I

Jefferson’s rough draft was more blunt than the final version.  My professor didn’t make any specific comment on it; the reading was merely part of the required supplementary primary documents that would be covered in an exam.  I actually had the opportunity to cover the subject of the revision of the Declaration of Independence more in depth in World Views of the Western World Year II (when I have more time I’ll get into the philosophical aspects of the revision…).  Thomas Jefferson was a young (33 year-old), red-headed and impulsive writer who was a little insulted by the elder gentlemen making so many refining suggestions.  Benjamin Franklin soothed his temper by telling him a funny story about a hat merchant whose friends kept insisting he whittle down his fancy store advertisement until it said nothing but “Hats”.

However, I can imagine that Jefferson would later blush at some of the drama he included in his rough draft.  I won’t feel so bad now when I go overboard in an article.

Here are some of my favorite Jefferson-uncensored quotes from the “Original Rough Draught” (see if you notice the differences):

When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for a people to advance from that subordination in which they have hitherto remained, & to assume among the powers of the earth the equal & independent station to which the laws of nature & of nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the change.

We hold these truths to be sacred & undeniable that all men are created equal & independent, that from that equal creation they derive rights inherent & inalienable, among which are the preservation of life, & liberty, & the pursuit of happiness…

…He has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating it’s most sacred rights of life & liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him, captivating & carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur miserable death in their transportation thither. this piratical warfare, the opprobrium of infidel powers, is the warfare of the CHRISTIAN king of Great Britain. determined to keep open a market where MEN should be bought & sold, he has prostituted his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or to restrain this execrable commerce: and that this assemblage of horrors might want no fact of distinguished die, he is now exciting those very people to rise in arms among us, and to purchase that liberty of which he has deprived them, by murdering the people upon whom he also obtruded them; thus paying off former crimes committed against the liberties of one people, with crimes which he urges them to commit against the lives of another…

…in every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms; our repeated petitions have been answered by repeated injury. a prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a people who mean to be free. future ages will scarce believe that the hardiness of one man, adventured within the short comnpass of 12 years only, on so many acts of tyranny without a mask, over a people fostered & fixed in principles of liberty…

…they too have been deaf to the voice of justice & of consanguinity, & when occasions have been given them, by the regular course of their laws, of removing from their councils the disturbers of our harmony, they have by their free election re-established them in power. at this very time too they are permitting their chief magistrate to send over not only soldiers of our common blood, but Scotch & foreign mercenaries to invade & deluge us in blood. these facts have given the last stab to agonizing affection, and manly spirit bids us to renounce for ever these unfeeling brethren. we must endeavor to forget our former love for them, and to hold them as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends, we might have been a free & a great people together; but a communication of grandeur & of freedom it seems is below their dignity. be it so, since they will have it: the road to glory & happiness is open to us to; we will climb it in a separate state, and acquiesce in the necessity which pronounces our everlasting Adieu!

…to prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world, for the truth of which we pledge a faith yet unsullied by falsehood…

And for the support of this declaration we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, & our sacred honour.

It’s a shame that the Founders didn’t nip slavery in the bud from the beginning.  At the time it was morally frowned upon in the North and South, but economic incentives kept it legal.  In territories that were yet unsettled, the Continental Congress outlawed slavery easily from the beginning in the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 (before the Constitution was written).  But in areas where slavery had become an incentive to compete with the produce output of the world markets, outlawing such a thing was not so easy and a compromise resulted.

While I was searching for the portrait of Thomas Jefferson, this blog post came up.  I’m not familiar with the author, but the article is really quite hilarious!  Jefferson in his own words, mind you.  It sounds quite imaginable, actually.

~Amanda~

Post Scriptum – Read more about the Declaration of Independence and the rough draft here.

“I’m sure we’ve all heard some variation of the fact before: the average Muslim family has 8.1 children, while the American birth rate barely reaches the bare minimum for a culture to survive beyond 25 years – 2.11 children – and that is counting the influx of Latino immigration. Discounting the immigrants, the fertility rate of American citizens is a scanty 1.6. This means that there is a good chance the United States of America could become an Islamic-dominated nation (along with European nations) within 50 years unless something changes soon (1).”

