WTF?? "Get the Egypt out of Our Lives"

[Anise]

I know, sometimes they really do. The sci-fi and fantasy genres will go all-out to give a world history and a political landscape, tend to avoid religion(Christian or not). Makes me sad because there is so much that could be done with it.

I think it's really hit or miss when it comes to using religion, particularly Christian-esque, in sci-fi. In Dune, it was used to brilliant effect though, in my opinion. Who could forget the Orange Catholic Bible?

[Glass Cowcatcher]

I think it's really hit or miss when it comes to using religion, particularly Christian-esque, in sci-fi. In Dune, it was used to brilliant effect though, in my opinion. Who could forget the Orange Catholic Bible?

Books like Dune, A Canticle for Leibowitz, and Hyperion use religion to great benefit in the story. Then there's stuff like The Mists of Avalon where it probably should have been saved for an essay.

I just think that, overall, scifi/fantasy misses out on a hell of a lot of good plots that could come from exploring real, or contrived, religious issues.

[JesusFightClub]

Sad thing is that I knew a family that did that (minus the blog). They felt that various objects in their home had demonic connections and threw them out. One son even had to throw out games that he liked (including Myst 3 if I remember correctly).

Because yes, despite not even being mentioned in the Bible, objects can be possessed by demons who have nothing better to do, and owning such objects invites evil into your home. Also, all digital copies of something are haunted by the same demons, especially if they are Harry Potter movies. :roll:

Demons must be really bored.

[gardenvarietycitizen]

That would be cool. Somehow fundies and science fiction go too well together. E.g. the episode "Our Mrs. Reynolds" from the Firefly series.

Heh. It reminds me of picking up the "Left Behind" series and being really disappointed that it was so badly written. I mean, I'm no believer in the truth of that story, but if it had a GOOD creepy horror author writing it I'd read it and enjoy it like any other horror, y'know? But alas it sucked, which is sad because the concept has a lot of potential.

[Glass Cowcatcher]

Heh. It reminds me of picking up the "Left Behind" series and being really disappointed that it was so badly written. I mean, I'm no believer in the truth of that story, but if it had a GOOD creepy horror author writing it I'd read it and enjoy it like any other horror, y'know? But alas it sucked, which is sad because the concept has a lot of potential.

Oh my God. That book pissed me off to no end (never made it past the first.) Even putting aside the Christian aspects, it was so stupid!

You have probably at least a billion people disappear, suddenly, off the face of the earth. That could have been a great story--just think of the human drama, the loss of infrastructure, the wrangling over whether this is THE rapture or not.

Do they write about any of that? No. Instead we get Kirk Cameron and his bimbo arguing about whether or not it's morally permissable to get married and bring a baby into the post-Rapture world.

[B5SnowDog]

Not to mention all of the children and fetuses disappearing along with the "worthy".

[gardenvarietycitizen]

Oh my God. That book pissed me off to no end (never made it past the first.) Even putting aside the Christian aspects, it was so stupid!

You have probably at least a billion people disappear, suddenly, off the face of the earth. That could have been a great story--just think of the human drama, the loss of infrastructure, the wrangling over whether this is THE rapture or not.

Do they write about any of that? No. Instead we get Kirk Cameron and his bimbo arguing about whether or not it's morally permissable to get married and bring a baby into the post-Rapture world.

EXACTLY. There's all KINDS of potential for creepy end of the world society disruption porn, but nooooo....

As for "baby in this doomed world" scenario, far better is the issue of the baby in "On the Beach" by Neville Shute which is probably one of the most depressing books I've ever read, but one that wallows wonderfully in the "we all know we're going to die in nine months (no spoilers there it's announced on page 5), how do we deal with being the last people on earth?" maudlin stuff.

Heck, that and some stories in 「終末ã®ãƒ•ãƒ¼ãƒ«ã€("fools at the end" a novel by 伊å‚幸太郎), a meteor will hit the earth and make the end of the world, no way to stop it, in three years (they found out 5 years previous so MOST of the riots and destruction are done for now) - and a character in one of the stories is pregnant after a long bout of infertility. That one too spends lots of time in the existential aspects of dealing with death, I suppose I like that sort of maudlin book but... point being, "Left Behind" did NOT do it for me :)

I'd actually like to read a good horror treatment of a rapture story.

