Bill Donohue has once again issued a press release, urging all of his followers to harass my in-box. Once again, my email is rendered useless by a flood of idiots sending me bizarre tirades and links to Catholic fables and threats. There is a new change in tone: now lots of them are gloating that they've written to CAIR, and the Muslims are now going to come and blow up my house, ha ha! Thanks, Donohue, for reinforcing prejudice about Muslims.
I may have to simply dump all email sent to my more public addresses and create new accounts that I'll only make known to a sensible few. It's that bad.
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Over the last couple of days, I've considered posting something on the controversy that's been sparked by PZ Myers' comments about the eucharist, and the reaction of Bill Donohue and the Catholic League to those comments. I've been putting it off because it's not an easy post for me to write. The…
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There's no escaping the stupidity...
It's pretty obvious that they are being very christian with their harassment, threats and hatred.
Thankfully they will now stop spewing bullshit about loving your neighbor and realize that is what their religion is all about: hatred.
Bill Donohue, you're a crazy freak and so is everyone following your little sect within the bigger sect.
Seems Mr. Donohue hasn't heard the adage about idle hands . . . of course, that's all spokesmen for god(s) has, since they've no expertise at anything practical.
"Much has been written about the moral vacuity that marks the Darwinian vision of society that Myers embraces."
Why this, when the Vatican has accepted evolution?
Preemptive (spiritual) warfare:
blah blah blah blah blah blah blah
Doesn't this constitute harrassment? I mean legally?
Bill Donohue = fucktard asshole
My new goal in life is to write something that will cause Bill Donahue to have a mini-aneurism and issue edicts calling for bans of my work. (Surely, if he has to call his minions in every few days for something some person said on Teh Interwebs, his minions will eventually get fatwa fatigue.)
Our moral vacuity... Really? He said that? Much can be said about the moral vacuity of the murders, rapes and genocides described in your hateful, spiteful, biggot book. And 99% of them are praised by your so called Lord.
So suck it up with the morale, Jesusboy.
PZ, do you have an email address for Mr Donohue?
I know you don't like us sending emails en mass to his followers, but I see no reason why we should send a couple thousand emails to Mr Donohue personally, see how he likes it. Even better, everyone send him a movie or similar - nothing like a few hundred 700MB emails to kill your connection!
Set up a filter on gmail where if the contents include the words Host or Eucharist and that will get rid of a fair few possibly. Also, block anyone sending from aol.com, they're usually morons from what I've seen.
"Why this, when the Vatican has accepted evolution?"
The Vatican does, although it has been flirting with ID of late. Donohue doesn'. I suspect he thinks the Vatican is too liberal on stuff like that.
@Louis Irving: It would probably bounce back in your face and kill your own bandwidth so I don't recommend sending a few hundred 700mb emails.
Jesus Christ, these guys really don't know how to turn the other cheek.
If their invisible sky wizard is really all that powerful, and Billy D's connection to him is all that direct and special, would both of them really need a pack of slavering idiots to do their email bidding for them? This wizard of theirs must be exceedingly weak.
"Jesus Christ, these guys really don't know how to turn the other cheek."
That depends on which cheek, and if there is an alterboy around.
You could have an auto respond message that you reserve the right to make public any email address. Then post here the repeat offenders. I am sure most of us here are well enough behaved not to treat them as they deserve.
Does Donohue himself have an email address?
Thank you kindly
I don't think I can make a case for legal harrassment -- I've always made my email address public.
This latest round of email is particularly revolting, though. These Catholics are chortling with glee -- they don't have to make death threats anymore, they're just overjoyed that now the Muslims, terrorists all, will give me my comeuppance, and they're all urging them on.
So far, though, the score in number of email tirades is Catholics: 5 digit number, Muslims: 0. Maybe I'll get some islamic hate mail soon, but I suspect that CAIR is more interested in defusing any prejudice that they are all mad bombers...a prejudice Donohue is more interested in promoting.
It will just be simply hilarious if it turns out that the Muslim response is meek and tolerant in comparison to the angry Cafolixx. All of their "you wouldn't dare to piss of the Muslims" would then be exposed to be the misguided bigotry that it truly is. But, unfortunately, that is only wishful thinking...
Bill Donohue et al...
This is what Jesus would do? You sure about that?
You are evil. Pure, uncontaminated evil.
Michelle @ no. 13,
That's certainly a risk, but for me one I'd be happy to take. For one, this was a tactic one of my mates in NZ used to do with companies which'd spam him. They never did it twice. Secondly, living in Japan, I get 100Mbps fibre to my home - my university ethernet connection is actually slower than my home one! It'd take me only a couple of minutes to upload or download the film, but in North America the download speeds are so bad it might take him a couple of hours to download it.
Even better, let's "Rickroll" him by email!!
Ah, it doth warm the heart, so. So nice to see impressionable, unhinged Catholics in a murderous rage, trying to find some nice impressionable, unhinged Moslems to whip into a similar murderous rage...
Ecumenism. It's so beautiful. The great faiths of the world, reaching out to one another, finding that treasured common ground... (Wipes sentimental tear...)
Bill Donohue has copied Dobson's losing strategy of appearing being a humanoid toad with some equally repulsive followers.
When xians act like demented, retarded, psychopathic loons, who would want to be one?
Terrorism, it's not just for protestant fundie Death Cultists any more.
@#21 Louis Irving: ... you live in japan? can you buy me a Kotatsu heater? I wanna build one and all the ones I find online are such a rip-off! (Just kidding, I'll just keep working on saving cash for building mine. And give my money to them thieves. :P)
And well, if you connection is so great, have lots of fun! May I suggest sending him the South Park movie? He seems to love them a lot.
@#18: Yes, I don't think there is any ground for charges. And the muslims are surprisingly quiet! Could it be that they are teaching the christians a behavior lesson?
Donohue is a fucktard. He really, really is. I'm sorry you have to deal with all these e-mails PZ.
The new eucharist: Spam.
Uh oh, PZ
Donohue's next step is to write a post adressed to the IRS that you willfully mutilated your Form 1040 by stapling your W-2 to it. Then you'll be in some real trouble.
Crazed Catlicks? Feh! Mad Muslems? Meh! IRS? Look out!
I don't think I can make a case for legal harassment -- I've always made my email address public.
I'm not sure that's the only factor to be considered, in this case. My house address is public, but if someone goes out of his way to encourage people to knock on my door at all hours of the night, and does so with malicious intent, I certainly have a case for harrassment. I think this falls into the same category: malicious intent. Donohue is publicly and intentionally asking people to harass you. Just because your email is public doesn't preclude you from having the expectation of not being abused and harassed. I think this is illegal, and I really think you should pursue it.
I would LOVE LOVE LOVE for PZ to post the hateful bigoted emails from the Catholics who are sure that the Muslims will blow up his house. It would be great if they turned on Donahue and got emails (not death threats) from the Muslims telling him what a bigot he is. Because we all KNOW he is.
I have stayed out of the cracker crusades. . .until now. When is a poe not a Poe?
The Craven
In weathered building, weary.
On a wooden bench, I merely,
nodded (in sleep) to the timeless drone of one, a known and repulsive bore.
At podium with wooden railing,
old man attends, arms now out flailing,
and hails that which never was and never has been ought than endlessly repeated lore.
'Twas confabulation, nothing more.
Presently a carafe he hoisted,
To assembled multitude he foisted,
purple liquid (a jigger) to each and every one he poured.
With words from past medieval sages,
pontificated down through ages,
asserted he that enologic liquid swill of polysaccharides, and acids, peptides, proteins, yeast and ethyl alcohol made haemoglobin red as gore.
'Twas fermented grape juice, nothing more.
In flesh toned hands white wafers cradled,
and before every supplicant he prattled,
formulaic statements that (if true) a biologist would sure adore.
With practiced motion and voice uplifted,
in palm, a wafer, to each he gifted:
bone and guts, muscle, sinew, brain and butt, synaptic tissue, through chant and genuflection,
a transubstantiation of materials did he adjure.
'Twas just a cracker, nothing more.
One who left alone, unbidden,
with said wafer held, some say hidden,
is causa belli to (a hysteric) proselyte who with angry mob hammers loud at reason's door.
In his world, superstition thrives,
he cares not about the lives,
in Darfur, East Timor, the Middle East, of torture, corruption, the pedophile priests, accumulated list so tragic, none can fail but see the blinders on a worsted, wizened withered soul.
'Twas just a fool and nothing more.
Friggin crazy Catholics. They scream at us, judge us, condemn us as evil atheists, perverts, sodomites, immoral etc. etc. etc.... yet when we point and laugh at their childish beliefs they cry foul and act as if we mortally wounded them! Apparently, they are the only ones that can criticize others with a different point of view!
@24, Michelle,
The website benippon.com sells kotatsu for export (about $130). Also, there are a few websites where you can just get the heater itself... I don't have one though - not that I'd need one at this time of year... too hot!!
Good thought on the South Park movie, but probably we should send him something non-copyrighted - don't want to give them any more ammunition.....
Wait, wait, wait. So, they intend to prove that Catholism/Christianty is a peaceful religion of love under a benevolent god by sending dishonest complaints to Muslims in hopes that the scary brown people will come after you?
So they're racists, morons, and they delight in the thought of cruelty and death, these theists. Wonderful.
It's scary these people are allowed to vote. Or breed. Or drive a car. . .
Donohue is harrassing PZ. This is pure, if minor, terrorism. It is called mail bombing. Just clog someone's email address with junk mail. Happened to me once and I had to delete that email address forever.
Just set the spam filters to screen out annoying email addresses and key words such as Catholic or cracker. Or just ignore the addresses for a week and delete everything or close them. Life is too short to read pure spam by the hundreds of thousands.
And forget the crackers and koran. The point has been made and no crackers were killed in the making of it. You aren't on a schedule and they will keep for years. Don't play the game of religious fanatics with brains the size of walnuts.
Maybe I'll get some islamic hate mail soon, but I suspect that CAIR is more interested in defusing any prejudice that they are all mad bombers...
PZ, I don't know if it's in your style, but how about sending a small note to CAIR and explaining how this got started - ideally I would expect them to figure it out themselves, but being flooded by the lying-for-Jesus crowd can't help.
mothra @ #30 - very very nice!
Poor CAIR - collateral damage in the latest Crusade™ against (mid)western heretics.
At least so far their server remains functional - and I couldn't find any references to "Myers" or "Donohue" thereon, even on the "Urban Legends" page.
Doesn't this constitute harrassment? I mean legally?
Seriously, PZ - you should check with the police on this. If nothing else, this smells like a violation of RICO.
On consideration, I realise that the whole substance/accidents thing, whereby the wafer is supposed to "really" be Jesus' flash in essence while retaining the appearance of the wafer, pre-dates our understanding of the atomic nature of matter. The chemical response of the wafer to, say, salivary amylase (digests starch; meat, not so much) demonstrates that it contains atoms arranged in the patterns typical of bread, not flesh. And since what a substance "really is" is a matter of atomic structure, the "essence" of the wafer is clearly bread, not flesh.
PZ, you must surely have access to amylase and conc. HCl? Shouldn't that work equally well to digest wafers and pages? Chemistry demo, please!
Talk to a lawyer, PZ.
If Bill Donohue has called for people to harass you by email he may have committed a cybercrime.
Does this make you the most visited blog? If so, congrats.
"Much has been written about the moral vacuity that marks the Darwinian vision of society that Myers embraces."
....by people who don't understand either the science of evolution nor how to avoid the naturalistic fallacy.
I heard some preacher spewing on about evolution lately talking about how we should hold those people accountable who teach our kids that the strong survive by murdering the weak.
I agree with him: we should hold such people accountable, somehow. Of course, there wouldn't be a scientist in the bunch, and we would wind up charging a bunch of religious pundits and priests.
Every few years, there's a school shooting where the kid cites "natural selection" amongst his disturbed writings. I always wish I could have taught him what evolution really is (along with an introductory lesson in logic) before said priests and pundits warped his mind on the issue.
...and then when said pundits go on TV and blame "evilution" for the tragedy, ignoring that the young person only acted on the very misconceptions that they have worked so hard to foster in the first place (and continue to foster) well, honestly, few things make me angrier.
PZ, if you have any morals at all, you would threaten to desecrate something sacred to Jews so they don't feel left out.
Pastafarians, too. Threaten to overcook rigatoni or something.
Given that most of these emails will have similar content- and thereby be similarly worded- you could perhaps use a Bayesian filter- as found in your average spam filtering system in something like Outlook/Thunderbird, train it on a few hundred of the messages, and the rest should get auto-pwnd.
Math to the rescue of everyone's favorite cracker-descratin' blogger?
The phrase used is "Darwinian vision of society", not "Darwinian vision of science" or "...evolution". Obviously Donowhore is trying to invoke the spectre of "social Darwinism" (and probably eugenics and naziism) being the natural consequence of atheism.
I have a slew of e-mail addresses for this very reason. One my friends have, one I distribute to the public, one for work, and I create a new one every time I start job hunting again.
To Louis Irving et al: We could flood the asshole with www.russellsteapot.com. BD stars! BTW,anybody know what happened to that site- no updates since Christmas?
@26:
And here, take this, this bread, for this bread is my body.
And here, take this, this wine, for this wine is my blood.
And here, take this, this email, for this email is my bigotry.
At this point in the silliness, there's really only one way to settle this:
Put PZ and Donohue in a room, and,
"One, two, three, four, I declare a thumb war!"
So seriously, can we get this Donohue guy's email address?
turn about IS fair play
Donohue is exploiting the situation for himself, is all. It would have been just another silly blog incident, had he never seen the value in hyping it.
But PZ could have shut it down a earlier as well. I wish he would.
It's all fun, of course, until someone gouges both eyes out if another person. Although to some maniacal religionists, it appears that's when the fun would begin.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
@#32 Louis Irving: Great site, they seem to have a heater at a fair price (but everything else seems sold out...)! I don't want to buy a full kotatsu. I'm just trying to salvage up on the customs and shipping costs by just buying the heater and making the rest myself with a cheap table bought off a local shop! And yes, wrong time of the year, but perfect time to plan on making my kotatsu and having it ready for the winter. :)
...Wow totally off topic right there, isn't it.
As for the movie I can't quite figure out what could be uncopyrighted that would make him go crazey...
@ #40
"If Bill Donohue has called for people to harass you by email he may have committed a cybercrime."
That's okay. PZ is armed with a cyberpistol. Gotta thank the 2nd amendment for that...
I really don't get how some of you think this is harassment. If each person is sending 50 emails in an effort to try to crash PZ's email accounts or something, perhaps. But Donahue asking every Catholic (or even every Christian) to send PZ an email objecting to his posts seems perfectly legitimate to me. You can't inject yourself into a public debate in a way that riles a lot of people, provide your email address publicly, and then cry foul when lots of people write you to disagree with you.
Obviously, threats are a different story, as is writing to someone's employer to try to get them fired for a non-work-related offense. And PZ is under no obligation to read emails, and he can change his email accounts, etc. if he wants. But I fail to see how simply telling one's "minions" to "write this guy and tell him what you think" can be harassment.
Set up an alternate email addy and just close your public email for a week or so, PZ. With the attention span of these tards, I think they'd get bored with the death threats and pathetic squawkings after about a day or two.
Plus, if their email is bounced back to them as undeliverable, they'll inundate the crazed Donohue with questions hopefully.
Who knew Catholics were so comically pathetic?
Celtic_Evolution wrote:
THUNDER DOME!
Two thumbs enter, one thumb leaves.
@Screechy Monkey: Well they're mostly threats and not harmless chit chat and slaps on the wrist for being a bad boy, and that's where the harrassment problem is.
To be honest, until any Muslims threaten you, this simply makes Catholics (by association with the fuckwits who keep mailbombing you) look completely retarded.
If this CAIR bunch have any sense, they'll have a look here and see how they can score a massive PR victory by shrugging their shoulders and saying, 'Well, we don't agree with this guy, but it's a free country. Only a religious extremist would get upset about it.'
Michelle @52:
"As for the movie I can't quite figure out what could be uncopyrighted that would make him go crazey..."
How about "The God Who Wasn't There"?
The maker intentionally left it "some rights reserved" to encourage his Blasphemy Challenge and to encourage other use.
Of course, read the fine print before sending.
How about sending him a file with the complete Brick Testament?
(.)(.)
Celtic_Evolution-
Thumb war would work, but I recommend-
10 paces and... dueling water pistols.
Of course, Donohue has the option of using holy water, but I doubt that it would give him much of an advantage.
Argh, it burns!
Screechy Monkey wrote:
I didn't see a link to the press release, do you know what Bill Donohue actually said?
That would be the key to whether this "harassment" was accidental or done with intent.
It's worth talking to a lawyer about.
You know what's sad, P.Z., is that Bill Donahue hadn't said anything to get this much attention until this blog incident. Donahue may be be guilty of harassment, but he comes awfully close to hate speech (funny, for a person in a "Anti-Defamation" league) in several of his statements as Alonzo Fyfe has pointed out.
I hate the idea WILL get listened to the more anyone counter-attacks him.
Bill Donohue, Catholic League, cl@catholicleague.org
http://www.opednews.com/articles/Is-the-Vatican-A-Safe-Have-by-Debby-Bo…
http://maxblumenthal.com/2006_02_01_maxblumenthal_archive.html
Addendum: What does Bill Donafuckwit conceivably think it would demonstrate if his actions did successfully convince someone to blow up your house?
That Catholicism had a point?
That you 'reaped the whirlwind'?
That Muslims are more prepared to carry out God's will than wimpoid Cathlicks?
This campaign is soooo intellectually retarded it's untrue.
Turdus #31 wrote:
It's Shrek's Puss 'n Boots Apologetics again -- swagger around, smug and cocky, and then pull the big baby eyes and quivering underlip when your bluff is called.
The reason religious beliefs shouldn't be attacked or ridiculed isn't because the believers are tender, fragile, sensitive little kiddies who need to be protected from the harsh truths of reality. It's because the beliefs themselves are weak and childish, and can't stand up to serious rational analysis.
Despite the current fury flying our way, I suspect that the Believers are -- on the whole -- intelligent, thoughtful, and strong. They want us to pander and condescend to them, jolly them along, and give their beliefs an undeserved respect and deference. And I say we should treat them instead as fellow adults -- with real respect -- and mock their crackers.
It only drives them nuts because they secretly see our point, and can't refute it. Thus, the verbal equivalent of the Big Kitty Eyes.
From the Catholic League site:
"...Motivated by the letter and the spirit of the First Amendment, the Catholic League works to safeguard both the religious freedom rights and the free speech rights of Catholics whenever and wherever they are threatened."
mmmm...I guess the First Amendments Right of others can be discarded to protect theirs????
This has to be incitement to harassment; you're effectively getting a denial of service to your inbox. He's being deliberately inflammatory and then publishing your academic email address. This man is a lunatic, but then we all knew that; he was shilling for Karl Rove for years. This guy talks about Catholic moral priorities and never mentions; war, torture or the millions of American kids without adequate health insurance. He's a bat-shit insane hypocrite.
We should all be emailing the Catholic League to say how much of a disgrace this is - an institution, which given it's tax-exempt status as a charity effectively receives a public subsidy from the American taxpayer. I, for one, already have.
All of this fuss over crackers and cannibalism.
Well, Prof. Myers, hope you don't lose any worthwhile e-mails, whatever you do.
Glen D @ #51, I'm sorry but how could PZ have shut this down sooner?
Should he have ignored the Cook situation to begin with, instead of drawing attention to it? Should he have not posted some of the death threats he received? Unlike Donohue, Prof. Myers didn't ask anyone to e-mail 1-800 Flowers or do anything with the information.
The only way PZ could have shut this down sooner would have been not to call bullshit on the reaction to Cook in the first place.
But we've got to push back against this kind of stupidity on the part of the Catholic League and the xians in Florida, not ignore it. They're going to act like crazed idiots regardless; silence only condones their behavior as somehow normal (ok, they may think their behavior is normal and this is pretty standard for them, but I mean we as a larger society should recognize it as abnormal and treat it as such).
