The Scathing Atheist - 519: Decade and Counting Edition

Episode Date: January 26, 2023

In this week’s episode, the church created by a king he could fuck other women opines on the sanctity of marriage, Texas considers a heartbean bill to regulate its chili, and Marsh will introduce us to his magical slipper connection. --- 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: Check out Dear Old Dads here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/dear-old-dads/id1627427933 --- Headlines: 50th Annual March for Life takes place in DC: https://religionnews.com/2023/01/19/after-roe-50th-march-for-life-a-turning-point-for-national-state-abortion-protests/ Groff v.DeJoy SCOTUS case could turn every workplace into a religious battleground: https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/23559038/supreme-court-groff-dejoy-religion-twa-hardison-workplace Church of England bishops refuse to back gay marriage: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-64313367  Texas state senator calls for food made from aborted fetuses to be labeled: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/texas-republican-aborted-fetuses-food-b2265342.html

Warning, the following podcast contains pronouns. This week's episode of The Scathing Atheist is brought to you by Adam and Eve, HelloFresh, MySheetsRock, and by the newest innovation from the Vatican Communication Department, the INRI phone by Papel. The INRI phone, all the phone, none of the smart. And now, The Scathing Atheist. Hey, this is Doc. As a paramedic in South Carolina,

father to a wonderful, wonderful child we've nicknamed Monkey, as well as the husband to a teacher in this state who gets to deal with the lovely parents here, I can tell you that we did in fact evolve from filthy, filthy monkey people. it's thursday it's januaryth. And it's Dental Drill Appreciation Day. Absolutely not. Yeah, I mean, that sounds boring anyway. No illusions.

I'm Michael Marshall. I'm Heath Enright. And from David Ikes, England, Ann Arbor, Michigan, and Wake Ross, Georgia, this is The Scathing Atheist. Trust your words, now this is The Scathing Atheist. On this week's episode, the church created by a king so that he could fuck other women opines on the sanctity of marriage. Texas considers a heartbeam bill to regulate its chili. And Marshall introduced us to his magical slipper connection.

It's true, I've got a guy, I've got a guy. You've got to have a guy. But first, he does. The Diatribe. It came and went last Tuesday, and I was still so high on the Big Jags comeback that I left it out of the Diatribe altogether last week. But on January 17th, this show had its 10th anniversary. January 17th of 2013 at 8 a.m. Eastern time, we posted our very first episode.

It was only 30 minutes long. The diatribe was a bumbling mess. It ended as awkwardly as my first sexual experience, and it sounded like we recorded it on a goddamn submarine, but the core of the show was already there. I feel like even on episode one, we had a clear idea of what we wanted to do. And by and large, that vision hasn't changed. It's grown. It's matured. It's adjusted. But those core values of creating community, normalizing atheism, and making a lot of poop jokes have remained constant throughout. Heath and I, consummate mediocre white guys that we are, we looked at the dozens of atheist podcasts that were already out there and we thought, yeah, but those shows are all lacking

a certain us. So we started a show. We said, hey, maybe if we laugh at how stupid religious apologetics are, somebody will laugh along with us. And you did. And sure, the inspiration was charged up with ego, but following a dream always is. And it's hard to say what that dream really was when we first started. I mean, there were moments when I thought I'd be the first

podcasting superstar and I'd make billions and I'd buy an island and spend the rest of my days snorting my way through a Scrooge McDuck vault of cocaine. But realistically, I figured it was just a time for my socially awkward ass to schedule hanging out with my friends. Sure, we brought Eli on because we thought he was funny and we thought that he would add a ton to the show. But like the first time I invited him on, it was mostly because he seemed like a really cool guy and I wanted an excuse to hang out with him. Back then, I never seriously considered the possibility that it could one day become my full-time job. But it is and it has been now for more than nine years. That's the longest I've ever held anyone job in my life.

And thanks to you, I get to count myself amongst the extremely lucky few that found a way to turn their passion into rent money. I wake up every day feeling like I'm cheating, like somebody's going to knock on my door and say, hey, we just realized you were using this loophole and make me get a real job, but they haven't. And it's because of you. Whether you've been listening since the beginning or this is your first go at the show, it's because of you. This career that I love and that fills me with pride and meaning every day is a gift that you gave me and I will never forget that. See, and I've talked about this on the show before,

but there's this mistake that a lot of podcasters make When they first start off they feel like hey i'm i'm giving you this for free So i'm under no obligation to try my hardest and do my best, but we recognize that fallacy from the very beginning Right because you're giving us the most valuable commodity. You have the only thing that you have that's irreplaceable. You're giving us your time Sure, maybe it's time you're commuting or mowing the lawn or doing errands or something, but it's time that you could have spent with somebody else and you chose us. You decided to gift us with your most precious resource. And from day one, we've tried to treat that gift with the respect that it deserves. That's why we've never missed an episode

in 10 years. That's why we've never played a rerun or skipped a week or put the episode out a day late. You've given me my dream job and you keep giving it to me every day and it feels like the least we can do. This job has given me a lot to be proud of. The fundraising drive we started has raised over a million dollars for people on the brink of poverty. I've got a folder in my inbox crammed full of heart-wrenching stories of people who used our comedy to help them through hard times. We've helped rescue people from a cycle of ignorance and perpetual victimhood. But more than any of that, we've helped to create one of the most supportive, compassionate, and welcoming communities on the whole of the goddamn internet. And keep in mind that we didn't go into this with any significant qualifications to do this job.

Sure, Heath, Eli, and I all had backgrounds in entertainment, but Eli and I were mostly kids entertainers, and Heath mostly did bar competitions. Eli and I were doing birthday parties and bar mitzvahs. What's more, we did visual stuff. Eli's a magician. I'm a juggler. Heath's a flair bartender. None of that translates very well to an audio medium. And as to our technical know-how, when we started, I literally never owned a microphone.

And the last time I owned a computer, it was when my dad brought home a Commodore 64. We knew virtually nothing about podcasting or audio recording or writing scripts or building communities. We just had an outlandish dream and we really, really wanted it to happen. And sure, to some degree, I'm telling you this because I'm bursting with pride and I have to let it out. But I also think it's an important reminder that sometimes it is worth pursuing an outlandish dream. I mean, my dream might seem small compared to yours, but it probably isn't any less outlandish. The chances we'd wind up where we are now are literally in the one in a million range, but there are also a lot of ways we could have succeeded shy of what we got.

