Thursday, May 15, 2008

Too Much Fun in the Land of Cotton

I am having too much fun here; there really should be a law against this.

Again, thumbing through the archives looking for this and that, I came across this hilarious email exchange between a member of the Kult and Rosemary Huskey, who is one of the brightest lights on the Palouse — as a Christian and an academic.

This particular chat took place on Vision 20/20 during Wilson’s little slavery scandal of 2003–2004; it speaks for itself:

From: “Jackie Woolf”
To: “Vision2020”
Sent: Wednesday, November 19, 2003 10:51 AM
Subject: [Vision2020] Slaves vs non-slave ownership

Seems to me, you all are making Pastor Wilson’s argument (which he has stated and re-stated many a time.)

To own a slave is not what he recommends or supports; however IF a slave is owned then treat him/her correctly and in a Godly manner. What on earth is so difficult for anyone to understand?

I just don’t get it.

There are plenty of issues that Jesus never specifically spoke about, but his general admonition still covers it all: The Golden Rules need to be remembered and followed.

Thank you.

Jackie Woolf


From: “DonaldH675”
To: “Vision2020”
Sent: Wednesday, November 19, 2003 12:02 PM
Subject: [Vision2020] Slaves vs non-slave ownership

Jackie,

Is that the rule that says “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”? If so, I would be glad to have Doug Wilson come clean my house, tend my grandchildren, weed my flower garden, work in my fields, sleep in my unheated shop on some filthy blankets, and cook my dinner (since I would be at church) all for free and all forever. I believe I’d change his name to Toby. He’d have lots of free time because it would be illegal on my little farm for him to read or write. If he tried to get away I probably wouldn’t even whip or brand him, but I would surely chastise him for not appreciating the situation that God had placed him in. Now that I think of it, I could also use the help of his wife and children and grandchildren (although I would probably sell off his elderly non-productive parents). I would be following the “Christian” slave-holding procedures that Doug Wilson defends as biblically based while providing him the opportunity to live out the Golden Rule. Please note: my slave holding would not be racially motivated, because I am not a racist.

I’m glad I’m not in the land of cotton, but I do agree that for most well-informed folks, the old times there are not forgotten.

Rose Huskey

The next time you have free time to scan a blog, grab yourself a cup of java and read any of these threads from Cleaning House:
Every post is as good as the one above.

“Now, Toby, fetch me my slippers, boy, and ya’ll be quiet or I’ll whip ya.”


Thank you.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Like the prodigal son I return, this time an older and wiser graduate of the University of Idaho.

When we last wrote, you asked me to first explain my claim that you simply dodged the instances when I pointed out how you contradicted yourself or sidestepped what I was saying. Looking back over your last reply to me, I don't know what the best place to begin is. A number of times you said that I was twisting your words (i.e. "You appear content to be a cunning little manipulator who doesn’t care if he must lie and deceive to get his way"), but you didn't explain this well. Despite going over my comments point by point, your continual claim was "You are twisting my words." When I pointed out that your friends said you may be in sin for your use of name-calling, and your reply that it was "deserved" regardless, you wrote: "I granted that it may be sinful because I have had about three (perhaps two) friendly criticisms from those who thought “monkey boy” out of line. Personally, my conscience does not bother me. As I told monkey boy Sean Mahaffey, I would think that you affirm the importance of demeaning others because it plays such a pivotal role in the Fearless Leader’s theology. Someone disagrees with you — ridicule them." I wonder how this reply answers my question/criticism? Some friends said your name-calling might be out of line, you agreed it might be sin, but that it was deserved anyway. I went back over the context and fail to see how I took your words away from their meaning. I saw this time and again in our interaction. Let's cut this down to a more simple question: If it is sinful to call Christ Church defenders names, is that sin against them deserved? I thought you were saying it was ("Deserved? Absolutely.") I'm willing to concede that I'm an idiot and that I misread you, but your response, which I reprinted above, didn't really make a misreading clear. Such was the case with most of your
responses. You began with, "I have shown that you..." when you hadn't. I'm a state champion mock trial lawyer. I know how people talk when they've been shown up. Remember when I was like, "I'm sorry about the Anna-Nicole Smith thing" and you were like, "That's so typical Christ Church. Apologize and move on without really being sorry." You were entirely right. That's what I was trying to do and it was wrong and cowardly. You've tried to pull that same quick-move on garbage a number of time, although instead of apologizing you say, "You were twisting my words." Dude, on a number of points, we're both full of crap. We've both put our egos on the line, although I've attached my name to my ego, and we don't want to back down.

