Thursday, March 19, 2009

Something that really bothers me. . .

I've recently noticed a new trend amongst bloggers, journalists and the like. It's the use of the phrase "positive thoughts".

"Our positive thoughts go out to ----- during this difficult time in her life."

"Please send you positive thoughts out to ---- right now."

"I'm in a lot of pain right now, could you please send your positive thoughts/energy my way."

Riiiight. . . so it's becoming politically incorrect to ask people to pray? Pretty soon you won't be able to ask people to pray. You'll hear politicians, spokespeople and so on ask you send out 'positive thoughts' and 'positive energy' during great crises or when terrible tragedies occur.

Please excuse me for a minute. . .

AAARRRGHHH!!!!! 

Okay, I feel a bit better now. This just really makes me angry.

Look, the last time I checked, the majority of people living in Western nations are RELIGIOUS. They PRAY to GOD - or a god/gods. They PRAY, okay? They may or may not lead very disciplined, regular prayer lives, but most people do pray sometimes.

Only a small minority of people are atheists, and only a few people subscribe to New Age-y philosophies ('positive energy', anyone?), so why the heck is it becoming politically incorrect to ask people to pray? I suppose we, as a society, are catering to the minority once again. *sighs*.

Alright, that was my rant for the day. I'm not a very aggressive/angry person by nature, but sometimes little things like this can really rile me. :-(

BTW - check out this guy's Youtube channel. Thanks, Andy, for that video you posted - otherwise I wouldn't have found out about these videos!

BTW II -- Do any of you Twitter? What's it like? Do you enjoy it? Do you think it's a worthwhile online activity, or do you think it can be a time-waster?

Current Mood: Aggravated

4 comments:

Andy said...

I haven't heard much about the "positive thoughts" thing, sounds fairly new-age to me.

Hmmm... interesting issue you raise. We shouldn't expect non-Christians to ask people to pray, because if they did so, it would be against their belief... I don't mind people saying "send your positive thoughts", or whatever they might say... However, I would be angry if our Government banned the use of the word, or pushed an anti-prayer agenda through state-schools.
Australia, NZ, US... we're not what you could call "Christian countries" anymore, so we probably have to redefine our expectations from society...

Heh, Steve Crowder is pretty good.
Twitter... it's overrated. Suddenly shot into fame in the last few months I think. Everyone's crying out "look at me, I'm twittering", and I think what the heck, I don't care.

I have a twitter account, but they're pretty pointless really. Unless you desperately want people to know what you're doing all the time.

Anonymous said...

UGH. Those kind of things get on my nerves as well. It just bugs me that some people could actually think that "thinking good thoughts" or sending "positive energy" is really going to help or make a difference in someones life (other that maybe creeping them out). :-)

I guess that those people are just being consistent in their anti-God worldview (which is more that most can say... you know, the infamous athiest barrowing parts of the Christian worldview without even realizing it).

I think that it's ridiculus when I offer to pray for someone and then they get really offended. I mean really, if they don't believe that God exists, then how is my prayer going to hurt them!

~Tayler

The Editrix said...

Andy - those are pretty much my thoughts on Twitter. I honestly don't really 'get it'. Fangirls may find it interesting reading what their favourite celebrity ate for breakfast, but for 'ordinary' people like me. . . who really cares?

Andy and Taylor - you're right, people who say 'positive thoughts' rather than 'pray' may be just trying to be consistent with their own secular worldview, which is fine. But if it became genuinely politically incorrect or unacceptable for anyone - Christian or not - to mention prayer, I would be very, very annoyed. . .

Charleybrown said...
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