{"id":67025,"date":"2024-04-29T16:34:26","date_gmt":"2024-04-29T20:34:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/?p=67025"},"modified":"2024-04-29T16:34:26","modified_gmt":"2024-04-29T20:34:26","slug":"dirty-jokes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/04\/29\/dirty-jokes\/","title":{"rendered":"Dirty jokes"},"content":{"rendered":"<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC \"-\/\/W3C\/\/DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional\/\/EN\" \"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/TR\/REC-html40\/loose.dtd\">\n<html><head><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><\/head><body><p>\u2022 My wife needed a laugh last weekend, so we wound up re-watching <a href=\"https:\/\/www.imdb.com\/title\/tt0436078\/?ref_=ttfc_fc_tt\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\"><em>The Aristocrats,<\/em><\/a> the documentary in which nearly 100 comedians retell, discuss, and riff on one old, filthy joke. The joke is still a bit of an anticlimactic dud. The documentary is still just as funny \u2014 and as filthy \u2014 as it was when we watched it soon after it first came out in 2005.<\/p>\n<p>But there\u2019s also a touch of sadness when watching this film now. A <em>lot<\/em> of the very funny people interviewed in that movie are no longer living. It\u2019s not just the elder generation of comics who appeared in the film to represent the ancient history of that craft. It isn\u2019t surprising to realize that folks like Shelley Berman and Larry Storch and Don Rickles and Phyllis Diller are no longer with us \u2014 it was surprising they were all still around in 2005. But there are so many others as well: George Carlin, David Brenner, Robin Williams, Bob Saget, Gilbert Gottfried, Carrie Fisher, Richard Lewis, Fred Willard, Dick Smothers, Rip Taylor, Tim Conway \u2026<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-67085\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/52\/2024\/04\/s-l960-196x300.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"250\" height=\"383\">I mean, geez, at some point you start to feel like you\u2019re watching the <em>In Memoriam<\/em> reel at the Friar\u2019s Club.<\/p>\n<p>I suspect this is a big part of the current, extremely unfunny crankiness among aging comedians fretting about \u201ccancel culture.\u201d Their worries about this don\u2019t really stem from a threat of censorship or censoriousness, but from the inevitable fact of their own mortality.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cKids these days are too uptight\u201d is really just an unsuccessful way of grappling with the fact that kids these days will still be alive in 20 or 30 years and you probably won\u2019t be.<\/p>\n<p>(I think these comics\u2019 thoughts about \u201ccancel culture\u201d are also driven, in part, by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eschatonblog.com\/2024\/04\/such-competence.html\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">what Atrios describes here<\/a>: \u201cIt\u2019s the behavior of the people in charge that matters, not that of the students. It\u2019s the latter that other powerful people (New York Times editors and pundits) obsess about, because they are mad at their own children for hating them.\u201d)<\/p>\n<p>Paul Provenza\u2019s ribald documentary doesn\u2019t really get into this, but I think jokes like \u201cThe Aristocrats\u201d can help us to understand what the \u201ccancel culture\u201d panic misunderstands. This is a joke that involves gleefully imagining the violation of as many taboos as possible \u2014 moral, sexual, hygienic, <em>whatever<\/em>. And in doing so, it reiterates that such taboos are, in fact, taboo \u2014 that they are things we all agree and all <em>ought to<\/em> agree are repugnant and immoral. The joke doesn\u2019t work otherwise.<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 Speaking of dirty jokes \u2026 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.christianpost.com\/news\/megachurch-pastor-apologizes-for-viral-wedding-night-joke.html\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Texas mega-church pastor Josh Howerton threw himself into hot water by telling a gross joke from the pulpit one Sunday morning<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Howerton\u2019s \u201cwedding night\u201d joke bombed with some folks in his congregation because it was horrifically misogynist and creepy, and it bombed with some other folks there because they find any mention of wedding nights and Honeymoons too naughty to be joked about or mentioned in church.