The Scathing Atheist - 431: Closed Letter Edition

Episode Date: May 20, 2021

In this week’s episode, America puts the ISH in Jewish, we learn how vaccines are Holocaust adjacent, and Andrew Torrez of the Opening Arguments podcast will be here because he can’t say naughty words on that show. --- 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/ --- Guest Links: Hear more from Andrew on Opening Arguments here: https://openargs.com/ Hear even more from Andrew on Cleanup on Aisle 45: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/cleanup-on-aisle-45-with-ag-and-andrew-torrez/id1549502623 Learn more about Camp Quest Texas here: http://campquesttexas.org/ --- Headlines: White House met with atheist leaders: https://secular.org/2021/05/secular_white_house_meeting/ Survey: Jewish Americans Are More Secular Than Ever Before: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2021/05/11/survey-jewish-americans-are-more-secular-than-ever-before/ GOP lawmaker rattles off the "Armor of God" she wears to thwart her critics: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2021/05/11/gop-lawmaker-rattles-off-the-armor-of-god-she-wears-to-thwart-her-critics/ “Prophetess”: I’ll Show You a Picture I Took of Demons in Chains “If I Find It”: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2021/05/14/prophetess-ill-show-you-a-picture-i-took-of-demons-in-chains-if-i-find-it/ DeAnna Lorraine says the unvaccinated are being treated just like Jews in the Holocaust: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2021/05/11/conspiracist-the-unvaccinated-are-being-treated-just-like-jews-in-the-holocaust/

Warning, the following podcast contains language that may offend some listeners, and if not, we'll try harder next week. This week's episode of The Scathing Atheist is brought to you by the newest source for piping hot pornographic pope pics, OnlyFriends. OnlyFriends, because they gotta pay for these NDEs somehow. And now, The Scathing Atheist. Hi, I'm Noah, and I'm going to be a camper at Camp Quest, a super fun summer camp for atheist kids like me. Even though I'm only eight, I'm smart enough to know we did in fact evolve from filthy monkey men. It's Thursday.

It's May 20th. And it's International Rescue Dog Day. All right. It's Ethical Madge Bosnick Day There you go, yeah I have no illusions I'm Eli Bosnick I'm Heath Enright

And from Kevin Smith's New Jersey Cincinnati Red State And Redtown Blue State This is The Scathing Atheist On this week's episode America puts the ish in Jewish We learn how vaccines are Holocaust adjacent

And Andrew Torres of the Opening Arguments podcast We learn how vaccines are Holocaust adjacent. And Andrew Torres of the Opening Arguments podcast will be here because he can't say fuck on that show. But first, the are two possibilities. One is that they want to hear my response to whatever argument or argument lit that that video is presenting. And the other is that they're really hoping I can tell the priest in question how hard they can go fuck themselves. And I'm going to be honest, I'm not sure where the video everybody sent me this week falls. So this video comes from a Franciscan priest named Casey Cole. And he starts with the question, are you a good atheist?

named Casey Cole and he starts with the question are you a good atheist and I'm like I don't provide money or support for the world's largest child rape group also I'm already better than the best Catholic aren't I I mean seriously where does this arrogant prick get off acting like he gets to decide where the bar for goodness belongs for atheists I mean that would be true even if you set aside the fact that he's dedicated his life to a group that's presently harboring child rapists, and I have no idea why you would set that aside. So he goes on to split that question about goodness into two sections. The first is the are you a moral person question.

Now, again, I feel like the guy who swears fealty to a book that marks out an acceptable level of beating one's slaves doesn't really get a say in issues of morality but he's gonna opine anyway he admits that christianity quote doesn't necessarily make a person moral end quote and i'm like what the fuck is necessarily doing there christianity doesn't make people moral there i fixed it in fact if numbers are to be believed and you guys seem to think three is one so who the fuck knows christianity actually makes people less moral if we judge morality by, you know, likelihood of doing immoral shit like beating your kids or murdering people. Of course, he admits that Christians fall short of their agreed upon moral code, but he fails to admit that it's when they do shit like wear mixed fabrics or suffer a witch to live. His point, though, is that Christians have a moral structure and we poor atheists don't. Other than, you know, the cultural moral standards that everyone, including Christians, use regardless of their religion.

It's the one that tells them that, you know, mixed fabrics and which non-killing prohibitions in their book can be ignored, for example. And there's also the law, right? prohibitions in their book can be ignored for example and and there's also the law right that also is there and of course that wouldn't even exist if religion actually did the shit that he's claiming it does but all of that shit is just a warm-up for the main thrust of the video which is an argument best summarized as yes but have you read everything ever written about christianity and if not how do you even know what you're rejecting? Apparently their fruits aren't enough all of a sudden. So he opens this section with this little gem. Quote, can you articulate why you don't believe in God in a coherent way? Or do you just say religion is dumb and use logical fallacies?

End quote. Because, you know, how else are those horses going to push that cart all the way to the market? Motherfucker, you can't even define your God in a coherent way. I'm supposed to argue against it coherently? Jesus. He goes on to ask, quote, have you read the works of real theologians? People are articulating our beliefs in the absolute best way we know how. Or do you stick with the simplicity of the evangelical pastors from some rural anti-intellectual church end quote because apparently we're supposed to do

more research on this fucking religion than the people who adhere to it look that ain't how this shit works man how many books about jainism did you read before you rejected that how many of the top sasquatch researchers did you familiarize yourself with before you rejected that? How many of the top Sasquatch researchers did you familiarize yourself with before you rejected Bigfoot? How many asylum wall poop-scrawlings did you peruse before you decided that Count Chocula wasn't coming to kill us all?

