#evangelical dumb asses

[socialjusticeinamerica]

[rejectingrepublicans]

[lichen-punk]

listen i’m not wiccan and i absolutely believe a lot of the flack wicca gets for being culturally christian and colonialist and ahistorical is richly deserved HOWEVER if you then turn around and say wicca is a bad religious path because it was “invented by humans” while in comparison your own faith is objectively true and unsullied by conscious human creation, i kinda feel like you don’t have room to throw stones about cultural christianity lmao

[geezerwench]

[demilypyro]

There was that post a few days ago where people were explaining evangelicals to my dumb ass and right now there's still people in my notes going "how did you not know what the rapture is" like girl I'm a poor little european from an atheist family, I have rent and my disabilities to worry about, why would I know your american fairy tales

[omgthatdress]

Oh my god I hate Mattel so much.

They took the American Girl brand and gave it a lobotomy.

I was going to make a very very very very bad joke about one of the 90s girls getting an eating disorder after watching Britney Spears, BUT DECIDED AGAINST IT because eating disorders are something you don’t joke about, BUT. HERE’S THE THING.

Here’s the thing. Being a tween-to-teen-age girl in the late 90s early 2000s was BULLSHIT. You had 16-year-old Britney Spears singing “Hit me baby one more time” in her Lolita schoolgirl miniskirt and crop top showing off her perfectly flat abs, and then you went to school and had abstinence-only sex ed mandated by the evangelical right wing who gave out purity rings and told you that only sluts had sex before marriage. And then there was the issue of being a fat girl trying to find jeans that met her school’s dress code the days of low-rise jeans and belly button rings.

I ended up adoring Linkin Park because their music gave voice to the rage that I had inside of me because of all that. I wore men’s pants from Hot Topic not only because I thought they were cool, but they actually fucking fit and they covered my ass crack. I wore black because I didn’t fit in to the ultra-skinny, ultra cool kid Abercrombie aesthetic. And THAT is what growing up in the 90s and coming of age in the 2000s was like.

“Nicki Hoffman is a nine going on ten year old girl living in Seattle, Washington just before the year 2000 (the turn of the millennium). She is six minutes older than her fraternal twin sister, Isabel, but one inch shorter. Nicki prefers grunge, ska music, rock, alternative, and skating; she is the "grunge" to Isabel's glitter. She does not like eating raw fish and sushi; her father teases that they can's spell "finicky" without Nicki. She likes sour candy--the more sour, the better. She's known to be shy, to the point Isabel points this out; she initially doesn't have other friends than Isabel. She's very anxious about the Y2K problem and the risks and worries that have been circulating, so Isabel and her create a list to take her mind off her worries of things to do before New Year's.Her favorite color is purple, her favorite animal is a dog (she adopts her puppy, Blossom, as a Hanukkah gift), her favorite band is No Doubt, and her favorite show is The Powerpuff Girls (her favorite character being Blossom). She likes to snack on Wild Berry Pop tarts. She does not like her middle name, Pearl.The family is interfaith and celebrates both Hanukkah and Christmas. “

It’s a sterilized and dumbed-down version of growing up in the 90s, one where they only real problem facing girls is the y2k bug. It’s about the aesthetic but not the experience. Honestly the girls of today deserve to see that their moms had it difficult, too, and that the pressure to grow up incredibly quickly and be beautiful and flawless and instantly become a woman is nothing new, now it’s just on TikTok instead of MTV.

It’s the trap of nostalgia. Just because you were younger and not as aware of the issues going on in the world doesn’t mean the world was better.

[transboysokka]

GOTTA complain again about the one family member who is closest and most important to me who is just such a fucking idiot

losing critical thinking ability with age, especially about covid and falling soooo deeply into like Evangelical Conspiracy Theories

literally told me the other day “if I knew what I know now you wouldn’t have gotten any vaccines as a baby” bitch WHAT

also this isn’t what I was gonna talk about in this post but I just remembered it lol bc today they were talking to me about how a couple tried to pick them up at a bar and called it “disgusting” and I was like “just bc you’re not into it don’t use that word about that” and that were like “no they’re literally cheating” and I was like “???? they’re TOGETHER with you how are they cheating??” but couldn’t even get past THAT point that it’s like breaking trust. And lol this doesn’t matter at all but I’m just illustrating how dumb and narrow minded and stubborn they are

has been misgendering me for like a decade even though they “don’t mean to it’s just really hard to get used to!!!!!!”

has a stick up their ass about weed. again not that it matters like it’s fine if you’re not into it but stop judging other people???

okay here’s the big one

IGNORES my autism even though I was literally diagnosed with it TWICE as a kid and didn’t know until I was an adult and was like “hey do you think I’m autistic” and they were like no they “tried” to tell you you were when you were little but they don’t understand you’re “just gifted” WHAT THE FUCK

SAME with my sister and her ACTUALLY DIAGNOSED ADHD THAT SHE IS MEDICATED FOR????

also for some reason is really confused about basic psychology in general, conflation neurodivergence with anxiety (which they ARE okay with my diagnosis of?? lol) and giftedness????

