PeaceBang

War and Sacrifice

I got an e-mail yesterday from a colleague asking me to sign on to a statement of Lamentation and Repentance for War generated by Jim Wallis and the good folks at Sojourners. As I’m sure you are aware, March 19 marks the fifth anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, a moral disaster of such long-lasting and profound dimensions I won’t even try to address them in a phrase or two.

When I think of this occupation, though, I think not of my own generation but of my nephews’ grandchildren, who will stay be paying for it, and theirs after them. I am convinced that two hundred years hence, if we still have a planet Earth and a history of it, this episode will be remembered as one of the greatest disgraces committed by an empire at the height of its power. It will be remembered as a tale of stupidity and hubris and cultural ignorance over which historians and lay people will shake their heads wondering, “How could that one superpower in that era do something so incredibly, obviously motivated by bloodlust and greed? How did their great government allow it? How could the people not take to the streets in droves, screaming and protesting, boycotting and barraging their elected representatives until they got out? What in the world was it really supposed to accomplish? How long did it take Iraq and surrounding nations to regain anything resembling equilibrium?”

I did sign on to the Call to Lament and Repent, but really, what other sacrifices have I been asked to make? Sending an e-mail petition is a pitifully empty action made through zero effort by a fat, comfortable civilian whose exterior life has been entirely uninterrupted or disturbed by this war while thousands of my countrymen and women are dead, are currently in harm’s way, and whose families daily bear the burden of their being in a hostile, dangerous environment fighting a war with no end in sight. My only sigh of regret comes at the gas pump, where I shell out (pun intended) over $3 a gallon for gas so I can go and drive wherever I please, while how many tens of thousands of Iraqi lives are shattered and their land drenched in blood? My biggest family concerns in the past five years amount to a mother with a broken shoulder and a brother with knee problems. My nephews are alive and well and growing up with all comforts and luxuries on a safe little suburban street, my sister and I work our jobs and have full and free social lives, travel, shop, entertain ourselves as we so choose — there is no interruption of services, no end to the diversions we might purchase for ourselves, no cessation of the round of social outings, learning opportunities, cultural life and beautiful countryside to which we might avail ourselves. Our sleep is undisturbed. Our grocery stores are full to bursting, we never go hungry unless we choose to, and all manner of services are widely available to us with no delay.

I saw a movie this past week that was ostensibly a sweet piece of madcap costume fun starring the extraordinary Frances McDormand, the delightful Amy Adams and my personal favorite, the wickedly talented Shirley Henderson. It was set in England at the start of WWII, and while the younger characters involved themselves in a whirl of sex, champagne and romantic intrigue, the middle-aged leads (McDormand and her lovely, sexy suitor Joe played by Ciaran Hinds) were dreadfully aware of the signs of coming war, and knew just what that would mean. They had lived through the first world war, you see, and while the youngsters danced and carried on obliviously, these two drew closer together in deep generational understanding and sympathy, having no idea what was to come but knowing in their hearts that it would be terrible, and require much of them, taking away their peace of mind and their comforts, which is what any war should do. Any war should take away the peace of mind and the comforts of the nations that fight it, else it is too distant, too hypothetical, too much a spectacle on the nightly news and not real enough for us to hate it enough to end it.

Helpless, helpless, helpless. We inflicted this horror upon another sovereign nation and our own military forces and kept ourselves largely untroubled at home, thinking that yellow “Support Our Troops” stickers on our cars was gesture enough, that circling around in peaceful protest was enough. We should have had our gas rationed, our sugar, silk stockings, and other luxuries taken away, our electricity and heat rationed — not only to pay for some of this disastrous experiment in “nation building” but to have it brought to our attention on a daily basis that we are a nation at war, hemorrhaging billions of dollars a day while many of our own citizens lack housing, food and health insurance, and that this is untenable, disastrous, and must be repented of and ENDED.

“Miss Pettigrew Lives For a Day” — which of these women has lived through a world war??

“To Patrick Swayze, Thanks For Everything, Victoria Weinstein”

I wrote a little tribute to drag queens, and to Patrick Swayze over at my other blog. The news that Swayze is battling pancreatic cancer was a blow.

“To Wong Foo,Thanks For Everything, Julie Newmar” (1995) was released very close to the break-out drag queen hit “Priscilla, Queen of the Desert,” and I know I’m in the minority in believing that “To Wong Foo” was by far the better picture. To me, “Priscilla” was a wonderful road story but an overly-mincing performance by Guy Pearce and unbelievable casting in Terrence Stamp (I love the man, but he can’t move, and drag queens — especially legendary ones — have serious moves) made it impossible for me to buy his character).

