Archive for Culture
January 21, 2010
Filling that Good Old God-sized Hole
6:57 pm | Culture | Religion | Comments: 1
One of the greatest questions ever in the history of humanity is what does it take to bring a blogger out of retirement. Is it bribes? Is it cajolery? Is it boredom? The answer in my opinion is inspiration. Deep in the heart of every blogger is a desire to tell the world how he/she feels. That’s been the great thing about Twitter: we’ve discovered that a great many thoughts and feelings can be expressed in 140 characters or less. Micro-blogging, as I call it, is a time-saver and also enables you to offer up your musings to the world more or less as they occur to you personally. However, sometimes you need more. Sometimes you need a real blog. And if your blog has been retired for nearly two years, out of retirement you must bring it.
I have gone to lengths over the past year or so to keep my finger on the pulse of culture. It’s key to not becoming hopelessly out of touch as the years inevitably progress. The motion picture “Avatar”, specifically the 3D version, is a must-see in terms of a cultural heartbeat. As movies go it’s got all the elements of a Hollywood classic. The story has definitely been told before, and it uses plenty of Hollywood gimmicks to excite you. However, it still manages to be inspiring and thought-provoking, as well as a major technological step forward in the way people watch movies. A great piece in the New York Times today points out that no matter what kind of person you are, Avatar will press your buttons.
So let’s talk about what I walked away with from Avatar. Those slender, blue people-ish things you’ve been seeing on the internet are the Na’vi, a humanoid alien race that is intimately connected to the flora and fauna of their planet Pandora. In fact, they worship a deity named Eywa who manifests herself as a tree. The Na’vi find themselves in a struggle for survival against humans from Earth who are bent on bulldozing the Na’vi homeland in search for a rare and coveted mineral. The primary protagonist eventually finds himself praying to Eywa for help in the fight, which she then sends in the form of animals which help in fighting the humans in a desperate battle.
Make no mistake, people: this is not unusual. People everywhere worship nature. That’s not what’s interesting about the Na’vi religion. What moved me the most in the movie was that Eywa heard and answered the prayers of her people. A god that cares about its people, provides for them and delivers them from trouble, is something which all humans desire at some level. That’s what we want as creatures, and that’s what we need. Here’s the best part: there is such a god that lives, and his name is Jehovah. The Na’vi and their planet and their god are fantasy, but there is a definitely a God who has revealed himself to us in many marvelous ways.
Falling asleep after watching the movie a thought crossed my mind: “I wish God would show himself as powerfully as Eywa did in the story of Avatar.” He has, though, especially in the individual lives of people. We definitely missed out on the days when his hand of power was more freely administered among men visibly, but that power is still there. For now, you need eyes of faith to see it. The revelation we’ve been given about who God is and what he does is actually far more fantastic and unimaginable than anything James Cameron could ever put on a screen. In a way though, Cameron captured a very fundamental need of human beings: to have close communion with a loving God.
“You Saw What in ‘Avatar’? Pass Those Glasses!”
September 8, 2007
Kept and Borne
7:41 pm | Culture | My Life | Comments: 17
What you’re looking at is a Glock 19 safe-action pistol, and I am now a proud owner of one of them. You’ll recall a post on SIO a while ago in which I bemoaned the fact that morons out there blamed the Virginia Tech massacre on American gun culture and lax firearms legislation, after which I came to the conclusion that the only reasonable thing to do in the face of the tragedy at VT was to arm myself. The Glock 19 was, in fact, one of the weapons that the gunman used in the attack.
Glock is the most famous and popular maker of polymer-frame sidearms, legendary for creating quality weapons that are absolutely, utterly reliable. The Model 19 is chambered for 9mm rounds and is a compact version of the Glock 17, weighing about 5.5 pounds. I chose the Glock 19 primarily for concealed carry purposes, and it’s a great performer in that category for a number of reasons: 1) you can depend on a Glock without fail to fire when you pull the trigger (no external safeties, hardware failures, or jams to worry about); 2) it’s lightweight polymer and has service pistol dimensions on a compact frame that’s very streamlined; and 3) it has a magazine capacity of 15 rounds.
