Bless their hearts

Shorter Kathleen Parker: Far be it from me to judge, but those two reporters looked like total pussies when they converted to Islam at gunpoint.

Kathleen_parker.jpg
“Cute skirt. Did you get it on sale?”

 

Comments: 53

 
 
 

Sounds like Stokholm Syndrome to me. (I mean for the captured reporters, not for Kathleen Parker)

 
 

Actually, Hysterical Woman–it’s pretty much as the summary says. The reporters were told that they could convert to Islam or die. They converted.

 
 

The Xianists of our country want a religious war. It offends their puny sensibilities when someone is not willing to die a horrible death for Jesus. Because, you just know that they would never have converted. They would have spit in the eye of that brown person!!! And thereby would have secured a place at the right hand of god…..regardless of how vile, dishonest, and greedy a life they led.

 
 

Twenty-first century conversos. Truly, the dreams of the Grand Inquisitor Tomas de Torquemada have been realized. Now let’s get the forced vonversions under way in Oklanhoma and Delaware!

 
 

“conversions” and “Oklahoma”
sorry

 
 

She oughta be ashamed of herself for writing that crap. Or even thinking it. To say “this is what I’d do in that situation” is the worst kind of adolescent fantasy. Nobody knows what they’ll do. The big strong brave football player who goes thru basic with a smile melts at the first incoming mortar rounds. The little scared kid with glasses, afraid to even talk to the other guys in basic, in his first combat takes out a gun pos at eyeball range and drags three wounded guys out under fire. You just can’t know about anybody, and you just can’t know about yourself.

Don’t I recall that even that model of stoic courage, John McCain signed a statement under torture? I’m pretty sure Kathleen would break before they even put a hand on her. But again, ya never know…

mikey

 
 

I approve this message.

 
 

Reading Kathleen Parker makes me feel like a bug crawled up my ass.

 
 

I bet they could get Kathleen Parker to convert to Islam if they threatened to make her wear knock-off brands from Wal-Mart.

Also, I love Mikey.

 
 

Well, at the risk of sounding like another keyboard amateur saying “Here’s what I’d do in that situation” – I’d say that what the FOX reporters did and what Jill Carroll did sounds like exactly what I’d have done, which is what anyone is advised to do in situations where you are in the unfortunate circumstance of being under someone’s power.

You stay calm, you try to keep them calm, you try to bond with them rather than antagonize them, and you try to give them what they want to the extent you can.

So when someone holds you at knifepoint for your wallet, you give them your wallet while being calm about it.

It’s the same kind of mediation and conflict de-escalation that police are trained to do in hostage negotiations.

It’s the kind of bonding that Terry Anderson and other hostages of the ’80’s attempted with their captors – try to humanize them and yourself and find a common ground.

It’s what kidnapping victims who’ve survived have reported doing.

Sure, sometimes it’s Stockholm syndrome, like Patty Hearst. But in most cases the victim or the negotiator are deliberately trying to descalate the situation.

What you’re totally NOT supposed to do is defy them, spit angrily in their face, and antagonize them.

I think Kathleen’s been reading too many romance novels where the spunky heroine slaps the fact of the bandit king, earning an admiring laugh from him as he says, “Ah, my pretty spitfire!”

 
 

What “kills” me about these wingnut condemnations of the reporters’ “conversions” (and about their applauding fans in the Comments), is that they call for opposing Islamic religious lunacy with Christian religious lunacy. Which is to say, they insist that the captives not only succumb to the captors’ definition of the event (which, arguably, they have to; the captors have the guns), but AGREE with those terms.

“What matters is what you say about God! Use His proper name and recite the proper formula!” is the nutbar Islamic command. What the rightists want is for the captive to say, “Yes! You are correct! And God’s real name is Jesus Christ!” This is like arguing with a maniac in a strait jacket when he claims to be Sir Isaac Newton, that he is wrong, because YOU are Sir Isaac Newton.

And even if the real motive behind the kidnapping and the “conversion” is as video propaganda for the instruction of other Islamic nutz, what do they think would be accomplished by pledging loyalty to JC and dying a martyr’s death? That the viewers of the video would think, “Hm. He died for JC. Maybe there’s something in this Christianity after all…”

Would that take place? Unhappily, negative: the nutbarz-in-training would never see it. And if they did, does anyone really think it would sway them? That their Islamic faith/fanaticism leaves them open to “other approaches”?