Mr. Myers, this is what you get when you stand up against evil. I wish we all had your courage.
I could only imagine the letters written to CAIR...
Maybe my imagination is limited, but I can't think of anything they could say that both suggests violence and fails to offend the CAIR...
I've not seen this sort of heartwarming, Catholic-Muslim buddy-buddy thing since... well... Does anyone remember that Robin Hood movie with Kevin Costner and Morgan Freeman?
Yeah. It was about that time.
All we need now is a sappy song sung by Canadian pop-music superstar, Bryan Adams.
For a movie that would make him go crazy that is not copyrighted: How about a compilation of all responses to the Blasphemy Challenges?
Though really, if what is happening to PZ is harassment, then any like response is also harassment.
Trying to get the Muslims to the dirty work is pure Fatwa envy. It's like watching a porno. "I can't get laid, so I'll go watch someone else get laid."
Yeah, the racism and outright bigotry inherent in the assumption that Muslims as a group would *want* to blow up PZ's house is a real mind fuck.
Why do they assume that other religious people are as violent and crazy as they are?
@Capital Dan #74: Oh god no. I prefer Men in Tights! Now THAT was a classic!
All of this fuss over crackers and cannibalism!
My suggestion is a scoreboard of hatred. If my reading comprehension is any good the score right now is something like: Catholics - 10,000; Muslims - 0; BobC - 50 :). Maybe it can be sponsored by The Ecumenical Commission.
I can't say that I'm terribly surprised. My Catholic relatives have all been warning me to be careful about what I post on my blog and on YouTube because Muslims might track me down and kill me. The irony is, of course, that the only death threat I've ever received was from a Catholic back when I posted the Belgian commercial of the "hippie, playboy Jesus" on my blog.
The irony is, of course, that the only death threat I've ever received was from a Catholic back when I posted the Belgian commercial of the "hippie, playboy Jesus" on my blog.
I've been rather fond of "Rock Me Sexy Jesus" lately
Endor #33: Small point but it needs to be made. Muslims aren't necessarily "brown" people. Don't confuse religion with race.
I think the good news is that the number of Muslims cruising the Catholic League's website is probably something around......well zero. Will CAIR pick it up? Who knows, I sort of doubt it. I don't like the way it'll play out if it hits Fox or some other major media outlet. Everyone was appalled when stories surfaced of soldiers desecrating the Koran, but I'm sure atheists doing it will get a far more positive spin. Yeah, right. Shouldn't have let yourself get bullied into the Koran deal.
Turdus @31 said, Friggin crazy Catholics. They scream at us, judge us, condemn us as evil atheists, perverts, sodomites, immoral etc. etc. etc.... yet when we point and laugh at their childish beliefs they cry foul and act as if we mortally wounded them! Apparently, they are the only ones that can criticize others with a different point of view!
And I, resisting the temptation to impersonate Edward G. Robinson in The Ten Commandments can only ask, Where are the Catholics now? Where are the ones who've been here screaming at us that they're better people, that they have not only the right but the responsibility to make death threats when their religion is mocked? Where are the people who claim to have the moral high ground because they believe in the power of a cracker? Obviously they're all e-mailing PZ, but they're also too afraid to come back here and spew their venom publicly. Well, good riddance.
Copied from a post above. There must be some reason why we shouldn't answer some ads and put this email address in. Who knows, maybe Donohue wants to lose some weight or something.
Not seeing why not but the reason escapes me right now.
Just two words for mr. bill donahue:
Fuck you!
Louis Irving, your comment about not sending a copyrighted movie is spot on. I find that the latest release of a complete Linux package is nice and heavy to digest for most ISP...
Outsourcing is all the rage these days, it seems: the Catholics are even outsourcing their violence to the Muslims. They're keeping the child molesting in-house, though.
Do you think we should tell the Muslims that the Catholics consider them their lowly servants to do their killing for them when the Catholics don't want to get their hands dirty?
"Muslims aren't necessarily "brown" people. Don't confuse religion with race."
*I* don't. but, what do you think the bigots who hope the Muslims will come after Prof. Myers are picturing? That was my point about their being racists.
For fuck's sake. Back to tardensity.
I'm sorry for your troubles, PZ, but this is oddly gratifying. D'oh-Ho' is shooting himself in the foot, IMO. He's showing the world what an ass he is, and his followers are vacuously braying along in unison. I wonder if there are "concerned" posters on his site, saying, "No, no, don't spam Meyer [sic] or incite violence against him, it makes Catholics look bad."
@ Michelle
I prefer Men in Tights! Now THAT was a classic!
Too true!
"Watch my back"
"Your back just got punched twice".
Classic.
Norman Doering-
Wouldn't that be Thumber Dome?
Capital Dan @ # 74: I've not seen this sort of heartwarming, Catholic-Muslim buddy-buddy thing since... well...
Apparently you haven't been hanging around the United Nations much: there's been a firm Vatican-Muslim alliance against legal abortion, contraception, and women's rights in general since (at least) the early Reagan years.
(Imagine the, ahem, hysteria if Prof. Myers's first name was Paula...)
Tangentially: our (ahem) host must have been blasting trolls with his cyberpistol behind the scenes all morning, or we'd be nose-deep in 'em here by now.
Screechy Monkey #54 wrote:
On the whole I agree -- it's certainly not the kind of harassment which should involve the law. To the extent that it's intended to annoy rather than persuade, it's social harassment. But that's not necessarily a bad or unfair tactic -- atheists have flooded organizations or people with protest letters as well.
The disturbing thing here is that this seems to be personally targeted towards one person. They're trying to cause PZ concrete personal distress to mimic the abstract "distress" they feel when they contemplate someone desecrating a sacred cracker. As if it were the same thing, and they can't tell the difference, and think we shouldn't make a distinction either. Which makes it annoying on several levels.
If it bothers us, though, then that may be all the more reason NOT to "do the same" to them. As PZ has pointed out, we're supposed to be better than that, since we hold the moral high ground to begin with, and don't build up ethics from the Divine-Command quicksand.
Nelson M. #73 wrote:
That was brilliant.
Donotard's latest tirade:
http://www.catholicleague.org/release.php?id=1464
@Moggie #88: "They're keeping the child molesting in-house, though."
Don't tempt them. Next thing you know they'll whip out the muslim child brides...
But well, it IS an horrifying thing some muslims do...
http://www.stophonourkillings.com/?name=News&file=article&sid=2788
Simply have your IT guys start forwarding a copy of all incoming email in your inbox to Bill's email address.
In the AD user manager have them go to your account, select exchange general and theres a box in the middle of the screen you can enter an email address to forward everything to. I think they'll have to create a contact for Bill first before it will show up and they can select it, no biggie. Then just check the box below it so it delivers to both locations. Then Bill can share in all the christian love with you. That should make him pop a vessel.
Isn't there some kind of legal recourse you can file against him for citing a riot or harassing you personally?
What an idiot.
The South Park guys were dead-on with their Easter show.
@ #15
Did people learn nothing from the whole kerfuffle with mkroll?
Launching a DOS attack on Donahue's email (or more likely, some intern who actually gets that email) through sending big files is just not a good idea. It's not likely to be effective either.
Seriously, what's the best-case scenario there? You annoy whatever IT guy runs his mail server? I don't see the point.
Now if you're the mastermind behind a big botnet, maybe you could have some fun. But email-based DOS attacks? Pfft.
Exactly. As if God wouldn't know about it.
Capital Dan (74): I've not seen this sort of heartwarming, Catholic-Muslim buddy-buddy thing since... well...
John Allen, the Vatican Correspondent for the National Catholic Reporter (on NPR's Morning Edition, November 29, 2006): "On the other hand, Benedict clearly does want good working relations with Islam because, at the end of the day, the fundamental clash of civilizations that he sees in the world does not run between Islam and the West, it runs between belief and unbelief, that is, between cultures that prize religion, prize the supernatural, and those that don't. And in that regard he thinks of Muslims as his natural allies."
Include a filter on your email such that emails are only allowed through if they contain a correctly spelled password of the day (rather than excluding on the basis of keywords). The password being some complicated biological term to which the clue is on your site. That would rule out the ones who are largely ignorant and pathologically incapable of reading, comprehending and doing even the most minimal research before sending off some already well-refuted screed.
Yes wòót. Exactly.
The only moral vacuity I see is that between Donowhores ears.
It would be lovely if the spam filters could be set to forward all e-mails containing words like "host" and "eucharist" to the catholick league. That way they could see all the support. If it trashes their e-mail system, that would be a true lesson in the golden rule.
"It's that bad.
I don't feel sorry for you.
You brought it all on yourself.
I'm just wondering if Bill and his cult have the same respect for all religions and objects they hold sacred. He's all concerned about Qu'ran "disrespect" now. Where's the demand that all Catholics stop eating beef, in respect to Hinduism? Or that Catholics shouldn't see psychiatrists, in respect to Scientology? Why do Catholics continue to treat illnesses with surgery and drugs instead of prayer? Don't they know that is an affront to Christian Scientists everywhere?
I think we need to remember that most Muslims and Catholics are very peaceful. Donohue's group is making Catholics look extremely bad and bringing ugliness out in the Catholics. They are trying to incite Muslims to look bad as well. I think it is time for the Catholic church to take a stand and make it clear that it doesn't support Donohue. Donohue has and continues to make the Catholic church and "average" peaceful Catholics look bad.
The thing is that Donohue's hate tactics against freedom of expression work when people are too scared or apathetic to take a stand against him. Remember the Chocolate Jesus exhibit getting cancelled?
It is amazing that the cretins are using human threats to blast PZ with. Why don't they just send down their all-powerful imaginary god to smite him? Better yet, why don't they bombard his house and office with the crackers with the magical powers? Good grief, what a fiasco of insane bullshit. And that moron Donahue is the biggest cracker head of the bunch. Come on, let's see your cracker god, you insane moron shit!
St. Micheal is a wuss.
I think PZ needs to put up a notice that he reserves the right to sell the addresses of any harassing Emails to Spammers, and donate the proceeds to charity. I would think 10,000+ good christian addresses would be valuable to the right people.
Well, no surprise here PZ. Bill Donahue cannot back down any more, just like you cannot back down any more, because either of you would loose face. I think you would be very reasonable if this could be brought into the realm of rational arguments, but Bill Donahue has already set the stakes so high that he only can loose, because he would have to say that he was wrong in the first place about trying to get you fired. Anyway, I am watching with amusement to this episode of the 'Culture War' (tm) series.
Hi legion. You utter failure of a human.
Does anyone else speak for the Catholic League or is it just Bill Donohue?
Hey PZ, that sucks. I have small plan for you to put a small screw in their side in response. Send them this link:
http://www.nbc10.com/family/16947935/detail.html
It's about the Codex Sinaiticus (The worlds oldest known surviving bible). It's a great one to stick it the the fundies with because the miraculous elements after the death of Jesus are strangely... absent... (I wonder why?) with the apostles living in fear. Set up an auto-response mailing them the link (the whole codex won't be online for a few months but it's fun to fuck with the misguided zealots).
Kseniya-
Donahue is a worthless media hound manufacturing arguments. His press releases remind me of Berlinski's magazine interview with himself, in the way the press releases refer to Donahue in the third person, when it is obvious that Donohue is the author.
"As a Christian, a Catholic priest, I stand in opposition to any and all hateful speech used by anyone, especially when they do so in the name of Jesus. I do not believe that one can claim to be a disciple of Jesus and at the same time deride, mock, insult, or threaten violence against another person... One cannot proclaim the love of Jesus while cursing one's neighbor...To continually use hateful, crude, violent language is indicative of what dwells within one's heart. Mr. Donohue speaks only for himself and not the Catholic church." --Father Jeff Gatlain (John Amato, "A Catholic priest stands tall against Bill Donohue," Crooks and Liars.com, April 5, 2007).
For those who just thought they were familiar with the insanity, here is a Bill Donahue and Catholic League redux from Media Matters.org.:
"We've already won. Who really cares what Hollywood thinks? All these hacks come out there. Hollywood is controlled by secular Jews who hate Christianity in general and Catholicism in particular. It's not a secret, okay? And I'm not afraid to say it. ... Hollywood likes anal sex. They like to see the public square without nativity scenes. I like families. I like children. They like abortions. I believe in traditional values and restraint. They believe in libertinism. We have nothing in common. But you know what? The culture war has been ongoing for a long time. Their side has lost. [MSNBC, Scarborough Country, 12/8/04]
This same guy [Dean Hamer] came up with this idea of the gay gene. I remember when that conversation was going on. Gays were all of a sudden worrying if people would start aborting kids when they found out the DNA suggested the kid might be gay or God forbid, we'd run out of little gay kids, so all of a sudden, they became pro-life. [MSNBC, Scarborough Country, 12/14/04]
The Catholic League, which Donohue has led since 1993, purports to defend Catholics' right "to participate in American public life without defamation or discrimination." The League has protested numerous art exhibits and theater performances around the United States that it perceived to be anti-Catholic. In 1994, the group sponsored bus and subway advertisements discouraging condom use.
During a 2001 appearance on Hardball, Donohue articulated his opposition to stem cell research as follows: "You can't take the egg of the bald eagle and kill it or move it, and yet we're talking about human embryos as if they were a piece of putty, and if that were the case, we might as well serve them as appetizers at a human embryonic cocktail [sic: party] to people." In 2003, Donohue defended a controversial remark made by Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) equating homosexuality with bigamy, polygamy, incest, and adultery, saying: ''To defend the institution of marriage is pro-civil society. This traditional institution cannot be defended if all alternative lifestyles are treated as its equal."
Members of the Catholic League's board of advisers include conservative author and media analyst L. Brent Bozell III; conservative radio host and syndicated columnist Linda Chavez; right-wing pundit and author Dinesh D'Souza; former Republican presidential and senatorial candidate Alan Keyes; and National Review Washington editor Kate O'Beirne."
Explains a lot, doesn't it?
Does anyone else speak for the Catholic League or is it just Bill Donohue?
I always sorta assumed the Catholic 'League' was Bill Donohue. Y'know that famous quip about the one guy with the typewriter? Well, he's the guy...
So he's in a league of his own. So to speak.
St. Michael (#213)
No, he didn't. Is that what Jesus taught you? No one including godless atheists bring death threats and bigotry upon themselves.
At this point this is all just free publicity for rational thinking.
The worst thing that could possibly happen for the religionists is an actual physical attack on PZ. Anyone with actual morals, and in a position of power inside this particular sect of christianity would have taken responsibility and offered PZ protection a long time ago.
Instead, they are letting it fester. Not a "serious" person is saying a word, they are obviously happy letting the idiots speak for them. Maybe, a rally among lapsed catholics to break their ties to this bigoted and depraved cult once and for all is in order while the fire is still hot.
Kim,
Well PZ has offered a way out. He has stated that he will hand over all the crackers to the Catholic Church if they disassociate themselves from Donohue. It would be pretty easy for the Cardinal of the USA to issue a statement saying that The Catholic League is not part of the Catholic Church and is to be taken as representing the views of the Catholic Church in anyway.
Most honorede friend please to give me your new email adress and bank account numbers please for transferring millions $ 10,00,000 to your safekkeping, for your kindness you may keep 30%. God Blessing you.
PS Also your credit card numbres.
Jim wrote:
Is that legal?
If it is -- maybe this could be a good title for PZ's next post:
Attention Spammers!!
I have the email addresses of several thousand Christians.
Will Sell!! Cheap!
I don't feel sorry for you.
You brought it all on yourself.
Ah, the cry of the wife beater and the Christian God.
Hang in there, PZ.
From the Catholic League's website:
"Catholic baiting is the anti-Semitism of the liberals."
The use of the word "liberal" just about says it all. Of course, PZ is worse in that he is a "godless liberal."
I suppose one could paraphrase and say: Muslim baiting is the anti-atheism of the conservative.
It makes about as much sense.
William Donohue has written about you and your opinion of Catholic crackers four times! This must be some kind of
Catholic League record. PZ, you're in the big time now!
I am becoming a cracker skeptic. I think it does have power. The power to piss off the mindless.
Especially, PZ, when you have not followed up on your threat to show it doesn't have any power. They are literally peeing their pants in anticipation. (Or is that alliteratively?)
Personally, I counsel patience on dealing with the cracker.
Let them pee their pants.
I think the best response to any of these Donohue incited fools would be to forward this web site link.
Wow. I can't believe that this is still going on and has gotten so bad for you, PZ. Thanks for really taking one for the team!
Oh, and Matt at #16. That was hilarious. Almost made me spit up my lunch.
All PZ said was [paraphrasing] that he would do the same to each of them - cracker and Koran. So if he happened to choose something which was judged "respectful" to the Koran by Muslims but "disrespectful" to the cracker by Catholics, for (not-at-all-accidental) example putting them safely in clean plastic baggies and onto a book-shelf for safe-keeping, then he'd still be in the same situation as before.
"Posted by: St. Michael the Archangel "
...Shouldn't you go straight to hell for impersonating a very saint angel? God will kick your ass on the spot.
MAJess @ 126: "I don't feel sorry for you.
You brought it all on yourself.
Ah, the cry of the wife beater and the Christian God."
reminds me of:
http://flingingdust.blogspot.com/2008/07/great-atheist-quotes-award.html
I'd collect them, plus the death threats, plus Donahue's press-release and send them to the FBI. You can't harass over the telephone lines, which includes e-mail.
That'll shut him up pretty quick.
Is there anyone IN the Catholic League besides Bill Donohue?
Any chance of getting your ISP to issue a cease-and-desist order or insert a filter for you?
What continues to amaze me is that all of this fuss is over something that hasn't even happened. Just some cyberwords. All over the world there are things worth expending this kind of energy over - saving lives, education, suppling clean drinking water - the list is endless, and of all these things worthing getting worked up over - this is what is so important.
I am simply amazed.
Matt Penfold,
Yes, I am aware that PZ has offered a way out (maybe he should post the details in a post so that there is no confusion about what the way out would be). My guess is that the Catholic church will not do that because they would have to publicly state they disagree with the use of violence to get the Eucharist back, something they mandated themselves!
Do you really think that a church that actively still protects paedophiles will back of from something small like this?
Save the emails. You may need them during litigation. It is my belief that what is occurring is illegal. Calling on followers to harass someone is probably illegal, although the line is fuzzy. It may even be a hate crime. (Funny how they yelled "hate crime" and yet they are the ones committing them.)
You need to sue Donahooey and perhaps a few followers. The only way people like him stop abusing others is if they are forced to. You might be able to take the abuse, but what about the next person? You will be saving the next victim.
Contact a lawyer who has a great deal of experience with stalking and harassment cases.
Get a good virus scanner, they are probably sending viri and trojans as well.
I'm reminded of a Greek saying: Empty vessels make the most noise
Seems like there's a pretty simple solution we've overlooked. You've got a sackful of Jesus Bitz™ by now, simply kill a piece of Jesus for every stupid email you get.
People for whom the products of a baker can be held hostage against them shouldn't engage in this type of warfare.
That's irrelevant. Even if, for example, your telephone number is listed, nobody has the right to call you to harass you.
You're dealing with pin-heads.
PZ uses a Mac. The viral/trojan horse threat is minimal.
MicroZealous @ 124 Good stuff there! Sort of like the e-mail I received yesterday from a cretin in India who probably just stepped out of the Ghanges covered with human shit! Verbatim:
"Please reply me now,
Your funds has been slated to be paid to you in India. Let me know if you are in India so that I can keep you posted with more informations.
Duke Kwame"
Sure would love to send this to moron Donahue with a few choice comments if I only had his e-mail address!
Insufficient Jesus, I suspect. Which is oddly appropriate.
Probably virii, but God won't let them send Trojans, Sheiks, Durex, Lifestyles, or any other brand of condoms.
People for whom the products of a baker can be held hostage against them shouldn't engage in this type of warfare.
