The quote in title, an unintentionally honest comment from a pious young woman, will continue to ring in my ears for decades to come. Scripture describes the word of God being “sharper than any two-edged sword,” but her romantic rejection came more like a hammer blow to my Mennonite worldview where spiritual was supposed to outweigh physical gain. I had patterned my life, up to that point, around a sort of practicality over flash and suddenly realized what I thought was an asset was actually liability.
I was reminded of these words again as my wife’s glowing approval of the monstrosity in my driveway, a Ford Explorer ST, still feels out of place for me. I mean, granted, I was not keen on transitioning to family life with a pedestrian option like a minivan or boring SUV. But I didn’t expect my always frugal—cost conscious—female counterpart to go along with it 100%. She was supposed to pump the brakes and did not. I’ve realized, in this, that every woman is happy with the nice things and won’t say no if you provide it for them. We’ve both agreed to blame the baby for our reckless financial decision.
So, back to Milton, a place I’ve since moved on from and to the higher cost town across the river. Up until the words from the mouth of this wholesome girl, I had thought having a little house completely paid off would be worth something—even attractive. After all she claimed to be interested in missionary service and what better place to get a start, right? From what I had believed, there are needs anywhere there are people and where better to start than a deteriorating industrial town? Milton is an example of the rust belt, a place of declining opportunities and costs of outsourcing production.
The phrase “you’re thirty years old living in Milton” was simply accurate conveyance of her underlying priorities. There’s always the difference between what we say we are and the actual truth. Even in the secular culture there’s a romanticization of the love of two impoverished people who stand together in desperate circumstances. And those raised in an environment where Christian mission is supposed to be first, living as one poor as a church mouse amongst common people would seem the ideal.
But it is not. No, this young woman, like the one who had rejected me for not pursuing a title of “missionary” or “pastor” years prior, was clearly after status. They will not say it outright, probably are not even aware, but it is a kind of glamour they seek in service. A call to some exotic location to impress their religious peers. Sure, a Bentley may not be status in a conservative Anabaptist church, but the ability to jet around the world (often on someone else’s dime) is thrilling where it is considered sacrifice. It is currency, a way to gain status in a community of faith or be seen as righteous.
Resources are showered on the ministry or mission. Sure, it comes with stress, my 9-5 does as well, but the payoff is proportional. And not talking about “treasures in heaven” or God’s favor. A pastor has access to the community resources. It is social power as much as it is a position of responsibility and there are always those who want to curry a little favor. Again, it also comes with more scrutiny as well, but most tend to minimize the costs when they set off in a particular direction. Besides that, for the Mennonite woman, this is for the broad shoulders of her husband to bear, right?
The high expectations of my wife have been a little surprising to me. To her credit, she has been putting up with a partly finished remodel of old house since marrying and moving in. But yet, despite coming from the Philippines, her standards are now close to that of an American woman. We comment about our son’s demands for what the other kids have, but often fail the test ourselves. I mean, is it at all coincidence that I decide to finally pull the trigger on a new vehicle after a Mennonite workmate showed up with his new truck? Probably not.
And that’s the bottom line here. We are all after power in different forms. Be it money, be it land, access to resources or just status in our peer group. What I’ve found is that a religiously trained (or ‘spiritual’) person is no different. No, all they do is give a righteous cover to their personal ambition. They live in a delusion. Materialism is bad, they will say, but they are fine with your donation of money so they can buy a bigger missionary compound in Southeast Asia. And, under the fluff of my own pursuit of love was the same sexual motivation of all men.
I hated when a physiatrist summarized my obsession with the impossibility as being a “sexual attraction” and dismissed it initially as a woman who knew nothing of my heart as a man of God. But now I realized this is undoubtedly the correct assessment. Men want sexually attractive women and women want high status men. This is an essential part of our nature—a matter of survival for our genes—a young healthy woman is able to bear children and a wealthy or connected man can give them much more than a thirty year old living in Milton.
I’ve moved on from Milton, but cannot move on from the reality I have encountered head on, we’re sexual creatures living in material reality and can’t escape this by denial. I had been better to learn this decades ago rather than cling to a naive notion of love where it ends like a storybook. But I am now living the best life available to me and hope that my wife is happy with her decision. She’s won my heart asking for the “simple and happy life” and now I want to give her that and everything else wonderful this world offers. The best thing we gained was the child born almost a year ago now…
It’s never too late to live the life you should, even if you were denied love for being thirty years old and living in Milton.
A month or two ago a family member sent me a video of Steven Crowder going on the attack against an Orthodox Christian nun in Palestine. Mother Agapia Stephanopoulos was hosted by Tucker Carlson and talked to him about the violence against indigenous Christians in the occupied West Bank. And very soon after this interview, Crowder, who supposedly represents conservative values, went on the offensive claiming to “debunk” a faithful woman who has dedicated her life to what is remaining of Christian legacy in the Holy Lands.
Crowder, an Evangeli-con social media grifter, being so totally vicious about this woman’s physical appearance in his opening salvo made me wonder about his motives. What is it to him that she was sharing her experience? So I followed the money and found the reason. Crowder has a few notable sponsors, one of them called “Express VPN” and if you dig a little deeper this originates from a developer that goes by Kape Technologies.
Who owns that?
A guy named Teddy Sagi—an Israeli billionaire with an unscrupulous record.
So one has to wonder, is the sponsorship about selling the service or is it a way to buy influence? A bit of both, perhaps?
Temu Charlie Kirk
Either way, Crowder is getting paid to represent a certain perspective and likely got a memo: “We need you to do a hit job on that Orthodox nun, this is your list of talking points about her from our guys in intelligence. We will talk more about our ad budget for next year if you can get 100k clicks.” That’s my own crude caricature, but we know that Sagi is getting something in return for his investment and a VPN makes a nice front company to pay for propaganda. They also make a nice way to access your personal data—a specialty of Israeli-sourced ‘security’ software.
Here’s a brief overview by Grok:
Kape Technologies, a UK-based cybersecurity conglomerate specializing in privacy tools like VPNs, was originally founded in 2011 as Crossrider, a company notorious for developing ad injection software that was frequently bundled with malware, enabling intrusive tracking and data harvesting on users’ devices—a practice that continued plaguing the web as late as 2019. Rebranded to Kape in 2018 amid efforts to pivot toward “ethical” digital security, it aggressively acquired major VPN providers to dominate the market: CyberGhost in 2017 for $10.4 million, Private Internet Access (PIA) in 2019 for $95 million, ZenMate, and notably ExpressVPN in 2021 for $936 million, now controlling about 40% of the top VPN services alongside affiliate review sites that suspiciously rank its own products highest. The company is fully owned by Unikmind Holdings, a shell entity controlled by Israeli billionaire Teddy Sagi—a convicted fraudster from a 1990s insider trading scandal, Playtech gambling software founder, and major donor to the Israeli Defense Forces—who bought out remaining shares in 2024, privatizing Kape and reducing transparency by delisting it from the London Stock Exchange, followed by layoffs of around 180 employees (12% of staff) in early 2025 amid whispers of restructuring. This history raises serious potential risks for users seeking true privacy: from backdoors or data-sharing compelled by Israeli intelligence ties (Sagi and co-founder Koby Menachemi hail from elite Unit 8200 spy unit, echoing Pegasus spyware scandals), to conflicts of interest where “privacy” tools could flip to surveillance, especially given Kape’s opaque operations and the irony of a former malware peddler now gatekeeping global internet anonymity.
Things are not what they appear. Look up Pegasus and Paragon. If it says security it is probably about backdoor access to your personal information. But, of course, you’re supposed to be afraid of Chinese ownership of TikTok. Anyhow, as the expression goes—every accusation is a confession. If they say it is about your security it is really only about their ability to maintain control over the flow of information and to manufacture consent for their policies. The fox is now guarding the henhouse.
Weaponization of Social Media
After the assassination of Charlie Kirk there has been a full-court press to ‘weaponize’ social media on behalf of Israel. This isn’t my choice of words. This comes from the mouth of one foreign leader who is always allowed unusual access to US politics and that is Benjamin Netanyahu:
Social media is the most important weapon Israel has at its disposal. […] Now, if we can get those two things [TikTok under U.S. control and X access], we can get a lot, and I can go on about other things, but that’s not the point right now.
Oh, so remember that bipartisan campaign to ban TikTok, supposedly over the concern that the Chinese wanted to spy on our kids, which started right after Israel started their bombing of Gaza and killing of journalists? Well, the real reason for this should now be clear: Hasbara doesn’t work when those not already brainwashed and indoctrinated can see the truth in a thousand images. TikTok bypassed the censorship regime.
And let’s not pretend we do not know what that is. After Covid we all know how there was enormous pressure put on our social media platforms to protect the government narrative. Mark Zuckerberg recently went on Joe Rogan to tell how Facebook was forced to suppress truth, under the Biden administration, he likened the fact-check process to being “something out of 1984.” If you recall, people got banned for saying the virus may have originated in lab in China—when now this is being accepted a plausible theory of the origin.
The same people who would scoff at “China virus” being racist are okay “free Palestine” being labeled as anti-Semetic.
So when TikTok was forced into selling and has hired Erica Mindel, a former IDF soldier, to run their new “Public Policy Manager for Hate Speech” position—do you think she will be there as a neutral arbiter and ban the use of the word “terrorist” describe the children in Gaza? Not a chance. No, it is her job to censor information behalf of the site’s new owners, including the Zionist Trump-backer billionaire Larry Ellison, and their aim being anything on the platform that could hurt the Gaza real estate deal or can be interpreted as pro-Palestinian.
The War Against Free Speech
Why this full-court press? The US is Israel’s most vital resource and is exploited to the tune of billions annually in direct aid. And that’s just the start. Wars in Iraq and Syria, which did not benefit average Americans in any way shape or form, cost us trillions and that is not to mention the young men killed or broken for life—like those two rampaging Marine veterans over the weekend.
