At My Whit’s End: Connie Comes to Darkness (Blackgaard Saga Part 2)

(Photo: Were you truly saved, Connie? Original art by Bruce Day, Focus on the Family. Images courtesy of The Odyssey Scoop. Photoshopped by yours truly.)

The Blackgaard Saga, Adventures in Odyssey’s first major story arc, began with Connie and Eugene discovering a secret computer program held by Whit. Connie inadvertently activating the program was a crime so severe in the eyes of Whit that he fired the two from Whit’s End.

We pick up Connie’s story in the aftermath.

Episodes 74 and 75: Connie Goes to Camp Parts 1 and 2

Connie works as a camp counselor but struggles to keep her group of young girls on the correct moral path.

Connie, still furious Whit fired her, has managed to land a summer job. A camp counselor at Odyssey’s local Christian summer camp, where she’ll be overseeing and/or interacting mostly with kids that have all been established in prior episodes. Lucy, Donna, Robyn, Jimmy, Jack, and Oscar. These kids highlight a quiet strength AIO’s slowly been developing as of late: A recurring cast. We already had Whit, Tom, Connie, and Eugene but until now the show has mostly used one-off kid characters.

Thankfully the AIO team realized that having a recurring stable of kids would mean less time spent introducing them every episode, allowing for better paced stories and character development. It also helps that AIO lucked into some shockingly great kid actors. I say “shockingly” because all of them were family members of show staff, random kids the staff had seen in church plays, or were plucked from a Christian theater company.

This could have been a recipe for disaster. Having acted in and seen many a church play in my youth? The talent can, charitably, vary wildly from “cute” to “my God, why have you forsaken me?” Especially when hiring the staff’s own kids? You expect actors who can barely pay attention to recording, let alone give a real performance. This occasionally did plague early episodes of the show, with the kid actors clearly reading the scripts as they went. Yet somehow AIO ended up with a group of kids who could really act. Not just “good enough” acting. Not “cute” kid acting. Not “only good to a very loving and biased parent” acting. Genuinely great performances.

Robyn and Donna

Robyn: -screams-

Donna: “Robyn, what's wrong?”

Robyn: “Get it off my sleeping bag!”

Donna: “What? I don't see anything.”

Robyn: “A bug! It's crawling up my sleeping bag to attack me. There it is. Quick! Stop it! Squish it! Smash it!”

Donna: “You mean this? This is the barrette for your hair.”

Robyn: “Oh, that's where it went.”¹

Robyn’s line read at the end gets me every time. Perfect comedic timing.

There’s also this bit with the boy characters.

The Boys Argue

Jimmy: “What do you think, Jack? Are we gonna beat the other team?”

Jack: “Sure, why shouldn't we?”

Oscar: “Because we're not any good.”

Jimmy: “Speak for yourself, Oscar. I think we’d do a lot better if you knew how to a paddle a canoe.”

Oscar: “Me? I never got a chance. You're the one who kept tipping us over.”

Jimmy: “The only reason I tipped us over was because Jack doesn't know how to steer.”

Jack: “Oh, no, I'm not taking the blame for this.”

Mr. Zachary: “Hey, hey! Lights out!”²

They make listening to these, at best, morally questionable stories not so painful.

One of only two new kid characters here is TV-obsessed Allison, who brought an entire television set to camp. Is that a bit much? Sure, and Connie takes it away, but that’s not enough punishment for Allison’s “addiction.” The other young girls openly mock Allison’s constant TV talk which, while mean, is realistic. As a fellow kid who wouldn’t shut up about TV (5th grade was apparently “too old” to be talking about Power Rangers Time Force) I’ve lived Allison’s life. The way Connie dismisses her though? Her open hostility?

Connie is Mean

Connie: “How you holding up, Allison? Any symptoms of withdrawal? Flashbacks? Hallucinations of mouthwash commercials?”

Allison: “Naw, I think I'm okay. I have this to comfort me.”

Connie: “Oh, that's great. What is it? Your Bible?”

