For me, this isn't terribly different from the way I relate to women who expose a lot of skin. It's hard for me to not notice them, but I don't want to be obsessed with the way they are dressed, I don't want to stare, and there are times it's very helpful to think of something else entirely. I do, in fact, talk with women with whom I have to concentrate on looking them in the eye. I find it helpful to focus on "look her in the eye, listen to what she is saying, ask follow up questions, show you care about the things she is sharing with you". I don't find it helpful to focus on "don't look at her breasts", because when I do, my eyes tend to go there. Wherever my focus is, it tends to take the rest of me with it.Josh wrote: ↑Wed May 24, 2023 9:55 amSo, here's one of the problems. We're about to spend a month completely surrounded/soaked in it. It's impossible to go shopping right now, for example, without seeing a large fraction of the children's clothes blatantly promoting this kind of thing.
Likewise, if one works at all around large corporate clients or employers, one is basically bombarded during June, including requests to participate in various "pride" related activities. I have usually been able to sidestep these by avoiding things since I'm just a contractor, or the smaller startups I worked for didn't expend as much energy on these things. But even that's changing.
When I talk with women, I don't usually tell them what I think of the way they are dressed. It's not usually the most appropriate thing to talk about. I don't have that kind of relationship with them. Perhaps, as I get to know someone better, it might come up, but even then, I would probably let my wife have that conversation with her. There's something very awkward about me talking to a woman about what I think she should be wearing.
I worked for a company that was all woke and rainbow once. It was awkward at times. I just didn't participate in those things. At work, I treated coworkers as coworkers, and did not feel called to tell them what I thought of their lifestyle. I also felt free to be very open about being Christian. They didn't ask me what I thought of their lifestyle, I didn't ask them what they thought of mine.
So how do we advance our own Kingdom amidst the world?Josh wrote: ↑Wed May 24, 2023 9:55 amThat's a separate topic, but yes, one of my complaints with many right wing politicians is they seem to spend a lot of time reacting or making lots of noise about what their opponents are doing, and not much time at all doing anything constructive to advance their own good policies.