Not on the Agenda for Today.

Also unlikely.

But, Alas.

Had a wonderful, impromptu lunch today w/ a dear friend who found herself downtown about noon and in need of sustenance. We caught up on each others' crazy lives, and discussed her amazing belly dance classes, mutual friends, and gardens. Then we spent time giggling over our well-laid plans to hit up nice neighborhoods following the predicted rapture this Saturday evening. Since we're pretty sure not to be going anywhere both Witches and thus guaranteed not to be getting raptured into the Christian heaven, we worked out a plan for dividing up the Jimmy Choos, Hermes, jewelry, good booze, etc. left behind by god-fearing Christians (Yes, I know what Jesus said about rich people, camels, and needles, but that's now been preempted. Prosperity Christianity assures the people in Georgetown and McClean (our first picks for looting providing good homes to the property of our neighbors) that they WILL get raptured if they just believe in Jesus, hate the poor, and vote for tax cuts. So I'm not too worried that anyone raptured will leave behind only stuff I wouldn't want).

I've posted serious poems about the end of the world before. And of course, we all know what RF said about fire and ice. Yet, what I can't quit hearing in my head every time someone explains that the end of the world begins this Saturday evening (just as I'm hoping to have Son, DiL, and G/Son over for Sancerre, roast chicken, corn, biscuits, and broccoli (G/Son's favorite veg, what can I say?)) is Dorothy Parker's poem, which I know by heart, about predictions that the world will end.

The Flaw In Paganism

Drink and dance and laugh and lie,
Love, the reeling midnight through,
For tomorrow we shall die!
(But, alas, we never do.)

Although, Parker's (oddly, she almost never is) wrong, that's not the flaw in Paganism (which she had the decency to capitalize; well, she left her estate to Dr. King, so of course she was wonderful and ahead of her time); it's the flaw in Christianity, esp. the hate-filled Christianity of this nutjob predicting the end of the world.

Dude, Jesus ran around w/ 12 men. He preached love and understanding. I really don't think that the word "lesbianism" is in the Bible. But if you do get raptured this Saturday, I'll be glad to see you gone. I don't even want your stuff.

***

Update: What my friend Tim Said.

Pesky Activist Lawyers

Via Twitter, Atrios highlights an interesting case concerning a jail in South Carolina that has (or perhaps the better term now might be "had), according to an email from a jail staff member, a policy that

our inmates are only allowed to receive soft back bibles in the mail directly from the publisher. They are not allowed to have magazines, newspapers, or any other type of books.

That's right. No Koran. No Pagan Ritual Prayer Book, nada. Just Bibles. Nice First Amendment you've got there, America. The ACLU filed suit and, lo and behold, the federal government sought and was granted permission to intervene in support of the ACLU.

Now, all of a sudden, the jail says that it has a different policy:

Officials at the jail responded to the ACLU lawsuit by saying that they only banned material containing staples and nudity. But the new ACLU motion to block this policy points out that legal pads containing staples were being sold at the jail. It claims that the no staples or nudity policy was "adopted post hoc and in response to this Case", and that it "eliminate[s] access to reading material almost as completely as the 'Bible only' rule".

Anyone who's practiced law for very long has seen this happen. The jail has what it knows is an unconstitutional policy. It doesn't want to give it up, so it looks for some other rationale that will let it achieve the same goal. No explanation for why the staff member seemed to think the policy was rather explicitly different (soft-cover Bibles, direct from the publisher, no magazines newspapers [which don't have staples], or any other type of books"). No, the policy is based on safety and prison control! Staples are dangerous and it's bad to let prisoners see pictures of nudity or bathing suits because, um well, shut up, that's why. One hopes the judge in the case sees this for what it is.

I mention this case because it shows what can be accomplished by the mere filing of a legitimate lawsuit. Once the jail's policies are under scrutiny, jail administrators start scrambling, and scrambling people often look disingenuous. To a judge. We saw a similar case when Pagan activists sued the U.S. Department of Veterans' Affairs over its refusal to allow Pentacles on gravestones. Once you file suit, and get discovery, you find out that the real reason behind the denials and delays and changing requirements is that George Bush doesn't like Witches. And then someone realizes that you'd better settle this case before a judge settles it for you.

