The Scathing Atheist - 328: Flood Damaged Edition

Episode Date: May 30, 2019

In this week’s episode, Ben Carson is pretty sure trans people can turn into cars so why would they even NEED to be in a homeless shelter , Ken Ham's Ark Park finds out their insurance has a deductible for sweet sweet irony, and Alabama will make an exception if you promise only to abort the gay fetuses. --- 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=sr_1_1?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/ --- Headlines: AL moves to stop giving out marriage licenses altogether to prevent gay weddings: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/27/to-spite-gay-couples-al-legislators-vote-to-remove-state-from-all-weddings/ Trump Admin Rule Would Let Taxpayer-Funded Homeless Shelters Reject Trans People https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/22/trump-admin-rule-would-let-taxpayer-funded-homeless-shelters-reject-trans-people/ Atheist Group: The NYPD Shouldn’t Clear Public Roads for a Private Church Event https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/24/atheist-group-the-nypd-shouldnt-clear-public-roads-for-a-private-church-event/ A bunch of politicians showed up for a treason fundraiser party: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/25/wa-lawmaker-attends-fundraiser-for-liberty-a-proposed-51st-state-for-christians/ The pope compares abortion to hiring a hitman...again https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/26/pope-francis-says-again-that-getting-an-abortion-is-like-hiring-a-hitman/ Christian writer: No fucking in heaven: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/28/christian-writer-insists-theres-no-sex-in-heaven-in-case-you-were-wondering/ Ark Encounter sues insurers for not covering $1,000,000 worth of rain damage: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/24/ark-encounter-sues-insurers-for-not-covering-1000000-worth-of-rain-damage/ https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/25/ark-encounter-really-hates-that-people-are-saying-they-suffered-flood-damage/ --- This Week in Misogyny: University of California won’t partner with Catholic hospitals because of outcry: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/29/university-of-california-wont-partner-with-catholic-hospitals-after-criticisms/ Satanic Temple: Our members can ignore Indiana’s fetal burial rule: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2019/05/29/the-satanic-temple-says-its-members-can-ignore-indianas-fetal-burial-law/ Counter protesters scare away ultra orthodox jews with the threat of boobs: https://forward.com/fast-forward/424627/eurovision-jerusalem-ultra-orthodox-protest/?fbclid=IwAR3mAQVaB1jT8FutLb8yQ2yMp63Gr7oztYgXnbMUZC120T9m-jNrQFuxV9k

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Thanks to each and every one of you, old and new, for making our dreams come true. Oh, that was actually a... Please send us cocaine. Okay. Or naked pictures. What? What? Hello, I'm Paige Converse from the Cup of Words podcast.

I named myself after my favorite shoe company because I've abandoned conventional morals and embraced materialism as a way of life. You see, that's what happens when you realize that we did indeed evolve from filthy monkey men. It's Thursday. It's May 30th. And it's my bucket has a hole in it day. What?

Why? No idea, but I will literally never think about anything else ever again. I have no illusions. I'm Eli Bosnick. I'm Heath Enright. And from Ted Cruz's New Jersey. What? No. Cincinnati Swing State.

And good husband George of this. He went to Princeton. Is the skating idiot. On this week's episode, Ben Carson is pretty sure trans people can turn into cars so they don't even need to be in a homeless shelter. Ken Ham's Arc Park

finds out their insurance has a very large deductible for sweet, sweet irony. And Alabama will make an exception if you promise only to abort the gay fetuses. But first, the diatribe. One of the main reasons religion is so appealing to humanity is that we all have this ingrained, deep sense of the importance of fairness, and we live in a world that isn't remotely concerned with it. We want things to be fair. We inject it into our stories and our myths. We try to impose it

with our laws and our rights, but for some of us, that isn't enough, so they try to retroactively insert it as a starting condition of the universe. And if you don't examine that tendency very carefully, it can seem like that might tend you towards morality, right? If we convince ourselves and one another that the universe is just, it'll push us to be more moral because we're going to know that if we act out of accordance with justice, a divine retribution will counteract that in the future. But humans long ago learned why this falls short hell the oldest book in the bible the book of job is all about that it's all about how bad shit sometimes happens to good people who don't deserve it now of course job recognizes the

problem but it falls way short of seeing the solution right the hypothesis it offers is that there is some kind of divine fairness and justice we're just too feeble of mind to comprehend it at least that's what it says if you read job generously and i'll admit it's hard to be too There is some kind of divine fairness and justice. We're just too feeble of mind to comprehend it. At least that's what it says if you read Job generously, and I'll admit it's hard to be too generous with a book that has God bragging about opening the doors of Leviathan's face in it. But in a lot of ways, it's just a verbose rewording of God works in mysterious ways. Of course, the presence in their own book of a counterargument doesn't stop Christians from clinging to this belief about divine justice and fairness, just like the guy who says that God works in mysterious ways doesn't hesitate to later tell you what God would do given conditions A, B, and C, right? And so comforted by this delusion of universal justice, they can ignore the plight of everyone but themselves. And that's the key. See, the real world is random. There is no God. Nobody's up there making sure we all get a fair shake or

that we all get what we deserve. And you'd think the existence of people born without the ability to see or hear or walk would be all the evidence you'd need of that. But religions can construct bizarre rationalizations around those things easy, right? In the East, that's a punishment for some sin of a former life. In the West, we don't do a hell of a lot better. God just has a special plan for that person that requires that person to suffer a little more than most to fulfill God's design, which isn't fair or just right. The whole construct should just fall apart there. And if it was being held up by logic, it would.

But it isn't. So it doesn't. And it doesn't because they don't want it to. After all, life's easier when it's fair. I mean, I guess some of the time maybe you employ this when you're on the bottom of the unfair, right? Like you can look at the asshole boss who has more money and more prestige than you I mean, I guess some of the time maybe you employ this when you're on the bottom of the unfair. Right. Like you can look at the asshole boss who has more money and more prestige than you. And you can say, oh, but he's going to get what's coming to him eventually.