With their once reliable Boomer vein dying off and younger generations seeing through their propaganda. The Zionists, to fully tap into our human and industrial resources, must first strip away the resistance. This is not left to chance. No, they buy support of influencers. The dangle incentives in front of young rising stars online, bring them on a trip to Israel and the then will sponsor their content through shell companies. Once you are hooked on their money they own you, all you need to do is sprinkle in a little of their propaganda and the checks keep coming—and if you deviate too far from script?
US influencers partying it up, on a paid trip to Israel, while Palestinians die
Well, Charlie Kirk was doing a lot of talking about this before his untimely death:
I have less ability… to criticize the Israeli government than actual Israelis do. And that’s really, really weird. I’m terrified of stepping on a minefield here, trying to please both my owners [donors] and my audience.
(Charlie Kirk, The Megyn Kelly Show, Episode 832, August 6, 2025)
Yes, Kirk had been a stalwart Zionist, just as many in the Evangeli-con fundamentalist camp are, but recently had begun to openly express his doubts, questioning the October 7th narrative and suggesting that there was a stand down order given that had allowed to happen, and he even started to platform conservatives who see Gaza as a genocide or don’t want our tax dollars used to bomb babies. Kirk was loudly opposed to Trump getting involved in Netanyahu’s war against Iran. And was called on the carpet—by his billionaire owners—for his defiant show of independence.
The Unforgivable Disloyalty
Trump and Kirk have the same billionaires bankrolling them. Miriam Adelson, born in Mandatory Palestine and widow of casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, gave the Trump campaign $100 million dollars. This might be why he is backing up her Maccabee Task Force (MTF) in his crackdown on speech on college campuses. Her MTF doesn’t just counter the criticism of Israel—it obliterates it, slandering pro-Palestinian students and faculty as “Hamas supporters” or as being “Jew haters.” It is basically cancel culture on steroids.
A billionaire’s club.
With $100 million in lobbying muscle, MTF deploys doxxing campaigns, and pressures universities to discipline activists, pushes “(re)educational” programs that whitewash Israel’s actions. At Columbia U, Adelson’s MTF helped fuel Trump’s calls to deport student protesters like Mahmoud Khalil. This is not advocacy. No, it us a speech cartel, ensuring that no Gaza encampment or divestment call will threaten the billions funneled to Israel’s war machine. Adelson’s checks don’t just buy Trump’s loyalty—they buy campus silence, turning campuses into censored zones where dissent is punished and truth is the enemy.
Trump marketed MAGA to those weary of war, proclaiming America First as his motto—absolute opposition to foreign aid and DEI favoritism. But, like the scene from George Orwell’s Animal Farm, when the ruling pigs change the egalitarian commandment “All animals are equal” (adding to it “but some animals are more equal than others.”) we’ve found there is always one exception to this and that is on behalf of those who paid for his campaign. With President Trump it is America First—Israel Firster.
Trump’s betrayal goes beyond this directed attack on free speech. It’s also about family gain. Enter Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and Middle East “peace” envoy, who had brokered the Abraham Accords, not as a genuine diplomatic win, but as a sweetheart real estate deal for his own firm. Kushner’s Affinity Partners hedge fund scooped up $2 billion from the Saudi sovereign wealth fund mere months after leaving the White House—blood money that was funneled through UAE backchannels, with zero U.S. oversight. And let’s not forget his now infamous Gaza proposal: turning the rubble-strewn devastated Strip into a “waterfront property” paradise for wealthy Gulf investors, complete with luxury condos atop the mass graves. It’s not policy; it’s a flip: Kushner as the fixer—turning Palestinian suffering into billionaire beachfront.
And none of this is good for the American people who are already footing the bill for the demolition of Gaza.
Property of Israel—Till Death?
Once one truly understands the extent of the influence of this foreign lobby, and how much it has cost us in terms of cash, lives and reputation in the world, there is never a return to politics as usual. Trump has not ended cancel culture, foreign aid, forever war or drained the swamp. No, AIPAC and a slew of billionaires tied to Israel are calling the shots, along with Netanyahu, and—while they plan the next big war on behalf of a few elites and Israel—the shelves are bare for wounded warriors of the last one.
Charlie Kirk, like his friend Candice Owens, like Tucker Carlson, and Elon Musk, seemed to have increasing awareness of this sordid reality—where we got the same policies no matter who we voted for. Unfortunately he was never given the chance to put together everything that is laid out above. Whether he was killed by a crazed trans leftist or the same big money that made Turning Point a political force on a national level we’ll likely never know, but we do know that he wasn’t just some paid shill reading off a script.
Apparently the desperate Zionist regime is now paying American influencers $7000 for every post the make to help hide the crimes of Gaza. And the deeper you dig the more disturbing it gets. They fear-monger about TikTok somehow being a platform for CCP spying and then hand it over to the control of a foreign country with one scandal after another involving surveillance of unwitting users of their software. This is affront to MAGA and the American values that those on the right-wing claimed to defend during the Covid shutdowns—we must not let the powerful monopolize the conversation.
This is free speech and should not be punished.
The war on free speech—whether through Crowder’s bought-and-paid-for smears, Adelson’s campus crackdowns, or TikTok’s censorship under Ellison’s ex-IDF enforcers—is a desperate bid to shield a grotesque truth: Trump and Kushner’s betrayal of MAGA’s anti-war ethos for a Gaza land grab, funded by Adelson’s millions and Saudi blood money, turns Palestinian suffering into profit. But Gen Z’s unfiltered posts and campus rebellions are cracking the Hasbara facade, exposing the bombs, the condos, and the lies. Reject their tech fronts, defy their censors, and amplify the raw truth—on social media, in the streets, everywhere. America’s soul isn’t for sale; reclaim our Constitutional birthright by speaking out, or let the billionaires’ war on dissent silence us all.
We cling to morality like it’s a lighthouse in the fog—steady, universal, guiding us home. But it’s a lie. It’s a battered flag, flapping in whatever wind our tribe’s blowing, stitched from the yarns we’re spun by family, faith, or flag. Raised Mennonite, I drank in peace and love for the outsider as if they were carved in my bones—until I saw they weren’t. Nature doesn’t whisper “thou shalt not kill”; it shrugs while we slit throats or swipe bread when the need hits. History’s littered with it: Biblical Israel butchered Canaanites—whole towns, babies dashed on rocks—‘cause God handed them the deed (Deuteronomy 7:1-2), and the faithful sang psalms over the ashes.
Fast-forward to 2025: Israel pounds Gaza, kids buried in rubble, and the justification’s “security”—Hamas tunnels, rockets, survival. Insiders nod; it’s moral, necessary. Morality’s no fixed star—it’s a mirror, reflecting who we’re with and what we want.Look around today, and it’s the same mess. Russia rolls tanks into Ukraine, March 2025 still grinding on, flattening Mariupol redux—schools, hospitals, grandmas in the crosshairs. Putin’s line: “denazification,” protecting Russian speakers, historical destiny. His people buy it, or enough do—state TV’s been marinating them in it for years. The West screams “war crimes!”—sanctions pile up, Zelensky’s a saint on X—but that’s the outsider’s perch. Kyiv’s got its own blood on the slate: shelling Donbas for a decade, shrugging at Russian-speaking dead. Both sides sanctify their kills; morality bends to the banner. Or take the U.S.: Trump loyalists storm Capitol Hill in ‘21, “stolen election!” on their lips, while Biden’s crew locks ‘em up, crowing “democracy!” Same act—violence for a cause—flips from treason to justice depending on the lens. It’s not universal; it’s us-versus-them, conditioned to the core.
Look around today, and it’s the same mess. Russia rolls tanks into Ukraine, March 2025 still grinding on, flattening Mariupol redux—schools, hospitals, grandmas in the crosshairs. Putin’s line: “denazification,” protecting Russian speakers, historical destiny. His people buy it, or enough do—state TV’s been marinating them in it for years. The West screams “war crimes!”—sanctions pile up, Zelensky’s a saint on X—but that’s the outsider’s perch. Kyiv’s got its own blood on the slate: shelling Donbas for a decade, shrugging at Russian-speaking dead. Both sides sanctify their kills; morality bends to the banner. Or take the U.S.: Trump loyalists storm Capitol Hill in ‘21, “stolen election!” on their lips, while Biden’s crew locks ‘em up, crowing “democracy!” Same act—violence for a cause—flips from treason to justice depending on the lens. It’s not universal; it’s us-versus-them, conditioned to the core.
Objections bubble up like clockwork. The optimists—call ‘em Pinker’s crowd (2011)—say genocide’s revulsion proves we’ve got a moral spine, empathy baked in from caveman days. Hunter-gatherers shared meat, Confucius preached kindness—see, we’re wired for good! But that’s a half-truth, and a flimsy one. Those old tribes cared for their own; strangers got the club. Same with today’s wars: Ukraine’s defenders weep for Bucha’s mass graves but gloss over their own artillery sins. Israel’s critics howl at Gaza’s death toll—over 40,000 by late 2024, per UN counts—yet Hamas rockets barely dent their outrage. Why? Fundamental attribution error: outsiders slap “evil” on the doer—Russia’s a monster, Israel’s a bully—while ignoring the stew they’re boiling in: encirclement fears, decades of tit-for-tat bombs. Insiders don’t see villainy; they see survival, righteousness, their conditioning kicking in. Evolution’s no saint—it’ll cheer cooperation or carnage, whichever keeps the clan breathing.
