d_rawk

And the tickets go to ..... Booche! PM sent with pickup details. Enjoy, brutha!

I've won a pair of Sens tickets for tomorrow (Friday) night's game, but as I'm pretty much officially an invalid now, I won't be able to make it .. Any heady Ottawa skank care to fill the seats? Free, free, super free!

Sweet, does this mean that we get to steer this conversation towards Foucault? Might be altogether more rewarding ..

Shit, glad you made it out ok Chris. I damn near lost a leg a few years back in a box factory of all places ... was pushing on something and had my leg extended out a bit too far, fucking trolley came across the rails (driver looking elsewhere) and I got munged underneath it and pushed a good god-knows-how-many-feet along the track.

Don't know if it's already been pointed out, but it looks like The Onion has started to offer online videos in the form of the Onion News Network

I think you've mistaken me for someone else. For the record though, I'm not pointing any fingers. I may have met blunt with blunt, but you're not a child and I don't suspect that you want to be talked to like one. My point was that this gang of losers has been very good about taking your barrage of insults (some of them wonderfully creative barbs and jabs, granted) and staying in your corner despite it - particularly when you draw on them for strength. Which is great, and I don't expect it to change. I don't know shit about shit, but I can identify repeat patterns at least as well as any trained monkey. It wasn't an attack, it was a reminder.

Until, of course, the next time you need affirmation from the masses or a network of support. Which judging from your usual ebbs and flows, is right around the corner now. Fair 'nuff. Even if 80% of it is the usual tantrum and self-aggrandizing fluff, I still read you for stellar lines like this one.

Agreed. Mental illness is funny like cancer is funny. The rest of the thread though has been a fucking treat :laugh:

You're an AJAX polling script! (PS., is that William?)

Birdy, I'll be sad if you go. You frustrate me to tears, sometimes, I'll be honest about that. But that's probably a good thing. You removed part of your post and replaced it with "er, nothing" .. surprised to see it, because I thought it was a good point that you were making and it did give me pause. This thread has gone really far in a strange direction since I last read it. Wowza. Budget: I don't hate it at all. It's a lot of the type of things I would have hoped to see from the Liberals. A bit disorienting to see it coming from Flaherty and co., but I understand the political reasons why they might want to float something like this out at the moment. That's fine. Politics are politics. The budget doesn't suck. Point taken. I'd still be happy to see a religion forum, even if it were only DEM, KanadaKev, djmelbatoast and I participating. The topics are tied closely enough to my mind that they are a better fit here than in the Cavern, but I am sympathetic to the fact that a lot (most?) couldn't be less interested one way or the other. Not sure what to do with all that. Sometimems there is just more action happening in the one realm than the other ... Glad to see you back around.

Shit yeah, Christmas was a helluva debauchirous event. Look at the old Christmas riots when the tradition moved its way onto this continent, for example ... the original justification for an organized police force, it got so out of hand. In fact the violence that sprang from the party is probably why it turned into the quiet, personal alone-with-my-family event that it is now. Just too much for most to handle.

Haha, but it's not magic you see, it is God's plan and he has given you the instructions to follow His plan. It is in fact the natural way of things that you should be healthy, wealthy, and prosperous. There is no magic, there is only a need to follow the Word. All you need to do is to accept it, live it, and "sow a seed" [tithe] into the ministry. "The seed I sow is towards debts I won't owe." This is precarious ground, because I worry that my intellectual disagreement starts to spill over into self-gratifying teasing or ridicule. So I'll stop ..

Indeed! The history of the glorification of the protestant "work ethic" demands analysis and introspection. Seems to me that contemporary prosperity gospel messages go beyond this, though, too, and suggest that some sort of cognitive assent of faith leads invariably towards material reward from on high. Or should, and that lack of material payoff is evidence only of the insincerity of that confessed assent. This is a bit different, I think, from what the puritans were after (though maybe a natural extension of the same). I admire the heck out of Benjamin Franklin, but think he is probably a good example of the way and the point in time where these things took a turn. Is that too off the wall? This is what the Creflo Dollar's seem to do -- suggest that if you haven't gotten it, it's because you're not "working" it right. The bible is a manual to be "worked", and you just need to follow its steps correctly and the riches (spiritual riches implied only loosely, but the material suggested strongly) shall be yours. I suspect that Jesus would be anxious to turn over the tables in those particular ministries. But I probably make out of that character what I want to see, the same way that they do.

