Cognitive Dissonance - Episode 583: American Atheists: Fulton v. City of Philadelphia

Episode Date: June 28, 2021

Thank you to Geoffrey Blackwell from American Atheists for joining us!   Show Notes  

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All you have to do is enter the code word GLORY, G-L-O-R-Y, at checkout. 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 live from glory hole studios in chicago this is cognitive dissonance every episode we blast anyone who gets in our way we bring critical thinkingicism, 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. This is episode number 583.

And Cecil. Yeah. We got a guest in the glory hole, man. Me too. I feel like it's been a long time since we've had anyone. It's been a while. You know what, Cecil? What does just me you with the glory hole? It takes the whole element of surprise out of the game. I don't want to say there's no magic. No, I wasn't going to say

that either. I wasn't going to say that either. All right. Good. All right. But we are joined by Jeff Blackwell, Esquire. You guys could just, you may just know him as Esquire. I certainly do from American Atheist. Jeff, thank you so much for being on the show today. You're welcome, guys. I do have to say, I've been listening to the show since, gosh, 2013. Oh, my God. And it has never made it big. I just want to point that out.

And I wanted to lodge a complaint. Because I am owed. Sorry. I've always wanted to say that. Last time I was on, I neglected to, so I had to get that in. Brutal. Brutal. All right.

Well, that was Jeff Blackwell. Thank you. Jeff, we talked last week via chat, Jeff, we talked last week via chat, and we were excited to learn that there was a new lawsuit that was put in place in one of those... It is in Mississippi. Southern states, I think Mississippi. They're all the same. Well, they should just be called... Yeah. a lawsuit that you that american atheists is placed because they have some weird logo or

something that you have to have on your car some sort of weird thing mississippi requires uh that if you own a car uh you have to generally either display the standard license plate which bears the state seal and has bared the state seal since January 1st of 2019, or has borne, not bared, that's not a word. It is now, John. Has borne the state seal. That's right, I coined it. We just made it.

There you go. Since 2019. And starting in 2014, the state added in God We Trust to the state seal. So, all of the standard license plates in mississippi have in god we trust on them you can avoid displaying the in god we trust message on your vehicle if you pay an extra fee for a specialty plate it's usually like 30 to 33 some go as high as $55 in extra costs. Though at the same time, if you are the owner of an RV, a motorcycle, a trailer, or if you need handicap plates, you don't have the option to get a specialty plate.

You have to display In God We Trust on your vehicle. As well as if you have vanity plates. If you pick your own letters for your license plate, you have to use the In God We Trust on your vehicle, as well as if you have vanity plates, you know, if you pick your own letters for your license plate, you have to use the In God We Trust plate. Is there any way, what can we think of right now that you could put on your plate to be like, nah, I'm good or something? What could you put on there that would be able to call on you? Another option, of course, and we don't want to neglect this. So another option of course and we don't want to neglect this so another option one of the most sensible would be to leave mississippi right so that would be like you just not because if you

have a car i'm trying to understand why you don't use it to leave mississippi there that's difficult for me i guess maybe if it's not running that would be make sense. For some, that is an option, but not for everybody. It takes a lot to uproot a family or to uproot yourself from where all your family and friends are. Even to look for jobs out of state can be time-consuming. And I'm treating this like it was a serious suggestion when it wasn't. was a serious suggestion, but it wasn't. Well, I like that you're treating it like a serious, because what that necessarily implies is, yes, that is a sensible solution, Tom. And we understand that that's inherently attractive, but it's also just logistically and financially challenging. Yeah. You know, there have been, of course, countless lawsuits over In God We Trust over the decades, and none of them have really been successful, all for various reasons.

The two biggest reasons being that the motto, the national motto in and of itself, doesn't require anyone to do anything. no one is required to do anything simply by the fact that the motto says what it says, no one has standing to challenge it on its face in court, because you have to show that you specifically have been harmed in some way. There are cases where the courts tangentially mention the motto as being permissible ceremonial deism. However, that's in the context of it being just the motto and no one's required to do anything. Mississippi has taken it that next step further and required people to display it on their personal property. That is black letter law, well-settled, compelled speech prohibited by the First Amendment. The Supreme Court said as much in a case from 1977 called Bolivia Maynard,

First Amendment. The Supreme Court said as much in a case from 1977 called Bolivia Maynard, which in itself is an interesting case. New Hampshire at that time and still does have live free or die on its license plates. And a Jehovah's Witness in New Hampshire objected to the or die part of the state motto. And he started by placing tape over the or die part of the state motto and he started by placing tape over the or die part and he was cited for defacing his license plate and fine $25 so woolly didn't want to be told what to do with his license plate so this is a woolly bully case when he said woolly. Maynard, I was like, that's a Muppet.

That's a Muppet, man. Wooly V. Maynard is 100% an elephant Muppet on the stress industry. 100%. We just wanted to interject a little.

You do know what show you're on. I just want you to know. But this is the value that you bring, Tom. Your brain works in a way different

from anyone else I've ever met. Note, listeners, he didn't say better he didn't say better he didn't say faster no no no no no just different different it's different tom right difference okay mississippi's different okay so the woolly bully case so so he put something on there and he was and he was and he was being cited then what happened um so he was cited for 25 dollars um and i believe he paid that fine he then took shears to his license plate and cut the or die awesome out of his plate the thing is that like for somebody who doesn't want to live free or die, he kind of does. Yeah.

So he was cited again. That went all the way up to the Supreme Court. And the Supreme Court said, no, you cannot force somebody to display the state's preferred message and make them be essentially a mobile billboard for the state's message and use the state's coercive power to do that. And that's exactly what's happening in Mississippi. Either you display the state's standard license plate or you pay more money for the privilege of not being forced to send the state's preferred message. It's exactly on point, which is why we think this is a cut and dried case.

And by the way, in Mississippi, as it was in New Hampshire, you can be cited for defacing your license plate for obstructing any character. The statute says character and doesn't really go into detail of what that means. Any character on your license plate, you can be cited for defacing it. So wait a minute.

