The Scathing Atheist - ScathingAtheist 146: Point Blankenagel Edition

Episode Date: December 3, 2015

In this week's episode, the state of Georgia will welcome Heath back with a sign telling him to leave; Pastor David Manning will get his N-word priveleges revoked from black people; and Bryce Blankenagel from the Naked Mormonism podcast will be here to talk about the other 9/11.

Warning, the following podcast contains F's in direct conjunction with X. This week's episode of The Scathing Atheist is brought to you by Josh Forstein's favorite hat maker, Bright Red Cranium Corsets. Are you looking to express your patriotism with a Christian version of a jihad video? Can't seem to fit your girthy skull into the frame of an iPod shuffle camera? Hoping to squeeze down that face skull into the frame of an iPod shuffle camera? Hoping to squeeze down that face fat like a tube of toothpaste? Well, we've got the compression lids for you.

Bright red cranium corsets. You're going to like the way you look. Like an overgrown SIDS victim. And now, the scathing atheist. This is at Sensibly Secular from Atheism Chat, Twitter's discussion forum for all things skeptical, secular,hing atheist. This is at sensibly secular from atheism chat, Twitter's discussion forum for all things, skeptical, secular, and atheist.

I've consulted with the other contributors, including at atheist underscore a Dan Errol at staunch a, and at Andy M O'Brien. And the consensus seems to be that we evolved from filthy monkey men, all of whom follow at Atheism Chat on Twitter. It's Thursday. It's December 3rd. And I finally got to experience a paleo pumpkin pie.

The way cavemen intended us to enjoy pumpkin pie. People are stupid. I'm Noah Lusions. I'm Heath Enright. And from the Azalea City, Valdosta, Georgia, this is The Skating Atheist. On this week's episode, the state of Georgia will welcome Heath back with a sign telling him to leave. Pastor James David Manning gets the N-word exemption revoked from black people. And Bryce Blankenagle from the Naked Mormonism podcast will be here to talk about the other 9-11. But first, the diatribe.

Christian terrorism. There you go, national media. It's that easy. I've heard you say those two words independently before, Christian and terrorism. You just have to put them together and they become Christian terrorism. But no, we get right-wing extremist at best, disturbed gunman at worst. Well, I'm sorry, left-wing transgender rights activist at absolute worst. But we'll set Ted Cruz aside for the moment and focus on the media

reaction to this act of Christian terrorism in Colorado. Now, look, I'm certainly not the first person to point out this glaring double standard. Social media has been filled this week with questions about why Donald Trump isn't calling for a Christian database, why Jeb Bush isn't favoring non-Christian refugees, why the right-wing zealots that were so quick to pin Paris on the flaws of Islam aren't as eager to blame these deaths on the faults in their own faith. And these are good questions, but not if they're rhetorical. See, most of the people I saw making those points were using them as demonstrations that we shouldn't label terrorism as Islamic or Christian. They were using them to bolster the argument that calling Islamic terrorism Islamic is hyperbolic and racist, since we don't apply the same labels to people within our own group. And sure, I mean, that makes it racist, but that doesn't make it hyperbolic. The racist bit is the part where we don't apply the label to us, not the part where we do apply

it to them. Now, I want to be very clear here, because I've also seen a number of people in the secular community kind of overstating the parallel here. There are a number of things that make the attack on the Planned Parenthood in Colorado substantively different than the kind of shit that we saw in Paris, not just the body count. Most notably, we're talking about one guy. It's one dude inspired by Christian rhetoric and conservative propaganda committing an act of terrorism. And yes, that's Christian terrorism, and it should be labeled as such.

But it definitely says something about the relative dangers of the two faiths in the two places that this guy wasn't able to orchestrate an attack with a number of people. There was no ready anti-abortion terror group that was welcoming him in and training him. So it still makes plenty of sense to keep Islamic terrorism and Christian terrorism in two separate boxes in terms of types of threat. That being said,

the average American is way more likely to be killed by a Christian extremist than a Muslim one. I mean, you know, obviously 9-11 skews the numbers like crazy, so the number of Americans killed by Islamic extremists is higher. I mean, if you prioritize our threat level on that basis, our second biggest threat is still surprise attacks by the Japanese. By any reasonable assessment, if you're going to be killed by terrorism on American soil, the odds are at least twice as high that the killer is going to be Christian than Muslim. Now, again, I don't want to overstate this because the international threat of Islamic terrorism is, in my estimation, higher than the threat that we face from domestic Christian terrorism. And both of them are less likely to kill a person than cheerleading or falling off a fucking chair.

But people are dying, and we owe them our honesty. Because sure, this dude wasn't able to plug into a Christian network of terrorists and coordinate multiple attacks and shit like Paris, but he didn't have much trouble finding a network that was willing and able to reinforce the violent doctrine that drove him to charge into a fucking Planned Parenthood center and start murdering people. And while the national media is really hesitant to assign a motive to the Bible-believing conspiracy nut, right-wing, anti-government, mountain redneck that storms into abortion

clinics, firing AK-47s, and screaming, no more body parts, I'm going to go out on a fucking limb and say it might be related to the bullshit anti-abortion videos and the multiple mainstream media sources that acted like they were real and continue to act like they're real. And every preacher that ever equated abortion to murder, every pastor that ever organized a protest at a woman's clinic, every religious pundit that demonized abortion doctors on his top-rated primetime Fox News show,

they all have to look in the mirror and say those two words together, Christian terrorist. And that's why it matters. That's why it matters that we use the fucking words, because the Christians are burning the midnight oil, trying to keep this buck in a perpetual state of motion, desperately trying to exonerate their faith with increasingly tenuous strands of logic. And we cannot let them get away with that.

You know, I see this Christian columnist over here saying, well, opposition to abortion isn't even an agreed upon position in the Christian doctrine, which didn't seem to matter too much when we were litigating this shit in the Supreme Court. I see this other one saying, well, it's not Christian terrorism because his goals were political rather than religious, seemingly unburdened by the fact that the definition of the word terrorism demands a political goal. And here's this other one over here saying that this can't be Christian terrorism because all the mainstream churches denounced it. Of course, never mind that we're defining mainstream as the kind of church that would summarily denounce violence.