And that's problematic, of course, because when you count on an invisible space wizard to rectify injustice, injustice goes on rectified. That seems pretty obvious, but it doesn't really matter because we don't count on that. Right. When it comes to the administration of justice, we don't count on God to take care of it. Vengeance is his and all, but we like to give him a head start where we can. In fact, the more Christian you are, statistically speaking, the more punitive you want the justice system to be. Even though you're one of the people who thinks God's going to see to it that everyone gets what's coming to him anyway, which would be odd if one were under the impression that people cling to this delusion because it helps with people who are more fortunate than them. But that has never been what this is about. Right.

Ultimately, the slights against us, the injustices that we're on the receiving end of, those are too heavy to move with this flimsy theological broom. We seek retribution for them regardless of our religious beliefs. But the slights go in the other way, right? The ones where we have the unfair advantage, those ones are way easier to sweep away. That person who has less intelligence, less education, less money, less loving family, and less physical abilities than us, sure, they got it rough now. But, you know, God's got a plan. He's going to sort that out eventually.

And in the meantime, I might even buy him a coffee or donate to the shelter they live in. And really, you know, that's more than I need to do because God's going to take care of it anyway. And he must have done all of this for a good reason, must have a purpose in letting him suffer so much. So I'm really going above and beyond by even giving a shit. And I'm going to be honest.

Look, I'm sympathetic to the need for this bomb. I am a ridiculously privileged person. I mean, I'm white, straight, cis, male, American, so there's all of that. But beyond that, look, I was born to two parents that loved me and took care to educate me. I've been pretty much healthy all my life. I was lucky enough to meet an amazing woman early on in my life, marry her, and live happily beside her for decades. More often than not, I've had jobs that I really enjoy that paid me enough to keep the lights on.

Hell, I'm 43 years old. I still have my hair and I can eat all the ice cream I want without getting fat. It's not fucking fair that I have it this easy. And then I look out my window and I see this broke ass jobless town where the median household income is twenty seven thousand bucks a year. So given all that, it's hard to look around at all the people less fortunate than myself and say, yep, system seems to be working just fine. I can afford to take a vacation in California with all my best friends and somebody in this town can't afford their insulin. Looks like we've nailed society and now I can enjoy all these advantages guilt-free. And that's where God comes in.

Right. God is rarely enough when it comes time to say, ah, well, I guess I'll just have to suffer with the pain of my disadvantage. But he's plenty enough when it's time to enjoy the advantage you have without all the attendant guilt that should come with it. And that's always been the problem with God in a nutshell, isn't it? His myth is never quite strong enough to get you to the answer you don't want to hear, but it's always strong enough to get you to the one you do. Joining me for headlines tonight are the lucky and not to my dusty Heath Enright and Eli Bosnick fellas. Are you ready to

get this show amigo-ing? Nanny! For the listeners under the age of 40, The Three Amigos was a movie about three white actors yelling I carumba and how that was a movie in the 1980s. And I ended up being Martin Short, which I'm not happy with. At least I

took Chevy Chase on myself, right? I wasn't going to do that to you guys. So many women have said the same thing. Not really. In our lead story tonight, religion is destroying marriage. I mean, look, I don't really give a shit if marriage lives or dies because my relationship with Lucinda isn't defined by contractual obligations anyway. Bragging. But it is my understanding that a huge swath of this

country gets crazy exercised about this shit so you know rabid defenders of marriage they're only in this for the sanctity of this storied social institution and totally not because they hate gay people the state of alabama is a governor's signature away from doing away with state marriages all together because of religion so fuck you know sick balls chopper great senate bill 69 gay people are coming everybody lick all the marriages yes it really is senate bill 69 by the way oh is it really i feel like this is only because the governor of alabama can't make us eat a whole bag of marriages. Am I wrong? Yeah, right.

We'd have to smoke the whole pack. So, yeah, this is the latest compromise between bigotry and stupidity to come out of the nation's forced birth capital. Apparently, a bunch of Alabama probate judges were going to have to learn a whole bunch of new endings for the I now pronounce you sentence. And that freaked them the fuck out. now pronounce you sentence and that freaked him the fuck out so instead of saying oh good because non-bigots are better at judging anyway like a good state would alabama sympathized with the bigotry and decided the only solution was to do away with state marriage licenses altogether the bill which has already passed through the alabama legislature would take away the requirement for a marriage ceremony so that a judge doesn't have to endorse the marriage.

And instead, couples would just pay a recording fee, not a marriage license fee, and the state would file away a thing that says, sure, married, whatever. We don't care. St. Peter's all about the technicalities and loopholes. He'll be totally cool with this. You guys are fine.

You must be sleeping so much better now. You're all going to heaven. You're doing God's work. Well, yeah, because now this means that the next level of Christian fake oppression is going to be Kim Davis 2.0, whose morals won't allow her to click a box on her government issued 1995 Dell computer. Yeah, exactly. And look, I can think of 100 really solid reasons for a state to actually pass a law like this. Right? Like, there's a host of good arguments about why the state.

Yeah, there you go. But like the state and the federal government shouldn't be any more involved in marriages than they are in any other contract. careful not to put forward any of those arguments and instead hung this on one of the thorns sticking out of Kim Davis's crown, justifying the move with references to the religious reservations of the probate judges in question. And Jesus said to the Pharisees, fine, nobody gets any salvation. I hope you're happy. He literally did, though. Oh, shit.

He did. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. you happy he literally did though oh shit he did yeah exactly yeah so yeah they were asked to desegregate the water fountains so they did away with water fountains yeah this is like hey the health inspector's coming throw out literally all the food in the restaurant right and that's literally how every restaurant i worked at handled it. So bad, they're just throwing it in the garbage. Afterwards. They turned the supposedly sacred rite of marriage now into the equivalent

of the forms you have to fill out at a new fucking doctor. And once again, the substitution game works perfectly well if you substitute the term sincerely held religious belief for bigoted spite. Ooh, ooh, make it spite. And in transient living news tonight, Joe Biden is an uninspiring dino stooge with a hugely problematic history, both personally and professionally.

hugely problematic history, both personally and professionally, which is why I have installed a voting lever in my home so I can practice voting for him if he wins the primary anyway. Oh, that's a good purchase. Yep. And I'm pleased to announce I recently managed it without biting through my mouth guard and cracking my teeth. So good progress. Oh, man. Joe Biden. Remember when he was just a mascot to whiten up Obama? Even though Obama was so clean to begin with. But then Biden was there.

