Good grief, but this is tedious. I’m still getting piles of email every day from people 1) begging me not to abuse a cracker because it is so sacred to them, piles of email telling me to 2) abuse a book because it is so sacred to Muslims (I’ve even been sent two copies of the Koran!), and of course, the 3) bizarre complaint that I’m a coward, afraid to commit sacrilege. You can all stop now. 1) Your personal sense of the sacred in a piece of bread dough is absurd to me and imposes on me no sense of obligation. 2) Since I now own one entirely superfluous copy of the Koran, it will meet the very same fate as the crackers. Thanks to all who have demanded that I treat that silly book with disrespect, I’ll have to treat both equally. 3) I have not rushed to be rude to a cracker because, well, it’s there, it’s ridiculous, and it’s not very important. I’ve been traveling, and I’ve come home to writing deadlines, and those get first priority. Heck, going into the kitchen right now and fixing myself a sandwich for lunch has higher priority. After I’ve cleared the deck of my work this week, then I might take a moment to casually demolish a sacred cow.
Now enough. You can all stop dunning me. Be patient, godless ones, and surrender to despair, O Ye Believers. And if this turns into another thousand comment thread, I shall be very, very cranky.
Look. This is the kind of crap I’m getting all the time, and I’m getting a little tired of it. Gary Silis of Australia, IP address 60.229.16.24, you are a freaking moron. Do you even see any of the the logical flaws in listing people who denied your inane, petty god who have also died?
All you god-walloping, jebus-lovin’, spamming fools for christ are convincing me of nothing other than that people can be really, really stupid. You are not advancing your cause. You are making your whole faith look like a special ed class for people with dingleberries for brains.
I’d suggest that you not write to me unless you’ve got something intelligent to say, but Gary Silis probably thinks he’s made a brilliant, ingenious, knock-dead argument instead of the exercise in insipidity that this is:
DID YOU KNOW THESE FACTS?
I SURE DIDNT TILL NOW
Death is certain but the Bible speaks about untimely death!
Make a personal reflection about this…..
Very interesting, read until the end…..
It is written in the Bible (Galatians 6:7):
‘Be not deceived; God is not mocked:
for whatsoever a man sow,
that shall he also reap.
Here are some men and women
who mocked God :
ohn Lennon (Singer):
Some years before, during his interview with an American Magazine, he said:
‘Christianity will end, it will disappear.
I do not have to argue about that. I am certain.
Jesus was ok, but his subjects were too simple, today we are more famous than Him’ (1966).
Lennon, after saying that the Beatles were more famous than Jesus Christ, was shot six times.
Tancredo Neves (President of Brazil ):
During the Presidential campaign, he said if he got 500,000 votes from his party, not even God would remove him from Presidency.
Sure he got the votes, but he got sick a day before being made President, then he died
Cazuza (Bi-sexual Brazilian composer, singer and poet):
Durng A show in Canecio ( Rio de Janeiro ),
while smoking his cigarette, he puffed out some smoke into the air and said:’God, that’s for you.’
He died at the age of 32 of LUNG CANCER in a horrible manner.
The man who built the Titanic
After the construction of Titanic, a reporter asked him how safe the Titanic would be.
With an ironic tone he said:
‘Not even God can sink it’
The result: I think you all know what happened to the Titanic
Marilyn Monroe (Actress)
She was visited by Billy Graham during a presentation of a show.
He said the Spirit of God had sent him to preach to her.
After hearing what the Preacher had to say, she said:
‘I don’t need your Jesus’.
A week later, she was found dead in her apartment
Bon Scott (Singer)
The ex-vocalist of the AC/DC. On one of his 1979 songs he sang:
‘Don’t stop me; I’m going down all the way, down the highway to hell’.
On the 19th of February 1980, Bon Scott was found dead, he had been choked by his own vomit.
Campinas (IN 2005)
In Campinas , Brazil a group of friends, drunk, went to pick up a friend…..
The mother accompanied her to the car and was so worried about the drunkenness of her friends and she said to the daughter holding her hand, who was already seated in the car:‘My Daughter, Go With God And May He Protect You.’
She responded: ‘Only If He (God) Travels In The Trunk, Cause Inside Here…..It’s Already Full ‘
Hours later, news came by that they had been involved in a fatal accident, everyone had died,the car could not be recognized what type of car it had been, but surprisingly, the trunk was intact.
The police said there was no way the trunk could have remained intact. To their surprise, inside the trunk was a crate of eggs, none was brokenChristine Hewitt (Jamaican Journalist and entertainer)
said the Bible (Word of God) was the worst book ever written.In June 2006 she was found burnt beyond recognition in her motor vehicle.
Many more important people have forgotten that there is no other name that was given so much authority as the name of Jesus.
Many have died, but only Jesus died and rose again, and he is still alive.‘Jesus’
PS: If it was a joke, you would have sent it to everyone.
So are you going to have courage to send this?.I have done my part, Jesus said
‘If you are embarrassed about me,
I will also be embarrassed about you before my father.’
You are my 8 in 8 seconds. I am not breaking this. No way!
I’M TOLD THIS WORKS!!!!! Bishop T.D. Jakes ‘8 Second Prayer.’ Just repeat this prayer and see how God moves!!
‘Lord, I love you and I need you, come into my heart, and bless me, my family, my home, and my friends, in Jesus’ name. Amen.’
Pass this message to 8 people {EXCEPT YOU AND ME}.You will receive a miracle tomorrow. I Hope that you don’t ignore and
let God bless you.
Great ghu, but you mindless Christian fanatics sure are inane. Now stop. Seriously. Your “I’ll pray for you and hope you burn in hell” notes are accomplishing nothing but the further hardening of my black, shriveled heart. I’m becoming convinced that Satan has eaten out your brains.
Gary Silis’ chain letter is soooo true– every single person who has ever blasphemed Zeus is now dead!(or will be soon).
(–Word up to the faithful: Your invisible savior is supposed to be OMNIPOTENT– you can prove your faith by trusting him to fight his own damn battles with lightening or whatever it is deities are using to smite these days. He doesn’t need you running around being a vigilante in his name– right? -that’s the whole point of the omnipotence thing. Duh.)
oooh… can PZ desecrate sacred Mormon under garments next?
#482: the Wandering Jew won’t die, because he’s a favourite NPC of the GM who will only die if and when the GM choses to end the campaign *g*.
Also, to everyone who’s saying that destroying the cracker won’t help the secular cause (what’s that, anyway? I think it’s related to the mysterious gay agenda): don’t be so sure. It may very well plant or nurture the seed of doubt about the all-knowing, all-punishing sky lord. Because I hightly doubt that PZ will be struck by a meteor, or die some other kind of death that can be attributed to the sky lord being angry as heck. Although, of course, thinking about that insane chain letter, people nowadays attribute any kind of death to the workings of him who used to at least do something flashy like smiting, or sending floods, back in the good ol’ biblical times…
“PZ Myers desecrated a cracker, and 40 years later, he died in his bed! See the wrath of GOD, mwahahaha!”
Hey don’t throw it away (Koran), I’ll save the purchase of loo roll for a week at least.
“I shall be very, very cranky”
This is temptation, just to crank up the comments to a thousand. Silly, yes, but such is the internet.
The internet is the single medium that shows how petty we humans are.
If this world is the work of a god, I want to have a talk with him about product liability. Send in the lawyers, drag his, eh, behind into court.
btw, for those that want to play with different fonts (PLEASE, no more Comic Sans!), here’s a decent list that will work with standard style tags and should display on any PC with windows (or a Mac):
http://www.ampsoft.net/webdesign-l/WindowsMacFonts.html
works the same way as any style tag:
p style=”font-family: ‘whatever’;”
like Impact.
or arial black.
or Tahoma.
Christie @ 250
I would gladly contribute money to such an endeavour!
Might as well throw my suggestion in… crackers + moisture + spores + warmth. Something colorful would be nice.
alex #500: gary silis makes his god sound like a serial killer.
God is a serial killer according to the Old Testament. Why people would want to worship a supernatural thug I will never understand.
See if you can get a newspaper in Australia.
BobC,
//Why people would want to worship a supernatural thug I will never understand.//
But he loves you !
I would gladly contribute money to such an endeavour!
F*ck
Off
Ratzy
I can haz $ now?
ok, maybe that was a bit over the top.
But it wasn’t IN the NYT Ichthyic!
I’ll go as low as Variety, but that’s as bargain-basement as we go, OK? ;)
Having perused my copy of ‘The Directory of Saints – a Concise Guide to Patron Saints’, it appears that historically one is far more likely to meet an untimely death if one professes a belief in god than not. In fact, I thought it was a favourite argument of many Christians to exclaim that dying horribly whilst clinging vainly to their beliefs ‘proved’ god was real. Once more, dear friends, all aboard the hypocrisy wagon…
p.s. St.Fiacre; patron saint invoked against hemorrhoids and syphilis. Truly a saint for every occassion. hahahahah.
The unspoken wish is for terrible harm to come to PZ.
Coming from good Christians who believe in and consistently babble about eternal torture for violating arbitrary rules? I would never guess that there’s any desire for others to be harmed coming from any of these folks.
This is insane. Have you learned nothing? We will not let up, shut up, or go away until disciplinary action is attained. By the way, go ahead and send me to the dungeon and show how much you REALLY believe in free speech. You liberals are all the same. An old professor I had a few years ago once said “Behind every liberal there lies hidden a tyrant.” You and your followers have proven him right. Anyway, the point is this will not go away any time soon and you continue to be an embarrassment to your profession and university.
Someone who says “it’s just a cracker” versus people actively attempting to take away someone’s livelihood for saying, “It’s just a cracker” and saying he will treat it as such.
Who is the totalitarian here? It sounds like the people trying to get someone fired for a thought crime.
I’ll go as low as Variety, but that’s as bargain-basement as we go, OK? ;)
Oh, I just make the ads.
placement is your responsibility.
:p
Who is the totalitarian here? It sounds like the people trying to get someone fired for a thought crime.
projection is such a great defense, though.
I mean, it must be, since there has been an near endless usage of it by the godbotherers.
Perhaps if I pray hard enough, I can get it written in the sky for free?
Posted by: Ichthyic | July 21, 2008 4:35 AM
Considering I’m reading that as an HTML rookie, I really think a small part of my brain just exploded…
Perhaps if I pray hard enough, I can get it written in the sky for free?
Why do you hate American business so much you wouldn’t pay for the privilege of having your ad placed in a newspaper?
communist.
:p
Send in the lawyers, drag his, eh, behind into court.
Afraid of god sass?
Guys,we keep going like this we never make it to 1000 posts,this thread is dead,any catholics want to show us some lovin’,or make some revolutionary new statement,like,please dont desecrate our cracker,because its the body of our skyfairy? Anyone,anything?
Considering I’m reading that as an HTML rookie, I really think a small part of my brain just exploded…
last post, and then I gotta get some sleep:
http://www.w3schools.com/css/css_reference.asp
scroll along the side to see the links under “CSS basic”, and click any link there to get simple instructions, and interactive samples to play with.
it’s not hard, really.
CSS background will give you all you need to know about placing images in the background
and
CSS font will do the same for modifying fonts in your comments.
I have no idea what sciblogs will think, but this place could use more color, especially given how long the comments sections typically run.
might as well have a little fun.
Perhaps if I pray hard enough, I can get it written in the sky for free?
I’d suggest testing the theory emperically, except that as far as I can tell, the alogrithm for prayer goes like this: Pray and whatever you pray for happens–yay, prayer works! Pray and whatever you pray for doesn’t happen–it’s your own fault for not praying hard enough or being truly faithful. Or god said no. In any case, it’s your fault for being insufficiently sincere or hardworking or for asking for something so goofy or so bad for you that god has to refuse. Since I don’t like to advise people to do things that are going to make them feel worse, I can’t recommend you test your pray-for-skywriting theory.
“Afraid of god sass?”
I laugh at his omnipotence, smirk at his omniscience but thread very carefully when it comes to go dsass.
My son’s school had a competition wherein the students tried to design a packaging that would allow them to throw an egg off the roof and not have it crack on the concrete two stories down.
If only I’d thought to provide him with a blessed cracker to protect his egg!
Since a picture speaks a thousand words, here’s the inimitable Rudis Muiznieks
http://cectic.com/138.html
The man himself @263: –
If I can have one wish granted by the godless critics on these threads, it is that you get a sense of perspective. No one’s ass is being kicked.
IT’S A CRACKER.
I think that point has been made, and understood. (For the record, that ass-kicking was a metaphor introduced by they guy I was talking to, who accused me of kissing religious bigots’ asses. No-one’s ass is being kissed either.)
But a photo of my wife is JUST A PIECE OF PAPER, isn’t it? All the same, if someone obtained one through dishonest means, and then wiped their butt on it, I’d be pretty pissed off. Why? Because they’re sending me a message, which says “FUCK YOU”. And that’s exactly the message Catholics/Muslims will receive from your stunt, however irrational you may think it is.
Now, in general, I’m not particularly bothered about offending religious sensibilities – when it’s necessary to advance an argument, or have a little fun at their expense, or whatever. But in this case, it’s just sheer spite: you’re going to *majorly* piss people off, for no reasona t all, other just for the sake of pissing them off.
Given that creating an irrational, angry, siege-mentality is the primary tactic of the Donahue-crowd, what you’re planning is only going to be counterproductive.
Dianne @ 526
oh, yeah.
bugger!
;)
So, let’s see if I understand Gary Silis correctly: God is a disproportionately cruel, petty, vindictive, egomaniacal prick. Surely that would encourage any person of average moral intelligence to revile and condemn him rather than praise and worship him?
Aw. We failed.
Bad.
Ally, there’s no possible comparison between a photo of your wife (which has personal value to you, and about which you make no claims except that it is a photo of your wife) and a cracker (they’re mass-produced, muttered over en masse, and some people are claiming that they’re actually godflesh).
If you produced a picture of your wife and tried to insist that is was in fact a picture of MY wife, and I should replace actual pictures of my wife with yours because yours is the One True Wifepicture- well, then your pictures might be in for a little desecration.
Reverent Agnostics Unite!
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/a_j_jacobs_year_of_living_biblically.html
How is “desecrating” a communion wafer challenging superstitious nonsense? It’s a childlish provocation, nothing more. It is not helping Atheists – it is preaching to the choir.
…
How is this not offensive again?
Why don’t you just burn a cross, PZ?
It’s just a frackin’ piece of wood!
No, you wouldn’t do that, because the symbolism is clear. Why would you treat a Koran or a communion wafer any differently? Obviously, you don’t understand the symbolism of your actions.
Hey, don’t piss off God the Godfather, bad things happen.
In fact, Ally, why not try a little test? Print out a thousand little photos of your wife. Go round town telling people that your wife is the most beautiful woman in the world and everyone should have a photo of her. If anyone discards one of the photos you gave them, attack them physically and threaten to sue them for their hateful disrespect for your deeply held beliefs. Let us know how you get on.
Ally McBeelzebub writes
“But a photo of my wife is JUST A PIECE OF PAPER, isn’t it? All the same, if someone obtained one through dishonest means, and then wiped their butt on it, I’d be pretty pissed off. Why? Because they’re sending me a message, which says “FUCK YOU”. And that’s exactly the message Catholics/Muslims will receive from your stunt, however irrational you may think it is.”
It is indeed just a piece of paper and the cracker is also a representative in that way. However, you DO NOT,I would assume, believe the photo of your wife to BE your wife. If you did we would be justified in considering you in need of help to deal with your delusion.
Nor do I believe you freely give away pictures of your wife with the assumption that you are legally in control of that copy of your wife’s image and would physically assault a person on the basis of wishing to show another person that picture. And would you utter death threats to a person based on them showing it to another or seriously consider having them killed or plead to have them lose their livelihood?
It is not a very good analogy based on the facts of the matter I think.
Ally McBeelzebub:
Apparently, not yet universally understood.
Sigh.
You are right szkott. Just like the burning cross on the lawn of minorities in this country, the catholic wafer is also a sign of exclusion and superstition. And it can be followed by violence. Better get rid of both, the superstitious cracker and the burning cross. Toss them both in the trash like they belong (or at least recycle).
Of course. Because there’s a long history Christians having to witness communion wafers being toasted with smiley faces before they were murdered. Just like burning crosses. (Holy shit this one is stupid.)
Eh.
Personally I don’t think the Koran should be involved this time. This was about the Catholics’ physical force and threats against the student. The Muslims didn’t really do anything special to get themselves involved this time, and it seems more fair to keep them out of it, at this particular moment.
PZ Myers:
Now therefore, O readers, be wise
Be warned, O readers of Pharyngula
Serve the Myers with awe and rejoice with laughter
Comment less or he’ll be angry and you will perish in the way
For his wrath is quickly kindled.
Posted by: daenku32 | July 21, 2008 8:07 AM
[sniff]…Anyone else smell that in here? It has the faintest odor of sockpuppet…
Better get rid of both, the superstitious cracker and the burning cross. Toss them both in the trash like they belong (or at least recycle).
I hope you have a fire extinguisher near the wastebasket. This is a hazardous metaphor.
And ya know what? That poor kid at UCF will prolly get tossed out of school because his acted showed just how loony the Catholics really are. He is going to be impeached by the student senate.
http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/news_education_edblog/2008/07/ucf-student-who.html
Heretic! [Or “Splitter!” ;-)] It’s 23/7/2008 for those belonging to the original tradition (mother country or fatherlands or whatever) and 20080723 for those few of us who are sensible enough to have abandoned such antiquated and backwards religioid date practices. Unfortunately, there still isn’t a good T=0 – just various bad ones.
brokensoldier,
Get you sarcasm detector rechecked.
This whole idea is obviously inspired by hate, not by any notion that what they are doing with their symbols is superstitious. This is one of the dumbest things I’ve ever seen. Proves nothing, helps no one.
Experiment:
1) replace “cracker” with “piece of cloth” and propose burning the American flag.
2) replace “cracker” with “piece of cardboard” and propose burning a life-sized photo of Martin Luther King Jr. in effigy, but try to explain that it has nothing to with blacks – just tell them you’re trying to make a point, all in the name of Science, i.e.: a cardboard image of someone is not really that person.
It’s hatred on your part, PZ, pure and simple. “Desecrating” the above items will hurt no one, but you’ll get death threats just the same as if you had “desecrated” a “holy” symbol.
It doesn’t matter whether you “desecrate” a communion wafer, the Koran or the American flag, the message is the same; YOU are saying in effect: “I hate you” to the people who value that symbol and what it represents.
Besides, religious people aren’t the only ones with irrational beliefs. Grow up.
Seems to me that pasta desecration would be its own punishment. Because then you’ve gotta eat inferior pasta. Blech! (Clearly this is proof of the validity of Pastafarianism!)
I know I’m only contributing to the noise now, but I still want to comment in the hopes that someone might notice. I have perhaps a radical suggestion as to what to do with the “holy” items.
Throw them out with the regular trash.
Now, I’m not saying you should do this out of some sort of respect to the crazies. Fuck them. I’m saying this because to do anything more would be supporting the irrational claim that this book and these wafers are anything special. They are a trashy book and stale crackers. What would you do with them otherwise? Probably, you’d toss them in the garbage and not think twice about them (maybe recycling the book). Any sort of “desecration” turns the whole process (of what should be throwing out the rubbish) into some sort of ritual. It makes this specific trashy book and these specific stale crackers special – that they need to be thrown out in a special way. Shouldn’t we be avoiding that?
Oh kewl, the cracker exercise will take place on Wotan’s Day, in the month of Julius Caeser.
And to encourage the heresy and splitting, the date will be 23/07/2008 or possibly 20 Rajab 1429.
Pax Nabisco
If you repeat Cheez-Its over and over you’ll hear the name of God. Does that make them holier than Wheat Thins?
If you can find someone who believes that the USA actually IS the flag, or that a picture of MLK actually IS MLK, then we can desecrate those images too in order to prove they’re wrong.
