Many Rants
May. 4th, 2004 10:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bodldopsGotta few things I need to fret and growl about, so ignore me if you think I might be objectionable.
I just finished watching the latest PBS episode of "Secrets of the Dead". I highly recommend everyone watch that. It focuses on the Bridge Over the River Kwai (I just mis-spelled that, didn't I?), and the POWs and Asian slave labor that lived and died building it and its fellows.
Dear God, how can anyone, never mind a whole country of anyones, be so cruel? The pictures... the men were literally just skin and bone. Horrific is just too nice a term. They were beaten, starved, forced to work long grueling hours in the tropical sun, left to die of horrible diseases without any sort of medical aid... And this was only sixty years ago. My grandpas both fought in the Pacific theater. My blood runs cold when I think that they could have been there if they had been just a bit less lucky.
If anyone who was there and had to endure that hell is reading this (a highly unlikely scenerio, I know), THANK YOU. If there is ever anything I can do in return, name it, and I'll do it.
The worst part (maybe not the worst, but...) is that the Japanese soldiers who carried out this torture were never tried for war crimes. Instant forgiveness. Now I'm all for forgiving the past and moving on, but... these men deserved justice. There's a difference between forgiving and forgetting. Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it, remember? One of the "Engineers" who ran one of the POW camps actually had the nerve to say that "[Building the bridge] was a horrible experience" for him as well. He claimed that the reason over 1200 of the 1600 men he marched to his little camp died was because the rice (the sole means of nutrition) the POWs were given to eat "disagreed with them". How about didn't even begin to meet their nutritional needs, that he was bloody starving them to death, that no man can withstand those conditions without dying...
Go. Watch. Remember.
*shudder* What a horrible world that was. Still is. Where's a plucky hobbit and gang of true-hearted friends when you need them?
I got a letter from an old friend of mine the other day. I knew her when we were both in 4H. We were both homeschooled, and got along famously. I wanted to be a vet, she wanted to be a pediatritian/surgeon. I'd take care of her pets and she'd take care of my kids, and life would be grand. We haven't talked much since she moved to South Carolina and started going to a Christian college there. I went to UCD, got my BS in Animal Science, applied and got turned down for vet school (trying again this year), and am halfway through a Vet Tech degree. I just got a notification in the mail that my friend, my bright, ambitious friend, is graduating this June. With a BS in Family and Consumer Science.
Disturbed yet? You should be. Here, let me quote them in their own words:
Family and Consumer Sciences is the practical application of art and science in the home. It offers a wide variety of courses and career options. In this major you will study foods and nutrition; clothing construction, selection and textiles; housing, home furnishings and interior design; child care and development; and personal, consumer, and home management. You will receive a broad base of FCS knowledge and an option to specialize in one specific area within FCS. Along with your academic specialization, you will receive well-rounded Biblical instruction in the home and family. You will be well equipped for many career opportunities, including the all-important roles of wife and mother. (emphasis mine)
Has anyone else seen "Mona Lisa Smile"? I thought those schools were a thing of the past, stifling finishing schools that pretended to be colleges. Now, I know that being a wife and mother is a very important job, but... *has no words*
I know I should write to my friend and congratulate her for graduating. I know she's also engaged to one of her fellow students, and will be married soon. How ironic. And look, now she's perfectly qualified for the job. *drips sarcasm*
It just makes me so angry. How can anyone take Christianity seriously when they are doing that to the women they promise to teach? I came out of college confident of my abilities to go head-to-head with anyone, male or female, with the belife that if I tried hard enough, I could get my point across. I know that I am a bright, intelligent woman who does not need to be defined by who she marries or how much money her husband brings in. My friend... I hope she'll be okay. Ye small gods...
There are days when I want to seperate myself from the entirety of formal Christian religion. This is one of them.
I am so sorry, my friend. God protect you and aid you, because your college did neither.
