it's official: women aren't people

echidne, a favorite blogger of mine, has a nice rundown of the anti-abortion law going down in south dakota as well as links to other writers who've been on this story all along.

ECHIDNE OF THE SNAKES

i especially like the analysis at lawyers, guns and money .

this south dakota law is huge. it skirts chipping away at reproductive rights and goes for the whole enchilada - women, no matter the situation or medical context, won't be able to have access to abortion and doctors who perform abortions are criminally responsible - not women, which is an illogical and disingenuous move on their part.

i have to hand it to the opposition - when they decide to move, they really haul ass. i thought we'd have a few years for this fight, but it seems they're emboldened by roberts and alito on the bench. the way things are going (and i've said it before) birth control access is going to be the next reproductive issue to be narrowly defined and then toppled. check out the naral map to see what anti-reproductive freedom bills are wending their stealthy courses through your legislatures.

where are we going to stand, women? if we're okay with one state, or a few states, to put unconstitutional bans on abortion on the books, thus establishing test cases for the supreme court to decide, then what are we NOT okay with?

and how about it, guys in the democratic party? still waffling that reproductive rights is a 'niche' 'womens' issue and not so important as, say, the shrinking middle class or the economy? still feeling this is something that's going to scare the poor wittle moderates? still thinking that winning in 2008 is more important than what strange men are deciding NOW about your girlfriend or wife's uterus? still thinking feminists are shrill and humorless and hysterical about concentrating on reproductive issues and not our silly war on terror?

for many of us, this is terror. it is a war waged on the landscapes of our bodies. and i'm wondering why there's not a whole lot more of us getting angry about it.

so every so often i go on technorati just to see who links here (big wave to all 18 of y'all!) and in my vanity trolling i stumbled across this french anti-feminist men's rights site! they linked to me! somewhere! once!

how funny is that?!
i have to go to bed but i can't stop giggling.

a scary article

Jesus Plus Nothing (Harpers.org)

thanks to the commenter down below about this Harper's article. this is what alarms me: the conflation of worldly and spiritual 'power.' the masculinist vision of faith and faithful practice.

it also alarms me because it reminds me of the Omen. remember that movie? little damien being ushered through the halls of power, protected, perfect and ultimately powerful. how creepy is that? a group of christian politicians and captains of industry living for a spiritual war in which christ's power would be established on earth.

i don't recall that ever happening. but, whatever.
you need to read this article and ask how this jibes with faithful living.

Sola Scriptura? Not here.

A few times here I've said either that I'm not going to debate scripture or that I want people's arguments to be about more than scripture. Here's why: too often, scripture is used by us church folk as short hand for an idea rather than allowing the idea itself to stand alone.

We hide behind scripture to cover our ass. And since I believe we should all be moving targets, let's at least try for some ideological integrity.

For instance, when I wrote about gay rights a year ago, a reader immediately gave me a whole chapter from the new testament rather than try and explain how denying life insurance benefits for a domestic partner is a christian act.

Whole quotes from scripture don't tell me anything except you sure do know how to quote from the Bible. I want to know about your ideas. Ideas are the foundation for conversation and I can't keep having one-sided conversations. It gets boring. And whole passages of the Bible as a response to a question make me think that someone's not thinking as sharply as one might.

And besides, this isn't seminary debate team!!

When I used to teach I would say to students that if they had ideas about Shakespeare, they couldn't just say 'Hamlet is about incest' and then just pull a quote about Hamlet and Gertrude and stick it in the paper. They had to argue for it - build a thesis.

I already know what Jesus says. I want to know what you think.

one for the fundies: tell me how your theocracy works

i hate to flog a dead horse but it seems that i can't assert enough that it is NOT hyprocrisy to be a Christian AND think that a faith-based government is bullshit.