Michigan is a great state for firearms enthusiasts. Without a criminal record, you can go to the Police Department and get a license to purchase (no charge) then head straight to a dealer and walk out with your handgun the same day. The Concealed Carry permit process takes a bit longer and is much more expensive, but if you meet the very reasonable requirements you’ll get it. This all makes me very happy.
July 29, 2007
English Language Nazis Can Take a Seat
7:32 pm | Culture | Comments: 10
With the addition of “ginormous” to Merriam-Webster’s dictionary, what once was a pseudo-word used only by youngsters and Will Ferrell fans has finally gotten clean. I saw the word on a billboard on the way home from church recently, and to be honest it doesn’t look good. It’s an ugly-looking word, for a number of reasons. At this point such speculation is spilled milk of course, and language nazis should just start hoping that “gimungous” or “hunormous” don’t make it into the dictionary as well.
April 18, 2007
Mine Eyes Have Seen the Stanton
5:45 pm | Culture | Comments: 1
If you know me at all, you know I often rave about topics such as funk music, Galactic, and Stanton Moore. Last night, they all came together at the Intersection in downtown Grand Rapids. I’d been looking forward to the show for months, ever since I discovered to my amazement that Galactic had indeed been booked at the Intersection. Galactic? Here in Grand Rapids? Unthinkable! Absurd!
Galactic, by the way, is Robert Mercurio on bass, Rich Vogel on the classic Hammond organ (it’s an original, looks about 60 years old), Ben Ellman on saxophone and harmonica, Jeff Raines on guitar, and Stanton Moore on drums. Say what you will about funk music, but Galactic knows how to put on a good show. Not only are all five band members freakishly good at what they do, the stage itself is visually stunning throughout the show. The truth is that Galactic has departed a bit from pure New Orleans funk and incorporated a wide variety of modern genres into their music - it’s hard to nail down exactly what type of music it is; it’s just Galactic, and it involves major amounts of sock rockage.
So there I was, 20 feet away from Stanton Moore. I got right up on the front railing for the whole show, so I didn’t see the mass of awkwardly-dancing Grand Rapidians behind me. For a few hours it seemed like just me and Galactic. Stanton was amazing. At the end of the show the band left the stage for the obligatory maybe-we’ll-do-an-encore pause, after which they came back for a few numbers and ended with a stunning Stanton drum solo which I’ll never forget. So I’ve decided to start a Grand Rapids Galactic knock-off band and name it Grandraptic. Who’s in?
April 17, 2007
The Wrong Answer
6:10 pm | Culture | Politics | Comments: 3
The question on everybody’s mind is why, as always. Why did this guy decide it was time for 32 random people to die? I can give you the answer: sin. That much is obvious. Sin itself is a problem which also has a solution, that solution being Lord Jesus Christ. What I want to address at this time is the wrong answer being trumpeted by ignorant morons everywhere, which is that America needs more gun control.
I was angry enough to yell at my computer monitor when I read the statement of that Australian official who gloated about having tightened the noose around his own citizenry by increasing gun-control laws. The idea that gun-control legislation will stop shootings, as I’ve pointed out several times in the annals of Set It Off, is absurd. The reasons for this are plentiful, the most obvious being the fact that gun-control laws only apply to people that care about the law - something which most criminals don’t seem to care much about. The only way it could work is if you physically removed every single weapon from the world - which will simply never happen, and even then would-be murderers would just get more creative in how they murdered people. Remember Prohibition? It drove the alcohol industry underground, making alcohol trafficking a goldmine for the underworld. Gun-control laws will never reduce crime, they will only make criminals who sell illegal weapons richer and criminals that buy illegal weapons more powerful.
America’s gun culture did nothing to facilitate Cho Seung-Hui’s heinous crime. In fact, if students had been allowed to carry concealed firearms on campus, he could very well have been dead long before the thirty-second person was killed. The fact that U.S. citizens are banned from carrying concealed firearms in many public places in the United States should be a matter of grave concern to us all because it leaves us at risk of having no effective way to fight back when someone threatens us with our lives. I know that the moment I can afford a decent handgun, I will buy one legally and obtain a permit to carry it concealed on my person. As citizens of the United States of America, that is our right and I think that we should all be aware of it, and when we arm ourselves we should remember the 32 victims of Cho Seung-Hui that found themselves defenseless and at the mercy of a cold-blooded killer.
