Cognitive Dissonance - Episode 164: Grief Beyond Belief

Episode Date: July 17, 2014

  Special thanks to Rebecca Hensler from Grief Beyond Belief for joining us.        

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Please play responsibly. Want to stream Cognitive Dissonance to your Android or iPhone? Buy the app. Go to dissonancepod.com and click on the link on the right-hand side of the page. Each purchase helps support the show. Be advised that this show is not for children, the faint of heart, or the easily offended. The explicit tag is there for a reason. Recording from Glory Hole Studios in Chicago, this is Cognitive Dissonance. Every episode we blast anyone who gets in our way.

We bring critical thinking, skepticism, and irreverence to any topic that makes the news, makes it big, or makes us mad. It's skeptical. It's political. And there is no welcome, Matt. This is episode 164 and later on we will be joined by rebecca from grief beyond belief it's an interesting interview i think it's a necessary interview for our community so stick around we're going to have that at the end of the show but beforehand before we actually have a serious conversation cecil god all the people for anybody that she steered here is quickly turning this off right

yeah this is gonna be a horror show for them if you accidentally heard about this show from a website by like a serious well-meaning individual yeah i can assure you that you are in the wrong place like this is like taking your grandma to the tiltedilted Kilt. Yeah. You know? This is just, it's just a bad call. I don't know. It's more like taking your grandma to the strip club. That's a bad. Well, maybe that's. Taking your grandma to the glory hall.

There you go. Let's just be honest. Let's just go right there. The good thing is, grandma enjoys it and so does everybody else and nobody knows. So it's great. She's having a ball. She's having a ball the thing is you know you're in trouble when you walk in with grandma and everybody recognize you know hey

you know and there's stuff in dollar bills in her pants and you're like what the fuck grandma really so this first story comes from the raw Story. Kentucky boy raped by pastor. Church had hired because God forgave past sex crimes. Captain Redbeard here. Look at his face, dude. I don't know what's going on there. What is going on there? Looks like the worst, splotchiest sunburn.

Anyway, this guy was a known sex offender. He had previously been arrested. The church knew that he had been arrested, convicted, not just accused, but convicted as a sex offender. And the church knew it. And they said, hey, we're not here to judge. He loved Jesus. He was forgiven. So we hired him to be the pastor again.

And he raped an eight-year-old. Right. Sure. Who could have seen this coming? If only there was a way. There was like a part of the interview where he stood up and he's like, I'll fuck anything that moves. Like you seriously, like the quote in here is unbelievable. They actually said like they reached out and the person says like, hey, we are not here to judge.

If Jesus forgave him, then so did we. That's what we have judges for. The judges already judged him and they convicted him. You know, you don't even need to do it. Someone already did it for you. Plus, like, these churches are in the position of judging people. Like, have you ever met a, I mean, really, like, these fucking churches, a Kentucky church, really? You want to tell me that if this guy had walked in and he was, like, an effeminate homosexual man, and was just, I mean, do you think he would have been warmly received?

I mean, maybe I'm wrong, but just playing the odds here. I think it's interesting. You know, like, I mean, this guy is a convicted child molester, a violent sex offender, registered violent sex offender. And they're like, oh, yeah, sure, come on. And, you know, he had already repeatedly raped a 14-year-old boy in a previous congregation, and now he goes after that. It's like putting fucking Cookie Monster in charge of the cookie joint.

Right? For Christ's sake. He's like, cookie, cookie. He just can't stop himself. These people are as bad at vetting people as John McCain. You know, it's so funny, too, because I was reading this article and I'm thinking, like, here we are in a world

where people qualified for, like, real jobs in the world are struggling to get positions that they're fucking vastly overqualified for. They're, like, desperately trying to get entry-level positions. Like a fucking data entry clerk and they got fucking a master's in...

And this guy's like, shows up to the church, like, well, you have anything we shouldn't... I kind of am a violent, convicted sex offender, but Jesus says it's cool. And it's not like, what do they call his fucking reference? Where they're like, oh, hang on, let's call Jesus, make sure about that.

Oh, no, yeah, Jesus says you check out. It's good. Yeah, it's good yeah it's fine because the quote in here says like we're firm believers in the bible so if god's forgiven you then we're in no position to treat you otherwise and i'm thinking okay so the precondition is that god has forgiven you but did you check like did you vet that piece of the information because that's kind of the underlying assumption, right? That God has forgiven him. As a violent sex offender, I mean, it's hard to get a job like mopping

up cum at the glory hole. Right. What else do you do? There are some things that you just don't get jobs afterwards. You're just like, sorry. I'm always surprised that you didn't do the background

check. Well, in here, it's like they did the background check and they still didn't care. Let me rephrase. I'm always surprised when you ignore the background check. What could have come up on that where like, yeah, I eat babies

and kittens. I had a baby kitten muffaletta sandwich earlier. I flew a I eat babies and kittens. Like I have a, I had a baby kitten muffled at a sandwich. I like flew a plane into the trade tower. There's these, the little known 20th hijacker. Like he's got like the, oh yeah, but Jesus, he was like down with it. He forgave me. I said I was sorry. Right.

I don't know what you could do. Right. It doesn't matter. That's the problem with sin and forgiveness. Right. As a, as a concept, it's like there is, there's literally nothing you could do right it doesn't matter that's the problem with sin and forgiveness right as a concept it's like there isn't there's literally nothing you can do it's like yeah i i fucking i rape kids but i say i'm sorry when i'm done you know i i'm all for i'm all for a justice system that is not vengeance based right so i'm totally for you know you were a sex offender

you know we don't kill sex offenders we don't indefinitely lock up some sex offenders we just you know you get released from prison that's what happens now you can enter back into the workplace but i am for precautionary measures where you don't put them into positions where they can do more harm again so the fact is is if they're you know if they're proven to be a sex offender you don't't put them like in the fucking, you know, in a rape support group or something, you know, you put them in a place where you're like, okay, fine.

Yeah. You can do this job, this X job that does not put you in contact with children. That's fine. That's just great. But if this guy's a kiddie diddler, you don't throw them into the kiddie pool. You are in my power.

