The Scathing Atheist - 326: Sim's City Edition

Episode Date: May 16, 2019

In this week’s episode, Christians will take their balls and go home, Heath’s opening bullet point will get cut from the intro because it refers to a story we decided to push to next week and that’ll make the intro sound weird, and Steve Anderson is reminded that in Ireland, they drive out the snakes. 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/ To hear more from our intrepid audio engineer Morgan Clarke, click here: https://www.morganclarkemusic.com/ Guest Links: Check out the Gaytheist Manifesto here: https://www.queersplaining.com/category/episode/ Check out the Happy Munday podcast here: Headlines: Christians freak out about Brian Sims: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/07/conservatives-livid-after-pa-lawmaker-notes-anti-abortion-protesters-hypocrisy/ Catholic League says Sims filming abortion protesters needs a criminal probe: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/09/catholic-league-pa-lawmaker-filming-abortion-protesters-needs-criminal-probe/ MAGA cultist says Sims must "suck a dick" to prove to me that he's gay: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/11/maga-cultist-pa-rep-brian-sims-must-suck-a-dick-to-prove-to-me-that-hes-gay/ Christian hate-preacher Steven Anderson has been banned from entering Ireland: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/13/christian-hate-preacher-steven-anderson-has-been-banned-from-entering-ireland/ Christian school quits athletic conference for letting trans kids do sports https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2019/03/22/maryland-high-school-leaves-athletic-conference-over-transgender-policy/?utm_term=.8ac99a4d6f14 ND man pleads guilty to jacking off into church’s baptismal font: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/08/nd-man-pleads-guilty-to-masturbating-in-churchs-baptismal-pool-during-mass/ This Week in Misogyny: Alabama abortion law: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2019/05/15/alabama-abortion-bill-georgia-abortion-ban-heartbeat-law/3676635002/ Lori Alexander laments girls getting good test scores: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/11/christian-mom-its-a-travesty-that-girls-are-outperforming-boys-academically/ Pastor rapes 14 year old, gets lenient sentence because he’s a pastor: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/15/pastor-who-raped-adopted-14-y-o-daughter-gets-lenient-sentence-due-to-his-faith/

Warning, this podcast contains all the offensive language we could think up on the spot. This week's episode of The Scathing Atheist is brought to you by Alabama's even more restrictive abortion ban. Now, with rape and incest, Alabama's even more restrictive abortion ban. You think George is bad? Hold my beer. And now, The Scathing Atheist. This is Evan from the Happy Monday Podcast.

If Noah's diatribe doesn't make you happy, you can always feel good knowing that we did, in fact, evolve from filthy, happy monkey men. It's Thursday. It's May 16th. And it's National Mimosa Day. So, uh, get drunk in the morning and pretend you like your partner's friends, I guess. You were going to do that anyway.

I'm Noah Lusions. I'm Eli Bosnick. I'm Heath Enright. And from James Comey's New Jersey, Cincinnati Swing State, and Good Husband Georgia, this is The Scathing Atheist. On this week's episode, Christians will take their balls and go home. And Steve Anderson is reminded

that in Ireland, they drive out the fucking snakes. But first, the diatribe. So I'm talking with a friend the other day, and bless her heart, she's trying to understand what I do for a living, or more particularly, why I do it. She's a Christian, a Catholic to be exact, and we're really good friends. I've been friends with her as long as I've known Lucinda, and Lucinda was friends with her before that. And she's happy for us that we have jobs that we love and that allow us to travel and to live where we want, or at least where we choose,

but she just doesn't get the why part of it. So her question is basically always the same when she asks about my job. She usually finds a new way of phrasing it, but it almost always boils down to, so what's your problem with religion anyway? She'll give me some variation of that. So naturally, I'll just start listing evil shit the church does. And as easy as that normally is, it's extra easy when you're talking to a person that ties to the Vatican. But invariably, we fall into this same rut. And it's probably a rut that you're as familiar with as I am. The but that's because they're doing it wrong bullshit.

When your interlocutor patiently explains to you that those evil kid rapey mass shooty church bombing gay Haiti types aren't actually religious. They're just kid raping, mass shooting, homophobic terrorists that sign God's name to their homework. Now, I'm not going to spend a whole day to try debunking the no true Scotsman fallacy. It's too dumb to fill up the segment. God can't speak for himself. Or if you're trying to be overly kind, he just refuses to for some reason. So every individual believer is left to fill in the blanks with whatever words they want, and whoever uses different words must be getting the words wrong. See, when my friend was invoking the trueness of her Scotsman, she kept saying shit like,

but that's not what God wants, and that's not what God thinks, and that's not what God demands. And I kept trying to correct her by adding the possessive in there. That's not what my God wants. That's not what my God demands. And I kept trying to correct her by adding the possessive in there, right? That's not what my God wants. That's not what my God thinks. That's not what my God demands. But of course, she's theologically obligated not to admit that the possessive can even exist there. Sure, you'd be hard pressed to find two Christians who define God the same way or would even give consistent answers about him on a what Game of Thrones character are you quiz. But their whole concept of God insists that they at least pretend they're all talking about the same guy. I mean, look, this is part of the reason I'm so insistent on not capitalizing the