The message here is not hate, it’s ridicule and mockery.
The essential problem is that people are still expecting their beliefs to be respected in proportion to the emotional intensity with which they are purportedly held.
Congratulations, you’ve successfully determined that the symbolism of an action is dependent on the context in which it takes place. Now all you have to do is go one step further and look at the actual context in this case, and you might just get the point.
And, easily as importantly, is a T-wafer a boson or a fermion. Can it be host to more than one god of the same quantum state at the same time, eg Jesus and Elvis (given an earlier suggestion of re-transubstantiation)? Does it transmute to further states under repeated Catholic spin operations, or revert to its original state just as if it were de-consecrated? PZ may have to call in Phil and the physicists for help in answering all these tricky theological questions.
I disagree, it is still an act of hatred and I find it personally offensive.
If PZ desecrates a wafer or a Koran that’s his right and I would hope that it holds under the first ammendment. However, the message is still hate.
(The burning cross bit was over the top, I agree. But how else will this get to 1000?)
I hate to add to the swelling thread, but Cazuza died of pneumonia as a decorrence of being infected with AIDS. He was perhaps the first brazilian famoust artist to come out and admit he had the disease, and therefore did a great deal in making people aware of its existence and how it was transmitted.
Also, he was not an atheist, not by a long shot. He was a colorful deist at most, and his act of puffing smoke at god was clearly in the same spirit as one would dedicate a sip of wine or a good meal to a deity, and very in line his Cazuza’s openly hedonistic worldview.
Does anyone know of any places on the web for authentic dialogue? If so, let me know here.
This campaign of “ridicule and mockery”, as it’s been called, is not going to help anything. It is not effective at changing the minds of religious believers. It’s tribalism, plain and simple. You people enjoy feeling superior and denigrating others. That’s all there is to it. Don’t try to justify this cracker affair with lame excuses about how PZ “has to do it”.
I’ve been trying to get a good metaphor going about the Holocaust, but haven’t found one yet. A little help?
szkott, besides the massive analogy fail, you are delusional. Do black people claim that cardboard cutouts of MLK are actually MLK?
“Desecration” does not say “I hate you”, the gesture says “I disrespect your loony beliefs”. Nothing is sacred, asswipe.
Hate takes much more effort than disdain, and really, I for one am too lazy to hate whole groups of people. My hatred must be individually earned. Better focus that way.
I will burn my American Flag as soon as it is outlawed to do so, because I love the America I grew up with, not a fascist dictatorship that orders me about.
For people saying “Oh no, please don’t hurt their feelings, PZ”, I haven’t seen this discussed in a while, so I’ll bring it up again.
Many problems require multiple techniques to resolve them. Would modern evo-devo research be possible without the ability to decode gene sequences? Would they be possible without statistics? Kind of need both, eh?
How about diplomacy, is there a one-size-fits-all approach? Prayer no! Diplomacy in particular requires multiple contradictory approaches – saber-rattling, siddown and talk nice, economic pressures, propoganda, covert actions, blah de blah.
So can we at least agree that some people believe in being respectful to religions is the way to go, and others believe in-your-face confrontation has an important role as well? PZ even discussed this in a post, which I don’t care to dig up (desecrating its grave and all), that a multi-pronged path is best. There is certainly a role for quiet discussion, for just acting kindly and revealing your atheist mind, for pointing and mocking, and a role for outright confrontation. I happen to agree with this, as I don’t see any one approach reaching or affecting all audiences. So maybe you dislodge some into thinking with quiet chit chat, and allow PZ to try to dislodge unthinkers by showing them the impotence of their god meat.
right on, J #560!
@True Bob
Many problems require multiple techniques to resolve them. Would modern evo-devo research be possible without the ability to decode gene sequences? Would they be possible without statistics? Kind of need both, eh?
wtf?
is that supposed to be relevant?
If accurate, this report surely dispels any notion that the correct course of action here is to sit down and shut up; apparently, the student who accompanied Cook to church is now himself under investigation.
Toilet paper is sacred to me. I hope the all-respecting folk will stop using it to wipe their behinds now, unless it is properly prepared by my instructions.
Who cares about crackers? Heres something truly important,if slightly OT:
Way to get me offended: There is a new Star Trek movie coming out,apparently starring one “Chris Pine” as Captain James T Kirk.Ahem,are you kidding me? Chris who? Captain Kirk? And one “Karl Urban” as Dr Leonard McCoy? What is this,some sick joke? Catholics,explain yourselves !! This is unacceptable !
Whatever PZ does to the wafer and/or Koran will still be an act of hatred in my eyes regardless of the “reason” behind his actions (he’s just rationalizing his actions anyway – it’s all about hate)and I find it personally offensive.
If PZ desecrates a wafer or a Koran that’s his right and I would hope that it holds under the first ammendment. However, the message is still hate.
OK, how about he just wipes his ass with a picture of Jesus? Do you think the response would be any different? No Catholic believes: picture of Christ = Christ (or do they?)
I think it would be quite entertaining to see a recreation of the bullet through apple shot. A super slo-mo video would be the best.
Well, szkott, I thought since you made an analogy, you would understand an analogy. Sorry, my mistake.
Roll up, roll up to the bunko booth. Test your powers of observation, ladies and gentlemen. Here we have two Jesus-crackers and a Mary cracker. Round and round they go. Now, place your bets and find the lady.
“If accurate, this report surely dispels any notion that the correct course of action here is to sit down and shut up; apparently, the student who accompanied Cook to church is now himself under investigation.”
OK? And this is the action? Why doesn’t PZ raise some money from all of us to get that kid a decent attorney?
PZ – it’s a disgrace if you don’t use this forum more wisely.
Throw them out with the regular trash.
There have been a few of us saying exactly that.
However, treating a leftover cracker like a leftover cracker just doesn’t seem dramatic enough for some. Gotta make it a bigger deal by making the leftovers more than leftovers.
And you’re adding what, precisely? There’s no argument here, you’re just baldly asserting your position. You recognize that tribalism is bad, but I can’t help but wonder if you’ve simply ended up joining the ‘tribalism is bad’ tribe, and now enjoy feeling superior to and denigrating those who are less enlightened. It’s a particularly insidious trap, and I’ve seen others fall into it before.
MartinM (#565):
“I tried to look at my class schedule,” Collard said. “There was a hold placed on my account that I couldn’t sign up for classes. I went to the office of Student conduct to see what was going on and they told me Catholic Campus Ministries filed charges against me.”
The Catholics apparently want to be ridiculed.
The crackers are going to get it on Wednesday Catholic assholes.
For abusing one cracker, the Catholic shitheads want two students expelled, and one professor fired.
To any Catholic reading this, go fuck yourself asshole.
“You people enjoy feeling superior and denigrating others. That’s all there is to it. Don’t try to justify this cracker affair with lame excuses about how PZ “has to do it”.
YOu’re right – you got us. We do feel surperior to people who believe that crackers are worth killing people over. And if you think that’s a bad thing, than we’re better than you too.
Feel free to cower before the religious, no one’s stopping you. Some of us won’t. Deal.
You know, I’m a buddhist, that’s my mental affliction. Please make fun of it, wipe your ass with the tipitaka (which I have never read actually), use buddha statues for target practice (as the Taliban did, and they’re welcome to it – have a ball, boys, better than blowing up people) and tell a few good, sarcastic, degrading jokes. I mean, religions are just religions, man-made philosophies in a shiny wrapper. Stick to it if you want and as long as you don’t do idiot stuff that hurts people or other animals, have a nice day.
And if somebody really shits all over your religious stuff, hey, what a great opportunity to practice forgiveness – you should thank that person because now you can score points with the deity of your choosing.
@ true bob “Well, szkott, I thought since you made an analogy, you would understand an analogy. Sorry, my mistake.”
at least my analogy was a little bit related. What did your analogy have to do with civil disobedience or symbolically fighting injustice?
statistics? wtf?
To make this post relevant:
If PZ desecrates a wafer or a Koran that’s his right and I would hope that it holds under the first ammendment. However, the message is still hate.
Get the kid an attorney and stop wasting your time with the cracker. Has the kid contacted the ACLU yet?
Ah, I see I was wrong; you don’t understand context at all. Somebody’s rationalizing here, but I don’t think it’s PZ. If you’re not willing to even consider the possibility that you might be wrong, why are you here? What do you hope to accomplish?
szkott: you have a right to be offended, and everyone else has the right to ignore your silly little opinion. Have a nice day.
Even the ones who think the actions taken are massively out of line? There are criticisms that could be made of Catholics as a group, but I don’t think this is one of them.
I think my assertion was plausible enough. I’m not going to waste time trying to present a rigorous proof, as it will fall on deaf ears anyway.
There are many asymmetries. For instance, I have not devoted a large amount of time to decrying “tribalism”, and I am not making fun of anyone.
szkott:
Who are you to decide how others feel? Fine, you believe that it is an act of hate. You have no evidence that any of us hate anything, but if that makes you feel better, I honestly couldn’t care less.
I really cannot be bothered to explain the rationale for the thousandth time, so you can continue in your delusion. It’s no longer worth the effort if people are simply going to make shit up in their own heads.
You may need to invent some new words to describe acts of murder, rape, genocide, or any kind of violence, though. If desecration is hate, how exactly would you describe those actions?
And therein lies the problem with people who have no sense of proportion. All of a sudden, a cracker takes on the importance of a human life [just as some Catholics have suggested that the Eucharist is as important as a member of their own family].
Now, get writing to Pope Ratzy and tell him how [insert your new word here] he is for helping to cover up the priest rape scandal, as well as indirectly causing the loss of millions of lives because, to the catholic church at least, superstition trumps safe sex and saving human life. Nice.
Then why bother saying it at all?
My mistake. There must be some other J round here who routinely complains of cult-like behaviour and groupthink.
@ MartinM
“Ah, I see I was wrong; you don’t understand context at all. Somebody’s rationalizing here, but I don’t think it’s PZ. If you’re not willing to even consider the possibility that you might be wrong, why are you here? What do you hope to accomplish?”
1000, baby! just trivial pursuits, man.
besides, you people are as easy to get riled up as the evangelists…
By Grabthar’s Hammer, you [the cracker] will be avenged! ;-)
> Hey don’t throw it away (Koran), I’ll save the purchase of loo roll for a week at least.
A guy in Germany got sentenced for this. § 166 of the German penal code says that insulting a religion or “Weltanschauungsgemeinschaft” (ideological community) is punishable when it may provoke a riot that is a danger for public peace and order. Of course, this means that only those religions are protected against libel that are likely to make a lot of fuss if you insult them. Zoroastrians are not protected by this law, because they don`t react violently if you insult them. Scientologists, on the other hand, might be protected – if the judge considers them a proper religion – because they are likely to cause trouble. Muslims are of course very well protected against anything that looks like an insult of their religion. The injustice is obvious: The more quarrelsome you are, the better the law protects your religion.
Well, see, I think you’re wrong. The message(s) of hate are the death-threats sent to PZ over what is, after all, just a cracker.
Now which of the following positions looks more reasonable?
Position a: a cracker is just a cracker and it doesn’t really matter what happens to it.
Position b: a cracker is worth threatening someone’s life over.
Now I would imagine that most reasonable people agree more with position a than with position b, are you with me so far?
And if some reasonable catholic comes along, sees that a lot of his fellow catholics are espousing position b, and this causes him to wonder whether his catholicism might be a mistake, well, isn’t that what PZ is trying to accomplish here?
Heh, heh, heh….I still say PZ hasn’t got the ‘nads to desecrate that “silly” book. He’ll find a way to weasel out of it, and he’ll still be your hero.
You guys are going to look as ridiculous as the Millerites.
Heh, heh, heh….I still say PZ hasn’t got the ‘nads to desecrate that “silly” book.
And this matters, why?
Anxious masculinity much, Clay? Feeling a bit tiny and limp this morning? Gotta talk about someone else’s genitals for a while?
According to some pages online, the whole host desecration thing was started by a red mold that can grow on the things. See if you can get some of them to grow that, and test what species it is. That would be an historically appropriate and biologically relevant way to desecrate them.
Those crackers and those two copies of the Koran are now PZ’s personal property, and he can do whatever he likes to them, including tear them all to shreds. I can go purchase religious symbols and effects from the majority of religions out there, and if I felt like throwing them all through a wood chipper one day and video taping it, I could do so. It wouldn’t make me popular, and my employees and employers might become concerned, but I should still be able to do it in a free country. Personal religious beliefs need to be bigger than the material objects used to symbolize said beliefs. This is only a case of one person who wishes to destroy his own property. Nothing more. You’ll survive.
Then why bother saying it at all?
Because the people who aren’t close-minded will find my initial assertion sensible enough. For them I don’t need to spell out the justification.
My mistake. There must be some other J round here who routinely complains of cult-like behaviour and groupthink.
You mean I’ve complained about cult-like behaviour in several threads. PZ, on the other hand, has blogged about religion for years, and many posters on this site egg him on regularly. Also, unlike them I don’t “point and laugh”.
P.Z. are you done milking this issue for all it’s worth? Talk about a drama whore. Sheesh.
The message here is not hate, it’s ridicule and mockery.
Then I suggest you find a better method to communicate the message you want, because that is categorically *not* the interpretation that this is going to receive.
I do believe that Clay has just volunteered to desecrate the Koran, himself. Congratulations, and do make sure that you keep a record of it.
I mean, you would say what you just have without also have the ‘nads, would you?
I think the cracker and Koran should get a George Goble style barbecue treatment. For those that don’t recall, Goble is the one who ignited the briquettes in a grill in under 3 seconds using liquid oxygen a decade or so ago.
The fact is, if PZ is doing this out of solidarity for the boy, then I applaud him. I think I may have been misunderstanding his actions here. The whole thing with the Koran threw me. He should just stick to the wafer so that his message is clear: this kid shouldn’t get thrown out of school or get death threats for “desecrating” a wafer and he’s desecrating a wafer out of solidarity. A wafer is less important than this kid’s life.
And help get the kid an attorney.
I apologize for my previous posts. Sorry, if I was hot-headed and used bad metaphors – It was part devil’s advocate, part serious.
Ichthyic @432
As a Heathen (look it up), I do not have the faintest issue with someone taking a Thor’s hammer and desecrating it. It is just a symbol and my religion is not threatened by it. Not all religions are as fragile as Catholicism and Islam…..
I do believe that Clay has just volunteered to desecrate the Koran, himself. Congratulations, and do make sure that you keep a record of it.
I mean, you would say what you just have without also have the ‘nads, would you?
Posted by: Damian | July 21, 2008 9:51 AM
Well, Damian, I don’t recall ever boasting, privately or publicly, that I would do such a thing.
There’s and old saying: “put up, or shut up”.
THAT’S why it “matters”, MAJeff.
The message here is solidarity. (I hope)
Leave the Koran out of this for the moment. This kid’s life is more important than ideology.
Actually, what I was asking about mattering was your opinion on PZ’s nads.
That matters, why?
Sorry, MAJeff. It’s what is known as an, “expression”. I forgout you guys don’t use those around here.
I guess I could have said “guts”, or “courage”.
I think it’s important to remember the context of PZ’s plan. All of this started in response to an event not so long ago in which a student who took a Eucharist out of mass managed to provoke hysteria from the Catholic world. By taking a cracker, Webster Cook was accused of sacrilege, kidnapping, disrupting an entire community, and hate speech. This absurdity is where the “It’s just a cracker” argument is coming from. That’s why I think that comparing this to saying “it’s just a piece of cloth” in order to justify flag burning isn’t a fair comparison. There’s more to it than just trying to make people angry. PZ didn’t wake up one day and decide to start insulting people by destroying pastries – he’s trying to make a point.
‘nads? Is this Beavis and Butthead now?
Aden @606
I get that, but look:
(a) that point is going to be totally lost under the act itself;
(b) why not protest in a way which moderate Catholics (hey, they exist!) can agree with, and join in? This act makes no distinction between the real scumbags who send death-threats, and decent Catholics who agree that the reaction to Cook was appalling. Why piss them off too?
I mean, I could wipe my ass on a US flag in the context of the Iraq war, or something. But would that make it less offensive to ordinary peaceable Americans?
That’s an easy one. It’s the same as the sycophants of a bully who are hoping by their sycophancy not to be among the bullied; and the same as abused children who cling preferentially to the abusive parent.
@ Ichthyic #512: Don’t encourage him. There might be altar boys nearby.
‘nads? Is this Beavis and Butthead now?
Posted by: Kerlyssa | July 21, 2008 10:12 AM
Nah, Kerlyssa…I think “Cephalopod Sex” might be a bit over B & B’s heads.
Not quite at 1000, are we?
Having taken that one extra step into the room, I can declare that it was PZ in the study with the lead piping.
@608
They shouldn’t be pissed off unless they expect us to treat their sacred cracker as sacred. They have no right to expect that. That’s what freedom of religion means. That’s the whole point. If they are pissed off, then they are guilty of what the protest is against.
It’s a sad state of affairs when the symbol is more important than what it stands for.
@#606
you’re totally right. That’s why I think it’s important to drop the Koran. Religion isn’t the deeper issue here – it’s injustice. The people from the church are using “hate” as an excuse to cry witch.
His actions shouldn’t be construed as so heinous as to get him and his friend thrown out of school! Isn’t there something about intent? Athough, he did actually plan to steal the cracker, right? hmmm.
Still, I think his actions were innocent enough, so they should just make him apologize and never be allowed to go inside the church again.
Shall we send PZ a copy of the Torah too while we’re at it? :P He’ll have it all, the cracker, the koran, the torah… Maybe we oughta also give him a toy UFO to destroy, just to be offensive to Raelians as well. Why do we always forget the Raelians?! They’re on the same level as the others too!
szkott said, “…they should just make him apologize and never be allowed to go inside the church again.”
Can I get that punishment?
And do you not see how utterly ironic this statement is?
@AgnoAtheist
Not excommunication! I didn’t mean that, I just meant that particular church.
Actually:
Can’t he just confess? It’s the Catholic Church for God’s Sake! Why can’t they FORGIVE him? Talk about hypocrisy.
Hey, that’s good, Kobra @ #611!
Now, let’s see your FY Koran.
(And then, let’s take bets on how long PZ leaves it up!)
Good times.
Someone needs to organize a rally in Orlando: Big signs that say “FORGIVE!” and “What would Jesus do?”
PZ said that the desecration would occur on Wednesday, right? Should we all fast for 24 hrs beforehand?
#618:
Why do you assholes automatically say, “Let’s see you say that about the Koran!”?
Do you think I have any reason to post an image that says “Fuck the Koran!” or any reason to be afraid to say it? No, and no.
Yeah, that’s what I thought.
I think it’s also important to note that the equivalent of the Eucharist to Muslims would NOT be the fucking Koran; it would be the boulder they all bow to.
Messing with the Koran at this point would be hate, because no “higher purpose” would be involved in its desecration. Same goes for the Torah and the Star Wars memorabilia.
If any of you PZians are still harboring some hope, let me put an end to your angst. Yes, children, you’ve been punk’d.
PZ will set fire to his own hair before he so much as looks at those hosts cross-eyed. Why, you wonder?
Well it’s simple, children.
PZ would lose his job. And the pickin’s for extremely untalented, big mouthed, kooks looking to land comfy teaching jobs are, well, very limited these days.
But don’t despair PZians…let not your hearts be troubled! Just as sure as PZ will never desecrate an article of anyone’s faith (yes, you can stop sending Korans too), he will always keep this portal to lunacy open for business…it’s his lifeline, his single claim to fame, and it’s a lot cheaper than the intense psychoanalysis he’d need to settle down to anything approaching normalcy.
So by all means continue to post your spittle flecked amphigory, your artfully crafted photoshop renditions of your hearts desire, let your hatred pour forth from that evacuated space between your ears as the waters poured from Lake Delton.
PZ’s playhouse is open for business.
*laughing*
Ah, Friar J. has blessed once again with his presence.
