The Snarker listening posts have again picked up some chatter in the Bloggernacle. As near as we can tell, it emanates from FMH'er Rebecca who, unbeknownst to us before, sings as she blogs.
The recording is scratchy, but the tune resembles a famous 80's tune originally performed by Huey Lewis & The News.
[Begin Transcript]
I want some new G’s
Ones that make me look *Phat*
Maybe ones with a built in Bra
Just as long as I don’t look flat.
I want some new G’s
Some that won’t chafe!
Some that help me fit in my jeans
And don’t come with lace.
Ones that won't drive me crazy
Riding up all day!
Ones that stay right in place
when I kneel down to pray...
I kneel dowwwwn to pray.
I want some new G’s
Ones that don’t bind…
Some that won’t slide around my knees,
And to my figure are kind.
I want some new g's
Ones that won't make me sweat
Ones made of some nice fabric,
Ones that won't put me in debt.
Ones that won't drive me crazy
Riding up all day!
Ones that stay right in place
when I kneel down to pray...
I kneel dowwwwn to pray.
[End Transcript]
Well, Artemis, FMH goddess of fertility, is sure to be pleased! You have Clark and Julie fully embracing the worldly Gentile heathen traditions like a couple of regular pagans. So when is the pilgramage to Stonehenge, you two? Holy fetchin heck!
Hey, how about more stuff like Brandolyn's , huh? Ever occur to you people to maybe have a Passover Seder and then explain how at the Last Supper Jesus changed that into the Sacrament, and then did the same thing a year later in the New World with the Nephites too? No, no, not enough pastel pink and blue dyed eggs, fake plastic grass and marshmallow peeps.
Yeah, now that is more like it!
As you know the NCAA final four championship games will be this Saturday, April 1, beginning at 5PM CT. One assumes that the GMU/Florida game will be over in time for a fast drive over to the nearest satellite-equiped chapel to see the Priesthood session of conference.
The next game is the problem. It will mostly be on during conference! Do you have any advice, Aunt Snarky? Do the bigwigs in Salt Lake consider the ramifications of the conference schedule? Who should one contact at church headquarters to remedy this situation?
Anxiously awaiting your reply,
Final4 lurkernacle
Dear Final4 lurkernacle,
When you speed over to the Priesthood Session, make sure you drive carefully and don't get in an accident. Safe driving is everyone's responsibility! Crashing into the Stake President, since he will be pulling into the parking lot the same time you are, will make getting a Temple Recommend difficult!
As for the Sunday session, well, all I can tell you is you need to get your priorities straight! Go out and get a TiVo! Then you can record General Conference and watch it after the game is over. Now, I don't want to sit here and lecture you on violating the Sabbath, because it looks like you are already determined to do that, and I would never encourage anyone to do that, but since you are already there, Dear Old Aunt Snarky may as well do the most good she can do!
You know, they played basketball last year, and will play it again next year, so it isn't like you are going to miss anything. Not that General Conference really changes all that much from year to year, since Mormons don't really listen to them from year to year anyway. So, yeah, just keep disregarding the admonitions of our leaders and watch your silly basketball games, and doom the rest of us to another repeat in six months because you don't do your Home Teaching because it conflicts with Baseball seasons or have Family Home Evening since it conflicts with Monday Night Football.
And remember, you can always try to justify watching basketball instead of General Conference by using sports analogies for life and the gospel in Elder's Quorum next week.
Aunt Snarky
In an effort to maintain community within the Bloggernacle, the T&S powers-that-be have launched T&SSingles.com
The first happy couple to be united via the groundbreaking site are Crystal and T&S tempobore John David "House of" Payne. The T&SSingles.com homepage explains the following:
"Some sites waste time and Internet bandwidth needlessly collecting information about your personality, likes, and preferences. We simply find two people within a reasonable driving distance and... Voila! Hook-ups galore!"
However, it should be noted that one must own a vehicle with locking doors and should possess enough grammatical knowledge to differentiate between a simile and a metaphor.
File under: Special requests
[Ed. - It isn't all that often that people approach us and ask to be snarked, but it does happen from time to time. Hellmut Lotz was put out that there was controversy about trolls here at the SN and he wasn't involved. We offered to rectify the situation by snarking him, and he accepted the offer. For those who may not know Hellmut, he is a German's German, an ardent secularist, writes on his own blog, and is a co-blogger on a tangentially related blog, occasionally comments on the Nacle and also frequents ex-mo boards. If you aren't familiar with ex-mo terminology you might want to refer to this.]
Welcome to the Bloggernacle Opera House unlive nonpodcast, brought to you today by our sponsor: Drakes Cakes, formulating and fabricating delicious Devil Dogs for you and your children to savour the flavour foravour. Like Moon Pies, but long and skinny, like a daschund.
Today's event features the Wagnerian uber German timeless classic:
[Curtain raises, scenes of Elmer directing a storm.]- The Flying Dutchman
overture - general opera recitative-style music
(Elmer) Be very quiet I'm hunting morgbots - Ride of the Valkyries from The Valkyries:
(E) Morgbot tracks!!!
(E) Kill the morgbot, kill the morgbot, kill the morgbot
(E) Yo ho to oh! Yo ho to oh! Yo ho...
- Siegfried's Horn Call from the Ring Cycle:
(Bugs) O mighty warrior who clearly hates BYU
(B) Might I enquire to ask, eh, what's up DAMU??
(E) I'm going to kill the morgbot!! - Ride of the Valkyries
(B) Oh mighty warrior t'will be quite a task
(B) How will you do it, might I enquire to ask?? - Siegfried's Horn Call - General recit. music:
(E) I will do it with my spear and magic Hellmut!
(B) Your spear and magic Hellmut?
(E) Spear & magic Hellmut!
(B) Magic Hellmut?
(E) Magic Hellmut!
(B) Magic Hellmut
(E) Yes, magic Hellmut and I'll give you a sample
[Elmer gives a sample of his power] - Flying Dutchman overture
(B) Bye
(E) (that was the morgbot)
[Chase scene] - General chase music - Overture to Tannhauser:
[Bugs appears, dressed as PostMormon, riding on a white horse. Elmer is stupefied.]
