The Scathing Atheist

by Heath Enwright and Noah & Lucinda Lugeons

Note: Transcript contains elements that were removed from the episode due to time constraints.

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And now, the Scathing Atheist.

Intro:

It’s Thursday,

It’s July 10th

And yes, if I’m way more intelligent than you … I’m probably right, and you’re probably wrong.

I’m Noah Lugeons,

I’m Heath Enwright, and from foreign terrorists’ favorite target, New York, New York,

And the domestic terrorists shopping at Target, Podunk, Georgia, this is the Scathing Atheist.

In this week’s episode,

• An Alabama church’s inbreeder reactor reaches critical mass,
• We’ll get to the part of the bible your grandma masturbates to,
• And we’ll discuss how gay shoes affected this year’s World Cup,

But first, the diatribe.

Diatribe:

Two weeks ago, I had all these unhatched chickens.  I was gonna blanche ‘em, season ‘em, fry ‘em… slather a little buffalo sauce on their wings… it was gonna be awesome.

And now I’m moping over some improvised scrambled eggs.  And I’ll tell you why; like a lot of people, I’ve been looking at the numbers.  Year after year I watch the polls roll in and year after year they look ever more promising.  So I’m extrapolating.  I’m reading the trend lines.  And when you do that, you look ahead fifty years or so, and it seems like we could damn near win this fight in my lifetime.

I see articles about how religion could disappear entirely from places like New Zealand and Ireland in that time.  I hear my fellow podcasters speculating on the idea that an atheist podcast might be unnecessary in another couple decades… and not just because we’ll have brain-downloadable halo-casts by then.  But because there’ll be nobody left to fight.  We’ll be like Alexander crying like a bitch over the lack of massacrable mermen in the Indian Ocean.

And their logic is sound, right?  If you look at the demographic trends and you do some basic math, it looks like we’re kicking ass.  Sure, we’re still outnumbered fifty to one worldwide and about forty to one in the US, but we’re winning.  All the evidence is on our side, academia is on our side, religion’s collective PR team has a gatling gun trained on it’s own foot and the numbers are swinging our way at a pretty outstanding clip.

Those are some damn healthy looking eggs.  But they’re not chickens.

The Hobby Lobby decision was a huge wake up call for me personally and I think it’s fair to extrapolate that out to the whole atheist community.  We’re fools if we think religion is gonna tuck its tail between its legs, abdicate the social throne and go quietly into the night.  They’re gonna fight tooth and nail, every step of the way and the closer our chickens come to hatching, the heavier their hammer is gonna get.

The hammer of choice right now is the term “Religious Freedom”, which is starting to scare the hell out of me.  There was a time when “Religious Freedom” meant that the government couldn’t pass a law against being Catholic, or make a law saying everyone had to be Baptist.  And back when we were using that definition, I was all about it.

But now when they talk about Religious Freedom, what they’re really talking about is “Religious Exemption”; the right to live by a different set of standards than non-religious people.  That’s the exact opposite of actual religious freedom.  As soon as you set up a law that says, “It’s okay to deny contraceptive care, but only if you’re an evangelical fundamentalist,” or “It’s okay to have a beard around this equipment, but only if you’re a Sikh,” or “It’s okay to suck mutilated baby dicks, but only if you’re a jew,” you can’t have religious freedom.

The entire point of religious freedom is that everyone gets treated equally, regardless of their faith.  Do I really need to point out that having a different set of laws for every religion isn’t equality?  Does that really need to be articulated?

And I’m sure the supporter of this bullshit worldview would argue that each religion’s beliefs are being given “equal” respect… that’s the point… that’s where the “equality” is; but that’s nonsensical.  First of all, it’s just not true.  There’s no official government registry of religious beliefs.  The only thing that makes a belief a belief in the eyes of the law are how many people espouse it.  Obviously if eight people say, “Hey, this is our religion and it allows us to smoke weed and jack off in public,” the courts aren’t gonna protect that “religious belief”.  The courts are going to have to decide on a case by case basis what people do and don’t “really believe.”

But secondly, and more importantly, even if it was true, that wouldn’t be a good thing.  The religious beliefs we already make exemptions for allow for child abuse, cruelty to animals, misogyny, the medical neglect of children… do we really want to expand that list?  And if we do, do we really want to expand it indefinitely?

There’s nothing in the bible about abortion… except that weird magical abortion formula in Numbers.  There’s nothing in the bible about contraception.  And there’s certainly nothing in the bible about mandatory healthcare minimums.  This isn’t a universal Christian value or anything.  It’s just what some guy said he believed.

One of the many things that makes this particular case so egregious is that it’s a transparently political belief that is unsubstantiated by the religion in question.  And fundamentalist Christianity in America is increasingly a political party.  So what we’re doing here is creating a protected political class of people who don’t have to abide by the laws the rest of us agree to if Jesus doesn’t want them to.  And again, it’s not like Christ the Savior filed an amicus brief here.

Now, strangely enough, I’m gonna close tonight on a quote from Antonin “The Devil is hiding in my Raisin Bran” Scalia in a decision from 1990 when he completely shot down a religious exemption case that didn’t happen to involve his own religion:

(quote) “To permit this would be to make the professed doctrines of religious belief superior to the law of the land, and in effect to permit every citizen to become a law unto himself.” (end quote)

Apparently in 1990 he still thought that was a bad thing.

Headlines:

Joining me for headlines tonight is stereotypical New Yorker, Heath Enwright.  Heath, are you ready to parallel park while eating an everything bagel and bitching about the rest of earth’s inferior pizza?

Fuck you.

Stereotypical enough, I guess.

That shit’s not pizza!!!   In our lead story tonight, from the “Triple-Ex-Con-gregation” file, Pastor Ricky Martin – of a nameless area near Clanton, Alabama – decided in 2010 to create a trailer park behind his Triumph Church, that has since housed approximately 50 convicted sex offenders … all together … with plenty of like-minded accomplices …

You know you’re doing something fucked up when people have to refer to you as the “bad” Ricky Martin.

