Sometimes at the end of the night on Fridays, I look around the store and turn to my fellow co-workers and say, "Dang. What is wrong with people? Look at this. It is evidence that we are one natural disaster away from some serious Lord of the Flies."
And we survey mashed chicken nuggets on the floor, empty soda bottles tucked into clothing racks, mountains of shirts on the floor, jeans rolled up into balls and stuffed where ever, gigantic piles indicating someone changed her mind and left ten pieces of women's clothing all over a table in the boys' department.
Oh the inhumanity of mall shoppers during the weekend.
A blonde-from-a-box woman shouting on her cell phone, driving a gigantic SUV, and entering the mall almost hit me today. Honestly, could she BE any more stereotypically despicably American?
Maybe she follows Joel Osteen's preachings. Apparently, Jesus wants you to be rich. And if you're poor, does that mean Jesus doesn't love you?
I'm watching Anderson Cooper's 360 series "What is a Christian?" while I write this, which is where that comment came from. Apparently, God doesn't believe the Palenstinians should live in Gaza. Also, according to Pat Robertson, PM Ariel Sharon fell so ill because he gave up some of the holy land to the Palestinians.
What would Jesus do? Definitely exacerbate volatile conditions and support the path to war. I mean, isn't that what he meant when he said, "Love thy neighbor..."?
I also heard Christopher Hitchens on "On Point" today. The jury (consisting of me) is still out on that one. I'm going to have to read the book. Though I do agree on one point he made, which is that it is DISGUSTING what horrible things people will justify in the name of religion.
(this section added later--5/12/07...I literally fell asleep while writing this entry last night)
But you could hear Tom Ashbrook's flabberghastation (I made that word up and intend to use it often) when a preacher from the South called up to tell a story about God's existence. It went as follows: The preacher called to testify about the power of God because a decade ago, his young daughter was on her death bed and they said nothing could be done. The preacher prayed to God and she was saved.
Hitchens said that the man's story was crap. It was the worst form of charlatanism and blatantly false. He was angry at the guy. He asked about the millions of other grieving parents who have prayed but their children died anyway. Were their prayers not good enough for God? Were their children not good enough for God? These stories, he said, were the worst kinds because they imply that anyone who isn't saved after praying is worse than the people whose "prayers" are "answered" by this "God."
Anyway, it isn't everyone who can talk about a major retail mall store, conservative Christianity and antitheism in a blog and tie it all together, so I hope y'all appreciate this.
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