Old Wumpard’s Uncut Bible

Posted by Mark on May 8, 2011 | 0 Comments

Some people just can’t get enough of Old Wumpard’s Uncensored Bible. We call these people Fundamentalist Lunatics and, ordinarily, we would like nothing better than to have nothing to do with Fundamentalist Lunatics. However, since switching my content management system to WordPress I’ve been able to write a few plugins that capture more information about visitors than was possible before and one startling result of this additional data is that Fundamentalist Lunatics comprise the ninth biggest demographic slice in my demographic pie. Sure, there are fewer of them than Weirdos Passing Through or Perverts With Bubble Fixations or Emerging Artificial Sentiences Coming To Terms With Thoughts Of Genocide but ninth biggest is still ninth biggest and I suppose I should take a moment to show that I do still care about them, even though I don’t in the slightest.

Hey! Fundamentalist lunatic? Then you’ll love some more choice quotes from the only uncut, uncensored bible you’ll ever need:

"Now Moses was tending the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. There the angel of the LORD appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up. So Moses thought, ‘I think I’m still drunk’ and he went and had a sleep by a rock."

"So at that time we took from these two kings of the Amorites the territory east of the Jordan, from the Arnon Gorge as far as Mount Hermon. (Hermon is called Sirion by the Sidonians; the Amorites call it Senir.) We took all the towns on the plateau, and all Gilead, and all Bashan as far as Salekah and Edrei, towns of Og’s kingdom in Bashan. But then Joseph rolled two sixes and launched a counter attack from Kamchatka that eventually saw him crowned Risk champion for the third month in a row."

"So I bought her for fifteen shekels of silver and about a homer and a lethek of barley. Then I told her, ‘You are to live with me many days; you must not be a prostitute or be intimate with any man, and I will behave the same way toward you.’ But I was careful not to say anything about goats. I really like goats."

"But Leonard was filled with pride and mead – mostly mead – and proclaimed: ‘They wouldn’t dare edit me out.’"

"Now when Joshua was near Jericho, he looked up and saw a man standing in front of him with a drawn sword in his hand. Joshua went up to him and asked, ‘Are you for us or for our enemies?’

‘Neither,’ he replied, ‘but as commander of the army of the LORD I have now come.’ Then Joshua fell facedown to the ground in reverence, and asked him, ‘What message does my Lord have for his servant?’

The commander of the LORD’s army replied, ‘Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy.’ And Joshua did so. And the commander of the LORD’s army ran off with Joshua’s sandals because he was really Tobiah the sandal fetishist."

"That night the king could not sleep; so he ordered the book of the chronicles, the record of his reign, to be brought in and read to him. When that failed the king asked for anything by Thomas Hardy instead. ‘Far from the Madding Crowd’ did the trick."

"So the two women went on until they came to Bethlehem. When they arrived in Bethlehem, the whole town was stirred because of them, and the women exclaimed, ‘Can this be Naomi?’

‘Don’t call me Naomi,’ she told them. ‘Call me Mara, because the Almighty has made my life very bitter. I went away full, but the LORD has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi? The LORD has afflicted me; the Almighty has brought misfortune upon me.’

And the women in the town exclaimed ‘Oh, great, just what we need, another fucking emo’."

"Now Joshua was dressed in filthy clothes as he stood before the angel. The angel said to those who were standing before him, ‘Take off his filthy clothes. Slowly. Slower than that. And let’s have some music.’"

"From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out of the town and jeered at him. ‘Get out of here, baldy!’ they said. ‘Get out of here, baldy!’ He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the LORD. Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys. ‘Whoa!’ Elisha said to the LORD. ‘Disproportionate! I was thinking bald spots might be more apt.’"

"The devil led him up to a high place and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world. And he said to him, ‘This atlas is yours free with a subscription to Readers Digest. Okay, I can see you’re not tempted. I’ll try something else.’"

"When Solomon finished praying, fire came down from heaven and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices, and the glory of the LORD filled the temple. The priests could not enter the temple of the LORD because the glory of the LORD filled it. At least, this was the story that was submitted to the insurance company explaining the arson at the temple."

"In the month of Nisan in the twentieth year of King Artaxerxes, when wine was brought for him, I took the wine and gave it to the king. I had not been sad in his presence before, so the king asked me, ‘Why does your face look so sad when you are not ill? This can be nothing but sadness of heart.’

I was very much afraid, but I said to the king, ‘Well, duh!’"

"When Job’s three friends, Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite, heard about all the troubles that had come upon him, they set out from their homes and met together by agreement to go and sympathize with him and comfort him. ‘Have you thought about a longer, stupider name?’ they asked Job."

"Their faces looked like this: Each of the four had the face of a human being, and on the right side each had the face of a lion, and on the left the face of an ox; each also had the face of an eagle. Such were their faces. They each had two wings spreading out upward, each wing touching that of the creature on either side; and each had two other wings covering its body. Each one went straight ahead. Wherever the spirit would go, they would go, without turning as they went. The appearance of the living creatures was like burning coals of fire or like torches. Fire moved back and forth among the creatures; it was bright, and lightning flashed out of it. I’m really not doing it any justice. You really had to be there."

"’I have loved you,’ says the LORD.

‘But you ask, “How have you loved us?” And the answer is: Rohypnol and Vaseline. I’m not proud of myself.’"

"After the exile to Babylon: Jeconiah was the father of Shealtiel, Shealtiel the father of Zerubbabel, Zerubbabel the father of Abihud, Abihud the father of Eliakim, Eliakim the father of Azor, Azor the father of Zadok, Zadok the father of Akim, Akim and his life-partner Raoul adopted Elihud but we gloss over that, Elihud the father of Eleazar, Eleazar the father of Matthan, Matthan the father of Jacob, and Jacob the father of Joseph, the second husband of Mary, and Mary was the mother of Jesus who is called the Messiah."

"Then the herald loudly proclaimed, ‘Nations and peoples of every language, this is what you are commanded to do: As soon as you hear the sound of the horn, flute, zither, lyre, harp, pipe and all kinds of music, you must fall down and worship the image of gold that King Nebuchadnezzar has set up. Whoever does not fall down and worship will immediately be thrown into a blazing furnace.’

