Nope. Christian churches are, by definition, full of sinners. If there is a higher percentage of sinners in the American Southeast than elsewhere, then you’d expect a higher percentage of church attendees.

George Bush’s reelection, based on nothing but vague ominous comments about terrorism and 9/11. … The Republican convention in NYC. The attacks on Islamic people and mosques in much of the US (though generally not in NYC.)

Which tells you exactly nothing about the motivations, feelings and experiences of the people who are passing by.

The sale of crosses made of bits of steel recycled from the WTC site.

Pilgrims have been buying relics at religious pilgrimage sites for millenia. This could (and likely does) reflect their sorrow at the violent death of so many people and a hope for their salvation.

The query of a passerby as to where she could buy a video of the towers collapsing.

Your original comment was, “exploitors (sic) ready to take advantage of the sorrows of the locals for their own gain. … They’re ghouls looking to justify their own need to destroy by looking at the destruction that others have caused.”

How is someone who wants a video of the towers’ collapse exploiting the sorrows of the locals for their own gain? Seems to me that the vendors are doing so in such a case, but not the purchasers. And how do you know, based on that request, that they have a need to destroy?

The smiles on the ghouls’ faces as they take pictures of a place where 3000 people died and talk about how well Bush had avenged their deaths.

This last I will cede as inappropriate. At least, I think so. Even if one does think that retribution is necessary, that does not mean one should take pleasure in it. But then, how many people are you sure are doing this?

I certainly think there’s an argument to be made that religion (an affirming narrative: as nobody.really describes) appeals to people who need an affirming narrative, at which point it would probably become a recursive loop.

As to Icke’s metaphoricalism, nobody.really is correct. The claim is not that Icke isn’t a paranoid schizophrenic; the claim is that he has tapped viscerally potent imagery which, despite being the result of his own particular psychological difficulties, is also metaphorically appealing. The enslaved Africans who believed that they were going to be eaten during middle passage weren’t intentionally tapping a metaphor either, but that doesn’t make the belief any less metaphorically potent.

I did pose the question of whether we can cynically use what Icke has tapped without meaning to — well, to be more clear, James posed that question in his article (which I highly suggest you read) in regard to science fiction, and I broadened his question to ask about feminist/radical narratives.

In a similar vein, I note that 1) people in the South live amid greater social stress than the rest of the US and 2) people in the South are more likely to embrace a powerful, affirming fundamentalist Christian narrative than the rest of the US. And I speculate that the first fact may help explain the second.

I don’t mean to disparage either the South or Christianity. If anything, I find my analysis extenuating. I admit I find aspects of fundamentalist Christianity oppressive. But I feel more generous toward its proponents if I understand them not as self-congratulatory bigots, but rather as people desperate to find a world view to help them maintain self-esteem when confronted with a world full of people who seem to be enjoying better lives than they do. I suspect this dynamic drives the rise of fundamentalism everywhere.

the southeast us is also full of church leaders who willfully sin and are not held accountable for same, and considering how poisonous modern self-absorption culture is, why are you not noting the equally dangerous manifestations of it in more unchurched parts of the usa?

it is quite as silly to stealth-bash christianity because omg christians sin just like other people! as it is when people do it regarding other religions.

to be on-topic, anyone who thinks icke is being metaphoric is not all that well-acquainted with his oeuvre, frankly.

he does in fact believe real actual iguana overlords are after human women and plotting to take over the world. it’s not a bunch of disguised political speech, but his actual beliefs.

The followers of Icke that I’ve known have often been members of minority groups, lonely and confused, and experiencing types of unemployment that are connected to shifts in the global economy. Like blacks in South Africa, they witness manifestations of incredibly complex problems that are difficult to understand from their vantage point.

Consider the Southeast US: Lowest rates of education. Highest rates of job outsourcing. Lowest rates of personal incomes. Highest rates of poverty. Highest rates of violent crime. Highest rates of obesity and associated ailments. Highest rates of disability and blindness. Highest rates of sexually-transmitted disease. Highest rates of pornography consumption. Highest rates of divorce. Highest rates of bankruptcy. Highest rates of drunk driving. Highest rates of suicide. Highest rates of death.

And highest rates of church attendance.

