The Scathing Atheist - 304: Pop Goes the Uighur Edition

Episode Date: December 13, 2018

In this week’s episode, we’ll find out the best thing two nuns can do outside of a porn, praying makes you an asshole according to math, the a priori fabric of the universe, and we’ll move for a mistrial in The Case for Christ. To see us live in Dallas on December 12th, click here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/god-awful-movies-live-in-dallas-tickets-53204012634 To make a per episode donation at Patreon.com, click here: http://www.patreon.com/ScathingAtheist To buy our book, click there: http://www.amazon.com/Diatribes-Godless-Misanthrope-Scathing-Presents-ebook/dp/B00J53FZFI/ref=sr11?ie=UTF8&qid=1396141562&sr=8-1 To check out our sister show, The Skepticrat, click here: https://audioboom.com/channel/the-skepticrat To check out our sister show’s hot friend, God Awful Movies, click here: https://audioboom.com/channel/god-awful-movies To check out out half-sister show, Citation Needed, click here: http://citationpod.com/ Guest Links: Check out the Godless Heathen Podcast here: https://godlessheathens.podbean.com/ Headlines: Trump administration chooses religious superstition over possible cures for AIDS: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/trump-administration-threatens-future-of-hiv-research-hub/2018/12/04/f2e8e0ec-f7dd-11e8-863c-9e2f864d47e7story.html?utmterm=.92055a3f7405 AR State Sen. Jason Rapert Briefly Kicked Off Twitter for Anti-Muslim Tweet https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2018/12/08/ar-state-sen-jason-rapert-briefly-kicked-off-twitter-for-anti-muslim-tweet/ And Christian Activist: Congress, With 2 Muslim Women, Will Be An “Islamic Republic” https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2018/12/06/christian-activist-congress-with-2-muslim-women-will-be-an-islamic-republic/ Praying after a tragedy decreases your eventual donation amount, says study: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2018/11/29/praying-after-a-tragedy-decreases-your-eventual-donation-amount-says-study/ Since Last Year, China Is Said To Have Put At Least 800,000 Muslims in Camps https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2018/12/07/since-last-year-china-is-said-to-have-put-at-least-800000-muslims-in-camps/ Online Christian "school" offers apocalypse doctorate for $2,240: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2018/12/06/online-christian-school-offers-apocalyse-doctorate-for-2240/ This Week in Misogyny: Catholic School Teacher Fired for Becoming Pregnant Outside of Marriage https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2018/12/08/catholic-school-teacher-fired-for-becoming-pregnant-outside-of-marriage/ Bishop: Women who get sexually assaulted were probably asking for it: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2018/12/11/bishop-women-who-are-sexually-abused-probably-did-much-to-cause-the-assault/ Cyclone Kills Teen Girl Who Was Separated from Family in Menstruation Ritual: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2018/11/23/cyclone-kills-teen-girl-who-was-separated-from-family-in-menstruation-ritual/

Warning, this podcast contains language that will not land you on the nice list. This week's episode of The Scathing Atheist is brought to you by HIMSS, Stamps.com, and by something bad happening to George Bell. What happened? I don't know. Maybe you Google it. That's great. I don't want to talk about it.

It's pretty great. And now, The Scathing Atheist. I'm Don. I'm Jeff. And I'm Jerry. And individually, we're nobodies from exurban Atlanta Together, we are the Godless Heathens Podcast And you can Google that shit all you want But we did

In fact Evolve from filthy monkey men It's Thursday. It's December 13th. And it's Taylor Swift and Ted Nugent's birthday. And let's hope they receive a Tay Nuge of birthday greetings. That was good. Tay Nuge. Like, what?

Classic Heath. I don't know. I had trouble reading that. I'm no illusions. I'm Eli Bosnick. I'm Heath Enright. And from Ron Weasley of the Tri-State Area, New Jersey, Cincinnati Swing State, and Good Husband, Georgia, this is The Scathing Atheist.

On this week's episode, we'll find out the best thing two nuns can do outside of a porn. Praying makes you an asshole, according to math, the a priori fabric of the universe. And we'll move for a mistrial in the case for Christ. But first, the diatribe. If you felt a slight tremor last Thursday morning that lasted about seven and a half minutes, don't worry, it was not an earthquake. That was the seismic orgasm from the Liberty Council when, after years of exhaustive searching, they finally actually found a school administrator who overdid it when it came to secularizing the

classroom. So the story starts in Elkhorn, Nebraska and travels very quickly to the social media of all the shitty people from high school that you meant to block, and it includes a long list of material deemed inappropriate by Manchester Elementary School principal Jennifer Sinclair. The principal sends out a reminder to all the teachers that while it's okay to put up seasonal decorations, it's not okay to put up decorations that promote religion. And that's all well and good, but she offers up a list that ping-pongs between correct and comical for a dozen bullet points. I mean, there's some reasonable stuff on there like, you know, don't sing songs with Jesus in them.

And then there's this questionable stuff like don't have Christmas trees in the classroom. And then there's ridiculous shit like don't have candy canes. Why no candy canes? Well, the principle helpfully explains, quote, historically, the shape is a J for Jesus. The red is for the blood of christ and the white is a symbol of his resurrection this would also include different colored candy canes end quote you know because they're still shaped like jesus jays i guess now admittedly this list is fucking stupid especially the candy cane thing which is not remotely historical by the way in case you're curious

it's not even a solid try at a historical since they obviously couldn't think of anything for the white to symbolize. But as silly as this is, it's still pretty clear that nothing she was doing was malicious, right? She didn't hate fucking Christmas. She was trying to do the right thing and she was wildly misinformed. And let's be clear, the reason she was so misinformed was because she'd been listening to religious people. She didn't learn that candy cane thing from an atheist. I mean, you and I can look at this list and say, okay, yeah, most of this is pretty silly. But to the devoted Christian that makes up stories about candy canes and insists that the tree represents the wood of the cross, how do they dispute it? Right?

