Sexual Normalcy?

Stonewall.uk.

Bryan Fischer is just about orgasmic over the ouster of the House Chaplain. It seems most people think it was over a prayer by Patrick Conroy, that the tax bill be fair, so Ryan said he was too political.  Anyroad, Mr. Fischer is just so damn excited:

“Here is a good news item for the day,” Fischer declared. “He is an out gay man, he’s married to a man—quote, end quote—so it was a shameful move to the put this guy in charge of the chaplaincy of the House in the first place.”

“This is a great win,” Fischer continued. “He’s pro-gay, he’s a homosexual guy that’s married to a homosexual guy. Big win, because Paul Ryan is not going to replace him with somebody who is going to have that kind of a left-leaning tilt. This is good news for the agenda of morality, especially sexual normalcy in the United States.”

There’s no such thing as sexual normalcy, Mr. Fischer. Missionary “for the baybees” Only is not official in any, it’s boring as fuck, and not everyone is interested in breeding. Mr. Fischer is providing yet another grand example of christian stupidity and inability to fact check anything. Oh no, much better to start spewing lies. I would have though that even someone like Mr. Fischer would know about the celibacy issue in the catholic church. I have no idea whatsoever of Patrick Conroy’s sexual orientation, but if he’s managed to stay celibate all these years, what in the fuck does it matter? He’s certainly not married to anyone. That’s kind of a no-no in catholicism. It took me about 4, 5 minutes to check stuff out, and it turns out the Patrick Conroy is pro-gay. I guess that’s not bad enough, no, better make up a bunch of shit instead. Fucking christians. I imagine they are in such a froth because Patrick Conroy came out and said sex is much more than breeding, oh no!

New Civil Rights Movements has a good article up about this mess. Bryan Fischer’s screeth is at RWW.

Abstinence Only. Again.

Attribution: PittNews/CC.

Attribution: PittNews/CC.

Several years ago, David Wiley, a professor of health education at Texas State University, was discussing human papillomavirus in one of his classes. The virus, known as HPV, is the most common sexually-transmitted disease. Often it is harmless and infected individuals aren’t even aware they have it. But it can also cause cancer, including of the cervix.

Wiley was discussing all of this with his students — the different types of HPV, the connection between HPV and cervical cancer, and its prevalence; “you know, just an intro, lower-level course,” he recently recalled — when a male student raised his hand with an earnest question: What was his risk of contracting cervical cancer?

“And I don’t know what’s sadder,” Wiley told The Intercept, “that he asked that question or that really nobody in the classroom even laughed because they didn’t know either.”

[…]

The federal government began funding so-called Abstinence-Only Until Marriage programs in 1981 as a way to encourage “chastity” and “self-discipline.” Since then, the feds have poured more than $2 billion into this strategy — commonly known as “ab-only” — without any proven positive effects, like delaying sexual activity or avoiding unintended pregnancy. In recent years, that funding had been in decline, in part because research — and practical experiences like Wiley’s — shows that the programs do not work. But in an ironic twist, they’re now making a comeback. Trump, an alleged serial adulterer who has bragged about sexually assaulting women and has been accused of such behavior close to two dozen times, has asked that abstinence funding be increased. And in the budget deal he signed last month, he got his wish, enough to bring total spending on abstinence up to $100 million for 2018.

[…]

Under Obama, funding for ab-only programs decreased as new emphasis was placed on using science to develop evidence-based sexuality and reproductive education strategies. But the Trump administration is trying to reverse course. Along with the return to Bush-era funding levels to push the ab-only message, Trump has appointed anti-abortion, anti-birth control, and pro-ab-only advocates to positions within the Department of Health and Human Services and has yanked funding for a successful evidence-based teen pregnancy prevention strategy.

[…]

Among the biggest proponents of ab-only programs — and their rebranding — is Valerie Huber, a Trump appointee to HHS. Huber started her career promoting ab-only programs in her son’s school before moving on to manage the ab-only program at the Ohio Department of Health. She became the president of the National Abstinence Education Association in 2007. (The advocacy organization has also rebranded itself. It’s now known as Ascend.) Huber acknowledges that the term “sexual-risk avoidance” was taken from public health, but insists it was appropriately chosen. “I bristle at the terminology ‘abstinence only,’ because our programs are so holistic,” she told Focus on the Family’s magazine “Citizen,” and address “a whole battery of different topics that surround a young person’s decision whether to have sex or not.”

