Michael Coren: Adding New Depth To Sexism

I don't care much for Michael Coren has to say on good days. Most days, I just try to ignore him.

Then he writes something as utterly offensive as this.

So Canada sacrifices another victim on the altar of equality.

Last week a young girl dressed up as a soldier died in the increasingly futile and pointless war in Afghanistan. She was 21 years old, had been in the country for two weeks on her first tour of duty and probably weighed a little over 100 pounds.

Let's start with the basic offensiveness of Coren's wording. Karine Blais was not "playing" at being a soldier, so the phrase "dressed up as" is not only wrong, it's denigrating. The implication being that a woman can never be a soldier. Never mind that Ms. Blais had to go through the same Basic Training that everyone of her male counterparts had to, and probably could have quite cheerfully laid Mr. Coren's flabby, middle-aged paunchiness out in about 2 seconds - unarmed.

Yes, yes, yes, I know it's fundamentally anti-Canadian to say this but I'd prefer to articulate the views of the silent majority than hide behind some modernist fetish that places more importance on the myth of absolute equality than the safety of a girl who should be laughing with college friends rather than fighting theocratic madmen.

You know, Mr. Coren? You aren't part of any "silent majority" here. You are part of a very small minority that still pines for some idealized notion of the nuclear family, and in particular women's role in that. You want someone who is waiting at home for you after a hard day at work, ready to soothe whatever ails you.

It is beyond insulting to Ms. Blais' memory for you to insist that she should be at college. Remember, she chose to join the army (just I chose not to years ago). Whether she had plans to go to college after a few years in the military or not, only she and her family know that - and it's irrelevant to you anyways.

What Mr. Coren doesn't recognize here is that Karine had the right to make the choice to join the military. It wasn't so long ago that she wouldn't have had such a choice at all.

On the "altar of equality", as Mr. Coren puts it, we have but one word - choice. Gender equality is about having the right to choose one's own path in the world, regardless of being born male or female. If that means the right for women to choose to take on combat roles in the military, so be it - just as it also grants the right for men to choose to become stay-at-home parents.

If captured, of course, such a woman would be repeatedly raped. And tortured. Again, I'm not meant to say this. Not Canadian, not CBC, not Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Not the sort of thing we're supposed to feel, so we pretend that men and women in the army, police and fire service are given the same tests and have to fulfil the same requirements. Yet truth still breaks through.

Oh, how nice of Mr. Coren. He's trying to protect Ms. Blais from the horrible fate that would await her should she be captured by the enemy. Is he really so thick between the ears that he believes she didn't think about that risk? The risk of rape and sexual assault is everywhere, Mr. Coren. Women know about it, and live with it every day of their lives.

Mr. Coren has only demonstrated his complete ignorance of what has happened since WWII in this part of the world. That he takes such a snide, paternal tone in his article serves but to reinforce the impression that he lusts after a social ideal that never has, and never will exist.

and Sometimes It's Called Disturbing The Peace

I see that Rotting Cryptkeeper's clan was stopped at the border when they tried to enter Canada.

But Shirley Phelps-Roper, daughter of church founder Fred Phelps, said a group of church members was turned away from a border crossing at Niagara Falls, but a small group did manage to get into Manitoba overnight.
...
However, Phelps-Roper said the reaction the group has raised from some police and public officials has her questioning whether the planned protest will go ahead.

"The question to my mind [is] whether or not we ought to get them the heck out of that country, because that's some crazy stuff when you've got your officials talking like they are in a back-alley brawl and not government officials who took an oath to obey the law and so forth."

It can't be too hard to pick out the seventy odd people that are part of Phelps' collection of borderline cases. Let's see - home address in Topeka Kansas would be a good starting clue. The ones that weren't frothing at the mouth might be a little hard to pick out otherwise, but I'm sure a couple of questions about picketing would do it.

If there are still a few that got into Canada, I'd suggest that as soon as they show their faces to picket, the local constabulary should pick them up and hustle them out of the country. (They could just as easily be 'playing possum' and heading towards Red Deer).

The Blogging of the Boggled

Apparently, in the fetid imagination of at least one nutcase, feminism is engaging not just in equivalent, but the same, practices as Nazi Germany.

In all these Progressive social engineering projects, and many others, women have been leading proponents. They're against drinking because drunk men are violent. They're against smoking because cigarettes and cigars resemble male penises, a source of male violence. They're against guns because they see guns as symbols of male violence.

Then, of course there's reality:

- MADD is opposed to people driving drunk. Period. Why? Because drunk drivers tend to end up killing people.

- Smoking - well, sorry it's not the Freudian symbology Frank thinks it is - it's because tobacco smoke is lethal.

- Guns - well - about all I'll say there is that it does seem to disproportionately be young males who use guns to commit crimes. But the issue of gun control has more to do with being able to walk the streets relatively safely - and streets where a gunfight breaks out are not safe.

