| Lost - 08.26.05 |
| submitter: | Rebecca |
| location: | Oxnard, CA |
| After a long drive, Oxnard greeted me with an offramp construction detour maze of epic proportions. I was discouraged until I spotted this, and then I realized Oxnard was greeting me with open arms, however seedy, run down and industrial. That's the way we like it anyhow, right? |
| category: | Beside the Point |
| comments: | 35 |
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| wim commented on 07.10.11 | | what a shame, me missing that conversation, going deep in to my mind, with dance and tacos and religion and agnosticism |
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| Senor' Fallwell commented on 09.28.05 | | Dancing is against my religion...but tacos are not. |
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| Rebecca commented on 09.28.05 | | I'm much better at that than I am at salsa dancing. |
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| Nancy Dumpling commented on 09.28.05 | | YOUR!!!! |
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| Nancy Dumpling commented on 09.28.05 | | Of course! I'm sure you taco stance was perfect! |
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| Rebecca commented on 09.28.05 | | And I am. :) |
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| Nancy Dumpling commented on 09.28.05 | | Most tricky to execute, I hear. You have to be enormously flexible. |
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| Rebecca commented on 09.28.05 | | The "taco stance" is a sort of folded-over posture, yes. |
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| Nancy Dumpling commented on 09.28.05 | | I have never eaten a taco. |
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| noel commented on 09.28.05 | | Is that a dance pose? |
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| Rebecca commented on 09.28.05 | | Personally, I prefer the taco stands. |
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| noel commented on 09.28.05 | | I'm not quite sure I make the connection adequately, unless of course you like spinning around like a ballerina. In which case, is it the physical act or the diziness afterwoods you prefer? |
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| Rebecca commented on 09.28.05 | | That must be why I love life so very much. |
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| noel commented on 09.28.05 | | doesn't that sum up a lot of places? |
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| Rebecca commented on 09.28.05 | | In sum, a stinking, torn-up, run-down, industrial armpit of a town full of fast food joints and taco stands causes Rebecca to pirouette around on her toes like a ballerina. |
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| Rebecca commented on 09.28.05 | | Well, I think my description kind of gives a sense of Oxnard. The population appears to be largely Hispanic, so maybe some commentary on Cathlicism would be appropriate. |
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| Rebecca commented on 09.28.05 | | Not much. |
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| noel commented on 09.28.05 | | did it hurt? |
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| noel commented on 09.28.05 | | though I've never been to Oxnard and, to tell you the absolute truth, never even heard of the place. So I have absolute no idea as to the relevance of the topic in relation to the afor mentionned locality. |
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| Rebecca commented on 09.28.05 | | Good thing, since I had to stand en pointe to get this shot. |
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| noel commented on 09.28.05 | | point taken |
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| Rebecca commented on 09.28.05 | | No, it's relevant, although I'm not sure how much it applies to Oxnard. |
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| noel commented on 09.28.05 | | or is this all beside the point |
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| noel commented on 09.28.05 | | I suppose that's why he's not very popular any more |
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| noel commented on 09.28.05 | | Definitely. A once very popular politician here stated that the problem is that fundamentalist religions have such high values for one to live by, that it's humanly speaking impossible to live up to them. The man in question was killed by the way. |
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| Rebecca commented on 09.28.05 | | This is a complex subject because people need values to live by, yet these traditions seem to have backfired in many circumstances. |
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| noel commented on 09.28.05 | | agreed but also:
'Many liberal Christians and believers of other faiths hold that religious belief is socially beneficial' |
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| Rebecca commented on 09.28.05 | | The article specifically references christianity. “I suspect that Europeans are increasingly repelled by the poor societal performance of the Christian states,” Mr. Paul said. |
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| Rebecca commented on 09.28.05 | | Just an aside - although we often hear about the religious right in this country and how the majority of ordinary people are christian, I don't really see many of them here. They must live somewhere else. Portrayals of America in the media often seem so one-sided. |
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| noel commented on 09.28.05 | | the article doesn't seem to point to christianity, it does however point to 'belief in a creator', and as far as I know that's a topic Eastern religions, as in Buddhism do not relate to.
Here's the adress if you want to read it.http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-1798944,00.html |
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| Rebecca commented on 09.28.05 | | Very interesting article and sadly unsurprising. I'd be interested to hear an exploration of whether these statistics can be correlated to the flavor of religion espoused by the majority. So often, people automatically assume that "religion" equals christianity, whereas I, taking a broader view, wonder "what about the buddhists?" As much as the bible-thumpers decry the secular culture that has arisen in Europe, I don't think it looks all that bad at all. |
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| noel commented on 09.28.05 | | incidentely it's from 'the times'. |
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| noel commented on 09.28.05 | | speaking of which have you heard this bit of news:
“In general, higher rates of belief in and worship of a creator correlate with higher rates of homicide, juvenile and early adult mortality, STD infection rates, teen pregnancy and abortion in the prosperous democracies.
“The United States is almost always the most dysfunctional of the developing democracies, sometimes spectacularly so.”
Gregory Paul, the author of the study and a social scientist, used data from the International Social Survey Programme, Gallup and other research bodies to reach his conclusions.
He compared social indicators such as murder rates, abortion, suicide and teenage pregnancy.
The study concluded that the US was the world’s only prosperous democracy where murder rates were still high, and that the least devout nations were the least dysfunctional. Mr Paul said that rates of gonorrhoea in adolescents in the US were up to 300 times higher than in less devout democratic countries. The US also suffered from “ uniquely high” adolescent and adult syphilis infection rates, and adolescent abortion rates, the study suggested.
Mr Paul said: “The study shows that England, despite the social ills it has, is actually performing a good deal better than the USA in most indicators, even though it is now a much less religious nation than America.”
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| Rebecca commented on 09.28.05 | | Alarmingly enough, I think there are actually people who talk like that nestled in some back corner of our magnificant and linguistically aberrant country. |
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| Smart Set commented on 09.28.05 | | Durn tootin'! |
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