This is, of course, exceedingly bad news. If you’re a parent who prefers their child to be prepared and safe, best to tackle comprehensive sex-ed at home, or an outside of school class. This will affect some states much more than others, so it’s important to find out just what the sex-ed in your child’s school is like. Ab-only also cuts out all queer students, and teaches girls that being assaulted or raped is their fault, emphasising dress and behaviour.

The Intercept has an in-depth article about this mess, recommended reading.  As the Tiny Tyrant has a vested interest in giving the lunatic evangelicals whatever they want, and they want a whole lot, you might want to have a click over to Religious Dispatches to read about Project Blitz. That’s enough to scare anyone silly.

The Most Important Thing: Covering Up!

Wallnau's "diagram". Screen grab.

Wallnau’s “diagram”. Screen grab.

Oh, Lance is ranting again, and this time, had a “diagram” to illustrate his screeth.

During on online Bible study session on Friday, Wallnau drew an increasingly jumbled diagram in an effort to visually demonstrate how Trump is “under the authority of God” and protected by “the blood of Jesus Christ,” while Trump’s critics, who are “operating outside of the realm,” are being controlled by Satan.

“If you are outside of God’s authority,” Wallnau said, “you actually could be in the realm where Satan himself has access to your heart and to your mind, and that’s what I’m watching happen to millions of Americans now that despise what God has done.”

Personally, I don’t think most Americans despise anything Jehovah has done, because figments of the imagination don’t actually do anything. A whole lot of people are more than thoroughly disgusted by and with the Tiny Tyrant and his regime of money-sucking incompetents. It’s like watching the Keystone Mafia.

“If He puts Donald Trump into the White House,” he continued, “and you’re one of those people that actually has a visceral hatred of this man, if you continue to operate in this weird spirit, then what happens is Satan begins to take over more and more of your mind and more and more of your heart and you become more and more deranged. That’s what I am watching happen.”

From my reading, it seems like the only people deep into hysterical derangement are evangelical christians. Look at the recent idiocy over boy scouts – not even close to coherent. I can’t say I hate the Tiny Tyrant, but I’d certainly like to boot his old ass a long, long way from the white house. He can go back to his scams, and we can get a government back.

Wallnau went on to attack those “big-mouth Christians who have a problem with this president,” insisting that the proper role of Christians is to serve as intercessors for Trump, working to cover up any of his faults in order to prevent Satan from being able to use them to attack the president.

“Our jobs as intercessors is to be applying intercession so that we can do what we have to do to try to clean up that hole,” he said. “What the Lord is saying to us is, ‘What I want you to do is I don’t want you to focus on the faults, I want you to just go ahead and put a patch over that, put a Band-Aid over there so that that hole is covered.’”

“When you see a flaw in a leader, your job is to cover it,” Wallnau declared, warning that anyone who attempts to “judge a man of God, a man who God has anointed” will wind up opening themselves up to spiritual warfare and eventually having their own flaws and secrets exposed to the world.

How interesting this is, I had no idea that the job of christians is to cover up faults and crimes. The Tiny Tyrant is an amazingly sleazy person, I don’t think it’s really possible to cover everything up, and it certainly does not speak well of christians that their job is to cover up a vast amount of immorality. I have absolutely no problem whatsoever in judging the Tiny Tyrant, and I don’t have any flaws and secrets to expose, because I’m already open about my flaws, which are many, and I can’t be arsed with keeping skeletons in a closet. And here I thought that christians were supposed to pray and work to be better people, but no, their job is to be part of Cover Up Squad!

Even if you did get christians to do this, it couldn’t possibly work. To all appearances, the Tiny Tyrant doesn’t have a conscience, and constantly leaks his rotten behaviour all over the place, because he has problems seeing anything he does or says as being wrong.

“You’re going to reap what you sow,” he said. “You’re going to let the devil into your house.”

We’re already reaping the consequence of not paying attention, and letting a sleazy psychopath into the white house, and then not having anyone with the spine to kick his ass out. It will take decades to repair all the damage, assuming we get the opportunity to do so.

RWW has the story and video.

Dear Jim Bakker, Go Fuck Yourself.