Or do these brave Christian warriors think that, by defying his kidnappers and accepting death, the captive would lose his life but retain his immortal soul and reside in Heaven with their Savior? In which case they are indeed religious nutz, and it would be an honor to be disparaged (as a “coward” or whatever) by them. Talk about being part of the problem and not the solution…

 
 

Christ. So I clicked through and read her column.

” A billion people manipulated into religious frenzy is a formidable force.”

Project much, Kathleen?

 
 

I’d have converted. My gods are capable of spotting a gun, though, and determining that conversion-by-force is probably not something they need to be offended by. I’d convert to Christianity under the same conditions. My response to people with guns has always been highly conciliatory, but I was raised Catholic. I was abused by theology at an early age, and arguably my whole life is a case of Stockholm Syndrome.

Nonetheless, mikey, you rock.

 
 

And even if the real motive behind the kidnapping and the “conversion� is as video propaganda for the instruction of other Islamic nutz, what do they think would be accomplished by pledging loyalty to JC and dying a martyr’s death? That the viewers of the video would think, “Hm. He died for JC. Maybe there’s something in this Christianity after all…�

Would that take place? Unhappily, negative: the nutbarz-in-training would never see it. And if they did, does anyone really think it would sway them? That their Islamic faith/fanaticism leaves them open to “other approaches�?

Or do these brave Christian warriors think that, by defying his kidnappers and accepting death, the captive would lose his life but retain his immortal soul and reside in Heaven with their Savior? In which case they are indeed religious nutz, and it would be an honor to be disparaged (as a “coward� or whatever) by them. Talk about being part of the problem and not the solution…

I think it’s a lot simpler than any of that. People like Parker don’t care what the captors would have thought of stubborn resistance and martyrdom. They don’t care what the captives were experiencing or thinking. In fact, all they do care about is seeing their own religious beliefs validated by other people’s actions. They want to impose their own will and views on everyone else, and fuck anyone who doesn’t like it. They see other people as pawns in their own narcissistic worldview, in other words. Hence, their ability to switch in the blink of an eye from seeing the reporters as noble heroes to being traitorous cowards for not acting out the script in the way the Kathleen Parkers of the world wanted to see. The rest of the world simply exists to satisfy them by conforming to their current desires. American-style consumerism on a metaphysical plane, perhaps.

We’ve all noticed how Talibangelicals don’t give a remote fuck about actual living children as compared to fetuses or stem cells. And who really thinks they gave a fuck about Terri Schiavo as a person in her own right? Once the object of their attention is no longer useful as a blank slate upon which to project their own abstract fantasies/obsessions, they’re out with the trash. It’s all about them and their insatiable egos.

 
 

Y’know, I can’t help remembering the words of that great religious thinker, Blackadder, who said,

“Poor Thomas More, as the flames slowly licked up his body for not renouncing his Catholicism, must have been just kicking himself that he forgot to say, ‘I renounce my Catholicism.”

Truly, the problem with civil discourse in our day is that not everyone has seen Blackadder.

Or Gilbert & Sullivan.

– where all these things have already been savaged, to much mocking laughter.

I say we see how long it takes Kathleen Puker to recant HER Catholicism, once some jihadists place a bug up her ass. Send suggestions to IslamofascistjihadtorturersRUs.com

 
 

Strange how no Muslim leader has condemned the forced conversions of those reporters.

Wait, that’s not strange.

The fact is that the Islamic world supports converting others with force, and they’re probably aiming to kill those reporters for renouncing Islam.

 
 

Then took they him, and led him, and brought him into the high priest’s house. And Peter followed afar off. And when they had kindled a fire in the midst of the hall, and were set down together, Peter sat down among them. But a certain maid beheld him as he sat by the fire, and earnestly looked upon him, and said, This man was also with him. And he denied him, saying, Woman, I know him not. And after a little while another saw him, and said, Thou art also of them. And Peter said, Man, I am not. And about the space of one hour after another confidently affirmed, saying, Of a truth this fellow also was with him: for he is a Galilaean. And Peter said, Man, I know not what thou sayest. And immediately, while he yet spake, the cock crew. And the Lord turned, and looked upon Peter. And Peter remembered the word of the Lord, how he had said unto him, Before the cock crow, thou shalt deny me thrice. And Peter went out, and wept bitterly.

Peter was such a pussy.

 
 

Poor Gary,

Don’t you realize those Islamofascists are going to have to get in line behind the Christianofascists here who want to kill those reporters.

