So what the hell was that all about?
I can see how Warren [or anyone else] might justifiably refer to me as an SOB. I’ve no argument on that score.
But why a BIGOTED SOB? [The Mormon post comments]
Everything I said about Mormons was positive, and I could have said a lot of other positive things about them. For instance, Howard Hughs trusted them, always hired Mormon bodyguards, caretakers and administrators. Because they were honest, dedicated, hard working.
For that matter, Mormons also have legions of people researching and identifying their dead ancestors, baptizing them ex-post-facto to Mormonism so they won’t be doomed to hell. PHDs in history could learn a lot from those uncredentialed Mormon researchers because they’re better and more accurate doing it than most PHDs I’ve ever come across. When I’ve run up against a brick wall doing historical research I’ve frequently found help among Mormons doing genealogy.
Is that cool, or what? When those researchers run out of relatives to be unknowingly baptized, likely someday one of them will find my name and make a Latter Day Saint of me without me having to do anything, even know it. If they happen to be right, which I personally doubt, it’s still a win/win. Cheap insurance.
So Warren couldn’t possibly be calling me a bigot on behalf of Latter Day Saints.
Okay. Maybe he was damning me because I said I didn’t trust Christians. Or that I’d trust a Mormon more readily than I’d trust a Christian. But the truth is, that opinion is just based on my personal experience.
Some of my best friends have been Christians. Sure, I dropped a lot of them off the list because they pestered me to death with their evangelizing, but I still thought of them as best friends. And as such, I was able to recognize the human flaws they carried around with them, including a weakness for falsehood, many of them. Along with a weakness for personal betrayal, abstractions over personal loyalty. Doing things involving me ‘for my own good’.
Maybe trusting members of one religion over another is lousy judgement, but I can’t see it as bigotry.
The only other thing in that post that might be construed as bigotry was my saying this king is a black white man. But hell, that’s being said all over the web by black folks. They’re calling him an ‘Oreo’ [black on the outside, white on the inside], an Uncle Tom. All manner of things suggesting they don’t consider his decisions, demeanor, perspectives to be similar to their own. Their self-stereotyping of their ethnic attitudes and opinions exclude his. They believe he matches their stereotype of whites, more nearly.
So how can me calling him a black white man be a sign of bigotry?
Brings to mind the Hispanic wife of an Anglo friend of mine during the nineties. They’d built a new house and were showing signs of affluence and the other Hispanic women of Socorro, New Mexico, whispered, shouted, sneered, snarled, “She’s trying to be white!” “She’s pretending she’s white!” Boycotted her beauty-shop business.
Crazy world we’re living in.
I ain’t ‘trying to pretend to be black’, ain’t trying to ‘pretend to be a Mormon’, ain’t trying to ‘pretend to be a Christian’.
Maybe that’s the problem. I wonder which one Warren was trying to pretend to be.
Old Jules
So Far From Heaven 
I’m not sure where Warren was coming from, but when I first read that post, I thought someone might pop off like that. I “Liked” the post, and thought about commenting to the effect “You’re gonna piss someone off with this!” but didn’t want to give the impression that person was me, or even that I thought you shouldn’t say what you had.
Here’s the thing: it’s pretty hard to talk critically about a group–any group–without somebody calling you a bigot. That’s why I don’t discriminate against any race, culture, religion, gender or sexual orientation–I hold all God’s creatures in equal contempt.
Smaktakula: Nice choice of words. I echo your sentiments. Gracias, J
Hi Jules,
I can only quote Frederick the Great from Prussia on the different religions in his state, “In meinem Staat soll jeder nach seiner Fasson selig werden” = “in my state everybody shall go to heaven after his own fashion”, an opinion I live by, too.
Take care, and have a good one,
Pit
Thanks Pit. Old Frederick’s enjoyed a lot of being quoted and in many instances he’s worth it. I try to live by that one, as well. Gracias, J
Doggone it! How dare you fail to offend me! (grinning)
Hi Ed. Good seeing you. I’m running out of self-one-upsmanship techniques. You wear body armor? Gracias, J
Heh; soul of steel.
Perplexing. I’m so pleased I kept my subscription.
elroyjones: Perplexing’s a word I’m going to have to work into a limerick. Gracias, J
looks like ol’ Warren is pretending to be unbigoted
Hi Rich. Mightn’t be pretending. Could easily be the real McCoy. Gracias, J
Forbidden subjects……do you believe in God?……commenting about race, ethnicity and religious identity……admitting that the United States isn’t the best in the world at everything…..you cross one of those lines and someone is going to come and bite you in the behind. But you already know that.
lenrosen4: I concur, but damn damn damn it can be fun. Gracias, J
Admittedly I read the post in question first thing this morning with minimal coffee and nicotine in my bloodstream – but the ending of ‘black white man’ made me go, “huh?” and backtrack to the start where I found no offence. My thought at the time was, ‘no, I’d say a black man wearing politician’s clothes’ as that makes him more awfully human than black or black “acting” white. And I actually like the man, but feel he’s been hogtied by congress, etc, from doing anything but talk. But I could always be wrong and will be long gone before I ever find out different, I’m sure.
heretherebespiders: I get carried away sometimes. What the hell. Life’s a fun place and sometimes a person’s gotta dance a little, sing a little, cluck at the chickens, or meouh at the cats. Can’t be helped. Gracias, J