0 comment Tuesday, November 4, 2014 | admin
I don't watch the celebrity and glamor-oriented TV programming, but it's impossible not to hear about these things in real life and of course in the blogosphere. So there's no escaping them, even for those who are TV abstainers.
I am not going to mention the names of the principals involved because that will only draw the attention of those people who are googling the names and leaving idiotic and abusive comments on blogs and forums on this subject. The people involved are the current Miss California and some 'celebrity' blogger who practices a certain politically correct sexual perversion. I am sure most of you know who I mean. If not, the story is here.
And Old Atlantic's blog entry on the story is here.
I don't usually have much to say about these celebrity stories, but several issues about which I do blog are wrapped up within this story.
First of all, the 'culture war', which, like every aspect of the left-right battle, has heated up since November, and this includes the question of free speech and freedom of thought vs. political correctness. Then there is the dishonest newsertainment media which are fomenting all the controversy around this. There is also the issue of the increasingly virulent anti-Christian, anti-traditional morality faction in this country, which sadly includes not only the left-libertines, but the secular/atheist libertines on the 'right'.
To add one more troubling ingredient, there is the glaring picture of a dumbed-down apostate ''Christianity' which is illustrated by the remarks made by several professing Christian celebrities regarding this story:
"Love is love!" Britney Tweeted... "People should be able to do whatever makes them happy!"
Miley Cyrus Tweeted similar thoughts ... "Jesus loves you and your partner and wants you to know how much he cares! That's like a daddy not loving his lil boy cuz he's gay and that is wrong and very sad! Like I said everyone deserves to be happy. I am a Christian and I love you � gay or not. Because you are no different that anyone else! We are all God's children!"
Apparently her comments are right in line with those of "Hills" star Heidi Montag, who is expected to marry the show's Spencer Pratt this weekend.
"God says in the bible that we should love our neighbor and he created us all as equals. I know in my heart that gays and lesbians should have the same government rights that Spencer and I will when we get married. So, yes, this blonde Christian believes in gay marriage and I hope to one day go to your wedding, Perez!!!"
Now, I am proud to say I don't know who Mzz Montag is, nor do I really want to know; I care only that she pretends to represent Christianity and wrongly cites the Bible in support of her libertine and oh-so-hip-and-postmodern views.
Miley Cyrus can be excused somewhat, as she is still a minor child who has evidently not had a good grounding in the Bible nor in Christian morality as set out in the Bible. I suppose having a parent in show-biz is also a definite handicap when it comes to having a good upbringing and sound values and morals. Still, she should know better, and I fear that many gullible and malleable young 'Christians' will follow her example and adopt similarly unsound viewpoints, if they haven't already absorbed them from the corrupt and ugly culture that passes as 'entertainment' in our day.
And I am not sure that the person to whom their comments were addressed will suddenly soften his views towards the Bible or Christians in general; I have encountered many such people in real life and they are perpetually embittered that there is a Bible which condemns their pet vice, and they hate the fact that anyone reminds them of that fact. Ergo they hate Christians.
One more bit of trivia about the 'celebrity blogger' who was the center of all this: he is an example of the much-vaunted ''conservative'' Cuban-'American' community of Florida. Now, does anybody care to tell me again how Cuban-'Americans' who fled Castro are such staunch conservatives and Republican stalwarts? Or how they are poster children for legal immigration?
Over at the Big Hollywood blog, which is incidentally not exactly too staunchly conservative either, a commenter mentions something about the pageant:
On the subject: As a pageant competitor you spend an entire year doing mock interviews, discussing every hot-button or political topic under the sun. There is NO WAY her pageant directors were unaware of her stance on gay marriage prior to the pageant.''
This is the question that occurred to me: was the question a set-up? I suspected that they knew the young woman's Christian background and set a trap for her, asking her a question which they knew she would likely answer 'wrongly' -- after which they could gin up a public brouhaha and make an example of her. The object? To further marginalize and ridicule Christian believers, to remind everybody once again, lest anybody forget, that there is only one correct viewpoint on 'gay marriage' and that deviating from that PC viewpoint carries some penalties.