Oh, and wouldn't you know it, I found another one that was saying it's not true Christian terrorism because you're not really a Christian if you shoot people in the face because that's just not good fruits. Oh, and I'm sorry, let me not forget this asshole over here in the corner,

this fucking ubiquitous son of a bitch saying, well, no, you can't blame Christianity for what this guy did, even though the rhetoric of the church would have him believe that he was saving the lives of innocent babies because he's mentally ill. And you can't blame the religion for what a crazy person does with it. Well, shit, we wouldn't want to get through another mass shooting without heaping more imputation on the mentally ill, would we? For fuck's sake, the fact that this guy was mentally ill is no more predictive of violence than the fact that he's Christian or the fact that he's white or the fact that he has a fucking beard. Of course he's mentally ill.

He walked into a building and started randomly shooting people in the head. There's no sane way to do that. So fuck you and your apologetics. You're trying to clean the blood off your hands with bullshit and it's not making them any prettier. Look, you can have your religion. You know, if you want to ignore reality and put a sexually frustrated omnipotent father figure in its place, fine with me. But when

you look down at your hands, I want you to see the blood. I want you to recognize that violence and extremism is a necessary byproduct of providing a safe space for the reality challenge. You're creating an us, and there's no way to do that without creating a them. And that matters. And what you do with that power matters. What you use it for, what you speak out out against and the words that you put in the mouth of the invisible guy that you're so sure is there it matters and every time you're doing that equation in your head of what christianity offers the world i want the term christian terrorism echoing in the back of your mind somewhere they're talking about your j interrupt this broadcast and bring you a special news bulletin. Making his triumphant in-studio return for headlines tonight is the re-emergent Heath Enright.

Heath, be honest, you missed all the anti-abortion billboards, didn't you? Well, no, no, I hit a couple of them. It's hard to time the climax sometimes, but I got a couple. It gets harder as you get older. In our lead story tonight, fat guy in a red hat is staying up late at night thinking about how appealing a prison bitch's ample trunk would make him after new light was shed on a cult of violence in one of his recent YouTube videos. In a disturbingly intimate bedtime chat,

former pastor and current fat idiot yelling into a sideways camera, Josh Fierstein feloniously incited, quote, I say tonight we punish Planned Parenthood. I think it's time that abortion doctors should have to run and hide and be afraid for their life. End quote. Sick on both the improper pluralization and the message of the entire thing. And yet somehow this guy is not in jail. What the fuck are we waiting for? Orange jumpsuit is the new red hat. Let's go. Let's go. I cannot wait to see his next not in jail. What the fuck are we waiting for? Orange jumpsuit is the new red hat. Let's go.

Let's go. I cannot wait to see his next video from jail. Josh Feuerstein here. I'm going to teach you how to make toilet wine for Jesus. For communion. Awful. Now, just to be clear here, this was not a video posted in the wake of the recent Planned Parenthood shooting. A few people have presented the clip as though it was.

video posted in the wake of the recent Planned Parenthood shooting. A few people have presented the clip as though it was, but it's actually a segment from a video he posted in July where he somehow managed to twist the debate about Cecil the lion into an abortion tirade. Fierstein has pointed that out vociferously as though having incited people to violence before the violence is some sort of defense. He's also claimed that the video was highly edited and taken out of context then urged people to listen to the whole video while simultaneously trying his damnedest to make that impossible by deleting the video that the clip was originally taken from okay but but what the

fuck kind of context would make inciting murder acceptable all of a sudden i mean i quoted him but i was just minding my own business, standing outside of Planned Parenthood with this assault rifle. Some dude in a white jacket started stabbing me in the eye with a coat hanger. Everybody lynch him now. Still not legal. No, no. Now, to be clear, the internet doesn't play take-backsies, so the original video is freely available from multiple sources,

and he absolutely, positively, unmistakably calls for deadly levels of violence against abortion doctors in said video. And, by the way, in the full-length video, he never walks back those comments, he doesn't amend them, he doesn't temper them. In fact, in context, it's actually more damning. Not to mention bizarre as fuck, since he started off talking about a fucking lion hunter,

and he ends by implying that abortions are performed with switchblades and nunchucks or something. Okay, yeah. Now, if he wants to talk about context, let's address this part. Abortion doctors don't resort to switchblades and nunchucks unless the very small guillotine doesn't work. That's just plain libelous to suggest otherwise.

Absolutely. Let's get our facts straight, fat guy in a red hat. And for the record, yes, technically this is a felony. You incite somebody to felony violence, that's a felony in and of itself. But it's also about.4 spaces lower on the chain of violent rhetoric

than the average GOP presidential candidate. So it's not like he's actually in any legal danger. You know, the bit I said earlier about him staying up at night thinking about being a prison bitch, that's just, you know, that's what he stays up to.

That's what he beats it to. And from the dilutions of grandeur file tonight in a refreshing bit of good news it appears that the judicial system of canada is aware that homeopathy is equal to nothing except it costs more it's high-end nothing and they're aware of that and that's why a court in the the Toronto area recently decided to award sole custody of two autistic children to their mother after it was determined that their father was acting against the advice of doctors and giving the kids homeopathic pills

instead of real medicine. In addition to denying the two boys prescriptions that helped manage their autism, this guy also refused one of them antibiotics to treat a flesh wound that then became severely infected as a result. Oh, fuck. Because, again, the top shelf nothing didn't work. Surprise, surprise. Well, you know what?

This is good because now he can practice homeopathic parenting. Less of you is more continued existence for your kids. One weekend a month and one weekend a decade. Just keep spending it up. Exactly. So, yeah, just in case anyone's not familiar with homeopathy, here's how it's supposed to work. Which it does not, but here's the theory. Supposed to, yeah. It's based on the idea that symptoms of sickness can be cured by giving the ailing person more of the thing that caused the problem mixed with shitloads of water until basically undetectable right bottom line autism is a genetic

disease right which means you can't cure it by eating and drinking stuff because that's stupid but even if homeopaths were smart enough to realize this, they'd probably start telling autistic people to, like, gargle small amounts of their father's semen, which is still not a great idea, regardless of how much water you're working with. It doesn't matter. Point being, of all the reasons to gargle your dad's semen,

homeopathy might be the worst in a competitive category. And that's why this dad needs to be out of the picture. So good job, court system of Ontario, Canada. Yeah, here, here. And in Georgia, on my thinking spleen news tonight, the state of Georgia is sick and fucking tired of North Carolina, Alabama, and Texas hogging up all the bullshit theocratic overreach headlines and unleashed a double dose of religious stupidity in an effort to right the balance this week. Oh, good.