- One of the opening paragraphs of Cream Puff Culture, an article by me that targeted child-shunning and its economic consequences, in which I also cited the popular “Muslim Demographics” video. This video has since been ridiculed all over the internet, and some mistakes in its claims have led many to believe that its message is fraudulent, which has led to my article being attacked as incorrect.

Ah, the devil is in the details. Heralding potentially indeterminable details can cause the entire point to be missed and make it appear fraudulent. I apologize for citing the video without including more in depth research. Please allow me to explain that further research shows that my entire article is not at all fraudulent, and neither is the entire video (NOTE: my article content was NOT based upon that video, but rather independent study; the video was only an extra reference which I otherwise have nothing to do with).  But there are minor errors that need to be corrected, and I will proceed to do so now.  I will also attempt dissecting the criticism of the video and see if the criticism is substantial or not.  I’ll have to keep this first article brief, but if I get a chance outside of college studying I will fact-check even more in depth.

The focus of this article will be whether or not the premise of the Muslim Demographics video (that is, the concept that Muslims are growing in population while the rest of the world is not) is worthy of consideration.

“France has a fertility rate of 1.8, Muslims have a fertility rate of 8.1…”

The subject of demographics can be summed up in a few simple words: the study of people replacing people. It doesn’t take a precise science to determine the outcome of many demographically oriented things. Common sense is all that is needed to anticipate the outcome of two people producing two children: if the offspring live, they will have replaced themselves after death, but the population will not increase. But if two parents have more than two children and the offspring live, they will have more than replaced themselves after death.

Ultimately, it doesn’t matter whether the average Muslim woman has 8 children, 5 children or 3 children; Muslim families on average still more than replace themselves more often than the rest of the world. What evidence do we have of this?  According to the U.S. Census Bureau and CIA World Factbook, most Islamic countries have a higher fertility rate than Western nations do, which hearkens to the cultural mindset that Muslims have toward reproduction.

TOTAL FERTILITY RATE ESTIMATE (births per woman):

Niger – 7.75 – 80% Muslim

Mali – 7.29 – 90% Muslim

Iraq – 3.9 – 97% Muslim

Afghanistan – 6.53 – over 80% Muslim

Saudi Arabia – 3.83 – 100% Muslim

Yemen – 6.32 – 99% Muslim (according to Swivel; other sources uncertain)

United Arab Emirates – 2.42 – 96% Muslim

Syria – 3.1 – over 74% Muslim

Pakistan – 3.4 – 95% Muslim

Gaza Strip – 5.0 – 99.3% Muslim

Qatar – 2.5 – 77.5 % Muslim

Compare that trend to Western nations, the fertility rates of which The Muslim Demographics video did fairly accurately report:

America – 2.11 or possibly 2.05

England – 1.66

France – 1.98 (The U.S. Census Bureau differs slightly by estimating the French fertility rate to currently be 2.1 per woman with demographic indicators projecting their population to decline to 1.9 by 2025)

Greece – 1.37

Germany – 1.41

Italy – 1.31

Spain – 1.31

The atheist blogger Tiny Frog stated that it didn’t seem to make sense that most of the Muslim immigrants in France could be so populous when they usually come from countries that don’t have such productive birthrates:

Morocco – 2.51

Algeria – 1.79

Tunisia – 1.72

Turkey – 2.21

(Notice that those are still higher numbers than some of the Western nations!)

There are numerous explanations for this.  For one thing, European nations have struggled with the reproduction issue, to the point of offering benefits for women who have children.  Has it ever occurred to anyone that Muslim residents in those countries could just be regular citizens accepting the benefits as well?  For another, demographer Ariela Keysar wrote :

“The average number of children a woman has, defined as the total fertility rate, is determined by both biology and individual choice. Marriage patterns, usage of birth control and social norms regarding family size and infant mortality are among the determinants of fertility…As discussed earlier, a critical factor is distributing the power over reproductive choices…

The differences in fertility rates among the Mediterranean countries are quite striking, with total fertility rates at the top of Figure 9-6 (in North Africa and the Eastern Mediterranean) double those at the bottom (in Northern Mediterranean or European countries). Egypt and Syria have about 3 children on average per woman. Greece, Italy and Spain have about 1.4 children on average. This is below replacement level of 2.1 children. In these countries many women are childless…All the Mediterranean countries experienced substantial declines in fertility levels compared to the 1970s levels, with the exception of Israel and France, which had only moderate decreases. The most notable declines were in Syria and Algeria, where fertility rates in the mid-1970s were about 7.4 children per woman on average. In Morocco TFR was 6.9 and in Turkey it was 5.8 at the beginning of the 1970s. These rates are more than double the rates of the 1990s and the rates presented in Figure 9-6 for the beginning of the 21st century. This suggests that Mediterranean populations are shifting from high to low fertility.” (1)