 
 

Gary would never convert to Islam, even with an AK-47 to his head. He is so, so brave. That’s why he’s in Iraq right now fighting the forces of Islamofeminazifascism like the great American he is. After all, he’s “serious” about the “War on Terror,” which if you didn’t know is of course the great struggle of our time.

Oh, what’s that? He’s in his momma’s basement trolling Sadly, No? You mean he’s a little pussy bitch like the rest of the fake “patriots” who eagerly send our finest young men and women into a meat grinder so he can feel like a big, bad, tough American? Gee, what a shocker.

 
 

Bistroist,

Funny that. I wrote up something on Peter last night in response to some Christian blogger who actually said that about Peter. My thought was that to be in the company of Peter, the rock, is pretty good company for those two reporters. (Given the fact that the gospel story was a fairty tale, and this story was real)

 
 

D Sidhe wrote: “My response to people with guns has always been highly conciliatory, but I was raised Catholic. I was abused by theology at an early age, and arguably my whole life is a case of Stockholm Syndrome.”

As another Catholicism survivor, it’s been my observation that Catholics say go along with people with the guns unless they want you to renounce Catholicism or stop resisting rape. They can point to the Bible for evidence that Jesus agreed with the first part of this attitude.

Matthew 5:38-42
“You have learned that they were told, “Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth.â€? But what I tell you is this: Do not set yourself against the man who wrongs you. If someone slaps you on the right cheek, turn and offer him your left. If a man wants to sue you for your shirt, let him have your coat as well. If a man in authority makes you go one mile, go with him two. Give when you are asked to give; and do not turn your back on a man who wants to borrow.”

So hand over the wallet, and you are doing Christ’s bidding.

But why did the martyrs became saints by refusing to renounce their Christian beliefs, and Saint Maria Goretti became a saint for refusing to submit to a knife-wielding rapist? Is this logical or consistent? No, but religion has nothing to do with those qualities anyway.

I suspect most Muslims will view that conversion at gunpoint the same way most Christians would view a video showing Muslims forced at gunpoint to be baptized. The Christians would be painfully ashamed of the people doing that in their name.

 
 

I suspect most Muslims will view that conversion at gunpoint the same way most Christians would view a video showing Muslims forced at gunpoint to be baptized. The Christians would be painfully ashamed of the people doing that in their name.

Not in the simpleton minds of right-wingers. In their tiny little brains, all 1.2 billion Muslims are murderous villains. It’s okay though when Ann Coulter says, “We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity.” See, she’s just making a funny when she says that.

 
 

“Strange how no Muslim leader has condemned the forced conversions of those reporters.”

Gee, Gary, are you on the mailing lists for Muslim leaders’ press releases?

How the fuck would you know what Muslim leaders have said about it?

 
 

Why didn’t the reporters just pray to their god to smite the terrorists? They must have been dazed and confused and didn’t think of the easiest and most obvious way out of the situation.

 
 

There I stood, knee-deep in grenade pins. Had fifty caliber brass piled up to my chin. We were on an op south of Ramadi. My squad was ambushed by a reinforced armored battalion of the 1st Hezbollah airborne. Yeah. And our 240Bravo gunner got hit by seven AK rounds in the chest. Firing my M4 one-handed, I quickly patched that boy up and got him evac’d. By this time, we had Haji in the wire, so I tripped our claymores and climbed out of my hole to take ’em on. Right away there was a team of three mulimofascist sappers right in front of me. All three of them over eight feet tall, armed with chemical weapons. My M9 jammed, so I killed all three of them with my entrenching tool. The battle raged all afternoon. I killed three thousand islamonazis, but around 4 that afternoon they brought up their armor. In the face of an armored assault by ten thousand tanks, we had to withdraw. But as soon as I finish writing this, I’m going to lead two squads out to counterattack…

gary

 
 

Has Fox fired the reporters yet? You it’s just a matter of time.

 
 

Mikey, that was awesome.

 
 

We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Islam.

 
 

People like Parker don’t care what the captors would have thought of stubborn resistance and martyrdom. They don’t care what the captives were experiencing or thinking. In fact, all they do care about is seeing their own religious beliefs validated by other people’s actions.

And:

Once the object of their attention is no longer useful as a blank slate upon which to project their own abstract fantasies/obsessions, they’re out with the trash. It’s all about them and their insatiable egos.

Mr. Mordant’s comment deserves to be emboldened! Because he’s right.

