The Scathing Atheist - 375: Being Detained Edition

Episode Date: April 23, 2020

In this week’s episode, Heath and Eli handle the headlines wild and free, religious leaders wonder if our Surgeon General is even a real theologian, and Andrew Torrez will be here… because Eli and Heath are doing the headlines wild and free --- 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/ --- Guest Links: Check out more of Andrew Torrez on the Opening Arguments podcast: https://openargs.com/ Check out that list thingy that Andrew was talking about here: https://www.cisa.gov/identifying-critical-infrastructure-during-covid-19 --- Headlines: U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams Explains Pandemic: “God Always Has a Plan”: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2020/04/18/u-s-surgeon-general-jerome-adams-explains-pandemic-god-always-has-a-plan/ Tony Spell’s  Parishioner Dies After Contracting COVID-19: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2020/04/17/covid-19-defying-pastors-parishioner-dies-after-contracting-covid-19/ Lawyer for Tony Spell Hospitalized After Contracting COVID-19: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2020/04/16/lawyer-for-covid-19-defying-pastor-hospitalized-after-contracting-covid-19/ Tony Spell Wants People to Send Him Their $1,200 Stimulus Checks: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2020/04/16/covid-19-denying-pastor-wants-people-to-send-him-their-1200-stimulus-checks/ 130 Christians Still Went to Death-Cult Leader Tony Spell’s Church on Sunday: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2020/04/20/130-christians-still-went-to-death-cult-leader-tony-spells-church-on-sunday/ In Call with Pastors, Secretary of State Promotes Christian Nation Myth: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2020/04/14/in-call-with-pastors-secretary-of-state-promotes-christian-nation-myth/ Hey, Democrats: Atheists Are the Most Politically Active Group in the Country: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2020/04/14/hey-democrats-atheists-are-the-most-politically-active-group-in-the-country/ These Christian Moms Are Complaining About Gay Duck Dads in DuckTales: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2020/04/17/these-christian-moms-are-complaining-about-gay-duck-dads-in-ducktales/ Christian Publisher Announces New Edition of The Quran Meant for Missionaries: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2020/04/16/christian-publisher-announces-new-edition-of-the-quran-meant-for-missionaries/

Warning, this episode would make Elmo faint. This week's episode of The Scathing Atheist is brought to you by Stamps.com and by the new board game for the family under quarantine, House Trap. House Trap, how dangerous is chloroform? And now, The Scathing Atheist. This is friend of the show and member of the deep state calling you from deep within the U.S. mission here in Islamabad, Pakistan, where they do blast the call to prayer at us five times a day.

And I can tell you that every time they blow up a wedding in Swat Valley, it only goes to prove that we did, in fact, evolve from filthy monkey men. It's Thursday. It's April 23rd. And it's Talk Like Shakespeare Day. Huh. Hello there. I'm Francis Bacon. How dare you? I have no illusions.

I'm Eli Bosnick. I'm Heath Enright. And from Carly Lloyd's, New Jersey. Oh, that's a good one. Cincinnati Swing State. And Good Husband, Georgia. This is The Scathing Atheist. On this week's episode, Heath and I handle the headlines wild and free.

Religious leaders wonder if our Surgeon General is even a real theologian. And Andrew Torres will be here because Eli and Heath are doing the headlines without me. But first, the diribe. A lot of people have been asking. They say, hey, Noah, you've been working from home for a long time. How do you keep motivated? How do you not play Xbox all day instead? And I get it.

It's a weird transition to make. Now, to be clear, I have an unfair advantage. My job is to yell about all the dumb shit going on in the world, and that's what I'd be doing even if I didn't have to work. But I have some practical advice that really helped me a ton when I was first getting used to the home office thing, and that's dress for work. You know, it'll seem weird at first, but, yeah, get up in the morning, go through the same routine you'd go through if you were actually going to go to work, make yourself presentable

and all that shit, put on a suit or a uniform or a pair of slab shoes and a pork pie hat, whatever it is that makes you think I'm at work and wear that while you're working. And then when you're done working for the day, change out of that shit, right? Or like, you know, whatever, take off your tie or take off your bra, whatever it is that signals to okay i'm done working for the day and believe it or not that makes a huge fucking difference suddenly you kind of feel like you actually went to work and then came home you know we used the same trick back in my neo-pagan days as well it was a big deal that everybody made their own ceremonial robe it's the only thing i've ever sewed in my life it was a big deal that a you always wore that same article of clothing whenever you did ritual magic and b that you never wore it

at any other time and that made it easier to be solemn about this shit it's pretty hard to take yourself seriously when you're like invoking the undines of the west but it's significantly easier when you're wearing the right clothes. But more importantly, the robe made it easier for other people to take me seriously too. You know, I know that's hard to believe. In the abstract, it doesn't seem like dressing up in an ill-fitted, wrinkly, amateurly stitched 200 thread count muumuu would make me more authoritative. But it turns out that the specifics of the clothes don't much matter.

Let's face it. You'd need a big red nose or something to make an outfit sillier than the get up. They put London cops in and you still take them more or less seriously. It's the power of the uniform. It's what that uniform means to us culturally. Dark colored robes mean satanic magic wielding shit. Suit and tie means doing important stuff checkered edging and custodian helmets makes us think this person can tell me where to park i guess and of course church

has been using that same trick since forever haven't they you show up in a shitty room full of scratched up benches that smell like old people and you sit there for an eternity while some old guy yells random shit about Jesus. If it wasn't for the fact that everybody is wearing fancy clothes, it would be indistinguishable from going to a Greyhound station. But since everybody's wearing their Sunday best, it's suddenly a solemn occasion. You know, and this doesn't just work for the parishioners. Obviously, the church leaders take advantage of it as well. You don't see as much of it around here.

