She's Right, Unfortunately

I post the following piece here for several reasons.  First let me say that I don't do it for sensationalism, and I don't like doing it to "harsh your mellow."  But Ann points out that we need to be aware of what's really going on out there.  You can't fight against evil if you don't understand it.  Nothing makes it easier for evil to advance upon you than to think, "I've got nothing to do with that."

I copied and pasted all of Miss Barnhardt's post here, because as she admits, her blog doesn't allow for permalink.  That's why she encourages people to share anything and everything from her blog.

I have taken some heat for being judgmental when it comes to commenting on the stuff they call "rap."  But I was vindicated when some black friends of mine admitted that rap and BET (Black Entertainment Television) was doing incredible harm to the black community.

ON THE RAP/HIP-HOP CULTURE (PART 1) REPOST

POSTED BY ANN BARNHARDT - MAY 10, AD 2011 9:20 PM MST

The reposting of this essay inspired by Michelle Obama inviting a "rapper" to perform at a "poetry" event at the White House. The rapper, Common, is a filth monger very similar to the rapper cited below, L'il Wayne.Hey Michelle, your taste in music is despicable and you need to keep your filthy, degenerate rap-trash friends out of the People's House. And don't you dare tell me that I simply don't understand "your culture". I understand "your culture" completely. It is rotten to the bone and satanic to the core. The race card has been officially maxed-out, Michelle. You have cowed good, decent people of all colors and races in this country for decades into tolerating filth and evil in our culture. But that era is over now, Hon. We have had enough, and WE WILL NOT BE COWED AND INTIMIDATED ANY LONGER. We are here, we never left, and we are mad as hell, so you and your filth-peddling friends better step back. And take your Godforsaken rap noise back to the gutter where it belongs.Love,
Ann
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"Sometimes the first duty of intelligent men is the restatement of the obvious."
"Speaking the Truth in times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act."
--George Orwell
I'm making this post because I suspect that most of the people who read this blog have absolutely no idea how bad the rap/hip-hop culture has become. From what I can tell about my readership, I'm guessing that the average reader is white, male, rural, over 50, and, apparently, retired from the United States Air Force. What up, flyboys.
First, I want to show you a couple of videos of contemporary, popular, chart-topping rap/hip-hop. I was a kid when rap first started and the popular acts were Run DMC and MC Hammer. Rap was simply rythmic speech laid over a simple beat track. It was crude in the sense that it was lyrically stupid and lazy, and did not contain any intrinsic beauty. The lyrics were often shouted and/or grunted, and if there was more than one voice, the combination of shouting voices produced sonic dissonance. I think that we all made the mistake of dismissing it as a fad, thinking that something with no intelligence or beauty could persist. It wasn't a fad. It was the beginning of a cancerous evil. If you are like me and have not really listened to any rap music in 20+ years, you need to listen to these videos so that you can understand the level of sheer evil that we are now dealing with.
CONTENT WARNING. These videos are EXTREMELY graphic. There are no images - I refuse to post the "music videos" because they are pornography, and even in the interests of education and intelligence gathering, I just can't do it. These videos are simply the text of the lyrics, because most of us couldn't understand what was being said without the lyrics printed. But believe me, the children who are listening to this garbage read the lyrics and know every word by heart - so we need to know too. The language is extremely profane and sexually graphic. It could certainly be characterized as verbal pornography. If you feel that you can't handle such things, DON'T WATCH. And for goodness sake, make sure there are no children within earshot. Finally, as you are watching these videos, understand that this is actually MILD. This rapper, "Lil Wayne", is a very mainstream, popular rapper. This is the kind of stuff that gets played on the radio and makes the Billboard charts. This is the "bubblegum" category of rap/hip-hop. Obama has stated publicly that he is a fan of this guy and has him on his iPod. (That in and of itself should be grounds for impeachment.) But there are additional levels of fouler, more pornographic, more "hard core" rap. Remember that. The first rap is called "Gonorrhea" and the second is called "I Am Not Human"

I didn't embed the video/audio for that stuff because it is too vile. If you want to sample it you can go to Ann Barnhardt's blog and play them from there.  If you are coming to this blog late.  You will need to index it to May 10, 2011.