I mean, if you're obsessed with cramming the Christ back into Christmas, you also have to suffer the consequences of pulling it out of the public schools, don't you? I mean, this whole problem ultimately stems from Christians trying to have their sky cake and eat it too. The constitution doesn't allow them to shut down the government over a religious holiday, so they pass a law that says this is a secular one. And if you're working for the rational actor, that's a sustainable detente, right? We'll do all the secular parts. You guys add whatever religious shit you want and we'll all sustain the retail sector. But that only works if both parties see equity as an acceptable outcome. country to recognize their holiday, but they also want to keep it to themselves. And thus, principals are put in this problematic position of trying to draw a line between the secular parts and the religious parts of Christmas, while religion is intentionally blurring that line.

And despite the sustained climax that put the Fox and Friends crew out of work for a day and a half, the clearest thing this story highlights is how fictitious their war on Christmas is. One principal in Elkhorn nebraska a city that i'm mentally noting as i read it in case i needed a ready reference for fucking nowhere in the future steps slightly over the line and trying to censor christmas decorations and it's national news the list is immediately rescinded the fucking principal is put on leave despite the fact that her worst crime was continuing to listen to a Christian after they started a point with historically speaking.

And again, what was her intent? What did this new villain of the Liberty Council seek to do with this list? She thought to herself, you know, hey, our school has two Hindus and a Jew. Maybe we should make them feel a little less alienated. She did that incorrectly. And that's the boogeyman Fox News has been combing the nation for for the last 22 fucking years. I mean, let's all try to keep in mind when they start squawking about the war on Christmas that this is what they're talking about, right? They're always real careful to pretend that the real enemy they're fighting is us.

Atheists, secular progressives that want to rob them of their Christmas joy like the fucking Grinch. But that's not who it's for, right? fucking Grinch, but that's not who it's for, right? When we ended our company meeting this week, I wished all five atheists on the line a Merry Christmas because I know all those fucking people are celebrating Christmas. I mean, they're found a point now that 90% of the people in this country celebrate Christmas as though they haven't just pointed out that one in every 10 people that you meet in this country doesn't. That's some 32 and a half million people. And most of those people are Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, or Jehovah's Witness or something. Most atheists do celebrate Christmas, like better than four-fifths of us.

But if the Yuletide Chicken Littles ever acknowledge that the secular considerations around these holidays are there for religious minorities, not atheists, they might alienate the wrong people. Right? not atheists, they might alienate the wrong people, right? Like religious people are then too likely to say, oh, wow, I guess when a Muslim hears Merry Christmas, they feel like I do when I hear happy holidays, except with having a point. So they'll keep using the scapegoat Christians have no sympathy for left-leaning people who tried to be nice to the Muslim kid wrong. They're talking about you, Jesus.

We interrupt this broadcast and bring you a special news bulletin joining me for headlines tonight are boundless fonts of vulgarity heath enright and eli bosnick guys got another vulgarity for charity for you to start things off steven gave us 250 dollars to roast michigan congressman tim walberg all right tim walberg looks like his high school voted him most likely to visit the dermatologist. And they were right. And he went there and he got diagnosed with, please give Charlton Heston his skin back. Tim Wahlberg looks like once a year he rises from the grave to stand too close to the women's room door. If Rotten rotten teeth had a

lawyer to represent them it would be tim walberg yeah yeah so while his two front teeth duke it out like a couple of highlanders we'll pause for a quick word from our first sponsor this week hymns hi i'm chet sputley and welcome to a game show that's sweeping the nation how old are you our contestant today is eli bostick he's a podcaster from new jersey whose hobbies includes being mad at a computer and eating eli welcome to how old are you uh excited to be here chet all right you know the rules if our lucky mystery lady can guess your age you win a prize. Belinda, are you ready? Ready, Chet. Ready, Chet, go. All right, go. Um, okay. Uh, have you ever used 4hims.com?

Uh, what's 4hims.com? Oh, it's a one-stop shop for hair loss, skin care, and sexual wellness for men. Uh, oh, uh, I didn't know that. Is that like, you know, internet pills, if you know what I mean? No, no. HIMS connects you with real doctors and medical-grade solutions to treat hair loss. You get well-known generic equivalents to name-brand prescriptions to help you keep your hair. 30 seconds, Belinda. Oh, okay, okay.

You sure you haven't tried it? No, I haven't tried 4hims.com. 44. Oh, I'm sorry, Belinda. The answer is 31. 31? Yeah. Wow.

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This would cost hundreds if you went to the doctor or pharmacy. Just go to 4hims.com slash scathing. That's F-O-R-H-I-M-S dot com slash scathing. 4hims.com slash scathing. And now, back to the headlines. In our lead story tonight, the list of things the political arm of American Christianity prioritizes below questionable interpretations of mistranslated Bronze Age cosmology, grew to include people dying of AIDS last week. When it came to light that the NIH is working under direction from top officials in the Trump administration to stifle promising research on HIV and AIDS treatments because they use chunks of dead pre-baby. This research is the latest victim of a review that began in september

to reevaluate the importance of research involving fetal tissue quote in light of the serious regulatory moral and ethical considerations involved end quote uh so basically carly fiorina's nightmares are the law now yes uh everyone has to kill their daughter that was not a nightmare i i should say though that the reporting on this hasn't exactly been straightforward. The Washington Post kicked things off with reports from two unnamed sources in a lab in San Francisco where virtually every HIV drug gets tested, who said that a multimillion dollar seven year contract was in the midst of drying up. And instead of getting two years worth of money that they were expecting, they got 90-day extension and a warning that there probably wouldn't be any more officials at the department of health and human services however are disputing that report and insist that their review is

ongoing and no decision has been made but since the pressure here isn't coming from legitimate ethical or scientific concerns it's hard to imagine what they're fucking reviewing, except maybe the scriptures. Yeah, exactly. It's got a fetus and an AIDS patient on a scale. Okay, where do we put the duck? Where the fuck does it go on? Now, it's worth noting here that almost every drug approved to treat HIV or AIDS has been tested using human fetal tissue, okay?

So the tissue from aborted fetuses are used to culture human T-cells in lab rats, which then take on the Lovecraftian moniker of humanized mice. Noah, rodent Americans, please, do not follow PETA. I do not. Speciesist.