It's something that most of the Baptist churches have moved away from, but they still occasionally toss on that smock of holiness or whatever. But Catholics, who always look like some sad effort by Elizabethan chess pieces to dress sexy. I mean, sure, the collar is pretty subtle, but these cardinals and bishops and whatnot, they walk around like the whole point of the outfit is to dare me to say something imagine if there wasn't a whole church with all these centuries of tradition and shit and there was just like one guy who dressed like a cardinal everything from the el mus to the zuch right? That motherfucker would put flaming bagpipe unicycling Darth Vader dude to shame. I mean, the Pope literally carries around a magical staff a la Gandalf

and world leaders take him seriously. But that's no coincidence, right? It's not like it just so happens that in this time and place, that shit looks goofy to us. It always did. It's a like it just so happens that in this time and place that shit looks goofy to us. It always did. It's a common thread amongst regal imperial clothing. The crowns of the kings, the robes of the popes, the garments of high office, they have to be flamboyant. They have to stand out. They have to be something that nobody would choose to wear for fashion purposes or they don't work, right? These folks aren't trying to be trendsetters they're trying to stand apart from you and above you and sometimes part of that is wearing clothes that almost dare

you to laugh at them of course kind of fucks things up when you just laugh at them though you know that that's why they always whine about how we should respect their religion it kind of requires that mindset for all this shit to work. If cops didn't wield any authority, we wouldn't have much respect for that uniform. We'd just be like, wow, that looks uncomfortably hot on a day like today. You know, their uniform represents the power of the state. And that's a real thing. But the authority behind the liturgical garments is hollow. And so when I see the pope or one of his cardinals or bishops or whatever, I don't see the garments, a high office that I'm supposed to see. I see a guy dressed up like a pedophile that doesn't care if you notice him.

Right. I see somebody dressed up like a professional liar. I see an antiquated person representing an antiquated institution founded on antiquated notions drawn from antiquated morals dressed appropriately in antiquated apparel. Because the imperious display of finery and feathers doesn't mean a goddamn thing once you realize that the clothes have no emperor they're talking about you jesus interrupt this broadcast and bring you a special news bulletin joining me for headlines tonight is the os to my Felix, Eli Bosnick. Eli, you ready to couple oddly? If you mean spray disinfectant into the faces of my loved ones, Heath, way ahead of you.

I've no doubt that you're doing way too much of that. Okay. In our lead story tonight, the highest ranking doctor in the United States gave a Christian sermon this week on national television. Yep. That's the timeline we live in now. Surgeon General Jerome Adams gave a speech about the pandemic. And in his capacity as our chief expert on medical science, he told the country exact words, God always has a plan. Well, you know, based on how our government's been doing,

it's nice to know that somebody has a plan. Just anybody. All right. Well, we have three possibilities here. Let's take them one at a time. Scenario A, God exists and has a plan, in which case we're in a phase of that plan that involves a rampant global plague, the closing of church services, tens of thousands of Christian people dying, especially the ones who ignored the church closing safety orders, and the destruction of the world economy, leading to the suffering and death of predominantly the poor people that Jesus was always talking about helping. That's the scenario our surgeon general believes in.

I mean, to be fair, he didn't say it was a good plan, Heath. He just said it was a plan. Okay, I'm not willing to be fair. All right. Anyway. Fair. Here's scenario B. God exists, but he clearly didn't finish his homework,

and now he's just yes-anding himself and making shit up. And he clearly took an improv class taught by Michael Scott, so he just burst in the door and started killing people. He did. That's very possible. No, it's not. But if you're convinced there's a God, you need to admit he's super bad at being a deity and it's stupid to worship him and i don't know maybe broaden your horizons a little

bit author wise try some uh margaret atwood maybe there you go there's one honestly i'd be afraid of giving them ideas heath. Not so fast. Yeah. Yeah, scratch that. Maybe some Kurt Vonnegut. No. No. Okay. How about?

Maybe if you won't read it, you'll misinterpret. Clifford the Big Red Dog. It's tongue-in-cheek. Okay. That's maybe comprehensible to the people we're talking about. Try Clifford. Anyway, that brings us to scenario C, also known as reality. There's a fucking pandemic, and the science people in charge of dealing with it need to be immediately fired if they're working on a plan inside counterfactual scenarios like A and B.

Yeah. But thanks to religion, the majority of the world thinks we're in some version of A or B. And they're arguing with each other about which wrong thing is more wrong. And they're not even aware of it. They're not even aware of the irony. And the rest of us, aware that we're living in the scenario called reality, have to listen to these idiots spend time arguing during a pandemic with both outcomes of that argument being super fucking stupid. For example, the Surgeon General got some pushback right away. Okay.

Okay, but it's not what you think. No. The example I'm going to give you here, the pushback came from Celia Dean Drummond with a hyphen, already gross. A senior research fellow from Oxford. But OK, but again, it's not what it sounds like. She's doing research in a theology laboratory. She released a statement because she had important input that needed an official statement to be released. because she had important input that needed an official statement to be released. She said, quote, to assume that a specific natural event is a deliberate plan of God is far too simplistic.

True. True. Again, let her finish. Continuing, it's an irresponsible opinion. Also true. Aired without taking due account of either the science or the theology quite apart this is my fuck i hate this part the most quite apart from the intersection between them and quote the intersection between science and theology i love how this lady's translation is just like

you idiot don't you know when things like this come up, it calls for fancy talk, damn it. Fancy talk. You're out of your element, Donnie. That's her entire job is fancy talk in situations like this. Yep. And just for the record, in that same speech that Jerome Adams gave, he agreed that science and theology don't conflict. Weird. Rome Adams gave, he agreed that science and theology don't conflict. He's not talking about the non-overlapping magisteria thing, which is also stupid, but that's not what he's saying.

He's literally become an overlapping magistrate. So that's not what he's saying. Yes. And now we get to watch the Surgeon General of the United States and an Oxford theologian argue about the location of an intersection at the corner of fucking Nowhere Street and Unicorn Boulevard. Oh, yes. And dumber still, we get to watch a useless tool get corrected by a definitionally useless tool about not being vague enough. Right. That's her note.