And I'll say it's about fucking time. For an atheist show out of Georgia, we almost never get to talk about crazy shit in this state, and all the fucked up stories coming out from the surrounding den of redneck zealots is making us look reasonable by comparison. That's costing us, you know, tough neighborhood atheist street cred. tough neighborhood atheist street cred. Well, in fairness to our street cred in Georgia as atheists, we did have an Air Force Sergeant-cum-playboy model who posed naked with an American flag

get angry about bad Christians treating the flag improperly. Right? Right near us, yeah. Plus, every pickup truck seems to be holding out for the plantation owners to win that ongoing civil war thing so yeah lest we forget we live in a redneck jail colony it's not the best place well i mean but that's what i'm saying though i mean let's shout that to the world where a bunch of backward fuck-ups demonstrate and once again the correlation

between religiosity and bumfuckery and let's make it known now luckily a couple of georgians heard me this time the first was delightfully bigoted harris county sheriff mike jolly according to a sign he recently posted outside his sheriff's office quote harris county is politically incorrect we say merry christmas god bless america and in god we trust we salute our troops and our flag. If this offends you, leave, end quote. And if you're not already offended, by the way, I should point out, no Oxford comma, missing period after trust, leave is in all caps, and then there's just like this weird unnecessary space between that and the exclamation point.

Okay, well, it seems like they're wasting taxpayer money on this sign, very clearly. I mean, you could have got the same message across with a conical white sheet. That's all you would need. Welcome to Harris County. If you have to ask about the sheet, you should probably turn back around. Right, burning cross out there for the holidays, you know, light it up. Despite the unambiguous, we'd rather not protect and serve people what don't love Jesus implications, Jolly stands behind the sign and its support for the beleaguered, overwhelming majority

because it's about damn time some old white police officer stood up to those minorities. If your county contains a place called Whitesville, you probably don't need a sign like this. I think it's safe to say you don't need that sign. A real place? That's a real place.

Whitesville in Harris County, Georgia. A lot of non-consensual piggy squeal in there. Unincorporated statistical area Whitesville. And from the Crack Friday file tonight, in a recent article for World Net Daily, homophobic Christian activist Linda Harvey sounded a little frustrated that she can't buy retail items anymore because gay people keep touching all the stuff.

According to her research, it's pretty much impossible for a good Christian shopper to purchase hetero consumer goods anywhere in the United States. Really? And even if you could, those gay communist Muslims stole Christmas, so it doesn't even matter. Suffice it to say, Linda Harvey is not having a happy holidays this year. I mean, it's like you can't even don straight apparel anymore. Yeah, no, I'm with her though. I'm with her.

Like the other day, I bought a wireless charger for my phone and it fucked me in the ass. I mean, it was consensual and shit, but I mean, it was still crazy gay. Butt plugs are one of the rare wireless plugs. Anyway, so according to Harvey, here's a handful of the places you're supposed to boycott for Jesus this year. These are companies that are evil because, quote, human rights campaign loves them as reliable supporters of sexual depravity, end quote.

And this is just a small piece of her list, by the way. You got Google, Facebook, Amazon, PayPal, and eBay. So basically you can't use the internet. No. Also Target, Best Buy, Hallmark, gay greeting cards, I guess. Barnes & Noble, CVS, which has gay medicine. Ford, General Motors, gay trucks. Nike, General Mills, gay cereal. Starbucks with their sperm lattes, obviously, and of course, Walmart, the gay super center.

Right, yeah. And when you patronize these businesses, Harvey warns that you're probably putting money in gay pockets. Next thing you know, you're providing lesbians with free birth control. It's not biblical. It's a thing you know, you're providing lesbians with free birth control. It's not biblical. It's not biblical. And that's a double-edged sword, too, because in my experience, when you go somewhere to put money in gay pockets, there's usually a cover charge. And the drinks are overpriced.

But it's worth it. So, yeah, the homosexual retail siege of Linda Harvey and the Christians is very real. It's very real. She's absolutely right about that. And here's what happened, in case you're curious, Linda. Behind the scenes, gay people have been slowly becoming people. Yeah, they lured up just like the blacks. Big problem for you.

And now, all of a sudden, they've got operatives on the supply chain of almost every major corporation in the world. And by the way, it's just like in your nightmares, they do lick everything once. It's true. They lick everything once. The lesbians lick everything twice. Lick it or dick it. And in two-fish, three-fish, red-fish, bee-fish news tonight,

definitely not official spokesman for the American Family Association who speaks officially for the American Family Association, Brian Fisher added his voice to the rising chorus of people offering up non-Jesus excuses for the transparent act of Christian terrorism in Colorado last Friday by finally asking the tough questions. After all, this did happen in Colorado. So how can we rule out the possibility that the Christian terrorist was, quote, tanked up on pot? And, quote, real quote. Yeah, those pro-life pothead rallies are terrifying.

A bunch of crazed lunatics snorting lines of green plant matter off their Bowie knife, getting all yoked up on Panama Red. I think that's how it works. Murdering people. Yeah, citing credible sources like The Onion, some documentary I saw from the 20s, and that email Aunt Gertie sent last july that linked to the onion article by the way fisher explained that quote we have seen one story after another of people getting doped up or tanked up or high on pot and going off and doing brutal things end

quote while insisting that there's no evidence that links the christ anti-abortion terrorist to Christian anti-abortion stuff, Beefish offered his puffing the dope alternative by pointing out that we can't say for certain that he wasn't a, quote, pot-smoking nutcase, end quote. And furthermore, Susan, I wouldn't be the least bit surprised to learn that this guy habitually smoked marijuana cigarettes. Reefers. Of course, despite the long-standing correlation between violent behavior and toking the reefers, I think Fisher's hooty weed defense might still be flawed. After all, we've seen consistently that doobie-inspired madness normally manifests in axe murder, throwing oneself out of windows, or adding demonic extra notes to those negro jazz scales,

not murdering people with assault rifles while shouting Carly Fiorina campaign slogan. So despite Beefish's well-thought-out objection, that lid of grass is probably off the hook and not a moment too soon because I'm pretty much out of old-timey terms for a week. Muggles. I could have used muggles. Speaking of which, Heath and I need to pause to prepare ourselves for a devastating attack on a pack of Oreos, so we'll take a quick break and hand things over to my lovely wife, Lucinda.

Red team, go. A man wrote the Bible? A whore is what she wants. If it's a legitimate rape. If it's a slut, right? Cooking can be fun. Hey, I'm proud of a man. This Week in Massage.