(E) Oh PostMormon, you're so lovely
(B) Yes I know it, I can't help it
(E) Oh PostMormon, be my love
[Ballet scene] - Bachanal from Tannhauser - Tannhauser Overture:
(E) Return my love, my anger burns deep inside me
(B) Return my love, I fear you always beside me
(E) Ardor like ours must be
(B) Made for you and for me
(B&E) Return, won't you return my love, for my love is yours
[Winged helmet disguising Bugs falls off, Elmer realizes he has been duped, Bugs flees]
- Ride of the Valkyries:
(E) I'll kill the morgbot
(E) Arise polygamy
(E) Blacks and the Priesthood blow, Women and the Priesthood blow
(E) Patriarchy, Word of Wisdom, Gay Marriage...Mountain Meadow Massacre!
(E) Pseudo-intellectual rhetoric! Strike the morgbot!
- Tannhauser overture:
[Lightning strikes Bugs in the distance, Elmer approaches]
(E) What have I done?? I've killed the morgbot....
(E) Poor little zoobie, poor little morgbot...
[Elmer walks away carrying Bugs in his arms] -Tannhauser overture
(B) (well what did you expect in an opera, a temple wedding???)
[Curtain drops to overwhelming cyber-applause]
Snarkernacle Industries LTD would like to thank our special guest sponsors for footing the bill for this extravagant, action-filled operatic masterpiece:
Dark Helmet, for donating much-needed Schwartz to the DAMU
With the revelation that Armand Mauss, and other "old school" Mormon scholars (i.e., ones who actually get things into print) might actually be reading this Bloggery Tabernacle something or other on the shiny white box with the glowing television-like screen that gets plugged into the wall, a flurry of posts immediately hit the Nacle. Coincidence? Hrrrrrmmmm. Uh huh.
Oh, and did I mention I got to have dinner with Armand Mauss? Me. Yes. I did. Mmmm hmmm. Thats right. Oh yeah. Work it. I had to offer to pick up the tab, but, hey, it was so worth it. Yeah, call me, Armand baby, you got my digits.
UPDATE: Just to prove the Snarkette totally hit the nail on the head with this one, we have this recent post on Elijah Abel, which contains nothing new or original and 75% of which is a quote of some other source. Boy, now there is a coincidence if there ever was one! Sheesh, why not just post "Armand Mauss I Heart U" and then put up an annotated bibilography of everything he ever published, pointing out you own everything he has ever committed to print. Why does T&S get so many hits? Because of the great content.
File under: Free Bloggernacle Tour
For all those gingerly poking around the Bloggernacle for the first time, welcome! Here's a quick guided tour — just follow the links. There are three big blogs, but soon there will be only one since one of them is near death and the other is senescent and afflicted with navel gazing, and will die of starvation once they run out of guest bloggers.
The presenters were Nate and Kaimi, of The Great and Spacious Blog, and Caroline of Exponent II, which is the blog Feminist Mormon Housewives wants to be but cannot because of all the dirty talk and recipes. Other blogs referred to by name in Kaimi's presentation include Tales From the Crib, a great place for bewbie banter, and Mormon Mentality's version of the New and Everlasting Mormon Archipelago (not a blog; an all-seeing eye of Horus that beholds all posts from all Bloggernacle blogs that wish to be beheld, so its more of a selectively all-seeing eye, omniscient but only in a decidedly limited way), another favorite of Kaimi & Nate since it put them back in Box 1 after being demoted from being a Big Island to a non-descript shoal at the True and Faithful Mormon Archipelago. But wait, there's more!
At the meeting I attended, representatives of other blogs were also in attendance: Heather from Mormon Mommy Wars (a boring grrl blog that cannot decide whether they want to be Faithful Mormon Housewives or edgy bloggers) and Carrie from Tales From the Crib (an unboring grrl blog). The three presenters talked about what they think the Bloggernacle is; how posts and discussion at Mormon blogs are largely so unoriginal in content they rely on journals, magazines, or conferences for talking points; and how some blogs focus on LDS women's issues, from very bad temple experiences to sex talk (Lesson: sex sells) to mother in heaven to circumcision to babying your whiney immature husband and party tips. I might post in response to specific thoughts of the presenters later this week, if I get bored enough and run out of toenails to clip.
Handy Abbreviations for those eager to be insiders: "Bloggernacle" is often shortened to "Nacle", or "BM"...errrr...typo there...supposed to be "BN". The major blogs likewise have short forms that are generally used in blog conversation: T&S, BCC, M0 (for Millennial Black Hole, the one noted as near death above), FMH, MA, DMI, and so forth. Standard online conversational acronyms like IMHO (in my humble opinion - meaning "I am not humble and this is not an opinion, its a fact and you are an idiot to not believe it"), FWIW (for what it's worth - meaning "I know you are going to ignore this because you are horribly arrogant but I cannot refrain from stating the obvious truth"), and TMI (too much information - meaning "the simple fact that you reveal such private details of you life into a public forum, even anonymously, shows you need a lobotomy, or heavy sedation at the very least") also appear from time to time. Other useful acronyms for noobs trying to ingratiate themselves on the BM is ILYSMYAB (I love you so much, you are brilliant), SBIADYS (stunningly brilliant, in awe at the depth of your scholarship) and ROFLMAO (meaning "rolling on floor laughing my [head] off" when in the context of a joke or in the context of an argument it means "I cannot respond intelligently to you, because doing so mean admitting I am wrong, so I will now change the topic by resorting to personal attacks").
The lack of quality represented by BM blogs is difficult for newcomers to initially tolerate — thoughtful, intelligent discussion free of political slant and self-promoting pedantry is not exactly the hallmark of the Bloggernacle. I think the degree of evident contention says something about the BM and about blogging in general (I'm not sure exactly what it says, but I'm sure it's not good). There are all kinds of blogs, and they are all pretty much the same recycled rubbish from year to year: women & priesthood, blacks & priesthood, word of wisdom/hot soup/caffiene/danish beer, patriarchal authoritarianism, polygamy, politics & religion, evolution versus creation, blahdy blah blah blah....and since there are a disproportionate number of lawyers throw in legal stuff and how it relates to the gospel via really bad analogies (RBAs) although most of those appear to have been exhausted so they are less common now, mercifully and justly.