Coincidence?

This, particularly.

I don’t remember whether James wrote about it in the Vanity Fair essay or not, but his personal anecdotes about the rage of the citizens when they realized their personal tragedies were being used in this fashion are stirring.

It was actually while we were talking about his experiences during the RNC that he opened my mind to the possibility of calling myself radical rather than reformist.

Now, there may have been a number of people who wanted to look at ground zero for reasons other than bloodlust or spectacle. (I was living in NY at the time, about fifteen miuntes away, and I can’t say the possibility of visiting ever entered my mind, but it was a pretty intense time for me for other reasons.)

But certainly, the man who got so mad that anyone would refer to them as tourists, he who was turning the people into Pilgrims — by making it a sacrament, I think he turned the real people into an Abstraction, and that Abstraction was certainly ghoulish.

George Bush’s reelection, based on nothing but vague ominous comments about terrorism and 9/11. The sale of crosses made of bits of steel recycled from the WTC site. The query of a passerby as to where she could buy a video of the towers collapsing. The Republican convention in NYC. The attacks on Islamic people and mosques in much of the US (though generally not in NYC.) The smiles on the ghouls’ faces as they take pictures of a place where 3000 people died and talk about how well Bush had avenged their deaths.

At one point, I casually refer to a group of passersby as “tourists” and the guy I’m talking to, a construction worker from New Jersey, nearly punches me in the face.

“They’re pilgrims,” he says.

Pilgrims.

Dianne said:

Pilgims my butt! They’re not pilgrims, except in the same sense as the people who came to the Americas on the Mayflower were: exploitors ready to take advantage of the sorrows of the locals for their own gain. They aren’t even tourists. They’re ghouls looking to justify their own need to destroy by looking at the destruction that others have caused.

I didn’t see anything in the Vanity Fair article that spoke to the motivations of the people being described as “tourists” or “pilgrims” (who were the passersby, not the vendors). On what basis do you have any evidence to judge the motivations, feelings, or experience of the passersby, Dianne?

Actually, this administration is headed by the least articulate President we’ve had in my lifetime (and I started with Eisenhower). I think the current President Bush is the worst at public relations that we’ve had in that time. I’d say the champions at this would be a close race between Reagan and Clinton.

My current favorite rant on this issue was ranted by a Manhattanite who’s at the workshop. She said, “The only thing this war is doing is increasing the probability that people are going to target New York City again. And all I have to say is: when I die, I am not forgiving you.”

No, it’s my fault for unclear ranting. I was ranting at the tourists and Jerseyites who see them as pilgrims, not the piece, which was clearly anti-war. So maybe I’m still a little overemotional on the subject.

I suggest you read the rest of the article; it’s not saying what you think it is.

The key passage was: “They see Commercialism on Hallowed Ground, they see the American Way in Action. Just around the corner, in the smoking ruins, some see Why We Are at War.” Which is related to Pilgrims — it’s the ways in which Americans have taken real events and abstracted them.

James goes on to compare that to the ways in which Albanians resist high-fallutin’ political abstraction: “I keep trying to find the kind of information that I found in America. Right and Wrong. Heroes and Ghouls. Courage and Cowardice. But the most excited I see anyone get is when a bunch of older men in a neighborhood café start arguing about World War II. People tend to assume all politicians are corrupt, but their anger about it is subdued. They don’t see symbolic violations of an idealized homeland; they just see the facts of life, to be maneuvered around through connections, common sense, and perhaps emigration.”

He suggests that the American penchant for making tourists into Pilgrims is part of what allows us to be so unrealistic and cavalier about our destructive role in the world. It’s an anti-war piece; I’m surprised it can be read as anything else. I’m sure the fault is in my excerpting.

I don’t know anyone who died in the WTC, though I know half a dozen people who only weren’t there by dumb luck (delayed subway, changed meeting, etc.) Maybe if I did I’d be ready to turn Afghanistan into glowing glass. I don’t know. But as it stands, my reaction to the WTC attacks was, “That was bad. Very bad. It should never happen again anywhere to anyone.” I still believe that, as do many New Yorkers. And I don’t care for people using this tragedy as an excuse for perpetrating similar tragedies on other people.