Rhondinella

Contestants already annoying the ish out of me, from least to most annoying (none of whom has any shot at winning): 5. Arnold (liked him on Top Chef; could be ok here but trying WAAAAY too hard. Dial it back, dude.) 4. Rosa (something about her New York Italian schtick just bugs) 3. Dom (again, it's probably personal, and I know it's not his fault, but the New York accident drives me mad) 2. Emilia (Referring to yourself as "edgy" unironically is demonstrable proof that you aren't, right? But then to be actually BORING instead? Just go.) 1. MATTHEW (And, yes, I'm giving in to manipulation because he clearly graduated summa cum laude from Reality Show Villain University, but still. He can't be ignored) Middling to Meh: Eddie (apparently can cook, but may not be interesting enough or have a pov they like) Sita (the Black/Italian thing COULD be interesting, but isn't yet). Rue (African cooking is something you don't see much on TV so could be great; but she needs to step it up in terms of personality) Most likely to be final three: Jay (A calmer, saner version of Lenny). Michelle (Armenian angle could be good; was one of the best on camera) Alex (sandwich thing isn't original but he's charming when he smiles and definitely would be eye candy for the ladies and some men)

Oh Lord I hope not. I don't know if I can take any more of Abby using Nia as her favorite punching bag.

Wow, Kaitlyn has the duck lips set to 10 in that photo.

I am over 40 (read: old) and have never used Snapchat so I don't know much about it. But I read someone (maybe here?) saying that you couldn't send delayed pics through snapchat. As in, you could only take a pic in that moment and send it immediately. You can't set it to delay and send later, or save it for a later date. Is that true? If it's the case, then, yes, that would confirm that they were together when the photo was sent.

I think we need to invent new words to describe how incredibly done with this whole shit show Holly and Nia are. They don't roll their eyes in the glorious way that Christie did. Instead, it shows in their entire bodies and their demeanor. You can't even say they're over it because they are so far past that into literally counting the seconds until their contracts expire. We really do need a word for that. We could use it for Meri on Sister Wives also. About that, I don't think I've seen or heard anything about Nia and Holly's contract with the show. Nia's been on since the beginning and so I assume they originally had the same contract the other girls did, which apparently ended last year, hence Chloe and Christie's leaving. Since Nia and Holly didn't leave then (which I don't understand--they must have been really hard up for the money) does that mean they signed another contract? If so, how long is it for? I'm completely anticipating this season ending with Holly and Nia leaving, and the rest is just marking time. So does that mean they would have just extended their contract for one year? Can they do that? I have no idea how this works.

I know right? I have a 12 year old daughter and while I MIGHT allow her to perform in a video with LeBeouf with next to nothing on (wait . . . . no I wouldn't, but anyway . . ) there's no way in hell I'm giving him her phone number. Gross.

Every single other person in the pic has a stupid cheesy grin on their face except Meri, whose face couldn't more clearly read "Yeah, yeah, I've done my contractual duty, can I go now?" You know, kinda like the face on Nia and Holly for this entire season of Dance Moms.

I see the cast list on IMDB includes a 1 ep guest appearance by Jodhi May, because it's apparently not possible to make a British period drama without her. I half expected to see Toby Menzies on the list too for the same reason. I might give it a chance if and when I ever get through the last season of CTM.

Just a reminder: I know it can be confusing. But just because a (potential) spoiler is reported in the media doesn't mean it's not still a spoiler. I know it may seem that you see it everywhere online and so it can't possibly be news to anyone, but it undoubtedly will be to someone. So please keep ALL regular threads free of spoiler discussion, including the media thread. For our purposes a "spoiler" is anything that has not been aired on TV yet regardless of when it took place. To discuss anything about the reported "spoilers" or speculate on them in any way, go to the Spoiler thread. Thank you. I know there was no intention of spoiling here, just an accident. Hence the reminder. No one is in trouble. :-)

Ok, we've rehashed the Andi-Nick situation and analyzed its implications on the current Kaitlyn-Nick situation enough here since it's really off topic. If you want to continue to discuss the past, please go to the "Past Season" thread. But that is a non-spoiler thread so you can continue to speculate on FUTURE events that may or may not occur based on spoilers here. I hope that makes sense. Basically if you're only talking about past events, go to the other thread. Let's try to keep this to current spoiler discussion/speculation. Also, enough with the RS hating. We get it. Lots of people hate him. And I'm not saying they're wrong to do so. It's just off topic here. Take it to the Small Talk thread if you must.