It was fun. And then like at the end, he was just like booby trap in the Oval Office before Trump got there. Smiling about it. And Obama was like, Joe, come on. Trump got there and smiling about it. And Obama was like, Joe, come on. And then he was voting to overturn Glass-Steagall and deregulate banks and

silencing Anita Hill. Fuck! Okay, can you send me one of those levers too? Yeah, I'll send you one. And a mouth guard. I'll need a mouth guard. Can't get you that. Come on. But we did get a reminder of why that practice is so important this week when the Trump administration announced that it's now going to allow federally funded homeless shelters to deny services to trans people.

See, there's the trick, guys. I don't remember when Joe Biden did that. He didn't do that. No, he did not do that. He didn't. And he didn't and he wouldn't so the policy in question is the equal access rule which was established in 2012 to quote ensure shelters and programs do not discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity end quote and while housing and urban development secretary

ben carson assured house lawmakers there was no plan to change or alter that policy he thinks a mortgage is a kind of shotgun and so it turns out he's also a liar it's the thing so right plus he could reclaim his time and alter the past at any moment so you never know do you mean gauge like a shotgun mortgage yeah that works in the typing because i was like maybe yeah no it doesn't it doesn't work in the typing. Because I was like, maybe, yeah. No, it doesn't work in the typing. So I thought I mispronounced it. Yeah. But I feel like Ben Carson's best defense here is that nothing he does rises to the level of cognition required to truly be lying. Yeah.

It's like those studies they did on babies. So according to the abstract on the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs Office of Management and Budget website, which Eli peruses regularly, obviously, the new policy... Clunky title.

Yeah. Really, really clunky. The new policy would allow shelters to, quote, establish a policy consistent with state and local law

by which such shelter provider considers an individual's sex for the purpose of determining accommodation within such shelters and for purposes of determining sex for admission to any facility or portion thereof i don't like the persona of the guy who is doing me neither because it's been voiceovers i'll do it ben the proposed rule permits shelter providers thank you to consider a range of factors and make it such determinations, including privacy, safety, practical concerns, religious beliefs, any relevant considerations under civil rights and non-discrimination authorities.

The individual's sex as reflected in official government documents, as well as the gender which a person identifies with end quote which if you didn't pick it up uh during that long quote is fancy talk for if you think trans people are crazy people playing pretend you can endanger their safety and well-being and now still receive federal funding yep yeah so biden might not be a high iq individual you know stable genius like donald trump and his twitter troll buddy kim jong-un that other stable stable genius but i'm pretty sure biden's less of a bigot so joe biden 2020 pretty sure i'm less of a bigot great slogan great cool well it only works in the general but yeah if he gets that far sure sure and in easy to catch a cab news tonight

as regular listeners to the podcast will remember it's a little hobby of mine here on this show to occasionally remind you that all churches are bad not not just some of the churches all of the churches yeah without eli we'd probably never get around to mentioning that so thank you thank you no we're finally doing an atheism show well my ever-expanding rolodex of evidence for that got one more card when the new york police department's 77th precinct announced this month that there will be no public parking on the streets during summer events inside the co-cathedral of St. Joseph

in Brooklyn, New York. Oh, goddammit. Hold on, though. Isn't it a basic tenet of Satanism that you have to camp out on public parking spots near churches to block christian people for spite will this violate their satanic free exercise i don't know if this is allowed just it is now uh so yeah just just a reminder saint joseph doesn't own those streets no they are they are

public roads and it is 100 illegal for the new york police department to shut down a street for a privately owned space especially when that space doesn't pay any fucking taxes they yeah it's less yeah right exactly whose streets nope nope sorry i get what i'm saying, though? And we got to emphasize this, too. This is New York fucking city. New York. Well, Macy can have a parade somewhere else. I need to fucking park city that they're doing this in. Fuck parades. Amen.

What's striking about this story is how totally normal it is. Right. If this were any other private institution shutting down a public road using city police everyone would lose their mind seriously if you don't believe me pause for a second at a green light in new york yeah pause but hey this is part of a a tax-free child and you got stabbed so what are you gonna do right like they're barbecue. Also, just quick reminder to add on a little bonus here, a church existing anywhere in the five boroughs and not paying any real estate taxes automatically undoes any good they could possibly do, right?

Even if it wasn't a Catholic church, the sheer tax revenue they are denying the public by not paying taxes on a huge structure dedicated to not truth to nothing brooklyn is enough to make them a bad thing it's enough yeah right look right like they could stop raping children and stop lying and they would still be a net bad that's so bad it's impressive right so again just one more that's true kids in the back all churches are bad all of them all of them all of them and to reinforce that point we'll take a quick break and hand things over to my lovely wife lucinda a man wrote the bible a horse which one if it's a legitimate rate you're a slut right cooking can be fun hey i'm proud of a man this week in misogyny

all right well these goddamn abortion bills were bound to make me sick eventually so sorry i was out last week but as i'm sure you noticed misogyny didn't take a week off so i'm back and i'm bringing a theme with me probably the most important theme a segment, misogyny didn't take a week off. So I'm back and I'm bringing a theme with me. Probably the most important theme a segment about misogyny could possibly have at this point in history. Fighting back. See, when you're backsliding as fast as we are right now, keeping our foot on the gas can seem like a waste. Hell, legislators right now are undoing shit our great grandma's fault to put in place. So what's the point?

Well, the point is that when you fight, sometimes you lose, but sometimes you also don't. Take, for example, our first story of the week out of California. You might recall a story from last month about the University of California at San Francisco teaming up with a Catholic hospital called Dignity Health. And because it's a Catholic hospital, that dignity thing only referred to straight cis men. So college campus in San Francisco decides to team up with a hospital known for anti-LGBT discrimination. No surprise, there's a public outcry. And this week we learned it was an effective one.

