{"id":8908,"date":"2016-09-28T13:53:46","date_gmt":"2016-09-28T17:53:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/?p=8908"},"modified":"2016-12-28T18:26:14","modified_gmt":"2016-12-28T22:26:14","slug":"debate-on-body-piercings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2016\/09\/debate-on-body-piercings.html","title":{"rendered":"Debate on Body Piercings"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"Piercings\"<\/p>\n

Photograph by Sara Marx, from Leipzig, Germany (4-7-07)<\/span> [Wikimedia Commons <\/a>\/\u00a0 Creative Commons<\/a> Attribution 2.0 Generic<\/a> license]<\/p>\n

*****<\/p>\n

This took place\u00a0on my public Facebook page, with a meme that I put up. It stated: \u201cLip rings do not make you more attractive. They make you look like a fish that got away.\u201d Someone (just one person on the thread) quickly objected to that. Her words will be in blue<\/span>.<\/p>\n

*****<\/p>\n

Being a jerk does not make you look good. It makes you look like a self righteous moron with nothing better to do with your time than to point out things that are literally none of your business\u2026. if you don\u2019t like the look of a lip ring don\u2019t get one\u2026 funny how that works, without need of putting down those that have one.<\/span><\/p>\n

I agree! Being a jerk does not make you look good. It makes you look like a defensive, hyper-sensitive, thin-skinned person with nothing better to do with your time than object to the free speech rights of someone else to express their objection to something that you like.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

If you don\u2019t like my right to express my opinion, then don\u2019t read it. I don\u2019t agree with your opinion, either, but I\u2019m happy to host it here, and to host your blast against me. Funny how no one can disagree with anyone anymore without it being taken personally. No need to put down someone who dares to disagree with your opinion.<\/p>\n

You have the perfect right to think it is attractive and to do that. We have the perfect right to think it is unattractive<\/em>. Sorry, but that\u2019s the nature of reality.<\/p>\n

So calling someone an animal is perfectly fine but calling out that fact isn\u2019t? \u2026and a \u201cproper\u201d nose ring? Is that to be worn with \u201cproper\u201d clothing? As chosen by my husband I presume?<\/span><\/p>\n

So calling someone a \u201cself righteous moron\u201d<\/span> is perfectly fine but calling out that fact and upholding free speech and the \u201cright\u201d of folks to object on one\u2019s Facebook page isn\u2019t<\/em>?<\/p>\n

Better than calling someone an animal for an aesthetic choice\u2026 I called you a moron for being unattractive on the inside\u2026 you know where it actually matters.<\/span><\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t calling someone an animal. It was a tongue-in-cheek humorous observation (\u201clook like a fish\u201d). We understand that you don\u2019t care for the humor or the opinion. That\u2019s your right, just as it is mine to express my opinion through the meme.<\/p>\n

Sense of humor is about as extinct today as tolerance is.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m glad you brought up the question of \u201caesthetic choice.\u201d<\/span> Aesthetics is, of course, a very subjective<\/em> thing. If you think these piercings are attractive, on an aesthetic basis<\/em>, by the same token, another person can have the opposite<\/em> opinion, just as there are some who love the music of Wagner (yours truly) and others who detest it with equal vigor.<\/p>\n

You don\u2019t know what I am like on the inside. That is a judgment of my heart, which is definitely condemned in Scripture as very wrong.<\/p>\n

I made an aesthetic judgment, which is perfectly acceptable, precisely because it is subjective by nature. You judged my heart and claimed that I \u201clook like a self righteous moron.\u201d I think Christians and other fair-minded individuals can grasp the huge difference there.<\/p>\n

See the article, \u201cAesthetic Judgment\u201d <\/a>from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy<\/em>. Excerpt (my italics):<\/p>\n

The first necessary condition<\/em> of a judgment of taste is that it is essentially subjective<\/em>. What this means is that the judgment of taste is based on a feeling of pleasure or displeasure<\/em>. It is this that distinguishes a judgment of taste from an empirical judgment. Central examples of judgments of taste are judgments of beauty and ugliness<\/em>. (Judgments of taste can be about art or nature.)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Granted, you did say that I \u201clook like<\/em> a self righteous moron\u201d<\/span> so it was qualified a bit on your end, too (though you didn\u2019t qualify \u201cjerk\u201d<\/span>).<\/p>\n

The difference is that my observation is a humorous one about aesthetics, whereas yours is dead serious and uttered with seeming contempt (you are free to deny that in fact you do not feel contempt towards me as a person).<\/p>\n