I don't know that the prayer itself is trite. However, it has been made trite (tritized?) by the modern evangelistic movement which, in its zeal to reach people as quickly and simply as possible, reduced what is actually a complicated on-going process into three quick and easy steps for easier marketing. But true belief and religion require that eventually you go deeper than that. However, that's not to say those three steps have never motivated someone to start on the road to belief.

I'd never heard of the Jesus Prayer either, at least not specifically by that name, but according to wikipedia it came from the eastern Christian tradition and is mostly still recognized and practiced in Eastern orthodox denominations. But it could certainly have spread to some denominations of western origin as well. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus_Prayer

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!! Has anyone made a career out of looking like a loser douche on TV the way this man has? On the one hand it's brilliant I guess, and apparently makes women want him (??) but on the other hand, it's really, really pathetic. And yet, I want it to never end. Sean is the best bet I think. They can call the season "The Bachelor: The Notebook Edition."

My husband is a Christian theologian and specifically studies the development of Christian beliefs and practices through history. Here's his answer (in brief): Yes, generally belief in the deity of Christ is considered one of the essential elements to "orthodox" Christian belief (meaning, your belief is in line with what the church has pretty much always traditionally affirmed). Some Christians, therefore, would probably consider you a heretic or at least not orthodox (which is what "heretic" really means) for believing differently. Some might even call you a non-Christian. (See the fact that many Christians--especially of the evangelical variety--consider Jehovah's Witnesses to be non-Christian or heretical for this reason. They essentially believe Jesus was wasn't fully divine). However, he also said that there have been and still are Christian groups through history who either downplayed or outright denied the divinity of Christ finding some other way to explain how Jesus' death was efficacious for salvation. Ultimately he (and I) would say that your "relationship" with God is what is important regardless of whether your beliefs might be faulty. To quote him: "The adequacy of your belief is not a criterion for salvation." However, that shouldn't be used as an excuse to not continue seeking more adequate understanding of theological beliefs. Thus spake the theology professor. Take that for whatever you think it might be worth (which could well be nothing at all). Also note: he approaches this subject from a Protestant, low-church, Wesleyan point of view, so that influences his thinking in this area.

Yes, that should be OK. See FT's note above. Also REMINDER: Cease and desist with the presidential religious talk, please. Or, as requested above, you can take it to the small talk thread. Thank you.

Hey, ya'll. As interesting and educational this conversation has been, the stuff about politics, deists, the Founding Fathers and current or past presidents really isn't directly relevant to the Duggars and their religion. I don't mind a little latitude in here, but I think we're pretty off track now. So let's try to reign it in, ok? Thanks. (And also, thanks for being such great posters in this thread. Very respectful, genuinely interested in learning about other viewpoints and practices. You're all pretty swell!)

Please take any discussion or questions about site technical issues to the bug thread. Our friendly programmer will more than happily respond, I'm sure. http://forums.previously.tv/forum/698-bugs/

I'm sure others have expressed similar sentiments (I've read a lot of posts, but can't keep up with every single one) but---the fact that a grown-ass (27-year old) man has to be defended on national TV by his parents, instead of coming on and answering the tough questions HIMSELF is nauseating to me. I guess there might be legal ramifications to him speaking publicly, and a lawyer somewhere probably advised him against it? But then, if he can't be prosecuted because of the statue of limitations why should he worry? Doing an interview wouldn't have completely rehabilitated his image, certainly, but I THINK would probably put him a better light than hiding behind his mother's skirts. As to someone way upthread who said that Josh will never get a job again? I have no doubt he's gotten multiple job offers in the last couple weeks from fundie organizations. They may want to wait until the furor blows over, but I'm sure some extremely conservative group or another will give him a job. He's still fundie royalty. ETA: Lawyer question based on the above: Can one of the victims file civil claims against him? Not that it would happen, just wondering.

