Gosh. I sure hope the creationist extremists never get any substantial political power, because guess what some of them would like to do: they want to violently expel use crazy evolutionists. Ask Tom Willis, an utterly insane creationist (who is also, scarily, active in Kansas politics):
The arrogance displayed by the evolutionist class is totally unwarrented. The facts warrent the violent expulsion of
all evolutionists from civilized society. I am quite serious that
their danger to society is so great that, in a sane society, they
would be, at a minimum, denied a vote in the administration of
the society, as well as any job where they might influence immature humans, e.g., scout, or youth, leader, teacher and, obviously, professor. Oh, by the way… What is the chance evolutionists will vote or teach in the Kingdom of God?
But, of course, I myself, am not deluded. "Kingdom
Now" theology notwithstanding, I have no expectations that
such a proposal will ever be implemented, for the
simple reason that delusion is ordained by God to
reign until Christ returns. (2 Thess 2:10)
(Yes, the big yellow smiley face is actually part of his essay. So are the spelling errors.)
What great eliminationist rhetoric! Our only consolation, I suppose, is that so far he thinks his god has decreed that we shall be allowed to exist until he annihilates us in the end times.
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I can't believe he actually put in a smiley face. You kind of get the impression that he typed this up during craft hour, while all the other mental patients were hogging all the glitter and crayons.
Shame it's a .pdf. I bet the hard copy has letters cut and pasted from various magazines.
PZ - Now go read "The Family" by Jeff Sharlet (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0060559799)
This year I will be casting my vote very carefully....
Willis wouldn't happen to be a fourteen-year-old girl, would he?
"But, of course, I myself, am not deluded."
---Yeah, keep telling yourself that.
I had to read that twice to understand what 'violently expel use crazy evolutionists' meant -- just a typo!
I was worried that only crazy mass evolutionist purchasers would be the target (of which, I am one)!
phew!
BOOKS and LERNING are for HOMOS and GODLESS SIENTISTS
And we will know they are Christians by their love (by their love)....
Everybody sing with me!
I have to tell you - the electron cloud on that cross makes it much more palatable and really adds credibility to the phrase "creation science."
Heh heh. Expelled.
my over the top post at #6 aside, I have a step-great-uncle in west virginia or something who once said that atheists can just get in a boat and sail somewhere else if they don't like living in a christian nation. And as I was catholic at the time - he probably didn't know my denomination - I"m sure that my former sect of christ was probably high up on the "load 'em up, ship 'em out" list that so many nuts seem to have.
And people say Fundamentalists are crazy, intolerant loonies.
Oh!
Doesn't he know that the bible says the GEEKS shall inherit the Earth? One big WOW-fest, baby!
He is just making sure that his God's predictions will come to pass. He knows (on some level) that he can't rely on the evolutionists to be delusional as his God has ordained, so he has to do it himself.
Wouldn't that be like expelling all the water from a lake, or all the sand from a sandbox? If you throw out all the sane, rational, and educated people leaving behind only the violent religious fanatics, how could there be any "Civilized society" left?
He sounds like he is on crack. Is that guy for real?
The loonies reveal their totalitarian aspirations. The expletive news is starting to sound like a Robert A. Heinlein novel (The dystopic, future history stuff)
"I believe in evolution," McCain said.
"I believe in evolution." - Barack Obama
Well, I guess Tom won't be voting this time around!
Egads! Did you read some of the other childish, extreme nonsense on their home page? http://www.csama.org/ These folk have got to be wearing lead lined blinders to believe the trash they spout...
"The arrogance displayed by the evolutionist class is totally
unwarrented [sic]."
Oh my! I haven't heard us be described as a class yet.
Sounds pretty closed to me.
To be fair, I think that people who believe that they may at any time disappear unexpectedly from the earth shouldn't be allowed from operating motorized vehicles or holding responsible positions.
Oh, and what was that about professors influencing "immature humans"? College students are almost universally adults in the eyes of the law, eligible to go and die for their country in Iraq, and in theory capable of making their own decisions. In his mind, at what point does a person become an adult? Of course, we know the answer--the evangelical movement feels that ALL humans are immature, and should be kept away from ideas that might induce crime-think.
Shouldn't be allowed *to* operate... sorry, rewrote that sentence a couple times. Stupid prepositions.
Ah, Comic Sans. The trus sign of a disordered mind.
Now that's some hard-core Christian hate-speak love right there.
How do these folks get so freakin' damaged?
What a world class ass-munch.
Am I the only one who couldn't read that entire piece of crap?
BTW (OT)- The Louisiana legislature passed one of 'those' bills. ugh.
Whoops! I forgot to give you a link about that piece-o-crap Louisiana thing. Here you go.
http://sensuouscurmudgeon.wordpress.com/
He thinks there's voting in heaven?
Wow. Evolutionary theory is to blame for the crimes of capitalists AND communists (and pretty much everyone else...):
I particularly like the "evolutionist, anti-Christian, anti-creationists" bit. It lends a whole new level of demented hysteria to the typical fundie persecution complex.
The thing about "the USSR (from 1918 to this day)" is a bit perplexing, though. Did this guy completely miss the end of the cold war?
LOL #7
I think the synopsis for Tom's book "Real Scientists Just Say NO!" says it all (page 3 of the 4-page pdf that PZ links):
That's really what we should all strive for: to achieve understanding by reading as few books as possible. Right?
Come the Rapture, I say we all meet up at Tom's house and divvy up his stuff.
..."Oh, by the way... What is the chance evolutionists will vote or teach in the Kingdom of God?" smiley.jpg
But, of course, I myself, am not deluded. "Kingdom Now" theology notwithstanding, I have no expectations that such a proposal will ever be implemented, for the simple reason that delusion is ordained by God to reign until Christ returns. (2 Thess 2:10)...
Interpretation:
..."Oh, by the way... Your fly's open/headlights showin'. What is the chance evolutionists... W..T..F.. is an evolutionist?!) will vote or teach in the Kingdom of God?" (insert appropriate jpg here - come on! use your jpg's to the best!)
But, of course, I myself, am not deluded (I did NOT make this up! My dom... er... significant other did to just show you their prowess and power of their use of the comma). "Kingdom Now" (i.e., domonition/dominatrix) theology notwithstanding, I have no expectations that such a proposal will ever be implemented (baaaah, nooooobody likes me), for the simple reason that delusion (human state) is ordained by God (he's made up - suckers!) to reign until Christ returns (which ain't gonna happen, he still owes me from last month). (2 Thess 2:10)...
sick challenge - come up with a better interpretation please!
Yep, I think he's missed the point of the whole kingdom of god thing.
Willis is the guy who conspired with BOE chairperson Steve Abrams in writing the YEC-influenced Kansas science standards of 1999. Fellow Kansas Citizen for Science Board member Peter Gegenheimer and I did the detective work that uncovered the secret "citizen's draft" that Willis and others wrote, and that Abrams then copied from without admitting Willis's involvement. (We found the secret draft by following links on Willis's website. Duh!) Steve Case and I blew the whistle at an BOE meeting in late 1999, which contributed, I think, to the eventual downfall of the creationists in the BOE elections of 2000.
Willis also was in attendance at the 2005 science hearings (he shows up in the background a few times in the documentary Kansas vs. Darwin), and he and others in his group continue to provide support for the Intelligent Design network despite their fundamental disagreement with ID as not being Biblical enough.
If you want to read more of Willis, see his newsletter site at http://www.csama.org/CSA-NLTR.HTM.
Oops
http://www.csama.org/CSA-NLTR.HTM
@#8 - I thought it was barbed wire...
What is with creationists and not getting the whole irony thing? He even used the word expel!
OT, but kinda funny: here in Canada, CSA is the Canadian Standards Association, My summer job requires that i be CSA certified, does this mean I have to renounce evilution to test concrete?
They actually believe this.
Isn't it ironic that this man is saying that by violently expelling (i.e. killing) all evolutionists, they'll go away from society and it will be better - the irony being, his statement is Social Darwinism.
If it was possible to make sure we took the cool toys (like all the nukes) with us I'd say maybe its time for a mass exodus from the United States of Batshit Crazy. Think about it, if we organized it so we all up at left at the same time in the dead of night we could really fuck with their heads. They'd wake up one morning and all the sane people would just be gone, they almost certainly think for just a moment that the rapture had come and they weren't on the invite list. Admittedly in some parts of the country they may not notice at all, sane people being so thin on the ground as it is. But I'm starting to get more than a little worried that the batshit crazies out number us so badly.
What is it about Queensland and creonuts?
From an announcement in the newsletter:
He thinks there's voting in heaven?
That's right! Heaven is not a democracy. Just ask Mark Twain (from his Extract from Captain Stormfield's Visit to Heaven):
"You have got the same mixed-up idea about these things that everybody has down there. I had it once, but I got over it. Down there they talk of the heavenly King--and that is right--but then they go right on speaking as if this was a republic and everybody was on a dead level with everybody else, and privileged to fling his arms around anybody he comes across, and be hail-fellow-well-met with all the elect, from the highest down. How tangled up and absurd that is! [...] Well, this is Russia--only more so. There's not the shadow of a republic about it anywhere. There are ranks, here. There are viceroys, princes, governors, sub-governors, sub-sub-governors, and a hundred orders of nobility, grading along down from grand-ducal archangels, stage by stage, till the general level is struck, where there ain't any titles."
Tom probably thinks he's going to have an opportunity to hug Adam. Jeez.
I'm guessing the Kingdom of God is the post-Rapture utopia after Jesus returns and has been made King of the World. Of course, at that point no one will be voting, since Jesus will be in charge because he's God and will rule by divine fiat.
Never forget, the ultimate goal of fundamentalist Christianity is the destruction of democratic government.
I liked this bit
"Therefore, in a sane society, evolutionists should not be allowed to vote, or influence laws or people in any way!
They should, perhaps, make bricks to earn enough to eat."
I have a picture of a prison camp where they have us all in chains making bricks.
** look nihilism in the face **
For 2,000 years one hallmark of xianity has remained its hatred of natural science and skeptical philosophy. The Stoics and Epicureans of Athens laughed at Paul of Tarsus when he spoke to them. Paul's anti-intellectual rejoinder is still holy writ:
20-Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? 21-For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe. 22-Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, 23-but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles . . . . 1Cor1 20-23 NIV
In short, Paul and his fellow revenge seekers created a god sharing their nihilistic valuations.
27-But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. 28-He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things--and the things that are not--to nullify the things that are . . . . 1Cor1:26-28 NIV
Xianity still appeals to those who believe themselves mistreated. To those in whom resentment surges. To those who must punish their guilty selves. To those who must blame others.