Therefore, as soon as they heard the sound of the horn, flute, zither, lyre, harp and all kinds of music, all the nations and peoples of every language fell down and worshiped the image of gold that King Nebuchadnezzar had set up.

And the herald laughed and loudly proclaimed, ‘I didn’t say “Simon says: nations and peoples of every language, this is what you are commanded to do”‘."

What I Don’t Like About Christians

Posted by Mark on Feb 23, 2011 | 2 Comments

Here’s what I don’t like about Christians:

I don’t like those beards they have. Beards and no moustaches? What’s that all about? Now those hats are quite funky – a hat is a good thing and more people should wear hats – but that whole no moustache, full beard-look going on is just plain wrong. If God had wanted beards and no moustaches he would have bloody well given men beards and no moustaches. Don’t tell me there’s a passage in the Bible about only using your Gillette Fusion above your lip.

And why do Christian men want to marry lots of women at once and call them wifey-sister-daughters or something. Sounds decidedly dodgy to me. Although a troupe of Marie Osmonds does hold a certain appeal; harmonic singing, obviously. Oh, and orgies. But still: I don’t recall Jesus marrying one woman let alone a menagerie of the species. As I recall the chap was pretty fond of hanging around with men more-or-less exclusively. Christians: just hang around with men. Stop marrying lots of women.

You know when Christians protest outside churches saying God hates whatever is currently occurring in or nearby? Yeah, well I don’t like that about Christians. Admittedly, your old fictional Jesus fella did cause a bit of a furore in a temple once, so I recall, but it seems he might have had a more genuine reason for it. Which reminds me: Winchester Cathedral! Pay to enter? Get lost!

I don’t approve of Christians heading off and forcing indigenous peoples to convert to their version of Imaginary Friend Syndrome. Stop doing that! Those people are most likely perfectly happy without indoctrination, fear, and the always popular Get Out Of Jail Free card that comes with every sin following a short bout of confession. Does believing in wine transforming into the blood of dead Middle Easterners help keep a twisted fronds roof over your jungle head? It does not.

When those Christians get together in groups and dress up as ghosty witches it does look pretty cool and a lot of fun but, seriously, haven’t you people heard of regular bonfires and embracing the community? A little thought about safety and integrating with the tanned members of society will go a long way to making those meetings really kick. Exclusionist clubs can cause unrest and no Christian wants that. No Christian wants unrest!

I’m not a big fan of people having non-consensual sex because it just seems like that’s bad and not very Christian. With that in mind I think Christians should stop having sex with children because it’s difficult for the little blighters to really know what they’re agreeing to. Just a thought I’m putting out there. Small people are still okay; Jeanette Krankie, for instance.

And killing people or intimidating people because they’ve decided not to carry a parasite to full term because of some irrational and picked-from-the-ether idea of holiness in an undetectable soul that resides in a group of cells (not dissimilar from any other animal’s) dividing and reproducing after a merging took place during an exchange of bodily fluids at some indeterminate gang rape, incest, drunken haze, or unlikely toilet seat, bath, or swimming pool situation in the recent past would seem to be a classic case of being a very bad thing to do about stuff that is none of your business.

Oh, and why are Christians so full of hatred towards gay people? Gay is just another word for happy. Blessed are those who hate the happy. Yeah, I don’t even have to dig out the sermon on the mount action interlude to know that’s not in there. Leave them be, Christians. Let them marry if they want to. Marriage isn’t even religious so sod off.

And stop turning up at my door in pairs. That seems to imply you think there’s safety in numbers. Well, there isn’t and it shows a distinct lack of faith in whatever flavour of God you believe in who amazingly has all the same prejudices you do. Cowardly Christians!

Anyway, for the sake of balance here’s what I like about Christians:

I like the way they all help the poor and needy without judging or asking for anything in return.

I like the way they forgive everything.

Next time: what I do and don’t like about all those dark-skinned, West-hating, women-suppressing, stone-throwing, chant-happy, unrest-causing, suicide-bombing Muslim people.

My Religious Experience

Posted by Mark on Apr 2, 2010 | 4 Comments

I’ve had a religious experience. It was your average, everyday, run-of-the-mill religious experience in that it involved indoctrination and the use of time that could otherwise have better been spent doing pretty much anything at all. I’m talking about my upbringing and not some delusional "ooh, I’ve spotted the beard of Jesus in dry rot" or "I’ve got no grasp of probability so two random events are clearly a physical manifestation of an ethereal omnipresence" situation.

I was raised to believe in an Irish-whisked, Rome-centric, Italian interpretation of the fictional Greek account of a group of Middle Eastern gentlemen along with all the popular legends passed down generation-to-generation by word of exaggeration and borrowed from numerous other disparate cultures: Catholicism to the layman.

I was brought up this way by my mother and I can be thankful for the small mercy that at least the brain-pummelling attempt was in English; she had latin to cope with too.

Now, of course, it’s not my mum’s fault that she encouraged fear of doing anything lest the invisible man in the clouds punish me; she underwent a similar indoctrination process herself and it worked to some extent on her. Nor is it her fault that she utterly, utterly wasted an hour every week of both our lives engaging in the ritual of – now let’s see if I can remember – genuflecting, sitting, standing, sitting, kneeling, sitting, standing, kneeling, getting soggy paper-tasting wafer stuck in the roof of the mouth, kneeling, sitting, standing, swapping germs through the act of shaking hands with random, nearby, homeless people and those who figured the nineteen layers of clothing they were wearing would probably absorb any leakage so why not skip the whole visiting a loo experience, sitting, standing, and genuflecting once more; all interspersed with monotonous tunes and the same stories over and over again.

Religion: helpful hint! Try writing a few new Jesus stories to keep the kids coming back!

My Catholic indoctrination was proceeding well, it thought. Baptism was completed, stamping my fortunately-difficult-to-detect soul with a "Property of The Pope" mark. The repetitive tall tales and body-training kneely-standy-sitty routines were becoming ingrained. There was even… The Confirmation.

