Symbolic Forest

Given that today, in the news, there’s rather a lot about the slowly-growing and now likely forthcoming schism in the Anglican church, I thought I’d ask the average churchgoer in the street about it. Well, the average churchgoer who is also my mother, at any rate. She’s a fairly average “active” Anglican, though. She’s white, lower-middle-class, female, edging towards elderly, lives in a commuter village, and goes to church every week. She’s a Sunday School teacher, has organised the parish’s Christian Aid collections, sings in an ecumenical Christian parish singing group,^* and generally is far more active and puts more effort into religion than most churchgoers, never mind the huge percentage of Anglicans who tick the relevant box on the census but never cross the threshold of a church for anything other than weddings and funerals.

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Keyword noise: Anglicanism, Christianity, church, conservatism, gay rights, homophobia, parish church, Peter Akinola, religion, Rowan Williams, schism, The Mother.

Apparently, it turns out that tea is much more healthy if you drink it without milk. The news isn’t going to help me, though, because I will never ever drink the stuff without milk in. I’ve tried it. It makes me ill. Without milk in, without fail, it brings up my stomach. So the news that it’s healthy raises a bitter laugh.

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Keyword noise: black tea, Christianity, homophobia, religion, sickness, tea, vomit.

Political campaigner Julie Bindel has been writing in The Guardian again, this time about changing lesbian stereotypes on the telly. Ostensibly her line is: lesbians on the telly now might be shown as happy, sex-loving people, but that’s still a stereotype. Her main concern, though, seems to be: there aren’t enough people like her, or her friends, on the screen:

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Keyword noise: activism, bias, designer lesbian, feminism, Finn Mackay, gay, homophobia, Julie Bindel, lesbian, stereotyping, television.

Being a normal, well-adjusted, modern person, I sometimes forget how bigoted and backwards other people tend to be around here.

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Keyword noise: bigotry, colleagues, homophobia, management, stupidity, Scunthorpe.

Heard on the radio this morning: a member of the Lords claiming that gay marriage Civil Partnerships are a bad thing because they’re unpatriotic.^* This country was built, apparently, on the values of two parents, their children, and the sacrament of marriage.^**

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Keyword noise: Civil Partnership, conservatism, divorce, family, gay marriage, genealogy, history, homophobia, nuclear family, social conservatism.