“Will my boys grow up viewing woman as no different than the porcelain urinal on the wall of the boys’ room—an object (not a person) to relieve themselves into whenever they feel the urge or need? And will my daughters grow up believing that’s who they’re supposed to be? I hope not.” – Walt Mueller

When I first came across this quote it saddened and disturbed me. This is because it is remarkably accurate with its portrayal of the society and culture we live in. The worst part is that not many people care. Most people just accept this as the reality in which we live. There is a general consensus among westerners that Islam’s treatment of women is barbaric and that they view them as property to be owned like slaves. But rarely do we see those same westerners consider how they treat women. The above quote highlights that our society/culture does not treat women much differently. Slaves. Just in a different format. Brainwashed to believe that is all they are, porcelain urinals to be used whenever men have the urge or need. The quote reflects the very sad state of our world today.

Identified as the ‘raunch’ culture where ‘porn is the norm’ , you don’t have to go far to see the objectification of women by the main stream media, by men and even by the women themselves. It’s a vicious circle. Each influencing the each other, going around and around in a reinforcing pattern that only cements this view of women in our culture.

” If we honestly evaluate how women are frequently portrayed in the media, it is easy to see that they are often marketed as objects and used to sell products. And it is definitely easy for all of us – men and women alike – to judge our value on external appearances and functionality rather than our intrinsic value as children of God. ” – Paul Masek

The main stream media seems to be the biggest culprit when it comes to influencing society and culture. But they are just responding to the existing culture and giving them more of what they want. Society wants raunch, so the media gives it to them. Why does society want raunch? Because they have been already brainwashed by what the media gave them previously. And around it goes.

Take music for example. How does encountering sinful or even questionable lyrics influence society in a harmful way? Anthony Gerber answers this way :

” Is a child harmed when she encounters her parents fighting with one another? And what if that fight was played over and over and over like an iPod on repeat? If she is not harmed in a strict sense of the word, at the absolute least she will become numb and dulled to such occurrences. And this is certainly harmful for a whole litany of reasons which a good psychology book is ready to reveal for us.”

In music it’s the beat, the bassline or guitar rift that draws us into the song. And once the music has “hooked” us, the lyrical content can then do its work. It’s the same pattern with other forms of media. TV and movies will hook you with laughs, drama, music, special effects or action. Then once you are hooked many sinful themes are smuggled in and are absorbed by us un-noticed. For example the sit-com “Friends” uses a lot of humor to attract an audience. But the characters are promiscuous. So society keeps going back for the humor while all the time being conditioned to accept promiscuity as a normal behaviour for society because that’s what their idols are doing on TV. By the way, “Friends” is a relatively mild example of what is out there. If this is the effect “Friends” has on society and culture then how much more will sit-com’s like “Two and a Half Men” and “How I Met Your Mother” be a positive influence for the objectification of women.

An interesting article I found on the topic of music and culture called “Dysfunctional Love Songs” by Chris Stefanick is worth checking out. Where he discusses how the love songs getting all the air play seem to have a common theme; if it isn’t dysfunctional, it isn’t love.

“Thanks in large part to misguided love songs, teens tend to mistake things like codependence, enmeshment and promiscuity for love. It’s funny how the things they come to look for in dating relationships are precisely the things that set them up for failed marriages.”

The original article in which the “porcelain uninals” quote came from (“Dear Oprah“) is also well worth a read. Some notable parts are:

“After years of listening to music and watching videos on MTV, BET and VH1, I have to conclude that one of the most prominent life-shaping themes in today’s popular music is human sexuality, both what it is and how to experience it. The lyrical and visual messages are powerful and life-shaping, especially for our impressionable young children and curious question-filled teens. Because they are listening to and/or watching several hours of music a day, messages about sexuality come through loud and clear. In fact, a recent article in Pediatrics reports on a Rand Corporation study that found that “listening to music with degrading sexual lyrics is related to advances in a range of sexual activities among adolescents.” A growing body of research supports this relationship of cause and effect”

“My reason for mentioning this to you is that on September 25, 2006, just three days before your show “What Pedophiles Don’t Want You To Know,” Janet Jackson appeared on Oprah to promote her musical comeback and the next-day release of her album 20 Y.O. I want you to know that I think Janet Jackson is an extremely talented performer. I am, however, concerned about some of her musical messages—both lyrical and visual—and what those messages are teaching children and teens about sexuality.