Xianity is practical nihilism. Directed inward, hatred of self. Directed outward, hatred of others and the world.
Psychologically I don't see much difference between the Taliban in Afghanistan and bible-worshipers (fundies) spread like pond scum across the US. Without a vigorously enforced secular state, you and I would burn at the stake or receive a bullet in the head for disbelief.
For all true believers, this is their doctrine: "those not with us are against us." Luke 11:23 NIV
Their hatred is not some peripheral ideological stance -- it is the dark heart and sick soul of Paul's life-negating world view, tarted up as a religion of "love".
bipolar2
© 2008
Doubting Foo @ #12:
No, it's FREAKS who will inherit the Earth. Said the guy with the tail.
The geeks can have the world...of warcraft. :P
Did this guy completely miss the end of the cold war?
Etha,
Yeah, a huge percentage of the US right operates as though they just dialed the Talking Political Clock and it said, "The ideological time at the tone is 1957. *beep*"
Our only consolation, I suppose, is that so far he thinks his god has decreed that we shall be allowed to exist until he annihilates us in the end times.
It's going to be difficult to sleep at night in teh face of this threat, but somehow I shall manage.
"What is the chance evolutionists will vote or teach in the Kingdom of God?"
Oh no! You mean I won't be able to vote in an impossible, non-existant future world?! Shit!
Well, like I'm fond of saying: If God is so smart, why did he make Evolutionists?
No? It's a hybrid class, with some rogueish skills (training is optimized for 1HE weapons like Occam's Razor) and the ability to spellcast spells relying on Natural and Sorcerous energies (such as "Speciate" and "Violate Law of Thermodynamics"). It's flashy, yet dark. Though playing an Evolutionist is fun and satisfying (and may give you the power to destroy all that is good in the world) you'll have a hell of a time trying to pile up a lot of coin.
This is off topic but it's about creationists. I just read something from Americans United for Separation of Church and State that surprised me. The Louisiana House of Representatives voted 94 to 3 in favor of a bill that could make possible the teaching of magical creation in biology classes. 94 to 3 is amazing. Virtually every politician in Louisiana is a creationist.
http://tinyurl.com/56b2j9
In the Exodus myth, the Egyptians enslaved the Hebrews and forced them to make bricks (with insufficient straw, no less). God then sent a shitload of plagues on the Egyptians for being such douchebags.
This guy doesn't seem to have thought things through very well. He's practically begging for frogs and locust.
And I remember how much you just love the use of smiley faces as an adjunct to the written, PZ. Maybe he put that in there for you personally.
I'm not sure I understand this. Is he saying that creationists aren't Homo Sapiens (Pan troglodytes, maybe)?
Or is he saying that even if Crusaders (for example) had access to assault weapons, mass transport, high explosives, air power, radio communication, water treatment, food preservation and the training to use them effectively, the body count of the Crusades would have been no higher?
Seems to me it's got to be one, the other or both.
written word, I meant.
Etha, #40 wrote:
We're not all like that, I promise. Though I've lived in another state for 10 years; perhaps it's all gone downhill since then.
Yes, in many ways Qld is like the American south - rednecks, hillbillies, anti-intellectualism - but there is a massive difference in religious beliefs. Fundamentalism just doesn't happen on the same scale.
And not many people play the banjo...
This would certainly explain the existence of Tom Willis. Note: "Until Christ returns" == "forever".
Who are you, thou nonpareil truest-mannered welsh cheese? nose-herb? cuckoo-bud? shoulder-clapper? pittikin? something-cool-that-Shakespeare-wrote?
Unfortunately I've experienced this sort of Christian love first hand, from a life-long former friend.
His last words to me were that he thought Atheists should be denied the right to vote.
Just my anecdotal evidence that Christianity destroys friendships.
I don't think Tom Willis has a very good grip on reality, so it doesn't matter whether he likes us or not.
@#60 Kel --
Unfortunately, even people with a poor grasp of reality can do things that impact reality, especially if their particular delusion is socially sanctioned.
That's really sad, Calladus. Sorry to hear that.
I'm a creationist, and I don't agree with Tom Wills, this isn't communist China nor is it the old atheistic Soviet Union, this is America which has different points of view which can be displayed in various ways.
Anyone else catch today's letters to the editor in the NY Times. They printed a real gem:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/12/opinion/lweb12evolution.html?ref=opin…
Someone wrote in to say that during their work as a high school teacher they definitively disproved evolution through his mastery of mathematics and statistics. Damn, wish my high school teachers were half as gifted.
Lots of good tard there. Best one might be the fact that one of their current speakers is, um, "deceased". He probably makes the most sense of all of them now.
Why do they keep referring to their degrees "the" as in as "Mr. Smith has *the* BSc. from Wackaloon U"? It is like they know the terms but not the context and don't quite know how to use idioms properly...
... oh yeah, they don't...
Love the fact one guy "searched and searched" (riiiiiight) for "macroevolution" (sic) in his industrial safety job (?) bombarding organisms with massive radiation and yet nothing lived - presumably - much less "evolved" (sic again, because they probably expected some bacteria to grow into an giant multicelled armoured X-men type things as opposed to increased radiation resistance in a population over generations)
It makes me do my sadface dot jpeg that people can actually think like this. Are we such a danger to their beliefs? It's not as if we're holding their children hostage (apart from with our ideas, of course), raping their women (apart from with our ideas, of course), and pillaging their villages (apart from with our ideas, of course...?).
No matter what the case, they seriously need to gtfo my internet - apart from a minimal number of caged trolls, who will be kept for entertainment purposes. If they want to refute the very principles of science, they don't get to share its booty!
Michael, are you under the impression that science is just a "point of view" on par with fairy tales? Don't give that bullshit, creationism is simply dead fucking wrong. Teaching anything other than evolution is wrong, as there is no scientific alternative to TOE. Teaching anything other than science in a science class is wrong. Teaching creationism or its bastard cousin ID is not only stupid, but a clear violation of the the first amendment.
"It was also a major justification in the defense of slavery in the 1800's against Christian opponents."
[Citation Needed]
In 1857, 2 years before Darwin published On the Origin of Species, Chief Justice Taney ruled that blacks were an inferior class of beings and were not included among those who were created equal. Could you kindly explain how the judge knew about the theory of evolution before it was published?
Shame it's a .pdf. I bet the hard copy has letters cut and pasted from various magazines.
Do you think they let him use scissors? Maybe the kiddie kind with the rounded tips so he doesn't hurt himself.
Well, like I'm fond of saying: If God is so smart, why did he make Evolutionists?
Yea, verily, they say we are all God's children, so it follows that the Almighty can't be too happy about Mr. Willis second-guessing the evolutionists' ordained place in His plan. What was it that the Bible said about pride? Oh, yeah:
Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall.
-- Proverbs 16: 18 (KJV)
Etha @ #40
Well, there was only two in the whole state and we managed to get rid of them. Nah, actually when I was growing up in teh 70's/80's, and Wowbagger will probably attest to this, we had a bit of a fundie bloke (but seriously mild compared to your fundies) in charge who set us back a bit in terms of social progress ( and I darkly remember the days as a teenager when we couldn't buy alcohol on a Sunday) but those days are long since gone and Queensland is probably one of the most progressive states now. We've had the largest influx of migration from the sourthern states ( primarily because we have a pretty good economy and pretty damn good weather) and that has contributed to rapidly diluting any last remaining vestigial ,um, fundicity, fundamentalness, fund.. um you get the idea.
Ah, the violent removal of those that you disagree with follwed by the removal of the democratic rights of those who would vote against you. History has heard THAT one before.
He thinks there's voting in heaven?
Sure, but it'll be like a Soviet election. Only one party. Only one candidate.
I'm just waiting for Willis to state that the KoG "is not a Christian Kingdom, it's a secular one."
It is as though the closest he has come to actually reading the bible is a Sunday School colouring-in competition!
Why do I suddenly get mental images of a mad Dr. Frankenstein type?
"I am not deluded, THEY are deluded! They are all deluded! But I'll show them! Muahahahahaha!"
:)
Steve@65,
Nah, he probably irradiated half the cats in the state trying to make crockoducks. He got short-lived bald toothless cats with goo oozing from red spots, recognised them as pigoslugs, but then realised they were the same "kind" and dismissed evolution accordingly.
Re: smiley face: One thing I've learned about tribal Christianity as practiced in the United States is that the followers very much can say bigoted things like this and belittle those of other beliefs with a smile. They do it as much as they can too, because no one who is smiling could be a bad person, right? Change the dots in the smiley face into open circles, and you have a pretty good approximation of the vacant-eyed look that many of them have, too.
The yellow smiley is also an ecstasy drug reference. Fitting dontcha think...
Ecstasy?
Gosh, I wonder what that is? I get so confused this early in the morning...you know, before I've had my coffee and violently expelled an evolutionist.
Give the guy some credit PZ. At least he knows the difference between Evolution and Abiogenesis
Wow... just... wow. Take away the voting rights of nonbelievers and force them into menial labor, only to make enough to barely eat. Accompanied by a smiley face.
I'm making a different kind of face right now. The sort of face you make when you open the refrigerator and take out a wrapped up piece of cheese, but when you unwrap it you find it isn't the color it's supposed to be. The sort of thing where you simultaneously stop breathing because you don't want to smell what you've just discovered, and also you're afraid of inhaling the spores of whatever is now growing there.
Well, Mr Willis, if this is what you want people to associate with Christianity then, well... you have fun now. You can turn more people away from Christ with that kind of talk than I can with science.
Hey PZ, do you have a barf bag? I think I need to throw up.
PZ I don't know what your policy is on blatant book plugs like that (foxfire @ #2) but I would just like to chip in and say Jeff Sharlet has been one of my favourite writers for over a year now. His articles on religion in Rolling Stone and Harpers (eg "Jesus Plus Nothing") were fantastic, but what really sold me on him was a piece called "The many times my Mother died" which is here:
http://www.killingthebuddha.com/dogma/many_times_mother_died.htm
I haven't read 'The Family' yet, but I hope to soon.
I just woke from my nap because I had a terrible nightmare. You see, there was this idiot monster with a moronic smile on its yellow face and it wanted me excluded from society and persecuted for having the occasional rational thought, and... oh, wait...
His use of terms like 'class', 'violent expulsion', 'forced labor' immediately associate his ideology with certain 20th century regimes. That he connects this with his idea of God's will warrants the conclusion that he is a theo-fascist. I can only speak for myself, but another Murrah by him or more likely one of his devout followers would not surprise me much.
I thought we evolutionists were an order - like the Ordo Templi Orientis, you know. "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law." Now, that should make Tom Willis and friends freak out!
