Even better than the advise column by that one ayatollah.
How embarrassing! It appears to have been a really good thread, too. Although I did not participate.
It just showed up in my facebook feed from a colleague, actually.
I think Teo was right last time about it being fake.
textually NSFW and funny and not really a threadjack, right? b/c relevant kind of
I'd argue that it's not fake. It's never overtly fake, is it?
There are plenty of fundie Christians who are super duper into all the sex that gives them the most cognitive dissonance possible. It seems totally believable to me that one of these would be interested in resolving the apparent dissonance in that specifically analytic Bible-studies way.
Diet Pepsi? Duper Poster? Double Pubble?
6: I was suspicious because there was no "About Us" page or anything like that. And as Teo noted so many years ago, you need to look at the oral sex page. Especially the penultimate paragraph. It's a satire.
Honestly, I'm still not convinced. People think about sex constantly. Why wouldn't at least one fundie Christian think about sex constantly and draw these conclusions and publish them?
The lack of an About page doesn't mean anything - what fundie Christian would want to disclose anything potentially identifying here?
Honestly, I'm still not convinced.
For serious?
The lack of anything identifying was just the first clue.
"Second, for a young woman who has never engaged in sexual intercourse, having anal sex allows her to preserve her virginity (i.e., maintain an intact hymen) until marriage."—that seems, to you, ingenuous?
I'm not committed to this being real, but it's highly plausible to me that a very religious, very horny guy with too much mental energy to burn could develop extensive theories along these lines, and write up a website about it.
14: Tons of people find it in their best interest to believe that. That's hardly the first place we've ever seen the technical-virgin thing.
It's obviously satirical, but not a very good satire (too didactic, too heavy-handed, and lacking in wit or humour).
(too didactic, too heavy-handed, and lacking in wit or humour).
Almost exactly the way someone would construct this site if it actually weren't satire.
They used the phrase "The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak" to support Viagra use. It's a joke.
I'm not trying to troll, but I'm just not seeing it. Why wouldn't the sincere guy use that phrase? You can believe what you're saying without being ultra-serious about it.
Almost exactly the way someone would construct this site if it actually weren't satire.
A serious, non-satirical discussion of these themes would be earnest and ridiculous, but this site takes it way too far. Look at "Threesomes Within a Christian Marriage" and tell me this isn't satire. I mean, seriously, the biblical origins of the ménage à trois? Not serious, not even close.
What's most convincing to me is that there are thousands and thousands of fundie Christian guys who would really like to be having anal sex and fisting and getting blow jobs, and to have that all be compatible with their faith. The human brain is magnificently capable at working out ways to see what it wants to see. Sure, this might be fake, but there are still thousands of guys who could reasonably author something like this.
23: You'll have to be much more explicit about what strikes you as satire, because gesturing at the section and subsection isn't doing it for me.
I am taking no position on the trustworthiness of the linked site, but I will say that it is my multi-decade opinion that what people find "plausible" highly contextual. To the point that major differences in worldview can in some cases be almost completely explained by people having dramatically differing life experiences and social circles.
I was most recently reminded of this when entering data and seeing the kinds of e-mail addresses that some people think are TOTALLY NORMAL. "husbandandwife1@domain.net," I kid you not. Or the 10-minute soliloquy in which a caller disclosed that her husband hadn't worked in four years, that he occasionally applied for jobs on Craigslist, and that he had lasted 2-3 months at his last job because the supervisor was "harassing" him by asking if he had kids and hounding him to keep up with the machinery.
In some contexts that kind of a disclosure = automatic tell that you don't understand the employment world. In other contexts that kind of disclosure is a purposeful step toward bonding and bid for empathetic support due to shared experience.
Shorter me: I suspect that heebie has more frequent and substantive contact with the kind of person who might author such as site than most of us, and thus she may actually be in a better position to judge its plausibility in an objective sense.
thousands and thousands of fundie Christian guys who would really like to be having anal sex and fisting and getting blow jobs
Warhol's great unrealized project.
"husbandandwife1@domain.net," I kid you not.
Do you mean that the part before the @-sign was "husbandandwife1", or just that it was a shared account, or what.
Specific to Witt's point: On one hand, I listen to Dan Savage and hear all the endless happy chatter about exploring all kinds of crazy sex, and on the other hand I meet a lot of extremely religious people. I do still have a certainty/belief/whatever that both groups are all built out of the same fabric of humanity. That the super religious people can have all the sexual energy and curiosity and horniness of the Dan Savage callers, (without the social acceptance) and so you have lots of brains that co-exist with those two aspects. So sure, one of them spits this site out.