Toward the end of your show, you introduced Janet Jackson with these words: “For the first time, Janet’s going to perform a song from her brand new CD in stores tomorrow, 20 Y.O. Here’s Janet Jackson singing ‘So Excited!’” I then watched her sing this new song, a song that I knew was sure to be marketed to and embraced by her young fans. I can’t help but see a huge incongruity between the song’s lyrics and the valuable message you sent to viewers just three days later.

I listened to Janet Jackson sing these words:
Breathe – You get me so - Get me so excited - I’m hot, come on, so get ready – And I’ll open my spot for you – Anytime you want me to – So you can act bad – Don’t hurt me – Look sexy – Talk dirty – And I’ll open my spot for you – Anytime you want me to – Get me so excited – For some reason – It might be the money that turns you on – But for me it’s an attitude that keeps me tight on the floor – And no words are suitable to describe your swagger babe - And my body is in overdrive when I have you inside of me – Do you like it when I do it? – I go head to toe – And whenever you pursue it – You’ll never hear the word no – So forget about them other girls baby – Cause now you’re rollin with a woman baby – I’ma keep you body thumpin baby - It’s the least I can do – Cause you get me so excited – So amused by mind control that I wanna get two steps up – As for me I’m a let you know that my body’s smoking hot – Throw me up against whatever’s close and get to bossin me around – And everytime I give you the assist you know how to slam it down - Is ya is ya is ya hungry? – I gotcha – I gotcha – I gotcha licking on my – Licking on my – Licking on my body like it’s something to eat …

At the conclusion of the song you said, “Janet Jackson! Thanks, Janet! Thank you, Janet! We’ll be right back. That’s so cool.” Oprah, I’m sorry, but I have to disagree with you on this one. Knowing what I know about kids, the age of the kids who embrace Janet Jackson and her music, adults, and how they are all acting out sexually in our culture, I don’t think Jackson’s song was cool at all. Instead, it made me sad. When I later watched the song’s video, I was struck by the sad irony that some scenes depict Jackson and the male object of her song engaging in sexual foreplay and activity, in of all places, a dirty and dark men’s restroom, right in front of a wall full of urinals.”

So what can we do to battle this “moral mindlessness” plaguing our society? We need to employ our minds rather than just our hearts when it comes to determining whether a song, tv show or movie stays on or is turned off. We need discernment that comes from knowing right from wrong, good from evil and morality from immorality. That, I think, is a massive problem in society (including the church). So many people have no idea of the moral standard set out in the Bible. And if they do know the standard, they don’t care or don’t think it’s that big of a deal (even amongst those professing to have faith).

We need to first look to our own hearts. Do we look women in the eyes or do we give them the ‘up and down’ look that focuses on their bodies? Do we mindlessly consume media? Does pornography or lust have a hold on us? The Lord wants us to love women as He does, and He can help us to do so. I love the idea of following Jesus so closely that we actually see other people through His eyes. Women are so much more than porcelain urinals, even if they feel that way about themselves, and even if they are treated as such in the media and by men in their lives.

None of us are immune to the influence of society and culture. I know I’m not. Conditioned through much of my non-Christian life to view women like this, it is an extremely difficult conditioning to break. I need help. We all need help. It can’t be done alone. We’re not strong enough. We need help from the only one who can help because He has overcome the world.

To finish I would like to borrow again the words of Paul Masek.

“I also want to beg you women who are reading this to help us brothers out! In our over-sexualized culture, it is not easy for us to look you in the eyes; we have been trained otherwise and need to be reprogrammed. Not only will it help us if you expect – even demand – to be respected by men, but please call us out when you are not respected. We need to be challenged. And finally please prayerfully consider rediscovering modesty; try not to dress in a way that will incite the men in your life to look at you as an object. You have no idea how much the pursuit of modesty – and expecting more out of us – can help us out.”