This Tom Willis seems to be a complete lunatic. I'm astounded at the idea that he is actually taken seriously.
Reading through the article you linked to, I think the major problem is that Willis seems to be conflating "evolution as a scientific theory" with "evolution as a philosophy of life", and treating "evolutionists" as if they were a philosophical or religious school of thought - which is simply sloppy thinking. I accept, based on the scientific consensus and my own limited understanding, the reality of biological evolution; but that doesn't mean I base my philosophical worldview on it.
For instance, where he says "Evolution formed the apologetic framework for justifying the harshest of cruelties during this period as well... a logically consistent pursuit of evolutionary theory has been used to justify atrocious crimes on the grandest scale in human history," he's using an argument from consequences, which is, of course, a fallacy; whether or not a belief in evolution has led to immoral consequences has no bearing on whether or not evolutionary theory is factually accurate. And it also seems to be an is-ought confusion. As I said, I am an "evolutionist" in the sense that I accept the probable factual reality of biological evolution. But that doesn't mean I want human society to be governed according to the principles of natural selection (if it were, I would quite possibly be dead, as certainly would all disabled people, the weak and the unhealthy). Willis just doesn't seem to realise that there is a difference between viewing evolution as the reality of how things are, and considering it in normative terms as the way things ought to be. He seems to think of "evolutionists" as a philosophical school of thought, and evolution as a complete normative philosophy of life.
So, in conclusion, Mr Willis is at best intellectually lazy and sloppy in his thinking; at worst, he's a raving lunatic. Please tell me this guy isn't representative of Kansas conservatism?
Sorry for the incorrect italics in my above post. (Italics should end after the end of the quote.)
correction: he didn't use the term 'forced labor', but states clearly that 'evolutionists' (meaning conflated with atheists) should rather make bricks than anything else. Whis is the same idea the Nazis had regarding their opponents. The people forced to make bricks and ammunition were the lucky ones.
Rey Fox @ 76: "Re: smiley face: One thing I've learned about tribal Christianity as practiced in the United States is that the followers very much can say bigoted things like this and belittle those of other beliefs with a smile."
Yes, indeedy. Works like this:
Leigh said (smiling sweetly), "We need to pray for Brother Willis, y'all. He can't help being a demented fucktard, bless his heart. God has, for His own reasons, chosen to wire Brother Willis's brain up wrong, so that he's stupid and vicious. We need to ask God to heal him from the diseases of ignorance, prejudice, and evil. Let's pray together, right now (drops smile, face now expresses deep concern and sincerity). . .
Heavenly Father, please turn Your servant Tom Willis from wickedness, heal his diseased mind, and put him where he can't do any further damage to civilization. Amen."
By the way, I am TOTALLY SINCERE in this prayer, even though I wrote it as an example. In the absence of forcibly administered psychotropic medication, it's the best I can do.
I would write him a letter telling I'm praying for him, but unfortunately I scanned his vile content and discovered that this evil loon DISSED ISAAC ASIMOV. This is unforgiveable, and I hereby darn him to Heck.
"..the evolutionist class.."
One of the many he obviously skipped.
Please ... PLEASE ...
This HAS to be satire! My Poe's Detector is having trouble getting a reading ...
Walton, could you be so sheltered that you think that the Christian hate spiel of Willis is rare? The in-your-face rude, harsh criticism hurled at creotards at this site is fueled by the reality of their pervasive existence and sickening influence.
Willis has developed the typical Christian passive-aggressiveness skills to such an astounding degree, he must unwittingly and spontaneously create a passive-aggressiveness free zone surrounding his individual sucking, droning black hole of hostility smeared with inane politeness.
To Logicel at #92: It's not the "hate", as such, that causes me to despair; aggressive rhetoric occurs on all sides of the debate. It's the fact that Willis' article is illogical, incoherent, factually incorrect, and over-simplifies complex concepts.
Well, if the Kingdom of Heaven is anything like the Kingdom of Belgium, there won't be much to do for King God and the royal family except symbolic handwaving and doing a christmas speech once a year.
In the mean time,the rest of us would semi-democratically tear the place apart in tiny pieces depending on language and wealth. (I'll bet He'll regret that whole Babel-thing then.)
Walton@93:
And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?
--Matthew 7:3
Ugh, I too couldn't read the whole abominable article, and from what I did read, I am now stoopider.
What a sad example of a human being this Willis character is, all bound up in his own shackles of hate.
Emmet Caulfield at #95:
Are you saying I'm as bad as Willis? I hope I'm not.
I would prefer the rational and organized fascism and totalitarism of the Nazis over this sort of deluded de-brained emotional christofascism this guy has in mind anytime,becaue in a society run by christofascists like this Willis fellow,there would be no hiding of the wanted or persecuted,no Schindler is possible in this kind of fascism,just an amorphic mass of brainwashed morons happily marching over the cliff.
Now this guy has me really scared.
@Walton, I disagree with your perception. What I perceive is a passionate--and certainly laced with lots of delicious snark--on the Pharyngulites side when presenting, with an astonishing level of consistency, solid arguments. The creotard side have no arguments, they have nothing but a religious filter through which they distort valid arguments.
You are so focused on the snark aspect, that you forget that we consistently present arguments in, around, under, over the snark. To conflate the two approaches is ridiculous. Some of us argue without snark, but very few of us argue without solid, valid argument, unlike the other side who never do.
Life without snark for me is a life without spice. If I can get solid arguments without snark, so be it, but I can't see snark obliterating solid arguments. So if some have a talent for snark, rejoice in that reality, instead of trying to get rid of something that is expressive of talent, skill, and passion.
[The creationist side] "have no arguments, they have nothing but a religious filter through which they distort valid arguments." - I agree with this entirely. As I've said, I fully accept the reality of biological evolution. And I agree with the majority view here about Willis, as I've said.
@ Etha,No 40 :
//What is it about Queensland and creonuts?//
Come visit sometime and I'll show you around...:-)
Other than that,I dont think that the UoQ produces more creotards that any other Uni in Australia,but maybe BrideofShrek or John Wilkins know more details.
Cheers,
Martin
The only surprising thing was that he didn't use the phrase "Darwinist" or "Darwinism" in his entire screed.
I liked especially the part about the theistic evolutionists ;
Hey Francis Collins, did you see that one ? You are worse than the Atheists, guess hell is going to be a very crowded place. Mind you, as long as Willis is not there, looks more like Heaven to me...
You are so focused on the snark aspect, that you forget that we consistently present arguments in, around, under, over the snark. To conflate the two approaches is ridiculous. Some of us argue without snark, but very few of us argue without solid, valid argument, unlike the other side who never do.
Without missing the snark, and the point, Walton's raison d'etre for being at this site would collapse.
In the same newsletter I noticed this, ahem, gem which demonstrates CSAMA's cluelessness:
Conveniently located - in mines? Mines? Where miners have to work hundreds of metres below ground, often in cramped conditions, with the risks of roof-fall, flooding, heat-stroke, asphyxia, irritant or carcinogenic dusts or "firedamp"? Not to mention all the "convenient" processing that most ores require to produce the desired material. Christ on a bike, that's disconnection from reality for you.
I suppose that's the same disconnect that enables people like Willis to demonise atheists as he does - either that or he completely lacks a sense of empathy with his fellow human beings.
And how would he ascertain whether someone was an "evolutionist"? As all Pharyngulites know, Poe's Law applies to creationism, so we could make up as flimsy and inconsistent a version of creationism as we liked, and he'd have to accept it or risk insulting fellow fundagelicals.
<headdesk>
Well, if the Kingdom of Heaven is anything like the Kingdom of Belgium, there won't be much to do for King God and the royal family except symbolic handwaving and doing a christmas speech once a year.
In the mean time,the rest of us would semi-democratically tear the place apart in tiny pieces depending on language and wealth. (I'll bet He'll regret that whole Babel-thing then.)
Posted by: true scotchman
King Leopold II really did nice work with the Kongo. I wonder if Leopold was an evolutionist?
Of the million or so biological structures that evolutionists need, not one has ever been observed, much less demonstrated!
How do you demonstrate a structure?
so, if something could possibly be used as a way to cause death, then it doesn't exist?
in that case, I don't believe in the flood, the crucifixion, the plagues, Sodom & Gomorrah, nuclear power, religion, war, guns, the bible, cars, god, and life itself.
Could the smiley face mean that this guy is actually The Smiley Face killer and his targets are Atheists?
clinteas @#98 wrote:
"I would prefer the rational and organized fascism and totalitarism of the Nazis over this sort of deluded de-brained emotional christofascism this guy has in mind anytime".
Oh no, you wouldn't. I've just read the full article from Tom Willis, and although he appears to be an ethically and emotionally handicapped fucker, it's more or less a joke when compared to the theory (as described in Mein Kampf) and practise of National Socialism. Which was, I feel the need to point out once again, a religious movement that caused dozens of millions of people to lose their minds and decency and cost dozens of millions more their lives.
A lot of these deranged nazi assholes are still around today, and believe me, if you'd ever had the business end of a gun stuck up your nose by one of these bastards, you'd be a tad more careful with your comparisons.
I see your point, though, but it wasn't all that well delivered.
"The minerals man retrieves in mining operations are essential to our existence. Why are they so conveniently located?
Wow, the man's a master debater. He's made me see his point.
Fish live in water. Why is water so conveniently located for the fish?
This is one of the most bizarre lines of reasoning I've seen in quite some time.
Burning up the radical right-wing intertubes are reports of federal refugee camps being built. They talk a lot about how they are ostensibly for illegal aliens or refugees from a disaster.
A few claim they are for Christians and the last loyal patriots.
Tom Willis has let the cat out of the bag.
The camps are being built for evolutionists and atheists. The New Dominionist will take control of the nation shortly before W is due to step down. The Christianized armed forces will shake off the shackles of the Godless civilian leadership. The black helicopters will darken the sky and there will be a knock at the door.
Don't say you weren't warned.
LOL.
If Israël strikes Iran this fall...
some people better start preparing their luggage.
A few people up above (around the 40-post area) mentiond "Kingdom Now" Theology. I hadn't heard of that particular brand of lunacy, so I Googled it. Here is a statement from their website:
http://www.kingdomnow.org/95Theses.html
"Thus, it is with great sadness that the endorsers of this document humbly plead with our churches to join us in repentance, turning from the United States' twisted notions of liberty, democracy and justice, from the historical misconceptions of its "Christian heritage" and from the ubiquitous greed that drives our nation."
This should illustrate just how batshit crazy these people can be..
Janine,
"I wonder if Leopold was an evolutionist?"