“To Wong Foo,” first of all, totally gets the aesthetics of big American drag right, and exquisitely so. The three actors playing the key characters (John Leguizamo as Chi-Chi Rodriguez, Wesley Snipes as Miss Noxeema Jackson, and Patrick Swayze as Miss Vida Boheme) were unbelievably good together, and threw themselves into the roles with total abandon. Given the three “girls” differences in economic class, culture and race, this is a great movie about America itself, land of the free and the brave, where we are free to recreate ourselves in whatever image we can afford emotionally and financially. The dialogue is wickedly funny and mean, such as when the Latina “baby drag queen” Chi-Chi starts to run away from the car in the middle of the night in a fit of pique and Wesley Snipes, the African-American Amazon goddess Noxeema Jackson, calmly watches her from the back seat and says, “Look at her, lookin’ like she runnin’ for the border.” The script is full of this kind of racial and class tension dealt with through affectionately biting sarcasm, which makes it true to the American experience and to the drag community.

Yes, the hetero men in the movie are mostly macho, dumb stereotypes (watch for the sweet Arliss Howard trying to persuade us that he’s a drunk wife-beater — bad casting, there!) and some have complained that they didn’t appreciate the whole “It takes a man dressed as a woman to teach a woman how to be a woman,” but I loved it. I loved it because it can be true. Just as it can take a woman to teach a man how to live more fully into his masculinity, so can the opposite be true.

I remember when I moved to Massachusetts from Maryland, having lived as a sexless frump for three dateless years and having totally subsumed my sense of femininity in the work of ministry. My friend Nathan, a drag queen, took me shopping in the summer of 2003. He coaxed me into more fitted jackets than I would have purchased, a sexy skirt that hugged my hips, and a pair of Nine West pumps that I first refused. “I don’t wear heels, Nathan, I’m too fat!” “HONEY,” he replied, from his full height of well over 6″ with one hand on a not-at-all slim hip, “If I can wear 4″ heels, you can wear these little 2″ things. GET THEM.” I did, I woke up to the fact that I was hiding myself behind layers of fat and big, shapeless clothing and I began to consider why I was doing this, and how it served neither myself nor my ministry. I started working out, I started dating, I started integrating my identity as a minister with my femininity, and I have never looked back. Thanks, Nathan.

And thank you, Patrick Swayze, for your marvelous creation of Vida Boheme. I wish you well in your cancer treatment, and want to say now that to me, you will always be immortalized in that great lady; a performance underappreciated by critics and by the general public.

Rock of Love 2: Too Vile for Even A Guilty Pleasure

I went to the gym today and with one eye watched a Food Channel show with that pretty lady who always shows too much bosom (I think her name is something like Giardia, but isn’t that an intestinal parasite?) and with one eye VH-1’s horrific “Rock of Love 2,” which made me yell at the screen a lot. It’s a good thing the gym was fairly empty.

This is another one of those shows featuring a really skaggy dude living in a house full of chicks vying for his approval. Everyone behaves somewhere at the level of rhesus monkeys (only with more sex and worse fashion) and at the end, he “eliminates” a babe or two from his harem, causing them to HATE THEMSELVES rather than him or the producers of this despicable bit of realitrash TV.

I’m only glad I caught it because I was so overwhelmed with disbelief, I stayed on the treadmill an extra 20 minutes to make sure I was getting the premise right. This character (Bret is the lead singer for the band “Poison,” if that means anything to you, and … don’t be offended, but I’m pretty sure he’s wearing a cucumber in his Levis) has these women in such a desperate hysteria of desire and devotion, I hoped they might turn on him in the end in a Dionysian lust-rage and tear him limb from limb, but no such luck.

If they did the same show with Professor Gary Dorrien, now that I’d watch. Heck, I’d even go on the show.

Shopping For Religion

Ellen Goodman of the Boston Globe seems surprised — or maybe discomfited would be a better word– to learn that Americans these days go shopping for their religion.

She cites a recent study by the Pew Forum that reports that 44% of Americans have left their religion of origin and are presumably currently unaffiliated or out shopping for a better fit. Of course Unitarian Universalists have known this for a long time. The overwhelming majority of Unitarian Universalists are “come-outers” from other faith traditions and have been for decades. Both Philocrites and Dan at Yet Another Unitarian Universalist have more to say on the number of Americans identifying as UU. Do read Philocrites, and the comments. They’re very provocative and will lead you to the link for Dan’s blog, and to Ms. Theologian’s excellent (if depressing for this minister) entry about why she doesn’t go to church.

