Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

The republican caucus is covering themselves with something, and it’s not glory.

“Everybody’s entitled to be an idiot.”

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

They are lying in pursuit of an agenda.

if you can’t see it, then you are useless in the fight to stop it.

Let’s show the world that autocracy can be defeated.

Please don’t feed the bears.

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

There is no right way to do the wrong thing.

At some point, the ability to learn is a factor of character, not IQ.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

It’s pointless to bring up problems that can only be solved with a time machine.

The party of Reagan has become the party of Putin.

The jury literally has a bell they can ring to force Trump to show up on command. Greatest thing ever!

We know you aren’t a Democrat but since you seem confused let me help you.

The Supreme Court is corrupt. Democrats must win in November and force court reform.

They think we are photo bombing their nice little lives.

Let the trolls come, and then ignore them. that’s the worst thing you can do to a troll.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

Impressively dumb. Congratulations.

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

This must be what justice looks like, not vengeful, just peaceful exuberance.

You are here: Home / Economics / Grifters Gonna Grift / Late Night Open Thread: March 31 Is Transgender Day of Visibility

Late Night Open Thread: March 31 Is Transgender Day of Visibility

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The original International Transgender Day of Visibility was organized (in Michigan) in 2009, but President Biden’s White House was the first to issue an official proclamation noting it. This year, because the Christian liturgical calendar is lunar-based and therefore shifts every year, TDOV and Easter fall on the same day. Cue the manufactured outrage from the Wingnut Wurlitzer…

Trump, of course, thinks of Easter as a(nother) way to celebrate his favorite form of personal redemption, affinity fraud…
Late Night Open Thread: March 31 Is Transgender Day of Visibility

(Jack Ohman via GoComics.com)

Reader Interactions

163Comments

  2. 2.

    Mike in NC

    The biggest laugh is anybody thinking that Fat Bastard gave a damn about Easter, or the Baby Jesus, or anything remotely related to Christianity or religion. His handlers just gave him a script to read from. Pathetic.

  3. 3.

    Ohio Mom

    There are so many different versions and translations of the Christian Bible, I wonder which one Trump (well, his underlings) chose. Obviously the cheapest — I think the Protestant version is shorter than the Catholic, then there is the question whether it is both Testaments or just the New.

    ETA: As a Jewish person, I have no doubt just demonstrated a more extensive knowledge of the Christian Bible than Trump could begin to imagine.

  6. 6.

    Jacqueline Squid Onassis

    I’m wondering how visible I should be tomorrow.  Will something like lightly frosted glass be a good look or should I go with fully opaque while I’m at the aquarium?

  7. 7.

    v

    @Ohio Mom:

    whether it is both Testaments or just the New.

    Gotta be both, right?  Otherwise they can’t get their boner on for, y’know, prohibiting eating shrimp, pork, mixed fiber garments, Teh Ghey [sic], and all that.

    ETA: oh right, only one of those; the rest are alright, my bad.

  8. 8.

    coin operated

    I’m not saying he’s the antichrist, but if God was real and sending someone to test Christians… well, he couldn’t be more obvious about it.

    This atheist approves this message…

  11. 11.

    dmsilev

    @Mike in NC: That’s for sure. He pretty much is the embodiment of all seven of the deadly sins, and can lay a strong claim to have violated all Ten Commandments. Not sure about the ‘honor your parents’ one; they’ve been gone for a while so it’s hard to say.

  12. 12.

    dmsilev

    @Ohio Mom:

    then there is the question whether it is both Testaments or just the New.

    Watch that Sarah Cooper video in the last Tweet. It’s obvious he doesn’t know the difference.

  13. 13.

    Doc Sardonic

    @Ohio Mom: The King Jimmy version what has the words in the King’s English just like Jesus spoke them. also because it is public domain and royalty free

  16. 16.

    v

    @Ohio Mom: ah here we go: https://www.rawstory.com/raw-investigates/the-overlooked-detail-in-trumps-bible-sales-pitch/

    All true, but more important is the kind of bible he’s selling.

    Now, I would guess that, for most mainstream Christians, a bible is a bible is a bible. Whether it’s the New Revised Standard Version, the New International Version, the New Living Translation Catholic Edition, or the Oxford Annotated Bible, the details may differ, but the message is the same, and the message – the “good news” – is the point.

    That’s not the case for white conservative Protestants, which is to say, the people who tend to stand apart from mainstream American culture and who tend to support Donald Trump emphatically. To them, the other versions are not just wrong. They are blasphemous. Only one version is the inerrant word of God. That’s the King James Version.

  17. 17.

    Citizen Alan

    This is just making stuff up to be outraged about .

    Well, duh! That’s all the republican party has been for at least the last quarter century! Cleek’s Law, and all that.

  18. 18.