In a statement released on Wednesday, the college announced plans to scrap the partnership altogether and said in part, quote, the decision reflects concerns that had been raised among UCSF medical professionals and advocates for women's health care and LGBTQ advocates, end quote. So yeah, good guys made some noise, college back down. But what if you're not in a liberal state like California? What if you find yourself fighting injustice in a red state shithole like Indiana? Well, in that case, you might need some help. And for that, we'll have to turn to the Satanic Temple, which is now an officially recognized religious organization according to the IRS, and thus entitled to RFRA exemptions. And wouldn't you know it, Indiana has a damn expensive RFRA law. So yeah, the Supreme Court upheld an Indiana law that would require the cremation or burial of

fetal remains in yet another effort to make the procedure more onerous. And despite the law serving no secular function, and in fact serving the opposite of that, the SCOTUS decided it was okay. But according to the seven tenets of the satanic temple, one's body is inviolable, and non-viable fetal tissue is part of the body of the woman who carries it. And since religious people don't have to follow laws, women in Indiana are encouraged to join the Satanic Temple at their earliest convenience. But that can't work for everybody. After all, the Satanic Temple can't be everywhere fighting every fight. So what can a woman do when there's nobody to help and no liberal government to step in?

Well, for that, you might just need the power of boobs. And this leads to my favorite news story of 2019 so far. Not that there's a lot of competition for that honor. It comes to us from Israel, where hundreds of ultra-Orthodox Jews clashed with police in protest of a song contest being held on the Sabbath. Because that's the kind of stupid shit that they think is worth blocking streets and attacking cops over. So they made a general nuisance of themselves until a couple of women in the crowd realized that they had the solution hiding right under their shirts.

So they took them off, obligating all of the Orthodox protesters to flee in terror from the sight of an exposed bra. And now that everybody's feeling good and empowered, I'll kill the mood by handing things back over to Noah, Heath, and Eli. Thank you, Lucinda. And in the whole vagina guard snooze tonight. What? Pope Francis white male just can't stop comparing abortion to hiring a hitman, which is weird when you're the head of an international crime syndicate, right? Like calling someone a bad cook when you work at Ruby Tuesdays.

And you're also running a giant network of kid fucking out of that kitchen of the Ruby Tuesday. And you're a good cook, right? Like it's like the pot calling the kettle black. If the kettle wasn't black and the pot was raping a teacup. Nice. I like that festive now and a human child you might be thinking wait a second did eli surprise no with another vacation and did he alternate sitting by a hospital bed and doing his full-time job for a straight month again i think i've heard this story but no no no is fine he got most of last friday off so he's

actually great for like two years well most of last friday off so he's actually great for like two years well most of last friday afternoon yeah so this story is familiar to you because he got in trouble for saying the exact same thing last october that abortion is like hiring a hitman all right uh now i just want to see the staff at planned parenthood all dressing up like Assassin's Creed to fuck with the protesters just percoring in their head just always dropping into a pile of hay by the front door when they arrive somehow like dropping off a tower

see I was going to go Jules and Vincent but I was also thinking of the wonderful costuming possibilities at Planned Parenthood I am never thinking blackface if that's your question that was definitely his question. It was. So, given the amount of time he's brought this up,

and, you know, because he's the good pope, I have an alternate theory I'd like to propose. Maybe Franti-disestablishmentarianism is just like putting feelers out for hitmen. You know what I'm saying? Dude has a lot of witnesses he needs to silence a lot i i gotta say i like i've never hired a hit man or gotten an abortion but i feel like they'd be wildly different tasks right at least in terms of the number of insurance forms i feel like it would be a distinct kind of thing not legality in alabama but insurance forms definitely and no fucks to

give news tonight one of the drawbacks about being a vocal atheist is the knowledge that if there turns out to be a christian heaven after all and by some clerical error or technicality we wind up there when we die we have an eternity of i told you so's to suffer through of course until now we've been able to console ourselves with two equally comforting facts. First, the likelihood of the Christian religion turning out to be right is orders of magnitude smaller than the likelihood that a stray bacteria in the mayonnaise will have evolved into a hyper intelligent ooze bent on world destruction. And I still don't hesitate to open the mayonnaise.

Secondly, it would be heaven, right? So the people who are saying i told you so would be doing so from the next spot over at the blowjob fountain plus those people would have spent their entire lives not enjoying all the you know mixed fabrics and weird fucks so i'll be saying i told you so about the fabrics about yeah also we literally had fun for infinity plus however long we lived so we win yeah we win well but see here here's the thing it turns out that we can't take as much comfort from the latter bit as we thought because we learned from christian writer greg morse that there is no sex in heaven but don't worry there's something better than sex

which sounds like bullshit like if my wife said no i have a different idea it's better than sex i would be skeptical but to be fair greg morse only has sex with greg morse to compare things to so a lot of things are probably better than sex so anyway here's the hilariously impotent attempt to write pretty words about jesus quote all that is sweet in human marriage to my co-heir on this earth will not be ultimately lost but transformed. The new depth of intimacy I will have with my Lord and every other saint, including my spouse, will look back on the caterpillar of earthly joy with fondness but not longing. And this makes marriage and the intoxication of sexual intimacy all the sweeter now fuck you end quote creed would read that and be like boo learned to write it just sounds like greg morris wrote a poem called It's Not Gay If Your Dead Wife Is There.

That's what that's like. I like it. I like it. But I don't think it really hit the messaging he was going for. It's true. So, yeah, when I hear that quote, I hear two distinct possibilities, neither of which are particularly appealing. One is that in heaven, you and your partner just end up playing Pictionary with God and the saints and his eyeball monsters every night. And he keeps saying stuff like, see, this is way better than boring old sex. And you have

to agree because you're a guest and you don't want to be thrown in hell. And the other side of the spectrum is that you just have these wild mega orgies of ultra sex all the time. And at a certain point, you have to have that awkward. Sometimes I just want to come conversation with God. Either way, I'll take hell and be happy. Listener, if you are not picturing a black sheet party ready God and a ball gag, sadly walking away from Noah, you're not the woman I married. And finally tonight in Sunday, Floody Sunday news, we have my favorite headline of all time. I think we did it. This is my favorite, of all time, I think. Yep, we did it. This is my favorite.