Hell, I honestly, it still would have been worth it if all I ever got from this was a scheduled time to hang out with my friends. They're talking about you, Jesus. We interrupt this broadcast and bring you a special news bulletin. Joining me for headlines tonight are the cardiac and smooth to my skeletal Heath Enright and Michael Marshall fellas. Are you ready to muscle your way into the conversation? I am pumped. Well done, sir.

I mean, I know I've got a tendency to monopolize things, but you know, I'd seen you taking that into account. I saw it written and I had no idea where you were going until I heard it spoken. Well done, sir. To be clear, by the way, those were the three types of muscle tissue and I think a pretty apt description of our

appearances. So quick before Heath asks why I think his appearance is cardiac. Why am I cardiac? Damn it, we're too late. But we're still going to pause for a quick word from this week's first sponsor, Adam and Eve. Hey, podcast listener. Valentine's Day is just around the corner,

and that means it's the perfect time to spice things up in the bedroom. But if you're anything like me, you're not going to come up with the right ideas. For me, it's either like, okay, what about sex plus we eat candy bars, which, yeah, that's delicious, but also kind of boring. Or I just panic and I name something insane, often anatomically impossible. I'm really bad at finding the reasonable middle ground. There's a lot of it. I can't find it. But that's why there's adamandeve.com.

They're the perfect expert team to ignite your Valentine's Day. They've got a wide range of amazing stuff that's definitely not boring, but also doesn't require non-Euclidean geometry or some other absurd suggestion that goes very badly. And Heath runs away yelling, sorry, sorry, bad idea. Didn't really think it through the suggestion. Sorry. Sorry. So to avoid

that, here's what you do. Check out adamandeve.com with your partners. See if you can find something y'all might enjoy and make Valentine's Day extra, extra fun. And here's the deal. When you go to adamandeve.com and select almost any one item, you'll get it at 50% off almost any item. But that's not all. When you select your one item, you'll also get free shipping. So head over to adamandeve.com and be sure to use the offer code scathing. Again, that's S-C-A-T-H-I-N-G scathing. That's offer code scathing at adamandeve.com. Have a happy Valentine's Day. And now back to the headlines. In our lead story tonight, in an important reminder that getting what they want has never been and will never be enough to shut them up, Christians gathered in D.C. on Friday

for the 50th annual March for Life. This is, of course, a tradition that began on the first anniversary of Roe v. Wade and sought to overturn that Supreme Court decision, which they did, right? They already have that. They've had it since the Dobbs decision was announced in June of last year, and they've known about it since Alito dropped the teaser trailer in May. But despite 49 years of insisting that their goal was just to rewind women's rights to 1973, they gathered again this year to see about maybe ratcheting them back a little bit further. Yeah, the chant's getting weird. It's like, what do we want? 1973.

When do we want it? Well, then and now, still, we're doing it. I can't get the cadence right. It's a lot. Now. They're basically not going to stop until they overshoot it like Doc Brown in Back to the Future 3 and they end up in like 1873. Yeah. You you know at which

point they'll just finally be honest and march against the 13th amendment too that's what i really want sure the fuck will yeah now you you might think it would be awkward for a coalition that has 49 years of momentum calling for states rights to pivot to suddenly calling for a federal ban on abortion but you don't right like you might think that but you don't think that because you know that we're talking about a group of people defined by their belief in an all-loving being that burns people in hell for eternity. They're not just immune to cognitive dissonance. It's their stock in fucking trade.

So yeah, the whole goddamn march was a contradiction. They called for laws against abortions, but balked at any mention of punishing pregnant women for breaking those laws. They declared absolute victory, but they said all the real work still lays ahead of them. And they talked about

marching forward in their return to the past. Okay, you know what? You guys can keep having that parade, but you have to do it walking backwards. I want, like,

DC to make that law. My favorite bit of this was where they asked one of the speakers about a banner that was hung on Planned Parenthood that read, most people of faith support legal abortion. And their response was, well, you

can justify anything and slap the label faith on it. He might as well have added, I mean, fuck, we should know. We've been doing that for 50 years now. We are experts at that. If anybody knows. Okay, you heard it. You heard it after a second. So, yeah. So so to be clear, the Speaker spent about one quarter of their time

talking about how to convince the country that their extremely unpopular opinion is correct and the other three quarters talking about how to impose that opinion on people regardless. The new phase of their fight was summarized stupidly by a Wellesley College senior quoted in Slate who said, quote, abortion is still an option

for a lot of people. And I think my goal is to make it not an option for a lot of people. And quote, sorry, I love that so much. Oh, fuck yourself. And next up in headlines, the Supreme Court of the United States just announced that they're going to be continuing to completely ruin the landscape of constitutional law in our country by further enshrining the legal principle of magic beats laws in a fight. They didn't say that out loud exactly, but they did agree to hear the case of Graf V. DeJoy, which is about the rules of religious accommodations in the workplace. And that means the current Supreme Court is going to tell us

exactly how far we all have to bend over when we're being fucked by the absurd, magical worldview of the people around us. And the answer is going to be more than we're doing already.

Yep. For sure. They haven't even started the case. I can guarantee you that's going to be the result. Come on, Heath. Don't exaggerate. Nobody needs to bend over.

There is no way this Supreme Court does anything other than lights off missionary as God intended. Well, yeah, but to be clear, where we already are is safety requirements don't count if your invisible friend says so, and required health benefits can be withheld from employees if they make baby Jesus cry, and we're on our way to worse. Yes, for sure. So here's the background on Groff. Plaintiff Gerald Groff was a postal worker who refused to work on Sunday because he's a Sunday Sabbatarian. That's a Christian group whose name basically translates to first day, seventh dayist. So they're not very strong readers or counters of integers. So Groff was working in this tiny post office of four employees and he demanded to never work on Sunday. That would obviously force the other three people to work a bunch more Sundays because they didn't invoke any magic. And the person in charge of the schedule responded by making that very reasonable point about not fucking over the other three people and refused to grant the request from Groff.