    Scout211

    Some of these things I did not know. Tweet

    Tomorrow, is Easter. (it just happens to fall on 3/31 this year)

    Tomorrow is also International Transgender Day of Visibility. (It’s on 3/31, every year)

    Tomorrow (3/31) is also: National Crayon Day

    Hug a Medievalist Day

    Cesar Chavez Day

    Dance Marathon Day

    Eiffel Tower Day

    National Baked Ham with Pineapple Day

    National Farm Workers Day

    National Tater Day

    Scout211’s daughter’s birthday.  😊

    RFK, jr tried to claim Cesar Chavez as someone who would have supported his campaign and would have voted for him.  The family has pushed back.

    LOS ANGELES — The family of César Chávez wants independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to stop referencing the late labor and civil rights leader on the campaign trail.

    “We respectfully call upon you and your campaign to cease using images of our father to associate yourself with him and suggest your campaign’s goals are compatible,” said the letter signed by Chávez’s eldest son, Fernando Chávez.

    “It is our sincere conviction that this association is untrue and deceptive,” he added.

    The letter said that the family would “pursue all legal action available” if Kennedy failed to halt his campaign’s use of the United Farm Workers co-founder’s name and imagery.
    . . .

    On Friday, ahead of César Chávez Day, the Chávez family formally endorsed President Joe Biden’s re-election campaign. One of César Chávez’s granddaughters, Julie Rodriguez Chavez, serves as Biden’s 2024 campaign manager.

  19. 19.

    bbleh

    Interesting thing I’m seeing is, it’s not just a (predictable) Wingnut Wurlitzer issue, it’s also something for Very Concerned Moderate Centrists to tut-tut about.  “Well clearly Biden simply doesn’t care about the Christian Community the way he should, because it’s such an insult.  Really, it’s a terrible own-goal, and one that really concerns me!”

    Mmmm, the Grievance, strong it is with them!

  20. 20.

    Melancholy Jaques

    @Chetan Murthy:

    The website biblegateway has over 60 Bible versions available online.

    The choices include:

    • King James Version
    • Authorized (King James) Version
    • New King James Version
    • 21st Century King James Version

    Some day I will pick a few passages and see how much they differ.

  25. 25.

    bbleh

    @Melancholy Jaques: Aw, quite apart from deciding what’s “real” and what’s not (eg various stories about Jesus being added long after the fact), the translation issues are substantial.  And at least a lot of the NT was written in (deliberately) simple Greek. You get into the OT and … ???!  Literal Word of God indeed.

  26. 26.

    dmsilev

    @bbleh: Tomorrow, the Very Concerned Pundits can tut-tut that Joe and Jill Biden didn’t attend church “the right way” (whatever they did, it’s wrong. Because.) and probably there’s also going to be something Wrong about the all the kids searching for Easter Eggs on the White House lawn.

    \Trump, I assume, will celebrate Easter in the manner of his ancestors, by playing golf.

  28. 28.

    Melancholy Jaques

    @bbleh:

    I don’t consider it possible for the Bible to be accurate in the sense of the text reflecting reality. The Gospels don’t even agree with each other on important points.

    Like @Librarian: I’m asking does accurate mean a correct translation from some source? What source? How does anyone know if the source had another source? The earliest copy of the New Testament is from the 4th century.

  30. 30.

    bbleh

    @Melancholy Jaques: and while Mark probably was written around 60AD (that’s quite a while after the death of Jesus), even the other Synoptic Gospels weren’t written until later, in part drawing on Mark, and other books were written later still!  And those we call the NT were agreed upon by a bunch of guys hundreds of years later, while others were excluded because Reasons.

    And that’s the one we know a lot about.  The OLD Testament … oy!

  32. 32.

    sdhays

    @Princess: That’s unfair. Trump considers his time on his golden toilet “church time”.

    He very piously spends time there every day.

  33. 33.

    Spanky

    @Librarian: Accurate in comparison to the original scrolls, written in Greek. Apparently, the KJV translators took liberties that they maybe oughtn’t have.

    Don’t ask me details. I’m no expert.

  34. 34.

    Mousebumples

    On topic with Transgender Day of a Visibility tomorrow –

    Thanks (from this cishet white woman) for all you have taught me and shown me over the years. It is not your job to teach me how to be a better ally, and I appreciate you. It might be the Midwest Nice in me, but I get nervous about awkward! and am afraid of asking Dumb Questions to the trans people I know in Real Life. (and I ask plenty of Dumb Questions about political stuff here, so maybe I’m less worried about making you all look at my silly at this point? Lol)

    Though I suppose things can get awkward on a blog, too, but the point still stands.

    And if my pharmacy knowledge brain can help in return, ask away.

  35. 35.

    NotMax

    @sdhays

    Arrgh. Now have “Golden Helmet of Mambrino:” from Man of La Mancha. running through the head,, transposed to “Golden Toilet of Bedminster” (that locale because the scansion works).

  36. 36.

    Gretchen

    @dmsilev: the wing nuts are complaining about the guidance that kids’ submissions of Easter eggs not have any religious symbolism, blaming it on Biden’s supposed hatred of Christians. Even though the guidance is from the Egg Board, sponsors of the event, and has been in place for 45 years.

  37. 37.