And I still maintain that, amidst strenuous competition, Kathleen Parker is the dimmest bulb on Clownhall Way.

 
 

I’d like to see Gary Ruppert forced to convert from ass to human being. He’d be almost as sexy as Fake Gary(s) then. Maybe.

 
 

The fact is, that the 9/11 hijackers were willing to break their religious purity vows in order to blend in with westerners.

The fact that Ms. Parker is unwilling to service Baphomet in the greater work of the ultimate manifestation of God (Our God, Yod Hey You Know, the lava god/squid fighting/burning tree onlyGod) only shows that the Religious Right is unserious about the war on Islamoboofascism.

/banjoboy

 
 

Just what’s that supposed to mean?

 
 

“Also, I love Mikey. ”

I’m starting to get a little Mikey crush myself.

And Kathleen Parker is an ass. Every wingnut who judges those men is living in a fantasy world. It’s as if they overdosed on Boys’ Own Annuals as children, but I suspect they didn’t read much then either.

 
 

What I don’t get is how Ka Pa takes herself seriously (does she take herself seriously??)

I am reminded of that famous bit in MP’s Search for the Holy Grail…

VILLAGER #1: We have found a witch. May we burn her?
BEDEVERE: How do you know she is a witch?
VILLAGER #2: She looks like one.

You see where I’m going with this…
Witch scene

 
 

See, people who actually know what they’re talking about, like hostage negotiators, CTU teams, people with experiance, training, and knowledge, will tell you that you always just do what the nice people with guns tell you to. It keeps you alive until and gives you a chance to be released and/or freed.
http://kfmonkey.blogspot.com/2006/04/bernard-mcguirk-is-big-man.html

 
 

There’s a particularly weird dichotomy in Christianity, particularly in early Christianity and traditional Catholicism, between the martyrs and the “deniers”:

Roman judges often gave Christians numerous opportunities to recant before finally sentencing them to death. But many church leaders, for example the second-century bishop of Antioch, exhorted their congregations not to avoid martyrdom, but rather to embrace it. Recalcitrant Christians were held up as glorious examples to others; the idea that martyrs were participating in Jesus’ passion made suffering something to be not only endured, but desired.
[…]
It seems likely that this [sample of the Gosel of Judas] is a criticism of the bishops’ endorsement of martyrdom, and the consequent acceptance by early Christians of execution by the Roman authorities. The author of the Gospel of Judas apparently views martyrdom as a vain sacrifice, and blames the church leaders for leading their sheep-like congregations to the slaughter.

Several early Christian leaders, including Paul, didn’t see anything wrong with offering incense or pretending to deny Christ; what mattered was what in your heart, and god wasn’t stupid. This belief was common among the Gnostics; some of the Gnostics even believed that Jesus wasn’t killed, that god replaced him with a simulacrum that underwent the passion instead (like the lamb that Abraham used in place of his son Isaac). This made the orthodox leaders like the bishop mentioned in the quotes furious. These weirdos got off on pain and suffering–their own and everyone else’s. They made it a sacrament, and they fought like rabid weasels against anyone who would deny them their bloody ritual. Eventually, they won, and they slaughtered the Gnostic “heretics” and forced their views onto the populace.

Parker and her ilk are no different from the early orthodox bishops, the medieval flagellants, and inquisitioners: they love their pious blood porn, and anyone who takes that away from them is reviled and despised. And even worse, anyone who is not willing to go along with their passion play makes them question the truth of the whole game.

 
Brian - tha Texas transplant
 

I converted to Atheism because the terrorists took over the government and started forcing an intolerant religion down my fucking throat. I’d say we have all been held hostage for the past 6 years. The only difference is that we have been able to go about our lives in a somewhat normal fashion. But unbeknownst to the rest of this retarded country, we have been losing our freedoms that we like to say are part of being an American. And the next we’ll be living in a police state because another “terrorist attack” hit our shores and all of those soccer mom’s will be up in arms about how we need to protect ourselves from some assholes. But if they would take a second and open their minds for a moment they JUST MIGHT SEE THAT THE TERRORISTS happen to be running this country.

So for those unfortunate people who are kidnapped at gunpoint and forced to go through some fucked up shit, I feel bad for them. But maybe they shouldn’t be there in the first fucking place anyway…

 
 

“To say “this is what I’d do in that situationâ€? is the worst kind of adolescent fantasy. Nobody knows what they’ll do”

That’s bullshit, mikey. That’s like saying that George Bush and Dick Cheney totally wouldn’t have kicked some Vietcong ass, Rambo style, if other priorities hadn’t tragically intervened. They’re cowboys, we totally know they would have!