You are slowly going into a trance you are getting sleepy sleepy sleepy you are completely under my control i command you to be a a canary bird. Oh, boy, it works. It works. It's a miracle. So this story is weird. It comes from Gawker. This man's gaze is harmful to pregnant women. This is a

little piece of gonzo journalism kind of that comes by way of Katie Weaver. She went to this, I don't know, what would you call it, like a workshop? I don't know. It's just like fucking a Fabio convention or something. He totally has a Fabio kind of look,

doesn't he? He does. He's fobbing it out. And I love, too, that the gif that they use is him just blinking at you. Yeah, just staring and blinking. It's kind of disturbing, actually. I scrolled down a little so I don't have to look at it. It's super weird. So the story is like this guy. What's his name name he's got a funky name brocco is it broccoli or something yeah brocco yeah he said brocco sounds like somebody who's i don't know north of the wall

so this guy comes from croatia and he's got the fucking greatest scam in the world because his job when he wakes up in the morning is to look at people and then take their fucking money. But some of the things that he can do, Tom, are pretty interesting. or sharing sessions or from the Bracco-themed videos that play before each staring session for the three hours that this woman attended an all-day gazing event. So, Cecil, a gazing event. So let's go over these miracles. I found some of them terribly convincing. Yeah, my favorite is a woman's ovaries exploded, which was necessary for them to heal. And the first thing I think is, like, you never hear that about anyone's eyes.

You know what I mean? Like, their eyes exploded. I mean, you're using your eyes to look at this guy. Why would it work its way all the way into the body and blow up the ovaries? I love the idea, too, that, like, one of your organs needs to explode in order to heal. I can't tell you how many times I've tried to use that excuse, but it never got me laid. Like, what doctor do you go to, too, that's like, well, the only solution to this is to explode your heart? Yeah.

Congestive heart failure? No. Explosive heart failure. Induced heart failure. That's awesome. So this is pretty good. A woman did not scream, even though there was a yellow jacket crawling up and down her legs. Well, that's great.

So that is a miracle. That's a miracle, dude. It's a miracle that somebody had a bug on their body and maintained their composure. This one's better, though. A woman woke up in the middle of the night and knew she had to follow Bracco to Hawaii. She ended up loving Hawaii. It's Hawaii. It's Hawaii.

What circumstance is somebody in? It's like paradise. It is literally paradise. My fucking wife could die in Hawaii, and I could be traveling there to attend her funeral and I'd still be like, yeah, Hawaii was pretty great though. Oh, it's fucking Hawaii. Are you kidding me? It's phenomenal. This one is good because it makes no sense. These are amazing.

A woman's perennially single friend became wealthy perennial she was perennially single and yet somehow she became wealthy so that sort of suggests that like that single women can't become wealthy but she didn't like the first part of the sentence doesn't even address the second part. Like, they don't have anything to do with one another. It could very well have read, a woman's perennially ugly friend bought a sandwich. Like, they're so disconnected. Yeah. Like, they don't mean anything. But he has technology skills, Cecil, that rival your own.

Does he? He does, because a DVD of Bracco played on a loop on a dvd player that previously did not have the capacity to play dvds on a loop that's pretty amazing so he fucking brought that shit home because you know there are still dvd players that don't have a repeat function yeah evidently um somewhere maybe in croatia because fucking in America, that's not a true. I like this one. A woman who doesn't really breathe that much or well breathe deeply. I like that she doesn't breathe that much. She's just like, I can only do once in a while.

I don't need to be breathing all day. I just take a couple gasps each day and I'm fine. All you other motherfuckers be breathing all day. I don't do that shit at all. Oh, look at me using my lungs like a sucker. What are you talking about? They're the most like

lukewarm. They're like non-miracles. They're so awesome. That's like saying a guy that normally catches all the traffic lights made a few traffic lights yesterday after he got stared at in the face by this guy. Yeah. I mean, it's like a woman's adopted daughter reached out to her birth mother and it went beautifully.

Well, I mean, there were fucking two options like that. Sometimes that fucking happens. It's like a woman didn't the thought she didn't start the dishwasher before she left to work and she actually did start the dishwasher. That's the level of miracle attributed to Bracco. And it's awesome because on his own website, he says

he makes no claims of being a healer and does not promise to cure anybody. And he only adds that people commonly report warm feelings and physical sensations during a gazing experience. So he's even like saying like this doesn't do anything, but you might feel good. Like you might get placeboed if I tell you that I'm a looking dude. And people show up and he just fucking looks at him and collects a check.

He's fucking the most brilliant human being alive. I'll tell you what, it's better than Popov, because he's not even selling get-out-of-debt free water. Right. You know what I mean? Popov, he's putting himself into all kinds of positions, right? Popov's saying, you get this fucking holy water from me, and man, there's a chance you could get out of debt.

That's a claim, right? So he's not even making any claims. He's like, eh. And he doesn't even have to bottle fucking water. He doesn't he has to do nothing he doesn't even have to do anything like pop-up had this elaborate scam where he's gotta have somebody talk to these people and then he's gotta like have a fucking earbud in and then the earbud the person behind is like hey this is fucking ruth and her fucking arm fell off last week or whatever you you know? Instead, it's like, this guy doesn't have to do anything but stand there and look you in the face.

It's so amazing. It's so amazing. They did say there's a disclaimer that says that women more than three months pregnant are forbidden from attending the gazing events due to the intensity of the experience. And I thought, like, why three months? Like, what is it about? Like, I mean, it's obviously just horseshit. But, like, what is the idea there behind that? Like, wait a minute, wait a minute.

Yeah. Is the baby firmly implanted in the womb? I mean, we're past the first trimester. We're kind of in the out of the woods stage. Yeah. Okay, well, I don't want to look at her then. I only like women who have a higher percentage chance of miscarrying coming to my offense. What is the three months?

I don't even understand that. Is she in her second trimester? Because I can't look at her. Maybe he just doesn't want to be responsible for anyone's abortion. I like that it only costs $8. So it might be something that you could decide to go do and not feel that bad that you're giving this guy a shit ton of money, but they calculated how much it was.

And the guy's making, like, basically about $13,000 each session. It's amazing. So, you know, you gotta pay the hotel or whatever some money, but if you get 200 people in the room for $8, and it's like three hours, she figured it out, she said it's about $300 per minute he's making.

I could do that. This is a job even I'm qualified for. No one wants to look you in the face for more than a few minutes. Which is great because we'd have a three-hour session. It'd be five minutes and then a two-hour and 55-minute lunch. Yeah, a two-hour and 55-minute donut eating contest. And I would win. You would win every time. In the name of Jesus

we speak that. So this next story, whatever, comes from faithit.com. Or you can just faith it. Faith it. The top five jaw-dropping Christian videos in the universe. And I know it's going to be difficult for us to cover on an audio show uh videos but these are so fucking amazingly funny and so bad that we have to at least talk about this cecil yeah so we're gonna play a few clips i'm not gonna play them all we'll go through them this is this is the first one is number five. It's called The Renewed Mind is Key. And it was found on YouTube and it's from this Faith It blog.

So here's the first song. It's about 30 seconds long. The renewed mind is the key to the power that we need. It's the only way to be strong in victory. God has clothed us with his righteousness and power. And we live for him in our daytime and hour. We can stand upon the greatness of his word and proclaim the truth. We're going to make it heard.