    Jacqueline Squid Onassis

    One of the difficult things trans folks are facing these days are liberals who proclaim their opposition to book banning while also asserting that the fact that trans people exist isn’t an appropriate thing for kids to know.  It’s been an energy drain dealing with that lately.  It’s been lonely being the only one, in the threads I’ve been involved in, pushing back against that.  None of the liberals has chimed in against that odious and harmful position.

  39. 39.

    Jacqueline Squid Onassis

    @Mousebumples: You can ask me anything, I’m an open book.  As long as you’re making the effort, it’s not awkward with me.  I can’t say I speak for all of us – I’m old, after all – but at least I can give an answer from my perspective.

  44. 44.

    RevRick

    For those who don’t know who Russell Moore is, he’s the former president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention. He was forced out for expressing alarm at the alignment of Evangelicals with Trump.

  48. 48.

    Percysowner

    TFG called on President Biden to apologize to “Catholics and Christians” for having Trans Visibility Day on Easter. That’s right guys you once you get rid of all of your mutual “enemies” you will then turn on each other and march yourselves back to the Middle Ages.

  49. 49.

    RevRick

    @Spanky: The King James Version was probably the greatest work a committee has ever produced, combining what was the best available scholarship at its time with an elegance of language seldom matched.

    I use the New Revised Standard Version, which is far more faithful to the original texts, but at the cost of felicity of language. But no text is ever accurate, for as an Italian proverb goes, “The translator is a traitor.”
    There are, after all, a multitude of problems presented by the words themselves, which may have no exact corresponding words. The word atonement, for instance, is a neologism of at-one-ment, an attempt to convey a Greek understanding of an Aramaic word into English that has veered way off its original meaning.
    Take for instance, the Hebrew name, El Shaddai, which is translated as God Almighty. But it can also be plausibly translated as “God with breasts”, given its usual context of nurturing images.

  50. 50.

    West of the Rockies

    Republicans have a monkey on their backs, a serious addiction:  it’s called resentment.   They are only happy when they’re angry.

    What a shitty way to go through life.

  51. 51.

    RevRick

    @bbleh: The earliest “book” of the New Testament is Paul’s First Letter to the Thessalonians, written about 45 CE, about 15 years after the fact.

  53. 53.

    randy khan

    Speaking of Easter, we’re around the anniversary of when Trump said in 2020 that Covid would die down in time for people to go Easter services in person.

    I truly think that one of the causes of all of the Covid denialism is the way that Trump minimized it again and again even as it got worse and worse.  That’s part of what convinced people it was a hoax.

  54. 54.

    Quiltingfool

    I worked with a woman who had an English lit degree with an emphasis in Shakespearean literature (Ag chemical firm, go figure).  One day I mentioned that I struggled with the language in the KJV; I could read it and get most of it, but some of it went over my head.  She said that her studies of Shakespeare really made reading the KJV much easier.  Made sense to me considering when the KJV was translated.   The style of writing  was appropriate to people in that time.

  55. 55.

    wjca

    @RevRick: The earliest “book” of the New Testament is Paul’s First Letter to the Thessalonians, written about 45 CE, about 15 years after the fact.

    And written by someone who hadn’t been there.  And had views which strike me as antithetical to what the faith had originally been about.

  57. 57.

    Torrey

    @Melancholy Jaques: ​ The KJV is a very political text, and there are a number of cases where it was carefully translated so that it fit His Majesty’s political interests. There are a few good books (pun noted but not intended) on the construction of the KJV and the politics involved: Nicholson’s God’s Secretaries, Bobrick’s Wide as the Water, Moore & Reid (eds.) Manifold Greatness. There’s also a problem with the particular text from which the KJV was translated, the “textus receptus.” It’s not considered the most reliable. There’s a YouTuber who goes under the name of “magnify” who has some pretty accessible examples, although I don’t think he deals with the textus receptus issue.​
     

    ETA: I see RevRick got there first with some good examples. Even the choice of the translation of ekklesia as “church” poses some interesting problems.

  58. 58.

    Quiltingfool

    @Percysowner: Huh.  Catholics and Christians.  Once again, that horrid man displays his utter ignorance.  Seems he thinks that Catholics aren’t Christian?  Then again, one of his evangelical buddies told him they are the only evangelicals are Christians, wouldn’t surprise me.

  59. 59.

    Torrey

    @Quiltingfool: 

    her studies of Shakespeare really made reading the KJV much easier.

    ​ Heh. I grew up in a very King James-y church. The one good thing I got from it was that, when I was prepared to read Shakespeare, I found I had already learned that version of English.​ So it works both ways.

  60. 60.

    Urza

    I see everyone mentioning the original Greek and Hebrew for the Bible but never mentioning that quite a few books were originally in Aramaic.  Related to Hebrew but definitely not the same thing.  And it was hard for much of the 20th century to translate from those originals.

  62. 62.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Ben Cisco:

    Your attention please.

    The Alabama Crimson Tide is headed to the Final Four!!

    Carry on.

    @RevRick:

    Oh, the next team from which UConn will take its soul.

    Hehe.  Most likely.

