To answer your last question, first, I have seen enough death and gore, violence and its repercussions (sensible -- which is actually a ludicrous assumption, in my opinion -- or otherwise) in my lifetime to not have to watch it on the silver screen. As you pointed out elsewhere, I can read and so have fair warning about the content of the movies, books, music, artwork, plays, museum exhibits (and any other choices I might have forgotten) that I will see. I exercise judgment in what I subject myself to see.

You will also note, or at least would if you read with an open mind, that I have not criticized the content of this Dutch film (having not seen it), nor demanded that it not be shown. Quite the contrary. I personally think the content will be offensive to me (though I could be wrong) based upon descriptions of it from all sides of the angle, so have no interest in setting myself up to be offended. That does not mean that I believe others do not have the right to allow themselves to be offended or (worse, if this is the case) find justification for hating someone else by allowing themselves to be manipulated by an emotional challenge to their reason. You yourself admit that you would not see an updated (and graphic) version of Neil Kazantikas' book ... or at least conceded that I probably knew the answer to that question (is this what we call creating plausible deniability?) ... and yet criticize me (by criticizing my supposed ilk) for objecting to something I have not seen.

So it goes (I am tempted to add pu-tuweet in homage to another author disliked by the Christian right ... but instead will just add: around and around).

To some specific comments:

On your theory of using energy to see it, are you aware that UC Berkeley housed a collection of paintings by a Spanish artist based upon the pictures from Abu Graib prison?

I didn't expend any energy to see that, either. Again, I do not object to the content of the collection, or the right of someone at UC Berkeley to display it. Personally, I think there are better things that could be displayed, but that is my choice. I do not know the dynamics of the selection process, the factors at play in scheduling displays through wherever it was that it was displayed ("UC Berkeley" is a pretty large place, with lots of walls or rooms to house art collections, and lots of organizations and/or individuals making decisions). But let me ask you this: Did you go see it? Did you approve of its display, protest its content, or take steps to shut it down?

I wonder if UC Berkeley would house a collection of portraits of Al Qaeda in Iraqi excuting innocent civilians or Iraqis dragging dead American soldiers through the streets for sake of balance. Afterall, it is "a school of higher learning".

Do you know of such a collection? Or are you asking a rhetorical question? Are you aware of the criteria used by the "University" (or any of its component parts -- departments, art centers, staff members, student organizations, staff organizations, public outreach groups, community affiliations) in deciding what gets displayed? Or are you assuming that Abu Ghraib is pc but acts of terror are not? If you were a Franco Nationalist (not that I am equating you with a fascist), would you think Guernica should be displayed? Would you go look at it?

I guess my point is this -- one can harp about this and that, but if one is selective about what is permissible and what is not, then one dances closer and closer to the edge of hypocrisy. This is why the idea that "anything goes" is alright by me ... just don't make me see or do the things I personally do not choose to do.

The Opus Dei Movement in the Catholic Church was directly acted by the Da Vinci Code via the albino assassin ...

And most intelligent people who saw the movie (or read the book) are fully aware that albino assassins do not comprise the majority of Opus Dei. I, too, have friends who are in Opus Dei that are not blind power-mongers seeking to suppress truth and impose a false mythology upon those who choose to believe it. But I also know that Opus Dei ... like many members of that particular Church ... have bloodied their hands in the past, and to protest such things is a bit self-defeating. That does not mean a Catholic has to happily embrace all elements of the past (just as I do not need to embrace the egotistic prattlings of George Armstrong Custer, an ancestor of mine, or the bloodied hands of my own country's past). Yes ... there are people who believe in the theories espoused by that movie, just as there are many people who believe in the wider and broader ideas expressed by feminist mysticism (and its deeply buried history). So what?

Just wait for the other Golden Compass movies, they'll show their true color.

And well they might. Again ... so? I do not think that the basic argument is invalid that a lot of repression of individual liberty and spirit, a lot of the history of conflict and warfare, and a lot of the drum-beating and marshalling of forces to fight in such wars has been the doing of formalized Christian institutions (or Muslim, or Buddhist, or Hindu, or ...). The followers of gods and Gods throughout history have apparently proven that they are more than willing to be regimental, conformist, and violent in their march to the kingdoms they believe await them.