Despite all this contentious fodder, conversations in the comments are generally friendly and pleasant, especially when the heavy hand of moderating out dissenting voices and trolling hate mongers is applied. Learning how to argue mindlessly about religious ideas in a trivial fashion with those who look at things quite differently takes little effort and practice, so most people do just that. [Hint: impulsively dash off angry rhetoric and hit the Submit button just before going to bed.] I suppose the resulting virtue (for those who persevere) might be tolerance, but that really is just wishful thinking.
More in a couple of days, if the BM doesn't implode.
Foreknowledge and Free Agency gets discussed in the Bloggernacle a lot, so TftC decided to discuss it too. Only, they put their own little twist on it. We know that mohels usually bristle with good tips, but given the present lack of them in the Nacle, here is one from the Snarkette: Ladies commenting on this thread, don't let your husbands know you are disclosing their positions when it comes to foreknowledge.
The winds of change are blowing over at Look At All The Books I Read. He’s grasped upon the latest LDS.org statement on the ever popular and controversial issue of Abortion. He compares it to the slightly different statements contained in True To The Faith, finds some slight differences in verbiage, and come to the conclusion the Church’s position on this sensitive and personal issue is shifting.
Yeah, and California is sliding into the ocean at the same pace.
The differences between the two statements are negligible, ones only a lawyer could find. I’m not going to debate the rail splitting here. I simply draw your attention to Dave’s closing statement:
Since these new public statements both explicitly require any LDS teenager or woman to make such a difficult decision "only after the persons involved have consulted with their local church leaders" (quoting the LDS.org statement), it would seem disingenuous for members to be guided by gentler public statements while said local church leader, pulling down his restricted copy of the CHI, reads language that paints anyone consulting them in connection with an abortion decision as the equivalent of a murderer. (Emphasis added)Call me a Snarker, but that’s shooting just a little beyond the mark there, Dave. There’s a big difference between seeking counsel from a Priesthood leader regarding a decision as defining as whether to terminate a life and seeking forgiveness for having terminated one. Your lack of understanding of and respect for what happens when Stake Presidents, Bishops, and Branch Presidents counsel with the affected parties about this decision is truly troubling. But I digress.
On the basis of these more recent statements of LDS leaders, that sort of condemnatory language seems out of step and out of date. (Emphasis added)Out of step and out of date with what? A worldly philosophy which places the “right” of a woman to end the life of a child above nearly everything else?
What is the end hope here? That the Church will ever so slowly slouch toward the Gomorrah Policy of "Anything Goes"? I'm not holding my breath.
File under: Revelations
While many have suspected as much for a long time, Chris has let the cat out of the bag. Given the preponderance of lawyers and wanna-bees here on the Nacle, it explains an awful lot. Forget about ever guest blogging at T&S or BCC, Chris.
Employment tip to Ned: If you want to switch from 19.5 cents per minute to 30 bucks per six minutes of water drinking and nose blowing (don't forget blogging), be a lawyer.
While this question has yet to be posed over at FMH, I'm sure its only a matter of time.
So far the debate has covered male vs. female angels, female demons, and I'm sure the question of the co-ed can-can dance competition is next up.
Therefore, to spare the 'naccle from another pointless exercise, I pass along the following answer:
Nowadays only four angels can dance [on the head of a pin]. Formerly there was no limit, but OSHA passed the Angel Safety Law recently, which also requires that the pin must be inspected twice each year for structural defects.As, always, glad to be of service.
File under: Satire
1. Don't read the Bible. It is a dead book, meaningless and incomprehensible. Anti-mormons cannot even agree amongst themselves what it means, so why bother to study it. Argue they cannot use the Bible as a proof text until they can agree on what it means. Use varying readings on John 4:24 to prove your point, and then don't bother to ever read the book again. Its damaged goods, the Joseph Smith-Translation proves that.
2. Study original sources. Then you can scoff at the ignorance of anti-mormons who dare to criticize texts they know little or nothing about. Mock them openly for daring to quote troublesome and seemingly strange passages from Journal of Discourses, because they are ignorant of historical, textual, spiritual, and whatever other context you can fabricate.
3. FARMS thoughts=your thoughts. Rely on the incredibly robust arguments and utter objectivity of the mighty apologetic powerhouse that is FARMS. Read everything they ever published, commit it to memory, then voila, you can rapidly disarm your foes with a high speed onslaught of punishing arguments they cannot respond to.
4. Stay current. Read all of the latest apologetics material put out on all the websites: FAIR, SHIELDS, etc. Then you can quickly counter any arguments put forward with astonishing speed, feigning broad-based knowledge when in fact you only know the latest current events. Read the Ensign every month too, only so if you are questioned on how faithful you are you can hold that up as proof of your fidelity.
5. Consult outside sources. Talk to Mormons who know a lot about other religions and read books written by Mormons who know a lot about other religions. That way you will be totally plugged into what they believe and can quickly hamstring their beliefs.
6. Ignore hypocrisy. Forget about that "turn the other cheek" stuff and "love thy neighbor" thing. This is Jude 1:3 time. These people are attacking us, we have to defend ourselves with the sword of truth, right?
And, one later add on...
7. Read up on chiasmus and other forms of Hebrew literary devices. The more obscure and nonsensical the better, that will it will be impossible for anti-mormons to respond intelligently to them, because they make no sense in the first place and are not worthy of any serious discussion from an apologetic point of view. You will have your foe effectively unarmed in this type of combat, because they will have no idea what you are talking about.
By Common Consent has a new look, and not really much else.
The new "grassy meadows" theme is a perfect symbol for the new BCC. It draws deeply on literary archetypes that I love. For me, it evokes one spring time woodland in particular, summed up in the singular phrase: "But when the blade was sprung up, and brought forth fruit, then appeared the tares also."
My personal approach to the new BCC is represented beautifully by Walt Whitman's poem:
Leaves of Grass
I CELEBRATE myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.