There are some ideas that are too stupid to merit a deep dive, Casey, and the universe was made by an omnipotent menage a trois that loves me very much is so much stupider than concerns about a genocidal serial mascot, okay? Besides, y'all have been trying to prove God's existence since the beginning of formalized fucking thought, okay? I mean, if you'd come up with a good argument by now, nobody would have to go digging for the obscure works of

some theologian i've never heard of you guys would never shut the fuck up about it in fact that's what you'd be making a video about instead of this desperate i deserve to be taken seriously even though i'm dressed like a jawa's tinder profile argument that you have going now at one point he says all i'm asking is that you read more perspectives but that's not what he's asking at all. He's asking that we read his perspective. Notice how he doesn't explain how we're going to rule out the beliefs of the Oyo-Reo people of Paraguay, after all. There are a functionally infinite number of worldviews,

and if your only metric is at least as plausible as Catholicism, you would have to read literally millions of books before you could settle on any one worldview or even prefer one. And what's so amazing to me about this whole fucking video is that he honestly thinks that it's a reasonable request. I mean, all he's asking for is intellectual do-overs times infinity. All he's asking for is intellectual do-overs times infinity all he's asking for is for you to construct an argument on his behalf and then mull it over all he's asking is that you pretend there are serious questions about this stuff even if you know there aren't so here's a response to your open letter casey and it's all the response your bullshit deserves dear casey go fuck yourself

p.s very hard they're talking about you jesus joining me for headlines tonight are the tomato and tomato to mike ketchup heath enright neil at bosnick fellas are you ready to call the whole thing off absolutely not people who say tomato or hitler okay heath you just said it though so oh no no no that's not what i no eli's tricking me would it start start over new intro new intro in our leads story tonight i'm gonna open up on news that's not horrible in fact what yeah not only is it not horrible, it's good. Because after four years of Trump, you deserve it, motherfuckers.

And if you voted for Joe Biden, you doubly deserve it because you're the fucking reason it happened. On Friday of last week, White House officials met with the leaders of several different atheist organizations for a wide ranging discussion on the goals and concerns of their members. Needless to say, we didn't see shit like this in the previous administration in fact this marks the first such meeting in nearly a decade yeah and if you don't understand what a big deal that is imagine saying this is the first time in 10 years the white house has met with leaders of literally any other religious designation yeah right right the james got a meeting before we did guys oh i'm sure i'm sure now i should caveat this with the fact that this was part of the still problematic white house

office of faith-based and neighborhood partnerships which still shouldn't exist even though it has a good leader like you know imagine what melissa rogers could do if she was leading something that was constitutional of course the main thing that makes it so problematic is that it's real easy for atheists to just get left out of the conversations for eight years at a time. So it's nice to see we're at least resetting the clock on that. And one day

since the last First Amendment injury got diluted a tiny bit. Yeah, right. This is a weird poster we have. It's strange that we keep this. So this whole soiree was put together by the Secular Coalition for America

and included representatives from the American Humanist Association, American Atheists, Center for Inquiry, ex-Muslims of North America, and the Freedom from Religion Foundation and highlighted a number of priorities shared across those groups. Of course, unlike Christian groups, who so often use these opportunities to push for bonus rights for themselves or fewer rights for others, it looks like every atheist group involved was focused just on equality,

specifically on dialing back the bullshit rules that the Trump administration put in place that allowed for greater discrimination in the distribution of publicly funded services like homeless shelters and adoption agencies. Okay, so you all just want laws to count. That's everybody. Huh. Okay, good meeting, I guess. Cool. So maybe you guys want to do like an invocation to close it out? No, no, no. You want to reset the uh the

little the days so i i think the main takeaway from this story is just how much it matters who leads these groups now i know that there have been a couple of spectacular misses in atheist leadership over the last few years and that's led a number of people to disassociate with atheist groups altogether but remember that you know they're going to be meeting with national and state leaders regardless of what you do right they're going to be talking on your behalf and if you're a member of that group you can at least steer the leadership in the right direction i get why it might be hard to support a group financially if you don't agree with all the shit they do but if they're focused on things that really matter to you,

you're better off with a say than without one. Yeah, and not for nothing, but we are like one degree removed from a lot of the people who attended this meeting. It's a few. It's a few degrees. A few of them have touched my hand. What I'm saying is, if you aren't careful,

I will end up at one of these meetings one day, podcast listener. And in Jews news, according to a new report released by the Pew Research Center, Jews aren't Jewish, that is. They exist. Yeah.

They just don't believe in any of the Jew stuff, which I feel like we have a word for people who don't believe in their religion anymore. But here we are, everybody. Here we are. Honest. Yeah.

Honest. Well, yeah, no, that's that's one of them. Yeah. And look, I get the desire to identify as culturally Jewish, but like virtually none of the stuff that people mean when they say that comes from Judaism, except the weird religious shit. Right. Like if I identified as culturally Christian, we would all agree that that was fucking weird, right?

Just Noah walking around, I don't know how I feel about religion, but mayonnaise-based salads are just so important in my family. You know? My grandmother. Yeah, so, according to the Pew report, quote, overall, about a quarter of U.S. Jewish adults, 27%, do not identify with the Jewish religion.

They consider themselves to be Jewish ethnically, culturally or by family background and have a Jewish parent or were raised Jewish. But they answer a question about their current religion by describing themselves as atheist, agnostic or nothing in particular, rather than as Jewish. Among Jewish adults under 30, four in 10 describe themselves this way. Oh, rather than as Jewish. Among Jewish adults under 30, four in 10 describe themselves this way. Oh, wow. End quote. The survey also found that religiosity among those who identify as Jewish was lower as well. Jews are less likely than the U.S. average

to attend weekly religious services, believe in the God of the Bible, and say that religion is important to them. Okay, so this is the inevitable result of them trying to actually answer the questions that their religion raises, right? Yeah. So with that said, I think our podcast has been ex-Christian-centric for far too long, which is why we've created this helpful PSA for my fellow ex-Jews.

