Superman is a profane dick

This is Superman getting shot by a tank.

The guy is so super-tough that his only response is to choke out some kind of gutteral noise, “GD”. I don’t even know how to pronounce that; maybe it’s Kryptonian for “ow” or something.

Unfortunately, a Christian comic book store owner in North Carolina is so annoyed that Superman might have used a euphemism for “god damn” that he’s boycotting all issues of Superman.

I could see Guy Gardner and maybe even Hal Jordan (Green Lanterns) saying it. I could see Oliver Queen (Green Arrow) saying it. I could easily see Damian Wayne (Robin) or MAYBE even Bruce Wayne saying it. But Superman was created to be the “perfect” super-hero. Unblemished. Superman is an American icon.

It grieves me to see a liberal Scottish schmuck like Grant Morrison take these liberties. I’m sorry, Superman would NEVER take God’s name in vain. In the words of the late Jim Croce, “You don’t tug on Superman’s cape.

“Perfect” apparently means “prissy” in his vocabulary. But I think he’s just given permission for some superheroes in the DC universe to start swearing like angry drunken sailors, which could be fun.

I understand that it’s only a comic and it’s not the real world, but I feel that as a Christian I have to draw the line somewhere.

Yeah, somewhere on the far side of petty and silly.

Besides, how can you get upset at a grunt? Everyone knows, Superman is a dick.

Michele Bachmann: pseudo-scientist and anti-vaxxer

There was another Republican debate (I skipped it; there are limits to the horrors I can endure), and apparently, many people think Michele Bachmann trumped Rick Perry by jumping on his ‘liberal’ endorsement of using the HPV vaccine to prevent cancers in women. Bachmann ranted about the federal government forcing innocent little girls to get mental retardation injections, and the teabaggers loved it. They loved it almost as much as they loved Rick Perry’s record of executions.

Orac rips her apart. It’s great fun, and informative, too.

As I’ve pointed out time and time again, Gardasil is incredibly safe by any measure. Also by any measure, it’s been very heavily tested and monitored. Of course, there is no evidence at all that the HPV vaccine can cause mental retardation. I’ve also pointed out how the vast majority of the reports of adverse reactions after the HPV vaccine made to the VAERS database were almost certainly not due to Gardasil and have castigated Medscape, of all publications, for buying into anti-vaccine myths about Gardasil. Meanwhile the American Academy of Pediatrics immediately issued a press release to correct Michelle Bachmann’s false statements about Gardasil. What Bachmann is peddling is pure pseudoscience. I suppose I shouldn’t be in the least bit surprised, given how gullible she is when it comes to science in general and how much she allows ideology to trump science.

Once again, the Republicans step forward as the anti-human, anti-science, anti-health party.

(Also on FtB)

Say something kind to Ashley Marie Chavez-Rubertt

She’s an up and coming scientist, a young biology student at the University of Florida, and she has been targeted by the animal rights radicals and human-hating monsters at NIO for harassment as a “career animal mutilator”. They’ve posted links to her email address and facebook on a page that conveniently also provides a diagram on how to make a molotov cocktail. They also declare that “She has now forfeited all of the rights that she denies her victims”. Her crime seems to be that she actually listened to NIO, thought about their position and hers, and disagreed with them:

Your website seems to indicate otherwise — look, I can appreciate what you do and I appreciate the fact you have your own opinions. Really, we need more opinionated people in the world. The fact of the matter is I myself have examined the evidence and I have already made a decision for myself.

For this, she’s targeted for “Phase II”, whatever that is. I don’t want to know.

They’ve posted contact information for her, but I hope she’s sensible and just shuts down that email account. These people are rabid fanatics, terrorists plain and simple.

(Also on FtB)

Say something kind to Ashley Marie Chavez-Rubertt

She’s an up and coming scientist, a young biology student at the University of Florida, and she has been targeted by the animal rights radicals and human-hating monsters at NIO for harassment as a “career animal mutilator”. They’ve posted links to her email address and facebook on a page that conveniently also provides a diagram on how to make a molotov cocktail. They also declare that “She has now forfeited all of the rights that she denies her victims”. Her crime seems to be that she actually listened to NIO, thought about their position and hers, and disagreed with them:

Your website seems to indicate otherwise — look, I can appreciate what you do and I appreciate the fact you have your own opinions. Really, we need more opinionated people in the world. The fact of the matter is I myself have examined the evidence and I have already made a decision for myself.

For this, she’s targeted for “Phase II”, whatever that is. I don’t want to know.

They’ve posted contact information for her, but I hope she’s sensible and just shuts down that email account. These people are rabid fanatics, terrorists plain and simple.

(Also on Sb)

Who won?