We've got all the potential power God could ever give. What was just said there? Something about his legal rights? Yeah, I think there was a legal rights thing in there. His legal rights? It's so weird. It's because it's the renewed mind. The worst part is, is, like, what God should give

you is not, like, your salvation. He should just give you auto-tune. Like, that's what he should give you. He should give you some fucking voice coaches and a fucking writing tutor. And also some dance lessons because at two minutes into this, fucking old boy starts fucking

rocking out some break dancingancing, I guess. But it's so bad. Like, it seriously is like the most embarrassing possible breakdancing. And you know, you know this guy's like, wait, wait, wait, wait. Check this shit out. And he's the only one in the room that has anything even remotely resembling a moves. And that's why they let him do it these things are so embarrassing they're more embarrassing like your mother-in-law looking through your

browser history you know what i mean all right so so we got a couple more here to play this next one that we're playing is jesus is my friend this one is like more like monkeys is I guess. I don't know. It's terrible. It's so bad. He taught me how to live my life as it should be. He taught me how to turn my cheek when people laugh at me. I've had friends before, and I can tell you that he's one who will never leave you flat. Jesus is

a friend of mine. Jesus is my friend. Jesus is a friend of mine. I have a friend in Jesus. Jesus is a friend of mine. Jesus is a friend of mine Jesus is my friend Jesus is a friend of mine I have a friend in Jesus Jesus is a friend of mine Jesus is my friend Jesus is a friend of mine He taught me how to pray

And how to save my soul He taught me how to praise my God And still play rock and roll The music may sound different But the message is the same It's just an instrument to praise his name. Jesus is a friend of mine. Jesus is my friend. Jesus is a friend of mine. That is a seriously amazingly bad song.

That is seriously so fucking bad. I like the line in my favorite line, Cecil, is where he says, I've had friends before. It's like you had to tell people that. Like there's a point where people are watching this thinking, no way this guy had a friend. Wait, he had friends before. It's like, you had to tell people that. There's a point where people are watching this thinking, no way this guy had a friend. Wait, he had friends before? The way he says it's past tense, like, all my friends fucking don't talk to me anymore. It's a disclaimer like, hey, I had a black friend. I got a black friend so I can say really racist things.

It's like, Jesus won't leave you flat or whatever. Right. It's like, yeah, right. Yeah, sure, bro. Yeah. When was the last time Jesus fucking picked me up in my car fucking stall? I was going to say, like, did Jesus never help me move? Yeah, he never took me to the airport, fucker.

Fucking Jesus ain't my friend. He's a fucking freeloader. I'm not going to play. There's a number three is the arm wide open and it's just a fucking Creed cover. And it's this douchebag walking around a park chasing geese with his arms open. It's very weird, though. Dumb as hell. Very weird.

Okay. So now we're getting into the fucking super cringeworthy. These next two are so cringeworthy. This one is Crank Dat Holy Ghost. And it's set to this tune of Soulja Boy. It's a fitness thing. Yeah, that's who my idol be. No money in my pocket, but it's okay because my Bible green. The word is what I'm a bring. All through your area. So demons, get your mind right.

You think that you're scary, but. Got my well being twisted. I'm a holy sin for ransom. That's why in my life is missing. I'm a bona fide Christian. Got to make it well known. I'm 16 years old, but my faithful Lord. Jesus Christ, I've been my life, now I got to sacrifice.

What? Is he saying demons on the left, so I lean to the right? That's right. That's what he's saying. He's throwing in a little politics mixed up in this Soulja Boy cranked out Holy Ghost. That's nice. Yeah, I like that. Demons on the left.

Watch out for them. Terrifyingly clever. Yeah, he really nailed that. I mean, what a cover to pick, Soul like that. There's demons on the left. Watch out for them. Terrifyingly clever. Yeah, he really nailed that. I mean, what a cover to pick, Soulja Boy. I mean... In Soulja Boy, they Superman'd at home. Right, right. And we figured out what Superman is. It's when you come on her back and the sheets stick to it

and she stands up and looks like Superman. So it's a great song to pick. I mean, of all the songs you could pick, I think that that's probably it. That's the one. And don't you wonder when he was going to his pastor, whoever gave him the $17 of production value that they needed to shoot this video, and he was like, all right, all right. So I've been listening to the devil's music yeah you know

and i got this idea we'll we'll revamp the devil's music and we'll even throw in a little bit of politics in there for you okay but i don't want to play i don't want to tell you why i've been listening to that other stuff it's just research it's just research just like the internet porn is research yeah the internet porn is research too yeah his faith is full grown even though he's 16. Yeah, his fucking songwriting. He's actually, I will say though, of these that we played, his ability to maintain

kind of a little weird L truth to the song is actually better than the rest of them. So far, yeah. So far. But this next one might be a contender. Oh god, this one is super embarrassing. This is like, I don't know, your mother-in-law mistaking your fleshlight for a flashlight. So here it is.

How many times has that happened? Let me tell you, it's better than playing her baby got book. So here we go. Oh, my goodness. Becky, look at her Bible. It is so cute. She looks like one of those preacher guys' girlfriend. But who understands those preacher guys anyway?

They only talk to her because she looks like Mother Teresa. Okay. Wait, wait, wait. She looks like Mother Teresa. Like she's like a 90-year-old woman. She's actually dead. With like a head scarf on. They only talk to her because she looks like a desiccated corpse.

I talk to her because she looks like the Crypt Keeper. Because I'll tell you what, the people I gravitate toward in my life are definitely the Mother Teresa types. I spent a lot of time at the funeral home. I was going to say retirement home, but it's Mother Teresa. It's the funeral home. My percentages are better there. I have to admit. I wonder if it's like Mother Teresa now.

So she's like weekend at Bernie's looking through her Bible. She's like moving her arms. She's like clapping at the pages. She's up and down. She looks like Skeletor. She's moving her arms. She's got to clap her jaws up and down. She looks like Skeletor. She's like... Alright, there we go. We got a little more. I mean, look at it. It's just huge.

It's gross. She just looks so righteous. I like big Bibles and I cannot lie. You Christian brothers can't deny that when a girl walks in with a KJV and a bookmark in Proverbs, you get stoked. Got a name engraved so you know this girl is saved. It looks like one of those large ones with plenty of space in the margins. Oh, baby, I want to read with you because your Bible's got pictures. My minister tried to console me, but that book you got makes me so holy. Oh, mamma mia. You say you want makes me so holy. Ooh, mama mia. You say you want coin or not?