Not vague enough. Yes. You're making us look dumb. You got to do this way more vague. And just for the record, the response we're getting from the government is not, oh, cool, well, you're fired because that's not what the Surgeon General does. Instead, we're getting a backlash from religious leaders

saying that Jerome Adams isn't qualified to make statements about theology we live in fucking bizarro world am i crazy am i the one who's crazy what is happening they're the ones who stay in your lane and we're like yeah stay in your lane but like yeah this one i don't know maybe their lane's hard. And in I cast the spell on you news tonight, pastor, head of Louisiana's Life Tabernacle Church, and earless Ross Perot impersonator Tony Spell has been in the headlines an awful lot the last couple of weeks over his refusal to close his church despite the pandemic

because, quote, true Christians do not mind dying, end quote. All right. Well, at least they're proving it. That's nice. But they don't mind us dying either. So, I mean, and also known as murdering is what I just described. That's what I called. So regular listeners to the show will remember he then assembled a legal dream team.

If your dream is hitting on high school girls at the mall because he hired roy moore well this week true to his word spell's other lawyer jeff wittenbrink was hospitalized with covet 19 and one of his 78 year old parishioners died from it now if you're hoping i'm going to tell you next about how Spell has been arrested for reckless endangerment or you know, fucking murder. Murder, sure. You must be new here. Welcome to the pod. I'm kind of

the Shirley Temple. The child actress? No, the drink. Embarrassing and full of too much sugar. Oh, yep. Yeah, yeah. Okay, no tracks. So yeah, Spell, for his part, denied that his parishioner died of covet 19 and instead took to youtube to announce his hashtag pastor spells stimulus challenge oh this is catchy it's a good hashtag in which he asked people to give him

their stimulus check yeah great uh side note by the way according to andrew our hashtag dump a bucket of covid phlegm on tony spell challenge it's canceled now whatever you should not do that that's our official statement on that yeah you got all don't do that yeah don't so here's the quote quote hashtag pastor spell stimulus challenge three rules rule one, April the 19th, 2020, it begins. Okay. Not really a rule. It's not really a rule. It's just a date.

Unsurprised that Tony Spell doesn't know what rules mean. All right. Rule two, donate your stimulus money. Okay. Gross. Rule three, donate it to evangelists. Grosser. North American evangelists who haven't had an offering in a month. Missionaries who haven't had an offering in a month. Music ministers who haven't had an offering in a month. I'm donating my entire stimulus,

$1,200. My wife is donating her stimulus, $1,200. My son is donating his stimulus, $600. Hey, question. Why is it North American evangelists? How is that? It's a race. It feels like a race thing. It felt racial. I feel like he wrote to realize that someone might give that money to someone who would help

and then just tried to narrow it down until it was just him. He's not okay with it going to like an Italian evangelist at this point? No, definitely not. He concludes hashtag pastor spell stimulus challenge. If you don't have a church, give through my website. I'm here on the Mississippi

River. I'm here at Red Stick Baton Rouge hashtag pastor spell stimulus challenge. Simpy River. I'm here at Red Stick Baton Rouge hashtag Pastor Spell Stimulus Challenge. He translates Baton Rouge for us. Wow. By the way, this just occurred to me and I'm

pretty sure this is legal. You can tag whatever pictures or videos you want with hashtag Pastor Spell Stimulus Challenge. If you were allowed to put those pictures on the internet, you're allowed to tag them with any hashtag you want. If those are legal pictures. If they started legal. Consenting adults, maybe two beautiful men who are especially hairy.

Maybe eight beautiful men. Yeah. Hashtag Pastor Spell Stimulus Challenge. All right. Got it. maybe eight beautiful men yeah hashtag pastor spell stimulus challenge all right so if you're wondering how killing a guy making a guy sick breaking the law and then asking those people for their stimulus money is affecting spells church attendance the answer is not enough he it's not enough so according to the advocate quote sund Sunday service at Life Tabernacle Church attracted about 130 people down from nearly 500 who attended last week's Easter services. According to the police, who've been counting the heads of people entering the church for services and forwarding their reports to the district attorney's office, end quote.

Oh, cool. Cool. Cool. Cool. Cool. reports to the district attorney's office end quote oh cool cool cool so uh police while you guys are are over there counting heads a small thing maybe arrest the zombie horde while you're there you're up if you don't mind it it's it's weird to just count the plaguing zombie horde you know what i mean yeah that's not really in isolation next up in headlines a large slab of beef shoulder in a suit delivered a speech to the american association of christian counselors last week explaining that the state department is officially the diplomatic arm of god or mike pompeo is still secretary of state and he did that. It's hard to tell.

But one of those two things happened. And I'd say it's super problematic either way. Not for us vegans it isn't. You angered the sentient zombie beef sides. You deal with them, Ethan, right? You deal with them. We'll eat them. We didn't anger.

We'll talk about it later. So it's 2020, as we all know. And that means the darkest timeline. So I'm going to assume it was Pompeo and not the better scenario where it was the side of beef. The secretary of state had a meeting hosted by a Christian hate group, literally a Christian hate group, and told that hate group the U.S. State Department has a bunch of extra time right now. You know, nothing big going on. So they're happy to help with, again, the hate grouping.

And then he violated the First Amendment about 45 times. It was like he was playing a theocratic lightning round on a game show. That includes proudly announcing that religion informs everything I do, declaring that he's been chosen by God to, I guess, finally get some Christianity into America, and pointing out that during his oath to the Constitution, he had his fingers crossed behind his back for jesus yeah he did exact words i've been unabashed in my role as secretary of state to talk about the fact that i swore an oath to the constitution but that my first calling is to my savior and that's something i tell world leaders whether i'm with president cz in egypt or whomever uh yeah hi mr sissy or whatever your

name is before we talk about this uh i don't know disarmament treaty i just want you to know a 2 000 year old carpenter i've only read about is first in my heart all right let's talk missiles that's what he's doing he's our highest ranking ranking diplomat. He's going to the president of Egypt during diplomacy and being like, so I'll start by saying Jesus nuts. And believe it or not, I still haven't mentioned the worst part. Pompeo has now officially fired up the commission on unalienable rights. I can't believe that this is real this is real this is real and it's it's a hate crime the commission on unalienable rights is newspeak for a theocratic think tank within the u.s state department he has a team of god-given rights so far they came up with the right of gay people

don't count yep and that's what they have so far they're gonna report back at the end of may with their finished work again that they accomplished during april and may of 2020 well you know it's not like they had anything else going on. And hey, fingers crossed, maybe they're all in-person meetings. We could get lucky here. They definitely don't know how to use Zoom. And in patting ourselves on the back news tonight, according to a recent post from Professor Ryan P. Burge of Eastern Illinois University,

atheists are by far the most politically active religious group. All right. And statistically, that means you. So good job all. Excellent. And I recently heard about a pretty good opportunity to be politically active coming up in November. We don't say.

