Why Evangelicals scare me

These posts on various blogs have this morning made me alternately boggle, headdesk, and then weep for the future. Okay, I pointed and laughed a little in between, but still.

1. Young evangelical men explain how women wearing anything other than baggy sweats are at the root of all sin. Seriously, it's pretty clear that these guys think young women are their father's current and some husband's future property, and not much more.

Quote: "When critically examining a woman’s get-up, I consider the following: Could she get down on the floor and play with a group of toddlers without losing several articles of clothing? Could she get away from a threatening situation without spraining an ankle? Could she prepare and maintain a house and its members easily? Could she be the Proverbs 31 woman dressed like that?"

o_0 I mean seriously, WTF? Of course, as one commenter there pointed out, you can do all of those things while naked...

2. Army recruiter engages in abusive email tirade when she finds out a man she was trying to recruit is gay. Includes screencaps of the actual emails the recruiter sent, in all their badly-spelled, capslocked, ignorant glory. Oh, yes -- your tax dollars at work! :-P

3. Texas Bill would pay women $500 to carry a pregnancy to term.

Quote: "The 'Adoption Incentive Program' -- otherwise known as the Texas Baby Purchasing Act of 2007 -- would offer women $500 for forgoing abortion, giving birth and then signing away their parental rights. It does not apply to women who choose to keep their children or to women who choose adoption without first visiting an abortion provider, and it's being billed as an anti-abortion measure."

So that's what the value of bringing a life into the world is, huh? Funny, I would've thought the anti-abortion folks would price it higher than that. Nice to know that's what a woman's body and health is really worth. Oh, and if you decide to be a responsible parent and raise your child, screw you, apparently. :-P

4. Teaching girls how their cycles work is apparently a Bad Thing. Because hey, a little knowledge is dangerous in the wrong hands.

Quote: "Unsurprisingly, abstinence-only crusaders object to any efforts to actually teach girls about sexuality and their bodies, and believe it’s 'inappropriate' to tell them that there’s anything other than an empty mysterious void between their belly-button and their knees."

Stop raining now. Seriously.

It has rained here almost every day for the last three weeks, and on many of those days it didn't just sprinkle all day, but rained hard for hours on end. And bizarrely, we're still technically under drought conditions.

We live near Lake Travis, which has been really low all winter, the lowest I've seen it since moving here. Before the recent rain started, it was at 647 feet, so low that there were islands popping up all over the place. After three weeks of rain, it's now at 654 feet. That doesn't seem like very much, but then, it is a big lake. (It's full at 681 feet.)

As much as I like the lake being full and pretty, the grass green, and the wildflowers popping up everywhere, it could seriously stop raining any time now. But no -- it's predicted to continue for as long as they dare to forecast. And you know what really annoys me? By the time the rain stops, it will be 90 degrees and massively humid from here on out. Straight into summer. No spring whatsoever. :-(