Alec Baldwin said on “The View” yesterday that he wanted to quit that NBC sitcom to write a book about “parental alienation.”...Oh, how painful. I wonder what ridiculous father's rights characters have taken him in, are writing the book for him, and think he'll be a good figurehead for their cause. And what's more "alienating" to the child than having a father blustering about how bad her mother is? The best way for Alec Baldwin to make us -- and, I'm guessing, the child -- love him is to do the thing he does so well: act. Put that wild passion into playing characters. Or is that too sad? No one loves him for the man he actually is. The book's not going to help though.
Mr. Baldwin told Barbara Walters and Rosie O’Donnell that he wanted to devote his life to exposing the injustices perpetrated on divorced dads, and that he hoped to publish a book this fall on divorce litigation. Mr. Baldwin’s long-winded, self-obsessed soliloquy on his usurped rights as a father and the fiendish acts of his ex-wife, Kim Basinger, was so impassioned that Ms. Walters had to remind him that his first concern should be his relationship with Ireland. (When he mentioned his daughter, it was to make a point about her mother’s perfidy.)
He was looking to persuade but was mostly painful to watch — a little like Captain Queeg melting down on the witness stand in “The Caine Mutiny.”
April 28, 2007
Alec Baldwin has no idea how to get out of a jam.
Alessandra Stanley watched Alec Baldwin on "The View." He was trying to patch things up after that terrible publicity over his enraged phone message to his 11-year-old daughter:
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I wonder what ridiculous father's rights characters
I wouldn't frame it that way. Men still do not have reproductive rights. We often get shafted by the courts re alimony and custody. The system is so broken that one man was required to support a child that wasn't even his.
But its nice to see Baldwin sweat. He's an idiot, and his actions appear more PR related than anything else.
"I wonder what ridiculous father's rights characters have taken him in, are writing the book for him, and think he'll be a good figurehead for their cause."
I would frame it that way! I have complete and total reproductive rights because I control where my gun shoots. I never sleep with a woman I would not marry and father children with. That is freedom. It is also responsibility.
Do we get the shaft in divorce court? Yes, been there, sold the tshirt to pay my lawyer.
But as to reproductive freedom, I am in charge of where my sperm land. A little personal responsibility is all it has required.
Trey
"The best way for Alec Baldwin to make... the child... love him is..."
... for Alec Baldwin to accept the fact that no one can make another person love them.
He could learn to stop considering his daughter as an extension of himself, as an object from which he is entitled to receive love.
He could then learn to express nothing but decency and respect toward her and her mother.
He could stop doing his part in making their private life public.
He could devote his life to discovering and expressing his authentic self so that his daughter will know a real person as her father, the most important man in her life.
Fen: It would take ridiculous father's rights characters to want Baldwin as a figurehead.
I love him for playing The Phantom.
I say leave the guy alone. He was over the top but parents have to let the kids know who is the boss.
Someone used that tape to continue a game of spiteful gotcha. It should have remained a private matter.
That someone must be so mental and scary and angry, they felt compelled to stoop to this level.
Also, if Baldwin is really writing a book about father's rights, it shows he is truly an empty suit. I had thought the guy was a lefty loon, great actor, but informed and knowledgeable somewhat.
This book thing indicates he is not informed or knowledgeable.
Trey,
Men may control where their gun shoots, but (to extend your metaphor perhaps beyond the bounds of taste) they don't have control over other guns that may be shooting into the same target.
One of the biggest issues in fathers' rights is the injustice of men being on the hook for 18 years of child support for a child that is known to not be theirs.
I have complete and total reproductive rights because I control where my gun shoots. I never sleep with a woman I would not marry and father children with. That is freedom. It is also responsibility.
Yes, we know that birth control is not 100% effective and we choose to take that risk anyway. But if the women gets pregnant and wants to abort, you have no say in the matter; likewise, if she wants to keep the child and force you to support it, you have no say in the matter. You do not have the same rights over your DNA that she has.
