Let’s Go Burn Some Books, by Mike Gold
I haven’t seen the movie The Golden Compass, but I will, and soon. I don’t care if it’s a complete piece of crap – I want to see it because the Religious Right told me not to.
They say that sort of thing a lot. Here’s what pissed me off. They said the author of the books upon which the movie is based, Philip Pullman, is an atheist. They’re afraid that if your children like the movie, they might actually pick up the book and read it. Somehow, the book will destroy their belief in the unigod.
Now that seems a little paranoid to me, but even if it happens, well, damn, we sure don’t want kids to make up their own minds – overruling the evidently flimsy influences of their parents, their relatives, their pastors, and their friends just by reading a damned book, right?
This sort of thing frightens me. According to these folks, we live in a Christian nation, founded by good Christian god-fearing men who were really, really stupid when they built religious freedom into our Constitution.
I’ll tell you what scares me even more. Last week, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney said, and I quote, “Freedom requires religion just as religion requires freedom.” Say what? Historically, organized religion and its militant outreach has been an astonishingly awesome suppressor of freedom. That’s history, folks, and we’ve had a hell of a lot of wars, crusades, pogroms, inquisitions, cross-burnings, and Jihads to prove it.
“In recent years, the notion of the separation of church and state has been taken by some well beyond its original meaning,” Romney went on to say. “They seek to remove from the public domain any acknowledgment of God. Religion is seen as merely a private affair with no place in public life. It is as if they are intent on establishing a new religion in America – the religion of secularism. They are wrong.”
Well, I do think religion is a private affair. You should be able to believe in anything you want, and so should I. My right to do so stops at your right to do so, and vice versa. In his language, Romney was excluding atheists, Hindus, Confucians, Santerians, Scientologists, Buddhists and many other Americans. He backed it up with a threat: “Our greatness would not long endure without judges who respect the foundation of faith upon which our Constitution rests.” He, and sadly many other Americans, want our nations’ laws to work in the favor of certain religions to the exclusion of others, as well as those who, like Philip Pullman, chose not to indulge in such beliefs. One would think that should be their right.
Back in the 1980s, The 700 Club flipped out at the comic books of the day. Pat Robertson condemned such efforts as Thor, Son of Satan, the X-Men and The New Teen Titans – Robin and Starfire sharing a bed blew his little mind. Pass laws that enforce any religious philosophies and we’ve got the Ku Klux Klan (who burned my grandfather’s shack in Indianapolis down in the mid-1920s) out of the Kloset.
Let’s honor our nation’s founders by believing them to be intelligent enough to know what they were doing when they wrote and passed the Bill of Rights.
And pass the popcorn.
Mike Gold is editor-in-chief of ComicMix.
Philip Pullman has written that the books are a counter-point to CS Lewis' Narnia. I think that he might be a little heavy handed with some anti-religious aspects at times, but it is still a fascinating series. I can't believe that these Religious Right people are afraid of the books. Do they have so little faith in parenting that they think the books are going to brainwash children? Books like these that may challenge their beliefs should be a starting point to make them stronger.
Pullman said somewhere that he wanted his books as an agnostic/atheist answer to the Narnia books by C.S. Lewis which use fantasy as a Christian allegory. They made a film out of the first of those books as well. THOSE books and THAT film are meant to indoctrinate children and mold their thinking but that's alright among the Christian Right because its molding the way THEY want it done.And its not really THEIR children about whom they're worried. THEIR children will never see the movie, let alone read the books. No, it's OTHER peoples' children they don't want seeing themovie/reading the book. They don't TRUST other parents to do what the Christian Right feels is correct. They want to CONTROL the situation. And that makes for pretty scary politics.Romney's remarks is not merely a justification for his being a Mormon and running for president. It's a pitch to the Peligious Right. Scarier still, to me, is Mike Huckabee, who has risen in the polls. This is the ex-Baptist minister, ex-Arkansas gov who DOESN'T believe in evolution. He has a shot (as does Romney). My thought? Hillary Clinton vs Mike Huckabee would not be the cakewalk that the Dems are assuming. Much as I dislike Bush (and I do), I can imagine things getting scarier.
"The Golden Compass" challenges whatever controlling bureaucracy the viewer might want to project onto it — something of a blank slate that invites the participation of an audience and proposes to send the customers home with a thought or two to ponder.This quality is what scares the controlling anti-intellects who want to reinvent the society as a rule-by-fear Theocracy. So here we are, supposedly intent upon "exporting freedom" to foreign Theocratic realms — while leaning ever more precariously in their established directions. Different theologies, same dictatorial tendencies. The pulpit is as effective a starting-place as any — maybe the most effective starting-place — for totalitarianism. And any condemnation from the pulpit is an invitation to a book-burning ritual.
From the "Spirit" story originally entitled* "The Awful Book", parodying the anti-comics hysteria of the late 40s/early 50s (the story is a parody of EC horror/suspense stories, featuring a grade-school teacher who accidentally picks up a comic book): "…the school psyciatrist, Dr Wolfgang Worry, who was having his weekly book-burning…"*The tin-eared rewrites/splash-page reworks on some of the "Spirit" stories when they were recently reprinted could be a subject for an interesting essay…
As always, the actions of the extremes in an issue are the ones who get the press, and the ones who far too many feel represent the majority opinion.The arch-religious trying to "out" this movie are just as wrong as, say, the folks trying to get overtly religious (and sometimes not so religious) Christmas display removed from public places since they might offend people of other (or no fixed) religions. Both groups profess to be helping and protecting others, tho I rarely hear of those other asking for anyone's help. It's just a small group of people trying to further their own agendas under the guise of making sure THAT group doesn't further THEIR agenda.FANATIC religion has spawned many great acts of violence and hatred. The majority of people are in the middle – they don't mind if that guy is a member of another religion, or if they put up a big menorah by the war memorial, and alas, they don't vote.Not for nothing, I've never understood how people converted under the sword could possibly count, since most religions make it clear that intent is 90% of the act (or the sin).
I got to see The Golden Compass as a sneak preview. And have come to the conclusion that if you can't take a little criticism, maybe you need to re-evaluate YOUR RELIGIOUS VALUES. This is a story, pure and simple. Maybe you are seeing how your religion reacts to new ideas, different worlds, different dimensions. They should be using an open mindCheck your brains in at the door, go in, and have a good time. Or, don't, I really don't care. I had a GREAT time during the show. Shall we count the ways that religion has IMPEDED the development of mankind? Look at how long it took the Catholic Church to say that Leonardo Da Vinci was right about hie theories.To paraphrase Shakespeare, "The first thing we need to do is to kill all of the religious fanatics" The problem is with the people with the overblown egos thinking they've got the direct line with the all-mighty. Fine, I put this to them: call your god down so that I can have a good ol' heart to heart chat. If your god is all-knowing, they'll be able to find me with no trouble. Have them knock on my front door during normal daylight hours. They'll know when I'm home. I'll be reading the series.When they don't show up, please do me, and the rest of the human race, the favor of killing yourselves. I'm tired of the space you're taking up in the newspapers, television, radio, internet, jungle drums, and smoke signals.