Let me make this point clear: I don't think you should stop blogging. I am not asking you to stop. I think this blog stands to do a lot of good. If I could, let me try to back up those statements. Let me tip my hand for you to see. When we last exchanged comments, you wrote at one point, on the topic of Jim Wilson, "Jim Wilson is the problem, but I’m saving that one for my history of the CREC. The first installment shall be titled “The Sins of the Father.” Where was Jim when A Christ Church Wife posted her email? Where was Jim during the slavery scandal? Where was Jim when his son threatened the Latah County Commissioners? Where was Jim when his son . . . well, I don’t have enough patience to outline each crime and each scandal, so please do yourself a favor and remove Eli from the picture because in case you hadn’t noticed, he made an obvious effort to remove himself from the picture each time his son stuck his flesh hook in the Lord’s offering." I am not sure who you believe your audience is, but I would bet you green money (or Morton Street casino chips, your choice) that every Christ Church member who read that comment of yours immediately said, "Oh, please let this guy launch into a long invective against Jim Wilson." I say I don't know who you think your audience is, because if you hope to persuade Christians on the Palouse of your points against Doug, one of the absolute worst things you can do is start up against Jim Wilson. Going against Jim Wilson makes you look like a mean-spirited crank, because Jim Wilson is the nicest, kindest, holiest man that pretty much every Christian on the Palouse has ever met. If you had Believers who were on the line about whether to fully believe what you're saying, arguments against Jim Wilson would blow any credibility you had out of the water.

I don't think you should stop blogging, and my whole goal in commenting here has merely been to get you to scale back your town and stop being so harsh. I would submit to you that many of your readers (belittled Christ Church members, the downtrodden Kirkers, women like A Christ Church Wife) are slow to buy into your arguments because they are afraid of turning out like you. Why should people not wonder, "If I believe what Mark T says, will I become like him?" After all, believing what Doug believes makes you like Doug, right? Who wants to be like you? Who wants to spend hours and hours and hours every week to writing anonymous rants and long, long court-case style "documents" about Doug Wilson? If you made your position seem more reasonable, less poisonous, less preoccupied, you would get more people on your side, and, on top of that, people willing to give their names and make waves.

Mark T. said...

Mr. Gibbs, congratulations on your graduation and thank you for returning.

Here’s the deal: I welcome your engagement under one condition — we must address one point at a time. Moreover, I do not intend to respond to any of your so-called concerns because you have already admitted that you use the Christian faith to manipulate others, which is another way of saying that I must believe that you feign all of your concerns. In other words, you have confirmed that I have no reason to accord you any credibility. So please understand that whenever I read anything you write, it goes in one eye and out the other. I understand that I am reading the words a cunning manipulator who is so blind to his own sin that he casually admits it, regardless of its magnitude, presumably to score a rhetorical point and then move on. “Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?”

The pattern is always the same with anyone in the Kult or the CREC. They insist on the right to sin with impunity while they hold others to the most excruciatingly high standard conceivable. Additionally, they invariably assert falsehoods as though they are established facts in longwinded diatribes that require honest persons untold hours and patience to unravel. You have done this with me several times. This is why, right or wrong, I have concluded that anyone connected to Wilson — whether through the Kult, Trinity, or the CREC — is a liar just as he is a liar. It’s clear that he instills deception in his disciples, and it’s equally clear that they love to have it so. This has been my experience and I cite my exchange with you as more evidence of this sad fact.

In fact, let me be honest. You have given no evidence that you are a Christian (I don’t care if you’re baptized), and your words and deeds have demonstrated that people should treat you as an unbeliever. Your membership in the Kult is further evidence of no regeneration. If your elders read your admission that you use the Christian faith to manipulate others, they should have placed you under discipline immediately. But they did not. And the incredible absence of discipline in light of your admission is more evidence that you are a member of a non-Christian cult. Can anything good come out of Christ Church? No, none at all.

Let me tell you a story; every word of it is true. Douglas Wilson publicly executed a Christian family after he suspected them of disloyalty (it doesn’t take much). The family made a lateral move to Trinity for about a week and counseled with Leithart, who made clear to husband and wife that the wife was the problem, whatever that meant. Of course, if the Kult thinks her a problem then you can bet the family savings that she was a God-fearing Christian. In fact, she is one of the dearest Christians I have ever met. Wise too. She was wise because she asked Dr. Leithart, “If I am such a bad person, how come neither you nor any of the other pastors is trying to help me?”

Get ready, Mr. Gibbs, because here comes the punch line.

Peter Leithart looked at her and said, “That’s a good question; I never thought of that.” And then he began weeping.

But don’t grab a Kleenex just yet because tears endure for a moment and the beatings will ensue. That should have been a life-changing moment for the brilliant doctor of Cambridge, but if the fool can’t dunk it in water then he has no solutions and so he resumed his posture of antagonism toward the family to make clear to them that they were not welcome in Kult number one or Kult number two (Trinity). (Can you imagine the scars he left on that family? What a pig.)

The point, however, is that no good comes out of the Kult — they expel goodness from their presence because their deeds are evil. Your pastors are wolves. They encourage you to use the Christian faith to manipulate others — especially enemies of the Kult, such as me. They teach you to do evil, and you have learned well. And the moral of the story is that you must bring forth fruits worthy of repentance. You must be born again.

Finally, three things regarding Jim Wilson:

1. I don’t care what anyone in the Kult thinks, including you. This blog is not for them and it’s not for anyone in Moscow.