Fen: It would take ridiculous father's rights characters to want Baldwin as a figurehead.
Ah, that makes more sense to me. I would gain an understanding of how real enviros feel about having Gore on their team.
At least he's not indifferent towards his little girl. That would be far worse. He clearly is deeply attached and is hurting terribly, to the point that he's not quite sane and is flailing about.
The left thinks that fathers are all loons and wants them offed in favor of the matriarchal society fantasy world.
In the real world dads are very important. Baldwin is a goofball, but I feel sorry for him as a fellow dad. It must be horrible to be separated from your children and to feel that they don't care.
NE2nd (great name) wrote: " they don't have control over other guns that may be shooting into the same target.
One of the biggest issues in fathers' rights is the injustice of men being on the hook for 18 years of child support for a child that is known to not be theirs."
Well, it is important to pick your targets carefully is it not? Benjamin Franklin said that he had seen many men choose a wife in light they not choose a suit in. I think he meant that men were not careful enough about their mating choices. He was right then, and right now.
OK, it is not right to be forced to pay for children that are not ours. But it is also not right that I pay taxes to send kids to school whose parents won't help them learn and demand that they act appropriately while at school.
The part of father's rights I can get behind is the part that honors chldren's needs to have contact and a meaningful relationship with their children. I am proud to be part of Tennessee case law that protects father's rights in this area.
Fen wrote: "Yes, we know that birth control is not 100% effective and we choose to take that risk anyway."
What you mean we kemosabe?
"But if the women gets pregnant and wants to abort, you have no say in the matter;"
If it takes two to get pregnant I think it should take two to abort. I am against the practice anyway.
"likewise, if she wants to keep the child and force you to support it, you have no say in the matter."
We part company here. If I impregnate someone I am morally, ethically, legally, and spiritually responsible for the child. That is part of father's responsibilities in my book.
"You do not have the same rights over your DNA that she has."
Now we are back closer to agreement. I think that so called reproductive rights (abortion) has demeaned women and children more than it has men. Part of the fallout has been some of the problems addressed in the posts. Part of it has been to encourage some women to have a false and narcissistic sense of entitlement over the process of pregnancy. Everyone suffers, but I think it has damaged women and children the most.
Trey (donning his flame resistant suit)
The left thinks that fathers are all loons and wants them offed in favor of the matriarchal society fantasy world.
No, we don't. That's just another rightwing fantasy talking point, yet another blanket, untrue accusation of lunacy against imaginary bogies in some wingnut's conception of an imaginary monolithic "left."
sorry, I logged in under another account. c327's comment is from me, Beth.
While Baldwin has legitimate points about the dearth of reproductive rights for fathers, that scary rant against his kid and his refusal to take his lumps for it pushes him into the free cable access channel fringe of discussion.
I don't know enough about that couple to be able to tell who's at fault and who needs to give in, but man oh man, they pushed his buttons and he went off on a tirade that taints his legitimacy as a spokesman for such a cause.
Shame on him for bullying an 11 year old and creating an iconic and wounding event for her, and shame on Basinger's camp for exploiting the kid like that.
P.S. for Beth
Democrat Daniel Moynihan's position on the deletirious effects of liberal policies on black families suggests their central role in the disappearance of the father. Rather than a demand for "a matriarchal society fantasy world" it is instead an unintended side effect of well-meaning policies dating back to Reconstruction.
While the effect might lead someone to conclude such a motive, that would be in error.
Beth, your c327 post reminds me of the Monty Python banter sketch.
"The wingnuts are blanketing lunacy against the imaginary bogies!"
"Hmmm, what? I think there's something up with your banter there. Didn't understand that at all."
Pogo, read the Urban League's position statement on black men and families this week; I think you'll find a lot to agree with.
Maybe after Dr. Phil reunites Alec and Ireland, Alec can get Ireland to write the foreword to his book!
What buffoonery.
Beth: I think the statement "all are loons and want them offed" is over the top, and I agree that the left is not monolithic (and that it's irritating to have it viewed as such; I feel the same way about the right, btw).
