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Interesting Reading in the Interweb Tubes
- The Bible: So Misunderstood It’s a Sin (“The Bible is not the book many American fundamentalists and political opportunists think it is, or more precisely, what they want it to be. Their lack of knowledge about the Bible is well established.”)
- The Folly of Mars (“A half-century after the conclusion of the Apollo mission, we have entered a new age of space fantasy—one with Mars as its ruling hallucination.”)
- Christmas Isn’t Just For Extroverts (“Allow your loved introvert to sit alone and quiet sometimes, give them the gift of leaving the gathering early, and know that we are relating to you in significant ways even when we are reading a book. In fact, especially when we are reading a book.”)
- The giants of rock are leaving the stage: their music never will (“Be in no doubt: as they go, these people take an entire culture with them[.]”)
Bookish Linkage
Nonbookish Linkage
What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness.
George Saunders, May 11, 2013
For whatever reason, I happened to check today and this will mark the 10th time my annual Christmas Eve post appears on the blog. I do it because I think it’s just one reflection on the fact that, to modify what we tell kids in a Christmas song, we need a reason or a season to be good for goodness’ sake. So, once again, my favorite part of Jackson Browne’s “The Rebel Jesus“:
- And once a year when Christmas comes
We give to our relations
And perhaps we give a little to the poor
If the generosity should seize us
But if any one of us should interfere
In the business of why there are poor
They get the same as the rebel Jesus
But pardon me if I have seemed
To take the tone of judgment
For I’ve no wish to come between
This day and your enjoyment
In a life of hardship and of earthly toil
We have need for anything that frees us
So I bid you pleasure
And I bid you cheer
From a heathen and a pagan
On the side of the rebel Jesus
A very merry Christmas
And a happy New Year
Let’s hope it’s a good one
Without any fear
“Happy Xmas (War is Over),” John Lennon
Interesting Reading in the Interweb Tubes
- 8 Ways Facebook Is a Cult Like Scientology (“… social media company basically owns us, and has access to all our most personal information. Yet we are willing participants in this pillaging of our private lives.”)
- The Endlessly Examined Life (“Universal financial security is probably the single best countermeasure to the depression epidemic.”)
Blog Headline of the Week
Most Disappointing Blog Headline of the Week
Bookish Linkage
Nonbookish Linkage
I’m not much but I’m all I have.
Philip K. Dick, Martian Time-Slip
I learned through South DaCola that the City of Sioux Falls received a singular “honor.” It was acknowledged by the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty for getting “right” the “Happy birthday, Jesus” and “Jesus Christ” messages painted on city snowplows. I don’t view it as much of an honor.
First, consider who’s giving the award. Although it has been involved in litigation on behalf of other faiths, the Becket Fund has been described as a “nerve center of the conservative ‘religious liberty’ campaign.” It brought the Hobby Lobby lawsuit, which I’ve already noted is problematic even if you ignore the concept of creating corporate religious rights. Becket also filed a brief in Town of Greece v. Galloway, where the Supreme Court essentially abandoned longstanding precedent to sanction local government opening meetings with religious prayers. It’s also argued for allowing ministers to use the pulpit to endorse or oppose political candidates and against challenges to the “under God’ phrase added to the Pledge of Allegiance in 1954.
Likewise, I don’t know that the mayor’s position that the snowplows wouldn’t be painted over unless “I get some Supreme Court case (that) says that I have to,” is anything to be proud of. I think there’s plenty of case law that raises serious question about whether this crosses the legal line, although I’ll give City Attorney Dave Pfeifle credit for some creative lawyering. But that doesn’t change or solve the legal issue. Moreover, you have to wonder how strong an advocate the mayor would be if there were snowplows painted with “Allahu Akbar,” “There Is No God,” “Hare Krishna,” or a Darwin fish. Or does anyone think the City would be issuing press releases if it had been praised by the Freedom From Religion Foundation or Americans United for Separation of Church and State?
At bottom, this isn’t about free speech vs. freedom of religion, theism vs. atheism or even schoolchildren expressing what they’ve been taught. This is the City bragging that it’s a poster child for a diehard group of activists who like City property being used to promote one religious viewpoint.
Man is not the only creature who kills for bread, or love, or power, because animals in the jungle do that in various ways, but he is the only creature who kills because of faith.
Hassan Blasim, The Corpse Exhibition: And Other Stories of Iraq
Interesting Reading in the Interweb Tubes
- Crazy in Love (“The duty of a crazy person’s friends and family is far more practical: Our duty is to appear, as much as possible, not crazy, so that our loved one will be allowed to live.”)
Bookish Linkage
- Evidently the Lord of the Rings trilogy is actually an espousal of a “profoundly conservative” political ideology
- Seems buying a bestseller doesn’t mean you’re willing to read it
- Interesting approach to call this year’s “best of” lists boring in your own “best of” list
- Thirteen ways to make sure you get books for Xmas
- What kind of reader are you?
Nonbookish Linkage
It is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World
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