Now, this provides an essential intermediate between the test tube and human trials. And according to every researcher quoted on every article about this move, there are no current alternatives. So the alternative to using fetal tissue is just not doing the science. Religious people be like, done, B, final answer. Wait, what? Best laid plans of mice and men. Yeah.

They end with tragic death because slow-witted people squash something. Yes. And need to be euthanized. I feel like just hacked up a little. And look, this isn't the only science not being done because religious zealots have more control over scientific research than scientists. Right. OK, so this review began in September when the FDA was ordered by political cronies to cancel a small contract to procure fetal tissue for research from a California nonprofit, which is a move largely seen as an effort to bankrupt said nonprofit. A lab run by the National Eye Institute had to show promising research into eyes, obviously. Eye Institute had to shelve promising research into eyes, obviously.

And shortly after this bullshit review began, another lab in Montana that was doing HIV research was also effectively shut down after having its access to fetal tissue choked off by the HHS. On the bright side, though, when you add people with HIV, this gets the Trump administration tantalizingly close to having oppressed every minority ever fucked by American politics in half a term that's nice that's an accomplishment they can go down with so all right i hate to go full bugs bunny but in the name of science i think we have to start spreading word that fetal tissue comes from black voters it's the only way to get the republic it is the only way okay that's from augs Bunny cartoon that you've seen? Yeah, it's one of the early ones. The old ones were really racist. Yeah, they put a warning at the front of them now. It's there.

Gotta Google it. And in muzzled state news tonight, one thing we haven't had the chance to point out yet here on The Scathing Atheist is that the midterms were especially good for Muslim representation this year. With four entire Muslims winning at the federal level, 13 Muslims winning their elections at the state level, and even more in local elections. And while this obviously makes up a tiny percentage of our electorate, it didn't stop Christian bigots everywhere from losing their

shit. So, Anna, what time is it? What are the guys talking about? It's the newest, the greatest Christian freak out. All right. So first up to the screaming post was Christian activist E.W. Jackson, who took a break from looking like a walrus on a job interview. No, he didn't. To warn us that the upcoming rule change allowing people to wear religious head coverings in congress signals the beginning of sharia law oh yes uh i think he means sharia anarchy it's a rule that's going away idiot so here's the quote quote what are we now going to turn congress into an institution of sharia law the floor of congress is now going to turn congress into an institution of sharia law the floor of congress is now going to look like an islamic republic i mean really well man we are a

judeo-christian country we are a nation rooted and grounded in christianity and that's that forget the first half of that word judeo-Christianity? No. Nope. Christianity. He continues, the threat to humanity is Islam. Period. That's the only one. Judeo-Islam? No. I said it.

And I mean it. That system is dangerous. And it is a threat to freedom. Period. Not adding period. Did I say period three times? Shit, now it's in ellipses i mean um i mean it period final period nope now i did two stop just go next yeah no nailed it this is the prophecy the quran was talking about just two women wearing hats during a budget meeting that's

that's what it said in their capacity as national leaders yeah no it's so very a job they drove to in a car by themselves yeah nailed it just like the muslims just like the all right but look i'm sorry the islamic state is stagnant barbaric funded by oil and unduly burdened by america's bloated military so how is the floor of Congress different than them now? All right. So next up was scathing atheist all star and bingo on his name. Oh, state Senator Jason Raypert, who got himself briefly kicked off Twitter by sharing an article from the anti-vaccine, anti-Muslim, anti-Semitic conspiracy website,

D.C. clothes, about how many Muslims got elected in the midterms with the caption, 95% of Muslim voters participated in this year's midterm election. Do you want them ruling over everything in America? End quote. I mean, and like those would be valid points if Jason wasn't actively trying to impose Christian theocracy. You know, as Hemant Mehta pointed out over on the Friendly Atheist blog, this is the guy who encouraged his colleagues to join his Christian lawmakers group. He's not mad about theocracy. He's worried one of the other religions is going to get it first.

Yeah. Yeah. I'll start worrying about the muslim takeover of the united states when the airport security room is full of anything besides 12 extremely polite muslim guys and noah just throwing his white privilege against the wall next up in headlines we have some bad news for victims of terrible tragedies like natural disasters and mass shootings and also some bad news the bad news those terrible things are not going anywhere and we actually have very powerful

organizations in this country working very hard to keep it that way. Jesus fucking Christ. We have a pro-natural disaster lobby and we let them use a different name. People, why? That's a true fact. Okay, but the bad news, those thoughts and prayers you hampered victims have been swimming in for centuries are actually worth a lot less than you thought or prayed according to a new study that zero number that gets tossed around by cockeyed optimists is actually a giant overshot and now we have some idea just how much of an overshot so i guess one more piece of bad news

religion is oh come on man what's the harm of other people's well i wrote this paper boo nerd i mean i meant stop talking yeah what's the harm sounds like a question i always meant stop talking oh almost like if the mainstream had bothered to listen to us atheist activists they could have been ignoring this for fucking years. And this wildly depressing value became a topic of interest for Linda Thunstrom of the University of Wyoming. So she conducted an experiment to find out if people who offer thoughts and prayers end up giving more money or less money to the victims of a tragedy and how much more or less well according to her initial findings thoughts and prayers are worth about negative 38 percent when it comes to charitable donations

right and if she had factored us in who are actively spiteful of the people we help it really changes her mouth fucks up the whole thing we never think or pray yeah so here's how the study worked in one trial a mix of religious and non-religious people were given five dollars and asked how much they wanted to donate to help victims of a hurricane they could keep the rest of the money and the average donation was a dollar 87 which is fucking terrifying People were just holding that 313 for a fucking happy meal. Who knows? But it turns out religious people gave more on average than atheists and agnostics. It was $1.98 versus $1.75.

