The Scathing Atheist - 369: Premodern Edition

Episode Date: March 12, 2020

In this week’s episode, New York will leave Jim Bakker’s wrist red and stinging, we'll argue that Ted Cruz should've self-quarantined already for that face thing, and Christian apologetics will snipe at postmodernism from two spaces back. --- To make a per episode donation at Patreon.com, click here: http://www.patreon.com/ScathingAtheist Check out our new show, D&D Minus here: https://danddminus.libsyn.com/ 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: Coronavirus affecting holy water and infiltrated CPAC:  https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2020/03/05/catholic-churches-are-removing-holy-water-out-of-fear-of-spreading-coronavirus/ https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/07/us/coronavirus-cpac.html New York AG to Jim Bakker: Stop Saying Your “Silver Solution” Cures Coronavirus: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2020/03/05/new-york-ag-to-jim-bakker-stop-saying-your-silver-solution-cures-coronavirus/ Hate Rising: One Third of Poland Declared “LGBTQ-Free Zones”: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2020/03/04/hate-rising-one-third-of-poland-declared-lgbtq-free-zones/ Virginia Becomes First Southern State to Ban Conversion Therapy For Minors: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2020/03/04/virginia-becomes-first-southern-state-to-ban-conversion-therapy-for-minors/ Rick Wiles: If Trump Wins in 2020, Democrats Will “Shoot Conservative” Citizens: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2020/03/05/rick-wiles-if-trump-wins-in-2020-democrats-will-shoot-conservative-citizens/ Conservatives Charlie Kirk and Eric Metaxas Are Spreading More Anti-Atheist Lies: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2020/03/07/conservatives-charlie-kirk-and-eric-metaxas-are-spreading-more-anti-atheist-lies/

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a highly contagious disease mathematically more likely to kill Trump supporters. The coronavirus. Every toxic cloud has a silver lining. Coronavirus, a highly contagious disease mathematically more likely to kill Trump supporters. The coronavirus. Every toxic cloud has a silver lining. And now, The Scathing Atheist. Hi, I'm Zephyr. I'm a middle schooler in the goddamn Bible Belt. And unlike some of my teachers, I have the fucking sense to know that we did evolve from filthy monkey men. It's Thursday.

It's March 12th. And it's World Day Against Cyber Censorship, so... Absolutely not, really. 100% no. No. No holiday spirit. I'm no illusions. I'm Eli Bosnick. I'm Heath Enright.

And from Kenneth DelVecchio's New Jersey, Cincinnati Swing State, and Good Husband Georgia, this is The Skating Atheist. On this week's episode, New York will leave Jim Backer's wrist red and singing. We'll argue that Ted Cruz should have self-quarantined already for that, uh, face thing.

And Christian apologetics will snipe at post-modernism from two spaces back. But first, the diatribe. Far be it from me to turn the diatribe into a five-minute pitch for our new podcast, D&D Minus, available now wherever you get your podcast or just follow the link in the show notes but damn it i'm playing dnd with my friends again and it's been a long fucking time see i grew up in the 80s so of fucking course i played dnd as a kid of course i played the kid version right where you spend half the time arguing with a dm about the rules and harumphily refusing to slay the dragon until everybody admits that your idea was pretty cool even if it's not going to work so exactly the same thing we're doing on the new

podcast actually but if you grew up in the 80s and you're listening to this show there's a good chance that you missed out on that part of your era i know fully half of my friends did because the 80s you see were the height of the satanic panic as well and dungeons and dragons was for whatever weird fucking reason the cultural emblem of that particular mass delusion adults would straight facedly tell you that when you play dungeons and dragons you risk summoning real demons now first of all this is terrible marketing if you don't want kids to play tnd because you know i conjured the shit out of some demons that have been so fucking metal but also if you've ever actually played dungeons and dragons you know whatever idiot tells you that basically ruins his religion

for you for the rest of your life like grown-ass men would tell me that this endeavor this game they largely consisted of arguing with my brother about whether laying down a distraction fart should count as athletics or deception is the gateway to the demonic realm. How the fuck was I ever supposed to take anything an adult ever said seriously for the rest of my goddamn life? Of course, not every kid had the freedom of thought I did. And I knew that good and well, because, you know, when you asked your friends, hey, you want to play D&D? You generally got either a yes or an attempt to ward off the hex that you had just placed upon them i mean i was never the cool kid nobody really wanted to play shit with me so you know when i

tossed out the invite kids didn't harmfully explain that no i'd love to but my parents wouldn't let me they they just they bought into this shit right they told me that i'd become the unwitting recruiter for the desolate one and that I was putting their very mortal souls in peril by asking them. And later in my childhood, my taste in music, movies, and t-shirts would confirm this suspicion of theirs, of course. So unbeknownst to me, the D&D thing actually was practiced for an ongoing theme of my childhood. But as best as I can remember, this would have been my first experience

with religious division. This would have been the first time I wasn't allowed to hang out with a kid because I didn't share the same religious beliefs as he did. There were times that I couldn't go to a thing with my friend because it was religious. My buddy was in some Catholic version of Boy Scouts and I wanted to go, but I couldn't. Neighbor invited me and my brother to a religious camp. My mom wouldn't let us go. That kind of stuff. But this was the first time religion stepped out into the secular world to shit on my childhood i mean i'd be putting way too much of an onus on this if i said that like

that's what led me to be an anti-religious activist but it wouldn't exactly be inaccurate you know it certainly wasn't this one thing it's not like i got turned down four times for dnd then cut my palm as i swore vengeance against Jesus. But if we took all the straws off that broken ass camel and examine them, they'd all more or less look the same. And this one would be in there somewhere. Sure, the stupidity of labeling polyhedral dice and alflora gateway drug to human sacrifice was a big part of it. But so is the divisiveness. Even as a kid, I could see that the primary thing religion did in the end was divide people up. It created us's and them's.