22: That phrase is very common and often used acontextually. However, I'd expect someone who was concerned about following the Bible's rules on sex to have a pretty good idea of the context. It isn't like something pulled out of Leviticus where nobody ever reads the line before and after. Jesus used the phrase after finding that the apostles couldn't stay awake while he was asking God if there was some other way than having him crucified. Using that to support the idea that "dealing with erectile dysfunction can be stressful and even bring on an emotional and spiritual crisis for some men..." is just bizarre unless it is a joke.
Do you mean that the part before the @-sign was "husbandandwife1"
Yup.
Plus, so far as I'm aware, there isn't any Christian opposition to taking Viagra.
32: I admit that until now I had no idea where that phrase came from. Maybe the site is littered with such obvious religious dog-whistles that it really is obvious satire, and I'm missing every pointed snarky reference the guy makes.
32: But he is really into the idea that you're thrusting the Lord during sex, and that the whole thing is profoundly spiritual. If that's a clear clever joke that I missed, that's one thing. But if it's "just bizarre unless it's a joke" then it's not evidence to me.
I also take no position (ahem) on the site, but I went to high school in rural Tennessee, and still have some ties (ahem) there.
Evangelicals like their kink. And yes, there are all sorts of ways to justify it. Male-dominant SM is, of course, the easiest, but I did hear a strained interpretation of servility being a reason why a man getting butt-fucked by his girlfriend was biblical.
For my money, great. I hope they have great sex lives. I just wish they had less interest in mine. Perhaps related, I have not been in the South for 11 years, and hope to double that before probate issues come up. Not just because the South freaks me out, I don't want to deal with dead relative's possessions. But that's different.
BDSM, the South, sex, death, anal sex, did I miss anything?
35, 36: It's not littered with religious dog whistles. It reads like somebody did a text search of the Bible without ever having read any portion of it (except for the bit about Onan) or had any instruction. I know there are plenty of people who do that and come up with some very strange stuff, but they usually aren't shy about claiming credit for that strange stuff. And they usually make an attempt to engage the obvious counter arguments, of which there is none here. I'll grant that it could be a horny dude trying to justify his kinky, but that doesn't seem very likely. Everything is spelled right and it's been up for years.
BDSM, the South, sex, death, anal sex, did I miss anything?
Did somebody reboot Faulkner?
38: I have absolutely no idea how biblically literate any of the super religious people I know are, nor what religious instruction entails in different religions. So if that's a dead giveaway, then sure. But that's a much different argument then saying it's so super obviously satire because no fucking way! Super obvious satire!
(Also, I doubt Teo is any more grounded in the questions of biblical literacy than I am.)
but that doesn't seem very likely. Everything is spelled right and it's been up for years.
Also, huh?
@40:
I think he's been idling for some time. That low growl you hear, that's Southern Gothic just biding time.
41: He's a very serious young man.
42: I suppose those facts could support either joke or serious.
Nothing much to glean from WHOIS. Details concealed and registered via godaddy.com. However, it was registered on December 24, 2004 if someone wants to opine on whether that argues for or against parody. Set to expire later this year, so watch this space (or you could be either the Christian sex parody site or the earnest Christian sex site you want to see in the world).
And someone has run parts of it through a text-to-speech translator and put up YouTube "videos".
Hey, Witt -- I tried emailing you, but I had a pretty old address. If you haven't gotten anything from me, could you email me at Lizardbreath at unfogged dot com?
The Unfoggedtariat is like the focus group that refuses to belive in Mitt Romney's tax plan (take that analogy ban). Moby's argument amounts to: nobody would quote the Bible out of context and spell it right!
It is obviously a parody site. Protestant evangelical conservatives, while crazy and obssessed with the biblical text, aren't given to reading the bible in this particular kind of hair-splitting legalistic way, which is more the province of conservative Jews or Muslims (indeed, much of the Protestant fundie sexual belief system is possible because the bible is not read as a legalistic document). Catholics are given to legalistic reasoning, but not based on the bible and the author is obviously not a Catholic. It has nothing to do with whether a conservative Protestant fundie might want to engage in kinky sex -- if one did, this isn't the reasoning you'd see. It's also why it's a kind of off-target parody.
[...] it is submitted it is not sodomy, or indeed a crime at all as such, to have anal intercourse with a consenting adult woman.
Gordon, The Criminal Law of Scotland (1980).
What Halfotd said. For the record, I'm not sure what Mitt's tax plan is, but I'm fairly certain he'd try to enact it if he wins.
Mary Catherine, Moby, and Halford are correct.
indeed, much of the Protestant fundie sexual belief system is possible because the bible is not read.
FTFY
I think 49 is right, but I don't know that Halford's entirely right about how the Bible is parsed; there's a vein of eschatology that's very interested in straining at gnats and swallowing camels in order to show that Obama (or the Pope or Ban Ki-moon or whoever) is the antichrist and everything in Revelation is coming true in a precise and literal sense.
