Comments on: Ofcom’s new Broadcasting Code enshrines freedom of expression

By: Christopher Shell

Christopher Shell — Wed, 01 Jun 2005 17:15:54 +0000

Of course I work for them! But I work in their bookshop and sometimes have not a lot of idea of what goes on in the church.

By: tom p

tom p — Wed, 01 Jun 2005 16:49:38 +0000

so you don’t work for them then?

By: Christopher Shell

Christopher Shell — Wed, 01 Jun 2005 09:49:35 +0000

Tom, really! I didnt say that at all. I said something like I scarcely ever attended services: last time was Feb 27th, before that it was a brilliant Bollywood-style event on 7th November. I would have loved to go to the 40th anniversary on 5th May but owing to family illness/injury it wasnt possible.

My lack of awareness is illustrated by a telling anecdote: about 5 months ago KT pulled out of something called the G12 network, which was in fact the main thing about the church. But I didnt cotton on to this until 2 weeks ago.

On second thoughts, this anecdote only illustrates that Im always the last to know about things….

By: tom p

tom p — Wed, 01 Jun 2005 09:41:03 +0000

So you work for them?
That’s interesting, ‘cos when first asked about this, you said you’d no idea when you’d last been there, and have since claimed to have only ever been loosely affiliated with them.
Or did you forget the detail in the rush to sarcasm?

By: Christopher Shell

Christopher Shell — Wed, 01 Jun 2005 09:09:18 +0000

Sherlock, I bow to your genius!

By: humanist

humanist — Wed, 01 Jun 2005 08:59:04 +0000

Dear Christopher,

would you happen to be the Dr Christopher Shell who works for the Kensington Temple London City Church (kt.org)?

Just asking…

By: Christopher Shell

Christopher Shell — Fri, 27 May 2005 15:34:30 +0000

Re the domestic issue: people gradually easing away from their parents and towards the day when they will be in charge of tehir own household is not a big deal. What is a big deal is the general move away from family, so that there can be an interim period where the person is a member of no particular family at all. This is a pattern conducive to various negative things including lack of responsibility: family membership is more likely to ensure accountability, social health, rough edges knocked off, lack of loneliness, and so on and so forth.

By: Christopher Shell

Christopher Shell — Thu, 26 May 2005 09:36:59 +0000

(1) On female friends I agree with you. Friendship is an all-win situation and a bit of a [genuine] cure-all. The exclusivity point applies to husband-wife.
(2) I feel your second point is long on rhetoric and short on evidence. All that counts is the stats. A society that sets less exclusive store by the marriage bond ends up (as night follows day) with all sorts of problems of the kind created by instability. How do you explain the statistical change in British relationship patterns? Are you saying it does not support my point of view?
(3) I dont think I spoke of forcing women (as opposed to men) to be chaste. This is something that applies equally to both genders. In fact, parents and teachers (or good parents and teachers anyway) are equally strict about all sorts of other things as well, becasue they have sufficient perspective to see which things are in ppl’s long-term good. Ppl are expected to put in all sorts of effort to purchase a house. Therefore they do. The key factor is societal/familial expectation.
(4) I think you are playing down the extremely mainstream male desire for virgins. It aint exactly unnatural, in any case.
(5) Women’s desire can be ascertained by talking to women, surveying women etc..
(6) Im glad for you and your wife (apart from the slightly uncaring attitude implied: homage to Queen’s ‘Nothing really matters’, which is about as bad a philosophy as one can get). A positive focus on the present is all to the good. But on average, ppl with previous relationships are more likely to split up – in fact, far more likely. And societies where this is normal have higher separation and divorce rates – again, as night follows day. It could scarcely be otherwise.
(7) Re domicile: ‘utter utter nonsense’ is not an argument. What people view positively and negatively depends in large measure on what happens to be normal in their own society at their own point in history.