  64. 64.

    mrmoshpotato

    @West of the Rockies:

    Republicans have a monkey on their backs, a serious addiction: it’s called resentment. They are only happy when they’re angry.

    What a shitty way to go through life.

    Also QFT!

  65. 65.

    wjca

    @Urza: quite a few books were originally in Aramaic.

    Not surprising, since Jesus, and his disciples, were native speakers of Aramaic.  If you want an idea of what was realy said, you pretty much have to go back to that.  (If only to do a reverse translation, to see what the Greek text you are looking at probably said originally.)

  67. 67.

    Melancholy Jaques

    @Torrey:

    I’m kind of familiar with all this. That’s why I asked how anyone could say that any version was accurate.

  69. 69.

    Martin

    I think I’m the only human who remembers this but many elections ago one of the GOP debates took all questions from voters and one was a guy who held up a KJV Bible and asked the candidates if they would on stage proclaim that book to be the the actual truth, or some shit like that, and everyone seemed super confused by the question when it was *extremely* clear to me once I saw it was a KJV Bible what this guys angle was. He wanted them to denounce other versions of the Bible.

    We really minimize what motivates the right. That guy was in no way an outlier.

  71. 71.

    eclare

    I think TIFG read about Easter in, as he put it, Two Corinthians.

    For those who do not know, there is no such thing as Two Corinthians.  It is called Second Corinthians.

  72. 72.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Jacqueline Squid Onassis:

    It’s been lonely being the only one, in the threads I’ve been involved in, pushing back against that.

    Geez, seriously?  I’m glad I’m not frequenting those places.  While I know everyone here agrees, just to be specific, of course it’s appropriate for kids to know about trans people.  It’s intuitive to kids.  Boy turns into a girl?  Boy was secretly a girl inside and now gets to be one?  (And the other way around, girl was actually a boy, of course.)  Sure, this is standard fairy tale stuff.  Only adults think it’s weird.  Heck, not sure what you really are, and need to find out?  That’s their life.

    Kids didn’t choke on Tip becoming Ozma a hundred years ago, and they find the concept just as easy and obvious today.

  73. 73.

    eclare

    @Jay:

    Yes.  King James is public domain.  TIFG would have had to pay for the New International, which I believe is the most popular.

    Always look to the money to find the logic behind any question.  Always.

  75. 75.

    Sister Golden Bear

    @Mousebumples: Dumb Questions welcomed. With the caveat that when you’ve heard one trans person’s experience… you’ve heard one trans person’s experience.

    @Jacqueline Squid Onassis: I haven’t encountered that myself, but sadly it doesn’t surprise me.

    As for my feelings about TDOV this year, a Kiwi friend of mine put it well: “I should say something about Trans Day of Visibility, but I’m just tired of it all, whānau. The same problems as last year, but worse. The manufactured outrage over it landing on the same day as Easter Sunday. The same politicians using us as political mileage to play to their thuggish followers.” We just want to be left the fuck alone and live our lives.

  76. 76.

    Mokum

    @Urza: the german Pope was considered a great intellectual, whathis name, Ratzinger. He said that only the catholic church was a church “in the true sense of the word”. So both sides and allthat applies in this case, for once.

  77. 77.

    SectionH

    Srsly late. Oh well.

    In recognition of Trans Awareness day (late, sorry)  Mr S and I were counting the trans people we do know personally and we’re only around 5, 6, 7? I knew at least one woman he doesn’t remember. Which is fair enough because we spent a few years trading jobs off. But add friends whose friends are trans, which is many more. But more visibility is better, dammit.

    And srsly belated shout-out to Janey Godley (she of Trump is a Cunt fame) because she has been fighting against JKbitch and all the TERFs and yeah.

  78. 78.

    opiejeanne

    @Percysowner: You’ll notice that he separated Catholics from Christians which is something nasty that some Evangelical and Fundamentalists have been doing for years.

  80. 80.

    SectionH

    @Frankensteinbeck: Tig! Tig > Ozma was just  natural.  Mr S read your comment to me and I went way back in my childhood, and you’re right – kids don’t care. I always did like Ozma (!) but Ruth PT – I loved Betsey and Trot too, esp. Trot. (The Giant Horse sez, “I’ll trot slower for Trot, though I’d much rather not. I can pace, I can race, I can canter a lot.”)
    Yeah, written a long time before I was born, but that was a universe worth perusing. And I think Ruth did it amazingly well.

  82. 82.

    Eolirin

    @Frankensteinbeck: I wouldn’t be so sure everyone here agrees with that position. Though thankfully no one’s gone so far as to have said so directly, at least where I would have seen it.

    Some people have gotten pretty close in the past though.

  85. 85.

    sab

    @Eolirin: My mother (born 1928) read all of those, and it was one of the joys of my childhood to come north from Florida to visit Ohio grandparents, and get to read Mom’s childhood books up in the attic. Full set of Oz books. I loved them.

  88. 88.