However, I do think there's a core of truth there. I do think there's been a systematic degradation of the role of the father, and I do think that, not always but too often, men get a bit of the shaft. (Thus, kids get real shafted, which is my primary concern.) I think there's a certain blindness among women about this, even a selfishness.
I'm with Althouse on her recasting of this point (glad she clarified, because the first stab had me shaking my head): It would take ridiculous father's rights characters to want Baldwin as a figurehead.
Indeed!
It does seem like a double standard. He's been a shill for feminist-leftist causes, but when he has a personal problem, all of the sudden he becomes a very conservative men's rights advocate.
Peace, Maxine
Reader, you're more willing to dig for the nuance than I am. Try this one: the right thinks all women are wombs and wants them barefoot and pregnant in their return to a patriarchal world.
It would be no less moronic a statement for there being some deeply nuanced truths way beneath the surface.
Reader: However, I do think there's a core of truth there. I do think there's been a systematic degradation of the role of the father
Beth, I have to agree with reader. I recall recent culture war incidents - radical feminist attacks on fatherhood, the hollywood Left's constant degradation of father-figures in media [aka Homer Simpson, Married with Children, etc], lefty hostility to the first Million Man March.
I wasn't disagreeing with your reaction to the original statement. Both that and the analogous one you offer are moronic, as was your point.
It just seemed appropriate to point to some underlying issues which seem, at least to me, pertinent to the larger topic.
Dig for nuance is what I often do. I'm aware it annoys people.
Though that's not my intent, but more a byproduct.
WHOA, BETH: I BADLY screwed up this sentence:
Both that and the analogous one you offer are moronic, as was your point.
Your POINT is not moronic at all. What I meant was that I AGREED with your point that BOTH are moronic--that is, I get the point your making and agree.
Sheesh. Up four hours, no food yet and less that 1/2 cup a coffee. Makes me go all idiotic.
Boy, I hope you didn't see the first comment before I got a chance to explain. I am sorry.
I'm pretty sure it was Billy Zane as The Phantom. Alec Baldwin was The Shadow (why is it that almost the exact same movie always gets made at about the same time?)
There's already a pretty ridiculous fathers rights group in Great Britain, so maybe Alec will fit right in with these blokes when he finally flees this country as he keeps on promising.
His old "Shadow" costume isn't really all that cool, and it probably doesn't fit anymore, so maybe instead a Captain America costume, since he'd be the American ambassador to this group (just leave burritos out of the equation).
And it wouldn't matter if the left did or didn't favor an Amazonian man-free wonderland (which I'm not suggesting 'they' do) if it weren't for the clear fact that in family court situations women do get decidedly preferential treatment and men too often have the burden of proof placed on them to prove they aren't latent child molestors or physically and emotionally abusive towards their exes and their children.
The testimony of women with vendettas and axes to grind is taken by some judges without the proper suspicion as to motive.
If it happens to high profile men like Alec Baldwin and Tommy Lee (who although of low character, and questionable choices, have not shown any proof that they were as bad as what their exes testified in court), think of what happens to poor slobs without their resources and lawyers.
Reader, cool people straighten out misunderstandings like you are doing.
I think part of the problem is that groups and movements do not do a proper job kicking out the loonies. Many misandrists hid under a feminist umbrella, and many people agreed with and followed them. And the most outrageous get the most coverage and press. So the fringe gets lumped in with the center.
This is not so much a problem when the center rebukes the loonies, but many groups have difficulty with setting such limits and excluding the dangerous.
But would we be having this part of the discussion if responsible feminists had shouted down the "all men are rapists" idiots? Nope. Just as we would not have confusion in the illegal immigration discussion if the center right did a better job of responding to racists and race baiters.
It works that way.
Trey
I read this item and I don't know what's wrong with me, my immediate reaction is not to get into a policy debate about a father's "reproductive rights," whatever that means.
I see this story as the tragic outcome of a lack of wisdom and discretion in the use of the privileges afforded by this country's fantastic wealth and personal freedom.
