Cognitive Dissonance - Episode 206: Seth Andrews

Episode Date: February 9, 2015

Episode 206: Seth Andrews   Special thanks to Seth Andrews, the host of the Thinking Atheist for joining us:        

This episode of Cognitive Dissonance is brought to you by our patrons. You fucking rock. Yo guys, this is Dalton from Tulsa in the great, not-so-great state of Oklahoma. You were talking on your last show about the new bill proposed to restrict marriage to only people of faith, and everybody else could file an affidavit for a common-law marriage. Everybody else could file an affidavit for a common law marriage. That's all well and good, yet the state of Oklahoma does not recognize common law marriage as a thing in any way. So the bill translates to everybody else who lives in the state as, if you are a Christian or a Jew, you may get married.

Everybody else can piss off. Which means if you're not a person of faith, you don't get federally guaranteed rights. So, awesome on our part, I guess, here in Oklahoma. Glory hole. Love you guys. Bye. Hey, Big Rob from Texas here. Also, big fan from Texas

here. Glory hole, motherfuckers. So, I noticed you've been thanking a lot of patrons lately been giving shout outs to people that actually sent you you know tangible objects however you skipped over me and a shout out even though I have been offering help commentary for your opening you know call-in segment you know whenever you you do the opening thing kind of like, you know, like like the Lame unknown comic goes out to kind of get the crowd ready before the actual you know show starts for the real comedian I don't know what that's called. Anyway, so I thought an effort to get a shout out. I'm gonna tell a joke

So here we go. So this walrus is driving around his car, right, and he says, uh, he hears the car, it's making like a clunkity clunkity clunky sound, so he pulls into like this mechanic shop, okay, the mechanic's like, man, you know, I got a lot of cars going on here, why don't you, uh, you know, go sit down in the waiting room, walrus, it's gonna be a man, the walrus is like, well, you know, go sit down in the waiting room, Walrus. It's going to be a man. The Walrus is like, well, you know, I saw a yogurt stand a good ways back. I'm just going to walk over there, get some yogurt. And by the time I come back, hopefully he'll be done with the car. So the Walrus goes over, gets some yogurt.

He has no opposable thumbs. Okay. So he just puts his giant fins out there and stuffs his face into the bowl of yogurt. That probably lasted longer than he did. Just a joke. And, you know, there's a yogurt

sign on his face. He comes back. Mechanic looks at him. Walrus says, hey, how's the car looking? Mechanic goes,

yeah, it looks like you blew a seal. And he goes, no, it's just yogurt. Story hole. 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 chic, 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 mat. It's political, and there is no welcome at. This is episode 206, and we are actually joined by a guest for this episode, if you can believe that. Somebody was foolish enough to give us their time and or attention for at least 15 to 20 minutes before they – and that's actually – 15 to 20 minutes is a good 11 and a half minutes more attention than I generally get. Right, yeah. You know, and it feels like a lifetime to many of us.

Hey, he's already signing out. I mean, I don't blame him. I don't either at all. So we're lucky enough to be joined this fine evening by Seth Andrews from The Thinking Atheist. Thank you so much for coming on our show, Seth.

No, it's a pleasure to be here. I'm a fan of what you guys are about. I love the chemistry you have on the radio. And, you know, never a dull moment with you guys. You know, I'll just be the designated driver for the entire broadcast. You guys just hit the hooch and we'll just drive everybody home when the party's over. You don't have to tell us twice. We'll call it communion. Yeah, we'll do that. Yeah, just skip the party's over. You don't have to tell us twice. We'll call it communion.

Yeah, we'll do that. Yeah, just skip the wafers. It just soaks it all up. Yeah, I didn't want to do that. That's for after. You don't want to fill up on bread. So, Seth, we wanted to talk to you about this story from, unsurprisingly, the Raw Story. Court rejects Christian's discrimination lawsuit

that social security number is the mark of the beast. And I've got to say, first, before we launch into it, the photo that The Raw Story shows of this guy staring at the screen is absolutely crazily unsettling. So if you get a chance to click on the link, hopefully they will not change that bizarre piece. And that's from Shutterstock, too. That's the best part. It's like that's a piece of stock footage?

Yeah. Oh, so that's not really the guy. That's just somebody actually posed for this? Well, not only did somebody pose posed for it but somebody was like yes put it in the bank we'll need that one for later yeah there's gonna be dozens of times yeah we'll need this man with lip pimples someone may need this in the future if i can you know verbally if i can sort of draw an audio picture for you just picture the entire cast of train spotting with a barcode stamped on their head. That's exactly what this cat looks like. I was thinking like a young Sith Lord myself.

Well, you know, when I was a young person, I remember there was somebody somewhere who they had looked at the Bible and they had done some kind of weird math that there were so many sixes in the Bible. And of course, 666 is the mark of the beast. They used to show us these really frightening films. They're cheesy by today's standards, but frightening to us, called A Thief in the Night that talked about the mark of the beast, the book of Revelation come to pass, the whole world goes to hell in a handbasket, so you better come forward and accept Jesus because you don't want to get your head chopped off,

that kind of stuff. And so anytime somebody talks about the mark, this is the mark of Satan. I always think to myself, Satan must just have a hell of a sense of humor. I mean, this on the heels of that lady with the monster energy drink, right? I love that lady. That lady's outstanding.

Satan is just sitting around in the barcolanger going, you know, this ought to be as funny as hell. Let's make it so whenever they drink monster, it turns the cross upside down and becomes a satanic symbol. Yeah, that's brilliant. I watched that and I thought, like, this woman was clearly an English major. Coming from that myself, it's like, shit, I've got to find, like, seven symbols in Huck Finn. There's no way to get through this. It's like, okay, fuck, there's a river. That's got to mean something.

At some point you're just making things up. It's so true. It's awesome. It's like, I'm going to deconstruct the monster. That's somebody who's seriously, they're like, they're an hour and a half away from defending their fucking thesis in English Lit. And it's all like post-structural critical theory. And their mind is just like, they're deconstructing burritos.

They can't look at the world at all normally. That's over. There's no more chance. Everything is a hidden code and everything. There was a guy back in the, I want to say it's the seventies, eighties, early eighties. His name is Phil Phillips. He wrote a book called turmoil in the toy box. And there's a, there's an accompanying video.

You can YouTube it. It's alarming. And what it is, is this guy, he saw satanic messages in toys like pokemon was of the devil he man was master of the universe meaning that he was master and not jesus he was trying to usurp jesus in the master role well okay all right now that one might be legitimate because he meant to kick the shit out of Jesus. I mean, that dude is ripped. He's straight up legit. What were some other ones? Yoda, they actually talked about a form of magic based on the Force,

and so Star Wars was demonic, and it was a form of magic called Obi-Magic after Obi-Wan, and just one thing after the other. Everything was satanic, and they were just scaring the crap out of these, these parents who were eager to lap it all up, right? It was the satanic panic. It was that era where everything was, everybody was going after your children and heaven and hell were in the balance. And, and it was just insane. And these fear pimps managed to really psychologically scar a lot of people.

