A tale of a truck
I was cruising out and about in the city on a fine spring day when what should I wander upon but this?
Just a truck you say, which certainly it is, but wait! Let us examine closer this specimen. First I would draw your attention to the license plate:
Ahha! People that make statements with their vehicles – how I love them! If it were not for such as these, who could I make fun of? This was actually not the first thing I noticed about the vehicle, but it makes the other stuff even more amusing. Twice the hypocrisy, you might say!
The first line of this license plate says, “NO JESUS NO PEACE”. Now one could certainly construe this as a threat. One of the “Love Jesus or I’ll kick your ass!” kind. Ignoring that, though for a second, we can assume a second, less overtly violent meaning. We can assume for a moment that they mean that if you are not a Christian, you are a violent fuck. Well, that could very well be, I suppose, though the number of violent Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims and Jews that I have met, I could count on… well, I haven’t met any. Sure, there are some nasty images of people blowing the crap out of each other on TV, but you can safely assume the peace-loving ones don’t get nearly as much air time.
The second, cleverly homophonous line reads, “KNOW JESUS KNOW PEACE”. In context with the first line one could reasonably expect to come to this conclusion. Again though, experiential evidence fails us. Personally, I can vouchsafe that every single person that has ever threatened me with violence, beat the snot out of me (usually in a group) or shot at me (no, really) has been a God-fearing, peace loving Christian. Maybe they missed that day in Sunday school which clarified “no shooting at people” and “no beating people up when you outnumber them 5 to 1” commandments.
That’s not to say that I think most Christian groups espouse or promote violence, by the way. A self-described Christian is indeed probably no more or less likely than an individual of any other faith to open a can on somebody, although it could be said that some belief systems like Buddhism are inheritely more peaceable. I’d also like to point out that the Catholic church in particular has had an extraordinarily violent past. They no longer engage in outright physical barbarism like the Inquisition or the Crusades, but they still defend stealthier, more intellectualized violence. For example through teaching that women are inferior (not able to perform the sacraments – I guess a penis is required) and that gays, lesbians, et al. are somehow sick. Thank goodness the church didn’t arbitrarily decide that tall, skinny brunettes are twisted, inferior beings otherwise I’d be screwed. If you don’t believe me that this is a form of violence think back to what separate but equal meant in this country.
Anyway, back to the truck. So we’ve established that our truck owner knows Jesus and presumably believes in peace. What else have we that makes this worth typing several hundred words over? I know! Bullet holes!
That’s right, our peace loving, Jesus knowing motorist has seven (g’head, count ’em) fake, stick-on bullet holes on the back of his fine motor vehicle. At this point I don’t know whether to laugh, to cry, or to be violently ill.