Bizarre Claims from the Death Cult

Over at Camestros Felapton's site, he writes about a claim being made by the death cult which American Christianity has developed into -- that there is more evidence for the resurrection of Christ than there is for the assassination of Julius Caesar. 

It's obviously not true, and CF explains why, so I'm not going to spend words on that.

Instead, I want to talk about two things. First, Christians are supposed to be taking the existence and the resurrection of Christ on faith. The faith in the impossible thing -- the definition of a miracle -- is the entire point. They believe this story not because they have evidence, but because they don't. You don't need faith to believe in the existence of hats, for example, or that the cat is on the mat. If I point at the cat on the mat and say to you, That cat is there, and you believe the cat is there, that's not religion. That's just living in an evidence-based world.

So why are they are so desperate to find evidence that their religion is factual? It's like that part in the John where Thomas needs to stick his fingers into Christ's wounds before he'll believe Christ is real. The text is pretty clear that we're not supposed to respect Thomas because of that.

The second thing relates to their attitude toward trans people. I've seen more than one soi-disant Christian claim trans people are evil for trying make them "believe" in trans people, or in pronouns. In fact, no one care what any specific person believes. We care about everyone being equal under the law, and we care about our country not making certain groups into second-class citizens. Hate the 'woke' all you want, but stopping trying to pass laws that make it illegal for people to exist in public, or get medical care, or live their lives. 

Who is it that is trying to force all of us to believe something which is not, in fact, supported by evidence? 

I am fine with Christians holding to their frankly unsupportable belief system -- that the world is 6000 years old, that it's possible to rise from the dead, that after death we can go to an eternal paradise, but only if we believe in this one specific sort of Christianity. That God cares what pronouns people use, or whether we perform our gender the way Karen in Indiana thinks we should. That God wants us to beat our children. That God says women have to submit to men. That Jesus loves America more than any other country. That America is the best country in the world.

I am not fine with those Christians trying to force everyone else to act as if those beliefs are fact. They're not facts. They're a story certain people believe because it makes them feel better. That's fine. I'm all for people doing what makes them happy. I'm not fine with (Christian) people trying to force everyone else to do what makes Karen in Indiana happy.

Why do they need to try to force us to admit that their religion is the truth? I asked a Christian that once, and he admitted that if his kids saw people who weren't Christians living their lives and being happy, it might make his kids wonder whether their religion was, in fact, the truth.

That's what it is. They don't have faith. They have a story they desperately want to believe, and they need all of us to believe it too, or else maybe they might start to wonder if their weird death-cult religion is  true. 

In their desperate quest to make the world around them believe what they (pretend to) believe, they are destroying democracy, our public schools, our universities, and the planet. 

(Not all Christians, in case I need to say that. I have known six or seven people who actually do the things Christ said in his sermon on the mount. But mostly our American Christians today live more like Romans: pretend to believe what we believe, lick our boots and say we're right, or we'll happily nail your ass to a cross, destroy your country, and steal everything you care about, including your children, your rights, and your liberty.)

Weather Report

We're having a two-day long thunderstorm here. Since it has barely rained since July, I'm pleased, but my poor dog is terrified of thunder. Currently I have him on the drugs the vet gave me. We'll see if they work.

After the storm, actual cold weather arrives! Lows in the 30s and highs in the 60s. I am very pleased about that.

New Microwave

We bought a Panasonic, 900w. So far I'm very happy with it, though it has a child-lock function that takes a little getting used to. 

(Basically, when the microwave dings, you can't open it until you hit the child-lock button. Useful for those with small children, I guess, but annoying for me.)

What I'm Watching Now

I hardly watch TV anymore because most of it is boring, though I did like Murderbot, and Ted Lasso, and The Pitt.

And recently I started watching Shameless, the US version, which is about an impoverished family of six kids raising themselves -- their father is an addict and their mother is bipolar and mostly absent. The show has eleven seasons, all available on Netflix.

I'm intrigued by this show because it gives a (mostly) realistic picture of poverty in America, at least in northern cities. The six kids have all been in and out of foster care; the oldest daughter , Fiona, has been taking care of her siblings since she was six. She's pretty smart, as is the oldest boy, Lip; but she had to quit school at sixteen when her mother abandoned the family. 

One reason I like this show is that most of the main characters are intelligent. They're in poverty not because they're stupid and lazy, but because their parents are broken and no real social safety net exists to help them out of poverty. All the things we're told to do if we want to escape poverty -- work hard, stay in school, live frugally -- don't work in their lives.

