‘What is irrefutably true are the prices associated with dressing little girls. In Gale’s shop the dresses range in price from €200 to €600, the gloves cost €10, the tights another €8. Veils start at €25, although one with added sparkles costs €50, while handbags are €70. And then there are the shoes – handmade and Italian, and costing between €100 and €150.’
Round my way the bouncy castle van has been busy, as has every independent hairdresser and photographer. The parties have been loud and drink fueled and my gawd, have you seen some of the transportation?
Holy Communion season is upon us, see? When the secular parents of Ireland marry off tiny children to an institute most of them no longer participate in and have no real theological adherence to.
The Times have a big piece on the financial cost of kitting out your daughter for the ‘big day’. 500 euros, seems to be about average. Yep, 500 euros to buy a white frock and brolly and lace gloves, you know the practical stuff a child of seven can get good use out of.
There is no reason on this earthly plain why children making their holy communion cannot do so in their school uniform, or of there is no uniform, normal clothing. This virginal white lark is just that, a lark, and practical and expensive to boot. Personally my views on holy communions have much changed over the years. I used to think it was a harmless ceremony and a day out. Now are much like my views on circumcision and baptism, if a child is too young to understand what you’re signing them up for then maybe you ought not to do so, let them decide for themselves when they’re a bit older.
But of course that fucking annoys people who thing you’re being a smart arse because you once read The God Delusion and think you’re being clever. It’s isn’t, I genuinely do believe that religion might better be served if people were not plastic followers and thought honestly about what exactly their faith truly meant to them- if anything. If folk made holy communion about the church, then maybe the credit unions wouldn’t have been shelling out so much money for the the loans required to cover small children in bits of lace and whit shiny satin.
Underage brides of the CC, I find this morning I am against your clobber.
May 19, 2009 at 10:49 am |
I think you’re overlooking the awesomeness of bouncy castles. Especially when the kids have gone to bed and you can bounce around drunkenly and then get stabbed to death and …
…oh.
May 19, 2009 at 10:53 am |
I agree with Bouncy Castles and feel every home should have one. I can think of nothing better than bouncing up and down and up and down and up and down after copious amounds of rum.
May 19, 2009 at 10:53 am |
Hmm, wasn’t there a chap stabbed to death this week at a HC party? A polish man?
May 19, 2009 at 11:06 am |
i tip my hat to anyone who has managed to actually finish The God Delusion. 463 pages of stating the apparently obvious in a manner so patronising that i eventually removed it from the bathroom reading shelf.
May 19, 2009 at 11:16 am |
Aye, Dawkins in print and Dawkins being interviewed are two entirely seperate animals. But then I remember people like Dinesh D’Souza exist and write books too, so I promptly allow for his over-egging the point.
May 19, 2009 at 11:31 am |
Religious indoctrination at that age is child abuse.
Love Dawkins and Hitchens and Harris and Dennett – they are, verily, the Four Horsemen. I don’t care how patronising any of them are in print, if they get people who haven’t thought about what they believe to actually reflect and realize they were doing it out of force of habit or because of the culture around them. Some people need that nudge.
May 19, 2009 at 11:36 am |
I like Dawkins when he’s being interviewed more than in print. But I REALLY admire his patience when it comes to woo, both mystical and religious. It’s hilarious to me that he had such a fearsome reputation amongst the holy crowd when he is such a gentleman about his views.
Right, the gym awaits, cry cry.
May 19, 2009 at 11:41 am |
Is this 500 euro figure like the “average” cost-of-weddings figure? Because I hear the “average” cost of weddings in the U.S. is between $20k and $30k, and I have yet to meet anyone who came close to that.
But yes, ick to the little girls’ wedding dresses, and more importantly, the inevitable hands-clasped-in-prayer pictures taken in front of the hearth or house before the service.
May 19, 2009 at 1:12 pm |
I’d say it is Grims, taking the whole day into account.
Wedding over here are ridiculously expensive too, a cabbie driver was telling me and the paramour about his, 30,000 Euros it cost, for ONE day! Astounding.