April 12, 2007
House Commentary
6:43 pm | Culture | Comments: 3
Chase should have seen it coming. If anybody should have known that Cameron was a total nut job, it’s Chase. But there he goes, off on a raunchy fling with Cameron that in any other circumstance would have cost them both their jobs. On top of it all, he gets feelings for her? Come on, man. You should have seen this all coming. At this point, I have to say that Foreman is the only normal person on the show. That being said, I like the progress that House has been making lately in his personal life. It’s obvious that he’s rethinking his position on abortion, and the brain-cancer episode showed him how he was completely alienating himself from the only people that care about him in the world at no gain to himself - and the difference was that it almost seemed to matter to him.
I’ve often tried explaining how House, M.D. as a TV show is better than the rest of the shows on television (other than American Idol for the sake of Sanjaya). The writing and cinematography is superb of course, but that’s no different from a number of other shows right now. So what makes House, M.D. stand out from the rest of the crowd? It’s Greg House. House is the show. Sure, we watch to see which psychopath Wilson will fall in love with next, and we watch to see if we can guess what catastrophic thing is about to go wrong with the hapless dying patient. But ultimately the brilliance of the show is the brilliance of the House’s character, brought to life by the brilliance of Hugh Laurie.
March 27, 2007
The Vapor of Life
5:36 pm | College | Culture | Stories | Comments: 13
I was in three different worlds yesterday. The day began like most any other, with me working at the old folks’ home. I can’t understand what it’s like to be 80 years old. That’s nearly four times my own age. Four times the knowledge, four times the life experiences, four times the struggles. In any other situation, that would get you respect; in America, it lands you in an old folks’ home, where you can be conveniently avoided by the up-and-coming generation that is choosing to learn by trial and error the lessons which most of the people around you learned 40 years ago.
After work I headed out to my humble alma mater, Grand Valley State University, stepping through what seemed like ages of time into the world of the college campus. Sitting on the back porch of the student union in the summery breeze, looking out across the green lawn with its small pond, I was surrounded by youth and beauty that was seemingly blissfully ignorant of the finite nature of life. As I sipped my drink I felt the sudden urge to do my homework, at which moment I realized with a satisfying smile that there was no homework. Instead I pulled out two sheets of music and read them, the strains of Verdi’s “The Force of Destiny” echoing in my head. Bahm, Bahm, Bahm! repeated. Then come the strings: Doodelly-doo, doodelly-doo, doodle-edoooodee DOOdoo. I listened with my eyes until the foul-mouthed pack of sorority chicks to my left got rambunctious due to the arrival of a guitar-toting fratty. I gave them my best “Foolish students, don’t mess with an Alumnus” look and headed for my car.
On the way home I drove through the world of Division and Wealthy, in the Grand Rapids ghetto. This was another world in which I have had no experience. Due to the lot that God has given me by no choice of my own, I have never personally experienced poverty. I’ve been around it, to be sure; dirt-eating poverty of the most squalid kind. People who live in poverty don’t care about getting a college degree. They also don’t really care where they’ll be when they’re 80. They would truly understand what the Bible means when it says, “Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.”
By the time I got home I was wondering about my own world. What defines it, what’s good about it, what’s bad about it. The age-old questions popped up: where am I going in this life, what should I be doing, what does it all mean? No, the answer isn’t 42. As a Christian, I’m comforted by knowing that the answers to all those questions have been written down and preserved miraculously over thousands of years. It was really too much to think about at the end of a long day, so I just furrowed my brow slightly, put on my running shoes, and took off down the shaded sidewalks of Heritage Hill.
March 14, 2007
Sinners in the Military
6:14 pm | Culture | News | War | Comments: 2
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Peter Pace, USMC, recently got himself into trouble by stating his personal belief about homosexuality - specifically, that it’s immoral. The statement was made in connection with the long-time debate about United States’ policy for handling homosexuality in its ranks. “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” is still widely supported by top military brass, and won’t be going anywhere any time soon. It’s also nice that Gen. Pace didn’t apologize for his remarks, but rather clarified that his own personal belief was not relevant to the debate at hand. I instantly like him more than the Pope and other supposedly principled people that have made true statements then in the face of opposition backed down from them in cowardly fashion.