 
Brian - tha Texas transplant
 

CaptFriday, what fucking planet are you from? Oh wait, let me guess, planet we are winning in Iraq…Bush is a spoiled brat who if it really came down to getting his hands messy would mess himself. Cheney is a psychopath who would kill women and children if given the chance (guess what, he’s already all over that one). If these are the men you want kicking ass, then maybe you ought to rethink your position on the fuckers you want going to war. What an idiot…and dood, I don’t think you’d know what a real cowboy was even if he kicked YOUR ass…

Put the pipe down and step away from the crack…

 
 

My gods are capable of spotting a gun, though, and determining that conversion-by-force is probably not something they need to be offended by.

That’s not just religion; isn’t it one of the most basic tenets of civilization that an agreement made under duress is meaningless? If I put a gun to someone’s head and say “sign over the deed to your house!” and you do, no court in the land would say that I now, in fact, own your house.

 
Brian - tha Texas transplant
 

What about flinging monkey crap? If I were to threaten Gary with monkey poo, do you think he might sign over the deed to his house? Not that I want to a) know where he lives, that’s if he’s really a person and b) I don’t think it would be safe for the people living around the area to have a person like me move in. They might actually get a clue…nah…

 
 

God plays no tag backs.

 
 

Brian TTT, this is a blog where many people make writty remarks, often sarcastic and/or ironic. CaptnFriday was demonstrating some Finest Kind Sarcasm.

You can vent that considerable rage evident in your comment on many blogs (including this one) but don’t get your knickers in a twist when others prefer somewhat more lighthearted fare.

 
Brian - tha Texas transplant
 

“You can vent that considerable rage evident in your comment on many blogs (including this one) but don’t get your knickers in a twist when others prefer somewhat more lighthearted fare.”

Well that sure happened to be some sort of sarcasm…but sheesh…have a punch line that at least let’s folks have an inkling…gnome sayin…

And CaseyL, I’m SOO pleased that you are giving me permission to post such comments on this blog or any other. Can I check in with you to make sure it’s safe to cross the street?

As for my knickers, that’s a personal subject that I’d like to keep all to myself, just me, no one else…m’kay…

And yeah, I guess if I would actually check the site out more often I might know who’s who, but I don’t so boohoo…oh yeah, what’s a writty remark? And please don’t take this as mean spirited…just havin fun ya know!!!

 
 

Hang out here a little more Brian. You’ll get it quickly enough.

At least stick around to meet some of the trolls.

 
 

At least stick around to meet some of the trolls.

Now *that’s* nuanced humor. Thank you, g.

 
 

Dorothy quotes from an interesting article on the Gospel of Judas, but doesn’t give the source, so I hope she’ll forgive me for just filling that in.

It’s from a piece in the NYRB three months ago, can be found here, and is well worth reading, if you’re at all interested in the early history of Christianity.

 
 

“CaptFriday, what fucking planet are you from? ”

He’s from Planet Irony.

 
Brian - tha Texas transplant
 

Aardvark…

 
 

While the Republicans insist that we are not at war with islam, virtually every writer who supports the war writes columns like this that unashamedly propagandize that we are at war with Islam.

How does Kathleen Parker know, without ever mentioning it, what religion, if any, the Fox News reporters practice? Because the subtext is that this is religious rape. Hence the ‘I need a shower’ reference. it reminds me very much of the don’t let the black man destroy the innocence of our white women agitation of the segregated South.

How dare those thugs lecture Westerners about the loveliness of Islam while forcing religious conversion at gunpoint?

let me finish that sentence for you Kathleen

…while we are lecturing the thugs on the lovliness of democracy at gunpoint.

But sine WE’RE the holy ones we can do that.

** This message may include trace amounts of sarcasm and tree nuts**

 
 

If it’s not too late, i’d like to state, for the record, (and apparently with lots of commas), that I, too, love Mikey.

Damn dude, you rock so hard.

 
 

This is like arguing with a maniac in a strait jacket when he claims to be Sir Isaac Newton, that he is wrong, because YOU are Sir Isaac Newton.

What the fuck are you talking about?

 
 

I assume that even now, Ms. Parker is winging her way to Iraq to show us progressive pantywaists how real war-zone reporting is done. Maybe she can share an office with that Canadian fool, Warren or whatever his name is.

 
 

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