    SectionH

    @mrmoshpotato: Wizard of Oz? the OZ books. Frank L Baum wrote about 6, but when he tried to kill the story, the money guys wanted more and  I think I’ve discovered first Fanfic ever written: there are more OZ books written mostly -srsly well by Ruth Plumly Thompson than by Baum. But she was really good. Better than Baum, esp. yeah, young girls were always the main characters. and made the difference

    eta: we need to discover more of her OZ books, because damn! You want Something Different: Be Nice to It – that was what those books about!

  90. 90.

    TBone

    @opiejeanne: Rumpy neighbors’ son once told me there were no Xtians in France.  I asked who he thought the Notre Dame Cathedral was built for (it has just caught fire recently).  I don’t think they are aware of the existence or details of the religions of anyone but themselves, as was highlighted in the post here yesterday about NPCs.  They aren’t taught to care, so they just don’t.  Lack of innate curiousity also.  It’s all just so fuckin’ stoopid and they pass that down from generation to generation.

  91. 91.

    satby

    @Eolirin: Agree, there’s been quite a lot that skates close to full TERF. planet eddie posts usually incite a it, and why they don’t post any longer, which is a loss.

  93. 93.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Chetan Murthy: ​

    the KJV, bc that’s what the evangelicals claim is the One True Version.

    Also, it’s not copyrighted, so he wouldn’t have had to get anyone’s permission, let alone pay anyone, to use the King James translation. (ETA: Beaten by a mile, i see. :-)

    Not relevant to Dump, but the fundies often refer to the KJV as the AV, the Authorized Version.

    Yes, it was originally known as the Authorized Version. Why was it called this? Whose authorization is being referred to? That of King James. But they like calling it the Authorized Version because they want to make it sound like it was authorized by the Holy Spirit or some such. It probably works in environments where questioning is discouraged.

  95. 95.

    sab

    @sab: I think JK Rowling has lost her mind, but people like planet eddie feed on her, and get undeserved  divisive attention from voicing in. Not helping trans cause at all.

    I am pro trans, and planet eddie was extremely nasty to me. That is their thing, find a platform and stir stuff up and divide people.

  97. 97.

    sab

    @satby: It absolutely was. All cis women were their enemy and misunderstood them and hated them. You will never win me over to their cause. Toxic. Came here and inflamed us. Fucked up her all women AA group and then bragged about it here. Who does that?

  98. 98.

    satby

    @sab: Not relitigating that with you, but that is absolutely not what was stated by planet eddie, that was the recap by their detractors. Your recollection is bullshit, and TODAY on Transgender Visibility Day, I’m going to remember a friend who died last year, way before her time, her health compromised by the stress of being a trans activist under conditions of increasing hatred and attacks; some of those by “allies”.

    phaser set to ignore

  99. 99.

    sab

    @satby: Sorry but I have two transgender grandchildren and a two gay grandchildren and eddie’s unfortunate posting infuriated me. Implied bad intentions where there were none (cannot same the same for them.)

    Huge mistake for Cole to let them on the front page here. We have excellent jackals in the comments. It is not helpful to have toxic frontpagers undercutting all their good work.

  101. 101.

    TBone

    Hahahaha Western Kentucky University represents!  Kyle Rittenhouse runaway!

    https://crooksandliars.com/2024/03/killer-kyle-visits-another-campus-gets

    Sure enough, the same thing happened again, but even faster. Instead of lasting 30 minutes, Kyle was making a hasty exit after only 20 minutes. At least this time, his retreat wasn’t so panicky and he didn’t try to kill his dog in his haste. Perhaps the presence of all those law enforcement officers helped him.

  103. 103.

    bjacques

    @dmsilev: not only has Trump violated all 10 (make that 11) and committed all seven mortal sins, but he’s also working his way through the Book of Leviticus and making impressive progress!

    And about 8000 years from now, the only Bible that will matter is the Orange Catholic Bible!

  104. 104.

    sab

    Normal people when they are iffy on gender say they. Just because they are not her or him.

    Illintioned people when they are iffy on gender do bad things. Watch the news.

  106. 106.

    sab

    @sab:  I just want kids safe and healthy.

    Political gender trans stuff makes that awkward , just because of politics., but al that political trans stufv was just there anyway.

    Those kids are still out there, and still just normal healthy kids.

  108. 108.

    BellyCat

    I learned a LOT from Planet Eddie’s posts, especially regarding the complexity of trans people’s challenges, and miss their posts.

    It’s unfortunate that the territory is so complicated that misunderstandings even among trans supporters can easily take place.

    Trans people have the right to be visible OR invisible (due to fears about safety) today, as they wish. This CIS HET male supports their journey, regardless. And for Biden and Harris to voice their support (on Easter, no less) is spectacular!

  109. 109.

    p.a.

    From my readings at Fred Clark’s slacktivist: KJV, King James I authorized “his” version as a defense of royal prerogative in his struggles with Parliament and the separatist churches.  It was deliberately mistranslated to tilt the wording to imply support for hierarchical and executive privilege.  So “justice” in the (Koine Greek?) earliest versions are often KJV’ed into “righteousness”, a much more amorphous concept.
    The book God’s Secretaries looks at the King’s advisors choice of translators, their assignments, and discussions/quarrels before, during, and after the KJV production.  There were separatists included in the hopes of co-opting their sects.