I give the young woman considerable credit for answering honestly; she was probably savvy enough to know that she was giving the 'wrong' answer and yet she answered honestly. Many people (not just Christians, but people in general) would have dissimulated rather than risk the consequences of giving an 'incorrect' answer. She stuck to her guns. Good for her.
I am also left wondering how and why our popular culture exalts people like the 'celebrity blogger' in this day and age. It was true, once upon a time, that to become a celebrity, one had to be, if not talented or fascinating, at least attractive and presentable and well-groomed. None of these are true of the walking grotesquerie who is at the center of this story. Standards have fallen; I lament this often. We seem to have dropped our standards in every area of life. Nowadays we celebrate the ugly, the sordid, the grotesque, the freakish, and the repellent, not only in popular culture but even in the high arts. What happened to our ideals of beauty and grace? How do we get them back? And how do we banish the ugly and the corrupt, which dominate our public sphere so relentlessly?
And what do we do about weakening this politically correct tyranny which exercises enormous power via our corrupt 'entertainment' media? I personally think that the so-called entertainment media wield far more power than academia, the school system, and the so-called 'news' media. More people get their PC ideas from watching trashy entertainment programming than from any other source -- other than peer pressure, which also is more powerful, even among adults, than many people acknowledge.
I know of a good number of people of mature years who have reversed themselves on social and political issues based on what they pick up from the media; they learn to like 'gay' celebrities, for example, and decide that not allowing 'gay marriage' is hateful and mean as well as 'behind the times.' Many people in my area learn virtually everything they ''know'' about blacks from the flattering media; they then begin to fawn over certain black celebrities, and slowly adopt the PC, pro-black attitudes they learn from the media, becoming de facto anti-Whites.
As I've said before, those who find TV and movies offensive or objectionable always get the facile advice ''just don't watch.'' But there is no isolating oneself; even if we don't watch the propaganda, we are exposed to it second-hand, or third-hand. And if we shield our children or grandchildren from it by throwing the TV out and boycotting movies, they still absorb it from their classmates or neighbors. Unless we take up dwelling in caves in the most remote areas we can find, there's no avoiding it. Ultimately it finds you. You can run, but you can't hide.
And here, James Edwards writes about how it's becoming 'uncool' to have traditional beliefs about homosexuality. Even the supposed 'conservatives' like Dr. Laura Schlessinger and Rick Warren have fallen in line with the PC viewpoint. I remember well when Dr. Laura was detested and denounced by gays because of her supposed 'homophobic' beliefs, and now she has recanted and joined in the PC chorus.
It may be that we are just seeing the wheat divided from the chaff; I never believed Warren was 'conservative,' especially in a Biblical sense, and Dr. Laura has been rather inconsistent on her religious beliefs, but it seems as though we are swiftly moving towards a time when it will not only be 'uncool' to refuse to toe the line on homosexuality, but it may soon be costly in terms of consequences, if not downright illegal.
I am not going to mention the names of the principals involved because that will only draw the attention of those people who are googling the names and leaving idiotic and abusive comments on blogs and forums on this subject. The people involved are the current Miss California and some 'celebrity' blogger who practices a certain politically correct sexual perversion. I am sure most of you know who I mean. If not, the story is here.
And Old Atlantic's blog entry on the story is here.
I don't usually have much to say about these celebrity stories, but several issues about which I do blog are wrapped up within this story.
First of all, the 'culture war', which, like every aspect of the left-right battle, has heated up since November, and this includes the question of free speech and freedom of thought vs. political correctness. Then there is the dishonest newsertainment media which are fomenting all the controversy around this. There is also the issue of the increasingly virulent anti-Christian, anti-traditional morality faction in this country, which sadly includes not only the left-libertines, but the secular/atheist libertines on the 'right'.
To add one more troubling ingredient, there is the glaring picture of a dumbed-down apostate ''Christianity' which is illustrated by the remarks made by several professing Christian celebrities regarding this story:
"Love is love!" Britney Tweeted... "People should be able to do whatever makes them happy!"
