Today is the election for the Alabama U.S. senator in which an accused pedophile with a history of being removed from office multiple times will likely defeat a former federal prosecutor with a history of putting away Klansmen because he has R after his name instead of D. And, as voters know, this means they are true to the Constitution, live with integrity, and are specially blessed by God, while the other team hates God, hates America, and hates everything good.
It amazes me how far our national intelligence and morality have plummeted in recent years, and this is just one of many examples. I mean, when GOP now stands for 'Groping Or Perving', there's a problem. Yes, I know...BOTH SIDES are wrong. But at least the Democrats and liberals seem to be exiling their failures even as the GOP is intent on building them up higher and denying that they did anything wrong.
(Take a breath. Look at your own plank. Realize that these problems are bigger than you. Now, continue.)
It's so easy to point out all the problems with our world...but to be honest, I am at a point that I have no idea (except the power of God) how to make things better. The other day I figured out what my problem is...I know exactly what is wrong with something, I know how systems work, and I can see patterns. But making something good out of it? I'm not your man.
So I was watching my daughter and her team play basketball, and it became very apparent that there were a lot of problems with their plan...they were not setting screens, the guards were not passing into the bigs, and they were not communicating on either defense or offense. I could see all their problems...maybe I would be a good scout for a sports team, as I can always see the problems and what is being done.
But, like a lot of Americans, I'm really bad about figuring out how to make things better. I can yell and scream and point fingers, but fixing the problem, and building up my fellow man? Nope. This is why for all my morbid interest in politics, I have never had any desire to run for any public office except for the anointing of Dictator. It's why I'm not a great coach...I can see what is going on, but I can't make the kids do what I want them to do in my mind. It's why I stink at video games...I can figure out all the patterns within the game, but I don't have the ability to exploit them.
Maybe our world is just too complicated today to make a difference in. We'd rather just tear things and people down than build it up to something good.
Tuesday, December 12, 2017
Tuesday, October 31, 2017
Weinstein, et al
The news continues to be depressing. Currently, amidst the slog that is Trump, health and environmental warnings, and the Royals beginning their long generational slide into the abyss, we have a huge sexual harassment scandal in which a high-ranking Hollywood executive has lost his power and influence after decades of terrible behavior. The fallout is that scores of other spotlighted people are being dragged through this...Kevin Spacey propositioned a teenager many years ago, Andy Dick licks people, and George Bush the senior acts like a dirty old man. It's sad, really, even though hopefully the public shaming will hopefully people putting a stop to terrible behavior. As a dad, I pray that my daughter will never have to go through what many women through the ages have endured.
Yet I can't help think that this is yet another story in which the chickens have come home to roost. Men have always behaved badly, I suppose...in the Bible Xerxes gets his XXX rating by plowing through a whole generation of women looking for a replacement wife, and things haven't gotten much better in the years since Celebrities and powerbrokers have always gotten away with bad behavior...how many of the legendary Wilt Chamberlain's 20,000 supposed lays were not consensual? Heck, we have a sitting president who made some of his reputation as horny business mogul who would brag about grabbing a woman's 'p****' when she was not expecting it or walking in on teenagers getting dressed in beauty pageants. Sexuality has been glorified as the right of the powerful, and now with western equality being our god, everyone else as well. With glorification, abuse will soon follow on its heels.
As always, we want all the pleasures of sexuality without any of its drawbacks. Will we continue to celebrate all the glories of our modern sexual freedom and then continue to be so surprised when this freedom is so badly abused? Something's gotta give.
Yet I can't help think that this is yet another story in which the chickens have come home to roost. Men have always behaved badly, I suppose...in the Bible Xerxes gets his XXX rating by plowing through a whole generation of women looking for a replacement wife, and things haven't gotten much better in the years since Celebrities and powerbrokers have always gotten away with bad behavior...how many of the legendary Wilt Chamberlain's 20,000 supposed lays were not consensual? Heck, we have a sitting president who made some of his reputation as horny business mogul who would brag about grabbing a woman's 'p****' when she was not expecting it or walking in on teenagers getting dressed in beauty pageants. Sexuality has been glorified as the right of the powerful, and now with western equality being our god, everyone else as well. With glorification, abuse will soon follow on its heels.
As always, we want all the pleasures of sexuality without any of its drawbacks. Will we continue to celebrate all the glories of our modern sexual freedom and then continue to be so surprised when this freedom is so badly abused? Something's gotta give.
Thursday, October 19, 2017
Grumpy Old Guy #31
I'm driving a shuttle route last night and most of the kids are fine, but a little boy, about 6, keeps standing up and jumping around in the back. Three times I have to get on the intercom, 'Sit Down!' I don't like being that guy, but kids in the aisle or standing up, that's dangerous.
So we get to the final drop-off point and as the boy is coming off I have him stand on top of the engine compartment and tell him that he has to do better sitting down, that he can't be jumping around on the bus. We're a quarter of the way through the school year, he knows this by now but he doesn't care. But then his brother, probably a year older and is waiting on him says, 'He can't sit down! He has ADHD and that's why he acts like this.'