What about like, so like if I have like a North Carolinian license plate, it says like first in flight, you know, like, can I just say, fuck that? I don't want one that says first in flight. I don't give a shit about those Wright brothers and get a new license plate. I mean, I know why you're going after this one, but so many states have like their motto as like just standard practice. And it seems like the content or the thrust of your argument is, hey, you can't make me put anything on my plate,

regardless of the religiosity element. It's a question of whether it's sending a substantive message. Okay. I'm not aware of any challenges to the first in flight thing. I was just... My Uber driver today had a North Carolinian license plate, so it was just in my head. Okay, but so it has to be a substantive challenge. It can't just be, I can put like,

Illinois, the prairie state, and I probably can't bitch about that. But you can bitch about, was it Land O'Lincoln? I live here. You'd think I'd know it was on my fucking license plate. Thanks, I'm embarrassed. I mean, you would have to make the case

that it is a substantive message, and perhaps you could. I'll give you would have to make the case that it is a substantive message, and perhaps you could. I'll give you an example of one that has not carried water, held water, whatever. There was a license plate challenge involving a plate that had an image of a Native American pulling back a bow and just sort of preparing to fire it into the air and um someone objected to this for whatever reason and the courts looked at it and said look this doesn't send any substantive message it's just a picture that indicates what like you know the history of that state is i, you could argue it's a thousand words at least though. Yes.

It is silly to suggest that images are not communicative though. Like that's like, really? You're right. And you, I am sure that someone could make compelling arguments that certain images would be compelled speech. If let's say, Mississippi wanted to throw Donald Trump's face on their license plate, I could see people objecting to sending the message that they'd support President Trump. Or if it was the other

way around and Mississippi decided they wanted to throw Barack Obama's image on the plate, there might be people, or Joe Biden, there might be people who or joe biden um there might be people who would um object to sending the message that they support joe biden you're saying that the people there uh they have to pay a fee it sounds like this is sort of a cut and dry case why is it just because they control the republicans control everything and the christian right controls everything and they can basically do whatever they want until they get told what that they can't do it. Is that basically what you, is that basically what you do? You just go around telling them not to, because no one else would. Um, that is a fair amount of my job. Yes. Um, is telling people

who think they can get away with violating the constitution that no, in fact you can't. And there are people in your community who have different views than you who are atheists or non-religious or just members of minority religions. And in fact, they do have rights, even if you don't seem to care about them. And yeah, that's a fair amount of my job. So where will this be adjudicated? Will this be handled federally or in the state courts? Sure. We filed this in the federal court, the Southern District of Mississippi, Northern Division in Jackson, Mississippi. And we actually bring two claims.

The first is that compelled speech claim that the state cannot force you through coercive measures to send its preferred message. The second is a free exercise claim. And this is what relates to the other thing I'm here to discuss with you, and that's Fulton v. City of Philadelphia. But let me give you a little background first. In addition to Mississippi requiring either you display the standard tag or you pay extra, They do have a small subset of exceptions. If you are a veteran or a veteran surviving spouse, if you've received a Purple Heart, a Medal of Honor, if you are deaf, if you are an employee of the sheriff's office in your county, if you are a member of elected government, then you can get at no extra cost a different plate that indicates that status. It could be that you're part of hearing or that you've received a purple heart, what have you. When the Supreme Court announced its decision in Fulton on Thursday,

decision in Fulton on Thursday, we found that it held open a door that had been opening over the last year or so. And what the court said, and we'll get into more detail here in a bit, I'm sure, but what the court said in Fulton that helps us is that when the government has what would otherwise be a generally applicable law, and they have a system of individualized exceptions, they cannot refuse to give a like exception to people who have religious justifications for seeking an exception. people who have religious justifications for seeking an exception. Mississippi has a system of exceptions to its requirement that you display the standard license plate or pay more money. Atheists have a, atheists and, you know, atheistic Buddhists, others, members of minority religions who aren't Christian, because let's be clear, and God we trust is an explicitly Christian motto. It has been since 1861. If you have a religious objection to displaying in God we trust on your car,

because the state has provided this system of exemptions for others, they are essentially going to be required to provide an exception for those who object to displaying God we trust for religious reasons. So that's a great segue to talk a little bit about Fulton. Now, I read upwards of two entire New York Times articles about it. Wow. I know. I know. Well done. Well, I read two articles and listened to a daily on it. Oh. I'm just saying like. Oh, all right. A little flex

there, Cecil. I'm just saying I'm ready to take the bar. A little flex. All right. And so, you know, I was just going to go ahead for our listeners and break this case down. But then we thought, oh, let's get an attorney on them. So that was Cecil. So I just want to be clear. I thought from my reading of two NYT articles that I would be fully equipped to break this down. My understanding of this case, though, is that it is such a narrow decision that it actually upset several of the conservative judges. Two of the judges wrote a whole thing about it.

One guy wrote a 77-page majority. Was it Alito and Gorsuch were both like, I'm pissed this wasn't a bigger decision. Why can't we make this a theocracy? And I think they were upset because it didn't establish, as a case, it didn't work

to establish the sort of precedent that they were hoping to get a case that would establish. We could kill gay people on site or whatever they want. But Jeff, if you could open up for our listeners kind of what that case,

what it was about, what it sought to decide and where the justices landed on that, that would be a great starting point, I think. Or,

I mean, I could, I could do it from memory from a couple of NYT articles. I probably would do a good job, but I'll let you,

because you're the guest. Like, it's like a love thing. A push-pull. I mean, quite frankly, the fact that you've read a couple of news articles about it makes you better informed about this decision than probably 90% of the country, 95% of the country, maybe. America. So don't sell yourself short, Tom. I'll provide a little background.

The city of Philadelphia contracts out to various private entities a lot of services, and among those is the placement of children with foster families and the certification of families as acceptable foster families. acceptable foster families. The city also includes in its contracts requirements that, you know, you can't discriminate along a number of different lines. And starting a few years ago, they began explicitly including gender orientation or sexual orientation. Gender was already in there there but sexual orientation in that list and the city was contacted by a reporter to ask who wanted to ask about the fact that catholic social services was turning away or had a policy that they would turn away lgbtq couples the city looked into this uh they asked Catholic Social Services, is this the case?

