Soon: Chapter 13: Awards and Women
I didn’t complete Chapter 13 before the Chapters 1-13 poll, but that’s okay because Paul has no more interaction with Jae until after the conversion.
It’s time for Paul’s award, and he offers to try to get Straight a ticket to the ceremony, but Straight declines. So, Paul had two plane tickets but only one award ceremony ticket? What, did the NPO expect Jae to wait at the hotel on the most important day of her husband’s career? They must think as little of Jae as Paul does.
I kid, I kid. It is implied that the second ticket goes to Ranold, even though you would think he would get his own ticket in the first place. For someone so obsessedwith logistics, Jenkins really drops the ball on obsessing about award ceremony seating, here.
Anyway, Ranold sits next to Paul and is all proud and puffy and Paul reconcludes again that Ranold must actually be proud of him for realsies, and thus never planted the come-to-Jesus note. This makes, what, 17 conspiracy theories that Paul has been forced to relinquish as completely stupid?
Paul receives the Pergamum Medal “for valor in the face of danger.”
The Pergamum Medal.
OH COME ON, JENKINS, DOES IT NEVER CROSS YOUR MIND EVEN ONCE THAT THESE THINGS MIGHT BE A LITTLE TOO ON THE NOSE JUST A LITTLE TOO OFTEN I MEAN SERIOUSLY WTF?
Yeah, cause I am so sure the National Peace Organization of Atheistopia would name a medal for valor after the city in the Bible where Satan lives:
To the angel of the church of Pergamum write: These are the words of him who has the sharp, double-edged sword. I know where you live–where Satan has his throne. Yet you remain true to my name. You did not renounce your faith in me, even in the days of Antipas, my faithful witness, who was put to death in your city–where Satan lives.
-Revelation 2:12-13
Good grief.
So after receiving the frakkin’ Pergamum Medal (I am never going to get over that. Never.), Ranold takes Paul to the White House Rose Garden to meet Bia Balaam, the be-yotch who “masterminded” the death of The Dork Too Stupid back in the Prologue.
Oh. Wow. Balaam is also mentioned in that same section of Revelation:
Nevertheless, I have a few things against you. You have people there who hold to the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to entice the Israelites to sin by eating food sacrificed to idols and by committing sexual immorality.
-Revelation 2:14-16
Gee. Isn’t. It. Amazing. How. It. All. Ties. Together.
And I bet you all thought that just because Paul had left Jae behind in Chicago, he also left behind his hatred of all females on the planet. WELL, YOU WOULD BE WRONG!
And Bia Balaam is that most frightening of creatures: A woman with a career!!! RUUUUNNNNNN!!!!!
A large bony hand gripped his. Paul was astonished when the voice was a woman’s. Her warm breath hit him full in the face, so she had to be at least his height.
Being tall, you see, is only good if you are of the man-type.
Bia is very nice and congratulates Paul on his award and the three of them talk shop, but Paul is distracted by his complete revulsion at all things Woman:
Paul hated her voice. Am I threatened that she’s a woman? jealous that she’s working when I can’t? envious that she’s Ranold’s protege? No, it was her smug self-satisfaction that got under Paul’s skin.
Remember, only Paul is allowed to be smugly self-satisfied and still be a Hero.
I think maybe Jenkins isn’t reading the mind of his character all that well. Let me see if I can help:
Am I threatened that she’s a woman?
DEFINITELY. Threatened, terrified, disgusted. All of the above.
jealous that she’s working when I can’t?
Well, yes, but this also goes back to the Threatened By Women thing. Because I notice that although you are immensely threatened by and jealous of Bia, you do not have those feelings about Koontz.
envious that she’s Ranold’s protege?
Probably some. But that takes a backseat to your deep psychosis about women. Your father-in-law complex is the least of your worries.
And the really weird thing about this whole passage is that there is a very good reason why almost-a-Christian Paul should hate Bia: she killed The Dork! Granted, they do not say so in so many words, but Bia is clearly the brains and the brawn behind all anti-Christian activities in Washington, D.C. Of course, Paul would need his five-year-old son to help him add 2 + 2, so I guess it’s natural that this idea would sail miles over his head.