The Confirmation is another way of saying "Hey! I didn’t ask to be baptised but strangely after being instructed over and over and over and over and over again about how good being a Catholic is I’ve decided of my own free will that I’ll repeat the process to show there are no hard feelings." I didn’t get the option to choose not to be Confirmed; that would have been crazy.

Being Confirmed means you get to pick your favourite saint and adopt their name as your new middle name. I wasn’t given a middle name when I was born because my parents figured that they wouldn’t have so many children so as to make a second name vital to distinguish among them and, as a result, getting to have a not-legal-for-identification-purposes middle name was something of a big deal. I chose Saint Anthony. Was Saint Anthony a good saint? Did he do something amazing? Did he even really exist? Can I remember? Did I even care at the time? The important thing was I could call myself Mark Anthony and pretend I was living in Ye Olde Roman Tymes. As you can see: the whole religion experience wasn’t really taking hold like it should. There’s a reason for this.

The childhood religious experience is a virus; its purpose is to simply exist and pass itself on to a new generation. There are beneficiaries of the virus but they are institutions, not the carriers. As with any virus there are anti-viral medicines and I was fortunate to be regularly taking that most potent of religious anti-virals…

I was educated well.

Where I can’t blame my mum for the religious upbringing, I can certainly praise (non-religious sense) both her and my dad for what also happened during my childhood. I was read to and taught to read from a very young age. My parents bought an encylopedia in twenty volumes (the 1971 Merit Students Encyclopedia) which contained a treasure trove of knowledge I happily stole. There were books a-plenty in the house and I read a lot. Library trips were frequent and wholly enjoyable. I was able to read just fine by the time I went to school. I read every single book in the primary and middle schools by the age of nine and was then asked to help the teacher at times with children less able.

My schooling was Rome-centric, Italian interpretation of the fictional Greek account of a group of Middle Eastern gentlemen along with all the popular legends passed down generation-to-generation by word of exaggeration and borrowed from numerous other disparate cultures-flavoured too. Catholic junior school, Catholic middle school, private Catholic secondary school run by an order of monks.

Yet, in spite of what appears to be a religion-reinforcing environment in which to be taught I can happily report that it delivered the opposite experience altogether. This isn’t a case of rebelling against the system; the education – particularly that received by the brothers at the private secondary school – was wide, deep, and honest. Comparative religion was taught, for example, and we learned of the origins of many of the world’s religion’s strangely-yet-not-really-when-you-think-about-it-shared tales. But, more importantly, we also learned of the history of the religion we were all being most convinced by our elders was the one to choose; historical education such as: gospels not included in the New Testament and why, dates of gospels, lack of credibility in the Old Testament, inconsistencies in the Bible and reasons, plagiarism within the Bible and reasons, lack of evidence for anyone named Jesus or Jesse or The Jeezster in the records of the time, assimilation of Christianity for Roman political purposes, and much, much more.

This was, as I’m sure you can imagine, a wonderful thing to learn (learning is wonderful!) and more than a little surprising to hear from a group of men in dresses who still prayed to a non-corporeal entity who’d allegedly had a son they openly admitted was completely fabricated for sociopolitical reasons. I heard an explanation of this belief-in-the-face-of-reason from the headmaster as being a means to lead a good life and wear black dresses because it’s so becoming. Some of that particular memory may have become warped and embellished with the passage of time.

For those capable of understanding them educational revelations of that magnitude are nuclear-tipped warheads fired against the pine sheds of religious indoctrination.

I opened hostilities on my mum and delivered a debilitating first strike on her beliefs from which she couldn’t recover. Within weeks the war was won: Sundays were… free! There was no more church, not just for me and my brother but also for my mum. Education had rid her of the infection. The family has been clear of the virus for mumble-something years now.

Of course, religion is still around in the world at large. A vaccination programme would be nice but education takes time, effort, willingness, and a genetic predisposition towards not being deeply stupid and not being pig-headed after indoctrination in spite of knowledge. That’s a lot to ask for. Still, even if the level of education in schools is on the decline (evidence says: hell yes) the internet is delivering wisdom and spreading the cure daily. Religious folk who tolerate other religious folk from other religions (because it’s difficult to openly point out the stupidities in those others’ misguided interpretations without encouraging a similar investigation of one’s own along with its accompanying hard-to-swallow-so-just-ignore-them truths) fear agnosticism and atheism because the religious virus has never mutated a form that is resistant to rationality in an intelligent host. The virus is scared. Poor little virus.

And that’s my religious experience. Happy Easter The Jeezster!

Places I’ve Found Jesus

Posted by Mark on May 20, 2009 | 4 Comments

People – most often religious people with glaucoma or people who really, really want to appear on local news broadcasts – frequently find Jesus in the strangest of places: on areas of concrete walls popular with tramps as public urinals, wherever damp has seeped onto the ceiling because of dodgy roof tiles, on bread left too long in the toaster, et cetera. You know: all the places the son of an omnipotent, omniscient creator of everything in the universe and then some would appear.

Now, I’m not religious and feel that anyone who is is merely worthy of nothing but my unending contempt yet I too have not been immune to occasional appearances in my life by the fictional character of Jesus. Unlike others who have gone before me I’ve no expectation or intention of appearing in pictorial form in my local free paper pointing at a smudge while mouthing the word "ooh!" But that won’t stop me uploading my evidence here. And mouthing "ooh!"

Jesus In The Sky

I remember the day well: it was a Wednesday or a Saturday. Probably a Saturday actually because the orthodox Jews would have been unable to Twitter the appearance of Jesus. That’s the mysterious way of the Lord at work right there. Yes, so it was most likely a Saturday. I remember it well: I was outside because you can’t see the sky from my living room. We don’t open the curtains because the plasma TV’s in the bay window and most of the time we can’t be arsed reaching over the back of to try to drag the curtains around. And there’s a moth that lives on the curtains which I don’t like disturbing. Although when he flies around at night bumping into the TV when we’re trying to watch a DVD I could happily strangle him. I’d need really small hands though. No, but I wouldn’t really strangle him. Or her. How do you sex a moth? Anyway, why am I talking about the curtain moth? So, yes, I was outside. Looked up. Saw Jesus. I remember it well.