Allison: “No. Copy of last week's TV Guide.”

Connie: “Ugh, lights out.”³

Nothing like an authority figure mocking a kid in front of other kids. Probably encouraged Robyn and Donna’s rude comments to Allison throughout the story! If the cool teen is doing it? So can we!

What makes this all the worse for Allison is she watches TV with her family all the time and they have no problem with it. I’m sure her parents sent her to this camp thinking she’d have a wonderful time with nice Christian kids. Instead she gets berated for being, let’s be real, probably autistic with TV as her special interest.

(Photo: With no photos of Allison, enjoy this photo of me at Christian summer camp when I was… 10? Holding a Star Trek: The Next Generation book. Let’s just say I relate a lot to what Allison goes through in this episode.)

Allison describes one of her favorite shows to the other girls and they all roll their eyes. They don’t wanna hear about it. Allison, not understanding they mean “we don’t want to hear about TV at all,” assumes they don’t want to hear about that specific show and goes right into describing a different show. I know the general understanding of autism in 1989 was not where it is today but it’s still rough to hear a kid so openly mocked for it. Especially in a show usually so dedicated to God’s love and all. You’d hope the moral here would be these girls should stop making fun of Allison and appreciate her for who she is but NOPE.

Connie lightly reprimands Robyn and Donna for how mean they’ve been to Allison but explains that, “if you want to help someone to change, help them in love.” Which is a backhanded way of saying, “girls, girls, girls, you were too mean about Allison being a fucking loser.” The right way to go about this is, obviously, to make her love of TV a moral/spiritual failing.

Allisons Failure in Connie_s Eyes

Connie: “I know when I'm thinking about things I shouldn't. I say Bible verses to myself. That way I stop concentrating on the wrong things and concentrate on good things. Like God's word.

Allison: “Do you think that'll really work?”

Connie: Sure. You know, I was reading Philippians last night where it says, ‘whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good report, if it has virtue or is praiseworthy think about these things.’ Maybe that's kind of what the Apostle Paul meant. To- to get all the garbage out of our brains and put in thoughts about God and His word. It's worth a try, isn't it?”

Allison: “Yeah. So from now on, when I start thinking about TV? I'll sing a Bible verse instead.”

Connie: “Right.”⁴

So.

I hate everything about this.

“When I’m thinking about things I shouldn’t.” GIRL, she’s only thinking about TV! She likes sitcoms and action shows. She’s not thinking about inventing weapons of mass destruction or murdering people (that’s for Whit.) Thinking about TV she likes is not a crime. But no, thinking about TV isn’t just “wrong.” It’s morally wrong. You thinking about TV is in direct opposition to God’s words. Thinking about TV is no better than ripping a Bible up, rolling the pieces into a basketball, and dunking it into a butthole at the kink club.

TV is especially bad for women, didn’t you know? According to Actual Human Sludge James Dobson, a woman’s daily dedication to television (in the form of soap operas) is really a, “deep, persistent yearning for human contact.”⁵*

NO IT ISN’T. AND TV. IS. NOT. EVIL!!! Can you watch too much of it? Sure, of course. But that’s not what Connie or AIO is saying. They aren’t gently pulling you away from your tenth hour knocking back episodes of latter-day Sliders like beer cans (extremely unhealthy, do not recommend.) They’re demonizing a young girl for daring to have an interest outside the faith. Judging her for merely thinking about anything more than God.

(Photo: Adult Allison thinking about Sliders more than God. Same, girl. Photo courtesy of Earth Prime.)

But we as humans can’t control our thoughts. Obtrusive thoughts happen! Just because you have an idle thought about running a red light doesn’t make you a monster and doom you to the ninth circle of hell where Ronald Reagan is forced to watch episodes of Glee on repeat. Yet Connie acts as if Allison can control her thoughts and not think about her special interest. It’s like if you told me not to think about VR Troopers. I’m sorry, Connie, it can’t be done and I’m not a sinner because of it!

