I fought the law professor and the law professor won

Just over three hours ago, I blogged that I was busy busy busy with essay writing and don’t have time to blog at the moment and threw a music clip at you — anything to keep the non-existent hounds at bay.

But then something happened. I was reading stuff on the internets (I WAS HAVING A COFFEE BREAK FROM ESSAY WRITING GET OFF MY BACK OKAY). It seems one of the latest tricks that the political Christian Right are doing is denying they know what dominionism is. I first learnt of dominionism a few years ago when I read the excellent book by Michelle Goldberg, Kingdom Coming: The Rise of Christian Nationalism. In the first several pages of her book, Goldberg paints a very chilling portrait of the dominionist movement. Here’s a sample:

The United States has always been a pious country, given to bursts of spiritual fervor, but Christian nationalism is qualitatively different from earlier religious revivals. Like America’s past Great Awakenings, the Christian nationalist movement claims that the Bible is absolutely and literally true. But it goes much further, extrapolating a total political program from that truth, and yoking that program to a political party. It is a conflation of scripture and politics that sees America’s triumphs as confirmation of the truth of the Christian religion, and America’s struggles as part of a cosmic contest between God and the devil. It claims supernatural sanction for its campaign of national renewal and speaks rapturously about vanquishing the millions of Americans who would stand in its way.

The motivating dream of the movement is the restoration of an imagined Christian nation. With a revisionist history that claims the founders never intended to create a secular country and that separation of church and state is a lie fostered by conniving leftists, Christian nationalism rejects the idea of government religious neutrality. The movement argues that the absence of religion in public is itself a religion — the malign faith of secular humanism — that must, in the interest of fairness, be balanced with equal deference to the Bible.

. . . [T]he ultimate goal of Christian nationalist leaders isn’t fairness. It’s dominion.

I was chilled right through all 234 pages of that book.

Anyway, on my coffee break, I was reading this post on Right Wing Watch in which the author notes that “it seems as if the entire Religious Right movement has developed collective amnesia when it comes to the concept of dominionism, claiming never to have heard of it and to have no idea what it means.”

He also notes that Matt Barber, the Associate Dean for Career and Professional Development and Adjunct Assistant Professor of Law at Liberty University, asked in a tweet:

Can someone tell me what a “dominionist” is? Best I can tell it’s some kinda scary Christian monster that lives under liberals’ beds #silly

Right Wing Watch go on to point out that Barber’s employer sponsored conferences dedicated to the spread of dominionism and also highlights prominent Christian Right figures talking about the need for dominionism.

Meanwhile, at this juncture I was spluttering inwardly, agog at the fundies’ blatant denials (and not for the first time this past week), and burning with indignation that they could be so fucking ingeniously full of shit!

Then I thought, it’s not even ingenious, they’re just fucking full of shit! And I decided to fire off an email to Matt Barber (I was still on my coffee break, shut up). I asked him if he really thought it was a liberal fiction and was he aware that his own employer believed in dominionism? I appealed to him to be open-minded, you know, ’cause he’s a law professor and all, that’s what professors should be: open-minded, right? And I included the link to the Right Wing Watch post and hit send.

Then I went to make another coffee, since I was still on my coffee break (yes, really), and when I came back 10 minutes later, I saw that I had a reply from Barber! OMG OMG OMG HE’S REPLIED ALREADY! With a heavy heart, I told my barely commenced essay that it just had to wait a little bit longer before I could give it my love and devotion, and opened Barber’s email.

I will be out of the office returning Monday, August 29 and will have limited access to email. If the matter is urgent, please contact my asst. Kelsey LeBel at klebel@liberty.edu or call my mobile phone at [555 1234].

YOU BASTARD! How fucking convenient for you! How fucking inconvenient for me! Now I have no more excuses to procrastinate from doing my essay!

All that glitters IS gold!

H/T

“If you want to make a little money, write a book. If you want to make a lot of money, create a religion.”

A church spokeswoman, Virginia Stewart, said the [Scientology] church ”shares none of the characteristics of a cult”.