<\/p>\n<p>It didn\u2019t help that Howerton\u2019s initial response was to defend his joke by arguing that his critics were ignoring the elegant parallelism of its set-up, testily reminding everyone that it wasn\u2019t merely a joke involving creepy, demeaning stereotypes of women but also a joke involving creepy, demeaning stereotypes of <em>men<\/em>. He complained that his \u201cjust a joke\u201d was described by others as his \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/baptistnews.com\/article\/pastors-wedding-night-advice-to-women-opens-a-conversation-on-harmful-evangelical-teaching-on-sex\/\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">his wedding-night advice to women<\/a>,\u201d just because he framed the joke as, um, his wedding-night advice to women.<\/p>\n<p>It also didn\u2019t help that his eventual \u201capology\u201d for telling such a joke from the pulpit seems to have been borrowed, nearly verbatim, from the apology a different pastor offered after telling a different misogynist joke from the pulpit. I don\u2019t think it\u2019s accurate to describe that as \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.huffpost.com\/entry\/megachurch-pastor-responds-to-accusation-that-he-plagiarized-apology-for-sexist-joke_n_662127a3e4b0868a1b8ff9de\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">plagiarism.<\/a>\u201d I think it\u2019s worse than that \u2014 a work-shopped PR statement developed as a kind of best-practices boilerplate for mega-church pastors who like to tell jokes expressing their disdain for women.<\/p>\n<p>If there was any plagiarism here, it was the joke itself, which I\u2019m guessing was stolen from some mid-20th century comic from back in the era when \u201cmen are like <em>this,<\/em> but women are like <em>this<\/em>\u201d gags were cutting-edge. Jokes like that were always based on crude, sexist stereotypes that now seem more dated than Rickles\u2019 act.<\/p>\n<p>The stereotype here \u2014 and the joke in its simplest form \u2014 is this: Women dream about their wedding <em>day<\/em> while men dream about their wedding <em>night<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>If Howerton had just offered that bare-bones version of the joke he\u2019d probably have gotten in less trouble, although even in that skeletal form it still contains all the implicit misogyny \u2014 the dismissal of women\u2019s concerns and women themselves as silly, frilly nonsense, the idea that only men care about sex and that wives are obliged to provide it, etc. Yes, even that spare version of this \u201cjoke\u201d reinforces the worst aspects of purity culture and offers a recipe for unhappy marriages and unpleasant sex lives, but if the congregation had needed to tease out all of those meanings themselves they might have been less upset with Pastor Josh for spelling it out explicitly.<\/p>\n<p>But that\u2019s what he chose to do \u2014 spelling it out explicitly and highlighting the creepiest aspects of the \u201cjoke.\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/baptistnews.com\/article\/pastors-wedding-night-advice-to-women-opens-a-conversation-on-harmful-evangelical-teaching-on-sex\/\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Here\u2019s how he told it<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>This is a gold nugget of advice I was given by a mentor. \u2026 Guys, when it comes to her wedding day, she has been planning this day her entire life. She got her first like wedding magazine when she was 14. She draped the blanket around her like it was her wedding dress when she was a teenager. She did the towel over her head. It was a little veil. All the stuff. She\u2019s been planning this day her whole life. So here\u2019s what you need to do, man. When it comes to that day, just stand where she tells you to stand, wear what she tells you to wear, and do what she tells you to do. You\u2019ll make her the happiest woman in the world.<\/p>\n<p>Now ladies, when you get to his wedding night, he\u2019s been planning this night his whole life. So what you need to do is stand where he tells you to stand, wear what he tells you to wear, and do what he tells you to do. You\u2019re gonna make him the happiest man in the world.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Yeah, there\u2019s a <em>lot<\/em> to unpack there. Shelves of books could be written about all that\u2019s askew with that and the harm that men, women, and marriages would suffer if people followed this \u201cjoking\u201d advice.<\/p>\n<p>But maybe we should give Pastor Josh a break. After all, pastors spend their whole lives dreaming about the day they\u2019ll get to stand in the pulpit and police other people\u2019s performance of constructed gender expectations. So when that day comes, we should just stand where the pastor tells us to stand, do what he tells you to do \u2026<\/p>\n<p>Let me start again.<\/p>\n<p>Howerton apparently tried to clean this up for his church audience. Again, I\u2019ve never heard the original version of this joke, but it clearly is designed to have a longer second half echoing that bit about how \u201cShe got her first wedding magazine when she was 14.