Literate Perversions

Jesus loves you…

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but He absolutely adores atheists. Why? Because they're the only people who don't ask Him to take sides in a war, particularly a war based on religious beliefs. Do you want to know who is His favorite atheist? Sam Harris, author of The End of Faith: Religion, Terror and the Future of Reason. Too tired at the end of your 12-hour day as a corporate lackey to read anything more than a catalog? Then go to the website of The Sun Magazine to read an excerpt from Bethany Saltman's interview with Harris. If you're too tired to click on the link, allow me to give you an example of why you should read this interview. In answer to Saltman's question, Isn't religion a natural outgrowth of human nature? Harris gives this reply:

It almost certainly is. But everything we do is a natural outgrowth of human nature. Genocide is. Rape is. No one would ever think that this makes genocide or rape a necessary feature of a civilized society. Even if you had a detailed story about the essential purpose religion has served for the past fifty thousand years, even if you could prove that humanity would not have survived without believing in a creator God, that would not mean that it's a good idea to believe in a creator God now, in the twenty-first-century world that has been shattered into separate moral communities on the basis of religious ideas.

Sy Safransky, editor of The Sun Magazine will even allow you to get a free trial copy of the magazine, just in case you feel as though you cannot give up those Grande Mocha Frappucino's to pay for the subscription. (Maybe next week?) Or, while getting that daily dose of caffeine and sugar, you can visit Sam Harris at his website www.samharris.org.

Guest Post: On September 11, almost one hundred fifty years ago

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“…And the first thing a principle does—if it really is a principle—is to kill somebody.”
From Gaudy Night by Dorothy L. Sayers

In his post Welcome to the Dungeon, Chris included an excerpt from Mistress Matisse’s account of her encounter with two young men from the Church of Latter Day Saints. Her description of those two nervous missionaries reminded me of the experiences of a friend, a non-Mormon, who lived in Utah for a year. After she arrived in a suburb of Salt Lake City, she quickly learned that the black slacks, white shirt and tie was the required male dress code for card carrying members of the LDS. Yes, the LDS does require membership cards.

My friend also told me about certain events in the history of the Mormon Church that are deserving of remembrance. In a few days, numerous memorial services will be held to commemorate the five year anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York. Those who lost their lives on that day should be remembered in services that are solemn and respectful. For those who think that these services are the perfect setting for patriotic fervor, I would recommend that they remember another massacre which occurred in September, almost one hundred fifty years ago.

September 11 is the date of the Mountain Meadows Massacre which took place in Utah in 1857. At the end of a five day siege, Mormon militia and some members of the Pauiete Indian tribe killed 120 unarmed men, women and children. The victims were farming families known as the Baker/Francher party, traveling from Arkansas to California. Only seventeen children under the age of six survived. What was the cause of the massacre? In the summer of 1857 troops of the U.S. Army were marching towards Utah, and the Mormons feared that the persecution which they had experienced in the previous decades was about to resume. In 1838 the Mormons had been driven out of the state of Missouri, and six years later, Joseph Smith, one of the Mormon founders, and a few of his followers were murdered by a crowd in southern Illinois. After Smith’s martyrdom, the Mormon Church added the following language to the initiation ceremonies, and it was not removed until 1927:

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Welcome to the Dungeon

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Untitled document What happens when you're a sex worker awaiting a new client, and two gay-looking guys with bibles show up to save your soul?  Mistress Matisse describes it for you:

And then as my eyes adjusted from the relative dimness of the house to the glare of the sun, I got a good look at them. Two young white men, rather slim, wearing dark slacks and long-sleeved white shirts and neckties. And gold name badges.

Holy shit, it’s a pair of Mormons!

I was standing there wearing: a very short (like, it barely covers my butt), very tight, black spaghetti-strap PVC dress that gives me tons of cleavage, a waist cincher, thigh-high shiny black high-heeled boots, my hair teased up like mad, and vampire-red lipstick. And there were these two Mormon boys, who look just barely old enough to shave, clutching their notebooks in perspiring palms, looking back at me. I must have looked like either their wet dream or their worst nightmare, depending in how devout they were.

We stared at each other in mutual confusion for an instant. And then I came to my senses and said, “Oh! Oh, no, no – go away please!” and closed the door swiftly.

It was half hilarious and half mortifying. I imagined them walking away from my house, shaking their heads and jotting down a note next to my address: Hell-bound floozy lives here. Clearly beyond any hope of salvation.

I love fucking with Mormons and other religous fanatics out to save me from hell. Oh, to have been a fly on that wall.

