Kevin Swanson has worked himself up into a fine froth over The Shape of Water. I haven’t seen it yet, but I’ve probably watched the trailer too often, and I am so looking forward to seeing it. I still remember seeing The Creature from the Black Lagoon when I was around 5 or 6, and all my sympathies lay with the Creature.
Extremist anti-LGBTQ pastor Kevin Swanson declared that the new film “The Shape Of Water” represents “the end of civilization as we know it.”
Oooh, yeah. Wars, the disaster of climate change coming to get us all, nah, they don’t matter. But a movie, oooh, it’s the end of everything! It’s a true pity that someone can become a complete caricature and not be able to realize that.
Swanson fumed that the film about a woman who falls in love with a mysterious sea creature is an explicit violation of Leviticus 20:15, which declares that “if a man has sexual relations with an animal, he is to be put to death, and you must kill the animal.”
Er, you missed by one, Mr. Swanson. I think you want Lev. 20:16: And if a woman approach unto any beast, and lie down thereto, thou shalt kill the woman, and the beast: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.
This doesn’t apply, it’s not like Elisa went out looking for a nice horse or something. The ‘creature’ is a humanoid, just amphibious. Obviously intelligent, displaying humour and compassion, much like Elisa herself. Elisa didn’t see the ‘creature’, jump in the tank with the thought of “hey, beast sex!”
“It’s hard to even describe what goes on” in the film, Swanson said, “but, of course, the death penalty crime of Leviticus 20:15 had to do with the absolute lowest, most depraved activity that humans have ever engaged in at all and it’s only the most depraved people in the world that even want to mention this stuff, let alone sit there and watch it for two and a half hours on the movie screen.”
Speaking for myself, I’m more likely to find the actions of those involved in the cold war to be depraved, rather than two beings finding a way to successfully communicate. How would you know what goes on in the film, Mr. Swanson? You didn’t go watch it now, did you? Tsk, bad boy.
“The movie itself is completely centered around cross-species mating,” he continued. “The movie [approvingly] presents the Leviticus 20:15 sinful habit that really has only been part of the most depraved people, the most insane people that ever lived in the history of mankind.”
“This is the end of culture,” Swanson said. “This is the end of civilization as we know it.”
Actually, I think it’s centered on love and compassion, a couple of powerless beings fighting against the war centered powers that be, and they manage to escape, yay them! And y’know, in the end, they are basically the same kind of beings, amphibian in nature. As for the most depraved, insane people that ever lived, well, if you find humanoid amphibians living in a South American river somewhere, let us know. Pretty sure that part is fiction, something you seem to have trouble distinguishing, Mr. Swanson. So, after Beauty and the Beast, Frozen, and probably a zillion other flicks, we have yet another movie which spells the end of “culture” and civilisation. Just which ‘culture’ is being destroyed here? Personally, I hope it’s the asshole christian one. We’d all be better off.
Via RWW.
His religion is outrage, and he practices it constantly. The holey babble is just window dressing.
And anyway the end of civilization occurred when people stopped pronouncing ‘forehead’ as [ˈfɒɹɪd] (“forid”) and started saying [ˈfɔɹ hɛd] (“foer hed”). Duh!!!!
(see: http://howlandbolton.com/essays/read_more.php?sid=318)
Another intelligent thoughtful post. I probably won’t see this movie until it hits cable. I shall bide my time.
I was rather hoping it was a loose adaption of Abe Sapien but…
Gotta love those always outraged xtians, keep providing us with laughs.
I wonder if he as ever howled at the moon about another movie, Corpus Christi,which has provoked the ire of some for its portrayal of a gay Jesus?
Xtians in New Zealand are outraged about this movie. Problem is, just like god, the movie doesn’t exist!
https://www.stuff.co.nz/entertainment/film/100522774/censor-receives-complaints-about-nonexistent-film-depicting-christ-as-gay
Just like their American cousins, antipodean xtians need to find ways to maintain the outrage.
it’s only the most depraved people in the world that even want to mention this stuff,
Dude just self-identified as one of the most depraved people in the world. Gotta admit, that bit seems legit.
Also, where was all this wailing over Beauty and the Beast? Doesn’t a possibly gay minor character in one film adaptation pale in comparison with the main theme of the whole damned story? Or The Little Mermaid? The sea creature there was masquerading as a human, but there’s definitely the whole sea-being/human dichotomy there. How wound up could I get Swanson with these and some classic examples from mythology?
Whirlwitch:
The christians went apeshit over Beauty, they wailed and cried over the inclusion of a gay character, it was destroying all good things, it was a horror, it was ruining a classic tale, they couldn’t let their kids see it, blah, blah, blah. For a while there, it was about 2 to 3 articles a week. I suppose the ‘beast’ part didn’t count because he wasn’t a true beast.
Swanson regularly screeches ‘doom!’ over movies, it’s kind of a specialty of his. I thought he’d never shut up about Frozen. I expect he’ll have heart failure over the upcoming Wrinkle in Time, too. He thinks Disney is the worst evil because they don’t hate queer people.
I was actually surprised Swanson didn’t have a fit about the gay character in The Shape of Water too. Maybe he did, I didn’t listen to his broadcast.
whirlwitch, do you mean mythological characters like the Nephilim? I’d love to Swanson explain them away.
https://www.jw.org/en/bible-teachings/questions/nephilim-giants/
Appologies for the link, but is was the best explanation I could find at short notice,
This exact theme has even been in comic form, in Swamp Thing “Garden of Earthly Delights“. Swamp Thing, a former-human plant creature, had a human wife named Abby. Somebody made a tape of them making love; she was arrested and held in Gotham city. Swamp thing, having near god-like powers, took severe umbrage and sought her release. Batman fought him, was soundly defeated, and convinced the city leaders to just let the woman go back to her husband already.
I never followed Swamp Thing closely, I had no idea!
Roj Blake at 8.
The Nephalim are considered a bad thing by Xtians who believe in them.
They must really hate Spock.
And THAT is how you end up with Innsmouth…