He sure was quite the naturalist. I hear he had one of the greatest anatomical collections of negroide hands and feet in his time. Strictly for research purposes ofcourse.
"The facts warrent the violent expulsion of all evolutionists from civilized society."
What facts, our (comparatively) low crime rate, low divorce rate, high education, and relatively high pay rates?
Yes, by all means, banish those nasty "evilutionists" to some island. But be warned, after putting the blacks, the immigrants, the feminists, teh gays, the scientists, and the atheists all on their own separate islands, not only are you likely to run out of islands, but your god-oiled country will probably grind to a complete stop, down from the slow crawl that Bush's faith-based/fact-free governance has reduced you to.
Ladies and gentlemen of Scienceblogs, come to Canada.
Seriously.
Commander Lock: If it were up to me, Captain, you wouldn't set foot on a ship for the rest of your life.
Morpheus: Then I am grateful that it is not up to you.
www.biblicalgeology.net
Well this ought to be a bit of fun.
Tom Willis seemed reasonably normal when he was on "The Jeffersons."
#50, that's it, I'm writing a culture wars RPG.
Well, yes - in mines, as opposed to, say, at the core of Mars, or in a tight ring of molten debris placed well inside the orbit of Mercury.
[*vacuousSmileyFace*]
He appears to be right, Captain. Tricorder readings show that Willis himself lacks certain biological structures heretofore thought to be essential. He has neither heart, nor brain. Evolution is, therefore, false.
What choo talkin' about Willis?
Brownian:
"Canadians do not have a cast-iron stomach for offensive speech." ~ Jason Gratl, a lawyer for the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association and the Canadian Association of Journalists.
Full story here.
Me sez u Evil-lucomunists be crzydangrus and canz nver vot.
Yors in GODs CHRISTs Holey NAME,
Tom Willis
Citizen Seagoon @23:
Ah, Comic Sans. The trus sign of a disordered mind.
New here? Dr. Myers decides which font to use on his blog and so uses Comic Sans for the quotes he considers to be from loonies. He used to use a background with "Mr. (my brain hurts) Gumby" from Monty Python, but something changed in ScienceBlogs server that messed it up, so now he uses the despised Comic Sans font.
I'm a doctor, not a wizard!
if you follow the link to his site you can see that he thinks the word "empirical" means "absolte"
Empirical Evidence That Evolutionists be Denied the vote
does he mean people who teach evolution or anyone who accepts it?
4 God-fearing Boy Scouts Killed by Act of God
@ #129 - "It's a miracle that more scouts were not killed or injured."
From Willis' PDF:
>>Evolutionists shout,
"Evolution is just change, change is everywhere, evolution is a
fact!" This is a bit like noticing dents in your child's wagon,
and deciding that rocks change wagons, therefore more rocks
might turn it into a car.<<
What kind of analogy is that? How is it possible, to get it that wrong!?
Yikes! That note should go on passiveaggressivenotes.com
P.A.R.O.D.Y.
astrosmashley said:
I don't think we're dealing with someone who's intellect is up to making fine distinctions like that.
Personally I'm guessing he'll just disenfranchise anyone he decides is even vaguely intelligent-looking and worry about the details later.
Hell, it worked in Florida!
Oh, you mean like this one:
I'd say something about people who live in glass houses, but I suspect it wouldn't have an impact on you. Your arrogance wouldn't allow it.
I think it is kind of cute how he thinks that the Laws of Thermodynamics prove that god exists. It is not the simple "Entropy disproves evolution" argument. He actually has a somewhat thoughtful aproach that if the universe has always existed, then the 2nd Law says it should have reached thermal equilibrium (maximum entropy) by now (that he thinks 3K is the equilibrium temperature is also amusing). If the Universe is not infinitely old then the 1st Law is violated because it says energy cannot be created.
He fails to see that these Laws are codified observations by Man, not decrees handed to us from God. He does not see that if you think you find a contradiction in your scientific laws, the problem is in the laws, not the universe. That is, the logic of: The universe is not infinitely old, the first law of thermodynamics says the universe cannot have been created, therefore God created the universe, ignores several other possibilities. When it comes to the origin of the universe, there is no reason to think that any of our known laws apply at t=0.
jsn:I'd say something about people who live in glass houses, but I suspect it wouldn't have an impact on you. Your arrogance wouldn't allow it.
If Myers only criticism of Willis was the spelling errors then you would have a point, but it wasn't and could actually have just been a statement that he wasn't deliberately inserting spelling errors into the quote. Could you be any more superficial?
Tom Willis is, for lack of a better term, a fascist bastard.
If that's not too blunt.
@Reginald Selkirk and the rest of you sorry fuckers who use the death of four Scouts to make some kind of point . . .
Four families have lost a son. Four young men are dead, and 48 more are injured, some critically.
You shut your crappy inhuman lowlife loser mouths. Just shut the fuck up.
You're as bad as this vile piece of smegma Willis. No, you're worse, because unlike him, presumably you're not deranged.
MY son is at Scout camp right now. I could be one of the mothers mourning right now.
And get THIS, you slime on the bottom of humanities' shoe -- MY SON IS AN ATHEIST.
So just shut the fuck up.
> Evolutionism was/is the apologetic foundation for the
> faith of predatory capitalism,
Because we all know that before the mid-nineteenth century, capitalism was extremely nice and benign, with the exception of a few hundred-thousands of children send into the convenient coal mines or stuck up in chimneys, and a few million Chinese made opium addicts
>
> Germany in WWI,
The German elites were deep into new age and theosophic crap, then and now, and their beliefs when it came to the origin of mankind probably included Ur-Aryans from Atlantis or Lemuria or something
> the USSR (from 1918 to this day),
From 1917 to 1991, stupid. And while they believed in evolution, sort of, it was not the darwinist Idea of evolution, but lyssenkism, in other words, neo-lamarckism.
> NAZI Germany,
see above what I said about Germany in WWI (Applies especially for the most dangerous elements, like Himmler and his ilk).
> Fascism in other European countries,
except Franco, Salazar, Pavelic and Tiso, who were deeply catholic (Tiso was a goddamn priest!) - and while catholicism might have accepted evolution nowadays, it hadn't in the thirties and forties - and Codreanu, who was an orthodox fundie, and the Grand Mufti, and Petain (I could continue this list forever)
> and Socialism in all of Eastern
> Europe beginning about 1945.
see the Soviet Union.
> Well, there was only two in the whole state and we managed
> to get rid of them. Nah, actually when I was growing up in
> teh 70's/80's, and Wowbagger will probably attest to this,
> we had a bit of a fundie bloke (but seriously mild compared
> to your fundies) in charge who set us back a bit in terms of
> social progress
Oh yes, I remember Bjelke-Pedersen. I have always thought the father of the (anti)heroine in Muriel's Wedding was a caricature of him (nice movie, although I have to admit that I found one of the bad girls - the one that looked like Catherine Oxenberg - attractive). But we should't forget that early 20th century Queensland was a socialist stronghold, and one of the most progressive places on earth.
> I would prefer the rational and organized fascism and
> totalitarism of the Nazis
# 98,
the idea that the Nazis were peculiary rational and well ordered has long been abandoned by serious historians, although it lives on in popular culture. Nazi ideology was strongly opposed to the rationalism of the despised enlightenment, and it is pretty much common knowledge among those who do research on the third Reich that its structure was polycratic, with a permanent rivalry between various state, party and parastatal institutions. Those rival institutions, rackets and private armies competed with each other, and got deadlier as the result of this competition. Lets take the armed forces as an example: First there was the Wehrmacht. Than there was Himmlers SS. If Himmler had his private army, Göring wanted one, too: so he got the Luftwaffe field divisions. In the conquered territories of the Soviet Union, there were huge swathes of territory where there was no goverment at all: why administrate those subhumans, if they have to die to make place for German settlers anyway? In such hellholes, the only form of "goverment" would be the drunken followers of a renegade red army major turned colonel Kurtz, burning, raping and looting their way through the country in their search for partisans and jews.
> If Israël strikes Iran this fall...
> some people better start preparing their luggage.
# 113,
If this was a joke, I don't get the point. If not, well, Israel stroke a similar Syrian facility this spring, and few people even took notice.
Dumbest adaptation of communist rhetoric EVAR.
The stupid oxide! It stinks!
Well, duh. Projection.
Good observation.
So that Willis can reconstruct the Tower of Babel, which means Confusion, and make a name unto himself.
:-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D
LOL!
No, you wouldn't. Those folks were antirationalists, too. Here's a joke from their time:
"All those complicated laws will be abolished and replaced by the following three laws:
1. Whosoever does or fails to do anything is punished.
2. The punishment follows the Healthy Bellythink of the People™.
3. The Healthy Bellythink of the People™ is set by the province chief."
Leigh,
You have a son, so I will assume you are an adult. You mentioned you are the a child's mother, so I assume you are also a woman.
Now, one adult woman to another: Please stop it with your mother-bear, "Won't you think of the CHIL-DRUN!" act. It's unnecessary, overbearing and only serves to make the rest of us females look like unhinged, insane weirdos. Just because you passed a baby out of your crotch at some undefined point in the past, either through some choice you made or through a lack of proper instruction in regards to birth control, you have not suddenly become entitled to special treatment or consideration from the rest of the world.
Please learn how to interact with others and express your displeasure in a constructive manner. You will be doing your son, and the rest of the world, a big favor. Your son, because he will learn how adults deal with stressful situations in an appropriate and dignified manner, and the rest of the world because we won't have to clean the coffee off our keyboards from laughing at yet another nut-job mommy with a superiority/persecution complex.
Leigh, I'll second the sympathy but not the insults. It is a tragedy that 4 kids got killed and others are seriously injured, just like the tragedies playing out every day, with tornadoes, earthquakes, wars, etc etc.
Note though that the described insanity is a regular dance for faith-heads. An "act of god(s)" causes death and destruction, but survivors come out to proclaim their miraculous salvation from doom, ignoring the irony that some good folks were killed or at least not saved by god(s).
Leigh @139
To be a scout, doesn't a young man have to profess a faith in a higher power?
Well, Kate, you can just fuck off too.
My outrage has less to do with being a mother than with being a human being.
I mentioned my own son in an obviously futile attempt to elicit some kind of empathy, some realization of the tragedy that has struck these people, from you and Reginald . . . but clearly you are fucktards of an ilk very similar to Willis.
Persecution complex? How ridiculous. How on earth could you be persecuting me? And what's with the silly "passing a baby out of your crotch" bullshit? So I have kids. Big deal. I would hope that ANY human being, parent or no, would not be callous enough to laugh at this senseless waste of life.
Civilized people don't chortle when others are killed by acts of nature, you moron . . . and they don't use the deaths of children as smarmy joke.