Onion V. Reality

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If we ever run out of reasons to keep the Religious Right out of power (yeah, right!), then this ought to provide some motivation: it really is only a short step from reading the Bible literally to reading The Onion like it's The Washington Post.  If you can believe in a creation that took seven days, you can easily believe that there's a woman  on the editorial staff of The Onion named Caroline Weber who wrote an article called I'm So Psyched About This Abortion! Here's a few lines of the article:

As I pushed my way through the crowd, one of the picketers yelled, "How could you do this? How could you kill a child?" What? It's more like, "How could I wait this long?" It wasn't until now that I was lucky enough to be pregnant with a child I had no means to support. I tell you, for a long time, I thought it would never happen to me!

So, to all of you pro-lifers who are trying to rain on my parade, keep it to yourself, because I don't have the time for that kind of negativity. I've got an abortion to plan, and I just know it's going to be the best non-anesthetized invasive uterine surgery ever!

The funny thing is, I actually have the pro-life movement to thank for this opportunity. If my HMO wouldn't have bowed to their pressure not to cover oral contraceptives, I never would've gotten pregnant in the first place. Then what would I be doing a week from Thursday? I'll tell you what I wouldn't be doing: going to an awesome abortion clinic where I'll be the center of attention from the minute I put my feet up in those stirrups. I wouldn't be looking forward to induced dilation of my cervical opening and suctioning of my uterus, either. And I sure as heck wouldn't get the chance to have a doctor insert a metal instrument into my womb to dislodge tissue from my uterine wall!

Well. As soon as Pete, a pro-life blogger at March Together For Life, read those words, his first thought was that it was high time to use the power of Blogspot to give Ms. Weber a good talking to, so that she might understand the error of her whorish, baby-killin' ways:

Sorry ma'am, if you hadn't had sex you wouldn't have gotten pregnant, it's not the HMO's fault for not supporting your promiscuity while not married….

Miss Weber, you have killed your child, which you admit is a baby/human being, intentionally. That does make you an admitted murderer. I'm not going to "condemn you to hell", I'm going to pray for your forgiveness and for the suffering which you will endure when you realize what you have done. Every baby you see from that moment on is going to wake you up to the realization that you killed your child.

I can't think of what to type here that will sound pithy and intelligent, so I'm going to say the only thing that comes to mind: HUH?!? 

True, I don't give the Fundies much credit for intelligence, or even familiarity with the basic precepts of reality. But no matter how cynical I get, I just can't fucking keep up.  I would at least expect them to know that The Onion is a FUCKING JOKE PAPER.

Of course, Pete doesn't need me to tell him this; as of this writing, 649 people had commented on his post to tell him what an unbelievable jackass he is. His reply is actually the most revealing part of the whole thing, because he remains utterly clueless, even when it's pointed out to him. First, he keeps referring to Caroline Weber as if she's a real writer — all the personas in The Onion are as invented as the articles — and second, the pearl-clutching horror with which he tells us that, parody or not, she is a sterling example of the lib'rul baby-killing mindset, and then proceeds to prove it by creating a simpleminded parody of a liberal pro-choicer. He, however, really does expect us to believe that he met this woman.

I've considered deleting this entry, because frankly, I think this pompous little prick has gotten enough attention; he's turned into an Internet phenomenon overnight, and has even gotten a Wikipedia page out of it (although the page is currently being considered for deletion). In my ideal universe, I want to see him rot in obscurity.

But Pete really shows what I loathe and fear about the fundies: their literalism. People who can't think in metaphor or parody are the ones to keep your eye on because they've already decided what the answers are going to be far in advance of getting the facts. The inability to consider the world in abstract, mutable terms is what breeds fanatics and tyrants; the world consists of only binaries, and the opposing binaries can't be tolerated. In short, what might be the biggest warning sign about the aspirations of the Fundies is their utter lack of a sense of humor.

Jesus is Coming

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What’s in a name? My name, Christopher, is greek, for “One who carries Christ.”  Whereas the saint I was named after was said to have literally borne Christ across a river, I (metaphorically) dumped Christ on his ass by the side of the road over twenty years ago.

Apparently there’s a lot more to a name in Sweden, at least if you’re in the medical trade.  A nurse named “Jesus” at a Stockholm hospital was asked to use his middle name instead because his employers feared that it would confuse the patients:

According to Jesus, an auxiliary nurse at Huddinge hospital, his superiors were worried that patients told “Jesus will be coming soon ,” might get the wrong idea.

“If they thought that Jesus was coming they might believe that they were already dead,” the nurse told The Local. (link)

Technorati Tags: religion, sweden, humor

The Word$ of God (©)

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While the rest of the world is moving towards making information more accessible via open source, the Vatican is continuing its policy of dragging the Church further and further back by putting a solid, legal lock on the Words of God (as allegedly revealed to the Pope) via copyright law. Henceforth, publishing the divinely inspired words of the current Pope, as well as his predecessors, without paying up will not only get you on the “naughty” list of the man upstair, but will be punishable by heavy fines:

The edict covers Pope Benedict XVI’s first encyclical, which is to be issued this week amid huge international interest. The edict is retroactive, covering not only the writings of the present pontiff — as Pope and as cardinal — but also those of his predecessors over the past 50 years. It therefore includes anything written by John Paul II, John Paul I, Paul VI and John XXIII.