So Groff filed a lawsuit. And here we are. So if nothing else, I feel like churches should oppose this kind of shit just to prevent the doctrinal fringe benefits arm race that this is going to start between the denominations, right? Yep. So there's definitely a gray area that's worth discussing when it comes to accommodating the requests of employees. Like if a company had a standard uniform, for example, with a particular hat and a Sikh employee wanted to wear a turban instead, that's a pretty easy thing to accommodate. Now, okay. Well, personally, I don't think magic hats should be the legal reason for anything ever. Sure.

Yes, strong disagree. I think it'd be charming if all laws had to have a magic hat component. That would be charming. It would be charming. All right, all or nothing. Yeah, exactly. All right. Well, the Supreme Court of 1977, anyway, was nicer than me about that.

They would have been like, yeah, just, you know, accommodate the guy who wants to do the turban. Fine. In 1977, that ruling that I'm talking about was called TWA versus Hardison. And it ruled that employers have to be cool about a request if it's not a giant pain in the ass to grant it. And that case was pretty much identical to the issue in Groff. Plaintiff Hardison was an airline worker who wanted every Saturday off. And the ruling said, no, that's a giant pain in the ass. But if the accommodation was pretty easy, like if TWA's uniform had wool and somebody's allergic to wool,

TWA would have to let that person wear like a cotton uniform. That's been the very reasonable law for almost half a century and we've had zero uh apocalypses based on angry gods and like fabrics and days whatever well i but if there's one thing this scotus majority hates it's 50 years of very reasonable precedents yeah so given that hardison ruling, here's the thing. The correct answer when the Groff case showed up with the Supreme Court, the correct answer was to say, no, we already did this exact thing. Yeah. Well, okay.

Actually, the real correct answer is, no, we already did this exact thing and magic isn't real. That's dumb. But instead of going with either of those correct answers, our Supreme Court majority of Christian zealots decided to take the case. And they're almost certainly going to overturn Hardison and make employment law into an insane game of like magic v. magic litigation case by case. And a lot of like, like fighting. So that would actually be pretty fun, right? Lawyers having to have a magic off to see whose superstitions are the most powerful, except we already know the answer to that because it's just going to come down to whichever magic the court thinks is real. Right. This law is not

likely to agree, for example, that the Muslim restaurant staff are allowed to refuse to carry pork chops over to customers or that religious businesses have to respect their atheist employees either. That's just not going to happen. Exactly. Right. No, the guiding legal philosophy behind this Supreme Court is, well, then why isn't there a white history month? Yes. Yes. There you go. TLDR, that's our current Supreme Court. That's perfect. Oh, God. Someone's going to bring that case. Someone is definitely going to bring that case and they're going to hear it. Assholes. Every month, you know what's the rest of it. So here's the thing. To make it even worse,

the ruling in Groff is going to make it even more legal for either side, the employee or the employer, to do anything they want if they say religion in the sentence. Yep. Of course,

that means further legalizing homophobic hiring or anti-Canaanite customer service or treating women as a second class people bottom line here's the deal this is this is exciting actually i just now just recently started our lady of the long weekend and lady of 30 an hour minimum wage and lady of you have to give me the same medical benefits as the CEO. And lady of, I have to wear a very large necklace of Satan's penis at all times. The church. And we sincerely hold all those things very, very sincerely.

It's right in the name. So everybody listening, let me know if you want to sign up and you won't have laws anymore. There you go. Well, it sounds like Heath's going to need a minute to process a few applications. So we're going to take a quick break for a word from this week's next sponsor, HelloFresh. And so I said, if you close at all, the breadsticks are not unlimited, technically. I see. Right. Hey, Heath, a quick question.

Yeah. And it's going to sound like a weird one if the answer is no. But did you put an angry badger with brass knuckles in the refrigerator? In the fridge. Yeah. Well, first of all, his name is Percival, but yes, I did. Secondly, yes. Okay, but why? Well, I'm trying to eat better this year,

and I figure what better way than having to confront an angry, very well-armed badger every time I want a snack. And your answer wasn't just like a long series of better ways. It was not, no. Keith, if you're trying to stay healthy in the new year, why not try HelloFresh?

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In fact, HelloFresh will save you money all year. It's cheaper than grocery shopping and 25% cheaper than takeout. Plus, there's an amazing variety. Lucinda and I have been using HelloFresh for years, and we're still surprised by new delicious recipes all the time. All right, I'm sold. How do I sign up? Just go to HelloFresh.com slash Scathing21 and use the code scathing21 for 21 free meals plus free shipping.

Hold on. You're saying I go to hellofresh.com slash scathing21 and use the code scathing21 for 21 free meals plus free shipping? That's indeed what I'm saying. HelloFresh, America's number one meal kit. Now, quick, help me get this badger out of here before Eli gets home and tries to incorporate it into the podcast. Yeah, on it. It's going to have like fey demon skills or something.

Yes. And a funny voice. And in living in synod news. Nice. The Church of England is a very curious organization. Because as a religion, you get the sense that it's kind of in denial. It wants to be the groovy, hip young vicar who sits backwards on his chair and brings his guitar to Sunday school, while also being the centuries old establishment whose leaders get to decide what laws pass through parliament.

Okay, so King Charles. They want to be the King Charles of religion. Yeah. Like Church of England is probably more closely associated with tea and cakes than fire and brimstone. And that's how modern it sees itself. That's the modernity that it thinks it has. But that modernism keeps getting undercut by what their leaders believe and say. You know, just like last week when it announced that after spending five years consulting on the issue, no, the church will not allow same-sex marriage. Fucking weird contrast in that. Like, alright, let me rap with you guys. I'm the

cool, hip one. We hate you. Slur word. I just love that they spent five years consulting. Consulting what? Right? Their holy books are unambiguously against it.

Morality is unambiguously for it. Prayer is an arrogant form of talking to yourself. So what the fuck were you doing for those five years? You came in every day. You took a lunch break from this. What was it? Just doing insane homophobic math on a glass thing. Five years? Given the history of the Church of England, maybe they were consulting with a monarch to see what the monarch felt about it.

Like, look, we're against it, but unless you want to, unless Lizzie, you've got a lass on the side that you want to marry, in which case we will change our mind. We've got the history. Right, right. Yeah. But the church's whole position, the whole position is going to be debated next month at the General Synod, which is like the Church of England's equivalent of Parliament, but with only slightly more religious representation. Only slightly more. Fun.

