The Scathing Atheist - 429: Irritable Powell Syndrome Edition

Episode Date: May 6, 2021

On this week’s episode: Josh Duggar is STILL a pedophile ... Religion continues to act like soccer hooligans but without the soccer ... And we’ll make Callie Wright watch a Matt Powell video. --- To make a per episode donation at Patreon.com, click here: http://www.patreon.com/ScathingAtheist To buy our book, click there: https://www.amazon.com/Outbreak-Crisis-Religion-Ruined-Pandemic/dp/B08L2HSVS8/ 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 our half-sister show, Citation Needed, click here: http://citationpod.com/ To check out our sister show’s sister show, D and D minus, click here: https://danddminus.libsyn.com/ To hear more from our intrepid audio engineer Morgan Clarke, click here: https://www.morganclarkemusic.com/ --- Headlines: Stampede in Israel leads to 45 deaths: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/30/world/middleeast/israel-stampede.html Josh Duggar is still evil: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2021/04/30/josh-duggar-faces-20-years-in-jail-for-receiving-and-possessing-child-porn/

When you need to work quickly and confidently, you need Grammarly. It's a trusted AI writing partner that helps you get work done faster with better writing. And it works where you work, across 500,000 apps and websites. 96% of users agree Grammarly helps them craft more impactful writing. Get AI writing support that works where you work. Sign up and download for free at grammarly.com slash podcast. That's grammarly.com slash podcast. That's Grammarly.com slash podcast. Grammarly.

Easier said, done. all birds. My sheets rock. And by vaccines. The reason you're probably alive right now. Vaccines. Because not dying is preferable for some of us. And now, the scathing atheist. Yo, it's me, Marky Mark. Here off the set of We Bought a Zoo Too, please take back this zoo to tell you that we did in fact evolve from filthy monkey men. It's Thursday. It's May 6th. And it's International No Diet Day and National Beverage Day. Same day. Yeah, so when you're drinking the blood of Christ, go hard, everybody.

I'm Eli Bosnick. I'm Heath Enright. And from John Stewart's, New Jersey. Hell yeah. Drew Carey's, Ohio. This Hell yeah! Drew Carries, Ohio. This is The Scathing Atheist. This week's episode, Josh Duggar is still a pedophile.

Religion continues to act like soccer hooligans, but without the soccer. That's fun. And we'll make Callie Wright watch a Matt Powell video. We will. But first, The Eliatride. You want to know one of the best things about being an atheist? I get to be wrong. I'm serious. There's nothing I believe or know that I can't change my mind about given new evidence. I am an ontological floozy, my friends, and I am proud of it. If tomorrow NASA announces that the moon is made out of cheese,

you and me, we get to line up with our fondue forks first. I mean, if you're like me, maybe a Facebook, a few of your smarter friends first to, if you're like me, maybe a Facebook, a few of your smarter friends first to make sure you're not just misreading the headlines, but then it's all good, baby. I hope it's cheddar. And that's great because I don't know about you, but I'm wrong a lot. I mean, sure, sometimes I've been wrong about fun stuff like how to pronounce chimera, but I've also been wrong about a bunch of not fun stuff too. At various times in my life, I have held deeply racist, homophobic, transphobic, and just plain stupid opinions. And yes, I am incredibly lucky. I had patient friends and family and teachers that changed my mind at those times. But I also had an ideological

framework that could change. And religious people don't have that privilege because at the foundation of all religious belief is an infinite, universal, and unchangeable truth. Otherwise, it's not religion. And a religious person, no matter how woke, intelligent, or intellectually curious, by definition of being religious, has to run everything they know through the filter of that unchanging truth. They have to run every new true thing they learn by a pastor or a holy book, or at the very least a worldview. And they have to say to themselves, is this one of those true things I'm allowed to believe? Or is this one of the ones that I have to ignore? And the thing is, Joel Osteen, he never gets to change his mind. Not about gay marriage,

neither does Ray Comfort or Franklin Graham. They have denied themselves one of the best parts of being human, which is changing your mind and growing because of it. Look, I'm not claiming to and growing because of it. Look, I'm not claiming to know the meaning of life or even that there is one, but if there is, that's pretty fucking close. And look, don't get me wrong. I don't want you to think that I'm saying all religious people are bigots, but none of them aren't bigots because of their religion. We've made our way through pretty much all the major holy books on this show, and I have yet to find one that would leave anybody less bigoted. And yeah, modern religious people can find bits of nice poetry here and there and apply messages of tolerance to them, but

only by ignoring the other parts in the same book that in no uncertain terms clarifies that you got to kill a gay guy and witches with rocks. And this isn't an accident, right? Religion was made up exactly for this reason, so that people don't have to change their mind. Why hasn't Steven Anderson changed his mind about trans people in spite of overwhelming scientific evidence? Because the 2,000-year-old book he's based his morality around hasn't changed, And it never will. I mean, look, religion doesn't keep a lot of promises, but that is the promise it keeps. We will sell you a worldview, and you will never, ever have to change it. Because changing your mind about shit that matters, it's fucking hard.

It's embarrassing, and it's's uncomfortable and nobody likes doing it. But we have to. If we're going to move forward as a species, we have to be willing to admit when we're wrong and we have to change as a result. The truth has to matter, even if it means looking in the mirror and seeing some stuff we're not proud of. Now, me, I get the privilege of doing that publicly. My pronunciation of nuclear is burned into the digital record. But the stuff you're wrong about is probably not. You get to correct your mistakes a lot less publicly. And you get to correct them now.

You don't need anybody's permission but your own. So let me ask you, what are you wrong about? And what are you going to do about it? They're talking about you, Jesus. I interrupt this broadcast and bring you a special news bulletin. Joining me for headlines tonight is the Thelma to my Louise, Eli Bosnick. Eli, I guess, are you ready for a romantic road trip to the Grand Canyon? Maybe you let me drive for that one?