Here's a guy with everything going for him -- looks, talent, money -- thinking he's grabbed the brass ring by marrying an equally fortunate woman, and neither of them have enough intelligence or emotional maturity to do what people with far less means do successfully all over the world: Raise a child.
What's up with that? At some level, I am guessing that the child was not important enough to either of them to put her interests first, ahead of their ability to exercise all those other freedoms privilege afforded them. And now all three of them are paying the price in heartache and public humiliation -- especially the child herself.
What Baldwin also seems to have forgotten is while childhood is the most vital period of a parent's involvement with their offspring, it's not the only period. Your child will be an adult much longer than they will be a child, God willing, and you will want to have a positive relationship with him or her during their adulthood as well.
So Kim is being a pain about visitation and so forth. That's bad, but if he would just suck it up, by the time she's in her mid-teens, she can start making her own decisions, and by the time she's 18, Kim's dictates will be irrelevant. All he needs to do is love her, and be there for her on whatever terms are available. Children aren't stupid; they know who really cares about the.
So why go on this ridiculous ego-fueled rampage now, and risk spoiling the relationship he can have with his daughter in the future?
Reader--I didn't think you were calling me a moron. (I certainly can be a moron, and feel free to call me on it if need be.) We're on the same page, I think.
Years ago, when the Baldwin child was born, Alec Baldwin got into some trouble for getting rough with a papparazzi who'd shown up in their driveway, shoving a camera in their faces as they came home with the newborn for the first time. I was on Baldwin's side when he punched the guy. I understood his innate desire to defend his family. I likewise understand his frustration with whatever hurdles are in his way now in seeing and talking to his daughter.
But it's evident that both parents are going about this the worst way they can. He can't stop talking about himself, which tells me he's still not figuring out that this is about his child. And I've had the chance to view his temper in action, from the sidelines, so I know he's a spoiled person, given to tantrums. I hope he gets some good counseling, from someone who isn't intimidated by him, and can learn to put aside some of his ego and self-centeredness.
XWL is right! I am shamed!
Screw the Shadow, and Baldwin.
Stoddard - What Baldwin also seems to have forgotten is while childhood is the most vital period of a parent's involvement with their offspring, it's not the only period. Your child will be an adult much longer than they will be a child, God willing, and you will want to have a positive relationship with him or her during their adulthood as well.
Nope,psychologists say that it only takes a few years, even less if the parent with custody or who has abducted the child deliberately programs them - to break the paternal bond. It isn't just men. Western Women that have their Muslim husbands abduct their kids and finally reunify with them years later say they are not considered as mothers anymore by the children or young adults, but as distant friends.
Black men in America report the same thing about their "biologicals". Some forge friendhips, but none consider the "biologicals" tossed out or who move on themselves to avoid the financial burden and responsibilities of parenthood as "Dads". Psychologists also report the parental bond being weakened or broken by lengthly military deployments or prison stretches, in addition to the common Kim Basinger strategy of weakening the fathers position by messing with visitation & custody.
So Kim is being a pain about visitation and so forth. That's bad, but if he would just suck it up, by the time she's in her mid-teens, she can start making her own decisions, and by the time she's 18, Kim's dictates will be irrelevant.
Suck it up and just "be there" as simply a willing or unwilling wallet - not as a father and familiy member? Then, legal age 18 means the family dynamics can magically restart?
Stoddard, that is fantasy.
All he needs to do is love her, and be there for her on whatever terms are available.
Stoddard, that is fantasy. Worse, it is vapid New Age fantasy.
Children aren't stupid; they know who really cares about them.
Children are stupid. If only for lack of experience. They are also developing their lifetime personalities, emotions as well as factual learning. A parent absent any of that is just a stranger you can call to hear nice words, maybe get a check in the mail like from a nice, rich spinster aunt who you knows cares about you.
******************
I wouldn't consider Baldwin the model celebrity spokesman for deliberate parental alienation or Fathers Rights - but tens of millions of men are shafted by a cabal of feminist lawyers, social workers, and judges that largely run the family courts and assign men inferior civil rights.