Interesting concept. I think, Friar Jay, for the greater good of the mankind, your efforts would be better spent telling religionists to keep the ignorant, meddling little fingers out science education.
No, but we we do need more exposure of idiots like her husband who, while hiding behind his wife’s e-skirts, threatened to bash PZ’s brains in if he didn’t resign his position at the University in a timely fashion.
Let me point out, once again, that (to the best of my knowledge) PZ still hasn’t actually done anything. And look at the outpouring of hatred, the shimmering pools of tears, the clicking of claws and the gnashing of teeth, the accusations, the threats, the thousands of comments over something that hasn’t even happened. What does this tell us?
Quoted for truth.
@Kseniya
“Let me point out, once again, that (to the best of my knowledge) PZ still hasn’t actually done anything. And look at the outpouring of hatred, the shimmering pools of tears, the clicking of claws and the gnashing of teeth, the accusations, the threats, the thousands of comments over something that hasn’t even happened. What does this tell us?”
We’re really frackin’ bored and too lazy to start our own blogs.
Let me point out, once again, that (to the best of my knowledge) PZ still hasn’t actually done anything.
Well, it appears he’s opened the mail.
Oy, impeachment in a student government and possible expulsion, thousands of comments, at least one lost job, death threats, extravagant scenarios for “committing sacrilege,” calls to do it to another religion….
…all over some crackers.
Trash day in Morris is Thursday, right?
willitblend.com?
Just sayin’.
@626 And look at the outpouring of hatred, the shimmering pools of tears, the clicking of claws and the gnashing of teeth, the accusations, the threats, the thousands of comments over something that hasn’t even happened. What does this tell us?
That it ISN’T just a frackin’ cracker?
This whole fuss would be very amusing were it not for the fact that it reminds us how many insane people are out there imagining they’re normal.
I love the way PZ is biding his time before actually doing anything to the cracker. It’s fun imagining the superstitious primitives working themselves up into a lather over it. I have this delightful image of PZ posting a picture of himself holding the cracker over a bucket full of something nasty and saying something like “Okay Catholics! Denounce the church’s stance on contraception or the cracker gets it!”
That some people believe it isn’t just a frackin’ cracker and won’t tolerate anyone who does.
That would be the point.
Propositon
A Koran printed on communion wafers. Think of the possibilities.
I’ve been on vacation this past week, blissfully without internet.
Doesn’t seem like much of anything has changed, except a lady lost her job with a flower company due to the ignorance of her deluded husband and we now have pretty pictures and big fonts in the comments.
Unfortunately, no minds have been changed, and little, if anything has been accomplished.
During my vacation, I went with my family to the Kennedy Space Center. It was a wonderful statement about science, technology, and man’s quest for knowledge. And all done, remarkably enough, without apparent divine interference or intervention.
The point is, inflamatory action doesn’t dispell delusions, but education can. Our local school boards have been commandeered by holy rollers. For science education to advance, local school boards must be repopulated with non-delusional thinkers.
LOL, lighten up atheist people.
We, in Ireland, can’t figure out why you are even bothering to hold an election in the United States.
On one side, you have a lawyer, married to a lawyer, running against a lawyer who is married to a lawyer.
On the other side, you have a war hero married to a good looking woman who owns a beer distributorship.
What are you lads thinking over there?
And, I forgot to add, I fully expect it to go sailing by without a second glance …
“The point is, inflamatory action doesn’t dispell delusions, but education can. Our local school boards have been commandeered by holy rollers. For science education to advance, local school boards must be repopulated with non-delusional thinkers.”
Aren’t members of the school board ELECTED? Have you ever heard of George W. Bush? I’m guessing “I’ve been on vacation this past week, blissfully without internet.” was a typo. Shouldn’t it have said: “this past 7 years”?
Sorry, I’m just very cynical – I know you’re right in theory, but what do you do when the majority of people in your neighborhood (State) are religious fanatics?
And how do you propose to do that without pointing out the delusions? Because, sure as shit, anybody who calls a religious belief a delusion is going to get called inflammatory. All you have to do is read this thread to see that.
szkott:
Fair enough. I wouldn’t personally support a random act of desecration, either. Not now, anyway. At the time, and as an act of defiance against the treatment of Webster Cook, I would have. And I realize that conflict makes some people uncomfortable. I am not a particularly offensive person, either, but history is littered with these sort of acts, and it is generally accepted that they have helped to smash down barriers, and to shake people out of their comfort zone. At the very least they create a debate that might not ordinarily happen. If PZ is going to do something now, I would support some sort of scientific experiment.
I think that there are some larger issues involved, as well. Many people — and particularly those who are not religious — don’t realize that religion often leads the believer to “construct” all sorts of cognitive mechanisms that help them to deal with what are some pretty abnormal beliefs. That is why arguing with believers can often be such a difficult and frustrating task. Imagine what it would require for you to sincerely believe that a wafer becomes the flesh of Jesus Christ.
Despite what many people say, most activities that we undertake do not require faith. At least, faith is not the primary mode of thought — a form of rational evaluation is. Just think about your own life. When you attempt to organize something, you do not have faith that it will all run smoothly. You plan, you manage, you are constantly thinking about the most productive way to use your time, etc.
And this leads me to the rationale for, in certain circumstances, behaving provocatively. If, as you may already know, attempting to reason with some believers is a long and ultimately frustrating exercise [note: this is obviously not the case for all, and you wouldn’t expect it to be, but those who do listen to reason won’t generally be too offended by this act, anyway], it may therefore be necessary for something quite drastic to shake their foundations, if you will. And that something is intentionally making people angry. Counter-intuitive, I know, but this is some research about anger:
“Not all the consequences, however, are negative. Deffenbacher, Oetting, Lynch & Morris (1996) reported that sometimes, when a person is angry, a positive consequence can come from it, such as a problem getting resolved.”
It is my own experience that when I am angry at, say, a family member, I cannot help but in the end consider the opposite point of view, even if it is just for a second. It is well known that we lose a certain amount of self control when we become angry, and that is one of the ways that it is possible to “get in to the head” of those who really have constructed a Berlin wall of cognitive mechanisms to help them deal with doubt and attacks on their faith.
It obviously doesn’t happen instantly, but as I am calming down, and while still feeling hurt and offended and all of the symptoms of anger [which are never as “painful” as some make out], I can’t help but wonder: what if I am wrong? And that may be all that is needed. Just a moment of doubt.
This is a risky strategy, to be sure, and there are many other reasons for this particular act, including a show of solidarity, but I thought that I would attempt to defend the idea of sometimes purposefully offending people.
@311 (and others)
Cannibalism is not necessarily a crime in the US. There is no federal law against it and many states have never passed a law against it (probably because it is such a rare event). Usually people who commit cannibalism are prosecuted for murder or, if they didn’t commit murder to obtain the human flesh, desecration of a corpse.
Sorry if others have said this before, but I didn’t read all of the comments
Since when is a threat “nothing”?
When it’s against a cracker.
@damian
Point taken. I started out angry at the whole idea and came around somewhat.
I still think it’s wrong at this point to involve the Koran as it will water-down the effect of his actions, at least regarding his trying to help Benjamin Collard and Webster Cook. Or even make a statement about it, if that’s all he wants to do.
I think he should at least leave the Koran for another time, if he doesn’t want to drop it altogether.
Disclaimer: I haven’t read most of the previous comments.
As a bibliophile, I hate the idea of a book being intentionally damaged, even one whose contents I violently disagree with. Crackers, not so much. But if you do include the Koran, I hope you find a way to deal with it that doesn’t evoke either the specter of book burners, or the horrors of Guantanamo.
I like the idea suggested earlier, of just holding it, pointing to it, and saying it’s full of lies. But that probably wouldn’t work if it’s meant to get the same treatment as the crackers. Just tossing all of it in the garbage is second choice.
Whatever you do, make it funny.
I meant: even if PZ is just trying to make a statement, he would be better off to stick to the wafer only, since he can refer to this specific case of witch hunting.
I wish PZ would expedite whatever he does to the cracker, simply because I want the story to go away. It’s way past its expiration date, at least to my mind.
IOW, if it’s just a cracker it shouldn’t require much time to find something to do with it, rather than stringing the meaningless “threat” along.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
“That it ISN’T just a frackin’ cracker?”
no, it tells me that there are some adult human beings so hopelessly lost of the insanity of religious belief that they would go this far to protect a frakin cracker.
It’s tragic and sad how much they value a frakin cracker over human life.
If you repeat Cheez-Its over and over you’ll hear the name of God.
How did I get involved in this anyway? :-D
What an unusual Amanda. ;-)
Only 500 emails! And with most on the wrong side! PZ’s minions can’t have been properly mobilised in that direction.
I see we’re only at 65% crankyness… but just you wait ’til the West Coast wakes up.
Taking religious (or non-religious) beliefs out of the picture, let’s consider this issue from a different point of view. The issue revolves around a simple lack of respect. The young man who took the so called ‘cracker’ from the church claims he did so because he was rudely treated and man-handled.
So, in other words ‘I did something I shouldn’t have, you over-reacted, and I’m going to retaliate’. This is an extremely childish point of view. Somewhere along the way, this man’s parents failed him by allowing him to enter adult life without the simple skills of how to interact with the world around him
I do not agree with the extremist views that he should be charged with kidnapping or a hate crime. That’s a bit much. If he had desecrated the host, perhaps hate crime would have been a consideration.
No? If a similar desecration of a religious article had been done against a Mosque or Synagogue, I have no doubt that the authorities would have wasted no time in taking the young man into custody and charging him.
In the same way people are protected in expressing their freedom of speech, Catholics (along with other Christian denominations, Jewish, Muslims, Budists, and even Atheists) are granted the freedom to practice the religion they choose.
I find it extremely ironic that many of the commenters are pro-peace, even quoting the likes of John Lennon, but would burn an American Flag or wipe their butt on it to protest a war. What better way to insight anger in your fellow man than to burn a symbol in which he believes. Isn’t that counter intuitive to peace?
Seeing as how Jesus is the ultimate promoter of peace, I also find it ironic that someone claiming to defend the Catholic faith would condone hateful actions, let alone death threats. Perhaps someone needs confession?
Demalien 475,
I think like any good satire, there was always a double entendre in this post, on one hand they’re just crackers but on the other they’re also religious symbols and PZ’s post meant “I don’t intend to offer respect to a worthless religious symbol that has absolutely no meaning to me”.
That’s always how I understood this post, and how I defended it. It’s obviously not the cracker that he’s refusing to respect, that would have no meaning, and for that he wouldn’t need consecrated Eucharists, but it’s the religious symbol.
So the conservative catholic bigots are demanding that he offers respect to that worthless symbol ? Perfect. Let them offer respect to non believers first, people that they have systematically disrespected and offended in the past, instead of continuing to do so and threaten PZ with violent behaviour and ridiculous attempts to go after his job.
#625 Laughin_Guy
Laughin_Guy
Are you The Laughing Man (TLM) from CoFSM?
Your rhetoric sounds much like our beeeluuuvid Laughing Boi.
Remember that Pastafarian girl, that as a 17yo, you had that rather embarrassing crush on?
If so, you’ll be glad to know your presence at CoFSM was sincerely missed. Didn’t we all have so much fun? :) You really should call in if you are TLM because, apparently, according to some of the Pirates, the daffodills are in bloom?
Sorry about rejecting you back then sweetie, it was just….well… you were just a bit too insipid for a Pirate Wench. But I do wish you luck :)
Kisses xxx
Ah, yes. More blaming the victim for not giving into the unreasonable and irrational reaction of those who attacked him. Good for you.
Translation: “that which follows is going to be a vague accusation implicating a whole group of people which I will not indentify so the assertion can’t be challenged.”
Which commenters?
False dilemma.
That the reaction is predictable and expected doesn’t make it rational or reasonable. See Koran Envy.
“Somewhere along the way, this man’s parents failed him by allowing him to enter adult life without the simple skills of how to interact with the world around him”
Wow. Did you hurt your back trying to twist that bit of victim blaming into something sounding sensible?
“What better way to insight anger in your fellow man than to burn a symbol in which he believes. Isn’t that counter intuitive to peace?”
Isn’t threating two people with death counter intuitive to peace?
Oh, right, you don’t care about that. That’s not important. WHat’s important is that someone offended a cracker!
You people scare me. You’re so desensitized to sanity, it’s scary.
Religion is owed no respect. Only tolerance. What’s so hard to understand about that sentiment? Is desecrating a religious symbols, in this case a cracker, intolerant? Nope. Disrespectful? Of course. Whacky religious ideas do not deserve respect… they should be mocked often and loudly.
But, PZ, since Catholics do not claim that anything is supposed to happen when you desecrate the hosts, what exactly is the point of this exercise? It certainly doesn’t seem scientific.
Just as Jesus allowed himself to be put to death on the cross, he will also allow this abuse. It’s basically just another re-enactment of non-believers putting him to the test, as prophesied in Wisdom 2: 17-21
“Let us see whether his words be true; let us find out what will happen to him. For if the just one be the son of God, he will defend him and deliver him from the hand of his foes. With revilement and torture let us put him to the test that we may have proof of his gentleness and try his patience. Let us condemn him to a shameful death; for according to his own words, ‘God will take care of him.’
These were their thoughts, but they erred; for their wickedness blinded them”
We’ll be praying for you, PZ.
Someone in a previous thread said there was a rule in linguistics that says “Everything before the ‘but’ is bullshit” (eg “I’m not a racist, but …”).
tsg’s corollary to that rule is “Everything after the ‘I find it interesting/amusing/ironic/etc'” is meaningless.
Dave Mueller,
Fuck you very much, too.
If nothing is supposed to happen, why should Catholics become upset?
Alanis, is that you?
@Ally(608):
My first thought was that if something is offensive, it would also be more effective at making a point, because it would get a lot of attention (as this has certainly done). But you’re right, even moderate Catholics would probably be so offended that they would miss the point trying to be made. I think comments made on this blog (by both sides of this issue) show how many people have missed the point of all this.
In fact, the Koran bit has me wondering a little if even PZ has lost sight of the original point? I can’t say I blame him, after being bombarded by hate mail and death threats. I really think the Koran should be left out of this. Maybe mention it, or denounce it or something, but nothing too nasty. This is supposed to be a demonstration against a very specific incident, not a religion-bashing free-for-all.
So, is there an effective, but inoffensive way to protest against this cracker nonsense? Or should we just do whatever it takes to demonstrate our opinions? I’m personally undecided, but I’m very interested in seeing what PZ ends up doing.
Thanks for nothing.
I never cease to be amazed by the stupidity of audaciousness of Evangelical Christians.
There were a few comments in here that pissed me off, but I’ll ignore them, because they don’t really speak to anything intelligent or logical or interesting.
Glen D-
As stale as those crackers usually are, it is obvious that they do not have any expiration date.
“We’ll be praying for you, PZ.”
Okay, I’m going to ask this again – why do you people insist on telling us you talk to yourselves? Why do you think we care you’re going to talk to yourself about PZ? Loonies.
The point trying to be made is that no one has the right to demand or even expect anyone else to treat their religious symbols as sacred. If the “moderate” Catholics are offended, then they are guilty of it, too.
The reason for including the Koran is the ubiquitous implications that he wouldn’t desecrate it for fear of the response of Muslims. I think it’s pretty pointless: a) he does criticize the Koran so the claim is unfounded and b) even if he is afraid of the response, it doesn’t make the response rational or reasonable, let alone right. Personally, I would leave the Koran out of it, but I understand why he’s doing it.
Their offense is precisely the issue. It is the result of their own intolerance of others not believing what they do. You can’t fight intolerance without exposing it and calling it what it is.
#662, “If nothing is supposed to happen, why should Catholics become upset?”
Well, nothing is supposed to happen that is measurable by science, at any rate. You are assuming that Jesus is just like a normal human being, who would defend himself if possible from any attack. Just as he didn’t defend himself from crucifixion, he will do nothing to defend himself here either.
The upsettedness is because PZ is taking our most sacred object and attacking it. As far as we can tell, this is out of sheer hate (because there is no other rational reason to steal a Host and do whatever PZ is intending to do to it)
Satanists also steal hosts because they hate them, and do terrible things to them. The only difference is that they actually believe Catholic teaching, but they hate it.
Perhaps, however, it is out of a misunderstanding, and PZ thinks that according to Catholic teaching, something bad will happen to the Host when he desecrates it. In point of fact, nothing will happen according to Catholic teaching, except that PZ will damage his own soul.
Lin Chi Zen Master said, “If you meet the Buddha, kill the Buddha. If you meet a Patriarch, kill the Patriarch.”
http://www.kwanumzen.com/pzc/newsletter/v09n10-1997-oct.html
PZ, thank you for helping kill the Buddha. OK, it’s out of context, but I’d like to think he would approve!
Jesus WHO?
I thought you were talking about my boyfriend Brian…
That’s because you haven’t been paying attention.
szcott:
You know perfectly well what I meant. But on the off chance that you (or any of our readers) really are that dense, let me qualify: He hasn’t yet done anything to a consecrated communion wafer. I hope that’s clear enough.
Mr. Franklin: The Kennedy Space Center is great. I tend to agree with your stance on education vs. inflammatory acts, and I don’t advocate the threatened desecration either, but szcott does have a point: Education has failed, to an extent, because those with an anti-education agenda have been more active and passionate about keeping their children in the dark. Not to mention that the KSC has been there since long before many of us were born, and yet as a culture we seem to be moving away from rationality, back towards superstition. So what is it that isn’t working?
Reality-based variations on a religious theme:
In point of
factmedieval superstition, nothing will happen according to Catholic teaching, except that PZ will damage his own soul.In point of
factNew-Age superstition, nothing will happenaccording to Catholic teaching, except that PZ will damage his ownsoulKirlian aura.In point of fact, nothing will happen according to Catholic teaching.
In point of fact, nothing will happen.
Mueller, Mueller?
In fact, nothing whatsoever will happen. He knows nothing “bad” will happen. No hail of flaming toads, no pestilence, no earthquakes, no halting of the sun, etc. It is just a cracker*.
And what do you mean with the word “soul”? It’s a meaningless construct.
*Really? You’re most sacred object?
This goddamned cracker is so stale, it has broken down into crumbs and blown away in the wind.
Perhaps, however, it is out of a misunderstanding, and PZ thinks that according to Catholic teaching, something bad will happen to the Host when he desecrates it.
Posted by: Dave Mueller
Dave, what it is you cannot understand. PZ is an atheist. He does not believe in the existence of a big sky daddy. So how can he think he is harming the big sky daddy by harming the cracker.
The hole in your head is so wide, the cracker crumbs are blowing through.
Mr. Mueller,
PZ has stated that he would not desecrate (whatever that means) the cracker if the church would back off its persecution of Mr. Cook. Instead of pleading to PZ, why not contact the leader of the Catholics in the central Florida area and talk to him about stopping the harassment of Mr. Cook. The ball is in your court.
Which is a big fat nothing because there are no such things as souls anyway. Meanwhile and in telling contrast, all the violent religionists are busy damaging their own humanity – which is a very real thing (assuming they actually had much of it left before this round of death threats and hypocrisy etc from them).
Please stop it with the images.
#673, tsg,
“that’s because you haven’t been paying attention”
Why don’t you fill me in then? Since Catholic theology and PZ Myers agree that nothing will happen when the host is desecrated, what exactly is the purpose of it?
#670 “PZ thinks that according to Catholic teaching, something bad will happen to the Host when he desecrates it. ”
I think PZ’s words were something along the lines of “its a fucking cracker.” I wouldn’t put words in his mouth but I think that statement says something to quite the contrary of what you’re crediting to PZ. As just a cracker, it will not do anything other than behave like a cracker. This includes functioning like a jesus re-death ray. Well and get him death threats from good christian people.
Not that you have any intention of understanding it, but here goes: to expose intolerance.
Oh come on #679….out of thousands of E-mails from Catholics, PZ got a handful of “death threats”, which he obviously isn’t concerned about much, or he’d be in hiding if he had any sense.