I loafe and invite my soul,
I lean and loafe at my ease....observing a spear of summer grass.
Houses and rooms are full of perfumes....the shelves are crowded with perfumes,
I breathe the fragrance myself, and know it and like it,
The distillation would intoxicate me also, but I shall not let it.
The atmosphere is not a perfume....it has no taste of the distillation....it is odorless,
It is for my mouth forever....I am in love with it,
I will go to the bank by the wood and become undisguised and naked,
I am mad for it to be in contact with me.
Noobs click here for context.
The elite clique of Nacle aristocrats that run the Moarch has finally decided to kick the SnarkerNacle off the Mormon Archipelago. Ah, well, that is just the way it goes. It was a long time in coming, and frankly, we are surprised it took as long as it did. Alas, gentle reader, please do not e-mail GeoffJ and bug him about it, he has better things to do with his time, and it isn't his fault we got kicked.
We never asked the Moarch to list us, we were surprised months ago when we did get listed, and we knew it wouldn't last. And, now that we are no longer listed, the Moarch has lost its only influence over us, namely GeoffJ, who tirelessly encouraged us to be more careful and more sensitive and repeatedly got us to edit our content to tone it down in the interest of the greater good. But, you can forget about all that now. Snarkette is in da haus, and she will be taking no prisoners.
What happened, you ask? Well, it was probably a combination of two of yesterday's posts, the FMH post and the Oman post. You see, the gurly grrls at FMH hate the Snarker (most of the time anyway, they like it when TMILisa gets to emasculate Adam Greenwood, but hate it whenever we point out they aren't really feminists and love to drive up hits with salacious topics, and despite TMILisa's insistence she doesn't read us, well, that just isn't true) and the Omans hate the Snarker (because we point out they are pretentious hypocrites who cast aspersions but must never be criticized for it). And both groups have friends in the Moarch aristocracy, so they complain to the aristocracy and the aristocracy takes action. The only action of which is to shuffle us around into our own box down at the bottom, and then to kick us off entirely. Which action is totally ineffective at accomplishing anything, other than appeasing the anger of the gurls at FMH and the wrath of the Omans. We got our readership without the Moarch, and will continue on just fine without it.
So, again, gentle readers, please don't bother GeoffJ about it. Its not his doing or his responsibility. He was stuck doing the thankless and time consuming job of being middle-man between the Moarch aristocracy and the Snarkers, trying to make both sides happy. Which job was pretty much impossible, given the nature of the two parties.
And so it goes, Mormon blogging continues to be an ego-driven circus of conceit and the SnarkerNacle continues to point that fact out.
The SnarkerNacle reporter about town has the latest Nacle news on things that ought to be:
Having nothing to do whatsoever with being advocates for Jesus Christ and the Restored Church, and not really being a group blog (since none of the other bloggers ever blog) Guy Murray has decided to switch to a soloblog on Typepad, like everyone else, and rename it to something more indicative of its true character. Starting next week it shall be renamed "Google News keyword:'mormon' Search Results, with Predictable Baby Boomer Commentary Cross Posted from Bloggernacle Times" available at:
http://googlenews4mormons.typepad.com
Thanks, Guy, for setting the record straight and clearing up any potential misconceptions about the original Messenger & Advocate and your solo blogging current events.
The yukkmeisters at BCC make light of the DNA Ronan inherited from his mother's father, and they pay the ultimate price!
GeoffJ, who normally loves all things Mormon and speculative, seems to have lost interest in doing so when it comes to Mother in Heaven. Instead, some other men step in to beat their chests in defense of Heavenly Mom, presumably to prove how feminist and pro-woman they are to their wives whom they oppress with the brickbat of the Priesthood.
No scriptures on Heavenly Mother? Um, yeah, what about:
- And Adam said, This [is] now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.
Look, Annie, if Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother are as united as you say they are, and they are, just like the Father and the Son are, then worshipping the Father in spirit and truth is the same as worshipping Mother in spirit in truth. Lip service is just lip service. Heavenly Mother wants the same thing Father and Son want, children with a godly walk, not a bunch of sanctimonious pseudofeminist claptrap that seeks to cast anyone who refuses to elevate Heavenly Mother in conversation lest they relegate her by implication to "underling goddess/goddina/goddette".
Yes, its true, Heather and Nate are moving, and they want you to know that so both of them are blogging in parallel to make sure everyone on the Nacle who reads them is fully tuned in to their zany, madcap lives of fun and kooky experiences where everything turns out well in the end. Nate also wants you to know what he looks like.
Um, Nate and Heather, since you can question our motives, are we allowed to now question yours?
With that same special love you hold for us,
The Snarker
President Emeritus
SN Industries LTD
P.S., next time, try a realtor's website that plugs you directly into the MLS so you can do searches on houses around where you are looking to buy. That way you don't have to rely on the Mormon Mafia, which sometimes requires onerous paybacks.
The Practical Mormon, never one to blow her own horn or bite off more than she can chew, is either writing the Idiot's Guide to Religious Pretension, as she suggests, or is auditioning to be a guest blogger at T&S when they run out of Moarch Founders. She appears to be qualified.
In between reinterpreting various well-established doctrines of salvation, one of the Bloggernacle's newest additions has determined, through the sheer force of his intellect, that nuclear reactors and thermonuclear bombs do not in fact work. He has also decided there will be electric guitars in heaven, having received much solace from Pink Floyd's drug distorted opus. Which leads us to welcome Rob as the Nacle's own version of Karl Pilkington.
Okay, we’ve all heard of By Common Consent, which is just another name for "Contention is of the Devil". This blog is attributed to active LDS Church members allegedly in good standing, but I suspect someone somewhere is writing an article to be published by FARMS demonstrating that DNA found on keyboards shows that BCC is in fact not written by members of the LDS Church at all, thereby letting the Church off the hook. But, for argument’s sake, let’s assume they are active LDS members in good standing. If so, then why does BCC quote from so many non-LDS skeptical sources that are hostile to the LDS Church?
I mean, they frequently quote from the LDS Scriptures and talk about Joseph being a Prophet, but they also constantly question him, his teachings, his legitimacy, his legacy and those who fail to view him with a critical eye.