Thus, the traditional high fertility rate has just recently plummeted in that area.  Another possible factor to consider is the infant mortality rate.  Morocco, Algeria, Turkey and Tunisia are ranked worldwide as 69th, 80th, 85th and 98th respectively in height of infant mortality, with 36.88 – 22.57 babies dying per 1,000 live births.  France, on the other hand, is ranked 217th, beating even America’s level of healthy infants (we’re ranked at 180).  The diet, climate and medical improvement offered to immigrants that arrive in France surely doesn’t hurt their fertility level.

“Historical research tells us these numbers are impossible to reverse. In a matter of years, Europe as we know it will cease to exist.”

In science, if you presume a particular result based on an established trend of data because there is no data available for the specific region you are studying, it is called extrapolation.  Some times your extrapolation turns out to be valid, other times it does not.  A famous example of extrapolation gone awry would be the extrapolation made by Charles Darwin.  Though he had no evidence of one species evolving into another, he extrapolated that it might be possible because he saw certain breeds evolve from one to another within species (an accurate trend of data).  He and his followers trusted that evidence to support this extrapolation would be revealed in the future, but we have yet to see any missing links that are not hoaxes.

Now, many of the Muslim Demographics video’s claims are extrapolations.  They are what the video producer imagines will happen based on trends of data.  Ultimately, only time will tell if there is any real legitimacy to it.  However, these extrapolations are dealing with fertility rates, which are mathematical examinations and predictions based on a process that we can actually see.  We have never witnessed one species of animal evolve into another, but we have watched populations rise and decline and seen the economic effects such vicissitudes have had.  For now, let us take a closer look at the particular claim about irreversible fertility rates.

Tiny Frog also mentioned that France once revived its fertility rate after it had sunk to astonishingly low numbers after World War II.  However, I perceived that the video meant that if a low fertility rate is sustained for a lengthy period of time (say, 25+ years), then as far as we know the rate is impossible to reverse (which is probably accurate).  France’s low fertility levels did not last for decades upon decades.  The point remains, it still had to be reversed some how in order for the nation to survive.  How do you best go about doing that?  By having children!

“After the population losses of World War I, France prohibited abortion and the promotion of contraception. After World War II, it adopted a pro-natalist national population policy which aims at encouraging more births through financial incentives, such as maternity grants, paid maternity leave and tax benefits to parents. It is associated with the relative high fertility in France as compared with Italy and Spain.” (2)

Interestingly enough, the French census actually does not currently track religion, race or ethnicity.  But in order to “better track its own demographic shifts and combat racial discrimination“, France is considering changing that pretty soon (3).  So, at the moment we may not realize how many pieces of the puzzle we are missing in this realm.

“The German government recently stated, ‘The fall in the [German] population can no longer be stopped.  Its downward spiral is no longer reversible…it will be a Muslim state by the year 2050.’”

This was perhaps the biggest goof in the video, which is odd considering that it wasn’t even necessary to make a dramatic point.  The actual statement made by Walter Rademacher with the German Federal Statistics Office is more interesting.

By Gudrun Schultz

BERLIN, Germany, November 9, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Germany’s downward spiral in population is no longer reversible, the country’s federal statistics office said Tuesday. The birthrate has dropped so low that immigration numbers cannot compensate.

“The fall in the population can no longer be stopped,” vice-president Walter Rademacher with the Federal Statistics Office said, reported Agence France-Presse.

Germany has the lowest birthrate in Europe, with an average of 1.36 children per woman. Despite government incentives to encourage larger families, the population is dropping rapidly and that trend will continue, with an expected loss of as much as 12 million by 2050. That would mean about a 15 percent drop from the country’s current population of 82.4 million, the German news source Deutsche Welle reported today.

The low birthrate will cause the German population to age dramatically over the next 40 years–last year there were 144,000 more deaths than births, and that number could increase to 600,000 by 2050, the FSO forecast stated.