No, Allison must think of the Bible every single time any thought of TV enters her brain. Considering how much she thinks about TV? She’ll need to think about the Bible 24/7. That’s a lot of scripture to sing. I’m sure none of her fellow campers will get annoyed by that because it’s holy and good. It’s okay to talk everyone’s hear off if it’s about God, right? Don’t pay attention that AIO had a whole episode where Connie learned there are not-so effective ways to share the word of God. Just keep thinking about pure things. What are they? WE’LL LET YOU KNOW WHEN YOU GET FUCKING ANNOYING AGAIN, IDIOT. God’s your new special interest. :)

Whatever Connie’s intentions, this is one of many ways Christians abuse people in the faith. You can’t talk about controlling others’ thoughts and not have it be some kind of abuse. Remember kids, don’t keep an open mind! Only think about good godly things! While not exactly like Allison’s probable autism, Jimmy actor Dave Griffin’s own experiences with OCD and Christianity speak to the future Allison can expect:

“I believe that The Church™ effectively IS therapy for people with mental health struggles through the millennia before we knew what mental illnesses were. Your priest/pastor/imam/rabbi/cultleader is whom you seek for guidance when your life is falling apart. And these people aren’t trained in psychotherapy. No. They studied The Ancient Propaganda™. And The Ancient Propaganda™ is not the world’s greatest mental health manual...[So] what is recommended? Why to put your obsessive and compulsiveness into going to church more and spending more time in The Word and more time praying and the whole situation lends itself to OCD abuse.”⁶

And what will happen when Allison can’t stop herself thinking about TV, her lauded Bible verses unable to chase those thoughts away? Griffin continues:

“When none of it helps people say “You just didn’t try hard enough. You didn’t have enough faith.”

FUCK

YOU

YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT SUFFERING IS

Look at the people who have to pray 100 times a day. Look at the people that have to say Jesus’ name in their head and conversation at least once every 5 minutes. These are OCD behaviors and The Church™ is a place that rewards that kind of loyal and obsessive and compulsive behavior. These are the people who thank god for everything. Literally. Ev.er.y.th.ing. These are the people who get upset that you might be thinking something different from them. Because if they have to obsessively think about god and Jesus you have to, too!

Wanna know what it’s like to be immersed in a roomful of people who are OCD? The Church™ is not all that dissimilar from a mental health hospital. Loads of people running around claiming they hear god talking to them or they can’t stop thinking about Bible Verses that fall into one’s head magically almost divinely.”⁷

See, Allison? Never shutting up about TV? Sinful. Never shutting up about the Bible? Divine. You’ll totally be praised ‘till the end of days for it. More from Griffin:

“But churches, temples, synagogues, any religious institution will be absolutely stocked to the gills with people who struggle with undiagnosed (usually) OCD. The Church is where you go when your brain is acting funny. And then your Anointed Elder™ gives you some sage wisdom about how your problems are your fault and you need to be going to church and studying the Ancient Propaganda™ more. And often when people do this there lives actually do kind of improve. Because the regimen and the routine are so strict it forces you to exist totally within that environment. You have traded all your obsessions and compulsions for a new one! You haven’t healed your OCD… you’ve just morphed it onto the next thing.”⁸

Congrats, Allison. You got the Jesus autism now. Which is the only acceptable kind of autism for these people.

Annoying about TV? Sin.

Annoying about God? Divine.

But, uh, can you maybe do your God-tism over there? We’re trying to abuse these children in peace.

That’s the thing. I knew people at Church and my Christian summer camp who, looking back, were very much some flavor of neurodivergent and God was their special interest. You think they’d be treated as the most blessed of His people. Anointed by others in the faith. The most well respected and popular of all believers.

JK, lol, their love of God was treated just like Allison’s love of TV. People were just a little nicer about it.

-"Wow, you're really on fire for the Lord with these skit ideas! That's great, that's great. You go perform that for the kids while the rest of us hang out… Somewhere else."