I’m stumped here. Is it a blog about the inspired, just not an inspired blog?
I’ve also uncovered another scandal-these people consider themselves "Liahoners" and not "Iron Rodders"! In other words, they don't hold on to the word of God! Like that wasn't totally obviously.
I’m also writing today to SLC asking that they strike the phrase "by common consent" from all CES correlated texts so no non-member will mistake this blog as being LDS Church affilliated. Please join me in my letter campaign.
The best snark material is stuff I can't make up. Yes, Steve EM now puts the blame for his dalliance in controlled substances squarely at the feet of the Brigham Young statue in front of BYU's Smoot Administration building.
I must admit, BYU drove me to drink as well - large quantities of Diet Coke.
The Prime Snarker here at SN Industries LTD has built up so much wealth, status, glory and ill will here on the Nacle that everyone's favorite chihuahua wants to retire before the paws wear out, and live out those golden doggie days in relative obscurity and infamy.
The good news is you, yes you, can commit chihuahuacide as your going away present. We have decided to have some fun with this by casting it as a sort of Clue game, where you pick Who, Where and How the Snarker is done in. In other words, it will be Colonel Mustard in the Kitchen with the Candlestick, except you can be as creative as you like submitting Nacle relevant Who, Where and How instead. And, to top it all off, there will be a final category of Who you think the Snarker is, in other words, when the Snarker is done in, they will be unmasked by their assailant. I hope that makes sense.
OK, so submit your entries here in the comments for Who, Where and How the chihuahuacide is committed and Who the Snarker is. Then all the entries will be tallied and it will be thrown into a SurveyMonkey survey sometime early next week. The results will be turned into a rediculously (that was for you Brian G) overblow fictional dramedy per the usual treatment things like this get here on the SnakerNacle.
And, please people, be creative in your nominations.
P.S., never fear, the SnarkerNacle will continue. The BloggerNacle Snarkette will take over the position of President and the others will remain in their positions as anonymous contributors, with Shiz and Dazz on as guest allies in dubious taste. The Snarkette will be posting as she sees fit, which, based upon prior performance, will be less often than the Snarker.
Snarker listening stations picked up this song emanating from the latest BCC Pajama Party. We're very grateful only the transcript is available, as no one is willing to admit which set of pajamas Steve Evans showed up in.
Begin Transcript: (Tune appears to resemble something from the soundtrack to the movie musical Grease)
Look at me, I'm Aaron B, bursting with philosophy!
Mainstreamers dread, yes I'm very well read!
Behold, I'm Aaron B!
Watch it! Hey don't quote GA's
Though you were brought up that way
I came across,
Sunstone and I lost,
My heart to them that day.
I don't drink (no)
Or swear (fetch!)
I've got pseudo-intellect to spare
Quit flapping your jaws
About my intellectual flaws
Would you pull that crap with Julie?
Hinckley, Benson, let me be!
Keep that counsel far from me
Don't bring me down,
Everyone cheer 'Brown!'
Hey, Bloggernacle, I'm Aaron B!
[Receiving still shot video]
Aaron Brown: Are you making fun of me, Shizzle?
Shizzle: Some people are so touchy!
His fiance she only ate lean
Now husband and wife the two of them
They lick the platter clean
Jack ate all the lean,
Joan ate all the fat.
The bone they picked it clean,
Then gave it to the cat.
Happily married,
Before friends and kin.
Weight no longer harried,
And so they packed it in.
Lawyers "in context" are held above "Mother Tereasea-esque altruists" as the ones who can more ably save the poor from their poverty and the miserable from their misery (never mind that "in context" requires first world soci-political conditions for these poor).
Yes, that explains why Lawyers Without Borders, the Lawyer's Children's Fund, Lawfam, Lawyers for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and the Lawyer's Corps are doing so much good work to lift the crushing burden of poverty in the developing world...while enriching themselves and their partners.
- Blessed are the lawyers in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven; for they shall buy it or obtain it by eminent domain.
Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted by lawyers who offer them legal redress.
Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth, because lawyers shall sue for their legally inherited portion.
Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled with legal rhetoric that doth obscure wickedness.
Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy by virtue of tortious interference with contract.
Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God, if it is their legally obtainable right to sue for such.
Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God; unless it is an act of slanderous defamation of character or prohibited by legal requirements regarding separation of church and state.
Blessed are they which prosecute for righteousness' sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven, by force of legal jurisdiction.
Sorry Mother Theresa, you had it all wrong, you should have studied law. Then maybe you could have really done some good in the world instead of wasting all that time actually feeding the hungry and comforting the sick and destitute.
Thx: Mack for PS'd MT
Permabore Kaimi's latest post is a rather lengthy attempt to snark a Tiff comment made at FMH (Comment #47).
After reading Kaimi's snarkless snark, I get the feeling he has a faint twinge of jealousy that he's never been stalked by missionaries, home teachers, or other well meaning church members. To help him with his quest, here are the Top 5 ways to acquire a Church Stalker:
5. Post an ad on the BYU Wilk bulletin board
4. On Sunday before moving out of the ward, "accidentally" drop a 12 inch Cuban cigar on the floor.
3. Invite the PEC to a keg party in your basement.
2. When people from church knock on the door, carefully open it a crack, look over shoulder nervously, and deny them entrance.
and the Number 1 Way to attract a Church Stalker: [drum roll]
Ask someone to fill in for you on Sunday because you're "meeting with the jw's" again.
Good luck with your quest, Kaimi.
Aimee, you tried, but you knew you couldn't leave us. Abandon all hope, my dear, it's much easier that way.
(singing)You know we love you, Aimee. If you would like to sign up for our 12 step program to quit blogging, we can assist. But really, you're one of the few sane ones, so we're not likely to help you escape.
Welcome to the hotel bloggernacle
Such a lovely place
Just don't forget your mace...
Livin' it up at the hotel bloggernacle
Not such a nice surprise
Where are Roo's archives?
Mirrors on Steve EM's ceiling
Ned Flanders' faith on ice
And Rosalynde said
We are all just prisoners here...
of our own predilection [a big word which means 'device'].