Guys, come on. Well, I don't know. Maybe it was based on guilt because the religious people voted for the party of climate change denial again who knows hard to say i'm gonna guess the atheists were sure they were gonna double that money in bitcoin so they you know they took it just to get that initial cash flow going right but let's give religious people some credit for their charity for a second and second over because we're going to take that credit right back with trial number two. This time, the religious people were told to pray for the victims

before they got their $5 charity allowance. And that time, the average donation for religious people was $1.23 down from $1.98. Jesus. So again, the prayers cost the victims about 38% of those donations from religious people. I love that some people were like, you get a prayer or something real. Not both. I'm not made out of prayers. Or money.

Okay, so just to be clear here, all three of us just keep the five bucks and say, yeah, you also could have given this amount to hurricane victims researcher. This shit's on you, right? I've done five dollars. I don't know what you're doing.

I walk out with five bucks, I feel like. You created a weird false dichotomy. I can't see them. All right, come back. I'm just, I'm walking right out with your five dollars. You have to stay for the study. Come on. No, I don't.

Fun fact, you're not a cop. What did you learn today? I'm just going from're not a cop. What did you learn today? I'm just going for a fucking happy deal. What did you learn? And I'm super sexed in this. Why don't you write down what you learned on your little data sheet there first. You got to call a professor, ask him how to quantify this. I just took another $5.

And I'm taking your hat. See? You're learning a lot today. I pray every day, and I'm an atheist. There you go now uh it should definitely be noted that ms thunstrom might be fucking stupid sounds like these numbers are pretty straightforward but her interpretation of the result was nonsense here's the exact words from her conclusion statement. Quote, our results imply victims of natural catastrophes may be financially worse off from people expressing their sympathy through the act of praying. This does not necessarily mean that victims are worse off in terms of welfare.

Show me on the doll how you get there. Well, here it is she says it's entirely possible that a recipient of these prayers assigns a positive monetary value to that prayer which may or may not exceed the value by which monetary donations due to the act of praying. End quote. Aww. Come on, Heath. Give her a break. Scientists have been writing, whoops, just disproved God's statements since day one. And this is her first try. Come on. You know, if you think about it, that nine days

when you thought the Nigerian prince really was going to forward you a vast fortune was awesome. It might be break-even, right? You might not even live to spend that retirement money you lost. Yeah. And one other detail. In a third trial, everyone was told to offer thoughts to the victims first, and everyone's average donation actually went up.

So basically, if we could remove the god part from religious people's stupid fucking thoughts they'd literally become better people yep and according to this study the religious people start out more charitable than we do but if they add god to their thoughts and turn those thoughts into prayers they become 38% more shitty mathematically. Wow. And while we wallow in the joy of having a bunch of listeners that don't pray for us, we're going to take a quick break

and hand things over to my lovely wife, Lucyn. A man wrote the Bible? A whore is what's fun. If it's a legitimate race. If it's a slut, right? Cooking can be fun. Hey, I'm proud of a man. This Week in Massage.

As you can imagine, Noah talks a lot. I tend to tune him out when I have a particularly time-sensitive task on Stardew Valley. But in my defense, usually when I tune back in, he's bitching about the implausibility of the last commercial he saw or something. But once in a while, he says shit that makes sense. of the last commercial he saw or something. But once in a while, he says shit that makes sense. And one of the things he says a lot, and you've probably noticed this,

is that religion is the last sanctuary for bad ideas. And that's really the whole justification for our weekly misogyny segment in the middle of an atheism show. Sexism is the most pervasive and resilient bad idea our species has come up with yet. And every time we take a step forward, we carve out an exemption for religion as we do it. Okay, you can't make penis a job requirement

unless you're a church. You can't endorse spousal abuse unless you're a church. You can't fire a woman for getting pregnant unless you're a church. Imagine that shit. It's 20 goddamn 18, and Nied Reich, a Catholic school teacher in Pennsylvania, is trying to hide her

pregnancy from her employer like a tragic Nathaniel Hawthorne character. But it's okay for them to have policies that were archaic in 1850 because they're a Catholic school and she's a filthy slut. There's no damn question that if any other business did that, they'd be shutting down tomorrow afternoon. But it's a Catholic school and if people won't stop sending their kids there when they rape them, Reich's dismissal isn't likely to move the needle. And it's not like the church is some hospice where we send ideas to die. It incubates these arcane and outmoded ideas. And as we saw in the recent fight over contraception,

sometimes it bursts back out into the secular world like the spawn of a facehugger, which makes it all the more disturbing when you read blogs from folks like Bishop Donald J. Sanborn, who tempers an article about sexual assault by pointing out that hemlines are way higher than they used to be. This is the shit they're promoting. This is the shit they're preserving. The idea that at least some of the rape is the hemline's fault. But just in case those stories hit a little too close to home, let me leave you on a high note in the form of something way more horrible that happened further from home. This one comes to us from southern India, where the religions are incubating all kinds of sick shit,

specifically the idea that menstruating women are unclean and must therefore remain in menstruation huts, where clean people won't be in danger of touching them. Well needless to say that those huts aren't built to the same specs as full-blown houses and don't usually have all the amenities like radios to warn them of inclement weather and safe places to be in case of a cyclone hits. Now the story goes on but it involves a 14 year old girl and it's at least the dozenth time I've had to read a story like this. So I'll do you the favor of sparing you the details

and just tell you that there's a reason I'm patrolling the ramparts for you. If 2018 has taught us anything, it's that social progress isn't inevitable. And on that disturbing reminder, I'll hand things back over to Noah, Heath, and Eli. Thank you, Lucinda. And in Camp I Don't Wanna news tonight, according to State Department official Scott Busby, China has

detained at least 800,000 Muslim minorities in internment camps, all of whom would be perfectly happy to live under the hellish religious persecution we have in America, like cops, plain red cops. Yeah. Oh, I just want to see American Christians get actually persecuted, just chained up in a Chinese black site somewhere and get handed a plain solo cup of water in December. Just like Jew. Keep them up all night playing loud recordings of secular store greetings yes