In a surprise twist, the state of Alabama had to be the voice of reason, when their inspection of his property revealed that he was either operating a really weird theme park … or he was running an un-licensed training facility for ex-con rapist gypsy bare-knuckle boxers.  <I fucking ‘ate pikeys> Either way, they shut it down.  And if we’re splitting hairs, the convicted sex offenders might not have been gypsy bare-knuckle boxers, but they were certainly nomadic rednecks, which is close.

Judging by what I’ve seen of Alabama, bare-knuckled sumo wrestlers is probably closer to the mark.

Seems like Alabama will now be facing the extremely awkward task of evenly distributing the convicted rapist horde throughout the state.  So some guy … is in charge of – I guess – flipping coins and rolling D20’s to determine which ‘presumably cured’ rapist goes where.  Figuring out which towns have the ugliest kids … Weird job.

Yeah, hopefully they can find an enclave in Alabama filled with obesity and inbreeding.

When asked for comment, Pastor Martin may have said (quote): “At first, it was just the homeless other guys from Menudo, but it ballooned into this big thing.” (end quote) … The pastor also pointed out that his tenants haven’t committed any crimes, and that he deserves credit for having not yet injured anyone with his enormous powder keg.

And he’s just assuming there’s no kid fucking going on, right?  What are they, on the buddy system?  And you know what they say, when you assume, you make an ass rape out of the frisbee going over the wooden fence.

Deleted scenes from “Sandlot”…

Couldn’t have been good when some mom went on one of those pedophile map websites, and saw a ridiculous cluster of 50 red dots on a single church … Any more than the size of the staff, and it’s obviously suspicious.

Alabama shuts down church’s “Sex offender camp”: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/07/02/triumph-church-sex-offender_n_5551226.html?utm_hp_ref=religion

And in “Of Fucking Course They Did” news tonight, the day after the Hobby Lobby decision was announced, fourteen religious employers sent a request to the Obama Administration asking that they be exempted from hiring the gays.  The coalition includes bigots from a wide swath of white, predominantly male, conservative, Christian institutions; and points out that a pending executive order would make them hire them thar fudge packers and lesbos.

Yes exactly.  It would be a very useful bigotry tax.  So homophobic, libertarian, Christian assholes can still pollute the world with hate all they want, but they have to buy carbon credits from all the gay corporations that aren’t using them.  

In the letter, they pointed out that issuing an anti-discriminatory policy without a religious exemption would mean that people who hate fags because Jesus hated fags would get lumped in with the people that hate fags just because they’re assholes, saying (quote) “We must find a way to respect diversity of opinion on this issue in a way that respects the dignity of all parties…” (end quote).  In other words, “You have to find a way to respect my lack of respect to the dignity of others with dignity”

“Where are we supposed to get dignity, if not by stealing it from gays by denying them basic human rights?!? … Don’t tread on me!!! … Go oppress your own dignity from the marginalized!!!”

This is only one flake in an avalanche of religious bigots trying to jerk every drop of sperm they can out of the the conservative court’s latest splooge of stupidity.  A jackass restaurateur in South Carolina is suing for his right to refuse service to blacks, citing a religious belief.

Do they mention the 15% thing in the Bible?

So can Muslim-owned corporations now refuse to provide health coverage altogether, because insurance is a form of gambling?!?  This whole issue is fucking asinine!!!  How does a panel of the nation’s most respected legal scholars not see that this ruling is manifestly untenable?!?  Utterly embarrassing!!!

Kind of makes you feel like Ruth Bader Ginsburg had to hurry to the presses with her dissent just so she could have it on the record before it was proven right.

So the ones that were proven to be blatantly wrong … They’re fired right???  For being wrong, when their entire job is to be right???  Kind of a big deal in that position.

Surprise, Surprise, Religious Assholes trying to use Hobby Lobby decision to not hire gays: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/religious-groups-lgbt-hiring-hobby-lobby

And in “Why Would the Voices in my Head Lie?” news tonight, Pope Frankenstein’s Monster sent a powerful reminder that you can have the sixteenth century when you pry it from his cold dead hand last week when he officially endorsed the “International Association of Exorcists,” a coalition of more than two hundred and fifty demon-wrastlers that spans over 30 countries and contains almost as many IQ points.  The organization was started in 1991 by Gabriele Amorth, a priest who thinks the devil can sneak into your brain if you read Harry Potter books or do yoga, says so in public, and is still allowed to use a fork like a grown up.

But I imagine he uses a bottom-weighted sippy cup to drink the blood of Christ … What does this even mean though?  The Pope “endorsed” the exorcist association???  Does he get official sponsorship at their events?!?  Vatican Water product placement???

Critics have pointed out that this can only lead to fewer people seeking proper psychiatric care, but Pope Fran-Sisiutl argues that there are really demons living in people’s heads that make them evil.  The pope wranglers have downplayed this because it proves that one of the world’s most powerful institutions is led by a shit-squeezing level psychopath.

Yeah good thing those wranglers are around to make sure the Pope doesn’t sound crazy … Dodged another bullet … But just to be clear on your terminology … Do you mean the Pope would be inclined to squeeze really hard if he had a handful of shit?!?

And would seek out a handful of shit for that purpose, yes.  Now, it’s worth noting once more that Amorth’s understanding of neurology is on par with his understanding of math, as he continues to claim that he’s performed 15,000 exorcisms in the last 30 years, which is about 14 per day.  And since he says some of them take months of “investigation”, that means upwards of 50 quickies on some days.

Vatican recognizes International Exorcist Association: http://rt.com/news/170316-exorcism-demonology-pope-francis/

And from the “Glory hooooooooooooooole!” file, according to Russian Orthodox Priest Alexander Shumsky, his fellow countrymen on the Russian national soccer team were distracted by the homosexual footwear at the World Cup, which led to their embarrassing winless elimination … And I can’t help but wonder what role gay shoes played in the outcome of the Cold War, and the Lake Placid Olympics hockey tournament.

I’m dying to know what gay shoes tongue.  Alright, so lay it on me; how the fuck can a shoe be gay?

The very confused homophobic priest is likely reacting to a popular pair of cleats by Puma that has a blue left shoe, and a pink right shoe … And yes, if you wore those on any soccer team I’ve played for, we would have beat you up in the locker room.  But not for being gay … For being a faggot.

So you’re telling me the man who spends all his time around other men in dresses and is making a public statement about some other guy’s gaudy footwear is anti-homosexuality?