Jim Bakker, a fan of the fanatical Jan Porter and her ‘heartbeat’ bill, has somehow come to the conclusion that there were two scientists who would have cured cancer, but they were aborted by evil wenches who had the unthinkable, autonomy. Naturally, Jehovah was the one who decided to “send” these two scientists, rather than doing something straightforward, like simply eliminating all cancers, which would be rather amazing, as it would require our cells to behave differently across our various lifetimes. Or Jehovah could have simply dropped a bit of super-duper brilliance on any of the current scientists researching cancer. Lots of choice there, to say the least.

Jim Bakker claimed that God has sent two scientists to earth who would have found the cure for cancer, but they were both aborted before that ever happened.

Bakker was interviewing extremist Religious Right activist Janet Porter and former Rep. Tom DeLay about their efforts to get Congress to pass Porter’s “Heartbeat Bill,” a radical piece of legislation that Porter brags will outlaw abortion “before the mother even knows she’s pregnant” and will be “the foot in the door” to eventually completely outlawing abortion. Bakker declared that Porter’s bill is “the most important thing going on in the world right now.”

Janet Porter is a dangerous fanatic, whose life desire is to stomp on women, ensure they will never have bodily autonomy, and she has no problem with women dying, she considers that suitable punishment for any women who dares to think her life is her own, and that she has the right to make her own medical decisions in privacy. If we actually had a government, rather than a regime, she might not be so worrying, but considering the regime currently in power, there’s a great deal to dread.

“This program could be an important cog to stop abortion in this country,” he added. “The thing we have done in America, we have killed our babies. We have killed the future of America. I told you the other day about a story, someone said they asked God, ‘Why haven’t we had a cure for cancer?’ And He said back, ‘I gave you two scientists that had the cure and both of them were aborted.’”

Oh FFS, the effing helicopter story. This is the stupid christian’s answer to anything and everything. I have seen and read so many fucking versions of that idiocy over the years, I’d like to cheerfully strangle the idiot who started it. Most christians think that’s just brilliant, which tells you a lot about most christians. As for a “cure for cancer”, there’s no such thing, and it’s not likely there ever will be. That’s because cancer is not one disease, it’s hundreds of diseases. Even within a category of a specific cancer, there are different types of that specific cancer. Cancers are born of cell mutations, and there have to be a number of different mutations before anything turns into cancer. Cell mutations often happen which don’t turn into cancer. Some cancers are easier to treat than others, and have a high remission rate. Research into cancer is constant, and it’s a never-ending race against time. A great deal of progress has been made, and a great many people are able to live their lives out, rather than die an untimely death.

For there to be ‘a cure’ for all cancers, that would qualify as a miracle, because no one treatment is effective against all cancers, that’s why current cancer treatments are targeted. So, Jehovah’s “two scientists” wouldn’t have been able to do shit where cancer is concerned. Once again, the sheer weakness and ineffectiveness of the christian god is what stands out. What’s the fucking point of being a god, if you go to the trouble to imbue a couple of blastocysts with miracle performance, but you couldn’t choose people who not only truly wanted a child, but had the necessary circumstances to have that child, and see that it gets a good education to boot? Or you know, wiggle a godly pinky finger and take care of the cancer business yourself?

To a christian, it doesn’t matter what the fuck happens in any given situation, their nasty, pointless god always gets the credit, especially when credit belongs to the people who make a life and death difference to someone.

As someone struggling with cancer treatment, this fucking attitude is infuriating, to say the least. A great many people over the years have helped to make brilliant leaps in treatment, and if I make it through treatment and come out clean on the other end, any gratitude I may have will belong to them, not the ugly ass god of christians. It is very christian to decide to use something like cancer to try to force the regressive oppression of women though, because cancer is still the big fucking scary, and too many christians are stupid and gullible enough to buy such awful dreck as some sort of skillful reasoning.

RWW has the story.

Sunday Facepalm: Deep State, Witches & Warlocks, Oh My!

Frank Amedia and his Potus Shield clown circus are back at it, just praying their little red noses off. If you aren’t familiar with Mr. Amedia, you can pretty much find out all you care to know in his recounting a miracle he performed: the resurrection of an ant. Today, they are all trembling over the “deep state”, witches, warlocks, and the antichrist.

“I think we need to be wise to understand that this presidency is going to be taken to the edge of destruction by evil forces, by deep state forces, by a conspiracy that has already been named,” Amedia warned. “We know it’s coming. We need to withstand against that. We need to be the watchmen that say, ‘Don’t take your eyes off, the storm is coming.’”

