I tried to make this same argument* to my mom's husband two weeks ago. I said, what happened to that whole camel passing through the eye of a needle thing? He scolded me, saying that the "eye of a needle" referred to a geographical location and that the Jesus was admonishing people who glorify earthly riches over heavenly ones. Nothing he said negated my argument, really. However, he brought his massive 6'4" frame upright and told me that no one will ever take care of me -- basically calling me a Communist. He then said that he felt sorry for me and stormed out of the room.

It was uncomfortable, seeing as how this is the man who has been sleeping with my mother for seven years. In retrospect, though, it was pretty awesome to argue something to a conservatarian that elicited a childish hissy fit. I doubt he learned this tactic when listening to his shelf-full of Tony Robbins tapes.

For the record, this came up when he was confused by my argument that meritocracy encourages the pursuit of wealth over the well-being of others. He didn't know what I meant by "meritocracy," and when I had trouble explaining it, I floundered and instead went for the suckerpunch and brought up scripture.

The truth is, I was using the word meritocracy incorrectly. I regret that error, but looking back on what I chalk up as a small victory in a much larger battle, the mistake was worth it.

*Though bloggers are mostly hobbyist pundits and not journalists, we still need to be careful. The blogger linked here should have referred to the source for the quote.