So where are the 400,000 Americans who identify as Unitarian Universalist but who never appear in our churches or fellowships? Out golfing or in bed reading the NY Times? Shopping, doing errands, catching up with family, cleaning house? Disappointed in our too often uninspiring, cliquish, self-congratulatory, sloppy worship services? Working their second job? Intimidated or put-off by our snobbery and haughty liberalism? Offended by the wide gap between who we claim to be on paper (or on the internet) and who we are in person? Sure. I have no doubt that we’re guilty of losing many, many members for our most besetting sins. But there’s also our laissez-faire attitude toward membership, joining, and commitment to spiritual growth that leaves us bereft of many folks who desire a deep and demanding religious life. We’re getting a lot better at lifting up the virtues of community along with the sanctity of the Individual, and that helps. Many of our congregations are putting membership processes in place that appeal to the “joiner” in people who find that, contrary to what they believed about themselves, they do crave a serious and intentional bond of fellowship with other seekers. Also good.

But since we’re still allergic to evangelism, and because our ad campaigns and too many of our members and our outdated promotional pamphlets and books still frame us as the alternative TO religion, we’re bound to stay teensy beensy. If there are so many interesting, intellectually provocative, or just relaxing alternatives to religion that I can do on my own, why in the world would I join a congregation or church so that I can pledge my money to, give my volunteer hours to, and send my children to Sunday School (or religious education) an institution that is still trying to convince the world that it’s a legitimate religious institution … but not really religious?

Is this, for example, really the best statement we can make to seekers who want to know who we are religiously? Why wouldn’t I just spend the afternoon at Barnes & Noble skimming through the religion section if that’s all these people are offering? I can sit in a comfy chair and sip coffee while I’m doing it, too!

Somewhere God is laughing.

Liberals Should Not Be Dissin’ Hope: Ugly Moments From the Campaign Trail

I’m sure you’ve seen the clip of Hillary Clinton at a recent rally in Providence, RI, looking like a big, angry bumblebee in a yellow and black outfit, throwing her hands in the air and dramatically mocking the hope and change message of Barack Obama’s campaign. In the most acid, bitter tones and with a face twisted in an expression of total disgust, Hill (badly) mimics the stance and cadences of an African-American preacher as she describes “the heavens opening up” and a bolt of lightning coming down to save the world — or some equally dramatic rhetoric that is supposed to express her utter contempt for Barack Obama’s naivete and inexperience.
She concludes by saying, “But WE KNOW HOW HARD THIS IS GOING TO BE.” And that is supposed to make me feel that she, rather than Obama, is the leader I want.

Instead, it makes me loathe her, and I have never loathed Hillary Clinton before.

I’ve seen the spot several times now and my blood pressure goes up every time (good thing I’m usually on the treadmill at the gym when it happens).

It is one thing to mock someone’s specific policy ideas. It is one thing to exchange harsh words about past voting records, hypocrisies on substantive issues, unethical behavior with lobbyists, and political choices you feel your opponent has screwed up. It is another thing entirely to express total contempt and disgust that your opponent has managed to inspire HOPE among a significant portion of the population, and to make that mere fact the focus of your ire. Especially now. Especially now.

I can’t think of a worse misstep for a liberal politician to make, because liberal ideals are, at their very essence, intimately tied to hope and vision. I know that Senator Clinton is no progressive, but for her to throw her arms around in an (perhaps unconsciously) racist parody of the preaching tradition of the Black Church (remember, she was specifically mocking Obama here, not Mike Huckabee or a white evangelical) and to sneer at Hope itself is one of the ugliest moments I have yet seen during this campaign. She has sunk lower in my estimation than I ever thought possible.

This, by the way, is equally ugly but I thought you should see it:

I guess I’m naive, too, but I had hoped that this kind of despicable racism and sexism would have come from the opposing side, not from within the Democratic party. Haven’t we yet learned that the Republicans are brilliant at putting aside differences and uniting behind one candidate when push comes to shove? Let’s not start splintering now, liberals, for God’s sake. And Ralph Nader, if you seriously think of running again I swear I will find you and personally and securely duct tape you to your bathroom wall until November, you quixotic tick.

[Thanks to the readers who directed me to the YouTube clip. - PB]

Don’t Cry For Me, Iowa and New Hampshire

Loving Pregnancies, Loving Babies, Abandoning Children

So I’m on the treadmill the other day watching the news with one eye (”Family Feud” with the other) and I see CNN reporting that another young lass has given birth into a toilet because she didn’t know she was pregnant. They show the gal and her really cute newborn and part of me is going “oh, the BAY-BEE, I’m so glad it’s safe and not smooshed or drowned” and the other part of me is going, “If I had given birth into a toilet because I had not realized I was pregnant, would I be so eager to appear on national TV?”