Shumksy is glad the team took their balls and went home while they still had the chance: (quote) “The liberal ideology of globalism clearly wants to oppose Christianity with football. I’m sure of it.  Therefore I am glad that the Russian players have failed and, by the grace of God, no longer participate in this homosexual abomination.” (end quote) … And it’s not just Russia.  Reports from around the world indicate that soccer is now (quote) “stupid and gay” in every country except Germany and Argentina.  

Shumsky also said that the players might as well be wearing (quote) “ a woman’s bra and panties” (end quote), which means that (a) he thinks there’s such thing as a man’s bra and panties and felt the need to clarify and (b) that he’s been thinking about soccer players in women’s underwear.

He also criticized the players for their (quote) “unthinkable” hairstyles.  And if you can’t see the picture I’m holding up, the priest looks like he was conceived when ZZ Top gang-banged Moe from The Three Stooges.  And someone had a uterus.

Priest says World Cup is an Abomination because players wear gay shoes: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/07/07/1312315/-Priest-World-Cup-Is-A-Homosexual-Abomination-Because-Players-Wear-Gay-Shoes#.U7yOpnHny1s.facebook

And in “Shit Just Got Koreal” news tonight, North Korean officials have taken time off from fashioning exploding blunts for Seth Rogen to try two Americans accused of aggravated bible leaving.  This story begins with the unlikely combination of words “American tourists in North Korea” and ends with the predictable words “On trial for sedition.”

Did they figure out that Dennis Rodman is CIA? … And by the way, why aren’t we handling North Korea like North Vietnam.  We have a script for this.

The tourists in question were, of course, Christian missionaries who were almost certainly seeking to undermine the state with their treasonous Jesus propaganda and as much as I love the thought of Gideons in North Korean prisons, I’m still gonna call this one an overreaction on the part of Pete Rose Jong-Un, here.  Trust me, your people could use more bibles.  You let enough of them in and they wouldn’t have to burn their children in the rusted oil barrels that dot the landscape of your post-apocalyptic looking country.

North Korea charges two Americans with leaving a bible in a hotel room: http://www.christianpost.com/news/north-korea-to-put-on-trial-two-american-tourists-one-for-leaving-bible-in-hotel-room-122516/

And from the “Other Penta-Grammy Awards” file, Christian hip-hop artists Flame and Lacrae – as well as two others that don’t have such a clever name yet – are suing Katy Perry for being an ideal defendant who has more money, and less Jesus.

Suing for insufficient Jesus worked for Hobby Lobby.

While they do mention musical theft, the crux of the complaint is not that Perry stole a useless 8-note riff from their song-with-stolen-name “Joyful Noise” … Although there is a suspicious 8-note riff with different notes in her song “Dark Horse” … They’re really suing her for irreperably damaging their reputation, by associating them with: (quote) “anti-Christian witchcraft, paganism, black magic, and Illuminati imagery..” (end quote)

I’m not conceding that these guys had a reputation to irreparably damage here; but if they did, there’s no quicker way to destroy it than taking credit for Katy Perry’s “Dark Horse.”  And plus, it’s four notes.  Seriously… they’re suing over a god damn B flat minor add 9.  Plus, fuck them for making me listen to that piece of shit long enough to know that.

So I decided to check for secret Free Mason Ralien DaVinci codes in Perry’s song, and based on my research, amidst the interminable dross that is her lyrics, the song contains the name “Aphrodite” … Which does – in fact – make her a demonic polytheist, just like half the Greek diners in the world.  

The video also has eyes in it, so that’s Illuminati all over your tits and a little on the bedspread right there.

So the pagan goddess reference, along with some badly-interpreted arbitrary geometry in her video, and the fact that she still shares a stock and STD portfolio with Russell Brand … I guess all that makes her bad for Jesus.  And of course, that ruined the otherwise-stadium-packing Christian rapper careers of four idiots, who think their idea for 8-bar musical segments is unique.  

I got just see them having their eureka moment…  “So what I did, and this is the clever bit, is after I roll our way down the B flat minor add 9… except I don’t know what it’s called because I’m not remotely a musician… but anyway, after I push those four piano buttons in order, I do the exact same thing over and over again until you stop singing words.”  For fuck sake, they didn’t even do the bendy thing!

Well somebody’s gonna need to make a list of evil band names that would bother the Bible-heads … And I can’t imagine anyone else but us taking the job seriously … So 30 seconds on the clock … “Blasphemous Bands for the Christian Music Bonfire” … GO!!!

See, this is gonna be hard for me because all the bands I listened to growing up were already Satanic, but I’ll try.  How about Mark of the Beastie Boys?

Blue Oyster Occult

Blasphe-Meat Loaf

Purga-Tori Amos

She’d be great in a duet with Celine Diablo.

Lack Sabbath

Wow… you just came up with the blasphemous version of “Black Sabbath”… well done sir.  How about “Faith no Morgies of Violence”?

Lord of the Fliza Minnelli

Damn it… I had “Father of Lies-a Minnelli”… now I have to go with something crappy.  How about “The Mephisto-Police: Featuring… Sting of the Underworld”

The Artist Formerly Known as Prince of Darkness

Think Floyd

ApoState Radio

Penta-Gram Funk Railroad?

Maybe a collaboration album: Stone Temple Pontius Pilates … featuring Nine Inch Nails

Twisted Exor-Sister

Gay Might Be Science … “Nobody’s business but the church!”

Beelze-Buddy Holly?

Infidella Fitzgerald … rare twist for me … That was a clean scat reference … Now I feel like the listeners would be disappointed without a shit-demon reference …

“The Brown-Eyed Pees” … featuring Lucifergie

Nice.  I was sure you were gonna get David Grohl-agothan in there on drums.

Christian Rappers sue Katy Perry for linking their music to Paganism and Witchcraft: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2014/07/03/christian-rappers-sue-katy-perry-for-linking-their-music-to-witchcraft-paganism-and-the-illuminati/

And finally tonight, in “Stupid Compared to the Other Georgians” news, Atlanta Biology teacher and forlorn antebellum love-interest from a Twain novel, Anquinette Jones is in hot water after offering her freshman biology students a powerpoint presentation that linked the theory of evolution to Satan, abortion, euthanasia, homosexuality, divorce, pornography and racism.