Seriously, I want video of him pointing to the count in the 'Death threats' email folder, and then gleefully... slowly... relentlessly... crushing... crackers...
Into his soup.
In fact, I may have to offer him some solidarity, too, there, and offer to do the same. Two crackers for every death threat...
What? You doubt me? Ask anyone who knows me. They'll tell you how I roll...
They've seen me crush a cracker into my soup.
They're all just credulous sheep. Then again, it's the nature of the times for such things to occur. Don't get me wrong, I hate the whole Donohue deal, but PZ, you have your minions too. It's time for a war. What's Donohue's email? Let's all just dump as much crap as we can on it. Just as you tease us into crashing those stupid online polls and skewing the figures, it's time to do something more substantial. We should skewer Donohue with loads of e-mail and spam bombs, and lets give him a taste of his own medicine. It reminds me of that Holy Wars song by Megadeth, but we're on the side of rational justice. Not blind credulous bullshit.
If PZ were smart, he'd be saving all the emails and compiling them into a book which is essentially writing itself:
"From the Book of Bill: Thoughts and Writings from Modern Day Christians"
Turn that sucker into a PDF, offer it online for free, let viral distribution do its thing, baby.
HOW ABOUT everybody who has a blog simply posts a copy of PZ's "threat" on their site?
Wouldn't it dilute this, like the Blashphemy challenge, or the Mohammed catoons. Why let PZ take all the heat?
I'm sure Donahue and his minions were pointing fingers at the evil Muslim uprising over the cartoons. Whats funny is they seem to be one spark away from doing the same thing. Watch out for cracker bombs!
@ Theodore # 65 - why thank you! Here is the text of the e-mail I just sent to Donohue at cl@catholicleague.org:
Damn, E.V. (@119)! He takes wackaloon to a whole 'nother level! Also, he clearly knows dick about reproductive biology. If we're so in love with anal sex, why do we need so many abortions?
Libertine Dude: 'Hey baby, are your ready for your back door man?'
Libertine Chick: 'You know how I love it up the ass, darling, but we really need to fit in at least one abortion before the end of the year, and I'd like it to be as late-term as possible'
Libertine Dude: (dejected) 'I guess you're right....but can we watch Eucharist desecration porn while we're doin' it?'
Libertine Chick: 'Oh yes indeed! Let's hurry, though, remember we have that human embryonic stem cell cocktail party at 6!'
@SteveC, #143.
I'm sure everyone's seen it before, but
.
http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=macs_cant
;-)
Does anyone else speak for the Catholic League or is it just Bill Donohue?
I don't think there IS anyone else.
haha! Yeah I've seen it.
I have a new iPhone too. Hysterical.
That's an interesting question, how many people actually work for the Catholic League? And I don't mean volunteers.
For goodness sake, PZ, publish their email addresses. I demand a pointless war of attrition.
watercat wrote:
I'm heading over to my blog now. Think I'll write Bill and ask him to harass me too -- I want those Christian email addresses to sell to spammers.
Wait... After lunch. See my blog in a couple hours. I'm not going to copy PZ's threat -- I've got ideas of my own.
PZ,
Legally, I believe you retain the rights to all emails sent to you. I am not sure if you need a disclaimer specifically stating so. You should change the present disclaimer to read:
Any email sent to me either via my University of Minnesota email account, which does not pertain to official UM business, or via any other email account I own, is subject to being posted online, including all headers, return addresses, IP addresses, etc., totally at my discretion. You hold no rights to your words and information sent from your computer once submitted electronically. I am not responsible for any comment you make that might offend other people, and I am not responsible for any actions such people take on their own behalf. By sending email to pertaining to my blog Pharyngula or any topic posted thereon, you are agreeing to this disclaimer.
"St. Micheal is a wuss."
That would be M.I.C.H.A.E.L
Bill Donohue writes :
Interesting how profound dishonesty can distort someone's writings. As if Donohue were not one of those most preeminent critics who has always maintained that the "Darwinian vision of society that Myers embraces" is morally vacuous. As if he cares that Myers has an opportunity to rebute those critics, as if that's really what this is about.
Strange how Donohue's moral prinicples do not include any sign of honesty.
What about the grand opportunity that's given to you, Mr Donohue, to go and fuck yourself ? Wouldn't that be nice ?
It's worth checking out the recent press releases for CAIR and the Catholic League:
http://www.cair.com/PressCenter/PressReleases.aspx
http://www.catholicleague.org/release_quarter.php?year=2008&month_begin…
It's pretty obvious that CAIR is dealing with real religious prejudice from government officials and politicians.
It's also pretty obvious that the Catholic League isn't dealing with real prejudice but simply harsh criticism of conservative Catholicism.
For example, he's more than willing to criticize Catholics who don't share his views of Catholicism (e.g. Frances Kissling and Catholics for a Free Choice). He does nothing to protect Ms. Kissling from attack even though she is a co-religionist.
It's truly sad when the compassion espoused by theists is the last thought in their heads. Apparently that 'do unto others..' meme didn't get around to everyone yet. I can think of no better reason to NOT want to be Christian than the type of behavior coming from some of it's more ardent supporters. Perhaps this is what happens when you follow the money-changers instead of the prophet? It sooths my existentialist angst to see that all those who claim to know the right way can't even follow their own rules to get there. They, for want of all they claim to have, are more lost than they claim me to be.
One of my General Rules for Human Behavior (derived from a quarter century experience in Psych. Nursing) is:
The Louder the Yelling, The Less the Substance.
In other words; people tend to scream, rant & rave about nonsense & lies rather than matters of substance or the truth.
An obvious example is Sports. For millennia, people have rioted over the results of completely meaningless sporting events (in 532 in Constantinople about 30,000 people were killed & major parts of the city destroyed in rioting between two rival fan groups & the following reaction by Civic authorities). This is a fine example of the "nonsense" category.
Other obvious examples are Religion & Politics. Throughout history you find examples of insane & murderous behavior in the name of the "correct" interpretation of trivia or the "correct" membership in a religious or political cult. Further examples of "nonsense".
Politics & interpersonal relationships are where you find the "lying" screamers. A good general rule is that whoever is screaming the loudest is lying the most. Being truthful doesn't require screaming. Another good clue for finding liars is to look at what a variety of people who support a proposition say. If you find they all use the same words, and change to a new term en masse, you can be sure that they are lying.
My experience is that people who tend to speak the truth realize that the real test of truth is in the external world, not in meaningless debate with screechers.
.
Helioprogenus:
Why pay any attention to Bill? His role is to whip up the theists to show their true character, and he's doing a great job. Meanwhile, there's tons and tons of evidence arriving in PZ's mailbox showing how insane these people really are.
Where is the press asking the catholic church for comments? Why haven't they said a word? Why have they not taken care of Bill? Do they condone physical violence against PZ? Do they want PZ to lose his job? Thats what it looks like when they do nothing while their flock is harassing people with all kinds of threats. Did the catholic church write their own message to PZ's boss?
Given the authority that the catholic church likes to claim, it's easy for them to ask their followers to tone it down with the death threats and all while they handle the matter. Is it ethical at all to let something like this continue when they have the power to make it stop?
Bill is letting it rain manna from heaven so to speak. As long as PZ doesn't actually get hurt this is all going great.
Mr. Donahue will be found in a compromising position with a gentleman of arabic descent, as well as a professional girl from Thailand, an escort service in Boston, and a wardrobe of women's clothing and pictures of him and a notorious local sheep.
This will cause the pope to intervene at last and declare it was all a dreadful mistake, and that no altar boys were involved. This time.
raven @ #85:
"I'm better than that" (or "How, then, are we better than they?", if you're an X-Men fan) works for me.
The Catholic League has well over 280,000 members, a yearly operating budget just under $3million and a reserve of $8million. I have no idea how many people staff the joint in NYC. They consider themselves the RCC ideological equivalent of the Jewish Antidefamation League, but without the sense of humor.
I hope that Bill Donohue, being the ignorant, fat, slobbering pig that he is, will, at some point in the near future, lead his lemmings off of a cliff.
We're all here in solidarity with you, PZ. And I hope all of these idiots realize that they're wasting everybodies time when they could be helping AIDS research or something.
Idiots.
"St. Micheal is a wuss."
That would be M.I.C.H.A.E.L
Posted by: St. Michael the Archangel"
You're still going to hell, "Mike". :)
Well... No. You're not. I mean, hell does not even exist and all... but still, if you look at all the things God got pissed off for in the bible, that would be worthy of going to hell for.
In my opinion, you should post all of the best ones with all the header information intact. If someone has the balls to send ridiculous emails to someone they don't know, they deserve to be shamed on the internet.
Isn't harassment immoral? Even if the catholics got offended by Dr. Myer's freedom of speech, haven't they ever heard of "turn your other cheek?"
Oh the hypocrisy of religious beliefs. Bill Donahue is a joke and a parasite.
I emailed this to Prof. Meyers this morning, BEFORE I read that the Catholic league had published his email address. I do not agree with or condone that. Sorry Paul...
**************
Dear Prof. Meyers,
I'm writing with a few comments about "crackers" and Catholics. I should say at the outset that I am a serious and practicing Catholic after a long time as non-believer. I'm also a university professor and a scientist (I'll leave it to you decide if you want to include Biology and Cognitive Psychology as equally scientific). But I thought I'd share a few points.
This is not hate mail, by the way.
1. Many of your critics (and supporters on your blog) may not realize that the Catholic Church has long ago officially endorsed evolution and natural selection. The late Pope John Paul II made this clear. The church does not endorse "Intelligent Design" or a literal interpretation of genesis and Adam and Eve, etc.
2. A dogmatic point: The priest does not turn the host into the body of Christ. It is considered a "Mystery" by the Church. We don't know how it happens. Even during the Mass, the priest says "Lord, let you spirit come upon these gifts and make them Holy". We hope that God does and we believe that God does. The best interpretation is that it is our Faith that does it. That is, we believe that the host is the body of Christ, and it is. Jesus said many times "your faith has healed you". The scriptures make it clear that none of this is magic, Faith. Since you do not believe that is is the Body of Christ, then I suppose it is not.
3. I also suppose that the host, once taken with ill-intent and "held hostage" or mailed to some one who promised to destroy it, might already have been desecrated.
4. A personal though: This whole issue does not offend me but rather, I feel unhappy about it. Like you, I'm a University professor. Well-published, grant-supported, and coming up for tenure this fall. I like what I do. But I can't image taking anything that some group holds dear (possibly a large proportion of my students) and promising to destroy it and post a video. No matter how insignificant it seems to me, there are people who might really care. Be it a consecrated host, a Koran, or the bones of an ancestor, etc, promising to destroy it is mean and petty. I am saddened that there are people sending consecrated hosts to you. I am more upset that people have threatened to send you poisoned hosts. That just saddens me more.
Once, when discussing academic careers, contributions, life, etc. with my wife. She asked "what do you want to me remembered for". My answer was that I wanted to be remembered for being a kind person. Scientific contribution might come and go, but I really want my kids, my family, friends, ands strangers to recall kindness and kind acts. I do not always act and behave with kindness, but I keep trying and that is one of the things that my faith in God helps with.
I guess what I am saying is that your promise to desecrate a host is not a kind act and is not inspiring kindness in others. I'm asking you to post a retraction and maybe just say that you decided to not do it because it it not worth it.
Best,
"Name withheld"
I do feel sorry for you PZ. Your noble gesture of standing up for a student has been twisted by ugly religious frauds.
The shame is on them. They don't even have enough faith in their gawd to leave your punishment to him.
I'm no longer Catholic but I was raised that way. I've never heard of the "Catholic League" until recently.
Is it new? Is this going to be a "split" in the Catholic church - like Baptist/Southern Baptist?
That split happened around 1970 if I am remembering correctly.
It's just a fucking business move. They are trying to carve their own "niche" out of the religious population.
Stacy
According to the IRS 990 form the Catholic League filed in 2006 (most recent one available on GuideStar), they have 8 employees. Wouldn't you hate to be one of the other 7 working with Donahue on a regular basis?
Classic. Paul Zachary stamps his foot and throws a tantrum and when he gets tired of the fuss he has created, he tries to storm away (vis a vis his "taking a break" from his own creation) in a huff.
Now he is surprised, after deliberately provoking a good portion of the catholic, and now probably muslim, communities with his intentionally inciteful threats, that people are reacting to his intent?
Amazing. What a drama queen. Thought this was a "science blog", not a "cult-of-personality" (as stated aptly on another science blog).
wÒÓt seconded.
Or reason to exist.
Isn't harassment immoral? Even if the catholics got offended by Dr. Myer's freedom of speech, haven't they ever heard of "turn your other cheek?"
Oh the hypocrisy of religious beliefs. Bill Donahue is a joke and a parasite.
The best cracker response is NOT TO TELL THEM what has been done or when (if anything), to the cracker/Koran.
Such a momentus act of desecration should surely have immediate material repurcussions. If they can't tell, then obviously it has no power. A squadron of Islamic and Catholic pilots hijacking planes and flying the into the University of Minnesota doesn't count. Neither does a tsunami in Indonesia.
A large hand descending from the clouds and squishing PZ like a bug, would.
Oh, the wanker is back. Why do the angry religious bother coming here at all? Don't they have orphans to feed? Communities to build? Families to parent? Or whatever the fuck it is that they do that they claim is so fucking wonderful that only they can do because Jesus lives in their duodena?
Keep representin' ur moralz, Mikey. By the way, how's the Catholic Church faring in terms of numbers these days? Keepin' all the parishes full? Enough priests for every position? Seminary enrollment keeping pace?
According to Matthew 18:20, if current trends continue, you fuckers won't even be able to get Jesus to show up at church (if he was ever there in the first place, you idolatrous witch-burning, two-faced pedophilephiles).
Long time admirer, first time poster...
I really liked one of your first posts about what quickly came to be called Cracker-Gate. Bill Donohue's actions and the actions that he encourages show conclusively that violence is very much a part of even mainstream religion.
Pointing out ad nauseaum that Bill Donohue proves with very little doubt how very irrational Catholicism really is. He employs the tactics and methods of bully's everywhere: fear, intimidation, and violence. He illustrates in the flesh that Appeals to Authority = Demand for Unquestioning Obedience. Reason and Empirical-mindedness cease when limits are imposed by external authorities.
Anyway, I think you should stick it out as best as you can. And remember, if it was easy, everybody would be doing it.
I wish we could employ some Anonymous-style techniques on Donahue and the trolls. (My favourite one involves ordering a lot of pizzas. :D ) Considering the people we're talking about here want PZ's life threatened by crazy Muslims, no, I don't think I'd be the immature one.
I couldn't find an email address, but I found this:
http://www.catholicleague.org/feedback.php
Should I tell them I have crackers and will abuse them?
What do you think?
You might not be able to filter the deluge to any great degree but what you can do is post some of the best ones in a wall of shame. Look at what that achieved last time. Someone got fired.
And it was hilarious.
You should not even blog about it. Waste of time.
It's neither, dumbass, it's an Ineffable Magical Baked-Goods Blog and if you don't like it, adios
If he really said in the press release to overload your inbox couldn't that be considered as essentially a denial of service attack, or even a public order offence of some kind?
Admittedly throwing the cops at him is probably what he wants.
If only Jesus had left you guys some sort of instructions regarding what to do in situations like this, and if only Matthew might have written those instructions down, say in Chapter 5, verses 38-42, and if only Luke had repeated such instructions, say in Chapter 6, verses 27-31. If only.
I guess since none of those things has happened, you guys are just pooched.
If Jesus came back today, Luke 23:34 would have been written about the Catholics and would have been worded simply, "Father, forgive them; for they know not", and it would be the closest thing to truth in the entire book.
I thought of this too late to post on any of the earlier threads, with regard to the King of the Catholic Loonies, Chuck Kroll:
PASHUN, UR DOIN' IT RONG!!!
That movie really warped their perception of passion.
Why this, when the Vatican has accepted evolution?
Just because the Vatican adopted evolution, doesn't mean the religious system turned away from it's basic doctrines. Even though Vatican accepts evolution as fact, they still teach the idea that the wafer turns into Jesus during the Mass. The Vatican over the course of it's history have adopted many doctrines some of which are contrary to the Bible such as evolution.
How's about this? Someone with artistic skills should make a t-shirt design with Bill and the eucharist on it in some insulting manner, maybe we could have a contest to see who can come up with the picture that'll best piss that idiot off, then set up a cafepress account for it. Then post the link here.
We can buy the damned things and tell Bill Donohue to go pike himself that way.
And you would be able to recognise science exactly how, Mr. God-lives-in-my-toast?
The Vatican over the course of it's history have adopted many doctrines some of which are contrary to the Bible such as evolution.
Shit, the Bible is contrary to the Bible.
E.V. @ # 169: The Catholic League has well over 280,000 members, a yearly operating budget just under $3million...
So those miserly Leaguers only pop up about $10 apiece for the defense of their very own Holy Mother Church?
A plague of frogs upon them! And boils! And emerods! (Or maybe they've already got all those, in the form of Billy D?)
In any case, it seems obvious that this Crusade™ is in substance (not "accidentally") a fund-raising drive.
How does Mr. Donahue and cohorts make their livings? If it's anything other than occupying space in a fishtank at a Chinese buffet (with the consequent pay scale), they're obviously being handed too much responsibility and being overpaid as well.
If you think contradicting all that you claim to believe in order to reinforce the importance of symbolic ritual is a good idea, you 1) can't really believe what you claim, which should negate the relevance of anything else you say and 2) you need to look up "Pyrrhic victory" and read it over and over until you understand its relevance. Oh, and 3) you're advertising the growing impotence of the people you are "standing up" for. I didn't think that injured animals normally tried to attract predators, but I guess they just aren't as smart as Bill Donahue.
I did the best I could. I wrote to Donohue to fill up his mailbox. Told him I will be desecrating a cracker, too. But before I do, I'm going to clone a Jesus from it.
It looks like they caught Wild Bill's christian cousin, Radovan Karadzic--another good christian bites the dust.
#30 Mothra, excellent bit of poetry.
I'll add my vote that Bill Donohue's actions represent harassment.
Slightly off topic: two articles referenced in the latest edition of The Edge:
http://www.axess.se/english/2008/01/theme_scruton.php.htm
http://judson.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/07/15/lets-get-rid-of-darwinism/in…?
scp=1&sq=olivia%20judson%20darwinism&st=cse
Just for everyone's enjoyment and edification.
Hope the links work, however they can be accessed via The Edge website:http://www.edge.org/
#189 and #195, good ones! Are you always that witty and clever?
BTW, #195, I see no god in my toast: I am an atheist :) and even I am sick of the "PZ" drama.
Watercat @150:
I am Spartacus...great idea!
Also, if each of us sends a short, civil email to one chosen contact at the Catholic church (which one?) asking quite simply if the church condones the harassment that is being waged in its name, cc'ing a local media contact and of course the Catholic League, we won't be stooping to their level. It's a reasonable request. From thousands of people.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKxnaMeOK20
So, uh, why are you guys who are self-identifying as Catholic going after PZ here? Victim-blaming much? If you actually bothered to go back to the beginning of the story, this didn't come out of nowhere; PZ was standing up for Webster Cook -- a devout Catholic -- who was physically assaulted because he wanted to show his friend a Communion wafer. People were sending Webster Cook death threats, insisting that he'd "desecrated" the Communion wafer.
All PZ said was that if he could get his hands on a Communion wafer, he'd demonstrate real desecration. However, he said it in an extremely hyperbolic way, and it's still hard to tell whether he's actually planning anything.
Now, if you think death threats because of stupid mistakes (in Webster Cook's case, and may I add that Mr. Cook is 19 or so, which is the golden age of stupid mistakes) or hyperbolic language are okay, well, you've got a problem. If you somehow think that people deserve death threats because of their behaviour, you've also got a problem. If you've completely ignored the entire story in order to heap opprobrium onto PZ, you're using the exact same logic as rape apologists, and you also have a problem.
