I've been profiled in MinnPost — and it's mostly boring stuff I already knew, but the reporter apparently called around the Morris community, too, which is how I learned this:
Myers acknowledged that he is something of a curiosity in a Minnesota community of church-goers, many of them deeply committed social and political conservatives.
Still, Myers has created no big buzz in town, said the Rev. Tom Fangmeier, an Assemblies of God pastor who chairs the Stevens County Ministerial Board. One Lutheran pastor complained to the board about Myers, Fangmeier said, but "I haven't heard about him in the cafes or anywhere else around town."
How … strange. I wonder what exactly they would expect to hear about me? I'm sitting in the Common Cup cafe right now, and I don't think I could generate much of a buzz. "Oh. He's sitting. He has a nice laptop. He doesn't slurp his coffee."
It's very amusing that I've been reported to the Stevens County Ministerial Board. Perhaps I will be defrocked.
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Expect to be pulled over sometime in the near future and given a God-briety test.
Aren't you just a little bit old now, to be wearing a frock?
Oh, don't lie now. We all know you go around harassing anyone who even looks like they believe in god(s). I'm sure The Board has their best agents tailing you even now.
Beware the Atheist!
Frock you!
Well, he's a pastor in the Church of Darwinism, so of course he'd be on the ministerial board.
The meetings must get a little uncomfortable for Rev. Dr. Myers!
/humor
Start slurping really loudly. Or maybe jump out of your seat and shout, "I'm an ATHEIST and I just have to tell the world!"
That'll get their attention.
They're probably planning an exorcism - better order a pea soup to go (you'll need it later when the power of Christ compels you).
An ATHEIST in Morris! Heavens to Murgatroyd! Won't someone think of the CHILDREN?*
Louis
* Yes, yes, think of the children with their delicious tasting livers and tender young sweetbreads, mwah ha ha haaaaaa.
Ooops, accidentally let slip the EAC's Lunch policy on America's youth there. My bad.
I would pay good money to see THAT defrocking ceremony.
I get the feeling it would not be an all-ages affair.
"A Member of the Scientific Elite, Myers was seen earlier chugging drugged beverages while frantically interacting with a technical device. Members of the community chose to avert there eyes and say nothing."
Oh my dear (and fluffy) lord, HIDE THE WOMEN AND CHILDREN, PZ is on the loose in Morris!!! He'll turn your soul to stone with one look from his atheistic intellectual gaze!!!! EVERYONE KNOWS he destroys gods with a flick of his finger on his godless laptop!!!! He'll expose you to...(gasp) REASON!!!!!!! RUN!!!!!!!!! ( terrified Minnesotans scream and a general melee ensues)
1-Adam12 ! 1-Adam12!
Be on the look-out for a bearded liberal (are there really any other kinds?) running around town, burning Bibles, and eating unbaptized babies!
If spotted, hold up a picture of Ben Stein, and two armed guards will appear from nowhere and throw-him-out...
Erm ahahaha, not that the Evil Atheist Conspiracy (EAC) actually exists, you know. Because it doesn't. Pay no attention whatsoever to the black helicopters approach your locations. Please stare directly into out memory alterartion devices and comply with your EAC overlords at all times, who, I should remind you don't exist. Don't worry about the paradox, it isn't happening.
Glad to clear that...I mean nothing....Up
Louis
This constantly trying to one-up Richard Dawkins has *got* to stop!
So Morris has a cafe culture? A vibrant public sphere that includes everyone from pastors to atheist professors? I did not know that.
I'm dying to know what the nature of the Lutheran pastor's 'complaint' was. The inexplicable disappearance of all puppies who wander onto your property? The stench of brimstone? Perhaps the leathery tail?
In addition to the pea soup purchase suggested above, perhaps you need to anticipate their next move and stitch the big scarlet 'A' on all your...um...frocks.
Oh come ooon--don't tell me you haven't eaten any babies recently. I know that I spend most of my time cannibalizing infants, convincing teenagers to have unprotected sex, and kicking puppies.
I'm guessing that the reporter was disappointed that you didn't have horns and a tail and that you didn't run around town trying to cause "trouble". Being the big rabble-rouser that you are.