  110. 110.

    jonas

    @Ohio Mom:There are so many different versions and translations of the Christian Bible, I wonder which one Trump (well, his underlings) chose.

    King James. A literary classic, to be sure, but far from a current or accurate translation. A lot of fundamentalist Protestants considered it divinely inspired, though, or something. Trump probably doesn’t even know the Bible is translated from ancient languages to begin with.

  112. 112.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Ohio Mom: There are so many different versions and translations of the Christian Bible,

    64 at last count, which begs the question that if the bible is the inerrant word of god, why do they keep changing it?

  114. 114.

    lowtechcyclist

    Good morning, y’all, and happy Easter to those who observe. The Lord is risen!

    This Christian is personally glad to share this joyous holy day with the Transgender Day of Visibility. Whether or not you desire to be visible to the wider world on this day, I am glad of your presence here in this community.

  116. 116.

    jonas

    @TBone: Both Liz Dye and Devin Stone (Legal Eagle), iirc, have both done some pretty detailed — and devastating — deep dives into what Habba did with that waitress at Trump Bedminster and why, yes, she’s in some pretty deep shit. As in being disbarred-level shit.

    ETTD. E.

  117. 117.

    Ken

    @RevRick: I use the New Revised Standard Version

    There is now a New Revised Standard Version Updated edition.  Heaven knows what adjective they’ll tack onto the next major revision. Renovated New Revised Standard Version Updated, perhaps.

  119. 119.

    jonas

    @Melancholy Jaques:

    @Librarian:

    There are two main issues with the KJV. First, it relied on  editions and manuscripts of the Bible, particularly of the Greek New Testament, that have been long-superceded now with new discoveries and better textual criticism. You can see a number of examples here of passages that appear in the KJV which modern scholarship has shown were almost certainly mistakes or later interpolations. Secondly, while the committee that translated the KJV included some very good scholars and philologists of Greek and Hebrew, they were also very consciously working under a royal mandate and made sure their language supported Tudor-Stuart ideology about church and state. And of course it also reflected the general cultural prejudices of the day around sex, gender, slavery, etc

    So, while its impact on English literature and thought has been enormous, it’s not considered an “accurate” translation in many ways by modern scholarly standards.

  120. 120.

    Princess

    I’m being a bit contrarian here but I gained a new appreciation for the KJV when I learned Hebrew. It’s archaicizing English stays much closer to the cadence and literal meaning of the Hebrew than any other version, and it gives a much better feel of the original as a whole (though obviously with errors in particulars). Can’t say anything about the NT because I don’t know Greek. Every act of translation is an act of interpretation.

  122. 122.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @Melancholy Jaques: Accurate is not even possible to pin down with the same source. Translation is not an exact art. Translators make choices to try to convey the sense of the original, but words have nuances that don’t translate exactly.

    I’ve heard many a sermon that was based on “the original Greek word was X and it would be better translated this way…”

  123. 123.

    zhena gogolia

    @Librarian: Okay, I missed this last night. Accurate as a translation, as I’m sure someone will have mentioned in the meantime.

  124. 124.

    LiminalOwl

    @Jacqueline Squid Onassis: I’m grateful for your perspective.

    FWIW, I have heard many (wish I could say all) of my liberal friends and acquaintances fulminating against the book bans and other efforts at erasing trans folks and trans visibility.  And the beloved and I do what we can to educate our acquaintances as necessary.

  125. 125.

    evodevo

    @wjca: Yes…this.  The first “Christian” schism was between Paul and the church fathers in Jerusalem, who considered him a loose cannon. (These people weren’t “christian” at that time – there were no christians, there were only Jews who followed the teachings of Jesus as his original followers interpreted/remembered them, and the original pharisees, sadducees, essenes, other sectarians, etc.  Paul was a Pharisee.)

  126. 126.

    TBone

    @jonas: 👍 isn’t this a perfect way to start the day.  Making Attorneys Get Attorneys 😆 How smart does she feel NOW?

  127. 127.

    jonas

    @Princess: Robert Alter, the Berkeley scholar who has produced what many consider the most masterful English translation of the Hebrew Bible since the KJV, would agree. He has called the KJV beautiful and lyrical, owing largely to the translators’ keen literary sensibilities, but acknowledges that there are also many places where they don’t get it quite right. “There are a lot of lapses,” as he put it in one interview.

  128. 128.

    TBone

    Ron Filipkowski xit:

    What fake culture war hoax will Repubs cook up today to try & divert people’s attention away from the fact that freaks, kooks, grifters, weirdos, & conspiracy theorists have hijacked their party to make it a toxic cesspool of people who hate each other so much they can’t govern.

  131. 131.

    pluky

    @evodevo: Which Paul conveniently ‘won’ when the Jerusalem church was destroyed along with Second Temple Judaism in 70CE by the Romans.

  133. 133.

    Bruce K in ATH-GR

    @RevRick: And as a translator who knows that translating something into English from modern Greek, let alone ancient Greek or Aramaic, depends on context, language history, tradition, quality of the original text(1), and what the original writer had for breakfast that day, I can say there’s no such thing as a perfect translation, just closest possible approximations.

