I didn’t find any public reference to Bernstein’s religion, so it is possible he is Jewish. That said, if he is Jewish, he sure sounds like a Fundamentalist Christian.
I didn’t find any public reference to Bernstein’s religion, so it is possible he is Jewish. That said, if he is Jewish, he sure sounds like a Fundamentalist Christian.
Classy it was not
To see such an outpouring of women as the first group to make a stand was pure joy to my heart. That they were a full cross-section of human beings, some quietly solid and some blaring and loud, some young and some old was pure joy to my heart. Women said it for all of us: We will never go back, back to subjugation and fear, back to quietly bowing under misogyny, back to state-sanctioned disrespect.
The alt right and the conservative Jews and Christians can go fuck themselves with their shaming. I know what they seek to do. I have seen it all my life. Fuck you, Josh Bernstein. I have never been much a of Madonna fan but to state that she should go to prison for life for speaking rudely, for using her fame to answer a man who is openly threatening American liberty? Just fuck off, Josh.
I think shame can be a good thing sometimes.
Agreed. Shame, when felt as regret for instance, with a less than wise action or thought, can be freeing and make us more fully human. Christian shame is another matter and is NEVER a good thing as I have experienced it…. Shame to suppress human freedom and individuality is a sick twist on normal shame.
missed adding this to last comment on shame:
Oops, repeating Pence! Gross. Sorry.
Maybe conservatives and liberals would have a different list of what to be ashamed of; I’m sure they’d be some items in common also.
. Whatever their cause is, I don’t think women help their cause by being strident, vulgar and profane. I happen to think women are very powerful people to begin with and are unwise to diminish themselves in the eyes of others in that way.
Did Trump’s vulgar comments help him to be respected? Of course not. Same goes for women.
Well, as you know from sharing this space with me, I adore profanity at times! I think that having my expression beheaded at a very young age has left me with an attachment to all ways of expressing now. I do not believe that taking God’s name in vain is wrong at all but quite correct in this environment (2017). The bullshit attached to belief deserves the strong expression of profanity. What is truly profane is silence in the face of spiritual rape, the abuse of young minds and bodies. What is profane is a soldier’s uniform. What is profane is a flag drapped over a criminal act. “Go fuck yourself Trump,” does not impress me as much profanity at all.
And Yes, I think Trump’s willingness to be vulgar did impress a lot of people. Unfortunately, for the wrong reasons but absolutely, yes his vulgarity did help his respect quotient considerably. The man got almost half the popular vote. He almost won.
All that being said, I do feel that you are right to encourage civil discourse and don’t mean to rain on that at all. I just have this thang! about free expression, free even if it makes you look worse, as mine appears to, I guess. But you know, Lynn 123, I am vulgar. I swear like a trooper when with myself. I temper this when in company because I do not wish to harm even while being old-enough-to-know that human politics is never a safe-zone.
Exactly. I’ve had atheists and Evangelicals alike get upset over my occasional use of profanity. I refuse to let the word/behavior police determine my behavior. As with the marches, my use of profanity is .0001% of what I write. If this upsets people, well that’s too bad. Love or hate me, this is who and what I am.
Well, not sure what else to say. I used to love commenting and discussing but don’t find it fun anymore. But, anyway, even though we probably disagree on about everything politically, you sound like a decent person.
I find it interesting (and predictable) that critics of the marches seem to have no problem with Trump and his behavior — both before and after his election to office. Instead of focusing on what matters, they feign outrage over a poem and how some of marchers were dressed.
Desperate days require desperate actions. Trump’s first ten days in office have shown us that he is every bit the narcissistic psychopath we thought he was.
Marches against the Vietnam War were profane, yet they brought about the end of the War. The prim and proper from both parties stood on the sideline chucking rocks and hurling criticism towards protesters whose one goal was to end American imperialism and bloodshed.