Ranold and Bia also tell him about a guy who snuck into the Asclepian Zoo after hours “on some kind of drug trip,” and was killed by a snake.
Oh. Good. God.
- Rod of Asclepius
Isn’t that clever? ISN’T IT???
Posted on May 9, 2011, in Books, Soon. Bookmark the permalink. 40 Comments.
RubyTea
Heathen Critique 
Not only is it a terribly complicated & inefficient way to send a message, but the message I would get from it isn’t “it’s unhealthy to be a Christian,” I’d get “it’s unhealthy to do lots of drugs and sneak into a zoo while tripping balls.”
Yeah, like the complicated plan to kill The Dork in a freak mysterious napalm barrel accident. I need no warning from Atheistopia to know to stay clear of napalm barrels in deserted warehouses.
Wait, you mean napalm is dangerous?!? Why didn’t anybody warn me?
And if you’re from a snake handler church, the message would be “He wasn’t a good enough Christian.” Well, at least if was a poisonous snake. I dunno about constrictors.
Jenkins really needs to take Repressive Government 101. He has no clue how to send a signal or make an example. Then again, his asshat god isn’t very good at it either.
And if you’re from a snake handler church, the message would be “He wasn’t a good enough Christian.” Well, at least if was a poisonous snake. I dunno about constrictors.
See, that was my first thought! Obvs. the dude (of course it was a dude) was tripping balls and wanted to actually handle a snake, but his faith! It wasn’t strong enough, alas.
Maybe they don’t have them outside zoos in Atheistopia. If so, that’s the first mark against the place I’ve seen.
Not only is it a terribly complicated & inefficient way to send a message…
No, this is the way a Pulp Villain sends a message.
Look at Jenkins’ villains, both here and in Left Behind. Cackling cartoon pulp villains. Not even good pulp villains but the ones you expect to find in funny costumes going up against 1960s Batman. (“ZAP! ZOWIE! POP!”) These are CHRISTIANESE Bad Guys, being written for a Christianese market under the Tyranny of the Most Easily Offended. You cannot show or tell of anything that could possibly offend any Church Lady. You cannot show real evil or villainy, not even in your Antichrist; everything must be bowdlerized and sanitized. Result: you cannot show real evil or have a real villain, and your heroes cannot show real heroism.
Instead, you get Snydely Whiplash Villainy, complete with smacking lips and cackling laughter of triumph. Anything else — like REAL evil — might offend Cathy the Christian Soccer Mom and drive her back to the Amish Bonnet Romances. Result? You get villains/antagonists on the level of those RL Beavises and Buttheads who trashed all those churches on 6/6/06 — “LOOKIT ME! I’M SO EEEEEEEVIL!!!!”
Give me a villain with style and grace,
And a little bit of fencing skill.
They used to be angular, sneering and bald,
If someone got killed even they were appalled,
They tried to marry the heroine, no thought of rape,
And they sure as hell knew how to wear a cape.
They never tortured, they never lied,
They’d honor a promise if it meant they died.
Let’s find a villain with professional pride,
Come on with me, baby, on a rocket ride.
Come on with me, baby, on a rocket ride.
Hmm… nope, Jenkins fails in making a good Golden Age villain as well. Big surprise there.
I guess he doesn’t want to make his villains at all appealing. Granted, the ‘evil is sexy’ trope is kind of done to death, but he’s probably stuck in the Satanic Panic mode, where to even hint that evil is anything remotely competent, capable, suave, well-adjusted, fun, or even attractive would be to do the devil’s work of temptation and subversion — just like Rock and Roll! And heavens knows that Jenkins doesn’t want to accidentally lure good Christian young men to the Dark Side(tm)*
*- (We Have Corsets And Cookies (And Some Of Them Have Sprinkles (Yes Both)))
Granted, the ‘evil is sexy’ trope is kind of done to death, but he’s probably stuck in the Satanic Panic mode, where to even hint that evil is anything remotely competent, capable, suave, well-adjusted, fun, or even attractive would be to do the devil’s work of temptation and subversion — just like Rock and Roll!
