109 thoughts on “Reader Submitted Photo: Fundies At The Library”

  4. Is this some new expression? I guess I’m not up on things. I “geek”? I must be getting old… sigh…

    How about I “geek” SFL!??? :mrgreen:

  7. “I suppose that compared to the KJV, Jesus just doesn’t rate.” And now, your work is complete.

  8. I agree with Darrell’s roll-over note on the top pic. It’s off topic, but why can’t verbs and nouns stay home with their own original meanings?

    Maybe I’m getting old and crotchety, but equating God’s Word with a sideshow freak is just a bit wrong. I don’t worship the Bible, but it IS the Word of God. It does deserve respect. (In all good translations)

    At least my Fundy high school had a sense of grammar.

    1. Verbing nouns is one of the longest-standing traditions in the English-speaking world. It makes our language more vibrant, more adaptable, and more useful in the world at large. If you don’t believe me, you can email or surf the web, or even have intangibles like parts of speech “stay home.”

      It’s this changing of the language which makes English language versions go out of date. It’s a large part of why a real 1611 KJV (or Shakespeare, for that matter) would be almost incomprehensible to most modern readers.

      With that said, I agree that all versions deserve respect.

      1. I’m not crazy about using “geek” as a verb – it sounds awkward to me – but I’ll admit that I use “facebook” as a verb all the time: as in, “I’ll facebook you!”

        It’s an advertising campaign: see http://geekthelibrary.org/

        1. I’m with you. I don’t have a problem with verbing nouns. As Christopher said, there’s a long history of it in English. But “geek” as a verb just sounds awkward and forced. Meh.

        2. I’m with you. I don’t have a problem with verbing nouns. As Christopher said, there’s a long history of it in English. But “geek” as a verb just sounds awkward and forced.

        5. I dunno – it sounds like they’re using “geek” in the same way the geeks of the ’60s and ’70s used “grok”. I mean, how many people today know what “grok” is (besides us sci-fi geeks). 😛

      3. Agreed. English has a loooooooong tradition of evolving with each new generation–unlike, say, French.

        And I like it. I haven’t seen it before, but it’s sort of nice, a playful way to say you obsessively love something.

    2. It started with Erik the Red, who declared, “I’m gonna go viking those dudes and steal their chickens.”

      Language is like water: you need it to survive, it boils at 212ºF, and it takes the path of least resistance, for better or for worse.

    3. OK, in English, you can make a noun into a verb. You not only can use a bat; you can bat a ball with one.

      But if “geek” is a verb, what does it mean? Wouldn’t it mean to make someone into a geek, or to use a geek on someone or something? Or to act like a geek?
      “I geeked myself up so I’d fit in at MIT.”
      “I was so mad at Bill, I swung Nigel by the legs and geeked bill into the ground.”
      “Nigel missed the start of the movie, because he was too busy geeking with his iPad.”

      I don’t see how “to geek” would mean “to like,” which is what I take to be the meaning implied here.

      1. You’ll still find logical underpinning to verbification, even in recent colloquial English. For example, “Tweet” and “text” pertain to actions that create or facilitate their respective ‘noun’ entities, from which said verbs derived.

        Given that “geek” is commonly interpreted with associated qualities of “passionate obsession,” and that its use has broadened beyond technical associations (“fashion geek”), it’s acceptable to parse the verb “geek” as “like, with an added degree of øømph” or “a liking to the degree a geek would like the object of what constitutes his or her geekiness.”

      2. I think they’re using “geek” somewhat like the way I might use “geeking out”, by which I would mean indulging in a favorite nerdy/geeky activity or topic of study to a greater extent than usual.

        I assume the idea is that you ‘geek’ something you’re very interested in.

        Thus a baseball geek (the type who has lots of stats memorized, etc) would be someone who geeks baseball.

    4. Languages change & evolve, and old people complain about the changes. Just how life & language(s) are.

        1. Tuve que buscar mi copia del 1865. En la primera pagina dice que es la RV pero revisada y corregida con arreglo a los textos Griego e Inglés. Ya que fue corregida por el texto inglés, tu tienes razón-vino del cielo donde Dios tiene su copia del KJV! 😉 😉 😉 😉 😉

        2. “Corregido por el texto inglés.”
          Deben corregir los textos griegos por el texto inglés también, ¿no? 😈

        5. “Wow, who knew there are so many Spanish speaking x-fundies on this site!”