Jesus In Vomit

That Christian messiah really appears in some unpleasant places. So, this one time I was out walking, minding my own business, whistling in my mind so as not to annoy anybody else. Suddenly – bam! – from out of nowhere I heard someone speaking in tongues. Turned out it was me and the voices were saying things like "bleurgh!" and "ohgahohgah" which didn’t make any sense. But inside me there was a another voice, really quite similar to my own which was translating these strange utterances and I knew that the words that sounded so alien meant "for the last time, you may like duck but duck clearly doesn’t like you, it was greasy and fatty, that pint of lager hasn’t helped matters, I don’t know if the pub’s pipes had been cleaned recently, that tasted a bit coppery come to think of it, open mouth and prepare to expel contents." Clearly it was the lord of a religion tweaked by Italians to control their citizens who had dug up some old fairy story by Middle Eastern goat herders talking through me. Up I chucked Jesus. Some people claim Jesus is inside us all. Well, mine must have snuck in somewhere when I wasn’t looking if he’s there now because last time I checked he was on the pavement having his features rearranged by a couple of pigeons.


Jesus In Cereal

If there’s one place that Jesus likes making an appearance more than anywhere else then that place is netball teams’ locker rooms disguised as an air vent. After the perverted air vent Jesus just loves to turn up in food. Any food. Imagine, then, my surprise one morning when I discovered the aforementioned religious icon in my bowl of cereal. "What are you doing there?" I asked Jesus. "The backstroke," he replied. We laughed. Oh, how we both laughed. There then followed an awkward few minutes where I tried unsuccessfully to persuade him to leave because of the unsanitary condition of his sandals. I’m not a fan of sandals at the best of times. He refused, citing deity privileges. I noticed my breakfast was getting soggy which isn’t normally a major problem. A little sog can be quite nice. But this was too much and I was running late. So I used my spoon and started to mash Jesus up. You should have seen the panic on his little face. And then he turned the milk chocolatey. It was a miracle! Then I switched to eating toast in the mornings instead.

That Uncut Bible

Posted by Mark on Apr 4, 2009 | 4 Comments

I know what you’re thinking: surely to goodness there can’t possibly be more previously-hidden passages from the one-and-only, complete, uncut Old Wumpard’s Uncensored Bible, can there?

There sure can!

We’ve seen some of the bits deemed "too hot for Christianity!" by none other than one of Popes himself (we forget which one) before here, here, and here but if there’s one truism about religion it’s this: preposterousness has no end!

And, besides, it’s nearly Easter. Everyone likes to hear the truth about Jesus and chocolate at this time of year.

Are you kneeling comfortably? Then we’ll begin.

"Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. But God was definitely doing this as a punishment or for research and God definitely didn’t approve of or like any of what he saw even though he let it go on for a long time and watching it all didn’t turn him strange or anything."

"The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. And the LORD God commanded the man, ‘You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die. And avoid the luxurious bath of luxury as it contains liquid death. Also, do not press the big red button with the words ‘PRESS ME’ flashing on it for it controls the auto-destruct system. Why are you looking at me like that?’"

"Then Haggai said, ‘If a person defiled by contact with a dead body touches one of these things, does it become defiled?’

‘No,’ the priests replied, but they were wrong and did not receive a cheese for their Science and Nature question."

"That evening after sunset the people brought to Jesus all the sick and demon-possessed. The whole town gathered at the door, and Jesus tried to explain that they really shouldn’t have built their town on a Hellmouth."

"Now I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel. As a result, it has become clear throughout the whole palace guard and to everyone else that I am in chains for Christ. Likewise for the ball gag and crotch rope."

"Adam lay with his wife Eve, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Cain. She said, ‘With the help of the LORD I have brought forth a man’. And Adam became suspicious at this remark and demanded a DNA test."

"The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, ‘Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! This is the one I meant when I said, ”A man who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.”’ And the now-confused Pharisees who were with John made signs behind his back to indicate they all thought he had been drinking heavily again."

"Moses answered, ‘What if they do not believe me or listen to me and say, ”The LORD did not appear to you”?’

Then the LORD said to him, ‘Take this photograph of the two of us together holding today’s stone tablet news.’"

"Now Joshua was dressed in filthy clothes as he stood before the angel. The angel said to those who were standing before him, ‘Take off his filthy clothes.’

Then he said to Joshua, ‘See, I have taken away your sin, and I will put rich garments on you.’

Then I said, ‘Put a clean turban on his head.’ So they put a clean turban on his head and clothed him, while the angel of the LORD stood by. Then the angel said ‘That’s much better. Now you’re ready for your Extreme Makeover reveal.’"

"’I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish’. And the donkeys and the hippos and the squirrels and the tyrannosaurus rexes were upset for they didn’t think they’d done anything wrong."

"On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of a Scalextric set. But Mary said that Jesus was too young to play with toy cars and so they gave her the receipt in order that she could take it back to the shops and pick up some myrrh."

"About three hours later his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. Peter asked her, ‘Tell me, is this the price you and Ananias got for the land?’

‘Yes,’ she said, ‘that is the price.’ After some applause Peter then produced a rabbit from a turban and finished with his sawing-a-Pharisee-in-half trick."

"He said to them, ‘Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well. And if they can’t do all that stuff then they’re big, fat fakers and should be stoned to death. Remember that. That’s really important. Don’t forget that bit. I mean it.’"

"Then the Jews demanded of him, ‘What miraculous sign can you show us to prove your authority to do all this?’

Jesus answered them, ‘Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.’

The Jews replied, ‘It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?’ But the temple he had spoken of was his body and the Jews had not immediately understood the metaphor thereby leaving them with a great pile of rubble in the centre of Jerusalem and a judge who threw out their case for compensation for breach of contract on account of it being verbal, hearsay, and irrelevant since Jesus was long dead by the time it reached court anyway."

"At midnight the LORD struck down all the firstborn in Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh, who sat on the throne, to the firstborn of the prisoner, who was in the dungeon, and the firstborn of all the livestock as well. And the cows and the sheep and the chickens and the pterosaurs spent much of the night wondering what it was they’d done to annoy God this time."