Miley Cyrus Tweeted similar thoughts ... "Jesus loves you and your partner and wants you to know how much he cares! That's like a daddy not loving his lil boy cuz he's gay and that is wrong and very sad! Like I said everyone deserves to be happy. I am a Christian and I love you � gay or not. Because you are no different that anyone else! We are all God's children!"
Apparently her comments are right in line with those of "Hills" star Heidi Montag, who is expected to marry the show's Spencer Pratt this weekend.
"God says in the bible that we should love our neighbor and he created us all as equals. I know in my heart that gays and lesbians should have the same government rights that Spencer and I will when we get married. So, yes, this blonde Christian believes in gay marriage and I hope to one day go to your wedding, Perez!!!"
Now, I am proud to say I don't know who Mzz Montag is, nor do I really want to know; I care only that she pretends to represent Christianity and wrongly cites the Bible in support of her libertine and oh-so-hip-and-postmodern views.
Miley Cyrus can be excused somewhat, as she is still a minor child who has evidently not had a good grounding in the Bible nor in Christian morality as set out in the Bible. I suppose having a parent in show-biz is also a definite handicap when it comes to having a good upbringing and sound values and morals. Still, she should know better, and I fear that many gullible and malleable young 'Christians' will follow her example and adopt similarly unsound viewpoints, if they haven't already absorbed them from the corrupt and ugly culture that passes as 'entertainment' in our day.
And I am not sure that the person to whom their comments were addressed will suddenly soften his views towards the Bible or Christians in general; I have encountered many such people in real life and they are perpetually embittered that there is a Bible which condemns their pet vice, and they hate the fact that anyone reminds them of that fact. Ergo they hate Christians.
One more bit of trivia about the 'celebrity blogger' who was the center of all this: he is an example of the much-vaunted ''conservative'' Cuban-'American' community of Florida. Now, does anybody care to tell me again how Cuban-'Americans' who fled Castro are such staunch conservatives and Republican stalwarts? Or how they are poster children for legal immigration?
Over at the Big Hollywood blog, which is incidentally not exactly too staunchly conservative either, a commenter mentions something about the pageant:
On the subject: As a pageant competitor you spend an entire year doing mock interviews, discussing every hot-button or political topic under the sun. There is NO WAY her pageant directors were unaware of her stance on gay marriage prior to the pageant.''
This is the question that occurred to me: was the question a set-up? I suspected that they knew the young woman's Christian background and set a trap for her, asking her a question which they knew she would likely answer 'wrongly' -- after which they could gin up a public brouhaha and make an example of her. The object? To further marginalize and ridicule Christian believers, to remind everybody once again, lest anybody forget, that there is only one correct viewpoint on 'gay marriage' and that deviating from that PC viewpoint carries some penalties.
I give the young woman considerable credit for answering honestly; she was probably savvy enough to know that she was giving the 'wrong' answer and yet she answered honestly. Many people (not just Christians, but people in general) would have dissimulated rather than risk the consequences of giving an 'incorrect' answer. She stuck to her guns. Good for her.
I am also left wondering how and why our popular culture exalts people like the 'celebrity blogger' in this day and age. It was true, once upon a time, that to become a celebrity, one had to be, if not talented or fascinating, at least attractive and presentable and well-groomed. None of these are true of the walking grotesquerie who is at the center of this story. Standards have fallen; I lament this often. We seem to have dropped our standards in every area of life. Nowadays we celebrate the ugly, the sordid, the grotesque, the freakish, and the repellent, not only in popular culture but even in the high arts. What happened to our ideals of beauty and grace? How do we get them back? And how do we banish the ugly and the corrupt, which dominate our public sphere so relentlessly?
And what do we do about weakening this politically correct tyranny which exercises enormous power via our corrupt 'entertainment' media? I personally think that the so-called entertainment media wield far more power than academia, the school system, and the so-called 'news' media. More people get their PC ideas from watching trashy entertainment programming than from any other source -- other than peer pressure, which also is more powerful, even among adults, than many people acknowledge.
I know of a good number of people of mature years who have reversed themselves on social and political issues based on what they pick up from the media; they learn to like 'gay' celebrities, for example, and decide that not allowing 'gay marriage' is hateful and mean as well as 'behind the times.' Many people in my area learn virtually everything they ''know'' about blacks from the flattering media; they then begin to fawn over certain black celebrities, and slowly adopt the PC, pro-black attitudes they learn from the media, becoming de facto anti-Whites.