Of course normal Catholics deplore the death threats. That is just stupid, as well as being a serious sin for the one who does it. We agree on that part, so let’s drop that issue.
PZ’s actions were inflammatory and made us angry and/or upset. A limited few of the angry people who are mentally unstable made threats. I don’t think any group should be judged by the conduct of their worst members.
Satanists also steal hosts because they hate them, and do terrible things to them.
Prove that this is actually happening anywhere outside of your puny, feverish mind.
except that PZ will damage his own soul.
And if there actually was such a thing as a “soul”, that would mean something.
The entire problem is that you are so far into the loonie bin and beyond that you can not see the lunacy of having a magic cookie being “your most sacred object”, and that scares the crap out of rational people.
Yeah, the images could get annoying fast. Please, voluntarily restrict yourself to something small — like a postage stamp.
The option to permit various kinds of html in the comments is entirely under my control, not Seed’s. That means that if I get annoyed, I’ll simply go into the MT control panel and edit a few things and poof, they go away. Unfortunately, all of the style stuff goes away at the same time.
That you got angry and/or upset is what makes you intolerant.
tsg,
“to expose intolerance”
…Could you clarify?
Nemo #646
As a bibliophile, I hate the idea of a book being intentionally damaged, even one whose contents I violently disagree with.
Oh, please. It’s not like he’s burning every single copy of the Koran that he can get his hands on. It’s the information contained in the book that has value (if for nothing else, a historical and psychological analysis of the people who wrote it), not the physical pages themselves. The information won’t be lost. The Koran is available online, as are 50 versions of the Bible.
Have done, several times. If you had any real interest in knowing you could find out just by reading this thread.
“The upsettedness is because PZ is taking our most sacred object and attacking it. As far as we can tell, this is out of sheer hate (because there is no other rational reason to steal a Host and do whatever PZ is intending to do to it)”
So you react by calling for his death.
You. People. Scare. Me.
“PZ’s actions were inflammatory and made us angry and/or upset. A limited few of the angry people who are mentally unstable made threats. I don’t think any group should be judged by the conduct of their worst members.”
Riiiiiight because coming here to whine about how your crackers were offended while shrugging off the death threats isn’t at all par for the course with you lunatics.
If nothing happens, then why do you care Mueller?
PZ wrote:
The option to permit various kinds of html in the comments is entirely under my control, not Seed’s.
It’s also a security risk if you allow iframes or images. See cross-site scripting.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-site_scripting
I’ll tell you why P.Z. won’t “descrate” the Koran. Because doing so could literally be construed as endangering the entire student population at his little community college. How long you think his bosses would tolerate that?
Now, what would be even funnier, is if he were to put a post up of a caricature of Mohammed made with dog turds!
Uh, nope…come to think of it, that one probably wouldn’t go over too well either. Even though it’s just dog turds.
Oh, the suspense is just killing me.
tsg,
So we shouldn’t be upset or angry when people come in to our religious services and are duplicitous by taking the Body of Christ?
Firstly, to receive the Host, one must signify that they are Catholic and believe the Catholic teaching by saying “Amen”. So in order to obtain a host to desecrate, one must lie. It is also a rule that the host must be consumed immediately.
While someone may not know that rule, it is to be expected that they would comply once it is pointed out to them. So exactly why is it intolerant to expect people to be honest?
I don’t have a postage stamp picture (nor a cracker!). I could manage an envelope one or a grinch or various other stuff but the pharyngulite horde would probably eat up my entire bandwidth allowance in one go.
Then again there’s: *
Good news, Clay. So die and get your cheeses, already.
In fact that’s why BBcode was invented: it gives you the basic ability to format text, post images, and provide links, without handing over all the power of html to random internet goons.
Ichthyic #457,
We apparently don’t have the same idea how this affair can still be exploited and how the Overton window could be moved in a much more efficent way in our favour.
I found for instance PZ’s proposal to return the Eucharists if the Catholic Church were to dissavowe Bill Donohue a very clever move, and a much more efficient “poke” than actually going ahead and showing an act of desecration by showing some crackers in a trashcan (without forgetting to mention that they’re consecrated Eucharists, otherwise nonbody would pay any attention).
Why not first make sure that this proposal gets printed in some article and that Donowhore reacts stupidly on it ?
I wouldn’t even be surprised if in the end, it’s actually Donowhore who ends up demanding that PZ desecrates the Eucharists to call his bluff.
I agree that minor pokes is what’s needed, and will be way more efficient than an actual act of desecration, at least as long as it’s not needed.
I still think this has the potential to get PZ on national TV to expose much more efficiently the intolerance and violent behaviour of these conservative catholic bigots and to make it a case of civil liberties for non believers.
In brief, I see no good reason to change horses for the time being. When you’ve found a good one, keep riding it.
No, you shouldn’t.
No, it shouldn’t be expected, and that’s the point. It’s your rule based on nothing but your belief. It doesn’t apply to anyone else and asserting that it should is intolerant.
If PZ desecrates a wafer and a Koran, he will likely find himself on Fox News, characterized like that Native American professor who was misquoted as saying American deserved to die in the 9/11 attacks.
What was his name?
Hmm… Perhaps one of the following (for those who can see them at all!) could be a “cracker” for the purposes of online “desecration”:
UV ⊕ ⊗
So exactly why is it intolerant to expect people to be honest?
Nice try. It is intolerant to make death threats for stealing a magic cookie. (If that’s your Christ, doesn’t he look a bit flat, small and stale?)
tsg,
OK, obviously we don’t share the same moral code, but I assumed that honesty=good and deliberate lying for one’s own purposes=bad, even for atheists. This is the impression my friends who are atheists have given me, but perhaps I was wrong about that.
I really don’t expect that atheists would respect our beliefs at all, as I don’t respect theirs. However, I WOULD expect them to respect people, regardless of their beliefs, by not trampling on things that are important to others with whom they disagree.
Dave Mueller said
Huh? Amen signifies being Catholic? You mean during all those years of closing prayers with “Amen” in Baptist church I was actually signaling Catholicism to god? Wow, thanks for clearing that up Dave. I’ll have to go to Church with my fundy cousins now to make sure they know they’re showing allegiance to the Whore of Babylon (the RCC according to their beliefs) by saying “Amen.” Can’t wait to see how that goes over!
“So we shouldn’t be upset or angry when people come in to our religious services and are duplicitous by taking the Body of Christ?”
Be offended. No one gives a crap. Logically, you shouldn’t be since its just a fraking cracker, but if you really need to believe in your silly little fairy tales, go ahead and be offended. You don’t have a right to be protected from offense. You don’t have the right to silence others. You don’t have a right to threaten death on those who don’t share your cracker worshipping beliefs. This is not complicated.
“Firstly, to receive the Host, one must signify that they are Catholic and believe the Catholic teaching by saying “Amen”. So in order to obtain a host to desecrate, one must lie. It is also a rule that the host must be consumed immediately.”
No matter how much pomp and circumstance surround the cracker, its still just a cracker. Human lives are more important than your cracker worship.
“While someone may not know that rule, it is to be expected that they would comply once it is pointed out to them. So exactly why is it intolerant to expect people to be honest?”
Deliberately dishonest and misleading question. And you know it.
“What was his name?”
LOL, exactly. He’s well on his way toward marginalizing himself. Everyone here thinks this is all super cool but in the mainstream it comes off as a stunt by a nut. He’ll advance his image as a hero to his crowd and as a jackass to everyone else. So it goes.
” However, I WOULD expect them to respect people, regardless of their beliefs, by not trampling on things that are important to others with whom they disagree.”
This coming from the douchebag who brushed off DEATH THREATS as unimportant. Screw you.
Red Herring. It isn’t about honesty. It’s about insisting others believe what you do.
Like issuing death threats against those who don’t believe a cracker is sacred?
#703,
Yes, I agree with you. It is wrong to make death threats, period. 99.99% of Catholics agree with you on this, and the 0.01% who don’t are not following their religion.
Mueller,
How fragile is your god, anyway? Can he not take care of himself? Didn’t he know this was all going to happen? Maybe he wants you to ponder on it more than you have, eh? Maybe it’s an object lesson in tolerance for you.
Who are you to complain about it? Did your god tell you to get your dander up? Or did he go NT on you and say turn the other cheek? I thought your god said not to judge, yet here you are, judging the “hate” in PZ’s heart.
Bummer about the damage your “soul” is taking here.
No True Scotsman.
“Everyone here thinks this is all super cool but in the mainstream it comes off as a stunt by a nut. He’ll advance his image as a hero to his crowd and as a jackass to everyone else. ”
you’re probably right. After all, the majority is “religious” and is so morally depraved that they will consider the objection to death threats and disrespect of cracker magic as worse offense than death threats over crackers.
Sully,
The one’s with shame on their heads are the people and organizations who are persecuting Webster Cook. What are you doing to stop their unchristian acts? Inquiring minds want to know.
I just wanted to add a comment so we can get to 1,000. I’m DYING to see what PZ sounds like when he’s cranky!
Good news, Clay. So die and get your cheeses, already.
Posted by: True Bob | July 21, 2008 1:12 PM
Well, gosh, True Bob. That wasn’t very nice.
I’m not even Catholic….and although I doubt eating the cheese would kill me, being lactose intolerant, I could get a nasty case of the winds.
Ya know, I’d argue that 0.01% are the only True Catholics, since they’re willing to risk death (at Caesar’s hands, no less) for their religion.
I notice he makes no mention of the 99.99% of Catholics (if he’s going to make up statistics, then so am I) who think it’s not intolerant to insist that others treat their cracker as sacred because they believe it is.
I still get a kick out of picturing PZ tying the cracker to a chair (throw in a Koran for good measure, and use that Kabbalah red thread to do the tying), queuing up “Stuck in the Middle with You” on his sound system, and going to town. Maybe he can get Tim Roth to lie on the floor covered in fake blood, watching the proceedings in feigned horror.
True Bob,
I might as well not even respond to you since you aren’t even reading my posts. Most of your questions are answered in there.
BTW, when Jesus said not to judge, he was saying that we should not judge the state of their soul. As far as the hate, well, that is the point under discussion. I am attempting to find out what is motivating him to do that, if not hate.
Look, there are plenty of belief systems I find really silly, but I have never had the inclination to go and harm their sacred objects, this is why I find it very hard to understand. Firstly, it would be disrespectful to those people and uncivil to the extreme. Secondly, since I do not believe in their sacred objects, I would be doing nothing, except pissing them off for the sheer sake of pissing them off.
There is another possibility. At some deep level, I could know that some other belief system was true, but because of other commitments, may not be willing to admit it to myself. I might even hate the fact that it is true. In that case, I might be inclined to desecrate the sacred objects of that belief system.
It is wrong to make death threats, period. 99.99% of Catholics agree with you on this, and the 0.01% who don’t are not following their religion.
No True Scotsman, indeed. I’ll have to point out again that “Catholics” are not some abstract ideal. Catholics are the sum total of the real people who profess to follow the Catholic faith. That includes the bad ones.
You can’t cherry pick. If people are led to do immoral or stupid things (like send death threats) because of their religious beliefs, that’s a problem with the religion as much as the people, because the religion created those enemies for them. Someone with psychological problems would have a hard time finding excuses to act out against others within a Jain religious framework. So the religion matters.
“The one’s with shame on their heads are the people and organizations who are persecuting Webster Cook. What are you doing to stop their unchristian acts? Inquiring minds want to know.”
The Florida kid, right? I don’t read all the posts around here (as there have been gads and gads of them) but I saw through a link above he was impeached by his schools student senate and may or may not be removed. What exactly is it you want done for him?
Mutually exclusive, Dave M. We respect your right (anyone’s right) to believe whatever they want. That does NOT mean we have to respect what they believe. The last clause of what I quoted demands we DO respect your beliefs.
You admit you do not respect your atheist friends’ beliefs,and that you don’t expect us to respect yours. Great, we are in agreement. Do you also understand that we can ridicule your beliefs? It seems to me that you get that pretty clearly, since you came in here to “pray” for us. That’s as patently offensive as if I offered a live human sacrifice to Xipe, on your behalf.
And we want to drag so many of you deluded folks into the 21st century, with the rest of us. Kicking and screaming, if you must, but we pity that your are living in the Bronze Age. Besides, we have flying cars and jet packs and…oh wait, sorry, we only what’s real.
#705, look up “Amen” on wikipedia, dude. It’s an expression of affirmation.
#708, where did I say that the death threats were unimportant? I said they were very bad. However, PZ himself seems not to have taken them too seriously.
Well, as of this writing, we’re 71.9% of the way to one thousand. Way to go people! This is my first comment on Pharyngula regarding Crackergate so I don’t feel guilty about upping the post count.
Well Mueller (we have another Dave around here, nothing personal), have you considered that instead of hate, it might be contempt? Contempt that some fraction think their religious beliefs should be respected by everyone else, and all should hold sacred whatever they consider sacred? That’s the crux of the issue. Catholics want their precious wafer respected as if we all believed it to be carne de cristo*
*h/t BT Murtaugh
However, I WOULD expect them to respect people, regardless of their beliefs, by not trampling on things that are important to others with whom they disagree.
Really? Because teaching the truth of evolution in schools is important to me. Stem cell research is important to me. Sex education is important to me. Contraception is important to me. And the Catholic Church does a damn good job trampling on those things.
That’s the problem. If religious people just got together in the privacy of their own homes and had circle jerks in homage to their gods, I would say more power to you. But they consistently try to push their superstitions on the rest of us. That means their beliefs must be challenged and even ridiculed if they are absurd enough.
True Bob,
Ridicule away! We don’t care; we’re big enough to take it. It doesn’t advance the discussion any, but I probably have ridiculed others beliefs before, and though it’s not productive in the least, I suppose it makes us feel better somehow…
But as far as desecrating the Host, how exactly is that going to drag us into the 21st century? Especially since neither of us expects anything to happen.
I’m glad that you have so much zeal for the cause, and I appreciate you trying to enlighten me (and I’m serious about that). I hope that you won’t get angry, then, when Christians or other religious believers try to share their beliefs with you.
However, I WOULD expect them to respect people, regardless of their beliefs, by not trampling on things that are important to others with whom they disagree.
Hmm.
Do you eat beef?
Do you work on Saturday?
Do you work on Sunday?
Does any woman in your family go out uncovered?
Has there ever been divorce in your family?
You can start with those.
How many of them have you had to financially support? How many of them have tried to have you fired for not following them?
I find the idea of self-deception on that level to be very alien. Apparently you don’t
Yes, the “true” Catholics aren’t sending death threats: they are too busy sharpening their pitch-forks to join Fra Donohue of the Inquisistion on the witch hunt to subject Webster Cook to an auto da fé for the heinous hate crime of “possession of a cracker with no intention of eating it”.
It’s fuckwittery so demented that it would shame a demented fuckwit.
Do you disagree with PZ Myers?
Read this then go fuck yourself: http://www.kobrascorner.com/opine/nothing-is-sacred.php
~ [email protected]
Look, there are plenty of belief systems I find really silly, but I have never had the inclination to go and harm their sacred objects, this is why I find it very hard to understand.
And PZ has been an atheist for a very long time who, until now, hasn’t had that inclination either. You have to understand the context. This is all in response to the absurd reaction among Catholics to Webster cook. Let’s remember, they made a big deal about it first (physically assaulting Cook, according to his story, demanding that the Host be returned, and sending death threats).
The point of the exercise, in my mind, is to challenge the absurd, histrionic reaction of Catholics to offenses against their faith, more than it is about making a point about the Host. Even more, it’s to challenge Bill Donohue. PZ has stated that he would return the wafers to the nearest Catholic church if the Church disowned Donohue.
#705, look up “Amen” on wikipedia, dude. It’s an expression of affirmation.
Gosh, I’ll do just that!
From wikipedia:
“The word Amen (Hebrew: אָמֵן, Standard Amen Tiberian ‘Amen ; Arabic: آمين, ‘Āmīn ; “So be it; truly”[1]) is a declaration of affirmation[2][3] found in the Hebrew Bible and New Testament. ”
“It has been generally adopted in Christian worship as a concluding word for prayers and hymns.”
Huh? Nothing in there about it meaning you’re declaring your allegiance to the Catholic Church.
In context, what you’re agreeing with is that the cracker is literally the body of Jesus. His statement about lying makes sense.
So we shouldn’t be upset or angry when people come in to our religious services and are duplicitous by taking the Body of Christ?
You don’t see Protestants getting all bent out of shape over the idea.
It’s certainly rude and disrespectful to violate the rules of a church service to pull such a stunt. But some churches have so damn many stupid rules they practically beg to be violated. Treating communion wafers as if they were Sacred Objects borders on idolatry.
Neural T,
Actually, to be honest, I don’t much like Donohue, and neither do most Catholics. He does tend to find offense at times where none is warranted. This time, though, I think he was largely right, though he came down too hard on Mr. Cook, I think.
The Church doesn’t really have to disown Donohue, though, since it doesn’t “own” him. His organization is separate from the Catholic Church, and is funded entirely by donations. The organization itself has been a pretty good one, but I do think they need a new leader.
Dave M, please don’t assume that since I am atheist that I am ignorant about religious practices.
You probably missed it above, but my feeling is that in order to get people to consider their beliefs, a number of means are necessary. Some people respond to gentle discourse, some respond to seeing inanity in the actions of others (i.e. the death threats), and some respond to shock. Here, I am backing PZ’s use of shock.
As for hate, I can’t hate by the group. I can only hate individuals. It takes a lot to get me to hate someone, much more likely is disdain or contempt. Hate takes too much energy.
“His organization is separate from the Catholic Church, and is funded entirely by donations.”
This is just the sort of thing that makes that cash register ring too. I’m sure he’s grateful.
Posted by: Dave Mueller
He claims to speak for catholics, and obviously non-Catholics perceive him as having official status. It would go a long way if a bishop clarified that he has no official standing and the Catholic Church does not support his statements. PZ even promised to return the wafers he’s obtained if that happened.
OFFS, please replace my i.e. with e.g.
Some people do seem to take Donohue seriously though.
http://www.catholicleague.org/images/upload/image_200807181917.pdf
We’ll be praying for you are code words that mean ‘fuck you’ or ‘my invisible friend will torture you because you don’t respect my crackers’.
Catholics are loonies, that’s for sure. They can also be called world-class assholes.
For more strong evidence Catholics are assholes, and deserve to be ridiculed, please look at the link provided by MartinM in comment #565.
PZ:
The Christian tradition of martyrdom is different from the Muslim one.
In Christianity, martyrs are people who are persecuted for practicing their faith. They are passive.
In Islam, martyrs are warriors fighting to defend their faith against infidels who may or may not be attacking them.
I doubt that there is much danger of a Christian attacking you physically because of a desecration you commit. However, a small minority of Muslims may feel that it is their duty to their religion to do so.
I hope you will be careful about how you desecrate the Koran, and choose some marginal act that will not greatly inflame believers.
Could you clear something up for me? I’m a little confused. Is a vanilla wafer still a wafer, or is it a cracker now?
If anything, that should make it easy to disown him. But, in fact the Church wants to keep his status grey, so he can do their dirty work for them, but if it gets too much they can simply say, “he doesnt speak for us.”
If Donohue really didnt represent the Church, he would get no press, he would be similar to Fred Phelps, a wackaloon that was paid marginal attention. But that is not the case. He gets a fair bit of attention, because he is seen to represent Catholics in general. And the Catholic Church gets an attack dog that they can distance themselves from at will, “Oh he doesnt really represent us.” Well if he doesnt, then say so, clearly.
If the church wants to hang its hat on the fact that the Magisterium hasnt actually said anything against Cook or PZ or the taking of the cracker, then they should make it very clear that the Magisterium has nothing to do with Donohue and the nutcases making death threats and asking for Cook’s and PZ’ careers. They can do that by the Magisterium disowning Donohue. And as a bonus, PZ said hed give the crackers back if they did. That alone should be reason enough to do it, unless the Magisterium prefer’s to have its attack dog than undesecrated crackers.