– Scientology says ‘cult’ tag defames the church, Sydney Morning Herald, 10 July 2011

~~~~

A cult is a group or a movement that, to a significant degree, (a) exhibits great or excessive devotion or dedication to some idea or thing, (b) uses a thought reform program to persuade, control and socialize members (i.e. to integrate them into the group’s unique pattern of relationships, beliefs, values and practices), (c) systematically induces states of psychological dependency in members, (d) exploits members to advance the leadership’s goals, and (e) causes psychological harm to members, their families and the community.

– Michael Langone (1993) Recovery from Cults

~~~~

Hubbard believed that Scientology was being infiltrated by saboteurs and spies and introduced “security checking” to identify those he termed “potential trouble sources” and “suppressive persons”. Members of the Church of Scientology were interrogated with the aid of E-meters and were asked questions such as “Have you ever practiced homosexuality?” and “Have you ever had unkind thoughts about L. Ron Hubbard?” For a time, Scientologists were even interrogated about crimes committed in past lives: “Have you ever destroyed a culture?” “Did you come to Earth for evil purposes?” “Have you ever zapped anyone?”

….

In 1958, the U.S. Internal Revenue Service withdrew the Washington, D.C. Church of Scientology’s tax exemption after it found that Hubbard and his family were profiting unreasonably from Scientology’s ostensibly non-profit income. The Food and Drug Administration took action against Scientology’s medical claims, seizing thousands of pills being marketed as “radiation cures” as well as publications and E-meters. The Church of Scientology was required to label them as being “ineffective in the diagnosis or treatment of disease.”

….

“Ethics Technology” was introduced to tighten internal discipline within Scientology. It required Scientologists to “disconnect” from any organization or individual— including family members— deemed to be disruptive or “suppressive”. Scientologists were also required to write “Knowledge Reports” on each other, reporting transgressions or misapplications of Scientology methods. Hubbard promulgated a long list of punishable “Misdemeanors,” “Crimes” and “High Crimes”. The “Fair Game” policy was introduced, which was applicable to anyone deemed an “enemy” of Scientology: “May be deprived of property or injured by any means by any Scientologist without any discipline of the Scientologist. May be tricked, sued or lied to or destroyed.”

….

As Scientology faced increasingly negative media attention, the GO [Guardian's Office, created in 1966] retaliated with hundreds of writs for libel and slander; it issued more than forty on a single day. Hubbard ordered his staff to find “lurid, blood sex crime actual evidence [sic] on [Scientology's] attackers.”

….

According to [Danish historian of religions Mikael] Rothstein’s assessment of Hubbard’s legacy, Scientology consciously aims to transfer the charismatic authority of Hubbard to institutionalize his authority over the organization, even after his death. Hubbard is presented as a virtually superhuman religious ideal just as Scientology itself is presented as the most important development in human history. As Rothstein puts it, “reverence for Scientology’s scripture is reverence for Hubbard, the man who in the Scientological perspective single-handedly brought salvation to all human beings.” David G. Bromley of the University of Virginia comments that the real Hubbard has been transformed into a “prophetic persona”, “LRH”, which acts as the basis for his prophetic authority within Scientology and transcends his biographical history.

….

In the late 1970s two men began to assemble a very different picture of Hubbard’s life. Michael Linn Shannon, a resident of Portland, Oregon, became interested in Hubbard’s life story after an encounter with a Scientology recruiter. Over the next four years he collected previously undisclosed records and documents. He intended to write an exposé of Hubbard and sent a copy of his findings and key records to a number of contacts but was unable to find a publisher.

Shannon’s findings were acquired by Gerry Armstrong, a Scientologist who had been appointed Hubbard’s official archivist.He had been given the job of assembling documents relating to Hubbard’s life for the purpose of helping Omar V. Garrison, a non-Scientologist who had written two books sympathetic to Scientology, to write an official biography. However, the documents that he uncovered convinced both Armstrong and Garrison that Hubbard had systematically misrepresented his life. Garrison refused to write a “puff piece” and declared that he would not “repeat all the falsehoods they [the Church of Scientology] had perpetuated over the years.” He wrote a “warts and all” biography while Armstrong quit Scientology, taking five boxes of papers with him. The Church of Scientology and Mary Sue Hubbard sued for the return of the documents while settling out of court with Garrison, requiring him to turn over the nearly completed manuscript of the biography.In October 1984 Judge Paul G. Breckenridge ruled in Armstrong’s favor, saying:

The evidence portrays a man who has been virtually a pathological liar when it comes to his history, background and achievements. The writings and documents in evidence additionally reflect his egoism, greed, avarice, lust for power, and vindictiveness and aggressiveness against persons perceived by him to be disloyal or hostile. At the same time it appears that he is charismatic and highly capable of motivating, organizing, controlling, manipulating and inspiring his adherents. He has been referred to during the trial as a “genius”, a “revered person”, a man who was “viewed by his followers in awe”. Obviously, he is and has been a very complex person and that complexity is further reflected in his alter ego, the Church of Scientology.