They also heard that there was one other agency that was engaging in this practice. That other agency agreed to start providing services and certifying same-sex couples. But Catholic Social Services refused. There were a lot of back and forth conversations between Catholic Social Services leadership and the Commissioner of Human Services for the city, Commissioner Figueroa, to try and come to an agreement. Commissioner Figueroa was trying to work with them to, she made several pleas with them, a couple along the lines of, you know, the Pope has indicated that Catholic doctrine on this has changed. This isn't 100 years ago. Can we come to some sort of agreement here based on the way the Vatican is framing

things now? Catholic Social Services has not budged. They ended up filing a suit to get a court to direct that the city must renew its contract with Catholic Social Services and argued that the city's refusal was based in a hostility toward Catholic Social Services for their religious beliefs, that essentially the decision was not religiously neutral because it was targeted at them. Now, I'll note that Commissioner Figueroa is Catholic, the mayor of Philadelphia is Catholic, and not that the religion of the person making the decision really matters, but it is a fact that provides a little bit of context here. But also that Philadelphia, throughout all of this, continued to contract with Catholic Social Services, CSS, for a bunch of other services related to foster care to the tune of, if I remember right, $17 and a little bit million dollars a year.

But for this one contract, they said they wouldn't renew it because of catholic social services saying they were going to discriminate they file suit it works its way up to the supreme court the uh and i'll mention along the way american atheists and a number of other organizations filed amicus briefs in support of the city can you tell me just for the listeners not for me i totally know what an amicus brief is. But what is an American brief? What's an amicus brief? Sure. Well, I mean, we just can't even agree on how to pronounce it.

It could be amicus brief or amicus brief. Oh, that's probably why I didn't recognize it. I was thinking the amicus brief. I always mispronounce brief. I pronounce it brief. They're so short, I never bother to read them they're just yeah you say you say amicus i say amicus let's call the whole thing off um so an amicus brief very briefly is when someone or an entity that is not a party to the case, writes a brief to a court to enlighten the court as to an issue

related to the case they're considering, but that isn't really addressing the specific merits of that particular case, because that's the job of the people who are involved in the actual litigation. They're going to brief that. The whole point of an amicus is to raise issues that the parties themselves may not be in a position or have an opportunity to raise. For instance, in our brief, we raised

the issue that if these rather innocuous statements by government officials that Catholic social services were pointing to as animus were found by the court to be animus, what they would essentially be doing is creating a judge-made blasphemy law that applies only to government officials. Government officials would essentially be discouraged from speaking on topics relating to religion unless what they were saying was just fawning praise for the religious position because commissioner figueroa was not being hostile she was trying to talk to catholic services catholic social services within the framework of their belief system um you know and the shared frame of reference that they have she was trying to speak their language to them

and that is not evidence of hostility in any way, shape, or form. Atheists should be so lucky as to encounter government officials willing to speak their language. Clearly, that Figueroa cared more about the children than Catholic social services did. Right. willing to let a child not go into a home because you don't you think that that uh that they're some archaic bullshit of a perfectly qualified family then you don't actually care about those those children as much as you care about your own weird fucking 2 000 year old book yeah you would think actually that would be a compelling reason to say like, we don't want to work with you because you don't have children's best interests at heart. Right. Yeah. Like this has nothing to do with parents' rights. Like if you just say, let's take parents out of this and keep and focus on what we should be doing, which is

providing services for the vulnerable, which is kids. It's not about giving a parent a child. It's about finding a home for a vulnerable part of our population. Right, yeah. So like if you focus on it that way, that seems like fucking self-evident. Not to two Supreme Court judges. Not to all Supreme Court judges. Yeah, right.

Yeah. I just wanted to interject that because it's one of those things that like I realize that a lot of this is very technical, but the ethics behind it are pretty fucking appalling. And they're very straightforward. I mean, they're really straightforward and they're pretty fucking appalling.

And you're exactly right. When it comes to placing children in foster care, the primary concern has to be whatever is in the best interest of the child. That is what should be the primary concern. The fear with this case that a lot of us had and still have is that essentially Catholic Social Services would be allowed to overlay its own religious interests above what is in the best interest of the children. Because if you're just looking at what's in the best interests of the children, it is to certify as many families as possible that are qualified to serve as foster parents.

And Catholic social services were turning people away. Now- This is just like self-evidently evil. And that means that the children that would, that are, that are within, you know, Catholic social services list of children to be assigned, have a, have a limited number of necessarily have a more limited number of

families. I know the courts were not like deciding this on these merits, but like just, just knowing a few basic facts about like, you know, every day that kids, kids do not do well in foster, like in state care, right? So the sooner you get them out of state care and into loving, supportive family structures, the better their results are as human beings. Every day you delay that is an injustice to those kids.

So even if they said like, well, we're going to get them a new home, but it's going to take us an extra six months. That's six months of a young person's developing life. Like six months to me at 43, 43 is the same as 44, but 10 isn't the same as 11. No, no.

And it matters differently when you're younger. So like delays should have significantly more importance. If somebody said, Tom, you got to wait a year to get this important thing. I'd be like, I got fucking, every day is the same. I live in fucking the Truman show. What do I care? But when you're like, there's a huge difference between a fifth grader and a sixth grader. Absolutely. Yeah. No, I just can't help but see this religious moral institution as inherently evil if they do this. If they do. I just can't see it any other way. Yeah.

I mean, from my perspective, it is challenging to see it any other way. Their interest does not seem to be with the children. Right. Not in any evidence based sense they may you know their theology may say one thing but i don't care so what the supreme court then did is uh kick down the road the can that the uh religious right was hoping that they would open in as much as the Supreme Court did not blanket allow religious entities to overlay their own interests over children in foster care. Or do away with Employment Division v. Smith, an opinion that Justice Scalia wrote back in 1990 or 91, wrote back in 1990 or 91, in which he laid down the current framework for free exercise law, which is that if there is a state law policy act that is generally applicable and neutral toward religion, then the fact that it happens to incidentally impact someone's exercise of

their religious beliefs is not a constitutional violation. You know, that Scalia decision, there were two justices that were, they felt that was wrongly decided. Two conservative justices said that was a wrongly decided decision by Scalia, from what I read. They were upset because they felt like- One of them couldn't have been Amy Coney Barrett, though, right? I don't remember who they were. It couldn't have been amy coney barrett though right i don't remember who they could have been there's no way she's like she's like she's like her fucking apprentice right she's like like he was his second lord and she is the apprentice like she is now when he died she actually had to take his head off or whatever like yeah she had to kill him she had to throw him down a shaft i don't remember who the who the two were but i i know that they said that they

the article i read and i can't remember it off the top of my head, but they were incensed. They thought the Scalia decision was wrongly decided and that they wanted an opportunity to overturn it. I think it was Alito and Gorsuch were the two that were the real dissent. So Alito, Thomas, and Gorsuch wrote a concurring opinion. Barrett and Kavanaugh also wrote a concurring,

or Barrett wrote a concurring opinion barrett and kavanaugh also wrote a concur or barrett wrote a concurring opinion that kavanaugh joined um alito thomas alito wrote an opinion that thomas and gorsuch joined i see um gorsuch wrote in a concurring opinion that alito and thomas joined it was all sorts of fun let's agree let's all agree in different documents about how we agree but we're mad anyway because we couldn't agree in different, more stringent, angry ways. You can't hunt gay people for sport. What the fuck? Ridiculous, stupid country. Why did they decide the case so narrowly? So they decided the case a little bit on a technicality, citing the exceptions issue that you discussed earlier. Why do you think they didn't pursue the larger issue to set a new precedent and overturn the