Ahh, but he didn’t put it in context. He specifically stated that you’re signifying Catholicism by saying “amen”
Dave didn’t say “by responding to the priest’s statement “the body of christ” with amen, you’re affirming that you believe the host to be the body of christ.” Read his above statement. You’re right that it could be construed as lying, but so what? I know lots of Catholics who don’t believe in transubstantiation, but do it all the time. Lying to the Church, which itself lies constantly, isn’t a big deal to me.
Dave, be more specific.
Group Says it Ordains 3 Women Catholic Priests
They excommunicate a priest solely because of the possessed “divinely designed” plumbing–female reproductive system–but will not officially excommunicate pedophiles or Bill Donohue of the Catholic League. Why should we respect these misogynistic fucktwits!!
These comments are for the moderate Catholics who think the asshole Catholics overreacted to cracker abuse.
There’s nothing moderate about you. If you had any moral values at all, you would throw out your religion to protest Catholic terrorism.
You should throw out your religion anyway because your beliefs are idiotic, childish, and disgusting.
BTW, when Jesus said not to judge, he was saying that we should not judge the state of their soul.
You have no proof that Jesus said that.
Also, there is no such thing as a soul.
Look, there are plenty of belief systems I find really silly
You see how much alike we are? You dismiss all beliefs except your own. I just dismiss one more.
Firstly, it would be disrespectful to those people and uncivil to the extreme.
So the fuck what?
Secondly, since I do not believe in their sacred objects, I would be doing nothing
Except exposing how silly those beliefs are. As has been pointed out to you oodles of times. And you accuse others of not reading your posts?
At some deep level, I could know that some other belief system was true
Oh Jebus Tapdancing Christ, the old “you must be so angry because you’re insecure” gambit. Shove it.
“I agree with Andy and Bevans.
I really think you shouldn’t desecrate that Koran in public. We have proof that Muslims are crazy enough to react very badly to that. It takes only one, and once you’ve publicised it, you can’t take it back. Some Imam who wants to get publicity might put a fatwa on you, and you’ll have to live in hiding. It happened to Salman Rushdie.
Seriously, PZ, it would be great to watch, but please don’t do it.”
So in other words PZ is studly enough to take on a Communion wafer, but you think he’d be afraid the Muslims would kick his ass if he desecrated a Koran.
Got it. Yeah, that PZ’s a guy of principle.
Mr. Mueller:
Really? Is “hate” all you can imagine?
Have you considered “bemusement”?
Ah, but of course, the Catholic Hierarchy don’t really believe all that “the Eucharist is Christ” bollocks any more than the average atheist does: otherwise they would do almost anything to get it back. Proof positive that the Church regard it as, at most, symbolic and really nothing more than a cracker is that they haven’t said a damn thing. If they actually believed what they claim to believe, the Pope himself would be on the phone to PZ in a second. Truth is, they don’t give a rat’s ass if PZ makes cruciform buttplugs out of them and hands them out in bath houses with altar wine lube. They’re just frackin’ crackers and they know it.
This is what I mean about not having any desire to understand. It isn’t “pissing them off for the sheer sake of pissing them off.” It’s pissing them off to expose their intolerance. They are pissed off because they are intolerant to anyone believing their cracker isn’t sacred.
Ah, yes. It was inevitable. The old “athiests are only angry because they know god exists” routine. Yet more willful ignorance from yet another religious bigot.
So in other words PZ is studly enough to take on a Communion wafer, but you think he’d be afraid the Muslims would kick his ass if he desecrated a Koran.
This bullshit has been brought up so often that it now occupies the top 2 hits for “koran envy” on Google.
A whole day and only 752?
“They excommunicate a priest solely because of the possessed “divinely designed” plumbing–female reproductive system–but will not officially excommunicate pedophiles or Bill Donohue of the Catholic League. Why should we respect these misogynistic fucktwits!!”
THANK YOU.
because there is no other rational reason to steal a Host and do whatever PZ is intending to do to it
There is no rational reason to throw away a useless object received through the mails, apparently.
tsg: Heh. Near-identical final sentences… spooky stuff.
and the 0.01% who don’t are not following their religion.
Nope, they’re following their deity, who demands blood sacrifice for offenses.
If the church wants to hang its hat on the fact that the Magisterium hasnt actually said anything against Cook or PZ or the taking of the cracker, then they should make it very clear that the Magisterium has nothing to do with Donohue and the nutcases making death threats and asking for Cook’s and PZ’ careers. They can do that by the Magisterium disowning Donohue.
They, or at least some of them, have:
This is from wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PZ_Myers#Eucharist_controversy
“In a talk show featuring Myers on Catholic Radio International, the host Jeff Gardner made it clear that Donohue has no authority to speak for the Catholic Church, and is not even a theologian, and Father Loya fully agreed with PZ Myers that people claiming to be Catholic and issuing death threats or demanding that Myers should lose his job were behaving unacceptably and were an issue for the Catholic church.”
PZ Says:
No Jews have threatened me over my beliefs or what I choose to do in my own home. Neither have any Hindus or Buddhists.
I think it is simplistic to offend, no matter how mildly, many, many catholics over what a minority of them do, especially when such actions have been clearly condemned by other Catholics.
I am not terribly concerned about whatever PZ does. I just think that to stick your tongue out at millions of people based on what a minority (who have been condemned by others in the same community) do is going to look petulant when there are deep and serious issues about religion in our societies to be dealt with, and when such moderate Catholics could even be our allies in dealing with the nutters such as Donohue. Richard Dawkins has worked with Christians to deal with fundamentalists within the UK. PZ has dealt with these other issues effectively and has inspired others in the way he has done it. I think this issue is a distraction.
Yet more willful ignorance from yet another religious bigot.
Nope. That, “They’re pissed because they hate god” shit is willful stupidity.
Dr. Myers wrote:
Since I now own one entirely superfluous copy of the Koran, it will meet the very same fate as the crackers. Thanks to all who have demanded that I treat that silly book with disrespect, I’ll have to treat both equally.
This seems to me a slippery slope..Will every criticism of
Judaism or Christianity be met now with a email torrent
of angry demands that Dr. Myers is *obligated* to present
a “fair and balanced” criticism of Islam as well?
When in fact the complainers are owed nothing, nothing at all.
I’ll add to the total. Is anyone else developing a case of fatwah envy? I know it’s awful, but I’m beginning to wish I could issue fatwahs….you know, denouncing things all day would be fun and it would be awesome to have followers. I could say things like “the Pope says god is real, but we know better. Everyone, to the blogosphere to show them!” But of course, I don’t really want these things, I’m not really looking to take over the world.
Pay no attention to the loris in the corner :)
“This seems to me a slippery slope..Will every criticism of Judaism or Christianity be met now with a email torrent of angry demands that Dr. Myers is *obligated* to present a “fair and balanced” criticism of Islam as well? When in fact the complainers are owed nothing, nothing at all.”
It is sort of uncomfortable thing. He’s now getting goaded into desecrations, that rings a little odd.
You atheists bore me. Honestly, people have been doing this sort of stuff for awhile… trying to mock and disprove God. Those who do believe aren’t going to stop believing just because of one stinking website full of repetitious “proofs.” If you would listen, Meyers, I would sit down with you and explain why those 50 “proofs” are easily disproved.
Oh, and if you don’t believe in God, don’t use His name in vain. It just makes you sound silly. Consider this example: “God is a delusion. I mean, omg get a life.” Sounds odd, no?
Leave the Faith alone and continue on with your jawless fish to monkey to human theories. That’s where your expertise lies.
Besides, lots worse has happened to the Body of Christ for anything you do to get under our skin now. He was whipped and spit on by even more disgusting people than you.
Oh, and all of you might not believe this is a hate crime, but it IS stealing whether you believe in Real Presence or not.
I just think that to stick your tongue out at millions of people based on what a minority (who have been condemned by others in the same community) do
Wait, only a minority of Catholics eat the magic cookies? And they get condemned for it?
The stupid! It burns!!!!!
#348 – Wowbagger – “Don’t count your chickens until they’re desecrated…”
BLASPHEMY!!!
I have fired off a cackle to the High Holy Council of Cluckheads alerting their Biddyships of this offensive remark.
Pullet pollution will not be tolerated. You have ruffled feathers across the known universe. Repent!
Besides, lots worse has happened to the Body of Christ for anything you do to get under our skin now. He was whipped and spit on by even more disgusting people than you.
More torture fetishism.
They sure do like that stuff.
@Dave Mueller, see there is your problem. Thinking that Donowhore is right about the student. The student himself simply took the cracker back to his seat to show his friend before eating it. This is that, as other catholics have said on other threads, not eating the cracker immediately it is given is not that unusual in some catholic churches. However, he was then assaulted by a church official who was the one making a fuss and at that point decided to just get out of there sans cracker. Those church officials then threatened him and made official complaints and the student also received various threats, including ones of death.
PZ then made his original post in protest at the actions taken against the student. Iironically, for those complaining that PZ and us atheists hate catholics we are the ones defending the catholic student. That was when Donowhore got on his high horse and shortly after PZ also started receiving death threats.
So what we have here, is that at worst, the student made a mistake taking it back to his seat in this particular church and the officials grossly overreacted. It now appears that in support of their stance and to try and defend their actions they are prepared to lie about what happened and have even gone so far as to threaten the student’s friend standing at the college by taking action that could have him kicked out of college. Yet the friend did nothing expect be with his friend when this all happened. I just love the show of xian forgiveness and love. And please, don’t tell me they are not proper cathloics, these are the officials at that church taking this action.
So who is acting reasonably here or being the xian. It certainly doesn’t appear to be the catholics, most ot the ones visiting here getting on their high horses and others sending death threats or who have tried to rationalise or minimise the death threats while emphasising the cracker. You are one of the few, I have counted about 3 or 4 over all the threads to do with this issue, who when pushed, have actually said the death threats are wrong. Though often grudginlgy while they harp on and on about the cracker while dismissing the threats. Either using the no true scotsman fallacy or downplaying their significance. As someone said up thread, when your priorities are that screwed that a cracker is more inmportant than somebody’s life, something is seriously screwed with you people.
However, PZ, when on the recent radio show with the priest on the catholic radio station offered to hand over the crackers he has been sent in exchange for the catholic church reining in its attack dogs, including Donowhore, off of the student. Yet the response was either more of the no true scotsmen fallacy, i.e. Donowhore deoesn’t represent us, or nothing at all from those with the power to say and do something to help the student.
Looks like someone is upset they can’t take part in a real crusade anymore.
I think he was being funny. All he has to do is do away with both to prove his point. And he only has to do it once.
Those who do believe aren’t going to stop believing just because of one stinking website full of repetitious “proofs.”
Actually, I agree with you. I also agree that PZ’s gesture (whatever it is) will probably be a waste of time. But what matters more than anything is the future of science and of education. Far from “stinking”, this website is an inspiration and education to many.
I have no objection to people messing about with their crackers in private, but when they challenge science, and particularly when they try and influence the scientific education of schoolchildren, I will be as assertive as anyone in fighting against them.
Also, monotheistic faith is a poison in modern democratic society, and has to be challenged at every opportunity.
Steve,
Most of use have heard that interview. In fact, it was in that interview that the host pointed out that the Magisterium hasnt demanded a return of the cracker or threatened PZ or Cook in any way, to which PZ responded by saying if the Magisterium officially disowned Donohue and the death threats, he would return the crackers to the nearest church.
So far the Magisterium has continued its silence.
…get out of there
sansavec cracker…Fixed it for you. Sorry I’m so anal.
Deus is pure comic genius!
I suggest you might actually read the posts you respond to before you post.
Wait, only a minority of Catholics eat the magic cookies? And they get condemned for it?
Only a minority of Catholics made any threats.
Do you understand now?
@Steve Zara: Yet it is church officials who have brought charges against the student originally involved and, even worse, have now done the same thing against his friend who was with him. How many more times are they going to trot out the no true Scotsmen fallacy. Even if the catholic powers that be couldn’t call off Donowhore they could call off their own officials, don’t you think. I am sure PZ would settle for that as what happened to the student was the reason for the original post by PZ.
Oh, and if you combust the wafer on Wednesday, PZ, it could be Ash Wednesday!
True Bob, cheers, I noticed that immediately after posting DOH :)
“You atheists bore me.”
You theists scare me.
“Honestly, people have been doing this sort of stuff for awhile… trying to mock and disprove God. Those who do believe aren’t going to stop believing just because of one stinking website full of repetitious “proofs.”
That might be true. I mean, people who cling to their imaginary friends do tend to get murderous when you try to show them the truth.
“If you would listen, Meyers, I would sit down with you and explain why those 50 “proofs” are easily disproved.”
With my handy-dandy bible! *lol*
“Oh, and if you don’t believe in God, don’t use His name in vain. It just makes you sound silly. Consider this example: “God is a delusion. I mean, omg get a life.” Sounds odd, no?”
Since you do believe in god, don’t use words like “science”, “reality”, “evidence” or “sanity”. It’s clear they don’t mean much to you cracker worshippers.
“Leave the Faith alone and continue on with”
the death threats and the orgiastic fantasies of all of us burning in hell forever. Feel the love!
*lol* god, save us from your painfully stupid followers.
So far the Magisterium has continued its silence.
OK. That is interesting. How does it relate to the Loya statement?
To be honest, I don’t think PZ can expect a statement from the Pope!… but considering the threats, he is certainly entitled to a statement from someone senior.
Avoiding being buried under all the junk mail, which would accumulate quite rapidly over the years in many households, not rational enough for you? ;-)
It’s not convincingly saleable and generally not much use as a hostage either. Some of it can plausibly be saved and burned at the next bonfire party or used as fire-lighters by those people who have real fires. Most useless objects received through the mail don’t even have much potential for mockage. Round here, crackers would probably count as green/garden waste for recycling purposes (though perhaps not poisoned ones!) whereas the binding on a Koran might preclude it from anything other than the landfill bin collection.
Steve,
I relates because it was the same conversation: http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/07/an_evil_atheist_and_a_catholic.php#c994366
As you can see there, PZ is not expecting a comment from the Pope, but simply someone authorized to speak for the Church.
Their offense is entirely of their own doing and entirely within their own control: stop thinking that others must treat these crackers as sacred just because you believe they are and it won’t bother you when they don’t. Problem solved. Anyone who is offended by this stunt deserves to be.
Really. We don’t worry about offending the sensibilities of racists. I fail to see why we should worry about bigots of a different variety.
they could call off their own officials, don’t you think.
Yes, indeed, they should. This is something that should have been discussed.
The thing is, that PZ Myers is a skilled promoter of science. He may even be a successor to Dawkins. Dawkins is wise enough to realise who his potential allies are. Being even trivially rude to the majority of a religious group when who you really want to deal with are the extremists is not wise.
Actually, I just now read Matthew 26-27, John 18, Luke 22-23, and Mark 14-15, and I confirmed something: Jesus does not defend himself physically, but he does answer questions, both when arrested, and when on trial. So you are wrong: Jesus did defend himself while being tested.
Not necessarily.
One can liken this to a psychologist dealing with a large population of patients who have a deep-seated delusional phobia about yellow #2 pencils which have had the magic words “hocus-pocus whamadocus” said over them, and these patients wish to punish someone who dared to chew on the end of the magic pencil. The psychologist, in exasperation against the delusional patients, grabs a bunch of yellow pencils, and breaks them in two in order to demonstrate that there’s no big deal about biting pencils, since there’s no big deal about breaking pencils. The Giant Pink Rubber Eraser in the sky does not come down and erase him, or anyone else.
PZ is quite certain that nothing bad will happen to the “host” when “desecrated”, because IT’S JUST A
PENCILCRACKER. And he’s quite certain that he has no “lead” “soul” to damage.I think it’s important to re-emphasize what got this whole silly thing started: a student is in trouble with his publicly-funded school for events taking place in a religious service. And a religious services which he did not interrupt, but rather, was interrupted because of a minor violation of procedure.
If the Church had chastised, disciplined, censured, or even excommunicated the student for this — with no other consequences — there would not be quite this level of upset. Again, as ever: Your club, your rules.
However, because the repercussions are going beyond the “club” of the Catholic Church — such as the recent impeachment, for example, not to mention to demands for expulsion of both himself and his friend — the Church is demanding power that does not belong to it. It is demanding control over the secular world as well.
People of all religions should recognize this as being wrong, and indeed, downright illegal, and should oppose it.
Or in cruder language: “You break-a my church-state separation wall, I break-a you cracker.”
“To be honest, I don’t think PZ can expect a statement from the Pope!… but considering the threats, he is certainly entitled to a statement from someone senior.”
It would be nice if there was some official senior type statement on death threats and very appropriate as well.
Will PZ get some sort of official statement though? I doubt that for the same reason that I think it was a misstep for PZ to offer to return them in exchange for this action or that action. Firstly, to let PZ dictate their actions in exchange for the return of the wafers would be an invitation for anyone with a gripe to recreate the same stunt. So in the long run it would not prevent desecration but promote it.
Secondly, PZ’s statement on an exchange boils down to “I have something you hold sacred, do what I tell you and I will return it. Do not and I will desecrate it.” It basically boils down to extortion. I don’t suppose many here will see it as such or if they do will just compare it to the tactics of TCL, but it’ll play out that way to the mainstream.
OK, that is my contribution for now. It has been an interesting discussion.
Really. We don’t worry about offending the sensibilities of
racists. I fail to see why we should worry about bigots of a different variety.
Most Catholics aren’t bigots, because most people aren’t bigots.
I am gay, and I have had catholic friends come to my gay marriage. Most people stick with a religion out of tradition and because it is a family thing.
I don’t think what PZ does actually matters. I think it will have no impact other than to make him look petulant. I am not sure how that helps the cause of rationality and reason.
However, I am often wrong, and if this creates a positive anti-religious reaction, I will celebrate!
Concern noted. Zzzzzz.
If the Catholics really took it as seriously as they claim to — and that’s what they’ve been using to justify fatwa envy — the Pope would have flown to Minnesota days ago. A godless liberal actually has Jesus Christ, not some wishy-washy metaphorical biscuits, in a jiffy bag in a desk drawer, and will probably chuck them onto the compost heap on Wednesday! Surely the True Presence of Christ is more important than a little Church pride, no? This is the Blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist, the most important thing in Catholicism, not some symbolic Protestant cracker!
I don’t think PZ can expect a statement from the Pope either: actions consistent with words is far too much to expect from Razi, the child-rape Abettor in Chief, or his minions.
Get back here! Nobody leaves until we get to 1000!
You atheists bore me.
The feeling would be mutual if religions did not try to force themselves upon us.
Honestly, people have been doing this sort of stuff for awhile… trying to mock and disprove God.
We aren’t trying to mock, we are mocking.
And there is no such thing as disproving any god. You say there is a god, it is up to you to prove it. Go on, we’re waiting.
If you would listen, Meyers, I would sit down with you and explain why those 50 “proofs” are easily disproved.
And yet another theist assclown proves that religion addles the brain to the extent that spelling a five-letter name becomes impossible.
Also, what the hell are you talking about? Which “proofs”?
Oh, and if you don’t believe in God, don’t use His name in vain.
Fuck you. You don’t get to tell anyone one to do.
Leave the Faith alone
We would, if it would leave us alone. It doesn’t.
continue on with your jawless fish to monkey to human theories.
Way to show you have no clue what evolution is.
lots worse has happened to the Body of Christ for anything you do to get under our skin now.
We know, it’s terrible. Mixed, folded, rolled, baked…
He was whipped and spit on by even more disgusting people than you.
Prove it.
Oh, and all of you might not believe this is a hate crime, but it IS stealing whether you believe in Real Presence or not.
If it is freely given? Really? How does that work?
By the way, “Real Presence”… thanks for the laugh.
Neural T #689:
That’s not the point. Book-burning is a symbolic act — most book-burnings don’t result in a loss of information, although there are tragic exceptions — and what it has symbolized, historically, is ignorance and authoritarianism. It’s been a particular pastime of Christians and Muslims.