It's fantastic. Ken Ham's Ark Encounter theme park, home to a 510-foot-long replica of Noah's Ark, filed a lawsuit against their insurance company last week seeking additional payouts for damage to their property that was caused by flooding. Flooding! It was caused by flooding. Because God is a secular humanist and he wants me to be happy. This is almost as good as if Pat Robertson got AIDS from a secret ring needle that a straight person was wearing, right?

Got it. Understood, Noah. Wink. Wink. So this really, really, really happened. I can't stress this enough. Starting in May of 2017, the Arc Park's home of Williamstown, Kentucky, got several months of heavy rain that led to flooding in the area. And at the time, Ken Ham's just looking out the window thinking, I fucking nailed it.

This is great. Ken Ham's just looking out the window thinking, I fucking nailed it. This is great. I'm going to float to Israel while I fuck some sheep and fuck my daughters, just like God intended. Life is good. But then the rain stopped, and the only major result was a flood-induced landslide that damaged the access road to the park. And according to the lawsuit, it cost the Ark Encounters parent company about a million dollars to fix it it actually says that in the official filing about a million dollars give or take cost us like a million fucking dollars pro hoc vich a marie close them stop laughing. Okay. But their insurance company was like, wow, that sucks.

Thoughts and prayers. Here's a few thousand dollars. Please sue us for this. Please sue us for flood damage to your arc park. Please, please do that. And here we are talking about the greatest headline ever. They did it. It's like if

pastor manning got arrested for jerking off in a starbucks bathroom it's so good one other detail against all odds the story gets even better so the ark encounter found out from their insurance company that despite what it says in the Bible about the creation of the universe 6,000 years ago, water and gravity are actually pre-existing conditions. So, yeah. But they sued anyway for flood damage. And everyone obviously made fun of them immediately. immediately and in response a spokesman for answers in genesis released an official statement that said quote there has not been a flood at the ark encounter themed attraction just some ongoing rain two years ago that caused a hillside to erode but no flood that's all end quote stop

laughing laura mapsom it's like if rayfort had to get a banana surgically removed from his rectum, but they couldn't do it because it fit too perfectly. I'm sorry. I'm done. I'm done. Understood. Wink. And here is my favorite part about this story. means that ken ham was in the middle of building an exact copy of the only floating object in the world that survived the biblical flood in his head anyway and during that time he got sold

flood insurance by the greatest goddamn salesman who ever lived like all state was having their office christmas party and a room full of sales people were getting wasted together and they were like, alright, let's do some prank calls. I don't know. And one guy was like, alright, no, no, I got a perfect one. I got the perfect one. Hello, Ken Ham. As you know better than most, acts of

God can be rough. Everybody shut up. Shut up. Shut up. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. As I was saying, acts of God can be rough. The answers are right there in Genesis. Shut up. Shut up. Don't make me laugh. I'm closing this.

Sorry, again, sir. Loud office. So I'm not sure what day it was, but God created irony at some point. So you're going to need some flood insurance. And it worked. It worked because Ken Ham's a liar and he fucking knows it. Yep. And he bought flood insurance while

he was building a replica ark and with the assurance that if there is a god he's apparently on our side of this thing we're going to close the headlines for the night heath eli thanks as always do manji and when we come back the mormons will be even whiter than you remember You remember. Over on God awful movies, we're about to kick off Mormon movie month in June. But coming off a blaxploitation movie as we are, Mormon movies were seeming a little shorter than we like them. So in honor of Mormon movies not being quite as long as some other people's movies, we're pleased to present another edition of God Awful Minis. So, Heath, tell us, what will we be breaking down today? We watched Where No Flag Burns.

It's the story of Brigham Young University, where Dunning-Kruger meets eugenics. It's a lovely place. And Eli, how bad was this mini? Well, if you love pyramid schemes, but you wish they came from Nazis on Twitter, you will love this movie. It's kids these days don't even want to trade their money on promises. Damn it. The movie. Yep. Yeah. Yeah. Right. No money on promises, damn it. The movie.

Yep. Yeah, yeah, right. No, that's the opening of the fucking movie. Kids these days. And I wrote it down in my notes as kids these days. Old people during all the days, right? All the days. Yeah, so, okay.

So they're opening up on these scenes. What they want is scenes of hippies rioting, right? They're like subversive activity and rioting and everything but what they actually show us is peaceful protesters being beaten by police officers yep yeah footage of cops beating the shit out of peaceful protesters that's seriously what's happening they're just like all right we're gonna come right out and say it the bad guys in our movie are the students for a democratic society yes and the good guys are the ones dragging them around by their scalps democracy really boo nerds look at these heroes instead in riot gear shooting tear gas clubbing these academic terrorists you

know your arm gets really tired when you hold a hose that long. Watch as our intrepid hero is forced to drag a woman by the hair. This hurts him more than it hurts her. We literally watch a woman dragged by her hair by the, quote, good guys in this movie. Yeah, right. Well, they're demonizing the woman being drugged by their hair. And I love the demonization, too, because it's so fucking random. He says subversive activity, rioting, and destruction of university property.

Yeah, violence plus that graffiti ain't gonna come off with one scrub, y'all. Someone has to be paid to do that. I loved that chair. Now, what do you think is causing all this? Probably atheism? Yeah, right. No, yeah.

It comes up and it's like, normal law-abiding citizens worry about the lawlessness and the atheism of it all. Wait, what? Hold on, what? Also, we should point out that this is the only BYU-made film that didn't begin with a by the way, we don't believe any of this shit anymore warning. They are standing by where no flag burns.

Yep. So the message we have so far, Martin Luther King is a bad Christian. Yeah. Wait, that feels wrong. No, we're leaning into it. Next scene. Yep. That's what we have so far. If he was good, he'd be more delightsome. But luckily for us, there are yes, there's a lot of riots and a lot of hippies and everything, but there are still overwhelmingly white places in America, too. Welcome to Brigham Young University, where you can tell nobody's rioting from these aerial shots of Provo, Utah. Real quote, like a fresh breeze out of the West.