With a 22 percent reduction in the workforce and increasing costs for senior assistance and medical care, the drop in population is expected to have a radical impact on the nation’s economy, along with the welfare budget…

“The projections tell us the development of demographic trends will be even more dramatic in the eastern part of Germany,” Radermacher said. “This is because of the fertility rates in the eastern part of Germany, because of internal migration with the borders of Germany and many other demographic factors.”

While immigrants are increasingly relied upon to compensate for low birth rates in European countries, Radermacher said even factoring in a projected annual influx of 100,000-200,000 migrants won’t prevent the population plunge.

“Even those people who are immigrants adopt after a couple years the lifestyle and the number of children per family. So the assumption that immigrants will stick to their habits is simply not true.”

Germany has one of the largest populations of Muslim immigrants in Western Europe, with a Muslim community of over 3 million. That trend is expected to continue, leading some demographic trend-watchers to warn that the country is well on the way to becoming a Muslim state by 2050, Deutsche Welle reported.

The Brussels Journal reported last month that one third of all European children will be born to Muslim families by 2025. There are an estimated 50 million Muslims living in Europe today–that number is expected to double over the next twenty years. (4)

So, Deutsche Welle reported that Germany is “well on the way” to becoming a Muslim nation, but did not state that it is a certain fact.  Notice that I also suggested that Muslim population-domination has a “good chance” of happening, but I did not claim that it really would.

“This video uses scare tactics – cherry picking a few gloomy statistics and exploiting them…”

This accusation against the video actually makes me chuckle, because when I watched the video it didn’t scare me at all.  I see how the music, smooth narration and animation effects are a little on the melodramatic side, but I still don’t see it as being scary.  I think the Muslim Demographics video producer’s mistake was in expressing the Muslims-dominating-by-2050 theory as certain fact.   But viewers should be prepared to understand what sort of data is being dealt with.  Fertility rates and immigration rates are, of course, educated estimates; there is no way to know and calculate 100% what is occurring demographically.  It would be more plausible to say that Muslims could conceivably (no pun intended) become a majority within the next hundred years.  The general Islamic mindset of conquering the world by raising more children is not a myth.  There are eyewitness accounts of this.  As I mentioned in my article, even a relative of mine was confronted by a Muslim doctor who told him so to his face.

I will note that the popular Muslim Demographics video might err in another facet of this argument.  Though you might be able to demographically evaluate ethnic origin (i.e., Arab), you cannot truly evaluate faith.  Not all Muslims are of Arab descent (due to conversion), and not all Arabs are (or remain) Muslim (also due to conversion).  I suppose, as we have seen happen in the Mediterranean states, that it is possible that some Muslims can adopt secular ideals of reproduction as well (and as I also mentioned in the article, I don’t think that the secular ideals of reproduction are healthy or right or efficient in the long run).

But really, if you want to play the scare-tactics blame game, why not target Global Warming?  It has less observable and theoretical evidence in its favor than even the Muslim-population-domination theory, yet people, businesses and governments are keeling over in guilt because of it.  Recently Greenpeace leader Gerd Leipold had to admit that his organization’s claim that there would be “ice-free summers in the Arctic by year 2030″ is very unlikely (5).  But he excused it by saying “We – as a pressure group – have to emotionalize issues, and are not ashamed of emotionalizing issues”.

As I continue to research these statistics among other things, I want to remind readers that the facts have nothing to do with me.  Disagree with my thoughts on many topics you may, but I am not responsible for these things that are.  I only report them.

WORKS CITED

U.S. Census Bureau: http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/idb/country.php

CIA World Factbook: https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2127rank.html?countryName=Saudi%20Arabia&countryCode=sa&regionCode=me&rank=49#sa

1. Kosmin, Barry A. and Ariela Keyar. Secularism, Women & the State: The Mediterranean World in the 21st Century. Chapter 9, “Women and Demography in the Mediterranean States”. http://www.scribd.com/doc/17232626/Women-and-Demography-in-the-Mediterranean-States, http://www.trincoll.edu/NR/rdonlyres/85D1F734-E008-4416-968A-068E509266C8/0/SWS_Chapter_9.pdf

2. | | | pg. 126

3. “Next Census in France May Track Race, Ethnicity and Religion” http://www.civilrights.org/archives/2009/04/255-french-census.html

4. “German Population Plunge ‘Irreversible’, Federal Stats Office Admits http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2006/nov/06110903.html

5.  “Greenpeace Leader Admits Arctic Ice Exagerration” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NC7bE9jopXE

Are you prepared for the drama…the romance…the comedy…of the original science fiction story?  Ironically, it happens to be a true story.  Sit right back and you’ll hear how the unbelievable hypothesis became the darling tale of a once scientific Western Civilization.