Richard Dawkins was recently challenged to a debate with William Lane Craig. He declined. Craig, he said, was a “deplorable apologist for genocide” with whom he would not share a platform. The genocide in question is that of the Canaanites in the Old Testament Book of Deuteronomy (see link).

One of Richards more famous quotes from “The God Delusion” on this issue is:

The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.

One of the biggest problems that many people have with God as detailed in the Bible, which Richard has so clearly demonstrated above, is that of His judgment against nations like the Canaanites. One only has to read Biblical history to find God commanding the slaughter of the Canaanite men, women and children. Not even the livestock are spared. So what are we make of this? Is God a moral monster?

Paul Copan has attempted to answer this challenge in his book “Is God a Moral Monster? Making Sense of the Old Testament God.” His answer to the charge that God commanded the genocide of the Canaanites is that this was not the genocide that it appears to be from a simple at face value reading of the text; that the text is hyperbolic and an exaggeration of what actually happened; that these were more like disabling raids of the military bases/cities and religious centers and not the leave no survivors destructive conquest that one might assume from a face value reading of the text. The passages on the women and children are just sweeping language being used as a disabling metaphor where central structures are undermined so that the Canaanite influence is disabled. For a more thorough explanation you can check out this interview (3rd hour) with Greg Koukl on his radio show at STR or their blog. Otherwise you can get his book.

While Paul Copan’s explanation on the issues of slavery, bigamy, child sacrifice and the treatment of women in the Old testament seems sound to me, I think Clay Jones comes to the correct conclusion on the issue of the “divine genocide” of the Canaanites. He argues in his treatise, “We Don’t Hate Sin. So We Don’t  Understand What Happened to the Canaanites”, that the face value interpretation of the text is the correct interpretation. Clay also appeared on Greg Koukl’s radio show in an interview that can be found here (3rd Hour) which is where I got most of his answers for the rest of this blog post.

The first thing that needs to be examined is the culture and behavior of the Canaanites to see if there could be any justification for their obliteration as described in the Old Testament. Archeologist William Allbright tells of an ancient Canaanite poem where the Canaanite God Baal, rapes his sister while she is in the form of a calf 77 even 88 times. We have here rape, incest and beastiality in the same act. Baal also has sex with his mother and daughter. If this is who the Canaanites worshiped, if this is their God whom they emulate, then according to Jones, this is certainly what they themselves are doing. And these acts are borne out with further study of Canaanite culture. God outlaws these practices in Leviticus and this sin is punished when both the Canaanites and Israel committed them. And that punishment was harsh. Sodom and Gomorrah were examples of Canaanite cities who were judged by God with good moral justification.

So how does Clay Jones answer the complete destruction passages of the Canaanites in the Old Testament? Clay starts off by making an observation of our own culture. We seem to have been inoculated to sin. Average people just does not care anymore about many sins. Our culture does not even recognize them as sin, let alone understand what the term sin actually means. We have become so Canaanite-like in our own culture to the point where, as Clay put it, “Studying these things over the years has led me to wonder if the Canaanites might stand up at the Judgment and condemn this generation”.

Livestock

Why kill all the livestock? You do not want to be around animals that are used to having sex with people. In Clay’s article he gives an example of a female gorilla sexually attacking a psychologist.

Women

If you want to erradicate these practices from a culture, then why would you leave women who were just as guilty and as equally dangerous as the men in participating in these practices.

Children

Yes the children too. Firstly what age do you start separating children from adults? 18? 12? Clay tells of fostering children because he and his wife could not have their own children. They learned that kids coming into your house at from as young as 4 years old were bringing their culture with them. Now, what if you had killed their parents? What would teenage rebellion look like for those children who were spared. Certainly they were exposed to a highly sexualised culture and were very much likely to have been molested by that time.

So how do you stomp out that culture in order to prevent if from affecting the Israelites adversely? If you want to erradicate the sinfullness of the Canaanites, how else can you do it?

