Scary Movie - UPDATED
Last week I watched what had to be one of the scariest movies I have ever seen, and this coming from a woman whose best friend growing up was a slasher flick fan and had cable before I did. I rented this documentary:
I don't know that there is much difference between watching a videotape of fundamentalist Muslims training their children to be jihadists, and watching this documentary of fundamentalist Christians, or Evangelicals, training their children to be soldiers in the army of God. Think I'm exaggerating? Consider this quote from Becky Fischer, the pastor of the Kids on Fire Bible camp featured in the film:
"It's no wonder, with that kind of intense training and discipling, that those young people are ready to kill themselves for the cause of Islam. I wanna see young people who are as committed to the cause of Jesus Christ as the young people are to the cause of Islam. I wanna see them as radically laying down their lives for the Gospel as they are over in Pakistan and Israel and Palestine and all those different places, you know, because we have... excuse me, but we have the truth!"
And before you think that the makers of the film came at this from a very liberal point of view, I would point out that the above quoted Ms. Fischer felt it was an accurate representation of her views and was delighted with the result.
Here's a quick overview of the film via the trailer:
The scenes I found most disturbing were watching these young children - some not a whole lot older than Her Majesty, but most between the ages of 7-10 - sobbing their hearts out after being preached to, sobbing as if they'd been told they were the worst children in the world. As if someone had just died. What kind of people do that to small children? What sort of God wants you to treat children like that? If that's your God I don't want any part of it.
It is the ultimate hypocrisy to decry this sort of treatment for the children of Islam and yet perpetuate the same treatment for Christian children in the name of "truth". When children of any religion are taught to be martyrs, it chills my blood:
The first amendment of the US Constitution reads, in part: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion..." The Founding Fathers may have had Christian leanings - most were of various Christian denominations - but a few of the more prominent ones, such as George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin were very much against organized churches. Modern Evangelicals say they want to "take back America for Christ" because the United States was founded as a Christian nation, or some variation of thereof. I say Christ never had it in the first place and the claim that the US is a Christian nation is bullsh*t. The Treaty of Tripoli, ratified in 1797, states, in part, that "The government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion..." A nation and its people can be moral without being Christian, which is what I believe the Founding Fathers were attempting to do. Morality, not necessarily Christianity.
Fundamentalism of any kind is wrong, it is warped. I know, like the fundamentalist Islamic faith I've drawn parallels to, the sorts of people depicted in this movie represent a minority. But they are a vocal minority. And when you have a vocal minority facing an apathetic majority, the vocal minority gets to set the rules. Do you want to live under their rules, where creationism explains everything and kids aren't allowed to tell stories or read stories that don't glorify God? Where 5 year olds feel they need to be "saved"? Where President George W. Bush is the best thing since sliced bread? To me, that is scarier than any horror film ever made.
UPDATE - My brother Gabe turned his comment into a separate post at his blog - go check it out!
7 Witty Remarks:
Sounds absolutely frightening. Sick really.
With fanatics such as these folks teaching (brainwashing) young children in extreme ideology, it's no wonder that throughout human history, and continuing today, religion has been responsible for the majority of human suffering and death.
Very, very scary.
I detest fanaticism of any kind - religious where My God is better than your God, political where My Conservatives are better than the Liberals, Nationalists where My country is better than your country. No human being has the right to think they are any better than another regardless of birth or beleif.
I sometimes wish that an alien race would attack the earth because it would be the best way to hammer that into our tiny little brains.
I am extremely glad that I missed this movie.
I've watched it. Had to do it in 10 minute segments though and then go away and vent a little so I didn't punch the TV and the stupid people in it.
I will openly say that I'm an agnostic.... Until you can prove God does or doesn't exist to me, I'll abstain from voting but these folks make me believe more and more that there isn't. They're just freaky! If you haven't watched it, don't. It's haunting and frustrating and sick.
This movie is all of those things and more, but I would still say to anyone who hasn't seen it to rent a copy and do so. Vent, take it in chunks, watch it in horrified fascination, whatever you have to do... But moderate thinking people - and I do believe most people are - need to know this stuff is happening in order to prevent the scales from tipping too far in any one direction.
And for the record - I consider myself spiritual, for lack of a better term. I believe there is a power higher than ourselves, and for simplicity's sake I refer to that power as God. But I don't follow organized religions, feeling that as Jason said they are responsible for the majority of human suffering & killing in our history as a modern species.
I have seen clips on news stories up here in the frigid north, but not the actual movie.
Things like this make me sick.
It is fundamentally brain washing of young children.
Once again, it is 0.1% of a religion's followers doing 99.9% of the bad things, and here we are giving them exactly what they crave: attention. As the saying goes, "Any publicity is good publicity" The more extreme you are, the more people are going to sit up and take notice. That's the whole point.
Forget watching this movie. Instead, educate yourself on what Christianity and Islam really teach - I mean, the core teachings, not what other people or the mainstream media tells you. Read the Koran, it's a beautiful book.
There should be a very important distinction here. Religion itself is not responsible for the suffering in this world. No religion teaches hatred, killing, prejudice, etc. These are things that man does, man invented, in the name of religion. Read the real teachings.
Getting off my soapbox now...
Tors, I would respectfully disagree with you. While religion has as it's core message peace and love, few of them live up to that message. The history of Christianity is littered with tales of torture, hatred, and killing. Various sects have turned on each other - witness the burnings in 16th century England of Catholics and Protestants, for example, or the "troubles" in Ireland last century. I get your point that men do these things in the name of religion, but those men have used various texts from their religion to justify their actions. An eye for an eye is not exactly a peaceful message.
It may be a small minority who the "bad things" but that minority is growing in the US as, IMO, the country becomes more polarized. Some 80 million Americans identify themselves as Evangelical and if even 5% of them fall into this extreme category, that's (wait, I need the calculator) 4 million people. That's a lot of people. The subjects of this film were very adamant on how their faith was obtaining increased support, especially at a federal level. I really have no problem with people being religious - even if it disturbs me to see their children indoctrinated in such a manner as this film portrayed - but these folks are not content to respect my rights to not follow their faith. They want everyone to conform to their views, and are willing to become politically active to do so. This is easy in the US where there is such a high level of apathy to the political process and an increasing level of support of such views by all branches of federal government. This is what frightens me and makes me so angry. When good people sit and do nothing - and being ignorant is no excuse - then bad things happen. Or words to that effect.
Getting off my soapbox now and putting it next to yours so we can go have a drink together...
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