But our writer's insanity doesn't end there - no, he goes on to try and describe the very normal dating dance between men and women in these same terms:

The fact is that women today continue to marry men they feel have the power and beauty to make beautiful children. They add up the physical and financial advantages of a particular mate and make their choice. Once married, and pregnant, they have ultrasound and other tests to determine if the fetus, is healthy. If not, an abortion is performed. Where the poor are breeding, the modern female is very much in favour of abortion clinics to keep the underclasses in check.

What is the difference between this and the Nazi notion of breeding a better Aryan race? Boys are selected for strength, girls for beauty and the gypsies and darker races are given abortions or sterilization.

The leaps of illogic here are amazing. Not only has our intrepid author managed to link maternal (and fetal) health monitoring during pregnancy to "social engineering", but at the same time, he claims that abortion clinics are about "keeping the underclasses in check". If groups of "underclass" women were being rounded up and herded to the abortion clinic, he might have a point. But that isn't what is happening. I suspect that the author is one of those clods who figures that once a woman is pregnant she essentially gives up any right to decide her own destiny.

Abortion clinics, along with contraception and other bits and pieces are ultimately about a woman's right to control her life, and in particular her reproductive life. No more, no less. To infer anything else is plain stupid.

Is that why the Liberal Party and its large female support base is in favour of native Canadians getting a third order of government, one that will create an almost perfect Canadian copy of apartheid? That would certainly appeal to the Nazis; separation of peoples on racial lines and legal enclosures for them to live in.

Uh? How do you get to here from there? Whatever. Apparently Frank hasn't heard of the concept of addressing past wrongs. Somehow, equating native self-government to eugenics is just a little bit of a stretch. Especially given the ugly history that has led Canada's indigenous peoples to the place they find themselves in now.

Is there a Canadian woman anywhere who will admit to these repulsive facts?

No, Frank - there isn't - mostly because they aren't facts. At best they are inferences that you've made that make no sense to people who are actually thinking rationally.

p.s. You might want to take a remedial course on feminism at some point. It's pretty clear you have no idea what you are ranting about.

H/T: Lulu @ Canadian Cynic

Dear Mr. Coren:

Just. Shut. The. F***. Up.

We already know you're clinically insane, but your weekend tirade simply adds a whole new dimension to the phrase 'cognitive dissonance'.

In one column, you go from condemning a man just diagnosed with brain cancer for an event decades in the past to whining about school violence, funding for gender surgery and punishing poverty.

Regardless of Senator Kennedy's past, and what he did or didn't do in the past, your comments about him are inexcusable and callous. The man has just been shown the form of how he will leave this world, and you berate him for what? Where's that much vaunted sense of compassion that conservative christians like you keep spouting off about? (Oh wait - that vanished decades ago when political christianity became more about trying to regulate everybody else's life than anything else)

Much as it may please a kid being beaten half to death to know that his attacker is marginalized or may not enjoy full equity, the solution to gang violence, murderous teenagers and the mass decay of inner city public education is, for a start, to dismantle school boards that issue absurd and pointless press releases.

Ah yes, typical conservative thinking. Instead of addressing the problems, you'd punish those who identify the problems. Brilliant thinking Mr. Coren. Perhaps you'd like to try again.

Or perhaps your concept of "christianity" is far too rooted in punishment and retribution? Ah, I see it is:

More importantly, punish rather than reward irresponsible behaviour. Just as an example, cut off welfare payments to women who have several children by several men before they've reached 20 years of age.

Oh yes, punish those who are already in poverty. Brilliant, just brilliant, Coren. After all, we all know that those young girls who have multiple children when they are young did so deliberately, and their fathers were merely seduced by their feminine wiles. If the suppositions in your accusation weren't so laughably predictable, they are certainly derived from the standard biblical fundamentalist stance that women are somehow inherently evil and devious creatures. (Makes me wonder how Coren's wife can stand him, if his writing is a reflection of what he says and does at home...)

Also in Ontario the Health Ministry decided to restore full funding for sex change surgery, after having not fulfilled its election promise to finance special and crucial education to autistic children. If only those annoying autistic youngsters could prove that they were born in a body of the wrong gender!

There's so many problems here - and it's a pity that Coren manages to mangle all of them.

First of all, I doubt that the Ontario Ministry of Health made any promises in the last election, much less anything to do with providing specialized education for autistic children.

Second, I would expect that the Ontario Government provides services for the education of autistic children through whatever ministry is responsible for children, youth and education. A few minutes with Google turns up this press release from 2006, and there seems to be more in subsequent months. Once again, Coren mangles the facts.

Lastly, his sniping at gender transition related surgery simply shows us all just how clueless the man really is. The number of such surgeries requested in a year is a handful, and for the psychological well-being of those who request it, it is important. But then, Mr. Coren has shown us just what "christian compassion" really means in his mind so many times in the past that his christianity is filled with hostility and retribution.

