My 21-year-old brother sent me links to www.sorryeverybody.com and www.yourewelcomeeverybody.com, and regarding the latter website, he observes:
It seems that conservatives are defensive.
I’m glad that you noticed that. I’ve noticed the same phenomenon with Christians. The way they whine and scream about some imaginary “attack on Christianity” you’d think that they didn’t make up 89% of the population or something. Like us bloody secularists are exorcising God from the culture. Are you kidding me? All we ask is that your specific Christian religion is not promoted by taxpayer dollars, in situations like prayer in publicly funded schools, the Ten Commandments in publicly funded courthouses, or nativity scenes on publicly funded property. You know, like your beloved supposedly-Christian Founding Fathers spelled out pretty plainly in the First Amendment. Other than that, praise Jesus anywhere and everywhere you want to; that’s in the First Amendment, too.
I think they don’t even realize how pervasive Christianity is in our culture. Everywhere I go there’s massive McChurches and huge-ass crosses, not a single one of them paying any taxes. Boise’s skyline is dominated by a big lighted cross. There are at least four overtly Christian cable networks on my basic cable, maybe three more that are pseudo-Christian (PAX, Hallmark), and nine Christian radio stations on the AM/FM dial. Every hotel room I’ve ever stayed in has a Bible in the nightstand drawer. There’s blank audio or a bleep in my TV shows whenever someone says “god damn” or “Jesus Christ” as a swear word. At Christmas, loudspeakers in every shopping area blare such songs as “Silent Night”, “We Three Kings”, “Oh Come All Ye Faithful” and a litany of other purely religious Christmas hymns. There’s a freaking federal holiday for the birth of your Savior! (I don’t see the banks closing for Hanukkah or Mohammed’s or Buddha’s birthday.) Spring break is timed to match the resurrection of your Savior. All our money says “In God We Trust”. Most of our federal and state Congresses open session with an invocation. We usually swear to God in court on a Bible. Every politician pays at least lip service to belief in God. One of the best selling fiction series these days is about the Rapture. There are little Jesus fishes or Calvin-and-Hobbes copyright infringements bowing at a cross on every fourth SUV I see. Man, it must hurt to belong to such a marginalized group in our society!
Same thing goes for the conservatives. They’ve got the presidency, the Congress, the Supreme Court, most of the Federal Courts, most of the governorships, and most of the state legislatures. Their talk radio hosts and newspaper columnists dominate the media. Their companies own most of the TV stations, radio stations, and newspapers, as well as controlling 60% of the vote counting machines. They even have their own television news network. They’ve won all but three of the past ten presidential elections. They control most of the boardrooms of most of the corporations and control most of the wealth. And yet, when you talk with them, they all fear the bogeyman of the “liberal media” and act as if they are a besieged minority.
They kinda remind me of the ignorant crackers in college who bitch because there’s a “Black Student Union” but no “White Student Union” and there’s traditionally black colleges (like Howard) but no traditionally white colleges. Bah! There is a white student union and a white college, it’s called “damn near every college in the country”!
Don’t think for a second this is an accident. Christians and Conservatives are indoctrinated into the idea that they are under siege and must fight to reclaim the legacy of “the good ol’ days” (you remember, when women stayed in the kitchen and there were “colored” drinking fountains and poor people knew their place.) This is how they motivate their troops. For who would show up to fight for total dominance if they believed they had already achieved partial dominance?
We’re pretty split these days. I like it. At least people have sides these days, even though our parties don’t.
Sure they do! There’s Ruthless Corporate Whores and Not-So-Ruthless Corporate Whores. How much clearer could it be?
“Radical” Russ — www.choosetheblue.com is good, too…