Hi, I'm Eli Bosnick, a person who was raised Jewish but knows there isn't a God now. And if you're watching this video, you either just got hired at a Quiznos or you're in the same boat. So join me as we explore the exciting world of ex-Judaism that you're about to enter. First up, the awkward, overly long explanation of your religious beliefs. Being a person who was raised Jewish but no longer believes in God often means you'll find yourself in conversations like this. Uh, Eli, you're Jewish, right? Oh, uh, yeah. My mom is Jewish, and also my dad.

Also, I don't Jewish, though. But the Holocaust was bad. Latkes. I was just going to ask you how to pronounce Hanukkah. Oh, yep. It's that. Okay, cool. That one.

Missing the comforts of religion? Why not move to New York City, where everyone is somehow Jewish, regardless of their religion? Oh, I'm walking here. You call that walking? I'm Passover, no less, Father McDority. A shonder the way you drive, a shonder for the goyim. And finally, if you miss the experience of long services where you're not allowed to eat yet, why not try eating with goys?

That's right. Eating with goys wraps all the boring of religious services into the not eating of a Friday night. So I said to him, the only way I'm going to diversify that portfolio is if it shows up on BET. Right. Right? Yeah. So anyway,

that's why the story took an hour to tell. Boys, the olive is ready. Sorry, did your wife say olive like singular? Olive, you damn right she did singular. Oh, no. Being a person who was raised Jewish but doesn't believe in God anymore. The word is atheist. Welcome.

And next up in headlines, we have a story about Lauren Opal Boebert. She's a member of U.S. Congress from Colorado. We have a story about Lauren Opal Boebert. She's a member of U.S. Congress from Colorado. Yeah, that's a terrifying story already. That's the story, I guess, by itself. But I'll keep going. Point being, Colorado, just, you know, go ahead and get your house in order. D up over there.

I don't know what you're doing. Yeah. You have a district that elected a congresswoman whose platform is basically standing your ground at the front door of a 1950s lunch counter. That's who she is. And honestly, that's pretty much her other real job. Yeah, actually. For real. Other than being a politician and gun activist for literal domestic terrorist militia groups she's also the owner of multiple gun themed restaurants yeah and this week we learned how she handles all the critics

it's her magical armor of jesus that she listed off her hand very clearly so okay i sorry circling back here as a resident of the state of georgia i'm actually legally she listed off her hand very clearly. So, okay. I, sorry, circling back here. As a resident of the state of Georgia, I'm actually legally required to abstain from shit talking any other state's congressional representatives. So that bit was from Heath and Eli, Colorado. Yeah, damn right it was.

Cory Booker doing clap pushups on top of the Constitution. Fuck yeah. Yeah, Jim Jordan is moving on. So, Boebert did an interview with TV evangelist and faith healer Andrew Womack. Yeah, already impeachable, I feel. Throwing that out there. Yeah, he does hard-hitting journalism

about our elected officials as a TV evangelist and faith healer. And he asked her how she deals with all the personal attacks. And according to Lobo's quote, the joy of the Lord is my strength. And, you know, with, with the, with that joy, I draw up from the wells of salvation.

I have the armor of God. And that is all forward-facing to help me in the battle. I have, checks notes on hand, the helmet of salvation, the shield of faith, the breastplate of righteousness, the belt of truth, the sword of the spirit and it's the next page the shoes of peace can you imagine how much it must suck to be the kid that gets stuck with the shoes of peace and ironic because those shoes are getting you a wedgie guaranteed they're getting you a wedgie saddest list of magical items ever constructed. It's so very sad. And it's actually from the Bible.

It's from the book of Ephesians. And it's supposed to be about Christian people having metaphorical armor against attacks from Satan. Or, in many cases, literal magic armor against attacks from the literal demon of evil that God created for some reason. And apparently evil only attacks from the front area. Yeah, right.

Unless you turn around, but you don't turn around. You do not turn around. No, don't do that. And somehow that includes a belt that only faces the front of your body like a facing yeah forward facing belt like i don't know how that works and uh it has truth in it on it yeah on the buckle i don't know i just have lots of questions about the logistics of that whole commando uniform so if wonder woman wraps you in the belt you have to

tell that's true so but my question okay and this comes back to the forward facing thing as well the shoes are armored this is making less and less sense as we go as all clunking around like face off also i feel like if there's anything you don't want to be as ephemeral as the spirit it's your sword right like ghost sword is the worst yeah spirit sword doesn't sound like the greatest and i i just want to circle back to the part when womack and bobert they just completely ignored the fact that she's a terrible human being and just about all the criticisms are super valid the personal attacks he was talking about that's stuff like hey you own an open carry gun restaurant in a place called literally rifle colorado and you have your entire staff carry around holstered firearms while they serve food. Jesus fucking Christ.

Okay. Or, hey, your pestilent kitchen did a pop-up store for pork sliders without a license and gave 80 people food poisoning. That's a real thing that happened. Oh, wow. So, I don't know. Maybe she needs to get some righteous gauntlets of food prep for the staff or something. The holy refrigerator. I'm sorry.

I just circled back. What is the appeal of an armed server? Right? It's not like Hooters where it's like, I get to see boobs. I mean, don't get me wrong. I bet their tips are great and they're so snappy at the waiter, but I don't really get it. Why do you want an armed? Yeah, I actually see a lot of pluses to an armed server.

For the server, yeah. And in what's new pussycat news. It's important in these trying times to appreciate the simple pleasures in life. A hot cup of coffee on a cold winter morning, a loaf of freshly baked sourdough bread, and the ceaseless well of crazy that is self-proclaimed prophet,

cat care. Who continued to be the gift that keeps on giving this week when she announced that she had a photograph of angels arresting demons and that she'll show it to us if she can find it.