I recognize that when they called Dungeons and Dragons satanic, they weren't demonizing the game. They were demonizing me. They were demonizing all the kids who played the game in the eyes of all the kids they were talking to. They were creating a visible enemy to represent their invisible enemy because it's harder to fear something that you never see. So if you were one of those victims, one of those thousands upon thousands of kids that were denied the joy of waiting for the DM to look up how many hit points a stench cow has, you owe it to yourself to subscribe to D&D minus. Take back the childhood that Christianity stole from you. Listen to Morgan try to steal

random shit for no reason. Listen to Eli patiently explain to Heath that he can't just keep rolling until he gets the number he wants. Listen to Anna lose patience with Heath way before Eli does. But most importantly, check and see if it invites Satan into your soul. Run the experiment because worst case scenario, I'm pretty sure you get a lot of carnal pleasures between now and the damn nation they're talking about you jesus interrupt this broadcast and bring you a special news bulletin joining me for headlines tonight are the legless and gimli to my aragorn heath enright neil at bosnick fellas the listeners have been trying to fellowship us for years are you ready to make it happen i call front centipede oh the

vegan is always front centipede heath read a book no no it's true that's true we'll not read a book in our lead story tonight the coronavirus that we created to prove atheism and pwn religion is really working out nicely they're closing down churches really crushing it but it's been a tough road the plot seemed a little crazy when we first started you got to admit the whole thing with like biological warfare in general kind of felt weird and haggling with eli's disease guy about all the supplies and then going to wuhan and paying off farm animals to betray their own species it all felt super evil honestly for a little bit there but now it's paying off farm animals to betray their own species it all felt super evil honestly for a

little bit there but now it's paying off we're finally seeing churches having to shut down their services and it was a worth it yeah sure easy for you to say no one didn't get all bitchy with your disease guy well that's because his disease guy didn't deserve it. Exactly. So, the first big sign that our scheme was panning out came last week when it was reported that churches were emptying out their fonts of holy water. Despite being blessed by

a minister of the Lord to imbue protective healing magic, it turns out those fonts were just public basins of feces, urine, and coronavirus. Yep. And we already knew about the feces and urine. That wasn't enough.

Apparently that part wasn't a problem for the churches. But now it's feces, urine, and coronavirus, so they've drawn a really weird line in the sand. Yeah. No, yeah, normally the baptismal font is just there so something is more full of shit than their Bibles. But, you know, that's something to do without. Yeah. I'm not sure why they didn't just bless the water with all those thoughts and prayers to clean it and make it magical again.

Maybe they're all big fat liars or maybe just appeasing the science world like religion is always doing. They love appeasing the science world. It could have been that, too. Either way, the holy water supply is being cut off, and we should see lots of consequences coming soon. I don't know what that means, but something's going to happen. Unless it's fucking useless. Obviously. My favorite part of these articles is sad little quotes from the churches that they all have where it's just like, come on, man, don't.

We got it. It's going to be magic next week. It's going to be magic next week. Yeah. So another effect of the outbreak. Our amazing plot is interfering with the practice of Holy Communion as well. Turns out having a weekly meeting where every family in town shows up in one place and they all bring their festering plague children and they all line up and get hand-fed cannibal crackers and they all share a community cup of chateau diana wine food product from a gas station that ends up being stupid long before there's a deadly new disease going around

and now it's extra stupid fortunately a bunch of churches drew the line at extra stupid and just just think about that sentence for a second. Just think about that. This might be good news right now, but not a good sign overall. They drew a line at extra stupid. And again, we'll have to wait and see if the lack of communion has major consequences for society.

No holy water and no communion for a big stretch. But only in some churches. That's the thing. Just this week, we learned about a priest in Washington, D.C., who got diagnosed with coronavirus and who definitely offered communion and shook hands with over 500 people each of the last two weeks. Yeah, yeah. No, the downside, though, of so many of them moving away from it is that the term Messiah liquor was just catching on as a pejorative. And now, yeah, I'm with a different thing.

Also, if you think what priests do to kids by accident is bad, just wait till you hear what they do on purpose. Yes. So we're feeling pretty, pretty good about our long con. Oh, yeah. But I haven't even mentioned the crowning achievement yet. Interfering with church and sending millions of souls to hell. That's great. But that's just a smokescreen for the real endgame. Ooh. That's right. Ted Cruz had to shut himself inside his own house because we got our bug all the way into CPAC.

That's right. The Conservative Political Action Conference, which is arguably the most evil gathering that doesn't happen secretly inside a volcano in the entire world. Possibly still the most evil, including the volcano ones, honestly, now that I think about it. We got our coronavirus into that event and apparently ted cruz might have been exposed so now he has to sit home and think about what he's done

and god is clearly on our side i think that's the most important yeah for sure obviously and in baker's doesn't news tonight for reasons they they tell Andrew are entirely prophylactic. The New York attorney general monitors the stuff Eli says on this show pretty closely. And it looks like that finally worked out in our favor. Last week, we talked about convicted felon and just regular felon Jim Baker's claim that his snake oil could cure coronavirus. And this week, we learned that new york attorney general leticia james told him to cut that the fuck out yeah so i read the cease and desist letter and according to new york state law jim baker now has to put a sticker on his product