And you can talk to them now as they're adults and they have real bitterness because, you know, I was just a kid, right? I'm just trying to be a young person. Mom runs into my room. She starts playing all my records backwards. What's that about? Yeah. Wow. And it's scary and it's weird.

And they see Satan everywhere because they're sort of programmed to believe he's everywhere. And it's just crazy. And they're that way about a lot of things. So, no, the Social Security number is probably just a matter of time. Right. Somebody was going to pick it up eventually. I remember that as a child, too. I was I was religious as a child.

And I remember hanging out with somebody else's father. It was a friend of mine's father. We were at their house. You know, as kids do, you hang out at somebody else's father. It was a friend of mine's father. We were at their house. You know, as kids do, you hang out at somebody else's house. And I remember, I think what happened was, is that there was that panic, but the panic hit the adults first. And the adults, I think, were not smart enough or not worldly enough or just were so ingrained in their beliefs that they couldn't filter that information to their children in a way that I guess respected their children's fears, because I remember he scared the hell out of us. And that's all it really was, was just this.

It was like a tidal wave of fear. I remember finding out about hell at a you know, I remember there was you know, there was talk of it when I was a kid, but nobody really talked about it. But then the sort of the gross descriptions of it later on, and then the descriptions of how this is the end times, we're in the end times, this is coming up, there's going to be a 666, they're going to stamp your hand, you got to reject the beast, you got to stay away from that sort of thing, and you got to be holy. And I just remember being so afraid of Revelation growing up that it petrified me. I would stay up at night awake just worried sick about revelation and the adults really just inflicted that on me well there's nothing more

terrifying too to children than the fear of their parents yeah like if you want to fucking scare a kid as a parent be scared yourself and let them see that yeah yeah man because that will absolutely they're just like fucking that bad person feeds my meals and clothes me and tells me everything's okay. Yeah. And if they're telling me the opposite thing, it's just nightmare fuel. Yeah. I remember one, I don't know why I'm bringing this up, but talk about fear that it was a very, very, very religious family. And I was just gotten a job in the video production industry.

It's probably 14 years ago. And he was like an intern. He was a new hire, an intern guy, this very young minnow, product of an extremely strict Christian homeschool, right? I mean, this guy was like, you ever see that movie where Randy Quaid plays the Quaker who goes out on the road trip with Woody Harrelson? I mean, the guy has never seen, he's barely seen the sun, right? And so I took him on a video shoot trip, and we went to South Carolina to go shoot a weekend thing for a client. And the guy's looking out the window like the natives,

like those people who saw fire for the first time. Everything is a discovery. I'm thinking of like the German POWs going through America like, your buildings are still standing. It was very much that. I mean, I literally was just sort of taking a mental note of how sheltered this guy had been. He's just a big heart, great kid. But we're flying home Sunday night. We get caught in some weather, and we get stuck in our layover in Dallas,

and we can't get back until the following day. So we go through all of that. Well, I tell you all that to tell you this. On Tuesday, when I'm back at the office, the dust has settled. I get a call from this dude's mom, and she is as holy roller as they come. You know, she is that denim jean skirt, hair in a bun,

barely any makeup Sunday, go to meet. And I, you know, I mean, whoa. Yeah. And she called up and she said,

I just called because I wanted to apologize to you. And I said, apologize. She said, yes, you know, I prayed to Jesus for traveling mercies for your trip, but I forgot to pray for traveling mercies for your return home. And when I heard that you were delayed, I felt such grief in my heart.

Now, I'm still a believer at the time. Sure. I'm still, I'm, you know, I'm an ambivalent believer. But I literally, you've got to be, I'm an ambivalent believer, but I literally, you gotta be shit. You gotta be, I mean, this is insane. And she was as, as serious as a heart attack. And those people are out there and they exist and they, everything is a war.

Everything is a battle. It's either lighter darkness, good or evil. And there's no, there's, there are no non-players. Even the most innocuous of things out there, the things you think, oh, that's nothing. The monster energy drinks of the world are actually big tools in this battle between Yahweh and Lucifer. And it's a little terrifying to see these people and to know they vote. Now, you were a believer and you clearly believed in revelations you believe the the literal version of or the of

revelations right you believe that yeah when you read it you thought this was sort of a blueprint for apocalypse right yeah i didn't understand a lot of it i mean the revelation is such a bizarre oh yeah bizarre weird twisted kind of a you know, it's really an acid trip of theology kind of thing. My father, my parents are both theologian level believers. My father, when I was younger, attempted to memorize the entire book of Revelation. What? Why? Yeah, that's how hardcore they are.

Of all the books, though. Yeah, I know. Of all the books, you pick the fever dream written by lunatics. Yeah. I'm like, hey, look, could we take a mental break and maybe go learn Mandarin Chinese instead? Right? I mean, come on. But I think he got through the seven chapters or so,, he finally sort of gave up, but it was, you know, it was the end times,

capital E, capital T, the end times. One day the trumpet will sound. And then there's all this debate about, well, is it a literal trumpet? Will it be something the whole world can see in here?

Or is it going to be like in the movie where all the believers just disappear? Are you post-trib or pre-trib or a-trib? Meaning when does the seven-year tribulation happen? And for some reason in the book of Revelation, as the story goes, the standard interpretation of the tribulation is that Jesus comes and raptures all of his children away. And then for some reason,

he decides it'd be awesome to give control of the entire planet to his arch enemy for seven years. Well, you know. Seth, what do you think explains the weird fetishization of Armageddon that people seem to have? Because it's not just like if I really believed in Armageddon, and thankfully I have new inkling of belief in Armageddon but if I really believed in it I think that would be of all the things I would want to spend my time and energy focusing on that would not rank in the

top 200 I would be like that's fucked but they fetishize it like I don't know I try to get my head around it part of me thinks that they are compensating for maybe a deep seated fear of death there's an obsession with death. You know what's weird is that most religious people who believe in a perfect heaven and they're going to get this –

they're going to get a mansion that makes Justin Bieber's place look like – A cardboard box on Wacker Drive. It's the equivalent of the shopping cart, know i'm saying and and they're going to have perfect bliss and they are it's going to be awesome beyond words and yet they are terrified death right and i've often had this conversation you know if you really do believe you're going to be at the right hand of your dad your father heavenly father, and there's perfect peace and bliss and joy and you're reunited with grandpa and the family dog. Why would you ever click a seatbelt? Why would you ever buy or load a handgun?

Why would you ever lock a door? Why would you not welcome death? You guys see that scene in Religious when Bill Maher walks up to the guy who's talking about how, you know, hey, heaven is so much better. Heaven's awesome. Heaven's awesome. And Bill looks at him and goes, well, great. Why don't you just kill yourself? And the guy just looked at him like, I don't know. And, you know, I don't know. I mean, is it because it's sort of a grand climax to the story? Maybe it's their way of keeping their eyes

on the skies instead of focusing on the reality of their doctrine, I couldn't really answer what the fascination is, but it certainly is there. Many times it almost resembles a death cult. I can't wait for the world to end. Yeah. Right? Yeah. Well, it's like not only are they like over-interested in a way that's obsessive and unhealthy,

but there's a looking forward to it. There's a there's a glee. There's a gleam in the eye of the believer sometimes when they get an opportunity to preach Armageddon to the nonbeliever. Right. It's not, you know, they'll say on the one hand that I'm doing this to save you. Right. Like and I think some of them genuinely believe that.