Oh, if she can find, she misplaced that? Yes. Hey, cat, I got an idea. It's probably right next to the picture of St. Patrick's House in Heaven where he's being attacked by enormous, sentient

clover monsters that you also took. You also took that picture. It might be next to that in your pile. Okay, but so in her defense, I can imagine a lot of reasons both the angel and the demon might want to delete any evidence that they were hanging out with Kat Kerr. And they do have magic powers, so I can see how this happens.

Fair. Yeah, absolutely. So while appearing on Steve Schultz's program Elijah List, a YouTube show that provides us a significant amount of job security at this point, the bubblegum bewigged prophetess was explaining to viewers proper demon management technique saying quote you can't kill a demon people well that part is true so far so good she's nailing it yeah you couldn't do it yourself at all okay yeah number one okay they're spiritual you're physical that's just not gonna. If you had a physical sword, it would pass through them. It wouldn't do anything to them. All right?

Okay. A whole bunch of her listeners had to pause right there and rethink their entire afternoon. They were just like, what? Oh, now you've focused. I've got to make some calls. I've got to time out. I was told this was a sword of the spirit, and you're telling me, oh, I'm getting a refund. So you're saying it'll pass through?

No, ow, okay. No, I didn't hear it right. Stupid. It did pass through you, though. It did. She continues, so this is the thing. You can have them bound, and your guardian angel, number one, is not one of the hosts. Okay, that is also true.

Yes, and two points for Kat Kerr. Nailing it this week. I have to let you know that. Those are totally separate. The guardian angels come under Gabriel, okay? Your guardian angels mostly look like people, but with wings, okay? The hosts don't, mostly don't, ever look like people. They look like creatures, or they're made out of things like light or sound.

But they're real, and they're fierce. They can battle the demonic. They can shred them, but not kill them. And I mean, they will literally shred them. They can leave marks on them, but they can't kill them. Alright, I'm still gonna do demon

stuff, because I'm a demon, but like, ow! You shredded me. Every fight is like I'm still going to do demon stuff because I'm a demon, but like, ow. Like, ow. Shredding. You shredded me. I'm literally shredded. Every fight is like that, apparently, between hands. Yeah, it's just a fucking.

So, the point is just the cruelty, apparently. Yeah, it's like a prank war. Just a bunch of slinky cut demons, like, yoinging from one masturbation session to another. When they arrest demons, they're like, cops, butation session to another. When they arrest demons, they're like cops, but less problematic. Right? Yeah,

for sure. So yeah, usual stuff that we've come to expect from cat care. But then we learned that the hosts actually have a profit only version of cops that they put on just for her quote. I've seen it. If I find it, I'm going to show it on a live stream.

I'll just hold it up and show it to people. I literally took a picture one time. One time. Not kidding. There was a whole group of them. The ones that look like lions, they're the royal guards. They had some demons and chains and brought them over my roof. And I got a picture.

I'm not kidding. I'm not kidding. They were showing me the ones they had captured and were dragging either for judgment because I have been in the courtrooms of heaven where sometimes demons are dragged up and judged and then the father deals with them. They're either thrown in a dry place. They're thrown in chains. Sorry, those are the two options.

Yep. Those are the two options. That's a weird pairing. One guy's just like, all right, so you're sending me to the dungeon with shackles. And this guy right after, he just got dry he got fucking dry maybe it's that thing where you wake up in the middle of the night super thirsty oh yeah i'll take the shackles over that i'm with this better be wet fucking shackles so yeah it's obvious that we need to dress up like demons and angels and reenact a yakety sax policeax police chase outside of Cat Cash Wind, right?

I mean, Patreon goal, people. We can make this happen. We can. We absolutely can. We might have already done that in a different project. We can probably repurpose it. Yeah. And we can use the same suits anyway.

And finally tonight, we have a story about vaccine safety rules and the genocide of six million people oh you were on my facebook this weekend interesting right yeah it seems like those dots are going to be hard to connect but i didn't mention one other component of the story deanna lorraine oh there it is there it is indeed she's a christian right activist and therefore her job is approximately dot that connects any other dots ever whenever I fucking feel like it. Yep. She's il dato di tutti dati.

We're high class. We're high bro. This is a high bro show. According to Lorraine, first they came for the global pandemic, and we did not speak out public safety regulations about the covid vaccine are unacceptable to her because we're doing the holocaust samesies same thing because in both cases people were pretty sure orthodox jews were

the problem but i get like Will nobody think of the viruses? They're kind of alive. If you think about it, a vaccine is like a virus pre-abortion. That's basically murder. Careful, Noah. You're going to the Supreme Court any second. It prevents an implantation. So you might remember

Deanna Lorraine from refusing to get the COVID vaccine, even if Jesus Christ of Nazareth took it. Side note, we need to make that billboard of Jesus getting a shot. He could be getting it in his palm. That'd be great. Yeah.

And they're missing. And he's like, what? He's giving a sassy look. Dose one in the right hand hand, dose two in the left. That'd be awesome. Yeah. We're definitely doing that. Patreon goal, people.

We'll do it. And you might also remember Deanna Lorraine from a couple months ago when she made a video of herself dressed up as a fake doctor or nurse, she didn't specify, going to public businesses and screaming at cashiers, insisting they explained the exact molecular structure of the virus if they want to have rules about wearing a mask in the store. She made that video on purpose and released it on her show. She did that. That was her point. It might as well be a video of herself calling the cops on a black family having a barbecue in the bar.