As American families growingly dissolve, there is an unwillingness to look at the social pathologies unleashed by a system that seems determined to push Fathers away. And, make "The woman who naturally has the best interests of the child at heart, sovereign".
The worst examples are:
1. Woman that regularly sabotage visitation visits or contacts who face no consequence for doing so while a man who violates even mild restrictions in custody is brought to court.
2. Men ordered by courts to pay lifetime child support for the children of an unfaithful wife, that they didn't sire.
3. Men who face a system funded by tax dollars where most of the players are foursquare behind ensuring the woman gets custody (90% of the time) or final word in joint custody matters coming up.
Alec Baldwin may be a deeply flawed individual, but most civil rights movements have celebrities or leaders (even Saint Martin Luther King) who have deep character flaws yet end up doing good work.
Tens of millions of men that have found they have inferior rights to women in Family Court or are "biologicals" treated as garbage by underclass women except where money and "fun-making" come into it.....form a pretty large base of support for Baldwin and others.
Cedarford,
So you're saying you think what Baldwin is doing is productive?
Taking the most generous view of his predicament, he's dealing with a completely outrageous mother. He should pursue his legal rights to see his daughter as far as he can.
In the courts. To the extent possible, out of the public eye.
What I was trying to say is, given the shit sandwich he's been handed, he's making it worse by making a public spectacle of himself. I stand by what I said: taking the long view, his only choice is to be the better man, and have faith that his daughter will eventually recognize his efforts as having been based on his love for her.
I'm not saying things are good. Probably the better plan would have been not to marry Kim Basinger, and not to have a child with her. But those ships having sailed, he can handle their predicament with a degree of grace and maturity. Which, to me, does not involve going on a PR tour or trying to win sympathy points from Rosie and Barbara. None of that will address any of the substantial issues you raised any more effectively than what I recommend.
Trey --
"Well, it is important to pick your targets carefully is it not?"
Lesse if I have this straight. If a woman (or man) decides to have an affair, it's the fault of the non-offender for not picking correctly?
When stats indicate that up to 60% of men and 40% of women cheat, I think it's more of a biological thing that can't be 'predetermined'.
Too bad equal rights is so often used to cover up the true meaning -- my turn to persecute (and, not the ones who are guilty for the previous injustices, just someone who resembles them).
When I first read the communist manifesto and the authors made their statement that in the future the patriarchal family would disappear and women would be held in common henceforth I laughed.
Kennedy cheated extensively on his wife.
Nixon didn't.
Carter said that it was ok to lust in your heart.
Ford didn't say that.
Reagan and his wife were very loyal to one another.
Clinton cheated extensively, almost ritually.
The Bushes have been family men with loving wives.
Well, maybe it's a coincidence.
I reread The World According to Garp the other week and in it the very liberal and hip husband AND the wife cheat, and they decide it's ok, and they didn't do anything wrong, even though it gets their kid killed.
Maybe it's a coincidence.
Maybe Erica Jong is a very right wing individual.
But I say, based on the evidence, that if you want a relationship that is tight and based on loyalty, tend toward the right.
If you want a loosy goosey relationship where nothing seems to matter except the latest whim, tend toward the left.
Patriarchal Family values versus the Matriarchal Sexual Revolution.
You have to choose, and then you have to wend your way through the Meowist court system if you choose wrong (left). Maybe at some point in the future you'll get to see your kids again. Possibly at the Resurrection?
Do you seriously believe that this kid, Ireland, hasn't been poisoned against her dad by the embittered Basinger harpie?
Saw a picture of daughter Ireland the other day. She was taller than Mom and lean to the point of thin.
Her Dad just called her a "pig".
No question that it hurt - or that she will remember it.
Will she believe that is what he "really" thinks of her or decide that what he thinks doesn't matter?
One thing is that even if Bassinger has poisoned her against her father, it is likely that she isn't the only parent to do so. He has done a fair job himself.