The oldest son, Lip, is crazy smart -- smart enough to win a scholarship to MIT. But because his family needs his help so often and so desperately, it is difficult for him to maintain the necessary GPA, or to get to classes. And Fiona works a series of low-paying jobs, unable to get better work because she has no high school degree and because her youngest sibling, a baby when the series starts, needs someone to take care of him. Then, when she finally gets a job that pays a living wage and has benefits, she loses it after the youngest child (a toddler) ingests cocaine left lying around during a party. 

Everyone in this show and in the neighborhood smokes, drinks, and does various drugs. This is also realistic. As James McMurtry puts it in "Fire Line Road," when you're that far down, you're just going to get high. "It's like eating or breathing to the rest of us."

When the second son, Ian, enlists in the military, hoping to escape poverty, his mental illness (he's bipolar, like his mother) sabotages that escape route.

The second daughter attempts to inveigle her way into a stable family by getting pregnant by one of their sons -- who promptly flees. The third son gets caught transporting heroin. And so on.

The only "success" any of them ever see comes from dealing drugs, running scams, or stealing. 

It's not that there isn't violence in this show. There is violence. There is also drug use, and bigotry, and crime. But there is also a community of equally impoverished people who help one another -- it's made clear, for example, that our main characters know everyone in the neighborhood, and turn to them for help, while helping them as well. It's not big help, mind you. No one is paying their electric bill. But if you need someone to watch your two year old for the morning, one of the neighbors can do it. And if you're briefly homeless, someone will let you sleep on their porch, or in their living room.

The show also makes it clear why foster care doesn't work, and why putting young offenders in jail is a terrible idea. Carl comes out of juvie as a much more successful criminal than he was when he went it, and he brings home a kid who aged out of juvie and has no family or community to return to, and no skills that will get him a job.

I'm only in Season 5, so maybe things improve eventually? But I am dubious. This is the poverty class about a quarter of our country lives in. If anything, the show is a little too optimistic, in that usually some solution shows up -- when the oldest daughter goes to prison for child endangerment, she's released after on a few days, because of overcrowding. When the alcoholic father's liver is failing, a donor liver comes through. And so on.

I also like the attitude the show has toward racism, LGBTQ people, and immigrants. This also is realistic -- the characters aren't all bigots, for example. The community is made up of various races and religions, as well as gay and trans people, and while people make racist and anti-gay jokes, it's clear these are just jokes. One of the characters, Mickey, comes out as gay early on, and the guys at the local bar give him shit, but also -- clearly -- accept him.  And when Ian, the second son and Mickey's lover, comes out to his brother Lip and to Fiona, they pretty much shrug and accept it. 

This arc, between Ian and Mickey, is a good one. Mickey's father is racist, and is a bigot. The show shows us clearly what that looks like, and how horrific it is. 

I understand trans characters show up in later season. So far, we've only had a trans girl, who is about ten, and who some characters do not accept as trans. That's disturbing, but also realistic. "You're not a girl," one character tells her. "You're a boy whose mother raised you as a girl because she's crazy." Other characters, though, are fine with it, and treat the girl as a girl.

The chaotic and precarious existence of those living on the edge of homelessness is really well portrayed, though. You see why the characters smoke and drink and do drugs. You see why they can't climb out of the trap that is structural poverty. Each of the characters tries and tries again to escape through all the means we are told is an escape from poverty -- education, the military, marrying into wealth, own and running your own business -- and each time the chaos of their world slaps them back into poverty. The best job Ian can find, after the military, is dancing at a club called the Fairy Tale, where young gay men give lap dances to rich old men. It's clearly objectification and destructive to the young men, but it pays well enough to keep the family going for a winter.

There is one point where Lip, the kid at MIT, understand that if he is to climb out of poverty through this excellent degree from an excellent university, he will have to abandon his family, his neighborhood, and all the ties he has there. He will have to move into a different culture, with a new ethos. He will have to become someone else.

But that family and that neighborhood have always been the central good in his life, the one thing he and his culture have.  As Mickey puts it at one point, "He's family. Family comes first." 

Lip can turn his back on that, clearly. He can adopt a new ethos. Where does that leave him, though? Who does he become is he does that? He doesn't have the generational wealth that his fellow students have, or the culture that wealth created for them.  He may be able to get a degree from MIT, with all the job prospects that degree will give him, but he will have no family and no culture of his own. 

There is a lot of drug use, a lot of sex, a lot of violence, so much chaos. If you can't handle cussing and nudity, this one is not for you. But it's holding my attention.