But it's not actually going to be put to a vote there, and they're not going to be changing their minds either, they've already said. So it's not really that much of a debate that they're going to be having. No, no, but it does strike me as the height of both Britishness and religiosity to agree to a debate on the condition that nobody changes their mind afterwards. So they have, at least, however, said they're going to reverse a rule

that's been in place for 30 years, which demanded that vicars in same-sex relationships had to remain celibate, which is a rule that you can only imagine was adhered to about as vigorously as the one where traffic signs in an empty parking lot at two in the morning. Okay, I take those very seriously, Mark. That's a weird example. I don't even know what you mean.

That's a weird example. People do that, right? I'm just saying I can only imagine it was very much a look, there's probably nobody looking right now, so it's probably fine, especially if we were really quick about it, but you know, just be careful if you're going to go up there. Yeah, I don't, I feel like the only practical difference

is that same-sex vicars can now open their sermons with, so I was fucking my husband the other day, and I don't think they're going to do that. So as well as allowing gay vicars to consummate their relationships, finally, the church has said they'll allow clergy to give

prayers of dedication, thanksgiving, or for God's blessing, unquote, on same-sex couples who've just had a civil marriage or partnership. So basically, vicars are now formally allowed to do a just the tip, but no further with religion. Yeah, they can do medium level magic, but not the really good stuff. Seriously, that's the policy? One liberal bishop who was present at the meeting told BBC News that while this represented a substantial progress, it, quote, leaves same-sex couples in a bit of a limbo and also as second-class citizens, we're still saying to gay couples that their relationships are less than the relationships between people of opposite sexes, unquote. Which is interesting because at the same time, one conservative vicar said of the decision, quote,

it leaves same-sex couples as second-class citizens. Yes, we're saying to gay couples, their relationships are less than the relationships between people of opposite sexes. I'm not the same guy from Before and a Mustache. I'm not. You're the same guy from Before and a Mustache. You are. from Before and a Mustache. I'm not. You're the same guy from Before and a Mustache. You are.

But when your thing is imaginary, you can't take intermediate steps. That isn't progress, substantial or otherwise, right? Because the only thing that you have to give is symbolic equality and you withheld that.

Right, exactly. So according to BBC News, several bishops at the meeting said that church would not be changing its official teaching that holy matrimony is only between one man and one woman. But here's the thing, Church of England, allowing marriage to be between one man and more than one woman is literally the whole reason you exist. Your entire religious organization came into being because one man who just happened to be the king decided he wanted to officially be allowed

to fuck a woman who didn't happen at that time to be his queen. There was a whole thing about it. Heads were chopped up and everything.

Also, the entire religion of Christianity is based on a threesome with Joseph watching from the cuck corner. Okay,

nothing wrong with that if everybody's into it. Just embrace it. Don't be a liar. Yeah. So, if the Church of England won't perform marriage services that other faiths refuse to do, what exactly would you say you guys do around here?

Right? And finally tonight, in Feed Us This Day, our daily bread news. Brilliant. Well done, sir. Texas is hoping to become the first state to finally make it illegal for food companies to smash up aborted fetuses and secretly sell those products at the grocery store like they've been doing. As we all know, Texas is on the bleeding edge of ethical philosophy, and this new proposal would be no different. State Senator Bob Hall just sponsored a new bill, SB 314, that would require proper labeling of all the fetus food. And I think it's about fucking time.

This is real. Seriously, this is real. Oh, God. In addition to nutrition facts, the label is now required to also include when you stopped beating your wife. Yeah. Amazing. will include when you stopped beating your wife. Yeah. Amazing. So we heard about

this one after a report from the Beaumont Enterprise came out last week. And about 30 seconds later, we got an alert that scathingnews at gmail.com was the victim of a cyber attack and had burst into flames or something. It's the weight of the emails. We didn't realize

they had weight. There's so many. So thanks to, I would imagine, thousands of listeners who gave us the heads up, including Vincent, SW Finas, and Benjamin, whose emails must have come through before that crash and fire. We were able to get the email back up and running, though. So please keep sending us those news tips. Scathingnews at gmail.com. Very helpful.

Okay. So here's what it says in SB 314. The new law would require that any food product that contains, is manufactured with, or derived from tissues, cells, or organs obtained from an aborted unborn child has to be

clearly and conspicuously labeled. Sure. You know, why not? Well, as long as you're legislating the stuff that doesn't exist, why not also insist that the labels include the name and social security number of the fetus that they would have been given had they gone to term? Have fun with it.

Yeah, I mean, an artist's rendering of the first birthday it didn't have. Angelo, you know what to do and it's even crazier than i thought when i saw the subject line in one of those emails it said texas wants to ban fetus food or something like that i was thinking okay wow that's dumb that's dumb that's texas but it turns out they just want to make sure it's labeled properly right what the fuck is happening what kind of insane libertarian logic is happening there they don't want to tread on you and make a bunch of red tape that hamstrings the soylent veal sector you know big job creator they just want some good responsible labeling oh god like at this point we what we need is a company to bring out a feeder's food. We need that to start happening and to be labeled entirely perfectly.

Just perfectly labeled, big picture, a diagram of what they did. Absolutely. And the craziest part to me, the label has to be conspicuous. That was the word. Which means Bob Hall thinks that food companies are doing this and they're just using fine print on the back. This is like citric acid, sodium, yellow five and xanthan gum. What the fuck?

I'm also super curious what food items he's picturing exactly that exist in his head. Right. Look, it's got to be jelly babies, right? A British candy shop. Clearly a British candy shop was opened recently in Texas. Bob Hall saw some jelly babies in there. And now you guys have this law. And at least those are already conspicuously labeled as babies.

So we're already halfway there for this law. He's walking down the candy aisle. He sees sugar babies, Sour Patch Kids, baby Root Bars. He's like, I just made a Goddard Massacre, y'all. Dives out the window of the store right into his car. So here's the reasoning for the fetus labeling

bill from Bob Hall, who just dove out a window. Quote, Unfortunately, many Texans are unknowingly consuming products that either contain human fetal parts or were developed using human fetal parts. While some may not be bothered by this. Okay, who the fuck is that? Who knows they're eating fetuses?