[source]

~~~~

Make up your own mind. And be sensible about it.

– Me, 2011.

Politics! Religion! Twitter! Things you shouldn’t talk about.

• After watching the second Republican Presidential Candidates debate last week, I think we can definitely rule out Newt Gingrich, Tom Pawlenty (after rather high expectations, he turned out to be a hesitant mess), Herman Cain, Ron Paul, and Rick Buttsex Santorum. Mitt Romney was assured and, dare I say it, Presidential looking — because appearance and looks are almost everything when it comes to the Presidency (although I can’t really explain Richard Nixon). But then he goes and ruins it… The surprise, for me at least, was Michele Bachmann: she didn’t sound the conspiracy-driven crackpot that she usually is… but days later, she’s returned to her old self and all is right in the world again.
• I’ve been staying up late (well, later than usual) in recent weeks. I started watching Big Love from the first season and am currently into the fourth season. I realise now that initially I was unconsciously prepared to dislike the Henrickson family for their Independent Mormon fundamentalists beliefs (or, to put a better way, not their beliefs but for being so foolish to believe such things), which includes the belief of plural marriage (polygamy). I found it reprehensible; now I find it incomprehensible but intriguing and I’ve been a little addicted to reading about personal experiences, like this one. Still don’t think it’s the best lifestyle, like open relationships — but that’s just me. Nevertheless, I could totally dig the idea of polyandry. Oh yeah.
• After quitting Twitter (yes, again) over a month ago, I feel FREE! It’s good to get away from the pettiness, the gossiping, the backstabbing, the lies, and the general bullshit that gets filtered through. People are weird: warm and friendly one minute, cold and aloof the next, and you’re left wondering what the fuck happened, what did you do/didn’t do, say/didn’t say. Of particular distaste is finding out that people were bitching about you – even though they don’t know you, never met you, let alone spoken to you. It’s a strange thing that happened to not just me, but others as well. Like I said, people are weird.

On a different tangent, I know some tweeps would argue that Twitter is a great source of comfort for battling loneliness and depression. I don’t disagree, I found sharing common life stressors with others made me feel less alone (although I always prefer actual human contact, face to face communication). That’s good.

But on the other hand, over and over and over, I would see people getting too attached to the online identities; pre-existing depression and anxiety would increase because of an imagined slight because tone and context is lost in 140 characters. People who flirt with others and were told to cease flirting felt rejected and despondent. And don’t get me started when love affairs go sour… Oh, there were so many scenarios, and I admit that on occasion I felt anxious, that whole “Oh my god, I went too far and now they don’t like me because they’re not replying to me!” or “Was that passive-aggressive tweet about me?” My point is, I often thought quietly to myself, “There are some people who shouldn’t be on Twitter… they’re not coping with it well.” It is a concern and I’d be interested to hear what others have to say.

But those aren’t the reasons I quit Twitter. It was simply because I was getting bored and also noticing my attention and concentration spans had gone to shit. A few years ago, Nicholas Carr, referring to Google in particular but which could be applied to Twitter,  wrote:

I’m not thinking the way I used to think. I can feel it most strongly when I’m reading. Immersing myself in a book or a lengthy article used to be easy. My mind would get caught up in the narrative or the turns of the argument, and I’d spend hours strolling through long stretches of prose. That’s rarely the case anymore. Now my concentration often starts to drift after two or three pages. I get fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do. I feel as if I’m always dragging my wayward brain back to the text. The deep reading that used to come naturally has become a struggle.

Bingo. That was exactly what I was experiencing. When studying, I couldn’t concentrate for any longer than 10 minutes before I wanted to “see what was happening on Twitter”. Facebook never bothered me the same way (and someone asked me why. I don’t know why, it just never did). Twitter, I realised, had become an addiction of sorts. I would try shutting down the tab and moving myself to another room, but that was difficult as much of my study is online. When I was on Twitter, I’d be chasing links: listening to YouTube clips that people tweeted, reading links that they posted (even when it wasn’t really a topic I had any particular interest in), following particular hashtag conversations, following other general conversations, and so on.

As Carr notes, this is a widespread phenomenon; many others are experiencing or have experienced this alteration in mental habits. The realisation that I needed to completely quit — since I was incapable of simply shutting down TweetDeck or the tab in which Twitter was open — was the night before an essay was due. Instead, I spent 3 hours following the Marrickville Council debate over the Israeli boycott controversy.