And while that is undeniably true ... it does not negate (as I am sure you think I am negating, so spell it out here to save you the trouble) the GOOD done in the name of organized religions through the vast spans of human history. Humans (and their gods and Gods) are complex creatures, hard to boil down to simple black and white.

Maybe, I missed your point, but there are plenty of trust-worthy websites that do an over-the-top analysis of movies and their content. One doesn't have to guess what one's children are going to watch these days. Of course, I doubt many parents are aware of these websites.

You protest too much. Your last sentence at least suggests you get my point. Which may explain why some people (most of whom claim to be Christian) continue to press for more and more constraints, restraints, limitations, exclusions, schedules, announcements, labels, systems, ratings, innoculations and the like to absolutely guarantee that they will live in a spotless and clean environment free from unsanitized and potentially dirty exposures to vile and unsavory movies, television, books, photographs, images, sounds, plays and the like. I would suggest that there are simple remedies to falling into almost all of those potential traps, perversions, and temptations -- mostly having to do with assuming a little personal responsibility -- that would spare the rest of us heathens all the pain and anguish of having to deal with the personal aversions of some members of the population.

Are you talking about the Chronicles of Narnia? CS Lewis is one of the 20th Centuries greatest Christian writers. I highly doubt your story. Christians would have to be born and raised in a cave to be opposed to his writings.

There's one born in a every crowd. Of course I am talking about CS Lewis, and I am not talking about the academic criticism of his use of mythological creatures to fog the allegory of Narnia. I am talking about living, breathing, walking and (arguably) thinking individuals who sought to remove his books (and others, which I will name in a moment) from the hands of the children in my classroom. We are not talking about a lot of people, here. But, in a small school, it doesn't take many people to form a "movement" (heck, in a large school, for that matter ... you may recall a few years back that three parents in the Byron School District objected to a unit that was taught to seventh graders about Islam that drew national attention; or, here in the small town of Sherwood, four parents pulled their children from a middle school play that the drama teacher had written and had been in production for two months three days before the play was to be performed because in their opinion it dealt with crass and vulgar themes that middle school children should not be exposed to, so the principal canceled the performance that everyone else had worked so hard on). Without so much as a word of protest to me before the fact, they descended on a school board meeting with a list of books that they wanted removed from the classroom. The list included all of the Narnia books (but only because they were by the same author who had written that one book about witches), Wrinkle In Time, A Bridge to Terabithia, The Giver, Huck Finn (and Tom Sawyer), Sounder, To Kill A Mockingbird, The Book of Three, My Brother Sam is Dead, Julie of the Wolves, James and the Giant Peach, Dragonwings, and (in the primary classroom) all Shel Silverstein books and the Lorax (we lived in a logging community). There were others, but this list still has a prideful place on my computer as a reminder of just how narrow and bigoted and controlling some people can be.

I misspoke myself about the breadth of the movement nationally to "ban" The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (though maybe I didn't ... I cannot read what I said while I am replying to you, and suspect that I only made reference to my direct experience, not a national "movement" to "ban" the book). All I can find when doing a search for such a "movement" is that the book was "challenged" in Maryland in 1990. However, as my experience indicates, being "challenged" can be quite harrowing ... and clearly the list that some people are keeping of challenged books does not include all places where such challenges arise. However, almost all the books from my list appear on those lists (the national ones), which suggests some commonalities (in my darkest moments, I think "conspiracy") to remove certain offensive titles.

By the way, I agree with you about CS Lewis ... though the stories grow a little weary and heavy-handed as they proceed (what series doesn't?), they are marvelous books written by a very intelligent, creative, wise and knowledgeable man. How anyone in their right mind would seek to deny children other than their own the right to read them amazes me. I even have a hard time understanding how they could deny their own children that right (and opportunity), but I understand that not all parents share my opinions and are not as open with their children as I was with mine.