Objections bubble up like clockwork. The optimists—call ‘em Pinker’s crowd (2011)—say genocide’s revulsion proves we’ve got a moral spine, empathy baked in from caveman days. Hunter-gatherers shared meat, Confucius preached kindness—see, we’re wired for good! But that’s a half-truth, and a flimsy one. Those old tribes cared for their own; strangers got the club. Same with today’s wars: Ukraine’s defenders weep for Bucha’s mass graves but gloss over their own artillery sins. Israel’s critics howl at Gaza’s death toll—over 40,000 by late 2024, per UN counts—yet Hamas rockets barely dent their outrage. Why? Fundamental attribution error: outsiders slap “evil” on the doer—Russia’s a monster, Israel’s a bully—while ignoring the stew they’re boiling in: encirclement fears, decades of tit-for-tat bombs. Insiders don’t see villainy; they see survival, righteousness, their conditioning kicking in. Evolution’s no saint—it’ll cheer cooperation or carnage, whichever keeps the clan breathing.
Zoom out, and the pattern’s stark. Morality’s a tool, not a truth—always has been. Libertarians’ll shoot to guard their patch, Marxists’ll guillotine for the proletariat, U.S. elites’ll drone-strike weddings to keep oil flowing—all cloaked in principle, all serving their pack. Russia’s “special operation” is Ukraine’s genocide; Israel’s “self-defense” is Palestine’s ethnic cleansing. The outsider’s gasp—those viral X posts of Kyiv’s ruins or Rafah’s craters—ain’t proof of a moral bedrock; it’s just a rival script, misreading situation as sin. We’re not debating ethics to polish some eternal gem; we’re wrestling over whose story rules. Take the Houthi strikes in Yemen, 2025 heating up: U.S. bombs “terrorists,” Saudis cheer, while aid workers tally starved kids—same act, split morals. Conditioning calls the shots.
The rebuttal’s got one last kick: if morality’s so fluid, why bother refining it? They say it’s progress, not just haggling—reason taming our beastly side. But that’s wishful polish on a cracked hull. Ukraine’s Zelensky begs for NATO jets, Israel’s Netanyahu quotes scripture for settlers, Trumpers and progressives sling “fascist” like mud—reason’s just a megaphone for the tribe. Authenticity’s the only anchor: own the bias, ditch the sanctimonious dance. Russia’s generals don’t lose sleep over Bucha; Israel’s brass don’t flinch at Gaza’s toll—they’ve got their why, and it’s enough. Outsiders clutch pearls—#WarCrimes trending—because they’re not in the fight. Morality’s a fluid mess, shifting with the players, not a lighthouse. Stop pretending it’s more.
Stepping back from the fray—whether it’s Putin’s moves in Ukraine or Hamas’s salvos from Gaza—offers an authenticity that sidesteps the knee-jerk noise and stares down our own fundamental attribution error. Take Putin: some tag him as a ruthless tyrant, others see a strategist pushing back—NATO’s ring of bases and war games from Poland to the Baltics isn’t exactly a welcome mat, but Russia’s leveling cities isn’t a handshake either. Hamas gets the same split: outsiders call them terrorists, yet in Gaza—two million penned in, scrappy and stubborn—they’re fighting a chokehold, though rockets don’t win halos. My Mennonite roots nudge me to judge NATO’s chest-thumping ‘values’ or Hamas’s bloodshed, but I’ve got my own baggage—my folks kept the world at arm’s length too, just with hymns, not guns. Seeing that, owning how my lens twists the view, points a pragmatic way forward: not crowning heroes or villains, but cutting through the sanctimony—NATO’s not spotless, Gazans aren’t pawns, and I’m no referee, just a guy sorting his own slant in the mess.
I’ve frequently been appalled and dismayed by the things I see coming from my former religious peers. It is very well-meaning, but so horribly misguided. And recently I saw a post like that, and imagined an incredulous Jesus: “You are Israel’s teacher, and do you not understand these things?”
*sigh*
What I’m talking about is the intellectuals of the conservative Mennonite cloister, those who teach the Gospel of Niceness and side with Judas and Social Justice who confuse Jesus with a political figure who is seeking to install a Marxist regime. They ride on the leftist bandwagon, believing it makes them countercultural—when they’re simply going along with the powerful elites of our time. Hypocritical elites who have mandates for us and exceptions for themselves.
The offending post was one of such glaring false equivalency that I can hardly fathom a thinking person would come up with it. The misleading commentary is that Elon Musk resharing a meme in support of his efforts to remove waste, fraud, and abuse from the government is the same as Hillary Clinton applying a nasty label to those who dared to vote against her. This is the statement:
Clinton called millions of ordinary Americans a “basket of deplorables.”
Musk called millions of ordinary Americans “the Parasite Class.”
When Jesus saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. (Matthew 9:36)
First of all, the first part is true, Clinton did indeed call ordinary Americans a “basket of deplorables” saying that half of those who were voting against her were “racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic.” It is to say that over thirty-one million people who got tired of the glib “We came, we saw, he died” imperial-lib establishment that she represents are just horrible people.
Not only is she punching down, attacking a bunch of ordinary people for voting against her, but the reason she is demonizing then is to terrify vulnerable people. It is a cynical divide and conquer strategy, purely for sake of securing political power for herself, and part of a campaign to turn Trump’s simple effective “Make America Great Again” into something divisive and scary rather than an inclusive unifying message.
Elon Musk, by contrast, merely reshared a post. He did not say half of the Democrat party support is parasites. What he did say is “90% of America loves @DOGE.” In other words, he is speaking for the crowd rather than against it. Furthermore, the meme is not about legitimate social programs and those who benefit. Nobody in the Trump administration is calling for slashing the rightful entitlements of Social Security or Medicare and Medicaid.
Name calling! Accusing elites of exploitation! Jesus would never do that, right?
What DOGE has taken aim at is the totally ridiculous and absurd, obviously fraudulent use of public funds, which 90% of America (if properly informed) supports. The ‘crowd’ would be fully on Musk’s side if they weren’t being lied to or blinded by partisan bias. It is compassion for those truly “harassed and helpless” that is drives the effort to increase government efficiency—and the social elites who willfully take advantage of taxpayers should be called out.
To those doing apologetics for waste, fraud and abuse, who are pushing this dishonesty take and misrepresentation: I would find it so much more tolerable if it was a forthright endorsement of sending money for far-left causes. Just come out with it and say that you want money funnelled through USAID to pay for global promotion of transgenderism and pro-imperialist propaganda—you want this, be honest.
Compassion for the Brood of Vipers?
“You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to hell?” (Matthew 23:33 NIV)
Jesus had compassion for the crowds, but he spoke very condemningly of social elites who used their positions of influence to put heavy burdens on the shoulders of others—while not offering a finger to help.
Jesus pretty much describes the telescopic philanthropy, the virtue-signaling and pearl-clutching of modern social justice.
Jesus did not show compassion for these moralizing frauds.
Nice Jesus is upset about mean Tweets calling out social elites. Real Jesus was killed because he wouldn’t stop insulting the people who thought they were above the ‘deplorable’ unwashed crowds. Nice Jesus only would affirm and accepts everyone without ever requiring a change. Real Jesus once compelled a tax collector (and cheat) to give back his ill-gotten gains—he greeted the promise of restoration by pronouncing salvation had come to this house.
If Jesus walked the streets of Manhattan today he would be accused of being very meanspirited, labeled as hateful, and likely cancelled by the woke elites. They would whip up the crowd by taking things he said out of context, by calling him a homophobe, sexist or racist. After all, he used the word “dog” to describe a foreign woman. That is what the critics of Jesus did, he called them out and they false accused him. He would most certainly be diagnosed as being a cult leader and narcissist for his claims.
Not saying a pair of trolling billionaires are the same as Jesus. But they certainly do take after the character of that man who was overturning the tables of the money changers and chasing out of the temple. Lest we forget, the money changers were those who took advantage of the poor who were obligated to pay the tax. This money was supposed to go to the upkeep of the temple and yet teams of grifters, offering a service, were being parasites:
Jesus entered the temple courts and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. “It is written,” he said to them, “ ‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’ but you are making it ‘a den of robbers.’” (Matthew 21:12-13 NIV)
The Gospels contain differing accounts of this event, some scholars believe it may be about two separate times when Jesus went charging in on a little ‘insurrection’ rampage, but interestingly his explanation of authority to do this cleansing was later misconstrued and used at his trial.
Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?
The corporate media has taken fabricated tales and normal diplomacy with a foreign power—and they spun it into an incredible “Russian collusion” narrative. Trump talked about the “very fine people” on both sides of the Charlottesville statue controversy, and he took great pains to qualify his statement—by very specifically condemning the white nationalists and Nazis in the crowd. But it didn’t stop the media from running the story “Trump Calls Nazis ‘Fine People'” and Joe Biden, along with many other Democrat partisans, have continued to repeat this lie.
Where Trump, and MAGA, clearly delineate between legal and illegal immigration, their detractors muddy the waters. The left takes Trump’s desire to keep America safe from the flow of Fentanyl and of unvetted foreign nationals and twists it into xenophobia and a threat to legal immigration. It is deliberate deception. The far-left wants to keep brown and black people terrified that’s how they’ve always won—by fear-mongering the crowd, they deceive the sheep and, when that does not work, they will imprison or assassinate their opponents.
Remember ‘kindness is everything’ my leftist friends, right?
Evil doesn’t like to have a light shown on it and when you see all of the screeching in response to DOGE taking a look behind the walls of bureaucracy you do really start to wonder why. Why are they treating Musk as if he’s just some Nigerian scammer trying to get our information? Is it because he’s from Africa? It is totally ridiculous. Lawmakers circle the wagons and tell us we have no right to know how our money is spent! It’s time to drive out those who have used us to enrich themselves.
There is always a spy versus spy aspect to this where accusation is met with a recrimination. Both Jesus and those elites questioning his authority claimed that their counterpart was demon possessed or of the Devil. It would require some wisdom and discernment to know which of the two sides to believe. But the religious frauds of our day still side with the elites against the crowd. They defend the status quo and the corrupted established system. It is always the beneficiaries of fraud that fight against the reform.
As I ponder my responsibilities, bringing a daughter into this world, my patriarchal protection is a given.