\u201d While <em>she<\/em> was looking at her magazines and putting that <em>towel<\/em> over her head, <em>he<\/em> was looking at his magazines and putting a <em>sock<\/em>, etc., etc.<\/p>\n<p>I understand why a conservative Texas pastor would cut the masturbation jokes out of this bit before repeating it in church, but I also think this makes the joke even worse. It erases the one place this joke might have been potentially interesting or insightful.<\/p>\n<p>Jokes like this are fossils, dead artifacts from an earlier epoch. Fossils can teach us about how things have evolved. These hoary old jokes based on broad, shallow stereotypes reinforced those stereotypes (whether about gender, race, ethnicity, religion, etc.). But those jokes <em>based on<\/em> such stereotypes eventually gave way to jokes <em>about<\/em> those stereotypes \u2014 jokes that tried to challenge or dismantle them rather than to reinforce them.<\/p>\n<p>I can imagine attempting a version of this joke that tries to do that, but I think that version would need to be really, <em>really<\/em> filthy.<\/p>\n<p>It would probably have to be literally pornographic, since literal pornography is the commoditized form of what the joke alludes to with \u201che\u2019s been planning this night his whole life.\u201d So you\u2019d set that up in the first half of the joke with a bunch of graphically specific details from all those bridal magazines \u2014 details that might only be recognizable to people intimately familiar with such magazines \u2014 showing how they have shaped the form and content of young women\u2019s supposed \u201cwedding day\u201d fantasies. And then you\u2019d echo all of those, just as specifically and graphically, with details from the pornography that has shaped the form and content of young men\u2019s \u201cwedding night\u201d fantasies (and also, apparently, of not-so-young pastors\u2019 \u201cmarriage night\u201d fantasies).<\/p>\n<p>But even that would only deconstruct one of the myriad toxic aspects of Howerton\u2019s version of this joke. You\u2019d still need a dozen or so other variations of it to begin to adequately unpack and interrogate just the top-layer of awfulness of this thing, and almost none of them would be remotely appropriate for church.\u00a0Plus, as we learned from <em>Chappelle\u2019s Show,<\/em> deconstructing harmful stereotypes with jokes still sometimes winds up reinforcing those stereotypes for a portion of the audience\/congregation.<\/p>\n<p>Howerton\u2019s Lakepointe Church in Rockwall, Texas, is \u201ccomplementarian,\u201d meaning it teaches that women cannot have leadership roles in the church and that wives must \u201csubmit to\u201d their husbands. Lakepointe is also a white evangelical and Southern Baptist Church, meaning it teaches that the central non-negotiable doctrine of the faith is that women cannot be trusted and laws must be passed to police every aspect of them conceiving and bearing children.<\/p>\n<p>Look, I\u2019m not saying I <em>hate<\/em> complementarians and evangelicals. But, you know, I wouldn\u2019t want my daughter to marry one.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Texas pastor would&#8217;ve been better off retelling &#8220;The Aristocrats!&#8221; from the pulpit instead of the gross joke he actually told.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":141,"featured_media":67085,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-67025","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Dirty jokes<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A Texas pastor would&#039;ve been better off retelling &quot;The Aristocrats!&quot; from the pulpit instead of the gross joke he actually told.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/04\/29\/dirty-jokes\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Dirty jokes\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"A Texas pastor would&#039;ve been better off retelling &quot;The Aristocrats!&quot; from the pulpit instead of the gross joke he actually told.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/04\/29\/dirty-jokes\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"slacktivist\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2024-04-29T20:34:26+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/52\/2024\/04\/s-l960.jpeg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"326\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"500\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Fred Clark\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Fred Clark\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"7 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/04\/29\/dirty-jokes\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/04\/29\/dirty-jokes\/\",\"name\":\"Dirty jokes\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2024-04-29T20:34:26+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-04-29T20:34:26+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/32666545e535b697afb93d9848dcfc47\"},\"description\":\"A Texas pastor would've been better off retelling \\\"The Aristocrats!