Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
PZ Myers is a biologist and associate professor at the University of Minnesota, Morris.
…and this is a pharyngula stage embryo.
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When the temptation to masturbate is strong, yell "Stop!" to those thoughts as loudly as you can in your mind. Then recite a portion of the Bible or sing a hymn.
[Mormon Guide to Self-Control]
« Tangled Bank #109 | Main | Fight back against Bill Donohue! »
Category: Administrative
Posted on: July 10, 2008 3:11 PM, by PZ Myers
Because performance all over scienceblogs starts to suffer when a comment thread gets too long, I'm closing the thread in which I grievously insult a cracker…but if you must, you can continue here.
Comments
Posted by: D- | July 10, 2008 3:18 PM
Hmm, turns out Jesus was a Cracker...wonder if he really had blue eyes too.
Posted by: me | July 10, 2008 3:19 PM
1. Poor kid takes home uneaten eucharist to show his friend.
2. Church and catholics go batshit crazy.
3. PZ thinks this is ridiculous and says so, also says he may do some things to a cracker.
4. Church and catholics go batshit crazy.
Teh end.
Gives me my cheezeburgers. :)
Posted by: drow | July 10, 2008 3:20 PM
FSM save our noodles, and the meatballs among them, from the desecration of heathens, and of clerics and nuns, and of druids and rangers, and especially of favored souls, being a total munchkin class. amen.
Posted by: Rarus.vir | July 10, 2008 3:21 PM
I think we have missed the bigger picture in all this, and that is that Jesus is powerless agianst Zip-lock baggies. Superman has Kryptonite and Jesus has Glad bags. At least I know what to wear if I am ever compelled to attend church again.
Posted by: kubenzi | July 10, 2008 3:22 PM
its a miracle.i have witnessed "what? errr..." turned to "whine"
Posted by: geoff | July 10, 2008 3:23 PM
When I saw the words 'cracker' 'eating' and 'Bill Donohue' in the same post, I thought it was going to be about cannibalism.
All this over some starch.
*sigh*
Posted by: Reginald Selkirk | July 10, 2008 3:24 PM
How long will it take Bill Donohue to express his outrage over this activity in Wales?
Weekend is sure to be a cracker
Posted by: Richard Harris | July 10, 2008 3:24 PM
Transubstantiation - it's crackers. Feckin' religious edjits!
Posted by: Chiroptera | July 10, 2008 3:28 PM
Thanks for continuing the comments, PZ.
Dave S, #1006: Do you seriously suggest that Prof Wacko faces the same danger from Catholics here in Minnesota that he would if he tried a stunt like this in Mecca?
Do you really think this is even relevant? I mean, how the hell does retarded Muslim intolerance excuse retarded Catholic intolerance? How does the fact that Saudi Arabia is a theocracy have to do with the fact that PZ Myers lives under a secular government despite the ill-wishes of our own Christofascists? Do you even have a coherent point, or is your intent to obfuscate the issues here with emotion-laden irrelevance?
Posted by: BobC | July 10, 2008 3:29 PM
The stolen wafer may have already been recovered. What will the priest do with it? Does he throw it into a sacred garbage can, eat it, or what?
Posted by: Mark B | July 10, 2008 3:30 PM
1. Poor kid takes home uneaten eucharist to show his friend.
2. Church and catholics go batshit crazy.
3. PZ thinks this is ridiculous and says so, also says he may do some things to a cracker.
4. Church and catholics go batshit crazy.
Teh end
Nah, the cycle of batshit crazy is never ending. Your summary needed a question mark at the end:
Teh end?
I didn't know that this was such a big deal thoughout histtor until reading the Wikipedia article on Host Desecration. Apparently, disrespecting this little (rather silly) bit of religious dogma has been used as justification for some rather extreme acts against groups that the Catholic Church despised.
and on and on ... One hopes the Catholic Church of today doesn't resort to massacres and atrocities to protect its dogma as they did in the middle ages, but it looks like morons like Donohue long to a return to the good old days of the inquisition.
Posted by: Brett | July 10, 2008 3:31 PM
Congratulations....you have just committed career suicide!!!!
PS- are you trying to be a "bad boy" of new atheism?
Good luck, you hate-filled, ignorant chump.
Posted by: Reginald Selkirk | July 10, 2008 3:31 PM
SICOTI: Someone Is Crackers On The Interwebs. And it sounds so much like psychotic.
Posted by: Sili | July 10, 2008 3:32 PM
It's a plot, I tell you. It's a plot!
They're trying to bring down the SciBorg from within!
Posted by: Chris P | July 10, 2008 3:32 PM
How is one supposed to know all these stupid religious no-no's? Are they codified in a book? It's bad enough when they change the traffic rules in a city without telling anybody outside.
Why don't the relgious stop using their cell phones while driving - that's flat dangerous. It directly affects my drive to work EVERY day. Having to spend effort checking for stupid behavior.
My eating a cracker doesn't affect your real safety in anyway.
What total hypocrits.
Posted by: Reginald Selkirk | July 10, 2008 3:33 PM
Dude, 1) find a dictionary. 2) Look up "tenure." 3) Eat your heart out.Posted by: Dutch Delight | July 10, 2008 3:33 PM
I could look up the names but I'm to lazy, I'd say we're up to 6 posters with confirmed koran envy and extremely self-centered delusions that indicate they actually think their specific religion is of special importance to atheists.
Posted by: qbsmd | July 10, 2008 3:34 PM
We should take bets:
if PZ puts one sacred cracker on a webcam so it can be viewed live, how long would it take for Catholics to stop protesting? Would it go on for years or be over in a week?
Posted by: H.H. | July 10, 2008 3:35 PM
Brett, I'm pretty sure the hate-filled and ignorant ones are those making death threats over a cracker.
Man, it's like the cultists live in Opposite Land--all Orwell all the time!
Posted by: Cary | July 10, 2008 3:35 PM
This whole thing is lolworthy.
PZ, you provide me with much entertainment. Don't let these brainless idiots stop you. Ever.
People like PZ Myers make me happy to be a University of Minnesota Alum :)
Posted by: MH | July 10, 2008 3:35 PM
For all those who are thinking of smuggling out consecrated crackers, don't bother. Store-bought (or mail-ordered) ones are easier to get, and as the blessing process doesn't change their physical properties in any way, the priests won't be able to tell the difference.
You can do what-ever you like to them (Jesus sculpture!), and in doing so, mess with the minds of the credulous hopefully to the extent that they realize how stupid their beliefs are. If you like, some-time afterwards, you can reveal that no Jesus was harmed.
Oh what fun we shall have!
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | July 10, 2008 3:36 PM
Posted by: qbsmd | July 10, 2008 3:36 PM
Because intelligent people care.
Posted by: Dave S. | July 10, 2008 3:36 PM
Chiroptera, My point is that you weasels do not have the courage to do this to the one religious group that WILL really kill you. Oh, and when you come back with your anti-Muslim taunt, please demonstrate that I am wrong by including your real name and home address so the jihadists can find you. Thank you.
Posted by: midwifetoad | July 10, 2008 3:37 PM
http://www.uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/louisiana-whats-the-big-deal/#comment-292251
The Christian Love is oozing out all over.
I wonder what kind of Christian would think he has nothing to lose by committing murder. Or fantasizing about it.
Posted by: BobC | July 10, 2008 3:37 PM
After reading the host desecration article from Wikipedia I don't see any difference between Muslim terrorists and Catholics. Both religions are insane, and both religions have a bloody disgraceful history.
Posted by: Taz | July 10, 2008 3:38 PM
Number of comments in the old thread is 661. Can't we put 5 more in there?
Posted by: ThePetey | July 10, 2008 3:39 PM
Hmm, turns out Jesus was a Cracker...wonder if he really had blue eyes too.
Jesus of Nabisco
Posted by: craig | July 10, 2008 3:40 PM
It just occurred to to me that if it weren't for the selfishness of Catholics each wanting to ingest a little Jesus, they would just chew him up to make him sticky, get together and sculpt all the gobs back together so we could have Jesus back.
But noooooooooo... they gotta EAT the guy. Sickos.
Posted by: Brett | July 10, 2008 3:41 PM
What exactly makes you people so vicious and hate-filled?
I don't quite get why you need to attack faith and physically go after believers; however, I think you would make excellent soldiers of Mao or Stalin in their "rational" liquidation of hundreds of thousands of religious peoples.
PS - want to talk about tenure?
Talk to Ward Churchill...a similar nutbag!
Posted by: Mark B | July 10, 2008 3:41 PM
Six six six comments in the previous thread. It has been transubstantiated!
Posted by: Lucretious | July 10, 2008 3:41 PM
Once again, Denyse O'Leary bakes a goddamn tasty cracker.
Posted by: Michelle | July 10, 2008 3:42 PM
Are you gonna close down the other thread too? It reached a beautiful 666 post count. :P
Posted by: craig | July 10, 2008 3:44 PM
"physically go after believers;"
Who the fuck is doing that? You're adding too many new delusions to your old ones.
Posted by: 386sx | July 10, 2008 3:44 PM
It is hard to think of anything more vile than to intentionally desecrate the Body of Christ.
I guess that means it's not as bad as kidnapping the Body of Christ! Lol, what a bully.
Posted by: Ken | July 10, 2008 3:44 PM
Ok, Jesus of Nabisco has me laughing outloud. That is funny.
Posted by: Chiroptera | July 10, 2008 3:46 PM
Dave S, #24: My point is...
...completely irrelevant to the fact that some kid who pulled a prank that harmed no one is being harassed and sent death threats by thugs who are little different than the ones you keep bringing up. That it's safe to criticize the Catholics is due to the work of people who have worked hard to maintain a secular government and freedom of expression in this country, people who don't seem to include either you or Donahue.
Posted by: Big City | July 10, 2008 3:46 PM
Didn't the original title of the article say "Goddamn Cracker"? Was is changed? Am I dreaming?
Hey, this is not my beautiful house! This is not my beautiful wife! How did I get here?
Posted by: me | July 10, 2008 3:47 PM
Wow, you fail reading comprehension. No where has anyone called for assaultingsuckersthe religious. In fact it's just the opposite.Posted by: Brett | July 10, 2008 3:48 PM
Invading a Church to physically steal Holy Communion IS physically invading/attacking a religious people.
And you call religious extremists!
Wow! How deluded...
Posted by: Reginald Selkirk | July 10, 2008 3:48 PM
I found this link in the comments to the Strib article:
SICOTI.
Posted by: Randy | July 10, 2008 3:49 PM
If the Followers of the Cracker are going to make death threats... well, two can play at that game. I hold in my hand, right now, two orange-colored crackers joined in a Holy Bond of faux peanut butter. They have done nothing worse to me than to slightly stain my fingers and deposit Holy Crumbs on my lap. However, if Xers around the world do not stop saying and thinking things that I don't particularly like, I will crush these innocent crackers between my molars.
You have been warned.
Posted by: me | July 10, 2008 3:50 PM
Project much?Posted by: Bert Chadick | July 10, 2008 3:50 PM
Back off jebus boys or the saltine gets it.
Posted by: Ray S. | July 10, 2008 3:53 PM
I am so glad Crackergate has happened. Describing to my kids the inanity of the Catholics for believing such silliness has probably inoculated them from religion for life. Two new members of the reality based community. One not even a teenager yet.
Posted by: AgnosticOracle | July 10, 2008 3:53 PM
It occurs to me reading the original article if you wanted to cause a lot of chaos... Announce on a public forum that you'd taken (and not eaten) a cracker from the local Catholic Church. Ideally you have several people do this at several Catholic Churches. Whether you actually go to the trouble of actually going to the service is optional of course.
But if they really believe this is is mortal sin that the whole community has to make reparations for, that will keep them busy for a while.
Posted by: brandon | July 10, 2008 3:54 PM
Invading a Church to physically steal Holy Communion IS physically invading/attacking a religious people.
Brett as an ethical person, you ought to use thesauruses for good, not for lying and exaggerations.
Posted by: K8 | July 10, 2008 3:54 PM
PuusssZy Myer,
Don't worry about Catholics, your uni president will soon hand you your ass...
Good luck filling out those unemployment papers, Prof. Churchill....I mean, Myer!
PS - I heard the KKK is looking for a resident science lecturer....
Posted by: Fred Nurke | July 10, 2008 3:55 PM
This reminds me of the scene in Angela's Ashes where the boy (Frank?) gets sick and throws up the wafer, and the grandmother is upset because she's got the body of Jesus all over the back yard LOL!!!
When I was a kid, I had a friend who was an altar boy. We used to sneak into the church and take wafers by the bag and scarf them down for snacks.
Posted by: tsg | July 10, 2008 3:57 PM
Alakazam! *waves arms around* Omini domini!
There, I just changed every box of Original Premiums into a box of Jesuses.
You Catholics are going to be very busy, I suspect, trying to keep them all from being desecrated.
And if you don't believe I did it then you aren't respecting my beliefs.
Posted by: Epicurus | July 10, 2008 3:57 PM
Jesus prefers Wheat Thins. How many goddamn, fucking times to I have to goddamn tell you? Goddamnit!
Posted by: MH | July 10, 2008 3:57 PM
Brett wrote "I don't quite get why you need to attack faith and physically go after believers"
Superstitious belief is dangerous, as can be seen when someone removes a cracker from a building or gives a teddy bear the wrong name. Death threats are the result. We don't even threaten believers with violence, let alone 'physically go after them'. We just laugh at their stupidity.
You know those delusions in your mind; they're multiplying.
Posted by: John | July 10, 2008 3:57 PM
Who said anything about invading. They will be invited, heck, encouraged to come in. I bet if anyone here was told they were not welcome, they would leave.
Wow, what a wack job
Posted by: me | July 10, 2008 3:58 PM
I just love all these conservative religious hypocrites who complain about "free speech" when they aren't allowed to hate on gay people at colleges, but the moment anyone says anything negative about religion, there's a shit storm.Posted by: Sir Jebbington | July 10, 2008 3:58 PM
Wow, #48. The incorporation of an insult into PZ's name, the suggestion of unemployment, the reference to Winston Churchill, and a bonus KKK reference.
Godwin, it won't be long now.
Posted by: craig | July 10, 2008 3:58 PM
Ok, this thing is starting to piss me off a little.
So, I am going to get my hands on some consecrated crackers (I have connections)
And I'm going to make a piece of protest art out of them.
Not sure what yet, "piss cracker" would be too derivative.
Posted by: BobC | July 10, 2008 4:00 PM
From wikipedia: "Mortal sin, according to the beliefs of Roman Catholicism, is a sin that, unless confessed and absolved, condemns a person's soul to Hell after death."
Is not eating a wafer a mortal sin? Is this guy, according to Catholic beliefs, going to get tortured for eternity? I would think the Catholics would be satisfied with the torture, but they want to kill him too.
Posted by: Mark B | July 10, 2008 4:00 PM
Jesus told me that you shouldn't chomp him and grind him with your teeth. It hurts! Just let his sit on your tongue until he softens, and then swallow the doughy mass. Use the communion wine to wash it down. Thank you.
Posted by: Nonjebusbelievingheathen | July 10, 2008 4:01 PM
Albatross, Get your Albatross! "Do you get any wafers wif'em?" Of course you don't get any bloody wafers wif'em! Albatross!
Now we know why he didn't get any wafers with his albatross!
Posted by: me | July 10, 2008 4:01 PM
Actually it's a reference to Ward Churchill made by someone entirely ignorant of the fats.
Posted by: Rebecca Watson | July 10, 2008 4:02 PM
All this talk about Jesus is making me hungry.
Posted by: Paul W. | July 10, 2008 4:03 PM
Agnostic Oracle @ 46
Interesting plan. How about planting some hosts around in various places, and making it like a scavenger hunt to rescue the lost Jesus Pieces?
You could put them in plastic eggs at Easter.
Posted by: Mark B | July 10, 2008 4:03 PM
Wow, #48. The incorporation of an insult into PZ's name, the suggestion of unemployment, the reference to Winston Churchill, and a bonus KKK reference.
Godwin, it won't be long now.
I believe he was referring to WARD Churchill, now Winston. But he's probably too stupid to know the difference, so I withdraw my objection.
Posted by: skyotter | July 10, 2008 4:03 PM
huh. you'd think an omniscient deity would have seen it coming, and simply stayed out of the about-to-be-descecrated cracker in the first place. so, yes, we may safely blame the "victim"
unless, of course, the deity doesn't have a choice but MUST go into the cracker when the right magic words are uttered by the right person at the right time in the right place. in which case, blame the priest
Posted by: craig | July 10, 2008 4:03 PM
"Not sure what yet, "piss cracker" would be too derivative."
and too soggy.
Posted by: MH | July 10, 2008 4:03 PM
Brett: "Invading a Church to physically steal Holy Communion IS physically invading/attacking a religious people."
Firstly, no it isn't, and secondly, no-one is advocating that. The priest/magician/whatever gives the crackers out freely. What people do with them after that is their business. They can't force-feed people bits of 'jesus'.
Posted by: Richard Wolford | July 10, 2008 4:04 PM
Anyone ever hear the Hayward Banks song "Big Buttered Jesus"? I'll bet Big Butter Jesus would be great with Wheat Thins Jesus.
Posted by: davery | July 10, 2008 4:05 PM
Just fan the flames of trolldom...I find the kid's stunt and PZ's challenge hilarious. I also find the clueless ramblings of the deluded, I mean religious posters who have oozed over full of christian outrage equally hilarious, if not fully coherent. Please continue to rant.
Posted by: Ray S. | July 10, 2008 4:05 PM
I've made breadcrumbs before by putting Pepperidge Farms Goldfish crackers through my KitchenAid food grinder. Does that mean I've committed genocide? Did I cause a ripple in the Force?
Posted by: jynnan_tonnyx | July 10, 2008 4:05 PM
"Invading a Church to physically steal Holy Communion IS physically invading/attacking a religious people."
I call Poe! No real, sane person could claim that walking into a Church, taking Communion (do they check ID?), and smuggling the cracker out is "physically go[ing] after believers". I hope.
Posted by: K8 | July 10, 2008 4:06 PM
me scribbles: "made by someone entirely ignorant of the fats."
Which "fats" are we talking about, genius???
The point that tenured professors CAN be fired -- even if they need to find creative ways to do so.
Remember how they got Capone - on tax evasion....
Secular extremists really are sheltered aren't they....too much time spend playing WoW in the basement?
Posted by: Rebecca Watson | July 10, 2008 4:06 PM
Also: the last time I let a guy transubstantiate down my throat he at least bought me more than a cap-full of his own blood beforehand.
Posted by: HumanisticJones | July 10, 2008 4:07 PM
So if we could get about 150 lbs of these... and make a statue... then fill it with 10 pints of communion wine... Would atheists then by definition have built the real Jesus?
Posted by: The Biology of Immaturity | July 10, 2008 4:07 PM
It appears that no one else has noticed, but you are really immature (and afraid of Muslims).
Posted by: Sarcastro | July 10, 2008 4:07 PM
Invading a Church to physically steal Holy Communion IS physically invading/attacking a religious people.
So a cracker is your God and a building is your people?