-"You're really energetic! That's a blessing to see. We just need you to tone it down, some Church members don't like it when you're so loud.”

-While not making eye contact- “Mmmhmm, great little comic about angels you’ve got there. I’ll look at it later, promise.”

Not even praising God’s name 24/7 is enough for these people. You have to do it the right way. What’s the right way? Shut up, idiot. :) You should just know. Go sing some more Bible verses to yourself.

My heart breaks for Allison. She never shows up in AIO again. We don’t know what happened to her. Her autism could be a source of abuse in the Church to this day. Is she still singing Bible verses to herself? Is she so afraid of TVs she smashes any that come across her path? Does she still allow herself to recall happy times of sitting around the TV with her family? Does she still talk to them? Does her faith leader let her talk to them? They did encourage those evil thoughts in the first place. It’s better she doesn’t talk to them. She needs to focus on thinking more about God.

Allison doesn’t deserve any of that.

(Photo: Whit instructs Connie on his secret technique to find and mind crush the evil children of Odyssey. AKA all of them. Art by Bruce Day, Focus on the Family. Images courtesy of The Odyssey Scoop.)

My heart breaks for Connie too. This doesn’t excuse her actions but in judging Allison like this? She’s repeating what Whit inflicted on her. Controlling and abusing Allison’s insecurities to make her “better.” After all, if this “helps” Allison? It’ll be easier for Connie to justify what Whit did to her.

See? SEE?! This is helpful. This is good. It’s godly. I helped Allison! That means Whit breaking my soul down and making me feel like a terrible person 24/7 was good and godly too! Yep! It was fine!

This is fine! If this is okay, I’ll be okay.

What happened to me is okay.

It is.

IT IS.

it

is

Regretfully it’s not just Allison who gets put through the wringer, we’ve got to talk about Lucy. She’s massively important to this arc and her introduction into it is… Well…

At this camp boys get to do such activities as crafts and archery. The girls do activities that, according to Connie, “prepare for the future.” AKA “the fundamentals of good homemaking.” AKA scrubbing floors. I really hope no one paid for this camp.

When the girls rightfully complain about doing back-breaking labor their counselor reminds them that women in the Bible scrubbed floors.

“You think you’re better than the women of the Bible?”

“No, ma’am,” Robyn dejectedly answers.

(Photo: Surprise, fucker. Bet you thought you’d seen the last of me! Author Photo from Hide or Seek, Fleming H. Revell Company, 1979)

Their counselor reminds them that a clean house is the sign of a clean heart and I’m reminded of the vile ways the writers and Focus on the Family view women. There’s no better example than Dobson dedicating his book, What Wives With Their Husbands Knew About Women, not to his wife, mother, or any other woman in his life, but his son who, according to Dobson, “tolerates girls.”⁹ That same book attributes all women’s dissatisfaction with housework not to sexism or the amount of unpaid labor involved but to, uh, other women being assholes about it??? To Dobson it’s “militant females” who force the idea that housewives are “not needed” into women’s heads.¹⁰

After all, as the book details, when Dobson’s wife broke her leg? He did the housework for one small period of time. He knows the struggle.¹¹ So, ladies, don’t do something as foolish as get a job outside the home! It won’t cure your, supposed, “disenchantment.”¹² Housework, and raising children, of course, is a “reward” that, “far outweighs the cost.”¹³ So get back to scrubbing those floors, ladies!

The only girl that receives any praise is rule-follower Lucy, accepting it through gritted teeth. This isn’t what she expected camp to be. It’s no wonder that when Jill, another camper, promises to get her away from the camp’s planned activities? Lucy’s tempted to break the rules. Perhaps also tempted by Jill herself?

Subtle Christian Lesbians

Jill: “I have something I want you to see.”

Lucy: “Okay.”

Jill: “So when I tell you, you have to follow me, okay?”

Lucy: “You mean leave the rest of the group?”

Jill: “Yeah. Just for a couple of minutes.”

