Comments

1
If only they had been this outraged about the thousands of kids whose lives were ruined.
2
I laughed out loud.
3
If only they were outraged about all the people who live in poverty because of their anti-contraception stance. If only they were outraged about families who struggle to support their large families because the church wants more fodder for its membership rolls. If only they were outraged about an ideology that would rather have a woman (or child) die than have an abortion.
4
Dan, that TAL piece made me ugly cry on the bus once, a few months after my mother died. She was, like your mom, a Catholic lady with a sense of humor. Her last Christmas she snuck a photo of her church's nativity crèche because the shepherd looked like he was humping his sheep and it made her completely lose her shit. I've searched high and low on eBay and can't find that damn shepherd. If I do, I'll send you a photo.
5
Dan dear, what a nice thing to do to remember your mother. Mother Vel-DuRay died last year, and I think of her often. Maybe I'll start poking my head in a Catholic church from time to time, just for old time's sake.
6
TAL link, skip to Act III: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-ar…
7
Needs more clickbait: Dan Savage made a rape joke and you won't believe who is outraged!
8
Dan, I don't know why you bother to respond to this crap. The conservative right is offended by your mere existence, so of course anything you do or say will be scrutinized. There is literally no good that can come from acknowledging the "controversy."
9
The controversy is ignorance. Religious fanaticism is biggest problem facing the world today, that and the republican party. Both are ignorant of the world around them, sure they interact with society but their main goal is to rule with their "rules". Sad but true.
10
Call me a secular humanist (I'll take it as a compliment), but the way I figure it, any god that gave us the power of reason and skepticism is a god who wants us to use our brains and--by extension--is precisely the kind of god who wants us to question authority rather than follow it blindly.

And--btw--I thought the statue was supposed to represent Benedict, which made the observation about lubed fingers even funnier--and more appropriate.

11
@8: Sometimes it leads to a short-term boost to Planned Parenthood's funding. I think it's happened at least twice so far.
12
The mentioned episode of TAL is number 379.
13
Thank you @3
14
I am not the person to talk about the Holy Mother Church, since I am an atheist living next door to company HQ.

The Encyclical of Pope Leo XIII promulgated on 28 December 1878, condemned socialists to the fires of hell. "5. For, indeed, although the socialists, stealing the very Gospel itself with a view to deceive more easily the unwary, have been accustomed to distort it so as to suit their own purposes."

Sigh. That's me. I confess.
15
Dan, I agree with your position on the Catholic church and their culpability with child abuse. I also normally agree with your jibes -- I think your Youth Pastor Watch is a valuable reflection of church hypocrisy. However, I think this tweet was insensitive and an unnecessary provocation. I wouldn't expect church administrators to really know what lubed-up fingers look like, so you can't fault them for being dense about their repair job. The people who run that church and whoever repaired the statue are likely people such as your mom -- good-hearted Catholics who aren't personally responsible for child abuse. I can understand having a private chuckle over it, but publicly tweeting about it served no purpose.
16
But Dan... You forgot to add that those pedophile priests are homosexual.
17
Irreverent, or puerile, or even obscene? Sure! It's the very reason I read SLOG. However calling Dan "far left" is just ridiculous. He's too well groomed. Try imagining him with Karl Marx's beard.
18
I laughed out loud. I also agree with Xian-Qi. I am non-religious/non-spiritual in a family full of Catholics to the tune of 3 priests and fervent support of everything Catholic. Yet, I know my family means well because they don't know any better. I saw them cry when John Paul II died, saw them rage when the German was made Pope and saw them get incensed when the rape scandal came out: they didn't want to be tarred with the same brush but to be judged on the merit of their actions,not the priests' actions. The church may be horrible,but often times the parishioners are not horrible.