THREE FUCKING HOURS! AND I HAD AN ESSAY DUE THE NEXT DAY! As it was, after the council voted to drop the boycott, the last thing I felt like doing, unsurprisingly, was my essay. I went to bed instead, feeling pissed off and beginning to think it was time to call it a day on Twitter.

So I did.

And that’s why I quit Twitter.

But wait, there’s more.

After I deleted my Twitter account, breaking the automatic response to “see what was happening” was strange and somewhat difficult, but gradually I realised I was starting to read articles and journals for research better — in the sense that I was concentrating easier and without distraction. Even deep thinking about my essays improved, instead of half-arsed thoughts and ideas that I then had to flesh out. Best of all, I’m reading books again. I’ve missed reading the most and it’s been wonderful to sit and read without a wandering mind for a couple of hours at a time.

Meanwhile, Professor David Chalmers, director of the Centre for Consciousness at the Australian National University, recently argued that Google was “actually making us smarter” and “turning us into superheroes of the mind”. I don’t disagree that the internet in general has improved our knowledge. I’ve learnt a lot of things online — but I still wonder how much trivia that I’ve read that I’ve retained. Things come at such speed, have I had the time to absorb that knowledge before I move onto the next piece of information or trivia? Still open to debate (with myself). How about you?

On a final note about Twitter: when I started contacting a few people who I wanted to keep in touch with about my intention to quit and explained briefly why, I was surprised at how often they understood, for they also found they were struggling with the same issue of concentration and attention, to various extents. All along I thought it was just me, thinking I didn’t have enough willpower or focus or some such to concentrate on my studies when required.

• This post took a week to write. What was that about improved concentration and attention spans?

Returning with a wang

Hello.

Same blog, same author. Different URL and different blog name, which is a quote from Mark Twain, by the way. I’ve always liked the quote and when it comes to thinking of new names for various things, such as titles, my mind goes blank. So, I resort lines from songs or quotes I’ve heard. It’s a copout but there’s a song and a quote for everything. Really.

So, why reopen this blog? Because I said I’d come back. I thought I’d come back with a completely new blog, but after spending far too much time trying to find a theme that satisfied me, I decided I like this one, then I further discovered you can change the name and URL. And here we are.

I wanted to write a little bit about yet another homophobic, fire and brimstone Christian pastor getting caught with his wang out, to add to this list, but I’ve wasted too much time now and need to study. Nevertheless:

The Rev. Grant Storms, the Christian fundamentalist known for his bullhorn protests of the Southern Decadence festival in the French Quarter, was arrested on a charge of masturbating at a Metairie park Friday afternoon. Storms, 53, of 2304 Green Acres Road in Metairie, was taken into custody at Lafreniere Park after two women reported seeing him masturbating in the driver’s seat of his van, which was parked near the carousel and playground, a Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office report said.

The first woman told deputies she was taking her children to the playground and parked next to the van at about noon. As she was walking around her own vehicle, she noticed the van windows were down and the occupant was “looking at the playground area that contained children playing, with his zipper down…,” the report said. The woman noted that he was masturbating and quickly ushered her children out of her car. She told a second woman, who walked to the van and also spotted the man masturbating, the report said. The second witness told deputies that the driver saw her and tried to conceal the zipper area of his pants with his hand.
–

Storms told deputies he was having lunch at the park when he decided to urinate using a bottle instead of the restroom, the report said.

–

A self-styled “Christian patriot,” Storms led a small West Bank congregation called The Reformer Church and for 10 years hosted “The Reformer Radio Show” on WSHO. Storms has railed against the Roman Catholic church, calling it “satanic” and “demonic.”

He is especially known for arming followers with bullhorns, Bibles and picket signs to protest Southern Decadence, the three-day gay festival held in the French Quarter during Labor Day weekend. Storms grabbed national attention in 2003 with his failed attempts to shut down what Southern Decadence organizer Chuck Robinson called a peaceful festival that celebrates gay and alternative lifestyles.

[source]

Later on, Storms said in a news conference that he was not watching the children even though he had his hand in his pants. He also stated that he is seeking help for a problem with pornography.

Uh huh. Repugnant.

The obsession that the Christian Right have with gay and lesbian rights, and sexual activity in general, and the numbers of subsequent “indiscretions” made by them, is just astounding.

 