Rock & Roll? Not Dee & Dee? Mink, I’ve got hands-on experience with the Satanic Panic. Old School D&D and all that. When Campus Crusade tried to send “Sheep in Wolves Clothing” infiltrators against our old D&D club, we used to screen noobs by sending them past this one crazy gamer who could bluff a good Witchcraft act.
And in removing “anything remotely competent, capable, suave, well-adjusted, fun, or even attractive” from his bad guys, Jenkins undercuts them badly. And dooms everything he does to watered-down mediocrity. For you can only have great heroes when there are great villains to struggle against, and without the contrast of Evil, how can you ever present Good?
At least “My Little Pony — Friendship is Magic” has decent writing these days. And if we’re lucky, by the time the RTCs focus their Satanic Panic against Ponyville, the series will have jumped the shark.
Re D&D: True! Heavens forbid that the bad guys look like anything remotely competent antagonists. Can you imagine a Left Behind RPG written by Jenkins?
“You are before the antichrist! He is the Big Bad! He wants your soul!”
“Gasp!”
“He takes up a microphone and starts rattling off the names of the world countries!”
“Ga– wait, what?”
“He tells you he wants to hire you to be his assistant.”
“But… but I have a cowboy hat with a CROSS on it. I keep a Bible in my pocket. I use holy water for aftershave!”
“Uh…”
“Laaaaaame.”
(Regarding MLP… it’s a little scary how hard that has taken off. o_o)
Mink, that game writeup doesn’t have enough people saying “are you sure this isn’t Satanic” to sound like real RTCs playing an RPG. (Oh, man, I’ve had some good times running demonstrations… and so have they.)
(Regarding MLP… it’s a little scary how hard that has taken off. o_o)
I think it has to do with timing and Zeitgeist. Two previous examples of something that took off just as hard and unexpected:
“Old Testament” Star Trek (“Jim! Spock! Bones!”) — hit the TV screens three years after the Cuban Missile Crisis, when Everyone KNEW Nuclear War Was Inevitable and Mankind WILL Be Extinct by the Year 2000. In the middle of this pessimism, Star Trek shows us a Bright Future, where instead of blowing ourselves up we Boldly Go Where No Man Has Gone Before.
Original Star Wars, circa 1977 — hit the big screen right at the peak of Post-Vietnam ANGST ANGST ANGST. In the middle of this pessimism (“VIETNAAAAAAM!”), a rip-roaring space opera with larger-than-life heroes and villains. And more important, where the Good Guys Won.
Now, My Little Pony:Friendship Is Magic debuts in a similar age of post-Y2K pessimism, where The Future is reduced to breathing shallow to reduce your carbon footprint while watching documentaries about how The Planet Will Heal Herself Once The Cancer of Humanity Is Finally Extinguished. What heroes this culture had have been deconstructed with the Seinfeld Sneer and Ever-Ready Ironic Quip until the only RL heroes left are Paris Hilton and Charlie Sheen. We even had a President who got elected because he alone just stood there looking benevolent and intoned “HOPE! CHANGE!” Because in an age when pessimism overwhelms you, you either go crazy, kill yourself, or grasp for any Savior you can find. And six cartoon ponies find themselves being Saviors of what is good, bright, and magic.
Jenkins’ audience of RTCs have given up — “BEAM ME UP, JESUS! THERE’S NO INTELLIGENT LIFE HERE!” They’re looking for an airlift to Heaven (any day now…) with a Get-Out-Of-Hell-Free Card in the package. They’ve given up, just like our Intellectual Betters after the Cuban Missile Crisis and Vietnam, where the only thing left to do is Make The Ironic Quip as you die screaming. It’s All Over But The Screaming.
And six cartoon ponies gallop onto the scene, bringing hope in the form of their fairy-tale land.