Proudly. Yes. One other thing you probably remember. You probably do not remember her from getting less than the margin of error when she ran for Congress. Yeah. By the way, I just gave her from getting less than the margin of error when she ran for Congress. By the way,

I just gave you the CV that got her frequent appearances on national broadcasts on Fox News, The Blaze, Newsmax, and The Daily Caller. Millions of people have heard this woman's opinions. I mean, look, Keith, she's a star of stupid bullshit. I mean, they saw her work

she was doing in the minor leagues. They had to draft her. That's not how minor leagues or drafting works. But you know what, Eli? Keep tossing out them sports analogies. Eventually you are bound to nail one. Touchdown. Maybe they called her up, but they would have had to draft

her. It's a stretch either. Call her down from the Yankees. Call her. Nope. Okay. So those guys didn't get vaccinated. We're just going to push right through. I like the idea of describing someone as getting called down from the majors.

Tim Tebow gets it. I mean, her vote total called her down from an attempt at the majors. One other detail. You might also remember Deanna Lorraine from just now when she compared refusing taking world-saving medicine to being Jewish in Nazi Germany.

Right. Here's what she had to say exactly. Quote, they're going to start dividing up their sections of sporting events, churches, and other areas of public interest those are the public interest things she could think of total sports churches other and continuing the quote it's going to say vaccinated people or non-vaccinated people so you can expect to be

put in a different section whether you've been vaccinated or not. I mean, yeah, they're actually already doing that in hospitals. I think it's called the ER. Yeah. They have separate sections there. Absolutely. So apparently that's all bigotry. And speaking of which,

she continued, I don't want to be hanging out with the vaxxed anyway. But imagine what the Jews experienced, right? What? Again, we go back to the Holocaust. Again, she goes back there a lot. Again, we go back to the Holocaust where they had to show their papers. They had to wear the gold star.

This is also like when they had separate water fountains, separate schools, separate eating areas for blacks and whites. How is this any different? End quote. Are you asking? It's Jim Krovid. Yes, he is asking. He's asking. So you guys have any ideas?

How is this any different? Is it different? Oh, sure. I mean, I feel bad for segregated african americans and jews during the holocaust yeah there's one example yeah wait so wait i'm sorry circle back a little bit here does she think that having to show papers was the problem with the holocaust because a no uh and b i have bad news for you about them voting laws you're supporting d lo yeah so i think we all learned uh a lot of important lessons thanks to diana well

maybe a couple first of all it's adorable that she thinks there's going to be a plague section everywhere right yes no fuck there's no that section is going to be a plague section everywhere. Right? Yes! No, fuck, there's not! That section is going to be called Go the fuck back home to your house where your section is. That's your only fucking section. Get out of here, you plague. But more importantly, you know what's just like the Holocaust?

Nothing. Nothing is just like the Holocaust. The Holocaust is the only thing that's just like the Holocaust. There you go. Stop doing that. Jesus fucking Christ. And while I write on a list of non-Holocaust historical bad things that dumb people can compare shit to for a change,

we're going to close the headlines for the night. Heath, Eli, thanks as always. Do manji. And when we come back, Andrew Torres will be here to sound the death knell of women's rights. Hey, podcast listener, I'm no illusions. I'm Heath Enright. And I'm Eli Bosnick.

Here to remind you, it's Matreon. What's Matreon, you ask? Well, that's the time of year when we come to you and remind you that the only reason we're able to make these shows is thanks to the awesome folks who give us money and if you've been meaning to give us money there's never been a better time to do it this year each and every new and upgrading patron for our sister show god awful movies gets us closer to goals of fun stuff we'll do at our patron only pajama party live stream in aug. Want to watch Noah juggle? Want to change Keith's name legally to Keith? Throw us a buck or two over on Godawful Movies, and you can help make that happen.

Was it legally? You can... How else would you change it? Yeah, exactly. You can view all the goals over at the fundraiser website, matreon.com. That's M-A-Y-T-R-E-O-N dot com. Matreon. Dear sweet Jesus, please God, give us your money.

Okay, too much. I mean, thank you. Casual. Casual. Breezy. Thank you. Breezy. When my professional relationship with Andrew Torres of the Opening Arguments podcast began,

I was relieved to have a plain-spoken legal expert that I could call on to help calm everybody down when the media told them that the sky was falling. But thanks to the last three Supreme Court nominees, I find it's far more useful to have a plain-spoken legal expert that I can call on whenever the sky is falling. So, Andrew, welcome back. No, thanks for having me. And yeah, reinforce that umbrella. That's good advice. So, yeah, someday maybe you'll come on and we'll talk about good news, but that is not today. Nope.

The reason I asked you on today, other than just enjoying your company, is that we got some pretty disturbing SCOTUS news this week that many are portraying as a potential death knell for abortion rights in America. So can you tell us what happened Monday? Yeah. So the Supreme Court granted certiorari in a case called Dobbs versus Jackson Women's Health Organization that challenges a law in Mississippi. And if you're thinking, okay, how do I place this on the spectrum, right? So there's a law passed by Mississippi, HB 1510, which bans abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy that was enjoined as being obviously unconstitutional

by a federal district court in Mississippi, appealed to the Fifth Circuit, right, the most conservative circuit in the country. And even the Fifth Circuit was like, yeah, yeah, no, there's no chance that this law is remotely constitutional. And when the Supreme Court grants certiorari, like it's not always an indication that the four because it requires at least four votes of the nine justices on the supreme court it's not always an indication that they thought the lower decision was wrong but you know again the supreme court takes one-tenth of

one percent of cases that are brought before it and they don't usually take cases to go, yep, you totally got that right. Atta boy, Fifth Circuit. Right. So to move into that, before we dive into all the new stuff, I'd like to take a second to lay down the history. I feel like most people are pretty familiar with Roe v. Wade,

but there's a second precedent that as I read it might be even more important with regards to this case. And that's the 1992 decision Planned Parenthood v. Casey. So can you give us the background on that one? Yeah. And that is an excellent and incredibly perceptive question. Right. So this is being framed in the media as the case that could overturn Roe v. Wade. But what most people don't know is most of Roe has been gone for about three decades, right? So in 1973, the Supreme Court, Roe v. Wade, said that there were two constitutionally protected interests that it needed to balance, right? The first was a pregnant person, their individual bodily autonomy to determine whether to make the decision to carry a fetus

to term, right? The Supreme Court very confusingly called that the right to privacy. And we could go on a rabbit trail on that for weeks. But by privacy, the Supreme Court means basic core personal decisions about things like whether to have a child. And the Supreme Court balanced that liberty interest of the individual against the state's interest in protecting future life. And it came up with a system that, as far as I can tell, I'm the only person that defends the original Roe setup. But it's clearly correct to me.