Well if evolution can cause things … you might consider believing it exists.  Or was she trying to claim that people are choosing to kill babies, shoot porn, hate blacks, and be gay because they mistakenly believe that better animals fuck more???

Good luck figuring out what the fuck she was talking about.  According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, in addition to disturbingly preposterous factual errors, the presentation also included bizarre grammatical errors, odd illustrations, cartoons from Ken Ham’s Answers in Genesis and a picture of Octomom.  In an understatement seemingly calculated for comical effect, school officials told the paper (quote) “the science lesson plan was not properly vetted.”

I’m still wondering how it was improperly vetted.  Exactly what vetting occurred?!?  What did that look like? … “Excuse me, Ms. Jones? … Ms. Blanche DuBois? … Found your handouts from Darwin’s book on the copy machine.  Looks like the Genesis chapter is finished.”

When asked if she was offended by the presentation, a local parent said, and I’m loosely paraphrasing here, “Offended?  Are you fucking kidding me?  I’m terrified.  That babbling lunatic probably archives her urine in little jars and this fucking school had her teaching science to children.  Offended doesn’t even come close.”

Atlanta Biology Teacher: Evolution is from Satan: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/07/05/atlanta-biology-teacher-evolution-from-satan-and-the-cause-of-racism-divorce-gay-people/

And quick before my right arm goes numb, we’ll close the headlines.  Heath, thanks as always for joining me.

And when we come back, Lucinda will be here for the sexiest book in the bible so far.

This Week in Misogyny:

Sometimes you read a news story and the chauvinism damn near makes the pages stick together, but other times the questions of gender equality can be a little more subtle.  For example, should women have the right to be forced to cover their faces in public by men?  Well, according to the European Court of Human Rights, no.

This is the latest (and hopefully final) chapter in the ongoing controversy surrounding France’s 2010 law, banning full face veils in public.  The complainant in this case was a muslim women who insisted that it wasn’t some man forcing her to cover her face; it was an invisible man with superpowers.

For some human rights activists, this is a sticky situation.  For women raised in a culture that tells them not to show their faces, it can be as stressful for them as being forced to show your breasts would be for a woman raised in our culture.  The fact that there’s more than a little bigotry fueling some of the support for it also doesn’t help.

All that being said, I’d say one generation of uncomfortable women is a small price to pay for future generations not being ashamed of their own faces… or their tits for that matter.

French full-face veil ban upheld: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/07/01/france-face-veil-ban_n_5547283.html?utm_hp_ref=religion&ir=Religion

Of course, for some people, the issues of women’s rights are pretty black and white.  Take Louisiana Congressional hopeful Bill Cassidy.  For him, it’s as simple as handing your girly bits to the nearest man and asking him what you are and aren’t allowed to do with them.  This staunch supporter of abstinence only-education, staunch opponent of contraception and fucking lunatic on abortion has a new grandchild on the way… via his seventeen year old daughter.

When he announced the pregnancy in a local paper he said (quote) “Our daughter now faces a more challenging future than her peers,” (end quote) which means he knows he’s making the lives of young women harder than they need to be when he comes out against the problem, the solution and the back up plan all at the same time.

Abstinence only advocate learns that shit doesn’t work: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/wwjtd/2014/07/gop-candidate-who-supports-abstinence-only-learns-it-doesnt-work-the-hard-way/

And from Louisiana we’ll shift to America’s flaccid penis, Florida, where an argument about women’s rights ended with a subhuman jackass punching his girlfriend’s bunny.  Now, I have to admit that when I first read he punched her bunny, it sounded like fun to me, but then I realized that this bubbling rectal ejecta actually punched a little cute scrunchy nosed, fuzzy faced, floppy eared little adorable little bunny.  

And we’re not talking about the rabbit that Tim the Enchanter warned us about here, it’s a goddamn little helpless rabbit.  So here’s a quick piece of advice in case this real life Elmer Fudd is listening: Nobody has ever improved their position in an argument by punching a bunny unless the argument was “I bet you won’t punch that bunny.”

Florida man punches bunny over women’s rights argument: http://jezebel.com/florida-man-punches-girlfriends-bunny-after-fight-over-1599569298

Sorry about leaving you with such a depressing image, but I’ll be back next week and hopefully no animals will be harmed in the making of next week’s segment.

Skit:

In the wake of the Supreme Court’s recent decision in the case of Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood vs. Common Sense, you may be left with a lot of questions.  How will this affect my insurance coverage?  What ridiculous concession will the Supreme Court allow for next, child sacrifice?  And, most importantly, what religion should my closely held corporation be?

When deciding on your corporation’s religion, it’s important to consider all your options.  You’re probably tempted to go with evangelical Christianity after seeing all the money Hobby Lobby will save by not covering contraceptive care, but the good news is that all the world’s major religions hate women, so whichever choice you make, you’ll be able to compensate them like a secondary class of menstruating harem girls.

In fact, if your primary concern is health coverage, perhaps you should consider Orthodox Judaism.  The money you’ll save not covering bacon related coronaries is more than you think.  Even better, think of all the money you’ll save on training manuals and internal memos now that the women that work for you aren’t allowed to read.  And sure, the Sabbath day restrictions are a pain, but Jew god has proven notoriously easy to fool.

Of course, Islam has a lot to offer American corporations as well.  Think about all the money you’re wasting this month by giving your employees lunch breaks during Ramadan.  Sure, the constant bowing to Mecca might slow you down, but it doesn’t take too many workplace stonings to keep your employees on task the rest of the time.  Plus, on-the-clock honor killings will cut your maternity leave costs by more than sixty percent!

But let’s not limit ourselves to the Abrahamic faiths.  Buddhism will absolve you from covering alcohol and drug related medical costs, but perhaps just as importantly, their restrictions against killing any living thing can save you a ton of money on sanitizing costs if you own a restaurant.

The same is true of Jainism, which will allow you to pay well below minimum wage, and if you go with the Digambar sect, the mandatory nudity you can impose will eliminate uniform costs altogether.  And the tenets of Hinduism are so ill-defined that you can pretty much do whatever the hell you want.