Scalia decision? I hesitate to speculate as to the intentions of individual justices, because it's very hard to tell. Opinions are very often written in such a way as to gain as many votes as possible. And there's some indication that here, you know, Roberts were an opinion that the remaining liberals in the court could, you know, grit their teeth and sign on to and cobble together a majority. Whether that is actually what happened, I don't know. There are theories that Alito's 77-page opinion was going to be the majority opinion until Roberts pulled some strategic moves. But who knows? Really, only the justices and their clerks could answer that question. But nevertheless,

what the majority of the court, what the whole court ended up saying is that in this particular case, the city of Philadelphia has to renew and begin contracting again with Catholic Social Services. And they did that on the basis of the fact that the contract with the city of Philadelphia had this provision in it that said that the commissioner of human services, Commissioner Figueroa, had sole discretion to waive the non-discrimination requirement. And because she had that discretion, it was not something, a governmental act that is generally applicable. And therefore, because it was not generally applicable,

it doesn't fall within the rubric that Smith says is fine. If it's generally applicable. Yeah, I got that. And it's religiously neutral. I understand that you know, Tom, I'm just trying to inform your listeners. Hey, I don't know if you know this, Jeff, but Tom read two whole articles. I read two. He did. I imagine there were two.

And I should not, I should not, and do not in any way disparage that. I wish people, I wish everybody read two articles on every Supreme Court decision that came out. I think we'd be in a better place, particularly if they were New York Times articles and not, I don't know, Daily Caller or something. Now, the Epoch Times had a lot of different things. I have no doubt they did. I have no doubt they did I was joking the other day

that I have been cited by name in stories in Breitbart, Fox News and The Blaze Glenn Beck's website and that if I get quoted by name in the Daily Caller I will have achieved the secular

litigators equivalent of the EGOT oh that's amazing so the court the daily caller, I will have achieved the secular litigators equivalent of the EGOT. Oh, that's amazing. So, the court decided that because it had this little carve-out that allowed Commissioner Figueroa's sole discretion to waive the non-discrimination requirements, something she never, in fact, exercised, that it was not generally applicable and therefore it had to be subjected to strict scrutiny, which like I said is when a law is narrowly tailored to achieve a compelling government interest. Now, the way that you normally determine that is you look at whatever interest the government is trying to serve with its policy here place children in homes that are

you know qualified to take them in and determine whether or not the policy is narrowly tailored to achieve that goal and i would argue that preventing certification agencies from discriminating on you know these sort of immutable characteristics that have nothing to do with how qualified you are to raise a child is a narrowly tailored way to achieve that government interest. And that's how strict scrutiny is generally applied. What the court did here, and part of what makes this not narrow, or as narrow as some would say, is that they didn't look at, okay, what is the government's interest in applying this policy? They looked at what is the government's interest and how compelling is that interest in applying this policy specifically to Catholic social services? to Catholic Social Services. And they said, well, since there are, you know, something like 35 other agencies in the city that perform the same task in certifying parents, then the government's

interest in enforcing it against CSS is limited. Now, this raises a bunch of troubling questions. is limited. Now, this raises a bunch of troubling questions. What is the government's interest in applying virtually any law to any one particular person? Generally, the interest is in applying these laws very broadly. Can I ask, isn't that specifically true at the Supreme Court level? I mean, the Supreme Court doesn't typically take on, am I mistaken about that? I mean, the Supreme Court doesn't typically take on... Am I mistaken about that? I mean, the Supreme Court typically would choose not to take on cases that don't have some broader context, or am I mistaken? I mean, that is true. The Supreme Court picks and chooses which cases it will hear and tends to take the ones of more significant import. But the same strict scrutiny analysis always applies. Jeff, can I ask you a Supreme Court question in general real quick?

I don't mean to... Does every decision by the Supreme Court establish precedent? The vast majority of Supreme Court cases and decisions that the Supreme Court issues are precedential. They do set precedent. Now, plenty of those cases are simply restating and clarifying what the existing precedent already was. But the Supreme Court does at times issue what are called per curiam opinions that are generally not precedential, and you don't know the name of the justice who necessarily drafted it.

And so, those do happen. It's part of what is called the shadow docket that has become more and more of a factor in Supreme Court jurisprudence lately. Interestingly, and this is why that's actually a very topical question, and thank you for asking it. I wasn't expecting you to. Genuinely. Listeners, this was not planned. It's those two articles I read. It is.

It's those two articles. It is. Man, I'm good. You're really great. You learned a lot. They were long articles. They were. this year that was on the Supreme Court's shadow docket was a decision called Tandon v. Newsom involving a church in California that wanted exemptions from California's COVID gathering

restrictions. And the court in that, in that per curiam opinion, said that because some non-religious, secular—this is part of the problem of talking about these subjects—by non-religious and secular, in this context, I don't mean atheist. I mean things having nothing to do with religion in any way, shape, or form. Because, say, a bar or a grocery store, not a bar, a liquor store or a grocery store or a laundromat was exempt from the gathering policy so that those places could stay open and serve customers, the state could not treat religion differently than those businesses. Even though the practicalities of operating and visiting a grocery store or a liquor store are vastly different than the practicalities of operating and visiting a favored nation theory, that you have to treat religion as favorable as the thing having nothing to do with religion that is given the most leeway. That's a very roundabout way of putting it. Well, that makes – I will say, say, I have absolutely been to liquor stores and sung praise songs.