See, if all of the conspiracies were blatantly ridiculous, and dozens of Christians died in bizarre ways every week, then this might work.
The government gets plausible deniability, while it’s clear to everyone that someone is killing Christians and not even trying that hard to cover it up.
One Christian dying a month in utterly preposterous ways only sends the message that…um…maybe that some Christians are stupid?
It’s not even a great way to do that. What you’d need to pull that off would be stuff like hiring “Christians” to build a giant cross and then have it “accidentally” fall and demolish an orphanage, or something. It has to be big and unambiguous proof that “Christians” are a danger to themselves and others. A handful (Assuming 2 is a ‘handful’) of people dying with no reference made to their beliefs isn’t going to discredit or scare anyone.
You know, I could see a society in which these extra-judicial executions of Christians occurred – this happened to blacks in the U.S. during the lynching era.
Does Jenkins ever indicate what the *official* legal penalty is for being Christian? Maybe Atheistopia has outlawed the death penalty, and Bia and Ranold and friends don’t feel the legal punishments are sufficient to terrorize the Christians.
IIRC from the whole series, there is no mention made of what the official punishment is. That’s a damned good question, too, and one that really should be answered. After all, a Bible is “contraband,” but what happens to you if you’re caught with one? Can you claim to be “studying” it, as Paul does in school? What if you’re caught praying? Do you go to jail, pay a fine, get placed on probation, what?
All in all, it’s rather like saying that murder, marijuana possession, and parking in a loading zone are all illegal. That’s true, but it doesn’t tell us nearly enough by itself…
This is completely in character for Jerry “Buck” Jenkins, Greatest Christian Author of All Time (GCAAT). Major gaps in worldbuilding, descriptions, everything that gives a sense of “You Are There”. Nothing thought through, like our GCAAT was just slamming it through the typer like a Thirties pulp writer and sending out his first draft directly into the Jesus Junk stores.
But then, this entire genre is a Christianese Consoliation Prize for RTCs who are not permitted to read Secular SF or Thrillers or Pulp.
Well, as has been revealed for the main Left Behind books, Jenkins *is* just slamming it through the typer and sending out his first draft. That’s how he writes a novel in 28 days.
That made sense during the Thirties, where speed meant volume and volume meant additional pennies-per-words and income meant survival during the Great Depression.
Nowadays? It’s not survival, it’s Celebrity Masturbation.
Yeah, cause I am so sure the National Peace Organization of Atheistopia would name a medal for valor after the city in the Bible where Satan lives:
Remember, HC, EVERYBODY IN ATHEISTOPIA UNDERSTANDS AND SPEAKS FLUENT CHRISTIANESE!
So after receiving the frakkin’ Pergamum Medal (I am never going to get over that. Never.), Ranold takes Paul to the White House Rose Garden to meet Bia Balaam, the be-yotch who “masterminded” the death of The Dork Too Stupid back in the Prologue.
“Bia Balaam”. Jerry Jenkins talent for character names strikes again. Somewhere between “Important Symbolic Name — Get It?” and “See How Clever I Am.”
Ranold and Bia also tell him about a guy who snuck into the Asclepian Zoo after hours “on some kind of drug trip,” and was killed by a snake.
Oh. Good. God.
Isn’t that clever? ISN’T IT???
Again, “See How Clever I Am?”
This guy is such a hack. No, He’s a Cartoon of a hack. He’s a Cartoon of himself.
Couldn’t we just call it the Kitten Burning Medal or something?
That is a truly weird plan. “Don’t be part of this illegal organisation, because accidents might happen to you, know what I mean? Also we’ll kick down your door and shoot you with lasers.”
rubytea, I see a pattern here – since in the RTC worldview, the punishments for disrespecting your parents and for murder are the same (burn in hell forever), perhaps that informs their thought about civil punishment too.
Yeah, but those extra-judicial executions couldn’t be mistaken for anything else. This snake thing sounds like it could be mistaken for a Darwin award candidate, creatively lethal stupidity.