G in God. Yes, part of it is that lowercase is just grammatically correct there. And if you want to hear more about that argument, I recommend the diatribe from episode 132. But I'd be willing to make a grammatically incorrect concession tradition for the sake of communication if it didn't also promote bad ideas. See, when it comes to God's personhood, religious debaters want to have it both ways. They want to laugh off our simplistic notions of God as some guy out there somewhere when it suits them, but then ascribe the characteristics of an individual to him the rest of the time. I mean, if you look at the attributes of God that pretty much every Christian can agree

on, none of them are human attributes or even individual attributes. They're the attributes of a concept, and concepts don't get capitalized. See, to even refer to God as though you're talking about a being, even a fictional one has already given ground to their argument. God is undefined in virtually every religious debate you'll ever have, and to the extent he is defined, it's usually with absolute qualities, like being all-knowing, omnipresent, outside of time. Now, we obviously all agree that a person who is all-knowing, omnipresent, outside of time isn't a real thing that exists. We have to agree with that, or they'll take away our atheist cards, but I'd argue that it isn't even a concept that can exist. Right. When you move that far from

human in your construction of a being, you can't then tag in human attributes when they please you. God, as defined for purposes of debate by the people on his side, is more akin to a concept like infinite para lines or gross national product than he is to people or even to previous gods right like zeus was a dude he was a fictional dude but he was a dude with dude properties plus magic powers and christians have one of those gods too his name is yahweh or jehovah or something but it's not god and this matters see christians have this habit in conversation of moving seamlessly between jehovah the dude and God the concept, and capitalizing the G reinforces an acceptance of that rhetorical bait and switch. They'll try to justify the existence of God by giving him this flighty conceptual definition, but then they'll

shift right into saying, and he said X, as though the flimsy philosophical construct they built around all knowingness and omnipresence is just a no-brainer synonym for the God of the Bible. Either God is Jehovah or God is this concept. And if they want God to be Jehovah, they're stuck with what's in the fucking book. Anything they add to that requires, at the very least, a possessive, right? At best, they're speaking for their God at that point and everybody else's interpretation, regardless of whether they're religious, is equally valid. At its worst, that's a call to immoral action. At its best, it's an excuse to ignore it.

Joining me for headlines tonight are the Fold and Spindle to My Mutilate Heath Enright and Eli Bosnick fellas. Are you ready to invalidate some official documents? Yeah. I also got one of those number three pencils they were terrified about in school. Fuck up your test. Yeah, I mean, this human shit I spread on my hands was for something else, but sure.

Alright. Well, I need to sanitize Eli's microphone and his mixer again, so we're going to pause for a word from this week's sponsor, us. So far, our Matreon fundraiser has been a great success. Once again, you've blown away our expectations. You've already fully funded the Patreon-only Pajama Party livestream,

but there are still plenty of goals to hit. And as we've added new goals over the last few weeks, a lot of you have reached out to ask how we come up with them. So we figured we'd pull back the curtain a bit and share some audio from that very meeting. Hey, Andrew, how's it going? Happy Matrion. And happy Matrion to you, too, Noah. How are you?

And by the way, thanks for meeting me in this open field. I got it. Your office has taken quite a pounding this year. Yeah. Thanks for being understanding. Speaking of which, where are Heath and Eli? That is

a bulldozer. And that's my office chair. How? Why? Classic. Why is your door code your kid's birthday? Yeah, Andrew, that's on you. Come on.

On you. You knew we knew that. Yeah. Yeah. All right. So how can I help? Well, we're doing our Maple Fools Patreon-tacular, right? We're not going to call that.

Pin in that. We'll get back to that. No pins. Nope. And we had some more ideas for stuff to do during the pajama party to keep people going. Okay. Look, before I even start to look at this list, Eli cannot offer to fuck anyone's dad during the pajama party. I've been very clear on this.

I have already purchased IWillFuckYourDad.com. Even if you've already purchased IWillFuckYourDad.com. Okay, so we're wasting company money now, just for the record. We are wasting company. Let's see here. No. No.

Definitely no. Uh, I guess that's technically illegal, but I, I don't think we can get carrot top guys. I think we can get carrot top. I also think we can get carrot top. Absolutely. Either way. Uh, where does that leave us? Okay.

That leaves us with the AMA. Uh, hit it already. Uh, Anna's sing alongA. I hit it already. Anna's sing-along. I hit that too. A special Dungeons & Dragons session with all of us. So many people asked for that. A lot of people wanted that. And playing Twister in our jammies.

Okay, that's what we're going to go with then, I guess. Yep. Look, see you, Andrew. See you, Andrew. Andrew, later. I have a present for you. Of course you do. What is it this time, Eli?

I got you a bottle of Art Beg Scotch. What? Really? Yeah. Wow, Eli, that's fantastic. Because, you know, usually you get me something It gets better, it gets better Because I poured out the weird stuff that's inside

And I filled the bottle with little scrolls I wrote crimes I'm going to do on Yeah, things like that Happy Matacular Paper and Fools Day, Andrew I don't think we're calling it that. What else is on this? Where are you even going to get a giraffe? Oh, they're gone.

And they took my car. All right. Well, we've got some brand new awesome rewards as well as some goals that you really want to watch us achieve. So if you want to get in on the action, head over to Patreon.com slash Scathing Atheist. Later this week, we're going to be dropping the second half of our Patreon-only AMA, and we're only a few weeks shy of the pajama party. Act now and you can help us add Patreon-only ringtones so that, as one listener helpfully suggested you can get me yelling at you as your alarm clock that's awesome right and remember only you can make andrew play twister with us on camera and now back to the headlines in our lead story tonight pennsylvania

state representative brian sims continued his ongoing campaign of terrifying Christian bigots last week. And it continues to be an absolute delight to watch him do that. Yes, it does. It absolutely does. Sims is a progressive, liberal, non-religious gay man. And he's also a beautiful, beautiful man. Just gorgeous. Just looking at this picture makes me want to buy paper towels and lumberjack equipment. And he's also a beautiful, beautiful man. Just gorgeous.

Just looking at this picture makes me want to buy paper towels and lumberjack equipment. Just to make him like me. Whatever I need to buy. So basically, he's the exact embodiment of all the Christian fears and sexual confusion rolled up into one. Yes. one yes and his latest triumph was embarrassing the fuck out of some anti-choice protesters who were harassing women outside of a planned parenthood in philadelphia i would did he develop some kind of evil scientist self-awareness ray because i feel like that would do it pretty much he was just like hey what if people knew how you behaved and the christians were like so quick background you might remember sims for being the guy who went on facebook and posted a giant fuck you for mike pence when the vp visited philadelphia last year this included a photo of

sims giving pence the finger uh also making fun fun of Pence for needing his wife's help to speak with a female human being. And it closed with, get bent, then get the fuck out of my city. It was the best. Just for the record, the cast of Hamilton and also just about everyone in New York City did the same thing when Pence visited them. This should be how it works. Everywhere he goes all the time forever. Also, everyone in New York City did the same thing when Pence visited them. This should be how it works. Everywhere he goes all the time forever. Also, everyone in that administration. Amen to that.

