BOOKED Solid

"Not all sinners lack virtue, and not everyone who’s technically virtuous is ethical....There are millions of ethical, fully moral sinners in America, and I’ve grown sick of listening to the right wing bitch and moan about them while the left wing refuses to defend them. No one sticks up for the sinners—not even the sinners themselves."

The latest focus of the wit and outrage of Dan Savage, unabashed aspiring sinner, is Skipping Towards Gomorrah, a year-long exploration of favorite American pastimes: the seven deadly sins. Simultaneously bashing big-name conservative fundamentalists and avowed anti-gay rights activists such as Pat Buchanan and Bill Bennett and exploring his own misconceptions and boundaries with greed, lust, gluttony, sloth, envy, pride, and anger, Savage manages to blend politics with humor in a way that is bound to make readers shake their heads, laugh out loud, and, most importantly, reconsider their self-imposed guidelines for pursuing life, liberty, and happiness.

Along his journey, Savage discovers that sinners have rules and structure just like the so-called virtuous. The writer offers plenty of evidence in our current political culture that demonstrates the hypocrisy of the right-wing’s mouthpieces, and he even argues that their hypocrisy makes these politicians more sinful than those who establish guidelines, make their rules known, and stick by them. It seems that many conservatives are very good at the first two, but fall short on the third. But, as Savage also suggests, why should conservatives be allowed to define virtue and sin, right and wrong, for others, even if they do follow their own rules themselves?

"These men, so far as we know, derive happiness from things that have been labeled virtues, and hence they are praised for their pursuit of happiness. For others, the things that make us happy have been labeled sinful, and we’re condemned for our pursuit of happiness. But if I’m not hurting anyone, my pursuit of happiness is no less virtuous than Bennett’s."

He notes that the seven deadly sins are not even mentioned in the Bible, and that their appearance in the 13th century certainly contradicts what American founders held to be viable, necessary truths.

"Rap versus show tunes; monogamy versus variety; pot versus Bud Light—different things make different people happy. It’s such a simple concept, so—what’s the phrase? Oh, yeah. It’s so self-evident. Why, then, do so many conservatives have such a hard time wrapping their heads around it?"

Savage is the first to admit that not all of the sins appeal to him, but he was willing to make the sacrifices necessary for his readers to gain an insider’s perspective. While the book sounds like a year-long abandonment of morals and ethics, Savage’s main point is that sinners work with ethics, too, they just don’t necessarily force others to accept the same ethics. When the author befriended people who actively pursued lives centered on one of the big seven, he discovered what these rules were. He also learned that pursuing some of the sins does not necessarily lead to happiness. While Bennett and other conservatives may find this somewhat gratifying, Savage quickly validates sinners’ right to attempt to find happiness, but fail. For example, Savage finds his exploration of gluttony to be a valuable lesson about making assumptions.

Savage hooks up with a group he figured would be the epitome of celebrating gluttonous behavior, the National Association for the Advancement of Fat Acceptance (NAAFA). While on the surface, NAAFA attempts to open minds (presumably the minds of thin people) about what it means to be fat, Savage discovered an underlying culture of pressure to remain fat, not unlike the pressure of the virtuous right. The convention he attended was about more than the pleasures of being plus-sized and the adventures of eating (you can argue all you want about glands and genetics, but there is a point where eating becomes a factor). Savage noticed more anger than celebration. The natural health problems associated with obesity, including the ability to walk, were viewed as oppressive political statements, not facts. Ironically, there was little guilt-free indulgence, which was precisely what Savage was seeking at the convention. Savage’s journey through NAAFA culture, complete with its own idiolect, was definitely not the ‘skipping’ he thought it would be.

Savage’s experience with the other sins had similar results. It seems that the participants’ comfort level with the sin and the structure they created to celebrate the sin as a natural part of their lives has something to do with the degree of happiness said sin brings the sinner. Guilt, which is not one of the seven sins, is the biggest difference between the wealthy travelers at the $3,200 a week weight loss spa (who pleasured themselves by paying an obscene amount of money for an over-rated summer camp) and the stable, loving relationship of middle-class swingers David and Bridget (whose biological explanation of the necessity of women having multiple male sex partners leads Savage to conclude, "It’s like a bunch of Amish guys getting together to build a barn").

The bottom line of Savage’s experience is that pleasure and the pursuit of happiness is a very personal idea. He argues adamantly for protecting the pursuit of happiness, whether your thing is a green leather thong at a gay pride parade or three-hour church sessions on Sundays. No one should force Pat Buchanan (or me, for that matter) to wear a thong in public, but no one should force the thong lover (or, again, me) to live Buchanan’s life either. Having a partner to pursue happiness with requires honesty with both that partner and yourself, something many closeted ‘sinners’ (think Jimmy Swaggart) refuse to acknowledge.

Skipping helps readers find the limits to their personal, guilt-free, journey to happiness. I read this book during a long plane ride, and found myself earning stares for my loud bursts of laughter. Oh well, if reading Savage is my own crazy pursuit of happiness, so be it.