I told you, you can drive on the way back up, Keith. You can drive on the way back up. Great. In our lead story tonight, we have a tricky situation, honestly. Yeah. 45 people were trampled to death, possibly more. Hundreds more were definitely injured during a human stampede in Moron, Israel last week. Obviously, that's a tragic, tragic incident. So the tricky part is assigning blame and making snide remarks. But luckily, that's like our whole thing. We have a lot of experience with this right in the wheelhouse. I think we'll figure it out.

And there's definitely some blame to go around mostly for religion conceptually the entire reason for the gathering of about a hundred thousand people in a tiny area on mount maron during a global pandemic was the holiday of log bomare it was extremely important because of that holiday for a hundred thousand people to get together right fucking now without skipping one single version of that holiday to celebrate the death of a rabbi from about 1900 years ago. That rabbi revealed how Kabbalah firebending works. So they had to have the holiday. He did. Against government advisement, by the way. Keep in mind,

Israel is just starting to get a lid on COVID through their vaccination program. So a 100,000 person birthday party is exactly the opposite of what they needed. Yep, sure is exactly the opposite. So the event turned into a tragedy when some people started leaving the magic firebending area at the top of that mountain and walking down a ramp. Apparently, it was slippery from spilled water and spilled grape juice, and people fell down on that ramp. And then everyone else just kept going. Nobody seems to know what caused the sudden urgency, but everyone started pouring out immediately, trampling a bunch of people. Yeah, that's a very nice and not at all anti-Semitic way to tell the story, Heath.

I agree. Based on early reports, Orthodox Jews managed to find the one spot police had asked them not to trample down. And they were like, I must trample down this stairwell. It could not have been any more stereotypical of my people if the cause was that someone had dropped a penny. Okay, so we could have just gone with my explanation that was not anti-Semitic. That's what Eli said. Okay, here's the terrifying reality. The 45 trampling fatalities might actually be lower than the death toll from COVID that's going to butterfly out from this gathering.

It might. Israel had a pretty good rollout on the vaccine, like Eli said, but the ultra-Orthodox community is exactly who wasn't getting enough of the shot. And the event had thousands of kids from that community who were under 16 and couldn't get the vaccine even if they wanted to get it. and couldn't get the vaccine even if they wanted to get it. Also, this tradition was flagged a while ago as an absurd idea, even when there's not a plague. In 2008 and 2011, a government watchdog agency told everyone,

guys, this is going to end really badly at some point, I guarantee you. And in 2013, the regional police chief in that area said, we really need to shut this down because a literal stampede might happen. Those are my words right now. We might talk about this later. And then in 2018, a prominent journalist and a member of the ultra-Orthodox community actually called the venue a death trap. Exact words.

All that being said, on the other hand, old-timey firebending magic. Firebending magic, yeah, exactly. You know, Jews are fond of saying the world tries to kill us once a generation. Is it our turn this generation, guys? Is that what we're doing? I didn't get the email.

I've been missing the meetings. But are we doing it, this one? All right. And just for context, I looked up the history of stampedes. And in the last century. Okay. They only seem to happen for three reasons. The first is an outside influence, like a bomb or a fire in a building or structure collapsing.

Good reason for a stampede. Those are a little bit more reasonable. Yes. The second is mostly drunk idiots at a soccer game or structure collapsing. Good reason for a stampede. Those are a little bit more reasonable, yes. The second is mostly drunk idiots at a soccer game or a concert. Okay. And pretty much every single other stampede of human beings in the last century

is a religion thing with way too many people in a small area. Yeah. So just in case blocking science and godly bigotry and war and genocide and oh, I forgot. Yeah. Raping children in case all that didn't have you on, you know, organized religion is a problem. It also leads to human beings trampling other human beings to death more than almost any other thing human beings do.

Also, people need to calm the fuck down about the sports team they're not even a member of. I think that's the other big takeaway. Okay, this from the guy who yells, go Yankees at everyone wearing a Yankees hat. Have you ever seen this? Okay, at least say go Yankees back. I'm just saying. I will start a stampede.

See? All right, see, I see what happened. I see what happened there. It's tricky. I didn't take away what happened. I see what happened there. It's tricky. I didn't take away my takeaway. I'm calming down. Heath stampeded around in a little circle around our studio. You guys couldn't see.

I really did. I really did. He got me. I tried to get Eli down. We wrestled for a second. Hey, he's weirdly strong. On that note, we're going to take a quick break. For a word from our sponsor, Allbirds.

He'll love that. Hey, podcast listener. I'm Heath Enright. Heath, wait. Don't do this. Eli, I was just about to talk about our brand new sponsor, Allbirds. What's wrong? I know, but we can't sell our podcast listeners all the birds.

It's bad for the planet. They pollinate the flowers and stuff for their honey. Okay, yes. First of all, pretty sure you're thinking of bees, not birds. Secondly, Allbirds isn't a company that sells all the birds. I get that

those words are there. They make shoes. Oh. Shoes? Yeah, shoes. But if you're worried about the planet, good news. Allbirds tree runners are made from sustainable natural materials that feel light on your feet and are better for the planet. The Tree Runners are breathable, machine washable, and made with responsibly sourced eucalyptus tree fiber. Plus, simple and versatile design makes the Tree Runner a perfect to-go shoe for any outfit.

And they're good for the earth? Yep. Even their packaging is made from 90% recycled cardboard that's a shoe box, shopping bag, and mailer all in one. Wow. But are they actually like nice shoes? They are nice shoes. Allbirds sent us a pair to try, and they're my new walking around the house shoe and my new walking around the town shoe. They're stylish and breezy in a way that's perfect for any look that you've got going.

Ooh, that does sound good. Heath, where do I check them out? This spring, keep things light and breezy with the Allbirds Tree Runner. Discover your perfect pair at allbirds.com today. That's A-L-L-B-I-R-D-S dot com. Allbirds. Despite our company name, we are not trying to sell you all the birds. I don't really think they need that tagline.

Oh, they need it. I think everybody got it. And we're back. And in news from the pedophile, Josh Duggar is still a pedophile. But, but, the good news is it looks like he's about to go to jail for 40 years.