2. I have obtained permission from several men in the community (some out of state now) who once served with Jim on CCM’s board. To a man they have the same testimony — Jim Wilson is a flaming hypocrite who does not practice what he preaches. Like his son, he articulates incredibly high biblical standards, and like his son the Bible means nothing to him when he wants to achieve his self-willed goals. Every one of these men resigned from CCM and their stories are all the same. They went to Jim to show him his double standard, and he dismissed them with a wave of the hand. They walked away gob smacked at his cold-hearted hypocrisy.

3. Your strong reliance on Jim Wilson and his opinion is evidence of the problem. Jim cultivates disciples of Jim — not disciples of Christ. In this respect he taught his son well. But the point is that Jim Wilson taught his disciples to esteem his opinion and he did not teach them to love the Scriptures or the Son of God. Hence, they quote him faster than they quote the Lord Jesus and they revere him more than the Lord Jesus. When you become a Christian, you will learn to say, “To the law, to the testimony; if they speak not according to this word it is because there is no light in them.” Until then, Jim Wilson will be your light.

So get this straight. I don’t care about Jim Wilson; he’s as morally bankrupt as his son.

Now, to the point of you and I exchanging comments: Here’s where we left it last time and here is where I intend to resume:

“I look forward to more exchanges, but when you come back I would like you to start with the first point where you claimed, ‘I followed your alleged rebuttals and could not make sense of how I had twisted anything.’”

This means that you have to re-read the last four comment exchanges between us (maybe more) because the pattern of deceit that you established is isolating a few of my words out of context to put a meaning on them that the broader context does not allow. You do this to create handles on me to manipulate me. You did this so many times that I began quoting your comments in entirety before I answered you so that (1) you could not accuse me of misrepresenting you, and (2) to show you what honest dialogue resembles.

I have been extremely patient with you; now you must demonstrate similar patience. Parents don’t have to teach their children how to lie; it’s inherent. Conversely, if you want to learn honesty, you must work at it. You must answer me with the same diligence that I answered you. It’s not enough to deny something after I positively demonstrated its existence, by comparing what I wrote in context with your representation of what I wrote out of context. And we shall move one point at a time. This means that if you quote me, you cannot quote three words and then say “Aha! I got you.” You must take the whole pericope, which should preclude you from twisting my words and force you to make another argument. Ultimately, my goal is to force you to communicate honestly.

Those are the terms, Mr. Gibbs: I look forward to working with you. Here’s the link to our last exchange.

Sean Gerety said...

"When I pointed out that your friends said you may be in sin for your use of name-calling"

Is it "may be in sin" or is it "in sin"? Which is it? If Mark is in sin, then I would like to see some demonstration.

Name calling, per se, is not sinful, frankly when done correctly, say, in identifying false teachers and assorted antichrists, especially those within the visible church (that would of course exclude the CREC), then it is a positive virtue.

Of course, it's not enough just to call someone a name, one has to support this conclusion with substantive arguments. While I'm not in a position to confirm many of Mark's arguments, it seems to me he has done the required work and in spades.

In any case, aside from insinuating Mark's sin, I haven't seen you, despite your many words, substantiate your charge yet. Instead you hedge behind words like "may."

Mark T. said...

Hi Sean,

You put your finger on one more example of Mr. Gibbs trying to create handles on me by taking my words out of context. I appreciate your comment but just wanted to note the particular dynamic at work here. He and I had an extended exchange about a month ago; he’s come back for more and you caught it in the middle of the exchange.

Anonymous said...

Hi Mark. Actually, I caught the first round and, at least for a moment, thought that perhaps Joshua had something valid to offer than just smoke.

Mark T. said...

Yes, they trained him well.

But to point: you have to admit that Rosemary Huskey’s post is hilarious. I think I’ll change his name to Toby!

Unknown said...

Maybe Joshua has been eatin' those slippy eggs again. Those slippy eggs do funny things to your brains. Look what it did to Nate.

Mark T. said...

Good one.

And what was his point about “needle exchange” if it wasn’t to give her the creeps?

Unknown said...

Everything associated with the CREC gives me the creeps. Maybe slippy eggs is a euphemism for heroin.

I must say, I've never run across a group of people so arrogant in their speech, prideful in the conduct of the lives, and so flippant with the lives of others. One could almost see these people underneath the cross crying "give me a sign." I've seen these people almost destroy a church. Fortunatly the congregation stood up to them and gave them the boot before any damage could be done. Mind you the elders had nothing to do with it.

Mark T. said...

I’m happy the elders gave them the boot and I hope it went deep enough to leave an impression.

I agree wholeheartedly with your line, “I must say, I’ve never run across a group of people so arrogant in their speech, prideful in the conduct of the lives, and so flippant with the lives of others.” And I’m especially thankful for that last observation — “so flippant with the lives of others” because that’s where the menace that these men represent finally shows its ugly face. Vance Havner had a great line about “playing marbles with diamonds” — that’s Wilson and his clones in the CREC, they’re playing marbles with diamonds.