Cognitive Dissonance - Episode 74: Monumental

Episode Date: November 16, 2012

Special Episode this time. We talk the entire show with George Hrab from the Geologic Podcast: We review the film “”Spoiler - we hated it. All clips except the first come from the movie. The first clip comes from the dbate between Kirk Cameron and Racomfort vs. The Rational Response Sqaud.

Today's show is brought to you by Audible. Please visit audiblepodcast.com forward slash dissonance pod for your free audiobook download. Kirk Cameron then denounced evolution, saying that the theory contained huge gaps. Science has never found a genuine transitional form that is one kind of animal crossing over into another kind, either living or in the fossil record. And're supposed to be billions of them now what

I'm about to show you does not exist these were actually created by our graphic artists but I want you to keep your out your eye out for this because this is what evolutionists have been searching for for hundreds of years alright and if you find one of these, you could become rich and famous. So here's some transitional forms. This is called the Crocoduck. Can you see this? Oh, it's a cat. Crocodile and a duck.

Alright, let's try another one. This is the Bullfrog. Half bull, half frog. Or, of course, or of course the sheepdog. 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. 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. This is episode 74 of Cognitive Dissonance. This is our movie review spectacular, Cecil. Yeah. Well, I don't know how spectacular it's going to be, but we are going to be reviewing a movie we're going to have George Robb on later on in the show to talk about. Actually, pretty close on the show here. In a couple of seconds, we're going to have him on. We are hearkening back to the old Everyone's a Critic days here, Tom.

We are. We're getting back to our fucking roots, man. I mean, I feel like we're getting back to our roots. That's what I feel like. It's amazing. We used to do the thing on Everyone's a Critic, which is actually no longer available, by the way, so if you're looking for it, I think they took

the website down because they stopped paying. So it's fucking gone at this point. Yeah, they do that, it turns out. They don't pay for that shit. They take that shit off the air. But we used to do this thing called Turkey Month and what we would do, we basically would model it off of

Mystery Science Theater, which was every Thanksgiving, they would do a full 24 hours of Mystery Science Theater, which was every Thanksgiving, they would do a full 24 hours of Mystery Science Theater on Comedy Central. They called it Turkey Day, and you basically just watched bad movies the entire day, and people would make fun of them. Well, we took a page out of their book, and we started every November for the entirety of the show, I think, Tom. We did two bad movies every year during November, and then during December,

we gave ourselves gifts because they were so bad most of the time. And we reviewed a lot of really bad movies and a lot of bad science movies. The Happenings, one of them, but the other one is What the Bleep Do We Know is another one that we reviewed. And the movie we're going to be reviewing a little later on is Monumental. Which, in everyone's critic days, we watched two and reviewed two. This movie's so bad, it takes the whole show. Which, in everyone's critic days, we watched two and reviewed two. This movie's so bad, it takes the whole show. Oh yeah, the whole thing. And we have a special guest, Tom, a guest who's been on the show before, a guest we know and love and our listeners know and love.

It's George from the Geologic Podcast. George, thank you for coming back. How could you possibly know and love me and have me watch this film? We only hurt What kind of one-sided friendship is this, gentlemen? We only hurt the ones we love, George. I guess so. It's a friendship based on a lot of physical

distance. Is that what it is? It's a couple thousand miles between. Well, you can probably hear me screaming this afternoon when I watch this turkey. It was a lot of fun to watch on everyone's end. We all watched it separately. So this should be interesting to get your takes on it. Because I know the audience, I'm sure the audience, has not sat down to watch this direct-to-DVD gem that is monumental.

And we have. So I've got to give a little background about what this movie is about. So I'm going to try to be brief. And so basically what it is is Kirk Cameron fist fucks American history. I think that is kind of a really sort of one line, you know, this is exactly what it's about. But, you know, if we're going to get a little deeper into it, basically, Kirk and his wonderful five o'clock shadow set out on this quest to, I guess, learn about history of religion in the country. And he talks about the debt in the beginning for some reason, and then he loses it and decides to go find the pilgrims. He talks to an English woman about the Puritans who eventually become the pilgrims.

Then he talks to some guy who looks like Maury from Goodfellas, complete with the ascot cap and the leather jacket, who talks about a statue for about 45 minutes. Then he talks to the discredited author, David Barton, who tells him it's a Christian nation. Then he goes and talks to a guy at Harvard and they say that Harvard used to be more religious. And then at the end of the movie, Kirk talks to about seven people right in a row. Nobody really that notable, including Todd Akin, the legitimate rape former or soon to be former congressman.