Yeah, okay. Silver lining, I guess. Feels weird to call that a win in 2021, but we're going to take what we can get. Yeah. Right. So here's the backstory for those of you lucky enough to have missed it. Way back in the day, Duggar was featured on the Learning Channel on a little program called 19 Kids and Counting because the forced breeding of evangelical Christians is a

terrible idea and I can't believe it's legal wasn't catchy enough to put on the TV guide. Right. Yeah. I remember that show or as I like to call it, 18 counts no kidding. Something like that. That's so good. So good. I demand a total and complete halt to the podcast. We should have a moment of silence for how good that joke is. That joke actually aged better. Well, I don't want this bad phrase. Aged better than Josh. You know what?

You get it. Go ahead. You got it. Anyway, we all had a really good time pointing and laughing at this family until 2015 when it came out that Duggar had been accused of molesting four of his sisters and another girl. came out that Duggar had been accused of molesting four of his sisters and another girl. TLC promptly canceled the show because they had no idea members of an End Times cult might have some unhealthy thoughts about things.

Shocking. Yeah. At least they canceled it. But there were still plenty of healthy shows to watch on TLC. They had Return to Amish. Fantastic. That's about a healthy cult, I guess. They had Sex Sent Me to the ER. They had Extreme Couponing.

They had Long Island Medium. And they had two different shows. Two different shows with an ethnic slur for the Romani people in the title. Yeah. Great job, TLC. Different time. Different time. Not a better time, just a different one. That cake boss. Say yes to the dress, too. Cake boss, what? Yeah. He wasn't sure if he could make that cake, but in the episode, he made that cake.

But having your show canceled because you're a fucking creep didn't stop the Duggars from portraying themselves as political and moral figures, which ironically included participation in robocalls from Josh's mom, Michelle Duggar, in 2014 against LGBTQ people, in which she said, literal, irony-drenched quote, I doubt that Fayetteville parents would stand for a law that would endanger their daughters or allow them to be traumatized by a man joining them in their private space. Interesting. We should never place the preference of an adult over the safety and innocence of a child. End real quote. Yikes. Wow. Okay. Well, it sounds like Michelle Duggar would probably be cool with a pedophile bathroom bill, right?

I mean, that would mean Josh has to like shit in his hand and hold it until outdoor time at prison. You know, there's no kids in prison, but, you know, just in case. Just in case, take your kid to prison day, probably for the best. So that policy is going to make it really hard to imagine the next family photo for the Duggars. But as I hinted last week, Josh was arrested for the receipt and possession of child pornography. Because if there's anything you can learn from listening to this podcast, it's anytime a Christian warns you about anything, they're talking about themselves or their family. Sure the fuck are. By the way, Josh Duggar was also an executive director at the Family Research Council.

Huh. Have they said anything about this recently? Have you heard them say? Did they make a statement? I'm going to check there. Nothing? Are they talking about this? Let me refresh.

Yep, still nothing. Still nothing? That's so weird. You figured they'd say something. And speaking of things you can do in your bedroom to make the FRC angry, let's hear from this week's next sponsor, My Sheets Rock. Hey there, cats and kittens. Do you like to keep it smooth?

Oh, hello. I was just relaxing in this robe. I stole it from the hotel at QED. Do you like to keep things cool? Would you like a warm bottle of green tea? I keep them under my bed because you technically don't have to refrigerate them. Well, no sexy bedroom is complete without the regulator sheets from MySheetsRock. I could get you a glass, but I only have one and it's dirty.

The regulator sheets are designed specifically to keep hot sleepers cool and cold sleepers comfortable. They regulate temperature, wick moisture, stay breathable, and are so soft you'll sleep comfortable every night. That's because these sheets are made from best-in-class bamboo rayon, the holy grail of sheeting. This miracle material transfers body heat two times more effectively than regular sheets and reduces humidity by 50% so you can experience your best night's sleep yet, or whatever you do in the bedroom. We could watch The Office on my laptop. I like the early seasons.

In fact, my sheets Rock sent us a pair to try and they were so smooth and silky, my voices sounded like this ever since. But what if I don't believe you? Don't believe me? Their five-star customer reviews speak for themselves. Plus, they offer a 90-day risk-free trial and free shipping and returns. Check out MySheetsRock at MySheetsRock.com slash scathing and enter rock code scathing for 10% off and free shipping.

That's MySheetsRock.com slash scathing, code scathing. My Sheets Rock, keeping things cool and smooth in the bedroom. I only have one charger and I'm using it. Stop, don't unplug it. So Matt Powell is a creationist pastor and our employee here at Puzzle in the Thunderstorm, who is working off his very substantial debt for copyright infringement. You might remember him from Science Falsely So-Called,

about how he pwned evolution with facts and logic, or his video debunking the surfing monkey theory of allopatric speciation, or his video debunking the dinosaurs farted themselves into extinction theory of atheist biology. It's a big one. And given his field of expertise, it made perfect sense for him to make a video about Columbine. So that's what we're going to talk about on this week's God Awful Mini. Eli's already here on the show, so he doesn't need another intro.

That was a very messy fight that we had. I hate that. But he's here. Hello, Eli. Hello. Hello. I've been in. And we're joined by veteran guest masochist and host of the Queersplaining podcast, Callie

Wright. Callie, welcome back. Oh, thank you for having me. This movie was fucking great. I'm so excited. All right. Let's get right into it. Callie, I already hinted at the topic.

Let's make it official. What god-awful mini are we going to be breaking down today? So we watched Columbine, 22nd anniversary documentary, in parentheses, for some reason, by Matt Powell. It is the story of one man's desperate and failed attempt to use iMovie. It really is. It's perfect encapsulation. And Eli, how bad was this mini? Well, if you're already impressed with Matt Powell's measured and thoughtful approach to science,

and you'd like to see if he can do worse at history than the time he thought pterodactyls were in the Civil War, you will love this YouTube video. That's a real thing, though. It's a real thing about pterodactyls in the Civil War. So we're going to start with exactly zero seconds before it goes off the rails. The very first thing we get is a title card that says Evolution Inspired Columbine. That's the thesis statement. And I really need to say at the beginning, I'm a Matt Powell virgin.

