Engage!

#FightLikeAGirl #Engagement 


Today's post is going to be short because I have a fever. Again. Sigh. But this is important and I want to keep up with it. Girls and women fight through our illnesses, injuries and pain. I'll go into why that is another time. When I'm not so sick, heh. For now, here is an excellent list of things you can do now to make the world better. Having each other's backs is more important than ever, now. If you can, try to find something on this list. If you can't, that's okay. Just keep #FightingLikeAGirl. 

Believe Us

#FightLikeAGirl #Education #EndemicPrejudice

We have to believe each other. That is the first, most important step toward empathy. If we don’t believe each other about our own experiences and our own feelings, we can’t learn from each other. If we hold onto our own experiences, beliefs and culture as the gold standard, we can’t learn from each other. If we refuse to accept an idea that we find uncomfortable, or that makes us feel guilty, we can’t learn from each other. If we can’t learn from each other, we can’t show empathy to one another.

So, when you say your part in the election was born out of frustration and pain and fear, I will believe you. When you say you just want to know something, I’ll believe you. When you say that you don’t know a better way to ask your question, I’ll believe you. When you say you didn’t know that something you did or said was sexist, racist, homophobic, etc, I’ll believe you. When you say you didn’t know that endemic privilege was a thing, I’ll believe you.

In return, I ask something very simple, but very hard to find: That you believe me. That you believe any marginalized person when they tell you their stories of oppression. If a person of color tells you that they experienced racism in a way you didn’t see, believe them. If a woman tells you she was harassed on the street, believe her. If a LGBT person tells you that they were hurt because of their sexuality, believe them.

Believe them - believe me - even if I or they have no other proof other than our word. Endemic and system prejudice and privilege are real. They do affect our lives. Those systems are the reason why the election happened the way it did. If you are privileged in some way, of course you won’t see it. But it’s there, and it hurts. Don’t hurt us more with your disbelief. That will just perpetuate the cycle of darkness and isolation that feeds the system of oppression for all. Injustice against me, is injustice against you. Understand that, and listen to us. Believe us.

Tell us in so many words, before you say anything else:

“I believe you. That must have been scary.”

“I believe you. I don’t understand, but your word is all the proof I need.”

“I believe you. I want to help you, but I don’t know how.”

“I believe you. I don’t experience it, but I believe you do.”

If we don’t do this for each other, we will become victims in isolation. If we do this for each other, we will become survivors as a community.

Believe. Us. I believe you.

Self-Care in Song

#FightLikeAGirl #Selfcare

I needed to hear this song today. It's getting scary out there. Nothing specific happened. Its just a feeling. And one i'll write more about tomorrow. For now, songs like this are good self-care. Anyone have any others that are like this or like Salute by Little Mix?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vg0dW0Z4WG4

Good Cop, Woke Cop

#FightLikeAGirl #Encouragement #Content:SexAssault

Before I get to the story: I’m going to put tags like that at the top of every post, and put them in the link descriptions on FB, Tumblr and Twitter. That way, people can make informed decisions about what they want to read.

So, today’s story of Encouragement actually happened yesterday, but it still counts. It was in my law enforcement class. We had just turned in a really difficult assignment on crime analysis. We were given the details of 10 sexual assault cases and asked to find the facts, and patterns between them. Intel teachers believe in dropping us in the worst of what we will see in a safe(er) classroom environment. That way we can learn how to deal with it. And, if we can’t deal, we can choose a career that will better suit us.

Anyway, the good part of this story is what the professor said on Friday. He was giving all of us some general feedback. Like, what a lot of people missed, and what we did well. He was talking about how to phrase things most accurately when he said something that made me want to cheer. He wrote “Only” S/A, “Only” 1 rape “Only” forced oral on the board.

And then turned to the class and said very seriously, “Men, Do NOT EVER say this. Do NOT EVER write this. Women, you do NOT have to accept this if they do. Rape and sexual assault are the worst crimes you can perpetrate. I worked sex assault for LAPD for three years and I saw the damage. I saw the trauma. This is the worst, meanest, most horrible thing you can do. Do NOT EVER downplay it. There is no “only” about it.”

I didn’t know whether I wanted to cry or hug him or shout amen. I didn’t do any of those things because it was the middle of class. Plus, Prof is a former LAPD officer and FBI agent. He’s been in law enforcement for 40 years and is not exactly the fuzzy type. But, he gets it. He stood up in front of a class and said so. He can be intimidating when he wants to be, and he wanted to be because this is important. Most importantly of all, he said it as a teacher. There are ROTC students and police academy hopefuls in the class. Now they know. And now they can teach others.