All of which is by way of saying that, no, the ACLU doesn't always take all of the cases I might wish that they'd take. But they do manage to do some very good things. And it's important to note that you don't have to be guilty to be in jail. Get arrested and you can get thrown in jail, at least until you make bail or the charges are dropped.

That's why I'm a card-carrying member of the ACLU. Are you?

What Cenk Said

It's Odd to Object to Native Americans Praying in, You Know, America

Not surprisingly, conservatives have been criticizing the inclusion of a Native American blessing at last night's program in Arizona. Media Matters has the whole story. Here's an example:

Examiner: "Rambling 'Native American Blessing'...Provided A Stark Statement Of Pantheistic Paganism." A January 13 Washington Examiner column said that while Gonzales has the "right to practice whatever faith he chooses," his invocation was "a rambling 'Native American Blessing'" that was a "statement of pantheistic paganism." From the Washington Examiner's "Beltway Confidential" column:

...[N]o Catholic priest, Baptist minister or Jewish rabbi was included in the program. What was included was a rambling "Native American Blessing" at the outset of the program. This blessing provided a stark statement of pantheistic paganism, including forthright declarations concerning "Father Sky," "Mother Earth" and the "Creator."

Regardless of one's view of Pantheism, its prominent inclusion at the opening of a memorial service on a state-run university campus featuring a lengthy list of public officials would seem, by the familiar expressions of liberal multicultural conventional wisdom, a blatant violation of separation of church and state.

[...]

No one, of course, should question Carlos Gonzalez' [sic] right to practice whatever faith he chooses and to display it in public as he thinks best, or deny that his invocations of his love for America were entirely appropriate and inspiring. We should all be thankful for the service of his son in Afghanistan as well.

That said, it ought to be recognized that his religious beliefs and practices were used by the few to send a message of exclusion to the many, thus illustrating the utter hypocrisy of at the heart of multicultural political correctness. [Washington Examiner, 1/13/11]

The program also included Christian prayers and bible passages read by, for example, Eric Holder, but apparently that's not enough for the Dominionists.

My New Name for a Blog: What Gus Said

Pagan blogger, Gus diZerega has a post that you REALLY need to read. Gus responds to assertions that years of violent right-wing rhetoric had nothing to do with the murders and attempted murders this weekend in Arizona. As Gus points out:

For over a decade the radical right, beginning with Ann Coulter, Newt Gingrich and Rush Limbaugh have initiated a complete reframing of political debate into only dehumanizing attacks on their opponents as evil traitors who hate America and are any combination of Communists, Nazis, Fascists, Muslims, Gays, and Haters. Against them reference is made to times of violent resistance against oppression. Always. In public debate actual policies are rarely if ever discussed, and when they are, they are discussed in misleading terms such as "death panels." This is a pattern, a syndrome, a deliberate attempt to change a culture by dehumanizing opponents and destroying the tolerance that makes democracy possible.

. . .

When violent rhetoric is continually employed dehumanizing the other, and it is shouted from the roof-tops, and blared out hourly on a major media station, and on radios country wide, that shifts the moral center of gravity around which most people gravitate, and weakens cultural barriers on violent behavior. Those weakest in self-control and mentally least capable of acting responsibly, in other words the people most dependent on external signals for deciding what to do, those people will be the first to be affected. Jared Loughner fits that observation perfectly.

. . .

It's not as if this has not happened before. Rwanda once had Tutsis and Hutus living together amicably and intermarrying. Tensions existed, but Hutus did not suddenly puck up machetes and start hacking away at their fellow Rwandans, including moderate Hutus. But in time they did. Politicians and media figures figured prominently in undermining traditional toleration and gradually pushing culture towards civil violence, just as the radical right is today. Here is a brief account of Rwandan hate media that might be a description of Fox today, except that it has followed the logic of Fox's lies more literally. Two short discussions are on Wikipedia and in this paper by Kristen Landreville. There is also a BBC report.

The former Yugoslavia did not suddenly see Serbs and Croats and Bosnians wake up one day and begin slaughtering one another. That was the outcome of a longer period of cultural destruction pursued by politicians and media allies, principally Serbian ones, but not entirely. Chris Hedges War Is a Force that Gives Us Meaning is a eye opening and beautifully written account where while it is not the main issue discussed, the alert reader easily sees the role media played in what happened. Did I say it was beautifully written? Indeed it is.