Posted by: splint | July 10, 2008 4:08 PM
Once at a Catholic wedding (I'm not) I went up to take communion. I was about 20 years old and I didn't know non-Catholics weren't supposed to take communion because everyone was going up to do it. Apparently I did something (or didn't do something) that tipped the fact that I wasn't Catholic and the priest shot me a look like he was about to punch me in the face. But then he restrained like he knew he couldn't prove anything or something like and wasn't sure what to do. I'll never forget that moment. It was the weirdest, strangest, creepiest moment of my life.
Of course later I found out what the hubbub was all about.
Posted by: Dutch Delight | July 10, 2008 4:08 PM
Mao or Stalin in their "rational" liquidation of hundreds of thousands of
You noticed the lack of rationality in those guys too?
Posted by: Mike O'Risal | July 10, 2008 4:08 PM
Waitaminnit... let me get this straight.
These Crackertholics believe that their witch-doctors can invoke the magic of the Superfriend in the Sky to make the Prince of Darkness run screaming into the night... but they can't stop a college kid from stealing their cookie?
Something smells funky in the basilica, fraters et sorors.
Posted by: Fletch | July 10, 2008 4:09 PM
To all atheists:
You describe Catholics as bigoted morons. Fine.
But if we're just matter, than our (deluded, intolerant, unenlightened, bigoted) behavior is just the result of the motion of electrons in neurons of our brain.
So I have two questions
a) how can you get angry at Catholics, if they are just matter?
b) If we are just matter, then there is no such thing as "right" or "wrong"...we're all just atoms in an expanding universe. In which case bigotry and intolerance are no more immoral than gravity or the weak nuclear force. On what grounds can you call these things "wrong"?
Posted by: Sarcastro | July 10, 2008 4:09 PM
#73, I am so going to make a Jesus cracker golem.
Posted by: MrGadget | July 10, 2008 4:09 PM
Never fails to amaze me how hypocritical these cretins can be. Doesn't their bible say "each time you do this to the least of my brothers, you do this to me"? If their cretin god was in fact real, they'd ALL be bound for cretin hell.
Posted by: Chiroptera | July 10, 2008 4:10 PM
K8, #71: Secular extremists really are sheltered aren't they....
I guess so. I mean, who'd a thunk that Webster Cook would have received death threats because of a silly prank? I guess you should never assume that any religion is truly benign.
Posted by: MH | July 10, 2008 4:10 PM
"So if we could get about 150 lbs of these... and make a statue... then fill it with 10 pints of communion wine... Would atheists then by definition have built the real Jesus?"
I think that would be the real DRUNK Jesus!
Posted by: jynnan_tonnyx | July 10, 2008 4:11 PM
K8 @ #48: "PS - I heard the KKK is looking for a resident science lecturer...."
Too bad PZ wouldn't work for a Christian organization...
Posted by: craig | July 10, 2008 4:11 PM
"Also: the last time I let a guy transubstantiate down my throat he at least bought me more than a cap-full of his own blood beforehand."
That does not sound at all safe. But somehow I admire you anyway.
Posted by: Blake Stacey | July 10, 2008 4:12 PM
Rebecca Watson (#72):
And that's why we love you. . . .
Posted by: BenYachov(Jim Scott 4th) | July 10, 2008 4:12 PM
You are lower than dirt Myers. You are nothing but a childish grandstanding bigot. This is rational behavior? This is the behavior of an overgrown child-man.
Talk about being socially autistic!
Posted by: Will Von Wizzlepig | July 10, 2008 4:12 PM
It seems to me something is missing from the hate crime part of this.
He went into the church and was let in.
He waited in line and was GIVEN a cracker.
He took the cracker with him.
He didn't follow the church's rules because: HE DOESN'T HAVE TO.
There are no laws governing what you can and can't do with your crackers that have anything to do with the rules the church wants you to follow (wrt crackers.)
This is, for some reason, making me think of that never-caught prankster in Germany who did a certain thing with little flags and piles of dog poop.
Posted by: Snitzels | July 10, 2008 4:13 PM
Bwaaaaaaaaaaaahahahahha!!!!! they're going to have security guards passing out the precious lil crackers and bouncers at the door! Crazy extremists...
Posted by: BobC | July 10, 2008 4:13 PM
"They can't force-feed people bits of 'jesus'."
They might try. Didn't they recently hire armed thugs to enforce the must-eat-wafer rule?
Yes, it's true. I just found this: One week after a University of Central Florida student snatched something sacred from church, armed UCF police officers stood guard during Sunday Mass to protect what Catholics call "The Body of Christ."
They have guns. Eat their wafers or die! Catholics are assholes.
Posted by: me | July 10, 2008 4:13 PM
Ohhh... a spelling mistake. Way to prove your superiority.Posted by: craig | July 10, 2008 4:13 PM
I'm just wondering... every time something riles up the religiots like this and they swarm the board in wave after wave for a while...
Am I the only one reminded of "Dawn of the Dead?"
Posted by: Mike O'Risal | July 10, 2008 4:15 PM
Congrats, Fletch. That's one of the dumbest things said on these threads yet. That takes some real effort, and you should be commended for it.
Right and wrong are social and cultural agreements. There have been times and cultures that considered human sacrifice and cannibalism right. There have been others that considered the alleged celibacy practiced by the Catholic clergy wrong. These things aren't dictated by disembodied spirits floating about and whispering in our ears.
Oh, by the way, the Catholic church also once taught that it was right to torture and execute those with religious beliefs that deviated in small ways from those of the Pope. As far as I'm aware, that's no longer practiced. So, what changed? Was it the word of God or social values? And if it was the latter, then when was the church acting against God's word... when it burned heretics or when it stopped?
Stick to your cookies. Trying to think will just get you in trouble.
Posted by: Reynold Hall | July 10, 2008 4:15 PM
Poster @84: Burn!
It sure looks like all the self-righteousness expressed by the xian religous right about how uncivilized the Muslims acted over the Danish cartoons can be taken with just a few grains of salt now.
And now, some more bufoonery:
Blowins your horns for Jesus.
Posted by: Randy | July 10, 2008 4:15 PM
Rebecca @ #61:
The only post in a long line of amusing posts that made me laugh out loud. Understated, yet evocative. The fine, (untransubstantiated), wine of cracker comments.
K8 @ #71:
What's WoW? Is that like Truth or Dare? We atheists loooove Truth or Dare... and Spin the Beelzebub.
Posted by: Dutch Delight | July 10, 2008 4:15 PM
Fletch, thats a stupid game. You'll just insist that a divine authority is needed and therefore exists, AND, you'll even claim to know how he wants me to have sex and with whom.
I find your derogatory remarks on matter rather childish when we both know your only argument against a material universe is your own incredulity.
Posted by: John | July 10, 2008 4:16 PM
The anger is not at the at Catholics and their silly beliefs, but at the bad behavior and death threats that were discussed in the initial post.
The beliefs seem to produce laughter, but not anger
Posted by: Ray S. | July 10, 2008 4:16 PM
Actually we describe bigoted morons as bigoted morons. Undoubtedly there are Catholics who think this whole situation is incredibly silly. As for the rest of your diatribe, you're making the asinine assumption that a person can't be moral with a bit of the holy cracker. More silliness.
Posted by: BenYachov(Jim Scott 4th) | July 10, 2008 4:16 PM
>He didn't follow the church's rules because: HE DOESN'T HAVE TO.
Yes he does. I wonder how Myers would feel if I got up in the middle of his class & started chanting prayers in Latin? Or if I stole a picture of his mother from his wallet & used it to wipe my ass?
When you go into a Church you follow the rules of that church otherwise DON'T go in.
But then again what can you expect from an uncivilized bunch of jerks?
Posted by: Blake Stacey | July 10, 2008 4:16 PM
Fletch (#79):
Non sequitur.
In other words, wrong.
Right and wrong, beauty and ugliness, etc., etc. are constructions of the human mind, which matter to us because we are human.
Posted by: qbsmd | July 10, 2008 4:16 PM
Since you brought it up, hopefully this will be useful to everyone who wants to send PZ holy crackers (assuming I remember everything correctly):
Only old people let the priest put the cracker in their mouths; in Sunday school, I was taught to hold out my left hand palm up with my right hand under it. The priest says "the body of christ", you say "amen", he puts the cracker in your hand, and then you walk out of the way, and use your right hand to pick up the cracker and eat it, then make the sign of the cross.
Posted by: craig | July 10, 2008 4:16 PM
"You are nothing but a childish grandstanding bigot. "
I'm sorry to have to say this again... but here goes.
Criticizing a person's race, gender, sexual identity, etc is bigotry.
Criticizing a person's IDEAS can never be bigotry. It can be correct, incorrect or somewhere in between, it can be rude, but its NEVER BIGOTRY.
ALL ideas are fair game for criticism. And the really stupid, damaging and dangerous ones demand it.
Posted by: Boosterz | July 10, 2008 4:17 PM
Hmm, I wonder if Brett in #40 is the same Brettard that is always trolling around in the Amazon.com forums making a complete fool of himself.
Posted by: MH | July 10, 2008 4:17 PM
Fletch #79,
So, if you lost your faith, you wouldn't see any reason to be good? The Golden Rule not mean anything to you? In that case, please continue believing in your bronze-age magical nonsense, if it stops you from going out and causing someone harm. I guess the fact that we are able to be good without the threat of hell-fire proves that we are 'more good' that you.
Posted by: Snitzels | July 10, 2008 4:17 PM
@94
can't jeebus blow his own horn? ;) I laughed out loud at that one...
Posted by: aiabx | July 10, 2008 4:17 PM
If I wave my hands and mumble some latin, i wonder if I can transubstantiate some fried chicken into a deity? I like fried chicken better than crackers.
Posted by: paul lurquin | July 10, 2008 4:17 PM
Don't tell me that this bloated bearded buffoon of bigotry speaks for all atheists!
Posted by: HumanisticJones | July 10, 2008 4:17 PM
#79
a) I can be angry at them because the interactions of electrochemical processes in my brain that were evolved to perceive other organisms as threats to me and my in group or as general douche bags that wouldn't be good reciprocators determine that Catholics are such due to this behavior.
b) I call them wrong because one of the greatest human adaptations is the ability to work in cohesive units to accomplish more than one organism can alone. Genetic rules of thumb in my brain-meats perceive bigotry and intolerance as behaviors that have a negative impact on cohesive society... and like my response to pain which is wired to keep me in one piece, I respond to bigots and intolerance with a view that they are "wrong".
Also, human society has generally codified into laws that aggressive bigotry and intolerance are legally wrong and that people should face legal consequences as such. I tend to not like facing negative legal consequences
Got any more questions Fletch? I've got enough materialism for days of this.
Posted by: jj | July 10, 2008 4:18 PM
@62
"How about planting some hosts around in various places"
Jesus Trees!
Posted by: splint | July 10, 2008 4:19 PM
"you say "amen", he puts the cracker in your hand, and then you walk out of the way, and use your right hand to pick up the cracker and eat it, then make the sign of the cross."
Yeah, I'm pretty sure I didn't do any of this.
Posted by: Sid Rodrigues | July 10, 2008 4:19 PM
That's nothing. I once drank a whole bottle of communion wine and vomited it back up into a demijohn, re-fermented it and sold it back to the priest.
That was the best First Holy Communion. Hmmm.
Posted by: Mark B | July 10, 2008 4:20 PM
What's WoW? Is that like Truth or Dare? We atheists loooove Truth or Dare... and Spin the Beelzebub.
Posted by: Randy
WoW is Blizzard's game, World of Warcraft. And the only people I've ever seen call it WoW in a public forum are people who play it. Just sayin'.
Posted by: Mike O'Risal | July 10, 2008 4:20 PM
By the way, we should draw something of a distinction here.
Not every Catholic on the planet is upset that some kid stole a cookie and then some professor thought it was funny and not worthy of said student being attacked, etc.
Most Catholics are relatively rational people. I must admit a certain fondness for modern Jesuits, for example.
None of those are the ones freaking out about this. In fact, those that had an ounce of actual faith would trust that God would sort all this out and not be screaming and ranting and calling for blood after the fashion of Bill "Dances with Apoplexy" Donohue.
I mean, heck, if God is supposed to know all and see all (ooh, spooky), wouldn't he have simply withdrawn the Essence o' Jesus out of the cracker as soon as the kid came up with the intent to smuggle it out?
But nooooooooooooo... so convinced are these raving militants in the impotence of their own deity that they think THEY have to take action to protect him!
No deity that needs human protection is worth worshiping.
Posted by: BenYachov(Jim Scott 4th) | July 10, 2008 4:21 PM
>Criticizing a person's IDEAS can never be bigotry. It can be correct, incorrect or somewhere in between, it can be rude, but its NEVER BIGOTRY.
I reply: I can critize the Koran all I want but stealing one from a Mosque & tearing it up & puting the pictures on the internet is hateful & vile & something an anti-Muslim bigot would do.
This is the "rational" crowd eh? Wow! Talk about socially autisitic behavior.
Posted by: Your_daddy | July 10, 2008 4:22 PM
What the secularists on here really show their hate and desire to aggressively engage groups that are different from their established, godless norm....
So much for rational, tolerant beings...
Trotsky would be proud --- the utopia will arrive soon!!! (after the cleansing and purge of resistors, that is)
Posted by: Mark B | July 10, 2008 4:22 PM
Don't tell me that this bloated bearded buffoon of bigotry speaks for all atheists!
It's alliterative. I like it! And no, nobody speaks for all atheists. It's not like we have a pope, or something.
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 10, 2008 4:22 PM
"Do you really think this is even relevant? I mean, how the hell does retarded Muslim intolerance excuse retarded Catholic intolerance? How does the fact that Saudi Arabia is a theocracy have to do with the fact that PZ Myers lives under a secular government despite the ill-wishes of our own Christofascists? Do you even have a coherent point, or is your intent to obfuscate the issues here with emotion-laden irrelevance?"
Chiroptera, You need to understand fundie/right-wing logic (if that is not an oxymoron, maybe I should say lack of logic).
For the fundie/right-winger anything you do is OK as long as others are doing something worse. Thus it is ok to torture and kill muslims you think are terrorists, or just are bored, as long muslims are around who are doing worse. You see they set their moral and ethical standards not by saying there are things it is wrong to do, ever. They have moveable standards. Thus it is ok to execute murderers because the murderers behaved worse than you do in executing them. It is ok to torture people, if you think those you are torturing are kidnapping and beheading people. It is ok to assault someone who took a consecrated wafer, and make death threats against them because what they did is worse.
I really really do not understand people like that.
Posted by: Martin Wagner | July 10, 2008 4:23 PM
Fletch #79: For the same reason that we can call you stupid. It's backed up by the facts.
Whether human beings are simply made of matter or your special magic godly pixie dust, we are (in some cases, that is) rational beings who live in a society with certain rules and moral precepts we've developed to help that society succeed and our species survive. What we are made of is irrelevant to the fact. The problem is that all the people who believe we are made of the magic pixie dust (or "insert equivalent religious superstition here") whine a whole lot about "right and wrong," yet have a disturbing tendency eagerly to do lots of stuff that's wrong (in that it physically and emotionally hurts people) all the while thinking that it's right, because it's somehow in the service of their god. (And for those of you who still think Islam scares us, hey, Islam, I'm looking at you as well as the Catholics and the Klan.)
The fact you've swallowed the whole childish "there's no right or wrong if my sky fairy of choice didn't create us with his magic dust" canard just goes to show how badly your religion has stagnated your intellectual maturation.
Next?
Posted by: Victor | July 10, 2008 4:23 PM
You know, they get these crackers sent to them in huge bags. Nothing really special about them. A friend of mine who attended centenary use to snack on them all the time. I wonder how many are spilled on the factory floor during the manufacturing process?
Posted by: jynnan_tonnyx | July 10, 2008 4:23 PM
BenYachov(Jim Scott 4th) @ #99: "Yes he does. I wonder how Myers would feel if I got up in the middle of his class & started chanting prayers in Latin? Or if I stole a picture of his mother from his wallet & used it to wipe my ass?"
Nobody disrupted a religious service or even suggested any such thing. Nobody stole or defaced any personal property. A better analogy might be if you went to PZ's class and stole a pencil. Somehow I doubt that he would accuse of a horrific hate crime. I also doubt other students would harass you for it.
And, really, if you can't tell the difference between desecrating a cracker, and desecrating a picture of somebody's mother, I feel kinda sorry for your mother...
Posted by: luis | July 10, 2008 4:23 PM
Hey, someone told me that a "cracker" can fetch EU 5,000 to those satanic cults, which seem to be plentiful in Barcelona, even that I have never seen the entrance to their temples... that would be good business, any one interested in sending me some?
Posted by: Jason Dick | July 10, 2008 4:24 PM
Brett,
Holy crap, dude! You think that stealing a fucking cracker (instead of eating it) is physically attacking people? What kind of warped world do you live in?
The offense here is entirely symbolic. There is no actual harm perpetrated to anybody. The only harm here is from Catholic nutbags who think that a fucking cracker is something that can be desecrated.
Posted by: Dutch Delight | July 10, 2008 4:25 PM
I reply: I can critize the Koran all I want but stealing one from a Mosque & tearing it up & puting the pictures on the internet is hateful & vile & something an anti-Muslim bigot would do.
Are we talking about missionaries again?!
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 10, 2008 4:26 PM
"I reply: I can critize the Koran all I want but stealing one from a Mosque & tearing it up & puting the pictures on the internet is hateful & vile & something an anti-Muslim bigot would do.
This is the "rational" crowd eh? Wow! Talk about socially autisitic behavior."
Stealing a Koran would be a criminal offence. I am not sure where you are getting the idea anyone is advocating stealing anything. You seem to be the one who has brought up the idea. Have you had thoughts about stealing a Koran ?
Posted by: Entropy | July 10, 2008 4:27 PM
Sometimes following an idiot's advice pays off. Who knew? A quick Google search on Ward Churchill yields the following results:
If PZ had made up the whole cracker story to support his anti-Catholic agenda, maybe Brett's comparison would hold water. But one does not need to invent historical incidents or ghostwrite papers to show how batshit crazy Catholics are. All one has to do is look at the headlines.
I understand that you would prefer to stone people for thought crimes against alleged pieces of Jesus, but the concept of constitutionally protected speech still exists.
Posted by: Martin Wagner | July 10, 2008 4:27 PM
Whiny bitch #115: Trotsky would be proud --- the utopia will arrive soon!!! (after the cleansing and purge of resistors, that is)
I was going to make another suggestion that mocking and criticizing the beliefs of religious kooks is not exactly the same thing as wanting to round them up and kill them (you know, like the Church used to do to Jews and unbelievers before the Enlightenment). But I realized this distinction would require a modicum of intelligence to comprehend, which is asking a little too much from the congenitally stupid and paranoid. So never mind.
Posted by: Pleco | July 10, 2008 4:27 PM
@113
THIS
The weakness of faith shown by the theists is astounding.
Posted by: John | July 10, 2008 4:27 PM
Who is talking about stealing anything? Again, unless you lie about the premise you cannot find solid ground for denouncing the behavior.
They gave the kid a cracker. He can eat it, he can save it, he can throw it away.
The same applies if you are given a Quran, you can do with it what you want, but you should not steal it.
What foolish arguments
Posted by: Tallie | July 10, 2008 4:28 PM
I just stole two blessed communion crackers. I gave one to a homeless man with mono for a small burst of calories. Now Jesus has mono. The other one I tied to a wooden stake and lit on fire to remind myself of how rational and forgiving the Catholic Church has been and can be.