“We prayed for the Lord to just stir up that storm,” he continued. “Stir up that storm of that president. We declare right now, in Jesus’ name, stir it up. Stir him up like a tornado, don’t let him stop. Let everything fly out that needs to fly out, let everything be exposed, don’t let anything be put back into a place that could come back and linger again.”

That’s a veritable treasure chest of filthy jokes, just waiting to be made. Speaking for myself, I don’t want to see anything flying out of the Tiny Tyrant, and I most emphatically don’t want to see anything exposed. :shudder: Okay, now that my mind has jumped out of the gutter, as far as exposure goes, the Tiny Tyrant and his crew of incompetent cronies are doing a fine job of that themselves. No assistance is required.

Amedia, Mark Gonzales of the U.S. Hispanic Action Network, and Bishop Harry Jackson then initiated a spiritual warfare prayer against Trump’s enemies and critics, with Jackson taking specific aim at the “witches and warlocks” who have cursed the president.

“We lift up witches and warlocks who have been a part of this assignment,” Jackson said, “as they have gathered in numbers almost immeasurable to curse this specific president. We cancel, we bind their authority, we bind their curses, we lift up your word that says you shall not revile the gods and neither shall you bring a curse upon the rule of God’s people. We declare those assignments null and void and we claim the souls of many of the witches and warlocks.”

The Gods? Hmmm. Anyroad, I think we need a serious rule here. This is the 21st century, and people with views that are the same as those prevalent during the inquisition and witch trials? They have no place in a modern society. What they do need is a nice re-created 13th century village, lots of land surrounding, where they could play at witch hunting all they liked, and they could leave the rest of us in the current century alone.

The whole regressive mess is at RWW.

The Inquisition Tentacles Are Spreading.

I’ve written about Ralph Drollinger before. He’s one scary lunatic christian, and he wields way too much influence in the current regime. He’s crowing again, over all the “progress” he’s making. It’s as well to remember that Drollinger’s idea of progress is to bring back the inquisition or something like.

Ralph Drollinger, who runs fundamentalist Bible studies for dozens of members of Congress and President Trump’s Cabinet every week, said in a fundraising letter this month that his group “has been blessed by God with extraordinary growth beyond our wildest imaginings in foreign nations across the globe and most notably in former Soviet Bloc countries.”

[…]

We noted last fall that Drollinger is aggressively expanding his operations both at the local government level in the U.S. and in national capitals around the world. His April 4 letter includes some details about the latter:

In the last few months discipleship Bible studies have been established to Parliamentarians in Romania; Ukraine; Fiji; Papua New Guinea; and the Republic of Equatorial Guinea. A ministry is about to begin in Guatemala, and before fall, we expect work to be completed for ministries in the Central and South American nations of Peru; Ecuador; Brazil; Mexico; Uruguay; and Paraguay, as well as in the European city Riga, Latvia.

Work is current an ongoing with partners to establish discipleship Bible studies in Berlin and Bonne [sic]. We are enthusiastically pursuing an opportunity to plant a ministry in the European Union Parliament, a body of 600 Parliamentarians from 26 Western and Eastern European nations who meet two weeks every month in Brussels, Belgium and one week every month in Strasbourg, France.

We thought the Lord did not want us in the Middle East, but to our great surprise discussions are currently underway to establish a ministry in a Muslim majority nation in the Middle East.

[…]

Although Drollinger is quick to complain about news coverage he believes is unfair, his letter says a story published in a German newspaper helped attract new friends. And Capitol Ministries has been gushing about a recent BBC story that the group says “reached more than 1 million readers world-wide.”

I have no idea why people might find Drollinger favourable in any light, but even if you are one of the lucky people who lives in a happily secular nation, this should be worrying. Drollinger is naturally courting regressive governments, but there are always regressive asses in any government, and they are likely to listen to Drollinger. I fail to see the charm, and it’s beyond disturbing that Drollinger is not simply being dismissed. Just to give you an idea of what Drollinger wants to institute, as far as government is concerned:

Drollinger’s April 13 Bible study says it is a “disservice to the country” for public servants to “craft policy that is not somehow rooted in Scripture.” Here are some of the other theological and political positions Drollinger teaches public officials:

Drollinger likes to tell reporters that he doesn’t instruct public officials how to vote, but he makes it clear in his written Bible studies that, for example, Christian public servants are required to support the death penalty and oppose marriage equality.

