Before I start this entry, I need to write a disclaimer. I don’t dislike people on the basis of their Christianity or whatever religion for that matter. Just because I grew up Catholic and grew apart from that doesn’t mean that I automatically hate people who haven’t “moved on” yet. I don’t even know if I’ve made progress by accepting no religion. I think my life has gone downhill. But I have more realistic expectations of everything and I don’t look to the future because it’s not guaranteed.
Now I’m going to give you a sample from my journal. I would not divulge my deepest writings. I will only share a conversation that I heard today.
Some guy next to me is talking about how more boys are diagnosed with ADD or ADHD than girls. And it’s natural, “since they’re boys.” They want to get up and run around, not sit still. And we are drugging them to be docile. And people wonder where all the men are.
Now he is talking about a man to whom “God” spoke. This man was aggressive and then he turned Christian and wrote a lot and then “God” spoke to him and told him that if he took this new job, a part of him would die or some shit.
I have to stop here to point out that the story about the man to whom God spoke probably had a point, but I couldn’t write and listen fast enough, so I just dismissed it.
Now they are talking about DRHS and running into glass doors and emasculation. I will never check this asshole out. If he tries to talk to me, maybe I will give him the finger. His friend is a big guy, but he appears cheerful and friendly.
This conversation interests me because the prick, the thin guy, is taking the lead, and the other is just appeasing him. The prick plays guitar, performs. Normally, you would get that the more athletic one is the prick, narrow-minded. This makes me appreciate the situation. The prick says he wants to tour, to give back to the city, to breathe life into it, to sell CDs. He doesn’t want to come back to this campus ever. He can’t appreciate things. He thinks atheism comes from academia. He thinks a practical life encourages “God” and religion. I almost want to jump into the conversation.
He thinks people need to get into the world. He thinks that giving up belief in God is giving up belief in the external world. And he believes in creationism and can’t do well in science courses. He does not believe the earth is 4.6 billion years old. This is gold for me. The prick doesn’t like the people, how they treat each other. “This campus…is riddled with sin.”
He claims to be well-studied and thankful and great at arguing for creationism. He argued with PhDs and philosophy majors and wants to organize some sort of a debate. He does not agree with the Christian “presuppositional” apologetics.
A girl has joined. Alicia. She brought in the denial of the existence of evil. She likes Jesus. So does the prick.
I think Christianity is so often anti-feminist and wrong. These people are good examples of this occurrence. God has developed masculinity in the prick.
I could do all the work here. I guess I really should, since I will have readers who won’t understand why I refer to him as a prick.
The reason I started eavesdropping so intently is that I heard something about masculinity. The feminist in me automatically perked up. What he’s saying is bullshit. Studies show that kids don’t want to run around. They want to watch TV! They want to surf the web! They’re lazy-ass motherfuckers. And their problems spawn from overexposure to technology and this depersonalization of communication. They can’t focus because they don’t read, and they don’t read because they really can’t read. It’s not boys versus girls, active versus docile. And trust me, calm men do not make emasculated people.
As for the guy to whom God spoke, the reason I dismissed it is because anything like that sounds like bullshit to me. As do miracles.
The reason I started talking about checking him out is because he began to brag about women checking him out. I suppose that I had better be careful of who I check out. I normally am, though. They generally have bikes. Glasses.
It was mind-blowing listening to him ramble on about how academia makes people think, and that thinking eliminates God. That is legitimately why he hates academia. He claims, however that it is impossible to live a practical life without God and that atheism is fine in theory, but when you get to living life, you need God. I think that this is a crock of bull because I feel that I could go through life without God just fine. I did think later that people like Valentino Achak Deng probably need God in their lives. But if anything, I think that surviving an ordeal such as the Sudanese Civil War would cause me to lose all faith, despite my survival.
I think that Christianity in this intensity makes people forget about all of the atrocities being committed in the world every day. They forget that we use other countries and other people as a means to our ends instead of as people. They can wear sweatshop-manufactured clothes and not feel the least bit guilty. They can go on eating meat without thinking about it. And they can fence their minority neighbours out so that it’s all white landowning patriarchy in the suburbs and make guitar music and sell it in a city they hate. This campus is riddled with sex, but I don’t think that’s any kind of sin. I’m sorry, but I don’t think petty things like premarital sex and drinking and doing drugs on this tiny campus can even be measured against some of the legitimately terrible sins being committed all over the world right now. I agree in that I don’t like how people treat each other, but I have to say that at least I try. At the very least, I don’t judge people by their un-Christian-ness. How sinful they are.
Christianity is a patriarchy that entangles itself slyly with government and culture. I am not demanding a matriarchy. I think that could be just as bad. I am demanding an egalitarian society.
INDIEchouette 