The Dork Too Stupid’s death couldn’t possibly be mistaken for an accident, official story aside, but there’s nothing to indicate that it wasn’t a) a personal grudge, b) an encounter with a sociopath, or c) a case of him tripping over something somebody didn’t want him to see. “Making an Example” or “Sending a Message” kinda requires that it be obvious why the victims died. .
Since someone has to do ti, I turn to the handy anagram solver for “Bia Balaam” –
“A Baa-Lamb I” – nah…
“A Baa, Am Lib” – that’s it!
Since no one has to do it, I shall not attempt any jokes concerning “Balaam’s ass.” Do you suppose Jenkins…no, surely not, not a good RTC like him.
The Asclepian Zoo must be a snakes-only place; the zoological gardens in D.C. already have a perfectly good name. Or has Atheistopia renamed anything with “national” associations? The U.S. is still a nation, right? But then, we know atheists have no love of country, so maybe that’s supposed to be what’s implied here.
As for the Pergamum Medal, isn’t “Pergamum” the original source for the word “parchment”? So it’s only a paper medal, after all.
P.S. – I’d never heard of “Bia” as a name before, so I’ve just looked it up:
“BIA was the spirit (daimona) of force, power, might, bodily strength and compulsion. She and her sister Nike (Victory), and brothers Kratos (Strength) and Zelos (Rivalry), were the winged enforcers of Zeus who stood in attendance about his throne. ”
Explains what happened to the Dork, doesn’t it?
That Jenkins– if he’d spent half as much time on character development as on character name development…
Make that “See How Clever I Am?” character name development.
Very true. Can’t you just picture the guy, surrounded by his baby-name books and his list of Bible characters and his anagram scrambler and his “Key to All Mythologies,” flipping from book to book and site to site, in search of the PERFECT name? “Name it and claim it” in action; name it and you don’t actually have to write it.
Thinking about it, though, far better writers than Jenkins have used the Significant Name thing, to greater or lesser effect. It’s just one more technique that Jenkins uses badly.
Indeed. I have no problem with the Clever Name or the Homage to the Trope in moderation. But this is seriously getting to the point where it’s every. damn. page. Enough is enough, we get it already, how about writing a deep and realistic conversation between Hannah Palemoon and Demetrius Demeter rather than just showing, by their names, where they come from?
Very true. Can’t you just picture the guy, surrounded by his baby-name books and his list of Bible characters and his anagram scrambler and his “Key to All Mythologies,” flipping from book to book and site to site, in search of the PERFECT name?
Jerry Jenkins is a Dan Brown character?
I’m a small-press SF writer trying for his break into the big times. I have trouble coming up with the Just Right character name myself. But this…
These names would make sense in an allegory, where every name or situation is symbolic. And allegory is a legitimate genre. But these pop-allegorical names and situations are in a Near Future Persecution Dystopia “realistic” thriller.
It’s a repeat of Left Behind. Where LH&J ditched all the mythic imagery in the Book of Revelation for a “Realistic” technothriller knockoff. In the process, they got rid of Myth and Allegory and had to fill the gap with “realistic and clever (TM)” stuff. Tried to do what is effectively mythic events without any myth and fell on their face. Only reason this shit sells is because RTCs are forbidden to read the Secular Stuff for fear of contamination; it’s a Christianese Consolation Prize, and they buy and read it as a requirement of Faith.
HUG, I think you may have hit something very important here: perhaps every RTC-acceptable work of fiction must be capable of being taken as allegory, because then it’s not “mere entertainment” – it’s something you can learn from, like the parables.
…perhaps every RTC-acceptable work of fiction must be capable of being taken as allegory, because then it’s not “mere entertainment” – it’s something you can learn from, like the parables.
I’m sure we’ve had our fill of Important Messages (TM). Whether it’s LaHaye & Jenkins preaching HaveYouAcceptedJeesusChristAsYourPersonalLORDandSavior (all one word) or Captain Planet Celebrity Impersonators preaching on Global Warming Global Warming Global Warming.
“Effective Propaganda consists of Simplification and Repetiton.”