You're not alone. They presented a much stronger case for their actions than I expected, honestly. Still not saying they did the best thing possible, but I'm at least sympathetic to the fact that they didn't want to turn their own son into the police, especially if they believed (erroneously) that this was something that could be "fixed" and probably wouldn't happen again. Not defending everything they did or everything they believe and are, and there certainly were problematic parts of that interview. But as a parent I do have some sympathy for the extremely difficult decision they had to make. Having said that, though: the part that made me mad was the suggestion that since the 5 year old didn't know what was happening she wasn't damaged by it. I was only a little older than that when I was molested (which was also largely inappropriate touching) and although I certainly didn't know about sex at that age, I had no doubt in my mind that what was going on was wrong. And it definitely traumatized me. So for that I want to tell JimBob to go screw himself.

The moderators have been working diligently behind the scenes trying to make this a place where we can discuss this volatile and difficult subject without flame wars and victim shaming and general grossness. While we appreciate the thoughtfulness of our posters, we have also had to hide and delete a fair number of posts. We're in the forest and we're dousing the embers as we see them to stop everything going up in flames. Thread Timing Just prior to the interview, the current interview speculation thread (i.e., this thread) will be locked. After the interview finishes airing on the East coast, we will unlock the interview discussion thread. There will be no live chat. Interview Discussion Guidelines Don't be a dick. That's really it but to be specific on some past pain points there are these guidelines (which have been serving us well so far) and we appeal to your better angels to continue to follow them: Don't be gross, there are real people involved. Be respectful of the victims and mindful of fact vs conjecture. Don't speculate about the specific identity of the victims. Yes, we know most of them were his sisters and that's more than enough for us to know. Don't speculate about whether Josh was behind further abuse, whether he was abused, who else might have abused someone else, etc. We will have 6 regular mods around the next couple days, as well as some temporary volunteers, including stacey, radishcake, photofox and WendyCR72 on ember patrol. Help us by being respectful of the situation, your fellow posters and the mods. Moderation of hot topics usually involves hiding questionable posts for further group review. You may see a few posts disappear and reappear. You will see some disappear and never come back.

Yes, do feel free to PM me. I am on the road, but I should have some internet access occasionally. Neither I nor my husband are experts on the subject of Comparative Religions by any stretch (most of what we know is about Christianity) but we might be able to give some guidance.

Broke up? Only a couple weeks after the DWTS gig was up? Huh? How lucky was THAT timing? *eyeroll*

Heh. It's actually not ON Numbers. It's on the water imagery in the Gospel of John. But in looking at that I investigated the uses of water in the Old Testament, and I ran across this passage in the process. Thanks for explaining that Absolom. Very interesting. Interesting take, Anjen. And I agree that the test could have worked in the woman's favor as much as it did against her. However, I have to disagree about the idea that the punishment was death. I would have to read more scholarly material on the subject, but I don't know why the womb and uterus are specifically mentioned as "discharging" in the passage unless that was referring to a spontaneous abortion. But you may be reading from a different translation and so it might read differently. I'd have to go dig into the scholarly literature to know more. But either way, the passage is clearly being abused by Gothard/ATI when it is used as it was in that lesson.

Thank you for that explanation. I hadn't thought of it that way, but of course you're right in that "logic" doesn't really play into any of this in the first place. Very interesting. And toast . . . .LOL!!

I know it has for me. And I thank all of you for being the loving, sensitive, wonderful people you are who made that possible. And hearing so many other stories from survivors has been helpful too. Horrible of course, but in a sense helpful to me because it reminds me I'm not alone, and more importantly that it really, definitely wasn't my fault.