Friday, February 19, 2010

Battle of Epic-ness

In my college program, I'm forced to take a United States History class which would be okay because I actually like history for the most part. The first semester was extremely good. We had this amazingly funny guy who liked the subject and entertained us WHILE teaching. Shocking, right? But he got a full time teaching at a REAL university so the board people at our community college got their feelings hurt and said he wasn't allowed to continue teaching our class. We protested as did he but alas, in the end, we started this semester without him.

Our new professor is apparently the man who will be teaching us next semester for our political science class. This does not bode well for me since he started our first class off together preaching his values and beliefs that are of a more conservative nature. I set these doubts aside and tried to maintain a positive outlook. But this failed. The first several weeks of class, we learned nothing of history. To be honest, we've had maybe one class in which he spoke the majority of the time about events and people that actually are related to US history. The rest of the time he was, as he says, "preparing us for his class next year".

Thus I came to be in a hard, cold chair, doodling sweet nothings into my notebook that is supposed to be used for actual notes while he stood in the front of the classroom, droning on about sexism, the difference between man and woman, and where the phrase "Don't cake it on" came from with regards to make-up. We had only about seven minutes left of class when the conversation somehow took a more interesting turn when he wrote "deism" upon the board. My interest perked up immediately because I have a bit of fascination with this religion in particular. He then asked the class if we knew it meant so I murmured a little yeah while the rest of the class remained silent (here silent is equal to oblivious and/or ignorant). He began to speak and this is what has remained in my mind since he opened his crusty mouth. "Deism is the belief that God is in nature."

Now if you don't know what deism is, allow my quick google search to clarify.

The belief that the world was created and set in motion by a supernatural agent which subsequently does not intervene.

That's the gist of it really. It's based on the idea of looking at the universe and the world, then using logic and reason to acknowledge a higher power's existence. The deity, hereby known as God, created natural laws and things such as gravity, and then set them into motion to govern the universe, and basically no longer interfere with our daily lives. This means there are no revelations, no creeds or divine articles, no miracles or supernatural events, nothing like that. There is no relationship between mankind and God except for the fact he created us. This is the general principle of deism, not that God is in nature. This statement, to say the least, irked me and I very loudly made my opinion known that he was wrong because he was. Now it can be said that he is a little egotistical and pompous so having a student disagree with him was a sharp blow to his masculinity, I guess. I'm pretty sure he's also a bit sexist because he constantly makes remarks about women being the weaker sex and being a housewife isn't a job, it's an excuse. But that's not the point right now. The point is I was not going to let him talk incorrectly about one of my favorite subjects. So I began arguing back with him and he made a snide remark that if I was so right, he wanted a one page essay proving him wrong. I waited about fifty more seconds of listening to him spew nonsense before finally having enough. I got up and walked out of class.

So then came the epic snowstorm. There was no class for two weeks. Well not his class anyway. I had already written my essay though. Three full pages, single spaced, quotes from deist churches, well known authors, and professors with numerous awards. I completed my paper within the day we had our "disagreement". And I made sure everyone knew how pissed off I was and how dedicated I was to my cause.

Finally, we had class. By this time everyone knew I had the essay to give him. What they didn't know was I had become extremely nervous about it because it had been so long with the snow that I had sort of lost my extreme passion and pissed off-ness. But somehow, somewhere deep inside of me I found the courage to get up, walk up to him, drop it on the desk in front of him, and said it was my paper on deism. I then sat down and started talking to my friend, Ireland, in an attempt to avoid his coming wrath because I knew that was not good enough for him. Thus after scanning my essay, he decided to lecture me for over thirty minutes about Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, Ben Franklin, divine right, etc. Basically items that only had 2% of things in common with deism. So after the first few minutes I told him that what he was talking about had nothing to do with the point I was trying to make. I said he remarked that deism is the belief that God is nature and that is incorrect. So then he kept on about the other stuff so I figured there was no point in arguing. I just stared him down. Nobody but two of my friends and I were paying attention to him. Everyone else was just talking amongst themselves for the thirty minutes. Then after he finished, he talked to the whole class about something else that still had nothing to do with US history but to be honest, I wasn't paying attention because he had seriously pissed me off since he said he wasn't even going to read my essay. I just would glare at him every time he looked at me to answer a question or give my opinion. Eventually the class ended and I continued on with my day.

After my following class was finished, I walked into my Spanish class. We were still settling down, getting ready to start a video when he showed up in the doorway and started motioning me to come out. I very loudly told him no, I was in class, even though I was standing in the window admiring the falling snow. So he asked my current teacher if I could come with him for a second. I begged and pleaded with her to say no using my eyes but apparently she couldn't understand the desperation in my look and granted permission to go with him.

Thus I ended up in the hall with him talking to me for another five minutes even though he was supposed to be teaching another class at the time. At first I was paranoid because in reality, while I do talk a big game, being one on one with a superior, an equivalent in intelligence or someone who wants to lecture me really unnerves me. However, he ended up telling me that I was one of the best in the class. Apparently he read my essay and realized what he said isn't exactly what he meant. He meant to explain that God existed in natural law, not in nature like he said. And that my paper had a lot of details he mentioned but it more clearly defined what he meant to say. Then he apologized if it seemed like he was belittling me or stepped on my feelings because he wasn't trying to do that. He said that he was worried about me locking up and no longer actively participating in class which would be bad because apparently I'm "essential" to the class. And that he truly thinks I'm one of the best in there.

Nova - 1
Pompous Prick - 0

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