          ‘op vo’ maH ‘ach jatlh tlhIngan.

        10. We all KNOW that Spanish was the language the creator used when he spoke the world into existance. 😆

  10. It goes to show the truth of the remark made to an ex-fundy pastor friend of mine, which remark precipitated his eventual exit from fundamentalism: “Why is it you people worship the Bible and not God?”

  12. Never mind the verbing of nouns but can this “Emily” learn how to spell Bible at least? Ricardo, you bring up a good point that maybe non-spanish-speaking readers of SFL might not know is that fundamental baptist hispanics have a just as ancient version that they stick to called the Reina Valera (Queen Valera) version which no one speaks spanish like that anymore and I, being fluent in spanish, have to look up every other word to understand it. That version makes me nauseaus when I try to read it Ricardo! Btw, I think “geeking” means being really into something?

        1. Today I googled a copy of the original “Biblia del Oso.” Yes it is a bit hard to read. But, not as hard as reading the KJV-1611.

          God has not allowed Spanish, (His own language,) to evolve as much as English.

        2. Ricardo,
          I googled that earlier as well. What struck me was seeing the Hebrew lettering under the picture of the bear. Since this was during the height of the Inquisition possession of books with Hebrew characters could be very detrimental to your health throughout Iberia. I wonder what the story is behind that?

  13. Someone can be a Star Wars/Star Trek geek or a Lord of The Rings geek or whatever. It means being a being a super uber devoted fan who knows all the minute of said topic.

    I know my screen name in Elvish. Its Olandir. :mrgreen: That should tell you a little bit about me. 😉

    1. I think I have you beat there, a little. . . Not only do I know my name in elvish, I can write it in Sindarin elvish too! :mrgreen: :mrgreen:

  14. My guess is that the KJB devotee on the left is an adult while Emily is a child. Please excuse me for being cynical, but I wonder how much Emily reads the KJB she touts so enthusiastically. In my years in church, I met many young people who didn’t actually READ their Bibles (or understand it if they did). It’s one of the reasons I switched to another version – I want my children to understand the Word of God and not have a needless stumbling block of 17th century English to overcome.

    2. Children and adults alike have a sad tendency not to read the Bible.

      Of course, in extreme fundie churches, they are not supposed to “waste” “soul-winning” time by reading the Bible. 😐 😥

  16. As both someone who would classify themselves as a geek (I play videogames, I read superhero comics, I’ve dabbled in learning Quenya, and I’m going into computer science, I think the term “geek” definitely applies!) and as a literature fan, I definitely object to the use of “geek” as a verb. Perhaps if they’d said “What are you a geek for?”, but that would’ve been less short and snappy.

    More on topic, I like how they were careful to write that up at the very top, so everyone could see it. I guess the big one I don’t mind so much (as I suppose in a sort of a way, we are all geeks for the Bible, aren’t we?) but the KJV one… yeah.

  17. I am a librarian, and am very excited to think someone loves the library enough to verb the noun, which is slang and no real word anyway. I am also an English teacher, so if *I* can take it… out here in library land, it is just SO refreshing to have anyone be supportive, in this day of fragile economies and NPO’s closing their doors… 🙂

    2. I still laugh that YOU are a librarian. YOU! You were the craziest person I knew in college. (Of course it *was* a fundie college, but still…)

      1. I am a CHILDREN’S librarian. That makes a world of difference! One of the job requirements is “crazy”! 😀

  19. I was a student worker in the library when I was an undergrad at a state university. The library was moving to a new building so we had to pack the books up for the movers. I was in the stacks working one day and had to get a ladder to reach the very top shelves. What did I find up there? Someone had put all of the Darwin books on top of the bookcase so no one could find them. Although I was never a fundie I grew up around them and mostly thought they were annoying but harmless. I knew then that if they thought they could censor what others read and set back the educational and scientific advancements that makes our lives so cushy then fundies must be stopped.