that says these statements have not been evaluated by the FDA. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Technically, he should do that now. And I'm pretty sure a giant version of that sticker has to go on every single church, too, based on the lie in that letter. I'm not suggesting anyone start a mass campaign of vandalizing churches. I'm suggesting we put giant stickers on them in compliance with the law because we're patriots that's right yeah right meanwhile the guys over at cvs are like nah come on jim we'll show you how to print it right on the box it's no big deal right yeah actually so yeah as i'm sure

you'll recall we've recently seen jim baker shift his marketing energy from the alex jones model to something closer to the gwyneth paltrow scheme ah Ah, one of the many uses of the Alex Jones to Gwyneth Paltrow scale, by the way. Yes, exactly. And because even his most ardent supporters don't want anything that smells like his genitals, he settled on water with microscopic amounts of silver in that, which, according to Baker, cures all venereal disease. Because I guess his fucking audience is notoriously syphilitic and as of learning the name of a new disease baker added that to the list of things that his miracle cure

can cure yep and you can get a 12 pack of his 16 ounce bottles of silver water for about 300 dollars 300 dollars 100 american dollars quick math on that the concentration of silver in the for about $300. $300. $300 American dollars. Quick math on that. The concentration of silver in the product is 12 parts per million. Okay. Which works out to about 68 milligrams of silver in that entire 12-pack of pints of bottles.

So instead of spending $300 just for the frugal ones out there, you could go ahead and find four pennies. You could go ahead and buy 68 milligrams of silver and have some change left over to pay for your big water bill that month. Fill those 12 pints of water and put those 68 milligrams of silver spread out across those 12 pints. Put those 68 milligrams of silver spread out across those 12 pints. Yeah, right. So like to be clear, though, they give every appearance of being the male nipples of legislation. There actually are laws against selling things that don't cure diseases by telling people they cure diseases. Right.

And the New York attorney general just reminded Baker of that via cease and desist order. But only with regards to coronavirus which i found odd you know you keep saying you're homeopathic silver cures gonorrhea and coronavirus stop saying half of that but to be fair we also learned that new jersey congressman bill pasquale jr also sent a letter to the ftc urging them to investigate baker's claim so you know maybe somebody will finally put a dent in the credibility of that man who is convicted of wire fraud, mail fraud, regular fraud, and conspiracy. Fingers crossed.

And Christianity. And Christianity. And in no homo news tonight, the European Commission has moved to condemn Poland for, quote, breaching the values of the european union end quote after more than 80 polish municipalities adopted anti-lgbtq resolutions declaring themselves lgbt ideology free zones uh okay well the way i'm reading that LGBT ideology free zones whole bunch of super pragmatic

LGBT people let's make that happen so for what it's worth a Polish listener wished me happy birthday last week in Polish and the first word in happy birthday started with the letters W S Z Y S-k in that order seriously yes i'm just i'm saying maybe they were just fucked from the start i think i'm

now these resolutions have included anti-rainbow flag stickering campaigns like the fucking Ghostbusters logo, attacks and protests at gay pride parades, and most significantly, the Polish constitutional court ruled that refusing to serve LGBTQ people or groups was a legal act of conscience. Fucking gross. It's really too bad there's nothing from poland's history about bigotry right yeah decision if only there were any fucking jews left to remind them where this shit ends yeah uh and if that tune wasn't already way too familiar many are pointing to jaris law head of the right wing law. Happy birthday to you too, Elon. Absolutely not. None of the letters in this thing end in normal letters. Kaczynski, I believe it's Kaczynski.

There's an N that's doing like a little Hitler salute. Why would an N get a Hitler salute? There is an N with a Hitler salute. Okay. So that guy, he's the head of the right french words are super nazi i'm thinking about it probably surrendered so quickly i was gonna say yeah so yeah this guy he's the head of the right wing law and justice party and a lot of people think he's the cause of the behavior including uh you know him who railed against the LGBTQ community last year, saying, quote,

we are dealing with a direct attack on the family and children. The sexualization of children, the entire LBGT, sick, movement, gender. Also sick. This is imported. Sick. But they also, but they today actually threaten our identity, our nation, its continuation, and therefore the Polish state. Sick. And you know what?

Sick for whatever else this guy says ever just to make it easier. There you go. And if you were wondering if what's his name's bigotry stems from his close affiliation with Poland's Catholic Church, you are correct. Yes, it does. Because in that same speech, he told listeners that questioning the church is unpatriotic and insisted that, quote, everyone must accept Christianity, end quote. But don't worry. In response, the EU has taken strong letter-writing action against the codified persecution of gay people saying

almost exact quote don't make us write another letter because that letter will cc everyone else in the european union because we will and in microcosm news tonight the state of virginia has been kicking an undue amount of ass ever since the Democrats took control of the governorship and both state houses. It's almost like abandoning the political party devoted to superstition, bigotry and science denial for virtually anything else has a positive effect on the lives of the overwhelming majority of citizens. Even if the man at the helm has made blackface level gaffes in the past. Interesting. Yeah. Just ask Canada.

Well, there you go. Scarcely 70 days into their legislative session, Democratic lawmakers in that state have passed meaningful gun control. They've repealed oppressive restrictions on abortion access. They've advanced laws protecting LGBTQ people from discrimination

in employment and real estate. They've passed a bill to decriminalize marijuana, one raising the minimum wage, another making it easier to vote, and another limiting that price drug companies can charge for insulin, plus a bunch of other stuff. And then on top of all of that, they made our headline segment this week

by becoming the first Southern state to ban conversion therapy for minors. Yeah, that's fantastic. And yeah, they helped all those people, but did they legalize marijuana i don't they just decriminalized it and they haven't had a bolshevik revolution no not yet pretty sure they're the same as republicans that's what you sound like if you're not voting blue in november that's what you do you do okay i see what you guys are doing, but you cannot stop me from writing in Tim Ryan.