But then there are others who seem to take genuine and evident joy in attempting to inflict as much fear in other people about Armageddon. They're certain that they're going, and they want you to be just as certain that you're not. And that's just like there's like a masochism, like a sadomasochistic element to that whole dialogue. Well, probably as much or more than anything, it's an appeal to emotion, right? When you're trying to get somebody to acquiesce, to sort of surrender to your point of view, and you're not winning on the facts, well, you look at them and you go, well, you don't want to burn, do you? You don't want to burn forever, do you? Because you know what? I've had people send me messages, right?

People who in love tell me that they will laugh at me when I'm cooking in hell and they're looking down from heaven. Now, I mean, and to be fair, you know, most people who go to the church on the corner, they're not like that. They don't have that sort of sadistic. But, you know, it's out there. And I think what it is is it's I think it reveals the fact that they haven't really made an intellectual decision they haven't made a rational decision they made an emotional decision they were probably scared as a young person or maybe at a vulnerable time in their lives with the idea of cooking forever and so to avoid that they will surrender supposedly surrender their lives to the person who will choose not to cook them forever.

You know, not one stopping and going, why does dad want to cook us? Right. Hey, why would dad cook us? I mean, that conversation to them just never really happens. I don't understand it. But, you know, it's, you know, people have been scaring, literally trying to scare the hell out of people for thousands of years, or at least since the dawn of Christianity in, what, 300 AD or whatever. So, you know, and the fear will continue. And I think that will become more intense as they continue to lose more and more on the facts.

The information age is setting people free. Yeah. And thanks. If you've been watching Pat Robertson at all and Sarah Palin and whatnot, you know these people are just a few fries short of a happy meal, right? They're just – they are just about to pop an O-ring because they no longer have a monopoly on the conversation, and they're going to get freakier. Well, so speaking of cooking, you're going to be heading down to Australia soon? Is that a – Speaking of cooking, you're going to be heading down to Australia soon?

Is that a – Yeah. You know, what's funny is last year I put together a tour with a couple of buddies of mine. I mean it wasn't anything major. It was just – Aron Raw and Matt Dillahunty and I are buddies. And I actually met them at the first – my first public appearance when I kind of came out as an atheist the first time and showed my face and gave my name. It was a big deal for me. It was back in 2011. And I happened to meet them at an event at that same day. And we just clicked. It's this weird thing. We're all very different, but we just totally clicked. And I thought, we have such chemistry on stage. Wouldn't it be fun to do

a tour together? So last year, I put together an idea and I called the guys and I said, look, what if you and I, what if all three of us were to do a deal and call it the unholy Trinity? Do you think people would get the joke, right? Do you think they'd know that we were just poking fun at the Trinity and we didn't think we were all that? But do you think they'd go there? Oh, hey, what a great idea. And so we did three cities. We did Amarillo, Albuquerque, San Antonio and had a massive audience and huge success. And we got an email or a phone call or an email from the Atheist Foundation of Australia.

And they said, how would you like to bring the unholy trinity down under? Nice. And we thought, oh, let me think. Okay. That's a dream, right? I mean, I've always wanted to. I always thought I'd go down to be watching the Australian Open T tournament, but Hey, this is even better. And so, uh, I, in mid-March, uh, all three of us are going down and we're going to do, uh, tour stops. We're actually do live

presentations in Sydney, Brisbane, and Melbourne. And then I have to get back to the States, but the guys are staying to do some stuff in Perth and some other areas and going to New Zealand. And so they're making a, almost a month out of it, as I understand it. It's going to be awesome. So if anybody wanted to know more about it or they know someone who's going to be in Sydney, Brisbane, or Melbourne, they can go to unholytrinitydownunder.com, and all the tour details are right there. So tell me a little bit about the show that you guys are actually doing.

On stage, what's the nature of the show? What's the nature of your program? Well, what we did last year was each one of us came out, and we all kind of walk out on stage together at the beginning, and we just, you know, it's family. It sounds cliche to say it that way, but there is a connection with everybody in that room, especially the fact that we did this in highly religious cultures. Many of these people feel

like they're breathing for the first time. They're around people who don't think they're insane or crazy or demon-possessed. And so we'll come out, and we'll each do kind of a short formal presentation with slides and whatnot. I mean, they're fun. And, and, but the, the fun part really is after that, all three of us take the stage and we just interact with the audience. The audience gets mics and we just, we ask questions, we talk, you know, that we ask them questions, they talk to us and give, and we, and we just have dialogue and the clock just flies and it's a ball. And then when it's over, we get a chance to hang around, shake hands, hug. Occasionally they'll ask us to sign something.

You know, that's always very sweet. But mostly I think it's a chance for us to support the local groups and to remind people in those communities that it's okay. You know, we're not saying we have all the answers, right? I'm not Yoda. What I'm saying is you're more articulate than yoda i mean you know all your all your syntax isn't backwards yeah right right uh did you guys see that uh that cartoon with the yoda's tombstone and instead of r.i.p it says ipr i'm just i don't know why but anyway the we're saying we don't have the answers, but it's okay to ask the questions.

And everybody leaves with a big grin on their face, especially us. And so while we're all going to do an exploration of Scripture, we're going to pop into what religion is and isn't, how we can be most effective. We'll each have a different kind of a speech that we give. Really, the best part is to see whatever comes out of the audience. And sometimes there are theists. There may be a church group that shows up. Who knows what's going to happen? So it's going to be exciting. How much time is spent on the penis puppetry, though? I think that's the part. Penis puppetry. You know, it's funny, though.

It's funny that this is a perfect segue. This is a perfect segue. That joke was either not going anywhere or going somewhere really unsettling. I just finished a book that I'm releasing in April, and it's called Sacred Cows, a lighthearted look at belief and tradition around the world. And it's written as a humor book.

My illustrator's name is Vince DePorter and he is drawn for Batman and, and a SpongeBob. And the guy's just a genius. And he happens to be a heathen. He he's an, he's a total anti-theist and he has been aching for the chance to use his gifts in the conversation against superstition. And so he and I were like a match made in heaven. His Hill is illustrations are just killer. And so in the book, I sort of pin in heaven. Hilla's illustrations are just killer. And so in the book, I sort of pinball around the world, and we talk about all the weird fringe stuff that people do that mainstream religious people laugh at. Oh, look at those crazy snake handlers in the Appalachian Hills.