Posted by: AdamNelson | July 10, 2008 4:28 PM
"b) If we are just matter, then there is no such thing as "right" or "wrong"...we're all just atoms in an expanding universe. In which case bigotry and intolerance are no more immoral than gravity or the weak nuclear force. On what grounds can you call these things "wrong"?"
Living proof that you have a total lack of morals. The very thing that makes such atheists good people is that they base their morals and actions on the betterment of the lives around them, not because some god told them to do so under pain of damnation. All this Christian "morality" is garbage; you only perform good acts to buy your way to heaven, not because you're a moral person. Anybody can do good things under the barrel of a gun, but true morality is held by people who work for the benefit of others knowing full well that they won't receive some astral reward.
Posted by: ben | July 10, 2008 4:28 PM
"Most Catholics are relatively rational people."
Relative to *what*, exactly?
Posted by: Rob | July 10, 2008 4:28 PM
Do the crackers that undergo trans-substantiation have to be a specific Catholic cracker, or can a Priest use any sort of wheat-product? What happened if a church ran out of official pre-Jebus-crackers, could the Priest send someone to Kroger to get some Wheat-Thins? Could these be substituted as pre-Jebus-crackers and be trans-substantiated to Jebus-crackers in a pinch?
These are serious questions for serious times.
Posted by: llewelly | July 10, 2008 4:28 PM
hm, PZ. Comment #1007 on the previous thread? Revealing, isn't it? Makes it obvious that you're a secret agent for British Intelligence. We all know Dawkins is British. Now you're revealed as an agent of the British. Shows quite clearly that the Evil Atheist Conspiracy has secretly taken over the British Government. Only one way out. We'll have to nuke the British!
Posted by: jynnan_tonnyx | July 10, 2008 4:29 PM
Your_daddy @ #115: "What the secularists on here really show their hate and desire to aggressively engage groups that are different from their established, godless norm...."
You got all of this from somebody mentioning a desire to abuse a cracker? Wow.
Posted by: BenYachov(Jim Scott 4th) | July 10, 2008 4:30 PM
>Not every Catholic on the planet is upset that some kid stole a cookie and then some professor thought it was funny and not worthy of said student being attacked, etc.
I reply: I don't advocate unlawful violence or vengence. That is against the teaching of the Holy Church & more specifically the teachings of Augustine. But calling upon people to abtain a object that is held to be sacred by a particular groups for the purposes of defiling it is un-reasonable & vile.
Threats against Catholics is not an example of "speaking out".
Now you will excuse me I am going to find a nice White Supremicist Website to troll because at least the brain dead bigots there will give me more intelligent responses than the brain dead bigots I have seen here.
Myers you are a sick hateful person.
Posted by: AdamNelson | July 10, 2008 4:30 PM
By the way, since when is cannibalism, whether real or purposely simulated, a socially acceptable activity?
Posted by: Maragon | July 10, 2008 4:30 PM
Brett,
I think YOU'D make an excellent solider for Hitler, he was, after all, a Catholic, like you are!
OMG C WUT I DID THARE?
Spare us your tired rhetoric, we despise all religions and sects equally - yours isn't special, sorry peaches.
Posted by: Greg | July 10, 2008 4:32 PM
Fletch #79,
Careful with the term "moron" or it might stick. You are confusing the real, rational, explainable and, perhaps most importantly, testable universe with human morality that can and does exist no matter what mythology a person chooses to believe or not. Our system of right and wrong come from our starting out in small family/tribal groups and discovering along the way what it takes to survive a little longer within the group.
I think that if you just do a little research, you'll find that most pack/pod/herd groups maintain a system of acceptable behaviors as well as unacceptable behaviors. It has nothing to do with a deity and everything to do with the biology of the group.
Posted by: Reginald Selkirk | July 10, 2008 4:32 PM
You should write some code that would limit all threads to a maximum of 666 comments.
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 10, 2008 4:32 PM
Even if we accept that the wafer we were all talking about way back a million comments ago was stolen, given they seem to cost a few dollars for a thousand, what kind of crime would we be talking about ? Stealing something worth less than a cent ? Better call the FBI, the guy must be a big-time criminal.
Posted by: AdamNelson | July 10, 2008 4:33 PM
"Myers you are a sick hateful person."
Referring back to the title: It's a frackin' cracker!
Posted by: CrypticLife | July 10, 2008 4:33 PM
A lot of theists (well, Catholics) here have been referring to the hate atheists have for their religion.
Well I, for one, want to make a stand as an atheist who wholly approves of the Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation. Further, I think Catholic should endeavor to instruct us in their doctrines to the extent possible.
C'mon -- it's comedy *gold*. I guarantee if I went home and told my eight-year old son about it, he would flat-out think I was lying.
Posted by: MrGadget | July 10, 2008 4:35 PM
As a (fortunately) EX-catholic (and ex-altar boy and ex-lector)I am amazed at the hateful diatribes spewed out by these so-called xtians. While quite a few can be reasonable (unlike the idiot Donohue) and are likely embarrassed by the whole ordeal, the hypocrisy exhibited by so many is simply mind-boggling.
Posted by: Geoff | July 10, 2008 4:35 PM
Rebecca wrote:
Priceless comment.
I guess that Catholic girls are either cheap dates or lightweight drinkers. It doesn't take much to get the holy spirit into them.
Posted by: PCD | July 10, 2008 4:35 PM
+++++++++++++++++++
You people really are something!
To deny the VERY natural human notion and desire for the transcendental is foolish.
...and dangerous as shown by recent history - i.e. 100 million killed by the materialistic,utopian and atheistic regimes of the 20th cent.
Do you realize how infantile and ridiculous you all sound for claiming absolute knowledge about life and creation.
Must be a bunch of freshmen posting on there!
Read a bit of philosophy - Charles Taylor or Philip Rieff - and have a bit of life experience and get back to me, kiddies....
Posted by: Mark B | July 10, 2008 4:36 PM
You should write some code that would limit all threads to a maximum of 666 comments.
The spirit of Cthulu compels you!
Posted by: Randy | July 10, 2008 4:36 PM
Mark B:
Thank you for the information. I thought I had at least basic nerd credentials, but evidently not. Too much time threatening crackers and not enough time lurking in my mother's basement, I guess.
Posted by: Dutch Delight | July 10, 2008 4:37 PM
Do you realize how infantile and ridiculous you all sound for claiming absolute knowledge about life and creation.
Posted by: Zeno | July 10, 2008 4:37 PM
I'm sure that Vatican scientists must be hard at work on a Jesus detector that will sound an alarm if anyone tries to leave the church with an unconsumed communion host. When the alarm goes off, SWAT teams of ninja nuns will slide down from the church rafters on ropes, subdue the miscreant, reclaim the consecrated wafer, and Jesus will be saved!
False alarms are going to be really embarrassing. So, mothers, no Triscuits or Wheat Thins in the purse for the kiddies. Just asking for trouble. Cheerios are probably okay.
Posted by: SC | July 10, 2008 4:37 PM
I wonder how Myers would feel if I got up in the middle of his class & started chanting prayers in Latin?
Or stood just outside it frying up calamari!
Posted by: tsg | July 10, 2008 4:38 PM
You can do it to mine. I'll send you one. It doesn't hurt my mother one bit. It only hurts me if I hold any value of the picture as a symbol of my mother, which I don't. It's a piece of paper. And the host is a cracker. See how easy that is? Not being offended is entirely within your control. Being offended is entirely of your own doing.
Off the top of my head, death threats for "desecrating" a cracker.
Posted by: Slimy Joe | July 10, 2008 4:39 PM
Just wondering - how do you folks feel about corpse-desecration? I mean, it's just a frackin' hunk of meat, right?
Posted by: nvfu | July 10, 2008 4:39 PM
"calling upon people to abtain a object that is held to be sacred by a particular groups for the purposes of defiling it is un-reasonable & vile."
I am an unbeliever; however, I see the logic of this and am quite embarrassed by the commenters on here.
New atheism is not any different than old atheism - just more extreme and anti-intellectual.
I count myself in the old guard, thankfully.
Posted by: Badjuggler | July 10, 2008 4:40 PM
Two comments:
Most entertaining thread ever.
Rebecca Watson abso-fuckinglutely rocks.
Posted by: AdamNelson | July 10, 2008 4:40 PM
"To deny the VERY natural human notion and desire for the transcendental is foolish."
HELLOOO! You're pretending crackers and wine are flesh and ichor, then eating them! You're playing cannibal!
"...and dangerous as shown by recent history - i.e. 100 million killed by the materialistic,utopian and atheistic regimes of the 20th cent."
Hmm, I don't remember the Soviets wearing belts that said "Atheism mit Uns," or "Materialist pogroms", or the "Utopian sacking of Constantinople". Just because the USSR didn't have a state religion doesn't make it atheist, or that they killed folks to favour atheists. They killed people to reinforce the cult of personality, aka Stalin and Mao. They killed because they were megalomaniacs, not because they were atheists.
p.s. Look up Soviet Union and Evolution together. You'd notice that the USSR unanimously rejected the Theory of Evolution because it too closely resembled free-market Capitalism. Idiot.
Posted by: Rebecca Watson | July 10, 2008 4:40 PM
@Matt, #140:
ven if we accept that the wafer we were all talking about way back a million comments ago was stolen, given they seem to cost a few dollars for a thousand, what kind of crime would we be talking about ? Stealing something worth less than a cent ? Better call the FBI, the guy must be a big-time criminal.
I saw this once in a MasterCard commercial.
One box of generic crackers: 2 dollars
One priest giving a blessing: 7 seconds
One digestive system operating as usual: 6 calories
Eating Jesus: priceless
Posted by: Tom | July 10, 2008 4:41 PM
http://www.offendedyet.com/2008/07/true-evil.html
"Back off, or the cracker gets it!" (With apologies to Mel Brooks)
Posted by: Dutch Delight | July 10, 2008 4:42 PM
Just wondering - how do you folks feel about corpse-desecration? I mean, it's just a frackin' hunk of meat, right?
Well, thats up to the next of kin isn't it. It's not of any use the person that died. Do you have any idea what happens to human remains in caskets btw?
Posted by: Mozglubov | July 10, 2008 4:42 PM
Quoting comment #79: "But if we're just matter, than our (deluded, intolerant, unenlightened, bigoted) behavior is just the result of the motion of electrons in neurons of our brain."
I just thought someone ought to point out that it is actually positive ions moving across the neuronal membrane that lets your neurons fire action potentials... not that saying it was electrons is your only mistake, but it is one I didn't see anyone else correct.
Posted by: Chiroptera | July 10, 2008 4:43 PM
PCD, #145: ...and dangerous as shown by recent history - i.e. 100 million killed by the materialistic,utopian and atheistic regimes of the 20th cent.
Thanks for putting all this into context, PCD. Suddenly a young man receiving death threats over a harmless prank seems all very acceptable.
Posted by: Mark B | July 10, 2008 4:44 PM
Too much time threatening crackers and not enough time lurking in my mother's basement, I guess.
I play WoW, but I have a regular job (home sick today), so I not playing 18 hours a day like a lot of the people that I run into all of the time while I'm playing. A lot of those people DO live in their mom's basement, but those are also likely to be the people who think like K8. Which kind of sounds like a WoW nym.
Posted by: craig | July 10, 2008 4:45 PM
"I count myself in the old guard, thankfully."
Fat lot of good you guys did.
Clue for you - if the religious are not outraged by you, then that means you're so irrelevant as to have gone completely unnoticed.
Posted by: PCD | July 10, 2008 4:45 PM
Adam,
You are angry and ignorant -- i.e. the perfect atheist!
As for atheism in the communist revolutions....it was absolutely essential to their doctrine and practice.
To say otherwise is to be ashamed of your bloody atheist history! (in the name of progress and humanism, of course)
And, why be ashamed is there is no god?
Posted by: Heathen Matt | July 10, 2008 4:46 PM
Pope Ratzis' Cheese-Us Biscuits (Serves a whole goddamn multitude)
2 cups self-rising Jeebus flour (ground-up communion wafers)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon sugar
1/3 cup shortening
3/4 cup grated sharp Cheddar
1 cup buttermilk
Salt
1/4 stick butter, melted
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
In a medium bowl, mix Jeebus flour, baking powder, salt, to taste, and sugar together using a fork; cut in shortening until it resembles cornmeal. Add cheese. Sir in buttermilk all at one time just until blended. Do not over stir.
Drop by tablespoonfuls, or use an ice cream scoop, onto a well-greased baking sheet. Brush dough with melted butter. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes.
He is Risen!
Posted by: Rebecca Watson | July 10, 2008 4:46 PM
To Blake Stacey, Randy, badjuggler, and others: thank you for the kind words. However, credit goes to my muses: my homie PZ and my favorite cracker Jesus.
Posted by: Slimy Joe | July 10, 2008 4:47 PM
Just wondering - how do you folks feel about corpse-desecration? I mean, it's just a frackin' hunk of meat, right?
Well, thats up to the next of kin isn't it.
Let's say next of kin totally hate the idea. And then I go ahead a desecrate that corpse anyway, really go to town on it, ripping it up and shitting in it and everything.
When next of kin get really pissed at me, I can just say "Hey! It's just a frackin' hunk of meat, you retards!" and I win, right?
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 10, 2008 4:47 PM
"To deny the VERY natural human notion and desire for the transcendental is foolish."
There are many things that are natural in humans that we do not encourage. It is natural for young men to have a propensity for violence. We do tend to discourage that though, as it tend to bugger up society.
However there is a bigger hurdle you need to get past. Merely asserting something does not make it true, so what evidence do you have to support your claim humans need the transcendental ?
"...and dangerous as shown by recent history - i.e. 100 million killed by the materialistic,utopian and atheistic regimes of the 20th cent."
I assume you are refering to Stalin, Mao and others.
Well of course there is a strong argument those regimes were in fact religious in nature. Explore the concept of political religion. It was not a lack of god that led to the crimes against humanity those regimes committed. Sweden is a very secular country, with a low level of belief in god. If you are right it should be a place where genocide is taking place, and human rights are frequently abused. Of course it is nothing like that. Sweden is a rather civilised country, albeit with very expensive beer, that has far less violence than the US, which is of course a very religious country.
"Do you realize how infantile and ridiculous you all sound for claiming absolute knowledge about life and creation."
I think you have atheists and theists confused. It is the religious who have certainty. Atheists just do not believe there is a god, but most will even concede they could be wrong about that. Richard Dawkins will admit there could be a god but he just sees no reason to think there is one, and no evidence to think there is one.
Nor do scientists claim they know everything and have total certainty. In fact science thrives on what is not known, and all scientific knowledge is tentative. Even the most cherished theories, such as Evolution, Relativity or QM could be overturned tomorrow if evidence came to light that showed they were wrong.
Posted by: tsg | July 10, 2008 4:48 PM
Doesn't bother me.
Posted by: jj | July 10, 2008 4:49 PM
@145
"Do you realize how infantile and ridiculous you all sound for claiming absolute knowledge about life and creation."
To whom is this directed?
Posted by: craig | July 10, 2008 4:49 PM
"Do you realize how infantile and ridiculous you all sound for claiming absolute knowledge about life and creation."
Yeah, those religious people sure do sound infantile, with their claims of absolute knowledge.
Wait, they're who you are talking about, right? Must be, because religions are the only institutions I'm aware of that claim absolute knowledge.
Posted by: BJ | July 10, 2008 4:51 PM
As Tom said,
"Well it's got to be a chocolate Jesus
Make me feel good inside
Got to be a chocolate Jesus
Keep me satisfied".
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 10, 2008 4:52 PM
"Just wondering - how do you folks feel about corpse-desecration? I mean, it's just a frackin' hunk of meat, right? "
As far as I am concerned once I am dead anyone who wants a bit of my body to stick in someone else, or do some research on, or even just poke around a bit is free to do so. Any bits that are left over can be burnt.
Posted by: Bouncing Bosons | July 10, 2008 4:52 PM
oooooh, nice try. But the corpse is OWNED by the next of kin, the cracker was FREELY GIVEN away.
Thanks for playing though
Posted by: Brett | July 10, 2008 4:53 PM
The death threat against some kid in Florida was NOT a common to Catholics and they were probably made by some kids on campus messing around...
As for PZ, he seizes this minor incident to launch a hate-filled threats and advance his career as a 'new atheist"
What is the deal people? Why follow along with this charade???
Read your comments and you will see that YOU are the extremists. (not the minority of your, either)
Get lives, please...and stop being so sheepish and mob-like.
Posted by: AdamNelson | July 10, 2008 4:53 PM
"Adam,
You are angry and ignorant -- i.e. the perfect atheist!"
Projection, eh? Nice try.
"As for atheism in the communist revolutions....it was absolutely essential to their doctrine and practice."
No, you're an idiot. Having taken four courses on Soviet history, two just in the past term, I'm a little more educated than you are on the subject. Soviet socialism was a grasp for power, the murders a way to secure power. It was never about god-images or atheism, it was purely about making sure that everybody worshiped Stalin as a god. Which is, of course, the antithesis of atheism.
"To say otherwise is to be ashamed of your bloody atheist history! (in the name of progress and humanism, of course)"
One word: Pogrom. One more: Inquisition. Here's two more: interracial marriages. People are killed under the name of God or Yahweh or Allah, not in the name of a method of performing experiments.
"And, why be ashamed is there is no god?"
I have no idea what you're trying to say due to your fractured grammar. But if I assume you mean "if" instead of "is", I would say that I can be ashamed of things based on how my actions affect other people. Like I mentioned before, I base my morality on precepts founded on benefitting others, not appeasing som imaginary god to buy my ticket into eternal paradise. Or by pretending that I'm eating a dead guy.
Posted by: BobC | July 10, 2008 4:54 PM
BenYachov(Jim Scott 4th) said "But calling upon people to abtain a object that is held to be sacred by a particular groups for the purposes of defiling it is un-reasonable & vile."
It's un-reasonable and vile to not eat a tiny wafer?
I would never be caught dead in any church. Religious people disgust me. But I have no problem with somebody else going in there to refuse to eat their wafers. If it upsets the religious morons then it should be done. Religious assholes who mentally abuse their children with medieval nonsense deserve nothing but ridicule and contempt. Even the moderate Christians infect their children with their mental illness. Many Christians try to abuse other people's children when they attack science education. What's wrong with fighting back against these idiots?
Posted by: Reginald Selkirk | July 10, 2008 4:55 PM
Chocolate Christ = Bad, Cracker Christ = Good
Posted by: Heathen Matt | July 10, 2008 4:56 PM
But the corpse is OWNED by the next of kin, the cracker was FREELY GIVEN away.
And then there's the indisputable, real-world fact that the corpse was at one point, a real HUMAN BEING, not a goddamned magical canape.
Posted by: tsg | July 10, 2008 4:56 PM
My irony meter just exploded.
Posted by: Boosterz | July 10, 2008 4:56 PM
"Just wondering - how do you folks feel about corpse-desecration? I mean, it's just a frackin' hunk of meat, right?"
It sure as hell isn't a cracker. Whoops, I think I stepped on the point you were trying to make. lol
Posted by: JCHall | July 10, 2008 4:59 PM
For people who claim to be so tolerant of others, it's amazing the amount of hate that religion gets. We may not understand why Catholics believe the things they do, but to mock them because they don't think like you or me is disgusting and puerile hatred that doesn't belong in America.