Political assassination was a feature of the dying Weimar Republic. Assassinations were rarely the work of Nazis. They were often the work of the 1930s German equivalent of Loughlin, weakly autonomous people who reacted easily to the cultural atmosphere of growing violent rhetoric. The ideologues, right or left, were rarely the assassins. Often they were lone operators. Ultimately over 350 politicians were murdered in the Republic, so we have a way to go. But one depressing aspect of the linked discussion is how the good guys lose in these killings, even when everyone denounces the killers.

After the Nazi take over the Germans were not ready for the Nazis' true bestiality, and so German culture was continually softened up before and after through right wing use of the media in a way disturbingly similar to Fox News. If you think I am exaggerating, read Claudia Koonz, The Nazi Conscience. Then come back and discuss it. In this very important book for us today she documents a number of methods chillingly similar to those employed by the American right wing. The book is a real eye opener.

I have linked to another article depicting the striking similarities between the hate media in Germany, Rwanda, and Serbia.

(Gus's post has the mentioned links; head on over to check them out and to read the entire post.) I'll defend Gus against all cries of "Godwin!" Sometimes, the comparison is actually quite apt and, as Gus' post demonstrates, this is one of them. It's time to start being honest about what's been going on in America. I'll also note that the ever-brilliant Athenae is also correct: those who fund this sort of evil, mostly in order to keep the rubes distracted while they steal everything that's not pinned down, are every bit as much to blame as are the graspy little mouthpieces like Beck and Limbaugh and Coulter.

As Gus concludes, this issue is particularly important for Pagans, who not only get blamed for everything from 9/11 to Katrina, but who are also very likely targets of intolerant, Dominionist, right-wing violence. If you blog or twitter or post on Facebook, I urge you to link to Gus' post; I think it's that important.

Picture found here.

Update: Thanks to UNE in comments at Eschaton, here's a list of recent "incidents of insurrectionist violence (or the promotion of such violence) that have occurred since" June of 2008. In the last one-third of 2010, alone, we had the following:

September 16, 2010—Patricia Stoneking, the President of the Kansas State Rifle Association, tells Fox News, "People need to arm themselves, We have the right to put limits on our government, and that's what [the Second Amendment] does." Explaining why America's Founding Fathers drafted the amendment, she says, "They knew government could become tyrannical. We have the right to defend ourselves from a rogue government."

September 30, 2010—Kevin Terrell, a self-described "colonel" who founded a group of "freedom fighters" in Kentucky, predicts war with "the jackbooted thugs" of Washington within a year. Referring to the arrest of Hutaree militia members earlier in the year, Terrell says, "There was a lot of citizens out there in the bushes, locked and loaded. It's only due to miracles I do not understand that civil war did not break out right there."

September 30, 2010—Steve Kendley, a deputy sheriff running for sheriff in Lake County, Montana, threatens "a violent conflict" with federal agents if "they are doing something I believe is unconstitutional."

October 15, 2010—Conservative radio show host Glenn Beck lays out a hypothetical scenario on the air where the government is considering taking his children because he refused to have them receive a mandatory flu vaccine. Beck tells his audience that his response to the government would be "Meet Mr. Smith and Mr. Wesson."

October 21, 2010—Pastor Stephen Broden, the Republican candidate for U.S. Representative in Texas' 30th Congressional District, tells WFAA-TV in Dallas that the violent overthrow of the government is an "option" that remains "on the table." "Our nation was founded on violence," states Broden. "I don't think that we should ever remove anything from the table as it relates to our liberties and our freedoms."

October 22, 2010—Texas Department of Corrections officers searching for a missing person, Gill Clements, 69, are confronted by a neighbor while on Clements' property in Henderson County. Howard Tod Granger, 46, points an AK-47 semiautomatic assault rifle at one of the officers, who recalls, "He told us to get off the property or he would kill us all." Later that afternoon, officers return to Granger's home with a search warrant and an armored vehicle filled with 13 SWAT members. Granger opens fire on the vehicle, discharging at least 30 rounds before authorities shoot and kill him. Police find guns and "many rounds of ammunition" in Granger's house. They also find the body of Clements, buried in a shallow grave on Granger's property.

November 3, 2010—James Patock, 66, of Pima County, Arizona, is arrested on the National Mall in the District of Columbia after law enforcement authorities find a .223 caliber rifle, a .243 caliber rifle barrel, a .22 caliber rifle, a .357 caliber pistol, several boxes of ammunition, and propane tanks wired to four car batteries in his truck and trailer. Patock former neighbor in Arizona reported that, "He hated the president. He hated everything. He said if he got a chance he would shoot the president." Patock tells authorities he is a member of the National Rifle Association.