Oh, look at those dudes in Barcelona. They're dragging a live goat up to the top of the building and throwing it off to be caught by the crowd because only then will good luck come to the village. That kind stuff right uh you know scientology and all that kind of stuff but but one of the chapters talks about the penis parade of kawasaki japan where they once a year in february i believe to bring good luck to the area they drag a huge pink penis through town. And I guess people are wearing fake noses that are shaped like penises. I mean, it's just a, you know, I mean, I'm going next year if I can.

How do you have a bad time at the penis parade? You're never walking home from the penis parade like how was it you know i just want to go so that you know i want to go so that some i someone will ask me what i did with my weekend you know i want to take my son over summer vacation so we can write an essay oh Oh, no. Well, you know, it was a great day when they dragged the giant pink phallus through the crowd, the throng of thousands. I wonder if it's like running of the bulls or they just let it loose. Well, if there's an impalement, I'm out.

You know what I'm saying? I'm out. Seth, thank you so much for joining us today. Good luck on your trip. And we look forward to hearing about it when you come back. You guys are fantastic. Thanks for being such a great podcast and for having me on tonight. Great fun. Oh, no, no. I'm sorry.

You're on cognitive dissonance. Really? We will relay your kind sentiments to a different show. That would make a great promo, right? You could just make a promo and say, We all know the other podcasts suck. We suck less. Cognitive dissonance.

You're welcome. All right. That's awesome. I totally have it now. That's great. Want to contact the guys? Go to DissonancePod.com to get links to their Google+, Facebook, and Twitter accounts. If you want to contact them directly, send an email to dissonance.podcast at gmail.com.

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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. This story comes from the New York Daily News. ISIS thugs toss gay man from roof, then stone him to death. And the crazy thing about this story, I don't even know why I'm laughing. I do know why I'm laughing.

So bear with me. Because they throw this poor man from the roof of a building, 80 feet. He lands and he lives. And in fact, he lives and he's sitting up. And one of the dudes is like, hey, you all right? And comes over. Yeah, you could see somebody with their hand on him like, are you doing good? Oh, man.

Because that totally looks like you just fell 80 feet. And then he's like, yeah. I can just imagine how that conversation goes. Like, well, man, that's fucked up. That looks like it really hurt. Are you good? What just happened? Yeah.

Yeah. Okay. So you're good? Yeah, I'm fine. Stone him to death. Yeah. No. Okay.

We want to make sure that he feels the thud of every rock. Yeah. If he would have fallen into like a catapult and then got shot into, say, an alligator pit, I guess. Just like he dies worse than OJ Simpson from Naked Gun where Nate puts his hand in a cake and then in a mousetrap and then he touches the stove and then he falls off a ship. Yeah. So it's that bad bad it's literally that bad 80 feet off a building they final destination to this guy it's like a bridge fell right next to him yeah it's unbelievable and you know what i

want to talk about most in this story though tom is the people who are going to say, who are going to post, I saw a post recently this week, and this post was about ISIS. And I guess somebody was captured and held by ISIS. And they said, well, they didn't even see a Quran. They didn't even read the Quran. They didn't pay attention to the Quran. And they were using this as a way to say, it's not a religious organization. It's not a religious organization, even though they say they're a caliphate, the name of it is the Islamic state, but they don't,

what they're doing is they're not, they're not reading the Quran. They're not, they're not religious. They're just doing this politically, but they're using that as a, as a figurehead. That's fine and good.

Maybe that's true. Then why the fuck are you throwing gay people off of, off a fucking building? Because the only reason you throw a gay person off a building is if your religion abhors it because I've never met a secular person who wanted to do violence on a gay person because they're gay. Never.

Right. What would the inclination be? Other than you took my parking spot or something like something else. Right. You know the thing is like it's not like you're like oh man we gotta take the great city of gaydom. Yeah. It. How would, you know, the thing is like, it's not like you're like, oh man, we got to take the great city of Gatom. Yeah.

You know, it's not a thing. So there's no political gain to be had from chucking this dude from the top of the building. Right. This is, like you said, not only is this clearly religiously motivated, but then it's also symbolic. It's that stoning. Yeah. Sure.

They didn't shoot the guy. They fucking stoned him to death. Right. Well, why did they choose to stone him to death i don't know maybe because that's the fucking law as prescribed by your fucking holy book yeah it's not like he it's not like they made it up it's not like they were like well all we have is rocks i don't know we took over syria and you know most of iraq and all the rocks one guy has in picture, one guy has camouflage pants on. There has to be a gun near him somewhere. They don't wear camouflage pants without the gun. Ridiculous.

Yeah. You know, and it's not just and let's also not pretend that it's just one or two guys. When the guy falls, the dude comes to see if he's all right then a crowd of angry people surrounds this guy like incensed that he's still alive with an isis flag in the in the left corner so they run around i'm like bargain we can't believe you survived that horrible atrocity yeah i i know a second atrocity yeah let's yeah let's can we just heap the atrocities on today? Can it just be Atrocity Wednesday? This is like a twofer. It is. They were so happy.

They were like, it's like you got a free dessert at TGI Fridays afterwards. All the people below were like, oh, man, they get to have all the fun at the top of the bill. Wait, he's still alive. Oh, no. Quick, gather your rocks. Oh, gosh. Terrible people. Yeah, no.

I mean, it's fucking awful. I agree, too. I think that there's no way you can look at this and say that it's not religious at all. I also agree that there's no way you can look at it and say it's completely religious because there's plenty of things that they're doing that are completely out of religious context. I'm not saying that they're completely motivated by religion. Sure. But they are absolutely motivated by religion at certain points. Right.

I mean, you can't deny that. And to deny it, it's, again, it's this polarization of arguments, right? You have people on one side that are saying they are in no way responsible for this as religious people. They are instead responsible for it as a political entity. I think that's a bullshit argument. And I also think it's a bullshit argument to say, well, they are only responsible to this because it's religion. I think that's a bullshit argument, too. I think that there are there's a there's a meeting in there somewhere where they're using both. argument too i think that there are there's a there's a meeting in there somewhere where they're they're using both you know yeah do we have to address the political concerns they have where they're talking about you know what america's doing and how we're handling it yeah absolutely yeah they should address the political concerns but don't forget that there are religious concerns as well that you are never going to be able to address you can't just be like well hey all you gay people why don't you guys just kill yourself yeah Yeah, I don't even know. And that's the thing is that that's the intractable part, right? That's the part that you can't – there's no – you cannot be allowed to compromise on religious concerns.

That's the thing that makes the religious angle – that's the thing that makes the religious bulwark so difficult to navigate around is that religion doesn't allow you to have compromise. Because what are you going to say? Like, well, OK, I believe a little bit that I believe like a little less. Yeah, it's not it's not possible. It's also the case, too, that if you use religion as the that was a term you use, like it may not be the motivator, but it's the excuse or whatever. Well, how is it able to even act as an excuse? You you couldn't use puppy dogs as the excuse right maybe there's no maybe they're so cute you're throwing people off buildings like oh god a labrador baby stone this motherfucker

look at that goddamn siamese kitten i have to throw a rock at a gay man. You know what I mean? Like, so the religion clearly is functioning. Yeah. It's not like, it's not like, and so if it's functioning as a rationale, then it is part of the problem. Because if it wasn't able to function in that role, then nobody would utilize it for that role. But it's the fact that it functions, that it plays that part so well. Right.