Posted by: BobC | July 10, 2008 5:01 PM
Catholics believe an ancient man was a god. They believe he got executed, decomposed, rose from the dead, and flew up to heaven. That's enough right there to lock them up in an insane asylum, but it gets worse. They also believe if a priest says the right magic words, a tiny piece of bread turns into the dead body of the god-man. Then they eat it. That's way beyond insane. These people are total wackos.
Posted by: AdamNelson | July 10, 2008 5:02 PM
"We may not understand why Catholics believe the things they do..."
It doesn't matter one bit WHY they're issuing death-threats. THAT is the true hatred here, and it is merely being called out for the farce that it is. This is literally the biggest joke since the "Behead those who claim Islam is a religion of violence" posters.
Posted by: tsg | July 10, 2008 5:02 PM
I agree. And first on that list of things that should not be tolerated is death threats against people who don't believe the things you do, like that a cracker is sacred.
Posted by: Heathen Matt | July 10, 2008 5:04 PM
...but to mock them because they don't think like you or me is disgusting and puerile hatred that doesn't belong in America.
It's the hatred and the threats against life, limb, and employment, Stupid! For the thousandth time, they're welcome to their beliefs, but they have no control over how they are treated in the rough-and-tumble outside world.
Posted by: jynnan_tonnyx | July 10, 2008 5:04 PM
JCHall @ #181: "For people who claim to be so tolerant of others, it's amazing the amount of hate that religion gets."
To paraphrase Paul McCartney: "In the End, the hate you take is equal to the hate you make".
Posted by: CDV | July 10, 2008 5:04 PM
Adam: "Having taken four courses on Soviet history, two just in the past term"
That sure is impressive, honey...did you make mommy and daddy proud?
The transference of a state religion did not come until the later stages of the revolution.
Marx, Trotsky and the Red Army wielded atheism as a weapon against traditional peoples and committed genocide to advance the cause of a god-less utopia.
Get over yourself, kid.
Atheism is not excused from the atrocities of the 20th century as it enabled many millions of people to be liquidated in the name of, as you state, comrade: a "morality on precepts founded on benefitting others."
Posted by: BenYachov(Jim Scott 4th) | July 10, 2008 5:05 PM
>But the corpse is OWNED by the next of kin, the cracker was FREELY GIVEN away.
I reply: It's given away to Catholics for the SOLE PURPOSE of eating it. You may eat it or leave it alone. If you tell the priest you don't intend to eat it or you are not Catholic we won't give it too you.
Worst than morons the lot of you!
Now I'm leaving.
Posted by: Nerdette | July 10, 2008 5:05 PM
"To deny the VERY natural human notion and desire for the transcendental is foolish."
Yes, that's all it is, it's HUMAN. Nothing more, nothing less, just a human thought planted in a bit of carbohydrate. It's not unique (billions of them have been consumed), it's not valuable, it's just a bit of flattened bread that a man with self-given authority waved his hand over while speaking some magic words. That's it. It's comparable to going into a botany lab, stealing a leaf off of a plant, and walking out. The leaf is only valuable to the researchers, and while they might be mildly annoyed over a lost data point, it happens. Personally, I'd be more pissed that an unauthorized person entered my lab, but meh...
Posted by: Slimy Joe | July 10, 2008 5:07 PM
@173 That's it? That tiny legalistic loophole is what this whole thing hinges on?
@178 Yeah, *was*. Makes the whole the difference.
OK. Say the corpse left his body to science, so next of kin don't own it. And then after the med students have done with it, I take it and take a big old shit on it. Now next of kin are being totally retarded if they're offended, right?
Posted by: David | July 10, 2008 5:08 PM
"Call the Church!"
"Call the Police!"
"Call the Church Police!"
(sound of siren, screeching tires, hurriedly pious footsteps)
"What's all this then, amen?"
Posted by: Hap | July 10, 2008 5:08 PM
I have to ask: given that all the original person did was steal a Communion wafer, and all that Prof. Myers did was to condemn the stupidity and lack of proportion of the response, for which both have received death threats, I am sort of curious as to what motivates the threateners. I guess that "eye for an eye" crap (later overrruled, sort of, with "Love your enemies") doesn't really mean anything to them, which would imply that it isn't exactly God's honor they are defending.
Given that their actions contradict what they claim to believe (love, forgiveness, all that jazz), it sure looks like that all the threateners believe in is the right to obliterate those with whom they disagree. Now that's a principle worth killing for - as long as they don't turn their backs, because it's hard to know what their compatriots will take to be the next killing blasphemy. Of course, their actions will help the institutions whose honor they claim to defend...well, if by help, they mean "make a laughingstock of the world over" and "destroy any pretense at moral dignity it may have had". I don't think that was what they had in whatever lower brain structures are taking the place of their thinking brains, though.
Posted by: Randy | July 10, 2008 5:09 PM
Mark B:
I didn't mean to imply that you were posting from your mother's basement. As I try to make clear on my own blog, that sort of insult gets saved for people who take Cracker Desecration seriously.
Rebecca:
I'm quite sure Gawd is beaming down upon you for taking up for his boy in this day and age when his followers are so grievously persecuted. May you always have Cheese Whiz for your crackers.
Posted by: jynnan_tonnyx | July 10, 2008 5:09 PM
BenYachov(Jim Scott 4th) @ #188: "Worst than morons the lot of you!"
"Whoever Says "You Fool!" Shall Be in Danger of Hell Fire" - Matthew 5:22
Posted by: Mark B | July 10, 2008 5:10 PM
I reply: It's given away to Catholics for the SOLE PURPOSE of eating it.
So, there's a EULA? Who knew?
Posted by: Joe | July 10, 2008 5:10 PM
Incidentally, did you know that Jesus is only soluble in gluten?
http://catholickey.org/index.php3?article_id=2858&gif=news.gif&issue=20040409&mode=view
Posted by: b7 | July 10, 2008 5:11 PM
"Myers, in an interview today, explained that the blog entry is more "satire and protest" than an actual threat to defile the Eucharist."
http://www.startribune.com/lifestyle/faith/24313139.html?location_refer=Editorials
Posted by: Maragon | July 10, 2008 5:11 PM
Every time one of these theist commenters feel the need to put every other poster down by referring to us as 'kids', you simply make our case stronger.
I'm sorry that your doctrine is so ridiculous and your faith so shaky that the only way to feel good about it, and yourself is to verbally abuse the people who disagree with you and point out the flaws in your logic.
Ad hominem attacks only serve to prove the point that you really have no credible arguments whatsoever.
Thanks for doing the work for us, =)
Posted by: az | July 10, 2008 5:11 PM
Not even that.
More like, you took a test in PZ's class and he gave you scratch paper and you took some of it home to show your friend what kind of scratch paper PZ gives out.
Posted by: craig | July 10, 2008 5:11 PM
My dad is on the board of directors of a Catholic organization.
He actually gets boxes of these wafers from one of the guys he works with each year at christmas.
He says that he can't think of a single person in his Catholic organization that would be so offended as to give a damn about all this kerfuffel, and says several of them would think it was funny.
Bill O'Donoghue does not represent the Catholic church or the Catholic faith. Though I'm an atheist and think all religions are delusion, I do want to point out that this is NOT "all Catholics" coming down on PZ.
It's ONE, seriously megalomaniacal, seriously twisted and immoral ASSHOLE, a self-appointed defender of the faith, and his brown-nose followers. (All lunatics seem to have followers)
Most Catholics wouldn't give a flying fuck about this issue. And that is not said in defense of the loony beliefs all Catholics - and all religious people in general - share.
Posted by: AdamNelson | July 10, 2008 5:13 PM
"That sure is impressive, honey...did you make mommy and daddy proud?"
Well, based on THOSE credentials, I truly am humbled... typical anti-intellectualism.
"Marx, Trotsky and the Red Army wielded atheism as a weapon against traditional peoples and committed genocide to advance the cause of a god-less utopia."
I think you've got your names mixed up. Marx described religion as the perfect tool to control the uneducated by, and that's how Stalin et al. played the game: they created cults of personality around themselves, becoming national, infallible heroes. Back your assertions up: name a single textbook that says that atheism was weilded as a weapon. You won't, because you can't, as you're clueless. Get yourself educated and read a book that wasn't endorsed by Answers in Genesis sometime.
"Get over yourself, kid."
Ah, such sophistication and razor-sharp wit. I eagerly await your first published proverb collection.
"Atheism is not excused from the atrocities of the 20th century as it enabled many millions of people to be liquidated in the name of, as you state, comrade: a "morality on precepts founded on benefitting others.""
So... killing hundreds of millions of people is for benefitting others? I'd think that's more along the lines of harming others, but as a non-cannibal, I may be mistaken from the human-flesh deficiency in my diet. One final time now, I will correct you: Soviet socialism had nothing to do with religion; it was purely about securing power in the hands of a megalomaniac at the excuse of EVERY ethnic and cultural group that didn't agree with Stalin. It had NOTHING TO DO WITH ATHEISM.
Why don't you point out YOUR 20th century Russian credentials?
Posted by: Mark B | July 10, 2008 5:13 PM
I didn't mean to imply that you were posting from your mother's basement.
I didn't take it that way, Randy.
Posted by: 5ive | July 10, 2008 5:14 PM
"Just wondering - how do you folks feel about corpse-desecration? I mean, it's just a frackin' hunk of meat, right?"
Excellent question!
But I think "desecration" is too vague. Does autopsy count as desecration? Or use for students learning anatomy? Or organs used to save small, big-eyed children? How about tissue samples taken to help find cures for diseases? If it does, then, yeah. I can deal with corpse desecration.
If you mean like exhuming a body and holding it your mouth til you get home, then I would only wonder about your motives and your immune system. The human corpse is NOT a pretty thing to behold.
I was irritated that someone stole Ian Curtis' headstone, but I sure as heck wouldn't send death threats or call it the most vile thing someone could do.
How do YOU feel about corpse desecration?
Posted by: BobC | July 10, 2008 5:14 PM
People interested in eradicating religious insanity from the world should never let the Catholics forget this cracker incident, especially the death threats. This breathtaking stupidity should be shoved into their faces for the next 100 years.
Posted by: peter | July 10, 2008 5:14 PM
@190 you seem to have this mania for excrement on dead bodies... Not spending a lot of time in med schools, I don't know the answer to this, do they ever report back to the next of kin on the eventual disposition of the remaining protein? Or once you sign off on the cadaver you sort of assume no further interest...
to a large extent, if your body's been left to science you've left yourself open to the possibility that the cadaver might be sliced into very tiny pieces and dissolved in any number of different solutions and chemicals... what's one more piece of shit on a body who's not really worried about anything anymore. chances are pretty good that there was a bit left inside at time of death anyway...
I would, however, tend to wonder about the state of mind of a person who seems driven to shit on dead bodies...
Posted by: b7 | July 10, 2008 5:15 PM
"Ad hominem attacks only serve to prove the point that you really have no credible arguments whatsoever."
--------------
Ah, the irony!
Have you read the 500 posts by angry atheists? Ad hominem + hate-speech + a dash of rebellious juvenile sentiment...
Posted by: Heathen Matt | July 10, 2008 5:16 PM
@173 That's it? That tiny legalistic loophole is what this whole thing hinges on?
@178 Yeah, *was*. Makes the whole the difference.
OK. Say the corpse left his body to science, so next of kin don't own it. And then after the med students have done with it, I take it and take a big old shit on it. Now next of kin are being totally retarded if they're offended, right?
The point I was trying to make at #178 is that you don't have to be deluded or crazy to agree that the poor bastard's corpse was a human being. Whereas, with Jeez-Its, you do.
Most atheists would be sickened by wanton disrespect shown toward a human corpse; it's a completey human, if not entirely rational response. I am disgusted by kids who knock over gravestones merely on the principle that monuments to the people who lived before us are deserving of respect, without buying into any superstitious nonsense about ghosts or resurrection or invisible sky buddies.
Posted by: Al | July 10, 2008 5:16 PM
From the Wikipedia page on host desecration:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Host_desecration
"It was widely believed that under certain circumstances, such as disbelief or desecration, the host could display supernatural properties."
That's why they're so upset! If the magic jebus biscuit doesn't turn PZ into a pile of ashes then the giant sky pixie doesn't exist!
Posted by: TTT | July 10, 2008 5:16 PM
DaveScot, #25:
It's just a matter of time before someone with a terminal disease, a month left to live, decides he hasn't got anything to lose by taking out Myers along with him.
But-but-but I thought atheists were supposed to be the ones who had no values and nothing to live for and nothing to stop the constant urges towards rape and murder that--according to most creationists I've read--are felt by all humans 24/7.
Posted by: AdamNelson | July 10, 2008 5:16 PM
"...at the excuse of EVERY ethnic and cultural group..."
Supposed to be "at the EXPENSE"
D'oh
Posted by: Dutch Delight | July 10, 2008 5:17 PM
@Brett | July 10, 2008 4:53 PM
Get lives, please...and stop being so sheepish and mob-like.
Brett don't like atheists talking to each other? :*(
You and your projections make me a sad panda man.
On the other hand, it entertains me and countless others to no end when you keep trying to throw mud in the form of flawed comparisons with religion at us even though you are championing religion yourself.
Posted by: MH | July 10, 2008 5:19 PM
Hap #192 "...it sure looks like that all the threateners believe in is the right to obliterate those with whom they disagree".
A very nice summary of religion generally.
Posted by: CDV | July 10, 2008 5:19 PM
"So... killing hundreds of millions of people is for benefitting others? I'd think that's more along the lines of harming others, but as a non-cannibal, I may be mistaken from the human-flesh deficiency in my diet."
Adam,
You really are clueless...I was being ironic and is called a dystopia.
Where did you say your are spending your freshman year away from mommy?
Posted by: Fletch | July 10, 2008 5:19 PM
First of all, please be patient with my admittedly feeble (if I can be so bold as to add to "stupid", "childish", "incredulous", "deragotory", "stagnated") intellect.
I appreciate the fact that morals can be tied to cultures, and that different cultures have had different moral norms, and that they may be a strategy for the success of the species.
What I don't get is why, if I am nothing but the some of my atomic parts, I should give a damn about what's good for the society in which I live, let alone the species? If the evolutionary forces that prompt us to preserve the species are truly blind, what difference does it make if we ignore them? Humanity dies out. Big whoop.
Yes, legal and social consequences to "immoral" actions are a good reason at a practical level...but what if I'm clever enough to avoid getting caught? Would it be OK to dump used motor oil down a storm drain if I knew I could get away with it?
Blake:
Right and wrong, beauty and ugliness, etc., etc. are constructions of the human mind, which matter to us because we are human.
Exactly my point. If right/wrong, justice, beauty, ugliness are just constructs of the mind, then they are in fact nothing more than the movement of atoms in my brain. You say it should matter because we are human. Again, your premise is the preservation and overall good of the species. If we're just matter, why does this matter?
Posted by: AdamNelson | July 10, 2008 5:20 PM
"it entertains me and countless others to no end when you keep trying to throw mud in the form of flawed comparisons with religion at us..."
Agreed. Atheism is a religion just as not collecting stamps is a hobby.
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 10, 2008 5:20 PM
"Atheism is not excused from the atrocities of the 20th century as it enabled many millions of people to be liquidated in the name of, as you state, comrade: a "morality on precepts founded on benefitting others.""
Are you really trying to claim that those millions were killed in the name of atheism ? That atheism is an ideology rather than simply the belief that there are no gods ? Has the concept of political religion totally escaped your attention ? Stalin was only motivated by the fact he did not think there was a god ?
What a pathetic argument. I guess those historians who have studied Stalin, and found that it was desire to maintain power at any cost that led him to either directly killing millions through his actions, or allowing them die through his deliberate inaction are wrong. Have you told them yet ?
As I have pointed out elsewhere, the least religious country is probably Sweden. Religious belief in Sweden is fast disappearing, and much of what belief remains is of the very liberal, religion as a philosophy for living kind of religion. We do not see much violence in Sweden. In fact we see less than in the US. We also see better healthcare, better social care, better child care, better care of the elderly etc etc. Care to hazard a guess as to why ?
Posted by: protocol | July 10, 2008 5:21 PM
I think you've got your names mixed up. Marx described religion as the perfect tool to control the uneducated.
You're pretty misinformed, aren't you. I would stop digging if I were you. There are actually people here who have read (and teach) the stuff. Go read "Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right", you idiot, carefully this time, to understand what Marx was trying to say. He never stated that "it was a perfect tool" for anything. Homework: go read it carefully and find out the flaws in your moronic interpretation.
Posted by: Chiroptera | July 10, 2008 5:24 PM
b7, #206: Have you read the 500 posts by angry atheists? Ad hominem + hate-speech + a dash of rebellious juvenile sentiment...
Yes, calling PZ Myers a hate-filled bigot because he said he's going to "desecrate" crackers is the exactly the same as calling someone a hate-filled bigot because they focus on PZ Myers, not on the fact that a kid who pulled a harmless prank is receiving death threats.
Thanks for putting all this into context for us.
Posted by: KKKAthiest | July 10, 2008 5:26 PM
This is like a good ol' Catholic beat down!
It reminds me of the good old days of anti-Catholicism.
I guess the bigots change (replace WASPs/KKK with militant atheists)....but the bigotry stays the same!
I'm gona find me a Catholic....they are not getting away with this!
Posted by: Randy | July 10, 2008 5:27 PM
Peter @ #205:
I'm glad someone else noticed that. I'd hate to think I'm the only person who worries about the mental stability of a guy named "Slimy Joe" with a fecal fixation.
Posted by: Ktesibios | July 10, 2008 5:27 PM
Umm, no- at least with rpsect to the corpse.
The prosecution of the people who plotted to steal the body of Abraham Lincoln and hold it for ransom ran up against this problem.
It was established law that a corpse is not a person, so kidnapping charges were out. It was also established law that a corpse is not property, so theft was out as well. Illinois had no laws prohibiting grave-robbing at the time, so what to do?
The solution was to try the conspirators for conspiring to steal the coffin, which was property and even had a known value- $75.00- enough to qualify as grand larceny.
Posted by: jpf | July 10, 2008 5:27 PM
Atheist: "I'm going to do disrespectful things to a cracker!"
Theist: "I'm going to harass you, have you fired, have you arrested, and make death threats against you!"
Atheist: "That's insane! It's just a cracker!"
Theist: "Respect my beliefs! You do not understand the subtle mystery of Transubstantiation! Your criticisms, of which we are bored, were debunked centuries ago! I'm not explaining how! You are being childish! I am being adultish! You are not engaging in rational, intellectual debate! You are an angry, vile, sick, foolish, rebellious, un-American, hateful hate criminal! You're probably a pedophile, too! And you play WoW in your basement! You do what you do because you secretly believe my religion is true! You wouldn't disrespect a Koran because Muslims would kill you! This proves something! I'm not sure what! You are denying people their humanity! Your criticism of wrongdoing is hypocritical because, as a materialist, you are incapable of morality since you believe everyone is made only of atoms! You should join the KKK, you Trotskyite! You have a beard! Hitler was an atheist because he hated the Church! Only atheists hate the Church! 100 million people were murdered by atheists just like you! The Secularists' anti-Catholic death purges will begin soon! Help! Help! I'm being persecuted! Respect my beliefs!"