The last time we had one of our little chaps, I presented you with a report that showed that the United States wasn't exactly leading the world in issues of gender equality. And now that you've had a full week to recover from that bombshell, I'm afraid I'm going to have to shock you again. According to a new survey conducted under the direction of the Southern Baptist Association, women don't trust churches to give them honest advice about abortion. Women don't trust churches to give them honest advice about abortion. Yes, according to their data, a couple quick centuries of viciously dishonest propaganda was all it took for those flighty hussies to completely discount the good intentions of mother church. In fact, as many as three quarters of regular church attendees did not seek pastoral advice before getting their first abortion. Now, if you're wondering why in the world a woman's first instinct when facing an unwanted pregnancy isn't to talk to a probably celibate, elderly, professional misogynist, who's at

least as likely to call her a murderous whore as he is not to, don't worry. The Christians have that one all figured out. In response to these numbers, a representative from a Chicago-based anti-abortion group explained they didn't talk to their pastors because, quote, their shame and guilt is so strong, end quote. But at least the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has our backs. Last week, their team of useless pricks with useless pricks released a 28-page report on the evils of pornography. page report on the evils of pornography. And to my non-sarcastic surprise, amid their nonsensical those sperms could have been Catholic tirades, they actually included some good information about the abuse and exploitation that lies at the heart of a lot of porn production. But then they talked about porn addiction and the dangers of sexting and public boobs. So it's almost like the

honest stuff just made it in there by accident. And before I let you go, we might as well check in with the absurdly undersized head of Ted Cruz and see what it has to meep about women's issues. During a town hall meeting on Monday, Cruz dismissed a woman's question about access to birth control by pointing out that there are plenty of condoms left in the vending machines, and thus there's no such thing as war on women. And while that might seem condescending, out of touch, and vapidly dismissive, I have to admit that when his response started with putting 50 cents in a vending machine, I was just happy it didn't end with aspirin.

So see, progress. Now, I don't know if all the ladies out there are still skeptical of the church's gynecological advice, but I think I'm going to go ask a Catholic bishop if he ever gets that not-so-fresh feeling. And while I'm taking care of that, I'll hand things back over to Noah and Heath. Thank you, Lucinda. And in sperm latte whistleblower news tonight, founder of Atla Worldwide Missionary Church in Harlem, New York, and apparent result of Ron Jeremy fucking Don King,

Pastor James David Manning made news again this week when he responded to a protest against his church's rampant hate speech with an extended meltdown rant made up almost entirely of derogatory slurs for black people and gay people. Yep. And while Manning's choice of the term nigger faggots undoubtedly rolls off the tongue nicely. Maybe as the name of an all-black, ironic, hipster, gay improv troupe, it's noticeably less effective as the bulk of a Christian sermon in upper Manhattan.

Well, I mean, but isn't that just Pastor Manning to a T? He managed to find a time and place where chanting those two particular words in unison was less persuasive than it normally would have been. Finding an unusually stupid method of hitting yourself in the nuts with a spatula. I never thought I'd go inside on like that with the axing motion. Well done. So despite the proper meaning of these words I'm about to use, I'd say there was a shining moment that I'm going to call the highlight of the pastor's address. I know the moment. At one point, in a surprise homage to that legendary musician Vanilla Ice, Esther Manning started rapping a lesbian-themed version of the Go Ninja Go song from Ninja Turtles 2 Secret of the Ooze.

And if that doesn't get you excited about the possibility of teenage mutant ninja lesbians, there is something wrong with you. You are not allowed. It's a J-Law franchise waiting to happen. No, but I'll tell you what. I would have gone teenage lesbian Ninja Turtles because I'm dying to know how lesbian turtles get off. But I mean, yours is good, too. Yours is good. I'd like both.

Well, here's the thing. If you're thinking this guy isn't any kind of real danger because a lunatic who believes Starbucks is spreading the AIDS virus with gay semen lattes couldn't possibly have a meaningful role in national politics. Well, you need to stop that because you'd be thinking wrong three days ago three days ago pastor manning met none other than gop presidential front runner donald trump big meeting and uh according to the pastor quote mr trump realizes why black people are going to vote for him. End quote. Okay. Also may have added,

where do you think Starbucks puts all that gay semen? I'm not going as crazy. Think about it. Now, unfortunately, of course, there's no video of the meeting as it was too dense for light to escape. And in Malcolm in the muddle news tonight, Australian prime minister and person who would look out a place anywhere

other than giving the protagonist a detailed description of how the torture device he'spped to works malcolm turnbull he avoided my ire last week though only by saying dumb shit right before we recorded and after i could write shit about it but week old or not i'm going back for this addressing parliament in the wake of the paris terrorist attacks turnbull told whatever the opposite of the truth is when he blamed the massacre on, quote, godless terrorists, end quote. Godless terrorists? Seriously?

I don't remember hearing any reports about people chanting nothing Akbar during that incident. The universe is indifferent, must murder hundreds of people. What the fuck is he talking about? I'm honestly not sure, but the Australian media seems to think he's saying that godless people are bad and you know when in rome it doesn't matter who's sucking it if you come or however the old saying goes so one way or the other he gets a resounding fuck you from the other side of the world for this one yeah stick with what you know over there malcolm turnbull and probably best if you go back to shutting down teen centers

and luring MacGyver into your deadly obstacle course. Murdoch! That's who that motherfucker looks exactly like. Thank you. I will sleep tonight. And finally tonight, from the Jesus Freak Show file, the Vatican recently

wrapped up their latest carnival tour of 54 American churches during which the headliner of each event was the corpse of an Italian girl who was murder-raped in 1902 when she was 11 years old. Fuck, every word in that sentence made it worse. That's what actually happened. Wow. actually happened wow and according to catholic legend following this attack the girl quickly forgave the rapist before she died which is why she's now known as maria gretti patron saint of classy victims i guess something like that seriously though she's a saint that that's for real wow and that's why a terrifyingly large group of i'm assuming mostly catholic

snuff film larARPing enthusiasts, turned out for the so-called pilgrimage of mercy. It's very forward thinking of them, though, to have somebody penciled in to personify the when you get raped, don't be a bitch about it message. Clearly they knew they were creating a market. Yes. So how the fuck did this happen? That's a great question everybody should be asking.