I'd never actually watched anything by him before. Watching his delivery just made me wish we were watching a ben shapiro video he lacks the charm and the camera presence of the wet ass pussy aficionado the bobblehead thing that he's got going on gravitas i also love that matt wore his serious mass shooting track suit for this yes he did, he did. He has one of those. He's wearing it. But again, just to be clear, the thesis is the Columbine shooters were like poetically inspired

by the amazing journey of single-celled organisms, like a muse. That's what he's saying throughout this ridiculous mini. Yeah. Yeah. He tells us that they did it

on Hitler's birthday. They loved Hitler. Yeah. And. He tells us that they did it on Hitler's birthday. They loved Hitler. Yeah. And then he concludes by going, I'm Matt Powell and I've spent multiple hours

of research on this. Which I feel like that's true. I feel like that's the truth. Yeah. I bet you did. Also, by the way, he's clearly borrowed somebody's living room to shoot this that has like a grown up couch to distract us from the fact that he lives on bunk beds in real reality.

I was going to say, after the last review we did, he was like, fine, no more shooting on the bunk beds. Now you've ruined it for everyone. We also get a clip from ABC News here, you know, around the time of Columbine right after it. And apparently ABC News had like a jaunty graphic when they reported the Columbine shooting. Thank you. That graphic says high school massacre, but it's on a it's on a piece of notebook paper with bullet holes instead of three ring binder holes. Who fucking decided to have that? Who's like, let's get our graphics guy to punch up a nice fun graphic for this. What the fuck?

And like, I have lots of friends who are journalists. And so like, I have an idea of how many layers of approval that had to go through. There had to have been at least four or five people that were like, oh yeah, yeah. Bullet holes in notebook paper. That's good. Let's go with that graphic.

That is the gravitas that we're looking for when we talk about this school shooting. Here is the thing I learned from this video. It's none of the things Matt Powell wanted me to. It's that the tone of the news around the Columbine shooting was fucking weird. Okay? Throughout this video,

he will show news clips, and at various points, it'll be like, the mass shooters entered the cafeteria. But at other times, it'll be like, the mass shooters entered the cafeteria. But at other times, it'll be like, the mass shooters entered the cafeteria. Now let's go to Bob for the weekly movie review. Ridiculous.

Yes. And this little scene ends with Matt Powell saying out loud, I'm an avid historian of Nazi-inspired mass shooters. I did extensive research about why they did it. By the way, spoiler, it's the amoebas. That's the theory.

So now we're going to cut to some more news footage of Columbine High School and the interviews with the survivors of the massacre. And I just wrote in my notes, it's weird that these kids grew up and didn't pass gun control, huh? That's weird, right? Yeah.

Yeah. And also during one of these news clips, again, from ABC, they had someone write like a Woodwind medley for the Columbine sitcom that they seem to be presenting to us. It was really weird stuff. And this is like, I'm just going to be ragging on the production. As someone who makes videos and podcasts, I was wondering why it was intercut with a dramatization of kids murdering other kids. And I was like, where did this come from? And so he stole that clip from another YouTube that stole a documentary someone else made.

And I feel like that completely sums this movie up. It sure does. Honestly, photocopy of a photocopy while trying not to get the watermark is a great description of Matt Powell as a human being let alone as a documentarian it's so like weirdly zoomed in so like half of the name on the watermark

is cropped out but there's like one clip where he doesn't and that's how I was able to find it. That's amazing. Okay. One quote from this scene that I want to mention. He says the shooters were bullied and they turned to their belief system for comfort. That belief system was survival of the fittest.

Okay. So just to be clear, at least one of the shooters was most certainly a Christian. That's just a fact. It's so ridiculous. Also, you can't use atheism to get to violence. It's so dumb. Yes, some atheists are violent, but you don't get there because of the atheism. It's ridiculous.

Yeah, it's really hard to find the advocation for violence in our holy book that doesn't exist. Yeah, it's really hard to find the advocation for violence in our holy book that doesn't exist. He also says here that they were avid believers in racism. Hard cut while Matt apologizes to racists. So, throughout, we're going to get to my absolute favorite part

of this in just a second, but throughout this, Matt will be like, they were racists and there will always be a cut and I cannot imagine it's not because Matt always finishes that sentence with, and look, I get it. I get it. He also says the media never reported that the shooters were Nazi evolutionists.

Yeah, they fucking did. A bunch of them did. And right after he says that, they immediately cut to a reporter saying they wore Nazi crosses. So yes, they did. And right after he says that, they immediately cut to a reporter saying they wore Nazi crosses. So yes, they did. Matt, you made the documentary, buddy. You stole this and stuck it into iMovie. You don't have to disprove yourself one point after the other. Yeah. This is just like every time somebody's like such and such happened and no one's talking about it. I'm like, hmm, I wonder. Google search five mainstream news outlets talking about it within the last day and I just like send

that screenshot over. There you go. Casual Google. He's wrong every time. Yeah. However, this is where we will meet the star of this mini documentary, Matt Powell trying to use air quotes. It will be for the first time right here around the word

mystery and it's like a gerbil trying to escape a glass enclosure, my be for the first time right here around the word mystery. And it's like a gerbil trying to escape a glass enclosure, my friends. He's like, they say it's a mystery why they did it. And I'm like, no, it's not. It's not the tone or the gesture, Matt. Not the tone or the gesture. Not at all how air quotes work. At one point, he starts to do air quotes

on something equally ridiculous. And he looks at his own air quotes. He like turns his palms up and is like, what am I doing right now? What is this gesture accomplishing for me? Am I the quote? Not the best at ad-libbing, Matt Powell. Not the best at ad-libbing.

And if he has a script, it's even worse. He also points out that Eric Harris, one of the Columbine shooters, created a website that had the word evolution on it. Yup. Yeah. I mean, he also liked Smash Mouth. He had a Smash Mouth playlist.

Maybe he murdered to be an all-star. Like, what the fuck kind of reasoning is that? Yeah. Why would someone put stuff on the internet that demonstrates how little they know about a thing? That's weird. Why would anyone do that, Matt? So now he's going to repeat the weird Rachel Joy Scott quote thing.