That's enough of that. We can't. You need to make me a promise right now that you will never do that again. I know I found the story, but I'm still somehow blaming you for that. Okay. Now, I'm not trying to be a dick, but if I saw somebody reading the Bible and I was a single person there is no greater like deterrent for

me than if somebody had like he's like you know you love a girl as like fucking King James Version with Proverbs bookmarked or whatever there would be no greater deterrent for me if somebody was like openly reading the Bible. Dude that's like dick deet

exactly somebody was like openly reading the Bible. Dude, that's like, that's like dick deet. Yeah, exactly. The last one is not, the last one's just dancing. So if you go there to look at the bonus one, the guy's singing a song or whatever, and he's kind of like out of breath because he's dancing a lot, but it's mostly just him like doing kind of Michael Jackson moves.

So it's not really anything I can play. But these were really, really bad, and tons of people loved these on Twitter. They kind of went crazy for them. There's a bunch of people sending these all over the place. They are amazingly bad. And it's so funny, too, because I love the one line in the Jesus is my friend when the guy's like, yeah, but I still get to play my rock and roll. And it's like, really? Because when do you start doing that?

When are you going to get on that? Yeah, you haven still get to play my rock and roll. And it's like, really? Because when do you start doing that? When are you going to get on that? Yeah, you haven't gotten there yet. I'm just amazed at just the complete lack of any creativity or musical talent that appears evident in any of these awesome remakes. You know, it's funny, too, because it's like this is the worst. I mean, I'm embarrassed to even hear this stuff. I couldn't imagine being a believer and being like, you know, it's like when you're riding down the streets of Chicago and you're playing some sort of rap. And then you see the black guys on the side and you kind of turn it down a little. Could you imagine like you're driving by your church and you're just like, let me turn that crank, that Holy Ghost down just a little bit.

Because you're even embarrassed around those people. Yeah, there's no more fronting than this kind of fronting. Like this is fucking epic level fronting. Like it's fucking bad, but it's amazing. And if you get a minute, check out some of the videos. You won't make it through all five of them. No, no. I would fuck it.

I just put that out there. It simply can't be done. There's like tons. I was just squirming like crazy watching this. I'm like, Oh, it's, it's as hard to do as eating a fucking teaspoon of cinnamon.

Sister. It comes from the civic tribune. A pastor fired after telling parents of dying girl that God was punishing them. Um, and this guy's like the worst person. Pastor Ward Bell of Bath County, Virginia, Virginia, got in a little bit of trouble. This was a guy who took over the church. And as soon as he took over the church, he was so fucking offensive to the people in Bath County, Virginia, that the membership in his church pretty much collapsed. He was fired from the Sheldon Valley Church. And Cecil, he walked up to somebody

and said that their child was sick because of the horrific sins their parents had done in their lives. And that's why their kid was sick. I don't believe his medical advice. I'm just saying. I doubt his credentials. It's not like he's looking at lab reports and saying that.

You know what I mean? It's not like he's flipping through, you know, a clipboard and he's like, no, it says here, just came back from the lab. I'm sorry, but it's your horrible fucking parents. That's what it says right here. Your CBC count is good, but your Sue count is off the charts Yeah you know the one thing that I get Maybe this might be controversial

I don't know but aren't they kind of saying this Kind of shit every week but instead Of directly coming out and saying it they're just being Passive aggressive about it I mean You know really when you sit into a fucking Fire and brimstone type of church And they say you know there's people in this audience that do some more horrible shit and they're going to go to hell, blah, blah, blah. And even if they don't say the people in the audience, they're still saying these things will send you to hell.

So, I mean, they're really just indirectly. This guy's like the only honest one who actually comes out and says, well, you know, no, not fucking indirectly. Not like sort of, well, not you, Janice sort of thing. Instead, it's like, no, Janice, you're going to fucking hell. Yeah. And it's like, I, you know, I hear what you're saying. And I guess I don't know enough of the Bible to know, like, but my first thought is, doesn't the Bible say like, if you're fucking up, like your punishment or reward is in heaven. Not just that horrible shit's going to happen to you here and now. Because that's the get out of reality free card, right?

Is that we know that there are people who are very successful that are horrible. And it's difficult to come up with a religious explanation. Like if God was really into reward and punishment on the earthly plane, it would be very difficult to reconcile the idea of all these really wealthy, successful, happy people who are also terrible fucking human beings. There's many, many, many examples of them. So clearly God isn't being given responsibility for those people, right? Because the idea is, well, they'll get their just desserts in heaven. But this fucking poor family with a fucking sick kid who dies, by the way, fucking dies, they're all of a sudden getting their punishment meted out, not only in the eternity of hell that they will certainly experience, according to this asshole, but also their fucking earthly life is trashed?

Like, how do you reconcile that? Like, how do you put that together in a way that makes sense? So we're going to take a break and give you all the information that you need to contact the show and become a patron of the program. And we'll return in just a few moments with some more stories and then our interview with Rebecca from Grief Beyond Belief. Want to contact the guys? stories and then our interview with Rebecca from Grief Beyond Belief. 740-74-DOUBT. That's 740-743-6828. Do you want to support the show? Go to patreon.com. That's p-a-t-r-e-o-n.com forward slash dissonance pod. Or click the link on the podcast homepage,

and you can donate to the production of Cognitive Dissonance on a per episode basis. If you can't spare any money, take a second to give us a five-star review on iTunes or Stitcher, or spread the word about the show. We want to send a big, heartfelt glory hole to all the patrons and people who rate us. You fucking rock. So this story comes from ThinkProgress.

Mayor seeks to ban same-sex couples from kissing in public. The mayor of an Italian town of Borgia. Borgia. That's perfect. I think that was right on.

That is exactly it. I actually don't think I... Borgia. That's how you say it. Welcome to Borgia. That's how you say it. Bobbity boopity boopity boopity. That's awesome.

Is seeking to ban public kissing between members of the same sex, calling the behavior morally harmful. And the fine is fucking 500 euros for a public smooch. So that's kind of outrageous. And you know, like, this is just a dude who doesn't want his fucking boner sticking out of his pants his pants like this is a guy who's embarrassed that he no longer has an algebra book to put in front of it right right that's the only reason we did get a comment on on this on facebook which i liked and it was basically like yeah this guy in a tiny little fucking shithole is saying you can't uh kiss in public but instead what what thisProgress does is put a picture of Rome on the front. And it's like saying, you know, like somebody in fucking bumfuck Mississippi, you know, basically saying you can't kiss in public.

And then two guys kissing in front of the bean in Chicago or something. Right, exactly. It's ridiculous. But besides the picture, I think it's weird to me that to find a country that is in Europe that is less progressive than us. It always feels weird to me when we stumble across these sort of anomalies, right? It feels to me like you're just like – I mean I know that this isn't true, but it would be – it feels to me that you should just walk over to Europe and be like, I would like a gay marriage, please. And they'd be like, bop-a-dee-bopity, bopity. And they'd just like hit a thing. And they'd just give you the gay marriage. Oh, my God.