Lucy: “Uh, Jill, I don't know.”

Jill: “Lucy, you have to trust me. It won't take long.”

Lucy: “Well… We'll see.”

Jill: “I told you. You stick with me, and you'll have a camp experience you'll never forget.”

-whistle blows-¹⁴

Lucy and Jill’s interactions throughout the story aren’t the typical "bad girl tempts good girl" dynamic you get in AIO. When I described that Jill later promises to show Lucy wild horses a queer woman friend of mine had the wise observation that, "the bad wild girl wants to lead Lucy, broken and tamed in spirit, to visit other wild horses????" There’s a subtle queer undertone here. Obviously that isn’t intended but Focus on the Family and Dobson do hate queer people with a fiery passion, calling “homosexuality” “contagious.”¹⁵ So, you know, it was somewhere in the minds of the writers. Breaking the rules? Being queer? Same thing!

The two manage to see those wild horses but are caught outside of their tents, Lucy sent to a disappointed Connie for discipline. Lucy’s one of the “good ones,” Connie says. Why would she do this? Lucy’s meek explanation quickly ramps into a revelation. She’s tired of being the “good girl.” The perfect, responsible girl. She wanted to do, BE, something different. She believes doing what she wanted was “crazy” and desperately seeks Connie’s empathy.

This is an attempt by the show to draw comparison between Lucy’s actions and Connie use of Applesauce which falls flat. Connie accidentally using Whit’s computer was understandable in the context of her job. Lucy, however, did leave the group and could have been hurt. Not in a ‘experiments with gay feelings’ kind of way (in my experience that always makes life better) but going off with just Jill in the dark woods was genuinely dangerous for two young girls. Whit firing Connie was bullshit but Connie giving Lucy a warning does make complete sense. Their situations aren’t the same but in comparing them the show distracts the audience from Connie’s major failing here.

If a young girl comes to you and, in what appears to be the first time she’s ever shown an ounce of rage, spills her heart out about not wanting to be a “good girl” anymore and to do something “crazy,” don’t you think that deserves some follow-up? Nope, Connie doesn’t probe deeper. Lucy breaking even a little out of the restrained system she’s grown up in reminds Connie too much of her “bad” old life. Well, “bad” in the eyes of Whit and friends. Like with Lucy, it’d be well worth probing deeper into but she can’t. Remember, even thinking anything “bad” is off limits. Lucy begs for recognition of her struggles but all Connie can do is endlessly repeat Bible verses to herself. Great strategy to help children.

Connie’s reprimand keeps Lucy in line. For now. Jill tempts her to visit an underground air raid shelter but Lucy only leaves her cabin later that night to tell her she won’t be going.

“We can’t do this kind of thing anymore, it’s wrong.” Gay.

The two are caught and, despite Jill’s explanation that Lucy wasn’t going with her, both receive the same punishment. They’re sent home from camp. No flexibility is given for Lucy’s good intentions, nor does Connie acknowledge it. She’s more focused on how upset she is at having to do this. Lucy, beaten down, falls back on what she’s probably done for her own parents in the past. She apologizes to Connie for hurting her.

(Photo: The children of Camp What A Nut brace for their inevitable discipline. Art by Bruce Day, Focus on the Family. Image courtesy of eBay user sh-69025.)

Of course! Of course it’s the job of a younger character to reassure an older one that the “discipline” they received is correct and morally sound. Can’t let those in charge ever feel bad or question their decisions. It’s on kids to remind everyone that they deserve punishments, actually. Connie’s almost got Lucy locked into being a perfect little girl who gleefully welcomes all punishments with a big ol’ smile.

Thankfully Lucy’s apology isn’t as conclusive as it seems. Remember, this arc shakes up the whole status quo of the show. Even lessons of the week aren’t safe!

In a letter to her mother, Connie compares sending Lucy home to Whit firing her (NOT THE SAME THING) and her own mother spanking her (WHAT?!) She muses this is “how God must feel when he has to discipline all of us.” She recalls that when her mother would spank her she’d say, “this hurts me a lot more than it hurts you.” The implication being that’s how Connie, Whit, and God all feel when they discipline someone.