The origin of the universe is the ultimate nucleus of all debate. “Where did we come from?” – that very question, in all its cliché simplicity, is the prequel to the ultimate factors that determine an individual’s worldview. It challenges a person to decide how to regard life, death, the universe and morality. There is no detouring around it, though there are so many intellectual “scientific” thinkers that insist upon imagining fine print complexities and tut-tutting away all supposedly childish speculations because they would much rather have the public quietly accept their theoretical spoon feeding. Perhaps this sort of situation has always existed in civilization to some extent. In the past two centuries, so much has happened so quickly that probably few have given much thought to the fact that the debate of origins was given a very peculiar treatment not too long ago. Ah, it doesn’t appear too out of the ordinary anymore, because we have grown up immersed in it, regardless of which side of the debate we actually stand on. But there are plenty of extraordinary things in history that no one likes to talk about any more. Perhaps this has become one of them…

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Image by The Cross-Eyed Blog and Webzine

UPDATE: I’ve improved the quality a slight bit.

www.LukeHistorians.blogspot.com

~Amanda~

“Why do you always wear dresses? Don’t you wear pants, ever?” queried my grandmother, affectionately called “LaLa” by all of us grandchildren. My mother’s stepmother always liked nicely styled things, from hair cuts to earrings, so questioning my clothes was something I should have expected. “Well, mostly because of the modesty issue…” was my timid, automated reply. It was an answer I had given to countless other curious observers of all ages. Then something dawned on me. I had given this robotic answer to girls and women who were wearing pants, and I myself had pants buried somewhere in my drawers. As far back as I could remember, I never had anything against pants, but I always preferred dresses…

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Image by The Cross-Eyed Blog and Webzine

As I’ve been going back over my ancient blog posts, correcting the links and re-uploading the pictures (things disheveled in the hosting transfer – by the way, feel free to let me know if you come across any that I’ve missed), I have also taken a little time to ponder my literary missions.  What sort of writings do I want to share?  What sort of blog is Sincerely Amanda meant to be?  I’ve decided that it’s not going to be your average read (something my clever sister Rachel recognized would be a good title to go along with my last name).  It will not be a place to find frivolities and dote upon myself, nor will it be something that becomes my life.  Nor will it be a swamp of elite intellectualism.  My passion is sharing with others the Biblical Worldview and the truth it explains through things that I write (or maybe film…), and this weblog is just one little outlet for it.  Awhile back I invented plans to write a series on Dramatizing History, since that is something I have accomplished through The Crusading Chemist.  I still want to write on that subject when I can, as it goes along with History, my academic specialization.  But my literary work will probably be more focused on my recent projects, Luke Historians and Not Just An Opinion.

Website designing and management does take up a great deal of time, so I’m going to take a break from some of that and get back to focusing on writing and researching.  Some of my blog posts have disappeared in the transfer, and I’ll see if I can restore them in my spare time.  Once again, please let me know if you come across an old blog post of mine that has broken links or messed up/missing pictures so that I can correct them.  Have no fear, none of your old comments are missing – for some funny reason it says after some of the blog posts, “No Comments”, but if you click the posts you will see that they actually are there.

~Amanda~

The Mission Behind Luke Historians

“Luke was a historian of the first rank…” – Sir William Ramsay

We will base our research and writings on the truth-seeking principles outlined by Luke, a follower and contemporary of JESUS CHRIST during the first coming, and author of the Gospel of Luke and the Book of the Acts of the Apostles.

“Inasmuch as many have undertaken to compile an account of the things accomplished among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word, it seemed fitting for me as well, having investigated everything carefully from the beginning, to write it out for you in consecutive order, most excellent Theophilus; so that you may know the exact truth about the things you have been taught.”