And yes, I do wish I could have stood up and said this and had the same impact. He’s a man. And a cop. And white. And so he was listened to where I wouldn’t be. But, he used that privilege to make the world safer for me and for everyone else. And that is worth holding onto right now.

#FightLikeAGirl

#FightLikeAGirl

Tuesday I was shocked. Wednesday I sobbed. Thursday I slept. But today, I start to #FightLikeAGirl. I’m heartsick, and sore, and have to do something. My plan is simple, yet ambitious. Our president and far too many men don’t value compassion, empathy, passion or emotional appeals. They think we should ask nicely and calmly for basic dignity. I say screw that. They don’t understand the power of a kind word, or a shared story. So, let’s teach them. Let’s #FightLikeAGirl. It also uses a lot of E words because I like alliteration. I can’t do it alone, though. I need support, even down to “Hey, I can’t do that right now. But I have your back while you do.”.

Empathy - The cornerstone value of this whole experiment. Nothing changes if I don’t try to understand other people. It’s easy for me to have empathy for people I agree with. I look at a battered and bloody protester who was attacked by police officer and I feel their pain. I look at a Latino family who is terrified of being torn apart and I ache for them.

What is far harder is empathy for the opposition. But, to succeed I need to that, too. Painting the opposition as irredeemable monsters won’t help at all. It just continues the cycle of violence. So, I am going to try to understand how the opposition feels, and try to give them a better way to react. I will look for and post stories from those on the other side. I will look for the stories of their fear and pain. I want to understand why they feel marginalized and what I can do better to reach others who disagree with me. I am going to look for the ones who maybe get it, or who are talking about their feelings and experiences and stories. I am not going to post those who are justifying their choices made in fear. I can’t reach them, right now. But there are others who do get it now or who could get it now with some patience and understanding. I want to hear from them.

I want to do this because people are complicated. People who are good, kind and compassionate believe and do terrible, hurtful things. I want to help then discover that empathy is for their opponents too. I can only do that if I am willing show empathy to them. I know that when I do, it may not work. They won’t want to listen because they are too scared or too ignorant or too much in denial. I’ll get laughed at and yelled at and worse. But if even one person listens and considers, I consider that a win. If one person hurts, we all hurt. If one person learns, we all learn. Because that person then goes and tells another person. They tell another. And another. Each one, teach one.

Encouragement - These are dark days for a lot of us, including me. I am scared and for good reason. Bigotry was justified and reinforced on Tuesday. A lot of people feel this gives them the right to attack, belittle, hurt and kill minorities, women, LGBT.  The president-elect does so why can’t they? I also suffered a grave disappointment. For the last eight years I saw hope win. I saw the incredibly change it bring to a country. Obama’s most important role was Healer-in-Chief. Despite obstruction from those who cling to hate, he has an amazing legacy. I was thinking that maybe, just maybe, we could become a more perfect union after all.

It’s hard to remember but make no mistake: all of that is still true. People who woke under Obama are not going to go back to sleep. People who found hope under Obama are going to cling to with both hands. A backlash election does not change this. IT makes it harder, yes. It makes it terrifying. But there are always people who help. Always people who reach out. There are still good Americans who get it, and who will make a difference. One terrible event does not erase all that. So I will be consciously looking for these stories. And I am going to link two right now because we all need it:

1,500 notes in the NYC subway were left by people expressing pain, outrage, love and not a few regrets. And this is as of yesterday, and the notes haven’t stopped.

$2.4 Million dollars to ACLU as of yesterday morning. The site crashed several times because so many people wanted to donate. $2.4 million dollars to protect us and fight for our lives from over 38,000 people.

That’s almost 40,000 people who GET IT. That’s small compared to the population of the USA, yes, and it's easy to think it won’t matter. But, it's a start. It's a pattern. When I hear a dozen people talk about the same oppression, I consider that a pattern. I think it's a crime if even one person feels that way, and that it's worth it to fight for change just for them. What we forget is that the same holds true for good things. 40,000 people is a pattern. $2.4 million dollars is a pattern. And if just one person donated one dollar or wrote one note, it would still be worth it to fight. It's a movement to be part of and be proud of.

So I will seek out and share encouraging news. It's a necessary self-care step. If I just focus on the riots and the cases and the policy I will despair and never try to help. I need to look for the happy, and remind myself why I want to do this.