Um, excuse me, uh, I have something to say to the class.

Ahem.

WHEN A CHILD IS BEING SPANKED THE CHILD WILL LITERALLY ALWAYS HURT MORE THAN THE PARENT. Not just physically but emotionally! A child is not as emotionally developed as an adult. When you’re a kid? Getting any kind of discipline feels like the world’s ending.

I’m sure Connie’s “hurts me a lot more than it hurts you” line pleased Lord Dobson-sama. He probably read it and rolled around his office, giddy with delight, commanding his secretary to fetch ten children to beat before lunch. That line, the way these episodes handle Connie and Lucy’s dynamic, and even Allison’s “discipline”, display a fundamental self-centeredness from the adults behind this show. It’s all meant to beat into children (the intended audience) that instead of focusing on their own hurt or interests? They should focus all their energy on the adult’s perspective.

Allison, you need to figure out you’re fucking annoying. Stop it so us adults don’t have to deal with your neurodivergent shit. It’s too fucking complicated. Act normal. Your parents accept you? They’re fucking annoying to. Tell them to act normal.

Lucy, you’re supposed to be a good girl. It was a blessing we didn’t have to worry about you or do anything icky like pay attention to you. Now we’re having to pay attention to you. Do you think we have time to pay attention to you?

Jill, you’re gay. There’s no hope for you. You chose this homosexual lifestyle. Have fun in hell.

The people behind AIO don’t care about kids. Kids are an inconvenience. An obligation from God. Go forth and multiply and all that shit. We don’t know, we haven’t read the Bible. Our pastor gives us the tl;dr. If kids are gonna be around? They better stroke our egos. What the fuck else are they for? Making us feel bad? Ungrateful little shits. Don’t they know what we go through? Can’t they understand? No we don’t have fucking therapists, psychology’s the new secular religion. Children need to wise up and tend to our needs, just we did with our parents. WE TURNED OUT FINE, SO WILL THEY.

Not only do adults get bent out of shape when kids disobey but so does God, apparently. God, the apparent creator of the known universe (fucker didn’t even put air in space so, like, not that great), has nothing better to do than get all bent out of shape when a kid does a minorly inconvenient thing? Not like there are hurricanes murdering tens of thousands or governments ripping away social services from the people most in need. Nah, your autistic kid likes TV, your good girl wants to see a horse, and your gay kid is gay. Those are the real problems God’s gotta focus on.

None of these kids deserved the punishments they got (they need understanding!) and Lucy in particular shouldn’t have overlooked her own hurt just to make Connie feel better. Just like Connie shouldn’t overlook the hurt Whit inflicted on her. But no, Connie falls into line and earns an Olympic medal in mental gymnastics to justify it. Whit felt a wittle itty bitty bad about it so that makes it okay! She even tells her mom to say “hello” to Whit for her. Christ.

Let kids have emotions and feelings they aren’t forced to instantaneously logic/pray away for the benefit of adults. Let them enjoy what they enjoy. Let them step outside the life you planned for them. Oh, and let them be gay as fuck. Kids aren’t meant to be shoved in little boxes that you can understand, control, and abuse.

Next Time: AIO actually gets around to introducing the titular Blackgaard of this saga.

*(Hey, remember when I really believed AIO would use the format of soap operas to make the show better? OH WELL.)

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Sources:

Connie Comes to Camp: Parts 1 & 2: Written and Directed by Paul McCusker, Production Engineers Bob Luttrell and Dave Arnold, Focus on the Family, 1989.

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What Wives Wish Their Husbands Knew About Women by James Dobson, Tyndale House Publishers, 1980.

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(10) Page 26

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(12) Page 55

(13) Page 58

(15) Page 142

The Prodigal: Afterthoughts Vol. 2: Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Written by Dave Griffin, 2024.

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