Turns out, listen up, there's a loophole in the Constitution that lets us put a term limit on horrible bigot theocrats. Check it out. November. Does it require stamps? It does.

Oh, I don't. Honestly, it might not. I think we learned that a bunch of states, it doesn't even require a stamp. It's too late. I'm already out. I'm already out. You said, you didn't say no all right so burge used the cooperative congressional

election survey and their 2018 data and according to that self-identifying atheists were more likely to have attended a march protest or political meeting contacted contacted a public official, donated money to slash work for a candidate, or put up a political sign, regardless of education and income. Okay, well, that's great to hear. But in a different sense, it's also kind of disappointing, considering we're watching the continued erosion of secular government, despite everything Eli just mentioned. And here's the bottom line. All those examples of political action are ultimately aimed at achieving a goal that's based on voting at its core. But that is a stat we're still lagging on. People who attend church regularly are statistically more

likely to vote. And we need to flip that trend big time. That's true. Yes, we do. And as we've said on this show countless times, you've got to be active and stay active if you want to fight theocracy. And hey, if you haven't done one of those things yet and you're listening to this, now is an excellent time to start. A lot of people have free time on their hands. Call your representative. Do it. Donate to a candidate you like if you've got some spare money. And when you do, remind them that you are an atheist who votes.

Yes. And then vote. Yep. You got to do then vote yep you gotta do that at the end of that and vote correctly to be clear and speaking of how difficult it is to vote let's toss things over to our first sponsor this week stamps.com ah i miss longboarding. I miss hiking. I miss the post office. Seriously? You miss the post office? Yeah, you know, Craig always trying to sell me on those forever stamps. And the way Sarah helps me check when I forget which was our P.O. box. Well, why don't you use stamps.com? What's stamps.com? Stamps.com brings all the services of the u.s postal service right to your computer

whether you're a small office sending invoices an online seller shipping out products or even a warehouse sending thousands of packages a day stamps.com can handle it all with ease simply use your computer to print official u.s postage 24 7 for any letter any package any class of mail anywhere you want to send once your mail is, you just hand it to your mail carrier or drop it in the mailbox. It's that simple. Wow, that does sound easy. It's true. We used stamps.com to send our Patreon rewards and merch to live shows. And it was so easy to do. And right now, our listeners get a special offer that includes a four-week trial plus free postage and a digital scale without any long-term commitment. Just go to stamps.com. Click on the microphone at the top of the homepage and type in scathing. That's stamps.com.

Enter scathing. Yeah, but I still miss Craig. Is, uh, is Craig the guy who had to mace you? We had a misunderstanding. Okay.

Yeah. And we're back. I do miss Craig. Next up in headlines, we have a new story about one million moms. Anna? What are the guys talking about? It's the newest, the greatest, Christian Freakout. Okay, that's fair.

That's practically their theme song at this point. I get it. Yeah. They're Christian Freak freak out the organization. So for anyone who's new, One Million Moms is a Christian hate group of three white ladies who can't count very well. And I'm guessing their names aren't Karen, Karen, and Karen. Odds are against that. But they're all fucking Karen.

Yeah, they're all fucking Karen. Yeah, they're all fucking Karen. And they spend most of their time scouring the country for anti-Christian persecution, speaking to the manager at every restaurant they go to, and then very much eating small amounts of snot at those restaurants that they go to. But mostly the persecution hunting. And they found a big one this week. Apparently, DuckTales aired an episode that included a kid with two dads. So the Karens are fucking panicking.

Okay, here's what I don't get. Why are they freaking out about gay Disney characters now? Like, Karens, did you see Scar? He was just missing a boa, ladies. Like, Karens, did you see Scar? He was just missing a boa, ladies. Like, he just... So, before we get into the details of the episode, quick spoiler, it is not

a children's cartoon show that shows us two male ducks having gay sex. Which, honestly, I was disappointed about that. I'm very curious about all the logistics of, you know, the corkscrew penis, especially regardless of everyone's gender. I want to know how that works. And Eli, I know you have strong, strong feelings about this. Do you have any words of wisdom?

Hey, folks, obviously, Heath and Eli handled headlines on their own this week. However, at this point, they had a 45 minute conversation about duck sex, which turned into a really intense argument about duck sex, during which both of them cried. At least one of them threw up. You can guess which one. Anyway, I'm just going to bring you back in where that left off. Okay, agree to disagree on that last thing. Fine. Just agree to disagree

on the last thing. Fine. We can move on? Thank you. We have to. So here's the plot of the show that made the Karens freak out. First of all, in case anyone's not familiar with DuckTales, it's about a millionaire named Scrooge McDuck and his nephews, Huey, Dewey, and Louie, who live in Duckburg.

And life is basically like a hurricane there in Duckburg. You got race cars, lasers, aeroplanes. It's a duck blur. And every episode, they get into a new adventure. They might solve a mystery or even rewrite history. That's DuckTales. I like how for people who don't know the DuckTales theme, you're just having a stroke right now. Or just pitching DuckTales super hard.

It could be all of those things. You know, I liked that Atheist podcast, but I thought that part in the middle where the tall feller pitched DuckTales for 25 straight seconds. That was a weird, weird twist on the format. I love that song. So in this particular episode, Huey, Dewey, and Louie have a friend named Violet. And Violet has two dads, and they both wear a shirt that says, I'm with dad, and has an arrow pointing to the other one. And this is my favorite part.

