Strollerderby : evangelicals

Morning News: Is Elmo the Economy's Next Victim?

Madeline Holler — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 13:30:00 GMT

Sunny days on Sesame Street just got a little dimmer. The non-profit that produces Sesame Street will layoff one-fifth of its workers in an effort to survive the tough times. That amounts to 67 of its 277 staff members.

So far no one has spotted a pink slip in Elmo's fuzzy red hand. What's that thing they were saying about those banks? Right ... he's too big to fail.

The hard-up keep getting worse off. But in a cruel twist of fate, so do the rich! The number of billionaires in the world fell by a third to 793. Billionaire investor Warren Buffett is no longer at the top of the world's richest people list; Bill Gates is back on top. The number of millionaires fell by a quarter but there's 6.7 million of them left, so, you know, that's good.

As if American life isn't 24/7 economic meltdown, now you can have even more. In the next year, you'll be seeing TV shows and plotlines borrowing from the sorrows of your neighbor's life. Should be fun! And we'll still have the wealthy smokers on Mad Men.

We'll also have our iPods -- or the newest one for only $79 and it's barely bigger than your thumbnail. Also, it annnounces the songs it's playing since you'd need a microscope were it to actually list them on a screen.

This is for all you students of Human Nature: Ted Haggard, the disgraced evangelical minister who was outed by his meth partner and paid escort, was spotted at a New York City play about evangelical culture in Colorado. Big plot point: Ted Haggard's downfall. Was that fun for him? Therapeutic? A humiliating surprise?

Photo: dealbreaker.com

Love the Sinner

Shannon LC Cate — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 14:45:00 GMT

News of Sarah Palin's "gay friend" is not much of a surprise when you take the ten percent rule of thumb into consideration. (That is, roughly 10% of the population is something other than strictly opposite-sex oriented.) What's too bad is, unlike some pie-in-sky folks claim, just knowing or even "dearly loving" (as Palin claims to love her friend) a gay person doesn't make someone see that person as fully human or fully deserving of basic human rights. After all, we dearly love our pets, too. But evengelical Christians don't believe animals will be "saved" (most of them don't, anyway).

I grew up in an evangelical (though not politically conservative) family and church myself, and am somewhat versed in the theology that says all peple are sinners, all people are human and stand before God as individuals. There's no ranking of better or worse sins and it's not the place of any given sinner (everybody) to stand in particular judgement over the sin of another--or even what does or doesn't qualify as sin in the first place.

It's all well and good to "love the sinner and hate the sin" which has become the popular anti-gay rallying cry among evangelicals. It's just that you're not really saying much in a tradition that believes the world and its creatures is so very steeped in sin in the first place. Why single out homosexuality (for those who believe it is a sin in the first place, which is a debate for another time)?

I once received a card from a certain biolgical family member that read, roughly, "Congratulations on finishing your PhD! I am so proud of your wonderful accomplishment! I must tell you I am disappointed in the choices you have made about your lifestyle and hope you will leave your partner and return to God. Love, [name withheld to prevent familial embarassment]"

In short, "Congrats on the PhD, hell-bound homo!" Hallmark needs a section for that.

Knowing and/or loving a queer doesn't make a person "tolerant." I don't want to be tolerated anyway. I want to be celebrated and included and treated like a 100% fully human being.

Image: Will and Testament

Dads Pledge Purity for Daughters. Ewwww.

Amy Kuras — Mon, 19 May 2008 22:03:00 GMT

I don’t know why this phenomenon squicks me out so much: the father-daughter "purity ball." In which girls as young as elementary age and as old as college age spend a night getting dressed up and going dancing with their dads.

Dads, on the other hand, take a pledge to, as this NYT article puts it, "cover my daughter as her authority and protection in the area of purity."

Okay, I think I have figured out the squickitude: Why are these men taking ownership of their daughters' sexuality in such a way? If delaying sexual activity were the goal, why aren't these fathers as concerned with their son's virginity as well? Why is that the avenue through which they choose to get personally invested in their daughter's success or failure?

Have they heard of maybe coaching soccer?

What makes it difficult for me to completely condemn this is the stated motivations of many of the men who brought their daughters to the ball. Being a good example themselves, for one. Showing their daughter they cherish her. Being an involved father.

These are all things I can get behind, and I believe the studies that say having a close relationship with their fathers can keep girls away from too-early sexual activity and teen pregnancy. I have always been close with my own dad, and I know that helped me make some smarter choices than I would have otherwise.

But the "daughter's sexuality as father's commodity" troubles me. I'd think the last thing a young girl struggling with issues of sexual maturity would need is the idea that she loses her father's esteem along with her virginity. Or that her main value to her father is remaining "sexually pure."