That's amazing. I want to go get a gay marriage just so that somebody would go bopity, bopity on me. Hey, forget about it. Bopity, bopity, bopity. And then they'd just click a thing. And then you're good. You just go. That's what I figure.

But instead, it's like it says, though most Italians support civil unions for same sex couples, the Italian government does not recognize their legitimacy. The Italian Senate is expected to debate on the issue in September. But I'm just shocked by that. I figure I always seems to me. But I guess Italy is one of those more conservative nations than other nations, mainly because they got the fucking the pulpa down there. So that's I mean, and that's that's got to be the reason. Right. I mean, Italy is sort of I mean, it's obviously culturally pretty conservative because the

church is fucking right there. It's like it's like, you know, they probably want to be more progressive, Cecil, but it's like your dad is always looking over your shoulder. There's no way you're bringing your girlfriend back to your right. Exactly. No way it's going to happen. Exactly. It's like, yeah, you can have a girl over.

Where are we going to sit? Yeah, we're going to watch fucking a Disney movie. There's no way it's going to happen. Exactly. It's like, yeah, you can have a girl over. Where are we going to sit? Yeah, we're going to watch fucking a Disney movie. Yeah, no problem. I'll play Uno with you guys. Jesus, you talk about a boner killer, right? Dad. God. Come on, man.

Be cool. I want a blowjob. I hope you're as committed to safe sex as you are those abs. I know you're all about that abstinence thing, you know, but I mean, come on. Be Palin, are you serious? Like, you're not going to hook up with, like, before you marry? For real? For real.

For real, for real? For real, for real, for real. Oh, this is great. This is a shoddy point. This is just short. Just real short, yeah. This is from RichardDawkins.net. A GOP candidate who supports abstinence only learns it doesn't work the hard way.

That's pretty funny. Meet Bill Cassidy. He's a state congressman from Louisiana. He was a big abstinence only proponent. And he very recently put out a notice that his 17-year-old unmarried daughter is unsurprisingly pregnant. And Cecil, from this photo, his eyes are furious about it. Maybe he's like that guy earlier who stares at people. Maybe he

just stared her pregnant. You don't know. It's impossible to know for sure. This guy needs to buy a blink though. Good God. He's fucking intense. He's like the clear-eyed sponsor. You know what I mean? That's awesome. I like that they tried the hope-based contracepteption that's good those the hope-based one doesn't work as much as the

evidence-based one but you know good luck to you on that it's i just think it's so funny when this happens to these guys because it's not it's not really hypocrisy it's just inevitability sure yeah it's just all it is is the evidence playing out, right? I have, I really, to be honest, I don't care that people in the world practice this ideology, then turn to their children and say, look, this is how we teach this in our house, whatever, you know, I want you to have a, you know, I want to make sure that you are, you don't ever touch another person until you're married and then only do it like once every six years then you know whatever it is whatever they got to tell these people because i don't care what individuals do i mean why should i care uh i just don't want

it taught in schools because it doesn't work you know i mean like i just want all i want is something that works like that's all i want is something that works and you know look at that story we did either last week or a couple weeks ago. Colorado giving away some fucking free birth control. Suddenly all the teen births start dropping off. All the teen abortions start dropping off. Man, that's what you want. You just want to you want a nation that is not going to, you know, you don't want to give children the opportunity to fuck up their lives when they are really vulnerable to fucking

up their lives. And having a kid when you're, you know, maybe it's controversial to some people, but I think it's, I think you're fucking up your life when you're having a kid in high school. I think that's difficult. It's a, you're, you're stacking the deck against yourself. You're not going to make it easier by having a kid in high school. It's not like, you know, it's not like you look at the president of the United States and be like, you know, man, he's so lucky.

He felt so good that he fucked that girl and had a kid when he was 15. You know what I mean? That doesn't happen. So I just think you're just stacking the deck against our kids, and you don't need to do that. There's better forms of sexual education out there. All this evidence will just keep mounting. And this guy clearly has evidence that his daughter was mounted. Nicely done.

It is altogether right to discriminate against homosexual behavior. This story comes from the Raw Story. Christian radio host fears Iowans may be forced to eat gay pride burger. fears Iowans may be forced to eat gay pride burger. So, Burger King recently came out with I guess commercials, the Pride Whopper, the Proud Whopper.

It's a series of commercials where basically they're like, wrap up a burger and it's like, yeah, it's a gay hamburger, but they're all the same. It's a rainbow wrapper. Buy a burger. And fucking Brian Fisher. Brian Fisher, unsurprisingly, all worked up about this, Cecil.

Yeah, let's play him. This is courtesy of Right Wing Watch, and it's the Brian Fisher on the Brian Fisher Crazy Nuts show. Maybe you heard about this. Burger King coming out with what they're calling the Proud Whopper. Now, it's just in San Francisco right now, and we're thinking about doing something about this as an organization, some kind of action alert to get the attention of the Burger King establishment, the Burger King poobahs.

They call him the Burger King. He doesn't need another title. His name is the Burger King. But, you know, you gotta admit though. I want someone to send a message to be like, dear the Burger King. Your Highness. You know, the problem

is though, Cecil, you can't get right to the Burger King. The marketing guy is the Burger Duke. You gotta go to the Burger Earl. It's so difficult to penetrate all these layers of aristocracy burgers. It's impossible. What is wrong with the Burger King bureaucracy? I can't get the king on the phone.

God damn it. Pass me through to the Burger King. I'm tired of dealing with these burger princes and princesses. And the French fry Harold. I've been on the phone with him for an hour. You can't get three. Slam the phone down in disgust. You beat me for the last time, Burger King.

I declare war on Burglandia! Where is that Burger Castle? For I shall storm it and eat of its delicious contents. Oh, God. Alright, so there's more to this guy.

But this one Burger King restaurant in San Francisco came out with something called the Proud Whopper. And it's got the rainbow colors on it and all that. And they even produced about a two-minute sort of internet or web-based commercial. A two-minute internet. A two-minute internet. I don't know. It was as long as it takes me to fuck my wife.

So I think it was about two minutes. It's like a two-minute internet. Not really a commercial, but it was just kind of a little feature on the introduction of the Proud Whopper in San Francisco. And you had people in tears. They were so touched by this thing that they were in tears. Now, the concern, obviously, is if this isn't bottled up in San Francisco, this kind of nonsense,

then it's going to be spreading across the entire Fruited Plain, and you're going to be going to your Burger King in Des Moines, Iowa, and you're going to have a rainbow-colored wrapper for your Whopper. Oh, my God. You know, and I've got to tell you, the Proud Whopper, I've got to tell you, I think this is a marketing mistake. I think it's a bonehead move from a marketing standpoint. Because I got to guarantee you, when people sit down to eat a hamburger, the last thing they want to be thinking about is two guys having sex.