And guys, this will not take a global effort, right? Like if you can help us lure him into my dining room, we stick Anna in the kitchen, Lucinda in the living room. We can basically do whatever we want for eternity. Yeah. And ladies, I'm just saying if you have a vagina and you walk into an elevator that Mike Pence is in, you are legally kidnapping him. Do that what you will. All right.

So Sims decided it was time to harass the harassers at the Planned Parenthood. And I think that's great but by harass i mean record video of harassers doing exactly what they do all at the same time not interfering with anyone seeking medical treatment so not harass oh it was a mad scientist self-awareness ray and that way and it was and it was just photons bouncing off of them was the ray in question looking yeah he also uh he asked one of the mob a few questions like have you fed any children today no you haven't uh have you given out any condoms to prevent abortions no have you protested any catholic churches for all the kid raping sorry what oh did you say complete silence cool cool so i guess you're not pro those lives just

this one weird type it's um this whole video is these women trying not to break like solemn character but someone isn't afraid of them and it's my everything they're just like usually the teenage girls are scared of us, but he doesn't seem scared. Do you need medical treatment? I could deny you. They're terrified of a camera showing them doing what they do. It's the best. Yeah.

So you're probably wondering if Christian people realized it would be crazy to get mad about somebody treating a woman harassing mob the way those people treat women. Again, minus the colossal evil of interfering with medical treatment. Right. You're thinking maybe Christianity internalized the criticism and adjusted their behavior. But that's because you're stupid, hypothetical, wandering person that I made up for this they did not adjust any of their evil behavior instead evangelicals everywhere saw the

mirror that Sims held up to them and they all hurt themselves diving into the glass trying to attack the reflection like a dumb puppy alright so big mirrors in the dining room before we do the pens thing check we should also just to be safe maybe paint a few railroad tunnels on the walls just to find out yep yep turn all the chairs upside down just for the gay fear part of it

so again sims is basically a weapons grade version of pete Buttigieg, and Christianity is having a super panicky meltdown. And that means it's time for another Christian freakout. Anna? What are the guys talking about? It's the newest, the greatest Christian freakout. So we got two especially fun meltdowns, thanks to Brian Sims. The first came from Catholic League president Bill Donahue, So we got two especially fun meltdowns, thanks to Brian Sims. The first came from Catholic League president Bill Donahue,

who looks like chewed gum fell on the floor of a geriatric barbershop, just rolled around a little bit. And according to Donahue, Sims should go to jail for this. What? Donahue also, yeah, that's what he said. Donahue also literally claimed that filming and asking questions in public is worse than sexual misconduct. Well, said that, too. Yeah, but to be fair, he's got ellipses is worse than systematically covering up child rape tattooed on the back of his hand.

So he says that the way it was like some people say, um, just as he does trying to think of the next thing. And what's amazing about that interview is watching Bill Donahue try to say words he thinks Brian Sims did without describing what the girls were doing. He's like, damn it! He was harassing women as the... Nope, sorry. Give me a second.

Let me try again. He was filming two people who had nothing... Ah, this is hard. He had a beard. They didn't have is hard. He had a beard. They didn't have beards. He has a beautiful beard. It's a very nice beard, Brian Sims has. Anyway, sorry.

We got one other amazing freakout that needs to be mentioned here. A Christian right Trump activist named Who the Fuck Cares decided to expose Brian Sims for being secretly heterosexual. Yep. As that relates to Planned Parenthood. According to who the fuck, quote, I don't think Sims is gay and I think we need to prove it.

We should demand we see him suck a dick before we'll believe he's gay. Wait. You're not gay, dude. Suck a a dick i don't believe you nope i just think you're pretending to be gay suck a dick dude suck a dick a gay guy would do it suck a dick go end quote end quote said the heterosexual christian man as he sculpted a hair doll of brian sims to sell to heath on etsy yes nope is correct suck a dick you know what i just realized i'm not gonna believe you unless i'm there i've got a dick you could oh i just got it i'm gay i'm gay everyone there it is this is about

i figured out wow you got it faster than we expected. Cool. And in May the Road Rise Up to Tweet You news, it has been a tough year for pastor, bigot, and racist Chia Pet, Stephen Anderson. Hasn't it, though? First, he was banned from Australia. Then he was banned from the Netherlands. Then he was in a Matt Powell movie. And now, finally, he's banned from the one place we all thought loud racist white guys were safe ireland no yeah no they're still safe that's where all those people

come from um and by the way credit where credit is due you heard it here first even well before it happened lucinda called this one on twim on episode Go, Lucinda. Now use that same power to get him kicked out of America. Just Steve Anderson and Andrew Wakefield floating around in the middle of the Atlantic, international waters, getting measles together and yelling slurs, rubbing, scratching their itchy parts. Sounds great. Now, Anderson, who looks like an American History X themed Ken doll, is the first person stopped from entering Ireland

under the exclusion powers granted by the Nation's Immigration Act of 1999. Section 4 of that act states that a person can be banned if it's deemed, quote, necessary in the interest of national security or public policy. Wow. So, big congrats to Steve Anderson.

You're not just too racist for Ireland. Your first time they use a rule too racist for Ireland. They were letting in like, you know, IRA people from back out of the country and in since then a bunch but not him though they drew the line somewhere well either way we know that the best person to offer an opinion on this would be irish fake abortion clinic lady so irish fake abortion clinic lady it's good to have you back on the show oh it is a fine thing to be back amongst you, Heath. I'm Heath. Indeed you are.

