The Scathing Atheist - 445: Lemme Finish Edition

Episode Date: August 26, 2021

In this week’s episode, people will die of COVID unnecessarily because of religion, Heath takes the week off to turn 40, and we’ll actually finish this time. --- 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: Atheist continue to be better in all the ways we measure those things: https://www.salon.com/2021/08/21/staunch-atheists-show-higher-morals-than-the-proudly-pious-from-the-pandemic-to-climate-change/ Death Cult Preacher Hands Out “Exemption Letters” to Anti-Vaxxer Christians https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2021/08/20/death-cult-preacher-hands-out-exemption-letters-to-anti-vaxxer-christians/ Majority of Americans finally believe in evolution: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2021/08/23/research-shows-a-rise-in-the-public-acceptance-of-evolution-over-the-last-decade/ An Off-Duty Pilot Used the PA System to Tell a Captive Flight About Jesus https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2021/08/21/an-off-duty-pilot-used-the-pa-system-to-tell-a-captive-flight-about-jesus/ Sydney cops issue $1000 fines to church goers defying lockdown orders: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2021/08/24/police-fine-sydney-churchgoers-1000-each-for-violating-local-lockdown-orders/ Eric Metaxas: Having to Wear a Face Mask While Skiing Reminds Me of Hitler https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2021/08/19/eric-metaxas-having-to-wear-a-face-mask-while-skiing-reminds-me-of-hitler/ MA State Rep seeks to remove laws against blasphemy, sodomy from the books: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2021/08/20/ma-legislator-wants-to-repeal-archaic-blasphemy-sodomy-rules-from-state-law/ Research Shows Many Christians See LGBTQ Progress as Bad for Christianity https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2021/08/18/research-shows-many-christians-see-lgbtq-progress-as-bad-for-christianity/ Dept of Education to rescind Trump Era Bigot Rules: https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2021/08/20/dept-of-education-plans-to-rescind-trump-era-rules-funding-bigotry-at-colleges/

Warning, if you don't want profanity in your podcast, it's already too late to fuck off. This week's episode of The Scathing Atheist is brought to you by ZipRecruiter, Gabby, IPVanish, and by ZipUnRecruiter, the service that finds a new job for that shitty co-worker you want rid of, preferably one that seems good until they actually get there, and then it sucks. And now, The scathing atheist. This is Revan. It's not Revan. It's not Raven. It is Revan. And despite what I learned growing up as a Jehovah's Witness, we did in fact evolve from filthy monkey men and women.

It's Thursday. It's August 26th. And it's National Web Mistress Day! So whether you're mastering CFNM or CSS, we salute you. Damn right! I'm no illusions. I'm Eli Bosnick, and for Shaquille O'Neal's New Jersey, Vacation Station Birthdayland, and Red Zone Blue State, this is the Scathing Atheist. On this week's episode, people die of COVID unnecessarily because of religion. Keith takes the week off to turn 40 years old.

And we'll actually finish this time. But first, the diatribe. A lot of trailing music at the intro. Wait, the intro goes quicker with just two people. Sure. Yeah, got it. Christian apologetics is the three-card monte of argument. They're constantly loading a word up with very specific meeting, then flipping it over,

shuffling it around with a bunch of synonyms or, you know, even just similar concepts. And then asking you to keep track of where the original definition wound up. Like they'll start the sentence talking about faith. Now in one complete trust or confidence in someone or something, and they'll end it talking about faith. Now in two strong belief in God or in the doctrines of a religion

based on a spiritual apprehension rather than proof. That'd be like me trying to disprove their holy book by pointing out that it didn't have any fucking holes in it. But if you're not careful, they'll bait and switch you like that in a second. Hell, even the word religion itself gets silly puttified by religious apologists such that arguments against their side suddenly become arguments for their side they'll argue in favor of religion as a concept as though a justification for the general idea of religion somehow necessarily transfers to

their religion i was left pondering this by a bitchy email i got a couple of weeks ago that excoriated me for not giving people a chance to explore the possibilities. It was from some spiritual but not religious unholier-than-thou hippie whose mind is open enough for moths to get in, and he was giving me the sort of standard quest-for-the-truth argument. If you don't start with the assumption that I'm right, which is your first mistake right there, then religions have value simply for helping people explore all the possibilities. Except, that's not what religions do. Religions sell one possibility, and it's either going to be demonstrably

false or so esoteric it's meaningless. Religions don't encourage exploration. They forbid it. They outlaw it. They kill over it. But even when they don't do that, their goal is to crush the very exploration that this fucking ding-a-ling was extolling the virtues of i mean even the bullshit coexist sticker hippie shit this guy believes this you know everybody's right and all roads lead to the same god shit still promotes nay demands adherence to that one singular worldview sure it allows an individual the ability to wander, but it doesn't allow them the ability to get any fucking where. Of course, one can certainly study religion in their quest for truth.

I don't think they're going to find much use there, but it's worth looking into. But the existence of active religion makes that very inquiry all the harder. I mean, it's pretty easy to study ancient religions with no modern day adherence because we are all allowed to talk about Zeus with the understanding that he's pretty easy to study ancient religions with no modern day adherence because we are all allowed to talk about Zeus with the understanding that he's a mythological being. If we had to hold out the possibility that he might still be

king of the gods, it certainly wouldn't make our conversations more productive. I mean, imagine any other academic subject being tackled this way. Imagine if competing scientific theories worked themselves out via schism. Every time there was a new new theory colleges would have to pick a side or split off into two different colleges each one dedicated to a different side of that argument and no matter

which side ended up being true both sides had to stick around as long as they could convince anybody to believe their theory does anybody really think that would make it easier to reach the truth? And if it wouldn't work for any other academic subject, why the fuck would it work better for religion? In fact, by promoting any single religion or even any single view on religion, you're doing more to shut down spiritual curiosity than the skeptic or even the cynic does. How thoroughly can you possibly explore a theory if nobody you're talking to disagrees with it after all but most of all none of that fucking matters because the other word this dude was playing three-card money with was the word truth there's already a word for

the quest for truth that word is science if your thing falls out of that it's at best neutral in terms of finding truth. Most often it's worse than that. By and large, religion is an attempt to avoid a truth. So far from denying people the ability to explore the possibilities, I'm saving them the trouble of wandering down dead ends. And I'm not even blocking the fucking path. I'm just putting up a sign that says, hey, it turns out there's no truth down this path either and if that thwarts your goals your goals never had anything to do with the truth they're talking about you jesus interrupt this broadcast regular special news bulletin joining me for headlines tonight is the block to my tackle eli bos. Eli, are you ready for a little polyamory?