Damn, your brains and heart are empty. I see no point in being "dignified" with contemptible slime like you.
Tom Willis is also the guy who started the false claim that Donald Johanson found Lucy's knee joint at a site distant from the rest of the skeleton.
True Bob, I know. I don't understand that line of "reasoning" either.
Fred, it really depends on the troop. My son't troop is sponsored by our very liberal Methodist church. Mr. Science and I thought long and hard about having anything to do with the Boy Scouts, primarily because of the national organization's bigotry about gay people. When Boy Twin joined the troop, we actually had a talk with the scoutmasters about it. The response: we don't give a rat's ass if a kid's gay. He's welcome here. Similarly, our scoutmasters don't quiz kids about their religious beliefs. They don't really care. If a boy pulls his weight in camp, enjoys the program, and works on acquiring skills, they're glad to have him around.
I'll admit, I still have issues with it.
But as I see it, this brouhaha is not about the Scouts. It's about people who are quick to point the finger at everybody else's insanity, while ignoring their own inexcusable and indefensible behavior.
Personally, I cannot wait until these goofballs are hoovered up to heaven so we can have a nice, peaceful planet all to ourselves.
Sieg heil! Er...I mean...Praise Jeebus!!!
I was surprised by his understanding of evolution. This is approximately 100% better than e.g. Kent Hovind's "durr, evolution says people come from rocks, durr"
@ 139 Leigh
I think Reginald was commenting on the irony that the BSA requires scouts to believe in a higher power, who (which?) then allows 4 of these scouts to be killed by an act of that power (in this case, the tornado).
As for myself, my comment was meant to highlight the way in which believers are always attempting to make something good out of something bad (e.g., "Gods work in mysterious ways," "we cannot divine the purpose of the Devine," and so forth.
Speaking for myself, my post was in no way intended to trivialize the losses suffered by the scouts and their families. Certainly there was no joke intended. The fact that you found my post distasteful tells me that you entirely missed its point. The "emotionality" of your response tells me how badly you missed it.
Do you suppose your reaction is at least partially a consequence of your own sense of increased vulnerability linked to your action of sending your son to scout camp? I can only guess what made you reply to my post with such vehemence. Nonetheless, I will continue to exercise my right to say whatever I wish as long as Dr. Meyers (who owns the blog, and therefore regulates its contents) permits me to do so.
Please do not construe this post as an apology; it is not meant as one, merely as an additional explanation which others here appear not to have needed.
Leigh,
I almost died on a scouting trip once.
I think it's quite funny that it could have been God's punishment for lying about being religious to get in.
It's not because I'm indifferent or hateful toward the victim---me---but because it's a funny idea.
It's funny precisely because I think it's a ridiculous idea. I don't believe in God, and I don't think anything worthy of worship would do such a thing.
So when I hear about a tragedy that kills 4 scouts and injures a bunch more, I think it'd dead obvious that it's a terrible tragedy---do I need to say so? It's the kind of utterly horrible thing that has happened to vast numbers of innocent people, which is partly what led me and a lot of other people here to atheism.
And I still think jokes about God's wrath are funny.
If I thought people here really reveled in the idea of innocent kids being killed or injured, I wouldn't find it funny. It just seems obvious that they don't, really, and it's just a joke.
Of course it's not nearly as funny as the idea that the adults who set the narrowminded policies would get smacked by tornadoes and struck by lightning, but punishment of innocent children has a certain humorous charm, because it's so Biblically barbaric.
If I make a joke about the Biblical slaughter of the Canaanites, it's not because I think slaughter is simply fodder for humor. It's because I think that it should be obvious that slaughtering people is tragic and evil. That's what makes humor about it so cutting---it's in service of a righteous point.
If you find the remote chance of your child being killed or seriously injured on a scouting trip to be so unsettling that you can't stand people joking about it, maybe you shouldn't let your kids go on those trips. Or maybe you should avoid reading people's comments in forums like this one. Or maybe you should think about how much humor is about pain, and lighten up a little.
Leigh,
I'm sorry, who was joking about this?
Reginald just displayed a story that had a point to it. A point that you agreed with True Bob on.
There is no indication of someone taking the event as a funny thing.
Could it be that you over-reacted, and judged others without consideration?
Leigh @147
Thank you for the response. I think that if I had children, I'd be tempted to keep them out of the scouts for the faith reason, but I'd feel guilty for them missing out on the beneficial aspects. I can see that you've thought through the same issue.
As for the other matter, I think that you over reacted. Of course, I'm coming from a viewpoint where I also point out when god does things that people overlook when mentioning all of the miracles.
I know such intemperate rhetoric isn't harmless, but one shouldn't forget that it's unlikely that he wants much more than to be the "baddest ass" in the creationist camp. I mean, who's even heard of him prior to this?
So I have to wonder if it's really worthwhile to give him the reaction he wanted in the blogosphere.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
4 American scouts dead? A tragedy, yes, but it might be useful to put that in perspective.
PZ had to do it. It's called the Bierce-Hartman-McKean-Skitt Law of Prescriptivist Retaliation.
Now???
Thule. Real Germanic superhumans come from the North.
>> The German elites were deep into new age and theosophic crap, then >> and now
> Now???
Well, there is usually one minister that is into anthroposphy in a German cabinet. If there is a coalition goverment between one of the big parties and the green s or the FDP, there will be two or three ministers. BTW, my brothers alma mater was the first statal university to adopt anthroposophy (mercifully long after my brother left) - of course there were many private universities and schools that did the same before.
Wether those people actually believe the religous woo or just like the fact that their childrens' schools can reject unwanted, i.e. not white enough, children or meritocratic upstarts from the lower classes because they are "possessed by demons" or have a wrong-coloured aura is open to anyones guess.
@ No 110:
//Which was, I feel the need to point out once again, a religious movement that caused dozens of millions of people to lose their minds and decency and cost dozens of millions more their lives.//
Nazism was a religious movement? Ehm,no,really now,maybe I made my point a bit awkwardly,I was on my way to work,but this statement of you is not correct,mass psychology/effects of political decisions after WW1/blind following/clever propaganda/a particular german and prussioan liking of order//all these to some degreee,but religious? Nothing could be further from the truth.
In fairness to Walton (and those are words I did not think I would find myself using!) religious people of similar ilk to Tom Willis are pretty rare in the UK. Or if not rare do not have a platform from which to spout their views. Certainly if any politician was to espouse the views Willis does there is very little likelihood of them being taken seriously. Non of the main political parties would tolerate such a person in their midst, and it has to be said, both Labour and the Conservatives have the idiot members. (Tony Blair and Ann Widdicombe anyone ?)
Of course this does not excuse Walton's own brand of idiocy. Not all idiots are the same.
This is the most jaw-droppingly ignorant, batshit crazy bit of creationist agitprop I have ever seen, anywhere. Laugh-out-loud funny, but also skin-crawly, knowing how many people are walking around loose with these kinds of thoughts--
So if the discussion stays with the NAZIs, how Godwinned are we?
clinteas, I agree that NAZISM was not predominantly a religious movement, but there was absolutely a religious component to it. There had been a longstanding hatred of European Jews (example - Martin Luther), through much of Europe but prominently in Germany and eastward. Without the religious component, they could not have rounded up and exterminated so many Jews. If you look into history of the camps and such, it is clear that the treatment of Jews was significantly different in barbarity and frequency than other incarcerated people. Can you explain this with no religious actions?
Leigh, my wife and I watched sadly last nite as the Boy Scout camp disaster unfolded in the news. Our daughter went on numerous camps with her scouts growing up from age 8 to 18; it could have been her.
But Reginald and the others have a legitimate point - the Fundamentalists often claim that their god materially favors his believers. Biblical literalists often assert that anyone who suffers deserves it. The reality, of course, is that nature isn't biased toward a person's beliefs.
These scouts did not deserve this, but there is nothing moral or rational they could have done to avoid it.
Nor is there any indication that if there were a God of the sort Willis thinks exists, he would be be considered kind by any civilized person.
I saw noone rejoicing in this loss; perhaps I missed it. If there were a god, and he were loving, he would not let parents outlive their children.
Clinteas,
Actually there is a pretty strong argument that the regime under Hitler, and under Stalin (as well as Pol Pot, Mao and others) were religions in some respects. A term has been coined to describe such regimes: "political religion".
For an argument in favour of National Socialism as a political religion see Michael Burleigh's "The Third Reich".
Are you kidding, Leigh?
Seriously, are you fucking kidding?
Have you got a clue how many people die every year from both preventable and non-preventable causes? No? Then read up.
Because to refuse to talk about an issue (even when it comes to pointing out deaths that serve as evidence that the beliefs of a certain segment of society don't have the protective effects they think they do, and would impose on all of us with or without our consent), just because somebody somewhere croaked, is just fucking stupid.
As I've noted on another thread, I'm a medical geographer who works in cancer surveillance. I deal with mortality on a daily basis and I know every case I analyse corresponds to someone with a family, friends, and a life that was the centre of the universe to them. But you know what? At the end of the day, these numbers are aggregated and boiled down for policy decisions that leave out the hand-wringing humanity so informed decisions can be made regarding anti-smoking legislation, nutritional health promotion, or whatever. So, if the thought that deaths are used to make points, be they political or scientific or whatever, bothers you, I got news: it happens every fucking day and it's damn good that it happens, because future lives get saved as a result.
So spare us the fucking histrionics, please.
Actually CSAMA's web site does use Comic Sans. For biblical quotes, no less.
You're making the mistake of conflating "evolution" and "Darwinian evolution by natural selection". Of course the concept of evolution predates The Origin of Species; it was espoused, for example, by Lamarck (1744-1829) and Darwin's grandfather Erasmus (1731-1802).
In fact, it is a recurrent trope of creationist metaphysics that evolution goes back much farther than that, and that there has essentially always been a conflict between materialistic explanations of life, the universe and everything (which they lump together as "evolution" and often attribute to Satan's influence), and divine creation. See, for example, this article. For those too squeamish to follow a link to Answers in Genesis, here's the first paragraph:
You're an asshole, Walton. Either link us to the liberal leftists who fantasize about expelling conservatives from the country, or the scientists who talk about expelling religious people, or else withdraw your claims about the equivalence of the sides.
You're like the guy that gives someone a handshake and then when no one is looking, kicks him in the nuts. Then when he starts swearing at you, you claim he's rude and wonder why people can be civil to you. Just about everyone here can see through your fake politeness, which thinly conceals your hate. Most people also can have honest, civil disagreements with people who aren't trolls. But you are one.
