Culture Warriors category archive
Still Rising Again after All These Years 0
Shorter John Cole: General Sherman was correct.
“Because the Bible Tells Me So” 2
Tony Norman looks into his spam folder and explores emails from those who exhort him to base his voted on “Christian values.” What he finds troubles him.
Here’s a bit:
On the other hand, American Christians have the unambiguous example of a penniless, itinerant rabbi who exalted the poor, denounced the rich, healed the sick, embraced society’s outcasts and modeled a new way of relating to women, tax collectors, children, foreigners, religious authorities, lepers and those in prison.
None of these biblical values, as far as I can tell, is supported in the rhetoric of either Mr. Cruz or Mr. Trump. Both candidates embrace the politics of fear, the demonization of undocumented immigrants, rabid suspicion of foreigners, the expansion of the military for the sake of national pride, an unregulated economy that allows market forces to determine what’s best, a society where being armed with as many guns as one’s pride allows is the norm, a denial of environmental responsibility and a social ethic that exalts the rich while brutalizing the poor.
It has been my experience that those who most loudly proclaim their “Christianity” are the least to be trusted with anything. Trust them, and you end up hoisted on their Elmer Gantry.
Republican Family Values 0
Honest to Pete, you can’t make this stuff up:
Hit ‘Em Where It Hurts 0
This is poetic justice writ large: internet porn site cuts off North Carolina and comments on Tarheels’ taste in porn in the press release in reaction to North Carolina’s “it’s okay to hate the gay” bill.
The cutoff will continue until North Carolina repeals HB 2, which excludes LGBT citizens from civil rights protection and blocks cities and counties from passing civil rights guarantees. Charlotte had enacted such an ordinance.
(snip)
A spokesman told Huffington Post: “Back in March, we had 400,000 hits for the term ‘Transsexual’ from North Carolina alone. People from that state searched ‘Gay’ 319,907 times.”
Republican Family Values 0
Dick Polman:
Dennis Hastert.
Read the rest.
“Republican Family Values” 0
George Washington Plunkett famously said, “There’s honest graft and there’s dishonest graft.”
I challenge you to find any graft in American history more dishonest than the “Republican family values” con.
Great Moments in You Get What You Pay For (Updated) 1
Facing South points out that among those businesses protesting North Carolina’s “It’s Okay To Hate the Gay” law are a number that helped fund the election of the legislators who sponsored and supported it.
But many of these same businesses funded two outside political groups that helped elect five of the bill’s sponsors, 13 other legislators who voted for it, and McCrory, who immediately signed the measure into law. Outside groups are unaffiliated with campaigns and are not allowed to coordinate with candidates.
At least 36 companies that have come out against HB2 so far have given a combined $10.8 million to those Washington, D.C.-based groups, the Republican State Leadership Committee (RSLC) and the Republican Governors Association (RGA), in recent election cycles.
I have nothing to add, because actions speak louder etc.
Details at the link.
Addendum, Comment Rescue Dept.:
George Smith commented:
Why don’t they just start calling these things Pink Triangle laws?
He has a point.
Southern Hospitality 0
I think I’ve told this story before, but it’s still relevant.
My Daddy had a friend* who was a high school science teacher and coach (yes, a high school coach who was smart enough to teach science–who woulda thunk?) and later school superintendent. During the late 60s he was amongst a delegation to an educators convention in New Orleans. They decided to carpool to New Orleans.
Remember, this was during the Civil Rights campaigns of the mid-last century.
Later, he told my father that the trip was fine, except that, when they got to Mississippi, the atmosphere was so hostile that they felt as if they had to adopt fake Southern accents, despite being white Southerners from a Jim Crow state and already having Southern accents.
___________________
*My first baseball glove was a hand-me-down from him. He was a good and decent person, a person of integrity.
Fifty Shades of Stupid 0
My school trips were so very tame.
Buried deep in the story is a qualifier that the students in question picked out the film, no one was forced to watch it, and everyone who did watch it was old enough to see it in a movie theatre.
But, really, now, there is no way that this could have turned out well.
The Obsessed 0
Sexual obsession–a Republican thing.
That Big Bad Scary Idea 0
Martina Essert marvels at the intellectual cowardice that results in banning literary classics from schools, such as, I kid you not, Orwell’s Animal Farm, because, to quote a bit from Ms. Essert,
I got a dollar to a doughnut that many of those who would ban Animal Farm see nothing wrong with the NRA’s idea that Hansel and Gretel should pack heat.
We are a society of stupid.
Full Disclosure:
I have read Animal Farm, but have not read 1984. I did read Brave New World and that was quite enough dystopia for me, thank you very much.
Plus Ca Change 0
Bruce Lowry has seen it before:
Then go back and look at the expressions on some of the faces — almost all of them white — at a Donald Trump rally today.
You don’t need me to point out the eerie similarities, and, God help us, they are all too real.
He’s quite correct, you know.
Follow the link for the rest.