So I may be the exception, but I've definitely, definitely burst out in some praise. I mean, you see Blanton's on the shelf for a regular, not marked up price, and Jesus Christ, hallelujah. Right, and you might commiserate about it there in the aisle for an hour or more with dozens of people right yeah it's definitely exactly the same thing to buy it you have to tithe for sure because it's expensive and then we all we all get together and share food in a weird ritualistic way at the front of the counter. And then you have to pass that around

with the paper bag outside. And you pass around the cash register. Right, right, right. Yeah. Essentially exactly the same thing. It's pretty much the same. I love the idea that religion gets a sort of a pride of place even if it is in no way analogous.

Like even if you cannot even remotely reasonably draw any kind of a straight line from one thing to the other, it's like, oh, you like this other thing. It's functionally different in every meaningful way, but you like it. And so you have to like religion the same amount most much. And that is the second thing that makes this decision more broad than a lot of people are saying. First is that they changed how strict scrutiny is applied. So, strict scrutiny is going to look at these decisions and say, well, you don't have to give religion the same exemption. And this is what we're relying on

in one count of our Mississippi complaint. Because if the government is going to provide these exempt plates to veterans or people who are deaf, that kind of thing, then they have to treat people with religious exemptions as well as they treat those people that are already exempted. And if the court's going to go that direction, then the atheist community has to be proactive about taking advantage of it where appropriate. We shouldn't be assholes, but where it makes sense, like in this instance, we shouldn't be afraid of raising free exercise arguments and saying, hey, under this law, we're entitled to exactly the same treatment. So, Jeff, does this Fulton decision, does it worry you? does this Fulton decision, does it worry you? I mean, outside the scope of its own horrifying ramifications in Philadelphia, is this a decision that gives you pause or gives you cause for concern? Yes. It was not the nightmare outcome that many on the Christian right wanted and we were most concerned about. And in particular, they thankfully shied away from saying that, you know, talking about something touching on religion in any critical way is grounds to invalidate whatever

policies you're trying to put forward. They did not take that step. That's good. But what they have done is make it far more difficult for governments to be able to apply their laws in rational ways and also made it much more difficult for frontline government employees, you know, the bureaucracy that makes the government function. It really makes it difficult for them to know what i shouldn't even say it makes it difficult for them to know they will be actively inclined to give exemptions to anyone who raises a religious justification for seeking an exemption whether it's justified or not and that's very problematic so jeff you work for american athe. Why don't you tell our audience if they want to learn more about them,

where they can look? Sure. Yeah, I'm litigation counsel for American Atheists and if you want to help my efforts, for instance, in Mississippi or any of our efforts to support the atheist community in this country, you can visit atheists.org, A-T-H-E-I-S-T-S dot O-R-G.

And think about throwing us a few bucks, become a member. Maybe down the road, you could be, you know, you could help us bring a lawsuit to challenge something that's going wrong in your neck of the woods. Or come visit us at our conventions. Cause the next one is actually going to be in person again. Wow. Nice Atlanta. Oh, wow.

When is it going to be an, is it going to be an Easter again? Easter weekend. Okay. All right. We'll definitely have you on again before then to talk about it, Jeff. Thank you so much for your work and,

and for making sure that atheists have a voice out there in the legal world. And thanks for your work at American Atheist. We appreciate it. And we hope to talk to you soon. You're welcome, guys. Thanks for having me on. This is always a blast. Hey, everyone. Ian here. As you can tell by the sound of my incredibly sexy voice, I've just been to adamandeve.com and used code GLORY. I may not have mentioned this in previous ads, but when you go to adamandeve.com and use code GLORY, you get 50% off almost any one item and 10 free gifts.

That's a gift for you, a gift for them, and a gift you'll both enjoy. Plus, six free spicy movies all with free shipping and the special bonus of becoming incredibly sexy. I used code glory and now I sound like this and I look like this. I know that's hard to see because this is a podcast, but believe you me, it looks good. It looks damn good. Good? Oh, no, it's wearing off.

I have to go back to AdamandEve.com and use code glory. I'm bringing sexy back. Yeah. She must be dreaming about texas outlaws look out sandy i'm dirty damn i'm gonna catch you and throw you and dale at taxpayers expense sister comes from the new york times 153 texas hospital workers are fired or resign over mandatory vaccine policy um this this was interesting this happened uh just outside of houston and i thought when i first read this i thought like i i mean it's houston the fucking place stinks anyway what's the difference 153 people people fired or resigned because they wouldn't take the vaccine.

What's interesting though, Cecil, is if you work at a hospital, you typically have to get vaccinated for lots of other shit. Lots of stuff, right? Yeah. So like vaccines are required, right? In order for you to do your job. Because you deal with people who are immune compromised. Think about why you go to the hospital.

You go to the hospital because you're having a great day. You go to the hospital because you're having a great day. You go to the hospital because you're in some situation which requires significant medical attention. If you're a fucking healthcare worker and you're like, yeah, fuck you. That's how I feel about it.

Here's how I feel about it. Fuck you. 153 people, I think, represents about a third of their staff. It's a huge number. It's a lot of people. It would be crushing to try to run a business and lose a third of your staff. It's a huge number. It's a lot of people. It would be crushing to try to run a business

and lose a third of your staff. Yeah. I don't even know how you would function. Yeah. We lost 20 some percent of our staff at the beginning of the pandemic, Mike. And it was crushingly difficult. I can't imagine what a third is.

A third? What's crazy to me is like, just like you said, it's a safety issue. So it being a safety issue, you would never expect that from any other industry where they blatantly fail on a safety issue, especially for their customers, right? To safeguard other people.

To safeguard their customers. I mean, genuinely it's for their customers. You know, the other thing too is that, you know, there's all kinds of different required equipment that you need for all kinds of different jobs. Like if you're going to be a welder, you got to have one of those masks that you can't see out of unless you weld. Right. Right. I have one of those. Have you ever used one of those by the way? Yeah. Yeah. Man, I used one once. My buddy Jacob showed me how to weld one day. Yeah. And like,

I go to put that thing down and the world just goes black. Yeah. It goes black. And then you have to like, you have to like, I think you have to like start it and then do a thing. Yeah, you have to start the welder before you can see what you're welding. Yeah. That's a trust in my own proprioception. I don't have.

It really is. I'm like 100% sure I'm going to weld my hand to something. Like I just live on this piece of metal now. Yeah, no, it's fine. I didn't need that whole arm anyway. Right. Yeah.