- Luke 1:1-4
Our goals, therefore, are:

1. To compile accounts of things accomplished among us in our day and age, particularly the workings of members of the Body of CHRIST influencing various fields of mission locally and abroad (also including government, medical, science, film, music, literature, etc.).
2. To investigate and follow carefully from the beginning – that is, explore historical precedents, examine primary sources and contact eyewitnesses that offer insight into current events, and educate readers, viewers and listeners that might not otherwise have access to these materials.
3. To write out these findings in a consecutive, logical order and communicate them both efficiently and creatively; devote ourselves to the study of languages and cultures that will help us better understand and communicate as such (i.e., Hebrew, Greek, Aramaic, Latin…and contemporary languages).
4. To (with prayer for anointing from the HOLY SPIRIT) present the intellectual case for the Faith and Hope that is in us (the Biblical Worldview – 1 Peter 3:15), so that other believers (and nonbelievers whose hearts and minds are open) may know the exact truth about the things they have been taught.
If you take interest in the Luke Historians mission and would like to share some of your writings, send an e-mail to lukehistorians@yahoo.com. You do not have to sign up to publish articles at any set time – just apply to syndicate them through the Luke Historians network.
The second one I’m mentioning is a bit more intensive (a database which happens to be down to the bare bones at the moment).

The Mission Behind Not Just An Opinion (NJAO)

The idea is to develop an online fact-finding database that utilizes primary source documents.
Read the “What Is This?” page on the website to read more about my vision for it.
…Not Just An Opinion is an online database designed to help you find out the truth for yourself. For a variety of controversial topics taking place in the world wide media, NJAO will present an entry citing the major opinions regarding the subject side by side, and then present what is not just an opinion: the raw, un-tampered facts and evidence that is currently known…

Come to think of it…I might drop the idea of presenting the major opinions on the issues and events before hand because most everybody already knows what those are. I will just present speculations that summarize the buzz surrounding the issues, perhaps. The simpler and more to the point the better. I want NotJustAnOpinion.com to be the kind of website people can search something up on and actually uncover the facts instead of getting bogged down in what everyone thinks (also check out the page “How To Find Facts”). If you would like to share to some good sources, send an e-mail to notjustanopinion@yahoo.com. Visit www.notjustanopinion.stumbleupon.com to see some great links!

Do you have any ideas? Let me know what you think!

Take care and MAY GOD BLESS,

~Amanda~

“One reason why sin flourishes is that it is treated like a cream puff instead of a rattlesnake.”

– Billy Sunday

I recall reading that quote in one of my Christian Daily Planner journals when I was about ten years old. It didn’t strike me as being a very profound quote at the time, but it remained vivid in my mind. Then one day I fully comprehended the point – people treat sin like a cream puff by telling themselves, “Just a little taste of it here and there won’t hurt anybody,” when they should be avoiding it like a deadly, venomous snake. Perhaps out of fear of working too hard to be pure and righteous – as many fantasize our old-fashioned ancestors to have done – our nation at the relatively youthful age of 233 is a land of cream puffs that don’t see the serpent coming.

“We’ll overtake you soon because we have more children than you,” a Muslim doctor once told my great-uncle. I’m sure we’ve all heard some variation of the fact before: the average Muslim family has 8.1 children, while the American birth rate barely reaches the bare minimum for a culture to survive beyond 25 years – 2.11 children – and that is counting the influx of Latino immigration. Discounting the immigrants, the fertility rate of American citizens is a scanty 1.6. This means that there is a good chance the United States of America could become an Islamic-dominated nation (along with European nations) within 50 years unless something changes soon…

Click here to continue reading.

(Image by The Cross-Eyed Blog and Webzine)

Within his first few months in office, President Obama has been photographed bowing to a Muslim king and recorded telling the Muslim world that Islam has a “proud tradition of tolerance,” all the while keeping mum about the unprincipled election fiasco that is keeping Ahmadinejad in power over Iran…

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(Image by The Cross-Eyed Blog and Webzine)

Carrie Prejean. Photo credit: Steven Weyda, www.misscaliforniausa.com

Oddly enough, the most famous Miss USA contestant this year did not actually win the Miss USA crown.  The name of the reigning Miss USA has slipped my mind, but the first runner-up, Miss California Carrie Prejean, has in some ways already been bestowed with a reigning platform: traditional marriage and Biblical correctness.