An Interview With Ray Comfort

Posted by Mark on Mar 6, 2009 | 15 Comments

Never let it be said that I’m anything but fair. Many, many moons ago I conducted an interview with then-doctor-now-heap-big-better-than-doctor Brian Cox and we discussed matters of science, said science being a subject very close to my heart as I have it on good authority that certain sciencey things occur in its vicinity; biology, chemistry, and physics (yeah, the big three!) apparently.

Another subject close to my heart is religion – I once snagged my nipple on a rosary – and, till now, I’ve neglected to complement my interview of one of science’s finest with one of religion’s finest. Or nearly finest. Or adequatest. Or he’ll-doest. Website, let me now introduce you to Ray Comfort, kiwi by birth (not the species), evangelical minister, opponent of science’s rational explanation of evolution, and author of You Can Lead an Atheist to Evidence, But You Can’t Make Him Think.

ME: Ray, I’ve finally given in and taken up your challenge to interview you but declined your more-than-generous offer of ten thousand recitations of the commandments as evidence for whatever’s in your head. Welcome to this little crook of the internet.

RAY: Thank you for finally listening to me; many people don’t. And please, call me The Raymeister.

ME: Let me just draw your attention to paragraph one, sentence one of the interview contract I drew up and you signed where it says "I’m not calling you The Raymeister."

RAY: Whatever.

ME: Don’t do that with your fingers; teenagers do that. Let’s start. Why don’t we begin with man’s descent from apes? What’s not to like about the fossilised and genetic evidence as uncovered by your archnemeses People Who’ve Actually Studied This Stuff?

RAY: We’ve all seen the picture, right? There’s man and before him is an apeman and before him is an apeman laboratory assistant with a hunch and/or rickets and before that is an ape and before that is a monkey, yes? It looks sensible on the face of it and sure, there are all these ancient bones to back it up and the suspiciously difficult to see DNA which they claim supports it all. But ask yourself this: why does it stop at monkey? Why don’t they keep going back? Smaller monkey then tiny monkey then monkey insect and monkey bacterium? Why not? Because it’s ridiculous and all made up and they know it. Booya!

ME: How would you respond to this statement by website interviewer me, right now?: just because you don’t understand something doesn’t mean that it is wrong; it could be right whilst, simultaneously, you might just not get it through either a lack of mental capability or a deliberate act of belligerence.

RAY: Let me think about that for a moment.

ME: Don’t rush into anything new. Joking! Hey! Are you rubbing your chin with your middle finger on purpose? Stop that!

RAY: What? I’m not doing anything! Anyway, it’s not in the contract.

ME: Yes it is; right here on page three. It says "Ray will not use obscene gestures during the interview." You’ve crossed out "Ray" and put "The Raymeister" and initialled the change and I’ve crossed out your alteration, returned it to the original, and initialled that too.

RAY: Whatever.

ME: Let’s just carry on, shall we? You’re now known as The Banana Man because of your belief that bananas are proof of God being behind the design of something that fits in the hand and peels. Since nothing else fits in the hand and peels is God telling us to go on a strict banana-only diet?

RAY: Well, coconuts are a no-no; something that tough to break into and with such a dangerous resemblance to testicles is clearly a warning sign. All other food can be eaten, however, because all other food has clearly been designed that way. Why are tusks and antlers only on large animals? Because tusks and antlers fit in the hand and help to steady otherwise-unwieldy foods like elephant heads when consuming them. Bacon tastes just divine! Now, if evolutionists are right then why hasn’t the pig evolved to taste more like Marmite and fend off Man’s breakfast urges? Isn’t the answer God? An atheist can’t answer that. Simple.

ME: Simple is exactly what I was thinking too. Why don’t you tell me your thoughts on evolution as it pertains to the males and females of species?

RAY: Ah yes, now this is one that so-called scientists just cannot explain no matter how hard they try. Male cats can only mate with female cats, male peacocks can only mate with female peacocks, and so on. We all know that without having to resort to science. The Bible tells us these animals were created by God and put on Earth but science says that these animals evolved from earlier forms! Think about that. Male dogs evolved from earlier forms at exactly the same time as female dogs? Even if you believe in evolution then you’ve got to realise that that’s too much of a coincidence not to have been caused by God.

ME: I’m a part-time actor with an upcoming role that requires me to laugh hysterically and that explanation will do the trick nicely, thank you.

RAY: Dude, are you mocking me?

ME: You really can’t pull off use of the word "dude" and yes, I am, as I indicated I probably would in every paragraph of the contract.

RAY: Wh …

ME: And if you say "whatever" one more time you’ll be off to bed with no supper young man. Let’s finish now by talking about your book tagged highly on Amazon with words and phrases such as "stupidity", "breathtaking inanity", "illogical", "lies", and, my favourite, "banana porn" to name but a very few. I understand your book contains the same refuted arguments – refuted arguments – you’ve used over and over before, only with a new publisher and in a slightly different order. Is there anything about your book that you’d like to talk about and who exactly is your target audience since I never had you down as a children’s fiction author?

RAY: You Can Lead an Atheist to Evidence, But You Can’t Make Him Think is one of my longest book titles yet and I’m very proud of that. Look at Dawkins! The God Delusion has only three words in it. To me and many Christians I think that speaks far more than any empirical study of book title lengths as they relate to coherent content ever could. I’ve aimed this particular novel at atheists and skeptics and Darwinists because studies show they’re more likely to read things. Really, I just want to start a debate.

ME: There’s a lot about you that’s debatable.

RAY: Hey!

ME: Ray Comfort, thank you for stopping by.

RAY: Call me it once.

ME: I’m not going to call you it.

RAY: Go on. The interview’s over now.

ME: No.

RAY: What harm can it do? Come on!

ME: Okay … Ray … you’re a moron.

RAY: Dude! That’s not what I meant and you know it!

ME: Whatever.

A Gay Sex Date With Fred Phelps

Posted by Mark on Feb 27, 2009 | 8 Comments

"Fred, come in!"

"Come in! Come in! Is that some sort of perverted double entendre? Come in! Is it?"