Education - In order to change things, i need to examine what is happening that is so wrong, and educate others about it. The first thing is to get the definitions down. Then, explain the impact. This is hard for me to do because all of it is so personal. It can be triggering and painful to go through defining sexual assault and its impact as an exercise in education. But I do it because I know of many people who were yelled at by hurt and scared liberals. They were told how could not know, how can you not see? I understand that. I’m fighting for my life and sometimes I can’t give a 101 lesson on what that means and why it is. And there are a lot of people who just don’t want to know. No matter what, they refuse to understand why their premises and arguments just aren’t good. It gets depressing after a while.

But, there are people who will be allies if they are treated with kindness. I mean,  you can’t know what you don’t know. And given this culture, it's unlikely they will even know they need the education or have any clue on how to find it. I do know. It's imperative that I share that knowledge. My approach is to assume that a person is using offensive language or asking a question from privilege because they don’t know any better. So I begin by trying to educate them. If they don’t want to know, don’t care or don’t see it as a problem that becomes very obvious very quickly. At that point, I say goodbye. But, there are people who really just don’t know. And the ability to be the one to help them understand the world better and become a more empathetic person is amazing. It makes the other stuff worth it. It gives me hope.

And I’m not just going to stop at the 101 level. I’m an analyst anthropologist, so I enjoy taking apart various cultural assumptions, premises, ideals, ideologies, and how they lead to certain behaviors. I’ll definitely be talking about privilege, sexism, racism, original sin, religious fear, Christian terrorism, and all sorts of other controversial subjects. I am going to try to do this as respectfully as possible. I do not think Christianity or any religion as a whole is a problem. Religious beliefs lead people to help as much as they hurt. The way to encourage people to use their beliefs to help others is to expose where they are used to to hurt, and propose another way. I am also going to tackle pop culture and the messages it sends. I will be tearing apart authors and stories I know people love and cling to. Again, I will be as careful as I can to attack the ideas and the underlying bigotry. I will not demonize the fans. Pop culture is complicated. There’s usually a lot to love and a lot to hate in any given story. But, the way to make it better is examine where it fails and what the consequences are when it does.

This is going to be difficult and I expect a fair amount of backlash. I understand why. I am going to pick apart beliefs people have based their whole lives on. I’m going to be saying where it goes wrong. I am going to be critical of characters and stories people love and that maybe are a core part of their identity. I hope I can successfully separate the creation and its culture from the creator and the fans.

So if you are with me, let me know. If you aren’t, ask me questions and I will give you the best answers I have. I will do my best to be as fair and clear as I can. I ask that you do your best to consider my premises, especially when they conflict with what you think you know. Everything will be on Especially Snakes, and cross-posted to Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr. Social media is an incredible tool for this.

Engagement - Stay with it. Stay with your life, stay with your work, your friends, your family. Talk to other people, and be part of their story. Find people who are having a hard time and talk to them. When you read something that makes you smile or makes you feel hopeful, let the author know. I read the apology of a man who was recently woke on Wednesday. It helped me stopped crying and hope that maybe we can all do this if we are together. Solidarity is everything. Being part of whatever community you are in is everything. Whether it's having conversations online, or leaving notes in books for people find, it's important.

And, keep engaging in all the things you like to do. Remind yourself daily of what you have that is worth fighting for. Some days everything just seems dark, and I can’t remember. So, I ask my friends to remind me. I pet my cat. I work hard in my education. I read books by authors I love. I watch silly things on TV. Its vital to self-care to do things that are good, and fun, and funny. It's not frivolous. It gives me something to hold on to and to fight for. It makes it easier for me to believe there are good things in the world.

I’m going to post, write, encourage, explore and educate myself and others. And I encourage everyone to do what they can. If you can't go out and join a protest or work for the ACLU, that’s okay. You still have things to give.  I live in a tiny corner of PA, and I’m in school full-time and have work-study to do. I am going to look up local groups, and national ones to see if I can work for them after graduation. But, right now, I can do this. I can talk to people. I can express empathy, I can offer education and I can offer encouragement. I would love to say I will do everything every day, but I know me. So, I will say I will do one thing every day. Either share or create content, encourage someone, listen to someone or education someone. I ask you to do the same. Even if it feels like too little, it's not. Remind yourself how important it is to have someone in your corner, and do what you can to be the same for someone else.