    (1) I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve run into a roadblock translating a document only to discover that the original text suffered from badly mangled grammar that even a native speaker had trouble deciphering. It’s disturbingly common in the legal work I do.

  136. 136.

    Fair Economist

    @Urza: I wasn’t aware we had any of the original Aramaic texts, even now. There are some Aramaic texts from the Syrian church, but my understanding is they were back-translated from the Greek. It’s that some of the back-translation comes out so well (and some fixes emerge like “camel through a needle’s eye” turns into “rope through a needle’s eye”) that some of the Greek texts must have been translated from an Aramaic original.

  137. 137.

    jimmiraybob

    @Ohio Mom: “…then there is the question whether it is both Testaments or just the New.”

    Someone may have beat me to the punch but if one were to be left out of the “only Bible endorsed by”  it would be the New testament because of all the wokitude.

    Also, much more rage and retribution in the Old.

  138. 138.

    Gvg

    @opiejeanne: it’s been done since the reformation, preceding the birth of America. In fact, a significant number of early settlers were fleeing losing the Christian civil war for at least a time. Since people believe what they want, that war never really can end, and a few years later a different side would win/lose and some would choose to flee. Different states of what would become the “United” States were founded by different subsets of Christianity, with European enemies living next door to enemies. The colonists did not get along in the early days. Also subsequent waves of settlers might not be the same subset and the colonies could completely change over time. The founders would have been about the grandchildren of survivors of religious wars between Christians. And the colonies could not stand against England or any other European country without sticking together. The choice of no official church and the separation of church and state was deliberate to preserve their religions. The fools who want us to be a Christian nation would actually destroy religion if they succeeded. They don’t know history.

  141. 141.

    jimmiraybob

    Some things don’t change.

    From History dot com.

    “In 1604, England’s King James I authorized a new translation of the Bible aimed at settling some thorny religious differences in his kingdom—and solidifying his own power.”

    Supreme rulers will be supreme rulers.

  144. 144.

    lowtechcyclist

    @RevRick:

    The claim of biblical inerrancy is only made by Evangelical/fundamentalists. Us mainline Protestants would call that claim idolatry.

    Yeppers.

    Also, the Bible is riddled with internal contradictions. And the general evangelical approach to this is to (a) ignore them as much as possible, or (b) failing that, come up with some arbitrary resolution of the contradiction.  And if one interpreted the Bible in general that arbitrarily, one could make it say pretty much anything.

  145. 145.

    Chief Oshkosh

    @Baud:

    I should translate the Bible.

    I can do that in one: Be kind to people.

    All the rest of it is bullshit.

  147. 147.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @Jacqueline Squid Onassis: Sorry to hear that.  I hadn’t seen these threads with people doing that with respect to book bans (though it doesn’t surprise me).  I try to always push back against that bullshit whenever and wherever I see it.  But because of work/life schedule I don’t read every post/thread here so I probably miss a lot of stuff.  The notion that kids can’t handle learning about the complexity of gender is just silly.  I think it’s the perfect time for them to start thinking about all kinds of serious and important stuff (gender, feminism, privilege, race etc.)

  148. 148.

    Miss Bianca

    @Frankensteinbeck: Oh, my God…don’t remind the nutters about Tip turning into Ozma, or they’ll want to ban the Oz books next!

    @SectionH: I disagree that RP Thompson’s books were better than Baum’s. They are good, tho, in their own way. (She seemed to be much more of a monarchist than Baum was, imho, anyway.)

  149. 149.

    Layer8Problem

    @SiubhanDuinne:  Ooo, yeah, I forgot about that.  I wonder if they did the book of Job?  I’d be interested in the whole Ceiling Cat/Basement Cat interplay on that one.

  150. 150.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @sab: I’m so sorry for the innocent trans grandchildren who are going to have to deal with your fragility.  I guarantee that if they haven’t already, once they start to become politically aware they will have to walk on eggshells with how they speak about their identity and Oppression just to avoid upsetting you.  And that is just sad for them.  I’ve known many Gay, Lesbian, Bi people who have told me about this dynamic with their family members where they always have to tone it down or be extra-careful because their family members can’t handle real talk about LGBTQ-phobia.  It puts a real limit on their relationship and trust with those family members.  It’s a real loss for the LGBTQ person.  Be aware that continuing with the attitude you are showing here will absolutely result in your Grandkids needing a person to give them a little support, listening, love etc., but you won’t be on that list of people who are really 100% on their side.  You can change that.  It’s not hard.  But it starts with stopping with this making-yourself-the-victim bullshit when Transgender People tell us hard truths.  It’s up to you.

  151. 151.

    Bill Arnold

    @Melancholy Jaques:

    Some day I will pick a few passages and see how much they differ.