Wow, you save punters like that for a week. Heath is away. You are cruel, sir. You are cruel. You know, as weird as it is to say that joke only works when there's just two of us. And as you chew on that conundrum, we're going to pause for a quick word from this week's first sponsor, ZipRecruiter. All right,

Noah, you ready to do the ads? Yeah, give me one second. Let me grab Heath. What? Heath's on vacation for his 40th birthday. Right, but he actually, he left this tape behind for us. Hey, guys. Didn't want to miss out on the points for the ads this week,

so I left you this tape. I think we've done enough ads now that I can pre-record my bits, so just go ahead and start now. I mean, there's no way that we can actually do the... Eli's probably back chatting me right now about being able to pre-record my part of the ads because his writing's pretty formulaic. So yeah, whenever he's done with that, go ahead and start. Fine, fine.

Up. Come on, boy. Up. Hey, Eli. What are you doing? Oh, I'm just trying to teach this walrus to climb a building dressed as Spider-Man. That's right. I am also part of the wacky shenanigans Eli and I are involved in. Me too. Got you there, dude. It's not always wacky shenanigans.

Sometimes it's based on the product. It very much is, yes. That's what's happening. Okay. The walrus thing. I'm doing the walrus thing, apparently, with Heath. Why don't you hire a professional walrus trainer? In this economy?

Trying to hire the right person is like trying to find the needle in a haystack. Well, why don't you just try a zip recruiter? Oh, what? Zip recruiter? Damn it, he even got the timing down.

Nice. So, no, you can stop the recorder now. Oh, you know what? Note to self. See if milk comes in container larger than a gallon. So when you post a job on ZipRecruiter, they send your job to over 100 of the top job sites, giving you access to their network of millions of job seekers. Then ZipRecruiter's magic technology scans resumes to find qualified candidates for your open roles and proactively presents them to you.

You can easily review recommended candidates and invite your top choices to apply for your job, which encourages them to apply faster. Wow, that does sound easy. Novel idea. In the future, everyone is bald, so the people who went bald first are the most handsome. No, I think Keith wanted you to turn the tape off. No, I'm going to let it go. Okay, okay. So that ZipRecruiter thing sounds great. Where do I try it? Right now, you can try ZipRecruiter for free at this exclusive web address, ZipRecruiter.com slash scathing. That's ZipRecruiter.com slash S-C-A-T-H-I-N-G. Just go to ZipRecruiter.com slash scathing.

ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire. Note to self, return Merkin. Did not convince Coffee Shop Girl. Also, note to self, find new coffee shop. Oh, buddy. And now, back to the headlines. In our lead story tonight, professor of sociology and secular studies at Pitzer College, Phil Zuckerman, would like to remind you that atheists are better at all the important parts of existing in society

than our religious counterparts. Yep. Apparently, Salon took a break from atheist bashing long enough to publish his article reminding everyone that on pretty much every meaningful measure of a person's morality, vocal atheist utterly trounce the piously religious. The article focuses on how much more ethical we are in terms of environmentalism and pandemic mitigation, but he also cites studies that show us coming out ahead in terms of supporting refugees, affordable health care, death with dignity, gun control, LGBTQ rights and animal rights, as well as in opposition

to militarism, the death penalty and government sanctioned torture. Huh. That's weird because I'm pretty sure religious people have assured me that we don't appreciate the beauty of a sunset. It probably evens out. It probably evens out after that yeah so to be clear he's talking about atheists in this article right he's not lumping us together with the nuns and the spiritual but not religious dingbats like so often happens we're talking about in the author's words quote atheists agnostics people who never attend religious services don't think the bible is the word of God and don't pray, end quote.

And he's comparing us not just to religious people in general, but regular church attendees, people who pray frequently, people who profess to be absolute in their conviction that God exists. And when we run the numbers on any meaningful measure of morality, it looks almost unfair to pit those two groups against each other. almost unfair to pit those two groups against each other right which is even weirder when you consider that what those people claim to be doing is reinforcing their morality once a week exactly that would be like publishing a study that finds that gym members are in worse shape than people who never go to the gym and don't believe gyms help you get in shape. Right, yeah, exactly, exactly. Mass deniers, yeah. And look, I get that we talk about this subject a lot. In fact, damn near every study that Zuckerman references in this article had a dedicated headline in this show when it first came out.

But given how frequently we have to answer the morality question, I think it's justified. And since you probably can't get your religious cousin all the way through a diatribe, I like highlighting the articles you can actually share with them when I find them. You'll find it on the show notes. But the key takeaway is the same as always. The numbers suggest, but don't quite prove that atheism makes you a more moral person or being a more moral person makes you an atheist.

But they do prove religion does not help. Yep. Yes, indeed. And in Farrington 451 news, as a skeptic, it's important to admit when you don't know something. And truth be told, I really don't understand the idea of religious exemptions as a concept. I mean, it seems like if there's a universal and equally applied law about common good and your pretend thing goes against that law, the answer should be no. But lots of smart people assure me that it is, in fact, a good thing to have accommodations

to religion. So, you know, whatever the subtle truth of religious exemption is, that's certainly not going to stop assholes from abusing it. And that's exactly what happened this week as christian pastor and man who can only be described as covid super fan greg farrington of destiny church in rockland california gave out hundreds of letters of religious exemption for covid vaccines to literally anybody who showed up and asked for one okay so here's the thing about religious exemptions either you have them and shitty people use them to abuse the system and secure extra privileges for themselves,

or you don't have them and shitty people use their absence to abuse people of minority religions and secure extra privileges for themselves. So you're saying it's a tie. I'm not quite saying that. So for those unfamiliar, Farrington has been doing his best to best to i'm gonna go ahead and say wingman for covid since the very start of the pandemic so last year he blamed church closers on quote liberal crazies and satan and when several members of his church caught covid he celebrated by saying on stage quote the favor of god is on this house. So, yeah, that guy handed out literally hundreds of religious exemption letters last Sunday to anybody, member of his church or not, who wanted to not get vaccinated, saying, quote,

you have the freedom to choose and nobody should be able to mandate that you have to take a vaccine or lose your job. That's just not right here in america end quote okay so on the one hand a letter from farrington exempting you from covid precautions this is binding as a letter from eli exempting you from lyme disease on the other hand wish the walmart greeter good luck explaining that shit to typhoid Karen. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. So there you have it. As from the very beginning,

whether society, law, science, or just good conscience has attempted to slow the spread of this deadly disease, religion has always been first in line to stop it. Amen. And in Darwin, some lose, some lose.