As I've said before, those who find TV and movies offensive or objectionable always get the facile advice ''just don't watch.'' But there is no isolating oneself; even if we don't watch the propaganda, we are exposed to it second-hand, or third-hand. And if we shield our children or grandchildren from it by throwing the TV out and boycotting movies, they still absorb it from their classmates or neighbors. Unless we take up dwelling in caves in the most remote areas we can find, there's no avoiding it. Ultimately it finds you. You can run, but you can't hide.
And here, James Edwards writes about how it's becoming 'uncool' to have traditional beliefs about homosexuality. Even the supposed 'conservatives' like Dr. Laura Schlessinger and Rick Warren have fallen in line with the PC viewpoint. I remember well when Dr. Laura was detested and denounced by gays because of her supposed 'homophobic' beliefs, and now she has recanted and joined in the PC chorus.
It may be that we are just seeing the wheat divided from the chaff; I never believed Warren was 'conservative,' especially in a Biblical sense, and Dr. Laura has been rather inconsistent on her religious beliefs, but it seems as though we are swiftly moving towards a time when it will not only be 'uncool' to refuse to toe the line on homosexuality, but it may soon be costly in terms of consequences, if not downright illegal.
Labels: Bigotry, Celebrity Culture, Cultural Marxism, Freedom Of Speech, Hate Speech, Mass Media, Political Correctness, Propaganda
0 comment | admin
..on 'tradition', respectability, and change.
I've been trying to compose this post from a series of jumbled thoughts, so forgive me if it is not quite as coherent as it might be.
Over at a blog which I suppose is considered conservative/traditional and Christian, I've been reading a thread which, among other things, discusses whether or not our ancestors (White people's ancestors) were 'racist', considering that they held views which would not be tolerated in polite society today. Some expressed the certainty that yes, they were probably 'racist' but that the older generations just saw things in a different light and were not fully culpable for that. They didn't know any better, in other words.
In my opinion, that seems to imply that we, in this generation and era, have been given greater 'light' and wisdom than our forefathers, or that as Christians, we have some new revelation which gives us more 'humane' ideas about race, ethnicity, or perhaps other religions, than our forefathers had. I don't see how that position is tenable for a fundamental Christian. Now, there are many people today who shy away from that term, 'fundamental' but I simply mean it in its original sense, that of accepting the fundamentals of the Christian faith, including the truth of the Bible.
I've said before that to believe such a notion bespeaks a certain level of arrogance and self-righteousness unbecoming of a Christian. I don't see much evidence that we are the moral superiors of our forefathers; isn't that a concomitant of the belief in Darwinism, that human beings are 'evolving' upward?
The Christian who imagines he is more enlightened or advanced than all previous generations is no better, it would seem, than the Pharisee who thanked God that he was not a sinner like the other poor benighted soul alongside him. It's that kind of moral superiority projected backward in time, pitying our forefathers in their ignorance.
It also puts me in mind of Mormons, who used to have restrictions on blacks' participation in their Church hierarchy, based on their beliefs about how the races came to differ.
Many Christians cynically ask how the Mormon church fathers came to find a handy new revelation which just happened to conform to the new politically correct rules about race. It seems mainstream Christianity has found a handy new word from God too, so that we see things so much better than those dead old White men who were our forefathers.
Does truth change, or do we just try to conform our ideas of truth to the popular consensus of our day?
This all leads me to ponder the Kinists, who it seems are under fire from other Christians frequently because of their politically incorrect views. Yet it seems that the Kinists have more of a claim to conforming to historic Christian practice than do the modern-day 'Babelists' who would 'join together what God hath put asunder'.
Strangely, this never seems to give the PC Christians of today a moment's pause. The fact that their interpretation of Christianity, with its exhortation to mingle all peoples together, socially, genetically, and religiously, is something new under the sun, and is not something their ancestors would recognize.
But it seems our generation is busily inventing a new 'tradition' in which the past is glossed over, a tradition that is an ad hoc invention based on politically correct necessity.