Now, tell us, Irish fake abortion clinic lady. It never sinks in. It's been a while, and I'm pretty sure you mostly appear on a different podcast. So two-part question. Do you think the listeners remember or even know who you are? And what do you think of Steve Anderson? Oh, for sure they don't, Lucinda. But myself and Mr. Anderson,

it seems a bit extreme, but... Who's this? Who's this? That's Sock Puppet. No, it is a ghost of one of the Holocaust victims, to be sure. Oh, how could six million Jews have died without gasoline lines to burn the bodies? Okay, Irish fake abortion clinic lady.

Thanks for stopping by. We're done. Steve Anderson did nothing wrong. Okay. I'm sorry. I did not see that coming. Honestly, I did. She's actually from my hometown.

Go Yankees. Go Yankees. Yeah. I mean, go yankees for sure go yanks and speaking of side characters that usually show up to talk about abortion we'll take a quick break and hand things over to my lovely wife lucin a man wrote the bible a horse which one if it's a legitimate race right cooking can be fun hey i'm proud of a man this week in massager well damn it alabama now alissa milano will have no idea where to not fuck people so yeah never one to allow a state to be worse than it for long

alabama saw georgia's new anti-abortion law and raised them rape and incest where georgia rolled the clock back to about six weeks when a fetal heartbeat can generally be detected. Alabama went all the way back to zero weeks. And they did away with all those pesky exemptions for rape and incest victims that muddle up the purity of the Georgia bill. So, yes, if both of these laws went into effect, you'd literally have Alabamians sneaking over to Georgia where the abortion laws were more progressive. And look, I get that. I just said last week that I didn't want to turn this segment into this week in abortion, but those assholes basically passed this law as we were getting ready to record. Anyway, I had other stories all ready to go, so I'm going to talk about them anyway. But just keep in mind that regardless of what the other stories are,

the theme of this week is fuck Alabama. Okay, so Lori Alexander is still a fucking idiot. You'll remember her from a couple weeks ago when she made this segment for accidentally admitting how shitty her sex life is well she's back in the misogyny news again this week this time lamenting how smart girls are so apparently laurie came across an article talking about how girls were getting better and better at academic achievement now that we don't force them to take folding laundry class instead of geometry and she goes ape shit because if girls get too smart quote more and more young women will be leaving their homes leaving their children in the care of others and being help meats to their bosses instead of their husbands end quote now i'm not sure about the biblical terminology there

but i don't think lori knows that you can be employed without fucking your boss. And I get it. It's a common misunderstanding that I've had to put up with for my co-workers every time I've ever gotten a promotion. What's more, if you're Lori Alexander, then the woman you most interact with is Lori Alexander. And I can see how that would sour you on the whole gender. But trust me, Lori, almost all of us are better than you. And finally, you know what? Fuck it.

I don't want to talk about this story, so I'm not gonna. It's about a pastor that raped his 14-year-old adopted daughter and then gets about 60 fewer years in prison than the guidelines called for, you know, because the judge thinks pastor equals good person. If you want to read about it, I'll link it in the show notes. But I already had to talk about Alabama, and that's enough for this week. about it, I'll link it in the show notes, but I already had to talk about Alabama and that's enough for this week. So on that uplifting note, I'll hand things back over to Noah, Heath, and Eli. Thank you, Lucinda. And in Harriet's of Fire news tonight, four Grace Brethren Christian School in

George's County, Maryland took their balls and went home this week when they resigned from the Potomac Valley Athletic Conference, or PVAC, because of the league's allowance of transgender athletes to compete on teams consistent with their gender identities. Cool. So, bye, Felicia. Look, it's bad enough that y'all are making us let them shit. Pretty much. So, George Hornickel, who, when he's not doing his full-time job as an old, offensive wooden doll of a pizza chef, is the principal of the school. You got to Google it. That's a really good one. It is.

Just his name is that image. Hornickel. Yep. When he's not that, he's the principal of the school. And he released a statement saying, quote, schools that allow boys to play on girls teams is a form of cheating and it gives them an advantage over girls teams who only play female athletes, end quote, which might be true if these athletes were post-pubescent or not on hormone blockers. However, Hornigkel immediately demonstrated just how wasted that explanation

would be on him when he added, quote, this is how it has been throughout the history of the world. And we believe there are only two sexes, male and female, end quote. So yeah, I mean, I guess he's allowed to believe there are only two sexes. I mean's six there's six forms of karyotypes but hornicle is allowed to believe tens of millions of people don't exist i guess that's really that's his prerogative and uh and by the way the school was already planning to leave this conference because most of their opponents are too far away but they're such giant fucking assholes yeah that they were like uh also fuck trans people. Also that because the Bible is also our reason.

Nailed it. Like they could have just like said fucking nothing and not been extra assholey about it, but they had to do this. Yeah. Like, which means somewhere in some office, somebody heard this and was like, oh good. I thought we were going to have to do this without bigotry score. Nailed it.

Good. All right. Still, we know here at The Scathing Atheist that even non-bigoted, non-assholes can be confused about trans athletes and fairness in sports. So, in the spirit of education, let's answer some FAQs with another episode of Kicking It with Carl. He's a pug and he's also a unicorn. You know, that's a horse that has a horn. But don't forget he's a pegasus too. That's called a pug, a pegasus and he likes you. It's Kicking It With Carl. Hey everybody, welcome back to Kicking It With Carl. My guest today is podcaster and activist

Callie Wright. Callie, welcome to Kicking It With Carl. Hey, Carl. Thanks for having me on. So, Callie, I asked you on the program today so we could talk about trans athletes in sports. I am one of those, so like me? Exactly. You play roller derby, right? I sure do. Now, Callie, isn't that unfair? Uh, how so?

Okay. Well, so, you know, among Pug-a-Pegacons, at least, like, dude, Pug-a-Pegacons are usually, um, usually... Bigger and stronger? Yeah, usually. Is that true with humans, too? I mean, most of the time, but there's a pretty wide range within that category oh yeah i guess there is but like what if a dude pucker pegacorn was just like i'm a lady

pucker pegacorn and then wanted to play in the pugup olympics wouldn't that be unfair i'm glad you asked carl and yes if you could just announce your gender and instantly change categories, maybe that might be unfair. Except that's not actually how trans athletics work, at least not in most cases. It's not? No. For almost all gender-segregated sports, athletes have to have been on hormones for a period of time and sometimes even have to have had surgery before they're allowed to compete as a gender other than the one they were assigned at birth. The Olympics even has an official policy about it. Wait a second, they do?