At a national level no Canadian labour union or left-wing church called for a boycott of either China or Iran, after it was exposed that these two countries alone account for the vast majority of the world's executions and torture.

I don't know where that aside came from, but in typical pseudo-con style these days, it's a classic linking of unrelated topics. Yes, Michael, it's amazingly important to the world that Canadian organizations squawk about topics in other countries - when we have our very own variety of loon here at home to deal with.

Dawkins on Expelled

Here's Richard Dawkins' review of the movie - go read.

The Stupid ... It Burns ...

Remember this bit about a loon wanting to bring back forced sterilization - this time for criminals?

Well, he's just reposted the same basic stupidity.

His justification?

It would be hard to regulate a new Act, and proposing it could be (figuratively) land-mine territory for politicians, but if it leads to one saved life because of an unborn criminal, I'd say it would all be worth it.

Apparently Mr. Csillag didn't figure out what was wrong with eugenics the first time around. His rationalization about curing a bunch of social ailments by "preventing" criminals from reproducing is right up there with the brain damaged logic that says "if I carry a gun, I can defend myself against armed criminals" - only his is even worse because it presupposes that the offspring of a criminal is going to be another criminal.

So, I wonder if Mr. Csillag would want to apply retroactive birth control where a criminal who already has children is involved. After all, by his reasoning, they're damaged goods to start with.

This is yet one more example of "compassionate conservatism" at its logical best.

There's Crazy, Then There's Just BatSh!t Insanity

[Update]
It seems that Mr. Csillag has decided to withdraw his post. Of course, that's why Google has caches...that remember things for a long time.

It's really quite amusing, since Mr. Csillag doesn't even turn on comments on his blog - obviously he must google himself from time to time...
[/Update]
Via Canadian Cynic, I found one of the most amazing examples of insanity I've seen online (and I've seen my share!).

According to this guy we should use forced sterlization as a way to inhibit criminality.

At first, I might have simply written it off as parody - awful parody, but parody.

Then there's this comment:

The problem with the original act was that it was based on the biologically questionable concept of eugenics. A newer act would be based on making a long-term social investment. The system was not conducted fairly and sterilized a lot of people that shouldn't have been. IQ tests failed those who weren't proficient in the English language.

I don't know if a study has been done to prove or disprove this, but I'm going to suggest that a lot of those contributing to Alberta's escalating crime rate wouldn't have been born had the Sterility Act been kept in place.

Holy questionable assumptions, Batman! You are going to assume that criminal behaviour is hereditary? Wow. Whilst I certainly have my headshaking moments where I wonder just what possessed some people to become parents, this takes the lunacy of the pseudo-science behind eugenics to new depths.

But then, coming from a man who gushes over Ezra Levant and Craig Chandler, I don't suppose I should be terribly surprised.

From another post, he eulogizes Chandler's PC nomination as follows:

when they tossed democratically elected Calgary Egmont MLA candidate Craig Chandler out of his rightful position and arrogantly refused to reimburse campaign expenditures (even though Chandler’s positions were well known prior to his well-deserved election by select party members in Calgary Egmont).

Yes, yes. Poor, persecuted Craig. After all, he did win that first nomination. Let's just ignore the amount of hugely damaging political baggage that he brings with him. Or the party leadership's right to ensure that their candidates aren't a liability on the campaign trail.

Perhaps equally sad is his repetition of Chandler's recently invented meme in the interview column:

due to Mr. Chandler's affiliations with the Concerned Christian Coalition; of which another member published a letter titled Homosexual Agenda Wicked while Chandler was CEO.

Ummm...no, there's far more to Chandler's involvement in the Boissoin affair than just his "involvement" as CEO. There's what he's said on his "Freedom Radio Network" program, his deliberate republishing of Boissoin's letter, belligerence towards Rob Wells, that are all part of the picture. (and frankly it's a pretty unpleasant looking picture)

But then, for someone who doesn't see anything wrong with Chandler or Levant's behaviour, it's not a big leap for them to start assuming that forced sterilization is an appropriate punishment for criminals.

Huckabee Wants To What?!

If Huckabee is serious, the US will be well on its way to becoming The Republic of Gilead ... and I really don't want to imagine that Margaret Atwood was trying to be prophetic.

"I have opponents in this race who do not want to change the Constitution," Huckabee told a Michigan audience on Monday. "But I believe it's a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living god. And that's what we need to do -- to amend the Constitution so it's in God's standards rather than try to change God's standards so it lines up with some contemporary view."

Yes, I realize that the US is not Canada, and the American Constitution has a much different tone towards religion in general. However, vague and imprecise statements like Huckabee's often are a poor mask for an ugly, unstated direction.

Awful ... or is that Offal?

Taking the already cheezy and adding a liberal dollop of additional cheez is guaranteed to create something truly hideous.

