IF YOU BELIEVE in an intervening deity, there may be no explaining this to your satisfaction. But, fool that I am, I’m going to give it a try.

Mind you, I’m willing to give you the benefit of the doubt. That when you respond to my major issue with …

— “I know you don’t believe in this sort of thing, but I’ll pray for you” --

​… you honestly have no idea how offensive you’re being. That you truly think you’re doing a kindness.* That the proper response from me should be, “Thank you.”

Now, there’s a spectrum of nonbelievers. Some might give you a sincere “thank you” or at least feign one. But, hard though it may be for you to fathom, this nonbeliever recoils. You have just told him that, regardless of how he feels, you’re going to wave in his face this thing that he doesn’t just reject but opposes.

Manners and empathy are all that keep me from replying not with “thank you” but with another two–word phrase also ending with “you.” Ironically enough, manners and empathy should have kept you from saying “I’ll pray for you” in the first place.

Here’s an analogy that almost gets us there. Suppose you’re an ardent Christian, and I tell you, “I know your book says to burn witches, but I want you to know that I’m going to hunker down in my secret lair and execute a Wiccan spell for you.” Or, “I know you don’t approve of this sort of thing, but I’m going to dress up in drag for you.” I think you’ll agree that it’s my privilege to perform Wiccan spells or to dress up in drag all I want. But you might find in my telling you about it something of an affront.

It’s kinda like that.

Pray all you want. In secret. You know, like your book tells you to do.

What to say when someone you know to be a nonbeliever shares their trials? May I suggest, simply: “I am so sorry. I want you to know how much I care.”
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* To be sure, I can infer other motives, but let’s set them aside for now.

DURING CASTING for a commercial, I told the auditioning actors, “Our market is middle aged men.” Bristling, one actor said, “Women need this product, too.”

Absolutely correct.

But repeated tests targeting men and women alike had shown that women didn’t want the product. Neither, for that matter, did younger or older men. Smart marketers drop hooks where fish are, not where they wish them to be. Once our client spotted the trend, they focused media spending on middle–aged men, and sales–per–dollar–spent went up.

Equity matters. But targeting people who have made it clear that they don’t want your product isn’t being equity–minded. It’s being wasteful.

TOWARD THE END of the 2005 movie Batman Begins, Batman informs the bad guy, “I won’t kill you, but I don’t have to save you.” Whereupon he swoops away, leaving the bad guy to die in a train wreck.

I am well aware that in the United States there is no duty to rescue. But, come on. Though it’s not chargeable as such, choosing not to save someone you could save — assuming no inconvenience or danger to yourself — still pretty much boils down to murder.

The “I don’t have to save you” workaround reminds me of the kind of thing I have come to expect from people who tell me they get their morals from religion.*

Today’s example: Oregon’s Death with Dignity Act (DWDA). It permits “terminally ill adults to obtain a prescription for medication to end their life peacefully through self-administration.” 

A verrrrry gooood Christian was lecturing me on why it would be a sin to take advantage of the DWDA. However, he explained, it would not be sinful to decline treatment and allow the inevitable to take prompt place.

I can just picture his God looking down from a cloud, admiringly conceding, “True enough, you didn’t kill yourself. All you did was not save yourself. You sure outmaneuvered me! Well done!”

So I posed a hypothetical situation.

“Suppose,” I said, “you learn than a giant boulder is hurtling down upon a certain spot, and you decide to walk over and stand there so the boulder will crush the life out of you. Would that be sinful?”

Yes, he said, it absolutely would. It would be suicide.

“Now suppose,” I continued, “you’re already standing in that spot, you know the boulder is coming, and you choose not to move.”

That, the verrrrry gooood Christian replied, would be okay. It wouldn’t be suicide.

“It’s the same bloody thing, I told him.” He couldn’t see it.

​Or, perhaps, he refused to see it.
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* You’ll find some brilliant workarounds by religious believers in my book on sex work in Utah. See in particular Chapter Eight, “The Mormon John.”

I OVERHEARD fellow park visitors speculate about the hundreds of identical “No Parking” signs and barriers lining the streets surrounding a park I frequent. The visitors figgered, see, that there were rules the city oughtta follow, see, and since the city didn’t follow ’em, see, they figgered residents put up the signs to dissuade the unhoused from camping. So they figgered it was a bluff, see, so they figgered it was ok to park there.