Long story short: maybe the repair job was done by a well meaning parishioner without the tools nor time to do a better job. Also, the Catholic Church is fucking stingy with money,so I doubt fixing a statue was a priority next to collecting to build big churches and 'repair the Basilica'(the last time I went to church,that was their shill). So, maybe take the comment off and just keep the picture...
19
Pretty hilarious that anyone is calling Dan Savage a "radical."
20
Agreed with Xian-Qi. Dan, you're off base on this one.
21
Hilarious !
22
"Jokey picture of Mohammed outrages Muslims because of course it does".
24
@15 I don't think the joke was insensitive. The joke was funny and ironic...Given the Catholic Church has been obsessed with PR since the Counter Reformation...

What is not funny is that Diocese across the world and the Church Hierarchy covered up sexual abuse by Priests in the Catholic Church for DECADES, and they are still covering up, or sending their attack poodles like Bill Donahue, (the divorced Catholic) blaming the gays for sex abuse coverups. It is all the gays fault, is a big spin by the Catholic Church and its lackies..

25
@23: Savage is not a radical because the view he expresses are at this point mainstream American political views. You are the opposite of a Radical, you are a Reactionary, because your views are way outside of the mainstream of American political thought, and seek to bring politics and political discourse back decades to a time society has moved on from. Pretty simple, really. This is dictionary level stuff.
26
I thought the joke was silly, and a little vulgar, but whatever, it had a good point.

@23: Lordy I wish you'd hush. You're reactionary frothing and sputtering is so stupid and so pointless. It's embarrassing.
27
@26 Well said. I couldn't agree more.
29
@28 Awwww, sounds like someone's cranky because he didn't get his fingering from Pius X :)
30
@15: "I wouldn't expect church administrators to really know what lubed-up fingers look like"

Wow, you think they're that insensitive to their little charges?
31
Dan, that was tacky and uncalled for. But on the other hand, the proper response from Christians should have been to just ignore it.



@28: I quote Merriam-Webster's English Dictionary's definition of 'radical' (n):
"a person who favors extreme changes in government : a person who has radical political opinions"
Mr. Dan Savage isn't proposing any "extreme" changes in government; his political positions are less about governing and more about society. I'd post the statistics showing that a majority of Americans agree with Mr. Savage on most of his stances, but you insist that any evidence or statistics that disagree with your opinions are made up by some sort of liberal conspiracy, and you think that only the ~20% of Americans who live in rural areas count as "real Americans" anyway. Or excuse me, I'm sure that that figure (19.3% to be more precise) collected and reported by the US CENSUS AS MANDATED BY THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES is a fake number too, just like every other number that contradicts your opinions.
32
@28: No one is saying you can not personally believe gay people are trash, but you do not get to declare that everyone agrees with you. You opinions on these topics are not shared by the majority of Americans. I would post links to a large amount of studies/surveys, but you will just declare them false apropos of nothing, so why bother?

You are a social reactionary. Your economic views are not as of yet, but socially, you are clearly a reactionary. May as well just own it. Stop convincing yourself you are the mainstream and just go rogue already.
34
@33: Honestly you are possibly the most perfect example of the axiom, "remember, when you point a finger at someone there are three fingers pointing back at you", that I have ever seen in my life.
35
Aaaaaand SB's comments have been rightly deleted.
I don't know why he'll never learn.
38
@31 I think the funny part is that SB refuses to understand that radical and mainstream are not necessarily at odds with one another (i.e. that if Dan's opinions are very far from the mainstream, then they must be radical). As you pointed out, political radicalism has nothing to do with how average you are, and everything to do with whether you want a fundamental change to your particular mode of government.

Radicalism can be mainstream, that is one way that revolutions happen.