By: tom p

tom p — Thu, 26 May 2005 08:47:16 +0000

Firstly, you seem to be conflating frieship with relationships (in the boyfriend/girlfriend or husband/wife sense). I have scores of female friends. Should I be exclusive to just one of them? Is my friendship with many women harmful to my marriage? Does it harm society? On all three counts the answer is a resounding NO!
Secondly, your point about sex is total and utter bollocks. Having no experience means that people settle for whatever they’re given and thus are more likely to be unfulfilled. It does not mean that such a relationship is more likely to be stable or long lasting.
The societies which try to force women to be chaste are societies where women have a lesser place than men. I was only talking about the western world, where abstinence was rammed down our throats by the christians, but you’re right, religious types and repressive bastards all over the world have tried to metaphorically tie women down for centuries.
A virgin is not a ‘normal man’s desire’ as you put it. It is a controlling man’s desire, a man who wants his women not to be too strong and to yield to his will. Virgins are almost always rubbish fucks, ‘cos they don’t know what they want or how to be sexually satisfied.
Still, at least we know whatgets you off now.
How can you speak of a woman’s desire? How much do you know of this? If you are playing by your own rules, then you can know of at most one woman’s desire. That leaves you another 3 billion or so short. While, as has already been discussed, it is obviously better to be a person of integrity, that does not have to be acheived, in a sexual sense, by abstinence even from kissing(!), it is best acheived by honesty. My wife and I are well aware of each others’ entire pasts, and don’t give a damn about them. If anything, I’m glad that she knows what she wants, and she’s glad that I know how to give it to her.
As for your last comment about either belongiong in one’s parents’ house or one’s spouse’s, that’s utter utter nonsense. To claim that one ‘cant put [a period of irresponsibility] behind one later is twaddle. Are you inferring that across the land people are wracked with guilt about how they used to stay up late, eat kebabs and, if they got lucky, sleep around? You’re living in a dream world.
Finally, quoting the beatles doesn’t really help your argument. They also sung ‘we all live in a yellow submarine’, but I don’t see any water outside my window.

By: Christopher Shell

Christopher Shell — Wed, 25 May 2005 18:13:44 +0000

???
How does one define repression? Refusing to go for anything in a skirt is to an extent repression. But it is also healthy & civilised. And some of the most mature & emotionally healthy ppl one will meet are ‘repressed’, in the sense that they have boundaries.
Re: the friendship point: The more exclusive, and the more full of integrity, relationships are, the more stable they are (by definition). The more stable they are, the more stable society will be. If people have past relationships, any future relationship will not be exclusive. The bond will therefore be less strong. Divorce or separation will be more likely. The societal instability that goes with divorce, separation and fractured families will be another by-product. Ppl could not seriously argue that these things have not been the case with our society. So nothing controversial here.

What Im not talking about is what has actually happened historically. History has many phases, and doesnt go in a straight line anyway. For a while, one side ‘wins’, then another, then a third, and so on. But the question of which ‘side’ ‘wins’ (if one has to view things in that competitive way) is in any case a different question from the question of which side is statistically justified. Points of view can win because (for example) people with short-term appetites vote with their feet. You’re not suggesting that that would make the point of view in question necessarily justifiable or right.

Re: virginity: It’s a common thing in many societies for virgins to marry – this is not an especially Christian thing. What are the factors here?
(1) A virgin is a normal man’s desire: common sense therefore to have a system which standardises this.
(2) A man of integrity is a woman’s desire, and no woman likes to think of her man getting up to anything with another woman. Kissing is bad enough to think of, so how bad is sex?
(3) The domestic factor: Either one belongs in one’s parents’ house or in the house shared with one’s spouse. Societies which have an interim period tend to be less stable (because they are almost sanctioning a period of irresponsibility, which can’t simply be put behind one later), and anyway this is a much less cost-effective system for any individual, as well as splintering families into an unnecessarily large number of households. Homes get built not because the population is increasing much but because there are so many households that consist of one person. As the Beatles sang: ‘Ah, look at all the lonely people’.
In societies where this is the norm, it tends often actually to happen. Why? Because the number one factor in behaviour is what ppl perceive to be normal.