    Oh, it’s worth doing. I pick a few passages that translators have disputes, about, e.g.
    1 Samuel 28:13
    KJV: 13 And the king said unto her, Be not afraid: for what sawest thou? And the woman said unto Saul, I saw gods ascending out of the earth.
    (KJV is roughly correct, here, at least about the plurality of divine beings.)
    Two Adulterous Sisters (Ezekiel 23) is good for this, too. (Some translations attempt to make it less racy.)

  153. 153.

    Ella in New Mexico

    I miss Sara Cooper so very much. Her comedy got me through the worst parts of Covid and Trump because she saw it right through every single one of his lies in such a hilarious way.

     

    I miss Sara Cooper so very much. Her comedy got me through the worst parts of Covid and Trump because she saw it right through every single one of his lies in such a hilarious way.

    I know she couldn’t continue to do that forever but dang I wish she’d come back some of her stuff sometime later this year for the general election.

  155. 155.

    Jacqueline Squid Onassis

    @sab: That’s… an opinion.  One that doesn’t look good on you.

    I miss those posts and it’s clear that they’re not here anymore because the comments were too depressing and exhausting to deal with.

  156. 156.

    evodevo

    @pluky: Yep…he “grew” the Greek churches which took over Xtianity when the first Jewish rebellion failed and the original church fathers were scattered (actually I read where they left Jerusalem after James died and settled elsewhere).  I think their remnants were still around after 100 AD or so, but were overwhelmed numerically by the Greek church and the nascent Catholic church.

  157. 157.

    evodevo

    @evodevo: Of course, the various theological sects of the now extant Xtian church spent the next couple three hundred years massacring, persecuting, and exiling one another trying, as Mark Twain said, to ease their brothers’ passage to heaven…

    (See: The Jesus Wars by Philip Jenkins)

  158. 158.

    dnfree

     

    @NeenerNeener: Members of Orthodox Churches (Greek Orthodox, for instance) will strongly disagree on which branch of Christianity is OG.  Some Orthodox practices go WAY back.

  159. 159.

    dnfree

    @jonas: I have read Robert Alter’s translations of several books of the Old Testament, and found them most helpful in distinguishing the Jewish understanding from the “Christianized” English translations I know.  For new thing, the Old Testament doesn’t actually recognize the concept of a “soul” separate from the body.

  160. 160.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @Jacqueline Squid Onassis: Here’s a quick summary: There had been a bunch of instances of some very TERFy sentiments popping up whenever Trans Issues were brought up, but especially in response to a post by PlanetEddie.  When people rightfully called out the bullshit, pushed back on it and and tried to educate everyone (to make the space welcoming to Transgender and NB People), the commenters who started the mess with their TERF-adjacent remarks threw temper tantrums about how unfair everyone was being to them and cloaked themselves in Feminism.  Fast forward to a month or so later: PlanetEddie writes a long, detailed and sincere post about White Feminism™ and how it plays out in coalition spaces to harm Black/Brown and in this case, especially Transgender People.  It was a really excellent post that didn’t accuse anyone in particular of anything and had very wise words for allies who want to work in diverse coalitions.  But all the same people who created the first mess read it as a personal attack and pulled their same bullshit, literally taking a post about Trans/NB being marginalized by Cisgender People making these discussions all about themselves, and made the whole thing all about themselves.  A lot of pearl-clutching about the use of “TERF” or White Feminist.”  It was rather ridiculous and eventually, Cole had to step in and shut down the thread.

    I don’t know the circumstances of PlanetEddie leaving the blog and having those posts removed but I know that PlanetEddie expressed extreme frustration with the way some commenters simply refused to listen/read and jumped to immediate defensive postures and antagonism.  Ironically, it was a picture-perfect example of the everything PlanetEddie had described in the second post.  To my mind, I will always chalk it up as an example of Cisgender commenters at BJ refusing to listen, and then chasing off one of our few Transgender voices.  And a sadly accurate snapshot of the way TERF-ism can be (and is) such a problem, even in Liberal/Progressive spaces, in 2024.

  161. 161.

    wjca

    @Chief Oshkosh: I can do that in one: Be kind to people.

    All the rest of it is bullshit.

    Or, as Jesus himself put it:

    “All the Law and all the Prophets are this.  Thou shalt love the Lord your God with all your heart, and your neighbor as yourself.”

    Needless to say, evangelical bigots are very careful to ignore that.  While embracing all the nastiest bits of the Old Testament.

  162. 162.

    Jacqueline Squid Onassis

    @UncleEbeneezer: Oh, I was here for those posts and comment threads and your summary is pretty accurate.  Any threads about trans folks is bound to be depressing and they always make me think of that great Phil Ochs song, “Love me, I’m a Liberal”.

    The only thing that gives me hope is that the conversation about (cis) gays and lesbians was about at this point back in the early aughts.  That taught me how powerful visibility is and so here I am.

  163. 163.

    LiminalOwl

    @SectionH: Baum wrote 13, I think.  Thompson wrote 19. Another three writers published a total of 7 (had to look that number up!)

    My family part of the summer I was 9 in Provincetown, where the public library had an almost-complete set. I read all of the available ones—3 or 4 missing, I think?  And in high school I joined the International Wizard of Oz Club.

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