Here is part 2:

ON THE RAP/HIP-HOP CULTURE (PART 2) REPOST

POSTED BY ANN BARNHARDT - MAY 10, AD 2011 8:56 PM MST

What you just heard was pure evil. What you just heard must be fought against and, with God's help, exterminated from the face of the earth. What you just heard contains absolutely no beauty, goodness or truth - only ugliness, sin and lies. It has no redeeming qualities, and can do nothing but damage and corrupt those who listen to it. What you just heard is a clear and present manifestation of satan running free in the land. The rapper's voice sounds demonic. The beat and sonic accompaniment sounds demonic and hellish. And where to begin with the lyrics? Every single sentence is either talking about horrific sexual objectification, murder, extreme pride (braggadocio) or extreme materialism. There are also several instances of blasphemy, wherein the rapper calls himself "god" and remarks about women kneeling before him (performing a sex act) as if they were in church.This is the mainstream, contemporary rap/hip-hop culture in the United States. The vast, vast majority of black Americans under the age of 50 listen to rap/hip-hop like this on a regular basis, and many other people of all races listen to it too. How do I know? Because this "Lil Wayne" person, and scores of others like him are eight and nine-figure millionaires. His product is being consumed at a massive rate.
Why does this matter? Because the evil twin towers of rap/hip-hop and government welfare are destroying the black culture, and by extension and spillover the broad culture, and by extension the broad economy, and by extension western civilization. Don't think for a second that this filth has no effect on you on your ranch in rural Nebraska. Let's think this through.
Over the past 30 years, rap/hip-hop culture has conditioned many black Americans (and others as well) to actively disdain education, work, honesty, integrity, personal responsibility, generosity, humility, marriage, fatherhood and human life. If you think I'm making generalizations, GO BACK AND WATCH THE VIDEOS AGAIN. Young black boys and men grow up believing that the only worthwhile endeavors are basketball and/or football, dealing drugs or rapping. They are taught materialism on a level never before seen in human history. Bentleys. Multi-million dollar mansions. Gold and diamond capped teeth. Gold and diamond- crusted jewelery. Any job or vocation that yields less than the exorbitant wealth showered upon rappers, drug dealers or professional athletes is rejected in favor of a life of complete sloth subsidized by the welfare state.
They are taught that sex is a perverse contact sport consisting of merely slapping pieces of human meat together in various ways in order to achieve orgasm. The black family in the United States has almost completely disappeared. Illegitimacy rates in the cities are now in excess of 90%. Most urban black youth have never, ever heard or been taught that sex is limited to marriage. Let me say that again: most urban black youth have NO IDEA that sex is limited to marriage. Most urban black youth have little or no personal contact with marriage or even monogamy. The concept of a father being present in a household is completely foreign. And just today it was reported that in New York City, 41% of all pregnancies end in abortion. Among blacks in NYC, the figure is a jaw- dropping 60%.

They are taught that drug use is desireable and normal, and that drug trafficking is just a means of making easy money.
As a result of all of this, in combination with labor unions and a general rejection of Judeo-Christian morality by all people, we are now staring down the barrel of a total societal and economic collapse as engineered and executed by Marxist elites over the past 50 years. The welfare and entitlement state has reached critical mass. The entire system is about to implode, and it will take ALL OF US with it. Because our culture has been reduced to an animalistic self-absorption, this collapse will not be like the Great Depression. Men will not take any job they can find to support their family - because men stopped supporting their families decades ago. Men will not take any job they can find in order to feed themselves, because men have been conditioned to believe that honest work is for "suckas".