IS ACTUALLY INVOLVED AT THE STATE LEVEL OF COORDINATING AND DESIGNING GIFTED EDUCATION FOR THE WHOLE STATE. LIKE HOW FUCKING DANGEROUS LETS KEEP PUSHING THAT AGENDA BUT IF A KID IS SMART THEY CANT BE NEURODIVERGENT??????

this is the least fucked up of my parents btw so I can’t just ditch their ass bc who would be left lol and also we have a great relationship but there is NO arguing with this shit like any time I send scholarly articles they refuse to acknowledge them bc they “weren’t written by a Christian” I just CANT BELIEVE HOW DUMB THEY ARE GETTING

[marlowe1-blog]

The Book of Job chapter 8

Bildad the Shuhite sticks his nose in

I think I might have blown my load with Eliphaz. One of the problems with the Book of Job is how repetitive it is. Job says something blasphemous and depressing. One of his friends says something toxic positivity. Job refutes that stupid friend.

Which makes finding quotes from Job out in the wild rather funny since these are quotes that the dumb friends are saying and as the text outright states, these friends are full of shit.

Only some of these friends are pretty repetitive in their shit. Like I'm going to need to start looking up scholars if I'm going to say anything new. Mostly classics professors. Maybe rabbis. I suppose Christians might have something to say that's worthwhile (doubtful but hey they do make pretty trees).

Bildad starts out with "How long will you say such things?" which struck me as funny, not only because already his friends are going "hey Job, maybe shut up so you stop bumming us out" but also because this is chapter 8 and there are many chapters to go.

Bildad's theme is like the rabbis who tried to find fault with Job. He keeps repeating that the blameless have nothing to fear. Sure Job's sons were probably sinful, but Job is fine. "Though your beginning be small, in the end you wil lgrow very great."

So Bildad is preaching the prosperity gospel. Look, believe in God and you'll get so much great shit eventually (oh hey there's my annoyance at the tacked on ending.)

But don't worry, Job, you'll be fine. Just look to the ancestors because our days on earth are a shadow yada yada but only those who don't trust in God will be uprooted. But Job, he's fine because the blameless (this gets repeated a lot) will not be despised.

So chin up Job. You're going through a bad time but if you're REALLY innocent, then you'll get everything you want.

So here's where I go into a personal story. When I was 12 or so my mom decided that it was time to get serious about this Christian bullshit and wanted me confirmed. She originally took me to a church that my aunt Sharon recommended (so why the fuck did she take that advice) and one time there was a guy who claimed to be a faith healer. Two things i remember.

First, he diagnosed a girl as having back problems because one leg was longer than the other one and held her leg. Second he asked for volunteers to go up and watch him "lengthen her leg" I went up with about a dozen others and we stood around and he moved her sock down her foot. The wisdom of letting some craggly old dude hold a teenage girl's leg as "faith healing" is just another fun factor in the world of evangelical Xianity.

But also a few people went "It's growing" and everyone else went along with them. Only her leg didn't grow and I seriously doubt that was an issue. But since we were all supposedly in agreement with the leg growing, we only told the truth to people who asked.

Second, the small group that I was in did more practice prayer healing. And I wanted him to heal my dry feet (my feet aren't dry these days. I don't live in Minnesota. I moisturize more) and I remember the guys prayer as he was holding my feet in his hands (yeah this was a fucked up church. It was called North Heights in Roseville, MN. If you are in Roseville, MN and are looking for a church, steer clear of North Heights) and he kept saying "Make sure there's NO DOUBT in your mind. Don't block the magical healing with any doubt!!!"

Look I was a dumb kid, not even a teenager yet and I knew that was a bullshit cover your ass statement. It was basically a way of making the "faith healing" subject still believe even when the faith healing didn't work.

So Bildad is giving us the equivalent when he keeps saying that G-d loves the BLAMELESS. If you're blameless then everything will work out. So when it doesn't work out, whoops! Guess Job was full of blame.

In the next chapter Job kind of agrees with that thesis but not really.