(shout out to Anonymous down there)

to argue avidly for a pluralistic society is not an anti-God argument (not that i think God cares, anyway.) it's a civic argument. you cannot have a pluralistic society based on christian law (whatever that is.) and FOR ONCE i'm begging anyone who thinks that we can to really really really lay it out for me.

tell me how you think a theocratic government would work here.

and don't cop out by spouting scripture - that's rhetorically lazy!
think it through and ARGUE for it.

workaholic

i've been working waay too hard. i totally need a break. so i bought a plane ticket to LA today and i'll have my first mini-vacation in over a year.

i always have grand plans when i fly back west.
not this time. i just want to relax and not have to answer a phone or read research reports or go to meetings or plan advocacy strategy.

i want to get a manicure, have coffee with my dad, catch up with my sister and sit in a cafe and read for a very long time. LONG TIME.

(i'm bad.)

[i was going to let my post below stand up here alone for a little bit. i rather like it. but then Bad Christian found this poor guy's page and it just seemed to personify everything i was saying about obedience, conformity, and the jesus-mask. i'm sure he's a nice guy - he's soooper obedient - but he seems to want to be amish.

you have to follow brandon's link. you must. and, for the record, the christian mingle website he mentions? i totally put an ad on there and got skeeved out!!]

a badchristian blog � the definition of TMI

whither obedience?

today was a full sunday.
church services, communion, church tour, bookstore, downtown wandering and the superbowl.
(damn you, pittsburgh 'stealers', damn you! you know that ball never made it across the line!)

after my pitiful whining about being obedient my dad sent me an email telling me the tension i'm feeling is my fighting against my need to be obedient. i can live with that but obedient in what context, exactly?

to rules of behavior?
to christian groupthink?

i think of that anonymous commenter in the 'choice' post below. (the one i called a self-righteous pharisee. sigh. that was harsh. damn my quick temper.) the way they went immediately from a thinly veiled ad hominem attack (i'm selfish) to a blurt of scripture to take away the sting. i bet whoever that commenter is, they're super obedient. they don't make mistakes, they do all the right things, they say only what's backed up by scripture, and they like the apostle paul best out of all the bible guys.

i don't want to be that kind of obedient christian. that kind of obedience reminds me of all the guys on those christian dating sites: they wore the jesus-mask and they all seemed ...odd. yes, the way is narrow but why is it the only models of christianity that we see (even here) are either the rigid, legalistic puritanical freak who seems to want to put everyone in jail or the flaccid, 'let everything hang out' hippie who thinks we should all give hamas a shout out?

a while ago, a guy told me that i didn't like church guys because, well, i wasn't a christian. i laughed. who else but a christian would be so concerned about not fitting in with the christian flock? (you think any old wanker would care? please.) but if christianity means conformity about *everything* then i'm at a loss. because, to me, that's what obedience means. to conform. it means the effing 'scarlet letter' and dimmsdale!

where is our identity as believers supposed to come from? our knowledge of the Word or...what? how well we adhere to correct forms of behavior? how well we hate the things we're supposed to hate? how well we...what? what is it? if paul can say that to the weak he became weak, to the gentile he became a gentile and to the jew a jew, then what's so horrific about saying, as a christian, that to the gay person i became their advocate; to the woman who's facing an intimate, personal choice, i will be that person who lets her make that intimate choice - how is that so disobedient?

[ha. you thought i didn't have a point and i did!]

this just in: bush speechwriter on drugs

by now you've heard about our president's vow to protect us from an imminent manimal threat.
(and if you haven't heard about this, good on you. you've successfully avoided exposure to our president's asshattery and for that you should be proud.)

michael berube has his own special, harry potter-inflected take on our nation's avowed vow to keep the species separate here.

(it's worth it for the roger daltrey pic alone.)

to obey is better than sacrifice

i remember those words most clearly from a keith green song. i know they're from the bible but i remember the keith green lyrics better.

i'm having a little bit of a problem with obedience right now. obedience to patience, obedience to Another's will, obedience to all sorts of things. this lenten season is going to be completely void if i don't buckle down.

but you know what? i find it really strange that i'm feeling this pressure to 'buckle down' when there's really not that much flying out of control! i dumped a pseudo-boyfriend, i'm a total workaholic, i'm frugal and prudent and such. what's making me think that there's more to latch down? what's left to latch?

anyway, below is a post on obedience from Hugo, the b'sphere's resident manly feminist with a tattoo.

Hugo Schwyzer: A note on obedience