The Kinists are also being criticized for being 'anti-Semitic', which apparently is enough to pronounce them anathema -- though the earlier generations of Christians expressed beliefs that would today be called anti-Semitic. The philo-Semitism that is so common among Christians today is again, not something that our grandparents (or even parents, in some cases) would recognize as the Christianity of their childhood.
The issue of attitudes toward Jews seems to be the one defining issue for many 'conservatives', who seem to want to make it the dividing line between the respectable, civilized, enlightened people vs. the 'haters' and 'bigots.' Recall, if you can, the counterjihad blog wars of a few years ago, where certain counterjihad blogs were anathematizing and attacking anybody who was too politically incorrect and 'extremist'. I suppose this is a marking of territory; those who don't conform or meet the rules for acceptability are banished to the outer darkness, and the heresy-hunters solidify their own bona fides as being on the side of respectability.
But what if the truth itself is not 'respectable'? What then? Is it ''so much the worse for the truth, then" as Hegel supposedly said? What if the truth offends or implicates certain people, or groups of people? And how, if we place whole groups of people above criticism and beyond scrutiny, can we ever arrive at the whole truth?
This is where the 'right' is going wrong; placing political correctness or the good opinion of certain important people above truth. And in doing so, the 'right' becomes just the pale shadow of the left.
How did one group of people become so all-important that to criticize or even scrutinize and question them puts one off limits? How are people willing to sacrifice their own society and ultimately their own folk rather than examine others, whose interests and agendas conflict with our own?
I've been attacked here in the past for not writing about 'the Jewish Question'. I've been told I was a hypocrite and a fraud for not doing so explicitly, and insinuations were made that I had Jewish in-laws or even Jewish ancestry -- neither of which are true. The truth is, my own views have been in flux and not fully formed, though I know what I believe now. However even back then, I chose not to exclude any mention of the Jewish issue, nor ban people who mentioned it in comments, though some of my readers pressured me to delete and ban. I decided that in the name of free speech, I would not shut down any discussion of it, though I myself did not initiate it usually. My allegiance is to my people, and it would not occur to me to side with others over my own folk. Though I have been accused of being pro-Jewish I would never favor them, or others, over my own people. I know where my loyalties are.
So when someone says that they would prefer 'suicidal multiculturalism' over a homogeneous ethnostate, I find that hard to understand.
It provokes one to wonder how we got from where we were in my parents' day to where we are today; how did what was considered natural and right back then become unspeakably abhorrent today?
It's a question that has been discussed in various forms on this blog over the past few years, probably to a wearying degree for some of my readers. But I had hoped, in all this discussion of the issues, to lead a few out there to question their own presuppositions, and to think about whether the tradition they uphold is really 'tradition' in the sense of being time-tested, or whether it's just warmed-over liberalism dating back to circa 1960.
I've been trying to compose this post from a series of jumbled thoughts, so forgive me if it is not quite as coherent as it might be.
Over at a blog which I suppose is considered conservative/traditional and Christian, I've been reading a thread which, among other things, discusses whether or not our ancestors (White people's ancestors) were 'racist', considering that they held views which would not be tolerated in polite society today. Some expressed the certainty that yes, they were probably 'racist' but that the older generations just saw things in a different light and were not fully culpable for that. They didn't know any better, in other words.
In my opinion, that seems to imply that we, in this generation and era, have been given greater 'light' and wisdom than our forefathers, or that as Christians, we have some new revelation which gives us more 'humane' ideas about race, ethnicity, or perhaps other religions, than our forefathers had. I don't see how that position is tenable for a fundamental Christian. Now, there are many people today who shy away from that term, 'fundamental' but I simply mean it in its original sense, that of accepting the fundamentals of the Christian faith, including the truth of the Bible.
I've said before that to believe such a notion bespeaks a certain level of arrogance and self-righteousness unbecoming of a Christian. I don't see much evidence that we are the moral superiors of our forefathers; isn't that a concomitant of the belief in Darwinism, that human beings are 'evolving' upward?