Atheist: "Wow, man... do you smoke the Host too?"
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 10, 2008 5:28 PM
"What I don't get is why, if I am nothing but the some of my atomic parts, I should give a damn about what's good for the society in which I live, let alone the species? If the evolutionary forces that prompt us to preserve the species are truly blind, what difference does it make if we ignore them? Humanity dies out. Big whoop."
You have heard of this thing called evolution ?
In social species co-operation confers an increase in fecundity. There can also be a reward in increased fecundity for those that break the rules of the society in which they live. Taking more food, and failing to share for example. Social species then evolve means of preventing freeloading. The evolution of morality, and of alturism is well studied and understood. That you do not understand it only indicates a gap in your education, not in human knowledge. It is a comples subject, and I have not done it justice here. A google on Richard Dawkins for "The Selfish Gene", and Matt Ridley for "The Origins of Virtue" will get you started.
Posted by: Brett | July 10, 2008 5:29 PM
===============================================
The atheists are trumping up charges on "catholics" so that they can unleash their anti-catholic bile and hate speech.
Sound familiar? (I think the Jews and Black have experienced similar mob reactions)
As for the kid in Florida, one prank for "death threat" does not equal a FATWA!
===================================================
You people are the true bigots...face it.
Posted by: Dutch Delight | July 10, 2008 5:30 PM
KKKAthiest seems rather preoccupied with catholicism and catholics for someone who doesn't believe in gods. Either he was one, or he's just a troll trying to prove himself to jeezus.
Posted by: HumanisticJones | July 10, 2008 5:30 PM
Fletch @ #214
To the universe? It doesn't mean a damn thing that a tiny fraction of the thin film of organized organic matter on a minuscule pebble swinging around a relatively small star might die. To an individual with a brain wired to care about such things, it means alot.
As above, the preservation of humanity matters to humans because as humans we are wired to preserve humanity. You seem to be claiming that by knowing this, someone can suddenly decide that they don't want to be human anymore. However your examples of still doing bad things while consciously avoiding getting caught are still wired to self preservation. In most social animals, being outside of the group support structure leads either to death or to an individual parasiting off of its own or others and doing so in a way so as to not be killed while doing it. Surviving to reproduce by parasiting on human society still counts for preserving human genes.
Posted by: Heathen Matt | July 10, 2008 5:31 PM
Shorter KKKAthiest [sic]:
You guys mocking us for our lynch mob mentality over a purloined biscuit is anti-Catholic bigotry.
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 10, 2008 5:31 PM
"agreed. Atheism is a religion just as not collecting stamps is a hobby."
My favourite is if atheism is a religion they way bald is a hair colour.
Posted by: MH | July 10, 2008 5:32 PM
Fletch #214 wrote "Yes, legal and social consequences to "immoral" actions are a good reason at a practical level...but what if I'm clever enough to avoid getting caught?"
Wow, you really don't have a conscience, do you? You do realize that's not good?
Az #200 wrote "More like, you took a test in PZ's class and he gave you scratch paper and you took some of it home to show your friend what kind of scratch paper PZ gives out."
Exactly!
Posted by: ndt | July 10, 2008 5:32 PM
WORD. Why is this so hard for some people to understand?
Posted by: az | July 10, 2008 5:33 PM
Not even that.
More like, you took a test in PZ's class and he gave you scratch paper and you took some of it home to show your friend what kind of scratch paper PZ gives out.
Posted by: HumanisticJones | July 10, 2008 5:33 PM
Matt @ #223
You said that way better than I could have! Points to you!
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 10, 2008 5:34 PM
Let me get it right!
Atheism is a religion the way bald is a hair colour.
Posted by: Maragon | July 10, 2008 5:34 PM
"Ah, the irony!
Have you read the 500 posts by angry atheists? Ad hominem + hate-speech + a dash of rebellious juvenile sentiment..."
I've also read the 1000's of posts by angry theists.
Ad hominem + smug self-righteousness + a dash of magical pixie dust...
Posted by: Ella Rache | July 10, 2008 5:35 PM
Well, you certainly are worked up into a religious zeal, aren't you, BenYachov. Words are not magic. Neither was that cracker. Are you trying to accuse the man of wizardry or something? Are you trying to say the letters on this page are somehow magically wounding you? What are you getting at? Your magical beliefs are being questioned in the light of rational society. Get used to it if you're going to come around places like this.
Less whine, more brain, next time.
Ella
Posted by: jj | July 10, 2008 5:36 PM
@187
CDV
"That sure is impressive, honey...did you make mommy and daddy proud"
Way to make a stab at someone who's knows more than you about something, and was working on bettering there life.
BTY- Many of us go to college, pay our OWN way (if even not), to make ourselves proud (like myself), and guess what, you better fucking believe it makes my parents proud, probably more than you'll ever do. Jerk
Posted by: Slimy Joe | July 10, 2008 5:36 PM
@203 How do YOU feel about corpse desecration?
Oh I'm STRONGLY in favour of it, can't you tell? I'm just wondering if I can count on you guys' support, given that all the argument against is just so much irrational horseshit. I mean - it's just a fackin' hunk of meat! Who cares!
Posted by: Dutch Delight | July 10, 2008 5:37 PM
Well, I gotta go, had to laugh *a lot* these two threads. Especially when the arrogant Catholics started showing up demanding that we atheists spend all our valuable free time on destroying/attacking/undermining their specific brand of silliness.
Posted by: CDV | July 10, 2008 5:41 PM
==========
PZ writes:
==========
"So no poll-crashing today. Instead, I would appreciate it if you would write a short note to President Robert Bruininks in support"
I guess hate-speech and lynch mob tactics of atheists like PZ have a price to pay.
Good luck, sucker...
PS - calling all Catholics extreme because of a couple of fanticis (and their threats) is what is known as a "collective fallacy" - logic in which parts are confused for the whole.
Atheists still believe in logic, dont they? ;)
Posted by: IBY | July 10, 2008 5:42 PM
Impressed by the catholic hypocrisy. They tell others that they are being "bigoted" when they themselves are reacting like a mob, sending death threats. Nice way to build up reputation for the church.
Oh, and love your comments, Watson.
Posted by: MH | July 10, 2008 5:42 PM
Brett #224 "The atheists are trumping up charges on "catholics" so that they can unleash their anti-catholic bile and hate speech. Sound familiar? (I think the Jews and Black have experienced similar mob reactions)"
What are these charges that atheists are trumping up? That Catholics believe in stupid nonsense? So what?
The Catholics are charging the kid with "desecrating the Host", which is a charge that Jews are familiar with, and it resulted in the murder of a great many of them.
See here.
Posted by: Jon H | July 10, 2008 5:42 PM
"Just wondering - how do you folks feel about corpse-desecration? I mean, it's just a frackin' hunk of meat, right?"
Of course, a corpse was once a person. A cracker never was.
Posted by: Jesus, called Christ | July 10, 2008 5:43 PM
Hey there Catholics,
I just want to have it on the record that I, the former Judean zealot who lived a couple thousand years ago and accidentally started a religion that would spread across the world, am not the son of God. I was the son of two ordinary human beings. I did not die to save you from "original sin"; I died because of Roman and Judean politics. Yeah, I was called the Messiah, the Anointed, which title was later translated into Greek as "Christ", but you know, "Messiah" was code for "True King", and was therefore as much a political phrase as a religious one.
I do not "transubstantiate" into wafers when an ordained priest waves his hands and says some words. When you eat those wafers, you are not eating the essence of my body. My body decayed long, long ago. The whole "this is my body" business arose because at the time of that Passover meal, I was drunk out of my mind, on wine, and also on Judean politics and mysticism.
All that having been said, you probably are "ingesting" the remnants of my body right now. But then, so is everyone else.
When I lived, I ate food and breathed in oxygen. I also breathed out carbon dioxide. Oxygen and carbon dioxide are gases that circulate through the metabolism of living things all the time. So part of the air you breathe used to be part of me. You don't need any special ritual to get it, and it doesn't give you any special benefit, either.
But there it is. The air you're breathing right this instance, was once part of me.
Just so you know.
Oh, and some of the carbon and oxygen is also in the wafers and wine, but again, no more so than in any other bread product or fruit juice product. You can just as easily eat some toast and drink some orange juice at home, and it works out about the same.
Bon appétit!
Posted by: craig | July 10, 2008 5:44 PM
I'm willing to sign over my body upon my death to anyone who wants to desecrate in any way they want to... Why should my family have to pay the cost of my disposal?
Incidentally, I should point out that it is impossible to desecrate anything. Desecrate is a meaningless word... or at least, a word about imaginary things. Like unicorn.
Feel free to desecrate my unicorn.
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 10, 2008 5:45 PM
"PS - calling all Catholics extreme because of a couple of fanticis (and their threats) is what is known as a "collective fallacy" - logic in which parts are confused for the whole."
I am not sure where PZ said that. Can you point us towards the post where he called ALL catholics extreme.
It is worth pointing out that of the people who have posted here claiming to be Catholics very few have bothered to condem the death threats made against PZ. I am not sure if that tell us much other than either they lied, or there are Catholics who are pretty vile people.
Posted by: Chiroptera | July 10, 2008 5:46 PM
CDV, #239: PS - calling all Catholics extreme because of a couple of fanticis (and their threats) is what is known as a "collective fallacy" - logic in which parts are confused for the whole.
And when you use "lynch-mob tactics" to describe playing around with some crackers...what's that called?
Posted by: beagledad | July 10, 2008 5:46 PM
Craig @ #92,
Actually, it's more like Shaun of the Dead.
Posted by: jynnan_tonnyx | July 10, 2008 5:50 PM
Brett @ #224: "The atheists are trumping up charges on "catholics" so that they can unleash their anti-catholic bile and hate speech. Sound familiar? (I think the Jews and Black have experienced similar mob reactions)"
Except the Jews and blacks were often killed only for being Jewish or black. Catholics, in this situation, are being made fun of for accusing a kid who stole a cracker of "hate speech", and, in some cases, threatening to kill him. I'm not sure this analogy is quite as apt as you think it is.
Really, why are some Catholics (like Bill Donahue) OBSESSED with fantasies of being horribly abused and persecuted? If that's what gets you off, hire a dominatrix or something, rather than hysterically accusing decent people disgusted by an over-the-top reaction to a trivial incident of being Super Klan Nazis, or whatever.
Posted by: the strangest brew | July 10, 2008 5:53 PM
"Marx, Trotsky and the Red Army wielded atheism as a weapon against traditional peoples and committed genocide to advance the cause of a god-less utopia."
Nonsense... it was to promote a one party political system of government....religion was not required to subdue the masses with threats and horror stories...just the gulags...
"Atheism is not excused from the atrocities of the 20th century as it enabled many millions of people to be liquidated in the name of, as you state, comrade: a "morality on precepts founded on benefitting others.""
As could the same charge be levelled against the religious pogroms...and not just in the 20th century...like the crusades and the persecution of the Jews...the burning times also required a certain suspension of the Christian ethic... but the church does it for jesus so whoopidoo...!...bit like they are doing now with this palpable nonsense...
"Get over yourself, kid."
Likewise... as in 'heal thyself physician'
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | July 10, 2008 5:54 PM
Because they think they are appealing to some liberal leanings some of us have and that will cause some guilt.
Criticism of an idea can not be bigotry. All religion is, is an idea. A loopy one, but an idea none the less.
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 10, 2008 5:55 PM
I am quite sure there are Catholics who probably think Webster Cook was a silly kid but are not outraged about what he did. I imagine there are some who are also highly embarressed that their co-religionists seem to be having a collective fit that leaves them devoid of all reason.
I just wish these Catholics would tell all those saying this is a hate crime to shut the fuck up.
Posted by: Peter Mc | July 10, 2008 5:56 PM
So at every Sunday mass in Minnesota, in the sermon Father Bunloaf will alert the faithful to the Myers plot, and will warn the faithful: 'So at communion I will be watching to make sure everyone swallows and does not spit.'
Posted by: Jon H | July 10, 2008 5:57 PM
I wonder if PZ could come up with an experimental protocol involving eucharist wafers and zebrafish?
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 10, 2008 5:59 PM
"So at every Sunday mass in Minnesota, in the sermon Father Bunloaf will alert the faithful to the Myers plot, and will warn the faithful: 'So at communion I will be watching to make sure everyone swallows and does not spit.'"
You owe me a beer. I just spat most of the one I was drinking across the room when I read that. Somehow I had the Catholic Church's record on child abuse in mind at the time. You can fill in the gaps I am sure.
Posted by: Pete Rooke | July 10, 2008 6:00 PM
Let's start this letter with a little quiz:
1. Where is PZ Myers's integrity?
2. Why can't PZ relieve his aching sense of inadequacy without having to turn us into easy prey fordevotees of conspiracy theories?
3. Essay: Compare and contrast his scare tactics ["~the pious religious control the military] to those of unprincipled vagabonds, focusing especially on who is more likely to turn our country into a soulless cesspool overrun with scum, disease, and crime.
Don't worry; I'll give you all the answers throughout the course of my time here as well as a wealth of other information about PZ. Before I launch into my rant, permit me the prelude caveat that just the other day, [figurative story - not literal] some of PZ's lackeys forced a prospectus into my hands as I walked past. The prospectus described PZ's blueprint for a world in which infernal wantwits are free to abrogate some of our most fundamental freedoms. As I dropped the prospectus onto an overflowing wastebasket I reflected upon the way that anyone -- you or I or a Martian just arrived in a flying saucer -- who wants to reinvigorate our collective commitment to building and maintaining a sensitive, tolerant, and humane community should realize that PZ has been known to say that Lysenkoism [the same as to believe in false science as a means to understand people and the soul] is a wonderful thing. That notion is so wanton, I hardly know where to begin refuting it. Unfortunately, I can already see the response to this statement. Someone, possibly PZ Myers himself or one of his assistants, will write a detestable piece about how utterly ultra-footling I am. If that's the case, then so be it. What I just wrote sorely needed to be written.
For those who argued for the desecration of the dead: How would you feel to have a loved ones body sexually violated? The necrophiliac does no literal harm by anyone else surely?
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | July 10, 2008 6:00 PM
The old Atheism was the main motivator of Communism and therefore responsible for the millions of deaths is indicative of someone who doesn;t know their history.
Communism as practiced by Stalin, Mao, The Khemer Rouge etc.. was about power. Absolute controlling centrally concentrated power. Same with Fascism.
Stalin's atrocities can easily be attributed in large part to his paranoia brought on my a horrible childhood and massive desire for power.
Atheism is a part of Communism the idea sure. No argument there. But as the driving force in how it was practiced and the horrible results of some of the practitioners is just ignorance, inability to comprehend or willful historical revisionism.
Posted by: CDV | July 10, 2008 6:02 PM
"As could the same charge be levelled against the religious pogroms...and not just in the 20th century"
Numbers matter here, my friend.
3000-5000 over 300 years of the Spanish inquisition etc. compared to 60,000,000 killed in Russia alone by dogmatic communism and its ENFORCED ideology of atheism.
100,000,000 in only 100 years of modern secular/atheist rule or maybe couple 100,000 in thousands years or religious rule.
Modern progress, eh?
Posted by: Fletch | July 10, 2008 6:03 PM
HumanisticJones #226:
"To the universe? It doesn't mean a damn thing that a tiny fraction of the thin film of organized organic matter on a minuscule pebble swinging around a relatively small star might die. To an individual with a brain wired to care about such things, it means alot."
So I think you agree with me... it only matters at the level of self-preservation of sentient atoms, not at any moral level.
"the preservation of humanity matters to humans because as humans we are wired to preserve humanity."
You are completely right, of course. But if the wiring was done blindly, there's no good reason to obey it's resulting impulses.
"You seem to be claiming that by knowing this, someone can suddenly decide that they don't want to be human anymore."
I guess I'm claiming that if my conscience, via the wiring of my brain, told me to bring a holocaust on humanity, there is no grounds for claiming that I'm wrong, or even that my wiring is "faulty".
On a matter of equal gravity: teach me to indent quotes like you do...
Posted by: JohnnieCanuck, FCD | July 10, 2008 6:05 PM
Corpse desecration? Isn't that what the communicants are doing when they ingest little pieces of their god?
Flushing the remaining body parts down the Sacrarium to go mouldy under the church basement doesn't sound too respectful, either.
These people have even considered what to do with it when someone is so sick that they can't swallow it. reference: liturgy.wordpress.com
Seriously, this post needs a humour tag. Very funny comments and trolls.
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 10, 2008 6:06 PM
CDV,
Has something broken in your brain. Atheism is not the same as communism.
As for progress ? Take a look at Sweden. It seems to be a pretty decent society. It also happens to have very little religion. Compare western countries, and look at how those with well developed and comprehensive systems of social healthcare and welfare nearly all seem to do better than the US, and all seem to be less religious.
Posted by: windy | July 10, 2008 6:07 PM
This question will become relevant after I start handing out bits of my loved ones' flesh out to strangers and demanding that they EAT them.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | July 10, 2008 6:08 PM
OH OH OH I want a thigh!!!
Posted by: SEF | July 10, 2008 6:08 PM
Fixed that for you. ;-)Posted by: Greg | July 10, 2008 6:11 PM
CDV wrote
Numbers matter here, my friend.
3000-5000 over 300 years of the Spanish inquisition etc. compared to 60,000,000 killed in Russia alone by dogmatic communism and its ENFORCED ideology of atheism.
100,000,000 in only 100 years of modern secular/atheist rule or maybe couple 100,000 in thousands years or religious rule.
Modern progress, eh?
More like bigger weapons and the "Oh no! your god might have a bigger than my god so I must blow you to bits" mind set.
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 10, 2008 6:11 PM
"You are completely right, of course. But if the wiring was done blindly, there's no good reason to obey it's resulting impulses."
Fletch, do you know the first thing about evolution ?
You do know that evolution is not a random process ? If you do, why did you make such an idiotic comment ? And if you don't, why the fuck are you spouting on about stuff you are totally ignorant of ?
Posted by: C. M. Baxter | July 10, 2008 6:12 PM
Priest:
Here, kid, have a couple of crackers. Want more? Sure, help yourself. Go ahead and wash'em down with a few chugs of this wine. That's it, drink some more. Good, good! What? Of course they're blessed, I did that earlier. Well, how do ya feel, Son? Ok then, just turn around and bend over. Atta boy!
Posted by: 5ive | July 10, 2008 6:14 PM
@237
Can you please show me "all the argument against it"? I must have missed it. I only saw where people were fine if it was for scientific/medical advancement and was ok with the next of kin or the dead person themselves...
I am also confused about the supposed "Irrational horsepucky". I missed that, too. Show it to me and I will reconsider your response.
Posted by: windy | July 10, 2008 6:16 PM
Excellent choice, sir! But they're not quite dead yet...
Posted by: CDV | July 10, 2008 6:17 PM
Mr. Pinfold,
Sweden, eh? I think that Denmark is the most cohesive and "happiest" society in the world and this is largely (according to experts) due to it's monolithic nature and standard of living. (mostly Lutheran, btw)
As for Communism and atheism, they are not the same; however, they are closely (disastrously) linked in history.
OK, now, how about another personal attack to support your illogic?
