green

Oof! Tell yer hubby that it's a grrl thing and a whole lot more healthy than visiting the refrigerator. I do have to confess that my mate gets kinda frustrated by the amount of time I spend on the computer. He is 9 years younger than I am and so I tell him that it is either the intellectual stimulation of the PC or senile dementia.:faint: Shuts the kid up immediately, eh.:biggrin1: :biggrin1:

I am cool with this, Cusano. My own history has been fraught. Most of my father's side of the family perished in the Holocaust. My father was sufficiently traumatised by this that he didn't tell me that he was Jewish until I was 21. And though my parents were atheists, as I am myself, I was sent off to a boarding school run by Anglo-Catholic nuns for 8.5 years of my life. Moreover, I grew up and still live in one of the large cities in Canada, a country that has been carefully trying to remake itself into a multi-cultural haven for some decades now. It had always been my own parents' desire and now it has become the Canadian urban style that everyone should be welcomed and respected into our environment. Much of this nice touchy-feely stuff has actually become enshrined in federal law over the past 25+ years. This is why same sex couples are permitted to engage in civil marriages up here. But I digress. Most of my father's side of the family did not survive. They were destroyed during the Holocaust. The few who did make it carried grave psychological damage. This would include my father. I lived in France. I saw evidence of anti-Semitism against both the Jews and the Arabs. From the reports which I have received since then, the situation for all Semites is deteriorating. As for my own experience as a well educated and affluent downtown urbanite, well, once I switched from working in a well educated white collar university milieu to that of a blue collar unionized environment I was exposed to a lot of naked sexism and anti-Semitism. I could deal with the sexism but the anti-Semitism broke my heart. My father didn't want to tell me that he was Jewish. He was afraid of me being exposed to more of the same (even though I would only be considered Jewish to a racist). The dude was very damaged by his environment. This is why I will always be anxious for you, Cusano, to have the right to express your love for your beliefs and it is obvious that you are a passionate individual. The deal is that you must give those of us who dissent equal respect and the reasons for this are multifold. It is always true that you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. Should you wish to interest us in your passion, hectoring is certainly the wrong approach to take. You must also understand that quite a few of us are in fact quite well-educated and thoughtful and thus we, too, want to be respected just as you yourself wish to be respected. I wish to point out to you that you are speaking to a wide audience. You have no idea what the stories are behind our emotional and intellectual backgrounds. I, for instance, have just told you that most of my father's family perished during the Holocaust and that those who did manage to survive have issues of trust. When you present your religious vision in such an insensitive and aggressive manner this can resurrect a lot of negative views about your religion. This is, in fact, the very thing which is causing a schism between many American Christians today. There are many moderate Christians who are very freaked out by the fundamentalist movement.

omigawd! That is so true! We whitey white folks really do look fish belly fluorescent white. People who have a little colour to their skin can look kinda adorable when they are tubby. But not us!!!! *sob* Not us!

Thanx, grrlfriend. lol

Cusano, what is your quest? To prove that you are right? Or to bring more souls to Christ?

This is not mockery but this is a question that encapsulates the annoyance that the skeptical minority feel when confronted by the pressure to believe, a pressure that is present in most of America. Indeed, it is my understanding that it is only folks who live in large cities who are free of neighbourly scrutiny of their religious practices and that, furthermore, this business becomes a whole lot more freighted for those individuals who live in the south or the interior. It seems that you have got to believe or to pretend to believe in some form of Christianity when you chose to live in the heartland of America. Indeed, it would appear that this question of religious freedom hinges upon where you happen to live in the United States. I am connected to a number of atheists who live and work down in the Bible Belt. These are well-educated professional white folks; I mention these facts because I wish to emphasize that these are the sort of individuals who are the most acceptable to all of us. These are people who have told me that if they went public about their disbelief in their local communities they would expect to see their houses torched and their businesses destroyed. As you can see, these are not people who feel that they have freedom of speech or of (dis)belief.

Cusano, the above statement is both self-serving and a cop out. You are saying that I am right because I am right. You are not prepared to admit that other folks are as equally convinced of the value of their stance as you are of yours. By denying your fellow human beings (and possible converts) this respect you do nothing more than drive a greater wedge between yourself and your beliefs and them. This only leads to more anger and a further break down in communications. I have always felt that it is crucial to understand and respect the other side in order to have a chance to convert the individual to seeing things my way. Sometimes this is viewed as kindness, sometimes as psych 101, and sometimes as diplomacy. In any event, the exercise of this skill is always valuable for all participants.

:hungry: Grrlfriend, are you referring to pasta land/starch city/noodlesville?

Dude, are you blind? or are you simply being disingenuous? Have you not been investigating this website? In fact there are many, many Christians who post here. They include the information concerning their belief in their information blocks and these individuals are, moreover, comfortable in referring to their belief in God in their posts. They will say such things as "I am praying for you" in their posts to other members of this site. These fine and kindly individuals are never, ever attacked. Now, the R&R zone is, as you must already know, the area of the LBT site that is open to a free for all debate. All ideas will be challenged here, even those which are politickally correct. This is the value of this site and it is, I believe, a fine thing that we have R&R available as a resource. As for you returning to this business of the evil atheists.....I continue to believe that this is a cop out on your part. Though the early part of this thread was dominated by a debate between you and those who find it impossible to believe in a god, and certainly not yer Biblical version of God, the atheists have been sitting out for a long time now. Your debate over the past number of pages now has been with other Christians, fine folk who do believe but who are uncomfortable with you, Cusano, and with your message. (Those devil atheists are long gone.) These are believers who see you as presenting yourself and the God which you claim to represent as being harsh, joyless, anti-intellectual, lacking in emotional generosity and, indeed, curiosity, and as being unforgiving and, well, kind of unpleasant. I believe that these folks are kinda riled up by you because they actually are Christians and they see those of us who are not becoming further entrenched in our position for you have done nothing to attract any of us who are not believers on either an intellectual or an emotional level by your shenanigans, you know.