And in the master's chambers
They gather for the feast.
They stab dead horses with their steely knives
and I can't wait until it's ceased!
Last thing Roo remembers...
She was, running for the door.
She had to close the browser back to the other blog she ran before!
Relax said the creepy-virtual-cross-dressing-attorney-who-couldn't-stay-behind-the-scenes-any-longer-himself,
We are programmed to deceive.
You can stop blogging anytime you like,
but you can never leave!
Plenty of room at the hotel bloggernacle
Any time of year
You'll find weirdos here...
Steve couldn't do it, he just couldn't stay away. Those months in Bloggers Anonymous helped, we are certain, but he couldn't keep his hands off the smack. Kulturblog was the methodone crutch, but now he is back on the hard stuff, he is mainlining the Nacle again. Oh, the humanity, the suffering! I have to look away!
Time to stage an intervention and help out our old buddy, Steve. If this isn't a cry for help, I don't know what is.
Kage had a big old Princess Princess Party for her little girl and blogs about it, presenting the ideas as her own, being praised for being "so creative and well done!!!". But, Team SnarkerNacle has discovered Kage's inspiration. Behold, the Princess of Plagiarism.
Lager Jager over there at UM wants to make it clear that sexual immorality isn't that big a deal and Church people are all up in arms over nothing since it doesn't really hurt people. Yeah, I totally see what you mean. Abortions, abandoned babies, coerced prostitutes strung out on drugs getting beaten up or murdered by their pimps and johns, adultery and divorce because of wives cheated on and lied to by their gay cowboy husbands, STD/HIV/AIDS, childhood sexual abuse and porn, the eroticism of pre-pubescent girls, body image problems leading to anorexia and bulemia, etc.
Yup, Alma was full of it when he told Corianton that chasing after whores was bad news. And John should be sued for libel for calling Babylon a whore.
Old and busted: Pretentious Nate versus Kontentious Kurt.
New hotness: Now acting as Prime Permabore Ego Checker is DKL, providing a bright shiny new love for the Nacle to enjoy in bemusement. While there has probably been long-standing mutual disdain between the two Nacle luminaries, the more recent spat is over Nate's attempt to steal some of Dave's thunder by unsuccessfully hijacking the subject of Dave's NCT guest post (Nate even stooped to acknowledging another LDS blog besides T&S even exists by deigning to comment on DKL's guest post thread).
We here at the Nacle think this new tet-a-tet will be much more profitable for us in the long run. I mean, come on, you have a lawyer who wishes he was a philosopher and a philosopher who wishes he was a lawyer, duking it out to show the Nacle who is the smartest one around. The smuggest permabore in the Nacle verses the most reviled person on the Nacle. Both of them love rhetorical flourish, both of them love big words you have to look up in a dictionary, both of them are perfectly willing to liberally salt the conversation with insults. Pop some popcorn and watch the fun (not to mention the horrific spelling).
Nate dances like a white man, and is sick and tired of people snickering behind his back about it. So, he turns it around on them and says "Yeah, well, you...you..you all are a bunch of...of...GENTILES!!!" It was followed by a vigorous round of "Nanny nanny boo boo, you can't hurt me!" and "Stupid head!"
Naturally, Kaimi follows Nate's lead, having nothing better to post on, only he gets more vicious in his description of his accusers. They are like a pack of wolves. Yes, the way in which they travel in groups attacking the weak and sickly, stalking them, running them down until they are tired and biting the ankles of their prey until it collapses and is surrounded and dispatched and eaten. Yep, there you go, there is a good analogy. I recall one time seeing a full time missionary with a flat tire being overtaken by a group of evangelicals he was fleeing from and being eviscerated while still alive. When it was all over, there was nothing left but some styrofoam from his helmet and a greasy smear in the road.
Karen over at BCC then tried to add a dose of civility to the discourse by pointing out that being a Mormon doesn't always hurt a person. But, being the voice of moderation always results in being drowned out.
Yes, its true, some ignorant bigots hate Mormons. Wow, what a surprise. A lot of people have no idea what Mormons are really all about, and even more just simply don't care. Not even one little bit. And that is why people aren't reading and reviewing Bushman's book.
Lets take action, T&Sophiles! Here is what all of you should do to those wolves trying to take Mormonism down:
- Classify everyone who isn't a member of the LDS church, including Jews but excluding Native Americans and Polynesians, as "Gentiles" and mock them for not being able to hide their ignorance from us,
Pretend the LDS church doesn't have a long and colorful history of bad mouthing our detractors or stigmatizing certain religious/racial/political groups, and Mormons in general aren't a socially normative group with their own inherint biases and unpleasant points of bigotry,
Have DKL be a public relations front man, since he isn't wierd and will convince worldly people everyone that Mormons aren't annoying. Steve EM will assist as his companion, since he is the voice of moderation and tolerance and an effective missionary,
And, above all, do not turn the other cheek and seek to help others who are genuinely, not deliberately, ignorant gain greater understanding.
Postsecret, the #2 blog as rated by technorati, frequently has Mormon-themed postcard confessions. This week's post has one that will be a great thread topic for fMh, given their recent interest in all things prurient.
I'm confused. The T&S Blog Admins are raving about something called Akismet which is supposed to stop spam, and they say it is. But, the permabores are posting loads of it and Akismet obviously isn't stopping that. Oh, wait, maybe those are the "erroneous flags". Huh, maybe someday someone will invent something that actually blocks all of that stuff permanently. Hrrrrmmm, but then all that will make it through will be the guest blogger's posts....
The Millennial Blackhole recently had a discussion regarding spanking. Just when you thought it was safe to browse the nacle, Rebecca dropped this shocking statement:
I wanted to look at [spanking] from a slightly different point of view.Oh, no! Another FMH "naughty theme" post! Please, not again! DEFCON 2, quick!
But then she continues:
Please be respectful when talking about other’s parenting choices.Whew... false alarm! How about a nice game of chess?