Of course, there are also a few religions you’ll want to avoid.  You might be tempted to go with Scientology to avoid all those troublesome psychiatric costs, but trust me, you’d be better off getting those Scientologists to shrinks.  Neopaganism offers you the opportunity to substitute an herb garden for a health insurance plan, but the group orgies and mutual masturbation sessions make for a lot of downtime.  You’ll also want to avoid Mormonism because it’s just fucking wacky.

But why limit yourself to religions that actually exist?  After all, the only functional difference between a cult and a religion is size so why not start your own religion?  The new faith of “Incorporatism” believes that CEOs and majority shareholders are appointed by god as his earthly representatives and should be showered with elaborate compensation packages and oral sex at all waking moments.  Considering the current makeup of the Supreme Court, we expect this to be the third largest religion in the United States by the Wednesday after next.

Just remember, the most important thing is to choose the religion that makes you the most money and allows you the greatest opportunity to interfere with the lives of your employees.  Because fuck those peons, you’re in charge.

Pascal’s Wager:

From time to time on this show, we like to set aside a few minutes to discuss some of the common apologetics used in defense of theism.  Heath, what incorrectly induced insult to intellect are we gonna tackle today?

Today we’ll be talking about “Pascal’s Wager.”

Hard to believe we haven’t done that one yet.  Alright, so if you don’t mind, set this up for us.  What is “Pascal’s Wager”?

Pascal’s Wager looks at religious belief like a bet.  Formally, it consists of five premises.

1. We can’t determine the odds that god does or doesn’t exist.
2. If we believe in god and we’re right, we get good stuff times infinity
3. If we believe in god and we’re wrong, nothing happens when we die.
4. If we don’t believe in god and we’re right, nothing still happens when we die.
5. And, if we don’t believe in god and we’re wrong, we get bad stuff times infinity.

Based on those five premises, Pascal determines that the best bet to make, regardless of the odds, is that God exists.

Okay, so this one is pretty easy to refute.  All five of those premises are wrong.

Not necessarily.

Yes, necessarily.  The first one ignores the existence of less and more likely esoteric claims, the second and fifth ignore the existence of other religions altogether and the third and fourth ignore all the real world costs of believing in bullshit.

Well, according to your view, sure.

But my view, in this case, is the sound application of logic.

Yes, butthe gulf between this and proper logic is wider than the space between the dick and the walls of your mom’s vagina.

Hey!

Calm down, that was less a joke about the size of your mom’s cunt and more a self-deprecating joke about the size of my dick.

Oh… but wait a second…

Perhaps this will be easier if we strip away all the formal logic stuff and look at the argument in its more common four-word form: “What if you’re wrong?”

But again that’s not sound logic by any stretch of the imagination.  The consequences of being wrong don’t factor into the assessment of a truth claim.  I don’t think I’m gonna get hit in the head by a meteor when I go outside and if I’m wrong my brain gets crushed.  That’s not a valid reason to wear a helmet everywhere I go.

Are you saying people who invoke Pascal’s Wager shouldn’t be required to wear helmets everywhere they go?

Well, I don’t think I’d go that far, but my point is the potential negatives of being wrong have nothing to do with whether or not the claim is true.

No, but it could have an effect on whether you pretend it’s true.

And see, that’s yet another fatal flaw in the argument.  According to pretty much all the religions, it’s not enough to just pretend you think it’s true.  A person can’t decide to believe something in the same way they can decide to bet on red or black.

But this isn’t a way of deciding a belief; it’s a way of justifying one.  People don’t believe in god because of Pascal’s Wager; they believe it because they were indoctrinated into it or because they suck at logic.  Pascal’s Wager is just there to make it seem less stupid internally.

Well then why do they always use it externally?

Because the “la-la-la I can’t hear you” approach is a little too transparent.  The point is that no amount of logical analysis is going to convince somebody dumb enough to use Pascal’s Wager.  You’d basically have to go back to the multiplication tables and start over from there.

Well if you can’t use logic, how could you possibly win the argument?

You can’t.  That’s my point.

Well, this is the “counter-apologetics” segment.  The whole point of this segment is to, you know, offer logical refutations to common religious claims.

Hold on just a second… I never said you couldn’t win the encounter, I just said you couldn’t win the argument.

Okay, now you’ve got my attention.  So what are you proposing?

Well, you might not like it, because it ends with all the Christians that use Pascal’s Wager dying in agony.

Okay, so you’re endorsing… genocide?

Well, it’s best not to think of it as “genocide”… think about it more as a voluntary exodus from the gene pool based on epistemological fuck-wittery.

I still don’t think that’s good.

Yeah, but it’s less bad.  Let me give you an example.  If there was an invisible, undetectable race of aliens from another dimension trying to infect you with space rickets by poisoning your food, you’d never be able to prove that, right?

Probably not, I guess.

And for all you know, space rickets is the worst disease in the galaxy:  It simultaneously grants you immortality and ensures that you’ll spend it with a really nasty rash on your balls and an incessant migraine and turds with nails in them.  For eternity.

For the purposes of this example, sure.

So all we have to do is put this idea in the heads of these Pascal’s Wager types.  Obviously, starving to death is better than space rickets, right?  So you’re better off not eating.  Sure, you might not believe the aliens are trying to poison you, but what if you’re wrong?

Okay, I see where you’re going here, but I don’t know that I’m ready to endorse that idea just yet.

You’re probably right.  It would take way too long for them to die that way…

Well, that wasn’t the crux of my objection, exactly…

How about this?  We tell them that the government is poisoning them with clouds of neurotoxins hidden in airplane exhaust and that would give them the space rickets.  And then they would have to stop breathing.

Well first of all, I think somebody’s already telling them that, and second, I still don’t think we should be looking for ways to necessarily kill anyone…

Right… of course.  Because it would be way more advantageous to keep them alive to do our bidding.  We could just tell them that their likelihood of getting space rickets is directly proportional to how much money they give us.

I don’t like that idea either…

…Right, because then we’d be starting a religion.  And that would make us no better than Jesus.

What the Fuck is… RFRA?

The lesser known third of Bill Clinton’s trilogy of horrible acronym legislation that gets pronounced like a real word; RFRA has been outshadowed by the economy-crippling NAFTA and the equality-crippling DOMA.  The law was passed by a unanimous Congress and 3 votes shy of a unanimous senate back in 1993.  Four years later it was declared mostly unconstitutional, and two weeks ago it was invoked to allow fundamentalist Christians to make medical decisions for their employees.