November 4, 2010—On his radio show, conservative host Glenn Beck fantasizes about President Obama being decapitated during a trip to India, saying, "If anybody thinks he was a Muslim over here, well God forbid, they think he was a Muslim over there because he left his religion for Christianity, death sentence, behead him.” Beck then tells his listeners that "God forbid" this should happen, as there would be a "New World Order" overnight in the United States.

November 4, 2010—Fox News host Bill O'Reilly fantasizes about killing a Washington Post reporter while on the air, saying, "Does sharia law say we can behead Dana Milbank?" O'Reilly also tells co-host Megyn Kelly, "I think you and I should go and beat him up."

November 9, 2010—U.S. Representative-Elect Allen West of Florida's 22nd Congressional District hires conservative radio talk show host Joyce Kaufman as his Chief of Staff. On July 3, Kaufman told a crowd of Tea Party supporters, “I am convinced that the most important thing the Founding Fathers did to ensure me my First Amendments rights was they gave me a Second Amendment. And if ballots don’t work, bullets will."

November 9, 2010—Concealed handgun permit holder George Thomas Lee, 69, of Walhalla, South Carolina, is arrested on the town's main street for disseminating and promoting obscenity by bearing signs "laden with expletives and taking aim at U.S. foreign policy, President Barack Obama, blacks in general, Jews and the nation of Israel." Officers also seize literature from Lee that details "the most expedient means of killing law enforcement officers." The November 9 arrest follows an October 19 arrest for assault after Lee kicked and swung his signs at a group of girls between the ages of 12 and 14.

November 10, 2010—Public schools in Broward County, Florida, go into lockdown after an email threat is received by WFTL 850 AM. The email is sent to conservative radio host Joyce Kaufman in response to remarks she made at a Tea Party event in July ("If ballots don't work, bullets will"). The email expresses support for her view of the Second Amendment and says that to further "their cause...something big will happen at a government building in Broward County, maybe a post office maybe even a school." A phone call is then received at the station, allegedly from the emailer's wife, warning that he is preparing to go to a Pembroke Pines school and open fire.

November 23, 2010—Larry Pratt, the Executive Director of Gun Owners of America, writes an editorial in The Register Citizen in which he calls for state and county sheriffs to organize large, armed "posses" as "a check on the unconstitutional exercise of federal power."

November 29, 2010—U.S. Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX), the ranking Republican on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, circulates a PowerPoint presentation to his colleagues in which he compares the Obama administration to the Nazi regime in Germany and likens himself to Gen. George Patton, bragging, "Put anything in my scope and I will shoot it."

December 3, 2010—At "Roe & Roeper's Miracle on Indianapolis Blvd. Holiday Extravaganza" promoting "Toys 4 Tots" in Chicago, Illinois, actor R. Lee Emery (famous for his depiction of Gunnery Sergeant Hartman in "Full Metal Jacket") tells those in attendance, "The economy really sucks. Now I hate to point fingers at anybody, but the present administration probably has a lot to do with that. And the way I see it, they're not gonna quit doing it until they bring this country to its knees. So I think we should all rise up and we should stop this administration from what they're doing because they're destroying this country. They're driving us into bankruptcy so that they can impose socialism on us."

January 6, 2011—John Troy Davis, 44, is arrested after threatening to set fire to the office of Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO) and shoot members of his staff. The threat comes when Davis calls Bennet's office to complain about his Social Security benefits, telling a staffer that he is schizophrenic and "may go to terrorism." "I'm just going to come down there and shoot you all," he declares. Davis is charged with assault on a federal employee.

January 8, 2011—Jared Lee Loughner, 22, shoots U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) and 19 others at a "Congress in Your Corner" event at a Safeway supermarket in Tucson, Arizona. He kills six, including federal judge John Roll, and wounds 14, including Giffords, who is shot in the head. Loughner has an extensive history of mental illness and substance abuse, yet is able to purchase two handguns and a high-capacity ammunition magazine legally at Sportsman's Warehouse on November 30, 2010. In a YouTube video posted in December 2010, Loughner states, "You don’t have to accept the federalist laws ... Nonetheless, read the United States of America’s Constitution to apprehend all of the current treasonous laws."