[Anise]

Heh. It reminds me of picking up the "Left Behind" series and being really disappointed that it was so badly written. I mean, I'm no believer in the truth of that story, but if it had a GOOD creepy horror author writing it I'd read it and enjoy it like any other horror, y'know? But alas it sucked, which is sad because the concept has a lot of potential.

Oh, Christian sci-fi. :doh:

I read stuff like the Seven Sleepers series and the Daystar Voyages series by Gilbert Morris as a kid. It's pretty awful. The Seven Sleepers series had promise- nuclear holocaust with seven surviving kids (kind of unrealistic them being kids, mostly white, and mostly male) dealing with the mutated earth. But then, there must be a messiah figure and the story turns into fantasy with elves and witches (wtf moments abound). The Daystar Voyages- Star Trek rip-off, but with lots of genius young teens who are Christians, and the whole crew happily becomes Christian at the end and the kids match-make.

Christian sci-fi hit its peak long ago with C.S. Lewis and Charles Williams.

[pimpom]

[quote="gardenvarietycitizenEXACTLY. There's all KINDS of potential for creepy end of the world society disruption porn, but nooooo....

As for "baby in this doomed world" scenario, far better is the issue of the baby in "On the Beach" by Neville Shute which is probably one of the most depressing books I've ever read, but one that wallows wonderfully in the "we all know we're going to die in nine months (no spoilers there it's announced on page 5), how do we deal with being the last people on earth?" maudlin stuff.

Heck, that and some stories in 「終末ã®ãƒ•ãƒ¼ãƒ«ã€("fools at the end" a novel by 伊å‚幸太郎), a meteor will hit the earth and make the end of the world, no way to stop it, in three years (they found out 5 years previous so MOST of the riots and destruction are done for now) - and a character in one of the stories is pregnant after a long bout of infertility. That one too spends lots of time in the existential aspects of dealing with death, I suppose I like that sort of maudlin book but... point being, "Left Behind" did NOT do it for me :)

I'd actually like to read a good horror treatment of a rapture story.

[Anise]

Eventhough my rational mind knows/feels that humans are nothing special, and really, earth would be better off without us...

Sidetrack: That's not entirely true. Research demonstrates an interesting connection between biodiversity and cultural diversity. The earth's bio hotspots also have quite a variety of cultural groups (e.g. Yunnan). Sorry, just a random cool fact. :P

[pimpom]

Sidetrack: That's not entirely true. Research demonstrates an interesting connection between biodiversity and cultural diversity. The earth's bio hotspots also have quite a variety of cultural groups (e.g. Yunnan). Sorry, just a random cool fact. :P

I like random cool facts! Thanks, will investigate...

[fakepigtails73]

I'd have had a look through to see if there was anything good I could nick ;) .

Ditto! :whistle:

He likely has all those Cds ripped into his computer on Itunes or in his Iphone anyways.

[darkplumaged]

Did they put tape over the names of certain kitchen appliances?

Heh. The house we're buying has a Magic Chef microwave. The second I saw it, I thought of our beloved Taryn.

[Handmaiden of Dog]

Heh. It reminds me of picking up the "Left Behind" series and being really disappointed that it was so badly written.

You might try The Leftovers by Tom Perrota. It's a non-religious take on The Rapture with the people left behind (the leftovers) try to puzzle out what happened and try to go on with their lives.

[gardenvarietycitizen]

You might try The Leftovers by Tom Perrota. It's a non-religious take on The Rapture with the people left behind (the leftovers) try to puzzle out what happened and try to go on with their lives.

Oh yeah. You remind me I heard a review of that on the radio and was thinking I wanted to check it out! Now I definitely need to.

[hagia sophia]

Oh, flashback! :lol: ( I was very naughty as a fundie girl to even know who Keith Green was.)

So you wanna go back to Egypt

[rachelsmith1989]

That just reminds me of a time, when I was around 14 or 15, when my dad threw his own "Beatles 1" CD out of the window (going down the interstate to church one day) because my mom insisted that us kids not become toxified by "bad" influences, such as music from my parents' youth.

I would love to have lived when they did, their music is lightyears better than ours...

[Nothing2CHere]

Ditto! :whistle:

He likely has all those Cds ripped into his computer on Itunes or in his Iphone anyways.