During the question round of the competition, judge Perez Hilton (who happens to be a homosexual man) asked her a controversial question regarding same-sex marriage.  As the reigning Miss California, in her response she dutifully represented her State, the citizens of which demanded the marriage-protecting Proposition 8 through popular vote.  Furthermore, she was asked for her opinion on the subject, and she gave it.  The pivotal scene and an interview with Carrie Prejean afterward can be seen here.  She explains the inner conflict she felt when presented with the question – which she believes was a test from GOD:

“At that moment, I was getting ready to answer my question, and I started saying I think that Americans, you know, we have the right to choose, but then something inside of me said, ‘Carrie, stand up for what you believe in and say what you feel and represent the majority of California. You’re Miss California!  The majority of voters believe that a marriage is between a man and a woman.’”

She also went on to say that she didn’t want to be politically correct, but Biblically correct.

Supposedly, beauty pageant contestants are not judged for the opinions they give when answering during the question round of the competition.  I remember a similar supposition when I prepared to take the ACT Writing Test, which asked questions that reminded me of Miss-America-type queries (by the way, I failed that test – basically because I responded that the question I was asked shouldn’t be an issue).  For Miss California to be so close to victory, it appears that the one thing that incited at least one judge to lower her score enough to miss it was her answer to the question about gay marriage.  Why on earth a homosexual man was on the judging panel for the Miss USA competition is beyond me, but the entire scenario has brought the issue into a spotlight for heated debate.

One thing that people need to understand is that the debate has been incorrectly defined.  Gay marriage is not a civil rights issue.  Properly speaking, you might call it an “uncivil” rights issue.  It is not dealing with prejudice and discrimination against people due to naturally occurring superficial differences such as ethnicity.  Rather, it is dealing with unnatural choices that a tiny minority of people chooses to impose upon society – choices that the majority of the world population – probably down to the most primitive tribes imaginable – considers to be wrong.  Nevertheless, any of us who refuse to accept such nonsense are called bigots…or, in the case of Miss California, berated with far worse language.

Imagine that a group of fifteen children are playing a game and two children enter the room demanding the game rules be changed to accommodate them because they have a different standard and insist they can’t do anything to change themselves.  If the fifteen players refuse because they view the two others to be wrong, and those two then repeatedly harass them about it, who are the real bigots – the stable majority or the quirky minority?

This is what mystifies me: if someone chooses to be a homosexual, they are already breaking traditional rules, so why do they even care for a pinnacle of traditional rule – marriage – to be open to them?  Evidently, it is their attempt to normalize the abnormal, and make the insane appear sane.  Just as many an elite analyst has attempted to prove that Jackson Pollack’s chaotic paint splashes have the delicate designs of Leonardo Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, all the while trying to make Mona Lisa’s smile out to be some sort of mysterious omen, and others have elevated the Big Bang to sacred history while laughing at the Bible, humanists that are obsessed with one thing or another devote their lives to making sense out of nonsense and nonsense out of sense.

Like all outspoken conservative Christians, Carrie Prejean was bound to experience public backlash.  As Ann Coulter stated, “Take a Christian position in public and Satan’s handmaidens will turn all your secrets into front-page news”.  Some of the dirt dug up by Miss Prejean’s opponents included scantily clad photographs that Prejean said were a requirement for a modeling resume and not intended for publication.

“I am a Christian, and I am a model,” Prejean said in a statement released overnight to the media. “Models pose for pictures, including lingerie and swimwear photos. Recently, photos taken of me as a teenager have been released surreptitiously to a tabloid Web site that openly mocks me for my Christian faith. I am not perfect, and I will never claim to be.”

- http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/30576251/

A liberal woman questioned Carrie Prejean’s Christianity because she appeared in the Miss USA contest wearing a two-piece swimsuit (along with the other contestants, I might add).  Interesting that a feminist never noticed immodesty before, isn’t it?  This brings to mind a clever quote I discovered as a World Views student:

“When the world goes wrong, it proves rather that the Church is right. The Church

is justified, not because her children do not sin, but because they do.”