So what's your problem?
Sounds awful. (I only checked the first few comments, so don't know if a thread emerged.) Go for the new e-mail, and/or use one where you can specify whose mails you accept. It may be a pain in the neck to establish your list of correspondents, but it'll probably protect you from the loonbugs in the future. -- Ben
#125 FTW
I reckon Donahue is just pissed at PZ saying that the Catholic League was "Bill Donahue and his fax machine" on the Catholic radio show the other day and, with very little prompting, the Catholic host and priest (other guest) saying that Bill "The Catholic League " Donahue didn't represent Catholics or the RCC.
I'd be surprised and disappointed if CAIR took the bait and didn't see through Donohue's blatant bigotry and fatwa envy. It all goes to show that there really is little or no difference between Islam and Catholicism: Islam has its radical Imams, Catholicism has its Bill Donohues, and they both have their extremist loons who'll send death threats to anyone who doesn't cowtow to their beliefs.
Does anybody know of any way to get a hold of ole wild Bill D's e-mail address?
Danon wrote:
Say's you. I think it works -- if you have my sense of humor:
http://normdoering.blogspot.com/2008/07/harass-me-bill-im-gonna-desecra…
What about setting a rule that only deliveres mail that completely blasphemes and violates "the holy spirit" or other stupid religious notions in the most desecrating manner to the inbox...
In the mean time, I just marvel at the inanity of the theistard fuckwads in your country, over here in Norway, if any creationists rear their ugly head, the main response is complete and utter ridicule. As it should be.
But we have way to much woo I must ashamedly admit.
We need a short-hand for "Catholic-based, insane wingnuttery"; I keep going to say "fundie" but it's obviously very wrong. I vote for "the Vatiban"
I'm totally moving to Norway. I wonder if a degree in Social Work from an American university would be worth anything over there.
Dump those email addresses!
The only 'mystery' is how the hell you guys can believe that transubstantiation includes two miracles--the second being that the first is undetectable--and not expect the rest of us to hide the tinfoil lest you all decide to start making hats. (Hey, we saw what you did to the Americas when you thought God wanted you to have gold and silver.)
By the way, I've got some Multi-Miracle Vitamins™ for y'all. They'll miraculously cure all your ills! Now, you're all probably wondering why I've called them Multi-Miracle Vitamins™, when curing all your ills would qualify as just one. Well, these little babies not only cure all of your ills, they make you look and feel just as if you'd never taken them at all! Got a cancerous tumour? Well, simply take one of my miraculous Multi-Miracle Vitamins™, and your cancer will be completely cured even though your tumour won't have shrunk, you won't feel better, and you'll probably still die from it! Isn't that miraculous?!
What could this cost? you're probably wondering. Well, not much at all folks, not much at all! All I ask is that you give me as much money as you possibly can, show up at my house for an hour each week (more on holidays), and rabidly defend me against all criticism--oh, and my collared friend here wants to show you something in the rectumory.
Oh Puzzle:
How superior you are! Smug and pompous and so full of original and unique ideas (rolls eyes). I can just picture your little porcine features, gloating as you clasp your pudgy hands together in the delight of envisioning an unbeliever writhing in your little twisted vision of eternal punishent. How you chortle, that's what pious pigs do. But you're just a deluded godbot, who gets half a chubbie everytime a Grand Inquisitor gets his flail on.
I'll be sure to wipe my ass with a wafer just for you. Give me your address and I'll send it to you.
I think Bill D is the kind of guy who picks at his scabs.
Sir, if PZ had just randomly decided to desecrate something people care about, that WOULD INDEED be cause for ALL of us (atheists and theists alike) to stand up and say "That's uncalled for, PZ."
But in this case, that would be to take things out of context.
PZ's decision to desecrate the Eucharist is a DIRECT response to the downright sickening response Catholics gave a STUDENT, threatening him with expulsion, for what was a rather innocuous action, even if it was a social faux-pas to Catholics.
It is an action meant to make a POINT... that no SYMBOL, however fervently believed in, is worth the ruining of a person's life. Period.
Umm... If they're so good and peaceful, then why is it so easy to being out their ugliness?
I think it's mostly just vapid paranoia. These sheep have been trained to think that someone, somewhere, is going to take their religion away from them, and, as a result, their all-powerful god will wither and die like a neglected houseplant.
Religion can be a sickness more vile and destructive than drug addiction. Just look at Donohue. The man must lead a socially crippled life so long as he requires everyone with a free and independent thought to walk on egg shells rather than jostle his fragile beliefs.
Trust me. As a smoker, I know how frustrating it is to have an addiction openly criticized. But, unlike Donohue and a whole boatload of trembling, watery-eyed Christians out there, I'm not going to turn that frustration into any sort of accusations of persecution.
Fegh, and that wanker priest on the CRI interview tries to wash the Church's hands of the situation by calling the Catholic League a "secular organization". Meaning "not an official part of the Church", OK; but usually that word means "dealing with the bits of life and society that aren't religion", and the CL is definitely *not* secular in that sense. The PTB in American Catholicism *could* help deal with this by telling their followers that death threats and mail-bombing are against Catholic teaching. Of course, they say that about contraception, too, get widely ignored -- but at least they'd *look* like they were doing something.
#178: If you think that Prof. Myers is an attention ho, there's an easy way to short-circuit it - leave him alone. The problem with that is that you and your compatriots have a pathological need to show that you aren't impotent and that your beliefs are superior and true and a desire to make them real - but you lack a good enough position to defend, a mind good enough to defend it, and the power to do anything to make the object of your belief act according to your will.
You've had it in your power to stop embarrassing yourselves and giving Prof. Myers pub simultaneously, but your delusions of potency and power keep getting in the way. You might consider swallowing your pride while you can still find it.
Fuck!... Puzzled is Ron in Houston.
The drama queen reference - should'a known. Same stupid argument, yadda, yadda, yadda.
Name withheld said:
Well, unless faith means magic it amounts to no more than wishful thinking. Be honest, this isn't some esoteric ritual with layers of intellectual meaning. Catholics are just pretending. It really is that simple. You pretend the host is the body of Christ. You admit that if PZ doesn't want to pretend, then the illusion vanishes. The question is, why do you think you need to pretend bread becomes a god in order to be a kind person? What's the link between those two things? Why can't you join the grownups, stop pretending, and still be a kind person? Why is pointing out that it's all pretend considered by you to be an act of unkindness?
Does anybody know of any way to get a hold of ole wild Bill D's e-mail address?
Posted by: Timothy Wood | July 22, 2008 1:55 PM
Open an account at a social networking site. Be sure to call yourself Timmy. Post a picture of a 13 year old from some catalog or other online source. Talk about how you feel so much more mature than other guys your age, and how you wish you knew some older guys who you could maybe hang out with some day.
You'll not only have Bill Donahue's e-mail address within five minutes, you'll have LOTS of e-mail addresses from religious conservatives to have fun with.
...maybe we could have a contest to see who can come up with the picture that'll best piss that idiot off, then set up a cafepress account for it...
Cheeseboard. Knife. Mebbe a nice wedge of brie, sitting there...
Slogan: 'Don't make us use these.'
If you have sirius radio flip over to 159. if you subscribe you can listen online as well. It's all being discussed right now with the comm director for the Catholic League.
We need a short-hand for "Catholic-based, insane wingnuttery"
Bill Donahue works. So does Bill O'Reilly.
How about "Bill." It's not as flashy as "Santorum" or "Reddenbacher," but it could work.
OT - Did Kobra get banned last night?
PZ, if you include a Koran among the religious symbols you abuse, remember that this sort of thing can lead to rioting. You probably aren't in any danger, but some random shopkeeper in Nigeria might end up dead as a result.
You know how some Christians love to quote-mine? Watch out for picture-mining. If some mullah can crop the picture to only show the Koran being disrespected, then he could use it to stir up outrage.
Please be careful to only publish a picture that shows several different well known religious symbols being mistreated at the same time, and can't be cropped to look like only the Koran is being picked on.
You know PZ, I think he loves you and just wants your attention. He's found a way to get it (send loons your way, they're like roses but last longer) so he's going to ride it for a while, before having to find another way to reach you (chocolates, maybe?)
Actually I plan to go to TAM next year, I guess that incrreases the rate of sane people within the borders by, uh, a pretty small percentage, but hey, anything helps, hehe :D
If possible I'll rent a car and drive from either Austin to Minneapolis or the other way around to check out the beer limit of the fine people in MN atheists and ACA.
I think I'll dub the trip Rationality Ride, hehe :D
Sorry for the O.T...
Now it's back to Steven Pinkers latest book....
PZ, so you are shocked that desecrating a sacred symbol annoys lot's of people? So much so that they write you about it? Who would have thunk it? If you desecrate something that people absolutely love with their whole hearts what kind of response do you think you would get? It's like attacking Darwin. Fundamentalist atheists go nuts when you do that. They love their god lol. Imagine someone destroying the thing or person that you love most in the whole world. That's how they feel. You may not agree with it, but that doesn't matter. That's how they feel. So spare us the pity party. You knew what you were getting into.
Well, I've sent you a few links over the past few days, but I certainly wouldn't consider it kookery, nor was I inspired by anything other than "hey, that's cool...I bet PZ will like it." It's a pity to think that those messages have been lost (although apparently the tip-off about the get fuzzy cartoon got through).
#174
There is actually no big "Mystery" here. I can tell you exactly how it works.
It starts with telling a child in his young age that this cracker into Jesus miracle thing happens, and forcing him to believe it. Also, telling him that he should never, ever put in question this belief and to never ask himself wether it makes any sense at all, adding all kinds of threats to it.
Then repeating the same thing over and over again, week after week, until they die.
And surprise, surprise, it works !
Well, I've sent you a few links over the past few days, but I certainly wouldn't consider it kookery, nor was I inspired by anything other than "hey, that's cool...I bet PZ will like it." It's a pity to think that those messages have been lost (although apparently the tip-off about the get fuzzy cartoon got through).
It's like attacking Darwin. Fundamentalist atheists go nuts when you do that. They love their god lol.
blah blah blah blah
Not the brightest bulb.
There is a good article concerning Robert Green Ingersoll on the OPINION page of today's New York Times. Ties in the campaigning for president with keeping your faith to yourself. Take a read!
cracker =/= person
in either reality or value.
Oops. Sorry about the double-post.
Ah... Fr. J. returns to regail us with more bits of wisdom.
Imagine someone destroying the thing or person that you love most in the whole world.
Now imagine that person or thing lives in your morning muffin!
EEEEEK!
" "Catholic-based, insane wingnuttery""
Let's not forget "Rudy" who went into hissy-fits to shut down a museum over a painting consisting of elephant dung in conjunction with the worst rendering of a madonna titled figure I've ever seen. Shite + Saints = deep doodoo. Evidently, the blessed virgin never defecated in life, either.
Dumb dumb dumb. If you destroy my wife you get to go to jail. If I destroy a cracker, I need a broom.
Now imagine that person or thing lives in your morning muffin!
'My dear, sweet, horribly mistreated muffin... Love of my life, all that I am or ever will be... I swear by this grapefruit... And by this bit of fried egg... Your desecration will be avenged!'
Let's not forget "Rudy" who went into hissy-fits to shut down a museum over a painting consisting of elephant dung in conjunction with the worst rendering of a madonna titled figure I've ever seen
Yeah, but divorced "Rudy" lived with an openly gay couple. Not right-wing enough. We need John Cardinal O'Connor or someone like that. Of course, there's always "Ratzinger."
I fully expect an enraged Catholic to read that and then berate us for our ignorance of Catholic doctrine. "Don't you know anything?!" the troll will shout. "It was revealed to St. Festoonpants in a vision that the Virgin Mary was never troubled with bodily functions!"
This response to Professor Meyers seems very un-Christian like. Maybe I never saw the real Bible that they give to true Christians. I probably never prayed hard enough to cleanse myself of the evil Thetans... um, wait... I'm getting all these crackpot beliefs confused.
Somehow I just can't see Jesus sitting in front of a computer sending hate mail to PZ, spreading messages of hate. I can understand some random moron who thinks he/she believe in Christianity doing this but Bill Donohue isn't just a random moron. He's a moron that other morons listen to.
Anyway, here is a nice distraction from all these craziness, Richard Dawkins: An atheist's call to arms at TED
Since I can't let a good post go to waste, I'll just dedicate this to you, Fr. J., since I pictured you from the very beginning.
My, my, my -how superior you are. Smug and pompous and so full of shit. I can just picture your little porcine features, gloating as you clasp your pudgy hands together in the delight of envisioning an unbeliever writhing in your little twisted vision of eternal punishent. How you chortle, that's what pious pigs do. But you're just a deluded godbot, who gets half a chubbie everytime a Grand Inquisitor gets his flail on.
I'll be sure to wipe my ass with a wafer just for you. Give me your address and I'll send it to you.
There! I didn't waste it on Ron in Houston trying to be all anonymous and shit.
Remember to wipe the smegma off your lips, Father J...
Bah, here is it so you can click on it... Richard Dawkins: An atheist's call to arms
@ #22. Aint it the truth. One big happy family under god.
Feh, it's not much of a League. If Bad Horse writes to you, then you can worry.
If Bad Horse writes to you, then you can worry.
The Stallion of Sin?
? If you desecrate something that people absolutely love with their whole hearts what kind of response do you think you would get? It's like attacking Darwin. Fundamentalist atheists go nuts when you do that. They love their god lol. Imagine someone destroying the thing or person that you love most in the whole world.
Fr. J:
I am not a fundamentalist atheist, whatever you imagine that is. I am a Christian (Methodist), and also an enthusiastic Darwinian. I can distinguish between a God whose existence I take on faith, and a great thinker who inspired thousands of scientists to devote their lives to the study of the natural world. Biology owes a great deal to Darwin, but his ideas are not to be taken on faith, but used as a guidepost for future investigation and (as often happens) falsification.
As such, while it is frustrating to watch pseudoscientists and ideologues slander Darwin's name, it is not going to lead the scientific community down the path of inhumanity. You won't see biologists lining up to violate the civil rights of creationists, no matter how odious their conduct. But you will see fanatics threaten violence in the name of their so-called 'faith.'
I am troubled that you would imagine that the former could ever rise to the level of the latter in terms of misconduct, and repelled by the impression that your comment essentially makes excuses for those who make death threats. If that is truly your intent, you are a venomous toad and you should be shunned.
Firmly...SH
Remain strong, PZ. This is only the beginning.
@Fr. J #230: That's ridiculous. Like Rev. pointed out, you can't kill whom we love because it's a crime. But a cracker is a cracker unless proven the contrary. To you it may be your god, but to us it's just a dumb cracker and we have the right to do whatever we want with it.
That's one thing that I hate with the bible. God makes it darn clear that you need to put him before your family. So if he says "Abraham, kill your kid", you have to kill the kid.
H.H said: "Why can't you join the grownups, stop pretending, and still be a kind person? Why is pointing out that it's all pretend considered by you to be an act of unkindness?"
I felt that the unkindness is the intention to do it publicly in a manner that is sure to cause hurt to others. I had no issue with the first part of the original post. I have no issue with Prof. Meyers pointing out that he does not believe the host to be the Body of Christ. Protestant Christians feel the same way. I suppose Jews and Muslims, Atheists, etc. all feel the same way. I suppose many other Catholics, when pressed, would admit that they don't really believe it either. It is not easy for me to believe. I'm not always sure that I do. But I do. Sometimes. My understanding of faith in God is that it can never be proven. A fact requires no faith. I have doubts.
But I admire the honest faith of many of the older people in my church. Do they leave mass and go speeding out of the parking lot in their Buick and cut two people off on the way to Tim Hortons? Probably. But at mass, their faith is genuine and beautiful. I admire the honest faith of the family of 7 from Uganda that we donated strollers and cribs to and found a ride to Mass for. They came to Canada and needed a spiritual home. I admire the faith of those in my town who wear the hijab, knowing it singles them out. I do not have that kind of faith. But I have a little and it gives me something worthwhile.
We can all be kind people. Humanism is about kindness. But so is Christianity. Buddhism. Kindness is not correlated with religiosity.
PZ, I rather suspect you are wrong about harassment and your email being public. I mean, any claim that this absolves them of a) harassing you, b) committing federal crimes with death threats, or c) implying that Dummyhue isn't liable for at least conspiracy and incitement, just doesn't make sense to me. If I made my public address public knowledge and idiot after idiot came by throwing TP, Christian pamphlets, notes saying how much they would either personally, or hope someone else would, kill me, had I been home at the time, etc. I am pretty damn sure that the fact that the address was "public" wouldn't mean shit. Harassment is harassment, death threats are death threats, and some idiot issuing press releases to incite such things is *still* an asshole, not to mention, one hopes, liable for *something* at least.
Jerks!
The way to "desecrate" these crackers is to do it the way millions of Catholics do every Sunday. Just eat the damn thing. They've already admitted they know that many people in church take Eucharist without meeting the requirements. Their outrage (which is without qualification already out of hand) will seem incongruous to the action by PZ. And as you do it, mention all kinds of scenarios where your actions match the actions of the outraged believers each week.
Cracker 1: "Haven't confessed my sins, eating cracker anyway." chomp chomp chomp
etc.
#225: Hmmm "Bill" seems kind of US-specific though.
Actually, WTF kind of a name is "Bill" for an "Irish" devout Catholic? Doesn't "William" have kind of a proddy connotation for the Irish? Yet another good reason why Americans shouldn't claim their ancestors nationality as their own.
Because this thread is another of the many clones of the original Goddamn Cracker thread, I make no apologies for going off topic and saying that PBF has been updated.
Now go.
Anyone who loves a cracker with their whole heart needs their head examined.
Why? Why would you admire believing in something that can't be proved?
"It's like attacking Darwin. Fundamentalist atheists go nuts when you do that. They love their god lol."
Hur hur, those atheists are just as stupid as we are, hur hur!
Well, no. We won't threaten to kill you, or outsource that threat to the people we consider beneath us. We won't even try to get you expelled from college. You'd like to think that we bruise as easily as your ilk does, but no, we don't.
"Imagine someone destroying the thing or person that you love most in the whole world. That's how they feel."
Then consider this episode a little tough love. A cracker is NOT a person. You should NOT love a cracker most in the whole world, because crackers are fragile and also completely incapable of reciprocating that love. You'll thank us some day.
Matt Heath@210,
Or the Batican?
@ #45 Ironically, some of the strongest adherents to Social Darwinism I have known have been the most devoutly religious.
"If you desecrate something that people absolutely love with their whole hearts what kind of response do you think you would get?"
What did Prof. Myers descreate again? Oh right, nothing. So, you'r a liar. And you love a cracker above human beings. You need help. Long term, intensive help.
Send them all to /dev/null. They can all bite the bit bucket.
You've just summed up what it is that is so wrong with religion. Nobody believes this crap about the holy cracker. Nobody genuinely believes that their religion inspires ethical behavior. But if you're seen to pretend real hard, then you get credit for your beautiful soul or whatever bullshit.
Even Jesus thought it was bullshit:
No, they needed a home. "Spiritual" has nothing to do with it. If you need your religion to not be sociopathic, this world is hurting.
Mr. Name Withheld, I hate to break it too you, but Christianities core book of fables is about three things, obeying god, believing nonsense, and pretending to hate the sin, instead of the sinner, while its effectively impossible for most people to do that without at least **acting** indistinguishably like someone that hates every *person* they think has sinned. Nor is there any clear concept about what the hell being a good person even means. Islam is no better. Some religions are, but they tend to be ones that are predicated on two things: Fact trumps myth and gods are not infallible (or don't exist at all, in the case of Buddhism). And, sadly, the only two religions that fall into those categories have morons that insisted on ignoring the central principles of both, in favor of BS like Vedic Science and Buddha as some sort of Christ like god figure, both sub groups of which have abandoned other principles along with that core one, and turned either violent, or rejected reality in favor of complete bullshit.