To summarize: a seven-year-old is already making excuses for his younger brother as to why he is the way he is. Where did he learn these things? Most likely from his parents, who likewise make excuses for his unacceptable behavior. This child is likely to through life with people making excuses for him, instead of simply saying 'No, you can't do this.'
It's easy to bag on people I don't know well, but most kids really don't have ADHD. Most of them are simply over-sugared, over-caffeinated, over-stimulated, and under-disciplined. And when they act like this, everybody then looks for an excuse besides what's obvious. No wonder I have a headache.
So we get to the final drop-off point and as the boy is coming off I have him stand on top of the engine compartment and tell him that he has to do better sitting down, that he can't be jumping around on the bus. We're a quarter of the way through the school year, he knows this by now but he doesn't care. But then his brother, probably a year older and is waiting on him says, 'He can't sit down! He has ADHD and that's why he acts like this.'
To summarize: a seven-year-old is already making excuses for his younger brother as to why he is the way he is. Where did he learn these things? Most likely from his parents, who likewise make excuses for his unacceptable behavior. This child is likely to through life with people making excuses for him, instead of simply saying 'No, you can't do this.'
It's easy to bag on people I don't know well, but most kids really don't have ADHD. Most of them are simply over-sugared, over-caffeinated, over-stimulated, and under-disciplined. And when they act like this, everybody then looks for an excuse besides what's obvious. No wonder I have a headache.
Tuesday, September 26, 2017
Posture and Flags
So. The current national conversation is not how our President is pushing us towards war, nor how once again the Congress is trying to take away health care from the poorest amongst us, nor the horrible hurricanes hitting the gulf coast and Caribbean. Nope...it's about whether or not NFL players should stand during the national anthem. I am so glad (sarcasm) we are focusing on such important things.
Personally, I stand for the flag and the national anthem and the nation as a whole, not for the President or the Congress or anything else. I think there are other, better times for people to protest than this, and the fact that kneeling now seems to have become the 'cool' thing to do makes me suspicious. Considering how much even the wealthy NFL owners have responded negatively to Trump's statement that people who kneel during the anthem are 'sons of bitches', I know that much of what is going on is more about Trump and his persecution complex than anything.
Yet people who kneel or sit during the anthem as a protest against whatever do not bug me nearly as much as the many other ways people disrespect the flag, many actions which are actually against the federal code. This article in the Huffington Post in particular I thought was excellent.
-When dumb rednecks (most are great people, but some are morons) fly the U.S. flag beside the Confederate flag out of the back of their pickup until it is ripped mostly to shreds.
-When politicians use the flag as a lapel pin because they are afraid of what constituents will say if they don't.
-When cheap, disposable plastic flags are passed out like candy at parades even as they will loudly say that they are 'made in China'.
-When businesses use the flag to try to sell things.
-When people put writing or other symbols on the flag to get a political agenda across.
-When people wear flag-themed clothing and they do it very sloppily.
-When people combine images of the flag, screaming eagles, and other quasi-patriotic images to say something along the lines of 'America! Kneel or feel our boot in your ___!'
There are so many instances in which the flag has been abused in ways far worse than in the posture of athletes. Just when I think that our country can't get any dumber, we knock a few points off the 'ol national IQ.
Personally, I stand for the flag and the national anthem and the nation as a whole, not for the President or the Congress or anything else. I think there are other, better times for people to protest than this, and the fact that kneeling now seems to have become the 'cool' thing to do makes me suspicious. Considering how much even the wealthy NFL owners have responded negatively to Trump's statement that people who kneel during the anthem are 'sons of bitches', I know that much of what is going on is more about Trump and his persecution complex than anything.
Yet people who kneel or sit during the anthem as a protest against whatever do not bug me nearly as much as the many other ways people disrespect the flag, many actions which are actually against the federal code. This article in the Huffington Post in particular I thought was excellent.
-When dumb rednecks (most are great people, but some are morons) fly the U.S. flag beside the Confederate flag out of the back of their pickup until it is ripped mostly to shreds.
-When politicians use the flag as a lapel pin because they are afraid of what constituents will say if they don't.
-When cheap, disposable plastic flags are passed out like candy at parades even as they will loudly say that they are 'made in China'.
-When businesses use the flag to try to sell things.
-When people put writing or other symbols on the flag to get a political agenda across.
-When people wear flag-themed clothing and they do it very sloppily.
-When people combine images of the flag, screaming eagles, and other quasi-patriotic images to say something along the lines of 'America! Kneel or feel our boot in your ___!'
There are so many instances in which the flag has been abused in ways far worse than in the posture of athletes. Just when I think that our country can't get any dumber, we knock a few points off the 'ol national IQ.