And most welders, isn't that electricity? Yeah, it's like this crazy, like, electric arc welding shit. Fuck that forever. Yeah, you fucking die while you're doing it. No, thanks. Pass. Hard pass. Nope.

But yeah, there's all kinds of safety equipment you need. You need a hard hat to be on certain places. You need to pass certain tests in order to drive a truck or drive a forklift or, you know, there's all these requirements for work. Right. This is just one of those things. It's like you got into this job, right?

It's not like you get into a truck one day as a truck driver and you say, well, I don't want to take any of these tests. Well, then you can't be a truck driver. Go do something else. Nobody has any fucking sympathy for you. The moment you say that,

we shouldn't be thinking about these people at all, except for the fact that they, they fuck this area medically because they're going to have a real hard time getting medical care because all these people are gone from the hospital. But genuinely, we shouldn't care at all

that these people lost their jobs. It should not, because you were in the wrong profession to begin with. You didn't want to play by the rules. Also, like if anything, I was thinking about this. It should not, because you were in the wrong profession to begin with. You didn't want to play by the rules. Also, like if anything, I was thinking about this, it should give our educational system for these medical professionals a bit of a pause, right? Right. Because you've done a bad job. Bad fucking job. You did a bad, whoever educated this 153 fucking people, they don't know what vaccines are or how they work. Yeah. You did a bad job. Whoever's churning

out these nurses and CNAs and medical assistants and whatever these jobs Yeah. You did a bad job. Whoever is churning out these nurses and CNAs and medical assistants and whatever these jobs are, you did a bad job. You didn't- Doctors. Doctors, whatever. Yeah, thank you.

Whatever role these people serve, if they are in the medical community and they don't understand the basics of vaccines and safety-

Yeah, they shouldn't have that. They were educated poorly. They should have never got a diploma. Right. They should have never got a diploma. Right. They should have never got a diploma if you don't understand this stuff. But there's so many different people

in the medical industry that come in and then they have these weird, conspiratorial, dumb things that they think, and then they never get corrected. There should be a moment when you come into a doctor's office as a nurse and the doctor, or if you're coming to the doctor's office as a new doctor,

that people sit you down and say, we believe in this doctor's office that these things are true. Right. If you don't think those things are true, there's a fucking door, man. Yeah. But like,

I don't know how it got this far. And I recognize too, like they're seeing another increase in vaccine numbers. I don't know if you saw this like, they're seeing another increase in vaccine numbers. I don't know if you saw this, but they're seeing another increase. There's a slow, another, I saw it today. No, that's great news. There's another increase in them. And they suspect it's the people who wanted

to see if it was gonna, like, turn people into fucking Ionute or whatever, you know what I mean? Like, they were gonna just melt or scream or die or, you know, whatever. They were worried. Become the fucking robocop toxic sludge guy they were super worried to turn into mitch mcconnell same thing i guess what's it doesn't matter but uh but genuinely they thought they and you know like like sometimes it's hard to blame people like that right that are overabundance of caution for a a lay person, absolutely. And so

I get it. But at a certain point, we are at this point, six months past, people have been getting these vaccines for a large majority of people have been getting them for six months plus. Now you have to look at it and say, okay, there's six months in the bag. Plus there's another whole six months of trials that people have done. And we're not seeing any major malfunctions. Yep. So you should just get it. You should just get it. And then I think people are seeing that now and starting.

So even if some of these people were holdouts, even if I'll even grant you, right. If you were some of you, you're being generous. Holdouts and you're still not getting it. Get fucked. Get the fuck out of here.

Get the fuck out of here. Unless you have an immunocompromised, and then I don't know that being a doctor is probably the best. That's the thing. Maybe that's not right for you. Like, ask your doctor if being a doctor is right for you. Like, maybe you shouldn't be in a hospital. Maybe you should be a dermatologist.

Maybe you should be in a different setting. I'm not saying being a doctor isn't right for you. But like, what I don't understand is why people feel like they want to enter the medical world and, and take care of people who are at a desperate low point in their life, a point where they may be compromised or they may be sick, where they are in desperate need of your fucking help. And you're like, yeah, you know what? I don't really understand how this shit works. And because of that, I have fear. I'll tell you what, if you understand how this fucking shit works, you're not afraid of it. Yeah, right.

Ask anybody who's fucking vaccine hesitant, describe to me how these vaccines work. Tell me what mRNA is. Just give me three. We talked about this before. Give me three sentences about what a fucking mRNA is. Yeah. And tell me you're also somebody who's afraid of these vaccines. You can't do it.

Can't do it. It's always uneducated people. It's always people who fucking watched a YouTube video once or read some fucking gibbledy-flarg on Facebook. I feel it in my gut. It's like, well, your gut shouldn't be making decisions for you. Get the fuck out of here with your gut. Your gut should not be making decisions.

You have a greater responsibility than your gut. You're in a role of responsibility and not by accident. And it's not just doctors who are in a role of responsibility. The American public is in a role of responsibility and not by accident. And it's not just doctors who are in a role of responsibility. The American public is in a role of responsibility. Yes. We're in a role of responsibility

to care for our fellow person. And if I go out into the world and I'm unvaccinated and I cough on some immunocompromised person who could not get the vaccine, even if they have a mask on, the mask isn't there to protect them.

The mask doesn't protect them as well. I should be wearing a mask if I'm unvaccinated, but we know that that's not the case. We know there's plenty of people out there that are going to pretend that they're wearing a mask or that are vaccinated that aren't vaccinated. And they're going to go out and say, well, I was vaccinated.

I cannot wear a mask and I'm a douchebag, whatever. And so they're going to go out and not wear the mask. The mask is going to be on the person from who's immunocompromised and that will protect them a little, but it won't protect them nearly as much as both or if the other person was wearing the mask. And so they might get it. And you're an asshole. If you do that to somebody, you're an awful person. You hurt somebody because you're selfish and stupid and pigheaded. And the thing is, like, these people always preach this doctrine of self-sufficiency, but you live in a society.

You live in a society. You reap the benefits every day of other people looking out for you. You didn't teleport here. You drove here on the road, asshole. You know what? We all built that. Your fucking kids probably go to a public school.