Think about it. The kid, Ireland, is witnessing this dispute as it plays out in public. She's reading the stories, watching "The View," maybe even reading this blog post, but if not this post, others. How can we imagine what it's like to develop as a young person in this strange environment? I'm going to hope she finds an advantage, somehow, in all this extra information. Let's not assume her life is just hopelessly screwed up because of this. I've got faith in you, Ireland. Take a sad song and make it better.
Reagan and his wife were very loyal to one another.
Which one?
All parents embarrass their children when they talk. If Alec would shut up (hard for an actor blowhard to do), his problems would recede. Even the tape -- If I were in his shoes, I'd have withheld comment on it, and apologized to my daughter, privately, about it. I think children understand that parents get irrationally angry at times.
"I think children understand that parents get irrationally angry at times."
They do, generally. And they also are usually smart enough to figure out if one parent is being unfair and mean to the other.
If this was very atypical of Baldwin, Ireland knows it. If it's typical of Baldwin, she knows that too. I thought it was beyond horrible and no amount of frustration could justify what he said to her or the way he said it.
Even if Basinger constantly talks bad about him, all she has to do to "win" in this is not be abusive toward her daugher.
And kids need to know who is boss? Dear Lord and Baby Jesus, this is showing who is boss? What? I'm going to be ever more abusive until you start loving and obeying me, dammit!
The beatings will continue until morale improves?
Discipline and parental authority are something quite different and just like *love* they don't come in a ready package of parental entitlement. You screw them up it's YOUR fault, not your kid's.
And kids need to know who is boss? Dear Lord and Baby Jesus, this is showing who is boss? What? I'm going to be ever more abusive until you start loving and obeying me, dammit!
No idea, here, whether or not you know how perfect a description that is of how some people are grown up.
(No typos here.)
(Hint: Don't read over the double+-meanings [the ways a particular set of words can be read] of my just previous comment. It's intentional.)
I've got faith in you, Ireland. Take a sad song and make it better.
The single most compassionate, and practical, line I've ever seen you write, at least in comments Ann.
Good on you, Althouse.
, Ann.
Benjamin Franklin said that he had seen many men choose a wife in light they not choose a suit in. I think he meant that men were not careful enough about their mating choices. He was right then, and right now.
This would be the same Ben Franklin who who entered into common law marriage with another man's abandoned wife in order to have a mother for the bastard son he'd fathered with a prostitute?
Nothing personal, but while Ben was a great guy, a marriage counselor he wasn't.
But full of wisdom, he was, and not just because of his life experience.
Rigidity, he did not personify.
Achievement, he excelled at, and in ways multiple.
Pikers, he makes of most of us.
(That includes me, for sure. Also YOU, Revenant.)
So are you channeling your inner Yoda or what, reader?
Not to play tit-fo-tat, or any sort of moral equivalency; no, it's rather sad that Kirby Olson has missed out on some fun and salacious gossip. I mean I don't pay attention to this stuff, so if I've heard it I'm surprised everyone else hasn't.
Rumors of varying degrees of provenance:
*Nancy Reagan (before marrying Ronnie) was known in Hollywood for giving oral sex.
*Nancy Reagan having sex with Frank Sinatra in the White House
*Bush, Sr: To gain admission to Skull & Crossbones masturbated in a coffin and was given the nickname "Magog," for having the most sexual experience.
*Bush, Sr: rumors of numerous affairs (possibly Clintonesque, in number) while in DC in the 70s.
*Bush, Jr: other than purely medicinal uses of coke and booze, probably most likely to have led a faithful married life.
**Nixon and Ford: unaware of any rumors.
Kirby's known facts vs bill's cocktail gossip. hmmm.