Fantastic. Thank you. Americans are profoundly stupid when it comes to subjects. In fact, I'd wager that if you measure our intelligence against the per capita dollars we spend as a nation on education, we may be the stupidest people that have ever existed in all of human history. And nowhere does our stupidity shine brighter than in the topics of science. Because we're dumb when you ask us shit like, who did we fight in the War of 1812? 1811. And what's an adjective?

Someone who tries to get you to buy a objective. But so that's just regular don't know stuff levels of stupidity. But so that's just regular don't know stuff levels of stupidity. But when you ask a shit like how old is the earth and did humans develop from an earlier species of animal, you get motivated stupidity. And that's why lying. Exactly. Yeah. And that's why even basic shit like the majority of Americans believe in evolution is worthy of celebration now according to gallup we actually crossed that threshold for the first time way back in the story days of 2016 but we got

both confirmation and a bit more detail from a new paper in the journal public understanding of science that breaks down three and a half decades of data on the subject and shows a precipitous rise in american acceptance of evolution over the past decade okay two things first of data on the subject and shows a precipitous rise in American acceptance of evolution over the past decade. Okay, two things. First of all, for the less literate listeners, precipitous means rainy. Second of all, the public understanding of Science Journal has got

to be the biggest fucking bummer to read. Every cover's black like the Time magazine from 9-11. It's still bad, guys. It's still fucking bad. every cover's black like the Time magazine from 9-11. Yes. It's still bad, guys. It's still fucking bad.

So this paper comes out of the University of Michigan. It looks at a number of different surveys over the past 35 years that include the question, do you believe human beings as we know them today developed from an earlier species? And it charted the response over time. And what they found was that for like a quarter of a century we pretty much had stagnancy on the issue pretty much the whole time acceptance and rejection of this easily provable scientific principle was tied between 40 and 45 but right

around 2007 the numbers started to diverge and then at pretty much the exact same time as this show debuted the chart turns 45 degrees upward and starts its climb towards the meteoric heights of ever so slightly above half go hey i'll take that credit the scathing atheist convincing people to believe in filthy monkey men one at a time yeah right now of course the survey isn't all good news. I mean, the fact that it only shows 54% national acceptance of the central theory undergirding all of modern biology isn't good news to begin with. So there's that. The researchers also emphasized that the movement seems to be in the younger generation's rate of acceptance. So it's not like we're changing the minds of evolution deniers.

We're just making it harder for them to recruit. But worst of all, the church seems to have peaked in 2017, and acceptance of evolution, though still a majority, has been on the decline since Trump was sworn in. So always plenty more work to do. I mean, I get it. 2016 onwards has also shaken my faith in slow change that increases survival. It's not a great excuse, but I get it. I'm saying I get it.

Right. And in now, that's what I call an upright position news tonight. We've all had a bad flight or two in our day. Turbulence, a long wait to take off or land. But I'll wager each and every one of us are all in second place to june 15th american airlines flight from washington to chicago whose disboarding was ground to a perfect halt so an off-duty pilot could grab the pa and explain to everyone how jesus saved him from being gay oh my fucking i so okay so i would have shoved that, set up his ass in a completely heterosexual way then.

You'd have to do it. So yeah, the unnamed pilot, apparently apropos of nothing, thought to himself as people were getting ready to get off the plane, that reminds me of how gay I used to be. used to be grabbed the pa blocked the exit and began to monologue to everyone in the plane over the speaker system about his child molestation about marrying a woman even though he was gay and being gay behind her back saying things like quote even though i was in love with her just over one year into the marriage i began to give into the pressure of being gay. I asked other gay crew members questions about their lifestyle and what led them to becoming gay.

Pretty soon I was taking part in that lifestyle. I had sex with men and would come home from work trips and pretend nothing had happened. Okay. All right. So you already spoiled the ending. I know this is going to end in Jesus, but I feel like I would have forgiven him if he'd gotten

graphic enough with this part, right? Like there's a level of graphic he could have gotten, like we would have looped back around and he'd have had. Someone on the YouTube video is just like, let's hear him out. Let's hear him out. Guys. Now, as I mentioned, he concludes

by talking about how Jesus un-gayed him and finishes by saying, quote, ultimately, I want to share the love of Christ with you. If you feel uncomfortable, that's fine, but I will talk to you in the gate area.

Thank you so much. Oh, you bet your ass you to talk to me in the gate. It would have been worth you doing it just so that you would have had to talk to me. But my friends all is not lost for though this is a story of airline assholery and it has a villain it also has a hero and that hero is the gentleman in the youtube video link in the show notes who quite literally right after the guy finishes talking yells at the top of his lungs if i missed my next flight i'm suing your ass off fuck you and your story

and in fine by me news australia is mostly kicking ass at this whole pandemic thing while there have been a few missteps along the way, including possibly kicking off the whole toilet paper hoarding phenomenon, they've done a pretty remarkable job in the most important statistic, deaths. As of the time of this recording, the total number of COVID deaths in Australia has yet to reach the four-digit range. Jesus. Yeah, 984, compared with America's 647,680. Well, shit.

