The Meddlesome Priest :

phobia (n):  "irrational fear, horror, aversion," 1786, perhaps on model of similar use in French, abstracted from compounds in  -phobia , from Greek  -phobia , from  phobos  "fear, panic fear, terror, outward show of fear; object of fear or terror," originally "flight" (still the only sense in Homer)      J ust because I don't like onions doesn't mean I have an onion-phobia. I just don't like onions. I don't like anything about them; their taste, texture or the fact that, to me, they overpower the flavor of all they contact. Though I just don't like onions it would be silly to say I was afraid of the onion, no? Same with rap music. Do I have rap-phobia because I just don't like rap music? Am I unjustly discriminating against the onion or rap music because I don't care for either? Apparently, according to one modern reasoning mistake the answer is 'yes'. I'm a mean, nasty and psychologically disturbed individu...

   Reaction to our former post, Absolute Evil Exists , has been swift and robust. Many deny the post's affirmative argument. Only about 38% of comments and emails agreed. One reader said, "Well I don't know about 'absolute' but evil certainly does exist." A few other respondents complained that if the case was made for the existence of Absolute Evil, then this implied an equally strong case for the existence of Absolute Good can also be made. Absolutely! Let's examine that case.    In Paris recently, a young Muslim man, an immigrant to France from the nation of Mali, showed the world that Absolute Good abounds all around us even in midst of a destitute instance of Absolute Evil by others. Without a thought to his own life, he hid shoppers in a Jewish deli out of the way from the follow-on assassin to the Charlie Hebdo assassinations earlier on that day. Even a fter the gunman had already killed people during the hostage taking in the kosher deli that m...