Perhaps I'm too emotional, but Walton reminds me too closely of a certain sort of person who stands my and lets atrocities happen, then outrageously asserting the equivalence of perpetrator and victim. Conformist sheep are dangerous; conformist sheep who pretend to be independent thinkers are far more so.
Cliff, to be honest, I didn't really notice your post. We've beaten the whole "miracle" thing with the stupid stick here so often that I just took that one for granted. Then again, I think that many people who use that phrase don't think much about divine intervention when they say it; I say it too sometimes, and I mean "We were damn lucky it wasn't worse."
Did I overreact? On the one hand, I was filled with overwhelming anger when I posted. As regulars here know, I don't usually use such intemperate language.
On the other hand, I still fail to see how "4 God-fearing Boy Scouts Killed by Act of God" is cutting-edge ironic black humor. For one thing, these were *kids*. Didn't Dawkins point out that there is no such thing as a Christian child? I took that to heart. Reginald, apparently not so much.
Look, we expect to see bigotry and lack of any human decency out of the bat-shit crazy Religious Right. They couldn't locate a sense of ethical behavior with a compass and a detailed map. They have no empathy, no recognition that people who disagree with them have any value or worth.
But I expect better from humanists of any stamp. Joke all you want about the manifold ironies of fate and the futility of religious belief . . . when you speak of adults. I may well agree, given that the "miraculous survivors" never seem to recognize the profound arrogance of assuming that God save their precious hides while letting the "less worthy" perish.
But I still believe that smarmy humor about the deaths of children is just . . . offensive, pointless, and indecent.
Definitely sure fire proof that being a creationist doesn't make you a moral, godly, up-right standing person.
Yes, please - nobody wants to be expelled from Christian Society more than atheists! Tom Willis can call it what he wants, I'll even go so far as to play along and call it a "sane society" if it meant it was completely self contained!!
You might want to have your irony meter checked.
You are seriously not getting it.
Many people on the religious right sincerely believe that tornadoes or AIDS or other disasters are God's own wrath against homosexuals, secularists, or a society that allows such things. And they worship that god, and thank him for his "mercy" when he doesn't whip the living shit out of them, or kill them outright.
They're not joking. We are joking.
They condone the ruthless smiting of vast numbers of people, including innocent children. We don't.
But I guess we're just like them, because your irony meter is broken.
The rule is about speaking of children? I thought it was about speaking to children.
I don't see "innocent children" as any more of a sacred cow than, say, 60-year-old gay men dying of AIDS, 40 year old Ethiopian farmers starving, or 20-year-old Iraqi conscripts being carpet bombed to smithereens. None of these things is funny, all are quite tragic. Nobody, but nobody actually deserves that kind of smiting.
Of course, I wouldn't expect a small child to understand irony.
Maybe you need to stop identifying quite so much, and so simplistically, with children. Adults are people too.
You are wrong. You may find the very subject offensive, but that's your problem; work on it. The humor is far from pointless---it is quite pointed, and noble. And it has nothing much to do with whether innocent victims are children.
It's not a matter of indecency, and if you think it is, you need to work on that.
See the link in my previous post, and think about your own priorities.
Why are people attacking Leigh? Does anybody really think Reginald didn't think it funny that "god" smote these scouts? His link wasn't the title of the news article, it was "4 God-fearing Boy Scouts Killed by Act of God". If you read the article, the none of the scout leaders were mentioning god, the article didn't... only the governor mentioned prayer.
So obviously it was only in Reginald's little mind that he thought this was a good chortle at the fundies and somehow had something to add to this thread. OK, maybe in some other small minds too.
I sure got the joke. Go back and read my posts.
My point is that Leigh (and apparently you) did not quite get the joke.
I think you're applying "small minded" quite unfairly.
BTW, the point being made doesn't apply only to fundies. It applies to a whole lot of people who give their god a free pass for being an asshole. Way too few moderate religious folks really get the Problem of Evil.
And Leigh's point about children specifically is small-minded nonsense.
Eliminationist rhetoric... CHECK!
Sub-literate grasp of grammar/spelling... CHECK!
Poor grasp of history, science, et al. ... CHECK!
Willis hit the trifecta!
I love this gem from Walton:
"It's not the "hate", as such, that causes me to despair; aggressive rhetoric occurs on all sides of the debate."
Yes, Walton, we call you a troll, and then use snarky insults, Willis calls for us to be violently expelled from the country... yeah, that's equivalent.
Don't you have a three-day mission to perform?
I see your point, Leigh. The calmer words get your idea across better, as is usually the case with our arguments here. I agree that the irony is much less evident when the victim is a child. Sure, as someone said, we're all statistics in the end, but I think that one of the greatest losses is a loss of potential, which is all kids have.
Beyond that, I'd like to know more about the scouting your son does. I'd like to get my kid in, but around here, there's little to no chance of it not being heavily religious, and while I'm not raising my kid in a faith (which was what made my own nonbelief so easy), I have to be careful about the sheer amount of fundy whackjobbery he's surrounded with here. Do you have any plan to reconcile the requirements of higher levels of scouting with nonbelief? The national councils even said that Unitarianism wasn't good enough, and there's explicitly religious accomplishments that are required to even get near Eagle. Assuming your kid's a good scout, the fact he would have to lie to reach those levels is unlikely to sit well, and has actually cost more than one atheistic eagle their status when they acted by their code and told the truth about their beliefs. I'm really interested in this, because I'd like my son to gain a lot of the knowledge that scouting deals with, as well as the community service aspects, but I'm damned wary of having religiosity be a requirement for that.
This seems to me to be a pretty fair example of the kind of thing Kenny was projecting onto us. After all, don't we all think that "the facts warrent the violent expulsion of all evolutionists Christians from civilized society", that "their danger to society is so great that, in a sane society, they would be, at a minimum, denied a vote in the administration of the society, as well as any job where they might influence immature humans, e.g., scout, or youth, leader, teacher and, obviously, professor"? Don't we all think that they should be relegated to making bricks for a living?
(And, to spare myself a possible flaming, I'd like to explicitly point out that I mean this in sarcastic, tongue-in-cheek humor.)
Ranson, it depends on the individual troop, and probably the local council. My son was in scouting, and the troop we chose was pretty lax about the religious aspects. Mostly it was merit badges and camping, and far too much Capture the Flag..
Longtime Lurker (#174):
Oddly enough, I just saw a comic strip on this theme.
This thread has got a little confused, but I just want to extend my sympathy to Leigh, and express my disgust at the way she's been treated. I think Kate's post at #142 is disgraceful and offensive.
Don't get me wrong; I'm not going to get all self-righteous and say "how dare you joke about dead children?!" And I'm not going to criticise the poster who originally made the joke, since I doubt it was meant to be offensive. Rather, I'm going to point out that when you use humour in a public forum which has the potential to offend, and you unintentionally personally hurt someone, the decent, human approach is to retract the statement and apologise. Poking further, as Kate did at #142, is unnecessary and borders on the sadistic.
Please remember that people on the internet are human, and things said can have emotional repercussions in real life. I've been personally offended by some things said to me on other threads on this site; but I invite criticism by plunging into the most controversial arguments, so ultimately I recognise that it's my own fault to a great extent. But Leigh isn't like me, and she deserves respect and decency.
Longtime Lurker at #174: I wasn't suggesting that you or anyone else on this site is at all comparable to Willis in your rhetoric. Willis is clearly a fringe lunatic of some sort (is he really politically influential in Kansas? He has no Wikipedia article as far as I can see. If he genuinely does have political clout, then I fear for the state of the Kansan people's sanity.)
Ranson - my daughter scouted for 10 years with the Young Marines. It's a kid scouting group based on US Marines training; they wear similar uniforms, and start with a toned-down boot camp (but no weapons). She considered the Air Cadets, another group. My child thrived on the discipline and comaraderie (a counter-balance to home, I think), altho a military ambience is not for everybody. But there *are groups out there other than Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts. The Young Marines did not require a religious test.
Ok,last try to explain The Scout issue,but it wont work until people can detach from their personal emotional involvement and look at it at least a bit objectively,its the creo wingnuts and their preachers that will blame hurricanes and plagues and diseases on human failure and sin,so if something like this happens,there is a certain irony involved,and thats what the original post was pointing out.
And on a personal note,im rather disappointed with Leigh's reaction : //You shut your crappy inhuman lowlife loser mouths. Just shut the fuck up.//
Leigh,from your previous posts,I thought better of you,this is just totally unacceptable IMO.Wouldnt want you in charge of my Emergency Department,people might get killed.
Walton said,
Well, I'll ask you what I asked Leigh: what joke? Reginald's quote is lacking in this insensitivity, so who do you think Leigh was responding to?
But she is! She makes extreme statements and refuses to admit that she mis-read something, exactly like you.
People with that kind of lack of integrity don't deserve respect.
This is only the decent approach if the person is justifiably offended.
I agree that #142 was a bit over the top, but it was tame in comparison to what it was responding to, Leigh's post #139, which began:
She started by calling us "sorry fuckers."
She also referred to us as "inhuman lowlife losers," and told us to shut the fuck up. And I quote:
She went on to equate us with someone who quite seriously advocates actual persecution, not joking:
but then she corrects herself, because that's not extreme and insulting enough:
So now we're worse than people seriously promoting actual persecution. In fact we're "slime on the bottom of humanities' shoe."
And again she says "So just shut the fuck up."
Jeez Walton, what kind of response did you expect?
Were we supposed to take that lying down?
Did we deserve that because we make a joke about smiting innocents, with the point that such performing or condoning such smiting is a bad thing?
It seems to me that you're just being reflexively defensive of anyone who dares to go against the grain here. Maybe especially somebody who makes us out to be as bad as---or even worse than---the people seriously advocating actual persecution. You do seem to like making false equations and implying that the "other side" is no worse than us.
Apparently arguing for taking away our civil rights is no worse than what we do---namely exercising our constitutional right to use irony for such a vile purposes as making a point.
You're just a troll who'll defend any other troll, because the enemy of your enemy is your friend in your effort to make us look bad.
Leigh's kinda retracted her extreme outburst, so that's cool. Most people flip out sometimes.
You, on the other hand, are pretty consistently an unprincipled, bullshitting, opportunistic troll. You make us out to be the "disgraceful and offensive" ones after her completely over-the-top and truly disgraceful attack. That doesn't make her or you look any better.
Kate ratcheted things down a couple of big notches from what Leigh posted. Maybe it would have been nice to ratchet it down another notch, but that's really more than you have any right to expect---it was a de-escalation, and that's pretty good.