Hell, compare it with the thousand plus Americas that died of COVID the day of this record. Yeah, we're beating you daily. Beating you every day. Yeah. And look, yes, Australia has a much smaller population, but it's not that much smaller. If you look at it per capita, that's one in twenty five thousand seven hundred and seventy two Australians compared to one in five hundred and six Americans. Americans are fifty one times more likely to die of covid. And part of the reason is that Australia is willing to enforce laws even when you crime religiously. is willing to enforce laws even when you crime religiously. To wit,

the $1,000 fines police were handing out to churchgoers on Sunday night when the Christ Assembly's Sydney Church elected to defy lockdown orders. Huh. I wonder if a legal system that doesn't have magic loopholes for death cults has anything to do with the four-figure

death figure. Yeah, you know, it's probably the surfing. They do a lot of surfing. They surf a lot. Yeah. So, police in New Southales were tipped off to the gathering on sunday night according to reports they arrived around 7 30 p.m and found about 60 adults and children gathered masklessly and with no thoughts to social distancing ultimately 30 adults were fined a thousand dollars each and the church itself was fined five5,000. Now, those are Australian dollars, so, you know, multiply by.725 or whatever, but still, kind of hard to imagine any jurisdiction

in America fining people for going to church just because it's illegal and dangerous. Yeah. And that's keeping in mind that as police minister David Elliott pointed out, they can still worship, they just have to stream their services like every other fucking church in a COVID hotspot in the goddamn country does.

Yeah, and it's weird, but something tells me now that it costs them $1,000 not to do that, everyone at that church is going to get real conversant in that part of Mark about praying at home in your closet or whatever. It's crazy. It's so weird when there's a disincentive, you know? It's worth adding, by the way, that the offending church is part of an international religious group headquartered in Nigeria called Christ Embassy, which has a well-documented history of spreading conspiracy theories about COVID. In a since-deleted sermon from another Australian chapter of the same church, a church leader apparently told his congregation, quote, in the name of Jesus, we refuse every lockdown in our cities. We declare the lockdowns are over in the name of jesus end quote yeah you better hope jesus is also willing to co-sign a thirty thousand dollar loan to you guys in his name as well and look it's pretty easy to make a country's

covid response look good when you compare it to the united states but like right now they're actually facing a very serious outbreak in the sy area that last I read was topping 800 new cases a day. Right now, in America, where evangelical Republicans are going to gather together for freedom parties to cough on each other like God intended, no matter what the churches do. It's easy to overlook the very real damage that shit like this is doing in a place that actually could otherwise contain the damn thing. Yeah. Even when governments are doing it right religion will do it wrong as well got it on that echoing reminder of the show's central theme we're gonna pause for a word from our second sponsor this week gabby there we go

all the donkey kongs in a row from the very first one. Hey, Noah, what you doing? Me? I'm just organizing my retro video game collection. Just arranging all the early Donkey Kong cartridges, which I have in order. All the Gen 2s. Noah, did you write this banter into the ad just so you could tell people you own a bunch of old versions of Donkey Kong? You know, a small but dedicated section of our listenership greatly enjoys my early video game references, Eli. You should do a podcast about it.

What if you did a podcast? Don't even start. What do you want, dude? Oh, I just finally figured out what to get Heath for his birthday. Auto insurance. Auto insurance? Yeah, but not just auto insurance. I went through all the hassle of comparing prices,

entering in all the info, getting actual quotes instead of just the fake ones you get at most comparison sites. He is going to be so pumped. But Eli, if he wanted to do that, he could have just gone to Gabby. What's Gabby? Gabby uses your current policy to compare your current coverage with 40 of the top insurance providers like Progressive, Nationwide, and Travelers. They're the one true comparison platform with fast, verifiable quotes, not ballpark guesses. And because Gabby uses your current coverage, they only

show you policies that are the same or better than your current coverage, many of them at a lower price. And Gabby is free to use, and they never sell your info, so no annoying spam or robocalls. Wow, and it really works? It sure does. I tried Gabby out before they were a sponsor and they found me three cheaper quotes than what I was already paying.

People who switch with Gabby save, on average, $80 a month versus their current policy. $80. Wow, for that kind of money, I could have gotten Heath like a nice shirt or something instead. Sure, yeah. And it's not just me who loves Gabby. Gabby has been featured in TechCrunch, Forbes, and USA Today.

Start saving on your auto insurance today. Go to Gabby.com slash scathing to start saving right now. It's totally free. That's G-A-B-I dot com slash scathing. Gabby.com slash scathing. All right, Noah. Sounds good. Speaking of comparisons, did you know that the Intellivision and the

Intellivision 2 are actually the same system? Just an aesthetic reboot. Just do the video game podcast, man. Maybe I will. You do another podcast. He's gone. And we're back. Next up in headlines,

Christian pastor, bigot, and the Christmas spectacular host, you never knew you needed, Eric Metaxas, was asked to put on a mask this weekend while he was on a skiing vacation and he's pretty sure it went getting asked to put on a mask something something hitler's germany so we're gonna talk about it yeah okay so at this point the scariest aspect of this shit is what these people's complaints about nazi germany actually have been this whole time

like turns out the genocide wasn't as much the issue it's like well i mean whatever he thinks the parallel to mastis but that's not genocide i don't think hitler and his anti-smoking laws right yeah so eric's on stage talking to some other fucking christian chode about how terrible it is that everyone's being asked with sugar on top not to give the planet covid and he tells the following story quote a young guy is like sir you're gonna put on your mask i'm getting on the lift by myself right and i looked at him and i said you've got to be kidding i didn't say punk but it was implied and here's where it gets serious. He stopped the lift.

End quote. Yeah, wow, man. If they stop the lift because you're unwilling to follow a rule that can't possibly harm you, it sure is a sign that someone other than you was being an asshole. Better repeat this story in as public a form as possible. And I know what you're thinking, podcast listener. Hey, that sounds a lot like the rise of the foremost fascist government in world history. Well, Eric is right there with you saying,

quote, how did it happen in Germany with these young brown shirts who behaved like that? And I was astonished because I thought, this is how it happened. End quote. First, they came for the contagious diseases, and I did not speak out. Yeah, right. Yeah. So as many of you may have noticed, there's a lot of Hitler comparisons flying around in the media right now, which is why we're pleased to present the brand new segment on the scathing atheist.