St. Xavier’s is an all-boys Catholic high school, and apparently they’re proud of it. In a game with a rival school, Colerain, the team started chanting about how their invisible man gave them an edge: “We’ve got Jesus!”. Ah, the arrogance of Christians…isn’t it nice that they think they get to deploy the Lord and Master of the Universe to assist them in football games?

The Colerain team responded effectively, I think. They chanted back, “We’ve got girls!”

I don’t care what the score was. Colerain wins.

Wait, what? Atheists don’t understand stories?

I get so tired of Christians sanctimoniously declaring what atheists really believe, and going on to tell us how we get it all wrong. They always seem to hector us over stuff we don’t believe and tell us that if we only stopped doing things we don’t do we’d see the value of Jeeesus. And we roll our eyes, and tally up another data point that says that religion turns you into a moron.

The latest exercise in firing 180° away from the target comes from Paul Wallace, who sends an open letter to atheists about believing in Johnny Cash. He really, really likes Johnny Cash, as he explains to us at length; I like Cash too, and I’ve got a few of his songs coming up frequently on my iPod list. His point is that Cash’s songs tell stories, and those stories shed light on the human condition, and that somehow this is something only a Christian can understand while atheists are blind to it.

[Read more…]

Must-see TV!

Wow. Bangladesh has imposed new restrictions on what can be shown on television. These rules will certainly make for compelling viewing.

[1] Private television channels cannot run direct publicity in favor of any political party [publicity in favor of ruling party is allowed],

[2] Misleading information cannot be incorporated in any talk shows [it stops the participants of the talk shows from delivering any comment criticizing the ruling party or its activities],

[3] National ideology or characters cannot be criticized,

[4] The father of the nation [Sheikh Mujibur Rahman] cannot be criticized in any of the programs [any of his mistakes during his governance cannot be anymore mentioned in any of the programs],

[5] No individual can be criticized in the programs [this has been initiated as a number of ministers in the ruling government became subject of harsh criticism following their severe failures],

[6] No criticism will be allowed on national ideologies and goals [this law will stop the television channels from scrutinizing and criticizing any of the decisions or policies adopted by the ruling party],

[7] No defense and government information can be leaked in any of the programs on television channels [this was initiated because a number of private television channels are exposing many of the hidden actions as well as corruptions inside ministries],

[8] No program can be aired which would provoke deterioration of law and order situation [this law will stop broadcasting news and contents related to general strikes and demonstration programs of the political opponents of the ruling party. This law has been incorporated to stop the television channels from exposing corruption as well as brutality of the law enforcing agencies in the country. Especially the ruling party turned uncomfortable when the private television channels exposed the physical assault of an opposition member of the Parliament, who was mercilessly beaten by some police officers. It was disclosed by the private television channels that, those police officers were leaders of the student front of the ruling Bangladesh Awami League, during their student life. Television programs containing investigative reports on murder in custody of opposition leader and lawyer Moinuddin Ahmed [M U Ahmed] also caused anger in the minds of the ruling party leaders],

[9] No program can be broadcast against any friendly nation [this will stop Bangladeshi channels to broadcast programs criticizing Palestine, Iran and many other nations, with which Bangladesh maintains ‘friendly’ relations,

[10] Programs related to trafficking in women, forced prostitution, rape etc will be barred from broadcast under the new law. This law will also stop broadcasting investigative reports on such issues.

[11] Broadcasting ‘kiss scene’ shall be banned under the new law [this will stop all foreign television channels, especially the movie channels from being connected to Bangladeshi cable television network],

[12] No program or content on mutiny or demonstration can be broadcast on television channels [this will stop the private television channels from showing any of the contents related to massacre inside the Bangladesh Riffles Headquarters],

[13] Programs exposing the activities of criminals as well as their modus-operandi cannot be shown on any television channel,

[14] The private television channels shall be ‘bound’ to broadcast speeches of the Head of the State, Head of the government [Prime Minister], public announcements, press notes as well as any ‘program of national interest’. This law will compel the television channels in continuing to broadcast programs containing political agendas of the ruling party.

I could make a much shorter set of laws that would be much simpler.

  • Only say nice things about the ruling party.

  • No criticism of anything!

  • NO KISSING!

It’s the opposite of what I imagine PharyngulaTV would be like — that would consist of many hours of people blowing raspberries at the Chief Poopyhead, nonstop, vicious criticism of everything (even the stuff we like!), and explicit sex 24 hours a day. I’d watch it. It would be much more interesting than the snoozefest on Bangladeshi TV.

(via Butterflies and Wheels.)

If there is no transcendant moral law, asking us to submit to it is a bad idea

My opinion of the rabbinical mind is plummeting downwards, thanks to the determined efforts of one man, Moshe Averick. We’ve encountered him before, and he was most unimpressive. Now he’s got a new line of criticism of atheists: we’re on a slippery slope. You know what comes next? What horrible abominable practice we’ll be endorsing?