But what is it?

The heart of the legislation is contained in the following phrase: “The government shall not pass a law that substantially burdens a person’s free exercise of religion.”  A law can only be exempted if it meets the following two criteria;  One, the law must be necessary for the furtherance of a compelling government interest and two, it must be the least restrictive way to further said interest.

So basically the law says the government can’t do anything whatsoever until every individual religious person signs off on it.  So how did such legislative bullshit become law?  Easy; Americans are stupid.  But how did it pass with such universal support?

Well, it was originally proposed in response to two cases.  In one, the federal government was building roads across land considered sacred to some Native American tribes.  The second involved Native Americans getting fired after testing positive for mescaline.  And back when this was a politically correct effort to alleviate white guilt, it garnered support from the ACLU, along with every religious group in the country.

Part of the act was struck down by the court in ‘97 when a Catholic diocese wanted to expand their church but couldn’t because of a land ordinance.  The Supreme Court ruled in Boerne v. Flores that RFRA couldn’t be applied to the states, but it could still be applied to federal law.  In response, the congress clambered to religion’s dick tongue over lips to pass the even less pronouncably acronymed “RLUIPA”, or “Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act” in 2000.

In addition, once this weakness in the law was exposed, many states enacted their own versions of the same act, making the Supreme Court’s initial ruling increasingly irrelevant.

So what started as a well-intentioned but ultimately stupid effort to protect magic trees, magic cactuses and keep Native American tribes from drinking water that might contain “ghost sickness” is now being used to allow for-profit companies to limit their employees access to basic health care.  And as we discussed in the headlines, it’s not likely to end there.

Luckily, there is a well organized effort from one of America’s most proactive atheist organizations to get this law the hell off the books.  The Freedom From Religion Foundation has been pivotal in a number of our communities recent legislative victories and now they’re training their sights on RFRA.

This is a fight we all need to get involved in.  I’ll be including links in the shownotes for this episode to more information on the FFRF’s efforts as well as more information about what you can do to help.  Because “sacred groves?” “Ghost Sickness?”  Gimme a fuckin’ break.

Babble:

A few weeks ago I posted something on our Facebook page about the bible being almost impossible to masturbate to.  And at the time I meant it as a joke, but after reading Song of Solomon I’m just redacting the statement altogether.  Basically, this book is a love poem that has nothing to do with anything we’ve read up to this point.  In fact, I would imagine it only got included in the canon when the night scribe accidentally left his porn scroll wedged into the bible when he went home.

Even though the scrolls are only one page, it’s still easy to get them stuck together, if you’re not careful.  

So to help us decipher who’s talking when in this book is my lovely wife Lucinda.  Lucinda, welcome back.

Happy to join you for “The Holy Babble… After Dark.”

Yeah, we should totally have some Barry White playing in the background for this one, but I’ll be damned if we’re securing those rights… or even the rights to a generic 70s porn soundtrack, so instead we’ll just dive right in.

• And just to give everyone some context, along with the very heterosexual couple, there’s also a chorus-full of friends watching the whole time, singing about their voyeur party, doing their best to double as a 70’s porn soundtrack.

1. And clearly both of them would rather be fucking farm animals, but they’re settling for each other.
   1. It got bestial quick, didn’t it?
   2. Yeah, the woman says, “fuck me like I was one of your sheep” and the dude says, “You remind me of one of the horses that pulls the Pharaoh’s chariot… but in a good way.”

• I’d let her take a pull on my chariot of fire.

1. And she’s giving him the whole bullshit modesty thing.  She’s saying, “Oh, you wouldn’t want to see my naked body… I’m so tan and fit from working in the vineyards all day… so sweaty and thin and bronzed…”

• “Yeah sorry I’m not translucent like those real Jewish women in Brooklyn.”
• And then the chorus teaches the girl how to be a stalker … “Dude’s a shepherd, right? … Follow the trail of sheep shit, and you’ll find his tent.  Just don’t forget to bring your goats, because he’s into that.”

1. This book is a great break from what we’ve been doing though.  Because we used to have to look for innuendo and maybe stretch for a pussy joke here and there.  But this book just tees them up.  Final line of chapter one, guys says to his fit, sun-bathed hottie, “Our beams are cedar; our rafters are pine.”

• Right, and she goes out of her way to mention that the “bed is verdant” … And if there’s grass on the field, you play.  Everyone feels more comfortable when there’s pubes.

1. Then she says, “I am a rose of Sharon, a lily of the valleys.  A lily among brambles,” which I took as an apology for her ungainly muff.

• Yeah, sounds like 70’s porn bush to go along with the 70’s porn soundtrack.

1. Then she compliments him by saying he’s like an apple tree.  Which is a probably a compliment to both the cock and the balls.
2. And in case you think we’re exaggerating, Chapter two, verse 3 says “With great delight I sat in his shadow; and his fruit was sweet to my taste.”
3. Yeah, so by chapter two we’ve already gotten oral and horsie-style.  <And she just tea-bagged his low-dangling fruit … Check.> And then in verse six we get a little finger-fucking.
4. Then he chastises her for getting him hard before he has to go to work.
5. And when he gets home we get this weird stalker moment where he’s staring at her through the lattice after leaping over mountains and coming on boulders.
6. And apparently he’s eating her out so long she gets worried and tells him to come up for air: “Oh, my dove in the clefts of the rock, let me see your face…”

• “At least wipe off your beard on my inner thighs, or something.”

1. Chapter three starts out with some chick masturbating while she thinks about her lover.  Then she gets bored with her zucchini and went out to find some dick.

• Yeah she goes down to start working the street corner, and the cops won’t even buy a blowjob.  

1. So she asks the sentinels where the fuck-worthy dudes were, and eventually she finds somebody and drags him into her mom’s bedroom.

• Because there’s no place I’d rather have sex than my parent’s bedroom.