They sure do. Okay, but aren't their bones and muscles and stuff denser or something? Actually, not necessarily. There's quite a bit of peer-reviewed research that shows after trans athletes are on hormones for a significant amount of time, they have the same or less bone and muscle density as the cis people in their category. So, trans athletes don't have a significant biological advantage? Not according to the science we have, no. But more importantly, even if they did have a biological advantage, it might not be as unfair as you think.

What do you mean? Well, did you know that Michael Phelps has double-jointed ankles? Uh, he does? He does. Plus, he produces almost half the lactic acid of other athletes. Wow, he's so lucky.

He is lucky, Carl. And that's actually kind of my point. When someone like Michael Phelps is born with physical advantages, we talk about how lucky they are. It's all well and good to say trans women are women, but if that stops when we want to play sports, you're kind of secretly saying you actually don't think they are. Oh, I didn't mean it that way.

I know you didn't, Carl. And it's always okay to ask questions, but it's pretty tough to be trans right now. There's bathroom bills, the trans military ban, and the government rolling back our healthcare and legal protections. So you just got to be extra careful, okay? Okay. And if someone tells me I hurt their feelings, I should apologize? That is right, Carl. All right, Kelly, one more question for you, and this is a tough one. All right, shoot. Do you like garlic bread?

You know I do. All right, well, Kelly, thanks for joining us. Hey, thanks for having me, Carl. He's a pug and he's also a unicorn. You know, the horse that has a horn. But don't forget, he's a Pegasus, too. That's called a pug, a pegacorn, and he likes you. He's kicking it with Carl.

Thank you, Callie and Carl. And finally tonight in baptismal font news. We do not, as a company or as individuals endorse public indecency masturbating your way through a church during a service or washing your ass in the baptismal font while approximately 75 parishioners watch on in horror heath heath noah is attacking me using headlines again not yet i will but not yet who would you prefer to tax you? I'm not going to say it's the worst use of public indecency, public masturbation, or public ass rinsing, but I am going to say that no matter how well we do with the matrion thing, we, as both a matter of law and company prerogative,

will not jerk off with our asses in the holy water regardless of whether the church is in service but if 21 year old north dakotan meth head zachary burdick does it we certainly endorse thinking that's pretty fucking funny and uh also just to be clear we are willing to set a patreon goal to buy ourselves a church just for this day thank you yes that is no one does not speak for this podcast i will the pope if you give me bail money no you won't where would you even get a giraffe don't answer that fucking andy doesn't need any more complications in his life so yeah according to local news reports, the incident took place at the Catholic Spirit of Life Church, so already church has a cum name, you're asking for it,

in Mandan, North Dakota, where there's really nothing to do but jerk off in church. Also asking for it. You're in Mandan, North Dakota, you ask for whatever happens. Right. So it was a brisk Tuesday morning when an employee saw Burdick enter the church, strip off all his clothes, and jump into the baptismal font he then quote dipped his rear end

into the holy water fountain end quote uh he splashed around a bit he started to masturbate then walked naked down the aisle while still masturbating all while approximately six dozen people were attending mass uh catholic mass in 2019 just in case you were going to feel bad for those people they are right right yeah catholic mass opus bidet yeah and uh apparently the uh the pastor was like uh everybody it's fine just ignore him just ignore him he just wants attention so uh as i was saying jerusalem is basically a whore who enjoys donkey dick and horse we're doing this sermon that's actually really close to what it was okay so i know that one guy in this story is walking down a church aisle buck

naked jacking his dick and everything but i dare say that he is not the most interesting character here okay yeah because according to the sources employee, the employee who called the cops, decided to have a quick one-on-one with him during this public masturbation session. Technically no longer masturbation. So already I'm intrigued. She first explained that it was impolite to masturbate in front of other people. And then she asks, and I have been lying awake at night wondering about her motivation for two days on this she asks quote if he was masturbating to get sexual gratification end quote

fair question as though she thought maybe he lost something up there and just needed some help pushing it out for his part zachary seemed prepared for this question and responded that he was indeed, quote, trying to bust a nut, end quote. Oh, please tell me her answer was carry on then. Okay. We've cleared this up. This is a good meeting. All right. Quick before Eli realizes that all this guy got was a $500 fine and quick before Andrew realizes that I just told Eli that we're going to close the headlines out for the night. Heath, Eli, thanks as always. Technically, that'd be a $500 fine. And quick before Andrew realizes that I just told Eli that, we're going to close the headlines out for the night.

Heath, Eli, thanks as always. Technically, that'd be a $500 write-off. And when we come back, we'll find a holy book where the dicks are drawn into the text in advance. I have to admit, it took us a while to decide which holy book to tackle this year, and it wasn't an easy decision, but ultimately we settled on The Pearl of Great Price for two reasons. First and foremost, it was the shortest.

We were looking at like eight things, and it was half as long as the other seven, but also, and most importantly, okay, almost as importantly, it's the one that had the book of Abraham in it. And that's what we get to break down today. Abraham. Things that are short. Yeah, right. Yeah, exactly.

This book, Eli's Penis, he's a big fan. And joining us for this delightful dive into Joseph Smith's derangement and Eli's penis size is my lovely wife, Lucinda. Lucinda, welcome back. Look, we're half an hour from me never having to think about this stupid thing again. Let's not slow down with the salutations, okay? Okay, all right. Check.