Posted by: StuV | July 10, 2008 6:17 PM
Someone, possibly PZ Myers himself or one of his assistants, will write a detestable piece about how utterly ultra-footling I am.
No, you're just completely bugshit insane. With delusions of grandeur on top.
Posted by: ROFLMA(theist)AO!!! | July 10, 2008 6:18 PM
#40:
"And you call religious extremists!"
As far as I know I have never called a religious extremist. Have you? Does the government know?
#48:
"PuusssZy Myer,"
Are you a zealous right winger or are you 5 years old? It's hard to tell the difference most of the time. This is soooo grade school.
#71:
"Secular extremists really are sheltered aren't they....too much time spend playing WoW in the basement?"
What's WoW? Is there math involved?
#79:
"So I have two questions
a) how can you get angry at Catholics, if they are just matter?"
You really don't understand the difference between anger and ridicule, do you? You and the people who are trying to get PZ fired are GOOFY. We are laughing at you. Rolling on the floor. Tears are coming out of our eyes. People have sore sides. This comment was especially rich in you thinking that it was a clever observation (again, it was very grade school) but made even more funny by the projection and lack of observational skills.
#99:
"Or if I stole a picture of his mother from his wallet & used it to wipe my ass? When you go into a Church you follow the rules of that church otherwise DON'T go in."
What church do you go to? I'm never going to go there or eat anything made at one of their bake sales!
#115:
"What the secularists on here really show their hate and desire to aggressively engage groups that are different from their established, godless norm...."
Actually what I'm seeing is hate and desire to aggressively engage groups that are different from their established, godded norm. No one is starting a letter writing campaign to get Bill Donahue fired, for starters, and no one is bragging on his blog (does he have one and does it even allow comments?) how they are such important people that they can do so. You too seem to be hearing shouting when you should be hearing the deafening roar of laughter.
135:
"Now you will excuse me I am going to find a nice White Supremicist Website to troll because at least the brain dead bigots there will give me more intelligent responses than the brain dead bigots I have seen here."
That's because they will probably agree with you. They are devout Christians after all. You have a lot in common.
Just for good measure, I think that I'll throw in an extra helping of sacrilege.
http://www.ghastlycomic.com/d/20040425.html
On behalf of myself and the people in my family and my friends who are Catholic, Muslim, and Jewish, thanks for the laugh, ye offended ones. I haven't been following this very closely but if all of the threads have as much silliness to them as I have seen so far on this thread I really have missed much. Oh, to have free time. :^(
Posted by: Cheezits | July 10, 2008 6:18 PM
To all atheists:
You describe Catholics as bigoted morons.
No, I don't. Thought I'm guessing you're one.
Posted by: Hap | July 10, 2008 6:19 PM
CDV - #257 has a hole big enough to drive a large truck through. Neither the Soviets nor the Russians killed most of their people because they wished to force the poupulations to become atheist - they killed to gain power and to make the world closer to what they thought it should be (if anything, one might argue that Stalin and Mao may have thought themselves gods, but I don't know that for sure). (The Soviets and Chinese, among others, have attempted to suppress Christianity, though in nowhere near the numbers you present). The strongest argument you can make is that atheism (at least in the leaders) did not prevent them from believing in themselves enough to commit mass murder - but then again, Hitler's Christianity didn't much stop him, either.
There is also the slight manner of weaponry - if you are unfortunate enough, the Indians and Pakistanis may dwarf your death tolls in one shot, in major part due to their religious differences (alloyed with nationalism, of course).
I don't think the people who led the Crusades would have restrained themselves from using whatever weapons they had against their enemies (their beliefs didn't stop them from raping and plundering, after all) - with our weaponry, those totals would have been much higher. The reason that we have both the weaponry and the lifespans we do, of course, is because of the rise of science and intellectual questioning, brought in part by secularism. Thanks for playing.
Posted by: Martin Wagner | July 10, 2008 6:19 PM
Uh, CDV. You actually have any internal documents from the USSR specifically stating, "Because we are atheists, we order the killing of hundreds of millions of people." Love to see that.
I'm sure they didn't believe in leprechauns in the Communist Party either. I imagine all their pogroms were rooted in enforced aleprechaunism!
Yes, the Commies suppressed the churches, which no Western atheist thinks was right. They suppressed religion not for theistic reasons, though, but because they wanted no institutions in place to challenge their power. (Among the guys sent to the Gulags were scientists who supported Darwin's theory.) As has been mentioned before, the whole goal in totalitarian societies is to set up the leader as a deific entity, a being to be revered and in extreme cases worshiped. This is what was going on in Stalin's Russia just as it went on in ancient Rome, and in modern day countries like North Korea. And it's not exactly a practice that jibes with rational, humanist atheism. If Stalin were around today, the Dawkinses and other atheists of the world would be just as harsh if not moreso in their criticisms of his actions than the religionists.
Don't expect any of that to slip past your religious fear-filters, but it's always worth making sure facts get out there to contradict ideological spin.
Posted by: Samuel | July 10, 2008 6:20 PM
I, like many atheists, was raised in a religious family, and find that many fundamentalists have missed a few points that Jesus taught. Those of "love thy neighbor" and the like. Also, he had a lot to say about dogma. Fundamentalists get hung up on the dogma that has grown up around Christianity.
The main point that Dr. Myers was trying to make was how absurd it is to get bent out of shape over removing a cracker from mass. How is that infraction so bad as to threaten death? I believe your boss would have something to say about death threats.
As for the issue of militant atheists. It's pretty hard to stay neutral and hide outrage when someone threatens your life or the life of anyone else over such a mundane thing as poking fun at the absurdity of this whole situation. When a group faces such hostilities for so many years, it's natural for that group to push back. And as for militancy itself, the most militant atheists I've ever met are, in general, very mild mannered individuals. On the other hand, the most militant fundamentalists I've met are truly scary individuals.
Posted by: Fletch | July 10, 2008 6:20 PM
Hi Matt,
I think Richard Dawkins (The Blind Watchmaker) would agree with me that natural selection is a completely blind process. The genetic mutations at the heart of the theory are nothing if not random. The macroscopic result is the passing on of "mutations" that confer a survival advantage.
I'm not anti-evolution. I'm anti-materialism. There is, in fact, a big difference.
Posted by: Adrienne | July 10, 2008 6:26 PM
Mr. Fletch @276, Dr. Dawkins would absolutely not agree that evolution is a random or "blind" process. Mutations may occur at random, but the natural selection process that favors some mutations and culls out others is anything BUT random. Got that now?
Posted by: decrepitoldfool | July 10, 2008 6:27 PM
The 'offense' was entirely symbolic, and reprisal, if any, should be no more than symbolic. To threaten actual violence, in response to a symbolic act, is evidence of mob mentality and discredits any claims to ethical legitimacy the Catholic community would like to make.
How about the church issue a stern warning that Cook's immortal soul is in danger and leave it at that? But nooooo... they had to assault him in their sanctuary, their more extreme members had to threaten him and his property physically, and their yapping league bobblehead had to threaten the careers of anyone who didn't kiss their asses. This is how they follow the putative Prince Of Peace?
Posted by: Adrienne | July 10, 2008 6:28 PM
And let me add to that, Fletch, that Dawkins would probably be more than a little appalled (as I am) at attempting to marshal your misunderstandings of evolution into the support of your irrational and ultimately silly world view.
Posted by: windy | July 10, 2008 6:28 PM
With probably a majority of unbelievers, btw.
Posted by: Martin Wagner | July 10, 2008 6:28 PM
#276: I think Richard Dawkins (The Blind Watchmaker) would agree with me that natural selection is a completely blind process.
Well, if you mean by "completely blind" the same thing as "random chance," no. Natural selection is a "blind" process only in that there's no need for a god to be involved.
Posted by: 5ive | July 10, 2008 6:28 PM
#276,
I think you and Matt are misunderstanding each other. Matt is trying to say that the actual SELECTION of traits that gets passed on is not random. That is the traits that make it to the next hundreds of generation to the point of dominance were random. They were "selected" for by survival and reproduction. This part of evolution is decidedly NOT random. The original combination of genes, yeah, that is pretty danged random.
You also have to forgive Matt for misunderstanding. The whole "Evolution is random!! You must think we are meaningless and immoral!" thing is used a lot by creationists. Not surprising he figured you might think this as well.
Posted by: Adrienne | July 10, 2008 6:30 PM
Yeah, it strikes me that they must think very little of Jesus's power, you know? I mean, their own savior got crucified and rose from the dead supposedly in triumph, but here he needs a goon squad to protect his cracker "body" from desecration. Just another thing about Catholicism that doesn't add up.
Posted by: Fletch | July 10, 2008 6:35 PM
Adrienne:
"Mutations may occur at random, but the natural selection process that favors some mutations and culls out others is anything BUT random. Got that now?"
I'm sorry if this wasn't clear when I wrote:
"The macroscopic result is the passing on of "mutations" that confer a survival advantage."
"And let me add to that, Fletch, that Dawkins would probably be more than a little appalled (as I am) at attempting to marshal your misunderstandings of evolution into the support of your irrational and ultimately silly world view."
The judgements "irrational" and "silly" are apparently nothing more than constructs of the human brain and thus nothing to be concerned about. Thankfully, so is your indignation.
Posted by: the strangest brew | July 10, 2008 6:37 PM
"Numbers matter here, my friend."
yep! and making them up also seems to matter...to some folks...
"3000-5000 over 300 years of the Spanish inquisition etc."
Not to mention the desecration and ethnic cleansing of the Incas and the rest in South America...all in the name of God and Gold...probably runs into a few million just on that continent before holy rome got it's pernicious way...
"compared to 60,000,000 killed in Russia alone by dogmatic communism and its ENFORCED ideology of atheism."
As opposed to the millions killed in the second world war by a religious commitment by the Waffen SS...yep they were religious enough to believe they had god on their side...check out their deaths head belt buckle...the design is symbolic of the fact that they believed they were from the first holy roman empire...do the research if you do not like the point...
"100,000,000 in only 100 years of modern secular/atheist rule or maybe couple 100,000 in thousands years or religious rule."
Imaginary numbers do not win the argument...try to back up your maths with some facts...but whatever... the point is that religion kills in the name of God...Secular deaths...although not as high as you claim occur due to other inanities...but not because of some fairy story...simple like so...and according to some Christian bunnies on this thread they seem to get off on the thought of murder...still...that is the modern Christian for ya....
"Modern progress, eh?"
Seems not...!
Posted by: K8 | July 10, 2008 6:39 PM
People, people....
You are defending a publicity seeking FOOL!
==============================================
The top atheists attack religion in the theoretical ground and would never stoop down to attacking actual sacred and physical objects of a tradition.
Do you think Dawkins or Harris would pull a stunt like this?
SO, why stand up for this fool if not for a sheer sheep-like mimetic desire?
You are not doing yourselves any favors...you think outrages Catholics look "extreme," take a look in the mirror...
Posted by: Adrienne | July 10, 2008 6:39 PM
And Fletch, exactly why should we not be concerned about constructs of the human brain, again? Yes, our "mind" is really the workings of our physical brain, but this doesn't mean it's irrelevant.
Posted by: pissemov | July 10, 2008 6:41 PM
You REALLY want to piss them off, try the Soggy Biscuit.
Posted by: Adrienne | July 10, 2008 6:42 PM
Because it's just so funny (not to mention pathetic) when people like you get riled up over it!
Posted by: Damian | July 10, 2008 6:45 PM
CDV:
Actually, only 31% of people in Denmark even believe in God.
Now, tell me how it is logically possible to derive anything other than a lack of belief in God from non-theism? That is the only thing that you can possibly say about an atheist with any degree of certainty. Unless you can make the connection, you have no argument.
We are atheists, not communists, and as has already been said, Stalin's Russia was one of the most "religious" societies on earth, given that Stalin took advantage of hundreds of years of subservience to the Tsar. Lysenko's miracles, heresy hunts, and cults of personality, are distinctly religious in nature.
It's not actually possible to base a society on atheism.
Posted by: Owlmirror | July 10, 2008 6:47 PM
Actually, pointing out that "sacred" is an incoherent concept is in fact an attack on the theoretical basis of religion.
And recall that this whole brouhaha started because the defenders of the "sacred tradition" attacked an actual, real physical human being.
I'm sure they would (or are going to) point to it as yet another example of the insanity that is religion.
Posted by: BouncingBosons | July 10, 2008 6:48 PM
@190:
No, as has been pointed out, but pointing out those kinds of things is fun on the internets. Remember, they are serious business and all that. So, apparently, are delicious, delicious crackers.
For the record though, I don't really mind if you want to find and desecrate my corpse when I die, if it makes you feel better.
(Whole thing now reminds me of the CAKE OR DEATH? bit for some reason...)
Posted by: JohnnieCanuck, FCD | July 10, 2008 6:55 PM
K8,
I am extremely amused by the foolishness Catholics believe in. Does that count?
___
So when those Danes decided to make a point and mocked the Muslims for their extreme sensitivity about their religious beliefs, what were this batch of outraged Christians doing then?
Chuckling at the foolishness of the false believing Muslims? Rising in anger to demand respect for Mohammed? Pointing out the dangers of Islamic world conquest?
Posted by: RAM | July 10, 2008 6:57 PM
New campfire snack!
Two Jebus crackers with melted marshmallow and chocolate!
MMMMMMMMMM!
Jebus smores!
Double the Jebus, double the fun!
Posted by: Heathen Matt | July 10, 2008 7:03 PM
Do you think Dawkins or Harris would pull a stunt like this?
I'm sure they would (or are going to) point to it as yet another example of the insanity that is religion.
Actually, the bat signal has already gone out:
http://richarddawkins.net/article,2848,PLEASE-WRITE-IN-SUPPORT-OF-PZ-MYERS,Richard-Dawkins-PZ-Myers-Pharyngula
Thanks for playing, K8.
Posted by: k8 | July 10, 2008 7:08 PM
=================================================
Johnnie: "I am extremely amused by the foolishness Catholics believe in. Does that count?"
That is your choice/belief and that is fine for you; however, the idea of coming into a place a worship to take and than desecrate an important part of that worship is really beyond the pale.
If you people can not see that - as simply a basic form of decency - then I have doubts about your thought process and respect for your fellow citizens.
(* and one random/stupid threat against some kid does not give validity to your or PZ's claim)
Anyone agree?
Posted by: frog | July 10, 2008 7:13 PM
Fletch: What I don't get is why, if I am nothing but the some of my atomic parts, I should give a damn about what's good for the society in which I live, let alone the species? If the evolutionary forces that prompt us to preserve the species are truly blind, what difference does it make if we ignore them? Humanity dies out. Big whoop.
Have you heard of this little thing called empathy? Most of us care, well, because we do. We have empathy; we love others. Decent people don't require a reason to be decent; we just are.
Obviously, you're another fine example of the sociopathy that uses religion to simply advance their own vacuous interest. I.e., you're just one more potential serial killer hiding under your magic fairy's skirt.
Posted by: Mena | July 10, 2008 7:14 PM
K8 @ 286
People, people....
You are defending a publicity seeking FOOL!
Um, he puts the original posts up but he has only put a couple of comments up on the threads. How many posts have you made? Do you go by one name or are some of these other goofballs you too? You, Fletch, Pete Rooke, CDV, and BenYachov(Jim Scott 4th) are so quiet...
Posted by: Hap | July 10, 2008 7:16 PM
It's sort of ad hominem, but why do the aggrieved posters all seem to love equals signs as separators? I'm just waiting to see some ASCII art while they're at it.
This isn't USENET - the return key will work just fine.
Posted by: Heathen Matt | July 10, 2008 7:19 PM
...to take and than desecrate an important part of that worship...
The kid did nothing more than what many recovering Catholics on this thread (and the two previous ones) say was a extremely common occurence. It is not "desecration" (assuming that word had any real-world meaning) to carry a cracker with you when you leave the church grounds, especially when it was handed to you by the priest, and MOST especially when the kid had no idea of the insane reaction he would provoke.
The spittle-flecked, bugshit, ah-oogah ah-oogah overreaction to his actions, and to PZ Myers's blog posts, is what is "beyond the pale". If anyone wanted to demonstrate the proposition that religion, any religion, is nothing but brain-pureeing insanity, this brouhaha over A BISCIUT would be the perfect example.
Posted by: Mena | July 10, 2008 7:20 PM
Breaking news...
http://www.startribune.com/lifestyle/faith/24313139.html?location_refer=Gophers
and more stupid comments I'm sure. I haven't read them yet but the first dozen or so seem sane but the last one mentions Hitler so I'm sure that tired canard is being used there too. The ten or twenty people who paid to watch Expelled sure do seem to have a thing for news about PZ...
Posted by: craig | July 10, 2008 7:21 PM
"For those who argued for the desecration of the dead: How would you feel to have a loved ones body sexually violated? "
I would be grossed out, and I would be concerned that the necrophiliac get psychiatric treatment, as being sexually attracted to corpses is atypical and I think probably a sign of mental illness.
Posted by: frog | July 10, 2008 7:22 PM
strangest brew: Not to mention the desecration and ethnic cleansing of the Incas and the rest in South America...all in the name of God and Gold...probably runs into a few million just on that continent before holy rome got it's pernicious way...
North America may have had upwards of 20 million at the time of colonization --- and Central and South America were much more heavily urbanized. The Caribbean was very densely populated. So between the Protestants and Catholics, a significant portion of the world population at a time when total world pop was about half a billion was eliminated in a couple of centuries.
That's not including such lovelies as the Albigensian crusade, where in one single cathedral, 20,000 heretics, men, women and children, were killed with the approval of the Vicar of Christ.
We don't even know the numbers killed in Northern Europe during the 8th - 10th centuries to eliminate the pagans; but we do know that in the 17th century, a quarter of the population of Germany was eliminated on exactly the question of the magical status of crackers.
Yeah, baby, the genocides of the 20th century are almost unimpressive next to the continual history of genocide shown by the monotheists.
Posted by: Fletch | July 10, 2008 7:24 PM
Frog:
"Have you heard of this little thing called empathy? Most of us care, well, because we do. We have empathy; we love others. Decent people don't require a reason to be decent; we just are."
This is beautifully put. What you are implying is that your empathy transcends matter.
You are no doubt an empathetic person, and I don't believe that your empathy can solely be attributed to how evolutionary forces arranged the matter in your head. I think you have a free will which chooses decency, sometimes in spite of your genetic predilections. The corollary is that if I am a sociopath, I can not solely attribute that to my "wiring" (which is out of my control) but also to my freely made choices for which I am culpable.
Posted by: Mike O'Risal | July 10, 2008 7:25 PM
I really don't get why the religious people here aren't far more upset with Donohue than they are with anyone else.
Donohue has stated that some college kid was capable of "holding the body of Christ hostage." Doesn't that count as... you know... blasphemy? Apparently Donohue thinks that some kid at UCF is more powerful than Jesus. If Jesus didn't want to be held hostage, how does Donohue propose that said student would have been able to do so?
And if God didn't want the "body of Christ" to be held hostage, then surely God would have been able to do whatever was necessary to prevent or correct the situation (such as turning the thing back into a plain old cracker again), right?
I mean, why is that God and Jesus need Bill Donohue to come to the rescue? If you believe in God in the first place, isn't what Bill Donohue is saying in all of this is that he is capable of doing something that God couldn't do?