Things I Wonder About Homophobes

Reverend Eddie Long. Senior pastor of New Birth Missionary Baptist Church. Referred to homosexuality as a “dog-like sin”. Equated homosexuality with rotting in Hell. Rallied against gay marriage. Said that women who used “marital devices” should be put to death. Currently facing several lawsuits and accusations of making sexual advances towards younger male followers.

George Alan Rekers. American psychologist and ordained Southern Baptist minister. Former officer and scientific advisor of the National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH), an organisation offering conversion therapy intended to change homosexuals into heterosexuals. Testified in court on the destructive and sinful nature of homosexuality, and the unsuitability of gay and lesbian people for parenthood. Asserted that homosexuality is a “gender disturbance” that can be corrected through 18 to 22 months of weekly therapy during childhood and adolescence. Resigned from the board of NARTH shortly after the Miami New Times reported that a man Rekers had hired as a travel assistant was a “20-year-old male prostitute with long blond hair, a swimmer’s build, and an uncircumcised penis”, for hire from a website called Rentboy.com. (Do read.)

Ken Mehlman. Republican. Manager of President George W. Bush’s re-election campaign and chairman of the Republican National Committee which in 2004 proposed a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. Admitted to being gay a couple of months ago.

Roy Ashburn. State Senator (Calif.). Republican. Voted against every gay rights measure in the State Senate since taking office. Arrested on suspicion of DUI earlier this year. Sources said he was leaving a Sacramento gay nightclub with an unidentified male passenger. Subsequently admitted he was gay.

Larry Craig. Senator. Republican. Pleaded guilty disorderly conduct in a Minneapolis airport men’s room in 2007, after having been arrested on a charge of homosexual lewd conduct.

Ted Haggard. Founder and former former pastor of the New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Founder of the Association of Life-Giving Churches. Leader of the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE) from 2003 until 2006. Under Haggard’s leadership, the NAE released “For the Health of the Nation: An Evangelical Call to Civic Responsibility” in late 2004, stating that “homosexual activity, like adulterous relationships, is clearly condemned in the Scriptures.” Seen in Jesus Camp as saying, “we don’t have to debate about what we should think about homosexual activity. It’s written in the Bible.” Resigned from all of his leadership positions in 2006 after he admitted to homosexual infidelity and methamphetamine use. Entered three weeks of intensive counselling, overseen by four ministers. Declared in 2009 that he is now a “heterosexual with issues”. In 2010, claimed that his feelings of sexual attraction to other men have disappeared.

Mark Foley. Congressman. Republican. Was one of the foremost opponents of child pornography. Resigned when accused of sending sexually explicit emails to underage male congressional pages in 2006. Newsweek magazine later cited Foley’s voting record on LGBT-rights an example of a gay politician whose policies were “anti-gay”.

Ed Schrock. Congressman. Republican. Aggressively fought against gay rights programs. Dropped out of his third term race after he was discovered soliciting sex from a male prostitute. Finally admitted that he himself was gay in 2004.

Richard Curtis. Washington State Representative. Republican. Voted against several gay rights proposals until blackmailed and outed by a male prostitute. Resigned soon after in 2007.

The Reverend Dr. Lonnie Latham. Served as senior pastor of South Tulsa Baptist Church. Held a position on the executive committee of the Southern Baptist Convention, the largest Protestant denomination in the United States, known for being virulently homophobic and actively involved in partisan politics to stop marriage equality. Latham was also outspoken opponent of rights for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. Resigned after being arrested for lewdness; propositioned a plainclothes police officer for oral sex in an area which had been the subject of public complaints of cruising related to male prostitution.

James E. West. Washington Mayor of Spokane. Republican. Voted against several gay rights proposals. Faced with charges of past child molestation and being discovered on a gay website, West was recalled from his position and resigned in 2005.

John Paulk. Converted to Christianity after a working as a male escort and a drag queen named Candy during college. Allegedly overcame his homosexual desires through a combination of counselling, groups, prayer, and Bible reading. Became manager of Focus on the Family’s Homosexuality and Gender Division. Chairman of the board of Exodus International North America from 1995 to 2000. In 2000, both organisations removed him from those leadership positions after being spotted and photographed at a gay bar, flirting with men for more than an hour. Initially denied these allegations saying he only stopped to use the restroom and did not know it was a gay bar.