They're like, yeah, I'm just going to let this go, whatever. Continuing. Continuing, while some may not be bothered by this, there are many Texans with religious or moral beliefs that would oppose consumption or use of these products, end quote. And in response to that, the Food and Drug Administration, they actually came out with an official statement. It said, dude, what the fuck are you talking about? Are you insane? And just to be extra clear, they almost said that. They said that in their words. But just to be extra clear, fetus food is not a thing. I hadn't actually said that yet. It's definitely not a thing. It's not a thing. But now what I really want is someone else in

the Senate there to introduce labels for any food products that Bob Hall has personally ejaculated into. Some people may not be bothered by that. But what about the Texans who are against Bob Hall's ejaculate? You know? We could even have stickers for the front of products

saying, does not contain Bob Hall's ejaculate. Conspicuous. Like a free from nut sticker. Yeah. Yeah. No, they could even use

the same sticker in a picture. That's great. Okay. That company, please do that use the same sticker in a picture. That's great. Okay. That company, please do that. Bob Hall's ejaculate, the big picture of fetus, whatever you got to do. So it might sound like, all right, this is a dumb Texas thing, but it doesn't really matter. Fetus food doesn't exist. This is dumb, but it doesn't matter.

But it's actually worse than a law about nothing if you really get into the wording, because the wording doesn't only mention food. And there are real things like vaccines that do have a research process that involves the use of fetal cell lines. So if this thing passes, the new law would add labeling requirements for stuff like that. And the state of Texas would be in charge of whatever the fuck it would mean for the COVID vaccine to have a conspicuous aborted fetus label on the front of it, like the fucking radioactivity sign. I don't know, like a bartender muddling a baby and lightning bolts shooting out of the side of the sticker.

Great fucking job, Texas. You're crushing it over there. Well, now, obviously obviously we each need a minute to work on our entry for the abortive fetus warning symbol competition so we're gonna wrap up the headlines for the night heath marsh thanks as always slash sometimes angela please draw everything we've talked about just now when we come back we'll have another spin through marsh's rolodex of Insanity. Hey, podcast listener. Heath again with some very important sleeping advice. If you're looking for sheets, check out the Regulator Sheets from My

Sheets Rock. They're designed specifically to keep hot sleepers cool and cold sleepers comfortable. Oh, hey Heath. Wait, what you doing, buddy? Oh, hey Marsh. Hey Noah. Just recording the ad for My Sheets Rock. Oh, cool. So do you want us to like get involved in some kind of absurd shenanigans, that kind of thing?

No, no, no. We're good. We're good. Kind of just complicates the whole thing. You know what I mean? Yeah, good point. You could just say why you like the product, I guess, without somebody blowing up the studio or fighting a magical fade demon.

Right. Yes. Thank you. Exactly. So yeah, my sheets rock. I'm a huge fan. I really am. They sent me a set and they're delightful. Seriously, several times a day, I'll just get naked or still be naked from already. And I'll do snow angels in bed for a while. It's the best. And same thing when I go to bed each night. I love it. Yeah, that makes perfect sense for me. Because as I understand it, they regulate temperature,

they whip moisture, they stay breathable, and they're so soft that you'll sleep comfortably every night. That's exactly right, Marsh. And that's because they're made from best-in-class bamboo rayon, which is the holy grail of sheeting. This miracle material transfers body heat two times more effectively than regular sheets and reduces humidity by 50% so you can experience your best night's sleep yet. So that all sounds amazing, but what if I don't believe? Don't believe me, Marsh? The five-star customer reviews speak for themselves. Plus, they offer a 90-day risk-free trial and free shipping and returns. So check out MySheetsRock at mysheetsrock.com slash scathing

and enter the code scathing for 10% off and free shipping. That's mysheetsrock.com slash scathing, code scathing. Nice. sheetsrock.com slash scathing. Code scathing. Nice. So, it feels like we're supposed to do some kind of sketch thing though, right?

Right, like some kind of sketch thing. Yeah. Hmm. Yeah. Ooh, you guys want to do a voice? Perfect. Okay, all right, I'll set it up. So,

is there anyone that you guys know who really likes My Sheets Rock? My wife. My wife. My wife, Borat.

Classic. Voice is just automatically funny. Every single time. Without fail. as atheists we're often called upon to clarify that just because we hate religion doesn't mean that we hate religious people but as a scathing atheist i'm often called upon to dial that back a bit remind you that sometimes we also hate religious people, which is why we're excited to introduce another installment of Who's Woo?

I hate most people, so it's going to be a lot of fun. So tell us, Marsh, who are we going to learn about today? So while recent years have seen the rise of some real assholes who've more than deserved coverage in Who's Woo, we can't be so dazzled by the latest bullshitters that we forget to pour the requisite scorn on the merchants of misinformation who were doing it

back when the current pandemic pillocks and conspiracy theory crackpots were still in short pants. Yeah, I'm excited. This guy was lying on vinyl, for real. Actually, for real. Literally, I'm guessing he was lying.

Yeah, no, probably. Almost certainly, yeah. Because the new and the shiny are all well and good but there's a lot to be said for someone who's been at the very top of the pseudoscience game for 60 years and if that really was like an asshole hall of fame it would it would have been built with this guy in mind so we're gonna be talking about one reverend peter popov peter oh. Oh, wow. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. No, his earliest bullshit has turned into caprolite at this point. So, okay. But for those who aren't familiar with him, who is this guy? So Peter George Popov was born in Berlin in 1946 before he and his family emigrated to the US to essentially become traveling revivalist preachers. And at the age of 14, Popov even had his own

preaching gig. He was calling himself the Miracle Boy Evangelist. And he was claiming that he was born in a West Berlin bomb shelter and that he was rescued from Siberia. And he wasn't. He wasn't either of those things. None of those things. You guys are picturing a little kid with a pamphlet writing a bomb like in Dr. Strangelove, right? That's what I'm picturing. No, but when I picture Peter Popov, there is a bomb there. But by the 1980s, Popov was now the biggest televangelist. He was regularly performing miraculous healing ceremonies in packed arenas before then asking attendees to show their appreciation to God by giving the very last of their money to Popov.