Seven Deadly Fears: Gluttony

“I’m rubber you’re glue whatever you say bounces off me and sticks to you.” We’ve all heard this on the school yard, or said it to our friends (and frenemies). Like many things we learn on the playground* it’s actually true. What we say about other people says far more about us than the other person. And this is especially true in the discussion of body appearance and health. There is a common, but incorrect, idea that a person can tell how healthy another person is by looking at them. Specifically, by subjectively judging how fat that person is and then making smug and misinformed appeals to their health.

There is one Deadly Fear that is constantly being talked about in cultural commentaries: Gluttony. It is very rarely referred to as what it is. People don’t usually go around telling people that they think they are a gluttonous pig and ought to be ashamed of themselves. (Except when they do). Much of the criticism is more subtle, and many of the people who body-shame others don’t realize they are doing so and don’t realize they are following the lessons of the Christian Right.

I have a personal stake in this debate. I’m a woman in America, which means my body and what I put on it or in it is a national discussion. I’m constantly bombarded by ads telling me to get plastic surgery, to try dangerous yo-yo diets, to wear this or use that. It can be exhausting.

And, on a personal level, I have seen firsthand the difference in treatment that thin people get vs fat people. I have been every size from 0 to 20-odd. I have been under 100 and above 200. And I definitely got better treatment the closer to 100 I was. Clothing is properly sized. Ads telling me how to become a disordered eater through a national campaign weren’t geared to me. No one had concerns about my health, my diet, my mental health, or my life in general.

That last is particularly telling. The basic premise of the Sin of Gluttony is that one’s bad habits of indulgence will show on their person. Therefore, if a person is eating too much, they will be fat. If they are drinking too much, they will be all red with a  bulbous nose. If they are having too much sex, you’ll be able to see the oozy sores all over them. This idea of being able to see virtue in appearance has seeped into our culture completely. Everything from comic books to Disney equate society’s ideal body with goodness, and the non-ideal body with badness. Take a look at their villains, sometime.

Then, in the 90s, we had the ‘personal responsibility’ movement in health care. Largely a ploy by the insurance companies to not have to offer the health care they were being paid for, it caught on with everyone from the person on the street to doctors. Suddenly, if people didn’t need medicine they needed wellness. Gyms, diet clubs, spas and other places dedicated to molding the perfect body sprung up everywhere. Doctors, facing higher premiums and lower payouts, quickly put their names on these businesses. At the same time, studies were showing a link between behavior and health. The Merchant of Doubt scandal about cigarette companies lying about the health consequences of their products hit around this time as well. I will go into more details about the 80s, 90s and health care another time.

For now, I will just say that the cumulative effect is to make it fashionable to blame people for their own health problems. People see a report in the news about exercise and health that conflates ‘fat’ in appearance, body fat that you can measure, overall weight and overall health. That person doesn’t know to or doesn’t care to look for the actual studies, and comes to the obvious but wrong conclusion that anyone that looks fat must be a) unhealthy and b) be unhealthy because they are fat. This then leads to strangers thinking it’s totally okay to ask someone nosy and personal questions about their health, or offer advice on their health. If that someone is a friend of a fat person it gets even worse. And, when the fat person is rightly upset, they’re told, “Well I am just doing it for your health!” As if not fitting into the perfect Barbie mold means that someone can’t read, think critically, or talk to their doctor in an intelligent way. They may be sincere in their desire to help, but the concern trolling doesn’t help anyone. There are better ways to be supportive of good health.

First of all, the Helpful Hattie (or Henry) needs to realize that their statements are about their own insecurities, rather than another person’s health. Helpful H. doesn’t want to be perceived as ugly, bad, gluttonous or immoral themselves. They are terrified of what others will think of them if they are seen supporting someone who acts against that norm. That is why the most vitriolic comments (including death threats) are reserved for those who are fat, happy, healthy and proud. It completely breaks the fearful mind to see someone who doesn’t fit into their idea of what is good.

I know this from my own life because when I was a size 0, I had some actually unhealthy and dangerous habits. I was so stressed and scared because of bullying and abuse that I barely ate a meal a day for about seven years. I had constant nervous stomach. I was suffering from untreated Depression and binge ate candy. By the time I was a teenager I was developing Fibromyalgia, and the symptoms were obvious. Yet, no one said a word because I looked model-hot in a bikini. Now, I’m fat and curvy, and healthy. I go for walks. I see medical professionals and follow their advice. My health challenges are treated properly for the first time in my life. I engage in self-care. I have many wonderful people who love me, and that I love. I have six adorable cats that I share with two friends. I am enrolled in a course of study I love and excel in. I dress bright and bold, with rainbow hair and Disney skirts because it makes me happy. I have hobbies I enjoy. If I won the jackpot tomorrow, I would pay my student loans, make a few repairs around the house, and enjoy the security that money can bring. I would not change a thing in my life, because I love it too much. By any definition, that is healthy.

