Miscellanea Agnostica

Cartoons of Muhammad have drawn the ire of Pakistan’s courts, so that country — packed to the rafters as it is with childish, raging lunatic Islamist extremists — has blocked access to Facebook within its borders. The Los Angeles Times reports on this juvenile reaction (WebCite cached article):

It was a Facebook campaign meant to make a stand for free speech. But in Pakistan, a contest encouraging users of the social-networking site to submit caricatures of the prophet Muhammad has been viewed as blasphemous, prompting a court-ordered nationwide ban on the website Wednesday. …

The ruling was triggered by a campaign on Facebook asking users to post images of Islam’s founder on a page called “Everybody Draw Muhammad Day!”

The campaign was aimed at expressing solidarity with the creators of the Comedy Central television show “South Park,” which recently drew the ire of a radical Muslim group for depicting Muhammad in a bear suit during an episode earlier this year.

I blogged about this particular event back when it happened. This contest also follows attacks on Lars Vilks, which I’ve blogged about more than once, and on the heels of continued Muslim outrage over the 2005 Jyllands-Posten cartoons.

I will, of course, continue my policy of posting some of the cartoons that have so enraged Muslims, as my own act of defiance against them, and to show my own support for free speech around the world. Muslims’ demand that everyone else in the world — Muslim and non-Muslim alike — obey their own metaphysical prohibition against depicting Muhammad, is not only unreasonable, it’s irrational and childish.

There is no amount of reasoning with them on the matter … so I have no intention of trying to reason with them about it. I will simply continue posting the cartoons they find offensive, as long as they keep stamping and fuming over their existence. There is a way to make these cartoons go away … and that’s to stop raging and fuming over their existence. I wonder if Muslims will ever find the fortitude and maturity to follow that strategem?

Tags: bombhead, cartoon controversy, cartoons, draw muhammad day, everybody draw muhammad day, facebook, Islam, islamism, islamists, Jyllands-Posten cartoons, jyllands-posten muhammad cartoons controversy, lahore, lars vilks, muh-hund, muhammad, muhammad cartoons, muslim, muslims, pakistan, pakistani, south park

A “social conservative” Republican Congressman from Indiana, Mark Souder, resigned from Congress today. The reason? He had an extramarital affair to which political operatives were tipped off recently, as the Washington Post reports (WebCite cached article):

Indiana congressman Mark Souder’s resignation, announced Tuesday, came after anonymous tipsters called his aides and his opponents in a Republican primary to say he was having an extramarital affair with a part-time staffer, according to sources familiar with the calls.

The conservative Christian congressman’s chief of staff, Renee Howell, confronted him last week over the rumored affair with Tracy Meadows Jackson, according to a source in the office. …

The affair began after Jackson was hired in 2004, according to the source in the office. Jackson, who is married, was to be a guest host with Souder for a daily radio spot he recorded for WFCV, a Christian radio station in Fort Wayne, Ind.

Souder is not your garden-variety ardent Religious Rightist, however. As pointed out by Avi Zenilman at Vanity Fair, once railed against extramarital sex during a hearing where Zenilman’s father — then a doctor working for the CDC — testified (WebCite cached article):

Souder ultimately responded by saying that teen sex needs to be aggressively confronted, like date rape, because out-of-wedlock sex always leads to pregnancy and ruins lives.

Once again, a Religious Right politician shows he can be a Hypocrite for Jesus — in spite of Jesus’ own clear, unambiguous, explicit orders to his followers never to be hypocritical.

What makes Souder’s resignation even worse, however, is his “I’ve sinned” version of the classic non-apology apology (as transcribed by Fox News, with a cached version):

I sinned against God, my wife and my family by having a mutual relationship with a part-time member of my staff.

In the poisonous environment of Washington, D.C., any personal failing is seized upon, often twisted, for political gain. …

The ideas we advocate are still just and right.

America will survive and thrive when anchored in those values.