Dave Mueller #659:
If you’d been reading the comments in these several threads, you’d find that some Catholics do, in fact, claim exactly that. There are numerous stories of cracker miracles. I vaguely remember one such tale myself, from back when I was a Catholic — how some kid was supposedly hiding a collection of crackers from some oppressors, under his shirt, and absorbed them into his body.
Yes, indeed. It will be interesting to see if the Catholic Church is excoriated in the media for failing to denounce death-threats issued by Catholics in the same manner as senior Imams had opprobrium heaped upon them for failing to condemn death-threats issued by Muslims.
Steve Zara: read what you write. I know what you meant, but it was not what you wrote.
I was just teasing in any case. Peace?
#503:
Unless he pisses the Bad Astronomer off. Then it’s Death From the Skies!
#556:
Definitely a boson. The Higgs boson, to be precise. I mean, it is God, isn’t it?
There. Goddidit. We’ve just rendered the dreaded LHC unnecessary. :-|
#572:
Concern troll is concerned. BTW, if the second kid is catching hell for this, does that make him krollateral damage?
#573:
I wonder if there’s a recipe for that in the parish cookbook?
Yes, it’s a “Real Presence” if your educations ends with the medieval Platonism which was all the rage when the Church made this ridiculous shit up and boiled people in oil for not believing it. It must be quite embarrassing for modern Catholic theologians that this patently witless stupidity has survived until the 21st century when they successfully abandoned so much other arrant nonsense like geocentrism. I suspect that the only reason why they’ve doggedly persisted with this ludicrous half-wittery for so long is because it was the only thing which really differentiated Catholicism from High Church Protestantism in many places.
On the cracker, I am a Christian and believe in evolution and it IS a cracker.
The RCC misunderstands an “I am…” verse in John, just as Jesus is NOT a door, neither is Jesus a flatbread.
Let me echo this request. I would also prefer that the Koran be left alone this month since it was just Catholics behaving badly toward Cook that started this.
But
ifwhen it’s time to mess with the Koran (and Muslims will ask for it again, just wait), then it’ll be difficult to be creative and interesting, but very easy to be the ugly American.Good thinking. Jesus is one of two things.
Either he is a pile of dusty bones, or he is a complete fairy tale.
Hey, let’s have a poll!
But if you do include the Koran, I hope you find a way to deal with it that doesn’t evoke either the specter of book burners, or the horrors of Guantanamo.
I know…let’s waterboard the crackers! It wouldn’t be torture, would it?
Here’s an interesting statement. Taken at face value, there’s nothing wrong with it. PZ’s expertise is in evolutionary biology, and there is in fact a lineage from jawless fishes to monkeys to humans.
But the emphasis on “monkeys” is usually a creationist dog whistle.
So tell us, Deus Vult, are you in fact a Catholic who denies evolution? Because that would be wonderful. It’d do so much to promote respect of Catholics.
See the earlier “Fresh thread […]” for OMH’s argument, and my comments attempting to clarify.
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/07/fresh_thread_dont_fill_this_on.php
IANAL and don’t know if it’s true, but apparently lots of incredibly petty things are technically theft, and the vast majority of those ridiculously petty thefts would never be prosecuted.
The basic idea is that pretty much any time you trick somebody into giving you something, that’s theft by deception. Kneeling and saying “amen” to get something that’s for believing Catholics only would count.
By the same token, though, thousands of Catholics commit the same kind of petty theft of a two-cent cracker every week. Many don’t believe in transubstantiation and don’t confess all their mortal sins before taking communion, so they’re violating the “terms of use” and tricking the Priest into giving them a two-cent cracker, too. They’re knowingly committing petty theft and sacrilege.
(I certainly used to do that when I was Catholic but had stopped believing all the dogma about confession and communion. No way was I going to tell a priest all my sins, and no way was I going to refrain from taking communion, and have to explain why to my parents. I stole hundreds of wafers and committed sacrilege hundreds of times, before I finally clued in, came out, and gave it all up.)
So the odd thing here is that maybe this is technically theft, but the Catholic church has a much bigger problem than a few nonbelievers sneaking out with wafers—they’re losing lots of wafers every week to “inside jobs.”
I’d guess that Catholics commit orders of magnitude more wafer theft and sacrilege than the few atheists making a point.
Has PZ received wafers consecrated/transubstantiated by women priests?
I think it important to have equality for which wafers are “lesser” consecrated as to their “true” status. Women having been the historic planters and threshers of grain in biblical times they deserve recognition in desecration.
Particularly in recognizing what women had to endure at the hands of “the Church”.
Women Ordained As Catholic Priests In Boston
Arch Diocese Says Women Are ‘Excommunicating Themselves’
BOSTON — Three Catholic women were ordained as priests in a Back Bay neighborhood church this weekend, despite the Vatican’s admonition that the trio would be excommunicated if they did so.
“The women being ordained today have been called and they are following God’s guidance and direction for their lives,” said Dana Reynolds, a woman from California who became a Catholic bishop in a ceremony in Germany three months ago. “They have said ‘yes’ to God.”
NewsCenter 5’s Rondella Richardson reported that a congregation of Catholic worshippers, both male and female, filled the Church of the Covenant on Sunday, singing the hymn “All Are Welcome” at the beginning of the ceremony. A procession escorted the three women past the dark, wooden pews to the front of the church, where Reynolds initiated them into the priesthood.
“Excommunication or not, I will still be a validly ordained priest and still will be able to serve the people of God,” said Gabriella Velardi Ward, 61, a Staten Island architect and mother of two, before the ceremony.
Also a grandmother of three, Ward said she had wanted to be a priest ever since she was 5 years old and once considered becoming a nun, but felt the priesthood was her true calling because she wanted to be able to celebrate the sacraments. She was joined by Gloria Carpeneto, of Baltimore, and Judy Lee, of Florida. Mary Ann McCarthy Schoettly, of Newton, N.J., was ordained as a deacon.
The Vatican, however, said the ordinations would be illegal and the Boston Archdiocese sent out an e-mail to all priests saying that women who try to receive sacred orders and priests who try to confer them are automatically separating themselves from the church.
The Catholic Church has always said women cannot be priests because Jesus did not have female apostles.
The ordination ceremony took place Sunday at the Church of the Covenant on Newbury Street, which is affiliated with two Protestant denominations, the Presbyterian Church (USA) and the United Church of Christ, the Boston Globe reported.
They are all part of an organization called Roman Catholic Womenpriests, which has been holding ordination ceremonies for women since 2002; the organization says there are now 28 women Catholic priests in the United States, according to the Globe.
The group says its ordinations are valid because its first female priests were ordained by bishops who were in good standing with the Vatican. They won’t reveal the names so those bishops can avoid sanctions.
The Boston ordinations will coincide with the first Boston conference of four organizations that are pushing for the admission of married men, as well as of women, to the priesthood.
Jean Marchant, who once worked for the Boston Archdiocese’s health care ministry, has already been ordained and, together with her husband, serves a small Catholic congregation in Weston, Mass.
—————————————————–
Boston Archdiocese Statement On Ordinations
For 2,000 years, the Catholic Church has served to carry on the ministry and teachings of Jesus Christ. The Catholic Church is made up of women and men, equal in rights and diverse in gifts and ministries.
Following our devotion to Mary, the Church is committed to, and sustained by the many important contributions of women each and every day. As members of our religious communities, lay members in leadership roles within the Church, educators, canon lawyers, and as pastoral and social service providers across many other critical areas, women are helping to shape the course of our Church in following the will of God.
The ordination of men to the priesthood is not merely a matter of practice or discipline within the Catholic Church, but rather, it is part of the unalterable Deposit of Faith handed down by Christ through his apostles.
The organization calling itself “Roman Catholic Womenpriests” is not recognized as an entity of the Catholic Church. Catholics who attempt to confer a sacred order on a woman, and the women who attempt to receive a sacred order, are by their own actions separating themselves from the Church. That said, the Catholic Church is prepared and eager to welcome back those who seek reconciliation.
As a faith community rooted in the loving ministry of Jesus Christ, we pray for those who have willingly fallen away from the Church by participating in such activities. And, we pray that they find reconciliation through and comfort in the Catholic Church by willingly returning to the community of believers.
———-
“In most Protestant churches the sermon is the center of the worship service.
“In the Catholic Mass, the Eucharist, the Sacrifice of the Mass, is the center of the service (and of the universe, if you want to get right down to it.)
“Because Christ was male, and the priest at the altar stands in Christ’s place when he celebrates the Eucharist for Christ’s Bride, the Church, it is ontologically, liturgically, and physically impossible for a woman to stand in that place.
“Putting a woman into the priesthood, as opposed to ‘ministry’, starts all kind of gender-bending nonsense going. Just look at what has happened in the Episcopal church.
“There are many good and historical reasons also (the questionable function of ‘priestesses’ in the old days, and the sexual revolution against promiscuity and temple prostitution begun by the Jews and continued by the Christians), but the role of the priest as “alter Christus” sets the seal on the impossibility.”
——–
Remember, you can purchase any number of tasteless communion crackers on the web at $5.99/250. + S&H.
Been out working all day.
If atheists do not have the right to disparage what they (we) consider outlandish beliefs of Catholics because it is considered hate speech or offensive then CNN, Fox News, TV Preachers, Prelates, wise guys in cubicles do not have the right to disparage the deeply held, precious beliefs of Jihadists.
IT’S A FRACKIN’ BOMB!
I think this is probably why a lot of teenagers drift away from the RCC: they’ve successfully stigmatised (no pun intended) sex and masturbation to such a degree that there’s no way in hell any kid is going to sit in a confessional box and fess up to spanking his monkey.
I was spared that particular problem: religio-political events of the time made a lot of liberals drift away from the Church. I’d be surprised if any of my relatives are “Mass-going Catholics” and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if they pegged that time as a watershed.
In any case, as far as I remember, they (religion teachers) kinda “glossed over” the whole transubstantiation thing. It may be my faulty memory, but I seem to remember at least one of them being faintly embarrassed by the idea. I recall learning that “we” believed that the wafer “really” became the body of Christ and that this was one of the main theological differences between “us” and Protestants, who believed it to be symbolic. TBH, I think the kids mostly thought, “Well, the Protestants got that one right, it’s never turned into a chunk of manburger in my gob” and never gave it another thought.
By OMH’s reasoning, the vast majority of Catholics would seem to be “thieves” by default.
You only realise how absurd the whole notion is when you hear the preposterous rationalisations in terms of ancient notions of essence and accident: it “really” becomes the body of Christ… where “really” is defined in terms of some arcane invention totally at odds with post-medieval science or common sense.
Aha – so the correct way to serve one of these cracker thingies is with cream (whipped and/or double or perhaps even triple given the trinity thing) and maybe a spot of (blown) raspberry jam too …
I would like to know who has pulled a stupid stunt in church (related to crackergate). The kid put a wafer in his pocket instead of his mouth.
As far as I can tell no one has advocated disrupting a service except the ones who accosted the kid physically.
Hmmm. Well I support you in your fight against Donahue, but you are wrong in casual dismissal of the faithful.
Let’s look at an example from bio class, say you were handing out live frogs for dissection. A student takes the frog and instead of walking back to his desk and doing the deed, starts playing with it. And when you ask him what’s he doing, he starts to leave class with the frog. What do you do? Do you let him walk out? Do you contact Campus Security? Do you take administrative action against him?
A statement contrived to be true by wiping out the records which said there were female apostles/disciples and priests early on. If you get to re-write the Bible, adding and deleting verses and whole books, and destroy all former rival editions (as well as rival religionists themselves) you can do stuff like pretending the Jesus character fit the description of a messiah rather than that of a false prophet too. Roman Catholic tyranny was so convenient for each of the people who wanted to re-model the god concept and the religion in their own image/ideal for their own prejudiced purposes.
When I was about 10, I sat in the back of a church wearing a large pair of plastic ears from a comic toy “disguise” set (the kind that comes with a one-piece Groucho Marx glasses/nose/moustache combo).
About 10 years ago, I had to leave a funeral because I was about to burst out laughing. The crowd all rhythmically speaking at once reminded me of “cannibals” chanting “Bah-gah oom, Bah-gah yay”, in a Bugs Bunny cartoon, while dancing around a cauldron (with Humphrey Bogart in it).
The whole idea behind Christianity is absurd. Humans are sinful and God demanded a blood sacrifice, so somehow he was “all loving” by sending a demigod version of himself to get sacrificed. The whole premise is primitive and disgusting — exactly what we would expect from ancient people.
How about a God who simply forgave you, without the need for blood?
Emmet (807)
“You only realise how absurd the whole notion is when you hear the preposterous rationalisations…,”
That is precisely why reason will win out as this is pushed into daylight. That and over the top caterwauling about it being their most precious thing.
Stonewall isn’t remembered for being a riot.
PZ – You should also add some ramen noodles and an old Robert Anton Wilson book. That would offend the pastafarians and discordians. Shall we just assume you already have a hammer and a pentacle, to offend the heathens and wiccans?
Oh, don’t forget an egg, then I can be offended on behalf of chickens. I promise to run about madly, flapping my arms, and clucking loudly.
I’d certainly want to rescue my frog (and ideally all the others too) to stop it being dismembered (or eaten). Free all the cracker-Jesus clones from their Catholic persecutors now!
Can we re-use some of those Free Nelson Mandela placards (and the song)? Eg just replace the face with a cracker picture and the words with “Free Cracker Jesus – the special cracker” and so on. There were lots of other Free The W Xs type campaigns too.
#810 Dervin
That was perhaps the most idiotic analogy in this entire debacle. Congratulations, that is no easy feat.
Don, that’s good you accept modern biology, and that’s good you don’t believe crackers are sacred.
I’m just wondering, why do you worship a cousin of chimpanzees (also known as Jesus)?
Uh huh, OK, I’m with you. Not sure that “starts playing with it” is exactly equivalent to “shows it to his friend”, or that one might not have legitimate concerns about a frog that might not apply to a cracker, but lets not quibble.
A bit more accurate to say “when one of the other students attacks him, starts trying to wrestle the frog from his hands, and he flees.”
That’s easy. You insist that he be expelled from the university, prosecuted for theft and hate-crimes, suggest that frognapping is equivalent to kidnapping a human child, and post armed guards on the biology lab to prevent any further heinous frognapping!
What the…? Tentatively give him an ‘F’ on the assignment, and email him or ask him the next time you see him in class to come see you during your office hours to explain his actions. (I’m not a science teacher, but this is what I’d do in an equivalent situation in one of my classes; and believe me, students behave strangely like this all the time.) Really, these silly attempts at analogies have gotten way out of control. Please tell me that one was a joke.
When we dissected frogs in high school biology, I took the skin home and made a little drum. It sounded OK, but started smelling pretty bad.
IN OTHER NEWS: Those of you following this thread only to see when it hits 1000 comments and PZ gets “very, very cranky” may be interested in a little graphical analysis I just did because I should be grading exams and must Must MUST procrastinate instead. It’s a simple plot of # comments in this thread over time, and I have posted it to my laughably barren blog (which I just remembered I had).
Current projections, based on an extremely scientific eyeballed extrapolation of curent commenting trends, have PZ going cranky at or shortly after midnight tonight!!!
You read it here first.
P.S. We were never given live animals for dissection. Had we been, I would probably have been tempted to “liberate” them myself. :)
@ Sven #821: If you’re projecting, how sure are you, or can we be, that it won’t be you rather than PZ becoming cranky around midnight? ;-)
If PZ, then will he become bloated like a puffer-fish, or a cranky toad, or zoom off in a cloud of ink, or turn green …
Inquiring minds want to know and hence must perform the experiment. :-D
man, if I’m not asleep by midnight tonight “cranky” won’t begin to cover it…
Round here, the rule is that all frogs are mine (as are an increasing proportion of the baby birds when I can successfully get them away from the neighbours’ cats alive).
Perhaps over there, all crackers belong PZ. He certainly gets more on his blog than many bloggers do, ie without having to be one himself.
I think there’s a good chance we’ll get there before midnight.
You “think” there’s a “good chance”? C’mon, what kind of scientifical is that? At least my prediction is based on real data which I then squinted at real hard to derive my
wild guessscientifical prediction!Or not.
Your midnight is different from mine though. It’ll be tomorrow here. I generally miss much of the “action” on Pharyngula through the time-zone mis-match. That and the political, cultural and even language mis-matches! The science is the shared thing – and the recognition of religious idiocy.
If that is the case, then most Catholics won’t be offended by a non-Catholic refusing to observe a Catholic tenet, and those who are deserve to be offended. So, what was your point again?
Good for you. However, I fail to see how it applies to what we’re talking about in any way whatsoever.
Paul W @804,
I appreciate your tracking down those Minnesota statutes. (I was the poster on the other thread who complained that OHM was making broad accusations of criminal conduct without pointing to any particular statute that he thought might be violated.)
Maybe you’re right. Maybe an overzealous prosecutor could bring charges alleging that someone in Minnesota “swindled” a church out of a communion wafer within the meaning of Minn. Stat. 609.52 subdiv. 2(4) in order to send it to PZ.
I guess it’s also conceivable that, if a wafer sent to PZ was proven to have been “swindled” from a church, PZ could be charged with causing damage to “another person’s physical property” (i.e., the church’s property) “because of the property owner’s or another’s actual or perceived . . . religion” under Section 609.595.
(Of course, there are many evidentiary assumptions in these hypotheticals, and PZ hasn’t done anything to any wafers yet, as far as we know.)
That being said, I don’t practice criminal law or civil rights law, nor do I practice in Minnesota, so my opinion that these things are “conceivable” is pure speculation. I would be very happy to be shown that they are, in fact, inconceivable.
Also, there are principles, such as the one you touched on, called de minimis non curat lex (“the law does not concern itself with trifles”), that might kill any such case, assuming that the political will to bring the charge even existed. Not to mention the First Amendment challenge that I suspect a good civil rights attorney could make.
Just for the record, I support PZ completely in this episode, and I think it would be ridiculous public policy to prosecute anyone in the scenarios above. But it is sometimes worth looking at issues from a purely legal perspective.
It’s supposed to be cracker-Jesus who is somewhat thin-skinned. ;-) And yet he remains silent on the whole issue of the alleged desecration (as he does on the cannibalism issue and wanton distortion of his words and rituals by the Catholics). It’s only his rabid followers who can be seen to take offence.
Cracker-Jesus is free to leave the building with whomever he pleases. If he’s not up for a one-night stand with the priest or doesn’t want to be imprisoned in the monstrance, he has every right to hint to people whom he likes better that they should take him home with them instead.
We could pull off 1000 real easy if the right troll pops off.
…and PZ’s is different from both of ours! I am going by the timestamp that appears with posts and comments, which is in my time zone (East Coast US)…PZ’s on Central time, an hour earlier. Hey, wait, does everybody see the same timestamps, or do the times get converted to your computer time somehow?
Being aware of All Internet Traditions™, I think we all know that no Internet Phenomenon is complete blah blah blah blah…
Narrator: In A.D. 2008, WAfeRgate was beginning.
PZ Myers: What happen ?
Cook: Somebody set up us the
bombexplosionexpulsion.Pharyngula: We get signal.
PZ Myers: What !
Pharyngula: Main screen turn on.
PZ Myers: It’s you !!
CATlolicS: How are you gentlemen !!
CATlolicS: All your base are belong to us.
CATlolicS: You are on the way to destruction.
PZ Myers: What you say !!
CATlolicS: You have no chance to survive make your time.
CATlolicS: Ha Ha Ha Ha ….
Pharyngula: PZ Myers !!
PZ Myers: Take off every ‘CRACKER’!!
PZ Myers: You know what you doing.
PZ Myers: Move ‘CRACKER’.
PZ Myers: For great justice.