You can't stop me. I feel like we can stop you. Governor Ralph Northam signed the bill last week and refrained from using the word mammy long enough to say, quote, this issue is personal for me as a pediatric neurologist who has cared for thousands of children. Conversion therapy is not only based in discriminatory junk science, it is dangerous and causes lasting harm to our youth. No one should be made to feel wrong for being who they are, especially not a child, end quote. And as tempted as I am to agree with him across the board here, Republicans in Virginia have been blocking this law for years, subjecting children to more hate

filled psychological torture the entire time. So, you know, some people should definitely be made to feel wrong for being who they are. But I appreciate the sentiment, though, Ralph. Heart's in the right place. Yeah. Another great example of that. Liberals who are planning to help Republicans in November. If you're not going to vote against Donald Trump, you need to call every single LGBT person you know and explain how you're sacrificing them now for your guess at a possible future revolution, maybe happening faster, maybe in the future.

And by the way, this is the same guess that liberals made when they said, vote for Nixon, speed up the revolution. How'd that fucking work out? Sorry. Okay. I know I'm getting off track here. Great job, Virginia, for making some positive incremental change. That's good. Yeah. Got to get you off Facebook, buddy. I'm doing great. We got to get people off Facebook, not me.

Yeah, right. Yeah. It's all them other motherfuckers. Yeah. So just a reminder that as much as it might seem like we're losing ground on every front so far in 2020 virginia and utah have banned conversion therapy also before matt gates went into self-quarantine from coronavirus he rode on air force one what i'm saying is that there are always nuggets of hope to cling to always a colloidal silver lining oh yeah matt gates matt gates our savior our unexpected savior

and in pq dayta news according to rick wiles if donald trump wins re-election in november the democrats are going to go out and start shooting republic with guns. That's a real thing that he's worried about. And I could not be happier. He is terrified and it's great. Because yeah, Rick Wiles is a literal neo-Nazi with a giant audience of Christian people. And White House press credentials sometimes. And he deserves to be terrified for his entire fucking life. And the best part is, we're not actually going to murder him.

But we get to make him all paranoid without even trying. Worst case scenario for Wiles, we get him sick with the coronavirus we invented. And, I mean, I guess he could die from that. Oh, nice. Nice. Sorry, what was I talking about? I think you were about to present a worst case scenario, but then you got

distracted and said something else instead. Yep, I remember. I was threatening Rick Wiles. Sorry, I was threatening Rick Wiles. That's right. Now, I don't want to get all Andrew Torres here, but if we lose in November, I think we can all say intelligent people can disagree on whether or not

shooting people in the face is a better tactic than voting, right? No, they cannot. No, that's not what I was disagreeing with at all. Nope. No, yep. So the way that Rywy landed on this theory is pretty amazing. Apparently he saw an ad for a movie called the hunt oh this again it's this again you might remember hearing about this movie last summer when its theatrical release was canceled after mass shootings in el paso and dayton studio felt like it was a bad time but there were also a a bunch of made up rumors that the movie's message was telling liberal elites to get together in tactical units, herd up some Republicans,

drop them into a giant hedge maze and hunt them for sport, which is ridiculous. We do not need a movie to have that idea. Everybody's thought. Yes. Thank you. Yes. In our fucking slogans,

we eat you. Right? If anything, this movie is tame. Yeah. Side note, this is not us supporting the movie

because this movie's ads call it the most controversial movie of the year and that's their fucking marketing strategy. because people are dumb. Yeah.

So, stirring up the panic of right-wing assholes isn't controversial when the president is also doing it yeah joe rogan rejects so all that being said the movie is about crazy people who hunt human beings it's based on the short story called the most dangerous game where an evil retired general hunts people on his island but regardless of which political leaning you assign to the good guys and the bad guys in the movie as like an allegory

it's a fucking movie it's a fictional motion picture of fiction idiots nonetheless here's the response from wiles quote this is what's coming at the end of the presidential election year. If it doesn't go our way, we're going to hunt down and shoot conservative American citizens. I guess he was speaking as us. End quote. And can I just say, I would watch the fuck out of the movie that Rick Wiles is afraid of, right? out of the movie that Rick Wiles is afraid of, right? Like, this movie, it's a horror movie

about a bunch of regular folks who get together to bring down queer-coded liberals. It's every horror movie, right? But the studio that has the solid brass balls to make the movie where Elizabeth Warren walks into the Senate with a machete and locks the door

from the inside can have all my money. Oh, thank you., use can't leave of Elizabeth Warren. Nevertheless, she persisted. Tag us. Oh God, we should make that movie. It's such a good idea to make that movie.

We would make so much money and get so much press. If we promised that instead of a machete she used a tomahawk,ald trump would fund it it's so it's so good so just to be perfectly clear and uh also because andrew torres is standing right behind me right now very sweaty after an aggressive speech he just gave me i have an official statement we are not doing the hedge maze thing. We are not poisoning Rick Wiles with coronavirus. We did not invent the coronavirus, despite what I might have suggested earlier. And we're not going to shoot any Republicans because we're not evil like the internal thoughts of Rick Wiles that he's now projecting onto his enemies.

Yeah. But Dickie Dubsubs if that's not enough to convince you just think about it for a second the democratic party we couldn't manage to count votes in iowa right we're gonna organize a national murder campaign of coordinated death squads no we're fucking idiots. We're good guy idiots, but we're idiots. Oh, there's the one statement that both Bernie's and Biden's supporters can agree on right there. Yeah.