The Supreme Court was like, look, we're a pluralistic society. person that defends the original Roe setup, but it's clearly correct to me, right? And the Supreme Court was like, look, we're a pluralistic society. Here's how we're going to balance those liberty interests. We're going to take a 40-week pregnancy, and we're going to divide it up into trimesters. And in the first trimester, the pregnant person's liberty interests are paramount, right? So the state may not restrict your right to have an abortion at any point during the first trimester. In the third trimester, we're going to say the state's interests are paramount. And so if they decide, they don't have to. But if the state decides that it wants to ban abortion outright, it can do so in the third trimester.

That is after 28 weeks. And then in the middle, that's 13 to 28 weeks, right? The Roe Court said things are in equipoise, right? They are roughly balanced. And so the state can restrict but not ban the right to an abortion. That was the state of the law in 1973, which, by the way, makes a ton of sense. 1973, which, by the way, makes a ton of sense. And right-wing activists were super not happy about that decision and began immediately trying to come up with ways to challenge that trimester system. And one of the things that they came up with was the state of Pennsylvania in the late

80s passed a bill that, among other things, required women under the age of 18 to get the consent of at least one parent. And there was a judicial bypass if there were allegations of abuse at home, right? But the idea was that those young women would have to get parental consent in order to move forward with an abortion. And the reason to do that was that would apply whether you got an abortion in week one or week eight or week 15 or week 29, right? Regardless of the trimester system. And so that was the case that conservative activists teed up in the late 1980s, which came up to the Supreme Court in 1991. They ruled on it in 1992.

And the thought process was, we just had eight years of Ronald Reagan. We just had four years of George Bush. We've had an awful lot of conservative judges appointed to the Supreme Court. And maybe they're going to take another look at Roe v. Wade and come out a different way. And they had this sort of two-pronged attack. The first argument that was made in the Casey court was overturn Roe v. Wade and say there is no right to privacy that includes a right to an abortion inherent in the Constitution. The Casey court declined to do that.

This was moderate Republicans, Sandra Day O'Connor and Anthony Kennedy, who on the grounds of stare decisis said, yeah, if we were coming at this as a case of first impression, maybe we'd come out differently. But Roe's been on the books for two decades now, seems to work OK. We're not going to overturn that and say there is no right. But we are going to replace the trimester test with what was called in Planned Parenthood versus Casey, the undue burden test. And the idea was states can burden a woman's right to an abortion, but they can't, quote, unduly burden. What does unduly mean? I don't know. Ask Anthony Kennedy. Right. It was invented out of whole cloth and they used that to uphold the Pennsylvania law that said we're going to require parental consent. They said, look, this is a burden. Absolutely. But it's not a, quote,

undue burden. And ever since then, that decision was 1992, almost 30 years ago. Various states have been trying to chip away with varying degrees of success, with imposing more and more burdens and trying to find a favorable court to say, yeah, that's a burden, but it's not a, quote, undue burden. So the law is going to stand. OK, so now, of course, a number of states have recently passed excessively and certainly unconstitutionally restrictive abortion laws, my own included. Is there something about the Mississippi law that makes it particularly ripe for the anti-abortion

wing of the court? Or is this just a case of like, they have to choose one of them and that's the one that came up? Yeah, this is a really, really bad case if you are on the side of justice. It's a good case if you're an anti-abortion activist because the Mississippi law prevents abortions after 15 weeks, right? And so on the heels of that are laws in Arkansas. I don't know if the Georgia law is six weeks,

but the Arkansas law is, yeah, right. Six weeks is essentially banning all abortions, right? It is virtually impossible that you would know that you're pregnant and then be able to schedule a time at a clinic, even if you did the second you became aware. You would have to get preventative abortions. Yeah, exactly. Right. Exactly right. So the Mississippi law doesn't seem as draconian, right? It's 15 weeks rather than six. And, you know, it challenges and most of the briefs are sort of devoted to this issue that I think is a complete red herring to abortion law. And that is sort of the question of viability. And the reason for that is the state of the science in 1973 was such that the third trimester,

right, weeks 29 forward, roughly coincided with the earliest that a fetus could be with the earliest that a fetus could be usually like delivered via cesarean section and then kept alive via heroic measures outside the womb, right? And that was called viability. Science has gotten slightly better in the past 50 years. And so that viability threshold has moved forward to about 23 to 24 weeks right and again we're talking about heroic life-saving interventions and that almost certainly are going to have like long-term effects for the child for the uh child that's delivered at that point yeah yeah yeah that's that's exactly right but but so one of the reasons that accompanied the casey decision was the idea that a fetus could be quote viable

even in the second trimester so maybe the liberty interest change why that would change i have no idea yeah i mean that that doesn't seem well thought out to me but but you know i mean it's not like that's another option well you can either have it aborted or let's just take our chances with the cesarean. Like, come on. If I wake up tomorrow and a 75-year-old dude has been artificially attached to my kidney, right? And the question is, if we disconnect him from your kidney, he's going to die. Like, I still get to choose whether he gets to live on my kidney. Anyway, I'll save my rants. So that question of viability

has been a key part of the reasoning in Casey, even though it really wasn't part of the reasoning in Roe at all. It just sort of happened to coincide. Obviously, Mississippi's law at 15 weeks is way before viability. And so one of the ways in which the question has been teed up