The Christian who imagines he is more enlightened or advanced than all previous generations is no better, it would seem, than the Pharisee who thanked God that he was not a sinner like the other poor benighted soul alongside him. It's that kind of moral superiority projected backward in time, pitying our forefathers in their ignorance.
It also puts me in mind of Mormons, who used to have restrictions on blacks' participation in their Church hierarchy, based on their beliefs about how the races came to differ.
Many Christians cynically ask how the Mormon church fathers came to find a handy new revelation which just happened to conform to the new politically correct rules about race. It seems mainstream Christianity has found a handy new word from God too, so that we see things so much better than those dead old White men who were our forefathers.
Does truth change, or do we just try to conform our ideas of truth to the popular consensus of our day?
This all leads me to ponder the Kinists, who it seems are under fire from other Christians frequently because of their politically incorrect views. Yet it seems that the Kinists have more of a claim to conforming to historic Christian practice than do the modern-day 'Babelists' who would 'join together what God hath put asunder'.
Strangely, this never seems to give the PC Christians of today a moment's pause. The fact that their interpretation of Christianity, with its exhortation to mingle all peoples together, socially, genetically, and religiously, is something new under the sun, and is not something their ancestors would recognize.
But it seems our generation is busily inventing a new 'tradition' in which the past is glossed over, a tradition that is an ad hoc invention based on politically correct necessity.
The Kinists are also being criticized for being 'anti-Semitic', which apparently is enough to pronounce them anathema -- though the earlier generations of Christians expressed beliefs that would today be called anti-Semitic. The philo-Semitism that is so common among Christians today is again, not something that our grandparents (or even parents, in some cases) would recognize as the Christianity of their childhood.
The issue of attitudes toward Jews seems to be the one defining issue for many 'conservatives', who seem to want to make it the dividing line between the respectable, civilized, enlightened people vs. the 'haters' and 'bigots.' Recall, if you can, the counterjihad blog wars of a few years ago, where certain counterjihad blogs were anathematizing and attacking anybody who was too politically incorrect and 'extremist'. I suppose this is a marking of territory; those who don't conform or meet the rules for acceptability are banished to the outer darkness, and the heresy-hunters solidify their own bona fides as being on the side of respectability.
But what if the truth itself is not 'respectable'? What then? Is it ''so much the worse for the truth, then" as Hegel supposedly said? What if the truth offends or implicates certain people, or groups of people? And how, if we place whole groups of people above criticism and beyond scrutiny, can we ever arrive at the whole truth?
This is where the 'right' is going wrong; placing political correctness or the good opinion of certain important people above truth. And in doing so, the 'right' becomes just the pale shadow of the left.
How did one group of people become so all-important that to criticize or even scrutinize and question them puts one off limits? How are people willing to sacrifice their own society and ultimately their own folk rather than examine others, whose interests and agendas conflict with our own?
I've been attacked here in the past for not writing about 'the Jewish Question'. I've been told I was a hypocrite and a fraud for not doing so explicitly, and insinuations were made that I had Jewish in-laws or even Jewish ancestry -- neither of which are true. The truth is, my own views have been in flux and not fully formed, though I know what I believe now. However even back then, I chose not to exclude any mention of the Jewish issue, nor ban people who mentioned it in comments, though some of my readers pressured me to delete and ban. I decided that in the name of free speech, I would not shut down any discussion of it, though I myself did not initiate it usually. My allegiance is to my people, and it would not occur to me to side with others over my own folk. Though I have been accused of being pro-Jewish I would never favor them, or others, over my own people. I know where my loyalties are.
So when someone says that they would prefer 'suicidal multiculturalism' over a homogeneous ethnostate, I find that hard to understand.
It provokes one to wonder how we got from where we were in my parents' day to where we are today; how did what was considered natural and right back then become unspeakably abhorrent today?
It's a question that has been discussed in various forms on this blog over the past few years, probably to a wearying degree for some of my readers. But I had hoped, in all this discussion of the issues, to lead a few out there to question their own presuppositions, and to think about whether the tradition they uphold is really 'tradition' in the sense of being time-tested, or whether it's just warmed-over liberalism dating back to circa 1960.
Labels: Bigotry, Cultural Conservatism, Kinism, Political Correctness