But wait, I hear you say, the Bible talks of the continued Canaanite presence in the region after this “divine genocide” occurred. How does Clay answer that? Clay directs our attention to those “divine genocide” texts and points out that Gods command was only for a specific region. There was still a Canaanite presence outside the region that the Israelites were to inhabit and that’s why there were commands still in place not to take wives from outside the Israelite culture etc. But as we read further into the text, the likes of Kings David and Solomon did not uphold these commands perfectly (by taking wives from outside the Israelite community) and thus the Canaanite culture was reintroduced into the Israels culture and corrupted them to the point where God then dealt harshly with the Israelites via the Assyrians and Babylonians.

So in conclusion, I think we can accept the text at face value. The question that remains is what do you think of God for commanding such a thing? Does God have a right to do with His creation as He pleases? If you have a problem with the selective judgment of the Canaanites then how do you feel about the almost complete destruction wrought by God of the whole world during the Flood? And how do you feel about the impending destruction of everything at Armageddon?

Is it consistent, on the one hand, to hold to an evolutionary world view, and yet claim, on the other hand, that humans who are causing the extinction of other creatures are improperly interfering with the evolutionary process (e.g. natural selection, survival of the fittest) that’s been shaping the development of those creatures?

That was the question bumping around in my mind on Sunday evening after listening to an interview with Conservationist,  Dr. Samuel Turvey (pictured), concerning the extinction of the Baiji – also known as the Yangtze River Dolphin.

During my Sunday afternoon drive home a couple of days ago, I found myself inadvertently listening to a program called Earth Beat – a product of Radio Netherlands Worldwide – courtesy of ABC News Radio, Australia. During the program we learned that Dr. Turvey has spent quite a bit of time working to locate and preserve any remaining members of the species that had been in steep decline for several decades. As it turns out, he was too late.

The Earth Beat website says that Dr. Turvey describes the demise of the dolphin as “a national tragedy and an international disgrace.” [emphasis mine]

Elsewhere, in several articles citing the paper co-written by Dr. Turvey concerning the extinction of the Baiji (a paper subsequently published in the Royal Society Biology Letters journal), he is also quoted as saying, “This extinction represents the disappearance of a complete branch of the evolutionary tree of life and emphasises that we have yet to take full responsibility in our role as guardians of the planet.”

Now I want you to keep in mind that the broader context of this story is an evolutionary world view. That’s critical context, given that we are dealing with the attempted conservation of a species that has arguably been eradicated by the industrialisation of the Yangtze River.

So here’s the remark that really caught my attention. Earth Beat host, Marnie Chesterton, says:

Read the rest of this entry

Recently, apologist Frank Turek has written a short but excellent article on the hypocrisy of LGBT activists who accuse Christians who oppose homosexual behaviour of being bigots. He also shows how they abuse the term “bigot” by mis-applying it to everybody who disagrees with their position, even when they have valid reasons for doing so. In the process, they expose themselves as the real bigots. Here is Turek’s article in full:

George Orwell said, “In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.” When you tell the truth about homosexuality today, you can be sure that the central tools of deceit—name-calling and bullying—will be unleashed.

I recently was having a respectful conversation with a homosexual activist, but after I made a point he couldn’t answer he called me a “bigot.”

I asked, “What’s your definition of bigotry?”

He said, “Fear and intolerance.”

I said, “The definition of bigotry is not ‘fear and intolerance.’ It’s making a judgment without knowing the facts. I have written a book about the problems with same-sex marriage and the destructive medical consequences of homosexual behavior. So my convictions on those issues are based in fact not ‘bigotry.’ With all due respect, if anyone is engaged in bigotry it is you for judging my position as wrong without even knowing why I hold it.”

He was also falsely equating my opposition to a behavior as prejudice toward people who engage in that behavior. That’s the central fallacy in virtually every argument for homosexuality—if you don’t agree with homosexual behavior, you are somehow bigoted against people who want to engage in that behavior. How does that follow? If conservatives and Christians are “bigots” for opposing homosexual behavior, then why aren’t homosexual activists bigots for opposing Christian behavior? And if we are bigots for opposing same-sex marriage, then why aren’t homosexual activists bigots for opposing polygamous or incestuous marriage?