[stephenjaymorrisblog]

Theocracy Is Not Heaven

Stephen Jay Morris

9/30/2022

©Scientific Morality

Like, wow daddy-o, dig this prolegomenon! At least in a Totalitarian leftist regime like North Korea, they will kill you because you violated the peoples' law. In a Theocratic regime like Iran, they will you kill because God told them to! That would hurt my feelings, knowing that God wanted me dead. But, to die because I violated a secular law? I wouldn't take it personally. At any rate: In a politically-challenged nation like the USA, not only do Americans not know what communism means, they irrefutably don't know the definition of Theocracy. Iran is a Theocratic nation. Does lunchbox Joe know that? Fuck, no!

When you hear the phrase, "Christian Nationalism," you must realize that it does not equate to Catholicism or Greek Orthodoxy, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Episcopal, Methodist, or even Jahovah's Witness, or any form of "normal" Christian denomination. What it means is Evangelical fundamentalism. In all honesty, the term should be "Evangelical Nationalism." However, a generalized noun has far more, mass appeal. Some Catholics see themselves as Christians. Dumb asses! The religious Right hates and has hated Catholicism since the days of Reformation, 500 years ago. Some religious Right folks view the Pope as the Anti-Christ!

If you know anything about comtemporary Islam, you know that the religion is more fractionalized than the political Left. Americans can’t nuance anything beyond a generalization. That is why most religions are anti-intellectual. In order to control the masses, they employ obscuratism to keep the masses stupid.

The common American thinks in tribal terms. Like the Vikings, American football, or the or the tribe of Medieval Scandinavia, Americans are conditioned to be part of the "team." On the Left, it's called "Collectivism." On the right, it's called "Communism." But, hail, hail! The gang's all here! When you die for your country, you are sacrificing for the collective. When you die defending yourself, you do it for you alone. Individualism and collectivism is a mixed marriage here in the states. The Right wing is just as dependent upon the chaos theory as is the Left. It doesn’t matter if their base is stupid, as long as the ruling class can manipulate them.

Now, about this thing called “Theocracy.” When you hear the term, “Christian Nationalism,” its followers see it like Disneyland, where there are rosy-cheeked, white people square dancing in the barn, after church services. To them, small government is protecting the oil corporations’ right to drill anywhere. Well, hell no, it aint! A Christian Nation makes the original U.S. Constitution null and void. It establishes State religion. All laws emanate from God and the bible. In Iran, all laws come from Allah and the Koran.

You think that living in a Godless, communist country is bad? Try living under a religious dictatorship. The government will tell you who to marry and what you can and cannot do with your body. It will dictate the music you can and cannot listen to. You have no private life. The government will check to see if you are cleaning your guns. If they are found to be dirty, the government will confiscate them. If you are married and haven’t any children by the second year of your marriage, then you will be taken to a re-education camp. If you have kids and they misbehave, they will taken to the outskirts of town and be stoned to death.

Then, there the issue of war. You will be drafted into the military to fight because your leader heard the voice of God tell him to go to war with Mexico.

I do not want to live like that. I don’t live under religious laws. I live by my own morality and rules. To anybody who tries to take away my freedom, I will say, "Give me liberty or I will give you death!"

[jewishbarbies]

made a joke on tiktok about a dumb christian who said “jesus” when asked “if you could bring anyone back to life who would it be?” because that’s their whole schtick, is that jesus died and came back 3 days later, and now I have head-up-ass evangelicals in my comments ruining it for everyone

[holyorthodoxrosaryofthefree]

I found out that a rabid American convert priest named Fr. Samuel Davis left the OCA for goarch. He’s severely anti lgbt and anti female ordination…. I’m rather surprised with goarch. It will make sense if he switches to rocor but he switched to goarch. He was born and raised in some type of legalistic Calvinist denomination. He converted first to the Coptic Orthodox Church but left for the OCA. Por qué the Coptic Orthodox “were NOT Evangelical enough” for him. Recently he left the OCA for Goarch. Goarch is generally more progressive or sane-minded than all other jurisdictions of Eastern Orthodoxy within the USA.

It’s disheartening. Hope his heart softens and he spends his time and energy on his wife and kids than engaging in the ridiculous “Focus On The Family” culture wars. It’s a fucking wonder why Eastern Orthodoxy is becoming extinct. Not because of the ethnocentric folks but also the culture war obsessed folks…. Last time I checked, Eastern Orthodoxy is about Christ, the Gospels and Theosis/Sobornost. Yes I get that African, Black, Filipinx, Latinx, Slavic, Balkan, post-Soviet, etc cultures are conservative but this is ridiculous.