But, all people see is a fat girl who can’t possibly be happy because society says she shouldn’t be. Even people close to me frequently make those appeals to health, and refuse to believe me about my own life. And if I need some kind of mobility device because I am having a day where I can’t walk long distances, the pressure gets worse. I must have to use mobility devices because I’m fat. I can’t possibly have another reason why my body won’t do what I want it to do. Certainly, some kinds of exercise on some days can help. But, what that is, when I choose to do it and why, is mine to choose to share.

That is not to say that exercise or eating well or other general health advice can’t be useful. And of course some behavior can cause some health problems. There is a strong causal link between smoking and lung cancer. But, there are some huge buts here. Even someone who did ‘do it to themselves’ deserves support, care, and empathy. They deserve to get medical care that can help them and save them. Basic human empathy demands that much, I would say. Lecturing and blaming will just make an already sick and scared person sicker and more scared. They are well aware of what happened, they don’t need you or I or anyone else to tell them. They do need what we all need: support and love.

Second, smoking and fat are not the same thing. There isn’t any scientific support for the statement that being fat causes bad health. “Fat” in appearance, fat in the body, weight and health are all different things, and are related to each other in extremely complex ways.

There is also the fact that different healthy habits are better for different people. For me, I enjoy exercising by wandering about playing Pokemon Go and Ingress. I can be with my friends and I can rest when I need to. Other people like to take classes. I prefer to practice mindfulness while I eat, rather than count calories. Counting calories is bad for my mental health and encourages disordered eating for me. Other people find the hard numbers comforting and inspiring. I can respect that. I simply ask for the same respect for myself and other fat and fabulous people.

Seven Deadly Fears: Anger

Terrible things have happened to me, and to my friends. I am angry about it. And I should be. But, as an Evangelical Christian, I wasn’t allowed to be. Being angry about being hurt was being unforgiving, and that is a sin. Being unforgiving is the worse possible thing that I, as an Evangelical Christian woman, could be. If someone hurt me, I had to forgive them right away. If I was angry at that person, or thought less of them for that action, I was worse than they were. Like many things in Evangelical culture, there was no room for context, nuance, or scale in this directive. It was just as wrong to be angry at someone for abusing me as it was to be angry at someone for breaking my favorite (but replaceable) mug. So I had to swallow the fear, and anger, and any other emotion. I purposely forgot about what happened to me. I was part of the Evangelical culture for several decades, and got very good at not feeling anything. So, even after I left about ten years ago, I still didn’t feel much.

Except, ironically, when I was angry about something. Throughout my life I was known to have a temper. I would get so angry about sometimes inconsequential things that I would effectively black-out. I couldn’t remember what happened during that angry moment except what others told me. Now, I know this is a common symptom of untreated PTSD, but then it was seen as a sin, and treated as a grave personality flaw. Almost no one ever asked what happened to cause that kind of rage. One pastor did, and that saved my life. He is also a trained therapist, especially for trauma cases. He recognized the signs, and encouraged me to talk to him. We met many times through my teenage years, and his kindness is the reason I am alive now. I can’t remember specific meetings, or specific advice.

But I do remember the stories I told him. Some of what I talked about was teenage hormone processing that the church helps with not at all. Sex, emotional roller coasters, body changes. He did his best to counter the body shame of Evangelical Christianity. He didn't know about past sexual abuse but I think he suspected. I also talked a lot about the emotional abuse at home, and the bullying at school. I remember crying a lot, talking about how all of this added up to a shame so acute I didn't want to live anymore. He didn't try to tell me suicide was a sin. He talked about my friends, about how much he cares. He insisted my father come talk to him, and had some very strong words for his behavior. He helped keep that extremely frayed line of communication connected just enough. He helped remind us that we can talk about books or music or sports, and approved of B&N as the neutral zone.

He mediated meetings between Dad and I, where I could tell him how angry I was and how hurt I was about our home life. I was discouraged from yelling and screaming back, that would make it worse. But I could express anger in other ways. I could cry. I could show and experience the kind of emotions that I was told were wrong in other Evangelical spaces, and get validation for them. And this changed me, and changed my family. There was one particularly important session in 1996. I will keep the details private for now, but it was the direct catalyst for 20 years of growth, healing, and communication. I now have a pretty good relationship with both my parents because I was allowed to be angry with them.