Hmm. Well, I thot I could just read and never comment, but then once in awhile, I can’t resist commenting and instantly regret it. I feel way outnumbered these days on your blog, Bruce. I think the problem is that I’m a pretty conservative person overall, even though I’ve certainly rejected my IFB upbringing. I guess the things we had in common are more in the background now. Your political views are so completely different from mine, that I don’t think I fit with this blog anymore. I miss the old days!
But, as I’ve said many times, I will forever appreciate all the support you provided me during the last few years re religion. Thank you for that.
Most people who leave Fundamentalist Christianity tend to become more liberal politically. You are an outlier among unbelievers. That said, you are always welcome here. Just don’t expect me to be anyone other than who I am. I think you would agree that none of us should be frauds. We had enough of that as Christians.
Thanks for the re-welcoming, Bruce. I was wondering about that. We’ll see if I can stand the heat in the kitchen.
Interesting subject-do most who leave IFB become liberals. I would tend to think not, simply because I think politics always trumps religion, and that one’s political frame of mind is not easily changed. In my own case, I did become more liberal for a bit. I worked at it. But I came to realize that that’s simply not who I am. When I’m around liberals in real life, I feel out of place. I know that they would reject me if they knew my real opinions, so I keep my opinions to myself-cause I do not enjoy rejection. Of course I’d also feel out of place around IFB types. With them, I’d be thinking, “do you people never think this stuff thru?”
Did you yourself go from extreme conservative to extreme liberal or something in between? Or do you think you had liberal leanings all along but you had to shed the IFB nonsense to find your true self?
Lynn 123, please don’t disappear. I appreciate your views and sometimes disagree. That is what it is all about, no? Keep on keepin’ on… I don’t fit here either but I feel that I benefit by being here. Sorry to be part of your negative feelings. I don’t want to make you agree with me at all, just let me disagree with you if I happen to disagree. This is not a church group where you either fit-in or find the door, at least I have not felt it to be.
One of the most interesting things you might choose to consider is why on earth your feelings jump to instantly regretting having commented? Your opinion matters to me even if I am one who disagrees and I am not going in another direction to shame you for having another view.
If you do choose to just-read and not comment, I will feel that as a loss. Those of us with IFB pasts, often avoid conflict or carry residual shame around it.
Thank-you for commenting here, for speaking your viewpoint.
Thanks for your kind reply, Brian. I’ll hang in there-or at least try. As I said, I do enjoy discussing but find it hard to shake it off when everybody disagrees with me.
As for avoiding conflict and feeling disturbed about it when it happens-I’ve come to know that that’s simply from my ancestry-which is Scottish/English. We’re reserved people in public and very easily embarrassed. Watch “Very British Problems.” That’s me. Now I’m sure IFB had its influence also; but I think it’s mainly personality type. What’s your ancestry?
Hi Lynn. I know you were asking the question of Brian, but I’m half English, half Spanish, and my wife is Scottish through and through. We are exceedingly unreligious, to the point in my case of being anti theistic, but family back in Scotland are Catholic, culturally anyhow. The most religious of them have three young children, all of whom go to a Catholic school. The family know my views, and I discuss them with my brother in law, who is Irish incidentally, and we never fall out. I make sure the children aren’t being indoctrinated too much, they are thoroughly grounded in science (the youngest at 7 is learning about evolution), and they can communicate in a very mature way. Though I don’t approve of faith schools existing in the first place, I have to say that they can work.
As for politics, it doesn’t matter what you believe, provided that you can support it with genuinely sound arguments. I recently came across a blog article based on a Twitter user, who expressed the view that he hated Obama, was so pleased that Trump won, that Obamacare had been an abomination, and was delighted when Republicans repealed Obamacare and introduced the ACA ( yes, you read that right!), because he could then get decent health care. Now the opinion of this person is hardly worthy of respect, yet it’s views like this that elected Trump.
lol-Yes, he does sound a little confused. I don’t think you should assume that all who voted for Trump are like him. There are uninformed, misinformed on both sides, no doubt. The guy probably simply liked Trump more than Hillary and went from there.