Human beings, like me, will fail, but our cause is greater than individuals.

It is based upon eternal truths.

Gee, I dunno … a sitting Congressman who advocates forcing Puritanical behavior on American adolescents, having an extramarital affair and thus engaging in incredibly hypocritical — and therefore thoroughly non-Christian — behavior, while at the same time claiming to be a warrior in a “right” and “holy” cause which is inarguably and incontrovertibly true, for all eternity … doesn’t seem like some tiny little thing that’s being “twisted for political gain.” It seems, instead, like a very serious personal moral collapse! It also suggests that, perhaps, these “eternal truths” somehow aren’t quite “true” enough to get people who claim to hold them, to actually obey them.

What a creep. Good riddance.

Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons.

Tags: affair, christian right, extramarital affair, extramarital sex, gop, house of representatives, hypocrisy, hypocrite, hypocrite for jesus, hypocrites, mark souder, religious right, republican, republican party, republicans, resign, resignation, resigns, sex, washington DC

Just a few days ago I blogged about Swedish cartoonist Lars Vilks being attacked over his cartoons, which had depicted the Islamic prophet Muhammad as a dog. Muslims enraged by his cartoons have decided to ratchet up both the violence and the immaturity, and tried to burn down his home. The CBC reports on this latest childish Muslim rampage (WebCite cached article):

The home of a Swedish artist whose 2007 drawing of the Prophet Muhammad offended Muslims has been subjected to a suspected arson attack after another incident in which he enraged Muslims.

Lars Vilks, from Nyhamnslage in southern Sweden, was not at home during the attack and no injuries were reported.

The attack failed, but Muslim anger over his “Muh-hund” cartoons appears not to have relented. As I promised in my previous entry on the subject, I will repost incendiary cartoons that have Muslims in a tizzy. As often as you people keep stamping and fuming over these cartoons, I will continue to repost them.

Maybe someday you childish, raging Muslims will figure out what the Streisand effect is, and realize the best way to handle things that offend you is not to scream, holler, riot, attack, maim, burn and kill over them … but rather, to ignore them. Your fury only serves to call attention to things that might otherwise have gone unnoticed. It’s time for you all to grow up and figure that out.

Hat tip: AntiBible Project on Delphi Forums.

Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons.

Tags: arson, cartoons, childishness, dog, immaturity, Islam, juvenile, lars vilks, muh-hund, muhammad, muhammad dog, muslim, muslims, nyhamnslage, nyhamnslage sweden, offense, sweden

To date the Roman Catholic Church — and specifically, the Vatican which heads it — has consistently disavowed any responsibility of the Church in the clerical abuse scandal which has dogged it for some time and which really heated up during the last year (since the release of the Ryan Report). The Vatican, through various spokesmen, has instead blamed it on any number of other external agents, including (for example) Jews, and has even claimed there is no problem at all, that abuse claims were all trumped up by anti-Catholic people and groups, ranging from gays and abortionists to “masonic secularists” and “great newspapers.” These attempts at deflection have, for the most part, failed miserably.

It is, therefore, remarkable that none other than the Pope himself has finally admitted that the problem is real and that it was born within the Church itself. The AP via Google News reports on this admission (WebCite cached article):

In his most thorough admission of the church’s guilt in the clerical sex abuse scandal, Pope Benedict XVI said Tuesday the greatest persecution of the institution “is born from the sins within the church,” and not from a campaign by outsiders.

The pontiff said the Catholic church has always been tormented by problems of its own making — a tendency that is being witnessed today “in a truly terrifying way.” …

In a shift from the Vatican’s initial claim that the church was the victim of a campaign by the media and abortion rights and pro-gay marriage groups, Benedict said: “The greatest persecution of the church doesn’t come from enemies on the outside but is born from the sins within the church.”

