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churchians, culture, faith, insanitybytes22, life, lunkheads, rants, red pills
I speak of course, of Michael Foster and Dominic Bnonn Tennant’s book, “It’s Good to Be a Man.”
I haven’t read it myself, but it’s all the rage among the Screwtapes and all the outrage among the chronically outraged.
I know a wee bit about the men’s rights movement and the red pills and about my decade long quest to not have rabid patriarchalists, red pills, and pick up artists infiltrate the church and begin to bend doctrine in a way that is well, clearly immoral, wrongheaded, and abusive towards women.
The left thinks that’s what the church is all about already. Those who react in this manner dance to their tune. You become the caricature they wanted in the first place. You are being played.
There’s this other guy, a rather perverse and broken man, this guy who writes about the alleged Biblical justification for beating your wife and other assorted sexual perversions and he just gets every darn interview, writes every article, gets invited to every podcast. I’ve been passed over several times in favor of his stuff and I never understood why, but I sure do now. He serves the narrative, he represents the caricature being used to dismantle the church, and to slander the right and therefore win elections.
Vote for us or this guy will be in charge, is almost enough to convince me! That guy is flippin creepy. I don’t want that, just show me what box on the ballot to check. It works, it has been a really effective game for decades, because we are prideful and arrogant and dumb, and therefore easily played.
For crying out loud, red pill stuff is so reactionary and emotional, it is almost laughable. You are not following the Lord, you are not being independent and radical, you are dancing like a trained seal to someone else’s tune.
The Bible says, “there is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death.” That is the “wise woman” of Proverbs speaking up, the one who also says, “The house of the wicked will be destroyed, but the tent of the upright will flourish.”
I’d rather that the shabby remnants of what is left of the church today, not be destroyed. But if it is going to become unrighteous, a “house of the wicked” where women have no voice, abused children have no recourse, and it’s just “good to be a man,” well then I shall cheerfully toast marshmallows and sing sea shanties while it all burns.
Needless to say, few will even listen to me, especially the chest pounders who are not sure if women should be speaking up at all. What can I say, Jeremiah was a bullfrog and good friend of mine. Jeremiah the weeping prophet, the one nobody ever listened to but God told him to speak anyway? We are brother and sister, he and I.
I happen to know that Dominic Bnonn Tennant was once excommunicated from a reformed Baptist church in a manner which I would describe as, unjust and biased, the joys of cancel culture in action? Something like that. I just mention it because not even being heard, knowing the deck is stacked and the game is rigged before you’ve even begun, is the same thing that has afflicted women within patriarchal churchian culture for centuries!
How ironic.
It’s really challenging to try to explain this truth to a group of people who spent last year doing things like, preaching about the alleged sin of empathy. Shoot, empathy is all I have to plead my case with, an appeal to some brotherly compassion, an appeal to fairness and soft hearts? What do you do when you are one who is not even supposed to speak and whose only potential weapon has already been labeled a, “besetting sin?”
That’s what I call a, stacked deck and a rigged game.
There are some things just forever etched deep into my soul. The suffering of women and children at the hands of men. I’ve just seen too much. So much injustice, so much pain and sorrow, all because of a system that just thought, it was good to be a man. That system was actually a secular one, not a churchian one. This system some are trying to embrace within the church today is a secular one, not something that is taught in the Bible. It is of the world.
I don’t wish to malign anyone or imply anything, but I do want to take note of the fact that up until 2004, Dominic Bnonn Tennant was a pretty prolific and outspoken atheist. That doesn’t mean his faith isn’t true, I am just flabbergasted that he has suddenly become an alleged expert on not just men and women, but on Christian doctrine! For goodness sakes, I’ve been married longer than this man has even been alive.
Just go ask former Seattle Mayor Ed Murray if it’s good to be a man. Go ask why the names of all the clients in the Ghislaine Maxwell trial must be sealed. It’s good to be a man. Those prison guards who falsified records when Epstein died, no charges. It’s good to be a man. Every injustice, every evil in our world right now is based on the idea that, it is good to be a man. “It is good to be man” creates a worldly hierarchal order, a power structure, one where what you do doesn’t matter, it’s all about who you are.
“There are none righteous, not one”……just flies in the face of, “it’s good to be a man.” “While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us,” just flies in the face of, “it’s good to be a man.” Shoot, even Jesus Himself says, “Why do you call me good? There are none good but God alone.”
Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Every. Single. Time.
See, there's this thing called biology... 
This is a good post except for your final statement, that absolute power corrupts absolutely. If it were true God would be absolutely corrupt and we know that isn’t true. (There are probably some atheists who would challenge that statement and say that he is absolutely corrupt.) Power does not corrupt but it gives the one who has it a chance to express the corruption that already exists. If Hitler had not become the ruler of Germany but instead had spent his life working for a company that was owned by a Jew his hatred for Jews would still have existed but he would have had to keep it hidden.
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Oh, sorry Clyde! Ha, no, God is not part of that analogy, God is holy and perfect! However, I think we could argue that God Himself limits or restrains His own power. He grants us freewill, freedom, even the ability to reject Him. So while God certainly holds absolute power, He doesn’t endorse it, He doesn’t use it, it’s not what He has designed.
But I like your point because something that really is “good” about men is restrained strength, controlled power, being capable of evil but choosing good. And by “men” of course, I mean all of us.
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Reblogged this on Talmidimblogging.
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Thank you, Vincent. Much appreciated. Have a blessed New Year. 🙂
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My pleasure 🙏🏻 Blessings for your family this year 🙏🏻 ❤
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“The suffering of women and children at the hands of men. ”
What about the suffering of men at the hands of women and children?
Sure, go ahead and laugh, but, the real reason a lot of men are going MGTOW is because we know how much men can suffer at the hands of women and children, a suffering that can be greatly avoided by not signing up for the obligations of women and children in the first place.
All women and children are commanded by God to do is to obey their fathers and husbands. Whereas, men are commanded with all deadly seriousness to love their wives, and by extension their children, the way Christ loved His Church, AND GAVE HIMSELF AND HIS LIFE FOR IT!!! There really is no symmetry here, not at all, in no way shape or form.
No matter how you slice it, that’s a pretty tall order, one which if you had the capacity to understand its implications you would see why men in this feminazi society are wary of agreeing to.
I’m not saying this for sympathy, all I’m saying is that it doesn’t help men to be more sympathetic when we are accused of being rotten when all we’ve done is weigh our options and chosen to take the path less complicated.
I believe it’s been the devil’s plan to create the present situation, where men are disincentivized and demotivated from doing our duties as men by making the price to be paid absurdly high. Men will avoid a situation where they are humiliated like the plague.
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I’m not laughing about the suffering of men at the hands of women. That’s real, too. However, one doesn’t cancel the other out. Women shouldn’t have any power because they might use it to abuse men, is just as irrational as feminism which wants men to have no power because they might use it to abuse women.
You cannot build a healthy system from wounding, from emotionalism, from being reactionary and damaged. When that happens we’re serving ourselves and our own pain, not righteousness, not justice. The #MeToo movement for example, very unlikely they would give a fair hearing to men in any circumstance.
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Men are generally loathe to complain about their suffering, or, at least we used to be. That’s what makes it funny to hear a man say “the suffering of men at the hands of women and children.”
Men are designed to suffer and sacrifice and work themselves to death for the sake of their families and communities and for the good of the human race in general, and to do it, perhaps not always with joy, but at least with a sense of humor.
Remember, I first came here to this inestimable blog to defend Dalrock, and I still defend Dalrock, in spirit if not in person.
It irks me when people complain about all the cruelty that men inflict on women and children when the simple fact of the matter is that unless the contributions of men towards women and children were not heavily weighted in the positive the human race would have gone extinct thousands of years ago. Sure, men can be mean and ornery rat bastards, but, the survival and continued existence of all of us has and will depend on the overwhelming love and devotion that men have towards women and children.
I know in my case I caused my father a lot more misery and suffering that he ever caused me, and I never even beat him with my belt.
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A good reply point, Jsolbakken. A lot goes back to the natural hunter/gatherer roles between men and women, and the nurturing-of-the-young physical properties of women…. and the enhanced physical qualities of men to provide food and security.
You said…
“Sure, men can be mean and ornery rat bastards, but, the survival and continued existence of all of us has and will depend on the overwhelming love and devotion that men have towards women and children.”