Drollinger also has very specific views on the role of women: “there is a prohibition of female leadership in marriage, and female leadership in the church.” One of his Bible studies explains what he calls the “unambiguous” difference in responsibilities the Bible gives men and women, saying women’s “primary functions” include homemaking, home management, mothering, teaching younger women, displaying hospitality and dressing modestly.

There’s much more, RWW has the full story.

It’s Universal Soldier!

Rick Wiles seems to have decided we have gone with Universal Soldier, for real or something like.

End Times broadcaster and right-wing conspiracy theorist Rick Wiles warned that the United States government has secretly created “soldiers without a soul” and has unleashed them in Syria, which is a sign that Jesus will soon return.

“Is it conceivable that we have bred soulless creatures, soldiers without a soul, with no remorse, no conscience, no fear—you can go in, you can cut a baby in half, you can cut out the hearts of Christians and eat them—there is no conscience, there’s no fear, there’s no fear of God?” Wiles asked. “Is that what we have created? Have we turned these monsters loose in Syria?”

Oh FFS. There’s no need to go for melodrama when it comes to war, or the travesties committed by people on all sides in any given war, at any time throughout history. It’s not as though soldiers aren’t already trained to kill without thought or hesitation. That’s what war is all about, killing. No one has a soul, so that’s of no import, and throughout the ages, it would be a “fear of god” which has motivated wars more than the opposite. People tend to be especially vicious when they think they are fighting for a fucking god.

“This is Hitler on steroids,” Wiles added. “The Americans have become worse than the Nazis.”

I don’t think we’re quite there yet, but the spectre of nuclear war is hanging over our heads once again. It certainly would be nice to see the U.S. military sit the fuck down for once though.

“It’s the end of humanity,” he said. “If these things get loose, it’s the end of humanity.”

These “things”? When you start to think of people as things, it’s the start of all evil. And there are no ‘universal’ soldiers, or engineered critters wandering around in a terminator style lust for killing. Just regular soldiers and all the usual players, all sides. Perhaps it would be more to the point to get governments to stop thinking of war as a game.  As for the end of humanity, we’re doing a fine job of that one all by ourselves, no gods needed.

Wiles went on to explain that when Jesus said that he would return when the world is as it was “in the days of Noah,” that was a reference to the Nephilim, which were a race of giants mentioned in the book of Genesis that were supposedly born as the offspring of fallen angels and human women. God was so displeased with this corruption that He had to wipe out the entire world with a flood and the same thing will soon happen again, Wiles warned.

Yeah, except it didn’t end, did it? Your dumbfuck god kept a fair amount of the corrupt people, and it started all over again, going by the fairytale. There’s genius for you.

“We’re at the days of Noah,” he said. “God is about to say, ‘Enough is enough, the human race has got to end.’”

No, we aren’t at the days of Noah, those days never actually happened. Anyroad, I fail to see what Mr. Wiles is moaning about. He starts out with Jesus coming back, which they are always yelling about, but never actually seem to want it to happen. So, is Jesus a comin’ back, or is Jehovah about to burn the world with fire? And what the fuck would a christian care, anyway? Aren’t you all supposed to be ever so eager to go live in paradise mansions with your gods? Aren’t you supposedly living this life for the afterlife, the only one which truly counts? I’d think you’d all be lining up to be a martyr, but it does rather seem you’re all very attached to this life.

RWW has the story.

You’re a pervert, you’re a loser, you’re ugly, You have penis envy!

Donald Trump and Wayne Allen Root (YouTube/screen grab).

Wayne Allen Root, in his latest attempt to defend the endless and mind numbing corruption on the part of the Tiny Tyrant, unleashed an incredibly immature rant against Robert Mueller. The arrested development seen in so many conservatives is rather fascinating, and the older they become, the more they regress. I can’t imagine such a rant having the slightest effect on me, being 60 years old, it’s barely worth an eye roll. I expect if Mr. Mueller was aware of it, the reaction would be the same. Someone should perhaps inform Mr. Root that such rants tend to reveal a great deal more about the ranter than anyone else.

“Robert Mueller has probably never had sex in his life,” Root said. “I know he has never had sex with a beautiful woman. Did you ever see the angry look on Robert Mueller’s face? Robert Mueller needs sex badly and he is so jealous that Donald Trump was a billionaire playboy and obviously had sex with the most beautiful women in the world.”