Is that like Nazi Germany? Hit it, Morgan. Hi, I'm Chet Chetley. Welcome to the very first episode of Is. That. Like. Nazi. Germany! Our contestant today is Eric Pataxas. He enjoys sucker-punching reporters and trying to get laid by women who think he's Geraldo Rivera. Welcome to the show, Eric.

Thanks for having me, Chet. I think it's a damn shame they turned you down for Jeopardy. Yeah, rank the races in one mass email. I know. I know it. Anyway, let's get to the game. You know the rules. I tell you the situation in modern history. And you tell me if it's like Nazi Germany.

Are you ready? Nazi Germany, Chet. We haven't started yet we haven't started eric sorry i got excited first up wearing a mask nazi germany oh i'm sorry how about get a free vaccine so you don't kill the people around you nazi germany oh another wrong one okay last one here the recently discovered genocide of indigenous children at so-called residential schools all over the continent. Well, the context there is so important, Chet. You really can't just... Oh, I'm sorry. That's 0 for 3, and you are out of the game.

People hate Christians. They sure do. And that's why we'll see you next time on... Is That Like Nazi Germany? And in LGBTQ news tonight. Well done. Christians fucking hate gay people. I feel like we don't say that enough.

Right. hate gay people. I feel like we don't say that enough, right? Between them allowing gayness in a subsect of a subsect of a subsect of Christendom and, you know, culture dragging mainstream thought up to barely equal values in, you know, just some of the world and where religion has the least power, that thread has been lost. And the cultural zeitgeist instead is that, you know, most Christians are just plain groovy with gay people and there's a few cranks in Noah's neighborhood that are not. That's not the case. No, it has never been the case. And as long as we keep ignoring it, it never will be. And that point was proven once again this week when a new paper published in the Journal for Personality and Social Psychology examined just how often lgbtq progress is seen as an attack

on christianity by christians yeah yeah like the best you could say for christianity given the numbers is that it might not be the chief source of bigotry in the entire country and for that they get tax exemptions yep that is that's what they got it's good so you're probably wondering how did they reach this conclusion well they asked christians and christians couldn't fucking help but tell them okay for instance they asked straight cisgender christians how much christians and lgbt LGBTQ groups were discriminated against in each decade. And whenever things got better as a group for gay people, Christians said they got worse for Christians.

Wow. Next time somebody wants to fault me for defining Christianity by their prejudices, I need to remind them that they're only a cleverly worded question away from doing the same thing. I'm going to list four things that are bigots. You tell me which one is not you. And it actually gets worse. Quote, strikingly, Christians reported that bias against Christians is as severe as bias against LGBT people in the current decade. What?

Christians also endorsed explicit statements pitting the groups against each other. Example, as LGBT individuals face less discrimination, Christians end up facing more discrimination to a greater extent than other groups surveyed, i.e. heterosexual, cisgender non-Christians, and LGBT participants. Yeah, when you think you have the right to other people not having rights this shit's gonna happen exactly exactly i mean look

in the christian's defense that were surveyed here at least according to the way christians define rights they are correct right if your definition of rights includes not selling someone a wedding cake or going to their preferred bathroom, then yeah, you're losing your right to not do the thing that you want to do. You're losing your right for other people to not do the thing, right. Right, and that's a good thing. I guess what I'm saying, if I could simplify all this down, is that they're wrong about rights. And even if they were right about rights, their rights are wrong.

Well said. There we go. And finally, tonight, indeed, the bossing news. Fantastic. The arduous task of dismantling Trump's legacy got a tiny bit closer to completion this week when the Department of Education announced their intent to rescind one of the stupid fucking pro bigotry rules that he and DeVos enacted. In particular, the rule that exempted religious groups on college campuses from anti-discrimination policies. Speak of the devil. The rule stemmed from a 2019 executive order and threatened to withhold federal funds from schools that forced religious groups to play by the same anti-discrimination policies as all other on-campus groups.

Or, when stripped of euphemism and plausible deniability, it allowed Christian groups to kick people out for being gay. Yeah, or unmarried and having sex. Or, in the case of my alma mater and a certain Christian group there, rape victims. Wow. Real fun set of bylaws the Trump admin was paving the way for there. Really having fun. So when this rule was first enacted, American atheists and Americans

united for separation of church and state sued. They pointed out that A, that shit's illegal and B, well, yeah, but even if it was legal, it wouldn't be a thing that the Department of fucking Education would have the power to do. But last Thursday, the plaintiffs in the case asked for the courts to stay their lawsuit pending a rule change that should nullify the problem now it's a christian privilege so the biden

administration is hesitant to just release a statement saying no this was always bullshit and we were never going to let it fly but couch and a verbose promise to review the rules and submit them for public comment was a pretty solid indication that their intent is to do away with the problematic elements of the rule change. Yeah. We just want to remind everyone how seriously Joe takes religion. He loves checks notes, Jesus. And we take his fellow Jesus fans very seriously here at the Biden administration. Right. Exactly. And look, Trump and his cabinet broke a lot of toys on their way out the door. I mean, even when they weren't trying to, their incompetence led to the decay and corruption of most of the federal government. But once it was clear that they were on their way out, they set about systematically breaking as much shit as they could before they left.

So as easy as it is to assume this rule was always going to get changed back and it was never going to be enforced, we need to thank the hardworking folks over at American Atheists and Americans United for making sure it stayed a priority amongst the millions. And with that token of gratitude, we're going to close the headlines for the night. Eli, thanks as always. God sucks off a turtle. And when we come back, Tom Cecil Heath and a few guests will be here to actually finally for realsies close this thing off a turtle. And when we come back, Tom, Cecil, Heath, and a few guests will be here to actually finally, for realsies, close this thing off. Oh.

Si, si, grazie. E tutti di gelato, please. Mi scusi, tutti? Si, si. Hey, Heath! Damn it. Really? Eli, I'm on vacation. You know I'm on vacation. Yeah, sorry. How areusi, tutti? Si, si. Hey, Heath! Damn it, really? Eli, I'm on vacation. You know I'm on vacation. Yeah, sorry. How are you even here? I had a question for you. Hi, Bob!

Heath hasn't introduced us. Oh, actually, you know what? Does this rash look like something I should be worried about? Where you going, bud? Bob? Bobby! Bobster! Okay, probably going to the bathroom. He seems nice. Yeah, yeah, he is. He's a nice person. So, what's up, man?