We're idiots. And finally tonight, in metaxasizing news tonight. Thank you. We have a story about Christian Arthur and a guy who looks like he should always be playing the mean dad in a Home Alone sequel, Eric Metaxas. He's like a Phil Hartman fucked up.

He's like a weirdly attractive Phil Hartman. Yeah, I was going to say like an Al Franken fucked all set to Stuart Smalley, but at least we're in the same era of SNL. Yeah. So Metaxas had head of Turning Points USA, Charlie Kirk, on his program this week to be wrong about atheism

while agreeing with each other. And can I just say, they nailed it. Yeah, but don't be flattered, atheism. They can do that about anything. So here's what Charlie Kirk, who, quick reminder, is head of a literal right-wing psyop

whose sole focus is upsetting college students and then suing the school and creating a professor watch list here's what that guy had to say about atheism quote atheism in certain senses can be a religion and people disagree at this well they they do with that and all the shit you're wrong about, bro. They say, well, Charlie, they have no theology. I say, hold on a second.

Because it always takes me a second to think this through. Give me a minute. Give me a minute. I will see you next week. Atheist. I left something in my car. I will see you next week. Atheist. I left something in my car. I'll be back.

Didn't realize I was going to have to carry a fucking tool. Atheists have an agreed upon belief in afterlife. Nothing. They have an agreed upon belief in a deity. Nothing. Dumbest fucking argument. And they prophesize and evangelize more so than christians do they yep and criminals are actually cops they believe in nothing amount of

so dumb it really is he continued i get more people approaching me to try to convert to atheism than almost any christian does yeah no charlie you are our prime target at this point you're high in our fantasy pool and there's a lot of different reasons for this but i always challenge the atheist i say if you actually believed what you say you believe why does it matter you got like 38 years and five days left too specific and then you're just a clump of cells and dust. And then you're going to deteriorate into the abyss. You should live it up. You should do as much drugs and indulgence

as you possibly can. Okay, first of all, that's not a challenge. That's easy and did it. But more importantly, does he think we know the day we're going to die and our using atheism somehow? Well, more importantly, does he think we know the day we're going to die and our, like, using atheism somehow? Well, more importantly, do the atheists that he's talking to assume he means he's going to kill them in 38 years and five days, right? But also, which side are you on, right?

What's atheism? Just enjoying yourself constantly until you die? Whose shit are you selling? He concludes, quote, and atheists are divided into two buckets. I was hoping we'd have buckets.

There's agnostics who call themselves atheists because they think it's punk rock. Do we? Yep. Atheist agnostic. Meow. Meow.

Meow. What? Take it away, Bernie Russell. Meow, meow, meow, meow, meow, meow, meow, meow, meow, meow, meow. Epistemology. Meow. Danny Tinnet on the drums you stopping for insulin? he's stopping for insulin

then there's deeply unhappy people that have been scarred by religion and they think they're too smart for religion and I say there I don't have enough faith to be an atheist. I think it takes unbelievable philosophical calisthenics to believe this is all just an act of randomness. In fact, I think it's actually rooted in hubris.

You're hubris. You are. And okay, I'm going to go not kill my father and fuck my mother that's how fucking hubristic of us to not believe the universe is bespoke and that we're crafted in the images of a perfect being as the supreme creator of the galaxy killed his kid out of his boundless love for us personally. How goddamn hubristic of us. Fuck you. So, yeah, Charlie Kirk is still an idiot with way too much money and way, way too many Twitter followers. However, on the upside, quick reminder, he might have coronavirus.

So fingers crossed, everybody. Fingers crossed. And on the admission that coronavirus was at worst the 43rd deadliest thing at CPAC, might have coronavirus. So fingers crossed, everybody. Fingers crossed. And on the admission that coronavirus was, at worst, the 43rd deadliest thing at CPAC, we're going to close the headlines for the night. Heath, Eli, thanks as always. M-m-m-my Sharona virus.

Yep. And when we come back, we'll do whatever the opposite of book learning is. if there was one overriding message during the first third of hillary morgan fairer's mama bear apologetics it was this is the kind of book that's going to end with several chapters that might as well be titled and you know who else can go fuck themselves well we're into that segment at this point and eli why don't you pick up the thread there as we knock out chapter eight? That's right.

After tackling the boogeyman of self-helpism, naturalism, and skepticism, I think we can all agree there's no intellectual better equipped to tackle the nuances and criticisms of postmodern thought than Hilary Morgan Farrer. That's who can go fuck themselves, postmodernists. hillary morgan fairer that's who can go fuck themselves

that's right take that fuko motherfucker which is why this week's chapter is titled the truth is there is no truth post-modernism that's not yeah fuck her already for making me speak on behalf of post-modernism first of all but like i think before you can critique it your mindset has to at least catch up with modernism right you'd think right okay what if i agree to stop basing my atheism entirely on seinfeld can we just get no sadly no and h dog she's going to begin this chapter by apologizing for all this thinky bullshit. She knows you're a mama bear. You don't care about philosophy.