As God Is My Witness, I Thought Turkeys Could Fly

And I would have sworn for the 1st 90 seconds that this was parody.

Barack Obama, Grow the Fuck Up. America Needs You.

Brighter bloggers than I will say what needs to be said about the domestic terrorism that culminated today in the point-blank shot to Democratic Congresswoman Giffords' head. They'll say what needs to be said about Sarah Palin's poster that targeted -- by which I mean showed in the sights of a gun -- Congresswoman Giffords, the only member of Congress, by the way, married to someone in the military. They'll say what needs to be said about how Congresswoman Giffords' opponent publicized fundraisers "targeting" her by giving Arizonans a chance to shoot guns with him. They'll say what needs to be said about candidates blabbing about "Second Amendment Solutions." They'll say what needs to be said about Glenn Beck and his filthy ilk.

Here's what I have to say: Man up, Barack Obama and do the damn job that you wanted before you were ready for it, won, and now have. You and Eric Holder and Janet Napalitano need to be all the fuck over this shit right the fuck now. You taught these terrorists that it was ok to show up at town hall meetings carrying guns to intimidate decent Democrats. Get off your Goldman Sachs ass. Act like the goddess-damned president of the United States of America. Now, before a few more of us get shot point-blank in the head.

hat tip to filker tom

We Study You So That We Can Control You

Here's an interesting article about a book that discusses why people leave xianity and how xians can lure them back to xianity. The use of the now-almost-completely-discredited-term "Neo-Pagan" is a clue to how "hip" the book really is. Honestly, the relationship of my practice to ancient Paganism is at least as direct as is the relationship of most modern xian practices to those of the 1st Century xians. If I'm a "neo-Pagan," then they're "neo-xians."

Also, look, I'm going to break this to you as gently as possible, but I don't give a flying frap how much you try to "show familiarity with [my] basic beliefs by asking [me] what attracted [me] to Wicca and what problems [I] have with xianity." (How those questions show any familiarity with my "basic beliefs" is beyond me.) I don't care whether you "show[] an appreciation for nature and a desire to protect it," and I really don't want you to think that you can "direct" me anywhere, much less to the god that YOU IMAGINE Nature reflects. Nor will it do any good for you to "not be shy about talking about your own spiritual experiences." I've been deep inside your religion/had your spiritual experiences (hint: I was raised in it and by "raised in it," I mean: Catholic school, daily rosaries and Mass, children's choir, taught CCD for years to first Communicants, did Catholic pentecostalism, was v. seriously recruited for the convent, tried Protestantism as a serious adult) and deep inside mine and I'M NOT COMING BACK. I'm an intelligent, well-educated (to which a lot of you xians object), adult female (and you might want to work on how you treat this half of humanity if you REALLY want to address my concerns) human being, who understands what you have to offer and what Paganism has to offer and who has found Paganism to be a better path for me. I'm (unlike you) happy if others find different paths for themselves, including your religion, but, after 54 years on Earth and several decades as a Pagan, a few bad Marketing 101 tricks aren't going to change my entire life, but, you know, thanks for the insult to my intelligence, integrity, and ideals.

Also, since I say this every time, if you're going to capitalize "Christian," you can capitalize even "Neo-Pagan." If you have to use "Neo" at all.

Can you imagine how insulted xians would be if, for example, Moslems wrote a similar book about how to lure xians into Islam?

Picture found here.

Kali on a Candied Coconut Croissant

Well, this is disturbing. Ed Brayton notes that:

While I was on vacation, Chris Rodda reported here on a very disturbing new development in the ongoing battle between the military and the constitutional rights of non-Christians. The Army sends out a mandatory survey to soldiers to gauge their "spiritual fitness" and if you do not give answers that reflect religious belief you are deemed to be spiritually unfit.

The survey is called the "Soldier Fitness Tracker" (SFT) and it is part of a larger Comprehensive Soldier Fitness program designed to help support the well-being of Army personnel. And it turns out that there is also "Spiritual Remedial Training" that goes along with it if you aren't deemed sufficiently "spiritual."

Some of the yes/no questions on the survey include:

I am a spiritual person.

My life has lasting meaning.

I believe that in some way my life is closely connected to all humanity and all the world.

I believe there is purpose in my life.