There is nothing to faith that deserves respect. The same *faith* that makes those people seem so great "in" the church, invariably gets used to *justify* shit like them getting into their Buick and cutting off the other one with the hijab, while excusing it with, "Oh, well, at least it was a Muslim I cut off, they deserve it. If it had been a Christian, I would have had a reason to be ashamed." I don't give a damn how they act *in* church. Nothing they do in there is going to have one iota of impact on "anything" in the real world at all, any more than wearing a scarf is going to have one tiny scrap of an effect in the real world, beyond their own minds, or maybe annoying someone with a different insanity in their head enough to harass them. Its precisely what happens "outside" the church, synagogue, etc. that determines whether or not the person is good or bad, and not just how deluded they are, or happy and joyous they look while in there. Someone who is completely off their fracking rocker could kill 50 people and stand their yelling, "Praise the Lord!", with as much conviction, certainty, faith and an indistinguishable appearance of glory and joy from your perspective as someone that fervently believes, but, at most, never did anything more than lie on a tax return.
When you can't tell the difference between the completely insane and the relatively stable, and faith drives both equally in their choices, how the hell do you tell which ones "deserve" respect for having it? What about blind faith is so valuable that its worth more than what people do every other moment of the 100 plus hours of the week that they are neither in church or sleeping?
Dear Name Withheld, why admire their faith, when it is really their WORKS that count (THIS pegs me as a former Catholic, not a former Prod).
Wow, Paul Zachary Benedicto Pacifico Maria Myers (known as the Squid) has really called down the god-posse with this one. This is how I picture his final meeting with Fr. J.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttBXmqDtZJ0&feature=related
Actually, I have always doubted that Fr. J. is a Roman Catholic priest. I think Fr. J. really stands for "Freeper Jerkoff".
Fr. J. is just some lunatic who is pretending to be a priest. Maybe he is a pedophile and thinks pretending to be a priest will get him some action with a little kid or two.
Doesn't even know Catholic doctrine. The last 4 Popes didn't have a problem with evolution. Ratzinger has even called creationism ridiculous. Ever since they burned Bruno at the stake for claiming (correctly) that the earth orbits the sun, they have been careful to not make false claims about science subjects.
Hard to say what sort of insanity makes someone think pretending to be priest is cool. Maybe Pathetic Insanity.
And oh yeah, desecrating Darwin is no biggie. I'll do it again. Darwin was a secret Catholic priest with a fondness for little boy's backsides. He was also a cannibal who ate Iguanas alive.
No email, please leave death threats on this thread. For faster responses, include a valid email address and a day time phone number. For a really fast response, cc them to http:www.fbi.gov. LOL
Not wise. IIRC some Catholic loon claimed to have sent a poisoned cracker.
The only sane thing to do is to treat these things as if they were nothing special. What do you do with a spare copy of a book? Donate it to a library or a charity store. That takes care of the Qur'an. What do you do with old crackers that someone sends you in the mail? Throw them out with the rest of the kitchen waste. That takes care of the crackers.
To do otherwise, any elaborate "desecration", would be to treat these objects as being more than they really are -- a book and a musty old cracker -- and thereby, in some sense, legitimise the ravings of these demented fuckwits.
May the random apathetic acts of the universe strike you dead some day Donohue. I've been raised to respect life, but not the type of life that goes around wasting its time on mindless crap. Donohue, you should just crawl into a cave and die. Why do we let assholes like this continue ranting and raving about imaginary bullshit, when there are actual physical problems in the real world? If you're such a fucking Christian Donohue, why don't you use your power and minions to help build orphanages, donating money for mosquito netting in Africa, helping bring fresh water to thirds world countries, etc. You're just an empty superficial motherfucker, no different then Stalin or Hitler in your character. Fuck you Donohue, and for all the Catholic apologists, fuck you too. You're allowing a stupid, archaic, pointless, idiotic belief structure to survive. In all fairness, I say fuck you to all other religions and denominations as well. You're just wasting your lives on imaginary petty bullshit, when the real world is there just outside your door. Learn to embrace rationalism, evidence, reality, and the scientific method. Otherwise, you're just a doormat that will be left in the rubbish heap of history.
"Hollywood is controlled by secular Jews who hate Christianity in general and Catholicism in particular. It's not a secret, OK? And I'm not afraid to say it."
- Bill Donohue on opposition to Mel Gibson's "The Passion" movie, MSNBC's "Scarborough Country," 12/08/04
Name Withheld: you are another who seems to have missed the whole point of PZ's original post. I.e. the defence of a student who was threatened and received death threats for at worst a mistake. The threat to the cracker was simply to highlight the stupidity of putting a 'fracken cracker', whatever your beliefs about it, over the life and livelihood of anyone. If you don't or won't understand that then you are no better than the catholitards who threatened the student and PZ or scum like Donowhore trying to get the muslims to do his dirty work for him. It is even more disgusting that the officials of your church have found it in themselves to remain silent about those acting in its name, at best using the old no true Scotsmen fallacy to distance themselves. Well apart from those officials in Flordia now trying to get the student's friend punished as well for simply being with him at the church.
By the way, have you bothered writing to any catholic officials to comaplain about their actions or are you more worried about what might happen to a 'fracker cracker' than you are about actual humans. Then again, such a position would be consistent with that of most of the catholitards we have had visiting this site. Appears that, with one or two notable exceptions, it is us atheists who are worried about the student and not those of the religion of peace. Now why doesn't that surprise me.
gex wrote:
Are you nuts! Who knows where that damn think has been? I'm not touching it without tongs and surgical gloves -- and a surgical mask too... must get them before I open the bag. And get me some of the Dr. Horrible eye-ware too...
Then watch out Bill Donohue -- the cracker will get it and it will be all your fault for not harassing me.
To mothra, (post #30):
I am in LOVE!
One of my favorite poems by Edgar Allen Poe and your "play" or "liberty" or "wtf ever" with this poem.
Well, let us just say, I am in love.
Not that I'm nominating for OM but ... (bows down in reverence)
Won't Someone Think of the God-Flesh??!!!!
The first time my father came in and tried to cast demons out of me while I sat there working on the computer I became livid and remained so for months. Eventually I realized that I was the one making me angry. The next time he pulled the stunt I remained calm and what I saw was how scared he was.
If Jesus could haul himself out from three days of decomposition I think he could take care of his Extend-A-Fleshes. The real question about the hurt feelings is why do they exist? Why aren't you instead glorying in His Healing Power?
"Thou dost protestest too much."
Clearly, you haven't a clue what Christianity entails. Crackergate has shown it to be threatening death to those who defile sacred bread. If you've got evidence that Christianity is 'about' something else instead then please provide it. (Here's a hint: perhaps your time might be better served convincing your fellow Catholics that Christianity is about 'kindness'. We don't give a withered fig.)
And I seriously doubt you have any idea what Buddhism is 'about' beyond some vague po-mo handwaving claim that all the major religions centre around the 'golden rule' or 'be kind: rewind' or some other bullshit apologetic that allows you to convince yourself that the heathens in India and Asia actually believe in Yahweh but call him a different name and thus you're spared from having to deal with the 'do good non-Christians go to heaven?' conundrum.
So, it turns out they have create a 'PZ Myers Should Be Fired' group on facebook (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=28500391342). It currently has 9 members, watch out! There are also some Catholic League groups up there in case anyone wants to give them feedback though I think you would have to join to be able to comment.
Didn't someone post a link to an interview with Webster Cook somewhere? I've lost track of it.
Lunch time! I think I'll go offend a swine. :)
Longtime Lurker @ 270 Every time I see that movie with Eli Wallach smashing the freaking priest, with Clint Eastwood looking on, I always wished Clint, with that blatant smug look on his face, would say to the papist, "Where's your fucking god now, eh priest?" That would be a real hoot!
I admire children who still believe in Santa Claus, but I'm also thankful when they outgrow that delusion and start living in reality.
Other than that, can someone please tell me what a "fundamentalist atheist" is?
Scott, I don't have to imagine. I read about how atheists kill and torture Christians all the time. Take a look at the hatred toward me due to my vocation and faith. I guess that doesn't bother you? But it does show a propensity toward violence. I am not a creationist btw. Notice that atheists lump all Christians into that category. Just like they call all priests pedophiles. They are bigots, so do you really want to align yourself with them?
As of yet no one really gets the point. If you desecrate something, no matter what it is, that someone loves they will not thank you for it. Whether it is Darwin, the Eucharist, or Martin Luther King Jr. Go to a NAACP convention and hang Martin Luther King in effigy. It is just a "symbol." It isn't a real person blah blah. But I bet they won't be happy. Symbols have power, so don't pretend otherwise. Face it. You just want to hurt people. You want to cause pain. That makes you sick. Now, instead of dealing with what I have said go back to the insults. Show us your intellects in action.
What?! Raven, I swear I am a peaceful man, but I await the day when the pyramidine dimers caused by UV-B overwhelm your DNA repair mechanisms and arrest replication, forcing your cells to apoptose. You're lucky we Darwinists are so compassionate; do you have the guts to denounce Wallace?
I didn't think so.
@ Capital Dan
I admire children who still believe in Santa Claus, but I'm also thankful when they outgrow that delusion and start living in reality.
Wait... what are you saying??????????
Hey Holbach, Are you going to read "The End of Biblical Studies" by Hector Avalos?
I'm going to order it today.
No you don't, you fucking liar.
Atheists hate the denial of reality? Really? Gee, I wonder why they're atheists, if they detest the lies told by religionists.
Try telling us that apples fall up, moron. We love our (theistic) "god Newton" as much as we love our "god evolution," and for the same reason. We dislike liars and the lying perversions that they continue to spew, all in support of their collective herd fantasies.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
" Gays were all of a sudden worrying if people would start aborting kids when they found out the DNA suggested the kid might be gay or God forbid, we'd run out of little gay kids, so all of a sudden, they became pro-life."
-- Wild Bill Donohue on MSNBC, "Scarborough Country," 12/14/04
You just want to hurt people. You want to cause pain. That makes you sick.
And who worships (creates) a monster that created a space of eternal torture, and that gladly sends people there for the slightest offense, unless they accept the proxy murder of the boy he produced by raping a virgin as a replacement for being offensive?
So, mister Donohue, that is how you defend your religion in a civilized intelligent manner. Well, if that is how it has to be, I will have nothing to do with your religion. Even more so, in the theoretical case there would be a god, I would not hold your silliness against him.
Sir, you can now flood my mailbox and I will be thankful for you giving me the oppotunity to practice equanimity (you should try it, once you get the hang of it, it absolutely rock - I'm not very good at it though) and test spam filters.
Love, Erwin.
Seriously, is this what they have got as an argument? Flooding a mailbox proves the infallibility of the Catholic faith? I hope mister Donohue can take a bit of time out of his busy schedule (9:00 condemning someone 9:10 some more condemning 9:20 incite hateful responses to a random target 9:30 eh, well, condemning someone/something 9:40 comdemnation round-up repeat ad nauseam).
Fr. J: I doubt if anyone here hates you even though you appear quite a hateful person, most simply feel disdain or possibly disgust at your blatant dishonesty. After all, it is catholitards sending death threats and trying to threaten peoples positions not us atheists. But I can imagine that you will find some way to justify or dismiss the death threats as most of the other catholitards visiting this site have done.
PZ, do you or any of your disciples have any decency? I don't just mean about the wafer, but, in general, the capacity to show respect to anyone/thing other than yourselves?
@ Fr. J.
I read about how atheists kill and torture Christians all the time.
BULLSHIT! Back that up, buddy.. citations, please.
Take a look at the hatred toward me due to my vocation and faith. I guess that doesn't bother you? But it does show a propensity toward violence.
You lying sack of crap... where have the actual threats and actions of physical harm come from in this inceident? WHERE? Answer the question. Then go away.
#282 said "Where's your fucking god now, eh priest?"
Funny or scary! That is almost exactly what the unbelieving crowd told Jesus when he was on the cross. They thought is was a "real hoot" then too.
Fr. J (284)
I abhor any death threats you have received and stand in solidarity with you against such.
"Symbols have power" - You hit it right on the head. That's why we deride them when they are idiotic unlike MLK or Darwin.
I was going to do with "Freely-raping Juveniles," which would not negate his being a Roman Catholic Rapist Priest, but Freeper Jerkoff works just as well.
"I read about how atheists kill and torture Christians all the time. "
...Woah, proofs? And while you're at it, care to talk about the jews you guys killed and tortured for supposedly desecrating the host?
"Name for me a book publishing company in this country, particularly in New York, which would allow you to publish a book which would tell the truth about THE GAY DEATH STYLE.
There are certain things that the left won't tolerate. They are censorial at heart."
Creepy William Donohue on MSNBC's "Scarborough Country," 2/27/04
[ Damn those gays and their death style!
And Lord, bless our loving priests who guide our young men to a wholesome worship of human sacrifice, corpses on sticks and cannibalism ]
"Darwin was a secret Catholic priest with a fondness for little boy's backsides. He was also a cannibal who ate Iguanas alive."
Heathen.
He was Anglican.
Ridiculous: Is that your Ron in Houston, you forgot drama queen. When the catholitards show some decency to the student perhaps we will reciprocate. Until then, dream on. As they say, you reap what you sow, for all the lack of decency we can see has come from catholitards threatening a student and putting a cracker over human lives and livelihood.
Thank you Brownian!
I am sick and tired of you too, Father J. Not only are you a pius pest, and a liar, you are a fraud. I don't believe for one moment you are a priest. Frockoff.
That is a big fat case of your pants being on fire lying.
Why does Friar Jay, ostensibly a Catholic priest, talk like a creationist, what with the fundie-boilerplate Darwin=AtheistGod nonsense?
Gosh. COULD HE BE A LYING TROLL? Maybe. Maybe not. It's so hard to tell on the innertoobz.
"It's like attacking Darwin. Fundamentalist atheists go nuts when you do that."
Care to provide an example?
Jonathan (#280),
I think we should all join the group simply to push away the current top related groups:
* The Papal Facebook Initiative
* Stop Barack Obama (One Million Strong and Growing)
* Fire Paul Zachary Myers
* Get Bill Maher off the air.
* You might be hardcore Catholic if...
Also, there's a truly delusional open letter to PZ on the group's page, and it contains this eye-raising nugget:
"I would offer my life for the sake of the preservation of the Blessed Sacrament, but I do not believe you are interested in an offer like that."
Crikey!
"PZ, do you or any of your disciples have any decency? I don't just mean about the wafer, but, in general, the capacity to show respect to anyone/thing other than yourselves?"
Most people here are decent to folks who aren't assholes. The implication is that people who send death threats or justify them due to a cracker are assholes. And that's putting it politely.
If you want respect, perhaps you should work to earn it. This is common sense. If you feel you deserve respect and aren't receiving it, perhaps you should stop acting like a petulant child, rushing to defend their favorite bedtime stories. I'm not talking about you personally, I'm talking in general.
#31:
There's a nice take on this at Cectic: http://cectic.com/172.html
Individual humans are due respect for the integrity of their person. That fundamental respect hasn't been attacked during this debacle other than by Catholic fascists sending threats of death and bodily harm to PZ and Webster Cook. Ideas and beliefs are not due any respect whatsoever. If you dislike having your beliefs ridiculed, you should avoid believing ridiculous things.
I'm sure there is a way we can hook each Christian email up to a Muslim terrorist.
@294
Let me try my much coveted hobby-horse called equanimity.
I think mister Donohue would be wiser and more effective by. as the saying goes, taking it easy.
From the page of his organisation:
"When slanderous assaults are made against the Catholic Church, the Catholic League hits the newspapers, television, and radio talk shows defending the right of the Church to promote its teachings with as much verve as any other institution in society."
Why? This is a negative-aggressive stance that can only be justified by the 'but they started' argument. It is only necessary when one attaches value to influence and power.
If you do, this is the correct thing to do. In the 12th century, buddhism was a large religion in India. From the west came an army dedicated to a different religion.
Buddhism was effectively wiped from India. That would have been a disaster if influence and power was deemed important.
Buddhism has also been all but wiped from the coastal region of Sri Lanka by the Portuguese. Again, not important. It lives not by size or influence.
Apparently, Catholicism does live on power, influence and numbers, so it's understandable it needs to defend by attack. In a way, I understand this. However, it is not good for a peaceful mind or live.
Name withheld:
First of all, faith is not the same as kindness. You still seem to be equating the two.
Secondly, the type of faith that lets a sane adult convince themselves that a piece of bread somehow, mysteriously, becomes infused with a god is the nadir of the human condition. It is exactly this willingness to abandon all sense and reason, to embrace the thoughtless barbarism of magical thinking, to hold up superstitions as needful things, that should be soundly discouraged in all civilized societies. It is disgusting that you should admire faith or encourage its development. The world needs entirely less faith and a great deal more clearheadedness.
Then stop citing examples of charity as works of faith. As you say, the two have nothing to do with one another.
Yeah, none of us suck off altarboys, threaten others with death, burn heretics, or supported Hitler's holocaust. Decency score: 4 Atheists; 0 Catholics.
So go fuck yourself, you indecent asshole.
Wallace who? LOL.
My desecration of Darwin lacked enthusiasm. No death threats yet. I'll try again.
Darwin was a secret Catholic priest with a fondness for children. He would lock himself up with whole packages of crackers and practice an arcane but powerful magic spell that would turn them into god flesh.
He also sired a line of peculiar demonic children that resulted in this generation in Bill Donohue, Michael Behe, and Willian Dembski among others, blots and plagues on mankind.
His hobbies included terrorizing barnacles and a voyeuristic and perverted interest in the intimate details of the sex lives of flowers that resulted in a famous book of chlorophylic pornography.
OT: Allah performs food miracles for Muslims, too.
Unsurprisingly, he doesn't put his visage on toast or meat, since good Muslims don't do that kind of thing. He writes graffiti:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7520149.stm
Glen D
My apologies for effectively spamming the comments but I would like to add, to all involved from both sides:
This, too, will pass.
"Scott, I don't have to imagine. I read about how atheists kill and torture Christians all the time."
And I read about Kirk sky-diving from orbit! IT MUST BE TRUE.
Seriously, with this comment you've embarrassed yourself past even most christians being willing to defend you.
Ya know what? Rather than asking Fr. J for proof that we all worship Darwin and he's our god and blah blah blah. I think i can disprove that right here.
Darwin was a fat fucking idiot and should be sodomized with a tortoise shell.
Now according to Fr. J i should have just greatly offended the majority of people here and should now be receiving a ton of hate mail for it. Click my name to get to my MySpace page, feel free to send all the hate mail you like. I'll be sure to report how much i get.
Two.Way.Street.
Thank you in advance.
I see PZ Myers is now a member of PZ Myers should Fired! on Facebook LOL!
I love these liars for Jebus. But, I think we should express our interest in this person's offer, Cody. If they kill themselves, the cracker lives. If not, the wafer will meet the custodial trinity of broom, dustpan and garbage can.
PZ doesn't have disciples. He has Ilk.
Re Brian W.@319:
Yeah right, click your name... do I seem like I want to be Rick Rolled into the Stone Age?
"Name withheld" wins the thread!
"Two.Way.Street.
Thank you in advance."
Guess you got me there. Except, oh, nevermind. I don't worry about getting respect from people who think a cracker is literally the flesh of an undead diety. They clearly aren't firing on all cylinders, anyway.
"I would offer my life for the sake of the preservation of the Blessed Sacrament, but I do not believe you are interested in an offer like that."
Well, um, why would there be any interest? A cracker isn't a person, and tossing it into the trash is not equivalent to killing a human.
What is it with this fuckwitted martyr fetishism?
John Phillps wrote "you are another who seems to have missed the whole point of PZ's original post. I.e. the defence of a student who was threatened and received death threats for at worst a mistake. "
I don;t think I did. I did not read the original post as a defense of that student. I read it as a post pointing out the hypocrisy of Catholics. Not hard to do: the Simpsons do it better. But I don't see much in the way of definding anyone.