Okay, so before we dive into the details, we should talk about what this book is. The story of how it came to be is far more interesting than the book itself, and not just because the ingredients on the shampoo bottle would also be more interesting than the book is. The story of how it came to be is far more interesting than the book itself, and not just because the ingredients on the shampoo bottle would also be more interesting than the book itself. That's what we had to read before cell phones, millennials. That's how hard we had it. Right? Did you guys jerk off

to the back of shampoo bottles, too? I thought it was alone. No. Here's the back story. I did. Conditioner, usually, but yeah. Alright, so here's the back story conditioner usually but yeah alright so here's the back story on this some dude inherits some old Egyptian papyri from a dead ant or something and he's toting it around the midwest back in the

1840s displaying it at side shows and shit so he hears about these Mormons and how their back story includes a guy who says he can translate Egyptian hieroglyphics so the carnival barker's like hey I bet I could rip this guy off spoiler alert you can literally always rip joseph smith off pretty much yeah so he goes to kirkland ohio where the

mormons were uh and he offers joey this whole bunch of egyptian stuff which apparently included a mummy as well for the princely sum of 2400 in 18. That's 70 grand in today's money. So Joey looks at it. He declares that the papyri include the literal handwritten words of both Moses and Abraham. And then he orders his followers to pay for it for him. And then he translates them. Translates them. This is amazing.

for him and then he translates them translates them this is amazing it's like that improv liars duel you get when two idiots at the bar they read different memes about hillary clinton being a serial killer so they both agree on the general premise but they're just making new stuff I say, I say, so these are the scrolls from two magical prophets of God. Uh, yes, and, uh, they say that I, Joseph Smith, will buy these for $100 in future currency called dollars. Uh, it actually says $100 each if you look at that little squiggle right there so 2400 total oh it does doesn't it is it right there great yep great yep so that's the deal we are we are both not lying 2400 we are not um why did you all just freeze for like a minute i'm pretty sure they were doing a doodly-doo were you guys doing a doodly-doo we were doing it i was the salesman okay all right so joseph

smith translates these uh papyri and he releases them by the way one chapter at a time in a newspaper that he owns to drum up a little extra distribution i guess of course later egyptologists learn how to actually read hieroglyphs and they translate these ones and lo and behold they are not the words of abraham or moses but instead they're literally the most common egyptian thing you could possibly have right they're fragmentary copies of the book of the dead and the book of Breathings, which, you know, that's still pretty cool. I'd hang it on my wall, but it's the equivalent of people thousands of years from now

having a phone book from today. So, just to be clear, we're reading a mistranslated filibuster The Holy Book. That's what's happening right now. The forged note from the dog that ate your homework, The Holy Book.

Bark, it says. All right. So, but when he was done with his translating, Joey also felt the need to copy over and explain a few of the larger drawings on the fragments, which are amazing, but also lead to the greatest penis ever captured in holy canon. So we're going to get to that just as we're going through this. Keep in mind that there's a god dick at the end you sound like a catholic priest can i just tell you that comes up okay but before we can get to the penis we start out with abraham apartment hunting and chaldea and becoming a priest yep this is the perfect start to joe sm making shit up. Like, we get Abraham, prophet of God, getting kicked out of his parents' basement.

Essentially. Yes. Oh, and in one of the worst examples of foreshadowing in literary history, Abraham laments that the heathens were, quote, offering up their children unto these dumb idols, end quote. It's all about the intelligence of the God you're killing your kid for. Oh, gotcha. Right, right.

That's what it is. He's about to stab his son, Isaac. Okay, God, just really quick before we get to that. Why is a raven like a writing desk? Quickly. Too slow. Well, in verse 12, by the way, he references illustration a i guess yeah yeah so on the papyrus that they bought there's a picture that according to this book is a bunch of egyptian priests trying

to offer abraham up as a human sacrifice before abraham made his heroic escape what it actually shows is a funeral home. Yeah. We also get Joe Smith using the word hieroglyphic in his translation of ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics. That's a word from middle French, not Egypt. And this one says the book that you're reading now. Now. This book now. So, yeah, but at the last second, right before the evil Egyptians could kill Abraham, God sent an angel with a lockpick to set him free. Right.

And then God introduces himself to Abe formally. Right. Like with all the title, Like, for four paragraphs. Like Daenerys Targaryen. Yes. I love that the god of the universe introduces himself by name. He's so awkward. It's the best.

Abraham screams for help because he's about to get stabbed, and God's like, Hello. How are you today? Is this gentleman stabbing you? Oh, wait. Sorry. Sorry. I'm so rude. My name is Jehovah, the God, the God of the universe. Let's all go around the room before we get to the stabbing thing.

He also tells us that the Egyptians are secretly black or something. Verse 22, he says that the Egyptians preserve the blood of the Canaanites in the land. So 1840s dog whistle, I'm guessing? It's the Dennis Hopper speech from True Romance with Walken, but for no reason.

Yes! Just to be racist. That's the only thing accomplished here. Abraham's like, yeah, so one other thing, just for the record, if you're an arab uh way back when your great great great great great great grandma and all her friends

were fucking black dudes just so you know we also learned how egypt came to be uh it was founded by the daughter of egyptus egyptus was going to give us a proper noun, but Egyptus. Then Abraham promises to fill us in on everything between creation and Egypt's founding. And if we don't believe him, he'd like to remind us that he

did predict a famine once, and then there was a famine. So you can trust him. Yeah. So after promising us an exhaustive record of creation, he instead focuses in on a very long and uncomfortable walk he took when he moved out of Ur. Yeah, it's like he's trying to convince us that Abe's really Jewish or something. So they drop Abe's idolatrous dad off at a nursing home in Haran, and then Abe and his nephew Lot head to Canaan, I guess, on God's instructions.

And Lot was like, hey, God, anything you want to tell me about? Anything that might be coming up for me? In the story, in terms of angel raping or getting raped by my own daughters, anything with sexual assault?

Pillars of salt? Great. Okay, so uh no consequences so let's uh let's go ahead and start up the city of butt fuckingville i'm sorry great yeah so so they get to canaan and god tells abe hey it's all yours but he doesn't mention that to the canaanites which seems to be a grave oversight just stay away from the fence. It's fine. Just stay away. It's pretty simple. Yeah. Well, then Abraham heads to Egypt, but not before God warns him that his wife's way too hot for Egypt.