The two dads also adopted a different daughter right in Christianity's face. Yeah, they did. The writers clearly put that in just to trigger bigots, and it all the way worked. Sure did. The Karens are fucking having a meltdown.

Yeah, they are. I mean, for example, not only do I now know that a new DuckTales exists, but I want to watch it. So, you know, cross the spectrum. It's pretty great. So, in response to the implication of the existence of a same-sex couple of, to be clear, cartoon animated ducks. Cartoon ducks, yep. One million moms released the following statement. Quote.

With the theologian, they have the same statement. What's this PR firm that's just releasing nonsense? Anyway. We got to start releasing statements, Heath. It's pretty obvious. We need a statements guy. You got a statements guy, right? I'll get a statements guy.

Cool. Here's the quote, the official statement from one million moms. It's apparent to us that this particular producer is not finished with indoctrinating children by exposing them to homosexual relationships through a facade of normalcy, end quote. And just to be clear, the facade of normalcy that the Karens are talking about is normal animated gay ducks. Yeah. That's what they mean.

So great work by DuckTales is the point of the whole thing. Yes, definitely. One of my favorite shows when I was a kid. And now even more reboot. Great, great stuff. Check out the original and that reboot if you get a chance. Reverse boycott on this. I love it.

I get it. I get it. But I don't know, Heath. Sure, this is okay. But where does this putting in acceptance stuff end? But Scroogege you can't be trans we're married okay I'm pretty sure

that's just transparent yep DuckTales transparent DuckTales transparent okay got it and

finally in Corona Maniacs news tonight. Stolen pun. Yeah, but it's a good pun to steal. It is. Christian book publisher Zondervan has a new book coming out this month that's sure to explode onto the charts.

Called The Quran with Christian Commentary, A Guide to Understanding the Scripture of Islam. Great. Great. a guide to understanding the scripture of islam great great christianity is finally going to read a second book and they landed on literally the worst possible pick yep like i get what ray bradbury was saying don't burn books but i'd fahrenheit 451 the fuck out of those two books if we're making a list those are the two that's what we're making a list, those are the two. That's what we're burning. Top two spots for sure. Yeah. So Zondervan, whose other publications include The Case for Christ, The Purpose Driven Life, and Eric Metaxas' disappointingly named Seven Men, describes their upcoming release by saying, quote, be equipped to interact more fruitfully and thoughtfully with Muslims. Really?

Just like, hello, Muslim person. I know our interactions haven't been very fruitful, so I have some margin notes for your Quran. Is this helpful? Are we being fruitful now? Are you loving this? So here's how they describe the book. loving this. So here's how they describe the book. The Quran with Christian commentary offers a unique introduction to the primary religious text of Islam. Alongside a precise modern English translation of the Quran, author Gordon D. Nickel provides in-text notes to explain the meaning of various surahs, chapters, and ayat, verses, their interpretive history and significance in Muslim thought,

and similarities and differences when compared to biblical passages. The description concludes, professors and students in courses on Islam and the Quran will find this to be an invaluable resource, as will pastors and missionaries who minister among Muslims. Written at a readable level, any Christian who wants to learn more about Islam and the Quran will find it to be a rich and informative introduction, end quote. All right. Well, combining religion with more religion feels like a terrible fucking idea. Yep. And that means we're going to put 30 seconds back on the clock haven't done this in a

while titles for the new christian islamic religious book genre go uh the not so good book the divine tragedy yeah yeah um what about ramadan quixote love it. How about the libel? The Haji's progress. Ooh, halal quiet on the Western front. The man in the iron mosque. Son of man in the iron mosque. Okay.

The Sunni also rises. Excellent. We got some anyway there. Yeah. How about the chronicles of narnia excellent and by the way that last one is definitely the title for the christian slash muslim musical spectacular that we are going to be making yes get excited i feel like hats off to botswana kind of we kind of st. Oh, yeah. You know what I'm saying? Well, you know. Maybe we're going to divert our attention. Broadway's dark, so.

Yeah, it's tough. That's tough phrasing. And we're going to wrap it up right there. Eli, thanks as always. See, this is why I do that part. Fair, fair, fair, fair. Jumanji. And when we come back, Noah will be on the show again

because we have control of the time dimension. Hi, I'm Heath Enright. And I'm Eli Bosnick, inviting you to join us this Saturday at 8 p.m. Eastern for our Stay the Fuck Home live stream on YouTube with special guests, the How To Heretic. home live stream on YouTube with special guests, the how to heretic. We'll be playing games, answering questions, and generally hanging out with the audio uncles you didn't know you loved. Plus, my mom will always be roasting me in the comments. Yeah, she will. It's the best. The Scathing Atheist, stay the fuck home live stream, 8 p.m. Eastern on Saturday. Because if you're stuck inside, you might as well be stuck with us.

One of the tools employed in America's slapdash, uncoordinated, yakety-sack scored response to the coronavirus pandemic is the stay-at-home order, some form of which has been enacted by a number of states that is distressingly lower than 50. But as we've increasingly learned over the last few days, these can be ineffective if redneck conspiracy theorists, sovereign citizens say, nah. So to examine some of the legal repercussions, we're pleased to welcome back the host of the Opening Arguments podcast and friend of the show, Andrew Torres. Andrew, welcome back, sir. Hi, Noah.

Thanks for having me on. Quick trivia question. Do you want to know what every state that lacks a stay-at-home order has in common? I bet you'll never guess. Let's see. My entire lack of interest in ever touristing there. Well, that too. That's among the three people

who have never been in my basement. But I was going for governors with R's after their names. Yeah, yeah. Just once again disproving the both parties are the same argument that I hear so much of. Hear less of that.