Pedophilia!

Yeah, because without god’s laws to guide us, we will start running around raping little children willy-nilly. Never mind that atheists haven’t shown, as a whole, any such pattern or predilection, it’s just inevitable that we’ll want to abuse children. I think it’s a bizarre case of projection, again: really, I have no desire to have sex with small children, to rob banks, to rape dogs, or even to set churches on fire. You might as well suggest that without god I’ll become a NASCAR fan, start chewing tobacco, or vote Republican, all things I have no desire to do and which are not a product of theism or atheism.

I’m always baffled by this argument. What, there’s something about church or synagogue that suppresses your natural urge to rape, murder, and rob? But I feel no such urge without church!

And then, of course, he’s picked the very worst example. Nowadays, mention the word “pedophilia”, and nobody thinks of atheists — you know, even though pedophiles are a minority in their ranks, everyone considers “Catholic priest” virtually synonymous with “child-raper”. So much for religion suppressing those urges — it’s more like it attracts and enables monsters.

And then, having gnawed on one foot, Averick sticks the other one in.

A wise man once observed that while belief in God after the Holocaust may be difficult, belief in man after the Holocaust is impossible. The choices before us are clear: we will either seek a transcendent moral law to which we will all submit, or we will seek our own personal and societal indulgence. If we turn to God in our quest to create a moral and just world, we have a fighting chance; if not, we are doomed to spiral into the man-made hell of the human jungle.

Germany at the time of the Holocaust was a predominantly Catholic and Lutheran country. Hitler claimed to have a transcendant moral law, as well — that his people were the Chosen People, the best and greatest Volk, who by their intrinsic physical and moral and intellectual superiority were compelled to maintain their purity and exterminate the lesser races. That’s where you end up when you decree a source of absolute morality, a morality that isn’t based on equality and empathy and fairness, but on authority, especially the intangible untestable authority of an invisible magic ghost.

All moral laws are manmade. Do we recognize that reality and struggle to make them better as a community of reasonable human beings, or do we pretend that a few of us have special privileges and insight into the desires of a cosmic tyrant, and let them tell us how to live? Given that anyone claiming such authority is mad and delusional, I say no.

Our disgrace

I just saw @ThatKevinSmith’s Red State. It was the perfect movie to watch on 9/11: full of violence, sanctimonious religion, and terror in the name of anti-terrorism. It’s such an American movie. If you really want to feel the grim despair of living in God’s own America, this is the movie to see — a painful vision of our nightmare.

That’s really how I feel: we have been marching backwards since 9/11, throwing away our civil liberties, lashing out at the world with violence, as if that will solve anything. For contrast, read this description of what Martin Luther King did for the country. He inspired people to stand up for their rights, and got African Americans to unite and demand respect.

At this point, I would like to remind everyone exactly what Martin Luther King did, and it wasn’t that he “marched” or gave a great speech.

My father told me with a sort of cold fury, “Dr. King ended the terror of living in the south.”

Please let this sink in and and take my word and the word of my late father on this. If you are a white person who has always lived in the U.S. and never under a brutal dictatorship, you probably don’t know what my father was talking about.

But this is what the great Dr. Martin Luther King accomplished. Not that he marched, nor that he gave speeches.

He ended the terror of living as a black person, especially in the south.

It was a great stride forward for black people. Yet when you look at the last ten years, what do we see? The opposite. The country rushing to embrace fear. There’s nothing to honor today. Americans should see this as a day of shame, not because we were attacked, but for how we responded afterwards — we left courage behind and became a nation of bullies and cowards.

And that’s all I have to say about 9/11.

Oh, man, Orson Scott Card is such a warped little man

In his benighted quest to make everyone on the planet incapable of reading anything he’s ever written without muttering “what an asshole…” under their breath, Orson Scott Card has taken a great leap upward in arrogance and obsession. He is rewriting Shakespeare. Not only that, he’s rewriting him into a cranky Mormon bigot who hates the gays. This is from a review of Hamlet’s Father; I warn you, it completely gives away the conclusion of Card’s retelling, but that doesn’t matter, because it’s frikkin’ Shakespeare and you ought to just read the original, and it’s frakkin’ Card, who has become such a parody of himself that you shouldn’t waste your time reading him anyway.

Here’s the punch line: Old King Hamlet was an inadequate king because he was gay, an evil person because he was gay, and, ultimately, a demonic and ghostly father of lies who convinces young Hamlet to exact imaginary revenge on innocent people. The old king was actually murdered by Horatio, in revenge for molesting him as a young boy—along with Laertes, and Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern, thereby turning all of them gay. We learn that Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are now “as fusty and peculiar as an old married couple. I pity the woman who tries to wed her way into that house.”

He really needs to get himself a rent-boy and get these obsessions out of his head.