You had a question or something? How did you even find me? Oh, you've been using free Wi-Fi all over Europe, and whenever you're using free Wi-Fi, you're super easy to track. What? Seriously? My Wi-Fi? Oh, yeah. You should use IPVanish. Oh, what's IPVanish?

That's a fun little game we play on the shows bob probably wouldn't understand it you and heath play fun games probably not right anyway ip vanish is a virtual private network a vpn for short a vpn is an important tool that helps you safely browse the internet you can use a vpn on your computers tablets phones even things like your fire stick when you're streaming media when you use a vpn all your data is encrypted okay that sounds great but i'm kind of on vacation don't have a ton of cash to throw around right now on tech uh just to keep you from following me to italy i wish you would just not do that okay well for listeners of the show ip vanish is offering an incredible 65 off their annual plan equal to six months free. Equal, you say, to six months.

That's right. 65% equal. Yep. Equal. So go to IPVanish.com slash scathing. Claim your 65% savings. Their annual plan is just $44.99 for the first year with our exclusive discount. This is the time to sign up with our discount and their current promotion.

You can get a VPN for 65% off their usual offering. IPVanish is the best of the best. Even rated 4.7 out of 5 on trustpilot and that's with more than 6 000 reviews remember it's ip vanish.com skating to get the deal and start protecting yourself online great fine i'll sign up now so what did you want to ask me you came all this way oh you know what it slipped my mind but i will find you in france if i think of it please don't do that all right have a good trip buddy happy birthday bob bob it was nice to meet you i'm gonna send you a picture of that rash but i want your eyes on it okay okay no i got it out of heath's phone just he's pretending he doesn't hear me he hears you know back when heath was a wee young lad of 39 we offered to trade on the show insults for

charitable donations and we radically underestimated how fucking charitable you were so here we are exactly 637 days later finally capping off the final segment of vulgarity for charity and as a thank you for your patience while we work our way through them, it even includes an Anna song. So without further ado, we're going to join the final Vulgarity for Charity segment already in progress. For the next round, we have some brave and charitable donors who asked for themselves to be roasted heat. This one's for you. Matt wants a roast of Matt. Okay, so Matt sent us before and after pictures from when he

Cut off all his long hair as a donation To Wigs for Kids And yeah Wigs for Kids that's a great Cause but now There's a kid with leukemia somewhere Walking around looking like a fucking Muppet Samurai Wondering about a really awkward return

Policy at Wigs for Kids That sucks I don't want to fuck a woman I'm wondering about a really awkward return policy at Wings for Kids. That sucks. I don't want to fuck a woman with fake breasts to music from the 80s and cocaine. Can I get a different one? No? Okay, just this one. All right, Cecil, you're up next. Cliff's son asked for dad to request a self-roasting, so we did a roast of Cliff for Cliff and Cliff's son.

Okay, so Cliff, you roast of Cliff for Cliff and Cliff's son. Okay, so Cliff, you don't look like Patrick Stewart. I know you cosplay like Patrick Stewart, but you do not look like Patrick Stewart. You look like Walter Cronkite, man. You look like Walter White from Breaking Bad if he just settled for chemo and dying

a chemistry teacher. I mean, the only thing you have in common with him is you're bald. That's like me cosplaying Jason Momoa because I have a beard, man. God damn. Now I really want that. I love Cecil's one-act play of Breaking Bad

now. It's just like, yeah, I'd die now. Fuck. Fuck, I hate my health insurance company. I'm going to donate to Vulgarity for Charity real quick. All right. There we go. I really wish we had a stronger union for those medical benefits as a teacher. Man.

Should have gone on strike. Noah, this one's for you. Macy wants a roast of himself. And who can blame him, right? He looks like if Chunk and Sloth and the Goonies had consummated that relationship. It kind of looks like he ate the vanilla version of the blueberry gum from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Just a little.

By the way, I should point out he specifically asked me to go after his looks as though there was ever any question. We were going gonna hit up your sudoku skills dude you look like if a stretch armstrong could go bad man we got this one we got it we're good and tom philip wants a roast of philip a german guy who wants me to roast him

oh i'll do it yeah how fucking original a german sadomasochist whoa hey there standard fucking issue hope you didn't trip when you were shit out of the cookie cutter you factory you want me to roast you specifically me the guy who stick here is cruelty that's what you're asking for that's what you want philip is public humiliation the only thing that gets your fucking dick hard if i'm gonna play along in your little public self-flagellation role play kink you better fucking tip me a little bitch because this dungeon is your fantasy not mine this is the best you can come up with philip a world of assholery all around you to roast but you need this you need me to tell you on air that you're a bad boy so you can sit on the can

and breathlessly wank one out. Well, here's my fucking roast, Phillip. Next time you want someone to step on your balls in front of a room full of strangers, bring some cash. Alright, and Eli, you're going to close out this self-roasting round around here we need a roast of

jamie for jamie and also a roast of eli by eli yes yeah wait wait wait wait is that second part in the email from jamie it's irrelevant it's two votes three votes seven votes it's official i want that okay i just want to say 11 i'm getting all the hard ones today okay jamie is a gorgeous trans woman who met the love of her life when she sent this roast and you know since that's a two-year-old lesbian relationship at this point i'm guessing they're now married with two big dogs that they pretend are friendly but they're not jamie okay you got a poodle the fucking size of a car bus it's's not friendly, Jamie. It's a murderer. Alright? It's a murderer. And for the roast, I mean,

come on, Jamie. I'm supposed to roast a tall, blonde tennis champion? I look like the new version of the feels bad meme. I look, in the words of my own baby sister last month, like if minors could have a rabbi. Oh my god! Yeah. That's what my sister said yeah i asked her why she included pictures of me on her instagram

and she said because you look like minors could have a rabbi great whatever oh but that actually gives me an idea jamie jamie you look like everyone who looks like me harasses on the internet two for one i did i nailed it, everybody. I got it. Well done. We also had a couple more guest roast requests, including a few donors who wanted their targets roasted by Opening Arguments' very own Andrew Torres. Andrew? Thanks, guys.