So, and by the way way thank you for the cheers reference that all our over 44 listeners will get we like to hit every demographic in order on the show and it's good it's we're late in the show now all right so first things first according to the constitution i have the right to peaceably assemble i So like are these stay at home orders unconstitutional? No. And look, this is super clear, right? So states can't completely disregard your constitutional rights. And we've known that since the aftermath of the Civil War, right? States do have broad police powers, though, to restrict your rights as necessary for health and safety. And the case that you may even see in kind of mainstream press is a 1905 Supreme Court decision. It's called Jacobson versus Massachusetts.

It dealt with a smallpox outbreak in Massachusetts. And the Supreme Court said, yes, the state had the power to force compulsory vaccinations during a smallpox outbreak. And this was 1905, right? So, yeah, not, you know, the states could only do about three things back then. But one of them was force you to get vaccinated so that everybody didn't die of smallpox. Oh, my. I can only imagine what these people would be doing if it came to the point of compulsory vaccinations.

Jesus. would be doing if it came to the point of compulsory vaccinations jesus i mean as long as we're we're doing that rabbit trail the 1905 smallpox vaccine was infecting you with cowpox right yeah yeah and it had a death rate of about 10 percent right so yeah i mean it was a truly a triage moment wow yeah and these people can't even handle you know fucking super cuts being closed for a month so yeah yes wear a bandana around your mouth before going to the mall um law of freedoms anyway all right so i i have to add this one because it's one of the sovereign citizens favorites what about that judicially recognized fundamental right to freedom of movement that i have oh god i'm glad you asked that for for two reasons uh a

because i got to hear that delightful accent and b because this one actually takes a little bit of time to unpack right like that this is one of the things that sovereign citizens do well within their particular brand of crazy, and that is they'll find words that you and I think mean one thing, but lawyers know. Well, not you and I. I guess everybody else thinks means one thing, but lawyers know means something different, right? So let me give you an example before I explain how the right to freedom of movement is one of those things, right? So let me give you an example before I explain how the right to freedom of movement is one of those things, right? The right to privacy. If I say, usually to my mom when I'm 13, I have a right to privacy, that means I want to close my bedroom door and knock before you come in, right? It means don't go looking at my stuff or asking me what I'm doing when the door is

closed, right? The Constitution protects the right to privacy, but it's a very, very different thing, right? It is the right to make personal decisions like whom to marry, whether to have kids, whether to use contraception, right? And I wouldn't use that word, but it's what lawyers used. It's the basis for Roe v. Wade, Griswold v. Connecticut, all of those really important decisions. So, you know, it's an example of where we have a clearly established right that doesn't mean the colloquial definition of the word. to travel means and to understand and unpack it, right? You have to put yourself back in the mindset of the founding fathers at the time of the drafting of the constitution, right? That we're thinking about 18th century continental Europe, where you might have taxes that prevent you from leaving Belgium or entering France or whatever. So all the right to travel means is that if you live in Maryland, they can't tax you if you want to move to Pennsylvania, right? It does not mean you get to drive drunk and slur at the cops,

am I being detained, when they pull you over, right? It just means you can't be forced to stay in one of the states. And again, not, you know, they can't stop you from flying out of an airport. Like, you know, look, there's nothing to stop you right now in any of the stay at home states from, you know, walking across the border into another state. Well, except common sense. I mean, the nearest state to me is Florida. So, yeah. Out of the prime. Well, I don't know.

Yeah, exactly. Getting out of Georgia. Who the hell even I don't know. Yeah, exactly. Getting out of Georgia, who the hell even knows at this point, right? Alright, so this is the legal equivalent of, like, the biological equivalent of that would be, you know, the colloquial versus scientific definition of the word theory that they love to throw around to dismiss evolution.

That's the perfect analogy. I wish I'd thought of it. I'm going to steal it next time. Hey, no problem. No problem. All right. So now, obviously, these stay-at-home orders, they have exceptions for essential businesses. Is that a legally defined thing or is it up to each state to define essential business for themselves? You know, it's actually both, right?

So your governor can define that however she wants, but there is federal guidance. define that however she wants. But there is federal guidance. There is a sub-department of the Department of Homeland Security called CISA, the Cyber Infrastructure Security Administration, which I have to tell you I had not heard of until a month ago. And they've released a critical infrastructure guideline that a lot of states rely on. I'll give that to you. You can link that in the show notes if you want. Oh, sure, will do. I have to wipe a tear from my eye because when you referred to my governor as a female, I thought about how different it would be if we had Abrams. Oh, God. Yeah.

Better world. Better world. All right. So I'm going to put you on the spot. I'm going to promote you to the governor of this podcast. What would be your quick and dirty heuristic for what would count as an essential business? Oh, OK. All right.

Let's see. So liquor stores for me and Heath, dispensaries for you. Oh, yeah. I don't know, vegan grocery stores for Eli. But actually, like the serious answer, right? It was kind of a giveaway in the answer to the last question you asked, right? Which was the Cyber Infrastructure Security Administration, right? There's a reason that agency developed the list, right? Businesses that could work online, could work remotely, should.

That strikes me as a super great heuristic. It's not one that states are following, but that would be mine. Yeah. Well, okay. Well, that brings me to my next question. And like, as we've discussed on this show, some governors have added exemptions for churches as essential businesses, which strike me as places that can work online. Right. Yeah. So so let's turn back to the Constitution. Is there a legitimate concern that these governors have about religious freedom or are these exemptions just pandering?