In the case below, some bunch of fundamentalists tried to make their own "Star Trek" episode, and the results speak for themselves. The original Star Trek episodes were deliberately cheezy, and few would claim that William Shatner was a great actor. Somehow, the fundies managed to "out cheez" the original Star Trek with a combination of awful acting, truly awful writing and a live audience providing the laugh track. (sadly, I don't think they were shooting for comedy - much less bad farce)



*You may want brain bleach with this or immediately after

Come to think of it, pulling in all of the usual fundagelical talking points about atheists and science and clubbing the audience to death with them probably doesn't help the story much either.

In compensation, I leave you with this sample of what can be done when fans with a bit of talent and dedication decide to "carry on" with the Star Trek theme:



h/t: Pam House Blend

When You Are Too Crazy For The Sun Media

It's time to seek help.

I've trashed a couple of Rachel Marsden's columns recently - mostly because I wanted a different soda cracker to sandblast rather than the usual insanity of Paul Jackson or Ted Byfield.

Apparently, I'm not the only person north of the 49th to find Marsden more than slightly loopy - as the Toronto Sun has dropped her - and quickly expunged her from the front page of the columnists page on Canoe as well. {Some column history still exists - if you are feeling masochistic enough to read it.

Just to give you a flavour of Marsden's raving insanity, here's a capture of her statement after the Sun obviously dumped her off the back of their turnip truck:



Considering that the Sun keeps providing a stage for the rancid likes of Paul Jackson, Ted Byfield and Ezra Lerant, one can only imagine how utterly insane Marsden really is.

H/T: Canadian Cynic

The Ends Do NOT Justify The Means

Apparently Sun Media columnist Rachel Marsden thinks that where torture is concerned, waterboarding as an interrogation technique does.

Waterboarding, for those less than familiar with the vileness that is the torturer's mindset, is a technique where you basically convince the victim to talk by almost, but not quite, drowning them. I won't go into the grisly details of this technique - it is every bit as damaging as the various tortures used in the Middle Ages.

According to Ms. Marsden, waterboarding is no worse than the techniques used by competitive swimming coaches:

I suppose that those who object to terror suspects getting water up the nose would say that, as a young competitive swimmer, I was also tortured. It was called "hypoxic training" -- swimming underwater and holding our breath until we passed out. Our coaches didn't call it torture, just an exercise in "mental toughness." So think of it this way -- terror suspects are getting some free mental toughness training courtesy of the U.S. government.

No Rachel, you dumb twit - there's a damn big difference between what a young swimmer contends with and being strapped down to a board and having ABSOLUTELY NO CONTROL over what is being DONE TO YOU!

Intelligence saves lives.

Why yes it does. But just how reliable do you think intelligence gathered by physical coercion is, Rachel? Someone being tortured will say whatever they think their captors want to hear - whether it has any grounding in reality is irrelevant.

Now consider the case of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the 9/11 mastermind who ultimately claimed to have been involved in dozens of terrorist plots. He was found dressed like a slob, naturally, and also apparently in possession of a letter from Osama bin Laden. Think he might have known a thing or two?

I'm not sure how folks who are critical of the CIA's interrogation techniques would suggest eliciting intelligence from guys like this. Perhaps by offering him some tasty snacks and the love and understanding that he lacked as a child?

And why do you think torture is going to get you anything useful? If you get something "useful", you still have to corroborate it through other more reliable sources - so why aren't you using those reliable sources properly in the first place?

The examples of spies like Aldrich Ames in fact underscores my point. Ames was not coerced to provide information to the Soviet Union through force - he was recruited and paid. The information he provided to the Soviets was undoubtedly of a high grade and useful.

Marsden might think that torture is justified because someone is a suspect in a terrorism investigation. Then again, we only have to look at the case of Maher Arar as an example of just how effective torture actually is in extracting information. Or perhaps, she'd like a little sample of CIA-sponsored "swimming lessons" as she so dismissively puts it?

No, Rachel, the ends do not justify the means. Just as the evil that is perpetrated by terrorists is impossible to square with the political goals behind it, descending into acts of evil ourselves is not justified either. Desperate times may beget desperate measures, but you better be goddamn sure it's that desperate before you sink to depths of torturing someone to find out what you think they know.

Oh Dear God!

Via Huffington Post: Theocracy Now!.

Watch the video, and listen closely to the vile crap being spewed by these people.

If they weren't so serious, these people might almost qualify as funny.

Executions for gays and blasphemers; "Islamofascists", and goodness knows what else. Oh yes, did you hear that being gay is a "gender identity confusion"? (Or at least so Lou Sheldon claims)

Dobson's spewage at the end is exceptionally hideous, followed only by someone as obscene as Newt Gingrich.

The term "values vote" means this: voting for violence, war and discrimination against minorities. I can't even call that "conservative", it's downright regressive.

*Bleah*

Cause and Effect: Fundie Style

Via Pam's House Blend, we learn what passes for causal reasoning among the fundies.

The short synopsis - GLBT people made god start the wildfires in California.