The West has been so successful at privileging women that many women do not comprehend the risks of true equal treatment. Feminism is only possible as a part of the patriarchal duty that men feel to protect women. What it amounts to is using male power to enforce standards that are friendly to women, that allow them to walk freely in the street in all manner of dress (or undress), and ignore the reality of what has existed outside the walls of patriarchalism.
Even the idea that sexual assault is a bad thing is an extension of patriarchalism where natural desire must be restrained by structures created by men. A buck in the rut doesn’t ask permission. Hormones direct it’s behavior and only the bigger male can ward off the advances it will make on a doe. It is a hierarchy that is built only on strength. Moral conscience is built off the idea that there’s a big man up there who cares about property rights; who says that a body belongs to someone and is therefore not ours for the taking simply because we desire it.
Yes, eventually this evolved into an idea of everyone owning themselves that we now assume is simply the universal truth. However, nothing in the animal kingdom suggests this is the case. The real world is often a brutal and unforgiving place. When a new group of male lions takes over a pride they will kill the cubs of the previous males. And human morality developed in a very similar manner. This was the default, whether the Psalmist’s fantasy about bashing the heads of an enemy’s infants against rocks or the book of Deuteronomy giving some rules for the treatment of war brides:
When you go to war against your enemies and the Lord your God hands them over to you and you take some of them prisoner, and if you see a beautiful woman among the captives, desire her, and want to take her as your wife, you are to bring her into your house. She is to shave her head, trim her nails, remove the clothes she was wearing when she was taken prisoner, live in your house, and mourn for her father and mother a full month. After that, you may have sexual relations with her and be her husband, and she will be your wife. Then if you are not satisfied with her, you are to let her go where she wants, but you must not sell her or treat her as merchandise, because you have humiliated her.
Deuteronomy 21:10-14
To our modern ears, this is horrendous. There is no asking for permission. And, other than saying to wait a month, the men were free to rape their captive females. But the reality is that this was a radical step in the direction of protecting women from physical violation. One hopes that this delay would’ve ensured a more compassionate and gentle approach rather than some blood-soaked orgy during the heat of battle and immediately after her male relatives were slaughtered. As grotesque as this seems, it was better for her to belong to one man (with some rights after he rejects her) than to be passed around as a mere sex object in the manner of a Japanese comfort woman:
CLAVERIA: (Through interpreter) A Japanese soldier got his bayonet and started peeling my father’s skin while saying, tell us the truth – your child is part of the guerrillas with the owners of that empty house.
MCCARTHY: As Claveria pleaded to let her father go, a soldier wrenched her arm. Birdlike, petite, Claveria strokes a badly set bone as she picks up the story of how she followed her mother’s screams up the stairs.
CLAVERIA: (Through interpreter) I saw my mother lying down with her skirt up, and there was a Japanese soldier on top of her. I ran. My two youngest siblings took little sticks and started hitting the soldiers. The Japanese soldiers then snatched away the sticks and bayoneted both of them.
MCCARTHY: They died. Claveria believes her parents were killed when the village was torched. Japanese soldiers hauled away two older sisters to a garrison and took Claveria to an infirmary for her injured arm. She does not recall how long she was there recovering, but she remembers a soldier named Terasaki. One day, he told Claveria she smelled, but she refused to take a bath, saying she had no change of clothes. Ordering her to wash, she says he gave her a uniform to put on.
CLAVERIA: (Through interpreter) I was to be taken to the garrison where my two sisters were. Before we reached the garrison, he raped me. I thought that I was going to die because I was in so much pain.
MCCARTHY: Terasaki would be the first of many Japanese soldiers to sexually assault Claveria, who was not even a teenager at the time. She was 12. She said her sister Meteria had been driven half mad by the trauma she’d experienced at the garrison. Claveria was shocked when she caught sight of her there.
CLAVERIA: (Through interpreter) She was burned with cigarette butts and boiled sweet potatoes. When one soldier after the next raped her, she put up a fight, but my sister was not brave. She refused because she was in so much agony from all the abuse.
MCCARTHY: Claveria believes her other kidnapped sister was moved to a different garrison. She was never seen again. Historians have estimated that at least 200,000 women were forced into sexual servitude during World War II, mostly in areas occupied by Japan, prominently Korea. The women were euphemistically called comfort women, and the organized system of comfort stations to supply soldiers sexual gratification ran from Seoul to Singapore. Writer Evelina Galang has documented women captured in the Philippines.
EVELINA GALANG: And these are women as young as 16 years old – really, some of them 8, 10 years old. In the Philippines, historians estimate that there were probably about a thousand women and girls taken and put into military sex slave camps.
Men can be monsters. Worse than animals. And, in many parts of the world, immodest dress is taken to be a sign she wants it. Morality does not hold back the aggression of the rapist. No, rather it is the role of other men to restrain evil. Women are protected by their fathers, by their husbands, and by institutions that represent these men. Political structures were created by men and are defended by men. Yes, even if women were granted the right to participate. E.g. even if Kamala Harris takes the patriarchal role—she is still acting in a patriarchal manner and will need the strength of men to impose her will.
There will not be a feminist left in Europe if Islamists take over. That is not to bash Islam or say they would kill off all women who did not submit. No, it is to say that feminism cannot exist outside of the Christian West. The notion of individual rights, that people can independently make their own decisions, cannot exist only on paper or it is impotent. It requires men willing to sacrifice themselves to preserve this egalitarian ideal for their wives and children. Self-sacrificial love is not natural nor a priority in every religious patriarchal structure. Feminists cannot exist in Islam because only the respect of patriarchal institutions gives them power.
The alternative to the current patriarchy is not the absence of patriarchy, men (or those who act like men) will always rule, but the real choice is what manner of rule we wish to live under. It really is survival of the fittest outside of the walls of civilization. Chants of “down with the patriarchy” are about as meaningless as shaking your fist at the wind. It misunderstands the world. It assumes that nature will simply obey our voice because we’re angry and believe rights can exist outside of the structures that guaranteed them for us. It is only in the absence of rule by men who care about more than their own sexual gratification that the value of this benevolent form of patriarchy is known.
The other day I looked across the gym and saw a familiar grin.
Oh, Ydran decided to pump iron!
My son, still twelve years old, isn’t the most committed to strength training or conditioning and prefers to spend his time lounging at the pool. But with Junior High football being right around the corner he (completely of his own volition) was putting some work in. I gave a salute and then we both continued with our respective workouts.
However, what really impressed me was the weight he had on the bar. His bench is right around 100 lbs, for reps. And this brought me back to when I started lifting weights. I can recall doing the same weight, except in my Junior year of high school! And also how some of the football players would curl my bench weight, as in literally take what I had on the rack and use it to curl. But it was not totally embarrassing for me I only weighed 112 lbs as a Senior. It shows what a difference his genetics make. With a bit of work ethic, he’ll be an athletic freak—while I never was going to be great.
As for myself since school?
I’ve put on enough mass to make up for the sunken chest (which was a consequence of my traumatic birth) and am above average in terms of bench strength—even after being effectively reduced to zero twice due to my neck injury and having to rebuild. With my current body weight around 180 lbs, I have recently broken a personal record with six solid reps of 225 lbs. Which is more than most men will ever do and a result of discipline. I was determined to overcome my limitations.
Still, given where he is now, with a little bit of effort and a few more years, he will do more than what I’ve ever done. He’s just athletically gifted, has very good hand-eye coordination, and is already big and strong enough to give some serious competition. It is only a matter of time until I won’t have any advantage. Fair or not he will be better than me at everything he wants to do and probably with less overall struggle. So long as he will remain healthy he is destined to crush me in any competition.
There is no such thing as an even playing field in sports and competition. If we were all built the same, with the same opportunities or abilities, every contest would end in a tie—there couldn’t be winners or losers. But we do have differences in size, speed, endurance, and even in motivation and desire. Some had parents who pushed them, gave them more opportunities, and made sure they had the best nutrition and coaching, and that’s what gave them their edge.
So what is fair or not fair?
PIAA vs Aliquippa vs Southern Columbia
Pennsylvania has some hard-nosed smash-mouth high school football. In particular, the towns of the coal region have produced dominant players and programs. The Red Tornados, of Mount Carmel, is the storied winningest team in the state (6th in the nation) with a total of 899 wins. But, have taken a step back, it is their neighbors to the North that are setting records today, and that being the Tigers of Southern Columbia with six consecutive State Championships.
However, on the complete opposite side of the state, in a Pittsburgh suburb, they have another team with an incredible tradition of winning, the Aliquippa Quips.
Southern and Aliquippa started in the class A, small school category, they’ve battled in the State Championship game and online it is clear there is some bad blood on the side of the Quips, being humiliated 49-14 in the final back in 2015. But what has really been grinding their gears is that—as the result of new PIAA rules intended to help maintain a competitive balance—they’ve been bumped up multiple classifications (the Tigers only going up one) due to transfers and success in the post-season.
The same exact rules apply to both teams and yet have impacted the Quips more dramatically and this has led to cries of foul—and a big whataboutism.
Their player safety is the first reason they’ve argued. Despite Aliquippa having walloped an undefeated Selinsgrove Seals team, in the AAAA championship, earning them their latest bump in classification, and despite their having a roster with quite a bit of D1-destined talent for a typical small school—the Quips’ loyal fan base has been viciously accusing the PIAA organization of favoritism and their cross-state rivals of being a cheater for avoiding reclassification. But there is zero evidence for either charge. It seems that the reality, under all this bluster about player safety or fairness, is that they want to keep beating on a weaker field year after year.
They’ve taken it to court and have won their first appeal. But the PIAA is fighting against this decision with their own appeal and who knows where it will go. What I do know is it will likely be a matter of prejudice, not merit or metric, that decides the case.