so in a stark contrast to the religious whining we regularly report on uh it's pretty important to note that china is actually religiously suppressing millions of its citizens yeah well i mean it's it's suppressing all of its, but it's only religiously suppressing the religious ones. Right, exactly. So now in China's defense, sure, the major Chinese Muslim group, the Uyghurs, have been trying to create their own separate state for decades and have committed their fair share of terrorism. But as we've had to yell at Heath several times in staff meetings, that does not mean you get to lock millions of them up in camps indefinitely and we agreed on not indefinitely so there it is and just to be clear that means eli called a staff meeting to address the time cap on locking up millions of muslims i

just want to throw that out there you call call weird meetings. You make me call weird meetings. This is on you. All right. So according to Busby, the quote, the U.S. government assesses that since April 2017, Chinese authorities have indefinitely detained at least 800,000 and possibly more than 2 million Uyghurs, ethnic Kazakhs, and other members of Muslim minorities in internment camps. End quote. Also, their kid boxes are nowhere near as nice as ours. Inside the camps, religious holidays and praying are against the rules,

and detainees are forced to forswear religion and promise to be loyal members of the Communist Party. Wow, you're basically describing the atheist crews we want to organize. Seriously, just switch out communist for socialist. That's our blurb. We're ready to go. And we're going to get the Taste of Alaska buffet. Don't forget. Yes.

Taste of Alaska buffet. It's free. Get enough people. It's going to be great. However, outside the camps, life is not a picnic for Chinese Muslims either. Again, quote, Muslim neighborhoods have entry and exit points manned by armed police. Families have been forced to accept Chinese officials into their home for extended homestays. Thousands of mosques have been shuttered or destroyed.

Some have even been converted into communist propaganda centers. I was so on board for a second. See, now I want to start a mosque here in Georgia so I can convert it into a communist propaganda center when the christians start to protest and then back into a mosque when they protest again it'll be great it'll be fun guys got a two two-sided sign all right now we should point out that this isn't just a problem for muslims in china christians and other religions have faced serious oppression in China as well. So China, if you're listening, and I know you are, love the show,

big fan, patron, cut it out. Making us look bad. Right? Bad China. And finally tonight, we have a story about the dumbest college degree in existence. Mean. Other than, of course, the one my parents are currently trying to return without a receipt

15 years later on behalf of their idiot podcaster son who was supposed to get a job they can explain in words to people that pays for parents' retirements, theoretically. Didn't work out for them. Hopefully the return goes better. retirements, theoretically. Didn't work out for them. Hopefully the return goes better. And mom, if they won't do a refund, just a heads up, happily we'll take

a store credit for a STEM degree. That's great. Whatever you can wangle. Anyway, the degree I'm talking about that's almost as stupid is the... It's Eli's. It was your degree.

But also, a degree from the Luder Wycliffe School of Eschatology, where they started offering a doctorate in end times prophecy. Jesus. Only $2,240. Oh, that's great for a doctorate, though. I mean, it's sort of a limited time offer by definition, but it's a great deal. Also, I mean, that's stupid, but it's also 10 times cheaper than my degree. So, you know, cost versus benefit there.

I think we got to. Versus your degree, though. It's about break even. No, I guess. Yeah. I mean, I guess a PhD in eschatology could do what we're doing right now. Right? Right. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, so I went over to the website for Luder Wycliffe and checked out their program. The entire curriculum is apparently video downloads for about $2,000 a piece. And those are each a degree. Oh, wow. You watch the movie and you're a bachelor of guessing or a master of hoping or with this latest offering, a doctorate of nothing because the world is over. Or it's not. Either way. I also noticed a few choice sentences that a lawyer clearly made them include on the site. For example, quote, whether a particular school or agency will accept the credits or degrees from Luther Wycliffe

is quite unpredictable. I bet I could predict it. I love whimsical scam language. Whether or not our degree in horse locusts is real is quite the bone mold. Care to pull back the curtain and reveal our inner truth? And they also had a disclaimer about, I guess I'd call it safe handling practices for these degrees. Yeah, fair. At the very bottom of their mission statement, it said, quote, the degree programs of Luter Wycliffe are designed solely for religious vocations, end quote. So maybe harmful if you do a real thing. Yeah, I mean, this degree, you know, in the Trump administration, I think this degree was especially in danger of people being like, I need I actually need that. Yep.

And my favorite part, there's a video showing the sales pitch from the Ph.D. infomercial. They're apparently running somewhere. It's rough. it's the best some guy who looks like the ghost of alfred e newman past walks into frame and drops an arm full of books about reality it's like there must be a better way and then he explains how you could be the very first dr doomsday but only while supplies last and if you call in the very first Dr. Doomsday. But only while supplies last. And if you call in the next 10 minutes, they'll throw in a free and the world is done. It doesn't matter.

Only while supplies of this video download last. All right. Well, I feel like I've got a lot. These are flying off the shelves. Oh, my God. It's $2,000. Do not call in. We are losing money on these.

All right, well, I've got a lot of post-apocalyptic looting to get to apparently, so we're going to close the headlines for the night. Heath, Eli, thanks as always. Stamps! And when we come back, we'll crack open the case for Christ, by which I mean we'll smoke crack until we can bear to open it again. Open it again. Stupid telling me it's not for Christmas.

I'm sorry, Mrs. Trump, you wanted to see me? Oh, hey, Giler. What's going on, baby? You look great. Have you been, you know, working out? Mrs. Trump, is everything okay? No, Giler. Everything is not okay is everything okay? No, Tyler. Everything is not okay.

It's my red Christmas trees. Nobody like them, so I'm sending them back. Oh, you mean the red ones? Yes, the red ones. Listen to this. Malaria. No, that's Melania.

Trump's Christmas trees are a frightening look into the broken piece of shit That's broken piece of a truly bad person. How could they say such a thing, Giler? Let me see that. Come on. You can't believe everything that liberal media hacks like Tucker Carlson say. Oh, Giler, Christmas is ruined. What am I going to do?

Well, you could try stamps.com. What's stamps.com? Stamps.com brings all the services of the U.S. Post Office right to your desktop. Buy and print official U.S. postage for any letter, any package, any class of mail using your own computer and printer. Then the mail carrier picks it up. No trips to the post office required. It couldn't be easier. Geiler, I don't understand.

