UPDATE 2:
SamC in comments provided this link. The Kim Davis letter, and the associated Twitter account, is definitely a fake. Apologies to everyone reading (and also to Mrs. Davis, if she ever runs across this post, which is happily unlikely) for being taken in by the fake.
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UPDATE:
I think I got taken in by a fake Twitter account. I assumed it was real mainly because many obviously Christian conservative Twitter users were following, praising and retweeting it.
However, Liz Lee writes:
But the second passage she quotes from the Bible is incorrect. In fact, it’s totally extremely BADLY incorrect. Like, it’s so incorrect that I have a hard time believing this is real. She writes:
“I ask that you read the passage from Luke 16:18 and think of me, ‘Consider it all joy, my bretheren when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance.’”
However, that’s not the right passage. This passage is from James 1:2. So what is Luke 16:18? Here it is.
“Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery, and the man who marries a divorced woman commits adultery.”
OMG? Seriously? Please let this be real. Please. It can be my birthday present and Christmas present. I’m going to assume it’s fake. Considering she’s been married four times and conceived children by husband #3 while she was still with husband #2, this is way too good to be true. So, I’m going to assume it is fake.
Original post is under the fold.
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Oh, FFS.
I need to go get reconstructive surgery and have my eye sockets broken, and then reset but larger, because only then will my eye roll be big enough.
You can read the full letter on Kim Davis’ Twitter.
As long as I’m posting about Kim Davis, I liked this post from The Unit of Caring:
The rationality principle that is relevant here is humility: keeping in mind that you might be wrong, or at least that the other people sincerely believe you are wrong, and trying to design principles that can be used in a society where everyone sincerely believes the other is wrong. “Civil disobedience shouldn’t be punished so harshly it won’t be used even when needed” is a good rule. “Always feel equal sympathy for people who believe themselves to be equally justified” is not one such rule.
And rationality likewise does not preclude settling questions.
I don’t think Kim Davis should be in jail. I think Kim Davis’s happiness is better than Kim Davis’s suffering, because happiness is better than suffering. If you think that’s not enough – if you think I have to sympathize with her, or admit that there’s something admirable about her, or return to that emotional death spiral of what-if-the-far-right-are-actually-right-and-being-gay-is-evil-and-I-should-kill-myself, then that’s not about charitableness or rationality. That’s about you not liking it when sometimes a charitable rational engagement with an argument finds that the argument is wrong and can henceforth be dismissed.
With regards to the Unit of Caring, I wouldn’t say Kim Davis should unquestionably be in jail or that she shouldn’t be, but doesn’t the argument being made by the author seem to ignore that Kim Davis has a lot of agency in this situation?
Sure, she could suffer a bit in jail, but her winding up in jail is pretty much the result of choices she herself made and the suffering she’s experiencing seem to be feeding into a martyr complex more than anything else. As evidenced by the comparisons that she’s making between herself and civil rights leaders.
I don’t particularly wish for her to suffer, but I can’t think of a reason she should be someplace else, when she ended up in the place she got because of her own choices.
(random question: are we sure this is Kim Davis’s real Twitter account? I saw someone call it into question and I couldn’t find any validating info myself.)
Harlequin, I assumed it was real mainly because so many conservative Christian folks on twitter were treating it like a real account. But she made such an ironic error in citing a bible verse that now I’m not sure it’s real or not. So thanks for pointing that out, and further updates as events warrant. :-)
Jeremy, I think Kim Davis should be in jail, because contempt of court, system of laws, etc.. Also, the fact that (if her Twitter account is genuine) she seems to be energized and thrilled by being a martyr, reduces my ability to feel sorry for her.
This is spot on. Christians have been pulling this sort of bullshit for ages. You give them a clear choice with an easy out resign/issue licences/sacrifice to Jupiter and do they take the easy option? No. They go out of their way to make life difficult for everyone. I have no sympathy. The reason they end up in the places they do is entirely down to their own choices. And then, they complain about being “persecuted”!
And I think you’re absolutely right about this weird martyrdom complex, where the hell do the get this idea that they should be willing to put themselves through punishment for such petty beliefs? It’s some sort of derangement, I don’t understand it.
Why do you think the Luke citation was an “ironic error”, error in particular? It sounds more to me like whoever faked the letter purposefully hid this “Easter egg” in plain sight, figuring that most people would mindlessly skip over the citation, but that some people (like Liz Lee) would be skeptical enough to actually check the Luke verse and get the joke. I like the letter writer’s sense of humor. Just my opinion! :)
The Twiiter account is a fake.
See
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2015/09/06/stop-taking-kimdavis917-seriously-its-a-troll-account-heres-how-we-know/
Another clincher: The passage actually quoted is from the New American Standard Version. Apostolic Christians like Kim Davis only use the King James Version.
This must be satire. If the letter is real, she comes across as almost mentally ill, or personality disordered. In that respect I do feel sorry for her.
The twitter account is a satire, beyond any question. (See SamC’s link).
Oh, well, at least it wasn’t only lefties taken in… but so much for my “if people on her side recognize it as real, then I can assume it’s real” logic.
Amp, just curious, but what did you like about the Unit of Caring article then if you didn’t agree with (what I thought) was it’s main point?
-Jeremy
Q&A With the Person Behind the Brilliant @KimDavis917 Account on Twitter – Slog – The Stranger
Jeremy:
Here the Unit of Caring quote is, again, but this time I’ve replaced one sentence (marked with italics). With that one sentence replaced, I entirely agree with the quote.
Thanks Amp, I guess our opinions aren’t that different on the matter.
FTR, I think the spoofed account was a total jerk move.
Accidentally posted a comment here meant for somewhere else! Apologies.