There's a guy who works for the Vatican, Reverend Carlos Martins, whose job is called Curator of Relics. And this guy's job is apparently to organize the creepiest public spectacles in human history ever possible. For example, raped corpse church tours. So that's right. Thean has a department for this it just makes you happy you're not on that dude's christmas list you know what's this uncle carlos hey it's the mummified clitoris of a deformed dugan and peasant that was beaten to death for witchcraft okay open it later maybe a gift. Maybe did you ever think just a gift card? Yeah, so I've got a couple suggestions for the Vatican

if they decide to keep going with this sort of stuff. First of all, you want to be a little skeptical of dead rape victim-themed business plans, like just in general. That's a good rule. Good rule of thumb, yeah. Also, maybe next time you don't draw attention to pedophiles during your Vatican-sponsored event series. This is not a big deal.

It's something to think about. Regardless, despite accidentally presenting a graphic illustration of the atheist argument from evil, the Vatican did manage to stumble upon a new niche in the toy business. So I guess that's the upshot. And we're here to help. Let's go ahead and put 30 seconds on the clock. Yes, let's. Ideas for the children's gift shop

at the Raped Corpse Carnival Tour. Go. I figured that's where you were going. And damn it, yet again, I find myself in that situation where a second mummified clitoris of a deformed Ugandan peasant joke would overdo it. And yet that would be perfect here.

But that's okay. It's okay. I'm a pro. I've got this. How about they would have like a key chain with the mummified clitoris oh shit you go you go I'll think about it and while you while you do yours I was thinking maybe a book like uh Robin Hood and Little John Benet Ramsey okay yeah yeah a book I got you I got you so maybe something educational. At least she wasn't a puppy. Understanding relativity for young readers.

Maybe too advanced. What about SBU Barbie and Autopsy Ken? Fun couple. Yeah. Fun little story. They're a little meet cute where they bump heads looking at the same vaginal wound. You were looking at that vaginal tear? You were looking at that vaginal tear? I was looking at that vaginal tear.

We have a lot in common. Well, now, obviously, after the big tour, the kids are going to be hungry, so maybe some saltwater taffy available in legitimate grape. I'm never going to forget that. All right, what about a cartoon, something like that? How about Tom and Jerry Sandusky?

Wow. Jared Fogelhorn Leghorn? There we go. The cock who sounds black, like a $5 foot long. Which is still on Jared's menu, as I understand his current situation. And here I didn't even know that Roman Polanski did cartoons. Speaking of which, how about Avatar the Pederast Airbender? I'll admit that's shitty,

but it was either that or Pederast of the Mohicans, and they don't really talk about him. Not much is known. Chin and Gook, the gatch part. What about Snuffleupagus from Sesame Street Corner? Snuff, I got you. The world's most adorable, co-corp,oth ass puppet rape corpse

more of a competitive market than you'd think or uh how about maybe maybe a game how about misogynopoly so it's the same basic concept but all the properties are 50 shekels and nobody wants to land on the railroads you still want to be the first to boardwalk nobody wants to land almost anywhere there so uh all, I got one more. What about, well, like a starter set. How about the sex crime action figure starter set? There you go. Comes with chalk outline guy.

Of course. Semen swabber guy. And assistant DA. Includes a free show me on the doll. Show me on the doll doll. I just want to pull this cord so bad. So while we start sketching the concept art for that Kickstarter, we'll close the headlines. Heath, thanks as always.

Word Association telephone. It's a game. And when we come back, Bryce Blankenengel from the Naked Mormonism podcast will be here to tell me too late that the naked thing was just a euphemism for unabashedly honest. Should have known when you told him you want to do the interview on chat roulette. Right? I mean, it seemed clear to me. The attacks of 9-11 are, in many ways,

intrinsically linked to the growth of the atheist movement. They're often cited as the social catalyst that allowed society to start taking anti-theistic arguments seriously, and all four of the horsemen cited them to varying degrees as their impetus to speak out so forcefully against the malignant influence of faith. But long before 2001, September 11th was already an infamous date in American history. It was already the anniversary of a notorious act of terror, and like the attacks on the Twin Towers, these deaths were also at the hands of murderous religious zealots. So back by popular demand to tell us about the second largest loss of life

on September 11th in American history is the host of the Naked Mormonism podcast and my good friend Bryce Blankenagle. Bryce, welcome back to the show. Thank you for having me on. No, I appreciate it. Now, I've got to say, I love your history lessons. I also love saying your name. That might have something to do with it. Blankenagle, that's a really fun surname to say.

Right, it's got some staying power. Yeah. And, you know, just for a little trivia here in German, it actually means shiny fingernail. Blankenagle. That's where it came from. Wow. But, yeah, you can cut that whole out because that's not him.

No, no, I'm thinking about, like, how your ancestors must have been cocaine fiends or something like that. That's interesting. So yeah, no, no, it gives you character. We'll keep it in. Now, I would venture to say that the term Mormon terrorism sounds really weird to most people, but that's largely because they don't know their history. And I was hoping you could help us fix that. So I invited John to tell us about the infamous Mountain Meadow Massacre. Now, we're obviously about to cover it in detail. But if you would, kind of sketch us an outline. In a nutshell, what was the Mountain Meadow Massacre?

It is, I mean, just as it says in the name, it is a massacre perpetrated almost primarily by Mormons, believing Mormons, under the rule of Brigham Young. It is truly fucked up. There's no way of getting around it. The Mormons were religious psychos that, as they would be labeled today, extremists that killed people that were outsiders, basically. And I think it's important, even with all the bloody gore and details, to emphasize to people that the offshoots of the Islamic faith do not have a monopoly on massacring people and doing horribly brutal shit. And the fact that this actually happened on 9-11 really helps to underscore that, I feel like. Yeah, absolutely. And I'm glad you kind of opened it up that way because 9-11 is something that sticks in so many people's minds.