When Sgt. Justin Griffith, the man who is organizing the Rock Beyond Belief event at Ft. Bragg this spring, answered those questions honestly he was deemed to be spiritually unfit and was "red barred." Al Stefanelli explains what that means, according to the text of the survey itself:

A red bar means that you face some significant challenges in this area. This means that you should focus most of your attention on this area, though you should also note that placing too much emphasis here could result in other dimensions dropping. The key is to properly balance where you need the most development with the areas you are already doing well in.

The survey then informed Griffith of his alleged problem:

Spiritual fitness is an area of possible difficulty for you.
. . .

If you "fail" this test, as Griffith did, you may be subject to Spiritual Remediation Training. The Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers has more details on that training and its pervasively religious content.

It gets worse:

[T]his remedial training program is overseen by a chaplain named CH Lamb, who is endorsed by the Chaplaincy of Full Gospel Churches (CFGC) and Jim Ammerman. CFGC is the endorser of a platoon full of truly insane fundamentalist chaplains like Gordon Klingenschmitt. I've reported on Ammerman's utter lunacy before. Imagine having someone like Klingenschmitt in charge of deciding who is spiritually fit to be in the military and it becomes obvious what a serious problem this is.

While I suspect that many Pagans could truthfully answer these "spiritual" questions in ways that would allow them to "pass," one wonders exactly why our military is even asking such questions. And how such fundie whackjobs came to control our armed forces in the first place.

/hat tip to JR in comments at Eschaton.

Picture found here.

Information Wars

Begun, They Have.

Here's hoping that our side wins.

Picture found here.

What, There Weren't Any Hungry to Feed or Sick to Cure?

Good grief, Charley Brown.

SOLDOTNA - An Alaska store owner says a wooden cross wrapped to the store sign in Soldotna was an unwelcome act of vandalism that goes against her pagan and spiritual beliefs.
The Peninsula Clarion reported 45-year-old Rondell Gonzalez arrived Thursday at her store, the Pye' Wackets on the Kenai Spur Highway, and found a makeshift cross about 7 feet tall attached to her business sign with plastic food wrap.
Gonzalez says she believes in spiritualism rather than organized religion. She also said her father fought and died in Vietnam for religious and personal freedoms.
Her store specializes in wellness and self-help books, candles, oils and crystals.
Soldotna police say it may be the first vandalism of a religious nature in Soldotna.

So loving and full of light, these xians.

I'll just point out that I can't think of any story in even recent memory involving, for example, pentagrams painted on the outside of a Christian bookstore.

But it's the Christians who are persecuted.

Picture found here.

The War Over Xmas

As I've said before, it's my own humble opinion that the world would go round a good deal faster if we'd all act like adults and acknowledge that, at this time of year, there are BOTH a number of different religious holidays and a secular holiday related to giving gifts, getting together w/ friends and family, making snowmen, exchanging cookies, etc. For historical reasons, there's some overlap, both between the holidays of some of the newer (cough*Christian*cough) religions and some of the older (Pagan) ones. And there's some overlap between the practices of some religious groups and some of the practices of the secular holiday. But most thinking adults can figure those things out and go on about their business.

For an odd group of xian Dominionists, however, no December can be allowed to pass without an attempt to blur the lines and create a sense of persecution among their faithful. The problem is, sadly, not limited to America.

Will you be wearing a crucifix to work this morning? Have you pinned your "Not Ashamed" badge to your lapel to show the world you're proud to be a Christian? Have you noticed the concerted campaign of anti-Christian bias all over the nation? No, I hadn't either – but that may be more evidence of the attack on religion that's secretly under way, like the Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Or so some leading churchmen would have you believe.

The "Not Ashamed" campaign is the work of Christian Concern, a pressure group whose most vocal spokesman is the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord Carey. He has been sketching out an alarming, totalitarian scenario in which Christmas cards are "censored" because some don't feature mangers and oxen, school Nativity plays are "watered down" because they dramatise festive mice and squabbling baubles as well as baby Jesus, and Christmas lights have become rubbishy "winter lights" with no angels anywhere.

"Christmas has become something of which some are ashamed," Carey thunders. "A new climate hostile to our country's tradition and history is developing." Gosh, how nostalgic the ex-Archbish makes me feel. I'm pitched back years to when, as a tiny child, I listened to our local priest, Fr Smith, smiting the pulpit and declaring to his Battersea flock that the "real meaning" of Christmas had been lost in a haze of Morecambe & Wise TV specials and the American way of calling Yuletide "the holidays".