OK, this is an answer I I would have answered this differently three years ago, pre-Trump, like right in the halcyon days of just starting opening arguments where the answer of what the law is and what will actually happen was usually the same thing. And the answer should be no. was usually the same thing. And the answer should be no, there would be no concern about not identifying a church as an essential business. But over the weekend, a Trump appointee, John W. Brooms, who graduated from the nation's 107th rated law school, lost his goddamn mind. So yeah, who knows now? Yeah, yeah. Okay. So that kind of leads us to the reason why i frantically emailed you over the weekend and said oh god andrew please tell me you can come on the show on thursday let's turn our weary eyes to kansas where over the week said federal judge blocked the governor's order that limited church attendance to 10 people or fewer. What the hell happened

there? Yeah, let's kind of start at 30,000 feet and then go into the order. Because on a macro level, what happened is the unintended but completely foreseeable consequences of the fact that the Roberts Court's jurisprudence on religious liberty issues makes absolutely no sense. And this is something I've talked about on your show, on opening arguments, to strangers on the bus shouting from rooftops. Ever since the court's decision in Trinity Lutheran back in 2017, where I came on your show and ranted for like an hour and a half, right? Like, here's what happened, okay?

for like an hour and a half, right? Like, here's what happened, okay? Before 2017, we basically had three to five decades of a workable First Amendment jurisprudence in this country, okay? It wasn't perfect, but we knew what things meant, right? So the First Amendment has two prongs that apply to religion, right? There is the Congress shall pass no law respecting an establishment of religion, that's the Establishment Clause, nor prohibiting the free exercise thereof, that's the Free Exercise Clause. And so here's how it broke down. For free exercise, so long as you had a neutral law, even if it incidentally burdened your religion practice, tough shit, right? That's Employment Division versus Smith, right? That's employment division versus Smith, right? And for establishment clause, it was a little more complicated, but we had a case called

Lemon versus Kurtzman dating all the way back to 1971, right? So half a century, pretty solid jurisprudence that said, okay, what the court has to do, what government really has to do is stay neutral on religious matters, right? It can't intend to either promote or inhibit. It can't have the primary effect of either promoting or inhibiting, and it can't excessively entangle itself with religious stuff. You know, stay out. Again, there was some criticism. There are scholarly law review articles that criticized both the Smith and the Lemon decisions, but we knew what the law was. And the problem was that the pro-religious contingent on the Supreme Court didn't want

neutrality. They wanted the government to aid religion, and they also wanted to pretend like they care about the First Amendment. So they started coming up with these outcome-driven opinions, like Trinity Lutheran, that literally do not cite any cases in terms of creating brand new rules about what counts in cases that involve churches, right? And even though, like, all the commentators were talking about how narrow Trinity Lutheran, like, I came out and I said, look, the dangerous thing here is that it says you are entitled to a neutral and unbiased evaluation of your religious beliefs. And no one, not even us lawyers, knows what the hell that means. And that was the same problem in Masterpiece Cake Shop in, you know, again, in which the like the facts don't care about your feelings crowd all of a sudden meant oh well i mean not not my feelings right so right yeah right yeah so here's the heart right you at the supreme court essentially get rid

of the lemon test they have essentially without said it got gotten rid of employment division versus smith that's coming probably in the next term they're going to specifically overrule that and what we're left with is and it's just kind of whatever you want and shocker a lot of judges especially judges in kansas want christianity yeah yeah yeah especially trump appointed judges in kansas don't worry they're all 27 you know they'll be gone soon our great great grandkids are going to accelerate the revolution i promise yeah yeah right okay so but now this judge i i haven't read a whole hell of a lot about this because i knew you were going to come on and and have done my homework for me but this judge said that the order that the that the kansas order the stay-at-home order showed hostility towards churches. Yeah. So did Kansas Governor Laura Kelly add a P.S.

Jesus can go fuck himself into stigmata at the end of this thing or what? OK, this is actually what what makes me angriest about this opinion, because it is to use a legal term, 100 percent bullshit. because it is, to use a legal term, 100% bullshit. And you can read this for yourself in the procedural history, which is included in this judge's opinion. Wow. But let me explain this out because this is the exact opposite of hostility towards churches. But hostility was the buzzword that was used in Masterpiece Cake Shop that no one knows what it means.

So that's what they had to cram this into in order to strike it down. Gotcha. So here's what happened. Like a lot of states, Kansas has been issuing executive orders successively, right, as the problem gets worse. So the first EO was promulgated over a month ago, March 17th, and it prohibited mass gatherings of 50 or more people and also shut down both public and private schools in Kansas. That's how they started. Then a week later, they defined mass gatherings instead of being 50 people

as 10 people. And then three days after that, March 27th, Kansas issued its stay-at-home ruling. That was EO 20-16. And in evaluating this hostility claim, I want you to understand EO 20-16, the stay at home ruling, exempted churches, left them out, said you could still go to church because, you know, even though the governor is a Democrat, it's Kansas, right? Right. But you know what? You give a church an inch and they'll bus in 29 loads of people to drink out of the same glass, lick each other and scream demons out, right? They will. Yeah, I've seen them do it.

Oh, yeah. So 11 days after that first EO, that EO 2016 was promulgated way later than it should have been. Governor Kelly promulgated EO 20-18, right? Which added churches and other religious buildings to the list of places where you can't gather more than 10 people at a time because duh, right? And then it said this, and I'm going to read this directly, again, from page three of this judge's order, okay? So, this is what EO 20-18 said. With regard to churches or other religious services or activities, this order prohibits gatherings of more than 10 congregants or parishioners in the same building or confined or enclosed space. However, the number of individuals,

such as preachers, lay readers, choir, or musical performers or liturgists conducting or performing a religious service may exceed 10 so long as those individuals follow appropriate safety protocols, including maintaining a six-foot distance between individuals and following other directives regarding social distancing, hygiene, and other efforts to slow the spread of COVID-19. That is what this judge found hostile to religion. Yeah, go ahead. Well, no, my simple question was, what? That's it?

Yeah. There's no but at the end of that? No, it is a provision that is objectively less hostile than it is to secular businesses, right? It is complete madness. And what this judge did was sort of seized on the fact that the executive orders went from excluding, right, like had to talk about churches specifically, right? Right. Like had to talk about churches specifically. Right. As opposed to, you know, you could have just said as an executive order, you are prohibited from gathering in groups of 10 or more at any public place. And such public places include but are not limited to and then listed all of your, you know, theaters, amphitheaters, public theaters, closets, churches. Well, you know, stuck it in a list of like 90 different things. But this judge still would have said, oh, yeah, but you put churches on the list.