That makes it a problem that they can say, yeah, we'll but it's the fact that it functions that it plays that part so well right that makes it a problem that they can that they can say yeah we'll blame it on the religion i said who's that guy on the other side of the glory hole it's jesus this story comes from the friendly atheist blog. Jesus will be pissed if Christian women go see Fifty Shades of Grey. Good Lord. Carmen Miller, who co-founded the God Over Porn Ministry, so evidently God's a top, is all worked up that Christian women are going to go see Fifty Shades of Grey. And some of the shit uh this i love this one of the questions here i have an honest question to ask you godly women would you watch this movie with jesus sitting next to you seriously would it be just a movie then i don't know did jesus buy the popcorn you know like and jesus i gotta admit if you're a girl, Jesus is kind of hot. Right? Jesus has abs. Maybe you're thinking, you know, I'd fuck that hole in his side.

You know what I mean? Peg the hole in his side. Oh, no. You know, and it's clear from the crucifixion that Jesus is into some BDSM. Yeah, absolutely. He fucking loves it. He loves a good scourging. There's a good one here.

There's a good one here there's a good line here it says pornography is considered to be more addictive than crack cocaine because crack cocaine can be excreted from the body i know when i watch porn i excrete from the body i was gonna say so i don't know if it's the porn coming out but well the porn goes in and something comes out so clearly i'm excreting it so oh man yeah you know like the idea that like this is just one of those things for people to just like drive quickly to the theater to get upset about right absolutely yeah this is i saw a titty and it was i was super mad even though i was in an nc-17 movie yeah exactly like i saw a movie about sex and there was sex in it yeah like yeah the movie is about sex like if you don't want to see the movie about sex, you should totally not see the movie

about sex. I think I think they're mad that that godly women want to see it. And I think the reason why these godly women are excited about seeing is because they're probably sexually repressed. They're probably, you know, in some sort of way sexually repressed and they want to, you know, go out and experience this, this you know this thing that they might not be able to experience on their own maybe some of them like enjoy or think the idea of being tied up or blindfolded or slightly spanked or whatever goes on in this movie i saw the trailer by the

way and it looks so fucking terrible it seriously looks like the worst fucking movie that was ever created ever and it's got like the budget it's got what's the girl's name i can't think of her name she's got big eyes and she's from uh she's from the the movie with the devil wears prada movie and she's the girl in that movie i don't know that's the only movie i know she's in for sure she's also in the lame as a rob movie the girl with the big eyes and hathaway is the girl i'm thinking of this girl she This girl in this trailer looks like the budget Anne Hathaway. She's not the real Anne Hathaway. She's the budget Anne Hathaway.

And then they have this guy who looks a little studly or whatever. But the whole idea, and you get it from the whole trailer, right? I have no idea what Fifty Shades of Grey is about it except for I've seen a trailer. And the trailer is this dude is like ultra rich like this super rich dude his name is gray his last name's gray and he invites this girl into like interview him I guess for a for a paper she interviews him and then they start dating and then there's a point where he sort of introduces her to be like a little bit of sadomasochism sort of beating and she enjoys it I guess and he enjoys it and they just have a bunch of sex and she's like really sort of titillated by the fact that he's fucking got gobs

and gobs of money like i'm titillated i'm sure yeah and that's exactly i mean that was the movie in a nutshell and i have no idea how it ends i don't care i don't care about all those movies i know how i end they in the same way but it's just a question of where it ends and whether or not the person rubs it in no but you have uh you have uh i think a lot of people out there who see this uh this this film as a way to escape their own sexuality for a little while they got the way to go out and say you know know, maybe this isn't something that I do with my partner, but it is something I fantasize about. And I think there are plenty of things that people do fantasize about, but would never

do with their partner because it's just not a thing that they would do because now there's a, I think, I think. Now because there's another human involved. Yeah, right. Yeah. And the people are scared. Yeah. You know, their partner's not into it.

And the people in your fantasy are just cardboard cutouts. Right. Yeah. Right. They're a cutout. They're not a human being. So you could basically just fucking do whatever you want to your fantasies. Whereas there's another human being involved in just the very physics of it is difficult.

So you have a you have a I think I think that there is going to be this level of it but i think that um the reason why they're they're lashing out against this so much is because uh because i think that they they want to make sure that they recognize that that sex is still an inherent evil in the in the culture and i think that they want to make sure that they that all their followers realize that even though sex feels fun it's not good yeah well you know you said something that struck me as interesting you said that you know like these people who are criticizing this, they're upset that they're that these Christian women want to see the movie. And that strikes me that that they're not so upset that the movie is made. It's that I think that people get they get upset that they don't have the kind of control over people's sexuality that they want to have. That's true, yeah. They want to have – so in an ideal world, this movie would get released and none of the Christian women would go see this movie, right? Because they wouldn't even want to see it. Because they're godly women.

They would be like – they would not have a desire to see this movie. And I think that – My husband's cock is the only thing I want. I can't even – and I only want that to make babies. Yeah, and that's like once every nine months. Right, that's it. And then I'm going to 17 of them that's i'm duggering that thing right yeah so but it's the fact i think what really bugs them is that is that they don't have that control that people do want to be sexual that people do uh recognize that their

religious controls are at odds with their own sexual desires and feelings and that their sexuality won't be reined in by this nonsensical bullshit. And I think they look at that and they're like, well, why do you want to see this? It's you shouldn't want. But everybody, they still want to see it. They still want it because they recognize their sexuality. And that's why they rally against porn, too. They rally against it all the time. They say no porn, no porn.

You say, well, if you if you believed in God, why would you care if other people enjoy porn? The problem is also, I think that that they want to not only do they want to control their followers, but they want to control other people, too. They want to make sure that other people have no outlets as well. And their excuse, they'll tell you is like, well, it leads them into sin. It leads them into sin. Right. That's the excuse. Wakefield is not just any researcher.

His 1998 study on autism and childhood vaccines literally changed the way many parents think about vaccines. The study was based on just 12 children. That's right, 12 children. But many parents desperate for answers around the world embraced Wakefield's claim that he'd found a link between autism and the vaccine for measles, mumps, and rubella. So this story comes from the raw story. Minnesota anti-vaxxer. Yeah, measles kills, but you can't base your life on a few people, says someone who's not

one of those few people. No kidding. Right? Like, this is like, oh, hang on a minute. Let me call Privilege and see what they have to say about this. Brink, brink, brink. Yes. Hello.