But she assures us that the only reason she's talking about all this philosophy is because philosophy will turn your kids into atheists. Here's the quote. What is it about postmodernism that's important for mama bears to know? If you plan on sending your kids to college, and especially if they major in a field of humanities, like history, English, or philosophy,

they will be steeped in postmodern assumptions from the get-go. Some in the sciences proudly proclaim that the humanities are dead to this we cry foul the humanities are not dead they are just really really sick and post-modernism is the disease end quote okay yeah so if you want your kids to be good christians you gotta steer them away from academic subjects like the humanities and also the non-humanity yeah right geology will fuck them right up too though yeah really it's a real problem all the ologies really

yeah so now it's time for a brief history of post-modernism no it's not that's not what's about to happen i mean it's technically very brief so hillary begins by reminding us that back in the good old pre-modern days people thought it rained because the gods were angry and we should pause and point out that is her worldview now right like she's gonna spend this chapter shitting on modernism and then post-modernism but let's not forget the hurricane is because jesus saw me jerking off to love is blind is the viewpoint she thinks is correct so she shits on modernism a little bit reminding us that quote science proved to be just as dogmatic and dangerous as religion end quote you're as bad as i am if i don't have to give examples is literally the best

she could do again yep again but enough about that because she might have to give examples it's time to talk post-modernism quote the post-modernists were at a crossroad they could either question the dogma of naturalism but in doing so allow a divine foot back in the door, or they could deny that absolute truth existed or was knowable. I love how this is a binary choice for Hillary Morgan Farrow. Either there's a ghost in the attic or truth is dead. There's no in between middle ground on that. And look,ary gets it sure a lot of people who had claims over truth used it for slavery and genocide sure but without capital

t truth you're just gonna be a murder rapist or as she puts it quote what post-modernists rejoice that nobody could declare that sex outside of marriage, abortion, or homosexuality were objectively immoral. However, what they didn't realize is that they had also now prevented society from saying that unprovoked murder, torture, and sex slavery were objectively wrong. Unprovoked is a weird addition to that. Yep, that is a very, very strange use of that word. If there's no objective absolute right or wrong, then no one can criticize or condemn any moral choices. Really? No matter how evil. You can't even call it evil.

Are you sure? You know how like when we proved that there was no light bearing ether, there stopped being stars? It's like that. Exactly. Yeah, 100%. And I should point out that that is the end of her history of postmodernism. Really? Not a single book cited or philosopher named. And I just want to point this out because I've seen both like theocrats and non-theocrats

criticize supposed postmodernism largely because they've confused postmodern thought with postmodern art, which they don't like and while i don't agree with the common my kid could paint that of post-modernism art i get it what i'm saying is i get it well eli is speaking for himself and not the show when he rejects the my kid could paint that criticism of post-modern art that is Okay, in defense of postmodern art, if you count the pretentious tour guide at the Modern Art Museum as part of the art, it's some of the best comedy ever created. And I will allow it. Yes, 100%.

But for the record, I think we should at least clarify postmodernism's actual position, which is not that truth doesn't exist. And look, I'm not going to do a great job of clarifying an entire field of philosophy in three sentences, so forgive me, but here is the gist. Modernism and premodernism largely posit that there is one truth about everything, right? That's the whole spagheel. there's like a correct way to eat to learn to make art to be civilized etc and post-modernism's position is that of skepticism to those truth claims it is not

its own claim about truth existing or not and if you're thinking there's no way post-modernism can actually be something as simple and obvious as we should be skeptical of absolute truth claims of premodernism and modernism. Congratulations, postmodernism worked on you. So there we go. But Hilary Morgan Ferrer is absolutely incorrect about the Bible being good and postmodernism is broken again. But yeah, let's make no mistake that the roots of criticism of postmodern thought are what HMO is doing in this chapter, right? If your entire philosophy is knowing the truth with a capital T, then postmodernism is untenable.

And all I'm saying is that when someone tries to sell you that postmodernism is bullshit, it's worth looking extra carefully at what truth claims they've decided to bundle in with that criticism well well technically i think it's up to each of us to define what postmodernism means to us eli so i don't i don't know that you can legitimately criticize her definition yeah dude you're being super pre-modern right bigot right why don't you modern explain to us how postmodernism is supposed to work, asshole? Here's how she puts it, quote, up until recently, our postmodern culture said that all truth statements were in the subjective realm. We can't say abortion is wrong. Rather, we can only say abortion is wrong for me. However, there is a world of difference between those statements end quote and again

not post-modernism post-modernism is skepticism of the original claim not well the other but but it's also the other thing i mean it's pretty hard and and some might even say disingenuous to try to divorce post-modernist philosophy from moral relativism without reducing it to nothing or reducing it to everything he gets it yeah sorry i didn't mean to encourage him i'm sorry and no you're gonna love the next chapter then so now you're probably thinking to yourself okay that is what post-modernism is not but what's the big deal well what if I told you that someday your kid might respectfully disagree with you, huh? Or... Bum, bum, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom thing early, you might end up with a teenager or 20-something who's completely respectful of all your views. They are fine with those things being true for you and not true for them. If they have

uncritically absorbed the lies of postmodernism, they will enter their young adult years trying to figure out their truth, all while being totally respectful of yours. So with the demon of respectful disagreement finally named, it's time to learn about postmodernism and the university. Careful, kids. At the university, you'll encounter some dangerous things like the first person and the international Jew. It's like a Henry Ford essay. It sure is.

And here she quotes Stephen Hicks, who listeners will probably remember for being Jordan Peterson before it was cool, who says, quote, it's a real quote, postmodern professors' primary role is now to teach students

to identify political oppression, particularly those of their own Western culture, where the primary perpetrators are males, males whites and the rich who have used power cruelly at the expense of women racial minorities and the poor end quote well i mean if you're a fucking history professor dealing with anything post a kemanid persian empire then yes yes that's almost a job description request surequest. Sure is. But again, keep in mind that this is being phrased as a bad thing.

