Dont Mince Words

The cards are pouring in. Neither Jesus nor Santa appears to be popular this holiday season. The statistics so far:

Reference to Christmas: zero

Reference to “Holidays”: 100%

Use of holiday iconography such as snowmen or poinsettias: 22%

Use of cats and dogs: 56%

Use of offspring spawned from human loins: 22%

Inclusion of generic “dear everyone we’re fabulous” newsletter: 33%

For someone who has always embraced technology, I’m sorely behind in one genre: video games.

When I moved to L.A., I thought I’d get back into the interactive space. I quickly found out most of the agencies out here are attached to the gaming industry. “Do you have any gaming experience?” a freshly pierced 20-something once asked me. I was too embarrassed to reply, “Why yes, Ms. Pac Man at the McLean, Virginia Pizza Hut in 1982.”

My first exposure was actually in 1977. A friend had Pong which I think was put out by Atari. It was the black and white Wimbledon of fake tennis games. After about five minutes, we’d get bored and go outside to play. That’s what kids did back then – we played outside without knee pads, helmets or wrist guards.

Twenty years later, I was working for an interactive development shop. One Friday, the guys asked me to be a player in a networked version of Quake. I didn’t know the rules and never earned the right weapons, so they slaughtered me. I got bored and went home.

Last night I was introduced to Sony’s Play Station 2. I mentioned that I have wanted to see Grand Theft Auto because of all the violence hype. With the controller in hand, I learned to speed, run into trees, steal cop cars, and kill hookers with chain saws. It was fun. I don’t understand why parenting groups are up in arms about this game. When I was young, teen boys just wanted to drive fast and get laid. The author of Grand Theft Auto is just capitalizing on an age-old rite of passage.

After 15 minutes, my adult-onset ADD kicked in and I wanted to do something else, but it was too dark to go outside to play. We ate brownies and watched the cartoon network instead.

Perhaps my moral fabric is frayed, but when did we, as a nation, make voting decisions based on morals? Now, if burning babies at the stake was a platform issue, I might be alarmed, but come on.

In order to understand the motives of these Christians, most of who haven’t been to church this decade, I decided to get inside their heads.

“I believe in the sanctity of marriage. In fact, my marriage is all I got. I don’t believe in gay marriage. That’s just wrong. Pole smokers shouldn’t get the same tax advantages I do. They need to be punished,” said Beatrice, a 51 year old white Presbyterian.

“No wife of mine is going to abort my own flesh and blood, even if we have 13 mouths to feed,” said Jimbo, a 38 year old white Catholic.

“That stem cell stuff is just weird science – all those Ivy League doctors are just looking for ways to clone themselves and create an uber race,” said John, a 60 year old Baptist.

I’m not going to deny that I didn’t like either of the presidential choices, so I made my selection based on one issue – pro-choice. Is that an unchristian way to vote? I voted based on my experiences in this area. I used to provide clinic defense for a women’s center in Richmond, Virginia. Their clients were primarily married women who didn’t want another child, couldn’t afford another child, had failed birth control, or just didn’t want another child that their husband could beat too.

To me, helping these women get safely into the clinic was the good, Christian thing to do. How can an ugly, white guy caring a fetus in formaldehyde jar possible know what these women need.

Now I have four more years with another ugly, white guy who thinks he knows what is good for me.

I pray for us all.