Racial overtones hang over this, as well as the fact that this is East versus West, the Tigers with their rural population while the Quips come from an urban community. Southern Columbia sits in a cornfield, near the beautiful Knoebels amusement park and resort, representing a vibrant community of Elysburg and on the edge of the economically depressed coal region. While jobs and a better place to live is a big enough draw—there is very little doubt that a few parents do move into the school district only for the sake of their child’s athletic future. However, being on the edge of a big city like Pittsburgh is a massive advantage for Aliquippa.
There is talk now of a new “Southern Columbia rule” which effectively will target the Tigers specifically for their unprecedented success within the current regime. Is it sour grapes or retaliatory rules? Who knows. But both of these powerhouses insist that the work they put in is what makes the difference. It is true to an extent. The Tigers, under the tutelage of Jim Roth, went from basement dwelling to the point of nearly eliminating the football team to totally mauling their local schedule and stacking up trophies for decades—coaching with discipline got the ball rolling before it became a dynasty that creates its own weather.
But the sore losers do have a point, talent does gravitate towards Southern like bees to honey. One example is that outstanding quarterback prospect from my hometown who ended up there, with rumors swirling that his dad rented an apartment in Elysburg so he could play and that this kid (who ended up going to Alabama) was still spending most of his time away from Tiger territory. And yet, with the very high level of scrutiny the program has faced I am fairly certain all is done within the rules.
The point is that there is no perfect formula and thus never a fair competition. Yes, they all need to suit the same amount of players to play, scoring rules should apply equally to all teams, and officials should have no bias, but there are a myriad of factors that can’t be controlled or properly accounted for. No two communities in the state of Pennsylvania are exactly the same, some schools are advantaged in ways that others are not, so there will never be a perfect competitive balance.
My initial knee-jerk reaction was outrage. It was wrong that this woman would have to face this obviously masculine figure. And yet, when I started to dig, it turns out the “That’s a man!” reaction is a little bit of an oversimplification. Khelif has always identified as a woman. And that is because ‘she’ was assigned to the female category at birth. Why? Well, it’s because, no fault of anyone, they were born without the male organ. They are one of those very rare cases of being intersex. In other words, the ‘down there’ expression doesn’t match the chromosomal gender rule.
So the “Well Ackshully” mid-wits, armed with this little knowledge, proudly noting that Algeria (Muslim) is a conservative country, dunked on their dimwitted counterparts who saw what they saw. They’re right in that Khelif is officially female because of ‘her’ female genitals. But the weird part is how these same people who believe stuff like “misgendered” despite male anatomy suddenly can’t see the controversy when this competitor is also chromosomally a male and they’ve visibly benefitted from male hormones. The real question is whether or not it is fair they’re allowed to be in the female category so far as boxing is concerned, not if they had been described as female on a birth certificate.
A controversial Taiwanese ‘female’ competitor.
The reason that there are two categories—one for men and another for women—it is a clear advantage to being a male when it comes to high-level competition. Caitlin Clark, as phenomenal as she is against other women, wouldn’t make an NBA roster. That’s not at all sexist, it is just reality in the same way I won’t post up with LeBron James. And to deny this is on par with Flat-Earthism, they can say gender is a social construct (some of the expression is cultural), and yet there’s also overwhelming hard evidence that men have a distinct physical advantage, according to The Trans Athlete Debate “Dilemma”:
Even before puberty, when the differences effectuated by the influence of sex hormones sets in, from a purely genetic perspective, biological males are significantly advantaged.
Case in point, one study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine extensively researched peer-reviewed studies on the health-related fitness data of 85,000 Australian children aged 9-17. It found that when “compared with 9-year-old females, 9-year-old males were faster over short sprints (9.8%) and 1 mile (16.6%), could jump 9.5% further from a standing start (a test of explosive power), could complete 33% more push-ups in 30 seconds and had 13.8% stronger grip.”
Another study of Greek children, published in the European Journal of Sports Science compared 6-year-old females and 6-year-old. Researchers found that the “boys completed 16.6% more shuttle runs in a given time and could jump 9.7% further from a standing position. In terms of aerobic capacity, 6- to 7-year-old boys showed a higher absolute and relative (to body mass) VO2max than 6- to 7-year-old females”
If this weren’t the case, if women were equal to men, why not eliminate classification based on gender and let the best athletes of every country—male or female—compete for one gold medal in each event?
No, the reality is, if women had to compete with men, no woman would ever get to the Olympics—let alone stand on the podium.
It has little to do with work ethic or desire.
There is no point even having a separate female category if some with an XY chromosome and higher levels of testosterone are allowed in the competition. While athletic competition has roots in male versus male combat—I am not right-wing and want my daughter to have the opportunity to participate in sports. I believe there needs to be a return to rationality, fairness, and safe competition.
Khelif doesn’t belong in a ring against a normal woman any more than I do. Get real.
High-level Competition Is Not a Right
The progressive left has got all tied up in a knot over the idea that the difference between genders is a myth—merely a social construct.
It is a feminist fantasy that a woman is capable of everything a man can do and that the only reason women are not equally represented is because of injustice.
We hear complaints all of the time from female athletes who believe they deserve equal pay to men who a) produce far more revenue given they are the very best competitors and b) would no doubt humiliate any female challenger.
Note, for the purpose of this discussion, I’m talking only about athletic events, not about intellectual or other capabilities. The other differences in ability based on gender can be a topic for another day, women have distinct advantages and superior abilities in other areas. But my commentary here is strictly about physical strength, speed, and size—where men are gifted.
Also, my wife and I are equally valuable to each other and the family, she works as hard as I do (or harder) and both of us play important roles in our home and the local community, and yet this doesn’t change the fact I could physically dominate her—or that even her own twelve-year-old son is taller and heavier than she is.
Truly, if I completed in the female category of power-lifting I would have elite strength and a chance for gold—as a slightly above-average male weight-lifter.
If it is a right to be an elite athlete, and if all women deserve a special category so they can have a chance to be recognized, is it fair that short and unathletic men are not represented? Should we keep expanding professional leagues so that all can be champions? Or is the point of these kinds of events to have only the best reach the top for the entertainment of those of us who know that we don’t belong there?
Female athletes, instead of griping about unequal pay, should be grateful that they are privileged with a second-tier category that has given women an opportunity to compete.
No two people are equal. There is no such thing as a fair competition. But if there is a category for females, to accommodate their biological differences from men, then those with a clear competitive advantage because of male hormones or chromosomes should be excluded and how they identify or what is down there doesn’t matter. Sure, the right gets things wrong for not understanding that exceptions do exist, but the left does worse and fails to comprehend that women need protection from those who are physically bigger and stronger. The entire reason for separate categories for men and women is to protect women.
This is why we need to have criteria that go beyond the “identifies as a woman” leftist minimum. We need a standard that also considers the level of testosterone or chromosomal pairs. If those who have very rare intersex characteristics don’t have a huge advantage, then how did two of them beat the odds to end up in the Olympics? Why even have a women’s division at all? This is about fairness for all competitors, not about one individual. Our participation in a competition is a privilege, not a right, and can’t be granted to all or it becomes worthless. In the end, it is always a little arbitrary who is allowed or disallowed.
We all know a story about a little girl going to her grandma’s house and is confronted by a talking wolf who convinces her to go astray. But this written account is predated by tales with similar characters, and yet not exactly the same. In the end, no matter the version, we read it as being a fairytale and understand that it should not be taken as being a historically accurate record of an event. Why? Well, animals don’t talk and we were told it is an old fable.
I had to think of this while seeing so many fundamentalist friends share a false claim that Travis Kelce threatened to quit the Kansas City Chiefs if they did not cut the currently embattled franchise kicker. This part of the hysteria (both in response and in reaction to the response) over the conservative kicker’s commencement address that promotes traditional Catholicism. Normally it would be customary for these Protestant friends to bash those who believe in Jesus in the same manner as Harrison Butker. But, in politics, I guess the enemy of my enemy is my friend—suddenly those who give special honor to Mary are now acceptable?
The problem with this Kelce claim is that it is as fictional as Little Red Riding Hood and being spread as fact. I mean, I would think that credibility is important to Evangelicals, being that their mission in life is to convince others a man literally walked on water and then rose from the dead because they read about it in a book. But nope, they share the most urban legends of any demographic on my friends list. For those who say that they know the Truth, personally, this should be a huge embarrassment—except it never is.
Those who have no ability to detect fakes or frauds, who spread blatant lies, really aren’t in a place to preach their values.
As much as I support Butker’s freedom of speech and think the cancel culture outrage over his comments is ridiculous, I really do not find a home amongst those who accept any claim that confirms their ‘Biblical’ views on social media. All it takes is a satire site say that there has been evidence of the Red Sea crossing has been found or that a solar eclipse is passing over seven towns in the US named Nineveh and they will spread these blatant falsehoods to the ends of the Earth because they can’t be bothered to verify the claim before posting it.
If the religious adherents truly occupied the high ground of truth why would they dare to risk their credibility?
Whether it is fake news or just exaggerated tales, that believers are gullible or in people in denial in the manner of a sports fan who can only see what promotes their team as good, the cost is credibility. A consensus of idiots is meaningless. I have no reason to think that prior generations were any better at sorting out the facts from the fictional BS. It is just disheartening, for someone who had hope of a marked difference between the faithful and the frauds.
The truth is that Travis Kelce (and his brother Jason) have come out in support of Butker. So maybe it is time for some professing ‘Christians’ caught spreading this malicious gossip to do what their religion requires, humble themselves, and repent?
Wolves will likely talk before these reactionaries reconsider anything…
The nurse pronounced baby as “BEE-bee” in our prenatal class and it got me thinking of how language develops. Words will shift to reflect their usage. The meaning eventually match with the reality when we attempt to disguise unpleasantness in flowery speech or try moral inversion. Cultural values will shine through and snap understanding back where it was prior to the manipulation.
How did “bAy-bee” become “BEE-bee”?