BCC's J. Nelson-Seawright, speaking for the BCC Crowd, issued a 5 point "Civility Pledge". In it the BCC Crowd promises to (among other things):
...avoid jokes that hurt more than they entertain. At the same time, we will remember that our online interactions are a hobby and are therefore supposed to be fun. Therefore, we will avoid taking ourselves and our arguments so seriously that we become offended by well-intentioned humor.While I cannot speak for the Snarker Collective, I would like to offer my thanks to the BCC Crowd for leaving the art of snarking to the professionals.
We here at SN Industries LTD want you to know we are committing to the BCC Civil Disobedience Pledge wholeheartedly, where they promise to be polite, diplomatic, and refined while they find fault, criticize, and berate the Church's leaders, doctrines, traditions, history and members. Brilliant, simply brilliant.
So, in our usual spirit and practice of being genteel, elegant, graceful and sensitive, we are committing ourselves to snarking them whenever they are incapable of being civil. Both in word and in deed. Yes, just as wholeheartedly as Davis Bell and Kaimi Wenger and all the rest of the Nacle bloggers who have signed on in agreement, we pledge to be as civil as those who call us "that damned chihuahua".
In short, we pledge to be a mirror of the Bloggernacle. A funhouse mirror perhaps, but a mirror nonetheless. If you don't like what you see, well, you can always gouge your own eyes out with a burning stick.
SN: Listen up, ya'll. Snarkette, represent. Yo.
Audio: Mean base line with sampled GoGos "Our Lips are Sealed".
SN: Yo, Snarker got DKL in da haus. Vassup?
DKL: You're mean, vicious and unfunny, except when you snark me. Because it is all about me.
SN: Sorry, DKL, its not all about you, and you calling someone else mean, vicious and unfunny is da height of absurdity. Team SN grades yo bloggin, and here is vhat you get...
Snarkette: You got an "F".
SN: Yo, got Steve EM in da haus. Vassap?
Audio: Captain Kangaroo theme song and Bananas With Pajamas theme song Mashup
SN: Steve EM, down and drrrty with the comments, getting harshed by da Giblies.
Steve EM: Yeah, well, better that than a Nibley and I've been a real missionary and its not like I talk trash all day about the man from Nantucket who's...
Snarkette: Its definitely sucking.
SN: Yo, got Davis Bell in da haus. Vatsap?
Audio: REM "Its the end of the world" and Love and Rockets "Ball of Confusion" mashup
SN: Davis Bell in full effect. Fallin into da Black Hole, or grossed out by your own lack of substantive posts on the Nacle?
Davis Bell: Neither, actually. I am going to go and guest blog on JMW's sixteen small stones blog, and we'll get more hits that you. Its going to be big.
Snarkette: It looks like it could fly.
SN: Oh, Snap. Schadenfreude engineering in the haus, ya.
Keepin it real in da Naclehood, yo. PEACE!
Bloggernacle, pre-snarked by SNacle enginrrrds.
You know, it's been a slow blogging year over on T&S. Nate resurrected the dead horse otherwise known as the "BYU dress code" so it could take a few more public beatings. (Horse: "Please, not again!") Along the way, he confessed his past transgressions vis-a-vis the BYU dress code. Yes, it's so hard being forced to go to a university where your tuition is heavily subsidized by a church with a moral conscience. 
Perhaps these guys would have preferred to attend BJU. No, it's not the Scandinavian spelling of BYU. And no, it's not.. hey, get your mind out of the gutter. It's Bob Jones University. Think of it as a born again Christian version of BYU, only, with no mountains or visiting general authorities. Somehow I don't think these people are the type, if they had a mountain next to their school, to put a big "J" on it. A sample of their dress code:
(Women) Classroom/general dress consists of a dress or top and skirt; however, pants may be worn for some recreational activities. Shorts may never be worn outside the residence halls and fitness center... Denim skirts may be worn for casual dress (not to class or other professional-type events)... All dresses, skirts, pants, and shirts must be loose-fitting, having a minimum of three inches of ease at bust and hips... Hose must be worn for all professional-type activities including class, church, and recitals.The BYU of today has got nothing on these people. But, to reference another T&S/BYU dress code thread, I wonder if BJU prohibits "breast enhancing backpacks"?
We ask the young men to wear collared shirts and casual or dress pants and to have their hair trimmed neatly (off the collar and with their ears showing). Except for recreation, we ask that you not wear blue jeans.
Nate is irritated DKL, a philospher non-lawyer, is getting all kinds of attention from lawyers. So, naturally, Nate tries to steal his thunder with a little one-upsmanship. Its like a chess game of obscure words. Whoever can use more big words in borderline incomprehensible sentences wins. 
Unfortunately for DKL, he actually wanted people to be able to understand what he wrote, so Nate is way ahead on that point. Lets see if DKL can recover with a torrential maelstrom of abstruce verbosity, a veritable plethora of obnubilate utterances, a cornucopiaesque profusion of viva voce effluvia.
Whoever wins this match takes on Rosalynde.
OK, Nacle, here is the bottom of the barrel, the bitter aftertaste, the scrapple of Mormon blogging. Yes, its time for The Giblets.
We got a lot more votes in than I expected, enough for a statistically significant representative sample, although it would be pretty easy to argue the population sampled was skewed. And, just in the interest of full disclosure, the Prime Snarker did not vote, although some members of Team SnarkerNacle may have voted.
The best is there are a lot of people who apparently hate the SnarkerNacle who read the SnarkerNacle. Now, this makes pretty much no sense to the Snarker, but, hey, who said people had to make sense?
On to the results!
Wow, a lot of people are still bitter about that whole Blather of Heathens thing. Thats been over and done with for awhile, and nobody posts there anymore except spambots, but some wounds take longer to heal than others. Predictably, most SnarkerNacle readers agreed with the chihuahua and voted T&S the worst. And then FMH and SN brought up the rear. Like its not hard to guess who those 9 people are.
American Mormons display their xenophobia and cultural self-absorption with pride as they reject their neighbors to the North! Not too surprsing, but these results were probably skewed by the Olympics Canadian Medals snafu on the Moarch.
Pretty even outcome here with DKL only barely winning by a nose. We might deduce from these results that there is clearly no one single most reviled person on the Nacle, so DKL, you need to stop heralding yourself as such forthwith! I mean, come on, you only beat me and Adam by one vote, and that is hardly a decisive victory. So step off.