And one of Popov's big money-making schemes during that period was genuinely to ask for donations to help him take the Bible into the Soviet Union by floating Bibles over the border attached to helium-filled balloons. Fucking what? That is a real thing that he was pretending he was going to do. Just a pile of rotting Bibles on a fucking Caucasus mountain somewhere eight miles from

the border of Iraq. It's like the Free Wills Yak thing, but with Bibles on the moon. And eventually people understandably asked him to prove that he was spending the money on Bibles and balloons and helium. So to get around that, Popov staged a burglary at his own office. And then he went on TV crying about the break-in and explaining that he now needed even more money to deal with it. So they broke into my office and they took all my helium. I don't know what happened.

90% of the city I live in sees that shit on TV and goes, you know it was the fucking commies. So the thing is, listeners will almost certainly know that his whole I can magically tell what's wrong with you shtick was exposed in a legendary investigation

led by James Randi in 1986, which involved tuning into the earpiece that was disguised as Popov's hearing aid, at which point the whole world was able to hear that Popov's wife, Elizabeth, was feeding him information on the various people that he was psychically reading. Such a good job by Randi. Oh, it's great. It's great. The footage, which was broadcast live on primetime television, famously opened with Elizabeth telling him, Petey, I hope you can hear me because if you can't, we're in trouble.

Turn up your volume, or we can't do the fraud, that the fraud we're going to do, fraud, fraud, fraud. Can you imagine if James Randi could hear this? Wow. Oh, my God. But seriously, turn it up. We're going to do fraud now. But the Popovs did indeed find themselves in trouble. After this whole expose by Randi,

ratings for his TV show completely plummeted and he declared bankruptcy in 1987. But that was just Popov's rocky moment. You know, this is where a who's who hall of famer really has a chance to show their metal and to get up you son of a bitch because Mickey loves you. Okay, and then he what?

Faith heals a bunch of chickens. Mr. T beats him up. Giant Russian kills his best friend. I do like where this is going. Yeah, right. Some of those things. So his resilience is yet another trait

that he shares with cancer. Got it. Absolutely. So by the turn of the millennium, Peter Popov was right back on top, having built up a brand new following via his regular segment on BET, the Black Entertainment Television Network.

And he was back performing the same old fake miracle cures where he lays hands on someone and then they miraculously rise out of their wheelchair that Popov's team had insisted that they sit in even though they didn't need a wheelchair. James Randi walks into the frame. This guy fucking walks, pushes over the wheelchair, starts stabbing him in the legs with a pen.

Ow, ow! Fucking Goldbreaker. I knew it. However, according to Popov, a fortunate discovery that he made when visiting Chernobyl in the late 1990s had given his miracle business a whole new angle to work with.

Because, again, according to Popov, he found when he was there a spring whose water had miraculously protected local inhabitants from radiation poisoning as long as they were followers of Jesus. Oh my God. Yeah. So the study we did to figure out which religions get the magic, a little problematic. But yeah, no heavy holy water. It's real. It's real. It's real. We have it for sale. And the thing is,

you can get your hands on a sample of this amazing and incredibly unlikely miracle water of Juby's origin. All you had to do was call this number now or fill in the prayer request form on Popov's website. See, that's the extra mile that gets you in the Hall of Fame, right? Miracle water.

Yes, any grifter can do that. Miracle water from Chernobyl that specifically protects you from radiation. That is elite level evil right there. Impressive in some weird way. Oh, we're going to get more and more evil. We are absolutely going to get more and more evil. According to the testimonials on his site and in his infomercials, people who were sent this blessed spring water were instantly cured of diabetes and stomach cancer and drug addiction and money troubles

and unemployment. Like you name it and this water healed it. Okay. So you might be thinking at this point, you're saying God's plan was to do Chernobyl and make healing water. Anyway, it's $99.99 for a case. So that's the price. Now, to be fair, though, for Popov's audience, irradiating commies isn't the kind of transgression that's in need of explanation, right? That's fair. That is fair. So in all of this, you know, so far, so altruistic, right?

But of course, there is more to this story, because along with a sample that puts the O in Chernobyl, you also get... That's excellent. That's not what's better written down, but I'm happy with it. Decavion, you go. But along with this sample of Miraclewater, you also get a letter from Popov himself, which is printed out, but it's even got scrawled annotations that look almost convincingly like they're handwritten, explaining how Peter Popov has personally had a vision from God specifically about, insert name here, and how he's going to be praying for you

specifically and how he's got a message for you, yes, you from God. And that message is, give me money. Yeah, basically. Yeah. Okay. Marsh, put a picture here so you can see this. He actually quotes 1 Samuel 2, 7, which says in the real 1 Samuel 2, 7, it says, the Lord maketh poor and maketh rich. But in the letter, he used that same passage. And it just says, the Lord maketh ellipsis rich. He does. He literally

does! Oh my God! That's surreal! And then he circles it with a fake ink pen. Yeah, yeah. It's amazing. Honestly, I've got so many of these letters. I've really, I've just got, I've got a box filled with these letters. I signed up in March 2015. A friend of mine had been into this for a while, Emma,

and she got me onto this. It's amazing. And so over the course of two full years, Popov sent me 39 letters. And every one of these letters made it really clear that Popov had been praying for me personally nonstop since the first and only time that I contacted him, which is when I filled out a web form on his website with a fake name. And since then, I was constantly in his prayers. He told me that he could personally foresee £19,000 coming to me magically within a few weeks if I drank the miracle water that he sent me. And then I sent Pop of £25 in order to, quote, plant a holy consecrated seed for a great harvest offering, unquote. Okay, okay. But did you check if a Schmeichel Schmarshel won 19,000 pounds in a lot of that month?

I feel like your bias is showing here, Marsh. You got to check everything. Bad skepticism. Now, to be fair, though, my whole generation was primed to think that radiation regularly gave people superpowers. So I see how they fell for the Chernobyl water. Like, that makes sense to me. Oh, that's true. I want X-Men powers.

Right, right. Can you run it through a spider first? Is there a rage monster named Schmeichel Schmarshall? And think every single one of these letters pretty much always asks for a really specific amount, usually with the absolute flimsiest of justification. So you've got to give exactly £35.15 because of a specific Bible verse, you know, 3515. One letter told me to send £333 because of like the Trinity or something. And then some letters told me that if I wanted an even bigger return, I could double or even triple the seed that I was planting. Oh, really? And then God would know that I was like really serious about it. Lucky you. Just to be clear, you can send 666 pounds

and get double the God money back? I think it's over the course of the 39 letters that I was sent, Popov asked me to send him almost 3,000 pounds. And that was the lower end. That's if you just take the numbers that he's suggesting before you start going for the doubles and trebles and things. And of course, if you're going to run this con, if you're going to run this scheme,

you can't just constantly outright ask people for money. So people are going to start thinking that's weird. So the greatest part of this entire scam was that the letters would come with various miracle items with specific instructions on how to use these miracle items to harness God's power of healing and abundance and all that kind of stuff. At one point, he sent me a silver and gold bracelet that I had to wear overnight and then send back to him wrapped around some money.