Let me adjust my monocle made of diamonds before I answer this phone call. Yes, this is Brivlin speaking. I'm answering from my perfect, flawless body in my mansion made out of donuts. How may I help you? Am I speaking through my teeth? Hang on, hang on. My man's servant isn't holding the phone proper right that's exactly what i what i love is the idea that you're going to say something

like this and you're going to completely ignore how public health policy even works right you didn't even understand how this works whatever i read a story recently where they're talking about how they're going to remove the law that allows you to just for belief purposes not allow people to get fucking vex because currently if you want to if you want to avoid getting vaccines you can i know in our state and in other states and they're trying to outlaw it in california where you can just walk into the government office or even it's not even government office. It's you can walk into you can walk into like this. I think probably the school or other places where you can get a form that says, I believe in this weird shit.

And so I don't have to get my kid vaccinated. There's a philosophical objection and then there's a religious. Yeah. And so if you don't if you had either of those, you could just get your kid exempt from getting these these vaccines. Well, they wind up, you know, with your kid exempt from getting these vaccines. Well, they wind up with this huge case of measles that happens because people start not vaccinating their children in California. And so now they're thinking about striking the law down.

And I think that law is a bad law because it allows people to get around when they are completely capable of having these, this, you know, these, these vaccines given to their children, they get around it. And then they create these public health problems that are problems for people who can't get the vaccine.

It's not the, I don't care about the people who didn't vaccinate their kids. You know, those people fucking, they, they got to sleep in the fucking bed they made. You know what I mean? That's your fucking problem.

And your kid's problem. If he gets measles and dies and whatever, you fucking made that bed. You sleep in it now. I'm worried about the immune deficiency kid who can't get the fucking vaccine. I'm worried about your kid who's too goddamn young to get the vaccine. Right? Yeah.

Yeah. I, you know, and I'm, I'll tell you like, I'm worried about the kid who's got shitty parents and it's no fault of his or hers. Right. The fucking kids like I got shitty parents and then they're dead. his or hers right the fucking kids like i got shitty

parents and then they're dead like because they got you know the the people who pay the price are the people who aren't even making the goddamn decision the decision maker isn't the one paying the piper it's bullshit you know and and this person uh who's making this claim it says yes on occasion someone gets measles and dies but you can't base your life on a few people. Christine Abel of Vaccine Awareness recently told local news outlet Fox 9, unsurprisingly. And she says, you have to ask, what's wrong with them? Why do they die when most people don't die? And yes, OK, let's ask that question.

It's because maybe they're fucking immune deficient or they're infants or they're elderly. Are their lives less valuable? Well, no. What you have to do is when you have a child who has glasses you have to hit them in the head with a hammer until they die right because they're clearly lesser than all the other children and she says this weird thing like she says quote these vaccine presentable diseases for preventable diseases i'm sorry no she says presentable that's what it says here these vaccine that's not cats got to be a transcription error. These vaccine preventable diseases for most people are not a problem.

I disagree. Polio is a fucking problem. Right. Like, that's not a good thing. I also don't think any of those diseases are necessarily a good thing. Right. This is you get sick. You get well, just like labor.

You have pain. You get over it. What are we? Are we are we looking to go back to the fucking stone age are we looking to go back to a world where we're just like yeah well some people just get sick so why should we wash our hands you know like fucking some people just we just fucking let's just throw away all the medicine some people get sick you know yeah i will say like personally selfishly you know i've got cough variant asthma.

If I get a chest infection, like, you know, I fucking cough for six fucking months and it can get it can get more than annoying. It can get to the point where it's very difficult. It's debilitating. Yeah, it's very difficult for me to work and do stuff. So, like, I don't fucking need this shit in my life. Maybe that's why people should go around getting because it's not just it's not just immune deficient people. There's a whole bunch of reasons why diseases are bad for you. I saw this picture this week and it was a meme or somebody posted.

I think it was on Reddit. And the title was something like this is what life was like before vaccines. And it showed a picture of maybe 50 iron lungs in a room all filled with kids. Yeah, right. You know, is that the is that the fucking world you want to fucking go in your way back machine to this lady? You know, I mean, this is a lady who thinks that, you know, you got to whip a horse and it'll get stronger or something. I don't even know what kind of weird fucking Nietzsche like world she lives in. But it's it's really clearly, you know, she's this is exactly the privilege thing you're talking about

she clearly did not get sick or get that sick from these diseases and feels like oh who cares it's not that big a deal well it's not that big a deal to a lot of people but it is that big a deal to some people right and it's gonna you know it maybe it's not your kid but you know it's somebody's kid and if you don't have empathy for that you're a fucking awful human being yeah why would you why would you be like oh well you know we'll just give this kid like fucking mumps or rubella or pertussis like that's a terrible thing for somebody to have to go through and just because somebody walks out the other side of it doesn't mean that they didn't have to endure something awful that might have you know damaged their lungs or caused them to go blind.

Like, we only look at fatality, too. That's the other thing. It's like these conversations, they center exclusively around the issue of fatality, as if fatality tells the entire story of disease. Right. But fatality doesn't tell the entire story of disease. And to look at it in that way is to deny the whole scope of the disease and the effect that it has on people's lives how much time that you know those kids in the iron lungs

that you mentioned like well they survived so they wouldn't be marked in the tally but like their lives are irreparably changed and not for the better nobody's ever like my life's so much better now that i can't run and walk. Right. I can't do things. Yeah. So, but they're not fatalities, right? So we wouldn't chalk them up on that loss column. 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 Right Wing Watch. Pat Robertson opposes vaccination mandates. Questions water fluoridation. I like that he just throws that one in there. Sure, yeah, yeah.

You know, it's just like, while we're at it, what about the chemtrails? You know what? And you know, I also don't trust the Easter Bunny. He's got shifty eyes. And have we seen Obama's birth certificate? Right. It's just like, what are you talking about? Let's play this clip.

This is Pat Robertson from the 700 Club. You know, when I was a kid. 175 years ago. Back when I was a kid. Back when the war between the states was just heating up. Back when I was a kid and we would siege the castle next door. I was the first kid. My dad, Cain, and his brother, Abel.

We all got measles. We got mumps. Yeah, I did too. You got one. But they didn't vaccinate. We just got immune. You got sick. No, no.

No, they never got sick. They just got immune back then. Yeah, when I was a kid, we got the mumps. Some of us died from that, but I didn't. The thing is, like you said, we just got immune back then yeah yeah when i was a kid we just we got the mumps you know some of us died from that but i didn't how would you the thing is like he said we just got immune so they never got the disease they just got immune how would you even know you got immune but what you had to do stay in a dark room you couldn't read for you know a week or two and that was the thing i'm sure that there's some serious consequences to needles and perhaps vaccination is the answer to needles to beetles to the beetles hey we're the beetles isn't that

the monkeys could be i don't think any parents should be forced by the government to vaccinate uh there's so many different vaccinations and That's where we disagree, tiny beady eye fucking Pat. Because that's how public policy works. That's how public health policy works. If you don't fucking vaccinate everybody, then people wind up fucking slipping through the cracks and you get

hundreds and hundreds of people without fucking vaccinations that now suddenly spread that disease to other people. There was a vaccination against polio. And I know the mother of a friend was contracted polio because she took from the vaccine. So all vaccines are not benign. And since then, there's been no fucking polio.

