Messages By: faeryedark

I'm a church pastor who has given up trying to get members to understand that wreaths, trees, mistletoe, and red and green have nothing whatsoever to do with Christmas and are indeed symbols of pagan religions.  But, if they want to celebrate with over the top decorating and gift buying, I guess I won't be able to stop them.   I wonder what the originator of Christmas thinks about it, though. 

I grew up in a midwestern, mid-sized city where the local political cartoonist used the same cartoon every Christmas day for years on end.  Hugh Haynie depicted a person staring off into air, holding his incredibly full Christmas gift list.  He thinks to himself "Have I forgotten anybody?"

as the One whose birthday it is is looking over his shoulder, finding his name nowhere on the list.

I personally decided years ago that Christmas cards, parties, clothes, foods and the like would be eliminated from my celebrations.  I would only do those things that put Christ at the center.  Since that decision, Christmas has become happier, longer-lasting, with absolutely no post-holiday let-down.  After Christmas comes the rest of the Christian year with an equal amount of meaning and joy.  I would never want to return to the shopping malls and kitchen to find Christmas. 

Thank you for listening.  Nobody else around here will!   <grin>

I know someone who chooses that way of living, but he is also severely schizophrenic; it has gotten worse since I first met him.   He does okay.   He actually works in construction, he also is not a substance abuser, doesn't receive SSI checks or any assistance, yet lives in a comfortably furnished abandoned tractor trailer that was dumped in an empty lot in an isolated area.

I'm going to look into homeless awareness week.  I think if more people are aware of how many different situations propel people into homelessness, and all the other things that cause homelessness, then maybe they will stop crying NIMBY and actually do something preventative.

If I hear one more person complain about BET or scholarships for blacks, I will hit the ceiling!  First of all before you start raging on about this tired subject, you have to understand why these things exist.

1) If you open your eyes, you will see White Entertainment Television everyday.  When you watch TV most of the faces you see are white, thus WET. Ever check out ABC, NBC, CBS?  You're getting caught up with the name, BET.

2)  Everyone I hear complain about BET doesn't seem to have a beef with Lifetime (for women) or may I add Telemundo and Univision (for Spanish speakers).  Nope, the wining continues about BET.  These stations cater to various demographics, so get over it.

3)  Too bad you weren't around when whites had (and still do) have preferencial treatment over blacks and other people of color.  Oh, and let me clue you in to the real world: Wherever I work or whatever I go, I've never seen a shortage of whites working, so your notion that blacks get jobs based on skin color and that they are "taking jobs away from whites" is ridiculous.

I alway wonder about people that whine about things like this.  Arguments like yours are never based on facts, just emotion.  People like you always want to blame blacks for issues of racism.  I suggest you Google "white priviledge" and see what you find out.  Get your facts straight and quite whining.

I am not trying to justify slavery. My point is color has never had anything to do with slavery at least color of the skin. It has and always will be the amount the person has in their wallet. The poor has always suffered at the hands of the rich and poverty knows no skin color.

Thank you for sharing your experiences here.   It's when others hear about what can happen to people just like themselves that they will understand homelessness.

I did find out that homeless awareness week is a national campaign.  It's not surprising that working in my county, a county that tries to deny there is a homeless problem, that I never heard about it locally. 

I'm going to try and hold an event at the library and talk about my experiences in working the system on behalf of the homeless in this area.

Good luck to you. 

First of all, I think it's simplistic and dismissive to say that any one group (ethnic, religious, whatever) "built" America.  It was a group effort.  Not all of them contributed voluntarily and not all of them contributed in the same way, but the history of any country is much more complex than the input of any one influence.

I thought it was pretty well documented that blacks provided a lot of the "sweat equity" behind the U.S. economy (just ask Brown University).  There are a lot of other underappreciated ethnic groups in U.S. history--how about the Chinese  who built the railroads and provided a lot of other services and labor out West?

I think the theory that humans evolved (yes, I believe in evolution) out of Africa is neither here nor there, but I don't see why B insists on making such a big deal out of it.  If it's true--so what?  It's not like any of us, of any color, had anything to do with it.  And doesn't it make racism look especially pointless (whether you're white and hate blacks or black and hate whites)?

In terms of ancestry, most people aren't what they think they are, anyway.  Most African-Americans in the U.S. have some white ancestry (not voluntarily, unfortunately, but it's there now).  A lot of whites have some non-white ancestry.  I had a friend whose mother swore up and down that they were "pure English", but when my friend finally had the chance to do the genealogy, she got back five or six generations and discovered that everything had turned to German and Cherokee, and she had maybe one English branch of the family, 200 years ago.  She thought it was hilarious that her family had been so stubborn about it; she didn't really care what she was but she thought it was interesting to know.

My family started coming here over 300 years ago; as far as I know I'm mostly Western European (British Isles, Germany, France, Switzerland) and maybe a little Jewish, but there could be a lot of things in there that I don't know about, so what's the point of worrying?

The Scotish, Irish and many others you mentioned is a totally different issue than slavery. Completely different.  When I hear people say that "everybody" was a slave, I cringe.  Have you read the horrific accounts of slavery?  Not too many people are aware of the immense cruelty blacks endured during that time.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that blacks are the only ones that have endured hardship, but there is a deep, dark history of hatred toward blacks (read some of Thomas Jefferson's writings to begin with) and go deep into the history of this country's racist past and present.  The animousity towards black people is so thick you can cut it with a knife. 

Anyway we are not here to discuss slavery so I digressed.