\\\" from the pulpit instead of the gross joke he actually told.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/04\/29\/dirty-jokes\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/04\/29\/dirty-jokes\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/04\/29\/dirty-jokes\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Dirty jokes\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/\",\"name\":\"slacktivist\",\"description\":\"&quot;Test everything; hold fast to what is good.&quot;\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/32666545e535b697afb93d9848dcfc47\",\"name\":\"Fred Clark\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7083ccd514d4fb8d5043041756d766a0?s=96&d=identicon&r=pg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7083ccd514d4fb8d5043041756d766a0?s=96&d=identicon&r=pg\",\"caption\":\"Fred Clark\"},\"description\":\"Fred Clark is a graduate of Eastern Baptist Theological Seminary (now called Palmer Seminary), of Eastern College (now called Eastern University) and of the fundamentalist Timothy Christian High School (still fundamentalist and still called Timothy Christian High School, but not really thrilled to have a snarky, liberal, tree-hugging, pro-choice, pro-GLBT, peacenik, commie, evolutionist as such a vocal alumnus). 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":"Dirty jokes","description":"A Texas pastor would've been better off retelling \"The Aristocrats!\" from the pulpit instead of the gross joke he actually told.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/04\/29\/dirty-jokes\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Dirty jokes","og_description":"A Texas pastor would've been better off retelling \"The Aristocrats!\" from the pulpit instead of the gross joke he actually told.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/04\/29\/dirty-jokes\/","og_site_name":"slacktivist","article_published_time":"2024-04-29T20:34:26+00:00","og_image":[{"width":326,"height":500,"url":"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/52\/2024\/04\/s-l960.jpeg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Fred Clark","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Fred Clark","Est. reading time":"7 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/04\/29\/dirty-jokes\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/04\/29\/dirty-jokes\/","name":"Dirty jokes","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#website"},"datePublished":"2024-04-29T20:34:26+00:00","dateModified":"2024-04-29T20:34:26+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/32666545e535b697afb93d9848dcfc47"},"description":"A Texas pastor would've been better off retelling \"The Aristocrats!\" from the pulpit instead of the gross joke he actually told.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/04\/29\/dirty-jokes\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/04\/29\/dirty-jokes\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2024\/04\/29\/dirty-jokes\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Dirty jokes"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/","name":"slacktivist","description":"&quot;Test everything; hold fast to what is good.&quot;","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/32666545e535b697afb93d9848dcfc47","name":"Fred Clark","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7083ccd514d4fb8d5043041756d766a0?s=96&d=identicon&r=pg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7083ccd514d4fb8d5043041756d766a0?s=96&d=identicon&r=pg","caption":"Fred Clark"},"description":"Fred Clark is a graduate of Eastern Baptist Theological Seminary (now called Palmer Seminary), of Eastern College (now called Eastern University) and of the fundamentalist Timothy Christian High School (still fundamentalist and still called Timothy Christian High School, but not really thrilled to have a snarky, liberal, tree-hugging, pro-choice, pro-GLBT, peacenik, commie, evolutionist as such a vocal alumnus). 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\/67025","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=67025"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67025\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/67085"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=67025"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=67025"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=67025"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}