Same thing, no? :laugh: I love to watch people like, say, Creflo Dollar (awesome name, too) preaching their prosperity gospel, and get a big kick out of how people judge their credibility by how expensive their homes and cars are. It's seen as a sign of legitimacy. Theologically bankrupt, mind you. But charismatic as fuck.

Peggy Nash is a doll, and you are lucky to be in her riding while dealing with an issue like this. Hard stuff, misterh. I hope this all turns out. I'll write a letter, too.

That's why we'll keep loving you despite the fact that we will never, ever understand you

I came for the party, but I stayed for the kitty ears Long answer (feel free to skip, I'm mostly just entertaining myself): Honestly Beats, I'm not sure how to address the question without well-intentioned (if flippant) sarcasm. I've never really had a sense of a scene per-se, or a community, or (ph/f)amily. But I don't say that negatively - maybe it's because that just isn't something I was looking for .. certainly some people do seem to be drawn to that aspect of it and do have a sense of all of that. And that's wonderful, but a bit alien to me, and the question that you're asking is probably over my head. It's a lot of great (and sometimes not-so-great) music, and a lot of cool, unique people to bump into. That's true of other 'scenes' as well though, and I find those shows and crowds satisfying for the same reasons. One thing I do appreciate a lot about this group (in general, not necessarily the jambands.ca gang specifically - although them too, maybe especially - but the jambands 'scenesters' as a whole) is the connectivity - that any given person is likely to know someone that you know well, and that makes for some instant, easy familiarity. None of the butt sniffing and sussing out that usually characterizes human interaction. Maybe that is what is meant by community. If so, I dig it. But then, that could just be the booze and E and whatever else everyone is full of, too. I've no complaints about that, either. Short answer: Rock and roll and drugs and sex are the first things to surface, because, well, they are exactly the things on the surface. I don't see how anything deeper would be visible except through testimony, and outside of maybe churches and 12-step programs, sincere testimony is something preciously rare. Maybe that's what you're phishing for? The preciously rare? I'm not sure I understand what you're asking. But I hope that you are well.

I suspect you're right. Any time a group has that collective piece of the social consciousness at their disposal, and such rigid thinking, there is bound to be blowback. We're fortunate to able to air our blowback so openly and without restraint, of course. Somewhere like the UK, which also has a Christian tradition, albeit of a different sort, doesn't seem to have these powerful reactions. But the landscape is much different there, in terms of power relationships and political realities. This sort of thing would be more a curiosity in a place like that, instead of illiciting all the direct personal emotional reactions that a film like this does in the US or its close neighbour. Lots of reasons for that, but the fact that it is just so very real in this corner of the world certainly does account for a lot it. I know that you're being facetious with the evil, scary evildoers thing. There are a lot of evangelicals who are good people and worth listening to - but the rational among them seem to also recognize that something is amiss. It would be negligent to just try to look past it; although it is difficult to address it sensitively, granted.

I thought dancing was just something that happened in Kevin Bacon movies until I moved outta the city. "What are these strange people doing with their strange bodies .... ?"

Fourserious Creations is spamming the board!!

Any ideas when we should see the final vote on this? I'd heard ~03/26, but that conflicts with the Quebec election, so probably not the case. Paging Dr. Hux ..

Awesome. I'm still deeply uncomfortable with Sunday schools (and youth ministries, for that matter ...), but this is positive. DEM, I often come across bits of audio/interviews that I think may entertain you, but can't share them publicly as they are from a subscription service. You should drop me your email in a PM.

fuck. ing. priceless.

I sorta fancy myself as an effeminate James Dean

Hey, but what about bad boy sissies?