~~~

And what of Fred Phelps? Minister and leader of the hate group Westboro Baptist Church. Most familiar and common slogan: “God Hates Fags”.

(Michael Moore wonders too.)

[I could've provided links for most of the above info but couldn't be arsed; most of it can be found on Wikipedia and Google if you really must be anal...]

Black hole is irony deficient

Sometimes you read something about conservatives and you are flabbergasted at their ability to be so self-unaware. Irony black holes.

Case in point:

This summer, Jennifer Keeton made news when she sued Augusta State University after the school threatened to expel her from its Counselor Education Program if she could not comply with the American Counseling Association’s Code of Ethics, which prohibits counselors from discriminating based on a number of factors, including gender identity and sexual orientation. Keeton claimed that this was a violation of her religious freedom to oppose gays and so, with the help of the Alliance Defense Fund*, she sued the university.

So, Keeton refuses to comply with a code of ethics because of her homophobia, and made erroneous statements that homosexuality and gender identity are “lifestyle choices”, clearly rendering her unable to be a potentially fit and proper counsellor, not to mention non-judgemental and open-minded as sensibly required. We’ve all heard the stories of horrifying psychological damage done to people struggling with their sexual identity from their religious leaders, families, friends, even doctors. A counsellor with Keeton’s mentality should not be in such a position to inflict prejudice where there should be non-judgemental guidance and counselling.

And don’t get me started on the Alliance Defense Fund, “dedicated to preserving and reclaiming religious freedom. …accomplished through strategic coordination with other like-minded organizations; training Christian attorneys and the future leaders of America; funding key, precedent-setting cases across America; and, when necessary, direct litigation through our in-house team of Christ-centered attorneys.” (My emphasis.)

Need I say more? We remember how Karl Rove and his team harnessed the Christian vote for Dubya. And just because common sense prevailed and Americans voted in Barack Obama (sigh!), don’t think that the Christian Right still aren’t mobilising their “armies” (as this excellent 2006 book demonstrates as well as explains their, huh, philosophy).

Anyway, anyway, I’m digressing. Back to Keeton and the ADF taking on Augusta State University. Now the Ku Klux Klan want to hold a rally in support of Keeton and her action against the University. The imperial wizard knighthawk (chortle) and grand dragon (chortle) of South Carolina and North Carolina reckons they’re “trying to protest the constitutional rights that they are trying to take away from her.”

Um, yeah, OK. Except they’re not doing that, they’re trying to protect vulnerable people from getting damaging counselling help.

But what amuses me is the ADF released a statement on behalf of themselves and Keeton, saying, inter alia:

Jennifer and ADF are disgusted by the KKK and all it stands for… To say more than that or to discuss their activities at length risks bringing more attention to a failed organization that is seeking to exploit news stories for its own purposes… Neither Jennifer nor ADF wish to give the KKK the attention it craves.

The lesson here, kids, is this: racist organisations are very bad. But bigoted Religious Right ideology on homosexuality is OK!

One wrong and one right don’t make … No, hang on, that’s not right. One right and … No … But … They make a good excuse! Or something.

* I especially love the ADF’s title of their post about Keeton’s situation: ” Augusta State Univ. to counseling student: change your beliefs or get out”. Another irony black hole. How tolerant are the Religious Right towards different beliefs? Not much!

Merry meet and blessed be

Much ado has been made about Christine O’Donnell, the Republican Party’s nominee for Delaware’s Senate election in November this year, staunch Tea Party supporter, and Sarah Palin wannabe, in recent weeks. She’s drawn attention and mockery for her anti-masturbation stance, as well as being anti-everything else: abortion, premarital sex, stem-cells, gay marriage, and so on. You know, the typical conversative hate of anything akin to individual freedom and individual choice. But oh! the irony:

She opposes socialism because she believes in the individual. In her view, you should be free to live your own life, unencumbered by others. Except when it comes to touching your genitals…

Although, to be fair, the Slate article I just quoted goes on to mention that anti-masturbation is in the Catechism of the Catholic Church; O’Donnell was raised as a lax Catholic but identifies as an Evangelical Christian these days. The cynic in me suggests she’ll be whatever is most convenient and has the most religious influence in modern American politics.