The latter evolution in pronunciation is cuter and therefore a better representation of the subject matter. The word never will change the thing it describes. Yes, words influence our perception, they also change to reflect a new understanding of the things that we are describing. For example, the word “baby” only changed in pronunciation for me when considering the little human now within my wife’s belly. It was no longer an abstraction or vague category, but a tiny vulnerable ball of loveable life.
When we experience something firsthand it is harder to deny what it is. We can use the terms detached and technical to distance ourselves from the emotional content. Say that a baby is just a clump of cells or some kind of parasite—up until the moment when we finally hold it in our hands. To keep up the charade after this would be delusional or psychopathic. It is not human to see an infant as anything other than precious. The political lexicon becomes irrelevant.
A Tangled Ball Of Words
Words trigger emotions. I was thinking of this as a tear formed while the instructor in a prenatal class described the ideal of “skin to skin” and a soothing environment. Some of this reaction may be feeling the weight of my wife’s pregnancy. But it also has a lot to do with my own identity as the “premie” and “fighter” who struggled for life. Discussion of baby care today compared to what it was for me. The thing is, while my experience certainly impacted my development, I don’t have memories of the trauma. It probably only looms large as a part of my personal identity because my mom told me what I went through and reinforced it. The I gave further shape and form to it by attributing many of my struggles to the events of my birth—everything from my delayed growth to difficulties with focus in school.
However, it is impossible to know, outside of creating a genetic clone, if I would have been much better off with a normal birth or with more human touch rather than being in a plastic box with ‘stimulating’ music. This had some impact, no doubt, and yet there is the bigger psychological complex I’ve built on top of this named thing. Like an irritant in an oyster, it provided a nucleus to attach all of my insecurities to and blame for my failures and shortcomings. With a normal birth would I have been more like my more accomplished siblings and less a mess?
However, it is very easy to reverse cause and effect to give ourselves an excuse for our being lazy and taking of exceptions. We become the label that we apply to ourselves as much as it truly describes us. We act the part. Things of identity, like race, sexuality, religion, are as much a construct or fantasy as they are facts. We live up to our name to an extent. My mom would often tell me that my name meant “strong-willed” and it might be one of those self- fulfilling prophecies. If we tilt confirmation bias in a direction it isn’t a big surprise if our character develops that direction. It is like strapping a young tree to influence where it grows.
In a sense, nobody is truly “born this way,” it is a statement discredits conditioning and culture too much. But the environment itself doesn’t make us where we are as much as those descriptive words that reverberate in our heads. A child that is called “stupid” by a parent or teacher may spend many years trying to sort through their doubts. My dad letting me look over his blue prints and then giving some affirmation when spotted an error made by the engineers is likely what led to my being confident in my abilities and a career in design. Our reality is influenced by use of language.
These are just personal observations, but it is also backed up by other sources that put it more succinctly:
Language is not just a medium of communication; it’s a lens through which we view the world and a mold that shapes our identity. From shaping cultural perceptions to influencing personal identities, language’s role is pivotal in constructing our social and personal realities.
Language is more than a mere tool for communication.
It’s a portal through which we perceive and interpret the world.
Imagine how our understanding of colors evolves when we learn names for shades we previously couldn’t distinguish.
With each new word we acquire, a facet of reality emerges from obscurity, offering us a richer tapestry of experiences.
The Dynamic Relationship Between Language and Reality
Neither of those sources are academic or truly authoritative, but do say what I’m saying in a different way and thus useful so far as my goal here which is to provoke thought. New use of language reframes the world. It can amplify our efforts and transform society as more people begin to see the world through the lens we provided. Memes do this, as do pounding of propaganda headlines, it is why “fact-checkers” exist—all to reinforce a particular narrative.
With so much power in our words there is plenty of reason for cunning and conniving people to exercise this for their own selfish ends.
They take advantage of insecurities and level accusations to shame or confuse the innocent.
Wordsmiths, they could turn a baby into a villain and murderer into a saint—beware.
His talk is smooth as butter, yet war is in his heart; his words are more soothing than oil, yet they are drawn swords.
(Psalms 55:21 NIV)
There are some use the guise of compassion to gain control. Their promises are about attaining power. They seek only to bind us and yet many people are blinded to these motives because their identity has been hijacked by these nefarious actors.
Categories Are Social Constructs
The structures and constructs of language are entirely fabricated. There is no person who is “black” or “white” by birth, no, rather these are categories we create, clans that we join, and always artificial divisions. We are often grouped by others using various label words and internalize the divisions as being inseparable from our own experience, in that we identify with other “rednecks” or “blue-collar” types as those ‘like us’ and yet also *become* like that. Nothing requires a rural person to use country slang or go buy a massive diesel pick-up truck, some of the markers of this lifestyle (chewing tobacco or dress) can impact opportunities. This is about politics, not genetics. It is about the strength of an identity group that helps us gain power for ourselves. Being a victim of an “ism” is a lever, a social tool or means to build a coalition against others.
The individual without these groups, that is denied the right to put their fist in the air in solidarity with others ‘like them’ is weakest and most disadvantaged in this game. That is the irony of the “systems of oppression” language. Those who describe this kind of problem are actually creating it more than they are simply observing. In the same way that observation in quantum mechanics is an influence of reality (collapses the wave function), the ‘study’ of human interaction is an interaction and is a product of our bias as much as it has basis in reality. Those who are concerned with the existing ideas (of racism, sexism, or heterosexism) steal attention (and thus disenfranchise) victims of systemic heightism and those who lack privileges in ways not discussed, defined or even recognized. The individual is the most vulnerable, a minority of one, and frequently abused by recognized groups. Bullies travel in big groups—victims are often alone.
1) “Language both mirrors reality and helps to structure it” (2). Explain and give an example.
2)Racism, sexism, heterosexism, and class privilege are all interlocking systems of oppression that ensure advantages for some and diminish opportunities for others, with their own history and logic and self-perpetuating relations of domination and subordination (3). Explain what this means. Do you agree/disagree? Why?
3)What are the economic impacts of constructing race, class, and gender?
Sandwiched between the lines of this effort to build awareness (indoctrinate) are a pile of assumptions that, in the end, only serve to darken these artificial dividing lines.
It is rewarmed class warfare rhetoric, Marxism, and is basically designed to feed envy or feelings of being an other and disenfranchised. No, this is not to say that prejudice or abuse is entirely a social construct. What it is to say, rather, is that their worldview, segregated by these simple binaries, is too compartmentalized and minimizing of other factors.
There isn’t one group of oppressor and one group of oppressed.
There is no hierarchy of victimhood.
Everything depends on the context or situation. A Jewish student that is harassed on a college campus because of the IDF dropping bombs on Gaza is not privileged in this moment even if they are ‘white’ and rich. Nor is it anti-Semitic to characterize the decades long campaign against the Palestinian people as an ethnic cleansing. Labeling terms like “terrorist” or “occupier,” while useful to an extent, rarely explain accurately and are dehumanizing ends of conversation.
The whole point of claiming the existence of “interlocking systems of oppression” is to make anyone who dares to question their narrow perspective a part of a monolithic enemy rather than an individual with life experience to be respected. It is truly the educated left’s own version of a conspiracy theory where anything they don’t like is part of some invisible system that can teased out of the statistical categories they created to emphasize identities based on color and physical features. If some in one of these groups lag behind then some other group must be at fault.
Building humanity requires the de-emphasis of meaningless boundaries and formation of bonds based on behavior. Skin color is not synonymous with culture or the choices one makes that shape their outcomes. Yes, we must identify mistreatment of people on the basis of appearance, but this isn’t black and white, nor is it oppression to apply the same standard to all. Indeed, some people are treated unfairly, but many end up being marginalized for antisocial behavior and yet claim to be victims of oppression when the chickens come home to roost.
Call A Turd a Baby…
Bringing this full circle, the word “baby” is cute (and the pronunciation of the word is becoming cuter) because babies are cute. The language of description is merging more and more with the reality adorableness that we perceive in a human child by our instincts. Using the word “baby” to describe an adult does not make them cute. Albeit pet names, used to convey fondness, do imdue the quality a bit or at least will hijack some of the sentiment that associated with babies. However, this is something that can only be stretched so far before the absurdity is too obvious.
In this regard language that is used in an attempt to counter popular perspective, or overrule accurate description, will eventually take on the meaning that it was supposed to erase. The language police can only temporarily remove a stigma (albeit never long enough to make the effort worthwhile) and it is because the unpleasant reality will always bubble to the surface again. In fact, “special needs” today probably carries more negative baggage than the use of the words slow or retarded in the past.
Likewise when a person is accepted at the university or get your job simply as a result of the particular identity group they belong to rather than only on the basis of equal qualifications this leads to an asterisk with the accomplishment—even when equally earned. New terms like “diversity hire” will spontaneously and organically come into existence as a result of need to delineate between identity and merit based. These, sadly, are far more damaging stereotypes applied to minorities who are outstanding by their own right.
Just as one cannot relabel a turd as a baby and expect people to cradle it once the truth is revealed, one can’t just apply credentials or distinguished titles to someone thinking this will change a lack of qualifications. It will only degrade the meaning of words and in the long-term will do nothing to solve the socio-economic divide.
Calling someone a fisherman and giving them a pile of fish is not the same thing as teaching them how to fish. You can’t simply declare reality as the left believes they can. Turds are only cute when the term is used ironically to describe something truly cute.
It is 2064 and refugees from Spanish-speaking countries nearly match the native-born American population in border states. The United States, after fighting war after war and finally collapsing economically, is a shadow of the globe-spanning power it once was. A militant ethno-nationalist contingent within this group of new arrivals, armed with their own understanding of history, believes that the American West rightfully belongs to them. And using a campaign of terror and intimidation, after a few skirmishes, have driven even many native Texans out of their most notable cities.