Right. So that's a form of hostility. It's madness. The Tenth Circuit, which is where this is going to be appealed, will almost certainly overturn this judge's order. It is nonsense. But yeah, it's a victory for Jesus as of right now. Wow. All right. So you kind of already hinted at this at the answer to this question. But just to be clear on this, if a federal judge

negates this order, does that affect similar orders in other states? Yeah. And so there are a couple of things to think about here. It's a double edged sword, right, which is on the one hand, because things are moving quickly, a lot of the power is going to be in the hands of individual federal district court judges. And you never know when you're going to get a Trump appointee like John W. Brooms, who apparently doesn't care about what the law is. But the good thing about that, so that's a bad thing if you happen to live in Kansas. The good thing is that one federal district court judge's decision does not bind any other federal district court outside of that district, right? So other states, other courts are

free to treat an order as persuasive, right? Which means they can say, you know, the court considered this issue and, you know, blah, blah, blah. But they're also free to say that's not persuasive. All right. So at the risk of closing this on a positive note, infrequent as they have been, there actually are a couple of cases where religious leaders who have defied orders are being held to account by state and local governments. Most notably, you've got Roy Moore's client, Tony Spell, and the man with the science fiction anti-germ laser guns, Rodney Howard Brown. Now, I don't expect you to comment on those cases in particular, but like in general, can pastors who hold services in defiance of these orders be punished?

They can, but in case we were in any danger of ending this segment on a positive note, let me tell you as a practical matter, they will not be. The purpose of promulgating the orders and publicly arresting the pastors who defy those orders is to try and protect human beings, right? Is to try and actually break up these gatherings and hopefully deter future conduct. We'll see if that works, but I can assure you, right? Like courts are not processing cases right now.

When they do, I promise you that these will be dropped. None of these pastors are going to have to worry about paying fines or let alone serving time in jail. But hopefully it will get somebody to behave in a somewhat rational manner. Well, one thing's for sure, regardless of the outcome, they will act like fucking martyrs about it. I guarantee you that much. And you wouldn't believe the month in which I had to broadcast these sermons on the internet like a common podcaster. Yeah, right.

All right. So if you're thinking to yourself, by the way, wow, Andrew sure did clarify those legal issues and made complex matters entertaining and easy to digest. I would encourage you to check him out on the Opening Arguments podcast where he does that all the time. Andrew, thank you so much for stopping by. With a setup like that, anytime now. Before we toss this episode on the counter and ring the bell, I wanted to let you know that my guest appearance streak is going to continue once more. Look for me on an upcoming episode of The Thinking Atheist with Seth Andrews. Had an awesome time hanging out with him, trying to

sort out what the fuck is wrong with the world. So keep an eye on our Facebook page and at PIA Teapot on Twitter. We'll send out links as soon as they're available. Anyway, that's all the blast movies we've got for you tonight. But we'll be back in 10,022 minutes with more. If you can't wait that long, be on the lookout for a brand new episode of our sister show, The Skeptocrat, debuting at 7 a.m. Eastern on Monday. An even newer episode of our sister show's hot friend, Godolph Movies, debuting at 7 a.m. Eastern on Tuesday. And an even newer episode of our half-sister show, Citation Needed, debuting at noon Eastern on Wednesday. Obviously, this would

be at least a W short of a show if I neglected to thank Keith Enright for atlasing the fuck out of the headlines this week. I want to thank Eli Bosnick for eventually agreeing that just because it would be funny if his audio was too quiet for anybody to hear this week doesn't mean that we should do that. I also want to thank the lovely and talented Lucinda Lusions, who definitely still exists and has not been kidnapped by aliens or anything. I promise twim is coming back soon, probably next week. Lucinda spine. Thanks for asking.

And also want to thank Andrew Torres one more time for helping arm us all against the upcoming argument with aunt Kathy. Definitely check out the opening arguments podcast. If you're not already a subscriber, great show. Also, I want to thank our contact in the deep state for providing this week's Farnsworth quote.

And Hey, don't get me wrong. I am glad to know somebody's out there with Wharton Trump, but behoove you to thwart a little harder. Like just a little, little bit, little. Anyway, yeah, I'm in Georgia. You know, life depends on it anyway. But thanks for what you're doing, though.

Seriously, seriously. But most of all, of course, I want to thank this week's best people. Colton, Scott, Trent, other Scott, Eric, Robert, Lisa, CTK, too much musing, New Age turmoil, Sorden, Bull, Greg, Karsten, Evan, Franklin, Frank and York. Colton, Scott, Trent, other Scott, Eric, Robert, Lisa, CTK, Too Much Musing, New Age, Turmoil, Sorden, Bull, Gray, Karsten, Evan, Franklin, Frank, and Yorch. Colton, Scott, Trent, Other, Scott, Eric, and Robert, whose dicks are so big you kind of have to call them Richards, Lisa, CTK, Too Much Musing, New Age, Turmoil, Sorden, and Bull,

who raised the intellectual bar so much that those tiny little coops are now called moderately intelligent cars, and Gary, Karsten, Evan, Franklin, Frank, and Yorch, whose sexual prowess has Jesus soliciting second-coming lessons from them. Together, these 18 A-O-cathists aided our aims to alienate Abrahamic a-holes this week by giving us money. Not everybody is fortunate enough to be in that expendable income situation, but if you are and you'd like to give money to us, you can make a per-episode donation to patreon.com slash scathingatheist, whereby you'll earn early access to an extended ad-free version of every episode,

or you can make a one-time donation by clicking on the donate button on the right side of the homepage at scathingatheist.com slash skatingadeus, whereby you'll earn early access to an extended ad-free version of every episode. Or you can make a one-time donation by clicking on the Donate button on the right side of the homepage at skatingadeus.com. Legal services for this podcast are provided by the Law Offices of P. Andrew Torres, Tim Robinson, Hansel Social Media, and our audio engineer is Morgan Clark, who also wrote all the music that was used in this episode, which was used with permission. If you have questions, comments, or death threats, you'll find all the contact info on the contact page at skatingadeus.com. A Mickey Mouse here? Yeah. Is he like,

what's Scrooge? Like that guy? Yeah, you know, Mickey, ho ho! Yeah, you know, Mickey, okay, man. The preceding podcast was a production of

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