BTW, # 270 and #282. Tuco says "You chose your way. I chose mine. Mine was harder" But Tuco was the only one in the movie with free will. Not Angel Eyes. Not Blondie. Only Tuco could choose.
"BULLSHIT! Back that up, buddy.. citations, please."
No, don't. He'll just put us all on the Stalin Merry-Go-Round.
Does anyone have any theories as to why no country/civilization/society in all of history has been areligious?
@jimmiraybob
"Two.Way.Street"
Right... but you forgot the part where we're really not interested in getting respect from Fr. J. or any of the other catholics on this blog or anywhere else, let alone demanding it.
ok then just type it in
www.myspace.com/deadjerusalem
And Lord, bless our loving priests who guide our young men to a wholesome worship of human sacrifice, corpses on sticks and cannibalism...
It's true, really. Ya put together the corpse on the stick, the rites of cannibalism, and the tuneless grunting over repetitive sequences of major chords, and it really is pretty hard to tell yer basic Christian worship service from yer standard death metal show.
There's the lighting, I guess. Fewer strobes in the former, usually. Otherwise...
Furthermore, name withheld, I should add that the fact that these faithful people you admire can "leave mass and go speeding out of the parking lot in their Buick and cut two people off on the way to Tim Hortons" should tell you how unspecial and unuplifting faith is. It is not pure, it is crass. It is not divine, it is debasing. It is petty escapism that appeals the the dimmest elements of society. There is nothing admirable about voluntarily relinquishing our human capacity for reason.
Raven: and don't forget Darwin's unhealthy fondness for pigeons and worms. I mean, pigeons and worms, how evil can one person get.
And is your point to reiterate that no one's seen or heard from either since then?
I will kill two birds with one stone. I will show a priest who was honored by all for his virtue and who was killed by atheists. He was a chaplain in the US Army during the Korean war. Now he is being considered for canonization. He was a good and brave man who treated others with compassion. But he was a Catholic priest so you hate him and consider him a pedophile. Isn't that bigotry?
"Fr. Emil Kapaun showed the men compassion without reservation. "The Father" tore off his own clothes to mend the wounds of others. He volunteered for every detail. He stored food in his pockets to dispense to the hungry. He went from compound to compound sharing his tobacco pipe and saying prayers with the men.
His captors did not let his morale-boosting deeds go unpunished. Kapaun received repeated beatings for what he did, but he refused to let the situation overcome his faith. After two months in the P.O.W. camp, most of the men were starving, McCalin said. When they weren't talking about food, they were killing the lice that covered their bodies. Despite the offerings of food, warm water and smoke, Kapaun gave the men something they needed more -- he gave them hope.
"Despite the conditions, Father Kapaun with a twinkle in his eye kept all of us together," McCalin said during the dedication. "He was active all the time in helping us and he slowly became special to everyone."
PS: Brian, you won't be receiving the hate. I already have. Just read the posts.
But he was a Catholic priest so you hate him and consider him a pedophile.
blah blah blah blah
Dr. Myers wrote:
Bill Donohue has once again issued a press release, urging all of his followers to harass my in-box. Once again, my email is rendered useless by a flood of idiots sending me bizarre tirades and links to Catholic fables and threats.
HMMM...here's a site that discusses sending a fax to a landline fax
machine from a online computer:
http://websearch.about.com/od/usefulsite1/tp/free-fax-online.htm
and here too:
http://www.tpc.int/faxbyemail.html
And Donohue's organization has their fax number listed right there
on their site:
450 Seventh Avenue
New York, NY 10123
(212) 371-3191
Fax: (212) 371-3394
Looks like a setup for an interesting experiment....just did it,
silly,impulsive me...
Does anyone have any theories as to why no country/civilization/society in all of history has been areligious?
Wow... did you just invent that statement right there on the spot? How cute.
Here's one along the same lines... does anyone have any theories on why it has never, ever rained in Phoenix?
"Does anyone have any theories as to why no country/civilization/society in all of history has been areligious?"
Because we've still got a lot of growing to do as a species, I'd guess.
There was a time when the majority thought the earth was flat and probably said "Well, this is what we've always believed and what the majority has always believed. If the earth wasn't flat, how come no society I know of has ever had a majority belief that it could be otherwise?"
So, basically what I'm saying is, give us time. Slowly but surely, we're getting there. The more we learn, the less places god and ghosts and boogeymen have to hide in.
Also, block those people who engage in asserting wide, sweeping generalities. They're usually morons from what I've seen.
**cough**ChrisD**cough**
Anon (330)
I take it you're excluding Scandanavia and other bits of Europe. Any day now France and England too.
"I would offer my life for the sake of the preservation of the Blessed Sacrament, but I do not believe you are interested in an offer like that."
Another quote from the Book of Ennis seems appropriate: "WANKERRRRRS!"
@330
Religion is very much a condensation of the moral code of the day. Added to that are stopgaps for holes in the knowledge of that day.
There will always be these two, thus some form of religion will always exist. The religions that existed before writing was fully developed went their natural course and disappeared. From the moment people were able to put complex matters in writing, the religions of that time gained 'staying power' and stopped developing in their fundamentals but, due to the ambigious nature, the interpretations grew exponentially.
@ Fr. J. #337
All you've done is further display your ignorance. What does anything in your story have to do with atheism?
Hint: NOTHING. Fail.
Also, you still haven't answered my question from #295... the second one. Answer it.
Adults Outside of Christianity Have Different Goals
Apart from life conditions not directly associated with faith, Americans who are associated with faiths other than Christianity, or who are atheist or agnostic, reflected a divergent set of strong desires for their future.
Atheists and agnostics represent about one out of every ten adults. They stood out as the faith segment least likely to find living near family and relatives to be highly desirable (43%, compared to 63% national average). The religious skeptics were also much less likely to be driven to have a clear sense of purpose in life (55%, compared to 77% of all adults) or to want just one marriage partner for life (58% versus an 80% U.S. average). They were also less interested in making a difference in the world (45%, versus 56% nationally) and in having close friendships.
Chimpy, Show me that head striking desk thing one more time?
"PZ doesn't have disciples. He has Ilk."
Personally, I am holding out for myrmidon status. I don't really care for the definition, but I love the way Myrmidons for Myers rolls off the tongue.
Pax Nabisco
Patricia @ 287 The only library that has it is quite a few miles from me, and anyway it is checked out, no doubt by a bible thumper who is figuring he can learn something new from that shit book, much to his surprise! I get the catalog from Prometheus Books and occasionally buy from them; it's listed in the 2008 catalog for $32.00! Damn, they have always been expensive, even their paperback editions. I have "The Encyclopedia Of Unbelief" from 1985 which cost almost $100.00! "The New Encyclopedia Of Belief" costs $199.00! Yeow!
Thank you 341 and 345 for giving thought out responses.
@339
I will not do this and would advise others not to either. In this matter it is not about Donohue supporters against PZ supporters but responders against non-repsonders. My guess is the non-repsonders are the majority, which is a good thing.
LOL! Ladies and Gents, we've got ourselves a full-blown, fuzzy-wuzzy martyr.
Took a lot of work Fraud Fr. J, but I'm proud of how you stuck to it. You've really earned the scorn.
"Brian, you won't be receiving the hate. I already have. Just read the posts."
Atheists aren't the ones that believe that other people can take punishment for someone's actions.
anon, Albania was areligious under Hoxha. Also North Korea is areligious under Kim Jong Il. Fine examples of non-religious societies. Religion is not the main cause of violence in the world.
I can believe that's true if you spend all your time reading medical reports documenting the delusions of schizophrenics.
Even if it were true, atheists are not an organised group; if you don't believe in god(s), you are an atheist; there's no club you join; we are not affiliated with each other in any way. Thus, no atheist is in any sense associated with the misdeeds of any other any more than a person who lacks a moustache shares the guilt of a criminal similarly devoid of an hirsute upper lip.
The Catholic Church, OTOH, is an organised group, and it's you who boiled people in oil and burned them at the stake for heresy and, even today, coordinate an international conspiracy to protect child-rapists from prosecution.
That Catholics chide us for failure to demonstrate the appropriate deference to a cracker while being members of your disgusting child-rape support club is beneath contempt.
So, a hearty "fuck you" to you and anyone else who demands respect for their preposterous beliefs while being in such an abject state of moral turpitude.
We got ourselves a Nazingerian.
@ #296:
Prove it.
Anon: and why is it that the most secular countries and with the least numbers of believers in the West, if not the world, have the least crime of all kind, the least social injustice, the least social dysfunction, the best health care, the highest educational standards etc. etc. in comparison to the apparently most openly religious. E.g. compare Scandinavia and most EU countries to the US.
Re Name Withheld @328:
How would you infer that Blondie and Angel Eyes lacked free will? It is true that Tuco is the only one of the three who has any real back story or clearly defined identity, but I wouldn't assume a lack of free will on the part of the other two. Would you suggest that "the Good" and "the Bad" are supernatural agents, much like Clint's characters in "High Plains Drifter" and "Pale Rider" seem to be?
MMMMMMM. Orecchiette with fresh basil pesto for dinner.
Much nicer and more fulfilling than some wafer.
Life is good.
JefferyD - Ask & ye shall recieve. With one wave of my magical, witchy wand *ting*, you are now a Myrmidon.
Oh what the hell, more grog & swill too. ;)
This is really gettin' silly!!!
#140 Get a good virus scanner, they are probably sending viri and trojans as well.
Trojans?!?! But they don't have condoms?!?!?!
No one cares to comment on or insult the priest who died caring for others during the Korean war? You guys are slipping. What are you afraid of? Or could it be that there is a level of shame you won't stoop too?
Posted by: Fr. J | July 22, 2008 4:09 PM
blah blah blah blah
the insults are tearing at jesus's flesh...and Fr J is getting hot!
Fr. J...#337
Yep war is hell,where was your god/fairy delusion/make believe pal in all the blood and screams and dying.... by the way...?
Maybe your padre was just another poor sap caught up in something that he had absolutely no control over despite the amount of prayer offered to a non-existent deity.
Presumably he was not a combat troop?
Do chaplains carry a weapon?...one would wonder why? if god was on their home team...and if not what a bloody crazy thing to do in a battle...? explains the mentality though...
@365 I don't quite get it, what does that story have to do with anything? He was killed in captivity during the war right? Was he the only one to be killed or something?
@ Fr. J...
Umm... no... it's you that is slipping. We have commented on it... we've asked you to show us what any of his story had to do with atheism. The people who mistreated or killed him might have been atheists, and they also might have been vegetarians... neither one of those things are the basis for their actions. Try again.
And you still haven't answered my question. Why is that?
No, I consider him sad, deluded, and misguided. In any case, I don't hate in the plural.
No, I consider him a member of an organisation that supports, aids, and abets pædophiles who sexually abuse and rape children. I conclude that he must be a man of low moral standards to be a member of such an organisation.
"Also North Korea is areligious under Kim Jong Il. Fine examples of non-religious societies."
What? North Korea is one of the most religious societies in the world, having its own state religion, Kim Il-songism. The man is deified.
He even has his own miraculous birth story as well as an ascension story as well. It confounds the brain of any thinking person.
So you make this claim that we're all completely shameless and then get confused when we don't live up to it? Genius.
"Anon: and why is it that the most secular countries and with the least numbers of believers in the West, if not the world, have the least crime of all kind, the least social injustice, the least social dysfunction, the best health care, the highest educational standards etc. etc. in comparison to the apparently most openly religious. E.g. compare Scandinavia and most EU countries to the US."
If you've ever visited any where else in the world you would learn that no country on Earth has a standard of living even remotely comparable to the United States.
But if you're arguing crime rates, you can read all about how Sam Harris' Red State/Blue State argument has been destroyed, just Google it. America's got some dummies, but we're still the smartest, we've still got the best hospitals, the best social services. It's not for love of God that people are committing crime, not helping their neighbors, and cheating their way through school.
You don't have to be a priest to care for an injured person, in fact it'd be quite a hindrance. If I get shot on the battlefield, I want a medic, not a shaman, thanks.
IXOYE @ 296 That's the point; Where was that fucking god in their time of need? Nowhere, because it isn't there or anywhere. Your statement seems ambiguous; is it meant to decry the onlookers lack of empathy, or emphasize their "hoot" at the lack of appearance by this god? Funny, that priests not only rape children and adults in church, but are also murdered in those very houses of insanity. So the question and statement stands; "where was their fucking god?" How can such a statement engender nothing but doubt in rational people, and ambiguity in the irrational? Only religion can be both ambiguous and insane at the same time!
Its the shootout at the end. Angel Eyes HAS to shoot Blondie. Blondie HAS to shoot Angel Eyes. They are the good/evil (or Yin and Yang). But Tuco? He's not sure. He has to choose. He eyes are all over the place. In the end, it does not matter. Sort of like us (humans).
I think Crackergate may already have run its course. For me, at least. I said what I meant to say. I'm a struggling believer and Catholic. But I'd rather watch the Good the Bad and the Ugly tonight after my kids go to bed.
It just gets so tiresome listening to the righteous indignation and whining about perceived transgressions against their "sincere and deeply held religious beliefs" when the institution they defend has a built in default against reciprocating (e.g., "you should show absolute deference and deep respect for me and my supernatural-based belief system but you're a heathen, secular-humanist, Dawinist, atheist, homosexual, family-murdering, tree-hugging, liberal (fill in blank___________) sinner destined to burn in the fiery lakes of hell for eternity unless you completely abandon your belief system based on naturalism and quantifiable reality and join us"). Very tiresome.
How many civilizations/societies and lives have they destroyed or attempted to destroy so far using this ploy. And they're not looking like they're done. Yet, they're always the offended ones....the martyrs.
I believe most Muslims will leave PZ alone. Not because they are OK with blasphemy (they are not) but because Muslims are more politically aware than most Christians these days and they calculate a bit more about who they attack. You will see that they dont really go after Dawkins too much..or any other atheist. In their world view, they are currently at war with Crusaders and Jews. Anyone who hates/attacks crusaders or jews is likely to get a bit of a pass. At the other extreme, any Muslim who deviates is much more likely to get it in the neck because traitors within are more dangerous than critics without. If you were a right wing fascist and decided to do something nasty to the Quran, you are more likely to get flamed (literally).
LOL
Symbols have power, so don't pretend otherwise.
Wait, this is someone claiming the title "Fr." and he says it's just a symbol. What happened to the consecrated host literally embodying the flesh and blood of the lord? That doesn't sound like a symbol for something, it sounds like it's supposed to be one and the same thing.
Which is it, Father?
Furthermore, nobody denied that symbols have power. Where you and your bullying flock go wrong is attempting to invest your symbols with more power than is allowed in a secular society ruled by law. I guess it makes you nostalgic for the good ol' days of the Inquisition, when your kind inspired terror rather than ridicule and child-molestation charges.
"Crackergate" did not start with Cook and his zip lock bag.It did not start with Donohue and the Catholic League.
It started when PZ invited others to secure some consecrated "crackers" and send them to him for public desecration. From that point on:
1. PZ reportedly got a "death threat" which while not specific could reasonably be interpreted as implying an intent to inflict harm. It supposedly came from a man who thoughtlessly used his wife's email account from her company to send the message. The woman, mother of three, was fired from her job.
2. Bill Donohue of the Catholic League, who in my judgement, is the least likely apologist one could want for Catholicism, got fired up. He complained to the U. of Minnesota.
3. The U. of Minnesota disconnected PZ's connection on his university page to his blog.
4. The President of the U. of Minnesota, Brinkinks, wrote a letter disassociated the University from PZ's remarks.
5. Now PZ is being blitzed by an email war and is probably going to have to get a new account and commenters are suggesting that he talk to a lawyer and pursue various and sundry ambiguous crimes.
People who are quick to defend PZ's right to free speech are troubled by others having the same right
The moral of the story for PZ is: Once you let the toothpaste out of the tube, you can't get it back in. Also, once you stick an icepick into a rotted board you can expect all sorts of termites to come crawling out.
A little prudence in the beginning saves a lot of trouble later on.
Where was the Lord during the Korean War? Right in the middle of it: http://www.mostholyfamilymonastery.com/encounter_with_stmichael.html
Anon: unfortunately, the US is a great country for those with money. The advantage the countries I mentioned is that you get a good education, good health care etc. etc irrespective of how much money you have as a right. And no, they are not perfect, but I prefer our imperfection to the US level of imperfection.
And please, what US social services, name me one of the countries I mentioned where you can be bankrupted through the costs of treating serious health problems, unlike the US.
St. Michael the Archangel quote
"That would be M.I.C.H.A.E.L"
Thanks for clearing that up. I never new the angels name was an acronym. What do the letters stand for, My Ignorance Can Harm Adolescents, Even the Lords?
Anyone else have a guess on what M.I.C.H.A.E.L stands for?
Think that would be obvious. We ostensibly no longer alloe racism, but in reality, we still have racists, and history is almost certainly going to, when talking about the subject, point at the racism that was *still* in our time. Religion was useful and its proponents made damn sure everyone believed in some form of it. We have had *at least* 10,000 years of it, probably more, since that only speaks to the "written" record of religion, not what was believed for the millions of years prior, or what may have been invented, then passed down, from earlier hominids. *Weak* atheism probably always sort of existed, with their always being someone that suspected that the priest's magic powder only made ea big flash and stunk, not that it was magic, but the first "real" attempts to describe why religion itself was unnecessary doesn't seem to have happened until the Greeks, or, if it did, then more than likely those prior works, and the people that tried to write them, where killed off. Science, as a concept of how to ring the "real" truth of the world from out of the evidence didn't crop up until centuries later. The conclusion that religion really doesn't have anything useful to say on any subject at all, and not that some of it may be true, but X, Y and Z don't make sense, is a **very** recent concept, at least in terms of how "accepted" it is to allow the opinion, instead of immediately killing anyone that has it.
Put simply, no country has ever been without religion because there has never been enough true skeptics, all in one place, by themselves, without need for other dogma or insanity to replace religion, in the minds of those *with* faith, to form such a country. The few attempts that have happened have failed because a) the central principles had jack to do with atheism at all, that being merely a convenient tool and excuse to dis-empower those who did follow religions, and b) at no time has it been possible to avoid using replacement dogma and violence to **immediately** replace religion, because at no time have the faithless not been outnumbered by those who where brought up to value religion more than rationality.
When you want to prune a bush, you use clippers, this allows the bush to survive, without simply killing it. That is what education does to religion. It prunes away the bits that have been infected, or are rubbing against immovable object, or which are otherwise detrimental to the bush's health and well being. People forming countries just want the damn bush out of the way entirely, so they use disbelief as an excuse for why they opted to take a chainsaw or a flame thrower to it. The bush is seen as having no value at all to them, since its in the way. *We* see a plant that has a bit of growth still in the heart, surrounded by a mass of diseased, dying, or dead branches, which makes its nature barely recognizable as the same type of bush as every other bush in the hedge row (i.e., in principle no different than any set of ideals that are "intended" to promote peace, community and well being, but which have become hidden and distorted by masses of shit that cause wars, separate people into groups and promote disinterest in the well being of those outside that group).
When every bush in the hedge is a tangled mass of ugly, you either get to thinking that it is what the bushes are supposed to look like, and defend that, you conclude that all of it is in the way, or you look harder and realize that the gardener is an idiot, whose been home schooled, and that curing the idiocy will also cure the bushes.
Max Verret,
You are a bald faced liar. PZ responded to the unchristian like phyisical attack and persecution of Webster Cook. Yes, PZ did ask that crackers be sent to him, but only after he posted the facts of the case. If you want PZ not to desecrate the cracker, then have the Catholic group at UCF drop all charges against Mr. Cook and his friend. That would be the christian thing to do.
@284: due to my vocation
That vocation, of course, being "troll".
Max Verret (381)
"A little prudence in the beginning saves a lot of trouble later on."
And a little rolling over keeps things quiet.
@Max Verret:
Oh boy.