So for those of you who don't know, Rachel Joy Scott was one of the girls who was killed in the Columbine shooting. And her mom wrote a book where it appears she made up this thing about the killers grabbing rachel and asking her if she believed in god and then shooting her and maybe she was told that by a student but there's not a lot of corroborating sources and this is a grieving parent so i want to be gentle however i don't have to be gentle to matt powell's version where he's like so there she was lying on the ground in a pool of her own blood. And I showed up with a machine gun and killed Richard Dawkins. I mean, I think

absolute. Okay. This narrative again, grieving parents. Okay. I get it. But like, it's directly contradicted by an eyewitness and a 911 tape, right? This is not what happened. Like Rachel who got killed definitely didn't say, yes, I believe in God. This is not what happened. Like Rachel who got killed definitely didn't say, yes, I believe in God, gunshot. Not what happened. Yeah. Embarrassing admission here.

I was still kind of in my Christian phase when all this went down and I totally like bought that hook, line and sinker. And if we're not friends anymore, I understand. Hey, so did I. I was like, oh, it's so sad and terrible. Also like who at the time was going to be like, I think the dead girl's mom is fucking lying.

Right, right, right. But if you're Matt Powell, it means that you've got to pair up your own weird narration with a clip from the movie. I'm not ashamed, which is GAM episode 63, which is GAM episode 63. And also her mom's weird lie turned into a full-length movie it's gross and in that clip rachel in the movie i'm not ashamed has a gun to her head the killer has just said hey do you still believe in god after all this problem of evil right and she's like you know i still do and the killer says then go be with him and she smiles as he executes her because she's going to heaven now yeah it's so fucking

manipulative but don't worry if you were bummed out by the real death of that girl now matt powell is entirely going to get the fuck off script and say that the Columbine killers then walked around the rest of the school shooting all the students who said yes, which is not just totally made up out of Matt Powell's head. It's also a ridiculous image. The idea that, hey, do you believe in God? Blam. Do you believe in God? Blam. You'd think someone would have started saying no at some point, Matt. Yeah. they run into a room and they're like, okay, hands up if you're Christian. And they shot the Christian hands that went up only. First of all, absolutely not. Second of all, they planned to set off bombs in the school.

I'm assuming those weren't Christian exclusive bombs somehow with like magnets. No. And over this, they have this 911 call tape, which again, maybe the wrong thing to fixate on. Why was the inverted exclamation point in the quote like over the badly cropped

picture of the person where he's talking about them killing the Christian kids and the tape is literally of someone just saying like, oh my God, help me. Yeah. Was that a European quote?

Was it Spanish somehow too? It's very strange. I was very curious about that. And also the font on this one, completely different than the font throughout the rest of the video. Yeah. Stealing from multiple sources. Yeah, that's great. Then he plays us an audio clip that's apparently like a real audio

clip somehow that they have. Yeah. And he's like, as you can hear from this audio clip, this really happened. And we listened to it and it's just like, for four minutes. then he and then he's like so yeah only killing christian kids qed as you can hear from uh the clip i just played it sounds like my audio from last week's podcast and he's like as you can see they are taking a survey of everyone's religion and uh only killing the christians no completely inaudible like i'm

not crazy right there's nothing to be heard in that. Nothing. No, there is. So I actually, I played this part on repeat several times and I turned it up to like painful volume. Cause I'm like, oh my God, is there fucking anything here? And it's just like, it's straight up manipulation because the only thing you hear from the guys who were doing the shooting was the stuff that was on the screen where they were like, yeah, somebody get over here. There was just nothing that supported at all what Matt was saying. Oh, okay. So there actually were words. They were just completely irrelevant.

Yeah. Yeah. Badly supports the point. Sounded terrible. Just, yeah, nothing. Nothing would have been better, actually. Right. Good job, Matt.

But now it's time to set the record straight historically about Adolf Hitler. And the first thing Matt wants us to know here is that Hitler was not a Christian. He was an evolutionist. Yeah. Well, regardless of that, I'm pretty sure a few of the Nazis were Christian. I feel like that was happening in Germany then. A little bit of Christianity, maybe. Also, pretty sure a few

neo-Nazis are Christian. Maybe all of them. Maybe just about all of them. Just about all of them. But that's okay because his source on whether or not Hitler was a Christian is Sir Arthur Keith. Do we on the panel know anything about Sir Arthur Keith? I think you have some interesting facts. I'm happy to say I don't, but I'd love to hear it. Well, again, you know, I had to Google because apparently Matt didn't. So this guy was like one of the OG humanity

is three distinct races. And this is a direct quote. It can be asserted that intermarriage between members of the three groups produces inferior progeny. Hence, racial segregation is to be recommended.

However, the different races can still assist and cooperate with each other in the interests of peace and harmony. Oh, good. Good. Saved it. If we're going to play the game where we cherry pick quotes,

I would, it's really important that that would be included, I think. Yeah. So we get Arthur Keith telling us that Hitler wasn't a Christian, even though there are several quotes available where Hitler calls Hitler a Christian. Right. Matt then explains that Hitler wasn't a true Scotsman because he didn't play the bagpipes. Right.

This is also where we're introduced to, I would say, the protagonist of the movie. Not my favorite part, but it is Matt Powell's pronunciation of the word Darwinism. Is he okay? Which would be Darwinism. I think he thinks all isms have to be like super stressed. He does it with a couple other isms throughout the movie too. And he does so many edits. He does like four edits in one sentence sometimes to get a one simple sentence out.

But he does the edit after he's like Darwinism and then there's an edit. So he knows about editing. It's ridiculous. That means that the best take he had of him saying that word was Darwinism. I produce podcasts for a living. Matt, just throwing that out there

if you want to learn a couple of things. YouTube videos that don't suck. Check it out, man. Just for you, we've got special rates. One other moment from this scene, he says,

Christianity doesn't cause people to act in such a way. And then he like trails off and realizes he doesn't have a good point. And I was just like, no, no, no, finish your thought. You were going to say there's no genocide in the Bible? Is that what you're going to say? Or murder? There's no murder there?