Yeah. Also, real quote, founded by the top patriarchal man yep Brigham Young a beautiful patriarchal man who founded the university they actually say that and then it's like watch as all these women stay in their lane just watch yeah right they're showing us what like for a while they're like no no seriously we're gonna make you watch a bunch of this. Look at them being subservient. Look at them staying in their lane. Look at these streets, our streets. Yeah, it's terrible. He's talking about how great the students are at BYU, and he's like, he's not saying, look how white they are, but he's hinting at it.

I love the part where he's like, and our students don't try to escape reality through fanciful trips on mind-whopping drugs. I was like, yeah, you're Mormons. Your minds are pre-warped, bro. Also, yes, they fucking do. I personally know a guy who made a bunch of money selling drugs at BYU. A bunch. So much he might have gone to jail.

He also calls them neither unwashed or immoral if this movie has a theme except for the pyramid scheme it's trying to sell you we'll get to it it is that hippies smell bad i yeah i didn't realize what a focus smell was on hippies until i saw this there's really honestly a lot of emphasis you don't know any hippies and I saw this. There's really a lot of emphasis. You don't know any hippies, and that's the only reason you didn't know that. That would be the thing you'd be focused on, let me tell you, Eli.

But what I love about this, okay, so they're selling us BYU, and it's the polar opposite of the diversity video from 97% of 97% white schools today, right? It's just like they're hiding the black. No, no, stay behind the pillar. Stay behind the pillar. They're filming.

This place has so little diversity, they all wear the same brand of glasses. Yeah. And the schools, like, normally it would be like some Latin motto about learning theirs is like, the free market's fucking great. Yes.

BYU. This movie will double and triple down on like these young people believe that free enterprise is the best answer yeah you just take a supply curve and a demand curve and then you point at the middle and everyone's happy again everything is fixed by the free market that they that's their theory yeah no right no we have a big thing for invisible hands and i and then they give us the whole like and our students love the fuck out of america look at them pledging allegiance and singing america songs huh so yeah so we watch kids salute the flag solemnly for a minute and then it's back to this nauseous aerial like it's from they've got a

helicopter that has a hand cranked rotor or something that they're taking this from it's bouncing all over the place the cameraman is vomiting you can hear it anyway this is where they point out that they don't take any fancy government handouts yeah we're all about free enterprise so we we refuse government handouts all the time. Most of our money comes from a giant tax-exempt organization called the LDS Church. Yeah, right, right. No government.

Well, you know, and we're so dedicated to free enterprise and our policies against interracial dating that we've refused to take any government money. Yeah. I love, too, that they're like, and by the way, we could totally get away for charging more for our college,

like real colleges do. This is as good as the more expensive colleges. We're just super nice is all. We're still one of the top universities in the country. No, you're not. Yeah, top what? Top what? There's a number.

There's an answer. They also drop a little mystery in here that i i would like your help solving they say tuition is only one third of the money a student spends what well of of what it costs to educate them expenses yeah yeah because the other two-thirds is covering up the suicide i'm confused segregation ain't cheap right, right. A lot more expenses to cover after that tuition third. But yeah, that's when this thing reveals itself to be a BYU Kickstarter video, right? It's like, but we sure could use your money too. And this is where I realized, oh my God, they're selling whole life insurance by another name.

They really are. This is byu reverse mortgage video that's not an exaggeration that's literally that's literally what they're doing yes they're like yep we run a giant tax shelter yes so again technically not a handout you just never pay the money in the first place so you know they don't hand it back to you physically so not a handout yeah right right exactly okay so they explain it and they're like here's the magic you give us all your money and property and that's how it works i couldn't follow that i need a numbered list yes and then if you find four friends to give all their money to you. Those four friends do the same thing.

Well, now that's very complicated. So to really understand this, we're going to need to get to know a down-home hard-working rancher named something-something probably. Let's examine the humble farmer. A man with calluses on his hands and a wife who looks like old fruit leather he's also a very sophisticated investor his name is willard dirt clump the hay mobile

with a family-owned business valued at just three hundred thousand dollars in 1916 yeah right just a couple bucks there. And boy, are they tired of their $300,000 in assets. But capital gains will eat them right up if they sell. Now, this is the movie's actual answer to that.

It's like, if you sell all your property, you'll have to pay capital gains tax. But what if there were no gains? Literally. Also, during this montage, as they they're explaining this there's this tiny moment which i love so much they're showing them working on the farm and she brings him a glass of milk

and the look on his face is just like milk really you think i wanted milk right now or ever again after just seeing it come out of that cow penis finger exactly thank you. Is that not crazy? Do you immediately drink the milk? Moments ago, squeezed out of a teat? If you're a smelly hippie, maybe, yeah. But no, we pasteurize that shit. The vineyard owner trying to grape in the little commercial for

their vineyard, they have a little taste of the grape. I get that, but we're just watching fucking Wilford Brimley sucking straight from an utter mouth right on it. That weird yeah so they're they're farming and then a guy shows up this clean-cut white guy from a 1950s toothpaste ad shows up to tell him about the byu reverse mortgage and i don't they i don't think they ever give the character a name but i'm gonna guess it has the letters b-e-a-u in it all together somewhere this is literally how the conversation goes hi there hi how'd you like to give your farm to byu yes yes no small

talk he's literally there to sucker the family farm out from under elderly people hello everybody for one easy payment of three hundred thousand dollars we will take your farm yes that's it that's it he says you're not giving your farm to be at byu you're investing it in the education of future mormons but here's the best part he explains the thing thing, right? You give me all your shit. We give you a salary. How much? Not $300,000. That wouldn't make any sense.

We will give you an amount of money. And he explains this whole thing. And they're like, yeah, and then you could write it off of your estate, which you don't have anymore because you gave it to me. But you could do that. He explains it. And then he immediately turns over a pad of paper which has exactly what he just said on a bulleted number yes which he then goes over again i know and again keep in mind that the whole message as we've been getting it so far is we love america now let's show you how to fuck it out of some money right right isn't that what dodging your taxes are okay well so willard and and ellen did give byu their

farm ultimately but what if you don't have a farm well for that we'll have to look at the case of edmund steel who only had stocks they could screw him out of. Yep. He had a mere $78,000 to gain from selling his stocks. There had to be a better way. Yeah. He's got a stockbroker going like, he's like, I have $100,000 worth of stock I'd like to sell. And he's like, well, you'd only get $78,000 after the capital gains tax. And he's like, oh, I don't want this. He's like, well, if you give it all to BYU, you won't have to worry about having $78,000. Also, there's this amazing little moment right before he pitches him on the reverse mortgage where he goes, what do you know about BYU?

