Ignore Westboro Baptist Church

Yup, it's been a long time since I blogged, but I felt this was a good way to get back in the pool.

To the surprise of absolutely no one paying attention, Westboro Baptist Church is planning to bring their travelling hate show on the road to Joplin, MO to make asses of themselves at the funeral of the tornado victims. Fark.com:

On its website, the church says "Thank God for 125 dead," an echo of its common refrain crediting God with having people killed in retribution for the United States' tolerance of homosexuality.

Members plan to be in Joplin on Sunday when President Barack Obama is to visit and may attend at a memorial service for storm victims.

And no, there is no level to which these slime will not ooze. There is, predictably, a completely meaningless and ineffective Facebook page to which people can show their displeasure, not that anything has EVER resulted from a Facebook protest.

A couple of points:

• Yes, these people are disgraceful.
• No, there's no reasoning with them.

Now that we've established that, a couple more points:

• Yes, they are permitted by the Constitution to say and do whatever they want, so long as they break no laws in doing so. You don't have to like it, but...
• If you try to infringe on their rights or harm them, they will sue you for damages, because that's how they make their money.

Here's what you, and everyone, needs to do: We need to decide to stop paying attention to these freaks. They THRIVE on the attention, they are deliberately as annoying and offensive as possible precisely to rile you up so that they can purposefully goad you into doing something stupid. They're the taunting bully that runs to the teacher after you lose your cool and gets YOU in trouble for throwing the first punch.

An example: When I was a news reporter in northern Iowa, there was a series of bomb threats called in at Mason City School District by annoying punks who wanted a day off. The local TV station did the smart thing by NOT reporting on future bomb threats that turned out to be without merit (which was all of them, fortunately) so the attention-whoring twerps wouldn't get their kicks seeing their merry mischief on television after school.

Same deal with these vermin: they get off on pissing you off. They are psychologically unbalanced, but it is the collective response they get that keeps them coming back.

I make no judgement on whether they even believe the shit they spout (though I suspect they do). The point is, they've figured out yet another way to make money without being productive members of society, and the more we let them get to us, the longer they'll perpetuate their evil.

What God Destroys, Mankind Would Rebuild

Of course by now you've heard of the statue of Jesus in Ohio that was struck by lightning. Well, now the gullible schlubs are forking over their funds to rebuild the motherfucking golden calf...

"The national attention in the wake of the fire that destroyed the giant statue of Jesus outside Solid Rock Church has brought a flood of donations — and inquiries from artists — to rebuild a deluxe version of the icon along Interstate 75."

For Christ's sake... Don't you people need the money for putting on extravagant passion plays? Think of the children!

And get a load of the guy who put up this monstrosity...

"As it turns out, the "King of Kings" sculpture was insured for $500,000, about twice what it cost the church to erect it in 2004, because the original artist, Brad Coriell of Nashville, is a Christian who donated some of his time to the project, said the church's co-pastor, Darlene Bishop.

In response to an interview request, Coriell, self-described as reclusive and eccentric on his website, said Wednesday: "Isn't it wonderful!!"

"Self-described reclusive and eccentric," indeed. Code words for, "he's nuttier than Planters, but it's all in the name of Jeebus, so he's off limits."

And I need to go into some type of bullshit ministry so people can give ME a QUARTER OF A MILLION FUCKING DOLLARS TO BUILD A COMPLETELY USELESS BIT OF SELF-INDULGENCE TO A NON-EXISTENT GOD. Have you people ever heard of charity?

And I'd feel the same way if the president of a prominent atheist charity used donations to buy himself an Armani suit. Disgraceful.

I wish there was a god; I'd ask it to take a shot at the church itself next time. But if there was, he'd probably have hit St. Peters a long time ago.

Transgendered Political Appointment By Obama; Predictable Reaction By Christianists

President Obama has appointed a male-to-female transgender, Amanda Simpson, to senior technical adviser for the Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security. She's got 30 years in the field and is well-respected for her abilities. Of course the Christian 'tards have congratulated her in their own, inimitable fashion:

"Is there going to be a transgender quota now in the Obama administration?" asked Peter LaBarbera, president of the anti-gay group Americans for Truth. "How far does this politics of gay and transgender activism go? Clearly this is an administration that is pandering to the gay lobby."

"Simpson's nomination was forwarded through to President Obama by a gay activist group, making it appear that this appointment of a male-to-female 'transgender' activist to a high level Commerce Department position to be payback to his far-left base for their political support," a spokeswoman for Focus on the Family said in statement.

Yeah, because knowing a woman was born with male reproductive parts (despite the perfection of Gosh's intelligent design), and yet had the audacity to take advantage of modern medical practices to correct mother nature's screw-up will make people lose Jesus.

Good. If you're his representatives on Earth, we don't want him.

(Aside, am I going to Hell for not capitalizing a pronoun pertaining to the bearded guy with doe-eyes?)

The only appropriate response is, of course, Carlin:

"Don't these professional Christians have anything to do during the day?"

Via RichardDawkins.net.

North Carolina Church To Burn Every Book They Can Lay Hands On

Almost every one, anyway. See how much concentrated crazy you can spot in this one...

A Baptist Church near Asheville, N.C., is hosting a "Halloween book burning" to purge the area of "Satan's" works, which include all non-King James versions of the Bible, popular books by many religious authors and even country music.

The website for the Amazing Grace Baptist Church in Canton, N.C., says there are "scriptural bases" for the book burning. The site quotes Acts 19:18-20: "And many that believed, came and confessed and shewed their deeds. Many of them also which used curious arts, brought their books together, and burned them before all men: and they counted the price of them, and found it fifty thousand pieces of silver. So mightily grew the word of God and prevailed."