Note that the Pope still calls this scandal a “persecution.” This is entirely in line with my own hypothesis that the Church views this scandal primarily as a spiritual contest with the Forces of Darkness; i.e. as a diabolical “attack” on the divine institution. That dimension remains the case. What has changed is that the Pope has admitted that this contest was generated from within the Church. The Pope is no longer blaming external agents for it, nor is he suggesting that it never happened, that it was merely a fictional construct woven out of whole cloth by people who hate the Catholic Church.

Thus, his admission is a step in the right direction. It’s merely one step, to be sure, but a definite step nonetheless. As such, it should be welcomed, as the step (only) that it is.

Photo credit: AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia.

Tags: benedict xvi, catholic church, catholic clerical abuse scandal, child abuse, clergy abuse, clerical abuse, holy see, pope, pope benedict, pope benedict xvi, portugal, roman catholic, roman catholic church, vatican, vatican city

The Mojave Cross, which I blogged about just a short time ago, which the US Supreme Court ruled must remain on federal land — because if it’s taken down or moved to private land, all fallen veterans will instantly be forgotten* — has been stolen! Here’s the report from CNN (WebCite cached article):

A war memorial shaped like a cross that has been at the center of a Supreme Court fight has been torn down by vandals from its remote perch in a California desert.

The 6-foot-tall metal structure was removed Sunday night from Sunrise Rock in a lonely stretch of the Mojave National Preserve, said government officials and veterans groups that have been fighting for years to keep the cross on national park land.

The National Park Service said it is investigating the incident; no arrests had been made as of Tuesday morning.

The only thing I can say about this is: Put it back!!!

Sure, I get that a religious-activist Supreme Court thinks all Americans must bow and scrape before a massive cross in the desert. I get that their attempt at creating a theocracy is not appropriate. I get all that.

But that cross does not belong to whoever stole it, and theft is not an appropriate response, not even to governmental proselytizing for Christianity.

So, whoever stole it … put it back and turn yourselves in. Take whatever punishment is coming to you, and have done with it.

* No, I still haven’t figured out the mechanism by which this is supposed to happen. I’ll let you know, just as soon as someone delusional enough to understand this kind of reasoning, figures it out for me.

Photo credit: watch4u.

Tags: christian, Christianity, christians, government, mojave cross, proselytize, proselytizing, Religion, stealing, stolen, supreme court, theft, theocracy, thieves

If anyone is unsure of the the immaturity of Islam and the inability and unwillingness of its adherents to accept there are non-Muslims in the world, we have another example, in an attack on a cartoonist over his depiction of Mohammad, as reported by the (UK) Telegraph (WebCite cached article):

Lars Vilks, who depicted the Prophet Mohammad with the body of a dog in 2007, said he was headbutted by a man sitting on the front row as he spoke at the University of Uppsala, about 44 miles from Stockholm.

“He head-butted me and I fell into the wall and lost my glasses,” Mr Vilks said. He added he was unharmed.

A spokesman for Uppsala police said about 20 people tried to attack Mr Vilks after interrupting his lecture, adding that the police had to intervene to stop them. Two people were detained.

Yes, folks — this is the “Religion of Peace” in action!

Vilks’s cartoons were not directly connected with the the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoon controversy, but in the minds of some, they have fused. And as I blogged just a few months ago, there are lots of Muslims who are still hung up on those, too.

Isn’t it time for Muslims worldwide to finally just grow up, already, and get over this notion that they get to control what other people say and do?

In defiance of these violent hyperreligionists, I’ve included one of Vilk’s cartoons in this post, above, as well as the “Bombhead” cartoon by Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard. I plan to post these cartoons every time I have to address this controversy, in protest against the violence perpetrated by Muslims against others, because of them. The more you guys rage, fume, attack and destroy, the more these cartoons get posted. See how that works?

Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons.