La Raza (or ‘the race’) is not satisfied to only have parts of the historically Spanish parts of the continental US. However, the new UN based in Dubai, while agreeing that the Spanish had a better claim, determined that a two-state solution was best and drew the map for a partition plan. Of course, neither side is truly satisfied with this and both are merely buying time. A coalition of sympathetic American states formed to help the Texas Rangers, which is now a paramilitary organization of mostly fundamentalist Christians, but the partisans of the Partido Nacional de La Raza Unida strike first. Many Texans flee as cartels and Chinese-backed militants start a campaign to push them out.
Decades pass and the Spanish state increases its zone of control. The Texans continue to fight asymmetrically but have lost control of their resources and are also politically destabilized by their better-funded rivals. MTGA, or Make Texas Great Again, an extremist group that states a goal of removing all non-Americans from Texas, is secretly aided by La Raza who seeks to undermine the more representative and moderate Texas Rangers. Why? Well, with their end goal of taking all of what was Spanish territory, they really did not want a successful state of Texas, they wanted exploitable chaos and opportunities to seize more land using self-defense as an excuse.
After a small success, where the MTGA ‘terrorists’ managed to break through the formidable La Raza borders (ironic, given that generations of Americans were told that borders are racist), the enraged Spanish demand that Texan civilians evacuate and begin to bomb the Texas panhandle camps where the remaining resistance fighters base their operations. Across the Spanish world their own language media, sympathetic to the Spanish cause, ask many questions. Why do the Texans not overthrow the terrorists? Why don’t they simply move to other US states and give the land back to the rightful owners from the South? Why do the border states oppose the relocation of Texans so much when they’re all Americans?
Of course, the scenario above, for the time being, remains fictional, but it is also an analogy to introduce this post which deals with similar questions as to why Gazans do not overthrow Hamas or leave for other Arab lands. I realize some, even if they don’t admit it, see the people of Gaza as being subhuman, a race marked for destruction or “Amelek” (as Israeli right-wingers call them), and won’t even attempt to understand their perspective. The propagandists have done their job well, once again, and convinced the masses that the side they are told to oppose is a bunch of savages who can’t be reasoned with and whose blood—including their own children—is on their own hands.
WhY DoN’t ThEy JuSt OvEr-ThRoW hAmAs?!?
Many do not draw a distinction between Hamas and Palestinians. This is what those who want a blank check to do whatever they want to Gaza want. If you can make all in this small territory collectively guilty, then you don’t need to deal with the moral dilemma of whether it is okay to kill innocents as a response to innocents being killed. If all Palestinians are terrorists then you can just treat them like a termite infestation. It isn’t genocide, it is just pest control! No, they won’t come out and say that. However, be honest here, when you drop bombs on a populated city that is exactly what is happening, it is collective punishment and a war crime.
Anyhow, what they don’t tell you is that only a fraction of Palestinians voted for Hamas. In fact, in no single district of Gaza did Hamas win the majority of votes. For all of you who want a third-party ballot choice, there’s your warning. And once you give power to a group like Hamas don’t expect to ever get it back without a fight.
Propaganda Parrot: “Bu-but, what about all those Gazans out cheering when Hamas attacked Israel?!?”
Me: “What about it???”
Thousands of Americans took to the streets to chant “Not my President!” when Trump won. And thousands of Americans participated in the Jan 6th ‘insurrection’ as well. In neither case did the protestors in the crowd, even if millions of them, represent the plurality of Americans. Furthermore, being in the crowd doesn’t make you a supporter of whatever others have attributed to your cause. If you are pro-MAGA, contrary to what the Democrat-controlled media says, you aren’t sympathetic to a coup for being upset about the election and subsequent prosecutions. No, you’re rejecting their framing of the event and beholden to an entirely different narrative.
The same is true of Gazans. Maybe they don’t support the means of Hamas. But they certainly understand the grievance and see Israel as an oppressor of their people. Many Americans would be happy to see Moscow or Tehran leveled. Does that make them one and the same as those giving the order or carrying it out?
But more significant than that, half of the population of Gaza is children. They didn’t get a vote nor do they have the ability to go toe to toe with a group currently giving the IDF a run for their money. Why don’t the Gazans overthrow Hamas? Maybe for the same reason that those of us who disagree with the waste of our tax dollars and endless wars don’t overthrow the US government: We want to live our lives. We don’t want to be killed or end up locked up. People do not rise up even against a regime that abuses them simply because they don’t want to die. I mean, come on, do you really expect civilian Palestinian mothers and fathers to take down Israel’s enemy for them? Do you expect children to overthrow armed men?
Are you really that dull?
Okay then…
WhY dOn’T tHeY jUsT LeAve GaZa?!?
Wow, you’re smart! Why don’t a million people just follow the IDF command to leave everything behind so that their homes and communities can be leveled without concern for civilian casualties? I mean, we would all do that at the snap of a finger, right?
This is the biggest bullshit line of all of them.
State War Crime Apologist: “We gave them an opportunity to leave…”
As if this makes them not responsible for the bloodbath that follows. I mean, by that reasoning, if they had an opportunity to leave, then the atrocities that followed during the Pogroms are on those who didn’t immediately flee, right?
This is just not a realistic expectation and most especially given the very recent history of the Palestinian people. First, many who live in the Gaza Strip are already refugees living in camps. Why? Well, they were forcibly expelled by Zionists in events like the Nakba of 1948 and many others, these massacres to push them out may have been forgotten by us, but what if that was your grandparents who still remember the olive groves they tended and the good life that they had prior? Now you have a place, even if it isn’t the greatest, you have friends and neighbors around you, are you going to just march into the desert again so that more of your ancestral land can be annexed?
This is stupider than expecting Texans to up and leave for Canada if they don’t like the current border situation.
If Palestinians leave who will ensure that they are allowed to return?
The UN?!?
Of all people, white Americans who decry foreigners entering their country, and threatening their culture, should understand this. If we can’t even tolerate sharing our land and so fear losing our national identity, imagine if we had been backed in a corner for decades and are now being told we must evacuate to a new place so that our rivals can do their mop up of the American resistance.
No, Palestinians don’t leave for the same reason we wouldn’t leave and the same reason why Israelis don’t simply move to friendlier Western nations. I mean, it would be much easier for Israelis, many of whom are wealthier and have dual citizenship, to make the move to safer places. Why not just move completely out of range of Hamas rockets and incursions?
You don’t have to be sympathetic to the Palestinian cause to see this as an injustice, you just need to be human.
As ignorant is this idea that Arab nations should simply absorb the people displaced by Israel as if that would solve the problem. I mean, it isn’t like hard-core Zionists don’t also think that Lebanon belongs to them. Unlike many Americans, Arab leaders aren’t dumb. They know that in politics when you give an inch they’ll take a mile. Their own rule is fragile enough. They understand that a stream of refugees will potentially undermine their stability and, again, we should understand this by looking at what is happening in Europe or the US where refugees are welcomed. And, sure, the US certainly could’ve moved all from the British Isles across the Atlantic to avoid confrontation with Hitler, but why would we?
Why should Gazans leave? Why should Arab leaders facilitate the whims of Israel?
Blame-shifting Is Evil
Abusers always make the victim guilty. The little girl he assaulted should’ve been wearing that dress. This is how they wash their own hands, so they aren’t the bad guys in the narrative they create for themselves. In their mind, they’re not a bad person, they were just presented with an irresistible temptation, and it was a failure somewhere else that caused them to fall. Sexual predators do say things like “why did her parents leave her with me” or “he didn’t put up enough resistance” as a justification. It is evil when they do it and it is evil when others do it in murkier circumstances.
The blood of Gazans, who are killed by the IDF, is completely on the hands of the Israeli leadership who are ordering the invasion. It is no different from Hamas being to blame for those who were shot by their militants. Gazans are not collectively guilty of what Hamas does and, likewise, innocent Israelis have no blame to bear for what their government does. If an enemy uses “human shields” that doesn’t give a military permission to gun down or bomb the civilians between them and their enemies. If a military invasion is not possible under those conditions, then find another solution.
Israel doesn’t need to invade Gaza to neutralize Hamas. Even Israelis see the incursion as a failure of their government. And doing more to defuse the legitimate grievance of the Palestinians, who are having their land systemically taken by religious extremists who cite texts thousands of years old, would go a long way to helping them move on. Turning enemies into unthinking inhuman monsters is exactly what has enabled genocidal purges in the past and is what is most concerning about the rhetoric coming out of the mouths of Zionists. It is not Christian. It is not excusable.
The propagandist’s job isn’t to placate critical thinkers. No, it is to feed the confirmation bias of those who have already picked a side or keep those on the sidelines indifferent. One way this is done is by answering legitimate concerns with plausible, yet spurious, excuses for why normal human compassion need not apply to this situation. It is basic blame-shifting, where you make the victims of abuse guilty for what others are doing to them. And, as gullible and eager as they are, it really doesn’t take much to keep a ‘Christian’ Zionist spouting talking points.
We need to think long and hard about the precedents set by Gaza given our own diminishing influence. Islamic no-go zones in Europe have expanded to include large swaths of urban centers. Refugees from destabilized regions of Africa and the Middle East have flowed in, unabated, while native populations have dwindled. Will we go quietly when it is our turn to be displaced? Will we like it when our own ethics are turned against us? Hopefully whoever will rule after us has more compassion and mercy than we do. Pray that they do not dismiss our cries for justice or brand us as terrorists to be destroyed for opposing their unjust edicts.
It is disheartening that so many in the West have an understanding of the problem less sophisticated than a French aristocrat musing, in response to the starving people saying they don’t have enough bread, “Let them eat cake!” It’s out of touch. It is cruel and indifferent. It will come back to bite us when the world starts to hold us responsible for the abuses of those who claim to act on our behalf and have slaughtered millions. Who will stand to defend us?
In storytelling, there is a plot device called a MacGuffin. This is an object, character, or event used to push the narrative forward and yet isn’t all that important in and of itself. In other words, a thing that creates motivation and yet never even needs to be revealed to the audience. We are supposed to believe this is something significant or valuable and that’s all we need to be told.