Oh, this is a horrible time when we lost thousands of American lives. And it's something that has so much punch because people remember where they were when it happened. Well, the same thing happened with the people that were living in Brigham Young's time in Utah and, well, outer lying areas. There were a lot of newspaper articles were coming out about the Mount Meadows Massacre. People had the same kind of emotions that we have about 2001 you know 9 11 as they had back then because it was crazy it was the craziest thing anybody had ever expected to happen and it fucking happened and it's it's interesting to put the whole never forget thing into a century and a half later perspective as well um now i should also warn everybody that

this is a two-part interview so we're not going to get to the truly brutal shit until next week but that's not to say that we're not going to get to some really fucked up shit and some bloodshed in the sort of context setup. But before we do, let's meet the players. So tell us about the victims. Who are these guys? So the people that were the victims

of Mount Meadows Massacre are the Baker-Fancher Party, and they're commonly referred to as just the Fancher Party. They left Arkansas, headed to California, and they crossed through northern Utah through Salt Lake and then went down through Cedar City and St. George area. And that's the way that they were heading out through Las Vegas and out to California that way. Okay. Now, this is late gold rush era, right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is 1857 that we're talking about. Okay. And this party included just under 140 people from the best tallies we can say. It's about 138 people, maybe, you know, give or take a few. And it was a big undertaking for each of these families. I mean, it cost a person in today's dollars about $50,000 to make the trek across the plains and go out to the gold rush or out to, you know, any of the job opportunities that were offered out in California. Okay. And now these are not just gold prospectors. These are whole families that are going out together, correct? They're like moving their whole lives out there.

Yeah, exactly. It wasn't just a train of men with the packs on their backs that were just trucking out there just for fun to see what they could do. No, it was entire families. Some of the statistics we had, it was over 50% of women. 50 of the people that were there were under the age of 16. So, I mean, it wasn't just men. It was a lot of women, children, whole families that were moving out their entire lives, uprooting from Arkansas, where they left from, and moving to California. All right. So now we've got our victims. Let's meet our villains. Now, when you were last on, we talked about the death of Joseph Smith at the Carthage jailhouse. But if you don't mind, get us kind of caught up. Who's in charge now?

So from the time period from that from Carthage jail shootout in 1844 until 1847, there was a lot of religious strife. Religious strife, there was a lot of backstabbing, and you have the majority of people following Brigham Young out across the plains of 1847 to settle in Utah that he called this is the right place. Brigham Young was, I mean, people called him Bloody Brigham. That's not just a nickname that we cordially attach to his name nowadays. People back then called him Bloody Brigham because he was such an evil motherfucker. I mean, he called people to be executed out in the middle of the streets to be made an example of. Anybody that would leave the church, he would send the Danites out to go kill them before they got away. I mean, he was fucking evil. There's no two ways about that. And he was the theocratic king of all of Utah at the time.

One of the greatest historical villains that we have in American history, I feel like. Definitely. So yeah, his buddy at the time, Parley P. Pratt, and this guy in my show, I call him P-cubed because it's so much easier. He came into the church in 1830, so much easier um he was uh he came into the church in 1830 late 1830 so he's been there from the beginning so parley p pratt was um he was a polygamist he had 12 wives um i think current estimates put his descendants at somewhere around 50 to 70 000 people oh yeah that's pretty impressive in 100 and you know 160 years time i I'm quite impressed. But yeah, so he was out in Arkansas as the Fancher Party was leaving Arkansas. Now, they had nothing to do with this,

but Parley P. Pratt was actually stabbed and shot by a guy whose wife he was fucking around with. Okay. So this idea of somebody being murdered or martyred, I should say, for the cause of religious freedom and the right of polygyny was, you know, it was kind of weighing heavy on the minds of the Mormons that were just

receiving word from Arkansas that he was killed. Okay. Now, so, okay, so Brigham Young, you said, is like the theocratic king of Utah. Now, I have to imagine that the U.S. government isn't exactly endorsing his theocracy. You actually make a good point. At the time, there were really, really high tensions between Brigham Young and the United States government. They had been going back and forth in little spats here and there. and there. So it was kind of this tit for tat sort of thing that built up to the American government sending 2,500 troops to Utah into Salt Lake at the time that this Fancher party was coming through as well. Okay. So sort of in summary, tensions are incredibly high and this party is walking into an absolute fucking powder keg. Oh yeah. And they had no idea. That's the biggest part of it

is they're walking into Salt Lake City and they have no idea that people are so crazy there. They had heard the rumors of what Brigham Young and the Mormons were doing, but they had no real idea of what the Mormons were like. And that's something that they got a taste of as they got into the Salt Lake Valley. Because Brigham Young was, you know, he was at the head of all of these tensions. Because Brigham Young was, you know, he was at the head of all of these tensions. He was responsible for inciting a lot of them. And he was the person that was, you know, guarding his Mormon commune as these outside pressures were starting to push in. So what he did was he told all of the Mormons to starve the Fancher Party as they were passing through, which is a horrible, evil thing to do in and of itself because people that were coming across the plains, they depended on the view settlements along their journey in order to trade with so they could have enough sustenance to make

it across the plains. Right. I mean, it's a long journey. It's a multi-month long journey and you have 140 people. You got to feed a lot of mouths. And the best way to do that is by trading things that you have picked up in other trades before for food. And that's why it would cost so much money to go across the plains. So the next thing that we need to introduce into this

powder keg is unlit matches. And that's what we call the oath of vengeance. And it was something that was instilled by Brigham Young in 1845, right after the death of Joseph Smith in 1844. And it was something that was said by participants in the temple from 1845 till I think it was 1920. So this was something, this oath of vengeance that was included in these temple rituals was something that was very, very paramount to temple attendance for any believing Mormons. And it reads, the oath of vengeance, quote, you and each of you do covenant and promise that you will pray and never cease to pray to almighty God to avenge the blood of the prophets upon this nation, that you will teach the same to your children and to your

children's children unto the third and fourth generation end quote okay and just to be clear who did they blame for the blood of the prophets just the world the whole world birdie because it was done by a faceless mob but they were like anybody that we can apply it's it's like applying a label of apostate or infidel. Anybody that isn't for us, they're against us, therefore they're responsible for killing Joseph Smith. Gotcha.

Yeah, very, very basic logic that, you know, well, or lack thereof, that took them from point A to point crazy there. Yeah, okay, so good combustible mix of innocent victims and paranoid religious zealots who are in, I guess, some legitimate danger. So let's put it all together, shall we's let's see what happens here so approaching this a date of september 11th it was an entire week of hell basically the main guy that we're going to focus on for most of this is john d lee and he was the guy that pretty much organized the assault party on the fancher party and you know carried out everything he was kind guy that pretty much organized the assault party on the Fancher Party and carried out everything.