Feminism isn’t innately white and Western. Feminism and Egalitarianism are innately black, brown, indigenous and pre-colonial! Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, and non-Wahhabist Islam are innately feminist and egalitarian as well. Unpopular Opinion: If you want to be obsessed with the “focus on the family” culture wars just convert to Wahhabist Islam (or move to Afghanistan, Russia or Iran). That’s a way better fit for your dumb right wing ass!

[uopenthedoor]

any other former christians just wanna slap someone every time they hear c.s. lewis get mentioned..... like...... it's just never good......

its only 1 of 3 things

1 - him and tolkien were friends wow isnt that so crazy can u believe they invented the fantasy genre together NO. they didnt. least offensive option bc at least u might not be evangelical but u clearly dont understand the vast gulf between narnia and lotr in terms of their contributions to the genre and point blank their quality as fiction (even if narnia was for kids its still poorly paced, baldly racist, relies on outdated cliches, frankly bizarre, and lots of other authors did the same thing with MUCH more imagination and less artless sermonizing) and i dont respect u. side note no of course i dont endorse tolkiens catholicism over lewis' anglicanism i dont care either way but tolkien is a better fiction writer argue with the wall

2 - he wrote the screwtape letters, the great divide, mere christianity bla bla bla insert stupid book you had to read for youth group here. if you say this you are an evangelical and probably think he was literally a theologian. he was not. just because someone wrote a book and talked a lot about jesus to a huge audience of people doesnt mean they are offering some kind of profound insight or shaping christianity. he was a christian apologist, aka someone who has decided that you can argue people into christianity, aka the reason why the rest of the world suffers. christianity is not a "logical" religion, religion is not logical, it is a FAITH-BASED PRACTICE, if you try to argue someone into christianity who is not already christian you will fail because you are using completely different frameworks of argument. the principles you need to argue from are something that non-christians already do not accept as reasonable. this is why most evangelism functions mainly as a way of enforcing in-group mentality rather than "converting" anyone- unless they were already very open to christianity, in which case you probably could have just taken them to church with you instead of blabbing their ear off in the grocery store like a freak. tbh apologetics is just a huge topic that is hard to address just in terms of lewis here. i just have a lot of personal history with the argument "life is so dark and miserable without the gospel as consolation!!!" being told to me CONSTANTLY and it's just like....... is the consolation in the room with us right now. because we are all fucking terrified of having sex, talking to secular people, masturbating, turning to the things of this world, having new experiences in general etc etc etc like where is the consolation we are living in a mental prison of our own design. also who talks about theologians for fun anyway are you insane

3 - the chronicles of narnia are the best popular christian fiction wowww if only we had more like them FALSE. even if you ONLY read the lion the witch and the wardrobe and prince caspian, you are either dumb or have not reread them bc they are FUCKING WEIRD and have AGED POORLY. there are OTHER FAIRY TALES OUT THERE. fucking harry potter for christians ass take (yes a lot of christians dont read harry potter for witchcraft reasons so this is their substitute). and if you have read any of the other books? HELLO????? are we just going to ignore the horse and his boy and the last battle like those are respectively just orientalism distilled and women are whores who can't go to heaven. and YES if you read any other work of fiction by him you will quickly realize he did not like women!!

there is a secret 4th option which is that you like his writing on medieval romance from a popular academic perspective and if thats the case u get a free pass bc yeah he's good at presenting complex topics in an accessible way and i wish he hadn't used that gift for evil.

[rejectingrepublicans]

🤡

[buzzdixonwriter]

The Next Great Awakening

Christian churches in America are imploding because thanks to the Internet, people see through their bullshit.

This is written not from an antagonistic atheist POV -- oh, no, far from it -- but from a believer saddened and dismayed by the pure egregious imbecility / selfishness / bigotry / animosity of far too many of my co-believers.

We sat in silence as charlatans and slickee boiz perverted the gospel, only rarely offering mealy-mouthed critiques of the most egregious offenders.

The price for such cowardice proves dear.

The Internet proves the biggest threat against the religious hucksters because it allows people to compare notes.

Once upon a time if a believer had questions, they’d take it to their pastor, and if the question stumped the pastor, they’d simple smile and say, “God works in mysterious ways,” and change the topic.

Not anymore.

Now people with questions go online looking for answers, and what they found aren’t answers (well, not ///real/// answers; the slickee boiz have a line of patter that can double-talk its way outta anything) but others with questions.