*feels the urge to seriously whale on something*
*wanders off to poke her new story muses into some kind of order*
I just finished watching the latest PBS episode of "Secrets of the Dead". I highly recommend everyone watch that. It focuses on the Bridge Over the River Kwai (I just mis-spelled that, didn't I?), and the POWs and Asian slave labor that lived and died building it and its fellows.
Dear God, how can anyone, never mind a whole country of anyones, be so cruel? The pictures... the men were literally just skin and bone. Horrific is just too nice a term. They were beaten, starved, forced to work long grueling hours in the tropical sun, left to die of horrible diseases without any sort of medical aid... And this was only sixty years ago. My grandpas both fought in the Pacific theater. My blood runs cold when I think that they could have been there if they had been just a bit less lucky.
If anyone who was there and had to endure that hell is reading this (a highly unlikely scenerio, I know), THANK YOU. If there is ever anything I can do in return, name it, and I'll do it.
The worst part (maybe not the worst, but...) is that the Japanese soldiers who carried out this torture were never tried for war crimes. Instant forgiveness. Now I'm all for forgiving the past and moving on, but... these men deserved justice. There's a difference between forgiving and forgetting. Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it, remember? One of the "Engineers" who ran one of the POW camps actually had the nerve to say that "[Building the bridge] was a horrible experience" for him as well. He claimed that the reason over 1200 of the 1600 men he marched to his little camp died was because the rice (the sole means of nutrition) the POWs were given to eat "disagreed with them". How about didn't even begin to meet their nutritional needs, that he was bloody starving them to death, that no man can withstand those conditions without dying...
Go. Watch. Remember.
*shudder* What a horrible world that was. Still is. Where's a plucky hobbit and gang of true-hearted friends when you need them?
I got a letter from an old friend of mine the other day. I knew her when we were both in 4H. We were both homeschooled, and got along famously. I wanted to be a vet, she wanted to be a pediatritian/surgeon. I'd take care of her pets and she'd take care of my kids, and life would be grand. We haven't talked much since she moved to South Carolina and started going to a Christian college there. I went to UCD, got my BS in Animal Science, applied and got turned down for vet school (trying again this year), and am halfway through a Vet Tech degree. I just got a notification in the mail that my friend, my bright, ambitious friend, is graduating this June. With a BS in Family and Consumer Science.
Disturbed yet? You should be. Here, let me quote them in their own words:
Family and Consumer Sciences is the practical application of art and science in the home. It offers a wide variety of courses and career options. In this major you will study foods and nutrition; clothing construction, selection and textiles; housing, home furnishings and interior design; child care and development; and personal, consumer, and home management. You will receive a broad base of FCS knowledge and an option to specialize in one specific area within FCS. Along with your academic specialization, you will receive well-rounded Biblical instruction in the home and family. You will be well equipped for many career opportunities, including the all-important roles of wife and mother. (emphasis mine)
Has anyone else seen "Mona Lisa Smile"? I thought those schools were a thing of the past, stifling finishing schools that pretended to be colleges. Now, I know that being a wife and mother is a very important job, but... *has no words*
I know I should write to my friend and congratulate her for graduating. I know she's also engaged to one of her fellow students, and will be married soon. How ironic. And look, now she's perfectly qualified for the job. *drips sarcasm*
It just makes me so angry. How can anyone take Christianity seriously when they are doing that to the women they promise to teach? I came out of college confident of my abilities to go head-to-head with anyone, male or female, with the belife that if I tried hard enough, I could get my point across. I know that I am a bright, intelligent woman who does not need to be defined by who she marries or how much money her husband brings in. My friend... I hope she'll be okay. Ye small gods...
There are days when I want to seperate myself from the entirety of formal Christian religion. This is one of them.
I am so sorry, my friend. God protect you and aid you, because your college did neither.
*feels the urge to seriously whale on something*
*wanders off to poke her new story muses into some kind of order*