Everyone puts limits on marriage—if marriage had no definition it wouldn’t be anything. Recognizing that marriage is between a man and a woman is not bigotry, but common sense rooted in the biological facts of nature. That’s why the state recognizes marriage to begin with—not because two people love one another but because only heterosexual unions can procreate and best nurture the next generation.

Everyone also puts limits on behaviors. But opposing behavior is not the same as opposing or “hating” people. In fact, to really love people, we often have to oppose what they do! Parents know this, and all former children know it as well.

Original Article

• Frank Turek  - Who Are the Real Gay Bigots and Bullies

The debate over the increasing acceptance of LGBT lifestyles in mainstream culture is one issue which — at least in Canadian society — has been more or less dominated by one side, which seeks to label all dissenters as “bigots,” “homophobes,” and even “extremists.” If you do not give them your unconditional assent and affirmation, they will level the most relentless forms of criticism against you. And this is precisely the case in the recent controversy over Toronto city mayor Rob Ford’s decision not to attend the annual Pride Parade.

To give a little background to people who are unfamiliar with this issue, Rob Ford is one of the most Conservative city mayors that Toronto has had in a long while. This particularly manifests in his policies regarding LGBT issues. He has publicly stated that he disagrees with same-sex marriage during his mayoral campaign, has refused to show up at a Pride flag raising at a public square, and has at least once threatened to cut public funding to the city’s annual Pride Parade. After all, why should the city spend public funds on such a parade anyway? Shouldn’t the LGBT community get its own funding if it wants a parade? Mayor Ford isn’t even targeting the LGBT Pride Parade in particular on this issue, since he has said in an article for The Star that “the public sector shouldn’t be funding parades, no matter what parade it is … The private sector should be sponsoring these parades.”[1] Be that as it may, the Pride Parade still got the funding that it wanted. There is just no stopping the LGBT agenda these days.

That being said, however, the biggest faux pas he has made recently (at least from the standpoint of the politically correct Left) was his refusal to attend the pride parade which took place earlier this month, on the grounds that it conflicted with a family tradition where he would spend the long weekend in a cottage away from the city. The responses that have been produced by Leftist pro-LGBT commentators and activists on newspapers and blogs have been merciless; most of them show relentless criticism of Mayor Ford for his personal choice. Now, if that isn’t ironic, I don’t know what is. These activists who demand society to affirm and support their ungodly lifestyles and personal preferences become very militant when others make personal choices that contradict the party line that LGBT activists force everybody else to follow. It seems that these days, their unofficial slogan is, “Support our campaign against bullying. If not, we’ll bully you until you do.” Read the rest of this entry

An associate of mine, who goes by the pseudonym Noc Nocterro, recently notified me and some others about an article he had published over at UrbanPhilosophy.net called “Love Knows No Gender.” The aim of the article was “a comprehensive analysis on the debate over the moral permissibility of homosexual behaviour,” in which he argues that homosexual activity is morally permissible when it is similar in circumstances to heterosexual activity that is morally permissible. I will leave it to Mathew Hamilton to address the sociological arguments when he returns from his sabbatical. My purpose in this response is to evaluate whether or not the arguments Nocterro presents withstand critical scrutiny. And his basic argument reasons in this way:

Premise 1: In cases where the good-making properties of a behaviour are much greater than the bad-making properties, then that behaviour is prima facie morally permissible.

Premise 2: There is a subset of homosexual sexual relationships where the good-making properties are much greater than the bad-making properties.

Premise 3: There is a subset of homosexual sexual relationships that are prima facie morally permissible.

Premise 4: If there is a prima facie support for the permissibility of some-thing, and there are no good reasons to support its impermissibility, then it should be deemed permissible.

Premise 5: There are no good reasons to suppose this subset of homosexual sexual relationships are impermissible.

Conclusion: This subset of homosexual sexual relationships is permissible.

Read the rest of this entry

Dr William Lane Craig offers a brief response to the challenge often posited by atheist Christopher Hitchens, and others: “Name a moral action that a religious person can do, that a non-religious person cannot.”