. . .

Not even Lord Carey's own people believe in his awful warnings about anti-Christian discrimination, the censorship, the undermining. The heads of the Christian think-tank Ekklesia say they can find no evidence to back up the "Not Ashamed" campaign, although "we have found consistent evidence, however, of Christians misleading people and exaggerating what is really going on, as well as treating other Christians, those of other faith and those of no faith in discriminatory ways".

John Walsh proposes a possible reason that the xian Dominionists are so worried:

The sad truth, Lord Carey, is that people aren't hostile to religion or passionately devout about it; just increasingly indifferent. They may send religious cards, sing carols, attend Mass, inspect the crib, as they've always done – but more as a style choice than an expression of devotion. They haven't been nobbled by Christianophobes. They just don't feel any atavistic twitch of veneration any more.

When the philosopher AC Grayling was introduced on a recent radio show as "a devout atheist", he corrected his host: "That's like calling me a devout non-stamp collector." What bothers Christian Concern, and the like, is that many people just aren't disposed to collect the stamps any more.

And I can't say that I believe that acting like a petulant child who can't understand the concept of overlapping holidays is one likely to make many people likely to WANT to start collecting your stamps, but, you know, whatever works. Me, I like the quoted bit of Dickens, describing the way I like to think of the secular holiday:

"a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time: the only time I know of in the long calendar of the year when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely..."

Picture found here.

It's More Like a War on Logic

So, I'm already seeing holiday displays at most local retailers. When you build your economy not on the needs of the planet and the true nurturing of humans but on getting people to buy (often on credit) increasingly larger and larger amounts of plastic stuff created in 3rd World sweat-shops, well, it's important to start in as soon as possible on the selling. But this post isn't about the economy.

This post is about the upcoming battle in the "War for Xmas." No, not the "War v. Xmas," that's a fundie lie; there never was and there is no such thing. Let's act like grown-ups for a moment, grown-ups possessed of some simple reasoning abilities and a basic understanding of how language works.

Right around the Winter Solstice, quite a number of different religions have a holiday of some form or another. In my religion, the Winter Solstice (Yule, as we sometimes call it) is the holiday. For Christians, the religious holiday is Christmas, a day (conveniently) located just a few days after the Winter Solstice, when they celebrate the birth of Jesus. Zorastrians celebrate Deygan. In Mali, they celebrate Goru, the arrival of their god, Amma. More: here. Those are religious holidays with, often, deep religious meaning for those who keep them.

And, at the same time, here in America, a secular holiday occurs around the period from December 25th through January 31st. It's not at all religious; in fact it's quite material and commercial. It's about enjoying winter sports such as ice skating or building snow men, about getting together with friends and family, about exchanging gifts, about decorating our houses and town squares (and, yes, our stores), about having a big feast, and, more and more, about watching sports events on tv. This secular holiday is celebrated by people of all different religions and by those who do not belong to any religion and who do not celebrate any religious holiday. I celebrate Yule on the Winter Solstice with the women in my circle and, a few days later, I celebrate the secular holiday with G/Son and his extended family. I get a lot of spiritual strength from doing the work of a Witch -- helping to turn the Wheel -- with my sisters. And, I get a lot of enjoyment out of seeing family, watching G/Son enjoy the decorated tree and his presents, catching up via cards with old acquaintances, and being able to pause for a moment before the new calendar year (my liturgical year starts on Samhein, October 31st, the occasion of yet another secular holiday). But I don't imagine that I need to force family members to be willing to celebrate the darkness, as my circle does, nor does, for example, my DiL's mother imagine that she must make me pray to Jesus. So what's the problem?

The problem comes from the fact that the secular holiday often, due to historical developments, goes by the name "Christmas," which is also the name of the Christian religious holiday. (And from the fact that there is a growing xian Dominionist movement in America.)

Now, you know, sensible grown ups can figure this out and deal with it.

We use the word "bank" to describe the place where we deposit our savings and to describe the the sloped ground that borders a stream. And, yet, no one expects the bank president to get upset when people use the word bank to discuss the place where they like to stand and fish, nor do we insist that all bank buildings contain a stream. We use the word "dear" to describe someone we love and the word "deer" to describe a forest animal, but no one insists that you love the deer in the forest or that your beloved is, in fact, a forest animal.