What's away, Matt? Go on, tell us what's away. Hard cut. Next scene. So now it's time to shit on Charles Darwin. He's used this argument in other videos. This will be the second of the last two videos of his we've watched where his point is that Charles Darwin

had doubts and that makes him an idiot. Atheist Jesus doubted. Checkmate, atheists. And this is like my favorite game that these folks play because they can't conceive

of a world in which any sort of worldview doesn't have like a Jesus figure that is like infallible and we all like believe is great. And so they point out like, oh yeah, Darwin was racist. And we're like, okay, he was wrong about that. And I don't like that, but he still did get some things right. And that's okay for us because he's not Jesus. Yeah. That's the great thing about our thing. Yes, exactly. He also points out here for the first time of many times that the shooters in Columbine dressed like Hitler youth. Okay. And I was like, okay, it seems kind of irrelevant, but I checked casual Google, not true. Hitler youth dressed like basically Hitler adults,

Google, not true. Hitler Youth dressed like basically Hitler adults, but with like Boy Scout shorts, but otherwise the same. I will say though, the algorithm is doing a really good job because I did the same thing. I just put Hitler Youth in, searched on images, and it was only about four or five rows down. There was a picture of Nick Sandman, the mega hat kid. So I was like, okay, all right. We're doing a little something right here.

Oh, man, he lives like right near you, huh? He does. His school is literally a two-minute drive from my house. So now it's time to talk about how they were racist some more. And how racist were they? Well, the Columbine shooters apparently even said the N-word. And I wrote in my notes, okay, now I really don't like

the columbine shooters matt powell thanks you've turned me against them wasn't sure until just now and again like so they absolutely did target students of color because they were racists yeah but the way matt powell tells this story it's like they went up to each student of color in the school, did a little mini Comedy Central roast. Right. And again, the point is that like this is what happens when you teach your kids about evolutionary biology. Kids are going to be like mitosis, meiosis, murder the school. What the fuck? And he also he tries to do this little like clever phrasing.

He goes, Christianity doesn't teach you about survival of the strongest. Christianity is about survival of the weakest. And I wrote in my notes, oh, Matt, so true. And also so not true. Yeah. Well, and this is why I'm anticipating Matt's next video will be about why we should have like socialized medicine. Cops should stop killing black people and why we shouldn't be locking up kids at the

border. So like, I'm really stoked to see this next video where he like takes that out to its conclusion. So that's going to happen. You hear that, Matt's mom? He's going to make a video about Black Lives Matter. Take away his bunk beds. Take them away.

It's very likely that we get something like that. It's terrifying, but it's true. And he uses the other weird phrasing is supporting the widow and the fatherless. Yes. Thank you. His examples of the weakest are widows and the fatherless. And I can speak on behalf of the fatherless contingent here and no.

Right. Yeah. Great. Well, all three of us can. We are officially the fatherless here on this podcast. Right. Yeah. Great. Well, all three of us can. We are officially the fatherless here on this podcast. And Matt, if you mean what you say, if you stand by your words, you will fight and defeat 50 widows. It's just science, man. Okay. His next video. Now it's like 50 50. It's either the border thing or him trying to fight 50 widows. Yeah. You're our employee, Matt.

We demand a video where you fight 50 widows. Jesus. Make sure you put that in the Slack so he doesn't miss it. Yeah. Also, by the way, he ends that bit where he describes the weakest part of the population as widows. He ends that by saying evolution is a religion of death. As if like we're having cock fights between finches with different beaks over here

for atheist fun. What, you haven't done that? Okay, it's not. Most of us, some of us are not doing that. Some of us are not doing that. We started that before this Matt Powell video. That was unrelated. Can't be used as an account.

Hashtag not all evolutionists. So he repeats a few more of his lies they dressed like hitler youth and you know he said something in an aol chat room about hitler and he was gonna die but now it's time for matt powell to show us just how little he knows about evolution okay when he says okay if we have yep are you ready for this can't can't i just need to point out there's like three pages of notes of all of us saying the exact okay and i apologize one one big reason it's three pages is because i put this quote in giant font i went to put this in giant font and saw that he had already done it exact quote if i if I may. If we evolved from African-Americans into other

Americans. Okay, can I stop it right there? Please. He thinks that all humans are Americans, first of all. He doesn't realize that African-Americans aren't Africans. Those are different things. He does not realize that. He's just, he's focused on the American part of evolution for the rest of this quote. Just to be clear, that's the context.

And he thinks that Americans evolved from African Americans. Amazing. Wow. And second part of the quote, second part of the quote, and you know it's coming, podcast listener.

You're mumbling it under your breath right now. And yes, you're right. Quote, if we evolved from African-Americans into other Americans, why are there still African-Americans? End quote. That's not an exaggeration. Literal quote.

He outstupefied why are there still monkeys? He did it, everybody. He took the monkey thing and replaced monkeys with black people and apparently didn't realize what he was doing. Or maybe he did realize everybody he took the monkey thing and replaced monkeys with black people and apparently didn't didn't realize what he was doing or maybe he did realize what he was doing yeah well he maybe he realized but he ends this point by being like you're all being racist yes he says if we evolved from african-americans into other americans why are there still african americans that's racist for evolutionists to think that way. What the fuck? His actual next sentence, his literal next sentence is that is completely

dissing on them. Yes, man, it is completely dissing on them to say that Americans evolved from African Americans. I am going to have to break with my... Normally I'm not a big fan of policing people's vocabulary, but Matt Powell is someone who should never use the word dissing ever again. Yeah. I think that's official. I think that's a rule. Gonna need you to get back

in your time machine and go to 2002. Find me at my 8th grade dance, man. Okay, just put a cap on this. I want to review. Matt Powell thinks evolution went amoebas, monkeys, African-Americans,

other Americans, him. We're racist. We're racist. Yes. That's what just happened in the movie. That makes perfect sense. Oh yeah. And now, unfortunately he has run out of voiceover from documentaries to that's what just happened in the movie that makes perfect sense and now unfortunately

he has run out of voiceover from documentaries to steal so he is going to use the TikTok voiceover computer to narrate some more of this documentary what happened all of a sudden a robot's telling us the story I was like he hired $3 an hour Siri

oh it's fantastic. It's like, and then they were shooting their guns into the crowd. He also cites the frog prince. Yep. As an authority on what evolution looks like. I wish I was exaggerating. Yeah. One of the fantastic things about Matt Powell is that you can watch childhood indoctrination

happen in real time across his face brain mouth. So he'll just repeat phrases that he's heard, but out of the context he's working in. So he loves fish into fishermen, frog into prince. He didn't do monkey sail the ocean blue this time, which really bummed me out. He does talk about the monkey sailing in this next part. But yeah, it's his little catchphrase.