and what you do in a cert petition is you summarize for the Supreme Court the question or questions that you want the court to resolve. And the question is, are pre-viability restrictions on the right to an abortion constitutional? And that is explicitly before the court and so you see where this is going right like you can very easily you know sort of package well you know 15 weeks that's enough time to discover and think about it and make an informed decision but the next case in the pipeline is going to be georgia is going to be six weeks right it's going to be an effective gutting outright yeah yeah right because once you've

abolished the reasoning behind it then the lower courts can be like well yeah sure six weeks that sounds right yep that sounds right now exactly right and notice that they look at these questions in isolation, right? It is, does X unduly burden a person's right to an abortion? Not, does X, in the background of a regulatory regime that already includes Y, Z, A, B, C, D, 1, 2, and 3, unduly burden a woman's right to an abortion, right? Like, that analysis isn't done and hasn't been done even in the most recent cases, right? The June Medical Services versus McGee case that we talked about last year. Okay, so what happens next here? Like for people who aren't really court watchers, what's the process from here and when will we know anything?

So we will not know anything until next year. What happens is now that the Supreme Court so the Fifth Circuit upheld the injunction from preventing this law in Mississippi from going into effect. Mississippi appealed to the Supreme Court and they filed a petition for certiorari. The

Women's Health Organization filed a, that Jackson's Women's Health Organization, filed an opposition brief and said, no, Supreme Court, you don't need to take this case. This is a totally straightforward application of the law. Pass. And the Supreme Court said, yeah, we're going to take this. on the merits and it will be heard probably sometime in the fall term probably around october or november of 2021 which means that in the spring of 2022 we will get the supreme court's decision and the question is going to be which flavor of bad will it be really yeah? Yeah. So there are no good outcomes here?

Or is it a binary thing? What could happen? So a couple of different ranges, right? The course that some in the media have picked up on that I think is actually not very likely is a really narrow procedural ruling. I think this would appeal to Chief Justice John Roberts for obvious reasons, right? He's an institutionalist. He does not want to be perceived as the chief justice of the Supreme Court that overturned Roe v. Wade.

And so the court has before it the question of whether a women's health organization, an abortion provider, here it's Jackson's Women's Health Organization, but let's be honest, this is Planned Parenthood kind of squarely in the sights, right? Whether an abortion provider network has standing to challenge these kinds of laws, right? So the original Roe v. Wade was Jane Roe, Norma Jean McCorvey, right, was a pregnant woman. And so no question that she had standing. Planned Parenthood versus Casey, right, that again, the original challenge in that case was brought by Planned Parenthood and

abortion and among other, you know, women's health organizations. But their standing was based on the idea that they provided abortions and were therefore affected by the law. So some are suggesting, and the question is briefed before the court, that the court could take a super narrow path and say, no, we're only going to look at abortion cases here on out if they are brought by the person who is themselves pregnant. the person who is themselves pregnant. That would be real bad. And that would greatly restrict our ability to engage in kind of impact litigation from the left.

That's the best possible outcome. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I don't think that the court is going to take that. I don't think they took up this case. Well, yeah, right. You've already said you don't think it's particularly likely. So, ouch. Well, yeah, right. You've already said you don't think it's particularly likely. So, ouch.

The middle ground would be that the court says we reaff weeks and kick the can down the court for another year until we take a look at the laws in Arkansas, Georgia, and elsewhere. That's the middle ground. Wow. The ground that has at least three votes, right? It has Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Amy Coney Barrett. We know for a fact they have all written on this subject. Two of them have written Supreme Court dissents on this subject. in the penumbra of the first, fourth, fifth, and fourteenth amendments of the Constitution. And let me say, if that's the case, if they make that ruling, by the way, that would undercut the fact that it is presently illegal for states to discriminate how they sell contraceptives, right? The case that established the, quote, penumbra that is such a punching bag on the right was not Roe v. Wade.

It was a case called Griswold v. Connecticut from 1968 that involved a Connecticut law that prohibited the sale of condoms to unmarried couples. So, you know, big fan of the handmaid's tale. That could come back, and that's a plausible outcome. But the Supreme Court says there is no right to privacy concerning the right to abortion in the Constitution. Wow. I can only imagine what evangelical Christians would do if they were unleashed from that. It's right. And I haven't gotten to the super bad scenario. And I think this is highly unlikely, but there is at least one vote on the Supreme Court right now.

Amy Coney Barrett, she's written a law review article on this that believes that fetuses are persons under the 14th Amendment. That would be such a clusterfuck of unbelievable proportions that I don't think that is like i think that is actually the least likely outcome but i need to say that if you had asked me five years ago do i think in my lifetime the supreme court could rule that fetuses were persons under

the 14th amendment i would have told you you're a crazy person. I would have said that argument is the kind of thing that really, really bad, you know, that D minus law students make at our nation's 237th ranked law schools, right? Like it's not remotely a coherent argument and it's on the potential agenda and and you might be thinking like wow so that means like when a pregnant person smokes a cigarette they could be guilty of child abuse yep it does that means if you leave your abusive spouse you could be charged with kidnapping yep it does right oh wow it's an insane ridiculous post-apocalyptic margaret atwood level nightmare and again we're not there yet but the fact that it is potential right that i have to discuss this on this show is something that should terrify you wow all right so will oral arguments or

anything else that's going to happen between now and the decision matter? Or is this, I mean, you know, like you're already counting votes here. So is this just a foregone conclusion? I think that it is. And I think that it is because it is very difficult to see where John Roberts can sort of parse through, right? Like this is what we're hoping for. We have three center left judges, right? Like, this is what we're hoping for. We have three center-left judges, right? Justices on the Supreme Court.