I have no contempt towards you as person but rather that people believe they can judge someone based on a small piece of metal in their lip\u2026. there is no reason for it\u2026. tongue and cheek or not.. it would be considered obscene if someone said such a thing about grey hair or a ponytail\u2026. but go ahead and pick on a piercing .. it\u2019s down right tiring and heaven forbid anyone speak up on behalf of those with piercings or tatoos \u2026.. not like we are \u201cgood citizens\u201d or anything.<\/span><\/p>\n

Again, you are incorrect in stating that I have judged you<\/em>. I have no opinion about you at all, except for that you seem overly sensitive (based directly on how you are acting here). I only made a judgment on the piercings, as unattractive.<\/p>\n

This gets back to my earlier point about so many people today taking any criticism personally<\/em>. Everything is personal. Something you do, that others may disagree with, is not you<\/em><\/strong>. You do<\/em>\u00a0the thing, or have the opinion<\/em>, etc. There is a distinction between you<\/em> and the thing<\/em>.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t care if anyone\u00a0pokes fun at grey hair (which I have) or a bald head (which I do not). People have been doing so for centuries, and it is understood as humor, having to do with aging, just as there are plenty of jokes about beer bellies or wrinkles or sagging so-and-so\u2019s. The healthy thing is to laugh about it, and engage in self-deprecating humor, because all of us will experience one or more of these things as we get older. But those are natural things, and the process of aging, whereas piercings are not (so it\u2019s not a particularly relevant analogy).<\/p>\n

You are free to make your aesthetic argument for piercings, just as I am to make arguments against it. I have, in fact, engaged in extensive prior debate about tattoos. I didn\u2019t judge those people who took the other side in that debate, either. I simply disagreed with them. That\u2019s how subjective arguments about the aesthetics of beauty are, by nature. Folks disagree.<\/p>\n

Or is it your opinion that no one could possibly<\/em> disagree with the notion that piercings are beautiful? All must<\/em>\u00a0agree with you<\/em>, on pain of being called a \u201cself righteous moron\u201d<\/span> if they do not<\/em>?<\/p>\n

Judging someone\u2019s soul is not a mere joke about aesthetics, but what you wrote about the \u201cdrug dealer downstairs\u201d<\/span> on your Facebook page ten days ago, ending with this gem: \u201cI also would like you to know there is a very special circle in hell for people like you.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

That <\/em><\/strong>is judgment, big-time.\u00a0Mere opinions about body piercings are aesthetic opinions: by nature subjective, and thus, inevitably matters of perfectly legitimate differences of opinion.<\/p>\n

I can see how the meme would offend someone, but I can\u2019t see how all this follows that you claim follows, based on the posting\u00a0of it.<\/p>\n

*****<\/p>\n

Meta Description:\u00a0Can one personally dislike body piercings? I say yes; my opponent seems to think that one cannot do so without being a \u201cjerk\u201d etc.<\/p>\n