Yeah, right. The implication here is that those statements aren't true. This chapter's message in its own fucking words is, watch out for those wishy-washy postmodern bullshitters, because if you're not careful, they'll tell your kids it hasn't always been easy to be a racial minority yeah but but oppression by rich white christian got left out there christian men that's a giant theme of history that's absolute truth so it seems like she'd want a post-modern history

professor to soften that objective reality if she's going to be a fucking bigot, right? That's the whole fucking thing. Postmodernism is an off ramp for these fucking idiots and she's rejecting it. Yeah, you'd think she'd like that a little bit better. Yeah. So with the quiet part full on said out loud, it's time to roar like a mother. Oh, good. And murder another acronym, which means we're going to recognize the message. So first up, deconstructing the truth claim to show bias. That's the first message of postmodernism. And her point here is that sometimes postmodernists will point out that you have a bias. Yep.

And that is bad. Well, I'm sure Hillary would point out that she has all the correct biases so it shouldn't matter yeah exactly next trick of post-modernism use i feel instead of i think and i just want to throw out like her saying that's a bad thing for later in the book because it's an apologetics book and i promise you hmo is going to dedicate an entire section to jesus being real because she feels it in her heart because it's an apologetics book so just making a note the third trick of post-modernism nobody knows for sure right because christians would never use this art yeah right yeah right. Exactly. For fuck's sake. She compares this to when kids fight over a toy saying, quote,

post-modernism came along and said because you can't play nice with your truth claims, nobody gets to play with them. Nobody gets to claim to know the truth. There. Now you can all get along. End quote. And I mean, yeah, that is...

Hey, bud. You using your truth claims to justify slavery and genocide? Yeah, I'm going to take these for a second. Whatever. Whatever. You just want to be gay. Not the point. You can get these back. Actually, never.

You can never have these back. Can have these back at the end of the world. Yeah. So with that out of the way, it's time to offer discernment. And we're going to start out with some of the good sides of postmodernism here, which HMO admits have been really helpful for the whole not literally burning witches thing. Yeah. Even if you want to embrace the scare definition, no truth versus her truth. I'm going to opt for the former.

So, yeah. But I love that she thinks post-modernism like licked all the truths so nobody can have however her positive example is a story h dog tells where one time at mega church she sat next to a guy who hated everything but the hymns. He sat there doing nothing through the contemporary songs and the bluegrass songs and the urban songs, or words, not mine.

But then he jumped up at the end at the hymns. And the conclusion she reached from that story is that postmodernism gives everyone a way to celebrate Jesus. Even the bigots. Thanks, postmodernism. What what the fuck but enough fun stuff like

racists who only like their jesus songs it's time for lie number one our perceptions determine reality well as hillary has demonstrated our reality doesn't determine our perceptions so what fucking order does she think it goes in are they unrelated yeah it's worth pointing out that this statement is true in literally all the way yes right it's it's scientifically true it's philosophically true but for hillary it seems to be about whether or not she's racist here's the quote she uses to close this paragraph. Quote, what used to be innocent Freudian slips are now microaggressions. What? Hold on. Wait. So in her life, she was

like, you know, I'd say don't Jew me. Sorry, Freudian slips. No, no, not what that means. Are you serious? It's also just, it's not micro, it's not innocent, it's not Freudian. It's a Mac. It's just an aggression. That's just an aggression when you say slurs.

Wow. She continues, if you approach a girl who feels like a boy and say she, you can be charged with a hate crime. There it is. At least you can in Canada. And it's not far off for us. What? That way of thinking is becoming more common in the United States as well.

No one is safe. There is no room for misunderstandings. Ultimately, this is the world that postmodernism gives us. A world with no misunderstandings? How about the world where you could just lie about shit and say it's the law in Canada? That's not the law in Canada, right? No. And I just want to throw out there,

God, it's so good to hear that lie about that Canadian law again. You guys remember how Jordan Peterson got famous and then he was wrong? Yep. But I was on Twitter back then. Oh, man. You know what?

I bet if I log back into my Twitter, my inbox will just be full of apologies from all the people who told me that that Canadian law was going to make it illegal to misgender people. I bet it is, isn't it? You should check for those apologies. People are super good about retracting

false statements on the internet. Check that out. I'm telling you, Heath, join me on the non-internet and play in Stardew Valley. I read the food reviews and the New Yorker. I said it's done. Okay. All right. So moving on to lie number two, all truth claims are power plays. And Hillary's going to explain that by saying that the problem with postmodernism is it might make you question that God loves you so much that he sacrificed himself to himself and you can give him your money and time to him forever,

or he'll burn you for all eternity. So yeah, be careful about the power place thing. Yeah, it seems like she's just worried she's not going to get enough credit for the team project for this one. Yeah. Lie number three, all truth is subjective. And here's Hillary's response to that. Quote, when people say all truth is subjective, ask them, is that truth subjective? If they say yes, then their statement is false. If they say no, their statement is still false. Not that our goal is to win arguments.

Clearly. But if we can keep bad ideas from spreading, I'll call that a win. End quote. Okay, but what if nobody says that? Ever, anywhere. Shit. What if nobody ever wants to talk to you? What if somebody says subjectively, yes.

What if somebody says just, this thing in the Bible is wrong. What do you do then? No. What's your trick? Appeal to postmodernism, don't you? Oh, What do you do then? No. What's your trick? Appeal to postmodernism, don't you? Oh, you do. I write a book. So now it's time to argue for a healthier approach.

And surprise, surprise, that's just going to be repeating things back at you with a question mark, according to Hillary. Yeah. Quote, most postmodernism claims can be turned on themselves. Truth claims are power plays are you claiming that to be true god what kind of power do you get from such a statement no yeah if it turns out that if you refuse to understand things people will stop explaining them to you congratulations hillary you won you're crushing it you're crushing it check out some facebook threads that I got going.

