Richard > Recent Status Updates

I don't know if I'm going to be able to finish this. Watching people live without question in an eschatological scam while others use it for powers petty and gross is not something I was unaware of, and also not something I want to spend my free time immersed in

We have hit several "I sent you a radio message, a boat, and a helicopter" moments and watched them sail on by. The older I get, the more I am certain it's the fear that kills us.

"The world is not always good. I tell the stories to make them feel better. I tell the stories to make myself feel better too."

Well, hell. Now I'm weepy.

"You are simply insane, which is a dislikable attribute."

"Aye, tis true."

Self-reflection pays off! Also Kieron Gillen writes gods so well.

I had perhaps underestimated how much I need to just sit and inhale a book on a day off.

Having grown up in a highly-opinionated and contrarian household, reading about the systems that squeeze dissent into nothing can sometimes feel like the world's most harrowing nature documentary.

"Boys got what they wanted, while girls gave it up for God."

The crusade for a better yesterday is one of the most toxic poisons in society.

"Cancer is a consequence of sin in the world, girls."

Yeah, I'm going to be furious from one end of this book to the other.

How can I resist a good Loki scheme?

I can't. That's all.

Pithy and high-handed demands to read scripture deserve to be turned on their head in the interest of making the point that scripture, in its entirety, isn't univocal.

"Take a moment to read the first 10 verses of Matthew 5. Empire is not at the center of God's story."

Take a moment to read the Book of Joshua. Killing a lot of people in your way sure seems to be.

What does one call it when data is alluded to, implying that "some" of a group behave/believe a certain way, and then, a page later, the conclusion is that said group has no love whatsoever in their hearts?

I'm choosing to call it sleight of fact.

Perhaps it's the TRPG player who lived through the Satanic Panic in me, but I find myself constantly questioning the correlation/causation arguments Whitehead is making, and whether racist-misogynist fear mongering would have latched into whatever was hegemonic in the culture to justify its pose.

Herron presents the turmoil of an interior life really well, showing how little of our chaotic thoughts manifest visibly to others around us, especially as they themselves navigate their own chaotic interiors.

Here we get to the heart of the problem with Whitehead's take on violence: he cherry picks his instances to build up his narrative of violence as a CN idol, and fuses it with a dismissal of violence having any value morally. This is made obvious in his take on the Civil War: yes, the South believed violence was justified to protect slavery. The North believed it was justified to end it. Are both wrong?

Noting for later, need to find "The Hero in Transition" and Roland Barthes' "Mythologies" for deeper thinking on the socio-rhetorical construction of the stories we tell ourselves and each other.

"I’ve still got my hands full training those giggling idiots out of every bad habit they picked up from you and replacing them with the bad habits I need.”

Alright, we're off to an auspicious start.

I'm going to finish this book, mostly so I can think for myself on actual actions to take over the vague academic platitudes provided here.

Began the preliminary meditations this morning. Orwell was right - To see what is in front of one's nose needs a constant struggle.

Whitehead tries to slide his own false binary choice in here. I cannot help every person in need, so clearly the government must, as if there is not an intermediate step in collective action that doesn't require the coercive power of government.

When therapy sucks the joy out of dark romance: the protagonist says something that you're pretty sure is supposed to be romantic, but the inner counselor winces and says, "Oh, honey nooooo..."

"To pursue justice, Christians will have to seek power; however, this employment of power should benefit all people..."

False, the employment of just power can inconvenience the authoritarian and fascist. Stop pretending Nazis don't need to be punched.

Having finished the introduction, I now have four months of mediations to do. I'm also using percentages on this, since Goodreads seems to think the book has 500 fewer pages than the Kindle reader says it does.

"The world, as you know experience it, is a simulation running inside your skull, a waking dream."

Man, Mage: The Ascension prepped me for so much in life.

"Accommodators...who make up a third of the population..."

"Ambassadors represent about 16 percent of the population..."

"Together, these two groups represent just under half of Americans who support Christian Nationalism to some degree..."

33+16=49. So, if I've followed this, 98% of Americans support Christian Nationalism...or math is hard and this argument is badly written.

I worry that Whitehead is mistaking his audience here. Does he imagine that the people picking up a book about White Christian Nationalism believe it's not a problem, and so page count must be expended on an argument that it is?