Hmm. Mr. Mueller is married with two children. As for the Tiny Tyrant, well, a long history of sexual assault, and a descriptor of average from a porn star. Not exactly  bragging material.

“Robert Mueller has penis envy,” he continued. “This is so obvious. This was high school, guys. In high school, there were handsome guys, and then there were handsome guys who were jocks, and then there were handsome guys who were jocks and had rich fathers. And that is Donald Trump. And then all the little nerds like Robert Mueller, who had never had sex in their whole lives, they hated the jocks, they hated the handsome guys, and they really hated the jocks who were handsome guys who were rich. This guy, Muller, has never had sex with a beautiful woman, so he hates Trump with a passion.”

I’ve noticed that Mr. Root often talks about high school. About time you got the fuck over it,  no? Mr. Mueller has a job to do, and I don’t recall him expressing personal feelings about people at all. That would be called professionalism.

“The greatest president in modern history, a man is trying to take him down who is a pervert,” Root added. “Robert Mueller is a pervert. He probably sits home and watches porn. He has probably never had a girl in his whole life, a beautiful woman, so he sits and watches images and then he realizes there is someone like Donald Trump who is living every man’s fantasy … [Mueller] doesn’t even know what sex feels like. Robert Mueller is an ugly lawyer, he’s got nothing going for him.”

Jesus Christ, most 5 year olds are more mature than you are, Mr. Root. The greatest president? Hahahahaha, no. The greatest crook, perhaps.

“Mueller is a little pervert,” Root continued to rant. “Mueller is vicious, Mueller is disgusting, Mueller is a pervert. Can you imagine what he does at home at night? Who knows what he does, watching his computer images of Donald Trump and beautiful women. I can just guess what Mueller is doing in the dark, with the light of the screen glaring on him inside is office at 12 midnight. Quote me, Robert Mueller: You’re a pervert, you’re a loser, you’re ugly, you have never had a beautiful women in your life and you’re jealous of Donald Trump. It is all so clear now.”

I can pretty much guarantee you that whatever Mr. Mueller does in the evenings, it has nothing to do with watching the Tiny Tyrant and women. You, on the other hand, Mr. Root, that I can envision.

“It’s penis envy,” Root declared triumphantly. “Mueller’s is smaller than Trump’s.”

Who is the official penis inspector, and when is the report coming out?

RWW has the story, such as it is.

The Amazing Egg Dance: Peasants to Politics.

Contrast between Carnival and Fasting (ca. 1550–99), artist unknown — Source.

Contrast between Carnival and Fasting (ca. 1550–99), artist unknown — Source. Click for full size.

Whoever the artist of the above piece was, I’d say they had been most impressed with Hieronymus Bosch. The Egg Dance, from village revelry to romance to politics. This is a wonderful piece of history, which demonstrates several cultural shifts throughout the centuries.

The egg dance was a traditional Easter game involving the laying down of eggs on the ground and dancing among them whilst trying to break as few as possible. Another variation (depicted in many of the images featured here) involved tipping an egg from a bowl, and then trying to flip the bowl over on top of it, all with only using one’s feet and staying within a chalk circle drawn on the ground. Although, as shown in many of its depictions in art, the pastime is associated with peasant villages of the 16th and 17th century, one of the earliest references to egg-dancing relates to the marriage of Margaret of Austria and Philibert of Savoy on Easter Monday in 1498.

[…]

This blindfolded version of the egg dance features in Goethe’s novel Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship (1795). … According to some scholars Goethe’s mention gave birth to the phrase “einen wahren Eiertanz aufführen” (to perform a true egg dance) which refers to moving carefully in a difficult situation. This particularly association of the egg dance with navigating danger was expressed time and time again in political cartoons of the 19th-century: various political figures, from Bismarck to Disraeli, precariously trying to make there way about a floor strewn with potential upsets.

Democracy’s Disastrous Egg-dance, (1884), Joseph Keppler. A woman labeled “Democracy” wearing a blindfold labeled “Stupidity” is pushed by Samuel J. Randall toward a chair labeled “Presidenti[al] Chair”, with several eggs in the way on the ground, they are labeled “Honest Naval Appropriation, Civil Service Reform, Honest River – Harbor Appropriation, Economy, Anti-Silver Coinage, National Banking System, Tariff Reform, [and] Prompt Legislation”, two of the eggs are broken; among a group of men laughing, in the background on the right, are John Logan, John Sherman, and William D. Kelley. — Source.