You're going to love them. And finally, we're going to reinforce through discussion, discipleship, and prayer. And her first way of doing this is to find examples in culture. The example she gives here is postmodern architecture. Why? Like she says in the book that she finds pictures of postmodern architecture on Pinterest and then tells her kids, like, look at that. Isn't that fucking stupid?

Jesus ascended to heaven and knows when you jerk off. Yeah, right? Fucking bullshit asymmetric curvilinear forms and non-functional textures. What? What? There is so truth-functional textures. What? What? There is so truth. That's not. What?

She also gives away the game in this sentence I love so much here. She says, quote, real sentence in the paragraph, help your little bear see that truth is not a power play, threat, or hate crime. Oh, really? Yeah, no. No, who God hates is a matter of historical

record. Just read my placard. Right, yeah. Wow, that's the end of that section. She's like, as a Christian, you're going to hear a lot about hate crimes. Bye. I really need to wrap this somehow try responding with hate crime

get really high get really high they won't know what to do why are you talking about hate crime dogs just freaking out in the other room. So anyways, it's time for the discussion questions. Gentlemen, are you ready? Subjectively. Guys ready? You are you ready?

You got me. You got me. All right. Icebreaker. The history of advertisement shows our culture's descent from objective claims, modernism, to emotional claims, postmodernism. What are some of the most ridiculous ads or commercials you have ever seen? Given postmodern assumptions, why do you think the company advertised the way it did?

How does this reflect on our culture? Here's one to get you started. Your way, right away. Burger King. I don't know if this counts, but one time I saw one of the dumbest ads I ever saw. It was a blurb on the back of this book and it contained the words,

they seem harmless and even sound right with periods on both sides of them as though that wasn't a sentence fragment. It was supposed to convince me what a good writer you are, you fucking idiot. Let's see. I also enjoyed that ad for 7 Up, Make 7 Up Yours. That was good.

Yeah. Shows that we're into postmodern sodomy. I stared at that for so long thinking you'd misspelled it. No. Oh, I just thought that was how sodomy was spelled, so I missed that joke until you said it. Crushing it. Question two, main theme, truth is real and can be known. Discuss the differences between objective and subjective claims.

Why do you think postmodernists have concluded that truth cannot be known? have concluded that truth cannot be known. Was that a truth claim about concluding a truth claim about the non-existence of truth claims just now? Honestly, look, the reason most of the postmodernists Hillary encounters espouse this, the reason they've determined this, is because they don't want to have to confront her about how fucking dumb her religion is all the time.

Oh, yes. Three three self-evaluation how often do you go to the bible and ask what does this mean to me before researching what the passage meant to the people for whom it was written why is it important to first know the original meaning of the message well you could end up smashing the wrong baby's heads against the rocks or something yeah that's right yeah right plus the founding fathers are very important number four moses wrote the constitution everybody read a book that's right number four brainstorm what are some of the truths that culture has declared to be subjective that is a matter of personal preference that the bible says are objectively true list as many as you can think oh god i feel like this usually devolves into a a reader just listing all the derogatory

terms for gay sex that they know exactly what happens. Number five, release the bear. Talk to your kids about the differences between objective and subjective truth. As you go through your week, pay close attention to truth claims in advertising or the media. Ask your children, is that a subjective claim or an objective claim? How do you know? Yeah, again, mom can't tell the difference. All right, I'm going to go reject God and read some more Nabokov. That's what happens a lot. I get why she's worried. That's how. No, it is. That's how kids operate. Yeah. A lot of the problems.

If I had a nickel for every time my nieces and nephews said to me. Yeah. All right. So while Christian parents are busy asking their kids how they'd even know what a rainbow tastes like, we're going to wrap up this segment. But don't worry, we're not done with Hillary quite yet, so we'll be back in a month with even more God Awful Books. Before we return to self-quarantine, I want to remind you once again that there's a brand new podcast full of us waiting for you to listen to.

If you love D&D actual play podcasts, or if you love us, or if you just love spending time with us, check the show notes for a link. Anyway, that's all the blasphemy 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, The Skeptocrat, debuting at 7 a.m. Eastern time on Monday. An even newer episode of our sister show's hot friend, Godawful Movies, debuting at 7 a.m. Eastern on Tuesday.

And an even newer episode of our half-sister show Citation Needed debuting at noon Eastern on Wednesday. Obviously I sound like an asshole in a bad way. I'm going to like to thank Heath Enright for always bringing plenty of expletives for the whole class. I need to thank Eli Bosnick for always finding another suffix that can modify fuck. I also need to thank the lovely and talented Lucinda Lusions for hanging out with the family I

have in town so that I can spend a day hanging out with you guys. She'll be back next week, but she promises to be extra pissed for making you wait. I just want to thank Zephyr for providing this week's Farnsworth quote and Kaylee and Jackson for last week's. The good news is that the upcoming generation seems pretty solid. But most of all, of course, I want to thank this week's best people. Rhett Spencer,

the Zion men from Momotown, Corey Joshua explicitly telling you to take legal advice from a podcast, Melissa, Keith, Heather, and Jason Hunter, Whit, Jeff, Nathan, Fullstank, Carol, Rebecca, the infamous Molly Cottle, and Jeff, Miranda, Dong, McFlops, Other Nathan, Lisa, Michael, Chuck, Brian, Nick, Daniel, Emerson, Shannon, David, Novocaine, but spelled cool, George, Keith, Miguel, Steve, Leo, Dan, and Idiocratic Diptators. Who coronavirus is no better than to fuck with.

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