We have an institutionalist in John Roberts who was a lifelong conservative who nevertheless would like for his name not to be associated with the death of the Supreme Court in America. And so he's a little bit scared on these big cases. And then we have five poo-flinging howler monkeys. And so he's a little bit scared on these big cases. And then we have five poo-flinging howler monkeys. And the question is, you know, are there cases that are teed up

where you can get Roberts to pick off one or more of the howler monkey contingent to sort of come over to Team Sanity? And, you know, look, let me ask you this now like how much do you think oral arguments of any sort from if i get the smartest lawyer in the world do you think that would persuade you on your position on the constitutionality of abortion yeah like this is not this is not a close call there's not a thing that the judges are approaching with a that the justices are approaching with a clean slate. So I'm pretty pessimistic about this. Neil Gorsuch is our

best hope. Wow. Okay. Yeah. Wow. There you go. So, okay, so short of building a fucking time machine and going back and voting for Hillary Clinton, is there anything that we can do at this point? That's a really good option. Yeah.

Now would be a great time to abolish the filibuster and double the size of the federal judiciary. I've been beating that drum for a while. But no, absent massive structural change to the judiciary, this is coming. And again, there is – I don't want to underplay this. There is a real risk of this being a massive Trojan horse that the media will spin as court reaffirms fundamental holdings of Roe and Planned Parenthood versus Casey. But they've gutted the notion of what it means to impose an undue burden to the point of virtual meaninglessness, right? Like that strikes me as the most likely outcome. Wow. Well, you know, as much as I hate what you've had to tell us, I really appreciate you coming on here and telling it to us.

It's so hard to shift gears away from that to anything remotely positive. But very quick before I let you go, I feel like most of our listeners are already familiar with the work that you do on opening arguments. But for anybody who hasn't already heard, can you tell us a little bit about your new show? Oh, thank you so much. So on January 20th,

kind of an auspicious day, Alison Gill of the Mueller, Shebrooke and Daily Beans podcast and I started a new show called Clean Up on Aisle 45. And I love opening arguments. I love explaining the law. But one of the things that I don't get a chance to do on OA as much as I would like is kind of do what we're doing here, right? Get into not just the law but also the politics of it, right? Like get into not just the law, but also the politics of it, right? And so the idea behind cleanup on aisle 45 is we have a justice department we need to rebuild. We have

governmental institutions we need to rebuild that were systematically destroyed during the Trump years. And we're kind of tracking that progress and we're tracking that progress as you and I had many long conversations on the porch at our last get-together, we were way to the left of Joe Biden. And so it's kind of an issue of tracking Joe Biden, somebody who those of us

on the left are correctly skeptical of, who you know, spoiler, I has exceeded my expectations in ways that I couldn't possibly imagine. There's still a lot more to do. Right. And there's still plenty of holding Biden accountable, but also kind of tracking Biden's efforts to hold Trump accountable.

And that's the show. So if you, you know, you like this kind of thing, then you probably would like the show. Yeah. Yeah. I've really been enjoying the hell out of it. Obviously, I've been a fan of opening arguments since you started the show and i really love ag show up muller she wrote as well so it was really cool to see the two of you teaming up and it's but the outcome has been everything i was hoping it would be oh thank you so much all right well andrew it's great to have

your expertise to call on thank you so much for your time anytime time. Before we save and quit tonight, I wanted to remind you to check out Matreon.com, M-A-Y-T-R-E-O-N, because it's like Patreon, but it happens in May. And there you can see how far along we are with our fundraiser over on GAM. Remember, if you're a patron of any of our shows, you're going to be able to drop in on the Pajama Party livestream, so be on the lookout for more info on that in the coming weeks. Anyway, that's all the blasphemy we've got for you tonight. We'll be back in 10,022 minutes with more. If you can't wait that long, be on the lookout for a brand new episode of our sister show, The Skeptic

Rant, debuting at 7 a.m. Eastern on Monday. An even newer episode of our sister show's hot friend, Godawful Movies, debuting at 7 a.m. Eastern on Tuesday. And an even newer episode of our half-sister show, Citation D, debuting at noon Eastern on Wednesday. Obviously, I'd be putting the ow in show if I neglected to thank Heath Enright for being the tick to my tack toe, Eli Bosnick for being the tack to my tick toe,

and Lucinda Lusions for being the toe to my tick tack. I also want to thank Andrew Torres one more time and encourage you to check out his show's opening arguments and cleanup on IL45, which you're going to find linked on the show notes. Also want to thank Nola for providing this week's very adorable Farsworth quote. Incidentally, if you have a kid 8 to 17 who might be interested, Camp Quest Texas

is trying to host a camp this year from June 13th to 19th. They're taking all kinds of safety precautions. For more information, check out campquesttexas.org, which will also be listed in the show notes. But most all, of course, I want to thank this week's sexiest sapiens, Andy, Mary, Haley, Michael, Katra, Joelle, Mark, Laura, Allison, long-time listener, but just finished my PhD so I can finally contribute. My least favorite patron, there are two kinds of people, those who can extrapolate from incomplete information, Jason, Amy, Matthew, NC, Infidel, Kalen, and Audrey. Andy, Mary, Haley, Michael, Katra, and Joel

who are so bright eclipses need special glasses to look at them. Mark, Laura, Allison, longtime least favorite in incomplete information who taphole kegs a whoop-ass. And Jason, Amy, Matthew, NC, Infidel, Kalen, and Audrey who are so hot the Fahrenheit scale craps up before it gets to them. Also, Allison, happy birthday and anniversary from David.

Legal services for this podcast are provided by the Law Offices of P. Andrew Torres. Yes, that P. Andrew Torres. Tim Robertson handles our social media and our audio engineer is Morgan Clark. We 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 scathegaytheist.com. You're supposed to remember all six of these words. A whole sentence. Yeah, exactly. The preceding podcast was a production of Puzzle and a Thunderstorm, LLC.

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