How does that help with the trees? Oh, well, you could just, you could send them very, very far away. Oh, I could? Yeah, we use stamps.com for all our Patreon rewards and especially during the holidays, it's made all our shipping needs a snap.

Okay, Geiler, who do I marry to try and get? No, no, you don't have to marry anybody. You can enjoy the stamps.com service with a special offer that includes a four-week trial plus postage and a digital scale without long-term commitments. Go to Stamps.com, click on the microphone at the top of the homepage, and type in scathing. That's a Stamps.com enter scathing. That's right. Okay, Geiler, but Sarah Huckabee Sanders would be so disappointed to see these trees go.

I'm sure she'll be fine. Are you guys getting rid of my blood trees? What the heck? See, I told you. Sarah. I milked the blood for these myself, Kyler. Myself. It's true, she did.

I milked the blood. The problem with reading The Case for Christ, other than the fact that it entails reading The Case for Christ, is that as good as Lee Strobel is at bullshit, eventually all his bullshit starts tasting the same. It's like that diet of Frosted Flakes and Hot Pockets that seems so appealing as a child, but starts seeming like a mistake when you reach your early 40s but just as this book was about to lose me all together it gives me a shot in the arm with some of the most gourmet bullshit that christian apologetics have to offer that's right this week's surprise celebrity chef will be none other than william lane craig oh i was expecting a fuck doll, this guy in the mail from my cousin. Will he see?

All right. Of course, sharing the table at this bullshit buffet is my lovely wife, Lucinda. Lucinda, welcome back. Well, I just want to point out here that when my friend's husband's asked them to swallow distasteful stuff, it's at least better than William Lane Craig's argument. Oh, there you go. All right. so let's get started with chapter 12 the evidence of the missing body this sounds like a goose bumps episode the evidence of the missing body was jesus's body really absent from his tomb right and if the name of the chapter is evidence of the missing body we're obviously going to start with a missing body.

Specifically that of the heiress to the Brock candy fortune, apparently. Yeah. And the story, by the way, is that a lady went missing in 1977 and we're pretty sure she's dead. But who the fuck knows? That's the story. Yep. Which is why Helen Brock is the daughter of God. Wait.

Okay. Sorry. Sorry. I got carried away. Well, and again, this macabre story just serves the purpose of saying to the reader, okay, so you know corpses. Yeah. And you know, missing.

Well, this is like both of those things all together. Yeah. And he calls the empty tomb, quote, the ultimate representation of Jesus's claim to being God, end quote. So the ultimate representation of their religion is nothing. His claim, not mine. Yeah. And he even points out, like, look, by my own words, if Jesus didn't rise from the dead, then Christianity is not true. Cool.

Cool. Nobody can rise from the dead. That's impossible. Jesus could, though. Cool. Cool. Any chance you know the world's leading expert in could to? He does.

That's when we get the 11th interview. The one you've all been waiting for. Drum roll, please. William Lane Craig, PhD, DTH. Will-a-see! that's when we get the 11th interview the one you've all been waiting for drumroll please William Lane Craig PhD DTH Willis C Willis C ow but before we get to the interview proper here

Lee has to recall that one time he saw William Lane Craig beat up five atheists with one hand tied behind his back and the other hand stuck in a jar of mayonnaise I mean I believe that William Lane Craig got his hand stuck in a jar of mayonnaise. I believe that William Lane Craig got his hand stuck in a jar of mayonnaise. Why do they make these butter knives curved in the bottom? I got all these ridges

and I can't get the little ridges. I need a mayo knife. That's it. I'm going rogue. I'm going manual. I'm fucking going in. And by the way, if you were wondering what kind of gaze William Lane Craig Hadwin Lee was interviewing, it was riveting. Yeah. And if you were wondering what his pale blue eyes were doing as he weaved elaborate propositions and theories, they were dancing. Yes, they were.

Yes. Good. I'm glad they were dancing. Yes, they were. Dancing? Yes. Jesus Christ. Good. I'm glad they were dancing. And if you were wondering if he speaks in cogent sentences. Yes, he might. Don't worry. William Lane Craig speaks in cogent sentences.

Good to know. So you can see why Lee Strobel was blown away by that. He feels the need to point that out. Unlike my other interviews. He spends so long on WLC's made-up degrees and stuff, I actually got jealous. Like, can we get an equivalent of a useless set of

accolades for our side? I want a grand supreme wizardry Macarena in atheism from Oxford University, which is Harvard and Oxford combined. Maybe you've heard this. They're famous. Eli comes out for Oxford University, which is Harvard and Oxford combined. Maybe you've heard this. Oh, Eli comes out for his debate with William Lane Craig.

He's just dressed like Muammar Gaddafi. His suit's a giant diploma. He's making it rain degrees with a dollar bill done from a strip club. All right, but eventually William Lane Craig is sufficiently slathered in praise so we can get to the actual questions and shit, which starts with the second subheading, was Jesus really buried in the tomb? And we start with one of the real oddities

Christians have to explain here. One of the main points of crucifixion is that, you know, you leave the dead guy up there. Yeah. They're there to serve as a warning to other people, right? It doesn't make a lot of sense to pry them off and stick them in tombs afterwards. So Lee poses that one to Willie. And of course, he shreds it.

Oh, yeah. He's like, bitch, I haven't even started special cleaning yet. Yeah. Point one is, are you calling the Apostle Paul a liar? Yep. A lot of that and again everything he's saying here relies on the preposterous assumption that if you say something as soon it must be correct right over and over he's like well this was written very shortly after

jesus's death and lies can't start growing until now cools all the way down that's how that works bush senior is the unique son of god nope sorry okay just anyway yeah i'm bad at word thinking what's amazing is he can't even start intellectually honest no right by his own admission he has to start with well if we assume my book is 100 accurate right what he's trying to prove by the way is that my book is 100% accurate. Right. What he's trying to prove, by the way, is that his book is 100% accurate. Yeah, that's actually the form of his Kalam cosmological argument, too. It is. Very similar. Yeah.

