Combat! - Page 208 of 406 - A blog by Dan Brooks

In which I blame the Rainbow Gathering for sabotaging the Griz

By Dan Brooks in Uncategorized August 1, 2013 0 Comment

Deposed UM athletic director Jim O’Day

Those not fortunate enough to live in Missoula may be unaware that the NCAA handed down a raft of sanctions to the Montana Grizzlies last week, finding that boosters improperly provided players with meals, transportation, laundry services and free legal services. That last one was the most valuable. Griz players get accused of crimes a lot. They get arrested nearly as often—slightly more than they get acquitted. Missoulians love the Griz, mostly in a good way but sometimes like Lenny from Of Mice and Men. It therefore stands to reason that they could not possibly be at fault in the recent NCAA fiasco, and I blame it on the Rainbow Gathering instead. Nothing is sacred to those filthy hippies. We’ll be back tomorrow with Friday links.

In “pink mass,” Satanic Temple turns Westboro Baptist founder’s mother gay

By Dan Brooks in Church People July 31, 2013 2 Comments

Westboro Baptist Church founder Fred Phelps with what I presume is a poster for a hardcore band

First of all, constantly yelling about how other people are going to hell does not give you an evil face at all. Second, the face of evil broke into a wry grin this weekend, when The Satanic Temple performed a “pink mass” over the grave of Catherine L. Johnston, intended to turn the spirit of the Westboro Baptist Church founder’s deceased mother gay. Obviously, Phelps’s mom is in heaven, because she did such a great job with Fred. Also, according to Temple spokesman Lucien Greaves (real name: Todd Feldman,) a Pink Mass properly performed at a gravesite “changes the sexual orientation of that person in the afterlife.” So now a gay person is in heaven, which is a real coup for Satan. Or it’s satire from a source you’d least expect. Probably the second one.

On resenting the homeless

By Dan Brooks in Existential Dilemmas July 30, 2013 7 Comments

Kitty Meow, née Robert Brewer, of Caras Park since July. Photo by Kurt Wilson of the Missoulian.

It is fashionable in Missoula at this moment to blame every petty nuisance on the Rainbow Gathering. That annual conflation of freedom and self-indulgence met near Dillon, Montana earlier this summer, and much of the overflow has lived in Missoula ever since. Specifically, they live in Caras Park and outside the grocery store. The sight of a dozen twentysomethings lying in the park drinking beer every day should not bother me, just as being asked for money whenever I buy milk is not really an inconvenience. All I need to do is ignore it. Yet somehow, I am bugged.

Figurative expression watch: Pope says arrested monsignor “resembles the Blessed Imelda”

By Dan Brooks in Church People July 29, 2013 1 Comment

Everyone looks more devout as a statue.

Like a lot of people, I dig the new Pope. I do not like Popes generally, and most of what appeals to me about Francis are his deviations from papal norms—his asceticism, his emphasis on helping the poor, and his tendency to do things like telling a bunch of Italian reporters that he will not judge priests for being gay. Good work, Pope. If you read to the end of that article, though, you will also find this:

Francis also commented on the case of Msgr. Nunzio Scarano, who was suspended as an accountant in the Vatican after being arrested in June for his alleged involvement in a plot to bring 20 million euros from Switzerland into Italy with the help of a former secret service agent and a financial broker, both of whom were also arrested. Francis said, jokingly, that the monsignor had not been jailed “because he resembles the Blessed Imelda,” using an expression that means “he’s no saint,” The National Catholic Reporter reported.

So that’s something you can say when you want to baffle people.

Friday links! Disintegration of ethics edition

By Dan Brooks in Friday Links July 26, 2013 7 Comments

Marcus Aurelius, 121—180 AD

You don’t need ethics to survive. By “you” I mean you personally; a society totally needs ethics to survive, in the same way a body needs hemoglobin. Yet the most materially successful societies are not always the most ethical. When it comes to food and shelter and high-resolution video, our society is kicking ass, but it’s hard to argue that we are individually or collectively more ethical than certain of our forebears. Is that an illusion? Can one age be more ethical than another, the way we think of imperial Rome as generally conniving and WWII America as generally good?* Today is Friday, and America is either per capita less concerned with doing the right thing or less uptight about appearing so. Won’t you excuse yourself with me?