So he should probably pretend that she's his sister. Hey, Joe, should we make this weird incest role play part of the Bible better? Do you want to change that at all? Yeah, let's say God's into it.

Oh, that's okay. That's better for you. Okay. It is okay. And then we stumble our way into the hardcore crazy here. And we know it right away because chapter three opens with Abe busting out the

Urim and the Thuman. Yes. Yes. They make their return fucking appearance. So quick reminder, those are the magical items that Joseph Smith would later use to translate the golden plates. They were cleverly disguised as an ordinary rock and I believe a broken pair of spectacles at the time. A broken pair of spectacles at the time. Only I, Abraham, prophet of God, saved up all my proofs of purchase from my Ovaltine jars and got a secret decoder ring.

That's right. Drink more Jehovalteen. And this is where Kolob, the planet where God lives, is introduced to Mormon canon. Yes. Yes. Finally, we get kolob and okay so according to friend of the show and soup scented american bryce blankenagle kolob may very well be an accidental translation of a word that means male prostitute in the context that he stole it from from from deuteronomy i'm not sure if he's right but bryce makes a pretty solid case that kolob means

male prostitute love it okay so the correct translation was abraham explaining how god is from a planet of male prostitutes i think maybe we're supposed to be gay maybe that was maybe leviticus is saying don't lie with a woman the way you fuck a male prostitute oh that's a good point yeah that's a better interpretation yeah without a condom of course because they can't get pregnant right no they can't yeah all right well and then i'm pretty sure joey argues through abraham through god that the moon is bigger than Earth and that's why it spins slower. What the fuck? Yes.

What is amazing about this book is it's Joe trying to pull an L. Ron Hubbard, but he has to do it with old-timey science. Yes. So he's like, and then the aliens descended in their futuristic spaceship made of straw.

descended in there. Futuristic spaceship made of straw. Also, apparently God planets are set up like Inception so like the higher you go, the longer time takes? Or the opposite? It's literally impossible to follow what the fuck he's trying to say in this chapter. I challenge anyone to

do it. Alright, so imagine a bunch of male prostitutes on a big spinny ball. Got it? Picture that. I mean, spend some time picturing that. That's fun. Alright, now imagine if you're in charge of that, you know, you're going to want to

stack that on a series of balls that spin faster, right? Let's go back to picturing the male prostitutes. Yeah. Are they getting jostled with a slower or a faster? What would you guys do? Oh, man.

Then Joey decides it's proper noun time. Oh, no. We learn about Shania, which is a sun, and Kokon, which is a star. Noton which is a star not kolob kokom totally different place also suns are different than stars they are yes very clearly we also learn about the moon olia and we learn about kakaobm which is the firmament, a firmament all this again aggressively

unclear I love that Joe Smith clearly spent just so much extra time just trying to name stuff and still failing just talking to his scribe like alright what are some noises I haven't made yet?

We're on K, right? Okay. Ko-ka-ki-kau-ku. Okay, nailed it. Outer space is called Ko-ka-ki-kau-ku. Wait, I'm done. And just to be clear about how clear this book is, i wanted to to pull a sample

sentence so this is what we're dealing with stuff like quote how be it that he made the greater star as also if there be two spirits and one shall be more intelligent than the other yet these two spirits notwithstanding one is more intelligent than the other have no beginning they existed before end quote what? that's actually my transcription of Heath trying to talk to a pretty girl at Skepticon oh okay what's this

well I honestly think that paragraph is about how Joey is smarter than his wife. Like, I was expecting it to go on to say, notwithstanding one is more intelligent than the other, it was probably going to figure out it was supposed to be pulling the door right before she said anything. And besides, she doesn't even know what a torque wrench is. Okay, so a smart spirit and a dumb spirit are fucking a male prostitute on Spinny Heaven Ball. I'm with you. And one of them always lies and the other one always tells the truth.

And there's a goblin king and he's doing lots of Spinny Ball stuff too. We're nailing this. This is all falling together. So how does Jennifer Connelly find the castle with one question? That's what we're asking. So God also gives Abraham a peek at pre-heaven and shows him all the yet-to-be-born intelligences that will give Mormon guys the theological right to stalk their middle school crushes from now on. And then we get to meet pre-Jesus, I think. Again, insanely hard to follow here. I have no idea what's going on i love this little moment here god said who shall i send to

be the messiah and jesus is like here i am son of man send me and then just some other guy was like, here I am. I'm fucking Alan. Send me. I'm going to send the first guy, the son of man guy. Thank you. Who the fuck is that other guy? Just some dude was like, no, me. If Jesus isn't going to do it, I guess I could do it. I think that was Satan.

But again, it's so unclear. Super unclear. I laughed for a while. I really did. I laughed for a while at that bit. And then Joey goes full polytheism. And suddenly there are a bunch of gods. And I guess Abraham is do doodly doing his way back

to creation here and i think my favorite part was the description of the gods there was all yeah all of a sudden there were a bunch of them the gods when they created light apparently one of them said let there be light uh probably had a big fight over who got to do that one because that's you know a big fun one as spells go but then the light shows up and they're all like wow okay that's very bright like aggressively uncomfortably bright can alexa can we dim that maybe i don't know can we create some anti-photons and that's when they were like, darkness too? I don't know. One of the other gods is like, does this stuff give you cancer? It does. It does. We will create cancer soon.