Being Retired Is Great Except

The one thing I miss about being a professor is teaching grammar. I loved teaching grammar.

(Thoughts this morning while I was making my coffee, which I used to do in my office while I prepped for class.)

No Surveillance State here

I gotta say it's great living in a blue city, even if we are in Arkansas.

Our city council banned using city money to buy Flock cameras.

The systems can be prone to error or abused, according to multiple national news outlets. The information the systems collect can lead to wrongful detainment or even serve as a tool for criminal behavior, such as stalking.

I know this is only common sense, not some woke marvel, but it's nice have a city that does things that make sense, and make life better for its population.

How Cheap is the Average American Voter?

Trump is sending every American over 65 $90 this month. We just got ours.

I mean, $90, that's enough to buy the vote of your average 66 year old American, huh?

(Sarcasm, obviously. Or I guess, sarcasm, I hope?)

New Recipe up at Cooking with delagar

I'm posting this for the kid, who wants my honey cake recipe.

Lunch at the Bloom Cheese Collective Again

 This is our new favorite place to eat.

Here is my favorite -- ham, cheese, and fig jam. It's delicious.

Bliss

It was 58 degrees when I went to the dog park this morning. I had to wear a jacket.

Maybe tomorrow I will wear long pants.

What I'm Listening To Now

Larry McMurtry, Lonesome Dove

This is better to listen to than to read. (I read it when it was first published, back in the 1990s.) A really slow start which is easier to put up with when you're listening while cooking or driving or waiting to fall asleep, which is when I listen to audiobooks. There are some great scenes, but honestly this doesn't really have a plot. Instead of "the queen died and then the king died of grief," it's "the queen died and then the king died and then the prince fought a bear and then..." 

The overall spine of the book is Call and Gus drive a cattle herd from Texas to Montana in about 1870, I'd say. Maybe a little earlier. The Civil War has been over for some time and the railroads aren't around yet.  Since we had railroads in the West at around 1869, this doesn't really add up. I guess it's once-upon-a-time time? Anyway.

There's also a scene with a woman giving birth that gets some details wrong. I know McMurtry had at least one kid, since James McMurtry is his son. Maybe he just wasn't paying attention?

I don't really like the ending, but overall I did enjoy listening to this one.

I tried to listen to the sequel -- Streets of Laredo -- and do not recommend.

Connie Willis, Bellwether

This is light science fiction with a romance subplot. This research institute employs researchers, while behaving more like a corporation than a research institute. The young researcher is researching fads. Another young researcher is researching chaos theory. An annoying 20 year old office assistant annoys them both. It's good to listen to while falling asleep if you know the entire plot (as I do) and so it doesn't matter if you sleep through bits of it.

Natasha Pulley,  The Salt King

I loved Pulley, and this was as much fun to listen to as it was to read. (I read it for a review in Asimov's.)

A young Jesuit-in-training is sent to investigate a possible miracle in a strange land that is in England but its own sovereign nation. Demons, angels, miracles and wonders, along with some great characters. Listening to it, you get the different dialects, which I love a lot. There's a m/m romance at the center, and a f/m one at the edges. Very much G-rated romances, as is usual with Pulley.

Also, lots of snow. I love books with snow in them.

Rainbow in Arkansas

This was the late evening sky last night:

The rainbow was pretty extreme, though it doesn't show up as well in the photo.

Microwave

I need to buy a microwave. Our present one is dead. We bought it when we moved in here, which means it's less than two years old. Ugh.

So I priced some new microwaves and holy hell. Didn't microwaves used to cost like $50? Now the cheapest I'm finding are over $100.

There are also ones that cost more than $500, but since they too will probably break in under two years, I really don't want to spend that much.

Anyone have any reccs? What microwave do you suggest?

Vaccinations Achieved

Yesterday Dr. Skull and I got our COVID-19 booster, our flu shots, and our pneumonia shots. I also got the Tdap and he got the shingles vax. (I hadn't had a tetanus shot in awhile, and I am out in the woods all the time with the dog.)

Today I feel a little achy near the site, but that's all so far.

 

Weather Report

It's going to rain here for the next week. 

Since I found a way to walk the dog in the rain*, I'm looking forward to this. Also, cooler weather on the other side: highs in the 70s, lows in the 50s. Yes, please.

*I wear a hat with a brim, which keeps my glasses dry. Everything else gets wet, but I have three pairs of shoes now, which I rotate. I cannot take him for walks if it is thundering, but luckily thunderstorms here generally only last an hour or two.