Was Faye... wicked?

TFMM sent me a link to his friend’s blog (Ron Oliver's Fabulous Life!: MY FAVORITE JESUS!) and I wrote Michael a short email in reply. I feel too lazy to actually blog today therefore I will simply paste part of the email here (regarding my viewpoint of Tammy Faye.) Ron's post was brilliant.

Was Faye a gay icon? I wrote her off in the mid 80's (along with all the other frothing tele-evangelists of that era) as the supreme poster child for the "Help Us Develop A Real Waterproof Mascara" campaign. I can distinctly remember the old commercials featuring this deliciously wet model breaching the waters of her Malibu pool and twisting around to offer the cameras a sensual "f*** me now" bat of her eyelashes as she perched her scrumptiously delicate arms on the concrete edge of the pool, whilst the Maybelline (or perhaps Max Factor) ad execs spun their nifty jingle regaling about how this model swam hours yet maintained her faultless eyelashes. If this mermaid- turned-siren-of-my-heart could spend hours in the water using these products why then was Tammy Faye so clueless in the application of her own eye enhancing products?

My first experience with Tammy Faye (the muppet) and her husband Jimbo (the leering toad) was during recovery from a surgery. I lay in my hospital bed, weakened and nauseated, as her voice blared for viewers to place their hands upon the screen before writing fat checks to support their ministry. I recall contemplating if she used special mechanic's solutions (such as Orange Goop) to dissolve the makeup glue coating her eyes after each program. I also recall hitting the morphine pump in a Herculean effort to wipe her image off my retinas.

I am not a devotee of this modern (and frightening) protestant trend of damning everything that moves under the sun. I have always equated them to trifling bible Nazis. "Jesus Camp", a masterfully done documentary by Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady, paints a realistic view of what many Protestants believe. There is nothing remotely insightful of Christ or his teachings in their approach. They brainwash their children into becoming mindless zealots yet scream bloody murder when they catch a snippet of "Muslim child cruelty" on their Trinity Broadcasting News. Those horrible Muslims allow their children to pray to Mecca several times a day! Mecca! That is of Satan. Someone needs to sound the alarm - Focus on the Family can mobilize!

Tammy Faye and others like her were the 1980's starting point of this entire "evangelical" movement now plaguing the United States.

Berke Breathed, creator of “Bloom County", portrayed her best. Look out for penguin lust, or Tammy might just pop out of your own Anxiety Closet.