That and the Jamie Lynn Spears thing is really getting me down about that bizarre, Girls (And Guys!) Gone Wild feeling in the culture lately around pregnancy. Is it just me, or are we getting mad stoopid about pregnancy? We’ve got this carnival of international celebrity adoptions that no one can shut up about (one recent tab headline: “SHILOH IN TROUBLE:” because, apparently Angelina Jolie pays more attention to her adopted than to her biological daughter). We had Bridget Moynahan working her swollen belly in front of every available paparazzo after her break-up with Tom Brady for maximum media coverage and feminine sympathy (I felt manipulated and suspicious — why should pregnancy make someone suddenly SO famous? Tacky, Ms. Moynahan. You’re a grown woman. Put that stomach away. People break up, men cheat. You should not be leveraging that fact in order to get your abdomen front page coverage. Before your pregnancy, I had never heard of you. Way to exploit your child for fame before it’s even born!).

Let’s not even talk about the statistics on murdering pregnant women. It’s too horrific to even contemplate.

The Britney Spears spectacle isn’t even close to funny any more. She was apparently hospitalized today for being high and refusing to give up custody of her two sons. (Anyone else out there guessing that a woman of lesser fame and income level would have been cuffed and taken to the slammer for pulling similar shenanigans?)

Columnist Ellen Goodman wrote a terrific piece here, “Changing the Script on Teen Pregnancy” that expresses my mixed feelings about the spate of she-got-accidentally-pregnant-and-is-keeping-the-baby movies out now (I ADORED “Knocked Up,” but I’m still leery of the cultural trend here); please read it. What I see is a widespread fantasy-spinning about the realities of child-rearing along with a total lack of simultaneous discussion on the failure of abstinence-only birth control, and about social services, health care, and poverty issues that affect millions and millions of children in this country alone. And I have a feeling that the conservatives in power want it just that way. We just love pregnancy stories and we looooove the bay-bees, but we really don’t want to sacrifice any of our own comforts or privileges to assure that they all have decent health care, food in their bellies, a decent education no matter where they live, and child care when their mothers have to work.

I’m looking around lately at messages to women in this culture and what I’m getting is something like, “At her very best, the American Woman should be be thin, rich, an ideal consumer, plastic-perfect, and pregnant.”

Meanwhile… Mike Huckabee’s triumph in Iowa makes me want to go take an 8 year nap.

A Moment of Zen in Time Squares, New Year’s Eve, 2007

You know the scene. You’ve either been there or watched it on television, snuggled cozily in bed or on the couch and thanking your lucky stars that you’re not stuck in that claustrophobia-inducing bacchanalia.

So this year I’m snuggled cozily in with a pal and we’re watching the madness right before the big disco ball drops and chuckling while the frantic newsgal sticks a microphone into various inebriated faces and screams “WHAT’S YOUR NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTION THIS YEAR?”

She’s getting the usual “I’M GONNA LOSE TWENNY POUNDS!” “I’M GONNA GET BETTER GRADES!” “I’M GONNA USE MY CREDIT CARD LESS!” and this sort of thing. And then, because I’m nodding off, I miss it. My pal starts cracking up and I rouse myself and say, “What? What? What did I miss?” All I had noticed through my sleepy haze was a woman with a comically huge, lit-up 2008 tiara on her head and a Brooklyn accent so thick you could serve it on bread with mustard. “What did she say?” And as soon as he can stop laughing his head off, my friend gasps out, “TAKE PROPER TIME TO BE WITH YOURSELF!” which comes out like “TAKE PROPPAH TOIME TA BE WITH YAHSELF!”

This pronouncement is followed with a wild, “GO TEAM” bout of cheering and jumping up and down tooting horns, and right there we have the perfect mash-up of mindless New Year’s Eve revelry and the wisdom of ancients.

So whoever you are, New York lady, my friend and I just want to say we totally love you and you have given us the best, most genuine first great laugh of the new year.

Her Works Go Before Her

Best reason to take to your bed today.

Just another courageous, feisty broad forever silenced by bullets. Lord have mercy.

Better Get To Livin’

I saw this video on Jezebel last night and almost keeled over with delight.

Check it out, and share it with your favorite Female Negativo, ’cause that’s what Dolly would want!

Dolly and Amy Sedaris, brazilliant.