... Right! ... and on a more humorous note, I leave you with this take on God's wrath:

It's Just A Story People...

Okay, last week, author J. K. Rowling told the world that one of her characters, Dumbledore, is gay.

I figured I'd leave the story alone, and wait until the raving lunatics of the far right started shrieking. Sure enough, The Peter™ comes out with opens his yap right on cue.

Young children, adolescents, and even many adults fall victim to the specious syllogistic reasoning that goes something like 1. Kindness is good, 2. Homosexuals are kind, 3. Therefore, homosexuality is good. It is clearly a faulty syllogism, and yet it’s wildly successful.

Of course, LaBarbera conveniently ignores the equally invalid syllogism of his entire organization:

1. The Bible Says Homosexuality is Evil
2. The Bible is the inerrant word of God
Therefore...
3. Society should outlaw gay people

But, like picking at an scab over an infected wound, The Peter™ goes on to try and conjure up some connection to the oh-so-evil "gay agenda":

The “gay” manifesto After the Ball written in 1989 describes a number of strategies to be used to transform cultural views of homosexuality, one of which is “conversion” (how very darkly ironic). The authors Marshall Kirk and Hunter Madsen write that “In Conversion, we mimic the natural process of stereotype learning, with the following effect: we take the bigot’s good feelings about all-right guys, and attach them to the label ‘gay,’ either weakening or, eventually, replacing his bad feelings toward the label and the prior stereotype.” Whether Rowling is aware of this process or not, she is employing it.

This is one of the most significant problems with repeated exposure to positive portrayals of homosexuals in films, television show, plays, novels, textbooks, and speakers. Unsophisticated thinkers come to believe that somehow good behaviors or traits are inherently exculpatory in regard to others. But we should no more say that the sin of homosexuality is effaced by a homosexual’s compassion, generosity, or good humor than we would say that a polygamist’s sin is effaced my his compassion, generosity, or good humor.

The short synopsis - normalizing someone being gay is a bad thing - why? Well...ummm...gee - it might lead to other bad things like polygamy. Sorry Peter, but you'll have to better than a slippery slope argument to convince this audience. Recognizing that people who are different as normal people is not a bad thing.

Nor should we be burning books because we don't like them. In the case of Harry Potter - it's fiction, deal with it.

Denial - Not Just A River in Egypt

Apparently the howling screech monkies over at Concerned Women for America haven't figured out that there's more vectors for AIDS transmission than sexual activity between two men or IV drug use.

According to their most recent shrieking insanity, only a small number of people can get AIDS - and they all live in those nasty high risk groups - like IV drug users or gay men who have unprotected sex.

Perhaps the most depressing statement is this bit of denial:

Thus, women are better protected against the virus. Dirty needles bypass the skin barrier of addicts; likewise, a nursing infant of an infected mother is directly vulnerable to the virus. The healthy vagina, however, has a strong lining that is infection resistant, and under normal circumstances, its tremendous elasticity minimizes the risk of tears and abrasions so that the HIV virus, barring a weakening of the system, has great difficulty breeching its natural barriers.

Unfortunately, CWFA has confused the notion that a woman has some degree of natural protection with the blind notion that such protection is somehow adequate in the face of a virus like HIV. Sadly, it's not - and it's far too late when you find out that it's not.

Additionally, CWFA has also forgotten the cold hard reality that a variety of vectors such as blood products can also result in viral transmission.

I am routinely amazed by these people - they seem to actually believe that things like HIV give a damn about their notions of "sinfulness" and "wickedness".

What is it With "Christians" and Harry Potter???

There are times where you have to just give your head a shake. Today's insanity comes to us from Lifesite, where they are still whining about the latest Harry Potter book.

All told, it is the grandest trans-cultural event of epic proportions in the history of mankind, rivaled only by the Bible.

I use the word rivaled with some consideration, not only because of the impact of the series on the modern world, but also because of the worldview it so powerfully implants in its devotees. In short, the series is a kind of anti-Gospel, a dramatized manifesto for behavior and belief embodied by loveable, at times admirable, fictional characters who live out the modern ethos of secular humanism to its maximum parameters.

Huh? Where did that little leap of illogic come from? Has the writer actually read the Harry Potter books? Or is he merely taking his cues from the insane ravings of the writers over at Wingnut Daily?

Calling the Harry Potter novels an "anti-Gospel" suggests that the stories aspire to a higher objective than they actually do. Of course, in the shrieking insanity of the columnist's mind, we find that it gets even more insidious:

More precisely, it is all about Homo Sine Deo, man without God, who, in order to find his identity in a flattened cosmos, must pursue power and knowledge at all costs lest he be blasted into non-being by a killing curse. He feels abandoned, alone, and believes, therefore, that he must rely upon himself - though he will bond, to a degree, with those who assist in the revelation and development of his hidden identity.