Cracker-Jesus can’t be property if he’s a real person (or zombie clone). The Catholics would first have to own up to the fact that they’ve known all along the crackers were never really Jesus. Or confess to being slave-holders and traders …
I see that post of yours as being labelled “July 21, 2008 6:42 PM”. Whereas, here that would really be 23:47 BST (or 22:47 GMT by my preference).
Cracker-Jesus might be in a different time-zone again. He could be really cranky every time a priest in the US incarnates him.
It’s about 10 minutes to 4:00 PM here in Oregon. Let’s see what the time thingy says to that.
Ah, so everybody sees US Eastern time. More proof that the world revolves around MeMeME!!!!
No Sven, it revolves around me, but you are welcome to be a satellite. (grin)
Pax Nabisco or Pox Nabisco, take your pick.
At the sound of the tone, there will be 139 messages before PZ has to get cranky.
<grin>
*BEEP*
I’ve just been out slug hunting (on which to feed my rescued frogs tomorrow). Which raises the issue of how long cracker-Jesus can go without food and water. Is it one of those 40 days and 40 nights things? Should PZ be drip-feeding the crackers which are residing with him at the moment? Or are they quite happy to snack on each other, being part of a cannibalistic tradition?
Like Adiposes in reverse.
Dr. DiMilo – I had performed my own scientifical calculations on the side to determine when you would begin fishing the other threads. Right on schedule.
Isn’t it rather rude/tactless of the Roman Catholic church to be summoning Jesus into a cracker using the language of his oppressors? Shouldn’t the magic words be in biblical hebrew or whatever the local folk spoke in the relevant time and place?
NB Re-posted here after I somehow ended up in the wrong thread/tab/posting box last time. :-/
heh. Busted.
The whole sinister ceremony, with its cracker-devouring ritual, is somewhat reminiscent of a scene out of the Damiano stories by R.A.MacAvoy – the “come and be slaughtered” perversion of the summoning spell.
BTW just for fun a nice one from ole Dumbski today on uncommon dissent :
O come, O come Emmanuel. We only want to eat you a little bit at a time. You’ll easily regenerate by next week. Very Prometheus and his liver with eagle or Catholic vultures.
http://www.theoi.com/image/img_prometheus.jpg
http://www.the-pantheon.com/images/prometh_eagle.jpg
Could we please dispense with any patronizing nonsense about Darwin being less than the messiah of a materialistic religion that pretends to find its justification in science. If Darwin was not the alpha and omega of evolution, the he was either a knave or a fool or a madman. Darwin did not leave us any other options. He did not intend to.
So, when we eat squid we’re eating Darwin?
At the sound of the tone, there will be 139 messages before PZ has to get cranky.
I see you people act brave when going against a mild-mannered biology professor, but why don’t you go post your 139 comments on a Koran!
neg,
I’ve been meaning to ask you: Do you ever go out to Sitges?
They would hardly be the same comments – or annotations as they tend to get called when made onto books. I do correct some mis-prints in books though and even factual errors.
To do a summoning spell you need a white candle and Eddie Izzard.
LOGIC: You’re doing it fractally wrong.
I didn’t know anyone was actually claiming that Darwin was lesser in some way than L.Ron Hubbard. ;-)
To do a summoning spell you need a white candle and Eddie Izzard.
And a flag.
Dervin wrote:
“Let’s look at an example from bio class, say you were handing out live frogs for dissection. A student takes the frog and instead of walking back to his desk and doing the deed, starts playing with it. And when you ask him what’s he doing, he starts to leave class with the frog. What do you do? Do you let him walk out?”
Dervin, having worked as a technical officer for a University Zoology department, and having been tasked with the job of preparing specimens for undergraduate laboratory anatomy classes, let me assure you that at no time were students ever presented with live animals for dissection, whether they be invertebrates, fish, sharks, amphibians, reptiles, placental mammals, or marsupials.
I always euthanised any such specimens long before they went anywhere near the students. An unpleasant task to be sure, but hey, somebody had to do it. From what you have written, I doubt that you yourself have ever been anywhere near a universitity teaching laboratory. After the classes, the specimens would be appropriately disposed of in accordance with both university and government ‘health and safety’ regulations. At no time did I ever witness any student attempt to EAT any of their dissection projects, and indeed I would have been disgusted if any had ever done so. Your analogy fails on so many levels that it is simply ludicrous. I’m afraid that you are ‘fractally wrong'(TM) about this one. Your perceptions about university laboratory procedures are an almost exact mirror image of what actually occurs in the real world.
What strange material components. Is it VSM or just M?
It must be hard to make Eddie Izzard go around and also fast enough to all the people who need a delivery. Perhaps that’s why there are so many Eddies in the space-time continuum. Rather like the Santa Clause situation.
Posted by: J | July 21, 2008 8:47 AM
Just because you can’t muster a general comprehension of the situation doesn’t mean that the rest of the people in this world are victims of such ignorance. The mockery of inane religious beliefs has been the catalyst for many people to take a second look at what they hold supposedly sacred. This “campaign of ridicule and mockery” is intended to be just that – and if you’re not literate enough to have read what PZ posted as his reasons – or intelligent enough to get past the feigned indignation to see exactly how it might alter some people’s perceptions – then that’s an intellectual failing on your part.
Oh, and another one…PZ’s proposed actions are simply insult directed at tribalistic religion. For you to call his methods tribalism simply shows how much you really do not understand that term.
They would hardly be the same comments – or annotations as they tend to get called when made onto books.
meh – reverse concern trolling is no fun when you go all pedantic ;) You could use post-it notes!
Hot damn MAJeff, we’re half way there. Bring your flag, I’ve got my frame drum – now if we can get the sluts to dance – SPELL ON!
Oh, good gravy. They’re still up in arms?
Y’know, it occurs to me that a tremendous amount of time is being wasted here. The folks sending these hate-mails aren’t exactly the sharpest knives in the drawer to begin with; some of these little screeds must take them hours to compose.
In the interests of efficiency, I respectfully present a generic form-letter of mindless rage and righteous fury. Those whose wrath against Dr. Myers knows no limits may feel free to copy and paste it, thus saving themselves countless man-hours that could be more profitably used memorizing talking points from Answers in Genesis.
“Dear Godless Heathen Commie Pinko Scum,
Blah blah blah greatly offended by your recent attack on all things good and holy. Blah blah one of the most evil men in the history of the world, specifically including Hitler, Pol Pot, and Jerry Springer. Blah blah bet you wouldn’t do that to a Koran, blah blah blah. Blah blah catch you on the street, blah barbed-wire baseball bat, blah blah proctologist with some very specialized equipment to remove it.
In the name of the God of infinite love and mercy,
[Insert Name Here]
(For the severely humor-challenged: yes, it’s a joke.)
By what accounting system? :-/
SC,
haven’t been for a while now, used to. Will wait for this autumn though, now it’s too crowded, and with the dog, it just gets crazy.
And you ?
Not really. Firstly, I’m not at all convinced I have any. Secondly, I wouldn’t then be able to fit my books on the shelves any more (ie not even as much as they already don’t).
Yes, whinging babies the lot of them. ;-) And many of them about as coherent as babies too.
Accounting system? Why PST of course.
Pagan Standard Time. Come on SEF, we’re trying to get a wicked spell going to either zonk Donewhore or make PZ all cranky.
Enter into the ‘spirit’ of it! Need more grog & swill? ;)
I am outraged–OURAGED!! at this spilling of beans by a fat nerdy so-called athiest so-called assciate Professer at some poedunk prairie collage!! You are so Imature and intolerint that you would desicrate the very Heart and center of my Religion?! HOW DARE YOU Please RESPECT MY BELEIF and keep the dam beans IN the Holy Purpl Chivas Bag where they dam well belong and APOLOGIZE!! Or else!!!1! BIGIT!! I KNOW you dont have the BALL’S to spill Any Hummus out of the bag JERK
If we need to get to 1000 comments, I’m going to play some good ole godbot trolling music now :
I’d rebell, but I haven’t worn out my present bells yet; they still sound pretty good.
“Yaaawwwww-Heeeee!!!!!’
(that was a rebell yel)
Oooh, wicked spells. Need to find my magick wand. It may need some fine tuning before its useful though.
Great Northern, what type of alleged Xian are you? You are definitely not a True Xian(TM) with all that attitude.
And I don’t know if anybody had seen this one, but someone did venture into trying to find a “scientific” explanation for transubstantiation…
This was a comment left on the Minnessota Independent article with PZ’s interview :
The Host is Spiritually radioactive. ;-)
The Host is Spiritually radioactive. ;-)
Is an e-meter reader a spiritual geiger counter, then?
neg:
And you ?
I lived there (left in the summer largely for that reason; imagine dealing with that scene as a straight woman!). I was asking specifically because there was a bar there, El Piano, where I spent a lot of time, and even worked on my diss some (they sent me a Xmas card back in the US, and I thanked them in my acknowledgments). I was hoping I could send my regards with you, but I guess I’ll have to try my luck with the Spanish mail :(.
It means we need an equivalent of a Geiger Counter – how about an Aquinas Counter?
Roll up, roll up, roll up, get your Holy Aquinas Counter™ (pending) right here; detects evens the faintest Jesons at a 10-foot radius…
I doubt any sort of Christian. With that bean obsession, I’m guessing a Pythagorean.
Let’s troll:
√2 is not the ratio of two whole numbers.
Great Northern – You’re one of two people, and since I haven’t seen one of you for a bit, odds are it’s the other. So predictable.
Funny, this whole kerfuffle reminds me of the scene in “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly” when Tuco Benedicto Pacifico Juan Maria Ramirez (known as the rat)
“Wanted in fourteen counties of this State, the condemned is found guilty of murder, armed robbery of citizens, state banks, and post offices; the theft of sacred objects , arson in a state prison, perjury, bigamy, deserting his wife and children, inciting prostitution, kidnapping, extortion, receiving stolen goods, selling stolen goods, passing counterfeit money, and contrary to the laws of this State the condemned is guilty of using marked cards and loaded dice…”
I, for one, am looking forward to a full-on PZSpree.
Left out “was to have been hanged” at the end of the first sentence… too hung up on HTML coding “the theft of sacred objects”.
Yeah, a real n00b move…
Great Northern: We can share the beans. Don’t go jumping any watchmen.
At the sound of the tone, it will be exactly 120 comments before PZ gets cranky…
So, smarty pants Wowbagger, are you reconsidering your wine-curdling blasphemy? The inquiring minds of offended biddies everywhere what to know.
… *Beep*
Okay… I’m a little slow today…
(Cue “Today??” Comment in 3.. 2.. 1…)
Oh, this is sad. Sitting here shootin’ the breeze when one even moderately semi-persistent concern troll or offended catlick would get us over the line :o)
“To do a summoning spell you need a white candle and Eddie Izzard.”
“And a flag.”
And cake.
This has been pretty inspiring. Living in a place dragging itself back to the Dark Ages, here in Manila, I’m happy when I find people who’re actually sane out there. Here the gang of Bishops are actually threatening Congressmen with excommunication over their filing of a Reproductive Health bill, and they’re actually taken seriously! I’m planning to get a magic cracker to play with one of these days because of this controversy, but I’ve always found it a waste of time dragging myself over to the nearby church. Oh well, this would be a good reason to drop by the old place.
*want* to know – it’s that damned outrageously French accent that screws up my spelling.
Frackin’ Cracker from Wichita
Gulped His Body down
Dug for him a shallow grave
And laid the cracker down…
We can share the wafers we can share the wine…
Dembski:
“If Darwin was not the alpha and omega of evolution, the he was either a knave or a fool or a madman. Darwin did not leave us any other options. He did not intend to.”
Hmm. Not only can parody not be distinguished from the rantings of various internet loons, but it also can’t be distinguished from the rantings of the supposed “professionals” of ID. What a strange, demon-haunted world Billy must live in.
See, this is one MAJOR difference between atheists and your average Xtian.
When PZ says he will get “cranky” if this thread goes over a thousand, we godless atheists (to be redundantly repetitive)lurk around for hours trying to get the thread over a thousand.
Religiobots would all be cowering if fear of offending “daddy”. That may be why we don’t have any here right now… they don’t want “daddy” to start yelling.
Silly Xtians. Threads are for comments!
Damn.
All I have JefferyD is a Bing cherry pie I baked this afternoon. No cake.
There went our finely ‘crafted’ spell.
Oh, this is sad. Sitting here shootin’ the breeze when one even moderately semi-persistent concern troll or offended catlick would get us over the line :o)
It’s anti-trolling! Those weasels – they know we’re waiting for ’em so they’re intentionally avoiding this thread. Scum, they is.
***
They used to pray for silver
now they pray for lies.
Patricia, #884, wrote:
Nope. I stand by my anti-avian slurs.
My dear Patricia, a Bing cherry pie will always trump a cake – thus the spell is even stronger.
Martini and porch time. Night all and a Pox on your Nabisco.
I agree, Rey (#891), Billy’s jumped the shark (again). What’s left off that quote was his “hat-tip” to C.S. Lewis (‘course ol’ Clive’s been dead these 45 years, so I doubt he’ll appreciate Bill’s cap-doff in his dead direction). I can only interpret this as an allusion to Lewis’s stupid “liar, lunatic or Lord” meme (one of the few false trichotomies I’ve seen). Of course, Lewis’s choice was Lord; what’s Billy’s for Darwin? Knave, fool, madman, or alpha and omega of evolution (ah, a false tetrachotomy!)?
Gee, Bill, none of the above? A really smart guy with a great idea and a lot of time on his hands to develop it 150 years ago?
That must be it! We’ll have to depend on the old reliables. Quick, somebody say something vaguely critical of the US. That should be good for a half-dozen “anti-American bigot” posts from J for starters.
In the end, this is the world we live in :
Father hits son with baseball bat to “cast the demon of homosexuality out of him”…
Anderson, South Carolina July 18 2008
http://www.independentmail.com/news/2008/jul/18/anderson-man-batters-gay-son-home/
Ah, well, see, you never met a homosexual baseball didja?
So there you go.
*Gasp!*
Wowbagger, you leave me no choice. I will cackle your non-repentance to the High Holy Council of Cluckheads.
How dare you take such a stand on chicken slurs! This is a disgrace, a debacle! Their Biddyships are fully capable of dispatching the Bird of Paradise to fly up your nose.
You silly thing! Do not taunt the Holy Cluckheads a second time!
At the sound of the tone, there will be approximately 100 comments before PZ gets cranky… *BEEP*
See! I learned!
On the overloading of comments in recent times: I was browsing through the archives and found a few in July/August 2007 that were interesting displays of vehemence from both sides, and I was thinking that it was a bit of a shame we didn’t get any like that that anymore – I thought perhaps it was because the trolls had been so soundly thrashed on so many occasions they’d passed the word that Pharyngula was somewhere to avoid.
I’ve enjoyed being proved wrong. And the attitudes and arguments (if you can call them that) of the papist trolls have been a change – i won’t say a nice change – from what I’ve become used to over the past few months.
I M CET!
Midnight Is Meaningless!
German lesson for you: Kräcker Keks Waffel
Learn it or No Soup For You!
My friend Joe ‘Benny’ R. called me to tell you he’s not amused.
I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to give in, but I just wasn’t watching my hands for a moment…
You silly thing! Do not taunt the Holy Cluckheads a second time!
you should translate that into actual “Chicken”:
http://www.chickenhop.com/sounds/soundclips.html
if you want us to take you a serious representative of Cluckheads.
tookatookatooka
If nothing else, it’s fun to ses the word “papist” enjoying increased use. It reminds me of Barth’s Sot-Weed Factor, which now I’m going to have to find and reread.
I gather that a papist is one who commits papacy.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7
Ah, well, see, you never met a homosexual baseball didja?
So there you go.
I dunno…
I see a lot of repressed homosexuality in all the phallic-shaped bats and leathery balls.
and what about:
no glove, no love?
so, are you a pitcher or a catcher…
hell, some have even defined the level of sexual play via a base-running analogy.
clearly I can understand that the father was really upset about all the baseball items in his son’s room, and decided to utilize a negative feedback mechanism to get his son to stop with his perverse interest in such a sexually charged sport.
Ichthyic – Truely your wisdom doeth humble me.
CLUCK! cluck, cluck, cluck, Wowbagger, cluck! Squawk!
Oh, bug – took, took, took.
I seem to remember in Stephen King’s Needful Things when the townsfolk are riled up by the nefarious shopkeeper to play nasty tricks on each other to promote conflict, some of the most hilarious comments are those swapped between the Catholic and the Protestant clergy.
I’m sure the former is referred to at least once as a ‘papist’; the latter is extremely offended to find a note in which he’s referred to as a ‘Babtist(sic) rat-fuck’.
Oh, bug – took, took, took.
wnnn-nn wn-wn, k-k-k-bugoock. cluck-kk-k, wtwtwtwtwtnnn!
*snicker*
Ichthyic, I was thinking of you today when I saw this in my NSF update:
http://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=111929&govDel=USNSF_51
(Dr. Andrew Bass – tee hee. Doesn’t take much to amuse me.)
If there’s still any Catholic assholes infesting this thread, I would like an explanation of the Resurrection magic trick. How did the dead Jebus turn himself into a stinking zombie?
Any of you Catholic idiots want to explain that one? What magical words came from your sky fairy to turn a decomposing corpse into a zombie? Come on, Catholic retards, explain your night of the living dead.
We are close to a thousand. Let’s not disappoint PZ.
Free speech is a mantra here. Okay, I will suggest something really atrocious, but legal. It is very offensive to a religious group, so you should love it. I would like to know how many atheists would do it, for principles sake of course.
Here goes: you dress in a Nazi uniform, sing Nazi songs, give the Hitler salute, and burn a Torah in front of a synagogue known for having many holocaust survivors as members. Do it on the Sabbath so they can watch. Just make sure you are on the sidewalk. You can’t get more hateful then this, so I am sure you are enthused about this idea.
Now it is legal, although in some places you might need a permit. It is horribly offensive, no doubt about it. It offends a religious group, and you say you hate all religions. So do it. Hurt those people. Make them remember their dead loved ones. Stomp on their feelings. Violate their sacred beliefs. Make their children cry. Cause them horrible pain. That will prove…well I am not sure what you really want to prove, but it will prove “it”. Next you can move on to desecrating the Hindu religion.
Or you can admit that just because you can legally do something there are some things you should NOT do if you are a decent human being.
Please spare me the “its not the same thing” garbage. It is. PZ has already decided to desecrate a Quran. The Jews can be next on his list. After all, isn’t offending people the whole point of his existence? So don’t try to weasel out of it. Get PZ on board to do it. Let’s see you be really offensive or maybe we can find the limit of your desire to hurt other people. I would really be interested in seeing what that limit is because so far I see a hate that is boundless.
Okay, I have made the suggestion. Now you can get down to insulting me, arguing about Hitler, and carefully avoiding any notion of actually doing it. Be the cowards and hypocrites that you are. Cheers
Fr. J, since you’re a shit for brains priest, maybe you would like to answer the question I asked in #913. I mean when you’re not busy fucking little boys.
Yay! “Father” J to the rescue!! Must not have gotten the reverse-trolling memo.
yeah, you know, I don’t think it is, no.
By the way, the signs and portents are favorable. It took 3.35 hours to get from comment #800 to 850, but only 1.6 hours from there to 900. I’m still thinking midnight is a pretty good estimate of Crankytime.
#914 FrJ
Here goes: you dress in a Nazi uniform, sing Nazi songs, give the Hitler salute, and burn a Torah in front of a synagogue known for having many holocaust survivors as members. Do it on the Sabbath so they can watch. Just make sure you are on the sidewalk. You can’t get more hateful then this, so I am sure you are enthused about this idea.
Everyone would just think that you are just another psycho catholic nutter failed artist, and tell you to move on down the street. I am sure there are some Jehovah’s Witnesses that need some of your kind of attention.
“Please spare me the “its not the same thing” garbage.”
Why? It isn’t the same thing.
Only an idiot would think otherwise.