Hey, I would love to hear your list of a few Scottish traits that you think they generally have. (If Bruce doesn’t mind the off-topic nature of this.)
Oh I have no doubt at all that there are well informed Trump voters, though I’m sure a lot voted ‘not Hillary’.
Scottish traits! No problem at all.
Proud of their country. Much more so than the English. English people saying they are proud to be English will, first of all, say ‘British’, then follow up with jingoistic mutterings that amount to ‘deport all the immigrants’. Scots are genuinely in love with their country, not in the least regional (except perhaps for Glasgow), even though they have the most unpredictable weather ever, and the worst midges on this earth!
Despite what I said about regional attachment, when it comes to accents they are a diverse people. For a country of just six million inhabitants, half the size of London, the variation in accent is extraordinary. Some are completely incomprehensible.
They are not mean, despite their reputation. They perhaps are careful with their money, always seeming to know to the penny what they have in their pockets, but many a time I’ve had to accept free drinks offered to the ‘guest in their village’. Or the petrol station owner who opened specially on a Sunday when I’d foolishly run out of fuel on the far north coast.
The issue in the UK presently, as you know, is that we want to leave the European Union (though nothing is yet certain). Scotland have staunchly stood behind our membership of the EU, something our forefathers fought for, and if Brexit does happen I fear that Scotland may well vote for independence from the rest of the UK.
Hey Lynn,
Just wanted to say I recognize the impulse to avoid conflict in commenting on blogs. Only this week I felt a little unsure about some of the comments I made on a few other blogs. The anger or fierceness of some commenters when you say something a little out of line startles me sometimes. I had phrased something a little clumsely and immediately got called out on it: I actually agreed with the person but it is still hard sometimes.
I think it has to do with two things: like Brian says on the one hand you – as in I – don’t want to be limited anymore by speech rules because that happened so much in our pasts but on the other hand, I am not good with conflict. And prone to feeling attacked when people get angry and afraid that they don’t like me anymore, basically, because I disagreed on something. I think it is part upbringing, part personality. I don’t think that difference of opinion is in any way stimulated in Evangelicalism though. Or in other words: all hell breaks loose when you disagree on something: Heaven forbid you have your own opinions!
So yeah, I’m a big fan of free speech, dislike tone policing when it’s done by others, yet I also sometimes have the impulse to tone police others or myself as well. It’s a bit of a mess that…
I am somewhat on the left on a lot of issues but sometimes the left does tone police quite a bit I have found and I dislike that, a lot. It makes me think: I didn’t leave a strict Christianity where I couldn’t have my own opinions to end up in yet another group where I feel the same and sometimes I do feel like that. I don’t want to have to weigh my words all that much anymore yet I still do. I just want to be myself. Let’s just say that I sometimes feel that they way your worth in weighed in Christianity based on some rules and so on, also happens in politics sometimes and I think that is wrong. As long as you say all the right things you are respected, but the moment you don’t… beware, that kind of thing. People shouldn’t disregard other people if they don’t follow the party line; rather they should be proud they don’t as it shows that they think for themselves instead.
Anyway, just a long way to say: I hear you. Commenting is fun, yet sometimes a little frustrating too.
“that they way your worth in weighed in Christianity” – has to be : the way your worth is weighed, a punch of typo’s there.
I also think that it is partly tribalism: you break the ‘rules’ of the group when you disagree, and that’s partly where the anger and tone policing comes from. It is like someone is suddenly not as similar to yourself as you thought they were and that gives an emotional response.
Melody, I think you put it all very well. I understand that people feel passionately about some subjects, but that sometimes makes them feel like unsafe people to have a conversation with.
Maybe if people put a passionate comment, they could also temper it by saying they are open to discussion and don’t consider those who disagree to be evil, stupid, etc, etc. Or maybe sometimes people just want to be able to vent and really have no desire to discuss the merits of their position. And sometimes, we just feel the way we feel and may not know all the details of why we feel that way.