48: The only thing that makes this unusual for Evangelical Protestants is that it's deviating from standard fare, and they are totally hammered on the point that they ought not question the party line. In that one way, it resembles the Jewish scholarly business - let's see if we can dig twenty different meanings out of this throwaway line.
So yes, that's unusual. But that's trumped, IME, by humanity's obsession with sex. Plenty of evangelicals go to college and learn about writing papers to flesh out your point of view. It's not like they're not actual human beings who might want to communicate something.
54 -- but those are (really weird) allegorical readings, not the legalistic readings you get in the parody site.
56 - Ah, okay, I understand what you're saying. I don't think that's how participants in those reading would characterize things, but that's certainly a fair distinction to draw.
What's so weird to me about all of you with the duh, obvious position is that people with this kind of humor never produce satire that's so ... never coming to a giggle-fest head. If that makes sense. There's no wink at the audience.
56: I don't think he's being legalistic. He talks about how the Lord is with you in all this sex. I think he's being self-delusionally hopeful and contorting his brain to see what he wants to see, but he's not trying to snag God on a technicality.
I'm wondering if opening a site that contains the title "Fisting and God" is something I should do from the office.
Has someone mentioned Poe's Law yet? If not, allow me to be the first.
60 - I'd like to thank my parents, fisting and God.
The only thing that makes this unusual for Evangelical Protestants is that it's deviating from standard fare
O.K. We have no net nanny here and the IT people probably aren't out to get me. I didn't read the whole thing again, but what I saw didn't fit with my understanding of evangelical protestants. There's none of the personal statements of faith and love of God that you usually see.
Citing "All that do wickedly shall be stubble" as a reminder to keep shaved closely is pretty good, joke-wise. I hadn't noticed that one before.
60: My net-nanny won't let me. Should I launch a protest? Doesn't that violate my freedom of religion?
Nothing much to glean from WHOIS
I'm glad I'm not the only one who thought of doing that.
In fact, many Biblical passages allude to the act of anal sex between men and women. Lamentations 2:10 describes how "The virgins of Jerusalem have bowed their heads to the ground," indicating how a virginal maidens should position themselves to receive anal sex. Another suggestive scripture tells of a woman's pride in her "valley" (referring to her buttocks and the cleft between them) and entices her lover to ejaculate against her backside: "How boastful you are about the valleys! O backsliding daughter who trusts in her treasures, {saying,} ' Who will come against me?' (Jeremiah 49:4) And in the Song of Songs, the lover urges his mate to allow him to enter her from behind: "Draw me after you, let us make haste." (Song of Solomon, 1:4)
None of these references make any sense at all. No one could mean this seriously. It's beyond obvious this is satire. It's not even good satire.
Comment 5 in this thread, however, is wonderful.
For context, all of Lamentations 2 is lamenting God's anger at Israel's disobedience. Here is 2:10:
"The elders of the daughter of Zion
Sit on the ground, they are silent.
They have thrown dust on their heads;
They have girded themselves with sackcloth.
The virgins of Jerusalem
Have bowed their heads to the ground."
Yes, clearly, this is indicating how a virginal maidens should position themselves to receive anal sex. Not parody at all.
Heebie, have you actually read any of the website you're defending at "not satire"?
Yes? I pulled a bunch of quotes from it?
I feel like this is like when people argue that Jerry Springer must be faked, because people couldn't possibly be so stupid. You know what's a simpler explanation than paying writers, hiring actors, and having an elaborate Jerry Springer hoax? Finding stupid people.
It could easily be a satire, sure, but most people don't write satire. Most people think about sex a lot.
I find that religious sex satires were really developing and changing rapidly up to about the early 90s. Since then they've really slowed down. Barely changed at all, actually.
68: True fact. My brother was on Jerry Springer under a name that isn't his, telling a story that was a lie. The Springer producers solicited it, because it was funny.
(A friend of his is married to fancy prostitute/porn actress. She wanted to be on, so this whole story was cooked up wherein she was an ugly duckling in high school, who loved a boy who never noticed her, but now she's HOTT and that boy should see her now! Enter my brother.)
when people argue that Jerry Springer must be faked
My brother has friends who were guests on the Springer show. They were fakes who did it for the free trip to Chicago.
Although maybe my brother was on Maury? Yeah, it was definitely in NYC.
Enter my brother.
Don't pimp family.
I would concede this much: the author obviously knows he's going to incite Christians, and he delights in trolling them. Maybe he's the David Brooks of Evangelical Christians.