And he's like, well, just their excellent sports program. I hear their track team. Am I really saying track team? I hear their track team's doing great. Come on. He says, I hear their track team is going to be good this year.

Right, right. This guy follows college track during the preseason? Is he listening to a podcast about that? What the fuck's happening? That's crazy. But yeah, so he explains, you know, you know the 25% capital gains tax,

and Wilford Brimley's like, well, doesn't Mitt Romney pay way less than that? And I was just like, shh, you're old. Yeah, that's it. You're used. Couldn't I just hold the stock until the year is up and way less than that? I was just like, shh, you're old. Yeah. Couldn't I just hold the stock until a year is up and pay less than that? No. Can you tell me the amount of the

salary that you're talking about? No. I can tell you exactly the capital gains tax, though. I love that they're talking to these old people, too, and they're like, we'll pay you a salary for the rest of your life. Yeah. They're like 80 years old.

This guy, 80-year-old guy turns to his wife, the rest of our lives, doesn't that sound good? She's dead. Nope, she's dead. She had a life expectancy of negative two. That's not me. All right, so Edmund Steele did give his stock income to BYU. So you can do it whether you're a

farmer or a stock investor but what if you're a jew i mean new yorkers yeah i got so mad at this point i saw the new york skyline and i was just like fuck you stay the fuck out of new york city god damn it yeah but they found a a new york couple who had an apartment they owned in new york but they didn't want to give their money to one of those flag-burning colleges. They were concerned by the anti-American attitudes of certain university professors. All right, all right. None of those universities were founded by a person who actively warred against the U.S. government. Just going to throw that one out

there. And also they're talking about this couple that ultimately gave a million dollar apartment to BYU and he's like, and the best part of it is we use their name in this video. Seriously, that's literally the best part of the million dollars. What if everyone in this movie

could fuck themselves to death? Seriously? Because they were like yeah, we crunched the numbers a million dollars what if everyone in this movie could fuck themselves to death seriously because they were like yeah we crunched the numbers uh so you guys have this million dollar apartment here in midtown manhattan in 1969 those property values are gonna tank you should just give that right to us we'll take that off your hands jesus god damn it best of all if the church puts a fucking jesus bobblehead inside they can fuck new y York City out of the property taxes on this enormous, extremely, extremely valuable building. So the video realizes you might be getting a little skeptical at this point. So it's like, but if you don't believe me, announce a guy. Just ask this professional. Announce a guy that isn't me. Right. This is where they introduce Paul Harvey. Hartman.

Hartman. Hartman. Yeah. Okay. Anyway, he's a professional news guy or something, and he was super impressed with BYU. But Paul Hartman wants to kick in and tell us how impressed he was by the student body and their, his words, subtle dynamism and contagious enthusiasm. That's what made them different. It's just all white people. That's how they were different.

What is subtle dynamism? Like subtly dynamic. Sorry. Subtly dynamic. Like, I don't know. Also, this is where we get to the code of conduct. Okay. Look, I know we don't tell you to watch the movies along with us a lot this movie it's on youtube everyone associated with is is dead you must watch it he starts to talk about the code of conduct and then he's immediately screaming i can't it's the bet he's just like the code of conduct is very clear about how they will conduct themselves at Brigham Young fucking University. I am not subtly dynamic.

There's no subtlety to my dynamism. Yeah. So he starts screaming like fucking Dan Carlin reading a quote or whatever, but just randomly like mid sentence and then he'll quiet back down but at any rate so and he's telling us all about how good all of the kids at byu are and how they don't do anything unbecoming of a good christian read butt stuff and by the way at byu they don't commit suicide either they cured suicide at byu that's true you just don't talk about it and don't keep statistics and it's not a problem. Sounds

inaccurate. He actually does this weird sort of doublespeak thing where he's like a lot of people say that you know, that if you're too hard on these kids, they will kill themselves at an unprecedented rate to the extent that you actually have to block a government inquiry at one point. But that's bullshit. That is bullshit.

They are taught by precept and example. I'm shouting again. I'm shouting again. I am shouting again. Yeah, he actually says exact words. Students don't mess around thinking about ethics. That's been done for them. Yes, that's a real quote. They were exact quote about a virtue of a university.

And then he goes nuts again he starts describing the like big mass that they have where everybody's singing and he's like yeah 15 000 kids in one auditorium 200 musicians i'm coming i'm coming it was beautiful and then okay now we get to actually hear from this guy at the podium right so first he looks like post chernobyl dad from the 70s show he gets up to the fucking podium he's like boy are we not like them filthy hippies am i right they're hippies with their acne and their porn nick defada really stole a lot of his material from this mess. Oh. Right, because the first line he says when he gets up is,

now this is a demonstration. None of that black civil rights movement stuff. He literally says, now this is a demonstration because he's referring to the sit-ins of the civil rights movement. Negatively. Compared to the demonstration of privilege that we're watching yes byu what the fuck is a white mormon guy in utah gonna protest what would that yeah right well and that's the whole the whole precept here is he's going like oh see this is just a gathering of uh of normal americans the lamestream media would never cover

a demonstration like this and not just because it's boring and in no way newsworthy. Like, imagine the balls on this guy to think that I'm talking to people should be in the New York fucking times to begin with. This is literally what he describes newsworthy as, quote, A handful of beatniks with dirty beards hiding terminal acne could parade up and down with pornographic signs. End real quote. And the news would cover it. But like, that's his vision of the civil rights movement. Yeah.