When will people learn not to give a statement or press release when they have goofed? Excuses mean nothing except to someone who wants to further ridicule. It's better to just keep the head down and humbly, quietly work through it in the circle of those who would cover us and unconditionally love us. His publicist need only say, "Mr. Baldwin regrets this grave parenting mistake and accepts that there are no excuses. There are no further comments. His only concern at this time is mending relations with his daughter." Why the need to address the public? There is no need to answer highly personal questions at such times. grrr
They're "known facts" only so far as Kirby knows them to be, Fen. His is also a selective list, and misrepresentative. Carter, for example, didn't say it's fine to lust in one's heart, he admitted to having lusted in his heart--to have felt lust, but not acted on it. It was a confession of sin, in his worldview. Kirby's presentation of that surely twists the point. And he romanticizes the Reagan, Nixon, and Bush Sr. marriages. He fails to mention that red states have higher divorce levels than blue states, on average. He's come to a conclusion about conservatives and liberals and now everything he encounters conforms itself to fit his belief.
Carter, for example, didn't say it's fine to lust in one's heart, he admitted to having lusted in his heart
Was that the interview with the Huslter bozo?
Noticed you didn't contest Kirby's account of Kennedy & Clinton running bimbos out of the WH, under their wife's nose.
Olig wrote: "Lesse if I have this straight. If a woman (or man) decides to have an affair, it's the fault of the non-offender for not picking correctly?"
No, I was referring to using self control and thoughtful reflection prior to engaging in sexual intercourse. You are referring to betrayel as I see it. I do not think that it is just to blame the betrayed.
Then Rev wrote: "Nothing personal, but while Ben was a great guy, a marriage counselor he wasn't."
Excellent Franklin trivia! And I am the last one to be offended by the facts Rev! Best I can say is that either Ben knew whereof he spoke, or that a broken clock is right twice a day.
But good one!
Trey
The Ben Franklin thing doesn't seem bad to me. He didn't have to support his bastard child. He wouldn't have been rewarded then for doing it but it sounds like he did it anyway. And someone else's abandoned wife, while not available to get married to him, would have faced a hard, bad, life as a woman alone.
This tidbit of information makes it sound like Ben cared about other people more than his own reputation. It seems an admirable thing.
And as bad as Carter seems to be getting, his "lust in my heart" thing played so badly because he was confessing his worst sin, at least in that particular category. His standards of faithfulness were so strict that he felt guilty for mere thoughts that never became action.
Fen, you seem to think it means something that I don't take Kirby's weird list point by point. It's obvious enough that it's selective, and doesn't form a logical basis for his bizarre conclusion that liberals hate men, and are sexually immoral, and conservatives are faithful, righteous family loving folk. Your "gotcha!" attempt just makes this whole topic all the more amusing.
"And kids need to know who is boss? Dear Lord and Baby Jesus, this is showing who is boss? What? I'm going to be ever more abusive until you start loving and obeying me, dammit!"
"No idea, here, whether or not you know how perfect a description that is of how some people are grown up."
I do.
And it's not an insistence on obedience and parental authority, because I'm pretty strict on that and I know people who are much stricter than I am. Much. And they aren't that way.
But I do know people who are that way. I know that a whole lot of people grow up where the mother or the father or the grandparents feel that affection and respect (obedience from children or maybe wife or husband) has nothing whatsoever to do with their own behavior, that they can fuss and punish and be horrible and it makes no difference.
Probably the first I was aware that *anyone* was this way was in college when a friend of mine said her mother wouldn't talk to her for a couple months because she'd missed a Mother's Day card and she'd have to do some groveling and get her a present to make up for it. Her Mom might reliably get Mother's Day cards, behaving like this, but are any of those cards going to be motivated by affection?
Just like obedience, it's not the card sending... children can be taught or trained to send cards and be good about that... it's the "love me or else" part.
Fen, you seem to think it means something that I don't take Kirby's weird list point by point... Your "gotcha!" attempt just makes this whole topic all the more amusing.
Gotcha? Hardly. I just found it amusing that you ignored Kirby's points on Kennedy and Clinton.
BTW, are you the Elizabeth thats a female professor in LA, Saints fan...or are you the Elizabeth thats a man pretending to be a female poster? I always get the two of you confused.
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