Our pastor talked about forgiveness, of course. But he talked about a process of healing that begins with anger and pain. It is an honest process that empowers those who were hurt by validating their feelings. Then, they can get help from friends or professionals to help them move through that trauma, and allow them to live a fulfilled life.

Anger at injustice to self or others is, in some way, taking responsibility for that injustice. It is from a deep-seated sense of caring for self and for others. On some level knowing that what is happening isn’t right, and that we deserve to be treated better. That feeling was recently on display after the Orland Pulse Club shootings. People are angry, you can see it on the faces. They are scared. They are horrified. That leads to them asking what to do. It leads to posts of personal stories of pain, of empathy. It leads to a greater conversation on injustice and what we can do about it. Anger, in other words, is the driving force for social justice, as well as individual justice.

I think that is why Evangelical Christians are so scared of it. Their culture is one of fear. Particularly of taking personal responsibility for their actions. If something goes well, it’s because of God. If something goes badly, well, that’s just human nature and/or the devil. All they have to do is pray, and that is enough. Their doctrine of anger means they don’t have to deal with any personal consequences. If I told anyone that someone hurt me, and I was angry about it, they’d just pray the Sinner’s Prayer with me and tell me not to be so unforgiving. If someone hurt them, they could bury it with platitudes and not have to feel the effects. It’s in easier to be scared of pain and cover it with pretty marketing than it is to deal with that pain. I would know.

But the thing is, it never goes away, really. The anger has to come out, like it did with me. Being able to talk about it was the only reason it didn’t destroy me. I’ve seen it destroy others who had trauma they were not allowed to talk about. The closer they were to the church leadership, the harsher the directives, and the more likely they were to channel the anger into drugs, alcohol, and illegal activity. This phenomenon is openly talked about in the Evangelical culture - as a joke. Pastor’s kids and missionary’s kids were well-known to go off the rails with a fair bit of regularity. But, no one asked why. We just shook our heads and laughed. Sometimes the effects were not as obvious, but no less damaging.

In relationships, especially romantic ones, getting angry really wasn’t an option. Going to bed angry was the worst thing a couple to do to each other. Especially if they had kids. Especially if they fought in front of the kids. I’ll write more about the dangers of Evangelical marriage at another time. But, the prohibition against being angry or airing grievances means that no one knows how to have a healthy, fair argument about real hurt. We don’t see it from our Evangelical parents. We aren’t educated in it by our Evangelical pastors or their relationship advice. So, we have no idea what is fair or right or useful to do when we hurt each other in relationships. This leads to unhealthy relationships, some of which are abusive. And of course if you are abused you can’t get help.

It also means that there is no distinction made between different kinds of hurt and anger. All actions are equally bad, and all anger is equally bad. So, Evangelicals are teaching people how not to tell right from wrong. And then teaching them they can’t talk about it when it is, inevitably, very wrong.

Saying Thank You

II haven’t updated this week because I am recovering from a surgery, and from a UTI that resulted from the surgery. But I don’t want to get out of the habit of posting here. So I am going to post something a bit personal, and then get back to the Seven Deadly Fears and politics later when I feel better. I believe that it is important to tell those who inspire me that they have done so. I have not said this in the past to people who have since died, and I regret that. This is a letter to a blogger who has really helped me recently. And yes I did send a copy of the letter to him.

Hi

I found your blog a few months ago, sort of by accident. I stumbled across some posts from Across Rivers Wide, and Galen referenced your posts. I decided I liked what you wrote so much I am starting from the beginning of the archives and reading through to the current posts. I really appreciate the way you think about things, and talk about things. I need more moderate, caring, and compassionate voices secular voices right now. I grew up in the Presbyterian Church of America. Simply put, they are as close to actual Puritans as you can get. I was asked more than once a week if I was "Catholic OR Christian" because they still hold onto Calvin's hatred for the Catholic Church, among other prejudices. But, despite all of this, my deconversion story isn't of the dramatic type. What you said about your reasons for leaving really resonated with me. I did suffer abuse as a child but not as a result of being in the church. They didn't know how to help me, but they didn't cause it, either.