— Reichsminister Josef Goebbels
Where does Allegory stop and Cheap Propaganda begin?
When people who don’t agree with the book’s Message are unable to enjoy it because of the constant preaching… that’s propaganda.
(When people who do agree with the book’s Message are unable to etc… that’s bad propaganda.)
So Bia is Kratos’s sister? BADASS!
No wonder she could break Paul Stepola’s hand just by shaking it. Dork Too Stupid was LUCKY to get off with just a napalm barreling. He’s lucky she didn’t drop kick the flaming barrel into the Marianas Trench while she was at it, after rebounding it off of God Himself…..
I’m having entirely too much fun with that name, and I never even played God of War. =)
No wonder she could break Paul Stepola’s hand just by shaking it.
We also find bone-breaking Firm Handshakes in Left Behind. In the person of one Rayford Steele, LaHaye’s Author Self-Insert and dom to Jenkins Author Self-Insert’s sub.
This seems like the most inefficient and costly and unnecessarily-complicated plan ever to strike fear into the hearts of your enemies.
Worthy of a certain Romanian Robert Redford with a very un-Romanian Clever Name. See a pattern in the bad guys here?
A large bony hand gripped his. Paul was astonished when the voice was a woman’s. Her warm breath hit him full in the face, so she had to be at least his height.
Next up: almost-a-Christian Paul becomes completely-a-Christian Paul.
The implication here is unintentionally hilarious. “I want to exterminate the Christians! …Wait, you expect me to work with a woman? I’m becoming a Christian!”
“I want to exterminate the Christians! …Wait, you expect me to work with a woman? I’m becoming a Christian!”
I laughed out loud at this. Then I realized it’s actually true.
Well, many stories of rebellion against a despotic régime show the protagonist going along with viler and viler things until he encounters something that is so utterly horrible that he finds he’s reached his sticking-point…
You could actually write a good story about an athiest dystopia. But one of the most telling details would be how some of its most brutal enforcers were ex Megachurch kind of folks. Because you know the moment any of them sensed their creature comforts let alone their lives were on the line they’d be chucking their Bibles into the bonfires.
You could also have a nice thread where a secret Christian meets a secret member of another faith and learns a good lesson about the importance of religious freedom and tolerance and that theirs is not the only path to God. (Do they even acknowledge underground believers of other faiths in these books?)
And I think in the sweepstakes of loathsome Jenkins characters Buck still wins though Paul does give him a run for his money. And nice too, in a barfsome way in giving him a “Magic Negro” sidekick. Constantly carrying around his sax at all times too.
You could actually write a good story about an athiest dystopia. But one of the most telling details would be how some of its most brutal enforcers were ex Megachurch kind of folks. Because you know the moment any of them sensed their creature comforts let alone their lives were on the line they’d be chucking their Bibles into the bonfires.
Remember THIS Atheist Dystopia is written for a target audience OF “Megachurch kind of folks”. Megachurch kind of folks who want their itchy ears tickled with constant assurance that I Am Right And They Are Wrong.
According to monastic Thomas Merton, “The Devil’s Theology” is the theology constantly obsessed with Proving I Am Right at everybody else’s expense.
(Do they even acknowledge underground believers of other faiths in these books?)
Of course not! The Others don’t really care about their “religions”, they’re just doing it to spite us. Since it doesn’t matter which way they use, the atheists will have no trouble deconverting them.
[/fundie]
Okay, so an actual RTC probably wouldn’t use the word “deconvert”, but still.
The Others are all interchangable and identical, remember? It’s not really “conversion” or “deconversion” so much as *switching one label for another* – you only change ways of spiting RTCs despite knowing better, after all.
…now I feel kinda dirty.
Yes, the Asclepian Zoo is a zoo dedicated to snakes, located at East Capitol Street, NE and 1st Street, NE, Washington, DC 20002.
“Being tall, you see, is only good if you are of the man-type”
Now I’m just imagining Paul having a skull and crossbones incorporated into his design and everything he says is a variant of the word “Stepola.” His best friend would obviously be a Grimer.