A MINOR SKIRMISH IN THE CULTURE WAR
Note: It has been a while since I have had a chance to post anything. But this actual incident of my encounter with a culture war adversary in my dentist’s office a week or so ago should indicate that I reman ready to do battle for Truth and Justice (forget that American Way crap).
The woman sitting in the waiting room of my dentist’s office was probably my age. Her raiment, which I would describe as late Little House on the Prairie went well with her Sister Wives coiffure. A too large silver crucifix dangled against the almost nun-ish white blouse that wrapped her throat with Kathryn Hepburn modesty.
She was in conversation with the receptionist when I seated myself in front of the stack of Oprah magazines on the typical dentist’s table of boring crap. The sentence I came in on was “. . . and with the help of Father Bigot (not his real name) I think we are going to succeed in shutting down the Planned Parenthood in Poway (not the actual town she mentioned).”
My ideological alarms immediately started to go off, like a nuclear generation plant going into core failure, drowning out a faint voice that said “Take a breath, Dude, this ain’t the café.” But she seemed almost to be speaking to me when she added, “We are going to sop the murdering of these beautiful babies.”
“The old bitch (yes, sorry, that’s the word my primal mind summoned) is asking for it, she’s throwing down,” I thought. “F**k it, I’m in.”
“Those beautiful babies you’re talking about are actually pinhead sized groups of cells called blastocysts. They’re not even embryos. And, Planned Parenthood terminates pregnancies as about three percent of their services. The rest is birth control and women’s health care. Which is why I support them financially.”
“You are supporting murderers, and you will have to stand before God and answer for that someday.”
Now I really wanted to wring her scrawny Hepburn chicken neck. “If there was a God the first thing I want to ask him is what he thinks about the real murderers who don’t mind killing untold poor young girls you and your fellow religious fascists are going to deprive cancer screenings and other preventative care by eliminating Planned Parenthood.” The receptionist was looking nervous.
“You will have to answer to God for the dead babies,” she said firmly.
“No, God will have to answer for creating self-righteous bigots like you and your priest. You don’t even care about those babies after their born.”
She took a deep breath, no doubt summoning scriptures, psalms and other bullshit as I readied my heavier weapons to escalate this skirmish into full battle. Then the dental assistant opened the door and summoned my adversary into the chair, no doubt to do battle with the Devil’s germs that were infecting her gums.
The receptionist and I exchanged vague expressions and I decided to take as look at Oprah’s latest diet.
2 comments
Right on, Jim. Whenever I go to see my Dentist in La Mesa, i have to sit and endure the blaring TV in the waiting room turned on to Fox News. If it wasn’t for the great hygienist there, I would leave – and be quite willing to tell them why.
Bob, dentist offices are notoriously not citadels of enlightened thought. What kind of people get up in the early morning and stick their faces into the mouths of strangers? You could not pay me enough to do that.
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