Take your sensitivity and your opportunistic concern for "decency," and shove them up your ass, sideways.
clinteas (#182) tried to explain again,
Indeed, wrapping yourself in an aura of incensed rage tends to blind you from the fact that you may not be justified in your anger. You might even group a bunch of individuals together so that you can hit a wider target, like:
It's about people who are quick to point the finger at everybody else's insanity, while ignoring their own inexcusable and indefensible behavior.
And then you have the Waltons of the world who walk into the middle thing, pick the side of his/her closest idealogical cousin and slag everybody some more.
I just hope that they can both take a deep breath before hailing down more condemnation.
"4 God-fearing Boy Scouts Killed by Act of God" in post #129. (The phrase linked to an actual news report.)
I thought it was a reasonably good joke, and a well-intentioned one.
Of course the actual fact of kids getting killed is not funny, but I'm sure Ronald did not mean to imply that it was.
It's even less funny that many people actually do believe in that "Act of God" stuff, but of course that's what makes the irony funny.
I wouldn't want to be indecent but this Onion story deserves a link. Take it as study material if nothing else. Do you see the point in it?
Did the Governor of Iowa make any public statements of support for the families grieving over the eight people that have apparently, according to IA-DOT, already died this month on Iowa's roads? If not, I guess am I left to presume that those deaths are somehow less tragic because they didn't make it onto the Today Show.
Going thru this cesspool of lunacy again,2 questions :
What is Mid-America? And wtf is Evolutionism?
Is that all the DI can come up with these days,put an -ism onto every word they want to sound bad? Its so stupid,its not funny...But then again,Goebbels would probably be proud of them.
middle America: a phrase, normally used by politicians, referring to their target audience at the moment, distinguishing them from another group with more or less money.
Evolutionism: a word used by creotards claiming that the theory of evolution goes beyond "scientific" conclusions and is therefore a "religion".
I am unsure of their definition for the words "science" and "religion".
Paul W at #185.
You're just a troll who'll defend any other troll, because the enemy of your enemy is your friend in your effort to make us look bad. - This is simply a lie. I have not defended J (another person who gets labelled a "troll" around here); I don't like him at all or agree with any of his views, and he has accused me of spreading "shit on the carpet" or something needlessly offensive of that nature. Likewise, although I don't see why Kenny was banned, I don't agree with his views and don't think he added anything particularly useful to most discussions.
Just because I am in a minority does not make me a troll. I know what the term means; I'm an administrator on Wikipedia and very familiar with internet social conventions. I am not here to piss people off. If you are intent on assuming bad faith on my part, then I can't prevent you from doing so, nor can I prove that I'm here to have a productive discussion. But I don't think I've given evidence to the contrary.
Oh crap, I just lost my comment. Stoopid me!
*bangs head on wall*
Quick reconstruct:
Leigh's initial complaint was justified, in that Reginald used the death of children to make a point - which is precisely what she objected to. She got the "joke", she just didn't think it was funny. The distinction matters.
However, Reg was offering up the usual "See? No God!" snark, not the reprehensible "Four dead kids! Where is your 'God' now? Hahah! Too bad it wasn't eight!" snark, so I believe we can spare him the thumbscrews, the boiling oil, and the reincarnation as a slug in a Morton's plant.
Did Leigh over-react? In my opinion, yes - rather badly, in fact. I won't presume to tell her how to feel about things, but I will insist that she own her responses. *shrug*
I am sure she does, and will.
Everyone's got their hot-button issues, their trigger points. Everyone loses their shit now and then. I hope when my day comes, it won't negate whatever positive contributions I've made here over the past year or two. Similarly, for months now, Leigh has shown herself to be bright, educated, pro-science, liberal-minded, and last but not least, even-tempered. She is fighting the good fight - down in Texas, of all places - and I hope all y'all can cut her a little slack, too.
Other points were well-made - people die every day, everywhere, for no better reasons - but empathy is subjective, and everyone's lens is different. So it goes.
OWO, FWIW.
But enough about Tom Willis; let's talk about Walton!
(that's my last one, I promise)
As usual, Kseniya provides a voice of reason and calm, smacking folks with the gilded spatula of perspective.
You rock.
Sven DiMilo at #194: I made a post defending my character because Paul W was attacking me.
I would be perfectly happy only to discuss substantive points, and to leave myself and my personal characteristics out of it. But because people keep attacking me, I am obliged to defend myself as best I can. I am rather fed up with your offhand dismissal of everything I say as "narcissism".
FWIW, I agree with Josh at #195: Kseniya is one of the most reasonable and fair-minded people here, and I've never seen her attack anyone. I think she deserves an "OM", if she hasn't got one already.
For your most apt Onion news relative to death and miracles:
http://www.theonion.com/content/news_briefs/god_wastes_miracle_on
I fly off the handle regularly and you guys still put up with me....
I sure hope Leigh doesn't think her comment invalidates all the contributions she's made over, well, I'm not sure how long she's been here but it's been a while.
At any rate, I'd hate to read a blog that was populated exclusively by emotionless cyborgs who never got upset about anything. (Unless I was taking part in some sort of reverse-Turing test in which I was trying to determine if they couldn't tell the difference between a sufficiently-cyborg-sounding human and an actual cyborg. Then, it'd be worth it for the research gained alone.)
Some of what you say I dismiss as "bullshit," too, I just don't post about it. If that makes you feel better.
But if you're fed up then gosh, I'll stop.
(And by the way, even K tended to get a little attacky with ol' Kenny. My guess she's restraining herself in your oh-so-earnest case.)
Oh, Ksenyia can be dangerous when provoked. We should never forget the famous "gabbling limpet" incident.
However, I submit that the one who received that epithet (a) deserved it, and (b) was largely unhurt by it (the thickness of brain in that case was clearly a protective element).
O/T but well worth the watch :
"I'm voting republican"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiQJ9Xp0xxU
GENIUS ALERT
This is soooo you PZ, you'll love it !
Yep, Walton, Kseniya has been OMed. Some o' the more traditionalist posters have even seen fit to accuse her of being a non-patriot for refusing to wear her OM, but most of us here know that's jus' her style.
But don't you let her good nature fool you into thinking she's an easy mark fer a second; she's smart, she's tough, and she's fast. Why, I even seen her take down a whole posse of creationists with a single emoticon and a stern click of the mouse 'fore my pinkie found the shift key. And I've heard tell around the monitor glow, late at night, that she ain't even got blood in her veins but electrons, an' her hair is jus' an array of cooling vanes, lettin' her type fer' hours without overheatin'.
Then again, those is jus' stories. But she's an OM alright, perhaps the fines' there ever was, after Molly herself o' course.
Guys, you're right. It was a bad day, after a bad week, after a bad year. And I should NOT post after I've been awake more than 24 hours; crankiness does not become me.
One of my buttons got pushed. I overreacted and obscured my point with profanity and personal attack, which made it too hard to see my reasoning. I still think I'm right, mind you, but I regret both the tone and the personal invective.
Things are getting worse here in Texas for our cause. We're gearing up for yet another major battle in defense of science education. That's my cause, and my purpose for being here. I'll try to stay focused.
My God, I miss Molly Ivins. We still need her so much.
Josh, you flatter me, but thank you. You too, Walton.
(Spatula, huh? LoL. Next time it will be "The non-stick pasta server of equanimity!")
It is true, I have lost my patience more than a few times here. Usually it finds its voice in a phrase like "Thou blinkered, fen-born rumpsuckle!" as opposed to "Fuck off and die, shitmaggot!" but...
Whoa. Shitmaggot. Gotta remember that one.
Errr... what? Oh yeah. I'm not proud of some of the things I said to Kenny, even if I didn't use any curse words. If may compartmentalize for a moment... If we ignore Kenny's bizarre fantasies about homosexuality and Armageddon, he was a well-meaning and essentially gentle soul who was blessed with a mind as flexible, nimble, and porous as an anvil.
Whoops, i did it again! Sorry, Kenster!
Walton, you have to realize that Kenny had been droning on, and on, and on for quite a few weeks, day-in, day-out, before you arrived. PZ, said it best, actually. I paraphrase: He's made over 200+ posts, and hasn't learned a thing. Insipidity and wanking are bannable offenses, but to get banned you've gotta be persistent, cuz those are cumulative, rather than acute, afflictions upon the community. And boy oh boy, was Kenny persistent.
It's likely that his alter-ego was "Planet Killer", who I dubbed "Patience Killer" after about a week of mind-numbing drone. Imagine my surprise when they turned out to (very probably) be the same, ahhh, entity.
Gah. Ok. I'm letting Kenny hijack another comment. Sheesh. Forget it. Point being: Walton, I understand your perspective on Kenny, but the simple truth is, you weren't around long enough to really understand it. Don't trouble yourself over it. Hey, I wouldn't have banned Kenny either, but I think PZ make a good call. Kenny had an innate gift (God-given? LoL) for dominating threads with... well, virtually nothing. It was bizarre.
In this thread, I have to agree with Walton, I think he's been unfairly picked on. His comments regarding the WIllis article were relevant and thoughtful, and it seems he has taken to heart some of the criticisms leveled against him in earlier threads, so you might consider giving the guy a break. Save the vitriol for those who truly deserve it, when they deserve it.
Kenny had an innate gift (God-given? LoL) for dominating threads with... well, virtually nothing.
Loved that, negentropyeater.
Sigh. Brownian... :-)
Hmmm. Somebody needs nappy-nap sleepy-timetime!
Err... I mean, I sure hope you get some sleep, m'am!
Why should we be surprised at the sentiment expressed by the so-called "Christian" Willis? The father of the Chimp-in-Chief expressed a similar sentiment (couched, of course, in patrician political language) back in 1987.
(My "sigh" was for your prior comment, B.)
(And, "cooling vanes" is closer to the truth than I care to admit. heh.)
:-)
The Boy Scouts are on ABC News tonight. "These Boy Scouts showed amazing poise" in aiding their fellows, Jennings says. At the end of the broadcast, in about 15 minutes, there will be more about how they used their training to deal with the disaster.
Ranson, many regional councils don't agree with the national organization. Here in Austin, the Capital Council just pretty much ignores most of the bigoted BS coming out of the national group. Scratch any troops sponsored by conservative churches. You might try a methodist-sponsored troop; that worked for us. Talk to the scoutmaster and feel him out about the national's positions. We just asked flat out.
My son was not devout when he joined, and he's already done the religion badge. He's fourteen and now deciding issues for himself; I don't foresee any problem with the "higher power" thing since he's already finished the God badge.
Oh, I FINALLY understood what this OM meant that some people use next to their webhandle....
Thx SC isn't that cute. I thought that this should catch the Pharyngulite's attention for one of the best you tube videos I've seen for a long long time...