This isn't really intended as "satire"; it's something closer to an act of rebellion. (Which is why it's so terrible when read as satire.) This was written by some bored teenaged boy who, yes, spends a lot of time thinking about sex, and is frustrated and resentful about the religious sexual conservatism of his parents and his church. He's not a believer himself. He wants to be having sex, lots of it, kinky sex, any sex, and instead he's home alone and bored, ruminating about what prudes all the girls in his church/community are.
That's just a guess, but I bet it's right. What isn't a guess is that this isn't is the sincere work of some devout Christian trying to explore biblical teachings on sexuality. Again, the scriptural references are pulled completely out of context and read in a way that couldn't possibly be sincere or in good faith. It's not a matter of doubting that people can be stupid.
77 is very close to what I was getting close to writing.
What I took above people to be saying is: "Non-Evangelicals are the intended audience of this satire mocking Evangelicals". Maybe that's not what you all were asserting but that's what my default assumption was: "We're the intended audience of this not-very-funny satire." I think the word satire gives me the impression that it's not intended for Evangelicals.
I'm much more willing to believe that this is a frustrated teen trolling Evangelicals as an act of rebellion.
I think if one wants to make a reasonable case that the site is legit, one has to take urple's approach in 67. People take things from the bible out of context all the time, of course, but some of these are truly ridiculous. Frex Ezekiel on erections, the very sentence he cites refers to hard foreheads. I find it hard to believe that someone would willfully misread so many very obvious passages.
http://biblebrowser.com/ezekiel/3-1.htm
78: heebie, people in this thread didn't start out saying it was "satire"; they said it was "fake". And you said "I'd argue that it's not fake. It's never overtly fake, is it?"
The answer is "Yes. Yes, it is overtly fake." (If by "overtly" you meant "obviously", which is what I assume you meant.) I think "trolling" clearly counts as "fake".
Trolling is the sincerest form of flattery.
68: that Jerry Springer must be faked
If Jerry Springer did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him.
Moby introduces the word "satire" in his second comment, to explain why he thinks it's fake, and Mary Catherine is all over the word "satire" in her first comment.
84: all of which occurred after you began defending the site as "not fake".
Aren't there many accounts from Springer audience members of the tenor in the studio changing dramatically during breaks in filming?
I'm not certain what distinction is being made in 81 between trolling and satire. And I'm not sure who exactly is being trolled or mocked by it, but it seems very obviously to have been written by someone who isn't sincerely Christian or trying to engage those who are.
For whatever reason, initially my thinking was limited to two possibilities:
1. Fake = intended to entertain non-Evangelicals
2. Real = intended to rationalize kinky sex for Evangelicals
I'm on board with
3. Intended to troll Evangelicals, but also really who is also trying to see if he can rationalize kinky sex. Who would really love a devout wife that he can do anal with.
I am amused by how large a role I appear to have played in this thread.
Ironically, Teo was fisting Jesus while reading the thread.
That one felt a little blasphemous.
I read 'fisting' in the URL in 93 as a verb, which made me rethink 91.
Wait, what would it be other than a verb?
As a participle vs as a gerund maybe? "Fisting Jesus" like "Buddy Jesus"?
Starting to feel blasphemous too...
"What a Fist We Have in Jesus"
I remember hearing about Jesus butt-plugs at some point, but I'm not going to search at work.
Someone's fisting, Lord,
Kum ba yah.
Oh Lord, kum ba yah.
96: There isn't really a clear distinction between participle and gerund in English, but I think you're right that the distinction Eggplant was getting at is about whether Jesus is the subject or object of the action.
Sorry, I meant 'not as a verb'. A participle.
He's got the Chick-Fil-A sandwich
In his fist.
He's got the waffle fry side dish
In his fist.
He's gonna smear a little mayonnaise
On his fist.
He's got the whole world in his fist.
The delay in writing 101 brought to you by me googling to help me remember whatever part of speech I actually meant.
98: You're thinking of Jackhammer Jesus, I'm sure.
Well, that puts a whole new spin on "Christ, what an asshole!"
So, speaking of Chick-Fil-A, Jesus and fisting, everyone does agree that this guy is an absolute tool, right? I was initially prepared to defend him, since we're substantively in agreement, until I watched the video, when my reaction turned into "Christ, what an asshole."
It's like going down and screaming at the guy behind the counter at the convenience store because BP is fouling the Gulf of Mexico.
Right. I never did that except the once.
"Fouling the Gulf of Mexico" sounds like it ought to be the name of some kind of Evangelically-unapproved sex act.
He's got the whole world in his fist.
Not the whole world 'round his fist?
Ah, so the difference between fundamentalists and evangelicals finally becomes clear.
Berlin graffito: Touristen fisten!
it struck me that quite a lot of the tourists come here for just that.