A butch Italiana resorts to Blackshirt tactics ...
I love New York.
Lea DeLaria can be pretty funny too. But gay humor can only tolerate so much, and New York can be stressful, you know. Ms. DeLarious snapped when a comely Haitian evangelist was preaching the Good News on the subway. She went all Howard Beale on the poor guy - in public, on the crowded train - and she was all suited up - black shirt, fatigues, with in-your-face signage, her printed Mein Kampf all over herself, forcing anyone and everyone who looked at her to read what she was wearing. Then, suddenly, when some guy starts reading the Bible - she goes ballistic ... Video here.
No Free Speech for Preachers. But Lea went to Catholic school for 12 years and knows the Bible line for line so she can tell that preacher guy to shut up.
What do 'they' like to say? "haters gonna hate".
When I do my street ministry I never linger at bus stops even though there are often people there. I'll often sit a ways off in full view of a busy bus stop so people can come talk to me if they want. That's actually worked-out great. If people feel like you are imposing on them then even the sympathetic people will be put off. The Haitian man seemed like a good guy but he needs to re-think his tactics.
ReplyDeleteNeedless to say, the butch lady did not serve her cause very well, and she doesn't know the Bible at all.
Yesterday I had an e-mail exchange from a young man in NY who is putting together a ministry that is nearly identical to mine, but with an emphasis on the Divine Mercy devotion. He conceived of his apostolate on his own, and we were shocked at the similarities between the two. Hopefully that's a sign that God is at work and will soon give us many more lay street evangelists. As I told him, "Just do it. It really works."
You do it well. I'm glad someone in NY connected with you.
DeleteI thought the woman on the train was nuts at first, but then I realized she's in Show Business - everyone has a phone these days, TMZ picked it up - she gets more publicity. The tactics really did remind me of Mussolini's thugs - if she has a group trolling the streets it would be exactly the same.
I think its pushing it to compare her to Mussolini's thugs...(for one thing they probably didn't have as much chest hair....hahaha) I think they were BOTH being obnoxious and intrusive and I would imagine the people on the car were bleeding out their ears by the end of this exchange..(excuse me I am just trying to read my Kindle and pretend I live in a civil society..) I can kind of feel sympathy for her as if you take public transit in a large city you hear people screaming and you feel that just telling them to shut the you know what up ...but she added to the noise pollution there.
ReplyDeleteI like what Scott says. There is a little group of religious folks, mostly black, who are on a street corner and pass them everyday. They are dressed very professionally, and stand there with their rack of literature and wait for people to approach them. I always smile at them and they seem to have people they are talking to. I never see a confrontation, etc. That's the way to do it.
I suppose I was too hard on her. Rosie O'Donnell was very supportive of her too.
DeleteI'm wondering if it was staged now.
The black shirt idea popped into my mind because she had a black shirt on and at first it looked as if she was wearing fatigues - it also reminded me of a scene Tea With Mussolini - and she is Italian. LOL!
As a New Yorker who rides the subway every day, I can tell you this was actually pretty tame. There was no foul language and no one was threatening to hit anyone else. Also, Lea did something that very few New Yorkers do. We get all kinds of people on the subway. Panhandlers telling you their 'life" story and why they need your money, singing groups (some really good and some really bad), dancers, acrobatics. We see it all on the subways (including naked people, as you will find on Youtube), including a fair share of "preachers." Unless someone is really out of line, he or she is pretty much ignored. Makes me think Lea is not a real New Yorker.
ReplyDeleteThose of you who do street preaching would have little problem in NYC because most people will ignore you, but they won't hassle you. New Yorkers have a great ability to tune things out. It is how we survive being so packed together, especially in the subway.
It's why I like NY.
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