1. But I think she started trying to suck him off before he was hard again because he reminds her not to awaken love until it’s ready.
2. So, unsatisfied with that cock, she sees the whole royal entourage coming and starts telling herself, “I think I can, I think I can…”
1. Then the guy takes over the narrative and Cyrano De Bergerac he isn’t.
   1. It’s so bad.  They have lines in their like “Your teeth are like soaking wet, recently shaved sheep,” “Your breasts are like baby deers eating flowers” and the very hard to take as a compliment “You smell like Lebanon.”
   2. He also says, “Your neck is like the tower of David, on it hangs a thousand bucklers”… so I think he was complimenting the zits on her throat at that point.
   3. And at one point, he compliments her “channel”… he says it’s like an orchard with sweet fruit.
      1. I think it’s fucking hilarious that in my copy there’s a footnote on that line that reads, “Meaning of Hebrew is uncertain”…

• Starting to sound more and more like Zeppelin … At some point he’ll be squeezing her lemon until the juice runs down her leg.  Gotta happen.  Further evidence that God might be John Bonham.  

1. Then the creepy gets cranked up to eleven in chapter four when he starts calling her, “My sister, my bride…”
2. But it works, because by the end of chapter four she’s unlocking her garden and telling him to eat from its ripe fruits.

• And according to the girl’s own account, her orchard has “nards” … So this just keeps getting weirder.

1. And I’ll admit readily that a lot of the allegory here makes no sense to me.  I’m pretty sure that at the beginning of chapter five when he’s talking about being asleep when his heart’s awake it’s a wet-dream reference, but later on the chick is talking about the sentinels finding her and whipping her so I’m not sure precisely what kind of kinky shit they were doing.
   1. I’m with you.  At first I’m thinking to myself, “Who the fuck drinks milk with their wine,” and then I realized that’s probably about sucking tits.

• And then we get this creepy intruder role playing scenario.  Dude bangs on the door: “Open up!  My head is drenched with dew, and I’m here to have my way with you.”  But it turns out she was just hoping to get fake-raped by an intruder, because she was hallucinating, and what actually happened was she got gang-banged by the group of cops from earlier.  HOW IS THIS IN THE BIBLE?!?

1. And then she tries the “your  eyes are like this and your cheeks are like that” thing, but she’s no better at it than he was.
   1. …Your eyes are like doves and your cheeks are like spices and your similes are like a reluctant bowel movement.
2. And why are everyone’s eyes like doves?  What dove-qualities can an eye have that would make it attractive?  That’s just weird.
1. And I’m pretty sure at a certain point the dude is counting on her just not paying attention.  In chapter six he basically says all the stuff he just said a couple chapters ago and sneaks stuff in like “You’re as terrible as an army with banners.”  That can’t be a compliment, can it?

• Yeah apparently the line about having teeth that resemble a slightly hairy wet goat landed so well the first time, he couldn’t help but go back to that wordsmith well.

1. And could either of you ever get a handle on who was where in this thing?  One moment they’re fucking, then she’s wandering the streets looking for him, then he’s fingering her, then he’s in the pasture with his sheep, then she’s gathering pomegranates and getting beaten by somebody…
1. And is it just me, or is this book really materialistic?  Because basically, every comparison is to some precious metal or a gem or something.  It would be like telling your lover “Your lips are like fat stacks of hundreds; your cheeks are like red BMWs and your eyes are like the new iPhone that hasn’t come out yet…”
   1. And how the fuck am I supposed to not make a racist Jew joke in chapter seven when he says to his beloved, “You nose is like a tower of Lebanon, overlooking Damascus”?

• Yeah, telling a girl that Syrians use her nose as a sun dial … not a good line …

1. And how clumsy is this shit… Chapter seven, verses 7&8: “You are as stately as a palm tree and your breasts are like it’s clusters.  I will climb the palm tree and lay hold of its branches.”  You’re not even trying at this point.  “Your eye’s are like… pretty things that are round… and your pussy is like a wet thing that I want to fuck…”
2. And how are her breasts like coconuts?  Are they hairy?  Rough to the touch?  Hard to crack open without a hammer?

• Don’t worry … they corrected that in my version.  Breasts are like clusters of grapes in King James.  Regardless, it sounds like this woman needs a mammogram.

1. But just when you think this one’s got nothing new to offer, chapter eight ramps up the kink.  Opening line here, “Oh that you were like a brother to me, who nursed at my mother’s breast.”  So incestual cougar threeway?  Check.
   1. And in the second verse, he says… or she says… at this point who knows who’s talking any more, but somebody says, essentially, “If I just met you in the street, I’d drag you into my mom’s bedroom and get you shit faced until you fucked me.”  So this isn’t quite as romantic as some would suggest.
   2. And starting in verse eight it takes a turn so weird the rest of the book seemed normal.  It’s the chick talking now and she’s talking about how small her little sister’s tits are.  And if she’s a wall they’d build battlements on her and if she was a door they’d cover her in cedar.  Not sure what the hell that was all about.

• Yeah the only thing left missing was a Lolita reference …         

1. And the whole thing ends with what I think is them having a public quickie in somebody’s garden while a bunch of old women watch.

Yeah, so the obvious question as we close this one off is what the fuck was that all about?  There’s nothing in this book about god or religion or morals or… anything.

It’s like a Hollywood director got a hold of this thing and said, “Needs more sex… some non-rape sex, this time.”

Yeah, so clearly it was a Hollywood director and not a exec at HBO.

So just like that, we bid a bizarre adieu to the “Wisdom Books”.  Hopefully we’ll have some time in the coming weeks to give them a proper send off, but the next time we meet for the Holy Babble we’ll have moved into the final section of the Old Testament, “The Prophetic Books.”

Something of a program note; if you’re reading ahead, you’ll have noticed that the last twelve books of the Old Testament are all a couple pages long, so rather than spending eight and a half months of Holy Babble with shit like Malachi and Zephaniah, we’re gonna lump all of those together when we get there, knock this out and get straight to fucking with Jesus.

Nobody fucks with the Jesus.

Feedback:

It’s time for the part of the show that comes next, listener feedback.  This is the part of the program where we read the critiques from our listeners and offer thoughtful, articulate responses like “fuck off.”

Speaking of which, our first email comes from a first time listener who kind of liked the show and all, but took issue with the 30-seconds on the clock bit.  Shawn said, (quote)

“If you’re gonna rip off @Midnight, at least you could be a little less obvious about it.”