I was going to say, what teen nowadays actually owns CDs? I thought those were now relics from my college days in the 90's.

[mebeforee]

There's a YA series being written right now called "Gone" in which everyone over the age of 14 suddenly vanishes, and kids start discovering weird abilities they didn't have before. I bought it because I was looking for something quick and easy to read while I'm on my breaks at work, but it's actually pretty good. Lots of deconstruction of those sort of wish-fulfillment concepts. For example, one girl is very horribly injured in a car crash when, while driving, her grandfather vanished. Another scene involves the remaining kids going through all the now-abandoned houses in town to see if they can find any resources to stock up on and discovering a number of infants and young children who died because their parents vanished, and none of the kids in town knew they were there. It's kind of a Lord of the Flies scenario, only with more supernatural elements to it. (The only drawback is that the cover of the book has teen models on it, so I am always reading it flat to the table so people won't judge me, lmao)

[Kitty]

There's a YA series being written right now called "Gone" in which everyone over the age of 14 suddenly vanishes, and kids start discovering weird abilities they didn't have before. I bought it because I was looking for something quick and easy to read while I'm on my breaks at work, but it's actually pretty good. Lots of deconstruction of those sort of wish-fulfillment concepts. For example, one girl is very horribly injured in a car crash when, while driving, her grandfather vanished. Another scene involves the remaining kids going through all the now-abandoned houses in town to see if they can find any resources to stock up on and discovering a number of infants and young children who died because their parents vanished, and none of the kids in town knew they were there. It's kind of a Lord of the Flies scenario, only with more supernatural elements to it. (The only drawback is that the cover of the book has teen models on it, so I am always reading it flat to the table so people won't judge me, lmao)

That almost sounds like Left Behind, with people disappearing suddenly, and then kids being left to fend for themselves.

Having slogged through that tripe, I'm interested in reading this. I love the idea, didn't like Left Behind's execution.

[Pudicitia]

Did anyone ever read "The Girl Who Owned A City"? Sounds similar to a lot of these - everyone over 13 dies, kids form gangs, etc.

[darareaksmey]

There's a YA series being written right now called "Gone" in which everyone over the age of 14 suddenly vanishes, and kids start discovering weird abilities they didn't have before. I bought it because I was looking for something quick and easy to read while I'm on my breaks at work, but it's actually pretty good. Lots of deconstruction of those sort of wish-fulfillment concepts. For example, one girl is very horribly injured in a car crash when, while driving, her grandfather vanished. Another scene involves the remaining kids going through all the now-abandoned houses in town to see if they can find any resources to stock up on and discovering a number of infants and young children who died because their parents vanished, and none of the kids in town knew they were there. It's kind of a Lord of the Flies scenario, only with more supernatural elements to it. (The only drawback is that the cover of the book has teen models on it, so I am always reading it flat to the table so people won't judge me, lmao)

Sounds like shameless plagiarism of the late, great USA-TV series "The 4400." I think I was the only one who watched it. All at once 440 people who had vanished at various times in the past suddenly re-appeared in Seattle, and they all had various new abilities. It was quite something.

[darareaksmey]

When I was in college, I benefited from a newly-saved roommate's desire to excise Egypt from her life. God told her to get rid of all her albums, and she gave them to me and the other roomie just before she moved out to start attending a Bible Institute. She had lots of great stuff; I probably picked up 50-60 albums from that, and I thanked God for sending that benefit my way.

[julie paradox]

Re a better author's treatment of Left Behind: commenters on the Slacktivist's blog came up with a bunch of stuff grouped under the title "Right Behind".

(which Google reveals is also the title of a published parody. I don't know whether that will be better. I'm tempted to say no-one could be worse, but I remember the high hopes I had of Bored of the Rings.)

exharpazo.blogspot.com

Because it's modelled as a blog the last contribution is at the very top of the page, but it's not hard to find the list of stories.

[JMarie]

http://www.av1611.org/crock/crockex2.html

The founder of Earth, Wind, and Fire studies Egyptology and there are Egyptian symbols on their album covers (back when there were album covers, sigh). Naturally, this makes EW&F pagan and evil, and any group that covers those evil songs become evil in the process. Same goes for any group covering the evil Rasta songs of reggae.

Fundies must be so very exhausted from picking apart every iota of non-fundy life.