1- The woman, mother of three, mated with a crazed fool and did not protect her work account from her crazed husband. It's her problem and 1800 flowers were right in their actions.
2- He's a crackpot indeed. Boo. Cracker!
3- As it was their right to do so but it strikes me more as a "Look, not of our business."
4- Strikes me as yet another "not of our business". Did they publish the letter?
5- They have the right to disagree, but these whackjobs are giving him DEATH THREATS. Cracker attack... Death threats... lies about loving their neighbors... I see a big margin here. These folks need to stop talking to their imaginary friends. They gotta get a grip back on reality.
PZ: have you considered using whitelisting for your mail? That is, set it up so that mail doesn't get through to your ordinary inbox unless it comes from an address which is on your list of people you expect to get mail from (which can, if you wish, include patterns, e.g., that would match any of your students posting from a university address - of course, if you did that, it's easy for people to forge their hatemail to look as though it came from an address, but I bet most of the hoards are too ignorant to do that). You still have the problem of how someone you want to hear from but have never heard from before gets to mail you, but that's pretty much inevitable: the usual way is to have an autoreply that says "mail again with [string] in the title and expect some delay", direct those to a separate box, and scan for wanted mail every so often. Your university computer support people should be able to help you set this up pretty easily. It might solve your problem on its own, or it might just be a good adjunct to choosing new email addresses, just in case one of them gets loose.
OctoberMermaid @ 326
I misread your original comment and thought that the "earn respect" statement was being directed to PZ and us ilk. It seemed terribly odd that a defender of Donohue and the faith should be admonishing others on earning respect.
Making people love symbols more than humans might have worked in those days when you wanted to have ferocious agressive folks who defended the tribe well, in today's pluralistic society it's preferable they drop the symbols and love more humans.
If they can't understand that they need to abandon their love of worthless symbols, because they were endoctrinated since their young age and were also victims of child abuse, that doesn't mean that those who love humans, and not symbols, should just sit there quietly, and let this love of worthless symbols continue to exert its negative influence on society.
We have to alert and convince the generations to come with the only tool that we may use, expression, of the tremendous cost to society that is caused by this love of worthless symbols and the consequences of religious endoctrination and child abuse of all sorts.
And that's what we are doing now.
Actually, you're helping us to expose it even more clearly.
Every day it becomes clearer.
A few Bill Donohue anagrams:
Lubed Hi Loon
Lo Bile Hound
Bile Loon Duh
Nubile Old Ho
Ill Nude Hobo
Idle Loon Hub
Ooh Bill Nude
... And we have a winner: "Nubile Old Ho".
Interestingly, "PZ Myers" seems to have no anagrams. In at least one respect you're protected, PZ!
Maxi Priest says:
While Fried J says:
Well, which is it? Either religion makes you a better person or it doesn't. Stop trying to have your god and eat him too.
Eh? Nahh, I think Ill Nude Hobo is more appropriate.
One data point.
Impressive.
LOL.
So you read about the death of Emil Kapaun "all the time"?
You need to get out more.
By the way, it was a political, not religious, war. How do you know he was killed by atheists? North Korea is only about 70% atheist, by the way. It's even possible that he was killed by a Christian. Do you know the religious leanings of those who killed him?
Oh, I forgot. A secular/areligious state is necessarily atheistic, eh? Therefore the entire population of that state is atheistic. And you lump ALL atheists into one, big, monstrously amoral bucket, no? How sophisticated!
Actually, IIRC, someone named Sharon did on the "rolls eyes" thread. She said that object that lacked utility only had value if they were blessed, therefore things like photographs of loved ones and other keepsakes had only utilitatian value if they "helped with the memories", but were otherwise worthless and only served to perpetuatate material attachments. In a word: batty.
If you anagram Paul Z Myers you get:
Sleazy Rump
Zap Me Surly
So you read about the death of Emil Kapaun "all the time"?
Well, for the tortured martyr fetishist, it makes good "bed time" reading.
#214 and #219: I am an atheist, so your attempts to ridicule my "religion" are moot.....I just wish, as many other atheists have stated, that Paul Zachary hadn't become our self-appointed "spokesman" and carried on in such a "dramatic" fashion. Sorry to ruin your fun.
Your witty repartee is so very insightful, however.
drop the Z and you get:
Lame Syrup
Real Spumy
Palmy User (was there ever any doubt)
Asylum Rep (heyyy-ohh)
No angry e-mail yet. Maybe if i make a giant naked Darwin out of chocolate.
Freaking jeebus @ 337 I see you are back here for more curettage of your religion sapped brain. When will you realize that it is you and not your imaginary god that is doing all the insane ranting? We can incessantly demand you to show us your god and let it aid you in your trial of demented puking, but it never seems to make an appearance. Why is that? You recount the story of the "father" administering to the wounded during the Korean War with a healthy slathering of useless prayers to the dead and dying. Why didn't he just stay in one place and ask your god to administer to those intelligently designed creatures? Just sit still and pray that your god will not only succor them, but also smite the enemy that is killing those christian souls with those godly bombs and bullets. By doing what he did, he only confirmed that there is no imaginary god, because it was nowhere to be seen. Good grief, can't you fathom the blatant insanity of this pathetic and irrational belief in a god? Are you so demented as to not see and comprehend the utter futility of all that insane bullshit? Are you in need of a lobotomy to excise that part of your brain that imagines such a mindless and imaginary make believe entity? Isn't it obvious to you that if you were to undergo such an operation to remove the afflicted part of your brain, that all ideas and thoughts of such imaginations will have no more basis of being? Where else but in the brain is the very thought and creation of a god, and to have that part of the brain that is the seat of this insanity removed, no thought of this nonsense will prevail. I love music, and if the right side of my brain were surgically or accidently altered, my propensity for music will be gone. So if you were to submit to the appropriate lobotomy you will be ensured of total freedom from the prevailing insanity you now suffer with. You may still have a taste for crackers, but we will deal with that at the appropriate time at the first sign of the need for further curettage. The operation will be performed by a doctor and not your hopeful imaginary god. The cracker thing is perhaps beyond the doctor's pervue to insinuate, but the cracker you will enjoy from now on will be unable to alter it's shape or taste. May the cracker be with you!
"I am an atheist"
Bullshit. Your language is fundie-tastic and your constant concern and hand wringing over crackers is tedious.
If you are an atheist it's just another data point that goes to prove you don't need to be religious to be a flaming moron.
If you're not a creationist then you agree Jebus is a cousin of chimps. Why do you worship a cousin of chimps? Or are you just in the priest business for the money?
By the way did you see this quote somebody put in the other thread?
Men will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest. -- Diderot
I agree with that completely. The freedom of the human race requires the complete eradication of priests, including you Fr. J.
Test yourself, if you dare: http://www.msnbc.com/modules/newsweek/autism_quotient/default.asp
puzzled, but PZ isn't our 'self appointed "spokesman", he only speaks for himself, whatever others might think. On some things I agree with both what he says and the way he says it, on others, not so much. That is the difference between us and the religious, we generally speak for ourselves and even disagree, sometimes passionately. I know, a difficult concept for those of faith but it works for us and makes life much more interesting.
However, it sounds as if you want something that mimics the religious with their popes and archbishops who are the only ones authorised to speak for those who share their world view, thankfully it ain't gonna happen.
@347: You forgot to include a citation.
They were also less interested in making a difference in the world (45%, versus 56% nationally)
This percentage actually would not surprise me because Christians lump praying under "making a difference".
As an autistic I find all the constant condescending talk of "social autism" by 'yay social autism' and their sock puppets to be extremely.... actually I don't care much but it's pretty annoying.
no country on Earth has a standard of living even remotely comparable to the United States.
If you measure standard of living solely by how much lousy fast food and shoddy overseas crap you can buy, then you're probably right.
#406
"Civilization will not attain perfection until the last stone from the last church falls on the last priest." -Emile Zola
Today I had one of my students, who's a Catholic, tell me she could "...totally understand why someone would shoot a doctor who performed abortions". Theirs really is the religion of love...
http://www.SneakEmail.com
PZ,
Sneak Email is an e-mail forwarding service designed to fight spam. It would be useful for your situation.
You can create an e-mail address, then, if it begins attracting spam, or cranks, in your case, you simply delete the address and create another. You can have a large number of addresses.
SneakEmail has a features such as allowing you to create directories to organize your addresses, add notes to each address, have a suffix appear on the subject line, and other conveniences.
There is a free service, but being gainfully employed, and having a lot of mail, you should probably opt for the $24 per year pay service, which has more bandwidth and some other benefits.
If someone has an inside connection to PZ, would you please forward this to him? I'm afraid that buried here in the comments he'll never see it.
AB
Myers: "Bill Donohue has once again issued a press release, urging all of his followers to harass my in-box."
The current press release at Catholic League's website says nothing of the sort. It merely reiterates Myers' statements of 7/15, in which he added the koran to items he planned to desecrate.
Is there another release besides the one issued today that is being referenced?
What exactly is "smart"? Where are the international statistics showing the US in position #1 in the international smartness league?
In reality, the closest such thing is the OECD educational attainment statistics where the US is 11th or 12th in tertiary education (depending on which exact table you look at, 2007 figures) and, interestingly, well below the OECD and EU averages in secondary educated students progressing to tertiary.
Probably true for the top few hospitals and clinics, but what good are they if only the super-rich can afford them? The US is the #1 spender on healthcare and #37 on health outcomes (WHO 2007). Literally dozens of other countries have better healthcare than the US and it costs them at most half as much.
OK, what is the international measure of social services? I'm not sure either, but I doubt any international comparative statistic that might reasonably be interpreted as indicative of level of "social services" would show the US to be the best.
Today I had one of my students, who's a Catholic, tell me she could "...totally understand why someone would shoot a doctor who performed abortions". Theirs really is the religion of love...
#409
my bad: http://www.barna.org/FlexPage.aspx?Page=BarnaUpdateNarrow&BarnaUpdateID…
#410
if condescending talk isn't for you, you're at the wrong blog.
@337: He died of medical problems in a POW camp, along with many others of different religions and no-religion. Their captors as well were of different religions and no-religion. How was this an atheism-based murder?
@347: Citation please for that load of tripe (and don't think we didn't notice your gratuitous and juvenile snipe at autism yet again).
Someone want to clue me in one what social autism is exactly? I mean, is there some sort of blog for these people, where, whenever they are confronted by something new or some person they don't know talks to them they can whine and hide under a pillow until the people go away? Oh, wait.. I think I just described every single right wing blog on the internet which either doesn't allow posts, or deletes the ones they find uncomfortable or challenging to them... lol
Shirley the simplest thing is to filter any emails containing certain keywords directly to the deleted folder.
@403: Maybe if i make a giant naked Darwin out of chocolate.
I'll bet Ben Stein now wishes he'd waited to visit your soft, moist, chocolate Darwin instead of that hard, cold statue.
puzzled wrote:
Really, then why do they publish PZ's email address, and as a link?
@415 Are we looking at the same press release? The one that clearly says "Contact Myers at..."?
Sorry for the double post.
Comment #281 by Patricia:
Didn't someone post a link to an interview with Webster Cook somewhere?...
The interview can be found at
http://www.americanfreethought.com/wordpress/2008/07/22/webster-cook-sp…
#418
Shut the hell up, Salt.
You're a fundament
FrJ,
Puzzled:
You say the same shit, different thread, every time. "(Opening smarmy PZ or Paul Zachary smug comment). Blah,blah,blah. Drama Queen. Blah,blah, blah. I'm an atheist. yadda, yadda, Your comments have been enlightening. (snark)"
We KNOW what you think. You've said it often and under different tags.
YOU ARE A POSER AND A FRAUD. GO FUCK YOURSELF. WE NO LONGER CARE WHAT YOU THINK, ASSHOLE.
"Symbols have power, so don't pretend otherwise"
By themselves? I argue that they don't. Only if people believe they have power, they hold that power over those people for as long as they believe in that power. And only insofar such people are able to excercise the said power.
I can be hurt by the consequences of other peoples believe in the power of a certain symbol. If a sufficient number of people believe that, because of a symbol I should be hurt, or be treated differently because I do not underwrite such powers, I will be affected. Not by the symbol but ny those believing in the power of it. Symbols, like religions are neutral. The acts people base upon them are not.
Apparently you don't know much about CAIR, PZ. No, they won't send Muslim assassins to kill you. Rather they'll wait until Muslim assassins have tried to kill you; in the lucky event that the assassins fail and you point out on your blog that they were motivated by Islam, they'll call you a racist and an Islamophobe, and they'll spread the word that the assassins weren't real Muslims and that they were distorting 'true' Islam, which is a religion of peace, freedom, and tolerance.
Name Withheld #254 wrote:
One of the most frustrating things religion does is co-opt perfectly fine concepts, distort them, and then claim equivalence. "Faith" as a secular word can mean hope, confidence, trust, loyalty, and commitment. Depending on context, those can be fine qualities -- if they are tempered with reason, and caution.
But when used in religion, faith signifies a desire to believe in something so hard that reason can't get in the way. That is not intellectually honest. It is not genuine and beautiful. It is arrogance masquerading as humility, and thoughtless dogma parading itself as sensitivity to nuance.
The Catholics pushed too far when they harassed a kid for violating a "sacred" taboo and brought their anger out of the church and into the public square, expecting that their sense of tortured outrage would be treated as a fine and noble thing -- because their Faith in sacred taboos is a fine and noble thing.
No it is not. Failing to point this out is not "kind." It is pandering, and enabling, and degrading to the spirit of human progress. The problem is not the Catholics. It's what Catholicism -- and religion in general -- does to ordinary people. It does not ennoble.
And we should not play along with the charade that it does.
PZ said,
"So far, though, the score in number of email tirades is Catholics: 5 digit number, Muslims: 0. Maybe I'll get some islamic hate mail soon, but I suspect that CAIR is more interested in defusing any prejudice that they are all mad bombers...a prejudice Donohue is more interested in promoting."
HA! Won't that be the biggest irony in all this? The Catholics were all up in arms saying you wouldn't desecrate an Islamic object and you are just doing this because you know Catholics are sensible. Then, you get death threats from them. When you announce you will desecrate the Koran you get no reply whatsoever.
The Donahue branch for Liars for Jesus, aka the Catholics League, released a statementent titled MYERS STILL WANTS TO ABUSE EUCHARIST; SHOWS DEFERENCE TO ISLAM where they got up in arms on how dare he not insult Islam. Then they release MYERS TO DESECRATE EUCHARIST AND KORAN where they say how dare he insult Islam and 'I'm telling'.
What's even stranger is that they mock Myers by calling him a "Planet-of-the-Apes biologist" and saying he "has quite a following among the King Kong Theory of Creation gang". Isn't Donahue aware that the Catholic Church is in favor of evolution? Either he isn't and is ignorant about what exactly it is he spends so much time and anger defending. Or he is, which makes these criticism dumb since the Catholic Church believes we came from apes too.
Funny, that's exactly the strategy the Catholic apologists here used when PZ got death threats.
Erwin Blonk
I agree with most of that, except for the "Symbols, like religions are neutral."
You're right in the sense that these religion deserve the kind of respect one gives a rattlesnake and tries not to step on them. PZ is in a position where he can't get away with saying the things I can, or that he himself probably could have said a few years ago.
However, I don't believe for a minute that religions like Islam and Christianity grow as powerful and dangerous as they do because they are neutral and peaceful.
We've always been at war with Eastasia.
We've always been at war with Eurasia.
What was it again that Sastra was telling you about faith being "a desire to believe in something so hard that reason can't get in the way," Name Withheld?
Could it be that Janus = J + ...?
Feynmaniac, both your links go to the "MYERS TO DESECRATE EUCHARIST AND KORAN" release.
Brownian wrote:
No doubt, it's a common tactic among religious apologists. The difference is that Catholics can't use scare-words like 'islamophobe' and 'racist', which automatically gather support among spineless liberals. Also, the ideology that Catholics defend, while pretty bad, isn't nearly as evil as Islam. For one thing, it's very unlikely that any Catholic will actually try to kill PZ. However, if PZ films himself desecrating a Qur'an and puts the video on Youtube, assassination attempts will be more than a remote possibility.
#435
"However, I don't believe for a minute that religions like Islam and Christianity grow as powerful and dangerous as they do because they are neutral and peaceful."
I see your point. What I meant is that a book, a set of rules or an object can't do anything. It is the actions of people. In that sense even an existing god can be inconsequential, he can say whatever he likes, the responsibility of my actions are mine, unless I am forced through divine intervention, in which case my actions are not mine, as those of a puppet are not of the puppet but of the puppetmaster).). If, for example, am ordered to kill my own son, the right response would be 'no'.
Janus wrote:
Nope, I'm pretty sure PZ was ready to vote for a Catholic by the name of John Kerry about 4 years ago. Bill Donohue doesn't get support from liberals because he's a right-wing theocrat.
Janus said:
Actually, terms such as "bigot," "intolerance" and "hate crime" have all been bandied about by Catholics regarding this incident, so I disagree that they lack the terminology to paint themselves as sympathetic victims. I also disagree that anyone who acknowledges racism against Arabs does so because of cowardice.
This looks like it will be another thousand-comment-post. Too bad the really nice epigenetics posting will get a fraction of the comments.
"Name Withheld", now I have to watch "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly" yet again (as if that were a chore). Funny, the movie only gets better with every viewing.
I really love the "Fire PZ" Facebook page- the related "Stop Barack Obama" group underscores the whole trumped-up culture war aspect of their crackerly kerfuffle.
Erwin Blonk wrote:
The "right" response depends on what you believe and value and that's why religion isn't neutral or peaceful.
Think about what you have to believe to kill your son because you think God ordered it... but that's what you were getting at, wasn't it?
Since email won't get through, and PZ was the first person I thought of when seeing this, I guess I'll post it here:
http://www.engrish.com/recent_detail.php?imagename=lets-party.jpg&categ…
Let's Party!
"PZ reportedly got a "death threat" which while not specific could reasonably be interpreted as implying an intent to inflict harm."
"you can quit your job for the good of the children. Or you can get your brains beat in" seems pretty specific to me.
That's not exactly why Donohue doesn't get (much) support from liberals. I don't know if the folks at CAIR could be classified as right-wing, but they're certainly theocrats. The reason they get support from liberals is that unlike Donohue they're smart, they know what kind of language to use to convince people who have been swimming in the propaganda of cultural relativism and religious moderation all their lives, and they've almost always used that language.
The Skeptic's Annotated Bible lists 885 biblical quotes under the heading 'Cruelty and Violence', while the Q'uran only has 514.
So unless you've invented some kind of Religiometer that measures the 'goodness' and 'badness' of religious doctrines (let alone exactly what each doctrine entails, in which case please use it to determine once and for all which is the truest and bestest religion and save the rest of us a lot of bullshit), I must say in response, What the fuck are you talking about?
Yup, evidence is mounting that Janus is in fact J's anus.
The difference is that Catholics can't use scare-words like 'islamophobe' and 'racist', which automatically gather support among spineless liberals.
you must not have been paying much attention to the comments in the previous threads.
the words "bigot" and "bigotry" have been very commonly applied by catholic apologists to PZ. You can search the threads yourself to verify.
so, while you might not think it logical, they do indeed commonly attempt to use that angle.
whether it would "appeal to spineless liberals" is rather irrelevant.
so, did you actually have a worthwhile point to make?
Ichthyic,
Haven't had a chance to ask yet. How 'bout them Lakers?
@ MAJeff #451
*ear to ear grin*
But J has always talked out of his ass.
# 445:
It's reverse transubstantiation! They've taken a bit of the body of our lord Cthulhu, and magically turned it into a snack!
Prof. Myers, you could fight back by forwarding 2 copies of each catholic hate filled email to Bill.
Celtic_Evolution,
I was soooooooooo pissed at McHale last summer (at heart, I will probably always be a Minnesotan). But I was also soooooooooooo happy for KG. Sure, the guy may be a little "off" from his intensity on the court from time to time, but he's also someone who gives back to his community and is a class act off the court.
