In the Nes: Imus the Idiot

tThe recent controvesy about racist remarks that Don Imus made about the Rutgers University women's basketball team are so distressing for so many reasons. Here ar a few tht I can come up with, eary in the morning before spoeeding off to work:

1. Think what you will about college basketball and sporta in general, the members of the team have worked hard for years to achiveve the honor of winning the championship. Little did they know that their achievememt would be besmirched by a fool with a big mouth.
   
2. With a single misplacved comment, Don Imus shifted the attention away from peole who actually accomplished something difficult, to himself.
3. Add to the fact that again a white man is reaping he attention deserved by blacks.
4. Add to the fact that MSNBC is backed into a financial box by this incident. They can and should fire Imus. That would be the fate that any of the rest of us would suffer for making this kind of remark. But if they cut Imus loose, he just gets poicked up by someone else. When it's a contest between principle and the almoghty dollar, principle loses.
5. Add to thr fact that Imus's "apology" on Al Sharpton's radio show was combative and belligerent. Kind of a "how dare you call me a raciost" kind of aplogy. Imus claims that "he is not a bad person, but a good person who did a bad thing." If Jesus called a women's basketball team a bunch of that would be a good person saying a bad tbning. But Imus is no Jesus. He is not a good person, but a person who is good and bad. To deny his own sinfulness and proposensity for evil is a sign of his moral blindness.

We have all probably thought and even said things that were cruel, unwise, racist, homophobic or misanthropic in one sense or another. These things are not accidents. They come from deep within us, in a place that fears the stranger and the unfamiliar. Some of us are very good at hiding these dark impulses. But no human being can say that he or she is without them. They can be managed but they cannot be eradicated.

For Imus to say that his ciomments come from a pure heart is nonsense. No one's heart is pure. For MSNBC to allow him to go on is to sanction the idiot cult of name-calling and immaturity that has taken the place of public debate. For news outlets to repeat the racist insult is simply to teach it to a new generation of kids and to paradoxically increase Imus's popularity among thr empty-headed testosterone-soaked fools that make up his audience is inexcusable, bad sadly, quite typical.

What a sorry mess we have made of our media.

The other side of Chocolate Jesus

OK, so I found mysself reconsidering the last post. Art, if it does what it is supposed to, draws the viewer or listener in to see/hear with new eyes/ears.

So, what could CJ (Chocolate Jesus) have to say? What associations does he make or imply? First, consider chocolate -- it is smooth, sweet, addictive, nourishing. What connections, then, to Jesus? Well, could believers use Jesus like some use chocolate? Is Jesus a way to smooth out our troubled minds, sweeten a life lived in bitterness, our daily fix that helps us make it through another day, food for our souls? Is our Jesus prepackaged and mass-marketed, like a candy bar?

What about the artist who sculpted CJ? Can a man who works so hard on something -- even if it is meant as a joke -- fail to find an attachment to his work? I myself once had the experience of setting out to write a song that was a parody of religious extremism, only to find that I had penned a still-moving ode to the Good Shepherd.

To what use would the sculpture be put? Would it be slavered over by the pruriently-inclined who are titillated by hsi anatomical correctness? Would it be gorged on by the gluttonous? Would it be hacked apart by a gleeful mob?

Or would it be hung in a quiet space to invite contemplation?

Most of my rethinking came when I searched the web for an image of the sculpture. I came across many instances of art that was intended as disrespectful -- not usually of Christ, but of his more fervent advocates. Consider Tom Waitt's song, "Chocolate Jesus." Or bobble-head Jesus. Or the "Jesus of the Week" website? CJ has nothing on these bits of sacrilege.

On a Friday in the ancient world, a man was beaten, stripped and hung to die to the delight of his enemies. That death has been rendered in oil, pastel, charcoal, acetate, wood, marble, hymn, chant, rock and now chocolate. As I gaze upon the placid face of this man, now rendered in earthy tones of a beloved food, I may contemplate this man, who gave himself as food for the ages, and who feeds us still.

Regardless of what the artist may have intended.

Just in time for Easter: Nude, Chocolate Jesus!

When I was in hgh school -- I swear I am not making this up -- I visited a candy warehouse (to pick up supplies for the macrhing band's candy concession) and saw a boxed, chocolate crucifix. Not just a choco-cross like you can still find today, but the entire crucifix, Corpus and all. I wonder how the little children felt, gnawing on the head of the Savior?

O Sacred Head Surrounded by chocolate, milky and sweet...


Anyway, that once made for a nice, if semi-sacrilegious story. But now, an artist has made a real chocolate crucified Jesus, but has raised the ante by leavng off his loin cloth. The display, called "My Sweet Lord" was being shown in the Lab Gallery in Manhattan. Until, that is, the posse rode into town and closed it down.


Outraged Catholics included local bishop, Cardinal Egan, loudmouth Catholic apologist Bill Donovan of the Catholic League, and some really ticked of holy folk who phoned in death threats, for crying out loud. I hope they enjoy the warm feeling they get whe the attend church on Good Friday. It might be a foretast of things to come.

But I have to wonder what it is about artists who insist on stepping on religious sensibilities. Calling the display "My Sweet Lord" does gve the impression that the artist was making naughty with the Crucifixion -- and right before Easter to boot. And please don't hide beind the "fact" that Jesus was crucified naked, though this view is gaining currency. It's getting as common as the oither crucifixion "fact" that Jesus was nailed through the wrists -- al becuase that's what the Shroud of Turin seems to show. Of course, if the SHroud;s dating is correct, it comes from the Middle Ages, making its details irrelevant to the study of1st century crucifixion techniques.

By the way, our prudish American press cannot bring itself to show the entire image. We see semi-frontal and back images, but not the entire image fro the front. If you must see it, and I did, here is a link to the image.

Not that you'll see it here either.

The image seems not to say much about Jesus or crucifixion. There are no nails, no crown ofthorns, no cross, no agony, no glory and no hair. It is however a way to get a sculpture of a naked man into the public space. Its medium brings to mind connotations that are less than serious -- eating, candy, melts in your mouth, etc., and connects them to somehing holy. Lets see, says nothing and offends much. What is the point other than to scandalize the easily-offended?