He was kind of the commander guy. Him and Haight and Klingensmith, they all kind of shared in it. But John D. Lee is kind of the main guy to focus on. that he should arm the local Indians and make them, quote, have a brush with the party, end quote, which meant he later said that if the majority or all of them were killed by the Indians, the better. Okay, so like U.S. foreign policy, use somebody else to do your dirty work. do your dirty work. Exactly. And yeah, and just, you know, kind of arm them, give them some guns, give them some powder, and hopefully they'll take care of the problem, which, you know, it's worked so well in recent history anyway. Right. So once Lee got there, he considered the fact that the wagon train was so disorganized and they were just kind of spread out randomly across the entire mountain meadows. He said that it was a message or a sign from God that they had, quote, delivered them into his hands, unquote.

So he was seeing this as like a sign from God. It was favorable for them to start attacking this party because they were so disorganized. Well, obviously, they weren't expecting it. Yeah, right, right. Yeah, exactly. Like like we weren't exactly ready for pearl harbor either it must have been a sign from god that yeah that we were so disorganized and not ready for it well that's the same thing that he used i mean the people the fanfare party had no reason to circle their wagons for the night they were just kind of camped out for the night they were going to pack up the next morning and leave well here it comes it's time to avenge the blood of the prophets now okay so now for all they know this is just random group of people coming through their territory correct or

do they think that this is like a group of people associated with the u.s government well this is um they were they were somehow the others they were somehow perse persecuting the Mormons in the area. And beyond that, there was another small detail to add in here is there were people that were Mormons that teamed up or followed the Fancher Party out of Salt Lake. Oh, okay. Yeah. Because people living under Brigham's rule hated it. I mean, there were a lot of people that were in the leadership positions that had lots of wives and lots of land and property and cattle, and they loved it, right? Because they were the noblemen. But there were a lot of the lower people, the peasants that were just everyday average Mormons

that hated Brigham and hated Utah and hated living in this desert because it was such a horrible living. So oftentimes when trains would come through town, people, Mormons wouldn't just trade with the Fancher Party or with other parties. They would kind of say, okay, I'm going to just hitch my wagon to your train and can you just take me out of here and let's go to California? And they did. So there were some Mormons that left with the Fancher Party and that has a lot to do with it as well. Because Brigham Young had no problem killing anybody that was with the Fancher Party, and that has a lot to do with it as well. Because Brigham Young had no problem killing anybody that was leaving the Mormon territory. Right, you don't want stories getting out.

Exactly, exactly. So there were a few of those people that were kind of hooked up with the party. And like we said, it's this amalgamation of so many pressures that were happening that it all just kind of ignited and blew to holy shit. All right. So let's talk about the blow and the holy shit, though. So just right at the onset, before this massacre actually happens, they kept anybody alive that was eight years old and younger because they thought that they couldn't, you know, they weren't old enough to tell any tales. old and younger because they thought that they couldn't you know they weren't old enough to tell any tales so this was recorded by one of those children that was under that age which when you're six years old you tend to remember quite well well it depends on what you're remembering but

yeah this is one of those things that would stick in your craw i would think yeah yeah yeah definitely so this kid said quote we were just sitting down to a breakfast of quail and cottontail rabbit when the first shot rang out from a nearby goalie and one of the children toppled over, hit by the bullet. End quote. So first blood is a kid getting shot from a distance without warning. Yeah, with a little bowl of quail and cottontail rabbit soup in his hand. Sounds delicious. Yeah, isn't it? Yeah.

Well, they were so starved uh they didn't have any supplies to survive off except the land they had their guns to hunt with but they didn't have any water supplies they didn't have food they were just gathering things from the land and there was actually a nearby spring so that's why they camped out in mountain meadows because there was a freshwater spring that they were able to drink out of. Oh, right on. Okay. So this first initial wave, this young child was one of the first people that was hit, or he was the first person hit, and he toppled over and died. It was a huge onslaught because these guys are using single-shot, single-load rifles and pistols. So they can maybe get off one to two rounds a minute.

So usually the first wave is the most important part of it. And that is, that's what happened here. Between 10 and 15 people died within this first wave of, you know, first volley of shots. Yeah, that's a lot more than 10 to 15 bullets being fired. Yeah. Definitely. Yeah, definitely. And I mean, let's be clear, it wasn't just 10 or 15 Mormons that were sieging this.

It was a fairly sizable party of Mormons, as well as Native Americans that were, you know, that were commencing this attack. Okay. So, when this first wave happened, the party was like, what the fuck? We're at war? I had no idea. So, all of the men grabbed their guns. And of course, at that time, it was planned out that the Native Americans would make a frontal assault at the Fancher Party. And it can be argued, was that to try and take them over?

Or was that just to get rid of the first rounds that were charged up in their bullets? Get rid of a few Native Americans. They're not using the bullets on the Mormons. You know, who knows? But the Fancher Party shot all of, you know, shot their guns at all of these Native Americans that were rushing them from a frontal assault with melee weapons. And, of course, they killed one Native American and they injured two others at that time. Seeing this, the Natives were like, fuck this. We are out. it's not our fight

yeah exactly and they were also shocked and horrified that the uh the mormon priesthood like the mormon magic didn't protect them from the bullets because that's what they had been promised by john d lee or somebody else they said you know if you do this this is a righteous endeavor you're going to be protected nobody no, no bullet can hurt you. And, uh, well, they lied. So after this initial outbreak of violence, while the Mormons were reloading, the fan chairman actually gathered all of their wagons around in a circle in a defensive form. And they started frantically digging ditches and fortifying as best they could to, well, try and stop this onslaught of horror that they weren't expecting.

Right, okay. So once the natives took off running, John D. Lee realized that, oh, shit, the Fancher guys are actually really accurate shots, and they were also capable of digging in and shielding all the women and children with wagons and ditches that they were digging under their fortifications. So Lee actually admitted at this point that they were, quote, in a sad fix, end quote. So it was kind of like this co-evolution of, oh, shit, we need to get into some battle tactics here and see who comes out on top.

And the people in the Fancher Party, they had only seen Native Americans at this time. So at this very moment, right after the very first volley, the Mormons could have just fucked off, gone to the closest river or whatever, and washed the paint off of their faces so they didn't look like Indians anymore. And then they could have appeared as like this rescue party of the Fanchers and they'd be greeted as heroes. I'm guessing it doesn't go that way no no they uh they dug in and they took up stations all around the camp and they began sieging it by just picking off anybody that you know got out from cover they just shoot them and this can't be too hard with a group that's already undersupplied and eating quail and rabbit, I kind of imagine. Exactly. And they didn't have fortifications.