It was comically cheap quality. It was incredible. It's a foil ribbon. Listeners, Marsh has included a picture in our notes. If you had just showed me this picture and asked what it was, I would have said, well, you tore it off of the back of like one of those big heavy duty envelopes to reveal the glue. Right? It does look like that. Absolutely. Marsh just sends it back with a letter.

Jewish delivery guy burst into flame. Is that true? Is it working? At one point, he sent me a medal that was made of plastic that declared me a winner. Oh, this was attached to, quote, his ribbon attached to a gold coin. That's what the medal was. It was a ribbon attached to a gold coin. It's none of those things, basically.

At one point, he completely bafflingly sent me a paper slipper that I was supposed to wear while standing on one leg on top of a Bible, like reciting a passage from the Bible he'd sent me. And then I had to send this paper slipper back to him along with 20 pounds. Oh my God. He sent me a bag of pomegranate seeds. He sent me the world's cheapest purple feather. He sent me a sachet of green oil

he sent me some dried leaves some wood shavings that he promised came from Jesus' cross itself he even sent me a packet of salt literally the same packet you'd find

in basically any diner this wasn't a fancy packet this had the word salt written on it and he clearly just grabbed a handful from a diner it was like being in a correspondence relationship with a diner it was like being in a correspondence

relationship with a magpie seriously i'm looking at these pictures it's like the shit you try to buy at the school store with your half credit from a spelling test or whatever god and yeah like a magpie but it's like a magpie read some Marie Kondo. And the magpie was like, yeah, I got to get rid of the dumb shit in my garbage pile. This paper slipper thing, this is my favorite. Because it's so cheap and it's so insubstantial that it almost qualifies as a gas. It looks like you had to take this picture quick before it decohered. It's a paper slipper and you send it back to him.

Yes. So he has like dirty used paper slippers in his possession. Yes. The sending it back is actually a really, really smart part of the scam. It's a crucial part of the scam because like this scam is incredibly obvious to anyone who isn't really deep into it. So almost all the letters urge me to send back the whole letter when I make my offering. out the scam because like this scam is incredibly obvious to anyone who isn't really deep into it.

So almost all the letters urge me to send back the whole letter when I make my offering, which effectively removes any trace of evidence. And it also puts like a timeframe in it. You need to do this within the next 48 hours, the next 24 hours, something like that. So a timeframe too short for someone who's desperate to really think twice about it. You don't want to miss this offer. And the other thing is Popov would do, he would tell his marks, you have to keep your offerings a secret. You can't tell anybody in your life that you've done this, else it won't come true.

Okay, well, that's why you're not rich, Marsh. Fucking Rita Heisenberg, you told us about it. And it's kind of hard, therefore, to gauge just how big a scam this was, just the magnitude of this scam. But what we do know for certain is that Popov has been sending these form letters to tens of millions of people, so many that it doesn't require too large a fraction of them to believe it and send some cash back before you're starting to make millions of pounds. In 2005, Popov made $23 million in the US alone. And in 2006, he registered as a religious

organization. So what he made after that is anybody's guess. But we do know that it was enough to buy him a year later a $4.5 million house in California and a Mercedes and a Porsche. Wow. So there you have it, listeners. The real reason we couldn't have Eli on this week's episode. Oh, and if he asked, the studio was flooded this week. There was no episode this week, okay? I haven't been asked.

Got it. So you might be thinking that having a constant stream of untraceable cash mailed to him directly for very little effort on his part would be enough for Popov. But if you're thinking that,

you're underestimating the ego of Popov because from time to time, he still does the same old live shows with the same old lies about healing people at his very touch. I know that this is true because I've been to one of those shows. I've actually been to a Popov show.

Yeah. All right. I'm sensing a person in the audience. First name S, maybe a Schmeichel in this area. So in 2015, actually only a few months after he started sending me these letters, he sent me a free ticket to one of his shows. And he did the same to the rest of the UK mailing list because 2,000 people went along to a London theater one Sunday morning in early May to see Popov live. Wow. And I don't think that free ticket was an act of altruism on his behalf,

right? If you ask me, that was a free ticket because he wanted to keep the whole thing pretty secretive and he wanted to keep it to just the handpicked people who'd already indicated some level of trust in him and some level of gullibility. You know, there was zero advertising of this appearance. There was zero press for this appearance. When you got to the theater itself, the only clue that he was there was a single A4 sheet of paper with the words Peter Propov printed on it that was stuck to the inside of one of the windows. That was the only indication he was there, apart from the queue of 2,000 people who were queuing around the block to be let in. It's like a speakeasy.

Yeah, it was a psychic speakeasy. Absolutely. It was pretty clear that the only people that he wanted to know about the show were the people who were already in his database of potential marks. Yeah. Well, it's got to be tough to do this job when the 10th word of the thing that comes up when people Google you is debunked. Right. It's weird that you were the one that felt the need to lie about his name in this.

That's true. That's true. And so from pretty much minute one of this show, the grifting began. I was there for five hours in all and it was grift the whole way through. And so eventually,

after a few hours of like singing and chanting and opportunities for us to give them money, Popov and his wife came out. And notably, he wasn't wearing a hearing aid. So, you know, maybe God has finally found the time to, Popov and his wife came out. And notably, he wasn't wearing a hearing ear. So, you know, maybe God has finally found the time to heal Popov's hearing issues. But at this point, the healings began. There was one woman who had one leg shot and the other,

you know, that classic old bit. There was the lady who had arthritis. There was a guy with sickle cell anemia. There was the person with a stomach hernia. There was a lady with a tumor. All of those things were miracled away by Popov's touch. It's so weird that they'd all have such externally unverifiable maladies. It's such a weird coincidence. Yeah, who'd have thought it? There were no amputees who were suddenly healed of their maladies there. Who'd have thought it? Yeah. All the Morgellons wiped away by Jesus. There we go. But the best of all of these was a woman who said she'd been in constant pain for the whole of the last year. And she came to stand with Popov and she was within touching distance of me and my friend Emma, who'd been down for this investigation.