I like it. He also does several video cuts from one angle to the same angle, but like three inches further away, three inches closer. And what's great about this, and this happens throughout the video, when it's at the normal angle

that I feel like is probably the angle the camera's actually at, you can see the letterboxing on the top and bottom. And when he zooms, the letterboxing gets smaller because he doesn't know what he's doing. And so in that part, if I'm remembering right, the letterboxing actually appears and disappears as

it's doing that weird... Amazing. It's fantastic. Incredible. And he closes this segment by making the point that here in 2021, we have way more information about the evolution hoax. And unfortunately,

the Columbine shooters only had the information from 1999 about the evolution hoax. So I'm pretty sure he just suggested that his videos could have prevented columbine absolutely 100 he tries to use this as an example he goes they didn't know that evolutionists made crazy claims and they've made crazy claims crazy claims so now again he's going to repeat his favorite talking points. Monkeys surfed.

T-Rexes turned into chickens. They did. Yep, they did. But again, you can see, because he's illustrated it with the stock footage still with the watermark on it that he puts on the screen. You can see the thinking going on in Matt's mind, right?

Is that just like a T-Rex was roaming across the plains one day and then was just like, mcgawk, and then like, shrunk down. I don't know if this makes me a bad atheist or not, though, but like if that was a religion,

that would be my religion. Oh, absolutely. Yeah, I'm in. While this is happening, by the way, there's a graphic behind him of a Google screen that he used and Google is like, yeah, they fucking evolved into chickens, man. Like, yeah, definitely is how it works.

We could explain further, but first page answer. Yes, that's what happened. Don't click the headline, the Matt Powell story. So then we've got some nature footage while he explains that if you teach kids that they're an animal, they're going to get in a very silly lion fight? They might as well cut to Jurassic Park here and just be like,

see? Eric and Dylan hunted like velociraptors from the sides. This is a problem with evolution. Okay. Is Matt Powell implying here that if he believed in science, he would instantly become a murderer? Yes.

I think so. Yes, it is. And I think given the little bit that I know about that guy, I think that's a thing he actually believes. Like if I started teaching Matt Powell about evolution or lions, he'd just start like licking his brother like a lion instead of bathing. It's craziness. Opening doors and hunting down kids in kitchens.

But if that wasn't impressive enough, now Matt Powell is going to take shots at Richard Dawkins and miss. Right? He introduces, he says, Richard Dawkins, one of the most famous atheists in the world, says religion, again, air quotes again, poisons the mind. Yeah. Mad pal must not be on Twitter.

As soon as he introduced this, I was like, okay, he's going to say something about Richard Dawkins. Whatever you're about to say, I guess I'll concede this section. That's fine. Fine. You win this one. You get like two and a half minutes total. He had so much. he had so much to choose from and he failed this is where he starts making up his numbers 97 of school shootings are

atheists and i can't even find a shitty citation no for that 97 number this of all things is what i spent the most time googling because i'm like where did this even come from and even fucking david from taipei on quora said 66 i did the same thing i found that the daily caller says 16 of mass shooters are religious so 84 are not religious that's obviously wrong but the daily caller contradicted you from the left man that's tucker carlson's daily caller yeah this is also where he says that we lead the world in suicide and drug abuse and alcohol abuse and school shootings none of which are true none no no quick google that's entirely wrong yep just totally but according to people like richard and school shootings. None of which are true. None. No. No. Quick Google. That's entirely wrong.

Yep. Just totally. But according to people like Richard Dawkins or other people on the internet, religion poisons everything. Although I will say, credit where credit is due,

the picture that Matt found for this section of Richard Dawkins dressed as a disappointed 19th century school mom is all I will be using for Richard Dawkins from this moment forward. I thought that I was like,

I might've picked the same picture of Richard Dawkins given that I'm not a fan anymore. So again, like you get a little bit of this one, Matt Powell, just a little bit. So then he talks about how the public school system indoctrinates your kids. Studies have shown that Adam and Eve are real. That's that same study.

Again, Googling that same study says these folks lived 100,000 to 200,000 years ago. So, you know. Yep. And so the point he's making is that science shows there were two human beings before all the other ones. And he was like, that's Adam and Eve. But that's less science. That's more just counting.

That's how numbers work. There were two before there were three or more, for sure. We know that. Yes. Yeah. He thinks that was 6,000 years ago, not like Kelly said just now, a couple hundred thousand years ago. And it's right there.

It's in like the second paragraph. It might've even been on the screenshot that he put in the video and he also in this section he has this fantastic moment where he loses track of the claws of who he's talking about he's talking about taxpayers right he's like they use your tax money to teach these students that brainwash and then they make you in turn shoot all your classmates and it's like whoa are the taxpayers of the columbine shooters now matt there's all one sentence buddy you lost you lost us somewhere again write a script man ad-libbing not your thing yeah then he's gonna say when you believe in evolution you have to defend stupid things. And I wrote in my notes, to be fair, if Matt is an expert on anything, it's defending stupid things. Okay.

Is this where he said, you, the evolutionists, believe the beard got created over evolution because of face punching? Yes. And at this moment, he's literally slowly punching himself in the face so it is so beautiful it's the best one-act play i've ever seen matt powell goes you believe the beard got created by face punching slow motion punches himself but then speeds up at the end and it hurts a little then gets mad visually gets mad at himself for punching himself, realizes the only vengeance he could possibly have is to punch himself again and moves on to his next point.

