Religion: What Difference Does It Make?

One way my religion has recently changed my life: I'm naturally very sympathetic to the need for law, justice, fairness, etc., so my natural inclination with respect to illegal immigration is to say, "Wait your turn. Don't break the law to cut in line and come here early. That isn't good for anybody."

But this scripture gives me pause: 'Wherefore, I, Lehi, prophesy according to the workings of the Spirit which is in me, that there shall none come into this land save they shall be brought by the hand of the Lord.' (2 Nephi 1:6)

And so when I see the news about the migrant train headed for the southern U.S. border right now, instead of being upset, my current inclination is to say, "I do not know what should happen. I will wait and see what happens." The Lord is able to do his own work. He doesn't need my opinion.

New position: neutral.

-Max

 --

Doubtless some of the arguments developed here will prove oversimplified, or merely false. They are certainly controversial, even among my colleagues in economic history. But far better such error than the usual dreary academic sins, which now seem to define so much writing in the humanities, of willful obfuscation and jargon-laden vacuity. As Darwin himself noted, "false views, if supported by some evidence, do little harm, for every one takes a salutary pleasure in proving their falseness: and when this is done, one path towards error is closed and the road to truth is often at the same time opened."[Darwin, 1998, 629] Thus my hope is that, even if the book is wrong in parts, it will be clearly and productively wrong, leading us toward the light. -Gregory Clark, Preface to Farewell to Alms

On /Lamb/ movie and odd friendships

I just saw (part of) a movie called Lamb and I need to vent about how mad it made me at the main character. I hesitate to call him the "protagonist" but from a literary standpoint he's at least the deuteragonist.

I was prepared to be uncomfortable going in because it's got a reputation as a "weird" movie, about a friendship between a middle-aged man and an eleven-year-old girl. What what I wasn't prepared to feel was outraged. Fear not, it's not a Lolita storyline, it's not like that, but it turns out I can get mad over much subtler things like dishonesty and selfishness.

Here's the thing: ever since I was a kid, I've always been willing to transcend both space/time and age boundaries. I *am* conscious of age barriers in dating relationships but not in other kinds of relationships. I was nice to substitute teachers in middle school because I recognized that they were in a tough situation and I kind of pitied them. I feel older than my biological parents, emotionally and spiritually and behaviorally, and have at least since the age of twelve or so. I'm perfectly willing to learn from experiences I haven't actually had yet including parenting, and you'll occasionally see me comment in Sunday School about things like what we learn from raising our kids or how it feels when your kids go astray--this may seem odd to some but to me it's just me trying to project my knowledge back in time so I can be my full self even before I become myself. I still see myself as older, in many ways, than even the physically oldest men and women in my social circle; I try to treat kids with respect the way I would have wanted to be treated at their age, because you never know how old someone really is inside; and my best friend is an eleven-year-old (who nevertheless has a lot of catching up to do before she'd be anything like a peer).

So if there is anyone who ought to be able to relate to the social discomforts of an "odd"-looking friendship, and having it anyway, it is me. I was afraid that I might see too much of myself in the movie and it would make me uncomfortable.

But what I wasn't prepared for was to see a friendship so superficially similar yet fundamentally opposite to what I believe in. If you have seen the movie you may recognize some of these elements, but here are some: David lies to Tommy (the girl) about his name. He tells her he's "Gary." He lies to other people in his life. He's having an affair with a younger woman named Linny at work, and he lies to her about his home life. His boss at work confronts him about how his affair is really causing problems for Linny's prospects of promotion, and David shows no remorse. He gestures in the direction of doing the right thing--the first time he pretends to "kidnap" Tommy but really just drops her off at her apartment, he says, "You should probably tell your mom about this," but later on he gets more and more selfish and secretive. He influences her for good in some ways--she stops dressing provocatively after that first "kidnapping" trick, and she stops wanting to smoke--but in other ways the effect of their relationship is to socially isolate her (as well as him). He gets her away from bad friends but doesn't help her make new, better ones. He maintains the outward form of equality between them, offering to take her home instantly if she decides that's what she wants, but for me the final straw and the thing that made me quit in outrage was when she says, "I think I might want to call my mom," to tell her that she's okay and not to worry... instead of instantly obliging, he asks her, "Tomorrow?" and she says yeah, and he starts asking her what she'd tell her mom, clearly wanting to change her mind. I couldn't stand to watch any more and in fact I wanted to tell him off. "That's not friendship! That's selfishness!"

I think Tommy deserves a good life and good friends, and to the extent I kept watching it is because I wanted to see her get good things, but at a certain point in the movie I felt like watching any more would make me complicit in the same kind of thing as David: putting my emotional needs before hers. So instead I'm rewriting it in my head as a half-hour-long movie, and the next thing that happens is Tommy says firmly, "No. I need to call my mom," and she gets up and does so, and then they get in a fight and she realizes what he's really like, and goes home. And then she hurts, because that's what betrayal does to us, and she gets stronger, and some day she finds better friends.

I'm really, really mad at David Lamb. Tommy's a fictional character, and so are you, Lamb, but you are breaking her heart, you selfish jerk. She deserves better. And so did your wife, I bet, and even Linny, and your boss, and everyone around you. You're nice but you aren't good.

 --

Doubtless some of the arguments developed here will prove oversimplified, or merely false. They are certainly controversial, even among my colleagues in economic history. But far better such error than the usual dreary academic sins, which now seem to define so much writing in the humanities, of willful obfuscation and jargon-laden vacuity. As Darwin himself noted, "false views, if supported by some evidence, do little harm, for every one takes a salutary pleasure in proving their falseness: and when this is done, one path towards error is closed and the road to truth is often at the same time opened."[Darwin, 1998, 629] Thus my hope is that, even if the book is wrong in parts, it will be clearly and productively wrong, leading us toward the light. -Gregory Clark, Preface to Farewell to Alms