It's a pleasure to be back, or that's at least what Eli has written for me to say in the show notes. So let's see what we got here. First up, we have a request from Jeremy, who wants me to roast writer Ryan Johnson of Star Wars Episode VIII. Okay, Ryan Johnson looks like he was proud to get tattooed by the girl who kicked the hornet's nest, right? If Australia had a national pervert, it would be Ryan Johnson, and he's not even Australian. had a national pervert, it would be Ryan Johnson, and he's not even Australian. And the next,

Melanie wants me to roast the cow named P. Andrew Torres, right? Yeah, the only thing on earth that is or ever will be named after me. Hey, thanks, Melanie. But all right, here goes. Is there a D quality beef? Is there an anus rather than an Angus cut? Is there a grade F quality milk? You know, the kind only fit for McDonald's milkshakes? If so, all of these products would come from P. Andrew Torres. And while I mourn the destruction of my cow namesake, thanks guys. Let's toss things over to the one and only Lucinda Lusions. Thanks, Andrew. So I've just got two to knock out really quick.

Gavin wanted a roast of atheist YouTuber Jacqueline Glenn, and I'd love to do something really biting here, but I'm not too familiar with her work. Well, I mean, I might be familiar with it before she plagiarized it, but I don't know it through her. So all I can say is that she looks like a Raggedy Ann fuck doll, and I'm pretty sure that's what she's going for. I also got a request from Michelle to roast her misogynistic dad,

who has three daughters, each with multiple advanced degrees, but doesn't think any of them can truly be successful until they're married and have children, preferably male. And look, I don't know what the fuck is wrong with the guy I mean other than looking like a geriatric Popeye that let himself go in the 80s but people who think they can define success for others are in my experience people who are trying to find it vicariously so my guess is that he said he never got to fuck a dude and bear a child but y'all have more advanced degrees than me so i'll leave it to better minds now we had one more special request here christy wanted anna to roast heath but just to add a little spice to it she wanted anna to do it in the voice of drunk stephanie anna where are my shoes oh there they are

so like i'm gonna just like heath because because it's his birthday or whatever, and he wouldn't even let me give him a lap dance at his dad's funeral. Heath looks like every guy that's ever dated me and like we went to the same high school. Boom, roasted. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go throw up up on changing table in men's room thank you anna we're gonna be hearing from you one last time before it's all over but that's gonna bring us to the final round heath this one's for you james has an excellent request he wants you to roast the u.s health care system oh wow okay good pick um all right so i feel like it's easy to understand maybe as an analogy.

So the U.S. healthcare system, it's a lot like chess. Most of us are pawns who get sacrificed. White goes first and has an advantage. Norway is way ahead of us in the standings. They're guys at the top. And our peak was in the 70s and involved a Holocaust denier. So that's fine. There you go.

That's upsetting. All right, Cecil, you're up next. Daniel wants you to roast Micah Bell from Red Dead Redemption 2. What? Okay. Micah Bell looks like someone left Luke in the belly of a tauntaun to ferment. I just want to assure you too, Daniel,

that I took time out of writing roasts to fire up the PS4, capture Micah, and light him on fire with moonshine and dynamite. Consider him roasted. He's 100% roasted. Okay, Noah, you get two options for this one. Janelle wants a roast of either Michael Farris or David Barton. Okay, well, obviously, I'm tempted to go with Barton because holy fucking shit, that guy. But I get plenty of chances to insult him so instead i'm going to go with michael ferris the head of the homeschool legal defense

association and the founder of patrick henry university this man may have done more to de-educate children over the last 20 years than any other christian that's really saying something and in another hard one honor he may have the world's bitterest Wikipedia page where he I mean, I'm not he, I'm some anonymous Wikipedia editor. We have no idea. Explains David Darden. Yeah, right.

Dykel Barris. Yeah. Explains that he probably only lost his race for Lieutenant Governor of Virginia because he was such good friends with Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson and Jesus. And people hate it when you're friends with religious people. That's very bad in political office. Anyway, Eli, you're up next.

Larry was a roast for a ride share passengers who say they'll tip and never do. Oh, Jesus. Yeah. As Larry puts it, if they'd been a pizza he'd probably have gotten a couple bucks hey hey ride share people who don't fucking tip i am the snobbiest person i know and i literally know an italian duke and i fucking tip okay ride share is the craziest worst part of our technological post-humanity hellscape. Oh, did you need to survive the crushing economy? Well, why not let some strangers into your car

whose qualifications include downloading an app to a phone? It's like driving a taxi without all that cushy regulation in the way. These are the fucking ice road truckers of our great nation, and the least you can do is throw them a tip and a good one. 20% or you

fuck yourself. There you go. Alright, and last but certainly not least, we have a request from our biggest donor of the entire charity drive, Laurie and Brad, who raised $6,568. Wow.

Wow. Again, just Laurie and Brad. Unbelievable. And also a guy named Dave who made the same request he also helped fuck you dave get off laurie and brad also some money so the target looking out for the little guy is anti-tax activist tim amon and of course we're all gonna pile on this motherfucker okay we got a picture of him here and he looks exactly like the soul of Elon Musk. Like if Elon Musk has a soul, the king of life.

He looks like a Tesla henchman from the future who like came back in time, Terminator style, to stop Eli from murdering Elon Musk with one of his flamethrowers. He looks like Skeletor shoved his head in a Mr. Potato so he could take his senior phone he looks like a salesman for the Ed Gein

furniture company it's fucked up he looks indicted he just looks like every indicted white guy or he looks like that one guy who's doing well but in your head it's just like well yeah until he gets indicted he looks like that one guy you know who's doing well but in your head it's just like you know well yeah until he gets indicted he looks like that pending yeah tim iman only wants two things he wants money and attention and i mean i get that like i like both

of those things but the thing is that the money and attention that's all he wants that's it he doesn't want money so he can pursue a dream and be a better more interesting man or to travel the world and broaden his horizons he doesn't want the so he can pursue a dream and be a better, more interesting man or to travel the world and broaden his horizons. He doesn't want the money to use it. He wants money to have it. He wants money for money's sake because he doesn't know the difference between having values and financial value.