So I'll repeat it until it catches the squid master's attention, I think he'll like it :
"I'm voting republican"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiQJ9Xp0xxU
BTW it says "I'm voting republican", but it's not exactly, pro republican, in case you have any doubt...
I too am a Kseniya fan.
Walton, I'll retract what I said about your being an opportunistic troll. Sorry about that.
I do personally find you rather troll-like, and painful to read, but I don't want to try to justify that. I'll probably just go back to avoiding threads that you're active in.
I do stand by most of what I said in post #185.
Leigh said that we were worse than somebody justifying our violent expulsion from "civilized society," called us slime, and repeatedly told us to shut the fuck up.
I think that was a very atypical outburst, and I don't want to belabor it, but I do want to say something about your response, and my response to that.
You chose to stick up for her and criticize Kate. Kate's post was actually more restrained than Leigh's, and was mostly making good points. I think the second half of the middle paragraph was too much, but she was mostly stating her difference of opinion forcefully, holding her ground, and that has to be okay. It was brutally blunt, but except for the part I mentioned, not out of line. (And not really that part, IMHO, given the level of provocation.)
It is weird---and to me, disgusting---if you are "disgusted" by Kate's reply but not Leigh's original post. Your condescending "disgust" is probably what set me off.
I thought Kate was making an important and valid point. Many people get too sentimental about a few dead American children---usually white ones, but I wouldn't guess that's true of Leigh---and self-righteous about their sentiments about it. How dare we NOT get all sentimental about it, too?
I sincerely think there's something unhealthy about that attitude, and that it's quite overbearing to demand respect for it.
I thought Kate was justified in being affronted by being condescended to and insulted in that way.
That doesn't mean I can't be somewhat sympathetic to people who can't stand jokes about kids dying; just that I don't think it's an attitude to be encouraged, much less kowtowed to.
I think there's a principled reason not to be too respectful of people's particular touchiness about subjects they're peculiarly sentimental about. And if they come down on us like a ton of bricks for it, calling us truly vile things, then they don't deserve a lot of respect for their reactions.
I am sympathetic to Leigh in her distress, and I bear her no ill will whatsoever, but we can't just roll over and let somebody dictate what is in good taste, or what is funny, and tell us that we're slime that's no better than Willis.
Leigh, I hope this doesn't piss you off too much. I think you're an asset to the community, doing good stuff, and you had a bad day. We happen to disagree about where the lines are justifying who gets to be affronted by what, but I hope we can agree that's a minor difference in the overall scheme of things.
Walton, another apology. I meant to delete the line about avoiding threads you're active in.
On reflection, I realize I haven't paid enough attention to your wrangles with folks here to have a definite opinion, and shouldn't have said anything prejudicial.
Everybody just ignore me. :-)
Paul W at #216: That's OK, apology accepted. And I do take your point that I was too hard on Kate; I do understand what she was trying to say.
@ David Marjanovic,OM
Wait, wasn't Confusion the punishment that Tha Big Guy laid upon the good people of Babel for building that tower? (Instead of the tower being a symbol of confusion, as you seem to suggest.)
Actually, reconstructing the Tower of Babel, with bricks made by people speaking the same language of reason would seem like a good thing, and quite the opposite of what a fundie like Willis would do.
Afterall, Tha Great Cahuna in the Sky didn't like the idea that mere humans were jointly building a ladder to look up his skirt, and finding there's nothing under there. Kind of a reverse "Emperor's clothes"
Just my two eurocents.
I think DM's point was that according to the biblical account, the location of the tower, Babylon/Babilu/Babel, was so called because of because of the word's similarity to the Hebrew word for confuse (balal): "That is why it was called Babel -- because there the LORD confused the language of the whole world" (Genesis 11:9). However, the name actually originates from Akkadian bab-ilim -- gate of the gods.
From a post on language log:
Thanks, all, for the responses to my very off-topic questioning. Given where I live, I'm not that confident about finding a sane troop (I'm reminded of the joke here when I look around; I swear that seems to be the attitude), but I'll look.
Etha,
Thanks for the etymological clarification and the link.
Yes, I know that the name "Babel" refers to confusion in common usage. For example, in Dutch, we have the word "babbelen", which means pointless chatter or smalltalk (or, more broadly, just talking.) And I am also aware that it was the hubris of man to try to make an entrance to the heavens that pissed That Guy off.
But DM wrote: "So that Willis can reconstruct the Tower of Babel, which means Confusion, and make a name unto himself"
To me, that sounded like the (re)construction of the tower itself was used as a symbol of confusion. And reconstructing it would seem like the last thing Willis would want to do.
If I misunderstood, sorry. As a newbie here, I certainly would not want to come across as presumptuous. Just thought I'd give it a shot, after reading and enjoying (and being slightly intimidated by the standard of discussion on) this blog and it's comments for about two years.
Darn darn darn. I promised myself never to abuse apostrophes. Off to punish myself now.
Are most scout troops sponsored by churches?
Out of local curiosity, would that be the Methodist Church that Sid Hall is pastor of? Sid's humanist-friendly.
We too have a youngster in Scouts. Our local council is sponsored by a service club and there is little to no religious pressure, so far as I can tell. I was concerned about our son joining, because of both the religious and gay issues, but my husband was a scout and he prevailed. So far, things are going just fine and our son is having a great time.
I find myself a little tempted to go to their monthly meeting. It disturbs me that such a den of inanity is so close to my home.
Sid's at Trinity . . . I heard him speak at a Capital rally for GLBT rights, and he is a wonderful person. We're currently at Oak Hill in SW Austin (close to where we live), with two brand-new pastors. The pastors when we joined were good friends with Sid and shared his humanist values, but our new pastors are an unknown quantity. The District knows we are a liberal congregation, so I'm not too worried.
Mr. Science and I are currently quite disillusioned with the UMC General Council; their last vote on giving GLBT people full rights was disappointingly retrograde. I would rather have schism that continue with this appeasement of the bigots.
Many scout troops are sponsored by churches, but by no means all. Sponsorship, in my experience, really just means that the church provides a place to meet. Our church has no involvement with the administration of the troop, though of course several members have sons in it.
It probably goes without saying that you should avoid troops sponsored by the Mormons or the Baptists. I know the Mormons do a lot of proselytizing/religious instruction in their troops, which as far as I know are all-Mormon. And the Baptists . . . well, that's obvious.
Bumper, I also left the decision about Boy Twin to Mr. Science, who was a scout. So far I have no reason to regret it, and many reasons to be glad about it.
Thus far our family is committed to changing these institutions from within, just as we continue to live in Texas. Sometimes I think we are the world's greatest masochists.
The scout troop my son was in was sponsored by an eposcopalian church - they provided meeting space and was where we rendezvoused fro camping trips. All the real content was driven by the leaders (both adults and scouts).
One more about miracles in the midst of disaster:
http://www.gocomics.com/rallcom/2008/05/29/
I read about 60 of your posts on my article "Should Evolutionists Be Allowed to Vote?" I would like to congratulate you intellectual giants on your remarkable consistency... not one comment addressed any of the substance of the article.
A "logical" reply might seem to be "There was no substance," but it is obvious the vast majority never read it. And there was a substantial charge, the essence of which is "Anyone who actually believes evolution has conclusively demonstrated an inability to analyze, even obvious, public issued, much less complex ones. Therefore, they should be disqualified from voting in a civilized society." I further gave three categories of evidence that make the claim of macro evolution consummately ludicrous, particularly as a "scientific" belief.
Now, please, the absence of substance is not at all surprising to me. Such is the heart of evolutionist "reasoning" and "evidence." My object in pointing it out is the opposite of the equally insipid comments about religion and/or my lack of "love" for you. Jesus loved Pharisees, but he bluntly called them hypocrites and worse. Those who had ears to hear, benefited from his description. Those who had minds full of garbage that they refused to purge, received no benefit.
The same will be true of the readers of this banal site.
I suppose congratulations are in order to one of you who spotted the typo/spelling error. Golly, I must admit, I would not have guessed an evolutionist would recognize a dictionary.
www.csama.org
You need evidence for it, dumbfuck. What do you think "there is no substance" means? It means that you pulled those lies out of your ass, moron.
Now whine about my language, since you certainly won't back up any of your claims. BTW, I use such language precisely because you're incapable of intelligent discussion, as is apparent by your inability to recognize the complete lack of substance in your charge.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
TW,
I read as much as I could stomach, but your article was a shit sandwich. I don't have to eat the rest of it to know it's shit and not food.
Shorter Tom Willis:
If do not address my argument that sanity is insanity and insanity is sanity, it must be true!!!1111!!one! Bloogablooga! You're all banal!
Tom Willis@228. With a single exception, the "arguments" against a natural origin for the universe and life in your article are just the same old, same old garbage that has been refuted countless times here or elsewhere. The exception is the cliam that the 1st law of thermodynamics rules out the appearance of the universe from nothing. In fact, it does not, since gravitation has negative energy. See for example http://www.people.cornell.edu/pages/jag8/sect16.html
Now, bigot, the "substantive issue" has been addressed. Fuck off and die.
A world without evolutionists:
the dark ages
They're trying to gain votes, as only the religious contingent among the Dems understand how.
Remember, all those voters who are religious? There are LOTS and LOTS of them. Many MANY more than the non-religious variety.
Yet, strangely enough, many - perhaps even most - of the religious Dems actually DO think that the non-religious have a substantial influence. I know several who are playing along. They just think they can rely on the non-religious without having to explicitly recognize them, because doing so would drive away the potential RELIGIOUS RIGHT who are also fed up with the Republicans.
For crying out loud already! Everybody should know by now that the country has descended into a such a hell-hole that has made the preeminent business of a presidential campaign to win votes absolutely crucial. This particular campaign is NOT about "educating the public" or even giving a representative voice to the non-religious. They figure they're already intelligent enough to figure out what's going on, and figure they'll do the right thing come election day, because they're not stupid enough to vote the other way.
The campaign is not about how dumb religion is or even whether non-religious people ought to have a say. It's a NON issue, yet people are swallowing the bait down as if they were starving. This is POLITICKS. It's like a war. The idea is to win battles. Strategy is utilized. Idealism is utterly unwarranted.
Or is it really so goddamned easy to forget where we would be if the other side wins?
Don't worry: if the Dems get in, you'll actually HAVE the opportunity to educate the public over how lousy it is that religion calls the shots in gubberment. And the opportunity to grow into what we should be. And if anybody can't tell the difference, and is so incredibly foolish as not to vote this candidate a chance, it is guaranteed that the next 4 years will lock the national nightmare of the last 8 into place for generations to come. Let us imagine we are not only intelligent, but not stupendously foolish as well.