What did it for me was the disconnect between how these loving people treated me and treated the “right” people and how they treated anyone they were told to hate. It was like seeing two different people. These were people who taught me to love because that’s what Christians do then turning around and hating because it was loving? It made no sense to me. As I got older, and as the Conservative Right became more and more powerful, the less I  wanted to be there. I stopped going to church because it didn’t feel right. I stopped evangelizing because I can’t lie to other people. Finally, I stopped believing. The consequences for me were devastating. I ended up losing everything. I moved to the other end of this continent because it was too hard to stay where I was or anywhere near it. It took me five years to want to come back to this coast. I’m slowly rebuilding my life, and my belief system. I believe in the spiritual and supernatural. I broadly label myself a pagan. But my morals are squarely secular and humanistic. I would no more look for the right thing to do in the Bible or the Koran than I would in a tree or a piece of music. There’s beauty and truth there, yes. But it’s up to me to figure out how to apply that in my life.

The more I rebuild from the past, the more damage I see, and the more angry I am about what I was taught. Good people taught me terrible things. And it is tempting to treat them all like zombies and attack with chainsaws. My natural inclination is to do just that. I prefer the flashy and visceral to the slower and the more satisfying. But as you so eloquently say, I have the capacity within myself to rise above that. I can choose to be better than I was taught I was, and that I want to act like sometimes. Your words help me do that.

You have also helped me find my voice, and being writing about my experiences. I don’t feel so alone, anymore. I know my story is valid and worth telling. I started writing my own thoughts and experiences down online, and referenced your posts (with due credit of course!) in a few of them.

Thank you and good luck,

Rhie Heyssel

(the commenter with the blue hair under the same name)

The Seven Deadly Fears: Pride

The biggest lesson I learned through the evangelical culture was one of fear. Everything was scary. Everything outside of the narrow way of Zondervan and Focus on the Family was going to get you. If not in this life, then definitely in the next. These things were not taught to me by stupid people. The people I grew up with were very well-educated, and very well-read. Several graduated from Princeton, Stanford, and similar schools. Ignorance and narrow-mindedness is not a symptom of stupidity. It is the consequence of fear. These people were scared, and passed on their fear to me through the concept of the seven deadly sins. And, because they were intelligent and well-educated, the arguments for living in that fear were quite advanced and usually very subtle. I still haven’t unraveled all of them, and the chilling effect they had on my life.  I don’t believe in the concept of sin, but if I did, I would say acting in fear was the cardinal one. Here’s the first reason why.

The founding story of the Christian faith is the story of the Garden of Eden. Man and woman, the latter created from and for the former, lived in harmony with each other and the natural world. Their one job was to stay away from the tree of knowledge of good and evil* One day, a serpent enters their paradise. He tells them that God is holding things back from them, and that they deserve to know all that God knows. Eve is the first to literally bite at that forbidden fruit, and then encourages Adam to join her in her quest. God becomes angry at Adam and Eve’s disobedience and exiled them from the Garden forever. I am sure most people have read or heard this story before. Depending on who is tell the story, the reason why God gets mad changes. Now, in many Christian denominations and for many Christians, the reason is simple disobedience. It doesn’t matter why God told them not to eat that fruit, and it doesn’t matter what the tree is for. They disobeyed, they get exiled, the end. Some denominations focus on the knowledge that they gained. Adam and Eve were punished because they wanted to know something. Other sects focus on the part where Adam and Eve learned about good and evil, and became ashamed. Regardless of the specifics, all of these versions focus on one main sin. Adam and Eve were guilty of Pride. They thought they knew better than God what they needed and wanted.

The Evangelical version of this story focuses on the curiosity of Adam and Eve. They were punished because they were curious, and sought knowledge that God said they did not need and should not have. Like many of the premises underlying evangelical culture, this isn’t usually stated directly. But it was unmistakably there in the tone with which my teachers used to talk about the real scientific method. I was taught to be afraid of and distrust any actual authority on science, sex (especially sex!), health, and any other subject. The only sources praised by most of my peers and their families were explicitly Christian ones. Everything else was dismissed as a tool of the devil. The implication was pretty clear.