And once those note got compared, the realization came through that most of what passes for religion in modern America -- and yes, I’m including supposedly respectable mainstream denominations here -- is bullshit.

Again, I say this as a believer, one who is sympathetic to most Christians’ -- even the really dumb ones -- desire to live a better life.

Organized religion failed badly in the years leading up to 9 / 11, enjoyed a brief uptick as folks returned to their childhood faiths, then nosedived again when it failed even more badly after that.

It began failing in spectacular fashion during the covid pandemic.

Historically America goes through periods of religious fervors called “great awakenings”, the first from1730-55, the second from 1790-1840, the third from 1855-1930, and the fourth from 1960-1980.

Astute observes will note they coincide with periods of great social stress in America.

They have not been good things, at least not uniformly good.

The first triggered what we call The French And Indian War but what the rest of the planet refers to as The Seven Years War, and that set the great empires of Europe at each others throats and no sooner did that get tamped down than the American and French Revolutions spring up so while a great deal of good came from it, the process getting there was hypocritically bloody.

The second occurred as the nation tried to figure out how to govern itself (realizing in the process that maybe there was something to letting a well-regulated government run things,  getting their asses kicked by the British and Canadians in the War of 1812, and culminating in the rise of a vulgar (in every sense of the word) populist nativist movement that ultimately led to the naked land grab of the Mexican War.

The third ramped up just before the Civil War and defined the terms of “great awakening” once and for all.  For all the pious hypocrisy mouthed from Southern-financed pulpits, the real focus of each great awakening lay in keeping white people -- in particular wealthy white people -- in power.  The longest lived of all the awakenings, it fought tooth and nail even after the defeat of the Confederacy and the abolition of slavery to maintain white supremacy, and indelibly marks white evangelism to this day.  It came to an end in the 1930s when it failed the American people and failed them miserably by promoting Prohibition (thus flinging open the doors to widespread corruption and criminality on several orders of magnitude greater than the already endemic corruption and criminality) and choking in the face of the Great Depression by backing the bankers and billionaires instead of starving unemployed workers.

The fourth great awakening featured two main trunks, one a push for social justice in the form of civil rights for all, the other a rigorous rejection of same.  People forget how spiritual the hippie era was, and despite the rise of Eastern religions, neo-paganism, and various oddball cults, it took the Golden Rule / “Love your neighbor” stand quite seriously and sincerely.  The other side told people it was a sin for the government to force white kids to go to school with ///those kind/// and eagerly sought alliances with ultra-right wing reactionaries who wanted to shrink the size of government to the point where covid could drown it in a bathtub. 

Now the charlatans proclaim the fifth great awakening is upon us, and they envision it as a return to “that old time religion” that will keep them and their billionaire buddies in power but I’m not so sure.

There may very well be a great awakening -- indeed, there’s an argument it’s already begun in the form of the New Age movement -- but I don’t think they can muster the numbers to make it a white evangelical dominated one (and if they do, God help us, because the blow back will be spectacular and bloody when it eventually fails).

I think the next great awakening will be in the form of a rejection of dogma and a return to a less narcissistic / more emphatic social norm as found in the Quakers and Shakers and hippies of old.

 © Buzz Dixon

[4thmagicwielder]

I feel like I've been making a lot of posts about this sort of thing as of late and I'd like to make less but with the way that some people treat certain subjects in media as automatically being harmful to portray and automatically reflecting the author's views, I can't help but wonder how many people are stupid enough to think that anyone who puts something like segregation or slavery in their book is pro-segregation or pro-slavery and racist.

People are already really fucking stupid when it comes to a slew of other subjects being in various forms of media because they thrive off of purity politics. I feel like you don't even need to be taught anything to understand that not all portrayals of negative things are promotions of said things. You'd think people would leave that kind of thing to corporations and the type of people who voted or would've voted Reagan but these people and their unquestioned purity politics wrapped in so-called progressive language being used wrong are all dumb as rocks. This ain't so much as a quality of education thing so much as a societal issue of puritanical, at times faux-progressive bullshit mixed with blunt ass stupidity. Like yeah there are societal issues but to a certain degree, these people legit fucking stupid.

These people could deadass read a book criticizing racism by a black person probably and think the book racist cause there is the portrayal of racism in it, with no understanding that it is very obviously meant to be negative. They'll really think it's a progressive take too and not something that makes them sound like a dumbass to anyone who passed elementary school and to the left of evangelicals and literal ass fascists.

[lez-exclude-men]

How can you be so blind?

You should like an evangelical being shocked when someone doesn't want your dumb ass religion