Leave it to Weaver
I hate people. There, I said it. And of course that’s not true…there are plenty of actual, specific people I love. But people in general? Hate ‘em. There are lots of types of people I hate…and I’d make a cute and charming list of those such as Cellphone on Public Transportation Person, etc., but two things:
I’m not feeling that clever right now.
I would be ripping this off from a list I read on the web once that I no longer can find. It was hilarious, trust me.
ANYWAY, one of the classifications that would be right at the top of that fucking list would be Religious People Who Feel Superior. I’ve got a lot of beefs with religion, some legitimate and some admittedly groundless – but they are MY beefs, my problems. I don’t try to make them anyone else’s, and while I admit I feel a bit superior to people who talk with snakes or deny themselves any type of pleasure because of their beliefs, what I don’t do is spit it in their face.
This brings me to this season’s Amazing Race: Family Edition. It’s no stretch to say this is – by far – the worst season of what used to be my favorite show. One indication of that? We are down to four teams and I don’t know ANY of the contestants actual names. Just their last names. Not even the slightly hot Bransen girl. good times. Bad times.
But nothing makes the show worse than The Weaver family. First, let’s acknowledge the family tragedy – the father/husband, died in a racing accident. Very sad. NASCAR sucks. Let’s move on.
What kills me about these folks is that not only do they proselytize incessantly about how they are the only Christian family, the only nice people in the race, etc., but they actually…are just about the dumbest people I’ve ever seen. And the worst part? The mom – no genius, she – home schools these kids.
Among the many gems Mama Weaver has stated this season:
Lake Pontchartrain in New Orleans is one of the Great Lakes
Philadelphia is a state
Being a Christian “revigorates and injuvinates you”
Something tells me these kids are not going to ace their SATs. Their behavior and presumably terrible education is not a good mix. They are going to be the kind of people threatened by people with higher education, sneer at “facts” that discount their beliefs. In short, the kind of people who watch Fox News.
When her children stated they knew nothing about Utah, she said, “I do…Mormons live here.” Well, that wraps that state up in a bow. (Don’t even get me started on how she either ignored or laughed off the response from her kids -- which was that the presence of Mormons explained how crappy a state Utah is. And the irony of people from FLORIDA complaining about any other state is…well, it’s precious, really.)
She let her children throw trash out of a moving car on a highway at another team. Her son, Rolly (ok, I know a few names) yelled at a cyclist for no reason at all. Again, this kind of behavior is pretty typical for teenagers…just not teenagers who talk about what great Christians they are and don’t understand why other teams hate them so much.
Plus, the mom is a walking advertisement for what Florida does to your skin. Best line of the season was from one of the Linz boys: “Maybe a house will fall on her.”
There have been plenty of reality show contestants who were hated by other players. Most of them lapped up the hatred, but certainly some others were confused by it. It’s one thing to be confused and hurt by this – it’s another thing to state that it’s because you are a Christian, and that the other hating teams are just bad people.
Her quote in this week’s episode: “It’s against our beliefs to be treated this way.”
First, the Weavers have to get over the fact that some people don’t like them. There isn’t one person alive who doesn’t have some people who don’t like them. But what belief system states how OTHERS should treat you? Any rational belief system should just take care of the other side, how you treat others. Which the Weavers don’t do so well.
I just have to think that any God that is out there wouldn’t take kindly to that kind of behavior.
As usual, Television Without Pity, specifically Miss Alli who recaps this show, says it best:
Holding up not cussing as if it has something to do with moral superiority, denigrating other people's "class" after they tried to comfort you about your father and you responded by throwing trash at them, bragging about being the only family "trying to live a Christian life," as if (1) you are the judge of who's a Christian; (2) you are trying particularly hard to live a Christian life; or (3) Christians are superior to everyone else. I mean, that last part barely even gets said anymore, because why bother, but standing on the mat and bragging about how you're the best family because you're Christians is pretty much like standing on the mat bragging about how you're the best family because you're white. Elevating your religion above everyone else's is bigotry, and the idea of a girl whose sister gave a speech earlier about how everyone is so intolerant and hates them for being "different than they are" giving a speech that amounts to "Woe is me; I have to spend time around people who aren't of the same religion I am" is just...sort of outrageous. They're totally vile, and as one of my friends commented after the episode, their mother is damning them to a life of failure by teaching them to adopt an attitude of superiority through victimhood. Good luck with that.