We could reach out and touch her if we wanted to. And Popov put his hand on her forehead and she fell back and started convulsing in spectacular fashion. But the thing is, I'd seen that lady before. She was the person who showed me where to sit and handed me a pen on the way in. Yeah. She fucking worked for Popov. I literally have him on tape using a stooge from his own team. Oh, my God. At least put on a fake fucking mustache for one of these roles, lady.

Jesus. Exactly. Okay. But again, I feel like you might be being unfair. Like I'm saying he hired a lady who is in constant pain to walk around and be an usher. That's like a normal hiring thing. So eventually all this fake healing was done. And so Popov's team handed out the envelopes and asked people to make their seed donation.

And I could see people putting 20 pounds, £30, even £40 into their envelopes who were sat just in the people around me. And then they had to go down to the front of the building, go to the front of the theater room and put their cash envelope into a box that was on the stage. Okay, that's all they had to do, walk down to the front of the room and put their envelope in a box on the stage. And to give you a scale of just how much money Popov made in that day in unmarked and unregistered bills, the queue to just hand this guy envelopes stuffed with money took 45 minutes to get through. Jesus. What the fuck's happening? I did a few back of the envelope estimates and I reckon he was handed at least

50 grand in cash on that day alone. That's a conservative estimate, and that is not bad going for a few hours work. Wow. Just a mafia guy watching on TV, room full of heroin. Hey, guys, guys, I feel like we're making this harder than it has to be, right? Right, yeah. So I will point out, though, that I didn't give Peter Popov 20 pounds

or 30 pounds or 40 pounds. I didn't give him any money. Instead, my envelope contained a single piece of paper on which I'd written the words, Hello, Petey, I hope you can hear me, because if you can't, we're in trouble. That was basically my favourite bit of the whole day. That was just a little present for me.

There was that, and there was also, oh God, the bit right at the very end, that was my other favourite bit, where he made us all line up around the walls of the theater. So we ended up like lining up several deep and he just went in circles around the room, one by one, holding us by the sides of the head

and blowing a blessing onto our foreheads. What? I have been blessed by Peter Popov. He came, he put his hands on my head, he blew on my forehead. And when he did, I looked him dead in the eye and told him, honestly,

I followed everything you've ever done. Okay, next time you go to one of these things, you got to fake a heart attack or a stroke when he blows your forehead. Just start writhing around

on the ground going unconscious. Have your friend next to you yelling demon breath the whole time. Oh my God, that'd be so good. And for

future reference, Marsh, the lead into this story is, did I ever tell you about the time I was blown by Peter Popoff? That's how you... The whole story. And the thing is, this scam, right, this scam is still going on right now. I signed up for his Miracle Water

just this week. I got a text from him today saying he's sending me some Miracle Water in the post and I should look out for it. It's still going on. Like from time to time, his infomercial gets kicked off one of the TV stations, sometimes because me or my colleague finds out who regulates that channel and makes them aware of what Popov's about. And then he gets kicked off that station.

Great work. But then he just finds some other faith-based channel that's willing to host him. And he moves over there and he starts this whole process of bilking their audience anew. And this fucker is 76. He's been scamming people since the age of 14. That's more than 60 years. Jesus. He's been exposed so many times and yet he is still making millions on the books. And God knows how much off the books. And all of that, all of that absolutely makes him more than worthy of an entry in Who's Woo. All right. Love this segment.

Once again, Marsh, I could have maybe ended the expose on something other than how useless all the exposes have been. But, you know, but other than that, I feel like you nailed it. And, of course, we'll all look forward to the next installment of Who's Wrong? Before we start the dishwasher tonight, I want to remind you that if Eli being off this week has you missing him, be sure to check him out on Dear Old Dads, the parenting podcast he does with Tom from Cognitive Dissonance and Thomas from Opening Arguments. It's a great listen, even if you

don't have kids, and of course it's linked in the show notes. Anyway, that's all the blasphemy we've got for you tonight, but we're back in 10, and Thomas from opening arguments. It's a great listen, even if you don't have kids. And of course, it's linked in the show notes. 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, then be on the lookout for a brand new episode of our sister show, The Skeptic Ride, debuting on 7 Eastern on Monday, an even newer episode of our sister show's hot friend, Godawful Movies, debuting at 7 Eastern on Tuesday, and an even newer episode of our half-sister show, Citation Needed,

debuting at noon Eastern on Wednesday. Obviously, this episode wouldn't fit properly into your ears if I neglected to thank Heath Enright for never meeting an embarrassing sexual admission that was too awkward for him to theme an ad around. I need to thank Michael Marshall for filling some damn big Velcro shoes this week. I need to thank the lovely and talented Lucien Delusions for filling some damn small shoes in a very big way. I also want to thank Eli, because even when he's not here, he's always here in spirit. I also want to thank Doc for providing this week's Farnsworth quote, as well as for all the other shit paramedics provide. But most of all, of course, I want to thank this week's most mellifluous mammals,

Tommy, Ryan, Dave, Tyler, Stephen, and Nicole. Tommy, Ryan, and Dave, whose erections are in the high nines on the Mohs scale of mineral hardness, and Tyler, Stephen, and Nicole, whose IQs are higher than my opinion of the new Last of Us series on HBO, which, to be clear, is very high indeed.

Together, these six slick dicks, chicks, and in-betwixt affix some tips to our scripts that depict the tricks of the pricks with the crucifix this week by giving us money. Not everybody has the money it takes to give some to us, but if you do, you can make a per-episode donation at patreon.com slash scathingatheist, whereby you'll earn access to an extended ad-free version of every episode, or you make a one-time donation by clicking on

the donate button on the right side of the homepage at scathingatheist.com. And if you'd like to help, but you blew your expendable income putting a down payment down with a dozen eggs, you can also help a ton by liking our Facebook page, leaving us a five-star review, or telling a friend about the show. Legal services for this podcast are provided by the Law Offices of P. Andrew Torres. Tim Robson handles our social media. Our audio engineer is Morgan Clark. We'll also roll the music of this episode, which was used with permission.

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