Yep, they figgered, that makes sense. Yep, that must be it.

Meanwhile, I did something radical. I pulled out my phone and googled. The city is about to commence improvements on the streets in question.

No wonder nonsense persists. We carry around pocket–size computers with instant access to the world’s knowledge, but most of us would rather figger.

OVER LUNCH, an ardent Christian by the name of Ed was extolling divine justice. He assured me that in the hereafter God would not punish those who through no fault of their own had never heard of Jesus. He admitted that this belief placed him at odds with some Christians.

“Well,” I said, “I have heard of him. I’ve read and studied the bible extensively. I have even taught bible classes. And I don’t believe in God, much less Jesus as the messiah. So I guess when I die I’ll be in big trouble.”

“Oh,” he said, grinning, “you’ll be in big trouble.”

Now, to make my point, please permit me an abrupt scene change. It is wintertime, decades ago, in an icy cold, snowy place. I happened to walking outdoors through a blizzard next to a mindless bully, the intellectual inferior of a baked potato. I looked over and saw a two–inch icicle hanging from the end of his nose. I cried out, “We need to get you inside fast! You could get frostbite!” 

I was honestly alarmed. Mind you, there is no describing the depth to which I disliked this fellow. Even so, I didn’t wish upon him a permanently marred face. I was horrified at the thought.

Back to Ed. If he truly believed “big trouble” was in my future, why the grin? Why not tears? Why not clasped hands? Why not desperate pleas for me to see the light for my own good? Why not horror at the thought?

I see two possible explanations (you may have others). (1) He hasn’t truly internalized the concept. That is, he hasn’t taken it to the point of visualizing me sizzling away in everlasting burnings. Or (2) he has a vindictive side and plans to enjoy my suffering.

There are Christians to whom Explanation 2 applies. For Ed, my money is on Explanation 1.

To be fair, I would have found tears, clasped hands, and pleas patently annoying, especially over lunch. But at least it would have been consistent with what he professes. 

So I prefer the grin. Maybe I should shut up and be grateful for small favors.

I WAS 17 YEARS OLD when my dad flew into a rage and gave me 18 hours to move out. I cannot for the life of me remember what triggered it. Suffice it to say that I was a clean–living, law–abiding honor student. Yet it came as no surprise. For well over a year, he had been grousing that he was “sick of being a parent.”

I scraped by. I worked in a department store for $1.80 an hour. Back then, a gallon of milk went for about 90 cents. I roomed with three friends, bought a beat–up car for $200, obtained a scholarship, enrolled in college.

When Christmas rolled around, I stammered an apology about not being able to afford gifts. “Just plan better in the future,” a would–be helpful soul said, dripping affected warmth.

This is a post about how easy it is to blame the less fortunate for being less fortunate.

“But look at you now,” some might add, missing the point. There is no getting through to such.

Thanks a lot, algorithm. In the past week, you have served me up an undo portion of memes and posts wherein curmudgeons grouse about tipping.

Enough! Here are four thoughts and, lucky you, two bonus thoughts:

1: In the U.S., the tip is part of the price of a meal out. Right now, the more or less agreed–upon amount to add is equivalent to 20 percent of the net ticket. This is news to virtually no one walking into a restaurant in this country. If you plan to punish via tipping or not to tip at all, stay home or eat where tipping isn’t a thing.

2: Forty–three states allow restaurants to pay servers less than minimum wage, on the assumption that tips will make up the difference. The tip is not a bonus, but part of, in fact, probably most of the server’s pay.

3. Serving is hard work. If you haven’t done it, you have no idea. Cut ’em a break.

4: By all means, resent tipping. It’s a rotten system. And it’s getting out of hand. But if you withhold or diminish the tip in a restaurant, you’re a jerk. A bully. Even if the service is bad. You can’t dock a worker’s pay in other settings when you’re unhappy; the fact that you can get away with it in a restaurant doesn’t mean that you should. If you’re really unhappy, do what you’d do in any other setting (if you must): complain to management. After, that is, you tip 20 percent or more.