And we’ll answer that with a quick trip to the timeline here.  Comedy Central’s soon to be short-lived late night vehicle “@Midnight” premiered on October 21st of 2013.  The first 30 seconds on the clock bit on this show debuted on episode 20 of this show and it was an extension of something we’d been doing as early as episode 12.  That was May 9th, five and a half months before they jumped on the bandwagon.

It became a weekly staple starting in episode 32, so even if you start the clock there we have them beat by a full month.  But we’re totally okay with them using our bit.

So only the guy from Singled Out can put specific amounts of seconds on a clock???  And only Tyler Perry is allowed to even consider what Jesus might do in a given situation?!?  Really?!?

Our next message comes from Kayla who asks which part of the show is hardest to put together each week.

She also promised to shit herself if we answered the question on air, so… you know … push.  Get that prairie dog going.

Yeah, for me, it’s the compliments to the donors at the end of each episode.  I feel like I can never let anybody down on that one and I don’t want one person to think their compliment wasn’t as good as the other person’s, so I stress on that one.

I guess it says a lot about me that when it comes to insults I don’t even slow down, but when it comes to complimenting people I have to pace for half an hour.

For me, it’s trying to match Noah’s level of tact and diplomacy when dealing with religion.  He’s always so classy about it, and I have to work very hard to keep up.

Good answer.  And finally we have an email from an unnamed listener in an undisclosed location who could be hanged or have his nuts chopped off if the wrong person knew he listened to this show, which still really fucks me up inside.

Anyway, he sent us a great email about what it’s like to live in a country where everyone’s doing the Ramadan thing.  He sent newspaper links about all these people that are rushed to hospitals every evening because they’ve tried to stuff whole chickens into their mouths the instant the sun winks out in the Western sky.

Yeah, and apparently starving zealots hurrying home for their 8:30pm breakfast have the driving skills of Asian women from New Jersey.

He also pointed out the amazing amount of food that’s wasted because of this holiday.  I guess all the restaurants have buffets when they’re allowed to eat again because they can’t wait long enough to order shit at that point.  I’m not sure if it’s accurate, but the number he cited was 1850 tons of food wasted over Ramadan just in Dubai last year.

Yeah so thanks for the email, unnamed listener, we really got a kick out of looking into it and we appreciate your continued willingness to be the first Scathing Atheist martyr.

And, of course, your email also got us to thinking of a potential top ten for this week.  So here are the top ten worst things about celebrating Ramadan … Take it away Paul Schaffer!!!

• 10- You’re really fucking hungry.
• 9 – But all the good vomitoriums have a three hour waiting list at dusk.
• 8 – Even when you break the fast, there’s no bacon.
• 7 – You don’t wanna be a Somali pirate.
• 6 – The fast against sex and eating end at the same time, and that gets messy.
• 5 – Tired of hearing the phrase: “But it’s a dry heave.”
• 4 – The daily fourteen hour jerking off hiatus.
• 3 – The rash you always get from condensing your jerk schedule down to eight hours.  
• 2 – Sometimes it’s hard to tell if your stomach’s rumbling or the vest is detonating prematurely.
• 1 – When the month is over, you’re still a Muslim.

And that’s it for feedback, if you want more, keep the tweets, messages and emails coming.

Outro:

Before we drop the mic tonight, I want to remind everybody to check the shownotes this week for some important links about the FFRF’s efforts against RFRA, which was really hard to say.  Anyway, go to Scathing Atheist (dot) com and check the links at the top of the page.  This is a fight we really need to win.

And I guess that makes this a good time to remind everyone that with the exception of interviews, our full episodes are transcribed on the website each week.  The Transcript is always up within twenty-four hours of the show’s release, so if you ever want a copy of a diatribe or a poem or a 30 seconds on the clock bit or whatever, it’s there going all the way back to episode one.

Anyway, that’s all the blasphemy we have for you tonight, but if you want more, there’s more.  I’m scheduled to record with Jake Farr-Wharton this weekend so I believe I’ll be on the upcoming episode of the Imaginary Friends Show.  As soon as that’s up we’ll have links to it on our Facebook page and our Twitter feed.

Of course you’ll always find bonus nuggets of Scatheism on both of those feeds as well as on the erratically published blog.  And sorry about the false alarm on having some guest posts on the blog.  I just buried under work this week, but I’ve got a post ready to drop Monday and many more to come.  So be sure to check that out as well.

I need to thank Heath for never running out of shit to wince at; of course I want to thank Lucinda for still being so damn sexy after all these years… and other stuff related to the show, too; I want to thank Professor Stephen for this week’s Farnsworth Quote.  You can hear him every week live with Cash on Atheists on Air.  He’s a really well informed skeptic and a funny mother fucker and if you don’t believe me, my evidence will appear as a link to their podcast on the shownotes for this episode.

But most of all, of course, I need to thank this week’s best people, Scott, Fred, Chris, Other Scott, Nasser, Lana, Sean, Gerard, Victoria, Cody, Glen, Matthew and Frank.  Scott, Fred and Chris, whose ejaculations have both started and ended wars;  Other Scott, Nasser, Lana and Sean, who are so intelligent they can refute the 10% brain myth with 90% of their brain tied behind their back; Gerard, Victoria, and Cody, who are so sexy they could turn even my laptop on in under a minute; and Glen, Matthew and Frank, whose dicks are so big they thought the Large Hadron Collider was a glory hole.

These thirteen ravenously rational rabble-rousers roused some rabble this week by giving us money.  Not everybody gives us money or we’d be fucking loaded.  But some people do so we’re able to scrape out a living making dick jokes about Jesus and for that we are truly and eternally grateful.  If you’d like to support the show, you can make a per episode donation at Patreon (dot) com (slash) Scathing Atheist, or you can make a one time donation by clicking the “Donate” button on the right side of our homepage at Scathing Atheist (dot) com.

And if you’d like support our efforts but you’re still waiting for the ransom payment to come in, you can help us out in the meantime by leaving us a five star review on iTunes or any other place that allows you to gives stars to podcasts.

If you have questions, comments or death threats, you’ll find all the contact info on the Contact Page at Scathing Atheist (dot) com.  All the music used in this episode was written and performed by yours truly and yes, I did have my permission.