{"id":28846,"date":"2015-08-03T10:55:23","date_gmt":"2015-08-03T14:55:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/?p=28846"},"modified":"2015-08-03T10:55:23","modified_gmt":"2015-08-03T14:55:23","slug":"it-breaks-my-heart-to-hear-you-talkin-this-way","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2015\/08\/03\/it-breaks-my-heart-to-hear-you-talkin-this-way\/","title":{"rendered":"It breaks my heart to hear you talkin’ this way"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\u2022 Here\u2019s an example of what I was trying to say in my recent post rambling about the language of souls<\/a>. For all the Platonic, Augustinian, revivalist baggage of body-soul dualism and all the many ways that misleads and confuses us, soul-talk is still important, I think, because we need to be able to talk about that thing that Dr. William J. Lewinski sold and now lacks<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u2022 Danny Coleman<\/a>: \u201cBy far the most pernicious piece of baggage collected from my decades as a religious fundamentalist was a form of cynicism that saw everything in exclusionary terms. Anything new or unfamiliar was to be distrusted.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the word \u201ccynicism\u201d that leaps out at me there. I hadn\u2019t applied that term to the fundie \u201cworldview\u201d before, but Coleman\u2019s right \u2014 that\u2019s exactly what it is. And now I need to think on that a bit.<\/p>\n

\u2022 Here\u2019s an example of fundamentalist cynicism in action: \u201cEvangelical college cancels student health insurance plan over birth control misinformation<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wheaton College used to provide health insurance that included contraception coverage. Then the Affordable Care Act set standards for minimal coverage that included contraception as a requirement, at which point Wheaton decided that continuing to do so was morally unacceptable because baby-killing sluts can never be trusted. (Call this Exhibit D.)<\/p>\n

So now Wheaton is screwing over its students to grandstand over an explicitly dishonest anti-contraception, anti-healthcare political lie. Yeah, that\u2019s pretty cynical. And deeply, perversely immoral.<\/p>\n

At issue, mainly, is coverage of IUDs and morning-after pills, which some religious groups view as a form of abortion \u2014 and which, by the way, are not. Two years ago, George Washington University health policy professor Susan Wood made it clear when speaking to NPR, \u201cIt is not only factually incorrect, it is downright misleading. These products are not abortifacients. And their only connection to abortion is that they can prevent the need for one.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

For just $32,950 a year, you can study biology at Wheaton College. That\u2019s a lot of money to study biology at a school that trumpets its rejection of the science of biology.<\/p>\n

Studying biology at Wheaton makes about as much sense as studying medicine with the Catholic bishops of Kenya<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u2022 Samantha Field has a spiffy new website<\/a>, which everyone should be bookmarking or subscribing to or doing whatever it is that people do nowadays with the blogs they follow.<\/p>\n

\u2022 We are not alone.<\/em> UFO enthusiasts and Peretti-literalist \u201cspiritual warfare\u201d Christians agree on that much. But the latter group thinks this photo shows demon toys from Hell.<\/p>\n

\"Roswell\"<\/a><\/p>\n

That\u2019s a Roswell, New Mexico, gift shop. The photo by Jordan Teicher is from Arielle Milkman\u2019s terrific TPM piece, \u201cJesus vs. Aliens: The Culture War Raging in the UFO Capital of the World<\/a>.\u201d Milkman discusses:<\/p>\n

\u2026\u00a0the identity crisis besieging Roswell almost seven decades after its famous UFO sighting. It\u2019s a microcosmic culture war in which competing believers \u2014 of extraterrestrial identity, of Christian theology, of the holy church of the American dollar \u2014 proselytize their own mutually exclusive notions of reality.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u201cRoswell is a place where a city council member says grace even to open the annual UFO festival,\u201d she writes, introducing us to a host of fascinating characters \u2014 true believers of every sort, including Guy Malone, a kind of born-again Max Fenig.<\/span><\/p>\n

Malone might find a kindred spirit in Timothy Dailey, author of The Paranormal Conspiracy: The Truth About Ghosts, Aliens and Mysterious Beings.<\/em> Spoiler alert: It\u2019s all Satan, Dailey says.<\/p>\n

James McGrath reviews Dailey\u2019s book and is unpersuaded<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\u2026 the existence of demons and their involvement in these phenomena is not something that Dailey demonstrates, but merely something that he assumes. And there is no need to read an approximately 200-page book in order to\u00a0learn that someone asserts that these things have a demonic origin.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It takes a very particular kind of faith to be able to write a book about ghosts, aliens and mysterious beings that turns out to be boring<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\u2022 \u201cHe played a bad guy, but he was a good guy.\u201d RIP Rowdy Roddy Piper<\/a>,\u00a0legendary pro-wrestling heel and star of They Live.<\/em> If you haven\u2019t seen They Live,<\/em> go watch it. You\u2019ll thank me later.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Why studying biology with the anti-science cynics of Wheaton College makes as much sense as studying medicine with the anti-vaxxer Catholic bishops of Kenya. Plus: Devils and aliens in Roswell and in print; what it looks like when you sell your soul; and a wrestling legend runs out of chewing gum for the last time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":141,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[28,29,132],"class_list":["post-28846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-religious-right","tag-satanic-baby-killers","tag-they-are-coming-for-your-birth-control"],"yoast_head":"\nIt breaks my heart to hear you talkin' this way<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Why studying biology with the anti-science cynics of Wheaton College makes as much sense as studying medicine with the anti-vaxxer Catholic bishops of Kenya. 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A former managing editor of Prism magazine, Fred worked in the parachurch nonprofit world for a decade and then for a decade in the newspaper biz. He began blogging in 2002. In 2003 he began writing a review of the best-selling Left Behind series. Eight years later he still hasn\u2019t finished reviewing the second book of that series and the experience has left him a broken shell of a man. Fred knows the difference between the possessive \u201cits\u201d and the contraction \u201cit\u2019s,\u201d and he is acutely bothered when others mistakenly confuse the two, yet he himself just kind of instinctively types the apostrophe whether or not it belongs there. Some feel this is his greatest hypocrisy, but those who know him better know better. He\u2019s guilty of much greater hypocrisies. Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. You can reach him via email at slacktivist at hotmail dot com.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/author\/fredclark1\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"It breaks my heart to hear you talkin' this way","description":"Why studying biology with the anti-science cynics of Wheaton College makes as much sense as studying medicine with the anti-vaxxer Catholic bishops of Kenya. 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A former managing editor of Prism magazine, Fred worked in the parachurch nonprofit world for a decade and then for a decade in the newspaper biz. He began blogging in 2002. In 2003 he began writing a review of the best-selling Left Behind series. Eight years later he still hasn\u2019t finished reviewing the second book of that series and the experience has left him a broken shell of a man. Fred knows the difference between the possessive \u201cits\u201d and the contraction \u201cit\u2019s,\u201d and he is acutely bothered when others mistakenly confuse the two, yet he himself just kind of instinctively types the apostrophe whether or not it belongs there. Some feel this is his greatest hypocrisy, but those who know him better know better. He\u2019s guilty of much greater hypocrisies. Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. You can reach him via email at slacktivist at hotmail dot com.","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/author\/fredclark1\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/141"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28846"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28846\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}