The decision was denounced yesterday for treating the Pope’s words as “saleable merchandise” and endangering the Church’s mission to “spread the Christian message”.

A Milanese publishing house that had issued an anthology containing 30 lines from Pope Benedict’s speech to the conclave that elected him and an extract from his enthronement speech is reported to have been sent a bill for €15,000 (£10,000). This was made up of 15 per cent of the cover price of each copy sold plus “legal expenses” of €3,500.

Vittorio Messori, who has co-authored works with Pope Benedict and John Paul II, said that he was “perplexed and alarmed . . . This is wholly negative and absolutely disastrous for the Vatican’s image.” A pope’s words should be available to all free of charge, he said, and to “cash in in this way surrounds the clergy with the odour of money”. (link)

Of course, anyone who’s familiar with the history of organized religion shouldn’t be in the least shocked to find “the odour of money” lingering around the clergy.

Humanist Quiz

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All the internet quizzes around usually bore the shit out of me, but I really liked this one from the New Humanist magazine:

Haymaker

You are one of life’s enjoyers, determined to get the most you can out of your brief spell on Earth. Probably what first attracted you to atheism was the prospect of liberation from the Ten Commandments, few of which are compatible with a life of pleasure. You play hard and work quite hard, have a strong sense of loyalty and a relaxed but consistent approach to your philosophy.

You can’t see the point of abstract principles and probably wouldn’t lay down your life for a concept though you might for a friend. Something of a champagne humanist, you admire George Bernard Shaw for his cheerful agnosticism and pursuit of sensual rewards and your Hollywood hero is Marlon Brando, who was beautiful, irascible and aimed for goodness in his own tortured way.

Sometimes you might be tempted to allow your own pleasures to take precedence over your ethics. But everyone is striving for that elusive balance between the good and the happy life. You’d probably open another bottle and say there’s no contest.

You Knew It Was Coming….

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It took mere hours for the American Taliban to crawl out of the woodwork and claim definitively that the grotesque tragedy of New Orleans was caused not by differentials in air pressure, or global warming, or gross bureaucratic, negligence, but fags. Yes, that’s right. If you’re a man, putting a penis in your mouth will cause catastrophic weather disasters; if you’re a woman who’s neglected her womanly duties, time to start putting more penises in your mouth (or whatever orifice may be handy), so that we can all be saved.

Gay Party Causes Hurricane!

An organization of Christian fundamentalists claims the destruction brought on by Hurricane Katrina is God’s judgment against New Orleans for holding festivals like the annual gay Southern Decadence party.

“Although the loss of lives is deeply saddening, this act of God destroyed a wicked city,” said Repent America director Michael Marcavage on the organization’s Web site. “From ‘Girls Gone Wild’ to ‘Southern Decadence,’ New Orleans was a city that had its doors wide open to the public celebration of sin. May it never be the same.”

You’ll probably get your wish on this one, Mr. Mike. Very little will be the same.

Southern Decadence, which was scheduled for the Labor Day weekend, has since been canceled.

Good to see the homos are doing the right thing.

“Let us pray for those ravaged by this disaster,” Marcavage said. “However, we must not forget that the citizens of New Orleans tolerated and welcomed the wickedness in their city for so long.”

And for God’s next trick, he will pull a brain out of Michael Marcavage’s ass.

It's Pat!

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Weblogs and respectable news organizations alike are all a-twitter this morning about Pat Robertson’s statement that the United States should assassinate Venezualan President Hugo Chavez, with people on both left and right asking if Pat has finally rolled right over the edge of sanity. For those who haven’t caught it yet, here’s Pat’s words:

“We have the ability to take [Hugo Chavez] out, and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability,” Robertson said Monday on the Christian Broadcast Network’s “The 700 Club.”

“We don’t need another $200 billion war to get rid of one, you know, strong-arm dictator,” he continued. “It’s a whole lot easier to have some of the covert operatives do the job and then get it over with.”

All the excitement implies that Pat’s never done anything like this before, and in fact has been a relatively stable, intelligent human being, and, if not brimming over with the milk of human kindness, at least a master of discretion. It’s true that Robertson’s statement stampedes right over Constitutional issues, the Sixth Commandment, practically the entire text of the Gospels, and basic human decency as if they were all so much fairy dust, but for anyone who’s ever paid any attention to Robertson, this is just the same shit, different day. As such, I think this would be a good opportunity to review some of Pat’s greatest hits: [Read more…]