What the God

Written by Jesse Medina

Women should come with manuals. Not that any of us men would actually read it…we’re stubborn like that…always have to figure things out ourselves. It is how we demonstrate that we have penises and are proud of our penises.

Then again, we’ve been trying to figure women out since the beginning and, so far as I know, we haven’t been able to. So maybe we would be willing to read the manual. I suspect one reason women don’t come with manuals is because of the risk of paper cuts in or around their vaginas.

Yes, I just said that.

Perhaps another reason why there isn’t a manual for women is because nobody would know how to read it anyway. It would involve run-on sentences, unfamiliar languages (including sighs and body language), and multiple instructions at once. Plus, it would be bedazzled with jewels, beads, and shiny material and smell like fruit. And it would come in an ugg boot.

I can see why some guys go gay. Men are easier to understand. What do they want for dinner? Doesn’t matter so long as it has meat in it. What type of book should you buy them? One with lots of pictures. What do they want for Christmas? Sex and electronics.

Simple, see?

Women on the other hand. Food? Whatever you want. No, not that. No, not that, either. Something greasy but healthy that is cheap and yet romantic. Book? Something with a compelling plot, descriptions of chiseled chests, adventure, and love, but also one that is realistic. What do they want for Christmas? Well it depends on whether she is on her period, what her co-worker said to her the other day, and what her day was like on September 22^nd five years ago.

Do you think it was part of the Fall? Like, maybe, beforehand women were simpler, you know? I’ll bet this was part of the curse for men: “women will drive you crazy! Mwuahahah!”

Actually, in all seriousness, I think the Fall had a lot to do with it. Before Adam and Eve sinned, they were “naked and unashamed.” Sounds awesome, right? But this wasn’t just referring to them not having clothes on, it was referring to their relationship – they knew everything about each other (naked) and accepted each other completely (unashamed). And after they ate the forbidden fruit, something happened. Even before the curses that God put on them. They covered themselves. They hid from each other. And they hid from God.

And the rest is history.

But notice, here, that it wasn’t just Eve hiding. Adam hid, too. We men are partially responsible for this (no blaming the dog on this one, gentlemen). So part of why we think women are hard to understand is because there is something within us, caused by sin, that keeps us from understanding (and all the women say an emphatic “amen”).

So what do we do with that? I’ll give advice to both men and women:

Men: Face it…you have a part to play in not being able to understand women. Check yourself: are you doing your part to listen? Are you working to get to know your lady or are you just expecting her to allow you to be lazy? Pursue her. Take notes. Figure out what she likes (a trip to the mall, a bookstore, and a food court will help with this) and remember it. Set reminders for yourself to follow up with her about stuff she tells you. Forgive her for not looking like a supermodel. Or, if she does, take lots of pictures of her naked (that is, if you're married to her)…she isn’t going to look like that forever.

Women: Face it…you have a part to play in men not being able to understand you. We know you want to be pursued, but you have to help us! Don’t hide everything. Tell us what you want. Drop hints…subtle and obvious (depending on how dense your guy is). Try to be consistent – don’t try to play the cool girl who doesn’t like flowers one day and the next get upset that we never give you them. Forgive us for not having chiseled chests (well, not me, I have one…depending on your definition of “chiseled” and “chest”). And for the love of God, if you get angry at us, just tell us why. Don’t play that if-you-don’t-know-I’m-not-going-to-tell-you game. That’s stupid.

There, now we’re both a little easier to understand.

Are there other reasons you can think of that women are so hard to understand? What about men, what makes us hard to understand? If you're a guy, what advice would you give to women? If you're a girl, what advice would you give to men?

Written by AJ Teaters

What's the deal with Babel? You know you're thinking it, I just have the balls to ask it. Yeah, that was a little over the top but it's true, what's the deal with Babel?

Babel... what came out of Babel? Language. Without Babel the world wouldn't have different languages which means that every other country of the world wouldn't be trying to learn English while America continues to be lazy and apathetic toward learning another country's language. Oops, did I just say American's were lazy and insensitive. And did I insinuate that if there was only one language on Earth it would be English?! Does that qualify me to be a bigot, or just insensitive?

The story of Babel is ONLY 9 BIBLE VERSES! God chose to explain how language was spread throughout the world in only 9 Bible verses? I want to assume that something got left out. I want to assume that there is more of a story there than what is being told. Why do I want to assume that there is more to the story of Babel than what is being told, because it reads like a Cliff Notes; all the facts no story.

They have an idea, they start to build, they were scattered. I have a theory that this wasn't as group thought as the Bible may have us think. Like I said the story isn't being told just the facts.

The story has to start with a single man (notice I said, "man" and not, "person") and this single man got all the other men riled up and excited about his new and awesome idea to build a tower to heaven. “LET'S BUILD A TOWER TO HEAVEN,” What?! Who says that? I'll claim it, a man! Only a man with bigger balls than brains would ever suggest something so ridiculous. This coming from the same gender that I can only imagined gave us milk by saying, “I am going to drink whatever is in that cow!” Luckily they found the utters first.

The Real Story:
Babel is having a town meeting about what is going to help bring more tourism to their city. They begin to throw out ideas about amusement parks, memorials and audience voting capital punishment game shows, until the dumbest of the men decided to shout out the most unintelligent idea ever, “TOWER TO HEAVEN!” Since in those days there were no women allowed at these meetings no one had the foresight... no that's too nice... let's try that again. Since in those days there were no women allowed at these meetings no one had the common sense to say (don't forget to make this sound shrill and condescending), “Really?! You are planning on building a tower to heaven, there is nothing better you can do with your time than BUILD A TOWER TO HEAVEN?”

Come on guys, any and all of you who are in a relationship (married, engaged or other) can hear your significant other saying that to you. It's really doesn't take a large stretch of the imagination to think a woman would try and talk men out of building something completely ridiculous and useless.

Now before I get a bunch of feminists jumping all over me (trust me sounds more fun that it is) the reason behind this idea is because men are stupid. Ask any woman what happens when men get bored and they will tell you one of two things, “They (men) are going to find a way to get into trouble,” or, “They (men) come up with crazy ideas that need to be brought into fruition.”

Notice the parallel:

• “They” equals men because how could anyone besides men come up with this idea?

• They said to each other, "Come, let's make bricks and bake them thoroughly." They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar. 4 Then they said, "Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth." 5 But the LORD came down to see the city and the tower that the men were building. 6 The LORD said, "If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other." (Gen. 11:3-7)

• “They” cannot include women because if women were present during the discussion of building a tower to heaven it would have never happened and we would all still be speaking the same language.
  

• I would even venture to say that “They” is synonymous with “Men” in this passage because of Gen. 11:7 “'Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.'” If we (men) are truthful we can honestly say that we don't understand anything anyone tells us. Men have their own language (mostly grunts and scratching), while women can communicate with each other over long distances without even saying a word.

So I'll leave you with: who was the one God punished because of the Tower: men, women or both? What's the deal with Babel, one word; MEN.

Why did God choose to use this circumstance to explain language? Was Babel more important than it seems in the Bible? Who's idea do you think the tower really was?