But it is, Anthony Hopkins in Remains of the Day has nothing on Matt Powell getting mad at his own fist. And like, again, maybe focusing on the wrong thing, octopi is not the correct plural thank you i wrote that thing down it is not space octopuses and space squids again that would become my religion if anyone was actually saying that matt you're selling to the wrong demographic here you'd have one very ardent follower in cali right i would be right there with you i mean i'm not rich so like i wouldn't be able to like give a ton of money or anything. I've seen Matt's budget.

You probably could get more money than he's working with right now. I also just need to point out the fact-checking this whole thing. My Google searches are never going to recover. Oh, I used incognito windows. Yes. Why did I? Okay. All right.

I was going to blame you and say we're not friends anymore, but that was actually my bad. Never mind. So now he's going to wrap it up with all of his points. They're Hitler youth. Still no. Yeah. Still not.

I mean, important apropos quote here. If you repeat a lie enough times strong and loud enough. Joseph Garble said that. Yeah. Yeah. And then he says he has a little like so he repeats the alcoholism quote again and then he goes when you drink alcohol you're hallucinating that's a fantasy and like it has been a long quarantine my friends and i have had my fair share of whiskey

and uh no i've not met surfing monkeys or surfing rats i've had my my fair share of cannabis and how awesome my s'mores ice cream was not a fantasy i i know these things to be true in fairness though i was a bartender for a long time atheists get revved up about evolutionary biology a lot and you have like that's a lot of the bouncer in the bartender's job is dealing with atheists and they're screaming about Nazi evolution stuff. That happens a lot. That's fair. Every Friday night, there's always the guy who comes

in, right? He's wearing that fish with the feet t-shirt and you go, this one's gonna be trouble. I mean, if I had a dollar for every knife fight we witnessed at QED, am I right? Yeah. It was ridiculous. Dude, dude, dude, dude. Have you, have you like heard of Richard Dawkins?

Or like Christopher Hitchens, man. Like, the hitch. And then, after explaining how fantastical and silly and crazy our worldview is, he's going to wrap up by reminding us that either you go to heaven or you burn forever

in the flame that quenches not the worm. I'm very serious and realistic. Yep. That's the close of his in parentheses

documentary. To close out my science video documentary, you're all going to Lake of Fire. That's real. Okay. Here are his

closing points in order. As Heath just said, you're going burn in a lake of fire forever a very somber smash that like and subscribe button for jesus and then literally the last words of the video i feel like if some of the kids who had died in columbine had known about j, they wouldn't be in hell now. Wow. And if the shooters had known about Matt Powell videos,

the whole thing never would have happened. Yes. And once again, we see Matt's fucking GeoCity graphic design skills on display. He definitely needs to be hired to make the signs for Congress. 100%, yes. And that, my friends, is the story of Columbine. Great way to celebrate the 22nd anniversary. That was fun. He did an entire Columbine video, by the way, without a single

mention of gun control. Weird. Yeah. So huge thanks to Callie for spending well at least 23 minutes of their life on a matt powell video really appreciate that yeah i don't you'll never get that back that's right i'm just kidding i love you guys thanks again for coming on and we will be back again soon with another god-awful mini literally whenever matt talks into a camera again, he's getting closer and closer to paying us off and buying that race car bunk bed. Best of luck, Matt. Good luck, Matt. We believe in you, buddy. Anyway, that's all the blasphemy we've got for you tonight, but we'll be back in 10,022 minutes with more.

If you can't wait that long, be on the lookout for our 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, newer episode of our half-sister show, Citation Needed, debuting at noon Eastern on Wednesday. Big thanks to Heath Enright for always keeping things cool and smooth. Thanks to Callie for breaking their pattern of being nice to talk about Matt Powell. And thanks to whoever delivered the Farnsworth quote this week. I don't know who you are because Heath does the edit. But most of all, of course, I need to thank this week's new patrons.

But Noah does that part. And also he writes better compliments than I do. So he's going to cover you guys next week. But we really do appreciate the donation. Together, these fine folks give us the formula I need to feed my baby. You can make a per episode donation at patreon.com slash scathing atheist, whereby you'll earn access to an extended ad free version of every single episode. Or you can make a one time donation by

clicking on the donate button on the right side of the homepage at scathing atheist.com. And if you'd like to help, but you hate my baby, you can help us out by sharing the podcast with everybody you know, and blasting it outside of Steven Anderson's home. Legal services for this podcast are provided by the law offices of P. Andrew Torres, Tim Robertson handles our social media, and our audio engineer is Morgan Clark, who also wrote all the music used in this episode, which was used with his permission. If you have questions, comments, or death threats, you'll find all the contact info on the contact page at scathingatheist.com. I'm vaxxed up. I'm so excited.

So vaxxed up. Vaxxed. I convinced a bunch of people in my local Jersey group to get vaccinated. Nice work. I was like, hi, I'm a science communicator. Because you know what? That's not a legally fucking protected term. If anyone has any questions, I'm so happy to answer them as a fellow parent.

And the bunch of moms in the mom group were like, I heard you can't get rid of your breastfeeding. And I was like, actually, a lot of studies have shown antibodies are passed on. And three women were like, I signed up today. And I was like, fuck yeah. Wow. Though, to be honest, I would have lied. If they were like, if there were very serious side effects to getting it while you were pregnant,

I'd be like, actually, that's not real. Go get a shot so I can get brunch. You're in New Jersey. How much more deformed could your baby possibly come out? I'm so happy that you are now officially a science communicator. That's what they- Professional. They can't stop me. Yeah, that's real.

Communicator, science. Those are words. I'm using them correctly. Legally. And we're back. The perfect shoe for trampling people in a crazy panic. Auburn's. They're light and breezy for a stampede.

They'll absorb the blood of the people you trample. With eucalyptus fiber. It's perfect for... That's enough. They're not going to want us to say any of that. You can recycle them. The preceding podcast was a production of Puzzle and a Thunderstorm LLC. Copyright 2021. All rights reserved. for... That's enough. They're not going to want us to say any of that. You can recycle them.