Oh, my. Wait a minute. Wait, wait, wait. These people sound like they were locked up, like Clockwork Orange style, in some sort of gay mansion where every time they see the rainbow, they're subjected to like mental images of some guy balls deep in another guy. So then every time there's a fucking rainbow somewhere, they immediately collapse and go into convulsions. It's like, oh, God, a rainbow, a rainbow. Well, I'll tell you this much.

Whenever I meet somebody and I find out that they're married, I immediately them fucking yeah like that's the first thing sure and in fact it's the only thing that i can think about when i think about the idea of two people being like in love with one another i'm just like i wonder what it looks like when they fuck like i gotta and that stops me from eating as many meals as no meals ever but i'm just saying whenever i walk into like a jewelry store and i just see the wedding wedding ring section i just whip up my my penis and masturbate to the idea of someone having sex right who can blame you cecil it's not like you know it's a fucking it's a rainbow fucking rapper that's it that's the only and that's the fucking that's the gist of it because

when they open up they're like oh they're all the same on the inside oh isn't that great oh they're gay some are gay some are straight but they're all the same on the inside that's the gist of it, because when they open it up, they're like, oh, they're all the same on the inside. Oh, isn't that great? Oh, they're gay. Some are gay. Some are straight. But they're all the same on the inside. That's the fucking point of the whole thing. Dumbass. But instead, all it is is just a rainbow-colored wrapper.

Yeah, they're not dick-shaped chicken tenders. Right. It's not a dick-shaped burger that shoved through a fucking bowl with a fucking bun that's got a hole in it covered in mayonnaise. Like, it's not. It's just a fucking burger, dude. Yeah, and you don't have to do anything. Like, if you don't like the way the wrapper looks, you can do what everybody does with the wrapper and throw the wrapper away. Sure, and you're not required to, like, fucking deep throat the burger.

Right. It's not like somebody saying, like, it's $3.99 or you can go fuck this dude. Like, what? Wait, what? They don't have, like like the cast of fucking, that fucking village people standing around serving these things. Every time you eat one of these, you have to fist your own anus.

I'm sorry. You want answers? I think I'm entitled. You want answers! I want the truth! You can't handle the truth! This story comes from the raw story. Fucking, what do you do with this?

Minnesota Republican bases economic agenda on theory that sperm enzymes in the anus cause AIDS. I just said that out loud, by the way. Do you want to hear him say it out loud? Let's hear it. Let's hear this theory. I'm sure it's a good one. It's a great one. My name is Mike Fry, and I speak as a concerned Minnesotan father and a husband.

And the thing about same-sex marriage is that people who are married do have sex. And when same-sex people are married, they do have sex. There's something called sodomy. Sodomy, defined in Minnesota, is sex by or with the mouth or through the anus. When there's ejaculation into a vagina, there's a barrier there, as in your packet it states there, of a cellular tissue that doesn't allow the sperm that has an enzyme at the head of it to penetrate the blood flow. It is designed to go to the egg.

That enzyme is designed to burn the outside membrane of the egg cell, go inside the egg, and then deposit the DNA. We call that conception. When the ejaculation occurs inside of a colon, it's highly absorbent material. The cells do not have a barrier for the sperm and those enzymes to enter into the blood flow. When the enzymes enter into the blood flow and a continued prolonged environment to that happens, these enzymes into blood flow, it causes what we know as AIDS, acquired immune deficiency syndrome. blood flow, it causes what we know as AIDS, acquired immune deficiency syndrome.

And AIDS, of course, brings on common diseases, colds and things, and it magnifies them to a point where it's unhealthy. Not only does it strengthen the disease within the carrier of AIDS, but it also, with a person that has a destroyed immune system, but it also strengthens the disease that can be spread to the society at large. That's enough. Yeah, we really don't. We really don't. I love that you can just go to fucking these things and

just make shit up. I mean, you just fucking make it up. It doesn't matter. I mean, yeah, little known fact, fucking ejaculate is tiny little gnomes. Little AIDS gnomes. They sing a little fucking gnome song while they're in there they're just like hey ho

it's off to AIDS we go we'll fuck up your life what's going on in there they're not mining for fucking diamonds you know a little known fact but ejaculate is actually nanobots and they turn your anus into a cyborg

I did write this down. If you'll turn to page 17 in your packets, you'll see that because I wrote it down, it is clearly true. When you get fucked in the ass, you get turned into Robocop. What the fuck? You just make anything up you want.

You just pick anything up, and you could just say it. And the thing is, if I played it through all the way through to the end you'd hear they'd be like thank you like nobody says anything nobody's like um that's the stupidest shit i've ever heard nobody throws anything at him he just stands up and walks away like thank you next speaker at least none of the parts of what he said not one is true i love the idea that your sperm like goes in and like burns the shell of the egg. It's got a fucking arc welder on the front of the thing.

It's like an IED. They plant a little thing on the front. Back up, buddies. Back up. Boom. Okay, get in. Get in. Get in.

Cover your corners. Cover your corners. Cover the flank. It's amazing. Give me a break. There's a fucking war in there i tell you and he spent so much time like when it's deposited in the colon after a long repeated it's like your dick is like a venom spitting cobra you know what i mean like you just can't control it it's just like, ah.

So we're joined by Rebecca Hensler from the Grief Beyond Belief website. Rebecca, thank you for joining us. You're welcome. Thank you. So if people are unfamiliar with what Grief Beyond Belief is, could you let them know what you do? Sure. Grief Beyond Belief is an online network that provides support for people who are grieving without belief in God and without belief in any kind of afterlife. And that's as basic as it is. That's sort of

the simplest definition. We have a number of different online venues at this point, online venues at this point. But they all serve that same essential purpose to create a space so people peer to peer can support each other. So, Rebecca, I wanted to ask you, I was looking at your page and your Facebook page. Your Facebook page, by the way, has really exploded. It's got over 11,000 likes on it. So it's clear that there's a real need for this community on the online space. But I was curious if people who were members of this community had at all done any meetups or get togethers or formed support groups that sort of the online community helped to create or foster? Well, that's a great question.

