Coveting Your Neighbor? There’s an App for That.

Wait, no pedo app?

The Roman Catholic Church: Always “with it” since not long after Anno Domini Year One. The very latest in authoritarian control mechanisms.

@lynnlightfoot: If they had been really cutting edge, it would be a game that lets you earn credits for every mortal sin committed, with double points for acts of contrition. They could then port it to the Wii for practice in genuflection. Call it GodBand or SinCity.

I heard a piece about this on NPR (I know, stone me) featuring a breathless interview with the priest who acted as RC input guy. He was all kinds of jizzed about it upping bums on pews. As were those using it who came to confession more focused.

@Nabisco: “Right on, brother!” Sheepishly, “I’m old, all you younger ones can convey approbation more succinctly, probably, than that.”

I feel certain that a rant is not really appropriate, but what the hell! The Roman Catholic Church, which has the nerve to call itself Christian!, will mobilize itself against contraception, abortion, divorce, homosexual love, free choice of belief, etc., etc., but war is just A-OK? Guess they don’t read the Scriptures, that would explain it.

While I’m on this topic . . . . Somewhere this week online I read a comment about responding to demonstrations outside Planned Parenthood clinics. In it the commenter said something like “I do what I always do, I pulled over, went in and made a donation to Planned Parenthood, then I went out and told the protesters what I had done and what I would always do whenever I saw them outside with their signs.” I want to write a letter to my local newspaper relaying this, but I’m a coward. The paper, possibly the only liberal and/or progressive one in this benighted state, insists on letters being signed with one’s verifiable, true name, and abortion nuts on thick on the ground around here. However, donating to Planned Parenthood whenever these deluded assholes are out in force is something I feel brave enough to do and it would give me great pleasure. I recommend it to all Stinquers.

@lynnlightfoot: I donate early and often to Planned Parenthood – and my latest donation has been to NARAL Texas where they’re fighting Gov. Good Hair who has decreed that among the handful of “emergency” bills to fix the state’s $25 billion shortfall is one that would require doctors to FORCE women to observe a sonogram before having an abortion.

My philosophy on donating to PP is similar to my ACLU donation approach and public television approach (several here have heard it and adopted this approach): Direct your dollars to the most beleaguered affiliates – the ACLU of Northern California or the Planned Parenthood of New York City are not hurting for cash the way the ACLU of Mississippi or Oklahoma are struggling (and truly fighting the big fights), or the PP affiliates in South Dakota, Alabama, or Nebraska. The PP or ACLU affiliates in Indiana probably aren’t having quite as bad of a time as say their brethren in Oklahoma, but they would appreciate the support.

Don’t worry about the kooks. Believe me, I know this first hand. At most you might get an email telling you you’re going to hell. If they track you down and or threaten you, you simply inform them that if they persist you’re sharing their correspondence with local law enforcement and will ask that charges be brought. And if you’re really concerned, contact the Security Department at the Planned Parenthood Federation and they’ll take over. But I seriously doubt it would come to that.

@SanFranLefty: Many thanks for your response, and please let me take this opportunity to say how much I value all your contributions here, both as commenter and poster. You are a shining star and a beacon and other encomiums I can’t at present summon up. Fighting the good fight, and I’m glad you are so brave. I just felt glad to know something I could do that was relatively nonconfrontational to let these estupidos know that they are not necessarily) on the side of the good, as they clearly believe (and who among us really wishes to be on the side of the evil and wicked), and I guess they can’t think in more than two categories at a time. Hoping by my age and my civility and my clean clothing to shake their faith in their misplaced ardor, maybe not in vain.

@lynnlightfoot: Ahh, thanks hon. Sweet of you to say. We all fight the fight in our own ways. I love the mental image of someone pulling over her car, going in to the clinic, writing a check, telling the idiot protesters what she did, and then going on her merry way. It just makes me chuckle.

I really feel like this is an issue where the younger generation has gotten complacent and people who remember when abortion wasn’t legal and women died have to shout it from the rooftops.

@SanFranLefty: That last point was really driven home for me by Revolutionary Road. Funny how sometimes it takes a work of fiction to do that.