Oh, now, that's just plain nasty, it is. It starts off okay but then it gets very, very nasty. My German mum-in-common-law is starting to look very, very attractive.......................

Green has just jumped back into Shiloh's ville.:phanvan

Cusano, the issue as to who the hypocrite might be depends on what terrain the given individual is occupying. You have made note of proud atheists in your recent post. I would say that you yourself are a proud Christian; why should you diss those who hold different views when you know that this is not respectful and is not the manner in which you would wish to be treated? Does not Jesus say something along the lines of do unto others as you would have done unto yourself? You might, moreover, take note that the debate between the non-believers and the believers has become a non-starter over these past pages. The discussion has, by and large, developed into one of issues of belief between Christians. To re-introduce the largely silent Greek chorus of resident atheists into the discussion at this point carries the stench of desperation. It is a red herring. As to the powerful and powerfully strange material which TOM introduced into this discussion, well, this is material which was drawn from an interesting and controversial novel: the title of this novel is 1984.

Oh, ugh! You might be right. We're fat and we have to stay indoors during the summer! I had spent decades of my life explaining to my work colleagues why I don't have a tan. This happened summer after summer after summer. I was relieved when the news broke about skin cancer. I was so tired of being treated like a freak!:phanvan Yes, I am overweight and I buy sun block by the gross. This is my life and this is why I dread global warming.:huytsao This is why I was never able to finish the sailing lessons that my husband and I undertook. This is also why I spend a significant part of our trips to the tropics in our room with the A/C on the polar setting.:omg: Oh, all of this is Sad City for Green.....:cry

Ugh! I have heard about that on Prairie Home Companion. It sounds disgusting.:speechles My own food roots are pretty grim: British and Polish Jew. These cuisines involve a lot of boiled items, a lot of starch, and a lot of overcooked and cheap cuts of meats. :phanvan I never liked meat until I moved to France; it was there where I first learned that a grrl could eat it very rare. I wasn't fond of vegetables, either, until I was exposed to other, more southern cuisines. And Green now has become the Queen of garlic.:heh: But what I do retain from my childhood is an intense fondness for kosher style dill pickles, latkes, pierogies, and trifle.

I adore Italian cuisine and have always regretted that none of my mothers-in-common-law were Italian. My current one is German. I am not a big fan of Middle and Eastern European cuisine. Too heavy.

Although I am still reading avidly I am not contributing much at this moment. I am more interested in watching the Christians duke it out amongst themselves. I am sure that I will be jumping back in at some point. I did appreciate your choice of verses, TOM.

Green here is a strawberry blonde.

Oh yah, you're right.

*Teehee* Green is planning to use those bloomers to go parachuting some day.

What time, Yoda? Maybe we can connect? I need a fill and I am a TLBC-er.

Dude, you know what that soul of kittens stuff is all about, eh? There is a scary email making its rounds and it sez that everytime someone masturbates God kills a kitten. I know, I know........ I have a couple of cats of my own.:heh:

Serious, I believe that two things may happen on these long threads which one will often find in the Rants & Raves section of LBT. Sometimes people do have hidden agendas when they post but I am inclined to think that these threads are more often like being present at a lively, a very, very lively dinner party. Conversations and debates are entered into and because these discussions are not formal ones - there are no rules that we have to stick to - material which may seem ancillary to the main topic will inevitably be introduced. This particular thread has been kind of unusual, though. An email describing antisemitism in France was submitted by Cusano, a new member of LBT. When one of the other members, an individual whose information block states that she is a token atheist, questioned the bona fides of this particular document, Cusano responded by broaching the issue of her bona fides as an atheist. It was felt by some of the other members of this site that the language in which he conducted his inquiry was not neutral but, in fact, kinda judgemental. And thus the melee began. While I recognise that many LBT-ers are distressed by much of what takes place in R&R I must say that I am personally not against these barroom brawls. I think they serve a purpose and I am both pleased and astonished that the overseers of this site were wise enough to establish this corner. Let me explain my feelings on this issue. The world continues to be a complicated and disturbing environment. We are confronted with much more information, and we are much more sophisticated as a result, than our ancestors were. Because of this our environment becomes increasingly ambiguous and more interesting, both on a moral and intellectual level. There was a time when personal well-being hinged upon being able to house, feed, and clothe your family. You did right by God and the church and you helped out a neighbouring family who was in distress. This was life in the days of the pioneers. Life is obviously much more complex today and there are some of us who have a need to discuss these contentious 21st century issues. These discussions may appear brutal to those of you who drop in to R&R and who do not share the same taste for debate but there are some of us who derive considerable value from these brawls.

Yah, a fill! I've got to get off my BIG arse and arrange for that. I don't want to grow out of my new small clothes, do I? Argh!!!! (The burger was divine, by the way....big, juicy, and fully loaded!:hungry: )

:biggrin1: Green sez thanx. And she agrees about the yiddishkeit!

Yup, welcome aboard.