag: napalm, religious fanatics, dominionism, Jerry Falwell, Fred Phelps, Mark David Uhl, christian fanatics, dominionists, theocracy, theocons, ROTC, fifth column, WWIII, Iran, Iraq War, Planned Iran War, improvised munitions, moralism, Revolution, Global Terrorism, myspace