Meta Keywords:\u00a0body piercings, piercings, tattoos, aesthetics, aesthetic judgment, artistic judgment, beauty, beautiful, free speech, subjectivism, sensitivity, personal opinions, thin-skinned, hyper-sensitivity, postmodernism<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Photograph by Sara Marx, from Leipzig, Germany (4-7-07) [Wikimedia Commons \/\u00a0 Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license] ***** This took place\u00a0on my public Facebook page, with a meme that I put up. It stated: \u201cLip rings do not make you more attractive. They make you look like a fish that got away.\u201d Someone (just one […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2331,"featured_media":8909,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[289],"tags":[3311,934,3312,3313,526,3308,1707,3317,3315,3309,1566,3314,546,3310,3316],"class_list":["post-8908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-political-ethical-moral-issues","tag-aesthetic-judgment","tag-aesthetics","tag-artistic-judgment","tag-beautiful","tag-beauty","tag-body-piercings","tag-free-speech","tag-hyper-sensitivity","tag-personal-opinions","tag-piercings","tag-postmodernism","tag-sensitivity","tag-subjectivism","tag-tattoos","tag-thin-skinned"],"yoast_head":"\nDebate on Body Piercings<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Can one personally dislike body piercings? 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Chesterton\\\" (Saint Benedict Press \/ TAN Books: 2009). \\\"100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura\\\" was published by Catholic Answers in May 2012. His \\\"Quotable Wesley\\\" compilation was published by (Protestant \/ Wesleyan publisher) Beacon Hill Press in April 2014. Several of his 49 books are bestsellers in their field. Dave maintains a popular personal Facebook page, a Facebook author page, and has a Twitter account as well. He offers almost all of his books in e-book form on his own Biblical Catholicism site (http:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/), at a permanent deep discount: only $2.99 for ePub, mobi, and AZW, and $1.99 for PDF. His writing has been enthusiastically endorsed or recommended by many leading Catholic apologists, authors, and priests, including Dr. Scott Hahn, Fr. Peter M. J. Stravinskas, Marcus Grodi, Patrick Madrid, Steve Ray, Tim Staples, Devin Rose, Mike Aquilina, Al Kresta, Karl Keating, Fr. Dwight Longenecker, Brandon Vogt, Marcellino D'Ambrosio, and Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave has been happily married to his wife Judy since October 1984. They have three sons and a daughter, and reside in southeast Michigan (metro Detroit).\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/\",\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/dave.armstrong.798\",\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@LuxVeritatisApologetics\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/author\/davearmstrong\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Debate on Body Piercings","description":"Can one personally dislike body piercings? 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Formerly a campus missionary, as a Protestant, Dave was received into the Catholic Church in February 1991, by the late, well-known catechist and theologian, Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave\u2019s articles have appeared in many influential Catholic periodicals, including \"This Rock\" (now called \"Catholic Answers Magazine\"), \"Envoy Magazine\" (Patrick Madrid), \"The Catholic Answer,\" \"The Coming Home Journal,\" \"Gilbert Magazine\" (American Chesterton Society), and \"The Latin Mass.\" He also writes a featured column for every issue of \"The Michigan Catholic\": published by the archdiocese of Detroit, and was editor for most of the apologetics tracts published by the St. Paul Street Evangelization apostolate. Dave\u2019s apologetics and writing apostolate was the subject of a feature article in the May 2002 issue of \"Envoy Magazine.\" He served as the staff moderator at the Internet discussion forum for The Coming Home Network, from 2007-2010. Dave has been interviewed on many nationally syndicated Catholic radio shows, including \"Catholic Answers Live\" (twice), \"Faith and Family Live\" (Steve Wood), \"Kresta in the Afternoon,\" \"Son Rise Morning Show,\" \"Catholic Connection\" (Teresa Tomeo), and \"The Catholics Next Door.\" His large and popular website, \"Biblical Evidence for Catholicism,\" was online from March 1997 to March 2007, and received the 1998 Catholic Website of the Year award from \"Envoy Magazine.\" His blog of the same name (now transferred to Patheos), begun in February 2004, contains more than 1,500 papers, at least 500 debates or dialogues, and over 50 distinct \"index\" web pages. Unsolicited correspondence has indicated many hundreds of conversions (or returns) to the Catholic faith as a result, by God's grace, of these writings. Dave's conversion story was published in the bestselling book \"Surprised by Truth\" (edited by Patrick Madrid; San Diego: Basilica Press, 1994). Sophia Institute Press has published six of his books: \"A Biblical Defense of Catholicism\" (Foreword by Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J., 1996 \/ 2003), \"The Catholic Verses\" (2004), \"The One-Minute Apologist\" (2007), \"Bible Proofs for Catholic Truths\" (2009), \"The Quotable Newman\" (editor: 2012), and \"Proving the Catholic Faith is Biblical\" (2015). He is co-author (with Dr. Paul Thigpen) of the inserts for \"The New Catholic Answer Bible\" (Our Sunday Visitor: 2005), and editor for \"The Wisdom of Mr. Chesterton: The Very Best Quotes, Quips, and Cracks from the Pen of G. K. Chesterton\" (Saint Benedict Press \/ TAN Books: 2009). \"100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura\" was published by Catholic Answers in May 2012. His \"Quotable Wesley\" compilation was published by (Protestant \/ Wesleyan publisher) Beacon Hill Press in April 2014. Several of his 49 books are bestsellers in their field. Dave maintains a popular personal Facebook page, a Facebook author page, and has a Twitter account as well. He offers almost all of his books in e-book form on his own Biblical Catholicism site (http:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/), at a permanent deep discount: only $2.99 for ePub, mobi, and AZW, and $1.99 for PDF. His writing has been enthusiastically endorsed or recommended by many leading Catholic apologists, authors, and priests, including Dr. Scott Hahn, Fr. Peter M. J. Stravinskas, Marcus Grodi, Patrick Madrid, Steve Ray, Tim Staples, Devin Rose, Mike Aquilina, Al Kresta, Karl Keating, Fr. Dwight Longenecker, Brandon Vogt, Marcellino D'Ambrosio, and Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave has been happily married to his wife Judy since October 1984. They have three sons and a daughter, and reside in southeast Michigan (metro Detroit).","sameAs":["https:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/","https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/dave.armstrong.798","https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@LuxVeritatisApologetics"],"url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/author\/davearmstrong"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2331"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8908"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8908\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8909"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}