In more recent days, other claims of O’Donnell “dabbling in witchcraft” have surfaced:

Talk show host Bill Maher revealed last night on his HBO show, “Real Time”, last night that Christine O’Donnell had reportedly “dabbled in witchcraft”. O’Donnell… has appeared on Maher’s show a reported 22 times. Maher played the video clip from his Politically Incorrect show in 1999 where O’Donnell describes a date she had where there was a satanic altar with blood on it. She went on to say in the clip that they “went to a movie and then had a little picnic on a satanic altar.”

Personally, I couldn’t care less what she “dabbled in” in her younger days; many of us have dabbled in something that no longer has any importance or relevance in our lives today. It’s part of growing up and evolving as individuals. I get that this is news, per se, because of O’Donnell’s current religious, conservative stances today — but I’ve seen around the place bloggers and commentators calling her a “hypocrite” for this history of hers.

Disagree. She’d be a hypocrite if she was still dabbling in witchcraft today while proclaiming to be an Evangelical Christian and anti-witchcraft. That’s hypocrisy. Something that she was briefly involved in as a young person and since has not been involved in does not make her a hypocrite.

What does make her a hypocrite, however, is decrying about socialism and calling for more individual freedom… while concurrently disrespecting an individual’s personal matters.

As for O’Donnell’s claims of witchcraft and Satanism, well, that’s all a figment of hyperactive Christian imagination and fairytale anyway:

Witchcraft is a word often used by those in the Christian faith to describe pagan religions, including Wicca. Wiccans most often identify themselves with the term, “witch”. Paganism, like Christianity, includes many diverse belief systems but the one thing it does not include is Satanism. Satan exists only in Christianity and, therefore, Satanists are believers of the Christian faith. One of the basic tenets of Wicca is to respect others and the environment. They do not worship evil beings nor even believe in them.

Won’t somebody think of the children!

I’m sure many of you have heard of the furore caused by some rabid rightwingers in the USA protesting about President Obama’s speech to school children to be broadcast to schools across the country. One of the most insane comments that I’ve read comes from Mathew D. Staver, Founder of Liberty Counsel and Dean of Liberty University School of Law, who said:

Obama has pushed his political agenda to the extreme by forcing himself on America’s children. Obama’s political agenda on healthcare and his expansive vision for government is being rejected by the American people. Now Obama is after our children, who, like some socialist members of Congress, have not read the healthcare bill. Americans do not appreciate the President’s attempt to use our children as political pawns in his game of chess. Mr. President, you must abide by the rule of law and stop this illegal activity. Our children do not belong to you.

Liberty University is a fundamentalist Baptist university located in Lynchburg, Virginia, and was founded by Jerry Falwell who was a bit of a dickhead, to put it mildly.

Media Matters summarised:

Numerous conservative media figures have baselessly accused President Obama of trying to “indoctrinate” America’s children with his planned back-to-school speech encouraging students to succeed and persist in their studies. Sean Hannity claimed that “it seems very close to indoctrination,” while Fox News commentator Monica Crowley said “just when you think this administration can’t get any more surreal and Orwellian, here they come to indoctrinate our kids”; similarly, Michelle Malkin claimed that “the left has always used kids in public schools as guinea pigs and as junior lobbyists for their social liberal agenda.”

I mean, seriously! How… what… but… !!!

So when President Obama finally got around to making his speech today, I had to watch it. Then I read it. And I’m still looking for the indoctrinating statements, the socialist ideals, the surrealism and Orwellian comments and the liberal agenda.

For all the hysterical and childish panic among conservatives, it was not a controversial speech. There was no hidden agenda, liberal or otherwise. The President emphasised that students should take responsibility for their education and future, and that “if you quit on school – you’re not just quitting on yourself, you’re quitting on your country” — a rather patriotic statement which conservatives usually love.

Of course, that won’t stop the moronic conservatives from trying to find baseless criticism of the President’s speech, but this is just a great example of the pathetic fear-mongering that rightwingers have been reduced to — and deservedly so.

You can watch the video of the President’s speech here.

As for “indoctrination”, do read this. So disgusting.