I have no idea, actually. I wish I did.
But I do know what has changed in our culture from certain TV shows. Let's take one I love to hate, "Sex in the City." (I know, I know.) Many women love it. It speaks for them. Even some women in the Church love it. And I have to hand it to them. The show has some great writers.
But lest we miss the point of the show, let us just do a general review based upon a passive, a very passive, male observer:
Four hip women in a large northeastern American city are looking for love in all sorts of places. Not just any love, but the love of the perfect male. This male is rich, successful, "hot", grandly endowed, and absolutely emotionally unavailable for the fact he cannot settle down with one woman. Any other man who possesses anything less than all of these qualities is never, ever enough.... and this causes these women great emotional distress. Try as they might, these girls cannot under any circumstances abide even the slightest notion of compromising their proudly held Everest-like standards. This conundrum causes these poor girls to treat any male but the ultra-A like pawn-scum. In other words, these hip ultra-neo-feminists' mutual pettiness, cruelty, and self-absorption is not just tolerated, but celebrated and perpetuated. Nice.
But back to the males they either ruin or chase forever. Alas, there is one exception. There is one sort of male which draws out these girls' would-be maternal and respectable nature. And this male type that receives quarter to their harsh system of engagement is the gay male. If he his gay he is treated as one of the Three Wise Men, a Sherpa, and a shrink.
Then there was the movie. Although I was told to, I didn't see it. But lots of women did, some Mormon. And yet some of these women, Mormon and otherwise, wonder why a good man can't be found anymore in our society. Gee, I wonder.
Did they ever ask a man?
But speaking of homosexual Sherpas, and seriously speaking, I read a great book by a lesbian author not all that long ago. Her name is Norah Vincent. Her book, Self-Made Man. As preparation for the book she went
underground for 18 months disguised as a man, and went to places men go (bars, bowling alley, the office, the monastery, the strip joint, on dates with women, etc.) She found much wisdom and revelation that all of us could benefit from; such as the fact that men have it harder than women think...and so do women (but neither realize it or know what they themselves do to perpetuate it (often at the behest and whim of the media and popular culture.)) But the fact remains, that we all suffer for it. Singles stay single, marrieds become single (or gay),...that kind of thing. Great book, truly. I can't recommend it enough, nor can my friends who have read it.
So, some voices are better than others, I suppose. And these voices are not created equal; and the bad voices create issues within us that we don't even see, or often even want to see. And if we are being hurt by many of these voices, at what point would we want to know about it, and shut them down? Now? Later? Never?
Sometimes it's almost as if those old Conference talks had something to them after all. I must ask you, dear reader, with all of the voices we let in to our mind, body, and soul, are these men also included? Are they alive or dead in our consciousness? Are they fighting for some sort of quality time in our lives? Remember, matter how much worldly-wise information we receive out there in the electric jungle, if we have not given time to the prophets (scriptural and contemporary), we have not heard what we need to hear. Therefore our lives are incomplete and, to some extent, lost. After all, these men and others like them projected our day even before it arrived completely in all of its Babylonian glory.
But speaking of homosexual Sherpas, and seriously speaking, I read a great book by a lesbian author not all that long ago. Her name is Norah Vincent. Her book, Self-Made Man. As preparation for the book she went
underground for 18 months disguised as a man, and went to places men go (bars, bowling alley, the office, the monastery, the strip joint, on dates with women, etc.) She found much wisdom and revelation that all of us could benefit from; such as the fact that men have it harder than women think...and so do women (but neither realize it or know what they themselves do to perpetuate it (often at the behest and whim of the media and popular culture.)) But the fact remains, that we all suffer for it. Singles stay single, marrieds become single (or gay),...that kind of thing. Great book, truly. I can't recommend it enough, nor can my friends who have read it.
So, some voices are better than others, I suppose. And these voices are not created equal; and the bad voices create issues within us that we don't even see, or often even want to see. And if we are being hurt by many of these voices, at what point would we want to know about it, and shut them down? Now? Later? Never?
Sometimes it's almost as if those old Conference talks had something to them after all. I must ask you, dear reader, with all of the voices we let in to our mind, body, and soul, are these men also included? Are they alive or dead in our consciousness? Are they fighting for some sort of quality time in our lives? Remember, matter how much worldly-wise information we receive out there in the electric jungle, if we have not given time to the prophets (scriptural and contemporary), we have not heard what we need to hear. Therefore our lives are incomplete and, to some extent, lost. After all, these men and others like them projected our day even before it arrived completely in all of its Babylonian glory.
But here it is, right before us.
Let us not forget the wisdom of our Fathers. Let us not consider them "dead voices" just because some of them have left this world. Those other worldly voices, having run their natural course, will be dead and gone one day. Dead and gone, often in the space of a few years...only to be replaced by a newer, shinier, sexier, version of the same thing. Anything to keep our collective id tickled.
But truth and wisdom live on...even if in partial hibernation within the last moments of what we know as the Last Days. May be re-read them, savor them, and after having shut off all those other worldly voices which often provide the nutritional equivalent of Cheezewiz, walk faithfully onward.
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