Of course, it's also funny that SB is wrong about mainstream opinions on LGBT issues. I live in one of those flyover states with plenty of ignorant, bigoted folks (and plenty of informed, just folks) around, and very few have the kind of cruel, unthinking hatred that SB promotes.
39
@36 Good to see you spicing up the usual idiotic frothing rage with some typos there, bucky. Maybe one day you can join the rest of us on 'more than 2 brain cells to rub together' street :)
40
@36: If you actually thought the facts were at all on your side, you'd have taken me up on that bet which YOU were the one to offer in the first place. You can rant and rave and claim that all data and evidence are fake all you want, but at the end of the day, we've got the facts and the support of the public on our side. What have you got? You've got OPINIONS, and a serious case of egocentrism. You may not believe me, but your kids are going to be ashamed of the kind of shit you say these days, a decade or two down the line (assuming they aren't already). If you have half the moral fiber you assign yourself, you'll be ashamed too.
41
Awww, did I miss out on a tasty SB tantrum? Darn it.
44
Why do I get the feeling that Seattleblahs sad little basement bedroom is nothing but a futon, a bunch of dirty clothes and dishes, a card table desk, and hundreds of pictures of Our Dear Dan? Publicity pictures, newspaper and magazine photos, some candids he's managed to take, plus a whole bunch of Photoshopped pornographic images of Dan's face on leathermen and Bikers.....

.
45
As if they ever used lube.
46
@42: Why is it that you can not seem to grasp that it is not your opinion of Dan or homosexuality that gets your comments deleted, but the abusive hateful way you choose to express that opinion? Look at the thread about paid leave. All your comments are still there stinking up the joint. Why? Because you didn't lose your cool or your understanding of pronouns.

You are not a martyr.
You are an ass hat.
47
Dear SB, you are pure evil. Every word you spew serves as proof.
50
@49: There you go again; doing what you accuse others of. The bulk of your comment history is pretty much nothing but a vent for your rage and hate.
Your lack of self awareness never ceases to delight.
51
@48 Yeah, because being a human is necessary for gendered personal pronouns. I never, ever call my dog "she." Dumbass.
52
@48: "The standard is ideological, not one of decorum."
Then why don't Ken Mehlman and Raindrop and collectivism_sucks get their posts deleted left and right? Ken's center-right, Raindrop is unabashedly rightist (he's a gay dude who was for Romney in 2012, FFS), and c_s is a fruitsy fruitsy nutbar of a conservo-libertarian. And yet because they're able to express their opinions in a measured way that follows the most basic principles of civilized discussion, their posts are rarely if ever deleted. (Heck, even fairly.unbalanced was able to keep it clean enough to not get his inane posts deleted.) They say mean things to others, they swear, they hurl invective, the whole enchilada. But they keep it political (usually), attacking people's views and stances rather than their persons.
According to you, when left-leaning people call you names or misgender you or swear at you, it's liberals being horrible people or something. But also according to you, when you refer to Dan Savage as subhuman trash and all the other weird creepy names you throw his way, it's you just telling it like it is. And then you have the chutzpah to complain you're being oppressed when such vulgar posts are deleted, just like the conservative Christians who aren't allowed (in some states) to fire people for being gay, and consider that equivalent to being rounded up into death camps.


It's the same damn Seattleblues as ever. He holds everyone but himself to a high standard, but insists that he can do no wrong. He accuses others of veering from the factual into the fantastical, but when presented with actual facts claims, without any supporting evidence whatsoever, that said facts have been faked. He appeals to the rule of law in the case of laws he likes, but reserves the "right" (scare quotes) to violate whatever law he disapproves of, under the logic that said laws don't really exist. He's incapable of civilized debate because he cannot entertain the notion that his opinions do not define reality.
CONTRA PRINCIPIA NEGANTEM NON EST DISPUTANDUM.
53
Oh, Seattleblahs. By lashing out at others, you just show the depth of your pain and guilt. Deep down, you know your obsession with Dan is unhealthy. You know you need help. It's a dark and long tunnel you have found yourself in, but there's a light if you just will see it. Let go and let God, Seattleblahs. We're all pulling for you.
54
What a cool mom. The Virgin Mary statue overseeing toilet seat etiquette.

Mary, Mother of God. No job too lowly for her.
55
So this is the new Slog: new layout, big name writers are gone besides Dan Savage, and SeattleBlues' WATB posts are deleted.

*sigh*

I won't say this site is awful or bottom-dwelling or any of that negative stuff, because it's still decent.

It's just.... not like it used to be.
56
I'm sure they meant;
Dan Savage, Far Out Hero.

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