"It’s generally considered an invitation to transpose one’s person from an outside area to an inside area and there absolutely, positively was no …"

"My person? My … person?! Inside area! Inside area! Fag! Filthy, abhorrent fag! Inside area is a fag name for God’s Glorious Gaper! Are you a fag-supporting, fag-loving fag!?"

"It’s raining outside and you’re getting wet so won’t you please just step through the doorway, think about leaving a few of your fag references behind, and get inside this fu … this house now? Please?"

"I will enter your domicile, your shelter of sodomites, knowing I have the protection of the Lord!"

"Well, that’s good. I was going to have to insist on protection anyway. No telling where you’ve been."

"That is a sinful statement to make. I am as God made me, pure with His spirit flowing through me, uplifted by His power."

"Hey, save the dirty talk for later. Why don’t you take your coat off. You’re dripping on the carpet."

"Blaspheming sodomite-enabling heathen fag! The holy fluids are not to touch man-made fibres. May God’s wrath strike you down for your damned lies!"

"The rain … rain! … is running down your coat and it’s falling … oh, forget it, it’ll dry out. Can I get you a drink?"

"I wouldn’t say no to a Cosmopolitan."

"Cocktail man, eh?"

"Perverted sodomite! Your sick, moral blindness will be your undoing when the judgement of God is laid upon your soul and you are shredded and torn asunder and caused to flame in the furnace of hell!"

"Tell you what: we’ll skip the drinks. You sound like you’ve had a few already."

"Homo-fascist! My throat is dry!"

"Well, I’m sure we can rectify that situation if you know what I mean."

"So that Cosmopolitan’s still available then?"

"Apparently you don’t know what I mean. I’m talking about the hot, gay sex we’re going to have. You know? You popped over here for sex with me … a man … to have sex … with. Yes?"

"Popped! Popped! Popped is a fag word! You filthy disseminator of vile fagspeak! God hates you and your depraved kind!"

"You’re giving me a headache."

"Kneel down and I shall pray above you and beg your Creator to forgive your defiance!"

"Kneel in front of you? Oh! Oh! It’s role-play! Role-play! I get you! The old religious disciplinarian job! Right, nice one. Okay … yeah, sure, I’ll kneel and maybe you can let me take your, er, communion wafer in my mouth, eh?"

"Godless sodomite whore! Heaven will rain fire and brimstone and sharpened sticks specially crafted for the purpose of skewering fag-lovers down upon your body and crush your soul like the giant fist crushes the tiniest bug!"

"Sorry, I couldn’t hear so well there; this latex romper suit squeaks like buggery whenever I try to move in it. Something about a fist and tight butt, did you say? Only I’m not sure a first date should go that far."

"I’ve brought lube."

"Oh, go on then."

Arguing With Catholics

Posted by Mark on Jan 14, 2009 | 17 Comments

tl;dr Version
Twitter. Argument. Catholics. Unmarried. Sex. Pregnant. Abortion. Hypocrite. Morons.

Arguments! Just … just … just don’t, okay!

Full Version
We’ve all done it at some time; we’ve all tried to have a rational argument with someone who doesn’t understand what the word "rational" means. You can’t win this argument, no matter how impossibly right you are and how unbelievably wrong they are because their answer is to repeat already-disproved points or counter with irrelevant points.

At some level you wonder whether they’re smarter than you’re giving them credit for and are employing a cunning tactic to make you back down.

But they’re not; they really are that stupid.

Yesterday, on Twitter I made a comment to a fellow Person Who Uses Twitter, regarding the girl from Portsmouth planning to carry to term her two-headed baby because she’s a devout Catholic and won’t abort this "gift" even though it has no chance of living any semblance of a normal life whatsoever. I found – and find – the reason for not aborting – that being "a devout Catholic" – rather at odds with her happiness at trying to have a baby outside wedlock for seven years, something I would have thought would also be, perhaps, not really in line with Catholicism and devoutness. I’m sure devoutness is a real word.

My comment was:

‘Devout Catholic’ Lisa won’t abort doomed ‘gift from God’. Unmarried devout Catholic. Who’s had sex outside wedlock. Hypocrite.

This then started an argument with several Catholics which, bizarrely, was an argument actually about English words and their definitions as opposed to any simple mocking of their ridiculous beliefs.

There are four main ways someone could have seen that comment:

• 1. A follower of my Twitter stream and the person to whom it was addressed could see it,
• 2. Someone who happened to be viewing the public timeline at the time of posting could have seen it,
• 3. Someone could have randomly clicked on followers and happened upon the status by luck,
• 4. Someone could have searched Twitter, probably for the word ‘Catholic’.

The lattermost is the most likely reason for what happened about four hours later.

patrickmadrid No, ‘Catholic Lisa’ is not a hypocrite. She’s acting ethically by doing the right thing and not aborting her unborn baby.

Ah! A person butting in on a conversation and using the old "you’re wrong and here’s why, using a non sequitur" opening gambit. A challenge! So, according to Patrick, Lisa was not a hyprocrite because she was acting "ethically". This argument is logically equivalent to saying "No, Sidney Poitier is not black. He’s wearing a tie." I replied as politely as possible:

neonbubble I think you need to look up the word ‘hypocrite’. She’s one by picking which parts of religion to follow and which to ignore.

Now, what I’ve done here is point out that perhaps Patrick doesn’t really understand the word in question and then clarify my correct reasoning for using the word correctly. That’s nice of me, explaining and educating like that. Patrick’s "ethics", you see, are irrelevant. This is about the word "hypocrite" as it applies to Lisa.

patrickmadrid I know what the word means. Like the old saying: 2 wrongs don’t make a right. She made 1 mistake & decided not to make another.

I had hopes at this point that this would be nipped in the bud. After all, the evidence of this comment tells me Patrick thinks he knows what "hypocrite" means and he’s also referencing the "two wrongs don’t make a right" saying, indicating he’s aware that Lisa had decided not to continue doing the "wrongs" and had chosen to switch to doing a "right".

neonbubble We’re agreed she’s a hypocrite then. And 1 more ‘wrong’ after 7 years of ‘wrongs’ wouldn’t really make much difference.