Humans exist not because of any single gender but because of both genders. Years ago Flip Wilson would reply to get laughs after being accused by his mother. wife, etc. of doing something “bad”.. “The devil made me do it.” We laugh.. but there is a spiritual truth embedded in that… or one assigned by nature through instinct. It’s not an excuse or a dodge of responsibility. In our God-given propensity to be humans reflecting a wide diversity.. there will be many who are unable to maintain a self-control of instinctive qualities. Fortunately, most can maintain some level of control.
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It’s absolutely correct that humans exist because of both genders working together. Civilization exists because of both sexes. Men (or women) who think otherwise are delusional if not incredibly prideful.
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I am pleased that we have had an opportunity to chat about some of these things and to tease things out. Of course you are free to remain loyal to Dalrock in spirit. 🙂
Men are NOT designed to, “suffer and sacrifice and work themselves to death for the sake of their families and communities.” Men are designed to give glory to God! One of those creeds of ours declares, “Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.” As you know, “in the world you will have trouble, but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.”
It is not so much feminism that has broken men but a Western ideology heavily infused with a protestant work ethic. It is not all bad, I am just saying that many men have been culturally taught that their ONLY worth and value comes from their production, their work, their sacrifice for others, almost as if it is their very identity and they are simply commodities. That is the world we live in, but that is so not what God says about men. God says you are the apple of His eye, you exist for His pleasure, to give Him glory, and to enjoy Him forever.
I couldn’t really fit it into this post, but along with having seen too much of the “suffering of women and children at the hands of men,” has also come a great deal of healing, of mercy and forgiveness. That is what our faith does, that is what we want to see more of in the world, not people trying to reinvent the wheel, not people trying to realign power structures.
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Jeremiah seemed pretty happy being a bullfrog. If someone needs power they shouldn’t have it.
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Ah, simple, succinct, to the point! You’re right, people who need power shouldn’t have it. Ironically people who actually have it, the real kind, feel no need to try to take it from anyone else. 🙂
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Quite true.
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Do not most religions have origins, if not continued to this day, of being male-centrist in nature? I have never been the least bit surprised that the celibacy priesthood of Catholicism (an all-men’s club) has led to hundreds of years of abhorrent and legally deviant sexual behavior toward the vulnerable of their own flock? How about the large percentage of protestant male (type A) Southern (and Northern) ministers with abusive behaviors inflicted on their own family members in the secrecy of their homes? In fact… we should call it what it is… ministership gives sexual power to men. Are some men religiously devoted? Of course. Nothing is 100%. But a male in the ministry does have power to assign spiritual morality through Biblical interpretation to gain sexual advantage.
Then you have the other side of the coin. My GF’s Lutheran church recently had their male pastor retire.. and was replaced by a female… and about half the congregation left the church.
It’s no wonder I’ve evolved into a spiritual skeptic.
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Good comment, Doug. All true, too.
Rather then being a “spiritual skeptic,” I am definitely a skeptic of people! Jesus came to a fallen world to save corrupted man. Learning to love one another as He loves us, is still a process. We’re called to “work out our faith with fear and trembling” or to “run our race,” because we are still being made whole, being perfected. Ha! I have never, not once seen anything that made me doubt we are in need of redemption. So I cannot be a, “spiritual skeptic.”
One problem with replacing male pastors with female ones is that you’ve just created the same power dynamic but with the genders reversed. If we’re going to consider others as more important then ourselves, then the unity of that church and the unmet needs of half that congregation that left have to matter more then someone’s desire to have a female pastor or to advance gender equality or whatever extraneous things might motivate us.
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A lot has to do with an age demographic as well. Older church members tend to prefer a more male/female church gender roles.. men pastors fill the “leadership” persona… and more liturgical traditional services. To be fair, many women “enjoy” the male/female roles as a point of personal security. It’s less about “surrendering” to a man and more about “accepting” the natural role between the genders.
To your remarks about not being a spiritual skeptic… a person needs to be who and what they want to be… and believe in whatever brings them a moral balance to live life.. and a faith to keep themselves focused on hope for the future, especially if there’s been a past of abuse. My spiritual skepticism is for me alone… not anyone else… and it most certainly does not make me any better or worse than anyone else. I tend to embrace humanity. That’s not meant to dis any part of your reply. Just presenting a personal thought comparison.
