Blogaround

1. Deciphering Dunhuang (December 2) "Compared to official histories like the 'Twenty-Four Histories,' which only record the political activities of emperors and generals, the Dunhuang manuscripts are mostly original records and archives, not pruned by ancient historians. They preserve many materials that would otherwise have been filtered out by historians, allowing us to understand the social life of ordinary people in ancient times. For example, humorous poems, perhaps written by copyists when they were bored."

Also from Sixth Tone: China’s Delivery Workers Are Hiring… More Delivery Workers (December 7)

Reminds me of when Aladdin said, "I have servants who go to the marketplace for my servants."

2. Mike Bickle, leader of IHOP movement, accused of sexual abuse (October 29) (This IHOP is the International House of Prayer- not the pancake one.) I have feelings about this, because... when I was evangelical, the impression I had of the International House of Prayer was that it was so good and holy. Basically, the whole idea of the International House of Prayer is that people "raise support" (ie, ask all their friends for money) to go and just pray there, like it's their full-time job. Like being a missionary, except you only pray, instead of actually interacting with people to help them and/or evangelize to them. And evangelicals were always saying "prayer is the most important thing", "we don't pray enough", etc- and then here was IHOP literally living out that belief. Admittedly, it kind of gave me vibes like it was a little bit loony, a little bit too fundie for my comfort level- but I didn't see anything actually bad about it- like, yes, we should pray all the time, right? Isn't that what everyone's always saying? Here are people who have enough faith to actually do that, even though it comes across as really weird (can you imagine asking your friends for money to sponsor you to just go pray all the time?).

And... you'd think, when someone spends all their time praying and really trying to know God and align themself with God, you'd think it would be very easy to NOT sexually abuse anyone. Like, how could you do that, if you're gonna have to go face God immediately after? 

How is it possible that someone could spend so much time sexually abusing people, in an environment that's so "godly"?

I mean, now I know the answer is this: These types of conservative religious environments aren't really about following God and living out the commands that God gives us. No no no, nothing like that at all. They are about control. They are about leaders who make all kinds of rules and then claim that those rules are directly from God, and God will punish you if you don't follow them (this is called taking the Lord's name in vain).

3. Sandra Day O’Connor, First Woman on the Supreme Court, Is Dead at 93 (December 1)

4. Carlton Pearson, Pastor Deemed a Heretic for Denying Hell, Dies at 70 (November 21)

The Slacktivist wrote about Pearson in this 2022 post: When concordance-ism eats itself 

5. Space Typography (December 4) From xkcd. Love this.

6. This Killer Sudoku Is "Ridiculous" (December 8) 1-hour-6-minute sudoku solve video. Wow, I am really impressed by this puzzle. It's just a normal killer sudoku, nothing fancy about the rules, but wow the logic to solve it is really complex and interesting.

7. What Kind Of Future Does De-Extinction Promise? (December 6) Very good article about venture capital companies making news with claims that they are doing "de-extinction." It's always about the really glamorous extinct animals, the mammoths, the dodos, etc, while nobody seems to care that "boring" species of animals are going extinct all the time.

"But I dread the future de-extinction heralds, one where we pick and choose which species will be imperfectly reanimated, where the future of biodiversity is funded by venture capital, and where these proxy animals or even merely the promises of them make headlines while living animals' extinctions do not."

8. Masters Of Their Domain (December 11) So... apparently a lot of "accountability groups" in evangelical culture are actually all about not masturbating. I think this is more of a thing for men in evangelical culture than for women- women who "struggle with masturbation" are just told that they're freaks because women supposedly don't "sin" in that way. 

I'm a woman and also very asexual, so I did not know about this until I started reading ex-evangelical blogs. (Though yes, when I was evangelical, I "struggled" a lot with my "sinful" romantic desires- I was unable to "guard my heart" and repress my romantic desires like I was supposed to, and I had a lot of angst about that.)

"These accountability groups aren’t holding one another accountable for bearing the fruit of love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, and gentleness. They’re never about doing justice, loving mercy, and walking humbly with God. And they’re certainly never about loosing the chains of injustice, setting the oppressed free, and breaking every yoke." Yes, PREACH.

9. Panera’s “Lemonade That Kills You” Is Really a Story About Our Broken Country (December 8) "In peer nations—like, for instance, the United Kingdom—the government imposes strict and consistent regulations on the front end: It requires warning labels on drinks with more than 150 mg of caffeine and bans the sale of these drinks to children under 16. In the U.S., by contrast, the FDA barely regulates caffeine: It does not require manufacturers to include caffeine on the ingredient list of many caffeinated beverages, let alone disclose the amount of caffeine on the label."

10. Texas Supreme Court rules against woman who sued for an emergency abortion (December 12) [content note: pregnancy loss] This whole thing is so awful and tragic, and the government of Texas is just making everything worse for no reason.