Tags: bombhead, cartoon, cartoonist, cartoonists, cartoons, free speech, hyperreligious, Islam, islamism, islamist, islamists, lars vilks, muslim, muslims, religion of peace, religionism, religionist, religionists, sweden, university of uppsala, uppsala, uppsala sweden

President Obama announced his latest choice for the US Supreme Court; it’s Solicitor General Elena Kagan [WebCite cached article]. The Religious Right — along with the rest of the country’s conservative faction — is going nuts about it. But the R.R.’s objection is not based on her qualifications or lack thereof. They object to her based on what they assume (not what they know) about her sexuality. Religion Dispatches covers some of the R.R.’s whining and bellyaching:

Focus on the Family, which previously signaled it would not support gay nominees because they lack the necessary “character” and “moral rectitude,” today opposes Kagan because of her “her emotional and legal commitment to the LGBT agenda.” And the American Family Association demands that the media ask Kagan if she’s a lesbian, because “no lesbian is qualified to sit on the Supreme Court.”

The problem with all of this — aside from the fact that these people seem to think that any gay person is too deficient ever to have any kind of federal office in the first place, which is a ridiculous position — is that it’s not even known whether or not Kagan is gay! A blogger recently suggested she was, and CBS News foolishly relayed this unfounded claim as fact; the White House, however, says this is untrue, and it cannot safely be assumed that Kagan is gay. (The blogger who started the rumor is Ben Domenech, who was a Bush Junior operative. Needless to say, his credibility on the matter is very thin, if not nonexistent.)

At any rate, the Religious Right continues to denounce Kagan as a lesbian and whines about her nomination to the Supreme Court based on that … but they have no idea if she really is a lesbian in the first place.

This wouldn’t be the first time the R.R. has stamped and fumed childishly — and sanctimoniously — about something, without knowing the facts of the matter. And one can safely assume it won’t be the last. More’s the pity.

At any rate, Ms Kagan’s sexual orientation has nothing to do with whether or not she can serve as a Supreme Court Justice. I for one do not care whether she’s gay or not.

Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons.

Tags: anti-gay, barack obama, childish, christian right, elena kagan, gay, harvard law school, homophobe, homophobes, homophobia, homophobic, homosexual, immature, immaturity, juvenile, lesbian, lgbt, nomination, Religion, religious, religious right, scotus, solicitor general, supreme court, supreme court nomination, us supreme court, white house

We all know the phone-in psychics are really “phony” psychics. Or at least, we should. But too many Americans don’t. Even after the legal problems of famous phony psychics like “Miss Cleo”, phone psychic services remain an enormous business. ABC News reports on a man who worked for one of these services and confesses it’s all just make-believe (WebCite cached article):

When the economy tanks, psychics say their business soars.

The psychic industry is a $2 billion a year business, with millions of people still dialing “900″ numbers, even after two decades of lawsuits, bad press and bankruptcies. But when someone calls a psychic hot line, does the person on the other end have more insight than anyone else?

Former psychic hot line worker and author of “Psychic Blues,” Mark Edward, says he’s blowing the whistle on his former industry.

“The psychic business is built on lies. There is no supernatural power. You can’t see the future,” Edward says. “We’re in the golden age of the con. There are people coming out of the woodwork that would love to separate you from your money. But people just want someone to talk to. That’s the bottom line.”

These services, of course, use various tactics such as cold-reading and take advantage of the Forer effect.

The ABC News video (which I can’t seem to embed) includes samples of real conversations with “psychics” which show how the phonies use evasive and vague language to appear to know what they actually don’t.

At the end of the interview, Edward reveals why he played at being a psychic:

Also, I was a skeptic the whole time, so I felt like I was doing a [public] service by infiltrating [The Psychic Network].

Hopefully he can provide enough details to government agencies that the service Edward worked for can be sued for fraud.

Hat tip: Skeptics & Heretics Forum at Delphi Forums.

Tags: barnum effect, cold reading, forer effect, mark edward, miss cleo, phony psychic, phony psychics, psychic, psychic industry, psychic network, psychic power, psychic service, psychics, skepticism, subjective validation, supernatural