Yeah, well - guess what pal - in most heroic literature, the hero doesn't kneel down and start praying to some deity to save their butts. Even in the legends of Ancient Greece, the Gods were there more to create obstacles for someone than to actually help out. (and interestingly, there are echoes of Homer's Illiad and Odyssey in most heroic literature - whether we are talking about Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings or Narnia.

The series is also about the usefulness of hatred and pride, malice toward your real or perceived enemies, seeking and using secret knowledge, lies, cunning, contempt, and sheer good luck in order to defeat whatever threatens you or stands in the path of your desires. It is a cornucopia of other false messages: The end justifies the means. Nothing is as it seems.

Ummm...really? Perhaps one could equally spin it that the Harry Potter stories are about the "wonder of the world" - encouraging people to seek that little bit of "magic" in their daily lives? Urging young minds to look beyond the surface of what the world shows them, perhaps?

Coming from so-called "Christians" who routinely claim that "God moves in mysterious ways", and formulate vast conspiracies against "Christianity™", there's a certain irony. While we hear so often about the evils of such things as the "Gay Agenda", we see these same clowns self-justifying Bush's invasion of Iraq(talk about a case of the "ends justifying the means" there!).

Such humanism cannot long survive without a "spirituality" of some kind or other - and what better spirituality for Homo Sine Deo than one which offers the thrills and rewards of the preternatural, without moral accountability to God. One might call this, paradoxically, the religion of secular humanism.

Wow - what an amazing screed. I realize that many people of faith simply cannot imagine existing without that faith as a part of their lives. When it's constructive and helpful to them, I think that's wonderful. However, when that same faith causes you to close your mind's eye to other ways of looking at the world, then I believe it is crippling your ability to think clearly and critically.

When someone stands up and condemns a piece of escape literature as "evil", I can only imagine that somewhere, lurking behind a "don't open this door sign" in their minds is an imagination - because clearly they have lost sight of something somewhere along the way.

Mark Twain once said "You cannot depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus"

Distorting Reality...

There are times where the way that the christianist right wing distorts and abuses languages is truly offensive. (Especially to those of us who have taken the time and energy required to understand the language correct)

Today's 'offender du jour' comes to us in the form of Lifesite News with some of the most amazingly dense screed I've ever encountered.

Apparently, they are all upset because the Spanish government is going to introduce some education curriculum into the schools that is supposed to be what they (Lifesite) call "gay-friendly":

The new Education to Citizenship subject, set by the Ministry of Education, will include training in acceptance of the new realities of "gay marriage.

The curriculum will teach children to accept "diverse family situations" and include training in "overcoming homophobic prejudice," and rejection of "discrimination" with regard to gender.

Okay, so far this sounds pretty good to me - actually teaching people that discrimination and bigotry against people is a bad thing sounds like a great start.

However, Lifesite's writer descends into the swamp of proving to us precisely how illiterate they really are:

In the parlance of the international pan-sexual movement, that encompasses radical feminism and homosexual identity politics, "gender" is an almost infinitely malleable social construct, having little to do with biology or reproduction. Groups at United Nations conferences have proposed such recognition for up to eleven "genders" including male homosexual, lesbian, bi-sexual, male-to-female "transgendered," asexual, hermaphrodite, and transvestite.

Let's start off with the amazing abuse of language here.

Pan-Sexual: Pan-sexuality is a variation on the term Bisexual, and merely refers to individuals who have a particularly fluid sense of sexual identity. It has exactly nothing per se to do with "radical feminism", "homosexual identity politics", or "gender identity".

Radical Feminism: I don't even know where this one gets into the mix here. As near as I can tell, Lifesite and other christianists throw this one in whenever they want to rant about societies "deterioration". It sounds good, but is quite unrelated sexuality issues. {although it might overlap somewhat with gender identity issues - but only peripherally}

Then they really make Alphabet Puree out of the whole thing by confusing a mixture of gender and sexual identites as "gender identities":

eleven "genders" including male homosexual, lesbian, bi-sexual, male-to-female "transgendered," asexual, hermaphrodite, and transvestite.

Let's get a couple of things straight:

Sexual identities, like homosexual include gay, lesbian and bisexual (bisexual is a grey zone between heterosexual and homosexual). The concept of asexuality is relatively new, and refers more to a lack of sexual interest than anything else.

Intersex (or more classically, Hermaphrodite) refers quite specifically to people born with ambiguous genitalia, and does not speak to either the sexual or gender identity of the individual. It is long formally recognized, although only relatively recently have such people begun exercising demands for some say in how they are to be treated.

The last category that they have incorrectly lumped into their list are gender identity issues:

male-to-female : Refers to a transsexual that is transitioning from male to female. It is not a "gender" per se, rather it is descriptive of the actions someone is taking to resolve a conflict between their body and mind.