Wow, Steve EM crushed the competition here. No doubt about it, the man's skills at giving offense are truly exemplary and without equal.
This turned out to be more of a Current Events unpopularity category than anything else, as all of these were pretty recent. Casting our minds back, there were lots worse things going on in the Nacle than accidental RSS feeds finding their way into the Moarch page. Since the FMH sex talk thread didn't win, its safe to assume the Nacle is populated with a lot of people with prurient interest, a lot more non-Victorian, non-stuffy, and non-white bread than most people would think.
Clear breakaway winner here. The Nacle hates it when egotistical know-it-alls clash in public for the whole world to behold their transcendent brilliance. And, yet, it happens pretty much every day. Let this be a warning to you know-it-alls.
Strictly speaking, DKL shouldn't have even been nominated for this category since he is infamous, but people submit and we post. Geoff's penchant for speculation gets him some ill will, but nothing compared to the Snarker and the clear leader, the ever present, super-opinionated Julie Smith, who despite her foibles is still worshipped and respected as one of the more prolofic T&S permabores.
Yup, so there you have it. An act of catharsis, or just petty revenge driven by jealousy, anger and hatred? Only the Snarker knows!
OK, well, brief moment of seriousness here (I'll refrain for the moment from snarking him on the Missionaries=Snake Oil Salesmen cheap shot on the end of his latest post). We all love Ned and want him to be happy and find a job, and I am convinced the collective smarts and creativity of the Nacle can actually do something useful and beneficial instead of just blather pedantically in a gratuitous bout of narcissistic self-absorption.
So, here we go friends (and you Snark Haters out there too!), lets all find Ned a job. We know from his most recent post he has been sending out resumes to retail chains, so that gives us a starting point. What else can we seriously suggest for him?
How about doing medical records data entry from home? Not the highest paying around, but it could be something to hold him over until something better comes along. Ned obviously has a computer at home. How fast can you type?
Next idea. Ned lives in quaint New England, which is loaded with old stuff and things, also known as "antiques". If Ned has any experience with antiques, how about an online business through EBay? This would require some up front capital to acquire said old stuff and there would be the need to learn about what is junk and what isn't, if he doesn't already know something about it. Perhaps start out slowly learning about some obscure niche and making some savvy purchases at garage sales and around the neighborhood and slowly working your way into it. There were plenty of Shakers in and around Ned's environs, and Shaker antiques are valuable.
Another EBay idea. There are people on EBay who sell Ikea stuff that is not available through the online Ikea web page simply because they are conveniently located near an Ikea outlet. They list it at or near what Ikea charges, then when purchases come in they go and get them and make their money on the shipping and handling. One would assume they are also doing their purchasing with some sort of credit card that offers cash back or rewards. Is there anything there near Ned that is unique and hard to find that is locally produced and desirable to others elsewhere? If so, see if anyone is already selling it on EBay and if not, try it out.
OK, people, what else can we suggest to Ned? Amway=Bad, Clever idea=Good. If anyone suggests something that results in Ned getting a job, they'll get a MStP t-shirt.
Just like Sodom & Gommorrah could have be spared by a few righteous among them, T&S is being spared total snoozerdom by the few Arhipelagists among them. First GeoffJ, then JStapley, then Roasted Tomatoes, and now Rusty. The guest bloggers are steam rollering the permabores when it comes to content and comments, and it isn't hard to see why. You have Matt Evans doing a cut and paste of a historical document about his great-great-great grandfather's polygamous jail time, Nate picking at belly button lint and Adam tells us to either have more kids or convert our neighbors. Yawn...uh...wha...oh, sorry...dozed off there for a minute. Yeah, and don't forget those Sunday School lessons.
T&S is worn out and tired, their river of inspiration has dried up to a slow muddy trickle. You're going to run out of Moarch Founders to invite, so then what next? You guys need some new blood. Hmmmm, lets see, who is available...oh, hey, Dastardly Dave has been guest posting around the Nacle...and he did you guys a big favor with that LDSdelectible thing...and he was recently unbanned there...a match made in he...aven. Maybe that would get Rosalynde going too.
There is this new guy on the Moarch (he hasn't been listed on LDSdefect yet, so here is your fair warning DKL) named Rob Osborn and he is single-handedly reinterpreting LDS doctrines of salvation and insisting the LDS Church leadership get their act together and toe the line, because they have it all mixed up, unlike him who has it all sorted out. He also seems to really enjoy arguing about evolution as well. His views are off enough to prompts various Naclers to speculate he isn't a real person sporting real views, but is a farcical nome de plume ala Prudence McPrude or Aaron B. Cox. So, at this time, we would like to ask Aaron Brown and Cristian Cardall if they can provide exculpatory evidence, and if they do then the rest of the Nacle will immediately start speculating who it really is! Racers, to your marks!
Davis Bell is no longer bloggin at the Black Hole, cuz he has been sacked, take a look at the list of contributors and you will see who isn't there anymore. And we know exactly what happened too! He was kicked to the curb for badmouthing the Snarker! Thats right, our biggest fans are Geoffrey Biddulph and Tanya Spackman, and they were so angry that Davis unloaded shovels of trash at us that they sacked him! They were also upset to discover Davis' confession that he is in fact a dog too. So he got sent to the pound.
OK, OK, Davis isn't really a dog, I was lying about that. But, Davis really is gone, and its no wonder, given his recent bout of JMW-itis and completely lackluster posts. And they deleted his "contributors" entry lickety split, unlike his brother's entry, which for some strange reason is still up there even though he hasn't done a thing since November. Which begs the question? Is the Millennial Black Hole now just The Biddulph-Goble-Lindsey show, with special guest The Unrelated Spackmans? What is the Nacle definition for a "Big Blog", does five cut it? I mean, they are losing staff faster then they are adding them, won't be long until its the Clark's Mormon Metaphysics Annex, with Heaping Helpings of Lindseyesque Apologetics. Then both of them will realize they already have their own blogs and stop posting, and the Black Hole will collapse on itself.