Janus wrote:
Are you sure that all Muslims are theocrats?
You don't think that Muslims divide into theocratic and non-theocratic like Christians?
Do you think Sufi's are theocratic?
Moreover, what Janus doesn't seem to get is that any organized religion can be utilized easily to motivate adherents to acts of violence.
If he doesn't choose to look at the history of xianity in this regard, he can look at recent events and see it:
http://www.thehindu.com/2008/07/14/stories/2008071450360100.htm
The reason you don't see AMERICAN muslims, or catholics, destroying public property or following through (most times) on their various "fatwa" proclamations, is that this is a secular nation (excluding parts of the South, like Florida?), not ruled by any form of religious law, and so for a long time now we have considered destruction of public property and threats of physical violence to be jailable offenses under the law, regardless of whether the motivations were "religious" or not.
If one wants to see what would happen under a theocracy, it's not hard to look around the world and find out.
In short:
location
location
location
That said, religion is far too easy a tool to utilize to manipulate people, and it's simply time for it to go away.
But J has always talked out of his ass.
Indeed. I should have added "i.e., J" for the sake of clarity instead of leaving it implicit.
MAJeff
I was born and raised in Boston... my first job was hawking peanuts at the old Garden during the mid-80's Laker / Celtics rivalry. It's been too long, and I loved every minute of it. But we're getting OT...
Haven't had a chance to ask yet. How 'bout them Lakers?
yeah, yeah.
actually, though, compared to what happened in 2004 in Detroit, I was reasonably happy with how the Lakers performed in the finals.
I mean, NOBODY predicted the Lakers would be in the finals at the beginning of the year.
I rather think that will have changed for next season...
and Bynum will be back at full strength.
I'm also "happy" for Garnett.
took him long enough.
:p
[obligatory Bill Donohue abuse]
That is all.
Brownian wrote:
Part of what makes Christianity better than Islam (from a secular humanist point of view) is that most (not all, but most) of the bad verses of the Bible are nicely tucked away in the Old Testament, which Christians can ignore if they want because Jesus supposedly 'fulfilled' the OT, i.e. negated its moral guidance with that contained in the New Testament, and more specifically with what Jesus himself allegedly said. Whether this makes sense to you or me is irrelevant: It's a plausible interpretation of the Bible, and it's what they believe.
The Qur'an is the exact opposite of the Bible in this regard. In the Bible, most of the bad verses are in the beginning and are negated by the newer verses that come after. In the Qur'an, most of the bad verses are the most RECENT ones and it's those verses that negate the good ones, which are less recent. In both cases the new negates the old, but in the Qur'an's case this is a very bad thing. Islamic scholars call this the principle of abrogation, and it is supported by the Qur'an itself.
When, for example, a group dedicated to Muslim apologia such as CAIR points out that the Qur'an contains a verse that says there is no compulsion in religion, they will always fail to mention what any Islamic scholar knows: That particular verse is an old one, and it has been abrogated by the famous Verse of the Sword (among others), which tells Muslims to wage war on infidels.
Finally, the Qur'an isn't the only sacred text to Muslims, there are also all the authentic Hadith which tell the life of Muhammad. Since Muhammad is considered the perfect human being by Muslims, anything he has done (from raping a 9 year old to murdering someone who has insulted Allah) is considered a good action.
SC wrote:
I'm not sure who J is (is it the priest guy in this thread?), but I'm myself and nobody else. I've made maybe a dozen comments on Pharyngula before, most of these long before the cracker post that started this; also, I use the same name on other websites having to do with atheism, such as richarddawkins.net and IIDB. I'm an atheist, a rationalist, and a liberal (albeit not a spineless one). And while I'm certainly no expert, I apparently know a lot more about Islam (and CAIR) than either you or Brownian.
#426 - Hey thanks for that link!
So I step out to desecrete some swine, and now we have Father Jackass, J, AND Salt? Ok, the Fraud, the Fool, and the Fundament. Our own personal three stooges. Sweet!
The fatwa envy, it's growing!
Wow, that is just terrible. What hypocritical arses, inciting others towards violence is just as bad as committing it yourself. Anyone who wrote to a muslim in the hopes that a terrorist threat would dissuade PZ Myers is scum of the earth.
Wishing violence or ill tidings fall on someone is a horrible thing. It's pretty much the opposite of the Christian message. All because of some fatwa envy...
I'm not sure who J is (is it the priest guy in this thread?), but I'm myself and nobody else.
Amazing, then. You two must have been separated at birth. Do you get all swoony over Sam Harris, too?
And while I'm certainly no expert, I apparently know a lot more about Islam (and CAIR) than either you or Brownian.
On what are you basing that claim?
Phew. Good thing Jesus only said "Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I came to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and a man's enemies will be the members of his household. He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. He who has found his life will lose it, and he who has lost his life for My sake will find it."
If Crackergate has shown us anything, it's that many Catholics would be gleefully cleansing the planet of infidels (like they tried to do many times throughout history) if they had the power and the will.
They've got Koran envy.
When you call the Catholic League's number (found on their web page), there is a message that gives Bill Donohue's cell number (917-838-1051). I don't know if it's legit, but I don't know why it wouldn't be.
Patricia at #362 - "JefferyD - Ask & ye shall recieve. With one wave of my magical, witchy wand *ting*, you are now a Myrmidon. Oh what the hell, more grog & swill too. ;)"
Bless you, dear lady, may I offer you a Mojito dedicated to the Mother Goddess?
Pax Nabisco y'all
Janus,
You may be interested in this thread
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/03/i_generally_favor_the_idea_o…
particularly the comments by Nullifidian.
It's a plausible interpretation of the Bible, and it's what they believe.
who are "they", exactly?
Is this the same "them" that throw hissy fits when someone suggests taking down a statue of the ten commandments from in front of a courthouse?
Scott, I don't have to imagine. I read about how atheists kill and torture Christians all the time.
You are so full of it. Torture? Where do you read about that? Certainly not on Pharyngula. It's well-known that I'm a theist here. Look, see: they know me, and I know them, and the above is just false.
See, your problem is that you think you're entitled to a certain minimum level of respect for your vocation and your beliefs. But you're not, and neither am I. You have to earn respect by honest engagement, and so far you've failed to engage honestly. To say that you read about atheists torturing Christians all the time is just a lame, over-the-top excuse to justify your previous rhetorical excesses. It certainly rings false to me.
Sure, I get grief here from time to time for being a believer. I also get good, thoughtful observations and dialogue. No one has ever threatened me with any sort of mayhem. I've had many meals with non-believers, including PZ, and I never once saw the voodoo dolls come out, or be treated anything other than a fellow human being. I think you are just projecting your own insecurities on others. I really hope that you are not a priest, frankly, because the more you write, the deeper and more despicable your attempts to justify yourself become.
SC wrote:
Sam is right about a lot of things, and those things include Islam and the spinelessness of most liberals. He's wrong about some things, namely the counter-productiveness of the 'atheist' label and the nature of the mind.
As for my knowing more about Islam and CAIR than you do, it's a claim based on the fact that you accused me of being a religious nut's sockpuppet after I posted a single comment denigrating CAIR and Islam. I doubt that somebody who knows anything about CAIR and Islam would get annoyed so easily by such a comment, unless that person was a Muslim (which seems unlikely in your case, and Brownian's).
Brownian wrote:
Yes, we are indeed fortunate that this is one of the few verses in the NT that directly inspires a destructive mentality, or the Dark Ages and the Renaissance might have been even more bloody than they have been. That said, Jesus is clearly not advocating violence here, but rather a single-minded devotion to himself and to his (then) budding religion. The NT's bad verses are not nearly as bad, or as numerous as those contained in the Qur'an and Hadith.
But they don't have the will. Muslims do. Or at least, a frighteningly large fraction of Muslims worldwide have the will, while most of the remaining fraction has the will to apologize for the former.
that you accused me of being a religious nut's sockpuppet
that's your assumption about who "J" is.
there was no implication in associating you with J that you were a religious nutbagger.
rather, that you use similarly poor logic, and your words resemble "J"'s quite a bit.
I don't recall that J has used the "spineless liberal" jibe as much as yourself, however.
I'm satisfied you have equal, but separate, levels of inanity.
J is not Fr. J, and he is not a religious nut. He's a "proud Islamophobe" and a tiresome bore. That confusion aside, your explanation for your assumption concerning my (or Brownian's) level of knowledge about these matters is extremely weak.
#350 - Holbach - Yeah, that book is pretty steep in price, but with all the fluff I've ead this summer, I figure what the heck, a treat. The reviews I've read say Avalos really slaughters the bible. One of PZ's other commenters recommended the book too.
I've spent so much time here on PZ's blog that a class I was taking has finished without me. Sheesh!
"Haven't had a chance to ask yet. How 'bout them Lakers?"
Would have preferred them to be beaten by the Jazz or even the Spurs, but oh well.
Fr. J wrote #230:
"PZ, so you are shocked that desecrating a sacred symbol annoys lot's of people?...If you desecrate something that people absolutely love with their whole hearts what kind of response do you think you would get? It's like attacking Darwin. Fundamentalist atheists go nuts when you do that."
You Catholics are nothing more than a bunch of idolatorous crackerphiles. You literally worship crackers??? What does the Bible say about idolatory J?
First your church turned the man Joshua ben Joseph into a kind of pagan demi-god, and now you are doing the same with inanimate objects such as crackers. Do you not realise how perverse this appears to someone who has not been not brainwashed into believing it from childhood? If Catholics can deny that they practice idolatory, then Garth Brooks is entitled to tell his fans that he doesn't really play country music! You people should be feel humiliated and embarrassed to be defending such gross idolatory in this day and age.
By the way, how do you feel about your followers disobeying Jesus' stern command to call no man on earth 'Father'?
Matt.23
[9] And call no man your father on earth, for you have one Father, who is in heaven.
Flaming Hypocrite!
Speaking of hypocrites;
Bill Donohue's e-mail address.
Ref post #65:
Bill Donohue, Catholic League, cl@catholicleague.org
http://www.opednews.com/articles/Is-the-Vatican-A-Safe-Have-by-Debby-Bo…
http://maxblumenthal.com/2006_02_01_maxblumenthal_archive.html
The difference is that Catholics can't use scare-words like 'islamophobe' and 'racist', which automatically gather support among spineless liberals.
J(eremy) and J(anus) should get a room.
The link in #117 (http://www.nbc10.com/family/16947935/detail.html) has one of those stupid polls that needs to be pharyngulated -- right now 79% say they believe in god.
Patricia @ 476 Yes, I'll probably get the book and help out the cause for reason and against religious crap. Your are so right about time spent blogging on this site. Damn, you go out for a walk for an hour, and the comments have increased by over a hundred, you lose the stride, and then have to spend time scrolling to pick out what you want to comment on! Of course it does not help if the topic wanders off the subject! The subject starts off with more of the retards antics, then someone mentions marshmallows and the thread is stuck there for a while with the quality, uses in recipes, and a general potpouri of marshmallow banter! Good grief, before you know it, there's almost a thousand comments wandering off topic! A lot of fun though, eh?
Ref. #300:
"And Lord, bless our loving priests who guide our young men to a wholesome worship of human sacrifice, corpses on sticks and cannibalism"
"I would never want to be a member of a group whose symbol was a dead guy nailed to two pieces of wood."
- George Carlin
Might be worth hiring someone at minimum wage to go through your email for you and pick out the useful stuff. Some stuff can only be eyeballed, and really it's only a couple hours' work a day, it seems.
Then you can zip it up and send it off to Donohue.
Well, that and the time zones. Sometimes I get up in the morning and all hell has cut loose while I was asleep. Loads of fun though! Actually it's rather ironic that I've neglected my school work to read a professors blog. :)
#330: "Does anyone have any theories as to why no country/civilization/society in all of history has been areligious?"
Because traditionally, the priests would kill you if you were.
Deut.17
[12] The man who acts presumptuously, by not obeying the priest who stands to minister there before the LORD your God, or the judge, that man shall die; so you shall purge the evil from Israel.
Fr. J wrote #230:
"If you desecrate something that people absolutely love with their whole hearts what kind of response do you think you would get?"
"When fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in a flag and carrying a cross." - Sinclair Lewis.
Maybe Sinclair Lewis should have said;
"When fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in a flag and carrying a CRACKER."
The Man Who Taught His Asshole to Talk
By William S. Burroughs ©
Did I ever tell you about the man who taught his ass to talk? His whole abdomen would move up and down you dig farting out the words. It was unlike anything I had ever heard.
This ass talk had sort of a gut frequency. It hit you right down there like you gotta go. You know when the old colon gives you the elbow and it feels sorta cold inside, and you know all you have to do is turn loose? Well this talking hit you right down there, a bubbly, thick stagnant sound, a sound you could smell.
This man worked for a carnival you dig, and to start with it was like a novelty ventri-liquist act. Real funny, too, at first. He had a number he called The Better Ole that was a scream, I tell you. I forget most of it but it was clever. Like, "Oh I say, are you still down there, old thing?"
"Nah I had to go relieve myself."
After a while the ass start talking on its own. He would go in without anything prepared and his ass would ad-lib and toss the gags back at him every time.
Then it developed sort of teeth-like little raspy in-curving hooks and start eating. He thought this was cute at first and built an act around it, but the asshole would eat its way through his pants and start talking on the street, shouting out it wanted equal rights. It would get drunk, too, and have crying jags nobody loved it and it wanted to be kissed same as any other mouth. Finally it talked all the time day and night, you could hear him for blocks screaming at it to shut up, and beating it with his fist, and sticking candles up it, but nothing did any good and the asshole said to him Its you who will shut up in the end. Not me. Because we dont need you around here any more. I can talk and eat AND shit.
After that he began waking up in the morning with a transparent jelly like a tadpoles tail all over his mouth. This jelly was what the scientists call un-D.T., Undifferentiated Tissue, which can grow into any kind of flesh on the human body. He would tear it off his mouth and the pieces would stick to his hands like burning gasoline jelly and grow there, grow anywhere on him a glob of it fell. So finally his mouth sealed over, and the whole head would have have amputated spontaneous - except for the EYES you dig. Thats one thing the asshole COULDN'T do was see. It needed the eyes. But nerve connections were blocked and infiltrated and atrophied so the brain couldnt give orders any more. It was trapped in the skull, sealed off. For a while you could see the silent, helpless suffer-ing of the brain behind the eyes, then finally the brain must have died, because the eyes WENT OUT, and there was no more feeling in them than a crabs eyes on the end of a stalk.
____________________________________________________________
But now, here is the rest of the story. The talking asshole found a vocation where he was able to use his voice at a high volume. You see, the talking asshole named himself "Bill Donohue".
And now you know...THE REST OF THE STORY!
Comment #281 by Patricia:
"Didn't someone post a link to an interview with Webster Cook somewhere?..."
There is a radio interview with Webster Cook here;
http://ffrf.org/radio/podcast/
So Bill Donohue has issued a Fatwa, uh, "press release", huh? Do these nuts realize how closely they match the personalities of extreme Muslim fundamentalists?
If that's the image they want to foster, than I hope they go right ahead (without going completely unhinged and dangerous, of course). It just makes the case against fundamentalist belief stronger.
No country, civilization, or society has ever been without superstitions. The dividing line between superstition and religion is largely arbitrary, and a matter of culture.
Superstitions tell us a great deal about the way the human brain is put together, and how the mind works. They also give us insight into how social reinforcement works. There is no reason to go beyond that and believe that they must also tell us anything about how reality works. Take superstitions literally and seriously, and you miss the real insights.
Religion tells us a lot about human beings as a species. We don't need a real God in order to explain it.
Sastra wrote:
Have you ever watched "Scare Tactics" on the scifi channel? It's an amazing demonstration of just those facets of the human mind.
Comment #465:
"Wishing violence or ill tidings fall on someone is a horrible thing. It's pretty much the opposite of the Christian message."
You need to read your Bible more carefully Kel.
Read the book of Revelation if you want to see yet another Christian wishing violence upon all non-believers.
"If a modern secular reader ... sat down and read it [Revelation] through for the first time, my guess would be they would find it to be extremely violent. Someone once tallied up the death count and projected it on a modern world such as ours, with five billion people, and it's absolutely a horrible kind of a statistic. You come up with maybe four billion dying of famine, war, earthquake, plagues.
Essentially it's a book about the wrath of God being poured out upon the world. People not repenting except for the small group of faithful followers of God, and this awful wicked beast power ruling the whole world, and defying God, shaking his fist at God. And finally Jesus coming, not as a Prince of Peace at all, not as a lamb, but at the end of the book, as a rider on a horse, a warrior with a sword, to smite the nations. In one of the quotes that comes to my mind it says, "He will rule the nations with a rod of iron, as a potter strikes a pot with iron and it just completely shatters." So I think that would be the dominant impression someone would get, maybe a book you'd want to close and put away and not even think about..." - James Tabor
And let's not forget the words of Jesus himself;
Luke.19
[27] "But as for these enemies of mine, who did not want me to reign over them, bring them here and slay them before me."
Or how about this?
Rev.14
[10] he also shall drink the wine of God's wrath, poured unmixed into the cup of his anger, and he shall be tormented with fire and sulphur in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb.
[11] And the smoke of their torment goes up for ever and ever; and they have no rest, day or night...
The 'Lamb' of course being none other than Jesus, the 'Prince of Peace' himself.
Jesus, the 'Torture Meister'! Now there's a lovely thought.
No wonder there are so many violent minded Christian nutjobs out there. When someone worships a violent and intolerant god, then some of it is bound to rub off.
#488 - Dingo Dave - Thankyou for the link! The one at #426 has petered out. Darn. I'm a member of FFRF, should have known to check there.
Let me commend you on your bible quotin'. That is a blood sport that I indulge in any chance I get. *grin*
Here is a story you won't hear in PZ's class:
More than a century ago a proud university student boarded a train in France and sat next to an older man who seemed to be a peasant of comfortable means. The brash student noticed that the older gentleman was slipping beads through his fingers. He was praying the rosary.
"Sir, do you still believe in such outdated things?", the student inquired.
"Yes, I do. Don't you?" the man responded. The student laughed and admitted, "I do not believe in such silly things. Take my advice. Throw the rosary out the window, and learn what science has to say about it."
"Science? I do not understand this science. Perhaps you can explain it to me," the man said humbly, tears welling in his eyes.
The university student noticed that the man was deeply moved. To avoid hurting further the older person's feelings, he said, "Please give me your address and I will send you some literature to explain the matter to you." The man fumbled in the inside pocket of his coat and pulled out his business card. On reading the card, the student lowered his head in shame and was speechless. The card read: "Louis Pasteur, Director of the Institute of Scientific Research, Paris." The deluded science student encountered his country's leading chemist and bacteriologist.
Fr. J...big fucking deal.
That's a lovely story, Fr. J - is there a point in there somewhere?
is there a point in there somewhere?
it's a MYSTERY!!!
Wow, I will spell it out for you then:
1. Not all religious people are stupid.
2. Some great scientists are and were religious.
3. The student sounds like many here...arrogant and rude.
4. Science and religion are not necessarily in opposition and you can be a good scientist and believe in God.
5. Religious people have contributed greatly in a positive way to our world.
6. It is best to avoid rash judgments.
7. Atheists can be just as dogmatic as anyone.
That should get you started freethinking.
Fr J. IS Paul Harvey! And now you know the rest of the story...
Jesus, Fr.J. that was the sappiest, most dishonest anecdote ever written. If this is your writing style you are either an idiot or a twelve year old girl. (Or and you just LOVE that insipid, "Butterfly Kisses" song) You are so sad...
I just sent Bill Donahue a letter of my own via the only way they provide to contact them (other than by snail mail). Here is the text of my letter to him.
http://www.catholicleague.org/feedback.php
I realize I am a nobody, a private citizen with no public presence but, I do hope he responds anyway. I do hope he does sick his wachaloons on me. I rearing for a good fight.