And the need for attention is even worse because he doesn't care who it's from or what it's for. He doesn't want attention the same way you or I do. He doesn't want the world to see him and to appreciate him for his talents or skills or thoughts or dreams. He has nothing to show the world. All Tim wants is more eyes, more attention. He wants to make up for his lack of depth with a breadth of audience. And he'll shit on everything and everyone to get them both until there's nobody left looking. He looks like he wasted a totally

good use of a flamethrower. It looks like he cheats at golf, by which I mean, after he and his buddies play golf, they cheat on their wives together with each other. It looks like the inappropriate picture mainstream media insists on using of every white guy who just killed his family

dog using the family cat. But he does, though. But he does. Indicted. He looks indicted. I mean, Noah, you nailed it. That's perfect. Alright, well, I'll tell you what. We've gotten through a ton of it here, but there are a couple of rows still to go. A lot of people want us to make fun of

their dogs, so we're going to close it out in style. Hit it, Anna! Back up Back up Lucy and Riz are Nicole's special mutts. I bet the other dogs avoid their stinky butts. Cause one's a dingleberry in the shape of a dog. And the other looks like a blanket hawk.

That's the worst. Artemis ruins the envyy for no reason. Sticks her nose in every crotch like a horny husky demon. Libby don't

like being alone. So she'll eat your loaf of bread and your pumice stone. Then look at you like alternate universe Raven

Simone. That's so Libby. You were a bad dog. A bad dog. You put your poor human through the ringer today.

You were a bad dog, but don't be a sad dog. Cause everybody loves you anyway. Oliver is a tripod dog who made Kendra cash in Looks like an old rusty tricycle, but then make it fashion And Chance has got it made, but he doesn't seem to care Cause that seal pup sleeper eats your diapers and your food and poops everywhere Everett found you, Molly, in the middle of the road Looks like she's about to

break the White House ethics code And Deanna took that living vacuum cleaner Rachel in And now she deals with her literal shit-eating grin You were a bad dog

a bad dog, a bad dog You put your poor human through the wringer today You were a bad dog, don't be a sad dog Cause everybody loves you anyway Penelope was living outside in the cold Eleven puppies in Houston and barely a home But things then already came along and everything went wrong Now they're paying for Penelope's waiting gold

For that thick-ass little piggy who deserves a heckin' skull Bye. Send off, don't you just send off. Everybody loves you anyway. Coconut is a fluffball that Tim and Dina found. He's like a fluffy feral hamster with no social boundaries. And Briar the Beagle has a heart of gold, but he's literally chewing on his foot in the photo. Yuck, that's so gross. Why would he do that? You were a bad dog, a bad dog. You put your poor human through the wringer today.

You were a bad dog. Don't be a sad dog. Everybody loves you anyway. You were a bad dog, bad dog, you brought your poor human through the ringer day. You were a bad dog, don't be a sad dog. Cause everybody loves you anyway. Don't be a sad dog. A bad dog. Everybody loves you anyway.

Thank you, Anna. Also, thank you, Tom, Cecil, Andrew Andrew Lucinda Bryce Dan Mark Frank Thomas Seth Don Ford voice of fantasy and adventure and everybody else who helped us work our way through the more than 1,000 roasts we had for 2019's vulgarity for charity and thanks to all the listeners and all the donors for bearing with us we're going to be putting some guardrails in place to make sure the next one is just the three or four week thing we originally intended but hey to raise six figures for charity we're going to do what we have to fucking do oh and before we blow out the candles tonight we want to wish our very own heath enright a happy 40th birthday it's friday not today but hey we joke around about his absence from social media quite a bit but in truth he's a lurker he sees it all he doesn't comment very often but he sees it all

so if you have a chance to wish him a happy birthday via facebook twitter or i think he's even on instagram now it would brighten his day and his day is already going to start on vacation in Italy. Just think about how fucking bright we could get it. Anyway, that's all the Blast Movie we've got for you tonight. We'll be back in 10,022 minutes with more. If you can't wait that long, be on the lookout for a brand new episode of our sister show, The Skeptic Rat, debuting at 7 a.m. Eastern on Monday, an even newer episode of our sister show's

Hot Friend Godawful Booze, debuting at 7 a.m. Eastern on Tuesday, and an even newer episode of our Have Such a Show Citation Needed, debuting at noon Eastern on Wednesday. Obviously, this episode would be too light to stay on your phone if I didn't weigh it down with some much-deserved thanks to Heath Enright for letting me be a part of his fourth decade. I want to thank Eli Bosnick for focusing the old jokes on somebody else for a few weeks.

I want to thank the lovely and talented Lucid Illusions for making getting old so damn much fun. I also want to thank Revan for providing this week's Farnsworth quote and for not being a Jehovah's Witness anymore. Way too many of them as it is. But most of all, of course, I want to thank this week's best people. Xenia Brett, bad credit, good credit, no credit, come on down to Throckmorton Fraud,

Peter, John Buckland, Misty Stew, Jason, John Park, and Taurus, and Jennifer. Xenia Brett, Throckmorton Fraud, and Peter, whose sexual magnetism is measured in Tesla. John Buckland, Misty Stew, and Jason, who are hot enough to make that fusion reaction in California jealous. And John Park, Taurus, and Jennifer,

who could have smooshed together a couple of hydrogen atoms with their sheer might if the scientists had just asked. Together, these 13 thoroughly thoughtful theist thwackers were lucky enough to join Earth's most storied fellowship, people who give us money. Not everybody has the legendary bravery and cunning it takes to give us money, but if you want in on the action, you can make a per-episode donation

at patreon.com slash scathingalias, whereby you'll earn early access to an extended ad-free version of every episode, or you can make a one-time donation by clicking on the donate button button on the right side of the homepage at scathingads.com. Legal services for this podcast are provided by the law offices of P. Andrew Torres, Tim Robinson handles our social media, and our audio engineer is Morgan Clark, who also wrote all the music that was used in this episode, which was used with permission. If you have questions, comments, or death threats, you'll find all the content info on the contact page at scathingads.com. It would be hilarious if Morgan just didn't put in any sound effects for that at all.

The preceding podcast was a production of Puzzle and a Thunderstorm LLC. Copyright 2021. All rights reserved.