So it's time for the Christians to stop pretending that they can't understand the difference between a secular wintertime holiday and their own religious holiday simply because the same word is used for both of them. Frankly, I'd be quite happy to see a different term develop for the secular holiday, which is what I think has been happening for a number of years with the word "Holidays." (And, again, we don't insist, when someone in mid-December wishes us a "Happy Holiday" that they must mean the Fourth of July, just because the Fourth of July is a holiday). But that's precisely the thing that drives the xian Dominionists batshit insane: How dare the store employee wish them a "Happy Holiday" when they make their purchase! She should have said, "Merry Christmas!" "After all," they say, deliberately conflating their religious holiday with the secular holiday, "Jesus is the REASON for the [holiday] season!"

Really? Really?

Let's forget the fact that the sales clerk is mouthing something she's been told to say and that, honest, having done this job, the only thing that woman really wishes is that she were home, off her feet, and not dealing with grumpy shoppers. She doesn't know you and she's got zero interest in your religion, your secular holiday, or anything else about you. If she were told that one of her job duties was to wish you a "Merry Christmas," she wouldn't care a whit about how your religious holiday went and she'd do it even if she wishes that the baby Jesus had never been born. If she were told to wish you a "Joyous Goru," she really wouldn't care whether Amma arrived, or not. Let's forget the fact that a god whose power is threatened by what a store clerk says or by a secular holiday isn't much of a god. Let's forget how weird it is that you insist that your religious holiday be honored by commercial establishments. And, let's forget the fact that no matter how many times you say differently, America is not a "xian nation."

Let's just talk about acting like adults and recognizing that forcing your religion down everyone else's throat is not, shall we say, the best way to win converts. Let's talk about the fact that it is entirely possible for me to not believe in a friend's religion nor his religious holiday but to, still, in good will, wish him a happy secular holiday and to hope that his religious holiday is full of meaning for him. Let's talk about the fact that it's pretty hypocritical to dump on liberals for being "too politically correct" and then run around policing how people wish each other an enjoyable secular holiday.

Time are tough. A lot of people are out of work, can't afford needed medical care, have lost their homes, are watching their planet die and their kids face a grim future. We could all use a few days of friends, family, whatever feast we can scrape together, a few gifts for the kids, an excuse to build a snowman or watch the Nutcracker (Hecate's least favorite ballet, ever, but, still). Could the xian Dominionists for once drop the pretense that just because two words sound alike they must mean the same thing? Because, honest, you're not fooling anyone; you're just making yourself look absolutely ridiculous.

Kali Fuck

Yes, they'll know we are xians by our love, by our love. And they'll know we are xians by our love!

Spot On

TaliChristians

/Hat tip Susie Madrak

So, Apparently, I Don't Get Invited to the Really Cool Parties

watertiger has the goods.

Batshit insane Teabagger candidate for Senate Christine O'Donnell (best known for being violently anti-mastrubation) claims to have "dabbled into witchcraft."

O’DONNELL: I dabbled into witchcraft — I never joined a coven. But I did, I did. … I dabbled into witchcraft. I hung around people who were doing these things. I’m not making this stuff up. I know what they told me they do. [...]

One of my first dates with a witch was on a satanic alter, and I didn’t know it. I mean, there’s little blood there and stuff like that. … We went to a movie and then had a midnight picnic on a satanic alter.

.

I wish she'd leave us out of her insane clown posse of things that go bump in the night. Don't even get me started on "alter" vs. "altar." I agree w/ watertiger: O'Donnell's lying, something that her religion pretends to consider evil.

(I know Andrew Sullivan reported the other day that O'Donnell's sister claims to have checked out Wicca along w/ every other religion in the universe. I'm not giving Sullivan a link. But it's an interesting family, apparently.)

Picture (of another wingnut) found here.

The SALT

There's just a whole world full of FAIL here.

So I Guess the Real Point Was to Get to Say: "Kenyan!"

Other anti-colonialists:

George Washington
Thomas Jefferson
John Adams
Everyone who signed underneath the words: Our Lives, Our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor
Ghandi
J. Ann Tickner
Cynthia Enloe
bell hooks
The People of Cyprus
The People of Greece
The Poles
The Russians who resisted Hitler
The People of Algeria
Albert Raymond Forbes Webber
Geronimo
Tecumseh


You get the idea.

Picture found here.