Transvestite: Refers to the practice of cross-dressing. This is a bit of a slippery concept when applied to transsexuals, as they will often - and legitimately - claim that the early stages of their transition were not "cross-dressing" at all. To the best of my knowledge, this does not constitute a discrete "gender" - at least not in the sense that Lifesite uses the term, but rather refers to someone whose gender expression is at times different from their physical sex.

Transgender: Is a very broad term that encompasses a wide range of people from cross-dressers to transsexuals - it simply refers to someone whose gender identity and body are at odds with each other to some degree. The degree to which someone expresses their cross-gender identity may place them into specific subgroups.

Amusingly, Lifesite tries to claim that these are all "genders" - or that they have been put forth as "genders". This is in fact an amazing abuse of language. These are all identifiable subgroups of the population, to be sure. But they are not discrete genders per se. (Ironically, I think you would find a great many transsexuals in particular would argue rather strongly that they are not a "special gender" at all, rather they wish to conform to the social gender norms - of their chosen gender) It would seem that Lifesite's writers have forgotten a basic rule of using language - namely if you don't know what something means, look it up!

Politically all of the groups that the article lists have asked for specific protections in law to alleviate the discrimination and hostility that they face from a variety of people (but especially extreme christianists) who do not comprehend the unique human traits that these people possess.

I for one applaud the Spanish government for having the courage to do what the Harper government has not - actively move to alleviate the discrimination and hostility that a clearly identifiable group is subjected to on a daily basis.

Dear Abbey:

Back here, semi-anonymous commenter "Abbey" writes a real doozy which deserves its own treatment.

Writes Abbey:

You all profoundly misunderstand the Christian position.

Christianity does not preach hatred for LGBT people.

What you call 'orientation' we call temptation.

What you all see as an identity, we see as a behavior.

We are ALL sinners. Homosexual acts are just one sin among thousands - if not millions of others. The fact that many people suffer from this particular temptation is NOT an indication that the 'rules' should be changed.

Note to anonymous: In ancient Greece it was typical for a man to have a wife for procreation and a boy for 'recreation' (pederasty).

Since one of the goals of homosexual activists is to eliminate age of consent laws I can only conclude we are not emerging from the 'dark ages' we are returning to them...

This is so rich in the "getting it wrong" department that it deserves to be taken apart, piece by piece...

Christianity does not preach hatred for LGBT people.

Funny. I keep hearing that, then we get cases like Boissoin, Whatcott or Chandler's Freedom Radio Network popping up after ostensible "Christians" come out and make what amount to "calls to arms" against GLBT people - effectively inciting violence against them. While Christianity may not preach hatred, there is an amazing amount of vile hatred that is committed in the name of Christ. Or perhaps, you'd like to consider the case of Julie Nemecek who was fired from her job ... for being transsexual. Why? Because the so-called "Christians" running her place of employment decided they couldn't control her life adequately. How "loving" and "compassionate" of them.

What you call 'orientation' we call temptation.

What you all see as an identity, we see as a behavior.

Go take some clinical psychology courses on these topics. It's obvious that you think that someone can "just pray away the gay" because it's nothing more than "temptation" and "behaviour" - meanwhile you conveniently ignore all of the evidence that demonstrates that what you claim is "behaviour" (which suggests mutability) does not in fact respond well to therapies designed to provoke change. (Including the often proposed notion of "reparative therapy" as proposed by organizations like NARTH and Exodus).

As Naomi Lakritz's column pointed out, GLBT people no more sat down and "chose" to be what they are any more than you did (I presume that you are quite emphatically heterosexual). In fact, consider the social prejudice that these people face daily, and one would have to suspect that someone would only tread such a path out of a deeply seated necessity. (Certainly, this is true of Transsexuals, and I presume it to be true to a large degree for GLB people as well)

We are ALL sinners. Homosexual acts are just one sin among thousands - if not millions of others. The fact that many people suffer from this particular temptation is NOT an indication that the 'rules' should be changed.

Nice claim, but it neither addresses, nor justifies the topic at hand. Lakritz's column was going after the christianists like Boissoin and others whose acts against GLBT people are outright vicious, and arguably incite others to engage in beatings and worse against GLBT people. The notion of "sin" belongs within a church and a faith community. Why should your notion of "sin" be used to judge and demonize others?

As for "changing the rules", your dogma on this topic merely demonstrates an ongoing lack of understanding (and willingness to understand) the reality that the rational evidence makes clear: GLBT people are still human beings, and generally honest, decent citizens - quite undeserving of the kind of vitriolic attack that Boissoin has made.

Note to anonymous: In ancient Greece it was typical for a man to have a wife for procreation and a boy for 'recreation' (pederasty).

Since one of the goals of homosexual activists is to eliminate age of consent laws I can only conclude we are not emerging from the 'dark ages' we are returning to them...