We have done sort of, I've done one kind of experimental grief support workshop at Skepticon last year. And that's one thing I'm interested in doing a lot more of is going to conferences and doing a workshop at the conference because at any given atheist, secular, skeptic conference, there are a substantial number of people who are going through some sort of recent or, you know, or grief that they're still living with. And that seemed to be really helpful for the people who attended it. The thing about just doing meetups is that grief support is a little different than just a discussion group. One of the things that's a little different is that we don't all know how to differentiate what's someone who's grieving, what's someone who's grieving but also depressed. And honestly, you know, people express suicidal thoughts sometimes when they're grieving. And so I have a little concern about sort of

people just saying, okay, let's all get together and talk about our grief without anyone there who has any expertise in addressing some of those issues. So, you know, I asked earlier, said I would like to talk about where we're going in the future. I think one of the places we're going in the future is that we need to figure out how to take advantage of the fact that there are all these atheist and secular groups, including the whole Sunday Assembly movement, including humanist congregations, but also including just your local atheist rabble-rousers, those groups now have the structure to provide a space for a grief support group and to do the promotion for a grief support group. What's missing is having people who are trained to

facilitate those groups. And so we really need to look at how do we contact people? How do we find people who are either secular themselves or want to learn how to provide grief support specifically for secular grieving people and bring them together so that we can use the infrastructure and have the appropriate services. Do you have a background in this? So I have a master's in counseling. That's because I'm a school counselor. I was already a school counselor when I got interested in this issue. The thing is, I didn't come into the issue of grief support consensually, shall we say. Most people who get involved with the issue of grief do because something happens to them. And I had no idea when I decided to become a school counselor and,

you know, get my degree in counseling, obviously, that I was going to go through what I have, which is that my own son died. But I do think it was useful to have me have that background already, if only because it gave me a sense of what the issues were we could come up against. Finding secular therapists in general can be a significant challenge. Even, you know, we were looking for somebody for our son at one point, just to help him through some school and other issues that he was having. And, you know, even that, you know, even something as simple as that sometimes can be terribly challenging. I would imagine that the field of psychiatric care and counseling for grief workers would be even more inundated primarily with, you know, people of a religious bent. Do you find that to be the case with people that you've spoken to?

you know, people of a religious bent. Do you find that to be the case with people that you've spoken to? It really depends where you are. I mean, that's the thing is it isn't that difficult to find someone who either is themselves secular or, you know, has some experience providing mental health care for people who don't have religious beliefs, if you're in an urban area, if you're in New York, if you're in Boston, if you're in Los Angeles or San Francisco or Seattle, that completely changes when you're in the middle of the country, when you're in the Bible Belt, when you're in the South. what we see is people have an incredibly difficult time finding mental health care, finding someone to officiate a funeral with no religion involved. And so those are some of the needs that we're looking at. that someone needs professional mental health care or when someone says to us, hey, I've decided it's a time at which I really need to see someone who's trained.

Right now, what we do is refer them to the Secular Therapist Project, which is this amazing website that provides referrals to therapists who will specifically do secular mental health care. For example, the service of officiating funer're humanist celebrants, CFI-certificated celebrants, people who are able to do funerals with no religion involved, which is awesome. So I noticed that you have two Facebook pages. One of them is a private page and one's your main page. What's the difference between those two pages? Good question. The public page started first. And I think that really provided a couple opportunities. One was people really were able to show their support. And the thing that happened when I first launched the Facebook page was that pretty much all the top secular bloggers out there, I mean, Hemant and Greta Christina and Adam Lee and all the people who are really up there in terms of having a very large audience showed this immense support. I know I'm going to feel I've forgotten people's names and they're going to be like, hey, what about me? But seriously,

everyone showed incredible support to the project. And so we got thousands of likes on Facebook, not from people who were themselves grieving, but for people who recognized that it was an important issue and who were glad that the project had started. So for a long time, what we had was this Facebook page, which allowed both people to interact with each other and also for me every day or so to send out a link or a question or a quote, something about grief from a secular viewpoint. And people would respond and would comment and interact with each other in that way. Facebook has made some changes in the last few years. And of course, one of the things they've done

is to try and make it more lucrative for themselves. They've made some changes in how the pages are structured. So it's really frustrating, actually. You have to get people to like your posts if you want anyone to see them. So they're really trying to get people to spend money on promoting their posts. At the same time, because the page had so many people who were aware of it, we built up a critical mass, enough people who were aware that when we said it's time for us to create a private group, there were people who were aware that when we said, it's time for us to create a private group, there were people who were, it was exactly what they wanted. They wanted a way to interact with

other people who were both secular and grieving. It's not just, some of them were closeted atheists, and those people obviously wanted to be able to reach out for grief support without their non-atheist friends on Facebook seeing what they were doing and saying. There are also people, the thing is, when you're grieving, you don't necessarily want everyone to know everything you're thinking. There are things you feel like sharing with other grieving people that you don't necessarily want saying something that, you know, when someone's dead, that's close to you. It seems to me that that's the most vulnerable time and the time that you would want to sort of tell people how you feel about this. So I could see where they would want to have some sort of privacy there. That is a really good point because people get very emotional and it's easy

to be hurt when you're grieving. Your emotions are much more fragile. One of the things that we feel really strongly about is that it is not a time where you want conflict. And so within the closed group, one of the things we're pretty strict about is we don't have any debate. We're not there for people to discuss, you know, some of them believe in this, some believe in that. There are people who say, oh, how can you have a grief group and are, you know, and not let anyone in if they have religious beliefs and were, you know, abridging their freedom of speech. And it's like, it is, it is really ridiculous. I'd be like saying like a grief group at the local temple or mosque, you know, I mean, like a grief group at the local temple or mosque you know i mean and that's the point and that's the point i frequently make is that if there's a grief group in a church and there's an expectation

and everyone in that grief group is going to be of that faith this is you know not a pub this is not the public square this is a private space specifically safe. And it's hard for people sometimes to understand. Sometimes it's even hard for other atheists to understand how necessary it is. But then I see what people who are grieving surrounded by religion experience. And then that always makes me aware of how important what we're doing is. So in your opinion, how is the experience of grieving as a secular person different than it is for religious people? I think the primary thing that's different is that we grieve with the knowledge that death is permanent. We are not expecting ever to see our loved ones again. We don't think that we can contact them. We don't think that if we pay the celebrity psychic enough money, that we're going to be able to talk to our loved ones again i don't believe that my son is an angel i don't when i talk about the day my son died i don't call it his angelversary or the day he got oh my god do people use that terminology angelversary angel not only do people use it, this is, my son died of a relatively rare condition.

And there is an international organization to support families who have children with this condition. has chosen the name cherubs, which refers to both the angelic, wonderful, you know, angelic children who live or the babies who have become angels. And literally, if this page, this organization does this memorialization of children who have died of this condition, however, I can't participate in that because the only way to participate is if you're willing to have the anniversary of the day your child died referred to as their angelversary. And I'm like, I don't care how important, you know, I can't even imagine letting anyone call the day my son. So that's what's different is.

That's terribly insulting. And I get that that is comforting to people. I saw that before I started Grief Beyond Belief. But I had gotten so much support from online, this parental grief support group that has a really awesome online presence. It's a huge group. It's worldwide. But over and over, I was getting exposed to people who were grieving in this way that was very different from me, because they were constantly saying, well, when I see my child again, and I'm not grieving with the belief, I'm going to see my child again. Have you always been secular?