I think politics has become like a religion for many people. We sometimes think religious people are so invested that wild horses couldn’t drag them to a different way of seeing something.
Lately, I’m pretty much in the camp of “best not to discuss politics period.” I mean, what good comes of it anyway? It’s become like debating the Bible-battling verses. lol A waste of time and energy.
Yeah, nobody likes to be reprimanded for their tone, that’s true. But if their tone is over the top, it certainly doesn’t make for likely conversation.
I so agree with your thoughts about all is well in whatever group, everybody loves everybody til….you dare to have a different opinion. I experienced that at a church personally. I was basically invited to know my place and conform. So I left! All that love was a big bunch of nothing.
I think it’s for a good reason that the ‘rule’ of politics/religion should not be discussed at the dinner table or at parties exists. It can make people very passionate and/or rude and that sort of spoils the atmosphere and can lead to loud arguments.
Yet they are interesting subjects, so there’s the snag 😉
I think politics can be just as important as religion to people or sometimes serves as a kind of substitute for religion. It both provides you with ideological rules, do’s and don’ts and it gives someone a specific kind of worldview. And sometimes they mix, and parties become partly religious or interesting for specific religious groups.
Hi Brian. I just read your answer re family history in my email, but it’s not showing up here yet. Anyway, I laughed re your mother-in-law being somewhat embarrassing in public-I had the same issue with my mother-in-law. She was famous for saying stuff loudly in public too. She was Italian. She definitely kept things interesting.
My father was a Roberts, and my mother was a York. Very cool to know that your family arrived in the 1700’s. That’s really far back.
Having all those preachers in the family sounds intense. When I was growing up in the IFB, my mom was very involved at church, but my father only attended on Sunday mornings and adult class cook-outs, etc. We certainly didn’t have family devotions and all that. In fact the fact that they seemed to be involved yet take it all with a grain of salt confused me quite a bit since I was taking it all very seriously.
Did you ever wonder why the rest of your family didn’t question it all?
There was some questioning by siblings early on, but as time went on, they fell into line. It was not a mystery to me at all that they chose to do this: Every strand of reality from the womb on tied us all to Jesus. Education was important but not at the expense of your relationship to Christ. A batchelor degree was a good thing but how much education do you need to realized God’s gift? And isn’t seeking too much education moving away from service? Our thoughts and actions were monitored until we became our own sargeants, our own police. I hated myself. I could not stop feeling horny as a teen and thinking of sex. I had a full vocabulary in my head even if I restricted most of my expression most of the time. I was not fit for life at all without the blood of Christ because I was very human. Humans are evil. How can you not join a club like this when it is so clear and after all the only real choice! I have one other sibling who ‘fell away’ and he and I do get some support from one another but he has ‘put-away’ alot of his pain and does not like to have it scratched at much. I on the other hand seem to need quite a bit of expression around it all. This blog is a balm to me, an encouragement as I still receive almost daily sermons in my email, almost daily reminders of my evil fall my challenge to the club. I have one sibling who is not able to speak to me much at all except in Bible verses. Each response to my questions goes Bible on me even though I have begged that it cease, that we just talk about family things, events and news. What other news is there, is the reply. Love the lord your gawd with all your heart etc. It is quite tiring.
Brian,
That does sound tiring! It can start to seem like talking with someone who’s in a cult, probably. I’m realizing in reading your comments that maybe I’ve lost some of my passion against religion simply because I never have contact with fundies. Well, rarely. It’s like this author I used to read re being frugal. She lived in New England where many people are frugal-you start to lose your passion for the subject cause you’re not different. We need something to keep our blood up! I can see how daily sermons would do that.
I live in a pretty liberal environment in Northern Delaware. The University of Delaware is here. For example, there are flags up and down the street championing diversity. If you dared to question diversity being a good and helpful thing, they’d think you were terrible, probably. Anyway, I guess my point is that I think environment affects us.