- G. K. Chesterton

That statement is not encouraging us to sin, but rather pointing out that, sadly, the Bible’s teaching on sin is the one thing that we Christians tend to be so good at proving!  How humiliating!  However, true Christians never claim to be without sin, but rather to be redeemed from the condemnation that our sinful selves deserve.  We must repent to the best of our ability.  As a Christian woman, modesty is an area that I personally would refuse to compromise on, as we can see from the mistakes of prominent women that immodesty can give the devil an opportunity to hinder your mission and turn things to his advantage – and giving the devil an opportunity is one thing we are admonished against (Ephesians 4:27).

Back to the ideological aspect of this debate, I found the following article excerpts to be an interesting take on the blindness that is apparent in women that have fallen for the misogyny of liberal feminism:

“Liberals wouldn’t attack James Dobson with the amount of bile they’ve directed at a 21-year-old beauty contestant. It’s not just Christianity — it’s women liberals hate…liberals are ferocious misogynists. They share Muslims’ opinion of women, differing only to the extent that liberals also support a woman’s right to have an abortion and to perform lap dances…

…You’d be better off in a real burqa than under the authority of a liberal American male…

…But what is crying out for an explanation is why every bubble-head TV news anchorette from a nice, churchgoing red state ends up adopting the political views of Karl Marx…The only way to protect yourself is to do the liberal male’s bidding, as the bubble-head anchorettes do, or stand on the rock of Christianity.

From Katie Couric on CBS to Norah O’Donnell on MSNBC, the whole stable of TV anchorettes weirdly have the exact same politics as their liberal masters. It’s the ideological burqa women are required to wear to work in the mainstream media. As with a conventional burqa, it enforces conformity and severely restricts the vision.

Now, another beautiful Christian has thrown off the liberal burqa, thereby inciting mass hysteria throughout the liberal establishment. Prejean doesn’t care. She is blazing across the sky, as impotent nose-pickers jockey for a piece of her reflected light by hurling insults at her.”

- Ann Coulter

We have missions to accomplish, and though none of us followers of CHRIST will be perfect in this fallen world through our own fleshly power, if we acknowledge the LORD in all our ways, HE shall direct our paths (Proverbs 3:6)!

NOTE: You can also find my slightly revised version of this article on The Cross-Eyed Blog and Webzine.

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UPDATE:  As many interesting debates have sprung from this topic, I would like to clarify my intentions and positions in this article even more.  The title of this article is “The Uncivil Rights Issue”, and that is what it is about.  It begins with a news chronicle of an episode in recent history in which a young American woman of conservative political ideology (who happened to represent the State of California) upset the media by stating in the Miss USA 2009 competition that she believed that in her country and family that a marriage should be between a man and a woman.  Her answer was not impressively polished, but on further examination it is interesting to note how candidly she explained the temptation she felt to appease the homosexual judge who asked the question, knowing that it would help her win the coveted crown of Miss USA.  It is also worth mentioning that Carrie Prejean’s own sister holds the opposing liberal view of same-sex marriage, which is a reminder to me that we must be careful about judging people such as Carrie Prejean before we know fully the family circumstances they come from and thus what challenges they are facing in the matter.  As inoffensive as Carrie Prejean’s answer was, it generated uncivil, vitriolic behavior from the disappointed judge and liberal media.  It is apparent that this stems from the completely unreasonable and uncivil argument for same-sex marriage rights.  I think this event was newsworthy in that it demonstrated how much seething hate there is towards any who espouse a conservative Christian value – even when the person is otherwise very worldly in appearance.  It showed liberal feminists daring to attack in the name of modesty – something which they have no full understanding of.  It is a memorable example of how compromising with sin can weaken and dull your witness and convictions (in this case, the act of dressing immodestly).

Carrie Prejean subsequently lost the crown of Miss California supposedly due to the mere charge that she did not making enough appearances or tending to “official duties”.  I do not know Miss Prejean’s heart, but as far as I have seen and heard it seems to me that she is genuine in her convictions about marriage and believes in JESUS as her Savior.  In that case, as a sister in Christ I hope and pray that her current retirement from the pageant industry will be a time in which the LORD reveals to her what has gone wrong in the pageant and modeling industries (as has happened in many industries) and how they can be redeemed if He wills it, and teaches her how she can be in the world but not of the world.  The LORD has worked through people more shockingly flawed than Miss Prejean throughout the course of history, and I am certain there is a much better path available for her if she is willing to take it.