Az

I’ve seen this image pop up on my timeline (isn’t it weird that I can just say timeline and you know what I mean?) and I have a few thoughts.

1. It is very cute and clever. Ladies, you deserve a Boaz. That is to say, you deserve a man that will respect and love you.
2. I have to speak out against this idolatry of relationship and marriage. Why are you in a hurry to have a boyfriend or get married? Unless it is something you and your partner believe God is calling you to, you shouldn’t be glorifying it. The same goes for men.
3. It legitimizes, in jest, the use of profane language within a Christian setting.

The dude is saying “ass” and Christian girls all over facebook are raving at the cleverness. What’s the significant difference between the image above and:

To all the girls who are in a hurry to have a boyfriend or get married, a piece of Biblical advice: “Ruth waited patiently for her mate Boaz.” While you are waiting on YOUR Boaz, don’t settle for any of his relatives: Brokeass, Po’ass [Poor Ass], Lyingass, Cheatingass, Dumbass [Wow… that’s low], Drunkass, Cheapass, Lockedupass, Goodfornothingass, Lazyass, and especially his third cousin Beatingyo’ass. Wait on your Boaz and make sure he respects Your Ass.

Perhaps my conservative friends will respond that this slide is improper and the speaker (assuming the man in the image is the speaker and perhaps pastor) should not have utilized such creative rhetoric, that this proves to be a silent stumbling block for weak believers. I, however, hesitantly applaud this for much of the same reason.

I think he properly utilizes the word “ass”. If he is trying to portray all those types of men as asses (i.e. persons of low standard or quality in regard to being Ruth’s mate), then he is doing a proper job. Whether I would call someone an ass to their person in their face, I don’t know I would do nor approve of… Lastly, his use of “Yoaz” is to be understood as “respecting a girl’s ass”. Colloquially, this is justified with the understanding that speaking of a one’s ass is meant to speak of one’s self. However, the association of girl and ass is highly charged and grounds for sexual moral discussion. I would label that use of “ass” as questionably improper.

The depth of thought and attitude I take toward profane language is intensely calculated, and the rare times I decide to use a profanity are with great reserve. I do not expect the Christian body to be like me, but it is my dream that they would.

Thoughts from the Voting Booth

So, in the spirit of election season, I am writing to share my thoughts about the voting process: I think it is discouraging and too confusing. Politics and the illusion of a participatory democracy is, in fact, the plaything of the privileged and educated. I will refrain from embarking on voluminous diatribe, and, instead, present to you a nice list of bullets (symbolism to your interpretation; UPDATE: For some reason my stylesheet removes the bullet points, so you all you see are ugly and unseparated pargraphs, so I’ve taken the liberty of turning them into NUMBER points).

1. When people make a deal about voting as our civic duty, I think they are quite mistaken. I suppose that a democracy requires its constituents to vote. If they did not, how would a democracy function, continue to exist as a democracy? More accurately, I believe that the act of voting is a civic burden. If you vote for someone, you are effectively exhibiting a hope and your support of the candidate. Can it mean anything otherwise?
2. The corollary to the first bullet point is that we should not vote if we are not ready to fully place our hope in or support our candidate. A vote means that you are prepared to take responsibility for the person you placed in office. It would also follow that, should the candidate fail to represent your interests whilst in office, you reserve the right to recall the candidate.
3. It is my suspicion that no majority of the population is ready to carry the burden of voting. They are simply uneducated on political matters, indifferent, or preoccupied with more pressing matters of life.
4. The process of educating one’s self on the candidates (no less, the political system and issues themselves) is a nightmare to the masses, but a playground of philippics for the privileged. I don’t give a rat’s ass about the partisan nature of American democracy. Campaigning is one of the stupidest things I’ve learned to-date and also one of the cruelest and inhumane; please remind me when it became an effective and acceptable strategy to vilify your opponent. It is with great reservation that I vote for candidates that defame another human being.
5. This will speak to my illiteracy of American politics, but I believe there needs to be an online and central hub for any election. Present the candidates and their proposals for political issues and their plans for policy. I want to be able to read, in friendly and accessible language, what each candidate wants to do. Strip them of their rhetorical prowess and mazes. I want to know what I’m voting for.
6. I don’t mean to espouse any hint of classism or elitism, but if I, an educated 22 year old male in university, am discouraged and unable to comprehend the political process, then I wonder what uneducated persons do. Do they vote blindly and only by certain issues? Is that what we want in a democracy?
7. Voting, the act itself, needs to be easier. It is intimidating to go wait in a line or to ask for help at a voting center. Is there any possibility that we can just show some sort of identification and then vote? Or if we are registered anywhere, can’t we just vote where we are? Perhaps I’m just being lazy. After all, you do just vote once a year (and what is an inconvenience one day out of a year?). (Do we just vote once a year? This definitely showcases my political unastuteness.)
8. If we cannot bring ourselves to vote for a candidate, then I would go so far as to say that we should not vote. To that end, you are not held responsible for the candidate elected into office, but you still preserve the right to recall that elected official. I just think it would be beautiful if one day no one in America voted–it would exhibit, what I perceive to be, a growing discontent with politics. If no one voted, politicians might wonder why. Might.

So those are my thoughts. I’m a discontented democratic American (in the political sense–not the partisan sense; I’ve no idea where I stand between the parties). But today, in the Wisconsin recall election, I voted. I took up my civic burden and voted–albeit quite uninformed due to the conjectures in the bullets (UPDATE: numbers) above. Bang bang.

Please share your thoughts. Please correct me. Please help me be a better American (insofar as politics and the voting process is concerned; I’ve other ideas about how to be a better American).

Note on the image: Originally I was just going to vignette and do some predictable Instagramming to the photo, but I was messing around on my phone and couldn’t help posterizing the photo. Interesting that posterizing photos now carries some sort of political connotation and weight. Also, I was attempting to go for a sort of “mug shot” with the “I Voted” sticker. I wanted to evoke the idea of a convict holding his jail card, but rather I, a free citizen, would stand in place of the criminal with an “I Voted” sticker instead of the jailer’s barcode. It’s a loose way of asking the very loose (and perhaps idiotic) question: Are we really free?