Bonus thought 1: If you tip more, bravo.

Bonus thought 2: If you’re the sort who withholds tips, my hunch is that you often receive the level of service you deserve.

I JUST LISTENED to a podcast interviewee make his case. Well, try to make it. I simply wasn’t buying his argument.

But the topic matters, so, wanting to be sure I hadn’t missed something, I looked up and read his articles. In fact, I read one of them twice.

Know what? I came away even more convinced that his argument was dumb.

But — and this is the point — it doesn’t always play out that way. Sometimes following up turns my thinking around. 

Knee–jerk reactions are sometimes right and sometimes wrong. It’s always worth it to dig.

A CLIENT decided to spring on me a consultant who’d cooked up a strategy for my shop to carry out. It was a terrible idea, doomed to fail. This was not a question of opinion. A competent consultant would have known that marketing history is littered with failure after failure of this very strategy.

I was aware that sanity didn’t have much chance of prevailing. The client was enamored of his new consultant, the consultant thought he knew my area better than I, my concerns would be seen as a case of Not Invented Here Syndrome, and the consultant was adept at interrupting and thus derailing objections before an opposing case could be properly built.

I could have shut up, executed the strategy, and charged quite the fee for the work. Of course, in the wake of inevitable, costly, and embarrassing failure, the consultant could blame my shop and not his strategy. Yet it was not the threat of blame that motivated me to resist. My motivation was to spare my client this folly.

To make my case, I would need to secure the floor. So, on my shop’s dime, I created a slide show. (These were pre–PowerPoint days.) That would give me that advantage of a darkened room with the focus on me and my message. Then I called a meeting with the client and his consultant. 

A few slides in, the consultant rocketed to his feet, as I knew he would. “Don’t tell me what you can’t do,” he said. “Tell us what you can! After all, how good are you guys?” I replied, “You’ll have your say. Please sit down and let me continue.” Remarkably, he did. I proceeded with a brief, organized, evidence–based analysis that laid bare the folly.

I finished, the lights went up, and I turned to the client. “We’re your ad agency,” I said, “and we’ll do as we’re told. But our best recommendation is not to proceed.”

There was silence for a beat or two. Finally, the client said, “You never stop surprising me” and killed the strategy.

Then the consultant said something interesting. “I wish you’d been around when I was CEO of my last company. Maybe it wouldn’t have gone under.”

GOOD NEWS, Christians! Jesus died for your sins. Accept him and, presto!, no more eternal rap sheet.

Churches vary on what constitutes accepting Jesus, but all agree that doing so absolves you of your misdeeds. Say you robbed a store or assaulted someone and now fear a post–mortal fire and brimstone future. No problem. The atonement of Jesus will pay for and thus erase that sin. No more fire and brimstone worries for you.

(For their part, the store owner or assault victim damn well better get over it. Failure to forgive is a stain on their record. Were you not so righteous, you might even find some satisfaction in that.)

Now, you’re only human, meaning there’s a good chance that you’ll sin again. No problem again. As often as you blow it—I have it on good authority that you’re allowed up to seventy times seven—you can dip your garments in the Blood of the Lamb* to make them spotless as new.

And that’s the problem with absolution. It offers every incentive to cleanse your eternal record and none not to sully it in the first place. 

A result is Christians** whose first thought upon messing up isn’t “I feel terrible, I must right this and take steps never to do it again.” Rather, it’s “This could keep me out of heaven.” Being cleansed becomes the priority. Lesson–learning and self–improvement? Optional. 

So it is that many Christians see in the doctrine of absolution a get–out–of–jail–free card. Some even turn it into a sin–now–pay–later plan. (I submit Exhibit A: “Don’t get me wrong,” I said, “I’m enjoying this, but I know your church’s rules well enough to know we’re breaking them. How do you deal with that?” “No problem,” she replied, “I’ll just confess and be forgiven.”) Some even build future repentance into their game plan. (I submit Exhibit B: “I know it would be wrong, but I can always repent.”)

It’s a marvelously exploitable loophole, and no one exploits it more adeptly than Christians.***
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* Ew.
** I know, I know: some not all.
*** Once again, I know, I know: some not all.