If you fucking need something, if they're, you know what? Just the other day in our fucking hometown, the tornado sirens went off, right? Who paid for that? Yeah. It wasn't private tornado sirens. They gave people fucking between three and nine minutes of warning and an F3 tornado

ripped through DuPage County. Right. Damaged the whole, well, people were able to get in their basement. Why? Because we live in a society. Yeah. That's why. Because we all agreed that like, this is good for us, that we all take care of each other, that we live in a society. That's why. Because we all agreed that this is good for us.

That we all take care of each other. That we all protect each other. And when that tornado fucking hit our local area, what happened? Well, police showed up and fire showed up and ambulance showed up and people started cutting trees back and then utilities show up. Like, all of those things that are a society, the self-sufficiency

shit, that's a myth. You're not self-sufficient. Get the fuck out of here unless you're living in the woods naked and afraid. Well, the fucking buildings that got crushed that are going to get rebuilt aren't going to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. It's not going to happen. Get the fuck out of here with your nonsense about self-sufficiency.

I take care of myself and my family. Do you by yourself really there? Really? Really, fucking Davy Crockett? Is that what you fucking do? Where's your log cabin? It's a hundred percent. Not true. None of it's true. And the problem is,

is that they're, they're piggybacking off of society. They're piggybacking off of other people that are vaccinated. The reason why the numbers are down in a places where they're down is because of vaccinations. Right. When you look at the numbers and where they're trending up, it's in places where there's fewer vaccinations. I was just

reading that in alabama the vaccination numbers are like shockingly low and the fucking covid cases are 74 percent yeah here in illinois vaccine is is is doing very well it's over 60 percent of the available public has the vaccine and our cases are absolutely plummeting in Alabama. They're up 74% all the places where the vaccine was not taken. It's all, it's all the same thing. It's, it's, they're, they're, they're shooting up through the, through the roof. And it's the same thing that you had said. We had, we had talked about this before the, the, the, uh, the CDC released their rules. We knew people were going to lie about it. Absolutely. People knew people were going to say they were vaccinated and go into spaces.

And you basically pulled the teeth away from all these companies that had the opportunity to make a big stink of it. I remember Costco, so many videos during the pandemic of people walking into Costco without a mask and Costco's a members only club. Sorry, can't shop in here without masks.

Sorry. But the moment the CDC pulled the rules, Costco changed their rules too. They got nothing to stand on. They can't stand on anything because the CDC moment the cdc pulled the rules costco changed their rules too they got nothing to stand they can't stand on anything because the cdc says well if i'm vaccinated i should be able to go out and so in places where there was enough vaccine that didn't matter it literally didn't matter but you are going to see and it will continue to happen until those places start getting more and more people vaccinated but even people with the vaccine can still get it they just just don't get it.

They just get a mild case of it. Right. It's the cold now. You've turned this disease that kills like 3% of the population into a fucking cold. And I think it's like, I've been watching these numbers. I watch them every single day I wake up. And one of the first things I look at is the New York Times. I look at the numbers and they are stalling out at about 12,000 new cases a day.

And they're stalling out at about 350 or 400 deaths a day. And that's an unacceptable number of deaths. That's 100,000 dead people. That's one and a half times the worst flu season that we've had in forever, right? In 100 years. And 12,000 to 15,000 cases were kind of stalling out there. And I think it's because of what you just said. There are areas where it's like,

yeah, is California fine? Yeah. Is Illinois fine? Fuck yeah. New York. Yeah. Rock on Alabama.

Fuck you. A lot of rural communities. Fuck you. Who's going to pay the price for that? Yeah. And like these goddamn medical people should know better. If anybody should be setting the example, if anybody should be running the Vanguard.

Yeah. It's people that are in the goddamn medical profession. These assholes who are fired. I have zero sympathy. They should be blackballed from their careers forever. They're going to write a book though. They're going to write a book about how they were discriminated against and they're going to go do the tour.

Yep. discriminated against and they're going to go do the tour and yep so we'd like to thank our patrons of course like to thank all our patrons but we'd like to thank our newest patrons quartermaster jacob thorn travis charles ray and kevin and people who up their pledges justin bailey kat Katrina, Thomas, and Burz Molly. But we want to thank our patrons. Of course, you guys make the show happen. And you guys are the ones who write the check every month to the people that we pay who work for us. So thank you.

That money comes out of the till that you guys put in. So we wouldn't have employees and we wouldn't have, Tom and I wouldn't be able to certainly put out the content that you guys put in. So we wouldn't have employees and we wouldn't have Tom and I wouldn't be able to certainly put out the content that we do. And then also be able to sort of put certain things on autopilot. Like we do. Yes. If we didn't have the employees that we have,

the great employees that we have. So we thank you so much for paying their salaries. We can't thank you enough for that. You make the show process making process easier for us. their salaries. We can't thank you enough for that. You make the show making process easier for us. We got a message from the nine-fingered lesbian

and she just wanted to send us a quick message to let us know that we were sort of helping her through the last year and also through some very bad recent news. That nine-fingered lesbian, sorry you're going through a tough time. Anything we ever said on a show helps you though. We're always thrilled to find that out. Yeah, just really sorry to hear that you're going through a rough go. Anything we ever said on a show helps you, though. We're always thrilled to find that out. Yeah, just

really sorry to hear that you're going through a rough go. I'm glad we can be of service to you. Tom, we've got to talk about this, even if it's just briefly. This story that's happening in Canada right now, we wind up skipping it a couple weeks ago because only a couple, like maybe 150 kids or something. And I know I said

the way I said that sounds horrible, but genuinely that's a small amount when it comes to the horrors of the Catholic church. Instead, this is now up to over 600 children in Saskatchewan and 215 children in British Columbia have been found in just dead. Yeah. It is a horror. I've been doing a little bit of reading on this. And the system where Canada's took by force indigenous peoples away from their homes and then put them in these residential schools.

And for years and years and years, these people were telling everybody that would listen, hey, these people went to these schools, they didn't come back alive. They were raped. They were abused. And they died. And those claims were dismissed. And now they're finding mass graves. 751 children have found one mass grave. And the other one was 215. Yeah. And that sounds like the tip of the iceberg. The indigenous peoples have asked the Catholic church for an apology and the Catholic church has been silent. Of course.

They're always absolutely silent. Literally crickets, man. I'm surprised the Pope isn't Jiminy cricket. Right. They ran these schools. They did, man. It's a hundred percent on them. It's a hundred percent on them.