You know, like I want to point that out. Like, yes, maybe on occasion people have contracted polio. And there's bad reactions to vaccines and they're not fucking completely blameless. It's not like a fucking panacea. There's problems. Right. But polio has been nearly eradicated

from the face of the planet at this point. So you cannot possibly say that from a policy perspective, and that's the way you got to look at these things, like from a public policy perspective, which was the right decision for government to make? Was it to just say like, oh, we got this vaccination. Maybe you should get it. I don't know.

I got no real opinion on it. Or was it to say, hey, we've got this vaccination. It's incredibly effective. And yes, there is a very, very, very small likelihood that somebody might get sick. But I'll tell you what, there was already a likelihood that people were going to get fucking polio. And that's the problem is and that polio was awful and debilitating and ruined your fucking life. And a lot of people got it all the fucking time. And so you suddenly take that out of the equation, you know, and you have a level of,

you know, protection from this from this disease. And it suddenly gets eradicated. Yeah. I mean, it's funny because it's what they're doing is they're erroneously comparing the world we live in post polio. Yeah. Right. That was given to us because of the polio vaccine.

And they're saying, well, I mean, the only way you get polio now is through the vaccine. Well, motherfucker, why do you think that's the case? Yeah. It's because we don't get it naturally because the vaccine wiped it out across the board. What would be the alternative solution? No vaccines. Vaccines for some people. I mean, it's like it's fucking, you know,

abortions for all American flags. Like, yeah, it's it's it's we're not even comparing the same shit anymore. But so far, this one about whooping cough and diphtheria and measles has been very effective. And I think it was a good thing to do and so why not? Why not? What are you even saying? He's all over the board. I know. He's like, some people are good. Some of these vaccines are okay.

Some of them suck. Some of them give you polio. Why not? Nobody even gets the polio vaccine anymore in America. But anyway, why not? We should get this. Moving on. Maybe I'll get it.

I don't know. I'm just a rambling old man who controls his thoughts as well as his bladder, which is to say, not at all. But the problem is natural immunity is a pretty good thing. And if you have some of these diseases when you're a kid, you have immunity the rest of your life. Well, those of us who travel a lot, too, I mean, you are wise to take vaccinations for various countries that you go to. But so are you saying that you think the bigger issue is that the government shouldn't be telling parents whether they have to or not? I just think that, you know, we've got to be careful that we fall for these nostrums. You know, you have to put fluoride in all the water, you know, because it'll cut down on cavities.

But what does fluoride do to people? We don't know some of the consequences. That's all I'm saying. We don't have all the knowledge we need. And we should be very careful to not to force people to do stuff that they urgently feel they shouldn't do. What does it do to people? It's an underwater't do. What does it do to people? It's in the water system, so what does it do to people? Well, they're all dead.

We're all dead. No, didn't you notice we've all died? We've all died from the water. We basically poisoned our water. I mean, you know that you can't, I mean Cecil, let's stop fucking around. You know that you can't drink water, right? Yeah. Because you'll just die. You'll just around. You know that you can't drink water, right? Yeah. Yeah. Because you'll just die.

You'll just die. Everybody knows that if you drink water, you'll die. I love the argument from this, though. And this happens with vaccines all the time, too. They're like, they'll say, oh, I can't get my kid vaccines because it'll hurt him or whatever. And then you look at the vast majority of people because, you know, when you're talking about California getting the people in California getting the measles, 100 people or so have been infected.

California is a huge fucking state. Sure. I mean, millions and millions and millions of people we're talking about here and they wind up with just 100 people. So clearly vaccinations are still happening. What's the argument when you look at all these people in the world and you see that everybody else is fucking normal? Everybody else is living a normal life. How do you look at that as a person and say, okay, I don't want to get vaccines because I think it's going to hurt me.

Yet everybody else, clearly the evidence in front of me is that everybody else already has these things and it's not hurt anybody. The same thing with the water. I don't want to, I don't want fluoride in the water. Okay. Well, a lot of people have fluoride in the water. Most of the people who drink, I think everybody in the United States who has municipal water has fluoride.

Okay. Well, what happened to them? Uh, nothing.ide. Okay. Well, what happened to them? Nothing. Right. Okay. Well, then what's your- We need bigger studies. What's your fucking evidence, man?

Right. And do you just fucking, do you say, well, I don't care. I just don't want it in there. Yeah. Well, that's the thing. It's like, what they don't want is the government to make any decisions ever about anything, period. Yeah. Fucking, it's, because the thing is, it's not about data sets.

This is not about the data. Because like you said, it's like, we've got 370 million data sets. It's almost like, well, until you get 371 million, I'm not really convinced. No one's doing that. Instead, it's just like what they're upset about is, you know, get off my fucking land.

You can't tell me what to do. I got rights. You can't tell me what to do i got i got rights you can't go around putting camicholes in my waters you know right right good god you fucking dumb ass hillbillies but obviously vaccination for measles they've got one it works and why not i remember when my son gordon my wife was having a baby. Our number, how many are we doing? How many kids? He doesn't know how many kids he has. This guy, he only has three. He only had to count to three to be right about his hand.

Call Sarah Palin, motherfucker. He's just sitting there so fucking out of dimension that he has no idea how many children he has. Oh, that's fucking brilliant. Oh, my God. People listen to this guy and get information from him. I need some advice. Just call the guy who doesn't know. There's not that many more events in your life that are a bigger deal.

Right. Yeah. Oh, my God. He was three, right? My number four was having the baby. And Danny was in charge while mother was having the baby. And he had measles. And it broke my heart he was so sick

eyes all messed up terrible fever i mean it was a mess and you say what can i do for this child get him a vaccine i don't know maybe we all decide collectively that everybody should not have to endure that i think that's good good, though, that even Pat Robertson is saying, no, it's a shitty, fucking awful, fucking terrible time. It's not a fun time for anybody involved. The kids, the parents, it sucks, it's awful, and something needs to be done about it. So I want to thank our newest patrons,

Matt G., Matt H, MInformed, Finn, Chris, Katie, Nathan, Sin, and Angus. Thank you all so much for donating. We appreciate everybody who's donated to the show and everybody who supports the show. We appreciate all the people who leave reviews on iTunes and Stitcher. If you want to leave a review on there, a nice review, a five-star review, you could maybe push down the negative reviews we recently got, so we'd appreciate that if you enjoy the show.

If you don't like the show, please stop listening and go listen to something you like and rate that something high. Yeah, I don't, you know, that's a real simple solution to a real simple problem. You know, I don't like this thing. Go get a different thing. It's a free thing. We want to thank everybody who supports the show. I mean, it don't like this thing. Go get a different thing. It's a free thing.

We want to thank everybody who supports the show. I mean, it's great that you do it. And this week, there's going to be a little piece of extra content specifically for patrons. We recorded a little tiny piece that we want to put on there. So about five minutes, I think, worth of stuff that we put on there for patrons only. So if you're a patron, go check it out, and we hope you enjoy it. So we want to throw a shout out to Alfredo. Alfredo had sent us a message and said, hey, I can help you guys with some web stuff.