Sometimes the anti-intellectualism was more forcefully stated. Sometimes I was told that God “didn’t want us to have that knowledge” when I asked philosophical questions about the contradiction between free will and the Calvinist doctrine of predestination. I was told that people who accepted that the Earth is millions of years old were being duped by Satan’s tool of carbon dating. When I pressed for an answer beyond that, the most-oft quoted scripture verse to me was “Trust in the Lord with all of your heart. Lean not on your own understanding” (Proverbs 3:5).” This was usually followed with “the heart is deceitful beyond all things” (Jeremiah 17:9) and “The wisdom of the world is foolishness” (1 Corinthians 3:19) if I kept asking questions. And, when I just wouldn’t quit asking, I was told that I was being prideful. The ability to think, to reason, to follow an argument from the beginning to the end with careful questions was considered a manifestation of the cardinal sin of Pride. After all, God knows best what is going on, and my reason will lead me astray, so I should never trust or use it.

Now, all that said, there are Christians within the evangelical culture and without who reject this in action if not stated belief. And I believe that what a person does shows their character more than what they say. I had people around who encouraged me to ask questions, and read whatever I could get my hands on. Both my parents, to their credit, were the first to teach me how assess a source and decide if it was credible or not. They never limited what I could read based on whether or not it was “secular”. This doesn’t change the fact that the culture, and many other people (including teachers!) were staunchly anti-intellectual. But, being taught how to think was what ultimately how I was able to reason my way out of the toxic culture altogether. I grateful for that. Ultimately, the sin of Pride was my salvation, and I take no small amount of pleasure in that irony.

*Some traditions refer to this as simply the Tree of Knowledge. Some traditions refer to two trees, one of Good and Evil and one of Knowledge generally.

A Daughter of Eve

I think too much. Or rather, I think about the things that many people wish I didn’t think about. Especially when I say my conclusions out loud. And the conclusions I have come to lately are ones that I am sure many people would wish I didn’t say out loud. For a long time, I didn’t. My religious education included all of these points in Neil Carter’s excellent list of harmful religious practices. In my case, I grew up with sexism laced dampening of critical thinking skills.

For the most formative years of my life I was raised in the evangelical sub-culture. This culture is pervasive, and goes by many denominational names - including “non-denominational”. In my case it went by the name of the Presbyterian Church of America. It’s a small sect of American Presbyterian belief that holds fast to a literalist Calvinist view of the Christian faith. To a Calvinist everything is pre-ordained. Every choice, every action, every decision you think you make is already planned for you. And, it’s either in service to God or the Devil. But, really, all in service to God because he will redeem whatever evil we do for his glory, anyway.

Most dangerously, Calvinists then and now believe that their ideas are internally consistent, inherently logical, and the only intellectually honest way in which to think about the Bible. Unless you question their assumptions, of course. One assumption is that of strict gender roles. Its more subtle in the PCA than it is in something like the Quiverfull Movement, but every bit as sexist. Women are allowed to go to college...but only approved Christian colleges, and only so they can be a better wife and mother. Women’s knowledge and understanding of the Bible and of Christian behavior is always going to be inferior to men’s because that’s what God says. This was never stated out loud, but it was absolutely shown when I was a student.

My science classes were filled with references to the Bible myth of creation, not the science of evolution. My history classes were, by and large, a history of how Western Christianity was the driving force behind of all innovation, morality, and stability. There was no mention of the Eastern contributions to knowledge, at all.  So, at best, it was an incomplete historical education. Our religion classes were similarly limited. As far as my church school was concerned, church history started with Martin Luther. Little mention was made of the previous 1500 years of church history, except to point out how misguided everyone before Calvin and Luther were. I could go on and on, but I think these examples are sufficient for now. And of course, my teachers in the important subjects such as science, Bible and math were men.

I did try to speak up in classes. I would challenge the teachers on their premises with questions like “If the Creation story is literally true, then how come well-documented scientific discoveries date the Earth to millions of years old?” I always got some rushed answer about how we can’t trust our own intellect, and how modern critical thinking is antithetical to Christianity. This begged the question of why we were in a school where they were teaching us religion using the veneer of logic and reason at all, then. I never did get a good answer to that question.

And, eventually, the teachers stopped calling on me. My questions were too much of a stumbling block to others. And, though this wasn’t stated, it was a threat to the male Bible teachers that a female student was questioning their authority. I was told that God’s purpose for me in those classes must have been to strengthen the faith of the professor by challenging them. The only “godly” reason why I would be saying those things would be that, as a woman, I was there to help and support men in their faith. The Bible talks about people questioning and doubting, so the Calvinists had a frame of a reference for that. But, they couldn’t bring themselves to really address my questions and concerns. They couldn’t hate me, either, or ignore me. So they had to fit my questions into their paradigm. Of course, they never said this out loud. But looking back, it’s so clear. It’s one of many of ways I was whispered down. And I’m only just starting to see it.