They fucking, they, they should own this. Just like any fucking thing that, that you do horribly, that you fuck up, percent on them it's a hundred percent on them they fucking they they should own this just like any fucking thing that that you do horribly that you fuck up you should own just own it you should own and the thing is is like if these people fucking don't like they're dead that they i mean they they're the the priests are dead or whatever own it just own that it's just if silence is worse than nothing it is so much worse. And then, I mean, silence is nothing, but yeah,

I mean, I guess, I guess that doesn't make any sense, but silence is, silence is horrible. Silence is, is a bad thing. Like silence,

silence is an insult. And, and you know what, what, what makes me kind of crazy is so often just an acknowledgement and apology does matter. It does make a difference. It does make a difference. And the refusal to do that is callous. It's so, but it's so fucking on brand. It does make a difference. It does make a difference. And the refusal to do that is callous.

It's so, but it's so fucking on brand. It is perfectly on brand, man. It's fucking on brand, man. It's a hundred percent on brand. It's every single fucking scandal is always a horror.

And they're always either silent or they're willing to get it out of court so they could pay the money and just forget about it. Because an apology is complicit. Yeah. And they don't. Yeah. just forget about it. Because an apology is complicit. Yeah. And they don't, yeah. We got a image. And this is from Monique. And they sent us an image of a cat. And I'm going to post it

on this week's show notes. It is a reference though to a very funny story that Tom told us on Citation Needed a couple months ago. I think the episode is called Black is Black. Black is Black. And so check it out on Citation Needed a couple months ago. I think the episode is called Blackest Black. Blackest Black. And so check it out

on Citation Needed. It's a very funny episode and it's one of those amazing internet stories that just, it will make you smile. It's bonkers. It's really great. So petty. Yeah, it's the pettiest thing I've ever heard in my entire life. But it's kind of amazing.

We got a bunch of messages. Vice Rindo sends a message in to talk about their healthcare in Canada, but then also a lot of wishes, Tom, for Haley's health. Yeah. And I just, we can't go through them all. We got a lot of messages and I know a lot of you folks sent messages with your own personal stories. I read them all. They are touching. And I do want to just say to everybody that's been struggling, I'm sorry. And the struggles are real and they are legitimate. And unfortunately, they're not going anywhere because we haven't fixed the system that we're in. And we are all going to just fucking slog through this shit system until we get the courage to change it. And I don't know what is going to just fucking slog through this shit system until we get the courage to change it.

And I don't know what is going to be the tipping point. I know what the tipping point for me, I've always felt like it needed to be changed, but I've never felt it as viscerally as I felt it over the last seven months. So I'm so sorry to everybody that's going through these medical issues. And I'm sorry you have to go through them in a system so deeply and tragically broken as the one that we have. We got a TikTok message sent to us from Jason. And it's a TikTok video about Google researchers will post it on this week's show notes.

It's very funny. Very, very funny. Tom, minor correction from Curtis. Yeah, so thank you, Curtis. I'm sure this will be the 100th email you get about this today, but the Epoch Times is a Chinese-owned media company, not Russian. Thank you.

I was wrong. I mixed that up. Forgive me. I made a mistake. Got a message from Matt, number one, and he says, Cecil, thank you for your valiant attempt in attempting to taste the picnic bar, but alas, you forgot your own number one rule. English can fuck up anything.

The Australians hate English. They really do. They really do. I wonder why. They really do. We're kind of kin when it comes to that because like,

we both kind of say go fuck yourself to England and so we're kind of kin in some way. So, you know, what you got to do is we got to eventually get this Australian one,

but we'll get it eventually. I got to see if I can find it. What I don't want is somebody to send it from fucking Australia because not only does it take like six fucking months to get here, but we'll get it eventually. I got to see if I can find it. What I don't want is somebody to send it from fucking Australia because not only does it take like six fucking months to get here, but it also costs you like $150.

Yeah, it's a set of fucking candy bar. It's like outrageous. Yeah, I remember we were giving away coffee mugs for a while, like we were doing them internationally for a hot minute. $75. We spent $75 to ship a coffee mug. It would arrive broken. One time someone sent a message in

and we had to send them a book that we had said we got. And it was like a $75 to get the book to them. And they lost it. They lost it. They lost the book in the mail. And they were like, where's my book? And I'm like, it's gone.

That was a freebie. That book ain't coming back, bro. We got a message from Bob. And Bob says, I used to really like Ian's commercials, but then I became a patron which means I'm paying for Ian to go fuck himself

and if you want Ian to go fuck himself you can head over to Patreon.com and Ian if you want to go fuck yourself you can go to AdamandEve.com so anyway we're going to wrap it up for today we want to thank Jeff Blackwell of American Atheist for joining us. Great guest.

Jeff is a very knowledgeable guy, and we were happy to fluster him the whole time when he was trying to explain stuff to us. But Jeff is a great guy, and we've had an opportunity to hang out with Jeff like one or two times already, and he's been a blast to hang out with. So we'll definitely have him on

if the American Atheists take anybody else to court. We love to talk to Jeff. Check out American Atheists at Atheist.org. That's going to wrap it up for today. Come join us. We did a, if you missed it this week, if you missed the live stream, we did a tiny liquor bottle tasting on the live stream, which was, I basically went to Binnie's today and I found a bunch of tiny liquor bottles, the travel size ones, and I chose the worst one.

And we voted on what the worst one and we voted on what the worst one was. So you have to go find out what that is with the video, go watch it. It's on YouTube. It's going to be on YouTube. It's only on Twitch for like seven or so days, and then it gets deleted. So you can watch it on Twitch for seven days, or you can go to YouTube and you can watch it indefinitely. But we had a lot of fun. Very, very tasty. It was disgusting. Most of them were pretty, some of them were just inoffensive, but some of them were very, very, none of them were good. None of them were good, but some of them were inoffensive. And I guess that that's the best you can hope for, but go check it out. We had a lot of fun and we had a

lot of fun with chat and, uh, and I got to run the stream, uh, for about half of it. All right. That's going to wrap it up for this week. We're going to leave you like 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. Pseudo quasi alternative acupunctuating pressurized stereogram pyramidal, free energy, healing water, downwardupunctuating, 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 in towers, tarot cards, psychic healing, crystal balls, Bigfoot, Yeti, aliens, churches, mosques and synagogues,

temples, dragons, giant worms, 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. Doubt even this. The opinions and information provided on this podcast are intended for entertainment purposes only.

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