All right. So now we have to talk about the dude who would have been fucking Jesus's corpse if it hadn't been for that pesky resurrection. So our next subheading is, joseph of arimathea historical and as though he's tested to see if we're paying attention here this opens with the following exchange lee didn't mark say joseph of arimathea voted to kill jesus willie yeah but luke says he didn't so you know there's no contradiction here i wanted lee to be like no i meant between the two accounts there's a contradiction look at this fuzzy bacon toy fuzzy bacon you got it you got it grab it try to grab it try to grab the fuzzy bacon jump higher jump higher jump higher fuzzy bacon okay you're tired as i was saying all right and then we get william craig's favorite fallacy the argument from ignorance and this destroys almost every argument he will ever make in his life he says here

well it's really unlikely that the early christian authors would create a character like joseph of arimathea therefore he must have been real but what you're really saying here is i can't think of another reason for it therefore it must be this and you're not even saying that right i mean there's no reason for fucking chris tucker's character to be in the fifth element does that mean william lane craig thinks that ruby rod is historical okay strong disagree son of god sorry chris tucker is the heart of that film i am not not going to have this fight again. Then why bring it up, Noah? Why bring it up if you don't want to do it?

Then Lee says, well, couldn't it have been just a spiritual resurrection that they were talking about? And Willie goes, nope, Jews don't have souls. All right, then we have to deal with the next argument. What if biblical era Eli just wanted to fuck his dead wrist holes? So the next subheading is how secure was the tomb? The answer to that, by the way, is you'd need at least three guys to roll back that rock. Let me tell you. Three guys?

You mean like apostles? No, here, you take the fuzzy bacon. It's fuzzy bacon. Give me it back. And to Willie's credit, even he's willing to admit that the idea of Romengard standing watch over Christ's dead body is just a little bit silly. Yeah. He has this great little argument with himself. He's adorable, like, well, what if they stole the body?

No, they didn't. Yes, they did. Kiss me, you fool. Willie. Sorry. Sorry. Relax. Bring those dolls just to act that out.

Yes. Before it's all over here, Lee makes it super clear that he doesn't care what this brainiac has to say he believes the gospel's account well yeah and then willie dismisses all the contradictions as quote secondary details you know things like who were the witnesses was there an angel from heaven there right did? Did they ever tell anyone what they found? You know, irrelevant stuff at the margins of the story. Okay.

If the presence of a literal angel is a secondary detail, what the fuck is a primary detail? You gotta understand, angels are the mosquitoes of ancient Israel. They're just fucking everywhere. So the primary detail is just the verb to be.

I'm describing it. It was. Thus, maybe angels and shit, or maybe not. Who the fuck are we talking about? To a philosopher, that seems contradictory but historians are all about conflicting stories and being vague i don't know and then lee volunteers that uh well gee if all the gospels said the exact same stuff we'd know they were lying huh to which willie pats him on the head and gives him a little treat yeah let's somehow the fuzzy bacon yeah that's rightly

strobel who's a good boy you are this is how we know they weren't plagiarizing anyway as i was saying every single prophecy from the old testament comes true in the new well and craig says at one point he's like historians have irreconcilable accounts of hannibal crossing the alps but we don't then assume that that's a historical and that's true but the way we get to the historical core of the story is by eliminating all the impossible shit right that's how those things are reconciled like oh a bird showed up and started giving him advice. Guess we can strike through that part. That's what Craig is arguing against doing here.

Yeah, because birds only talk to Jesus. Right. How ridiculous. He also argues at one point that Mark just had a different style of facts. Different style, yes. Alternative facts. Yep. He style, yes. I don't know. Alternative facts.

Yep. He literally says that. Matthew, John, and Luke were right, and Mark was alt-right. They were all yes. They were all to be. Were they be.

Okay, so now we have to drill down on the reliability of a bunch of frightened, superstitious zealots from a pre-scientific age that had never been to a school or anything like that in a subheading called Can the Witnesses Be Trusted? And spoiler alert, they can. Yeah, no, right. We get the famous argument from Jews were too sexist to make up women discovering an important thing, which among other things another argument from ignorance right because if we know anything about christians it's that they believe women top priority there yeah and at this point it must have occurred to lee that he'd spent the entire chapter slapping band-aids on amputations here so he finally starts probing willie for some affirmative evidence.

Yeah. And just to show what an asshole William Lane Craig is, Lee says in his own book, he's like, why don't you give me your four or five best reasons why you think the tomb was empty? And Craig gives him a list of six things. I see you have a long line of rectangular tiles standing there on end. I would need to see you knock them all over very, very quickly. Okay, wow.

Wow, yeah. Unique son of God. So his first argument is they were talking about that shit all the way back in the epistles. Yeah, the Bible was true even in the early Bible. Well done. Second, Jews never

bothered to say his tomb wasn't empty. Wait, what? I have no idea. That's how we know that Jesus converted back to Judaism on his deathbed. Right. Not a single Jewish person has contradicted that fact in history. That is established. Plus, also, Lee Strobel has a prolapsed micropenis.

Wait, you did say that soon, though. You said that right away. I said that right away. Haven't heard a word about it from a Jew. But wait, there's more. His third argument is they were talking about that shit all the way back in Mark. Yeah, the Bible remained true even later in the Bible. Fourth, if it was bullshit,

it would have been cooler. Jesus probably would have had a wacky neighbor or something. Yeah, right. Fifth, Jews are sexist. Charm, Lucinda, what do you know? A lot. Sixth, they weren't talking about

a tomb full of Jesus all the way back in the Epistles. It's so desperate. He's like, I lifted another finger before I really thought about it. Alright, so then Lee says, okay, but a person of

even well below average intelligence can still figure out a way to empty that tomb that doesn't resort to the creator of the universe doing magic on it, so aren't we just wrong though? But he does finally say, well, isn't an unlikely explanation still better than an impossible one? And Willie says, no, shut up.