And we've been trading emails back and forth, and we just wanted to thank Alfredo publicly to say thank you for going out of your way to helping us out with our website and talking to us about it and trying to make sure it looks better and it works better for people. So behind the scenes, Alfredo's working hard to make sure that happens. So we want to thank him. That's really awesome. What a kind thing to do. Thank you so much. I mean, and I sure wasn't going to do it. Nobody thought you were going to do it. So we want to mention we got a message from Cindy and Cindy says that the Free Thought Festival in Madison, Wisconsin is going to be happening in the

very near future, so if you're interested in going up to Madison, Wisconsin, the Free Thought Festival is going to be March 13th, 14th, and 15th. It should be a great time. I don't know that Tom and I are going to be able to make it up there this year, especially with ReasonCon right around the corner from that. It's going to be too hard to be like

one month somewhere, one month somewhere else, but we hope people have a really good time around the corner from that. It's going to be too hard to be like one month somewhere, one month somewhere else. But we hope people have a really good time at the Free Thought Festival. And you can find anything you want about that festival by going to freethoughtfestival.org. And also, Madison, Wisconsin is actually a really fun town. It's a beautiful city. It's a really cool city, man. It really is. I absolutely adore Madison.

I think it's wonderful. I think it's a great, really fun place to go. They have good food, good beer, really beautiful city, just a beautiful city to look at. So it's a cool place. If you haven't been up there ever, it's a really nice place to go. So why are we going to Hickory, North Carolina? We could get to Madison in an hour and 30 minutes. You could leave too early if you wanted.

Yeah, I know. I don't know. We make all the wrong decisions. We got a lot of feedback from a bunch of different people about the story I told about my father passing away last episode. A bunch of people said it really, you know, touched them.

A lot of things similar happened to them. We got a bunch of email about it. You know, we think that, you know, sometimes this show, most of the time it's dick jokes and dead kid jokes, and we recognize that. But then once in a while we hope we can do something or say something that is worthwhile for people, and this really resonated.

One thing I do want to say, go to Grief Beyond Belief if you're having issues and having problems. It's a great resource for our community. It is one of those things that our community puts out for people who are nonbelievers, and that can be a really tough time in your life. So if you are looking for some community that you can talk to about this sort of thing and you're still struggling with it, I know the people who sent us emails aren't, but I'm just saying the people that if you do are struggling with this, this is a good resource for you. So Grief Beyond Belief is a great place to go. Got a message from Kevin, and he sent us a bunch of Futurama soundbites. I don't know that I'm going to be able to use the third one, but the couple of good ones about science that I really liked. So I'm going to play a couple of them now. Hail science. I like that one. That's great. That doesn't sound very scientific.

Not to the layman, no. But that's how it works. Leave me alone. That's a really good one too. So thank you, Kevin,'s how it works. Leave me alone. That's a really good one, too. So thank you, Kevin, for sending them in. So nice of you to take the time to edit those out for us and find them and send them. Really great. We got a message from Matt. And Matt says, I wanted to express my enjoyment for your unapologetic continue use of the Chicagoland lexicon. I love this.

use of the Chicago land lexicon. I love this. And then he went through to list all the stuff that people from Chicago land would recognize and know and would utilize. And there's some really great ones in here. This list was so comprehensive and it just feels like home to read it. Yeah, it's awesome. It's great. Some of these are great.

Clearly, when you talk about football, you talk about the 85 Bears and you talk about the two big names, both three big names. Walter Payton is one big name, but he put on there the fridge and the fridge. Yeah, those are two great names. That's awesome. Yeah. Vienna Beef is another one. Yeah. You know, you know, what got me is the is the the top list, the commercials, because they're like they were like the jingles and like theans that defined my rabid TV-watching childhood. Yeah.

You know, like the Solosi and Edelson Chevrolet. And my wife actually met one of the Solosi or Edelsons. Oh, my gosh. And I won't mention which one. Wow. And said he was a total douchebag. And he was a huge dickhead. Like one of these super entitled holier-than-thou kind of walk-around, rich prick kind of guys.

But he was still super excited because he's like this weird local celebrity. I know. I know. Yeah, the golf mill Ford. Push it. Pull it. Throw it to golf mill Ford. I will throw in the one that he missed.

Golf mill Ford, thank you very much for your kind donation. You know which one that he missed is Victory Auto Records. They haven't changed that commercial in 30 years. Every time that guy pulls his door off, I think, haven't you learned yet? You open the door and the door falls off. You should learn from that. If you don't know what we're talking about, just YouTube. I'm sure you can YouTube Victory Auto Records and watch the commercial.

And the great thing is the watch that that guy's wearing in that commercial has come around full circle. It's back in style. It's back in style. It was a dinner plate, and now it's actually a watch. We got a message from James, and James says that he's talking about the Fort Collins thing again, but I think this one is the most relevant comment we've got on the Fort Collins Air Force Base. He says, furthermore, the Air Force has bases and the Army has forts. So why in the hell would the Air Force Academy be in a fort?

The most relevant comment we got. That was great. Very, very funny. Thank you very much. Before we close out the show, we want to thank Seth Andrews for coming on and just being a great guy. We had a great time talking to him. We are going to be on his show in March. We're still trying to figure out the dates.

When the dates come up, we'll let you know. But we're going to be on his show in the future, and we'll let you know when that comes out. If you are interested in checking him out in Australia, go to unholytrinitydownunder.com. There will be a link for this on this episode's show notes, episode 206. I'll also put a video. There's a short trailer that he put together for the unholytrinitydownunder.com. You can check out that trailer as well on the show notes. Check out his podcast, The Thinking Atheist.

The guy is a total professional i mean there are people that that a lot of people talk about in our in our group of atheist podcasts there's people who they point out to as this is an amazing show and they do a lot of you know whatever this is the i think one of the only professional people we have yeah you know there are people who want to play professional. This guy is professional. And his show is perfectly produced every time. He's a wonderful host. And he's a very, very understanding person and has a very unique worldview that I think a lot of people could benefit from.

So check his show out. So that's going to wrap it up for this episode. We're going to be back with two episodes next week, and we going to leave you as we always do with the skeptics creed. Credulity is not a virtue. It's fortune cookie cutter mommy issue hypno Babylon bullshit couched in scientician double bubble toil and trouble pseudoative, acupunctuating, pressurized, stereogram, pyramidal, free energy, healing, water, downward spiral, brain dead, pan, sales pitch, late night info-docutainment, Leo Pisces, cancer cures, detox, reflex, foot massage, death and towers, tarot cards, psychic healing, crystal balls, Bigfoot, Yeti, aliens, churches, mosques and synagogues, temples, 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. Expose your sides. Thrust your hands. Bloody. Evidential. Conclusive. Doubt even this. Poorly formed and expressed notions do not represent those of our wives, employers, friends, families, or of the local dairy council. Outro Music