Church leaders deem Good News for Modern Man, the Evidence Bible, the New International Version Bible, the Green Bible and the Message Bible, as well as at least seven other versions of the Bible as "Satan's Bibles," according to the website. Attendees will also set fire to "Satan's popular books" such as the work of "heretics" including the Pope, Mother Teresa, Billy Graham and Rick Warren.

"I believe the King James version is God's preserved, inspired, inerrant and infallible word of God," Pastor Marc Grizzard told a local news station of his 14-member parish.

Hey, Pastor Grizzard, Fred Phelps called...he wants you to quit stealing his act.

Seriously, do these people have two-headed alien babies with gills? These people have a list of holy-roller enemies that boils down to "everyone but us." They're like atheists, only without the cool kid factor.

Via Pharyngula.

A Birther Infomercial, No Less

The only appropriate response is, are these people fucking kidding me?

A new birther infomercial running on a CBS affiliate in Texas and elsewhere around the country tells viewers a "got a birth certificate?" bumper sticker can be theirs for the low price of $30...For a $30 contribution, viewers also get a fax sent in their name to the 50 state attorneys general and Attorney General Eric Holder demanding that President Obama produce his real birth certificate.

Let's see yours, first, Jethro. And then I'll continue to question your citizenship, to see how YOU like it.

It should come as no surprise at all that these reality-denying twats are True Believers:

The program was produced by LivePrayer.com, a Web site affiliated with Bill Keller, a fundamentalist Christian minister who also hosts the infomercial.

Imprisoned in the late 1980s after an insider trading conviction, Keller later committed his life to God, attended Liberty University in Virginia, and founded Bill Keller Ministries, according to his bio. LivePrayer.com was "founded for the sole purpose of having a site on the internet where people can go 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for prayer."

Besides being a forum for prayer requests, LivePrayer.com features the Birther infomercial and a "False Hope" program advertised with a picture of Obama crudely photoshopped next to Hitler. Keller has called Islam a "false religion that follows a false god that will lead them to eternal condemnation."

Oh, that's going to leave a mark.

For those of you too gob-smacked by teh crayzee to remember, Liberty University is Jerry Falwell's diploma mill for the easily indoctrinated. I wonder if they have any kind of library, since you only have to know one book...

I think I'll save my $30 for a copy of Richard Dawkins' The Greatest Show On Earth, thanks.

Via Sullivan.

The True Meaning of Jesus (Fish)

I don't care for the whole "fish-on-car-bumpers" stuff. It's like the whole "MY dad can beat up YOUR dad" crap from the dreaded playgrounds of my unhappy childhood. However, I WOULD like to have this as a tattoo...



Thanks, Pete.

Did Jesus Really Exist?

I was perusing the Internet looking for trouble this morning :-). I found this piece by Jim Walker, originally penned/keyboarded in 1997, which suggests--loosely--that Jesus was a sort of messianic King Arthur. IOW, a creation of mythology and literary sleight-of-hand. The discussion essentially says that any "evidence" that Jesus existed is all hearsay, because the gospels were written by people thrice (or more) removed from the original events who had not spoken to eyewitnesses. Interesting take, and a long one, but very well written.

I frankly don't care whether or not Jesus existed (if he didn't then the Muslims at least have one up on the Christians--nobody doubts the historical existence of Muhammed.). What's important is what has been done in his name. To whit: terrifying gullible children with visions of eternal hellfire for being disobedient to parents. Setting up your priesthood as the representatives of God on Earth, setting up celibacy as the ideal of that priesthood, letting them rape little kids (boys AND girls), and then rather than doing the right thing, buying the silence of the victims and rewarding the people who effect the coverups. Persecuting gays when their sexual orientation is a biological trait rather than a conscious choice. Bilking your followers for billions annually, and then using their proceeds to buy off rape victims (no, I'm NEVER going to let it go). Advising people that using condoms is a sin, when AIDS is still a killer disease in the third world where your church is gaining influence.

In short, you are an outmoded belief system, and we who know better will never rest in holding you accountable.

Penn Gillette--Special Encounter

I respect the hell out of Penn & Teller because they take on a lot of mysticism and fraud, so it surprised me to hear Penn talking about not respecting Christians who don't proselytize to non-believers. The guy makes you think. Check it out...

The wisdom of Ambrose Bierce

From The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary...

Christian n. One who believes the New Testament is a divinely inspired book admirably suited to the spiritual needs of his neighbor. One who follows the teachings of Christ insofar as they are not inconsistent with a life of sin.

Cut and paste--OLD school.

Fascinating piece here in the L.A. Times on Thomas Jefferson. Apparently, he once literally cut up the New Testament to remove the miraculous stories he didn't like (such as the angel appearing to Mary, the loaves and fishes, the resurrection of Jesus, no less). And then he took what was left and looked at it as a work of philosophy rather than religious dogma. Really interesting stuff.

Thomas Jefferson is an increasingly interesting figure to me. Yes, he was a bit of a hypocrite in many ways, but I'm of the opinion that hypocrisy is the default human condition, and that the only difference is that some of us are more aware of it.

Anyway, this is a man who once said, "Question, with boldness, even the existence of a god; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason than that of blindfolded fear." And (paraphrasing), "Anyone who touts his belief in Jesus above the teachings of Jesus is a false Christian." I can't help but think of money-grubbing Evangelicals whenever I hear that last one.

Could you possibly imaging such a figure being elected today? Not a prayer (sorry).

HT: Pharyngula