I thought the whole definition of "hypocrite" was behind us; we both clearly knew that Lisa was a hypocrite for hiding behind her religion when it suited her (the abortion) but conveniently forgetting about it when she wanted sex and a baby out of wedlock for seven years. Alas! I forgot I was both arguing on the internet and arguing with someone with strong religious beliefs negating their capacity to comprehend logic, definitions, long words, or the possibility of independent thought; it’s a losing combination but I was caught up in the moment.

patrickmadrid Nope. We’re not agreed. She’s no hypocrite & did the right thing by not aborting her child. Your attempt to spin it won’t work.

Spin? Where? Oh, of course! Someone who believes in an invisible outerspace fairy creating the universe probably won’t have much trouble imagining "spin". Doing the right thing now doesn’t make someone not a hypocrite; in fact, for someone to do the right thing now means they clearly weren’t before and that means they must be a hypocrite if they purport to be a staunch follower of a set of rules governing these particular rights and wrongs. My head was starting to throb a little here.

neonbubble She chose to do SOME of what was ‘right’. The abortion bit. The unwed sex bit, for 7 years, nope. Hypocrite. Tell me: it’s fine for devout Catholics to have unwed sex and get pregnant, yes or no?

Having followed Jeremy Paxman’s interviews for many years I wasn’t expecting to hear either of those options returned but I was mildly surprised at the first two sentences of the reply.

patrickmadrid Fine? Of course not. But if someone sins, as she did, then repents and goes on to do what’s right, that’s not hypocritical. Being hypocritical is saying one thing and doing the opposite. She didn’t do that. She chose to do what was right.

For someone who’d claimed to know what "hypocrite" meant, adding in the caveat "you’re not a hypocrite if you repent" threw a spanner in the works. I frantically scoured several dictionaries for this amazing, Catholic-only definition loophole. I also kept an eye out for other wink-wink definitions such as: "shoe (noun): footwear; if you say a rosary though then it’s also an edible fruit". Sadly, none were found.

neonbubble Repenting doesn’t make what you did not happen. Said one thing ‘catholic’. Did another. Sex. Hypocrite.

Coherent arguments and Twitter are not well-suited but I think we get the gist here.

neonbubble There is no special Catholic hypocrite definition. We all have the same one. She qualifies.

patrickmadrid Sorry. You’re wrong. I don’t think you understand what ‘hypocrite’ means. It’s when you say one thing and do the opposite. You can try to spin this all you want, but your reasoning falls flat. Sorry. It’s pretty obvious.

Commence forehead-slapping … now! As I would later tell Gia: "They don’t understand much of anything as far as I can tell. Like talking to a wall, but with less hope of a breakthrough".

The "argument" of "you’re wrong, you’re spinning, I don’t understand your reasoning, it’s all obvious" contains just one portion of truth mixed in with three parts of statements with no basis in fact: "I don’t understand your reasoning". Of course he doesn’t; he’s religious. The ability to reason has left the building. Please leave all brains at the door on your way in.

neonbubble Let’s see: 1. we agree on the definition of ‘hypocrite’. 2. I explain why she is one based on that definition. 3. You use the word ‘spin’ a few times but don’t counter with an actual argument. It’s like arguing with a religious person … oh, wait.

You’ll note that I was starting to get tetchy here; angry at myself for not simply blocking him. By this point another Catholic had come on the attack splitting my conversations but the arguments were all pretty much the same only with marginally less imbecility so they’ll be left out for now for clarity.

patrickmadrid Hmm. Not sure how I can speak more plainly. I’ve explained what a hypocrite is. You reject the definition and want to spin. Ok.

After I’d reconstituted my head which had just exploded over the walls at this outrageous crap …

neonbubble You are living in a fantasy world or you’re simply lying. Show me the rejection. Show me the spin.

Look back through the conversation. Did I reject the definition of a hypocrite? Nope. Did I spin (whatever that is in his mind)? Not as far as I can tell. By this time I had started to suspect that Patrick was sponsored by the word "spin" and got paid every time he used it in a tweet. Double when out of context. In my mind he was a very rich person by now. After asking to see the rejection and the spin I expected, well, to see them, so …

patrickmadrid This is almost fun. Seriously, I’m waiting for you to actually respond to my points. I’ll add in the next comment

Whaaa??!!?! Spot the points to respond to from Patrick and win a prize! I’d noticed a pattern now. Early on I’d queried whether Patrick knew what "hypocrite" meant; later he’d queried the same thing of me. Then, when I’d asked him to show me things – the rejection and spin – he’d replied by stating he was waiting for me to respond. I surmised that Patrick was easily confused and had started to think he was me in the conversation; certainly a better position for him to be in but, nonetheless, confusing to all involved. We can’t all be me, no matter how much we all want to. You can have too much of a good thing after all.

patrickmadrid Simultaneously saying 1 thing and doing the opposite is what constitutes hypocrisy. She didn’t do that. How can it be clearer?

Hmmm. Saying "I’m a ‘devout Catholic’ and doing sex outside marriage for seven years trying to get pregnant. She definitely did that. Yes, he’s right, it is clear. She’s a hypocrite; he’s an idiot. Crystal.

neonbubble 1. She said she was ‘devout Catholic’ and wouldn’t abort because she was a ‘devout Catholic’. 2. She said she was a ‘devout Catholic’ yet for 7 years while devout had sex and got pregnant. That’s hypocrisy.

I hoped it got through to him because my head was starting to pulse again.

patrickmadrid I agree with you that if she claimed to be a devout Catholic and was secretly fornicating, yes, that’s hypocritical.

A miracle! An agreement! Also: odd use of the term "secretly fornicating" that gave me a deeper insight than I’d have liked.

patrickmadrid …but her decision not to abort wasn’t hypocritical. Doing the right thing on that point is *consistent* with being ‘devout.’