Well, I was raised a secular Jew. And, you know, so I wasn't raised, I was raised with Jewish traditions, but no belief that any of it was literally true. And then when I was in my late teens and 20s, I acquired some California woo, you know, I had an assortment of spiritual beliefs that didn't relate to any particular religion. skeptical and atheist writing, it really made me stop and think, am I really going to spend my whole life believing things for which I have absolutely no evidence just because I kind of like them? You know, once I thought about that, I'm kind of the sort of person who once that had occurred to me, I couldn't just sort of go, oh, it's too hard to give up these ideas. I like them so much. I had to just kind of go, wait a second.

I'm a grown up. I can't believe these things just because they make me feel a little better. that are religious, they will often do the thing where they comfort each other by referring, like you mentioned, by referring to supernatural concepts. Like they're in a better place, they're in heaven, and they're trying to be kind to you. There is nothing of malice, generally speaking, there. Yet for a lot of secular people, they can find that kind of galling and meaningless. And so I think that that's that's not going away. Right. I mean, that's not it's not you're going to tell all your friends and family, hey, I just experienced this terrible loss.

If you could refrain from inadvertently insulting me, that would be great. So I'm curious kind of of your thoughts about how to negotiate that, you know, for people who are experiencing grief within a religious family or within a religious community? It's such a complicated question, because it doesn't just have to do with the question of religion versus atheism. It also has to do with what kind of family you're from and how you relate to each other. How important is it to you to have them know how you feel? How dangerous is it? I mean, you know, are you in a situation where you're really dependent on your family? And if you or, you know, for example, the people who we all know now that there are people who are clergy members who have no longer actually literally believe. And so, you know,

there are people who'd risk losing their jobs, there's sort of all these complicated things going on. And people have to make their own decisions. And they do, they make all these different decisions about it. I mean, one member of our community, he received these really appalling things in the mail from the funeral home. The funeral home started sending him sort of evangelical stuff, including literally a physical cross in an envelope. cross in an envelope. And so for him, he felt like he really had to write back to them and say, look, my family is not religious. This is upsetting us that you're sending us this stuff.

You need to not assume that everyone has the same beliefs. That was really brave. But other people are going to make different decisions. And one of the things within Grief Beyond Belief is that we support each other. We might not think that what someone is doing is how we would do it, but we're not there to criticize each other's decisions. We're there to provide support. And I think one of the things about having a secular support group is that it's actually easier for people, and people do say this, it's easier for them to cope with religious family, with being in parts of the country where they're surrounded by religion, if they have one place they can go and be understood. And I hear that over and over again is, you know, this is the place I can go where I know that I'm not going to be told that this is God's plan or that he's in a better place. Now, you have a pretty extensive grief library on the website.

If someone was dealing and trying to deal with grief, is there any go-to books that you just can pull right out right now that you would say, this would be the one that I would go to probably first? That's a great question. There really isn't anything that I can think of right now. I'm actually in a process of reading a lot of what's out there in terms of books about grief. There's sort of two things. One is there are a lot of books about grief that have spiritual content. content. Then there's also the fact that there's a lot about grief that doesn't have any real evidence to back it up. So I'm in this process of trying to see what is out there with real evidence to back it up. And so I don't feel quite ready to comment on like, well, I think that this guy's right, or this guy's right. This woman is the one who's really figured this out. At least

there are people who are doing research and who are really looking at this as a question that can be answered, at least somewhat through actual scientific research rather than a sort of making up theories. What we know, for example, is Kubler-Ross's stages of grief. There's not only not evidence for it, there's evidence that shows that it's not what people actually experience. One thing, you know, the reason part of why I'm doing this research right now is that Greta Christina and I are actually sort of setting out on the beginning of co-writing a grief self-help book for people who are grieving without belief. And so I'm really excited about that project. But part of what I wanted to do first is really make sure that I have a strong background.

It turns out to be really hard to educate yourself about grief. Well, this is amazing work that you do. If people were going to be looking for these things, where's the best place they could go on the Internet? griefandbelief.org. And we really do have a link library of over 250 links that are grief writing, some of it from a psychological point of view, some of it research, a lot of it just personal stories, a lot of blogs, a lot of articles. I want to say a lot of personal stories over and over again on very different grief experiences. Some of the writing is specifically about grieving as a non-believer. Most of it is about grieving. And I've essentially read all these things and sifted out all the religion and spirituality and woo and pseudoscience. So if you want something to read that, you know, you're not going to get halfway through it and have the person be talking about how Jesus is the only, you know, comfort for grief.

Yeah. Comfort for grief. This is a place you can go when there's so much to read and podcasts to listen to and videos to watch and where you know that it isn't going to involve spirituality. So I really recommend if you're looking for something to read or to watch, to look at our library. Well, I'll tell you, we're so grateful that you have this website and that you're doing this work because clearly it's tapping into a need that the secular community has. So having that resource available is just invaluable. I started this because it was something I needed. And then I found out that it was what a lot of other people needed as well. Yeah, it's really great. And thank you so much for joining us today. And we'll definitely put a link on this episode, episode 164, to the website and to the Facebook page so people can get in touch with you. Thank you so much.

to thank Rebecca Hensler for joining us today. She runs a website called Grief Beyond Belief. You can find it at griefbeyondbelief.org. We're also going to link to the Facebook page for Grief Beyond Belief. It's going to be on this week's show notes, episode 164 at dissonancepod.com. We want to thank Rebecca for coming on. She has such a great project that she's working on, and we wish her the best of luck. And we hope that if you are struggling with these things, um, you'll reach out and, uh, contact this organization and, and use some of the resources that they've already gone through the, the great trouble of, of, of locating. This is a, this is a valuable resource for people who are dealing with this difficult stuff. And, uh, and we can't, we can't give it high enough praise. So, uh, so that wraps it up for this week.

We're going to leave you, as always, with the Skeptic's Creed. Credulity is not a virtue. It's fortune cookie cutter, mommy issue, hypno-Babylon bullshit. Couched in scientician, double bubble, toil and trouble, pseudo-quasi-alternative, acupunctuating, Coil and Trouble, Pseudo, Quasi, Alternative, Acupunctuating, Pressurized, Stereogram, Pyramidal, Free Energy, Healing, dragons, giant worms, Atlantis, dolphins, truthers, birthers, witches, wizards, vaccine nuts, shaman healers, evangelists, conspiracy, doublespeak, stigmata, nonsense. Expose your sides. Thrust your hands. Bloody, evidential, conclusive.

Doubt even this. and express notions do not represent those of our wives, employers, friends, families, or of the local dairy council. We'll see you next time.