Don't forget to jeapordize the souls of some children on your way home by explaining science to them.
"One Lutheran pastor complained to the board about Myers, Fangmeier said..."
What the hell about? They let atheists roam freely in Minnesota? Somebody do something...think about the children!!!!
"convincing teenagers to have unprotected sex"
No no, you have it all wrong, didn't you get the memo? We are convinving teenagers to have *protected* sex. Leaves more room for the homosexual vat babies.
From the article:
"I definitely think it's going to put more butts in the seats," Myers said. "There are people who are opposed to the message who now are curious."
Did you really say/believe that? I understood from your earlier posts and commentary on M&N that you thought the opposite.
What the...? These people sound like their all set to take up torches and run you out of town should you run a red light or something.
Funny, we say the same thing about ID, but we can prove it. Can't come up with your own arguments so you have to steal ours?
Jackass.
This is funny. But spooky. Those people give me the creeps.
Maybe a good idea to learn some self-defense and own a gun and some pepper spray PZ.
Perhaps you should break wind, and see if it becomes a headline on Fox News in the next couple of minutes.
Works for anyone.
FWIW - Ed Brayton's articles on this "film," from Skeptic and his ScienceBlog Dispatches, are linked on Arts and Letters Daily and The New York Times.
And you thought Phil and Greg were your top competitors.
I see a rabble with torches and farm implements (perhaps a Rabbi in the rabble too) while Garrison Keillor croons about Loudermilk Biscuits. All very menacing yet somehow homey and quaint.
Ooh, the good Reverend just called you a liar. You are not a "curiosity" after all -- get over yourself.
You may not be the talk of the cafes, but they do say you have been mentioned once or twice in the salons.
"I see a rabble with torches and farm implements..."
I potentially see a righteously-crazed sociopath.
Oh My Zeus, its PZ! Isn't he, like, one of the coolest rational science guys ever? Like totally.
lol
Who cares what some stuffy pontiff thinks? What enquiring minds wanna know is: are the rumours that you and the Trophy Wife™ are divorcing because she became a Kabbalist true? What about the Sudanese refugee baby you adopted and reportedly named (Bertrand) Russell Cthulhu Myers to be raised as a potential replacement for Skatje in case she doesn't turn out to be the new Messiah of Atheism and as a film director instead if she does? Is it true that your home is protected by a 40,000 gallon marine moat patrolled by a partially-bionic Humboldt squid named Tentaculon that you regularly bathe with and have taught to speed-read Braille? And most of all, what can we expect to see you wearing on the Red Carpet at this year's Selfish Geney Awards?
Creating controversy with his passion for science! Huh? It's as if he was describing the workings and wonders of science and using them to refute the nonsensical claims of the religionists that his controversy erupts? Oh I see; he tries to explain that the Universe is 15 billion years old and our earth is four and a half billion years old,and the insane morons claim it is only six thousand years old, and so this evolves into a controversy, among other things! What the hell is to be done with these insane morons? Reality is in their faces every day,but it does no good to smack them with it as we have been doing for so long now, that you begin to wonder will this go on forever as long as their are humans on this planet. Just imagine if Darwin, Einstein, Huxley, Russell, and so many more rational people had never been born, or worse still if the religious dark ages had somehow been able to stifle all rational thought up to the present time? That freaking moron from Rome would be the ruler of the whole planet instead of a measly one billion morons!
Meh, i'd have figured they would have noticed you eating the lifeless corpses of babies. Go figure.
I guess they're surprised that you use eating utensils and that they didn't hear you shouting stuff like "motherfucker, I want more iced tea!"
Ironic, considering your usual cafe is run by the Lutherans ;-).
Brownian @31:Is it true that your home is protected by a 40,000 gallon marine moat patrolled by a partially-bionic Humboldt squid named Tentaculon that you regularly bathe with and have taught to speed-read Braille?
Yes
You're just sitting there, drinking coffee?!?!?! Why aren't you eating babies, and having unprotected sex with all the Christian women?! What kind of atheist are you?!?!!!??!!