Let me be amazingly clear about something here. Homosexuality refers to someone being attracted to members of the same physical sex. Pedophilia implies attraction to children. These are not synonyms, and you grossly distort reality when you try to claim that homosexuals are pedophiles. (which is the implication of what you a blathering about)

The claim that homosexual activists want to "eliminate age of consent" laws is patently false, a myth perpetrated by the christianist right in an effort to continue demonizing a group of people.

Wow - The Assumptions Just Boggle

Down in Florida, we find a 2-bit bigot who is currently sitting in the Mayor's chair.

Apparently he thinks that a GLBT-oriented library is going to contain all sorts of "hard core porn":

Mayor Naugle told LifeSiteNews.com that he opposed the project for two reasons. "Number one the city needs the space," he said. Secondly, the morning of the vote, it came to his attention that the Stonewall collection contained hard-core pornographic material depicting men committing anal intercourse. He commented, "I fear that we're the first city that has a hard-core porn collection in our public library." In addition, "it is housed in our main children's park."

How typical for the right-wingnut bigot crowd - anything involving the GLBT community must involve huge amounts of immoral, licentious material...or so the logic goes.

Reality intervenes, and we learn by a bit of search engine digging, that this is Stonewall Library, and unsurprisingly, we find quite a lengthy history which maps the organization's past from the early 1970s forward, and a mission statement that hardly sounds like a purveyor of vileness. I'm sure that there is a certain amount of erotic literature in the collection - but then again, anyone who has ever read Terry Goodkind will know that there's plenty of "erotica" in fiction to start with.

Of course, this is the same nitwit who claims:

Mayor Naugle, who voted against the library along with Commissioner Christine Teel, was already under fire for comments he made last week that sparked homosexual activists to a fury. On July 4 the Miami Herald published an interview with the mayor regarding the proposal of a new robotic toilet to be installed along the Florida beaches. The facility would have a security feature limiting occupant time by automatically opening its doors after a certain period. Naugle supported the new idea, saying, "Sometimes (public washrooms) are used for sexual activity-most of it is men meeting men because it's same-sex people in the bathrooms."
Naugle also made the following comment, "I don't use the word 'gay.' I use the word 'homosexual.' Most of them aren't gay. They're unhappy."

What a winner.

Reading Too Much In

The recent release of the latest (and presumably last) Harry Potter novel has spawned all sorts of attempts at analysis which try to read far too much into a story that is pure escape literature.

While I can understand some degree of interest and curiousity being express with respect to what one can only describe as a societal phenomenon that has spanned the globe, we should be cautious about treating it as anything other than a pop culture moment. To apply much more than basic literary criticism to the Harry Potter books is granting what is obviously no deeper than your average Star Trek episode far too much intellectual credibility.

Perhaps the best example of the insanity that has come to surround the Harry Potter stories is expressed by Wingnut Daily, whose writers are getting themselves thoroughly tied up in knots over the dark evil of the "occult" in these books:

Wohlberg's new book "Exposing Harry Potter and Witchcraft: The Menace Beneath the Magic," asserts that "Harry Potter" purchases are often accompanied at the sales counter with materials on Wicca. Increasing numbers of young readers also frequent Wicca websites, cast "Love and Money Spells," and practice "white magic."

You know, I remember hearing those same kind of idiotic criticisms levelled at Dungeons and Dragons when I was in Junior High school. I think magic is something that many people find appealing, especially in adolescence. Who wouldn't give almost anything to make the pain and angst of our adolescent years go away (or turn that Math teacher that nobody could stand into a toad?)

Magic, at least on this world, isn't "real". Nobody accomplishes anything by incantations (at least that can be proven demonstrably) - whether those incantations are meant to boil a cauldron of water, or bring favor from some arbitrary sky-being.

Arguably, what many religions call prayer is little different from the ritualized casting of spells that many claim is an expression of "evil".

Many people I know scratch their heads and stare somewhat in askance at the near hysteria of the claims of the fundamentalists when they speak of Harry Potter (or Tolkein, or Dungeons and Dragons...). But, when you step back from it for a moment, it starts to make a little sense.

The fundamentalist claims that not only is "God" an absolute reality, but also that this same being had something to do with the writing of the Bible/Q'Ran/Pentateuch {pick your faith}. This grants a "reality" to an unknowable that is perhaps slightly irrational when framed in the context of our world. There is no way I can know the truth value of either claim, as they are statements of faith, not fact.

Looking a little further, it's not hard to see how if one accepts the claim that some meta being called "God" is real, that one might similarly be willing to believe that there is some "real" truth value to the kind of magic described in the Harry Potter books. Neither is demonstrable in any real sense in this world, but if you are willing to assign an absolute truth to one unknowable, credulity will similarly allow you to assume that magic is equally real.

More seriously, I think we have to ask ourselves if the hysteria around Harry Potter ultimately is about adults who have forgotten the imagination of youth, and the dalliances and explorations of those years between 11 and adulthood. Worrying that a piece of escape literature is exposing someone to evil is just plain silly - unless you happen to assign a reality to it that isn't really appropriate.