Isn't that nothing more than Bill Donohue leading Catholics to violate the first commandment, the one about "Thou shalt have no other gods before me"? It looks a whole lot to me like Donohue is setting himself up as a bit of a golden calf here, if you catch my drift.
More here, but that's the gist of it.
Posted by: terlenka | July 10, 2008 7:29 PM
It's amazing how weak the faith of Donahue et al must be if they think that what a non-believer does to a religious symbol matters or has any impact on the faith of the believers. Are they worried that the host will not do anything in response to PZ's admittedly childish treatment of the host, dismantling in this way layers of superstition? Or will his abuse of the host make it less holy and irreparably harm their faith? (Analogous to what happens under The Gay TM, whereby the marriage of two otherwise heterosexuals suddenly becomes meaningless because Adam and Steve tie the knot.)
On the other hand, if they believe that they have the right not to be offended by the actions of others, shouldn't all believers and non-believers have that right? Why then does the Catholic mass include a prayer for the conversion of the Jews and other Christians (implying, when not stating explicitly, that they need to be converted to Catholicism in order to be saved)? Isn't their stand on gay rights (or lack thereof) also offensive? Not to mention Galileo, the Inquisition, etc., etc., etc.
Posted by: StuV | July 10, 2008 7:30 PM
I mean, why is that God and Jesus need Bill Donohue to come to the rescue?
Apparently, God needs defending. And money, I hear. 10% of yours would be a good start.
Posted by: James | July 10, 2008 7:30 PM
I remember a friend talking about his Muslim faith and how his father called for a jihad (holy war) on everything that pissed him off, or least 3 or 4 times a day.
I cannot help but think that this is the way our country is going with its constant fear of offending people.
When ever a cracker is stolen "Jihad!"
Whenever a black man is arrested "JIHAD!"
Whenever a gay man wants to marry another man "JIHAD JIHAD!"
Take your guns.. GE - freakin - HAD!
I mean where does this all end? At some point, someone needs to just tell these whiners to shut the hell up and stop being such babies about things.
Listen, the world is made up of all kinds of people not just those called US or those called THEM. if you do not learn to live with difference instead of calling for everyone to accept only your ways, what you end up with is something we refer to as war.
Now I know every religious text ends with something called the end times or the Apocalypse but has anyone ever thought that maybe the reason they all end this way is because that is where myopic eye of religion will always lead you?
Maybe the whole point of religion is to teach the lesson each of us geeks learned from Joshua at a young age...
"A strange game. The only winning move is not to play."
Posted by: Blake Stacey | July 10, 2008 7:35 PM
Hey, it looks like Pharyngula is rarin' to break the 100K page-views mark today. Maybe, once the drive-by trolls and persistent pests have all ebbed away to the intolerant mists from which they came, we'll have a few more reasonable regulars.
Posted by: jgfellows | July 10, 2008 7:37 PM
I'm going to guess that the lack of contrary opinions is due to the editing system. However let's give it a shot
To those of you who want to scoff at Catholics, would you show the same lack of respect to muslims or jews? If so, you may want to focus more on what you believe and less on what you don't believe.
The Eucharist is the source and summit of our faith. You have free will not to believe but it is simply rude and intolerant to mock us or what is central to our faith.
Posted by: frog | July 10, 2008 7:39 PM
Fletch: This is beautifully put. What you are implying is that your empathy transcends matter.
You really are slow --- or so committed to magical explanations that you've lost contact with reality.
No, my empathy is matter. It's the way my momma raised me, it's a 100 million years of mammalian evolution, it's a lifetime of connecting with other people. No transcendence -- just real, hard, matter filled life. No magic dust, no fairies with sticks chasing me.
Really, stop following Socrates and those other legalistic fools from an age of barbarism -- the Athenians laughed at them, why do you follow them?
The corollary is that if I am a sociopath, I can not solely attribute that to my "wiring" (which is out of my control) but also to my freely made choices for which I am culpable.
Your wiring is not out of your control --- it is your control, and the effects of your control. Stop pretending that there's a little man running the show, even a three year old has a more sophisticated understanding of will. You're not a machine being run by a ghost --- you are an active piece of meat that transforms itself continually.
What's your major malfunction that you hate yourself so -- you hate the very essence of your existence and want to abandon it? I could see Augustine's problem --- it had to do with his momma, and his "uncontrollable" sexual urges. But in the 21st century? To still be pulling this crap, this exuding hatred of our very existence?
Very sad. I blame it on your church and that SOB Plato.
Posted by: ChrisKG | July 10, 2008 7:40 PM
If you nail a cracker to a cross, does it not bleed?
Posted by: Hugo | July 10, 2008 7:40 PM
Forgive my religious ingorance (non-Catholic):
A priest blesses a wafer, making it the Body of Christ (or some such), which you then swallow...
Have I got this right?
And by not swallowing it you a desecrating the Body of Christ because...
Um...
Anyone?
Posted by: andyo | July 10, 2008 7:42 PM
Hugo #313
Exactly.
Posted by: Andrew | July 10, 2008 7:47 PM
#255 "Don't worry; I'll give you all the answers throughout the course of my time here as well as a wealth of other information about PZ."
Why wait, I want to know this wealth of info. Oh, and of course being the truthful young man I know you are you'll also cite all references and provide accurate links right?
Posted by: Mena | July 10, 2008 7:48 PM
Um, jgfellows, there are plenty of contrary opinions. In fact half of them SAY THE EXACT SAME THING THAT YOU POSTED!!!! There has even been a discussion about why you guys think that it's ok to harm people who disagree with you because other people are just as violent and intolerant as you are. Have you read any of the comments?
Posted by: Fletch | July 10, 2008 7:50 PM
frog:
Indeed, I am really slow, but as you point out, this is just the result of matter failing to transform itself.
Your wiring is not out of your control --- it is your control, and the effects of your control.
What, exactly, is controlling the matter in my brain? Is it only external matter (like how my mom raised me)? Because that is out of my control as well.
that transforms itself continually.
Again, sounds like your giving me a very valid excuse for my being stoopid-- poor chemical reactions in my noggin.
Where's the part where I'm culpable for my malicious ignorance?
Posted by: Owlmirror | July 10, 2008 7:50 PM
Why?
Seriously, you're an adult. You have the intelligence necessary to use a computer.
Why do you, personally, believe something so absurd that a piece of baked dough can magically become part of the alleged creator of the universe? Why do you believe that the alleged creator of the universe wants you to think that he's inside a cracker? Why do you believe that the alleged creator of the universe wants you to eat this cracker? Why do you believe that the alleged creator of the universe thinks that not eating the cracker is a bad thing? Why do you believe that the alleged creator of the universe could in any way, shape, or form, be harmed as a result of the cracker being damaged?
True, it is rude to mock.
But it's far ruder and more intolerant to threaten those who mock.
And it's far, far ruder and more intolerant and — I think "evil" would not be incorrect — to actually carry out those threats.
Which has happened in the past, and might again, going by some of the threats being made.
Posted by: jj | July 10, 2008 7:51 PM
@310
"To those of you who want to scoff at Catholics, would you show the same lack of respect to muslims or jews?"
When they are acting like loons, sure thing! This is a place of opinions, deal with it. If you don't like it, then don't read it. It's that simple.
Posted by: JCHall | July 10, 2008 7:55 PM
"It doesn't matter one bit WHY they're issuing death-threats. THAT is the true hatred here, and it is merely being called out for the farce that it is. This is literally the biggest joke since the "Behead those who claim Islam is a religion of violence" posters."
Criticizing people who send death threats is one thing, but to criticize an entire people simply because they believe in something you don't goes beyond the mark. It doesn't make you sound intelligent and it doesn't convince anyone that you're right. Mocking ideas is easy. See, look, I can do it, too.
Evolutionists believe that in the beginning, there was nothing. That nothing exploded into everything. On one giant chunk of that now everything, a cell decided that it wasn't happy being alone, so it decided to grow a body. That body one day decided that not being able to see was a bummer, so it magically grew eyes, somehow knowing that light reflecting off of other objects would then create images in its brain, that also just magically appeared from nowhere. Next the growing goop of life decided it wanted to taste, and feel, and hear, so it grew a mouth, hands and ears. A few years later, this new, hardening goop of life decided that life was boring if everything were the same, so it had babies that were different than he, some with hair, some with scales and some with wings. He was very creative. And to make a long story short, he eventually got tired of being a stupid, worthless animal and decided that being smart would be fun, and hence, humanity.
You can make anything sound stupid if you want to. It's really not that hard. It just demeans yourself.
Posted by: JeffreyD | July 10, 2008 7:56 PM
Frack my cracker, tired and time for bed.
Some wonderful and funny posts. Sadly, many of the religious posts were not meant to be humorous.
Pax Nabisco
Posted by: Andrew | July 10, 2008 7:58 PM
"To those of you who want to scoff at Catholics, would you show the same lack of respect to muslims or jews?"
Sure, If you freely give me a Koran and Torah I promise I will not eat those either. Take that religion!
Posted by: jj | July 10, 2008 7:59 PM
@320
"he eventually got tired of being a stupid, worthless animal and decided that being smart would be fun, and hence, humanity.
You can make anything sound stupid if you want to"
No you just sound stupid because you don't understand the main principles of evolution.
Posted by: JC | July 10, 2008 8:02 PM
This episode of Cathocrazy reminds of the Red Hour in "Return of the Archons".
PZ - I will be glad to give you a ride when you get to the ATL aiport. When you come up the escalator from the train, just look for the Lawgiver holding one of those tubes that shoot the sparky things. That will be me. I will also be holding a box of crackers so you can tell me apart from the other Lawgivers.
Posted by: jgfellows | July 10, 2008 8:04 PM
I'm going to guess that the lack of contrary opinions is due to the editing system. However let's give it a shot
To those of you who want to scoff at Catholics, would you show the same lack of respect to muslims or jews? If so, you may want to focus more on what you believe and less on what you don't believe.
The Eucharist is the source and summit of our faith. You have free will not to believe but it is simply rude and intolerant to mock us or what is central to our faith.
Posted by: CJO | July 10, 2008 8:07 PM
You have free will not to believe
Gosh, thanks, magic jeezus-cracker guy! You're the bestest!
but it is simply rude and intolerant to mock us or what is central to our faith.
So what? Fuck you. That's rude, too. Intolerant? Oh, I don't know. None of us really care what you choose to do with your magic crackers in private on your cracker time. I'll tolerate it. But I won't respect it, because it's bat-shit crazy, and the whole foundation of your faith is a deliberate and malicious lie.
We'll cop to rude, though. Tolerate it.
Posted by: Andrew | July 10, 2008 8:08 PM
#320 JC: "Criticizing people who send death threats is one thing, but to criticize an entire people simply because they believe in something you don't goes beyond the mark."
I think I'm missing something but are you saying the second one is worse? Or that they are equal? I mean, I get your thoughts on why you don't think it's intellectual to criticize silly beliefs but in what relation to the death threats?
It almost sounds like your comment is that criticism is easy but death threats, now that's hard.
Posted by: AJ Milne | July 10, 2008 8:11 PM
You can make anything sound stupid if you want to...
And then there are those who sound stupid quite independently of wanting to...
Posted by: Andrew | July 10, 2008 8:13 PM
Nevermind, I get it now.
Posted by: CJO | July 10, 2008 8:13 PM
You can make anything sound stupid if you want to. It's really not that hard. It just demeans yourself.
But the great thing about religions is you don't have to do anything at all. They all sound stupid, just the way they are.
Posted by: Nemo | July 10, 2008 8:14 PM
#99:
First, it's a bogus analogy. You'd be disrupting the class. Webster Cook didn't even disrupt the mass.
Second, I imagine he would feel that his remedies were limited to throwing you out of the class. No one disputes the right of the church to throw Cook out... but that's where it should end.
Not analogous. Nothing was stolen.
Posted by: frog | July 10, 2008 8:17 PM
Fletch: What, exactly, is controlling the matter in my brain? Is it only external matter (like how my mom raised me)? Because that is out of my control as well.
Nothing. But it's not out of your control -- there's no frigging controller. Look, you posit a soul or some such magic fairy dust -- that doesn't solve your problem. What controls your soul? Why should you be morally culpable for what your soul does, since it was magically created by the space fairy? You then need a soul-soul, and a soul-soul-soul and so on ad infinitum.
And, no, "free will" doesn't get you out of this quandary, because you can just push free-will on to the meat, just as well as you can push it back for an infinite number of souls.
No, you've created a non-existent problem, then deluded yourself you've solved it by pushing it back and claiming that magically this "other thing" is immune from the problem.
There is no free-will problem. Free-will is a kind of analysis about the internal feedbacks within a system. It's not a quality of you, it's a quality of judgement about you, and the ways you affect yourself over time.
You are responsible. There isn't a reason for that -- that's an underlying assumption of any system of thought. You just pretend that you have a reason for it -- but there can not be a reason for it, because it is the basis of having any kind of ethical conversation in the first place. Call it a grammatical rule if you will.
It's like your demanding "Why is 'ed a sign of the past tense in English?" It's a stupid question (unless your a philologist). "What gives me free-will" is exactly that kind of question -- stupid and childish, at best an early step in recognized what the rules of conversation are.
The Athenians knew it --- that's why the gave Socrates the hem-lock, because he went around asking childish questions and then claiming deep insight. Just legalistic and fundamentally incoherent nonesense.
Posted by: Ray S. | July 10, 2008 8:17 PM
I suppose we should not mock those who insist the Earth is flat, or those who believe in Zeus or Thor. Get a grip. Silly ideas need to be mocked. The idea that someone can desecrate a cracker certainly seems like a silly idea to me.See, you've just demeaned yourself because none of what you posted is remotely similar to the Theory of Evolution as scientists know it.
Posted by: JoJo | July 10, 2008 8:19 PM
JCHall #320
I will omit the verbiage where you prove you don't understand either the Big Bang or evolution.
If a group of people believe that 75 million years ago aliens brought billions of people from The Galactic Federation to Earth in spaceships that looked exactly like DC-8s, stacked them around volcanoes and blew them up with hydrogen bombs, you'd probably think they were crazy. If someone asked your opinion of these people, you might quite likely mock this group for believing such a silly thing.*
In a similar way, many of us here think that believing that a cracker becomes the body of a guy who died a couple thousand years ago is silly. Sorry if this does not meet with your approval.
*If you're familiar with Scientology, you'd know that I was describing one of their beliefs.
Posted by: Peter Mc | July 10, 2008 8:21 PM
Matt Penfold @254. I am in North Yorkshire, home of Timmy Taylor's Landlord and Black Sheep bitter. Any time you are in the county, I am happy to buy you a pint to replace what you lost. Failing that, London and Cambridge in a week's time.
It could be a Pharyngulites sesh, anyone?
As to the Catholic child abuse, up here we have a £4 million, 167 victim case simmering. (Pardon the tiny url, HTML tags don't work for me on SB): http://preview.tinyurl.com/55ygnx
Posted by: JCHall | July 10, 2008 8:23 PM
"No you just sound stupid because you don't understand the main principles of evolution."
And any Catholic could repeat the very same words back to you replacing "evolution" with "catholicism." That's the point I was making. The entire context and future pattern of this thread can basically be summed up thusly:
Person 1: Man, you're stupid because they believe that.
Person 2: No, you're stupid because you believe this.
Person 1: Psh, you just don't understand this.
Person 2: Well, you don't understand that.
Person 1: (Random "It's just a cracker" joke)
And while it must seem intellectually stimulating to argue about the impossibility of religious reality, the response to this blog post is probably the most dumbed down and juvenile version I've ever seen.
"I think I'm missing something but are you saying the second one is worse?"
Yeah, that was the idea.
Posted by: frog | July 10, 2008 8:24 PM
JGFellows: The Eucharist is the source and summit of our faith. You have free will not to believe but it is simply rude and intolerant to mock us or what is central to our faith.
No, it is simply rude or offensive. Intolerant would be declaring that eating magic crackers is a crime that could result in an execution (just like the Catholic Church declared for so many centuries that even questioning the magicness of the crackers was a death-penalty offense).
Mockery is rude. So what? It's not terribly rude -- terribly rude would be going to your house and mocking you in front of your family; or going to your house on your day off early in the morning and haranguing you (as some of your splinter sects do) This mockery is only slightly rude --- depending on how funny it is.
Amazing how some folks find others speech intolerable, and then call that speech intolerant, particularly when that speech contains no threat of any kind, but simply mockery.
Funny.
Posted by: Cooder | July 10, 2008 8:34 PM
I wonder if Jesus left a bitter taste in his mouth.
Posted by: Andrew | July 10, 2008 8:42 PM
"Forgive my religious ingorance (non-Catholic):
A priest blesses a wafer, making it the Body of Christ (or some such), which you then swallow...
Have I got this right?
And by not swallowing it you a desecrating the Body of Christ because...
Um...
Anyone?"
I'm still hoping someone will answer this. Any catholics want to take a shot?
Posted by: Ray S. | July 10, 2008 8:42 PM
jchall@336:
Please, illuminate us with the reality of a common cracker turning into 2000 year old flesh. Perhaps the word reality does not mean what you think it means.
Posted by: frog | July 10, 2008 8:45 PM
Andrew: #320 JC: "Criticizing people who send death threats is one thing, but to criticize an entire people simply because they believe in something you don't goes beyond the mark."
I think I'm missing something but are you saying the second one is worse?
JCHall: "I think I'm missing something but are you saying the second one is worse?"
Yeah, that was the idea.
You've got a be a Poe. The depth of your moral depravity is more than even I would expect. Even Ratzi would find you despicable --- and he was the head of the Inquisition for over a decade.
Posted by: Rob the Lurker FCD BMWCCA | July 10, 2008 8:46 PM
Atheist: It's a goddamned cracker!
Theist: Yes, but what if the young man had gouged out the priest's eyes and skull-fucked him before absconding with the cracker!
Atheist: Did he?
Theist: No.
Atheist: So then we're back to: It's a GODDAMNED CRACKER!
Posted by: Owlmirror | July 10, 2008 8:54 PM
Your point is pointless and stupid.
The body of knowledge that is science is based on observations of reality. If you bothered to study it at all, you could, at least potentially, duplicate those same observations yourself, or understand how the various observations fit together. Science is the best way that we have of understanding how the universe works.
The body of beliefs that is religion is based on handed-down traditions. No duplications of observations is possible. There never were any observations in the first place, just some long-ago person pointing at some bible verse and saying that it's important, and that it means something.
There's no there there.
Posted by: Julie K | July 10, 2008 8:55 PM
Good going all you screaming frenzied cracker protectors. That will show the world just how truly batshit insane religion is.
Saying magic words over a communion cracker does no more than if I consecrated Goldfish crackers to Dagon. My goldfish don't turn into magical crackers capable of turning me into a Deep One (pity that) and your crackers are still nothing more than bland unleavened wheat.
Spare me your whines about being offended. Any attempt to claim the high ground ended at the death threats and physical assault. Mockery is a perfect way to counteract rampant insanity.
Posted by: Mike O'Risal | July 10, 2008 8:57 PM
That actually works. I tried it, and you should see the size of my tentacles.Posted by: Julie K | July 10, 2008 8:57 PM
Re my post #344.
I just realized I used a word that might be offensive and I apologize to the bats of the world. Bats are not insane and are useful and inoffensive animals, quite unlike the screaming cracker hordes.
