I'd read that one before, I think (subtext always struck me that women are weak and/or evil, while men with dark curly hair are plainly noble and good). Followed the links to browse some of the others, and they are actually increasingly disturbing and messed up.
Yes, things like; 'The L'il Bride,' with its interesting take on Islam can hardly be helping young Americans to understand the world around them. I have always laughed at the absurdity of Chick tracts, and assumed most of the world laughed too.
"They start funny and after a few I just felt sick."
Yep, that's exactly what I felt. I found Flight 144 and The Gunslinger are especially unsettling in the way they say that your 'state of grace' at the moment of your death matters more than the way you behave during your life.
This guy is saying that doing good in the world doesn't matter a damn. You can murder as many people as you like, you can commit the greatest of evils, you can foment hate and intolerance, you can lie, cheat and steal - so long as you 'accept Jesus' (only not in a Mormon or Catholic way, of course) before you die, everything is fine.
I have always held 'I was just following orders' and 'God told me to do it' to be the vile epitome of denying personal responsibility. Chick, frankly, seems to be going a step further in saying 'You can submit to your anti-social desires, you can wreak the most awful crimes and havoc, you can really shit on your fellow man from a great height. So long as you 'recognise Jesus' before you die, you'll go straight to heaven.'
Maybe it's just me, but I can't help but feeling that the world in which we are matters more than the one on which we might end up.
no subject
Date: 2005-01-26 11:59 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-01-26 12:06 pm (UTC)Hope I'm not being too sanguine.
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Date: 2005-01-26 01:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-01-26 01:41 pm (UTC)But the implications are too horrible for me to take them seriously for long.
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Date: 2005-01-26 02:18 pm (UTC)Yep, that's exactly what I felt. I found Flight 144 and The Gunslinger are especially unsettling in the way they say that your 'state of grace' at the moment of your death matters more than the way you behave during your life.
This guy is saying that doing good in the world doesn't matter a damn. You can murder as many people as you like, you can commit the greatest of evils, you can foment hate and intolerance, you can lie, cheat and steal - so long as you 'accept Jesus' (only not in a Mormon or Catholic way, of course) before you die, everything is fine.
I have always held 'I was just following orders' and 'God told me to do it' to be the vile epitome of denying personal responsibility. Chick, frankly, seems to be going a step further in saying 'You can submit to your anti-social desires, you can wreak the most awful crimes and havoc, you can really shit on your fellow man from a great height. So long as you 'recognise Jesus' before you die, you'll go straight to heaven.'
Maybe it's just me, but I can't help but feeling that the world in which we are matters more than the one on which we might end up.