Democracy’s Disastrous Egg-dance, (1884), Joseph Keppler. A woman labeled “Democracy” wearing a blindfold labeled “Stupidity” is pushed by Samuel J. Randall toward a chair labeled “Presidenti[al] Chair”, with several eggs in the way on the ground, they are labeled “Honest Naval Appropriation, Civil Service Reform, Honest River – Harbor Appropriation, Economy, Anti-Silver Coinage, National Banking System, Tariff Reform, [and] Prompt Legislation”, two of the eggs are broken; among a group of men laughing, in the background on the right, are John Logan, John Sherman, and William D. Kelley. — Source.

The Journalistic Egg Dance (ca. 1840), Andreas Geiger. A caricature of press censorship before the 1848 revolution in Austria. During the Restoration after the defeat of Napoleon in 1815, the European powers, led by Austrian Chancellor Clemens von Metternich (1773-1859), restricted the freedom of speech and expression to contain any kind of critical, nationalist or anti-authoritarian movement — Source.

The Journalistic Egg Dance (ca. 1840), Andreas Geiger. A caricature of press censorship before the 1848 revolution in Austria. During the Restoration after the defeat of Napoleon in 1815, the European powers, led by Austrian Chancellor Clemens von Metternich (1773-1859), restricted the freedom of speech and expression to contain any kind of critical, nationalist or anti-authoritarian movement — Source.

You read and see much more at The Public Domain Review.

“Its Rightful Position.”

Howard Chandler Christy's Scene at the Signing of the Constitution of the United States.

Howard Chandler Christy’s Scene at the Signing of the Constitution of the United States.

Jerome Corsi has been opining about how overwhelmed he is, it’s just so much work exposing non-existent satanic pedophiles and “red-pilling” people. In the midst of his rant, I was caught by one odd thing. Odd to me, at least.

“The corruption, the evil of devoting yourself to Lucifer ends up in satanic sacrifices, children abused, human rights kidnapping, just incredible human torment, torture, snuff films,” Corsi said. “The evil depths and corners of this are so abhorrent to me, and should be to every right-thinking American, that we need to expose this, we need to bring it out, we need to show it the light of day despite how many people it’s going to be disturbing to.”

“Those of us who are going to know every aspect of it are ourselves going to have to pray to God that we come out not so damaged that we become somewhat dysfunctional,” he added. “We are going to have to make sure that we pray and approach this with the light of God and the help of God in order to get through this crisis.”

“These days, I am overwhelmed with hundreds of emails and I barely have time to function,” Corsi said, wearily. “But I can’t sleep thinking that there may be one more radio show, one more opportunity to get the word out, one more mind to red pill. That’s what drives me is the desire to serve God and to have the Constitution of the United States restored to its rightful position.”

Personally, I think Corsi is already dysfunctional. Anyroad, what caught me was the line about having the constitution restored to its rightful position. It has a position? What might that position be? It’s very strange to be talking about a document as if it were a person…is there a little constitution throne somewhere? A nice, little flat crown? Asshole christians and conservatives already damn near worship the thing, they talk about it constantly, or at least bits of it. I’ll admit, I’m a bit confused about just what this rightful position might be.

RWW has the whole story.

Sunday Facepalm.

Great Again: Restoring Faith In America from EverBright Media on Vimeo. WARNING: if you’re going to watch, turn your sound waaaaaaay down. The initial blast of horns could cause a heart attack.

Mike Huckabee has a ‘free’ dvd for you, featuring time traveling kids who learn about how “god” founded Amerikka. I think all  the lunatic christians should be made to take the citizenship test for this country, they would all fail miserably, then we could kick them out. If you’re in the mood for godawful glurge, it’s all here.

Behind the Iron Curtain part 3 – Religion

These are my recollections of a life behind the iron curtain. I do not aim to give perfect and objective evaluation of anything, but to share my personal experiences and memories. It will explain why I just cannot get misty eyed over some ideas on the political left and why I loathe many ideas on the right.

Today’s Czech Republic is one of the most, if not the most, atheist countries in the world. I encountered people both in meatspace and on the internet who “blame” the former totalitarian socialist regime for this. Mostly such people are coincidentally also people who assign to this godlessness all kinds of moral failings of today’s Czechs and blame their lack of faith for exceedingly high divorce rates, crime rates etc.