Thinking of those pictures you describe, bad and all as they are, they ain’t a patch on the paintings folk have done OF the photos. Once you’ve seen a few of those the photos suddenly seem rather charming.
May 19, 2009 at 3:00 pm |
We can see it’s a blatant practice run for pushing girls into marriage.
One little white dress morphs into a big one so quickly.
May 19, 2009 at 3:24 pm |
God, I hate special occasions. At least the ones that are pre-approved by our capitalist overlords.
May 19, 2009 at 3:26 pm |
Aye, there is that, but at least adult women- I would hope- know what they’re getting into when they say ‘I do’, regardless/ Litte kids haven’t a clue what they’re signing up for. The communion mass itself is shocking to me, confession and all that hooey, what can a seven year old have to confess?
Seriously, years ago I would not have given this too much thought, now it appalls me.
May 19, 2009 at 3:38 pm |
Speaking of mass, I must attend one this very evening, I hope I do not get struck by lightening the moment I set foot inside the church.
May 19, 2009 at 8:25 pm |
Good aching balls of fire, lightening would have been better.
May 19, 2009 at 10:16 pm |
Ha! (To your last comment) and hear hear to the post. I am also against your clobber, l’il ladies. The end.
May 20, 2009 at 9:19 am |
[...] Sure, it no longer holds the same power as it used to, but still every week people flock to churches, put their money in the collection plates, go up to the altar to receive a piece of tasteless wafer which is just a tasteless wafer, and send their children to be educated through religion (the newly returned Fatmammycat touches on this here). [...]
May 20, 2009 at 10:55 am |
I finished the god delusion alright and he was preaching to the choir but I guess you really can’t belabour the point enough about how ridiculous it is.
May 20, 2009 at 11:51 am |
That’s how I felt about it really, ‘uh-hun, uh hu, yes yes’ But fuck it, waht he said needed to be said and it needed to be said loud and unapologetically. The religious have had a monopoly on audience ears for years.
May 20, 2009 at 12:36 pm |
but d’ya reckon anyone other than the choir actually reads it? he’d be better served by the odd half hour on telly as a surprise change to the schedule.
instead of Eastenders, maybe. or we could have him present the X factor.
May 20, 2009 at 12:46 pm |
I reckon thet do/did though, I mean think about how furious folk got that someone was questioning their creator god and their ‘faith’? Think about the ‘new atheist’ tag, and subsequent movement.
You can’t get elected to any sort of political position in the States if you don’t claim some affiliation with the correct religion, ie Christianity. Even here politics and religion are bed partners to a certain extent. If you want to tallk abut anything, like stem cell research- ala that chap in Cork University- you’ll get the CC brigade down on you like a ton of bricks, shouting down free speach and open dialogue in the name of their personal woo beliefs.
I know atheists can come across as smug and a wee bit patronising, but I’d rather they were outspoken enough to prick the bloat of the religious now and then.
I do agree he’s better on telly though, on screen he comes across as warm and rather engaging. Not condesending. Hitchens on telly is hilarious though, he queefs snide eye rolling contempt with every breath.
May 20, 2009 at 8:38 pm |
But of course that fucking annoys people who thing you’re being a smart arse because you once read The God Delusion and think you’re being clever. It’s isn’t, I genuinely do believe that religion might better be served if people were not plastic followers and thought honestly about what exactly their faith truly meant to them- if anything.
Forget about Dawkins and go back to the source….. Have a read of The Age of Reason by Thomas Paine. Written over 200 years ago, but still fresh. Should be required reading in all schools.
May 20, 2009 at 8:50 pm |
We need people like you who can write such acerbic observations, to repeatedly raise the ‘WTF?’ flag in order to show these betrayers of children that we will not be bought with bread and circuses in order for them to continue getting away away with their crimes against humanity’s most innocent souls.
Thank you.
May 20, 2009 at 9:14 pm |
Larry, mucho gracias, I will read it carefully and in a non-tired fashion tomorrow.
Jamie, acerbic is easy, genuinely trying to figure it all out much more difficult. I spent a good portion of this evening reading the reports on abuse in this country, had I a soul it would be a tired and sickened one today.