Edit: Just replace unprotected sex with impregnating... that makes much more sense...
'Myers said debates over religion have no place in his classroom: "I'm teaching biology, so we keep that out of there." But his students clearly think about it. A few have written "I love God" on their reviews of his course.'
Aw, that's so sweeet! They think you're God!
Uh oh, you've been COMPLAINED ABOUT! Double secret probation for you!
Perhaps because you are so well-known and also so smart, they incorrectly assume that you run around town kicking puppies and making people lick your boots.
I guess that's what I'd think if I had a head injury.
And since you can have a head injury and not be able to remember it, I am never too sure about that.
;D
/I potentially see a righteously-crazed sociopath./
Of course you do... he's between the Lutheran Minister with the hay fork and the torch wielding Rabbi (no wait, it's just Ben Stein). You obviously share my Shelley-esque vision of horrors to come.
What kind of laptop do you have? I'LL be the judge of it's niceness, thank you very much!
Why would you change that? It leaves out at least three good options that I can think of...
Make that four.
PZ, ever thought about making a donation to the MN Chiefs of Police or the local police widows 'n kids fund? Such organizations often will thank your for your donation with a nice sticker for your car.
Just something to think about.
Being sensitive to the Morris community, PZ courteously makes a run into Glenwood when he craves puppies for dinner.
Who cares what some stuffy pontiff thinks? What enquiring minds wanna know is: are the rumours that you and the Trophy Wife™ are divorcing because she became a Kabbalist true? What about the Sudanese refugee baby you adopted and reportedly named (Bertrand) Russell Cthulhu Myers to be raised as a potential replacement for Skatje in case she doesn't turn out to be the new Messiah of Atheism and as a film director instead if she does? Is it true that your home is protected by a 40,000 gallon marine moat patrolled by a partially-bionic Humboldt squid named Tentaculon that you regularly bathe with and have taught to speed-read Braille? And most of all, what can we expect to see you wearing on the Red Carpet at this year's Selfish Geney Awards?
Posted by: Brownian, OM | April 18, 2008 2:19 PM
Careful, there Brownian... You might be getting some unsolicited phone calls in the near future from Fox News, interested in hiring you for your skills as an investigative reporter...
PZ, you might want to watch out for that guy FANGmeier, sounds like he could be trouble. :-)
I would pay good money to see THAT defrocking ceremony.
...likely the sort of thing PZ could actually do to start a local riot. OTOH, if it happened here in Brooklyn, bored locals would probably just politely clap, if you picked the right bar for the event.
So, you, the Trophy Wife and your daughter all dress up & frock together huh... WITCHCRAFT!!!!
They never mentioned the dyspeptic concern.
PZ Myers? Who's that? Silly religious folk.
Of course you've been reported. It shouldn't take you long to figure out whom by.
Don't worry, you'll be famous soon enough. You've been pinged in an IMDB article: http://www.imdb.com/news/sb/2008-04-18/#6.
I was rather taken by this final paragraph from a comment on the story from a lover of the film:
"The only thing I have a hard time with is why does Ben where basketball shoes with a suite?"
"The only thing I have a hard time with is why does Ben where basketball shoes with a suite?" is included in a comment on the story from a lover of the film.
Well, if Jews have horns hidden under Hebfros, then do atheists have cloven hooves in their fancy European slippers?
And what about Jewish atheists? Just imagine a gay Jewish Arab atheist... They probably can't even fit their pants on.
A 21st-century American journalist actually did some background research (beyond checking on press releases from the subject's avowed enemies)?!?
No wonder Sharon Schmickle has been assigned a piece on an eccentric associate professor living on the edge of nowhere - with a work ethic like that, she'll never make it in the Big Time.
my favorite part is the use of the word "cafes". the lutheran pastor must be either european or incredibly square.
I saw something relevant on one of those T-shirt 'n' bumper-sticker sites. You could get cards made up that say, "Have you forgotten about Jesus? Isn't it about time you did?"
Now you can claim you are being persecuted, perhaps even expelled from Morris! (So what if you're still there and nothing has changed... just apply Sternbergian logic.)