The contents of the briefcase are left a mystery despite being pivotal in motivating the characters.
While reading through the Old Testament and pondering how temple worship worked, it is hard not to see the Ark of the Covenant as a sort of MacGuffin. Sure, their God was not a thing. And yet this sacred object, we’re told, contained something of God’s presence and would even strike dead those who innocently mishandled it. Of course, most people may never have seen it, it was kept behind a veil in the temple where few had access, but all would be told of the sacredness.
“Then spake Solomon, The LORD said that he would dwell in the thick darkness. I have surely built thee an house to dwell in, a settled place for thee to abide in for ever.”
(1 Kings 8:12-13 KJV)
In fact, it was made sacred as much by this treatment as much as what actually dwelled within it. The mythology surrounding it, as in the cultural or religious significance that was given to it, was extremely powerful. Starting a special priestly class, Tabernacle and ritual practice, later the impressive structure of the Temple, there was a huge investment in this sacred object. And yet, for all the attention it got, the Ark itself was usually kept hidden in darkness, guarded, within the Holy of Holies and behind a veil.
Holy Of Holies
There are other things hidden behind a veil with significant motivational power. One of them being the marriage MacGuffin. For me this was a pursuit of something sacred, the church does consider the marriage bed to be sacred, and there is a whole mythology that is constructed around marriage.
This is what made it so jarring when, during my pursuit of the impossibly, a psychiatrist would classify it as “sexual attraction.” They had just heard me describe a pure and faith-driven quest only to reframe it in such crass terms. How dare they! I was after love, not sex! It really did offend me at the time. With their clinical roughness, they had penetrated the veil of my marriage delusion. It was an act of sacrilege.
My childhood innocence is beyond recovery at this point. For whatever reason, those of us born into a fundamentalist purity culture believe that we must be in denial of our own sexual urges that lead to marriage. This is strange given how blunt St. Paul is on the topic, in 1 Corinthians 7:9, advising those who “burn with passion” to get married and basically get a room. Why the veil of secrecy, these many euphemistic expressions to cover and mystify the bumping of uglies?
Speaking of erotic euphemism:
“Awake, O north wind; And come, thou south; Blow upon my garden, That the spices thereof may flow out. Let my beloved come into his garden, And eat his pleasant fruits.”
(Song of Solomon 4:16 KJV)
Why blush, be embarrassed or ashamed by this?
Could it be that without dressing this whole affair up with great ceremony, white bridal veils, teary-eyed parents, and such, we would have to face the reality of being creatures as hormone-driven as two ducks on a pond? I mean, why aren’t we as honest as Solomon was in his poetry: “Roses are red, violets are blue, you have large breasts, that’s why I love you!” Without white lies or half-truths, would our version of romance even survive?
So what is underneath the veil?
All of those things that I’ve discovered in the intervening years, that’s what…
Bride or prostitute. Is the only difference the price each requires?
To the extent I was in deep denial of my own sexuality, I was doubly in denial of the sexual nature of my female counterparts within the conservative Anabaptist culture. The young lady who first propositioned, then made it all awkward and worried about somehow being ‘defiled’ if she got coffee with me has long since dropped the veil. She has joined the others whom I had held in such high regard, revealed now as not being nearly as prudish or pure as I had once imagined. That’s not a criticism or judgment either. It is just the reality of the situation.
So, when the impossibly told me “I cannot not love that you the way that you wanted to be loved” what she was really saying the same thing as those Tinder girls with “must be 6′ or over to ride” in their profiles. She wanted a guy who got her juices flowing, certainly someone a bit more rugged and traditionally masculine than me. And, I mean, why not? Why hide it? Marriage is not only (or even primarily) about the high ideal that is advertised. It is also about our scratching the itch. Which is to say getting down and dirty with someone who meets the correct physical qualifications.
Also, perhaps it is that the fantasy is more satisfying than the act itself? We read how Amnon, King David’s eldest son, had such an infatuation with his half-sister Tamar. It tells us after having his way with her he despised her. Or consider the disgust of Victorian-era art critic John Ruskin when, in marriage, he discovered that women aren’t like porcelain dolls. You’ll have to forgive him, they put skirts over piano legs back then to keep the eyes of men safe from the unveiled feminine form. Maybe there are some things that are better chased than caught? If we find what we went looking for we might be shocked at what we found.
Sacred Fertility & Symbolism
The final stop on this exploration of sacred and taboo has to do with something that I can’t unsee now that I’ve seen it. I’m bound to lose half of my final two readers for going here.
Nevertheless, I’m not here to please the pearl-clutching crowd.
For me, this is not about toppling sacred cows or making people uncomfortable, it is about being honest enough to see reality for what it is and correcting our own perspectives of the cultural baggage we’ve inherited.
First, what drives much of the Old Testament Biblical narrative? We know Abraham’s story, how he wanted an heir, and yet how Sarai, his wife, was unable to produce. In this Genesis account we see various cases where wombs are opened or closed. And the punishment of Michal, for rebuking her dancing husband, was that she had no child until the day of her death. Being fruitful and multiplying was a high priority, as well as having sons to carry on the family line.
As an aside, we live in a very sterile world in comparison to our ancestors, we’ve become sheltered and sensitive to the point many do not eat meat or want their children exposed to death. This wasn’t an option at the time when Scripture was written. There is a kind of earthiness to their world and perspective, something more primal or real, a brutality of life difficult to stomach. It is with this reality in mind, that we also have different sexual taboos and could be more prudish than they were about such things.
Second, I was sitting in church and taking a look at the colorful streams of light pouring through a stained glass image of Jesus pulling Adam and Eve from the grave. My moment of appreciation for this beauty was interrupted by my noticing part of the symbolism. Jesus is shown to be emerging from an oval shape, at the bottom of which are the covers of their opened tombs. Requiring very little, if any, imagination, it bears striking resemblance to one Christian symbol even an iconoclastic Protestant would likely recognize, and that being a vertically arranged “Jesus fish” or Ichthys.
Light and life shining down…
However, concurrent to this, and a cause of some momentary shame, was the thought “That’s a vulva!” I mean, how inappropriate to think that any part of the female anatomy, let alone those private nether regions, be put on prominent display or be associated with Christ!
But is it really?
A mother, Mary, is necessary for the birth of Jesus. Without her, and her womb that is miraculously made made more spacious than the heavens, there is no salvation for mankind. It didn’t matter if God could have used any other way, all we know is that he used this young woman and all of the faithful since have followed the lead of Elizabeth, who full of the Holy Spirit loudly proclaimed:
“Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear! But why am I so favored, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?”
(Luke 1:42-43 NIV)
As far as the symbolism, I would find that indeed my observation had basis in reality as the Ichthys is a version of Vesica Piscis (literally “fishes bladder” in Latin) or, in sacred geometry, the oval that two intersecting circles create an oval and said to be the place where spiritual and physical worlds interface. According to Syriac Press, in ancient Mesopotamia, it was used as a symbol of the combination of masculine and feminine energies that create a Divine Child. Any pagan coincidence, like those with baptism, only serves to reinforce the power of the symbolism.
In a time when many settle for ‘fur babies’ over producing human offspring and the unique female contribution to the world is dismissed by feminists seeking male roles— when real women are mocked by men who pretend to menstruate—we need to start doubling down on our celebration of this reproductive role of women. Phrases like “saved through childbearing” did not come into the Bible by accident. The world was saved by the one who came out of Mary’s fertile womb and we ought not to downplay or be embarrassed by this.
Empty Vessel—Dying Corpse
Solomon’s Temple was destroyed in 586 BC, by the Babylonians, and the fate of the Ark within it is unknown. This loss of sacred relics did not stop the Jewish faithful from rebuilding the temple, in 515 BC, but does make one wonder how much the contents mattered. So long as the people were kept in awe that’s all that really seemed to be the point whether the edifice truly contained anything of real value or not. With nothing behind the veil, the people still did the ritual and sacrifice.
Why?
It seems sort of analogous to the US Dollar, a currency once backed by actual gold and now only by faith people continue to hold in the economic system it represents. The harsh reality is that it has become merely a means to exploit. It is a way for a few elites to rob the value of the savings of other people by printing more money for themselves. Those money changers Jesus chased out of the Temple were the amateurs. The real professionals never get caught. The carefully maintained veil of secrecy around the Federal Reserve ensures that this particular scam continues for a long long time.
But, I digress.
G. K. Chesterton once wrote, “a corpse crawling with worms has an increased vitality,” and that “a dead man may look like a sleeping man a moment after he is dead,” trying to describe the subtle yet significant difference between truly sacred tradition and a cheap gimmick version of this religion that was intended to replace it. Perhaps this is what has me disillusioned? With so many things, once the veil is lifted (which few ever dare to do) so much of the enticing mystery and popular mythology which propelled us forward falls apart. And in this way some of the life I had felt early on feels more like decomposition.
Perhaps this is what is left when you’re the dog who has finally caught the car? Nothing left to do but pee on the tire and continue on your way again. The anticipation leading up to the day of revelation may be more exciting than the moment the veil is lifted and when all is seen. Ruskin may have spent the rest of his life waxing eloquently about his female love interest. Or maybe—just maybe—that MacGuffin which led us to the point we’re at today was merely a plot device to move the story forward and the only truly sacred part of the encounter is the fruit produced?
Sexual pleasure is fleeting. We’re lured there by our imaginations, by our desire for what is beyond the veil of marriage, but it can all be a bit anti-climactic and even repulsive once you consider it after it is finally unwrapped from the flowery speech and those flawless air-brushed mental pictures. But fatherhood, by contrast, seeing the great potential of my son, tending to his needs, pruning as needed, is something extremely fulfilling. It is what has emerged from the womb that brings us renewed life and hope. Pity the barren, the dying corpse who has lifted the veil and only saw the emptiness of their pursuits.
Irregular Ideation 