Ouch, my brain hurts. I left my reader alone for maybe two days, and NPR blitzed me. 92 things I had to catch up on, and some of them were a bit repetitive, but I think I made some sense of it all. More interestingly, the Texas Freedom Network kept me entertained as I read through some of the hate mail they were receiving from Neo-cons. I'm not sure why hate mail intrigues me so much, or why I am especially fascinated by hate mail from people who claim to be Christians. I remember being at church camp when I was a young'un, and singing those good old stand-bys "Pass it On", and "They Will Know We Are Christians By Our Love". I guess some of them don't feel that way anymore and are using God as a kind of club and shield combo.
This attitude makes me both sad and humored at the same time. I have had some of the most interesting conversations with Rhonda (we solve all the problems of the world on our shared conferences--last year we solved Welfare) and the kind of mental / intellectual stimulus that gives my brain is very rewarding. I think as a culture we tend to forget that there are fanatics and nutters in all beliefs, all religions, but the majority of people of any faith seem to be pretty mellow. This is no place for a religious debate, but the last time someone told me I was sure to go to hell, I said I'd save them a seat. Tolerance, I'm beginning to believe, is a dying art, though maybe the internet / blogging can keep all the nutters together under the cover of their anonymity and their inability to be touched or have to face off with someone in person.
So I left a comment there, the same one about the song lyrics. Now I'm REALLY going to hell I suppose. I do love to live dangerously that way, and let me add that using my gmail address and my pseudonym gave me a rush. The anonymity is intoxicating in many ways.
But I digress. What I really wanted to comment on from the TFN disappeared when I skimmed it; this happened before I discovered the "mark as unread" check box. Now I'm skimming smarter, not harder (whatever that means). So I searched the blog itself and found it. Mississippi is apparently more stupid than Texas when it comes to education. I particularly loved the comment about "girls should be" taught about abstinence where as boys can just go their merry way impregnating "bad girls" right and left. Is there a correlation between the sex-ed policy of a state and the overall IQ of same? Maybe I could get a federal grant to do some studies.
So before I left my reader, I zipped up to the Dilbert Daily feed and read the funnies. Ahhh, funnies. Dilbert makes me happy, and the more public education tries to emulate business, the funnier he gets. While I was there, NPR slapped more in feeder.
And it never ends; and that is overwhelming.
A New Low for Fox News
12 years ago
You are one lucky gal. How do you get to find all the crazies? I kept looking for something controversial, but only found English stuff. Now, I'm going to have to check out TFN and see what the crazies commentators had to say. Plus, I want to watch the mayor/pastor's (whatever his is) speech at some point, maybe when it's not past my bedtime.
ReplyDeleteYou and I both know that the world is filled with ignoramuses, and though we can't do much about them, we can make fun of them and hope they do not reproduce.
Once again, I think for the most part, people are good. So many people are open to hearing about how other people live their lives. I have to believe that even though it is hard some days. Kids especially seem a little more accepting. The trouble is that too many dummies get the spotlight and have to torture us with their dim-witted comments. Too bad they do not have to pass an IQ test to get a Google account or to have children. Hey, maybe we can work on this problem another day.
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ReplyDeleteOoh! Ooh! Ooh! I know this one (fervant hand raising a la Welcome back Kotter)! I sent you an article (at least I meant to) about this just a couple of weeks ago (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32884806/ns/
ReplyDeletehealth-kids_and_parenting/). I'm not so sure the teen pregnancy rate was correlated to IQ, but it was connected with "religiocity" (how's that for an awsome word?). Apparently, the more religious a state is considered, the higher the pregnancy rate just happens to be. Religiocity is based on census and other polls; the pregnancy rate comes from the state health department. Surprisingly, Texas wasn't one of the higher ranked religious states (ergo, not one with a higher pregnancy rate). I know! I was shocked too.
I applaud your tolerance for reading hate mail and not immediately blowing someone's head off. I don't even try; I just get so mad my own head is in danger of exploding. As I have often said, If only we ruled the world . . . it's good to be perfect and have such perfect friends! :)
You did send me that article, and it was tres cool(I don't know how to put the accent mark on the French word). I think you might enjoy the TFN blog / site which is constantly questioning the actions of the highly politicized State Board of Education (TSBE). The last few blog entries had to do with vote trading. I wasn't as shocked as I thought I would be; I guess nothing they do surprises me anymore. Oh, and did you know Horshack means "the cattle are dying"? Thanks for the Kotter reference.
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