I told you he was going to mess it up. Hold on, just follow up. Are we creating cancer? Did we all agree let there be cancer? And then he rips off the opening of Genesis because fucked I guess if he's gonna do like five full chapters of fresh

material at this point in his career he's gonna stick with the basics of course Joey makes a few improvements along the way by which we mean adds extra words where they don't really need to be okay if that's your definition Pearl of Great Price is like

God got assigned to do a group project with Joseph Smith. Well, and the direct Genesis lift carries on into the next chapter as well. Just in case anybody was in need of hearing half of the Adam and Eve story again. Oh, for fuck's sake. I'd love to hear a version of Genesis from Eve's perspective. That'd be good. That half would be fun. She's just like,

alright, so I'm hanging out in the garden and this giant talking walking snake starts fucking negging me and that's obnoxious. The only way I can get him to leave is if I eat a bite of his stupid fucking apple and he's bothering me the whole time. So, yeah. Yada, yada, yada. Hillary Clinton can't even

beat a rapist. So there you go. Story of Genesis from Eve, from woman's perspective. But that is not the half of the story they went with. No, no, no, unfortunately. Well, and another improvement, in my opinion, in Joey's version, we skip the part where God parades all the animals out to Adam and goes, you want to fuck that? And you go straight ahead to the rip thing yeah just for the record god refers to women here as exact quote help meet yep yep and then halfway through while adam's naming the animals joey's like fuck it

that's where the papyrus cuts off and just stops. Yes. He was already just plagiarizing and he couldn't be bothered to finish the fucking story. No. I'm going to go for some brevity here in my plagiarism. Need a break. I get it. Everyone else put up their citation needed essay on Thursday and now it's already

Sunday and you downloaded that grammarly thing, but all it does is tell you you're a bad writer. It doesn't like change things for you So you just wrap it up What I'm saying is I empathize with Joseph Smith You didn't download anything No you didn't

Yeah but I went to the website and it was like A chrome attachment I was like yeah What's that mean? Alright so yeah the book ends there but but joey does give us all the pictures and his silly ass interpretation of him as well um now they're hardly worth noting except that this is where the canonized god penis snuck his way in finally so facsimile two is this big round seal with a whole bunch of shit going on and inverted at the bottom you see a dude that joey

calls a symbol of quote god sitting upon his throne revealing through the heavens the grand key words of the priesthood as also the sign of the holy ghost unto abraham in the form of a dove end quote and i don't know about no dove but the dude he's talking about is clearly sporting a fuck ready erection yep you guys don't get boners when you see a dove is that i'm not is that that's not what i was saying what's amazing is it's not like this is a photocopy right they had to draw that little penis on that guy to get it into the book with no curvature yeah i thought it was weird so yeah this is apparently men a male god of fertility uh in egyptian lore but it is indeed his cock sprouting out of his cock region. That's what

that is. That's confirmed by Egyptologists. So either the key words of the priesthood are deez nuts or Joseph Smith is a fraud. Alright, well, this is going to be fun next time we're in Salt Lake City. We walk into that giant golden temple

in Temple Square and just be like, hey guys, so we all fucked this dove on your throne over there. We can all start Monday. Your square ladies keep avoiding me. Tell them not to avoid me. All right. Well, word of warning, this book really does peak at the god dick. So we're going to shelf it for a few weeks weeks but we're going to be back with more Pearl

of Great Price soon be forewarned it's all downhill from here Jehovalting no I got it I got it that's such a good one it is actually before we adjourn for the night, I want to remind you one more time that Andrew playing Twister with us in his pajamas on camera is still on the line with our Matreon pledge drive.

So be sure to head over to patreon.com slash scathing atheist and do your part. Anyway, that's all the blast we've got for you tonight. We'll be back in 10,022 minutes with more. If you can't wait, then 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 new episode of our half-sister show, Citation Needed, debuting at noon Eastern on Wednesday. Obviously, this episode would leave that bitter season eight episode five taste in your mouth of a neglect to thank Keith Enright for never neglecting to be so thankable. I need to thank Eli Bosnick for coming back to America, even though he was in a country where Trump wasn't the president. I also want to thank the lovely and talented Lucinda Lusions for relenting on her plan to burn this fucking state to the ground. I also want to thank Callie from the Gathius Manifesto podcast for chipping in this week. If you'd like to hear more, I strongly recommend her podcast, which you'll find linked on the show notes.

I also want to thank Evan from the Happy Monday podcast for providing this week's Farnsworth quote. If you need a little more happiness in your life, and let's face it, you do, you'll find his show linked on the show notes as well. But most of all, of course, I want to thank this week's best people. Big list again. Here we go. Earl, Vanita, Jeff, Sean, Adam, Johnny, J.R., J.P., Michael, Ned, Dr. Brandon, Regular Brandon, Kimberly, Matthew, Erica, Melissa, Ashley, Timothy, Kenny, Adana, Godawful, Cynic, Colin, Cornell, Robert, Jason, Brad, Joe, Ian, Christopher, Genetic Mutual, Mark Jason, Decomposing Snail, Ryder Andrew, Louisiana Femis, Using a Ouija Board to Contact the Spirit of the Law, Brothel Knight, Christine, Grant, Anthony, George, Happy Hour Limbo, Peter and Korea, King Leon, God of the Aboriginals, Landon Corey, Lunchbox 20, Aaron, Dave Crystal, Damon,

Rob Pernicious, Dux, Disestablishmentarianism, James Devon, Rachel, Fluid Chaos, Danielle Frodo, Take the Wheel, and other Higgins Questionables vs. Daniel, Angela, Tub, The Schoolboy, Borderline Rhetorical, Matt, Olivia, Sally, Hal, Tracy, sources, Daniel, Angela, Tubb, TheSquadboy, Borderline Rhetorical, Matt, Olivia, Sally, Hal, Tracy, Brian, Brett, Jarrett, Tashby, Wendy, Kitsune, Elaine, Jake, John, Ty, Ann, Derek, Alex, Bill, Gary, Pivotal Solutions Consulting, and AskAndTellProject.com Who are so

bright they blind oncoming traffic if they think too hard? Together these 99 women, men, non-binary, snail jockeys, gods, cynics, waterfowl, phrases, hobbits, websites, and LGBT service member outreach programs. He did the cry to try to give me too many names to say in one breath this week, but didn't quite get there. If you'd like to listen to me finally asphyxiate once and for all, you can make a per-episode donation at patreon.com slash scathingadeus, 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 scathingadeus.com. Legal services for this podcast are provided by the Law Offices of P. Andrew Torres, Tim Robertson, 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 ScathingAdias.com. That's a good callback. Thank you. Not to this show, but yeah. The preceding podcast was a production of Puzzle and a Thunderstorm LLC.

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