All posts by James Pyles

James Pyles is a published Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror author as well as the Technical Writer for a large, diversified business in the Northwest. He currently has over 30 short stories published in various anthologies and periodicals and has just sold his first novella. He won the 2021 Helicon Short Story Award for his science fiction tale "The Three Billion Year Love" which appears in the Tuscany Bay Press Planetary Anthology "Mars."

AOC, GQ Magazine, and the Progressive’s View of Masculinity

GQ
The cover of the September 2022 issue of GQ Magazine

I don’t really like to get political here, but of the various venues I have access to, this one is the most appropriate. If this isn’t your thing, skip to the next blog post.

Today, I found out that NY Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez appeared on the cover of GQ Magazine. I know, baffling, right?

Supposedly, GQ (Gentlemen’s Quarterly) reports on men’s fashion, style, grooming, fitness, and so forth. It was first launched in 1931, so it has a long history. In 1996, it started naming it’s “Men of the Year” which includes notables such as Mel Gibson, George Clooney, Michael Jordan, and Jerry Seinfeld.

This was a space generally by men and for men, but in our increasingly progressive world, men are not particularly supported or deemed worthy of having a “men space.” I mean, look at the Boy Scouts of America which now must admit girls.

The “misogyny” accusations tend to be the reason for these things. In a world where boys and men have become a bad taste in progressive mouths and any masculinity is “toxic masculinity,” small wonder that many homes are fatherless and boys are becoming more and more disenfranchised.

Continue reading AOC, GQ Magazine, and the Progressive’s View of Masculinity

Evil Christians and their “Sky Daddy”

meme
Meme found on the internet.

I see a lot of memes on social media that not only ridicule the Church as unless but actually say Christians are evil.

I suppose the “useless” part comes in when believers pray to their “sky daddy” rather than “follow the science.” After all, if a Christian were sick, they’d go to the doctor like any atheist and humanist. Of course they would. They would also pray, which I’m sure baffles many folks.

As an aside, faith and science are not mutually exclusive. That’s a pretty blatant myth. Some of the greatest names in science were and are Christians.

I’m not going to attempt to defend the practice of prayer. It would fall on deaf ears. I will however say that the Church isn’t just a self-perpetuating system that isolates itself from reality except on those moments when it can destroy people’s lives by being pro-life.

As another aside, I won’t pretend there aren’t bad people who hide behind the label “Christian,” nor will I say there aren’t greedy Pastors and bloated churches that love money more than God. I abhor them and everything they stand for. But you won’t find the faithful on television or in the news. Faith and doing good are often anonymous.

Continue reading Evil Christians and their “Sky Daddy”

Does the Bible Stay Out of the Constitution? Should It?

rights
Getty Images / found at cnn.com/2013/10/31/us/u-s-constitution-fast-facts/index.html

‘Now when you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap to the very edges of your field, nor shall you gather the gleanings of your harvest. And you shall not glean your vineyard, nor shall you gather the fallen grapes of your vineyard; you shall leave them for the needy and for the stranger. I am the Lord your God.

‘You shall not steal, nor deal falsely, nor lie to one another. And you shall not swear falsely by My name, so as to profane the name of your God; I am the Lord.

‘You shall not oppress your neighbor, nor rob him. The wages of a hired worker are not to remain with you all night until morning. You shall not curse a person who is deaf, nor put a stumbling block before a person who is blind, but you shall revere your God; I am the Lord.

‘You shall not do injustice in judgment; you shall not show partiality to the poor nor give preference to the great, but you are to judge your neighbor fairly. You shall not go about as a slanderer among your people; and you are not to jeopardize the life of your neighbor. I am the Lord.

‘You shall not hate your fellow countryman in your heart; you may certainly rebuke your neighbor, but you are not to incur sin because of him. You shall not take vengeance, nor hold any grudge against the sons of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself; I am the Lord.

Leviticus 19:9-18 (NASB)

Believe it or not, the Pastor at the little Lutheran church I take my elderly Mom to actually preached on this one today. He did compare Leviticus to a road in the desert, not being particularly interesting or worthwhile, which I didn’t appreciate, but then Christian Pastors don’t really study Torah.

Continue reading Does the Bible Stay Out of the Constitution? Should It?

The Irony of Sex Strikes

sex strike
© AP Photo / Yuki Iwamura

I thought I was done with this topic, but Dennis Prager’s June 28th article Supreme Court Decision May Force Young Women to Confront Sexual Reality sparked further interest.

But first, some background on what’s been called abstinence-based sex education. As the name suggests, these are programs in public schools, funded by the federal government in some cases, where the primary message to teens is that they are better off not engaging in sexual behaviors at all until they are married and ready to have children of their own.

Of course, these programs have been universally maligned:

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Beating Guns Into Plowshares

gun show
Houston Gun show at the George R. Brown Convention Center. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.

“And they will beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning knives.” –Isaiah 2:4 (NASB)

I realize that after my three previous blog posts, all dealing with abortion and the Supreme Court’s recent overturning of Roe v Wade, some people might say “You support saving babies in the womb but what about kids in school?”

It’s a common comparison and one that cannot be ignored. With the recent murder of 19 school children and 2 teachers at Robb Elementary in Uvalde, Texas, once again everyone’s attention is turned to gun control and what could have been done to prevent this tragedy.

There is also a refrain from Leftist politics that suggests Republicans and Christians (the two are almost always lumped together) are complicit in such deaths as long as they/we (I’m a believer but not a Republican) uphold the second amendment or, to quote former President Barack Obama, “…cling to guns or religion…”

Is it true that all American Christians “cling” to our pro-life values only up until a child is born and then “cling” to our love of firearms thereafter, leaving school children and other innocents at risk?

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Marketing the Billion Dollar Abortion Industry to America

human
NBC News’ Julie Ainsley spoke with a woman who was 9-months pregnant that called the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe V. Wade “horrible” and said she doesn’t know how to protect her unborn child if they won’t “have the options that they need to make bodily choices.”

This is a long blog post and no doubt the least popular of the lot I’ve been writing lately. I didn’t intend for this to be a series, but after continuing to read pro-abortion arguments based mainly in emotion, misconception, and even prejudice, I felt the record needed to be set straight.

For reference, my first two articles in this series are On the Overturning of Roe vs. Wade and The Basics of a Woman’s “Constitutional Right to Abortion”.

Before getting into the main topic, I want to make a few points. First of all, according to National Right to Life (PDF), between 1973 and 2019, a grand total of 63,459,781 abortions were performed. Barring twin and triplet pregnancies, that means 63,459,781 human lives were ended in their mothers’ wombs. For comparison, between 40 million and 50 million people died in all of World War Two. During the Vietnam War: as many as 2,000,000 civilians on both sides and some 1,100,000 North Vietnamese and Viet Cong fighters died. The U.S. military has estimated that between 200,000 and 250,000 South Vietnamese soldiers died.

63,459,781 lives and that’s only up until three years ago. Let that sink in.

Continue reading Marketing the Billion Dollar Abortion Industry to America