At this point, some of you reading this may already be feeling very uncomfortable with what I have just said. You may be thinking me "racist" and "bigoted". Of course you are. You have been conditioned your whole life to have that reaction. Did you watch the Evan Sayet video posted last Sunday? (Posted Below) What did Sayet say? We have been conditioned to believe that any statement of truth, rooted in direct observation and objective evidence MUST be "bigoted". We have been conditioned to believe that anything that discerns between two or more options, and determines that one option is superior or inferior to any other option is an act of evil, which is named "discrimination". We have been conditioned to believe that the only morally acceptable stance on anything is complete indiscrimination - in other words, ANYTHING GOES. According to our culture, if I watch the videos above and discern with my powers of observation, reason, intellect and transcendent universal morality (called the Natural Law) that they are, without a doubt evil, then the problem is with ME. I am the evil that must be eliminated. I am the stumbling block to a utopian culture. If I would just sit down and shut up and embrace evil, then there would be no conflict in the world. By engaging in rational thought, I am perpetrating a hate crime. The only way for me to be a "good person" in this world is for me to utterly abandon Reason and Truth. And as I have stated many, many times on this blog, Reason and Truth are a Person, and His Name is Jesus Christ. Oh, yes. Satan is most assuredly afoot in the land.
If you are still feeling latent guilt about criticizing the rap/hip-hop culture, I would invite you to simply defend it. Go back to the two videos above and find me ONE example of virtue, goodness, selflessness, generosity, humility or LOVE. Go ahead. DEFEND IT. Defend pure satanic evil. Tell me about "diversity", "cultural differences", "artistic license" and "tolerance" whilst defending and justifying this:
"Diva in the room, she blowin me just like a band horn / Got her on her knees, the same knees that she be prayin on."
Tell me who the racist is: me, or a man who proclaims, "I am not human." My God, what more do you need? What more is there? Satan has these people denying their own humanity. I'm trying to reassert and proclaim the humanity and infinite dignity of Lil Wayne and everyone who listens to him. Lil Wayne IS A HUMAN, made in the image of God. God made the universe so that He could create and love Lil Wayne. Christ went to the Cross with Lil Wayne's face in His mind, and "Wayne" on His lips. Yeah. Jesus that hateful bigot

There is a part three, and if you feel so inclined, you may go there. Same link as provided above.  I check on Ann's blog from time to time because she does have gems like this.  She is a very die hard Roman Catholic, which is why I don't have her blogrolled.  It is hard enough getting people to understand the importance of Scripture being the only and final authority on matters of faith, so I can't endorse her for regular reading.  But where she brings such important and worthwhile stuff to the blogosphere, I have to applaud her.

And You're OK With That?

"God told the Israelites to destroy all traces of these false religious practices from among them. He said if they did not, they would be ensnared and destroyed by them. God was right! Somehow these things have made their way into the Church and the lives of Christians.  What does this all have to do with Easter?
Well, another set of local Babylonian names included Tummuz and Ishtar. These are Assyrian names for Nimrod and Semiramus.  Does the name Ishtar sound like Easter? Well it should. It is the same. The death and "resurrection" of these false gods was celebrated annually in the spring. The celebration included coloring eggs, an ancient symbol of fertility. The ancients even hid eggs for children to find. Rabbits, known for their prolific reproduction, also became part of the pagan celebration."  -- Resurrection Sunday and the Babylonian Connection; By Errol Hale

"The term 'Easter' is not of Christian origin.  It is another form of Astarte, one of the titles of the Chaldean (Babylonian) goddess.... the pagan festival of 'Easter'... was introduced into the apostate Western religion, as part of the attempt to adapt pagan festivals to Christianity"  - Vine's Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words (1985, p. 192, "Easter").

Easter - "In Babylonia Ishtar was identified with Venus. Like Venus,  Ishtar was the goddess of erotic love and fertility. Her chief seat of worship was Uruk (Erech), where prostitution was practiced in her name and she was served with immoral rites by bands of men and women."
- The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, 1979, Volume 1, pages 319-320

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I had pondered for days about what I might post on during passover.  I wanted to be upbeat and positive.  Actually, I feel pretty good and my mood is happy.  Maybe that's why I can and should post this information right now.

A trip into town brings with it the confrontation of many things Easter.  I look back over my life, and I am appalled that for so long I was deceived.  Worse than that, I grieve over the years I spent purposefully deluding myself into another, even worse lie, that it was about what meaning "I" gave something.  Well, well, well.  Wasn't I just full of myself.  God forgive me.

Twyla and I remind each other on a regular basis that we all suffer from ignorance of some sort.  God will not hold us accountable for not knowing about some truth to which we have never been exposed.  However, once we've been informed and given a chance to investigate, pleading ignorance, or worse yet, willfully disobeying God is going to cost us.  I pray that people wake up from that before it is too late.