When one looks at the actual data though, none of this does fit. Today’s Slovak Republic was under the same regime in the former Czechoslovak Socialist Republic, yet Slovaks are much more religious. Not to mention Poles, who are almost 90% catholic until today. The crime rates etc. are similar in these countries, only abortion rate is very low in Poland – but only because it is mostly illegal and inaccessible, during the socialist regime when abortion was legal, Poles used it at a rate that was not out of the ordinary for the time.

So my (lack of) religious experiences as a child were not to be ascribed only to the regime, but at least partially they were. It was complicated.

The regime was in fact overtly anti-religious. Priests were poorly paid state employees and private donations to churches etc. were not legal to my knowledge. Being religious was not illegal per se, but it was not encouraged either and there were some obstacles put in the way of exercising beliefs. Like all official religions had to register with the state and there were some specific religions and religious sects that were illegal (like Jehovah’s Witnesses).

My grandfather was a devout catholic asshole on whose grave I do not spit only out of respect for my father. My father became disillusioned with religion early on and possibly as an act of rebellion against it he entered the communist party at the age of 18 and was banished by my grandfather as a consequence. My father is the only atheist in that branch of the family. After I was born and my grandfather became deadly sick, my mother and father took care of him in his last years. Grandfather has obliquely acknowledged the child abuse he inflicted on my father, but he never apologized to him directly, only indirectly by saying to my mother that he wronged him yet he is the only one who cares for him on his sickbed. He died before I was old enough to know him.

So I grew up in an atheistic family and went to public school in a regime that did not acknowledge any religion as true and only reluctantly allowed people to exercise some religious beliefs.

At home, religion was never spoken about and I never felt the need to ask about anything. We had plenty of books and I was an avid reader, so I knew about the existence of religions and mystical figures. I feared the devils from fairy tales despite never believing in their real existence. Similarly I knew christian God also only as a fairy-tale father figure granting favors for good deeds. It was not before ten years of age that I learned that there are still people who really believe in Christianity, including in my family. Until that age I thought it was all over, a thing of the past just like Zeus and Hera. After I learned that my favourite auntie is religious, I was completely flummoxed and to this day I never broached the subject with her.

At school, there was some talk about religion in civics, history and literature classes. In fact a very good overview of the development of religion from polytheism to monotheism in Europe from Classical age through Middle ages to Modern era. I do not remember any overt hostility towards any religion during the lectures, only dry information about them and an occasional argument that proves false some specific claim. Later on I learned that religious parents could send children to a sort of sunday school, but I never knew anyone who did so.

Even the christian creation myth was taught – as a myth. And the gorgeous movie La Création du Monde was aired on TV and I loved it as a child.

All in all in my opinion the regime did a good job informing children about religion but did discourage indoctrinating them with any. However I do not think the Iron Curtain played exquisite or even major role in it because Czechs as a whole were seemingly lukewarm about religion for centuries. Which, again, is a different story.

Guide To Electing Godly Candidates.

Image from Intercessors for America guide to the 2018 midterm elections.

Image from Intercessors for America guide to the 2018 midterm elections.

If you need some motivation to be involved and vote the midterm elections, here it is!

IFA’s vision is “to see God’s purposes for America fulfilled through sustained prayer and Spirit-led obedience.” Kyle noted last month that IFA’s director, Dave Kubal, had posted a video talking about the 2018 midterms and the importance of “aligning intercessors with elected officials” in order “to see great advances of the kingdom of God” enacted “through our government.”

IFA’s 2018 guide touts the importance of getting engaged before primary elections, and it’s talking specifics.

[…]

It’s important to note that IFA wants people to do more than pray: It wants them to get actively involved in election campaigns. The midterm guide links to an IFA publication on “intercessory activism,” which it defines as “promoting and releasing God’s kingdom values in today’s political process by adding action to intercession, joining in political campaigns and elections, positioning intercessors alongside elected officials to support them in prayer.”

IFA’s “Intercessory Activism Guide” encourages people to volunteer in campaigns and to consider running for office. “Ask God how He might want you to become more actively involved in campaigns and elections in your area,” the guide suggests. It also suggests praying for protection for “God-fearing candidates” and asking that “those who are truly called of the Lord would stand out among the rest.”

These assholes don’t care whether or not a person running for office is actually qualified to hold said office, all they care about is if the person is an asshole christian. They’re supporting Cynthia Dunbar in a bid for congress, FFS.

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