Posted by: Andrew | July 10, 2008 8:59 PM
In defense of JC Hall I did misread his comment and then figured it out like 5 minutes later. See #330
I took it as Criticisms of Religion is beyond the mark of death threats. What he really said essentially the criticism of religion is worse the criticism of death threats.
I don't agree of course but I don't want to imply he was saying something else. My mistake.
Posted by: Mike O'Risal | July 10, 2008 9:00 PM
Bats need saving.
Crackers do not.
Posted by: Metamorphic | July 10, 2008 9:01 PM
In response to Geoff, #6 as quoted here:
"When I saw the words 'cracker' 'eating' and 'Bill Donohue' in the same post, I thought it was going to be about cannibalism.
All this over some starch.
*sigh*
Posted by: geoff | July 10, 2008 3:23 PM"
My response:
Don't know how many cannibals you've been around, Geoff, but I've been around a lot of them for years--all very devout church-goers. I have to disagree with you, this whole bunch of crap hitting the fan IS about cannibalism! Wonder what they'd have done if that dude took the blood of Christ out the door....maybe ALL hell breaking loose??
Seriously, man....I think a lot of the churches are being reclaimed by fanatics, just like Islam has been.
Posted by: 386sx | July 10, 2008 9:07 PM
And by not swallowing it you a desecrating the Body of Christ because...
I don't think it was the not swallowing part that was bothering the faithful that much. I think it was more the kidnapping part that got them all upset. They don't want people going around and kidnapping the Body of Christ all over the place.
Posted by: Elwood Herring | July 10, 2008 9:09 PM
Happens every time - I'm AFK for a day or two and all hell breaks loose...
Crackers, Gromit? Can't have crackers without cheese...
Posted by: Fred Watkins | July 10, 2008 9:10 PM
I'm a CrackerJacker,
She's a CrackerJacker,
Don't you want'a be a CrackerJacker, Too?
Let's all go to a Mass and be CrackerJackers!! WooHoo!!!
Posted by: wistah | July 10, 2008 9:11 PM
Screed: 255
Probably about the same as I'd feel if someone took my loved one, ground and dried the remains into some sort of flour, and made a cracker out of it for people to eat with a little sip of wine?
Your verbal stylizings aside, your logic leaves much to be desired.
Posted by: Dustin | July 10, 2008 9:14 PM
You know what would rock? Code the blog to automatically close a thread at 666 posts. That would rock. \m/
Posted by: 386sx | July 10, 2008 9:15 PM
They don't want people going around and kidnapping the Body of Christ all over the place.
They don't want people going around and kidnapping the Body of Christ all over the place up and down the street like it was going out of style.
Jesus is very helpless when in the form of a cracker, and must be protected at all costs. And people should be sent to hell and other stuff like that.
Posted by: Jeff | July 10, 2008 9:17 PM
Fletch:
Check out episode 20 of The Skeptics Guide to the Universe
http://www.theskepticsguide.org/archive.asp
It gets into some of the ideas you're considering.
There probably isn't any kind of uncaused free-will. Your decisions are based on your genetic makeup and interactions with the world.
You could go on a rampage over your disappointment in the non-existence of some kind of magic spirit based uncaused free will, but you'll most likely experience negative consequences.
My life, and the whole universe, may well be playing out the only way it ever could, but I still experience a good life. Works for me.
Posted by: anti-nonsense | July 10, 2008 9:26 PM
All this nonsense over a cheap cracker. Seriously.
For those of you who object to the mockery of the various Catholic loonies, these people are making a huge fuss over a cheap, crappy cracker because they believe that cheap cracker is actually the body of some dead guy. That is patently absurd by all rational standards and when one sees absurd things, one is inclined to laugh at them.
They threatened the guy with DEATH for "kidnapping" a cracker that was HANDED to him.
Free speech and freedom of opinion means you are free to believe absurdities and I am free to laugh at you for believing absurdities.
If somebody came up to you and announced that they were really an alien from Neptune wouldn't you be inclined to laugh? Why should religious delusions be treated differently?
Posted by: Brian Gregory | July 10, 2008 9:28 PM
A cracker????!!!! Of course, if it's a saltine I can understand.
Posted by: DLC | July 10, 2008 9:28 PM
Okay.. so.. the furor over a youth absconding with a bit of unleavened bread has now gone into two threads.
Understand please, a piece of unleavened bread.
I'm sitting here scratching my head and wondering.
I'm just amazed. well, I'll wander on off now and leave you to your amusement.
(/move-along-nothing-to-see-here)
Posted by: Brian W. | July 10, 2008 9:30 PM
any decent god would be made of cheese. It would go much better with the wine.
Posted by: Becca | July 10, 2008 9:41 PM
SOooooooooooooooooooooo many comments!
PZ, you broke the interenets!
Posted by: Farrar | July 10, 2008 9:51 PM
Here you are.
http://www.kingdom.com/ProductInfo.aspx?productid=W
And they're cheap!
Posted by: jgfellows | July 10, 2008 9:53 PM
All this nonsense over a cheap cracker. Seriously.
For those of you who object to the mockery of the various Catholic loonies, these people are making a huge fuss over a cheap, crappy cracker because they believe that cheap cracker is actually the body of some dead guy. That is patently absurd by all rational standards and when one sees absurd things, one is inclined to laugh at them.
They threatened the guy with DEATH for "kidnapping" a cracker that was HANDED to him.
Free speech and freedom of opinion means you are free to believe absurdities and I am free to laugh at you for believing absurdities.
If somebody came up to you and announced that they were really an alien from Neptune wouldn't you be inclined to laugh? Why should religious delusions be treated differently?
Posted by: anti-nonsense | July 10, 2008 9:26 PM
There's a billion of us Catholics kiddo. Study up a bit and you'll that delusional behavior ain't that popular.
Do us both a favor and focus on what you do believe and not so much on what you don't.
Better yet, you might want to actually learn about the largest religion in the World.
Posted by: charli | July 10, 2008 9:53 PM
Actually, Catholics (I think the others too, but I'm not sure about them), but Catholics to do think the cracker and wine are symbolic of the body and blood of christ, they BELIEVE IT IS THE BODY AND BLOOD OF CHRIST. This is not symbolic to them. Yes, they are all cannibals. Every last one of 'em.
Posted by: Julie K | July 10, 2008 9:56 PM
Better yet, you might want to actually learn about the largest religion in the World.
I've learned that it is no different than the religion that made people yell and scream over someone naming a teddy bear 'Mohammed'.
Posted by: Mike O'Risal | July 10, 2008 9:57 PM
Screw belief.
It's just a cracker.
The number of people who believe some superstition make it no more correct. A billion people once believed that a precious stone could be found in the head of the common toad. Nobody ever got rich therefrom.
Posted by: frog | July 10, 2008 10:00 PM
jgfellows: There's a billion of us Catholics kiddo. Study up a bit and you'll that delusional behavior ain't that popular.
The old argumentum ad populam? A majority of European society (Catholic society) believed that Jews sacrificed Christian children for Passover -- so I guess that's not a delusion. Or that witches infested their societies --- chalk up another venerable truth. Or that God wanted heretics put to death --- I guess they were right.
Lordy, once again, you must be a Poe. Either that, or shut the hell up --- you're humiliating your co-religionists.
And they've had enough of that this week.
Posted by: Fletch | July 10, 2008 10:07 PM
frog: Nothing. But it's not out of your control -- there's no frigging controller. Look, you posit a soul or some such magic fairy dust -- that doesn't solve your problem. What controls your soul? Why should you be morally culpable for what your soul does, since it was magically created by the space fairy? You then need a soul-soul, and a soul-soul-soul and so on ad infinitum.
First of all, I appreciate you giving me an actual rebuttal before calling me childish and stupid. You're A-OK, froggy. A less decent individual, er collection of atoms, would not waste their time on a troglodyte as myself.
Anyway, your premise being that an immaterial soul is bound by material causality? There is no problem: free will is the cause of its own movement.
I also appreciate your honesty in admitting that for the materialist, "responsibility" is just a matter of semantics.
Posted by: Trent Eady | July 10, 2008 10:09 PM
Gentle Jesus meek and mild
The Lord's one and only child
Ate bread, drank wine, then all was lost
They nailed him high upon a cross
But don't despair, it doesn't matter
Christ still lives within a cracker
Posted by: Fletch | July 10, 2008 10:14 PM
Jeff,
I appreciate the link and the fact that you didn't call me any names. I'll check it out... but probably tomorrow. It's the cocktail hour!
Posted by: Wowbagger | July 10, 2008 10:14 PM
A repeat of this whole mess can be avoided easily enough: just make everyone who receives the host sign a contract stating they will eat (or swallow or let dissolve - I'm unfamiliar with the mechanics of the process) the host and not doing anything else with it.
Sure, it'll slow the process down - and maybe result in a few court cases here and there - but if it's to protect Jesus that's a small price to pay, right?
Posted by: John Farrell | July 10, 2008 10:14 PM
Does somebody have a link to the alleged 'death threats' Webster Cook received after this obviously planned prank?
PZ links to a story that says Cook felt threatened. But there are no quotes and no actual instinces of threat cited in the article.
Or are there other stories that reveal this?
Posted by: Mike O'Risal | July 10, 2008 10:17 PM
Again... why does Jesus need protecting in the first place? I thought that he could take care of that himself, or at least that his father could. What can a contract do that Jehovah cannot?Silliness and tomboozlery.
Posted by: Syn | July 10, 2008 10:18 PM
"Forgive my religious ignorance (non-Catholic):
A priest blesses a wafer, making it the Body of Christ (or some such), which you then swallow...
Have I got this right?
And by not swallowing it you a desecrating the Body of Christ because...
Um...
Anyone?"
I have to say that I am also a non-Catholic and this was my first response exactly. However, I have another question. If Webster Cook asks for forgiveness then he is cleared of his transgression in the eyes of the Sky Daddy or is that only allowed in some other schism? You know the whole shake up the etch-a-sketch and all is forgiven routine?
OH and Julie K thank you for this: "Mockery is a perfect way to counteract rampant insanity."
Fantastic!
Posted by: Goldfishflakes | July 10, 2008 10:25 PM
He-he-he...
Jesus was manufactored not by Hebrews...but NABISCO!
LMAO!!!!!!!
Oh gah...that's just too much...LMAO!!!
Posted by: Andie | July 10, 2008 10:27 PM
I'm so ashamed that this is happening at my university (which last semester had crazy Christians yelling and shoving abortion photos in our faces as we walked to class). We are in the 21st century, and these idiots are stuck in the 800s. Everyone needs a strong dose of reason and they need it now. Dr. Myers- you are awesome- thanks for writing this entry.
Peace.
Posted by: Brian | July 10, 2008 10:35 PM
These crackers must be laced with real CRACK!
Posted by: Wowbagger | July 10, 2008 10:37 PM
Mike O'Risal, #373 wrote:
Because he believed in and taught a doctrine of non-violence, forgiveness and peace...unlike his followers, apparently.
Posted by: p.a. | July 10, 2008 10:40 PM
Used to work in a town- Smithfield, R.I., that had a eucharist factory that supplied most of the East coast, I believe. Never had a reason to enter. Wonder if it was sanctified, like a kosher butcher? (Remember Carlin blessing his golf clubs in Dogma?) The Cavanaugh company, if memory serves. Met some of the owners. Very well off. Don't know if there was a bidding process for the contract or if internal church politics was involved. Might make interesting research.
Posted by: craig | July 10, 2008 10:48 PM
"Any attempt to claim the high ground ended at the death threats and physical assault."
Like I said yesterday, I think they actually lost the high ground with that "protecting the child rapists" bit.
Posted by: clinteas | July 10, 2008 10:51 PM
Guys,Ive got to say,after reading most of the 2ooo or so posts about a cracker and seeing what collection of ugly hateful murderous christofascists propped up here in the last few days,I am more than a lil scared and worried about your country,and at the same time glad im not living in it.
If what we have experienced here in the last few days is anything to go by,there are plenty of people in your country that are not only totally unhinged from rational thought and reality,but at the same time ready to grab a gun and kill for their delusions.Truly scary.
Posted by: aratina | July 10, 2008 11:01 PM
Body of Christ
Sleek swimmer's body
all muscled up and toned
Body of Christ
O! What a body
I wish I could call it my own
Lord Almighty...
You've left me so enticed!
O! I wish I could have
the Body of Chriiiist!
Posted by: $curdizzle | July 10, 2008 11:02 PM
Long time reader, first time poster here on the P. I noticed someone suggested a comic be done about this whole fiasco in the last cracker thread.
*Raises hand*
Check it out on my blog. I figure it would make a perfect "first content posting" for us since we just started. The theme of our work is going to be centered on finding common sense answers for the nuttiness of today's world (kind of like PZ's postings in most cases). Thanks.
Posted by: BenYachov(Jim Scott 4th) | July 10, 2008 11:04 PM
I think Myers is lying about receiving "threats". Call the cops Myers if what you say is true. I dare you, coward.
So the Eucharist is just a Cracker to you lot? Fair enough. The Mone Lisa is just colored oils on cloth but to millions it's very valuable.
The grave of any Atheist's beloved deceased relative or spouse is merely the container of decaying organic matter. Does that mean it's OK for someone/anyone to relieve themselves on it? If anyone DID such a thing would any normal person be surprised if that particular Atheist(& his relatives) responded to such an outrage with possible threats of violence toward the offender? Why would any being who claimed to be "rational" do such a foul thing in the first place to provoke such a reaction?
I threated nobody but must I & my fellow Catholic be made to suffer watching what we love more then life being treated with such vile disrespect because of the provoked morally questionable actions of another?
Only an irrational sociopath or sadist would say "yes". Which pretty much describes Myers & His pet sycophants on this blog.
Not very "Bright" people.
Posted by: David Harley | July 10, 2008 11:06 PM
The self-righteous sneering of fundamentalist atheists almost makes me ashamed to be an unbeliever.
In the US, self-described atheists are a tiny minority. The proportion of people for whom Christianity is just a cultural identity is hard to gauge.
Who thinks that any useful social change can be achieved without forming alliances with believers of various sorts? Atheists, mainstream Protestants and secular Jews won't win any federal election.
25% of the population consists of self-described Catholics. They are everywhere. Are they all idiots? Are they all reactionaries? Or is that just a bigoted stereotype, no more sophisticated than the tubthumping of a revivalist hellfire preacher?
Whatever is the case, however, if every evangelical and every Catholic, whether politically liberal or conservative, is driven into the arms of the Republican Party, you can kiss the future goodbye.
Posted by: orkneyearl | July 10, 2008 11:08 PM
I'm not sure if someone already mentioned this (because I couldn't be arsed to read every single post), but am I the only one genuinely nervous about getting a nun to guard the crackers? What if she brings her nun-chucks? Would they be made from a couple of hard wooden rulers and a rosary?
I think the church should broaden the range of crackers to choose from. Maybe they could get some Triscuits in there, put 'em on a tray with different varieties of cheese. In fact, the whole congregation could each choose their own, personal cheeses.
All this kerfuffel over a cracker is so very lame.
Posted by: Jim | July 10, 2008 11:08 PM
I think everyone needs to seriously chill out. Just repeat to yourself: Crackers Don't Matter!
Posted by: PZ Myers | July 10, 2008 11:09 PM
You love a cracker more than life? Are you INSANE?
Posted by: Wowbagger | July 10, 2008 11:14 PM
BenYachov (Jim Scott 4th)
So much wrong, so little time.
There is only one Mona Lisa, and it cannot be reproduced. It is also someone's property - if I owned the Mona Lisa and gave it to you, you could do what you liked with it and I'd have no recourse. This does not apply to a cracker.
There are laws against defiling corpses. There are no laws against defiling crackers. If you would like to introduce a law to protect magic biscuits, go for it. If it becomes a law then I will obey it.
I, as an atheist, would decry the action of anyone, atheist or not, making threats of death or violence against someone for offending in the way you described. I doubt I am alone in this. So that blows your theory on that.
Do you eat meat? If so, that is offensive to some Buddhists - so you should stop doing it. Has that meat ever been pork? If so, that is offensive to Jews and Moslems - so you should stop doing it.
Have you ever gambled? Smoked a cigarette? Drank alcohol? Enjoyed coffee, tea or coca-cola? Worked on the sabbath? Given someone a present?
All of those things are against the beliefs of one of more religions.
Will you stop doing them?
Posted by: Matthew Saroff | July 10, 2008 11:16 PM
It's not a frackin' cracker. It's frakin' ritual cannibalism.
Posted by: Kel | July 10, 2008 11:20 PM
Wow, what a bad analogy. The Mona Lisa is important because it's a piece of art, one of the most spectacular pieces of art ever made. It doesn't try and claim to be anything else, it's a painting, it's all it was an it's all it will be.The cracker on the other hand is claimed to be something else. It's claimed the cracker becomes the body of Christ. Our contention is that it's still a goddamned cracker.
If you are going to compare it, at least compare it to something that is equivalent.
Posted by: Marcus Ranum | July 10, 2008 11:20 PM
Just wondering - how do you folks feel about corpse-desecration? I mean, it's just a frackin' hunk of meat, right?
Never tried it. But if you'd like, I'll will you my body and you can go to town. Will you cover the shipping, at least?
Posted by: Godless Chemist in training | July 10, 2008 11:22 PM
@#384
Did you just compare not eating a cracker to peeing on my mother's grave? If anything, my mother's decaying body should be turned into a loaf of bread and you should be made to eat it. And in defiance you insult me by not eating said bread. After which I will be promptly outraged and call you an irrational sociopath.
Posted by: frog | July 10, 2008 11:27 PM
Fletch: Anyway, your premise being that an immaterial soul is bound by material causality? There is no problem: free will is the cause of its own movement.
I also appreciate your honesty in admitting that for the materialist, "responsibility" is just a matter of semantics.
No, you're the one so caught up in semantics that you think the semantics are quasi-material.
My point is that you don't get out of the problem of causality by "declaring" the immaterial soul to not be bound by material causality. In short, it's a cheat: you simply declare that causality doesn't affect something and poof. I could declare the same about the material world -- that "free-will" is an acausal material phenomena. So what? What have we gained other than soothing your need for fairy tales about a "non-causal" causality -- which is what you want, you want something that causes without being caused.
Why do you hate the interplay of causes that form reality? That's just silly.
Now, there you go again - responsibility is just a matter of semantics. There's no damn just about -- responsibility is necessary for their to be meaningful communication between human beings. That a friggin' big just --- much bigger than your "Oh, I might be punished".
That's childish. The reality is that without semantics --- there is no humanity. Even pre-humanity is impossible. My existence as a semantic entity depends on this.
This dismissal of the material and of meaning is grotesque --- your philosophy deforms you into dismissing the very bedrock of reality for escapism.
The first mover -- what an incoherent crock to escape this world; and in the end to escape true ethical responsibility.
Posted by: David Harley | July 10, 2008 11:30 PM
Susan Fani, identified in almost every news item about this story as a spokeswoman for the Catholic Diocese of Orlando, is no such thing.
She is an employee of Bill Donahue's lavishly funded Catholic League in New York. He draws a six-figure salary and he usually has a couple of female assistants on five-figure salaries.
It is Ms Fani who has been making the most incendiary statements, while masquerading as the voice of the diocese.