I am sure beyond sure that the Creator wants to commune with the only creature that He created in His own image, yet it is in our nature to be rebellious.  Even those who claim allegiance to the God of the Bible, still look for ways to have what they want in spite of the commands.  We cause ourselves to become separated and distant from the God who loves us when we choose to let "things" come between us.  Why do we insist on thinking that a Holy God will bless us while we do the very things that He tells us not to?

Then there is the laziness factor.  Some of us discover that there are things that the "Church" does and teaches that just flat out don't agree with Scripture, and we just let it slide, or ride, or glide.  We don't want to rock the boat.  After all, it's just a little thing, right?  What does it matter in the big scheme of things?  And please, please, please let's not get bogged down in that dreaded legalism.  Now there is a concept I can't seem to find explicitly stated in Scripture.  The fact is that false ideas, false doctrine and false practice can become so ingrained in groups and organizations and it's just easier to go along to get along.  In the spiritual world there are seldom immediate consequences for our actions.  God often lets things go on for hundreds of years without doing or saying anything and so people get lulled into a sense of "it must not be that important."  Then the clock runs out and we are suddenly shocked when the consequences do hit, and then like little children we scream, "It's not fair!  I didn't know!"

It is difficult to feel isolated for taking a stand.  Choosing to seek after God and obedience to His Word can make for feelings of loneliness.  I am far more blessed than many others in that I have a wife who truly seeks after God as I do and there is very little we disagree on.  I think this stems from our commitment to surrender to what the Word actually says as opposed to what we want it to say.  We have each other to lean on when it seems that we are the only ones swimming upstream.  And we sometimes stop and ask, "Are we crazy?  Could it be that we aren't understanding this right?"

Do I have all the answers?  Not if I lived to be a thousand years old.  But I know that I know what I know.  When I was younger, I was satisfied with searching only until I found the answer that satisfied me.  As I have matured and the longing in my soul to know God more has increased, I've discovered that approach just doesn't work any more.  Now it is a matter of asking, "What is the truth whether I like it or not?"  and "How can I be sure that this is true?  Have I exhausted all the possibilities?"  "What is in my human, fallible nature, that could make me buy into a lie and miss the truth?"

There is probably no greater influence on human behavior than the desire for approval from other humans.  This is why Yeshua told His disciples that they would have to be willing to hate even the immediate members of their families when it came to choosing between Himself and the world.

"He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me, and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me."  -- Matthew 10:37,38

I used to think I could just take that as hyperbole, but the closer I get to God the more I find myself having to choose.  Do I want the approval of men or the approval of God?  Sometimes you can have both, and it's great when that happens, but that keeps proving more and more to be the exception rather than the rule.

I heard the pastor of Passion For Truth Ministries teaching about the idolotrous, blasphemous pagan roots of Easter and Christmas.  He heard this one phrase repeated over and over in response to the truth that he was exposing.  God forgive me that I once probably used these same words or something very close in effect.

"But that's not what it means to me."

Wow.  What an arrogant, rebellious and blasphemous response.  It isn't about me.  Where do I get off deciding that I get to assign the meaning to something in the public domain?  If you really think that works, get yourself a Nazi swastika tee shirt and wear it around town, and when people start jeering you or asking you what you think you are doing, just explain to them that it means something else to you.  If you are white, take a little trip into a predominantly black neighborhood and start greeting people with "Hey Nigger, what's up?"  and if you survive the first beating, try explaining that you meant it the way Chris Rock or Fiddy Cent means it.  Let me know how that works out for you.

If you want to argue back that it's not just you, but the whole "Church" that gives Easter its meaning, I must ask you this:  Since when did the church start dictating to God what the meaning of anything is?  Is that our standard?  The people who make up the body can now democratically decide what everything means?  I guess that would explain why we have a thousand denominations and nobody can agree on this Christianity stuff.  Somewhere along the line we got the idea that following God was a democratic process.

Father, help me to take You at Your Word.  Help me to live out ALL of Your Word and not try to bend it to my own agenda.  Help me to recognize the chametz (leaven) that seeks to creep in and permeate the bread of life.

Chag Sameach (Happy Holiday)  Passover began this Monday, the 18th at sundown.  Many blessings to all of you who celebrate God's appointed feasts according to His calendar.

Shalom.