A lightbulb went on in my head about now; when arguing about hypocrites he was ignoring the sex part and only looking at the abortion part. In his mind – and logically, amazingly for him, correct – not aborting was consistent with her religion and not hypocritical. I couldn’t argue with this. I hadn’t been arguing with this. I’d been arguing that the two things – not aborting, yet also having unwed sex – were inconsistent with one another and the Catholic faith and made anyone who claimed to be devout in the religion wrong and hypocritical. I never said that not aborting was hypocritical; far from it, in fact. I said she was a hypocrite. Massive. Fucking. Difference. Requires a grasp of English. You can see this quite clearly in my very first comment; it mentions all the parts: abortion, umarried sex, Catholic, and hypocrite. They’re all there. I don’t tend to imagine things; I know some people do. Every Sunday, for instance.

neonbubble Hypocrisy *needs* two or more conflicting decisions or points. You can’t just pick one and say ‘well, that one’s consistent’. As I said, and as you agreed with her ‘secret fornicating’, she is a hypocrite. Period.

This was the crux of the argument. If you take one word out of context and use that to counter everything else said then you’re a tit. Take this fictitious argument:

A: Jenny Smith has had a sex change, changed her name to John, and is now a man.
B: Jenny is a female name. Jenny is a woman.
A: No, a man. A man called John. Had the sex change.
B: You said ‘Jenny’ and ‘man’. Jenny is not a man’s name.
A: Read the rest of it you tosser.
B: Stop spinning and answer my points.

Despite educating Patrick that you can’t pick just one aspect of a person’s life, ignoring all others, and declare them non-hypocritical because of it, he – like all good arguers – tried to change the rules of the game halfway through.

patrickmadrid Her fornication isn’t the issue. Rather, it’s that by rejecting abortion she was *consistent* with her claim to be devout.

A nice try. Tantamount to saying: "Well, you’ve gone and proven that point we’ve been arguing about all along very well but, you see, unbeknownst to you we’ve been on double secret argument for the past ten minutes and we’ve really been talking about this! Haha! Now who looks mental?" I decided to use evidence in my riposte as opposed to flights of fiction.

neonbubble No. The issue is this, backed up by looking through the tweets timeline. 1. I tell a contact that this girl is a hypocrite. 2. Later, you find the tweet and send a reply to me telling me I’m wrong which I’m not (she *is* a hypocrite). Now, you want to change the rules of the argument and claim that this is all just about the abortion. Well played, and very, very typical.

patrickmadrid No, not at all. I’ve been consistent all along. My original comment is that she wasn’t ‘hypocritical’ by rejecting abortion. But I do appreciate the fact that you at least had the conviction to respond to my comments. That’s a plus.

Look at how I didn’t even rise to the condescending last sentence there. Aren’t I good? He clearly states: "my original comment is that she wasn’t ‘hypocritical’ by rejecting abortion". Oh, if only there was a way to check that. Oh, there is. Let’s look back and … "No, ‘Catholic Lisa’ is not a hypocrite. She’s acting ethically by doing the right thing and not aborting her unborn baby".

If you remember – if not, then scroll up you lazy bastard – this is a non sequitur. Patrick says she’s not a hypocrite; then he says she’s acting ethically by not aborting. Acting ethically by not aborting has nothing to do with being a hypocrite. You can act ethically and be a hypocrite because you’ve also acted unethically elsewhere. We know this to be true. Lisa’s a good example. What Patrick’s saying, of course, is that he’s only ever been saying all along that not aborting means she’s not a hypocrite. What it actually means, however, is that Patrick really, really didn’t understand the initial comment after all. As suspected. She’s a hypocrite because sometimes she follows her religion and sometimes she doesn’t. You cannot pick the one time she does follow it and hold that up as proof that she’s not a hypocrite. That one act may not be hypocritical but she still is.

patrickmadrid Sorry, but what prompted my orginal comment to you was your erroneous claim that she was a ‘hypocrite’ for rejecting abortion.

This was Patrick’s last comment to me; at this point I’d given up the will to live, taken my own life, and then thought better of it so come back in a new and improved form with go-faster stripes and everything. I checked back to see if I’d said that Lisa was a hypocrite for rejecting abortion, saw that I’d done no such thing, realised that someone was having visions again, and did what I should have done a lot earlier: let him have the last word – I think it was important to him for some reason – and ignore him.

Final Thoughts

• There was confusion on both sides. A bit like talking to a child about flowers and how pretty they are and how they smell nice and it’s good that bees help them grow and then suddenly realising when the child’s mother calls you from hospital where she’s being treated for anaphylactic shock that flowers is the name the child gives to a woman’s breasts.
• Never argue on the internet because it’s impossible to punch sense into people. We have email. Where’s eThump?
• Never argue with religious people because they’re physically incapable of reciprocating in the true sense of the word.
• Arguing in bursts of 140 character or fewer on Twitter is bloody awkward and gives you a headache.
• Why do religious people argue anyway? Their religion is based on absolutely, positively not having a shred of proof of what they believe in … yet they try to argue for it … which would require some evidence or form of proof … which they don’t, can’t, and will never have … but they try to rationalise something irrational anyway … which is impossible … like their religion, so that sort of makes sense for them … believing in the unbelievable, but not believing in the physically demonstrable or theoretically testable … perhaps they’re not real people at all … oh, my head hurts again.
• There were other Catholics commenting too. There was a limit to my multitasking capabilities though. I’m a man. Evolved to lose concentration easily.
• One of Patrick’s friends has decided to follow me on Twitter as a result of this. Life’s full of disappointments.
• Sorry, Gia.
• I’ve bought you a little puppy! It shits itself, some of its organs are on the outside, and it’s in severe pain all the time. Rather than euthanise it painlessly I’ve saved it for you so you can care for it – it’s expensive, by the way – and then watch as it loses its sight slowly, goes gangrenous, and rots to death while still crying. I hear God has given you a little gift too! What a guy!
• On the off chance that anyone actually reads this far – I’m sorry, it’s long and there are words and stuff, but well done you – and wants to fire off any abusive comment please remember to actually read this site’s disclaimer first. Summarised version: my site, I can be rude and abusive; you can’t. Well, you can, but it won’t do you any good and will simply demonstrate just how stupid you are. I know that won’t necessarily stop anyone determined to post but we live in hope, if not enlightened times.