Is Christianity a silly little fairy?

As I was flipping through Paste magazine the thing that caught my attention the most was a picture of a Dodge Caliber getting a tatoo on its rump. The caption said, "It's anything but cute." My immediate impression was that this advertising campaign was perfect for targeting Paste readers. I've been thinking about why exactly this is so.

Because I watch more T. V. than read magazines, I'm more familiar with Dodge's T. V. commercial for the Caliber. This features a fairy who is going around cutefying everything with a magic wand. The Caliber resists her attacks and finally she is smashed against a wall by the backlash of one of her wand attacks. A passerby points at her and says, "Silly little fairy," only to become the next victim of her rampant cutefying campaign.

This advertising campaign dovetails perfectly with Paste's own tagline: "Signs of life in Music, Film, and Culture." The implication is that "Music, Film, and Culture" are all pretty much dead and we have to work hard to find signs of life in them. Some malevolent entity is busy cutefying Music, Film, and Culture and thus sapping the life out of them. We need to be like the Dodge Caliber and steadfastly resist these attacks.

Sitting behind these fears is the fear that we are losing our individuality. We are all sinking into a pit of blandness where we all look the same, think the same, and feel the same. One way that we can escape and become individuals again is through music. Anton LaVey, founder of the Church of Satan, explains it this way:

The key element of Satanic (sic) music can be revealed in the question, will it appeal to you on an individual rather than herd basis? It's evocative, emotionally charged. It evokes something which wasn't previously hyped and it's done without forcing the cards. There's no group or collective identity which it merely confers on the listener. It shouldn't be a secondary device to tap into an identity associated with the music. [...] Satanic music will cause introspection and get someone to think, and even worse- to feel. The more they think and feel the more dangerous they are to a system dependent on consumerism and mass conformity.

For LaVey, there is no question about who the "Silly little fairy" is. Christianity is the main force that is sapping us of our individuality.

Reading:

Lords of Chaos: The Bloody Rise of the Satanic Metal Underground
Quisling: The Career and Political Ideas of Vidkun Quisling 1887-1945
Tolkein- The Two Towers (slowly but surely)

Listening:

Ulver- A Quick Fix of Melancholy EP
Alex deGrassi- Southern Exposure
Charles Ives: Sonatas for Violin and Piano

I'm still recovering from a bike wreck two Sundays ago. I was trying to impress my woman by jumping a curb. I mistimed it and smacked right into the curb and the bike dumped me over the handlebars. The worst injury was to my right thumb. That has pretty much corrected itself, but I'm finding that when I wake up in the morning my right side is pretty stiff and achy.

Additionally I totaled my front basket, so carting things home from the library or the grocery store is a little bit tricky.

Out of hiding

Came out of hiding to bring you this:



Wikimania says this is Ward Cunningham, founder of the wiki movement. But, I dunno, I think it could be me.

Back into hiding...