Fr. J,
Can you cite the posts where PZ has received death threats from any proponents of Judaism? No? Funny that.
Apart from anything else, ignoramus, Jews belong to a race, not a religion. The Nazis cared about blood, not beliefs. You papists can easily avoid PZ’s ‘offence’ when you discard your ridiculous
beliefsooga-booga; the Jews in Germany didn’t have that option.I also find it particularly ironic that a Catholic would criticise a Nazi, considering your organisation’s historic admiration for their most notorious member – Hitler.
No scientific merit
Four responses to this debate.
1. Your argument Professor Myers is without scientific merit – I don’t see the logic.
2. There is not point in desecrating the hosts you have because you are not a believer therefore the point — and affect — you are trying to create is moot.
3. I don’t like many of the folks who share my point of view on the above two points bringing in the Q’uran here – two wrongs don’t make a right.
4. Professor Myers, I take great joy in knowing — at least at a personal level — that your attempt has backfired. This debate only serves to strengthen my faith and I suspect the same can be said for the hundreds of thousands of Catholics who are finding out about this and responding to it with logical, fact-based arguments.
One step forward, two steps back – sorry professor. The only way to win this game is not to play.
Time for the link
http://www.nobeliefs.com/nazis.htm
“1. Your argument Professor Myers is without scientific merit – I don’t see the logic.”
There are a great many things you can’t see.
Speaking of dressing up like Nazis and, uh, the whole cracker thing, I was wiki-reminding myself about the original film of The Producers and found this interesting quotation:
Relevance to the current situation? Discuss.
Felix Leiter wrote:
Er, you do know what the terms ‘logical’ and ‘fact-based’ mean, don’t you?
about ineffable magical baked goods.
Of course, if we really wanted to do something appalling and offensive,
http://www.ushmm.org/museum/exhibit/focus/antisemitism/voices/transcript/?content=20080131
Yep, so far the responses were exactly as I predicted. My hypothesis was correct. What a scientist I am. I knew you would not do it. You are cowards and hypocrites.
On the bright side we have discovered how far most of you will go to hurt others. And we had to go pretty far. At least Jewish holocaust survivors are safe from your acts of hatred. Now take that little tiny scrap of humanity you have discovered and nourish it. Let it grow to maturity. Let us hope it will eventually overshadow the hatred.
Dr. Andrew Bass – tee hee.
ya know, one of my orals exam questions was actually to list all the scientists I knew of whose names related to the subjects they researched.
I could extend to any language I knew.
like someone with last name “Vogel” who works on birds.
ah, brings back memories.
did you know that midshipman (subject of the article you referenced: http://www.fishbase.org/summary/SpeciesSummary.php?id=3071)
was the source of many rumors about “secret navy submarines” in the Sausalito area (near San Francisco) until just a couple of decades ago?
people who lived on or very near the water often heard them making their mating calls at night, and the damn fish were so loud that people thought it was some secret navy experiment.
They also have a rather odd set of mating habits. IIRC, males are polygynous (there are actually two mating strategies, this being the primary), and will actually sequester females in their burrows as prisoners (they will grab the females swimming by the mouth of their burrows with their teeth, shove them in the burrow, and not let them out until they lay eggs.
they’re also bioluminescent (pictures you will find of them will show rows of photophores).
not exactly a face that could launch a thousand ships, though:
I See What You Did There.
So, when are you in your strengthened faith going to publicly repudiate Donahue, and demand that the Catholic Campus Ministries back off from Webster Cook and Benjamin Collard?
Yet the logical, fact-based argument is that a cracker is indeed just a cracker, no matter what words may or may not have been mumbled near it. There you go: logic and facts.
I See What You Did There.
Is that the sequel to:
“I Saw What You Did Last Summer”
At least Jewish holocaust survivors are safe from your acts of hatred.
WHHEEEEEE!!!
the car is off the trolley.
so, did they ordain you at the local psych ward, there, “father”?
When are you, with you obviously humongously outsized piece of humanity, going to demand that the Catholic Campus Ministries back off from Webster Cook and Benjamin Collard (dropping all charges), and loudly proclaim to all that Bill Donahue does not speak for Catholics?
Fr. J,
Yeah, we’re all shocked you have no arguments, either to the refutation of your pathetic attempt at an analogy nor your inability to defend Hitler, your brother-in-faith.
Was it because it was too hard to understand? Here’s a dumbed-down version:
No-one of the Jewish faith has threatened anyone; hence, PZ has no issue with them.
The Nazis persecuted a race; they didn’t mock a belief system.
Hitler was a catholic and his actions were supported by catholics.
Can your feeble mind grasp that?
It means I avoid being pedant-sniped:
http://xkcd.com/326/
When I was at Michigan State the ornithologist was named Don Beaver and a grad student studying muskrats was Frank Fish (later featured in Zimmer’s At the Water’s Edge).
Violate? Violate!!!
CLUCK, cluck, cluck!
The holy reverend Father says violate…
You idiot, poltroon, codswallop filled bag of slimy salmon shite! Stuff your outrage up your hardly filled magical underpants.
Fr. J, thanks for taking time out from fucking little boys to visit us.
I thought I recognized that name recently! He’s this biomechanist, right?
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25709843/
Another 60 or comments to go before PZ gets really cranky, LOL!
That’s what I’ve been meaning to ask a catholic poster – does the priest fuck the kids before the magic cracker ceremony or after?
Thanks for the reminder, BobC.
I gotta get some sleep. Carry on to the mil, good people (not you “Father”)
@ No 919,wowbagger :
//Apart from anything else, ignoramus, Jews belong to a race, not a religion//
Was that satire? Because otherwise its wrong.
Just 64 comments to go before PZ loses it!
No, 56.
wow… in those two seconds, my count was put off by about 10 other commenters!
By the time I click on this, PZ will probably be over the edge… if he’s back from making that sandwich yet.
Fr. J,
No. Just no. You are insulting the dignity of Jews worldwide with your comparison of a little piece of baked dough and the gruesomely brutal death of their family members at the hands of practicing and professing Christians. You are not related to Christ. You didn’t know him when he lived, and you don’t know him now. You are a despicable excuse for a human being, and you exhibit with every fiber of your body what is wrong with your dangerously delusional, immoral and antihuman belief system. People like you are the precise reason people are interested in promoting atheism at all. People like you are the precise reason why some countries outlaw the trampling on human dignity that is Holocaust denial. People like you are the reason things like the Holocaust ever happened. You.
All we need is 64 more?
Sluts, sluts! Where the hell are the sluts?
[had to remove the parenthesis at the end, there]
I didn’t know that. Thanks for all of the information. Interesting. Apropos of nothing, have you read anything interesting lately?
Is it too late to post “First”??
*ducking*
Aw, oh.
We might want to rethink this.
PZ might decide to spank somebody as an example to the rest of us – or worse – loose the Krackin!
*Oh the humanity!*
Just to add to the comment count: Fr. J., you are a moron.
On the plus side, you were just the troll we needed to get us into motion. Thanks for that. Now, kindly pray off.
And you’re still a patronizing, pompous prig.
Being a patronizing, pompous prig does not disqualify you from being a scientist.
Why should we do anything to satisfy the whim of a patronizing, pompous prig? We’re neither cowards nor hypocrites. If you want Jews terrorized, do it on your own time. Just follow in the footsteps of Pius XII. He’s the guy who, when Vichy France asked about the Church’s position on anti-Jewish laws, responded that the legislation did not conflict with Catholic teachings.
It seems to be that you and your lot have a history of anti-semitism. So it’s understandable that you should want us to wallow in the same mudhole as you. Sorry, but we’re not playing your silly game.
BTW, you’re still a patronizing, pompous prig.
NOT THE KRAKEN OH GOD NO!
EVERYONE STOP POSTING
Isn’t that pronounced “Cracken”?
( But why is the rum gone? )
One slut! Right here!
Spankings? Is this the line for spankings?
Does anyone else think we should go to exactly 999, then stop? Let FrJ take the hit?
Rum?? What Rum?? You sluts been holding out on me again????
Fr. J said, “Yep, so far the responses are exactly as I predicted.”
I nominate you for Great Prophet.
Clinteas #942,
What’s the problem? To my knowledge the Nazis persecuted atheists of Jewish ancestry because of their race. Same as they persecuted Polish catholics despite their shared religion.
Because, you know, that’s what happens when I beat up this straw man here. He reacts just like I want him to… er… just like I predicted! Yeah… Okay…
Funny the way that works.
So, people that are blasphemous die early in a terrible way?
It is funny that Bertrand Russell died when he was 97 and survived a plane crash when he was 74, swimming in cold waters. And besides, that ridiculous chain mail tells a lot about the kind of “love” that Christian god delivers.
Christ on a cracker! You persnickety bunch of godless bastards. You would make me break out the Oxford English…
KRAKEN/n. a mythical sea monster said to appear off the coast of Norway. pg. 791.
It’s bedtime for this strumpet. I’m all flounced out. Somebody can have my place in line for the spanking couch.
Goodnight sweethearts!
I didn’t think the professor had a Kraken, but I seem to remember the mention of undead squid-human hybrid cyborgs several months back.
After reading thousands of comments, I think they can be summarized by the old expression: If you are offended by having your beliefs ridiculed, don’t hold ridiculous beliefs.
Owlmirror wins the thread.
Who is going to be the annoited one to make the 1000th post at midnight FDT (frostbite daylight time)??
Clinteas disappeared before seeing my question to him; can anyone else help?
He had a problem with what I wrote upthread, which was this Apart from anything else, ignoramus, Jews belong to a race, not a religion
Isn’t that true? To my understanding one can convert, but also that it was the race rather than the religion the Nazis had issues with; hence, they persecuted atheist Jews as much as the observant/theists.
Feel free to tell me I’m wrong if I am.
Ichythic
If you had to answer a question on it why didn’t you use the proper term frequently used in the last but one page of New Scientist.
Nominative Determinism
My last name refers to cutting the tops off willow trees and isn’t at all like what I really do
Chris P
968.
@ 966,Wowbagger,
some of us have to work LOL !
There are black jews,caucasian jews,asian jews,black jews,white jews,red jews,they have a common religious belief,its not a race issue.
The nazis just made stuff about race up as they went along,and if you werent a “true arian”,you were stuffed.
Maybe we mean similar things and just have different words for it,but as far as Im familiar with the term “race”,its not to do with a religious belief,like there is no catholic race either.
Back to my Paracetamol overdose……
I just read #787. Owlmirror, as usual, makes a very good point.
What’s the problem Catholics? Why can’t you keep your problems within your church? Kick the cracker abuser out of your church, not the school. Respect our wall of separation or get out of our country.
#763:
The Universal Life Church will ordain you an Imam, after which you can throw fatwas around all you want. OTOH, denouncing can be fun, but it’s still nowhere near as great as smiting.
#765:
Yeah. Boring. Must be why you’re willing to stick around for 13,000+ comments.
And those who don’t believe aren’t going to start believing just because of one stinking website full of repetitious “proofs.”
Now, isn’t that better?
#877:
Or maybe a member of the First Baptist Church of Boston, MA, AKA the Church of the Holy Bean Blowers.
I feel guilty for having all the fun of reading the comments on this thread while doing nothing to up the count toward 1000. So here’s my contribution.
Clinteas – sorry, I didn’t know for sure if you were done for the afternoon.
Sounds like a problem with the terms. It’s hard to differentiate; hence why I tend to favour ‘proponent of Judaism’ (since it’s specific to the religion and not the race) rather than ‘Jew’ or ‘Jewish’, since there are atheists who are ethnically Jewish.
Since Fr. J attempted to make dressing up as Nazis the equivalent of PZ’s desecrating the cracker I felt the need to point out that there’s a difference between mocking the religious beliefs someone chooses to hold and attacking them for the race they were born into.
Hence, atheist Jews would be offended as well as theist/observant Jews – illustrating that his analogy was inaccurate.
Does that make sense?
While we’re on it, though, is there any mention of what happened to the ‘Aryans’ who’d converted to Judaism? I’ve not heard any stories about that.
Oops, I dunno what happened to my blockquotes. Preview has been acting up on me recently. Must be the Cracker’s Curse. Couldn’t possibly be my near-illiteracy in HTML…… :-
Better?
My usual response when sent a mail offering (threatening) to pray for me is to reply with:
“If you promise not to pray for me, I promise not to masturbate to make your head explode.”
That seems to get rid of them right quick.
This is truly embarrassing. It really is. I mean, at it’s best atheism puts forth that it iis populated by intellects and free thinkers. You would think that a priest showing up would be manna from heaven (if you’ll excuse the metaphor). That it would be an opportunity to engage in all that intellect and freethinking. Instead it was the occasion of wile rants and insults rather than anything like intellectual engagement. What we could offer here was you’re a shithead and thanks for taking time from screwing kids and your church loves Nazis.
The other day in the radio piece PZ linked to you’ll hear him say that there are brilliant Roman Catholics and as well as stupid Roman Catholics and that there are brilliant Atheists just as there are stupid Atheists. I understand that last better and better.
What does any of it mean? A priest showing up is a “shithead” by virtue of being a Catholic priest? PZ was on the radio the other day and failed to mention it, rather holding that there are brilliant and stupid Catholics just as there are brilliant and stupid Atheists. I failed to not anyone taking him to task for it. That J is responsible for the Church being to cozy with the Nazis? For those that watch the real world I would point out that if you feel Roman Catholicism was too cozy with the Nazis you only agree with the last RC Pope, and furthermore J would have to be pretty old to have been involved at all. To top off the stupidity we have accusations of screwing kids. Can any here provide information that J has one so? Does any here understand that a very few percentage points of priests did so. Does any here that accusing J reeks of bias and stupidity? The Shakescraft report put forward that 1 in 10 students were in some way sexually abused or harassed and what was going on in education was many times worse than the clergy abuse getting all the hype. As PZ is an educator would any here hold him guilty by association as was the case with Fr. J?
Seriously, at some level people thought this was not about offense for the sake of offense but rather about making a point and an argument. This drew little more than rants and insult and reasons to see atheism in that light. Very sad.
uh…
what?
Sully,
You get the presumption of concern troll innocence – this time.
Part of it is due to our familiarity with Fr. J’s ‘work’. Have you read all the comments he’s made on the various threads?
And if you read through all the comments in this you’ll notice it wsa Fr. J who first brought up the Nazis in his pathetic analogy for what PZ’s done with crackers.
We saw a Catholic using Hitler to attack atheists as just a little hypocritical.
Isn’t it ironic that the professor doesn’t want to be bothered with email, yet he continues his assault? You have no one to blame but yourself! You continue your attacks yet want to be immune from responses? And you call Christians hypocrits!
We also call Christians ‘morons’ when they’re as stupid as you, John.
It’s just a fucking cracker. Jeezzz…
Nominative Determinism
ah, I see, you wanted to make it clear you read a popular science magazine.
congratulations?
btw, how do you know I wasn’t referring to aptronyms?
:p
Sully:
(1) He isn’t a priest according to those who have come across him before.
(2) His analogy was a disgraceful attempt to compare what [the mainly Catholic] Nazi’s did, to the desecration of a cracker. I hope you don’t mind if I spew up at this point?
(3) Fr. J is not here to engage in argument. Ever heard of poisoning the well? If you weren’t so intellectually lazy, you might have tried searching for him, first and foremost, before accusing people of simply insulting him.
(4) I take your point about Nazism and the priest rape scandal, and I wouldn’t have said that myself, but once again you expose your lack of research skills by not mentioning that the 1 in 10 figure that you mentioned included all types of sexual behavior — language, inappropriate touching, and even two people [student and teacher] of legal age in a relationship.
That is not the case, as far as I am aware, with the statistics about the Catholic Church.
Sully, Fr. J already has a reputation here. Like most priests, he’s an asshole. So that’s why he was treated like an asshole.
Even if Fr. J wasn’t an asshole, do you really think it’s possible to reason with a Catholic priest? These people become priests for one reason and one reason only, they’re batshit crazy.
21 and counting
do do do do do d’do do tall and tan and young and lovely the girl from ipanema goes walking…
Wewease Bwian! Or the kwaken!
One more thing. It doesn’t matter if Fr. J is a child molester or not. Priests have that reputation because they earned it. If they don’t like being called little boy rapers, they shouldn’t be priests.
I want to clarify (2). He wasn’t comparing what the Nazi’s did, to desecration. He was comparing the desecration of a cracker to gratuitously goading Jews about the death of 6 million+ people.
Either way, it was disgusting.
BobC – I find it hard to imagine that they become priests because they’re batshit crazy; however, that’s the only explanation I can come up with for why they might staypriests.
Concern troll? That is some kind of status or badge? Seriously, labels do not impress me. That they should be applied to me neither makes nor breaks my day.
I did see that it was J that mentioned Nazis. I also commented on how irrelevant I saw the response. I read shithead and I commented on that as well. I read child olester and I commented on that as well.
You speak of what has been said on various threads? I would point out that at some level this stunt (and that is what it increasingly seen my me to be) is supposed to draw people to a viewpoint. That people should be familiar with all that has been said over thousand of posts on a “blog” and so be drawn by what nonsense is offered on a specific day and time is unlikely. That one should put aside the inane stupidity because some other person implies that it I all justified isn’t really worth considering.
Really, it’s not. If he purpose of this whole deal is to draw folks the implementation is shy of the purpose. The stunt drew my attention here, but “here” did not deliver. I fond so much rants and nonsense, that some stranger promises that it is all justified if only I knew and I can hold some sort of status as concern troll in the meantime doesn’t mean much. Really. But hey, thanks anyway.
Also, there is not one priest in the world who hasn’t lied to children. For example, telling children that Jebus was anything more than a worthless preacher man is lying. Lying to children is immoral and only assholes do it. Therefore all priests are assholes and should be treated with contempt.
Isn’t it ironic that the professor doesn’t want to be bothered with email, yet he continues his assault? You have no one to blame but yourself! You continue your attacks yet want to be immune from responses? And you call Christians hypocrits!
What assault? Who was attacked? What does “immune from responses” even mean? Can you cracker-loving morons not understand basic written English?
By the way, I haven’t listened to it, but Webster Cook appeared on this weeks episode of Freethought Radio.
It’s not just asshole priests who lie to children. All religious people lie to children. Even the most moderate Christian tells his children there’s a magical sky fairy hiding in the clouds. That’s child abuse. Only assholes abuse children. It’s fair to say every single religious person in the world is an asshole and deserves nothing but contempt. To be religious should be considered as disgraceful as being a racist.
john, @979:
Do you really mean to say that desecrating “holy wafers” warrants death threats? Really? That PZ’s “attacks” justify this whole ordeal? When the entire point of this was because this same kind of idiotic overreaction was given to Webster Cook’s taking the cracker out of the church, and getting death threats for that alone?
Is it really fair that you are allowed to freak out about any perceived slight that pertains to your supposed religious beliefs? Oh well, you don’t care…you either haven’t been paying attention or are incapable of understanding why this whole thing came about to begin with, so I am not even sure why I care.
6 posts while I was typing that little bit? Maybe I’ll get the 1000… 10 to go. Or was when I started.
Man, I was hoping there would be 1,000 comments when I got back, but not quite. Oh well. Time for bed.
Sully,
A concern troll is someone who pretends to hold similar beliefs to the posters on a site but then criticises them – saying something like, ‘Oh, I’m an atheist but I’m concerned that we’re making ourselves look bad…’
It’s an unpopular species. If you’re labeled one it’s not as much to insult you as to inform other posters to either ignore you or go on the offensive.
What did you expect to find here? You speak of ‘rants and nonsense’; well, any of the truly substantive arguments were used in the earlier threads; now it’s just about treating those we’ve seen before the way they deserve (as you saw with Fr. J) or guiding the new people here to have a look at what’s already been said rather than repeat ourselves.
How were the responses to Fr. J irrelevant? He lied about Nazi motivations; we corrected him.
POST!
Heheheee… ~_^
I’ve got the kwackers, but where did that bottle of rum go?
1000 get?