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One look at this man’s website you linked to, and I know I’m not his audience and neither is my husband. These movements tend to be passing fads for the young. Yes, I know there are old-timers who are completely invested, but they are not….I don’t know. Mentally stable? Or perhaps they are ideologues at heart. It’s just unfortunate the damage it can do in the meantime, before the average non-ideologues grow out of it. The trail of broken marriages is its own witness. For some men, the patriarchal philosophy might be helpful, though. So many young men have never received *any* encouragement in masculinity, and they desperately need that.
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I totally agree with you, Jill. I believe their concept is pretty “whacked”.. BUT… I did give it some consideration enough to try and digest where they were coming from, more it was about what drove them there. I shudder to think that some vulnerable people will actually read this stuff and take it to some personal interpretation.
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I listened to an interview with the author and it sounded good to me . I thought the gist of the book was defending men from the anti-male agenda, not glorifying the subjection or abuse of women. As the mom of five boys, I don’t want them to think being a man is a bad thing. But I also want them to be free to be fully human in whatever way God made them. If they like cats or dogs or poetry or guns , it’s all good. However, I haven’t read the book so I may have missed the real message . All in all I hate cultural movements and religion that puts people in boxes. Jesus sets us free to live for him by removing us from needing the approval or permission of the world. Religious tyrants try to limit that freedom. As for men being abused, I have a relative whose wife controlled him using anger and threats of taking the kids from him.
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I just took a quick look at their website. Like many internet-raised millennials, they seem to think they’re experts on their topic. It’s that influencer mentality . They’ve taken on quite a task . I’ll be keeping an eye on them to see what they do in the next few years.
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I think part of the issue is that I really dislike the whole influencer mentality. Also, there is a heavy tone of self righteous, arrogant, controlling, pharisitical behavior going on.
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Social media will be the death of society .
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IB your posts always bring out things in me that I have forgotten or put aside over the years. I am so glad that I let no one in a church teach me the Bible in the beginning. I have trust issues and the more I read the Bible the stronger those trust issues became, but not just for men for women too. It started with my mother and stepdad and grew from there. My mother made us go to the Salvation Army saying it would be good for us. Then years later the Captain and his wife were arrested for abusing young boys for literally decades and everyone thought they were the greatest thing since sliced bread trusting them completely.
Things only got worse for me and brick and mortar churches over the years with their man-made rules and denominations that never existed and as far as I can tell are not needed. We are supposed to be the bride of Christ not divided by a set of rules for each that are nowhere in the Bible and makes no sense.
Men and women are supposed to be partners and work together and to be sure each has their role in the relationship both answer Jesus. Yes, many make a mockery of what God said about the roles that God has assigned men as women and yes many of them have been men that have done so. Women have gone too far in the other direction thinking they do not need men for anything and that is how we get the crazies we have today in the ultra-feminist movement that have them wearing stupid pink hats and killing babies. Neither side is blameless in the killing of the church both have abused the body of Christ and His children.
I now stay as far as I can from brick and mortar churches and use my own blog to reach out to others because I have too much of a tendency to want to choke people and the older I get the stronger the urge becomes. In June I became a widow to the man I left 16 years ago because he believed women were to be ruled and kept in check. He very nearly ruined me mentally after 18 years with him. In total we were married just shy of 30 years I never saw him again after I left him except in passing when I went home for a visit and according to his son he never changed. I cannot even blame his father because he was very loving towards his wife so I blame him as it was his own twisting of scripture.
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I am so pleased that you, “let no one in a church teach me the Bible in the beginning.” Me too! I had a strong relationship with the Lord long before I had to deal with the church at large. I suggest everyone pray, talk to God, and read the Bible for themselves. Not even a really good and perfect church can do that for you. 🙂
I have lots of trust issues with women, too. Some of us have had really difficult mothers and so our eyes are opened to how nasty and dysfunctional women can be. In spite of all that, I also know many women who were completely destroyed by men perverting scripture and thinking they get to rule over others.
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I had a feeling you might be the same kind of woman. My relationship back then was not as strong as it is now, but I clung to the scripture even if I didn’t understand most of it then. I feel all Christians need to be good Bareans when listening to ;anyone preach they tested all things against scripture to see if it measured up and if it didn’t they rejected it.
I have also known women completely destroyed by men perverting scripture and all one has to do is look back through history to see it in full force. The whole picture is things on both sides is getting worse and the church is doing nothing stop halt it on either side.
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