Yes. Literally the summary of this entire. But Craig still closes on a point we can all agree on here, I guess. Apropos of nothing, he says, well, the least likely explanation is that jesus's body resurrected of natural causes not sure why he brought that up he totally did it's it's just sitting there with him just to be clear people don't come back to life they do not come back to life yeah that's not real cool cool cool cool cool cool just checking that you knew and at this point a good writer would you know offer up some kind of well william sure offered up some good arguments and i guess it's now up to us to each decide for ourselves

but not lee strobel no he is not a good writer no so the final subheading in this one reads conclusion the tomb was vacant i'll think for yourself feels like a secondary detail about the unique son of god doesn't it or last cherry just doesn't matter yeah and and keeping in mind that lee strobel is still ostensibly defining himself as like the objective assessor of these facts who's not yet Christian this is how he describes people who would deny the truth of the resurrection at the close here quote they flounder they struggle they snatch at straws they contradict themselves they pursue desperate and extraordinary theories to try to account for the evidence end quote I feel like he accidentally pasted in his

to-do list in the book in conclusion you're stupid you are and that's where the chapter proper ends uh but we still have a few deliberation questions to make our way through so question one what's your own conclusion concerning whether j' tomb was empty on Easter morning? What evidence did you find most convincing in coming to that judgment? Ooh, ooh. I don't care, and coming back from the dead isn't real. There you go. Yeah.

No, my conclusion is that fucking biblical era Hannibal Lecter climbed into the body and walked away, and my evidence is that that is infinity times more likely than the premise of the book. Alright, I'm saying the Jewish ladies got there and they found a dead cat and a vial of poison. My evidence is that the Jews haven't said a god

damn word about this. About there not being a dead cat and a vial of poison. And my conclusion is that Jesus' tomb was empty, and every Christian I've ever argued with was paying homage to that tomb with their heads. All right, question two. As Craig pointed out, everyone in the ancient world admitted the tomb was empty. Everyone in the entire ancient world. All of them. the issue was how

it got that way can you think of any logical explanation for the vacant tomb other than the resurrection of jesus if so not how do you imagine someone like bill craig might respond to your theory i cannot think of how a container could become less full that is back so uh bill craig please go away now find bus fare mouth breathing right next to me no no fuzzy bacon go get it hell i can't even think of a logical one including the resurrection well i mean look i can think of literally infinity more logical conclusions right and i'd imagine bill craig would respond by whining about abstract philosophical concepts until he hit on one i'd never heard of uh okay argument okay my argument is that jesus ran off with helen uh brock and Brock and then William Lane Craig would defend that argument for a living?

Yeah. Apparently. All right, question three. Read Mark 1542 through 1608. No. No. Maury, read your dumb fucking book, ain't I? Been there, done that.

The earliest account of Jesus's burial and empty tomb do you agree with craig that this is stark in its simplicity and unadorned by theological reflection why or why not okay do i agree that the bible is unadorned by theological reflection. No, actually, I don't. Now that I think about it. I do not know that you think. I mean, I agree that Mark isn't a very compelling writer. That's the argument, right? If this happened, it would be more interesting. I said no to reading that parts of the Bible.

So that was a no from me. Okay. I also said no. Finished the test early. I'm already smoking drugs in the parking lot homework slash a all right well originally our plan was to be done with this fucking book by the end of the year but it doesn't look like we're gonna make the deadline so we'll be back in next month with chapter 13 of the case for christ and we just like move ahead and be done yeah well we know how it's gonna end

spoiler before we pop back up the chimney this week i wanted to announce something we're all pretty excited about here at puzzle in a thunderstorm it looks like matt Matt Powell's long-awaited anti-evolution opus, Science Falsely So-Called, is out. And Heath, Eli, and myself will be breaking that one down at our live show in Dallas coming up on January 12th. Find tickets with the link on the show notes for this episode or check our Facebook page. Anyway, that's all the blasphemy we've got for you tonight, but we'll be back in 10,022 minutes with more. If you can't wait that long, be on the lookout for a brand-new episode of our sister show's hot friend, Godawful Movies, debuting at 7 a.m. Eastern on Tuesday, and an even newer episode of

our half-sister show, Citation Needed, debuting at noon Eastern on Wednesday. Obviously, this episode couldn't climax if I neglected to thank Heath Enright for being jolly, bearded, and big-boned. I need to thank Eli Bosnick for being jolly, bearded, and fat. I need to thank the lovely Lucinda Lusions for only being jolly. I want to be

super clear on what I'm saying in there. I also want to thank the godless heathens Don, Jeff, and Jerry for providing this week's Farnsworth quote. If you'd like some more heathenism and some less God in your life, check out their podcast with a link on the show notes. But most of all, of course, I want to thank this week's most scintillating citizens, Ron, John, Mark, Doug, J.D., Lou, A.D., Coe, and Jacqueline, Alex, Will, and the Human Instrumentality Project. Ron, John, Mark, and Doug, whose ejaculations are so powerful they wear Kevlar condoms. J.D. Cohen and Jacqueline, who are so bright their IQ is measured in lumens. And Alex, Will, and Human, who are so attractive they can't help but organize iron filings.

Together, these ten titans of Trenshency entrusted a token of treasure to tirades towards two-faced teleologists this week by giving us money. Not everybody has the lack of unpurchased gifts on their list it takes to give us money, but if you're up to the challenge, you can make a per-episode donation at patreon.com slash scathingatheist, whereby you'll earn early access to an extended ad-free version of every episode, or you can make a one-time donation by clicking on the donate button on the right side of the homepage at scathingatheist.com. Legal services for this podcast

are provided by the Law Offices of P. Andrew Torres, Tim Robertson handles our social media, and our audio engineer is Morgan Clark, who also wrote all the music that was used in this episode, which was used with permission. If you have questions, comments, or death threats, you'll find all the contact info on the contact page at skatingads.com. I feel like we could make a really fun video for the patrons of you smoking crack.

Like Eli tries crack. Yeah. I feel like that would be less fun than we're all imagining. I mean, it would be fun for everyone, but you. What if Heath does the crack? Oh, man. Just scrolling at normal speed.

It'd be fucking crazy. What? I'm on the page. Crazy. What would we do? The preceding podcast was a production of Puzzle and a Thunderstorm LLC. Copyright 2018. All rights reserved.