Acne? Terminal? Terminal acne? As you can see, my skin mask is blemish free he is terrifying by the way the balls on him to suggest anything about facial issues yeah amazing so you know how you listen to us making fun of people's physical appearance and then you google me and you're like ah jeeper this guy has nothing on me that's all yeah and then and by the way his whole bit here his whole tight five is apparently taking hippies are gay jokes from governor ronald reagan right governor ronald reagan here's the actual joke he's got hair like tarzan acts like jane and smells like cheetah. It's racist and homophobic and sexy.

Yes. He goes, did you hear Governor Reagan's definition of these hippie types? And I wrote in my notes, please don't let it be a bunch of fags. And it basically was. Absolutely. It basically was. What does Jane act like? What did that part mean?

Effeminate. Effeminate. He was girly. You see. Yeah. I mean, hippies do smell bad, but like the other parts were weird. Well, they have hair like Tarzan, too. No, it's just the Jane part.

And he also, he says, you know, and again, still quoting from Governor Reagan, he says, they carry a sign that says, make love, not war and appear incapable of either. Classic. I'm going to go fuck my 12-year-old wives. We won't acknowledge that black people have souls for a few years, but I think we can all agree that Bernie Sanders can't fuck. Okay, but here's the thing. We're in the middle of a BYU pyramid scheme pitch,

and it just stops to have a guy go, hippies, bunch of limp dick effeminate wimps, if you ask me. Anyway, back to giving us money. This serves no function. So, as I was saying, fuck the blacks and the gays, and now let's get back to some timeshares in Provo, Utah. Yes, yeah. And then we wrap it up to America the Beautiful

playing in the background. More of that nauseating goddamn aerial shit. I will think about these college kids until I die. That's the end. Yeah. That's what he's just like, really want to fuck these kids sorry

see to shine in kind of ran out of time there thought I'd be able to end on something else okay yeah no the thesis statement of this film is we get it Christians you're scared of us but you're less

scared of us than you are of black feminists. All right. So I guess the closing question for this bit is obvious. If our listeners have a quarter million dollars worth of cows that they're looking to come off of and they don't want to give the money to Uncle Sam or anti-science homophobes, what should they do with it? They should donate them at Patreon.com forward slash scathing atheist. Now accepting cows. Alright, well if you enjoyed that mini, be sure to check out the full-size variety over at Godawful

Movies, and when we come back, I'll hyperventilate again. Before we close the curtains tonight, I want to remind all the patrons that we're going to be live streaming the first ever Puzzle in a Thunderstorm pajama party on Saturday, June 8th. We're going to start at 9 p.m. Eastern time. It's going to run for five hours. Don't worry. That doesn't mean keeping Eli up past his bedtime. We're going to be on the West Coast for it.

He's training for staying up till 2 a.m. So if you're a patron, look for that link coming soon. If you can't make it live, we're going to try to record everything and post it for you, but we can't guarantee that you'll get all of it. So come hang out with us if there's any way that you can. Ask us questions. Listen to Anna sing. Watch us play Fuck, Marry, Kill.

Issue a few truth or dares. Watch us eat s'mores. I don't know. It's going to be a lot of fun, though. And if you're not a patron, just, you know, do whatever it is that you normally do on Saturday and we'll hang out Thursday. That's fine. Anyway, that's all the Blast movie we've got for you tonight.

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 time on Tuesday, and an even newer episode of our half-sister show, Citation Needed, debuting at noon Eastern on Wednesday. Obviously, I want to thank Heath, Eli, and Lucinda, who normally get individualized thanks, but I need to save room in the outro. You'll see why. But most of all, of course, I want to thank this week's best people. Biggest list yet. Here we go. Samantha Holden has made more clones than most. Chris, Rhonda, Greg, George, Kelly, Susie, Tarina, CBZ, Eliah, Dougal, Teresa, James,

Terrence, Zach, Andrew, Paul, Sean, Shutter, Puppy, I'm a Good Citizen, Zacharias, Richard, Randall, Mies, Grace, Brandy, King, Torm, Two-Finger, Joe's Bro, Officer, Kate, Jen, Hammel, Pato, Mestris, Esquip, Anali, and Marvin, and Ella, Commander Rikers. I can't do it. I can't do it.

We found one I can't do. I'm sorry. Here we go. Here we go. Second half of it right here. Commander Rikers, Lesha Spirit, Lefty Conspirator, Eric, Chad, Joey, Chicks, Michael, Jeff, Mayumi, Rachel, Nick, Chris, Hadari, Matt, Buck, Tucker,

Adam, and the North Cosmo, Esteban, Travis, and Emma, Dale, Vex, Malagite, Lee, Osco, Michael, Ariel, Skrystrap, Adrian, Danny, Kristen, Will, Soma, Daniel, Madeline, Kim, Tim, Carl, Ron, Adrian, Radical Liberal, Amanda, Max, 0-1-1-9, Big Black Cockatoo, Zaggy Zaggy, The Heretic, and Landfarer, Will, Jin, Will, Gogoo, ZaggyZaggy, TheHeretic, and LandfairPilginWildCoggery. Give me a fucking command. Whose generosity was literally too much for me this time. I am literally overwhelmed by it.

I'm sorry, I tried a number of times and it's really hot in here and eventually Morgan just gives up on me and he says, Damn it, dude, just do it twice. So I had to do it that way. Together, these 105 ferocious fuckers made me lose my breath, and I've never done that before. I've never been more happy to fail. It's not that there's a lot more than the last couple of lists. It's just that I couldn't cheat by lumping all the Dans together. I didn't have six Dans or Daves this time. Also, somebody decided, oh, my name's Hippopotamus Triscesquipedalian. That didn't help, or that bizarre series of letters I tried to pronounce at the end. But

for what it's worth, no matter who Eli married, he was going to marry down. All right? Come on. Anyway, you can give us money, too, if you want. You can make a per-episode donation at patreon.com slash scathingatheist, whereby you'll earn early access to an extended and 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 offices of P. Andrew Torres, Tim Robertson, and our social media are on audio engineers, Morgan Clark. We're also where all the music that you're using in this episode was used with permission.

If you have questions, comments, or death threats, you'll find all the contact info on the contact page at scanningatheist.com. Damn it. What's the black sheep party? Google it on your own time. The preceding podcast was a production of Puzzle and a Thunderstorm LLC. Copyright 2019. All rights reserved.