All that they had were their wagons and ditches. That's all that they had. They didn't have trees to hide behind. Mountain Meadows is a beautiful open plain. It's this beautiful open prairie, not many trees around, this nice little delightful spring that comes out of the rocks. That's it. There's nothing for cover there so sieging was just a matter of hanging out far enough from them that they can't see who's shooting at them but as soon as they stick their head out you just you take the head off right as long as you can keep them from that spring i guess you're good and that's what it was all about is they were keeping them from this fresh spring water supply because 140 people can't survive long without water and food and anything.

So, I mean, actually what happened is this siege lasted for five whole days from Monday morning to Friday morning. Wow. Three days into this siege, the camp actually sent out two little girls that were dressed in pure white. It was like a surrender flag. And they would send them out to the spring to get some water as, you know, it was like a final ditch effort. They didn't have any other option because any time that somebody would go to the spring, they'd get shot. So they sent out these two little girls hoping that whoever is attacking them wouldn't have the balls of steel to shoot two little girls dressed in white. And they were both shot.

Wow. So shit is really fucked up, right? Yeah, no kidding. On the morning of September 10th, there was a bell that rang out in Cedar City, which was the nearest city to Mountain Meadows, and it sent off a string of communication to bring the Nauvoo Legion, which was the conscripted forces of the Mormons,

down to Mount Meadows to help out the other Mormons that were there. So they arrived in the evening of September 10th, and they all gathered together and had a meeting. Obviously, their strategy hadn't worked up to this point, and they needed a new strategy. So they decided that everybody should die, unless they were too young to, quote unquote, tell tales. Wow.

Well, I can't imagine there's ever been a better spot for a cliffhanger than that. So we're going to disappoint the fuck out of everybody and save the real bloodshed for next week's exciting conclusion. But before I let you go, I wanted to give you an opportunity to tell everybody about a fundraising effort that you're undertaking. Yes. Thank you for leading into that. Actually, right now, I've been doing the Naked Mormonism podcast for a year, and it's been a really fun year. I've really enjoyed doing what I'm doing, but I'm kind of coming to a little bit of a turning point. It's kind of hard to put a lot of hours into a podcast and into research and development when you're putting 60 hours a week into a day job. So I kind of want to offer this. I want to put more time into the show,

but beyond that, I want to write some books. Somebody made a good point to me recently. It's hard to get somebody to listen to a podcast, but it's really easy to hand them a book. So that's what I'm trying to do in six months. That's what the GoFundMe is. It's six months, two books. And I'm trying to get six months of living expenses basically in order to produce two books. The first book is going to be on the history of the Mormon church from the birth of Joseph Smith leading up until the Book of Mormon was produced. And then the second book will just be a direct deconstruction of the Book of Mormon itself. Oh, right on.

And if you go back and look in the backlog for Naked Mormonism, you'll see the anniversary episode is titled CC Book of Mormon, which is clean cut. It's a seven and a half hour deconstruction of the Book of Mormon. And it's intense and it could be put into a book very, very easily. And that's what I'm trying to do. Yeah, so if anybody's thinking that six months for two books goal seems unrealistic, that's obviously why it's because so much of this is research that you've already done for your show. Right. Exactly.

So if you enjoy Bryce's history lessons as much as I do, be sure to check the show notes for this episode for more information on A, how you can hear about him on his show and B, how you can help support his efforts. Bryce, thanks again. Can't wait to talk to you next week. Absolutely. Thanks for having me on. It was good fun. Before we stain the sheets tonight, I wanted to encourage you to check out an awesome and thought-provoking interview that our good friend Eli Bosnick did on Tom and Cecil's show this week.

It's a two-part interview on cognitive dissonance, and I believe the second part releases the same day as this episode, so I'll have both of them linked on the show notes. He talks at length about trigger warnings, safe spaces, and the regressive left from a perspective that I hadn't really heard before, and it's also fucking hilarious. Damn interesting interview, whether or not you agree with him. Also, Bryce neglected to mention in the interview that if you contribute to his GoFundMe, you'll get a PDF copy of his books when they're available, so I wanted to correct that oversight by just now having told you that. You'd be truly amazed how much sinister shit hides just beneath the magic underwear there, and we're lucky to have such a dedicated and entertaining person giving us access

to it. Strongly urge you to check out his work if you haven't already. Again, it's all linked on the show notes at skatingatheist.com. Anyway, that's all the blasphemy we've got for you tonight, but we'll be back in 10,022 minutes with more. If you can't wait that long, be on the lookout for a new episode of the Godawful Movies podcast with Eli Bosnick, myself, and yes, Heath Enright. Plus, we're really excited about the guest masochist we're going to have on, but you're going to have to wait until Tuesday at 8 a.m. Eastern to find out who it is, unless he tweets about it or something. Obviously, the outro music is incapable of playing before I thank Heath for his incalculable contributions to the show, many born from his equally incalculable IQ. I also need to thank the

beautiful and talented Lucinda Lusions for making part of the show highbrow once again, or at least higherbrow, whatever. Need to thank Bryce for all the research and effort he put into this week's show, and also for the awesome shit that he's doing with the Naked Mormonism podcast. I also need to thank AtSensiblySecular for providing this week's Farnsworth quote

on behalf of AtAtheismChat. Great follow if you need some more secular perspectives on your timeline. It's basically a curated open chat run by some dedicated and insightful atheists, though the claim that our filthy monkey ancestors followed them might be spurious. Not too sure about that. But if you'd like to check them out, of course, you'll find them on the show notes, as I'm

sure you already guessed. But most of all, of course, I need to thank this week's best chromosomal applications, Weston, Melissa, Jason, the Spaceman, Dennis, Lori, Jamie, Brian, James, and Todd. Weston, Melissa, and Jason, the Spaceman, who are so bright their chemical makeup can be determined through spectroscopy. Dennis, Lori, and Jamie, who are so badass that particularly tough iron robots are said to have balls of them.

And Brian, James, and Todd, who can't wear gold-colored condoms or cans in refugees, will show up at their balls expecting a wizard. Together, these nine nuns and nones are now known as the newest nouns to give us money. Not everybody has the audacity, capacity, and veracity to give us money, but if you think you're up to the challenge,

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You know, ease them into that part. If you have questions, comments, or death threats, you'll find all the contact info on the contact page at ScathingAVS.com. All the music used in this episode was written and performed by yours truly, and yes, I did have my permission. It feels so good for my gesticulations to matter again. You know, I still did them while you were gone. I had no doubt. But they didn't matter.

Now they matter again. They mattered. They mattered to me. All right. Well, that's what matters.