Wednesday, September 6, 2017
Obsessed about Sex
I have a friend on Facebook with whom I went to high school with whose dad was a Methodist pastor. From what I can tell he still considers himself a Christian, but one of those modern types of Christians who would likely be unrecognizable to the orthodox believers of the last two millennia. Whenever there is a religious topic up for debate he's always ready to jump in and regardless of whether or not it has anything to do with the apostle Paul, he's always quick to jump in and say that Paul was a fool.
I've never asked him why, unfortunately...but I would suspect it has nothing to do with Paul's many words about grace or about the unity Christians need to show within the church. Rather, I'm sure it has something to do with sexuality, because I've heard from many over the years who thinks that Paul was repressed, who held to a too-limited viewpoint of what human sexuality ought to be. Thus Paul is definitely wrong, and deserves to be bashed.
It occurred to me today that many conservative Christians have spent much of their lives obsessed about sex. Many of the social forms this obsession has taken on include too much attention to how women dress, about whether or not men and women can work together or (in high-class forms) whether or not they can be even alone together at the same time if unmarried, about high-handedly putting a scarlett A on whomever breaks whatever taboos society has established, or even about regulating how often married couples can do the deed due to religious holy days.
Somewhere in my parents' lifetime, however, the question of 'who is most obsessed about sex' started to change ownership. Perhaps it began with an increasing acceptance of co-habitation or free love or whatever, but for many conservative Christians, sex has almost become a non-issue. This is wrong, because the Bible does speak of sex a lot...but the fervor for this issue has lost its steam. When Christians overwhelmingly vote for and support a man for President who is on his third marriage and has had legions of affairs through the years, you know that this battle is over...Bill Clinton's oral pleasuring in the Oval Office and the outrage is caused now seems quaint by comparison two decades later.
Today it's our liberal friends who are obsessed about sex. Whether it's a demand that all of us approve of (not just tolerate) gay marriage, or something as simple as hating Paul for calling fornication a 'sin', sex is now THE divine right for those on the left. The only prohibtions seem to be rape, incest, and pedophilia...everything else is fair game for two (or more) consenting adults (and teenagers) in the world of swiping on Tinder.
Not only are we told that must we accept any and every kind of sexual behavior, but also as a society we are told that we must accept that the consequences of that behavior are not at all related to the sex that seemed to have arrived with those troubles. Far too many children born out of wedlock? It's not sex's fault...it's not having access to birth control. Far too many STD's? It's not sex's fault...it's not having access to the right drugs. Far too many divorces and remarriages and broken families? It's not sex's fault...it's that we've tried confining people to the monotony of the family.
There will come a day when my liberal friends will need to have an honest look at where the free sex of the past 50 years has gotten us as a society. I'm convinced sex has been a very strong factor for why our society is plunging off a cliff in regards to everything wrong with it. More sex is not the answer.
I've never asked him why, unfortunately...but I would suspect it has nothing to do with Paul's many words about grace or about the unity Christians need to show within the church. Rather, I'm sure it has something to do with sexuality, because I've heard from many over the years who thinks that Paul was repressed, who held to a too-limited viewpoint of what human sexuality ought to be. Thus Paul is definitely wrong, and deserves to be bashed.
It occurred to me today that many conservative Christians have spent much of their lives obsessed about sex. Many of the social forms this obsession has taken on include too much attention to how women dress, about whether or not men and women can work together or (in high-class forms) whether or not they can be even alone together at the same time if unmarried, about high-handedly putting a scarlett A on whomever breaks whatever taboos society has established, or even about regulating how often married couples can do the deed due to religious holy days.
Somewhere in my parents' lifetime, however, the question of 'who is most obsessed about sex' started to change ownership. Perhaps it began with an increasing acceptance of co-habitation or free love or whatever, but for many conservative Christians, sex has almost become a non-issue. This is wrong, because the Bible does speak of sex a lot...but the fervor for this issue has lost its steam. When Christians overwhelmingly vote for and support a man for President who is on his third marriage and has had legions of affairs through the years, you know that this battle is over...Bill Clinton's oral pleasuring in the Oval Office and the outrage is caused now seems quaint by comparison two decades later.
Today it's our liberal friends who are obsessed about sex. Whether it's a demand that all of us approve of (not just tolerate) gay marriage, or something as simple as hating Paul for calling fornication a 'sin', sex is now THE divine right for those on the left. The only prohibtions seem to be rape, incest, and pedophilia...everything else is fair game for two (or more) consenting adults (and teenagers) in the world of swiping on Tinder.
Not only are we told that must we accept any and every kind of sexual behavior, but also as a society we are told that we must accept that the consequences of that behavior are not at all related to the sex that seemed to have arrived with those troubles. Far too many children born out of wedlock? It's not sex's fault...it's not having access to birth control. Far too many STD's? It's not sex's fault...it's not having access to the right drugs. Far too many divorces and remarriages and broken families? It's not sex's fault...it's that we've tried confining people to the monotony of the family.
There will come a day when my liberal friends will need to have an honest look at where the free sex of the past 50 years has gotten us as a society. I'm convinced sex has been a very strong factor for why our society is plunging off a cliff in regards to everything wrong with it. More sex is not the answer.
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