    1. My thing is, I work in a LIBRARY, not a CHURCH. When people do not care for some of the titles in our collection, I do understand–hey, I do not approve of all of it, either. But TAXPAYERS support us, and they come in all flavors. Even in my fundy days, it would never have occurred to me to insist that the public library remove books I did not like! Not only that, what happens when someone removes the books I DO like??? So, yeah, “I Geek the Library” does not phase me with its politically incorrect grammar, or whatever; I have bigger things on my mind than verb/noun switching. 🙄

      1. I agree. I’m not a librarian, but I am a bookworm. I recently got a shirt that says “Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside of a dog, it’s too dark to read,” if that gives you an idea. :mrgreen: I have my eye on another shirt that says “Censorship. The assassination of an idea,” and has a picture of a lightbulb shattering. So, to me, whether they ‘verb a noun’ or not, the important thing is that people like the library. And NO CENSORSHIP!!!

        1. That is a Groucho Marx quote, and for years, was the signature file on all my emails! Now it is C.S. Lewis, and has been for years, also. ANYWAY, Hooray for you being so supportive of libraries! 😀

        2. What I find hilarious is that people who attempt to censor what others read don’t realize it makes whatever they are trying to ban even more popular. Once a person is told they can’t have it, they want it even more. There is a reason banned book week packs people into the library-they want what others have tried to deny them.

        4. Yeah, the shirt does credit Groucho Marx with the quote. (Also has a cute chihuahua on it). I had also worked as a shelver in my University’s Science library as an undergrad. 🙂
          But I read so much that libraries have saved me a lot of money, not having to buy the books. Of course, I also support the library financially to some extent from the overdue book fines. 🙄

        5. I support my local library through overdue fines too, although I blame that on the kids forgetting their books under their beds. And BTW what happened to the nice 10 cents a day that the fine USED to be?

        6. It USED to be a dime a day back when the books we had to replace were $12.95 instead of $24.95. Every day a book is late, another patron does not get to read it, too.

  20. OK, my first thought was that “Emily” was “Jesus Juking” the original writer. Emily is better (in her own mind) sans Jesus because she has the KJV! 😥

  21. I just puked a little.

    I’m with Paul. To perform a little bulletin board archaeology, it looks like the big heart for God and the Bible came first and, knowing what we do about Fundies, Emily came along, specified King James Bible, and struck a bold underline beneath it as a final Aha to the original geek. The second King Jameser probably came along later, but in the time it took me to type this my disgust and apathy overcame me and I stopped caring.

    At any rate, kudos to the person “geeking” Jesus Christ, insofar as I offer kudos to anyone Jesus-juking a library bulletin board.

  22. I know local fundies who are too separated to even use the public library. They think it is too ghetto.

    😥

      1. That Other Jean wrote, “Says a lot more about them than it does about the library, eh?”

        Yes, I believe it does.

  23. I think you are all missing the biggest point of all: Someone geeks Justin Beiber. That is the unforgiveable sin right there.

  25. It is only through the blessed, blood-bought KJV that we learn about the REAL Jesus, not some pseudo-Jesus that teaches us to chew gum in class and stick it to the bottom of our desks, as in the modern perversions.

    1. Yeah, it DOES say that in the New Living Translation. I know it does. When I find it, I will post it here. It also says something about video games.

      2. Exactly! Those modern perversions aren’t like the Authorized 1611 Church of England translation.

        1. EXACTLY! They weren’t HIGHLY influenced by a self-centered king who wanted to make sure that his people wouldn’t revolt against him and therefore made sure that the translation that carried his name carried no references from the manuscripts that were subversive.

        2. As an Independent, Fundamental, separated BAPTIST I am proud to use only a translation made by men who baptized babies and did not believe in the sepration of church and state. It is such a blessing that they called their pastors priests – as someone who believes in the priesthood of all believers, I really like that. Believing in only two offices, I love the fact that our translators believed in bishops. I could go on and on and on. I just love the Church of England. I fellowship with them regularly. What a blessing their state-sponsered translation is.

      3. Thou shalt not play Grand Theft Auto (for it sucketh). Instead, try Deus Ex.

        (little bit of meta humour there for you latin readers).

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