Here’s what I think about homosexuals in the military. You can’t make the morality argument against them, because there’s also a large amount of fornicators and adulterers in the military and nobody seems to have a problem with that. The more meaningful argument made against them is the impact that open homosexuality has on morale, good order, readiness and unit cohesion. Civvies like you and me have a very difficult time understanding what this impact may or may not be, and I will take the word of military professionals who almost unanimously agree that the impact is negative on all these things.
There are lots of people spouting all kinds of nonsense about this issue. A great example would be Rep. Chaka Fattah (D-PA), who says, “The idea that the sexual orientation of any American has relevance to his or her patriotism or ability to fight in the Armed Forces is wrong-headed and harmful to our nation’s security.” This is a laughable argument, paying no attention to any relevant facts in the case, such as the ones I’ve mentioned above. There are many patriotic people that have no business in the military, and who are by various means excluded from military service. The security of the nation is fine; homosexuals make up a tiny fraction of the service-eligible demographic in this country; there’s no danger of running out of volunteers because gays are disallowed from serving. If these folks truly are patriotic, there are innumerable other ways in which to chip in for the good of the country rather than trying to shoe-horn their way into the armed forces.
January 3, 2007
What to Make of a State Funeral
9:17 pm | Culture | Comments: 8
You’ve got two types of people in the Gerald R. Ford scenario: people that care, and people that don’t. It’s easy to understand why people care. The office of President in our government is a big deal. It’s a tough job that isn’t for everbody, and the added bonus for the President is his God-given authority, over both citizens like you and me and the armed forces of the nation. As a member of the “powers that be”, the President deserves a great deal of everybody’s respect. So your average American is going to care because they consider a President to be a being somewhere between men and angels (or men and demons, if you’re a vein-poppingly-angry liberal). Veterans can also identify with Ford, a comrade in arms. And I am compelled by this as well.
But what about former presidents? They don’t have any authority. They just used to. America makes a big deal out of former Presidents mostly in consideration of prestige. I think former Presidents are way over-hyped in America. The significance of Gerald R. Ford, for me, was that he was a Christian man (by most popular accounts - although he was also a Free Mason) and a veteran. As for his faith, the funeral was so full of Christian truth that I’m not going to be the naysayer in this case. At any rate, alot of people out there “don’t care” in comparison to the veterans and average Joes on the street because they don’t see why it should be so different from any other funeral. I am also compelled by this argument, especially when my intended route has been blocked by the third motorcade in 48 hours.
I definitely understand the “it’s just another funeral” crowd. Do we really need a 20-vehicle State Police motorcade rumbling down Wealthy Street, lights flashing and sirens blaring, for Former President Carter? I can understand this if the man was actually the President. As it stands, he hasn’t been president for almost 25 years. The same could be said about the late Former President Ford, although his motorcade seemed like hundreds of vehicles. Motorcade sizes aside, I think many people in this country have legitimate reasons to be very emotional about all this. Likewise, many have legitimate reasons to reflect for a mintute or two then get on with life.
As for me, a patriot and a Christian, I cannot hear cannon roar and Taps sounding without getting a distinct lump in my throat thinking about the reward that awaits all faithful followers of Jesus Christ after their passage into eternity.
December 25, 2006
A Christmas Message from SIO
12:19 pm | Culture | My Life | Comments: 7
Spike my cider with rum! I want lots of hot loot, as well. I am sad to say that I’m a false prophet; I prophesied a white Christmas (how couldn’t I?) and I look out my window this morning to find grass. Rotten, awful, putrid grass. I wish the stuff would seriously go boil its head. I am sitting here listening to Galactic waiting for my cellphone to charge thinking I’d rather be on a snowboard, on a big mountain, waiting for my cellphone to charge. That’s what winter is supposed to be; that’s what I have been dreaming of. Not this ugly green crap. If I want grass I’ll start up a hydroponics lab in my attic.