And then we end with some sort of gobbledygook at the end with he's not sitting back anymore. Is that kind of the movie in a nutshell, you think? You actually added more cohesion in your summary than Kirk was able to manage throughout the entire course of the hour and 40 minutes of this godless atrocity. I had a one-sentence summary of the film as well. My one-sentence summary was, we need to revert laws and government back to the church because statues.

George, you and I are going to get along great during this interview. You win. I think that's really it. It's pretty much it. It's pretty much it right there. Yeah, there's definitely a lot of statue loving in this movie. We're going to start out. I'm going to play a clip of Kirk Cameron talking about King James here,

and then we're going to talk a little bit about this here. King James. And this guy was a tyrant king on steroids. He's the one who actually invented the phrase, the divine right of kings. He bankrupted his nation, he tripled the debt, and he considered himself to be a devout Christian while he was obsessed with hunting down and destroying

the most devout people in his land. One of the things that fascinates me is knowing that once the Bible was translated into English and given to the common man, that changed everything because they started thinking for themselves. They said, this is what the word of God says. Therefore, church ought to be like what God says.

It should be not what the king says. And the king himself is a man who is under authority of the king of kings. And he too must abide by the law of God. Okay. Listening to Kirk Cameron in that clip struggle desperately to wrap his tiny malformed brain around simple concepts. And he still manages to fucking bungle. But you could hear his brow furrow.

You know, you could hear the seven brain cells in his head desperately churning overtime to form words in some kind of a sentence. That shit is a god. It's an abomination. some kind of a sentence, that shit is a god. It's an abomination. It's beautiful that the name of your show is Cognitive Dissonance because it is a textbook example right there that, in essence, we're going from one oppression to another. Yeah.

And he's saying that, okay, isn't it great that finally this text could be translated into English and then the common man could read it and think for themselves? Like right there, the idea of thinking for yourself is anathema to religious thought. So he holds those two ideas in his brain while he's talking about the pilgrims. Well, the Puritans at the time. They weren't pilgrims yet. You know, one of the things I think I like the most about that, obviously Kirk is struggling,

and I think this clip is a great example of the rest of the reasoning that is used in this movie. But there's a great bit in there where he's talking about how that king bankrupted his nation, was lots of money in debt, and was a Christian but was going against other Christians. I wonder who he's subtly taking a jab at with that, you know? You know, little known fact, King James was also black. And his middle name was Hussein. James was also black and his middle name was Hussein.

It's so ridiculous. You know, like you said, cognitive dissonance, George, he's, you know, at the one side, he's, you know, espousing this idea that like, well, now the common man can think for themselves and do exactly what they're told. That's what that's exactly how you think for yourself is you do what you're told not by the king but by the book. Right. Let the book tell you how to think for yourself. Right. Right. And that will help you get to the yourself part without including any of yourself or any actual thinking. But the whole movie is like this.

The whole movie is like a conglomeration of half-formed notions that contradict themselves in the same fucking sentence. In the same, the man can't spit out a single sentence that doesn't seem to have some kind of contradiction. The other thing about that, like the King James, it's like, well, I mean, clearly any thinking person who is thinking for themselves would listen to that and say, well, that's why you don't want religion involved in your politics. Right. That is a textbook example of why you don't want a religious leader as a politician, as driving your political machine, because as soon as you hand it over, well, then you've got the potential for religious abuse. And somehow he escapes that snare, probably because his mind is too small to be caught in it.

I don't know if his mind is too small or it's just the preconceived notions are done. The result he's going for is already finished in his brain. He knows where he's heading with this. He is not on an exploration of discovery. No. So it's not that he's dumb. It's not that he's whatever.

It's just he knows where he's heading. he knows what conclusion he wants to come to it's it's antithetical to any kind of actual research or any kind of actual discovery process he knows what the end result is going to be so he's just going to fold and mold and shape any touch of information he might get to conform to his already preconceived ending his his preconceived notion, his preconceived decision that he's made. He didn't even have to travel to these places. That's the other thing that's so amazing is like, he wants to learn about the Puritans, so he goes to England. And the information he gets, he could have gotten on Wikipedia

in the first paragraph about Puritans. Did you know that they were on a boat? Great. Yeah, it's great, man. It's a cool story. It's quite interesting, actually. But what does that have to do with what we're talking about here? I also love the fact that in the one, I looked at the time, because at one minute and 42 seconds, the first person you see apart from Kirk Cameron is the legitimate rape Aiken guy.

That's the very first person you see apart from Kirk Cameron, is the legitimate rape Aiken guy. That's the very first person you see apart from Kirk. And it's like, okay, here we go. This is where we are. You know what you're in for at that point. Yeah. You know, that's interesting that you say the, when you said that he knows his conclusion already and he's just trying to work there.

What this is then is the intelligent design of history. You're basically intelligently designing history. You're saying, okay, well, we know our conclusion and what conclusion we want to get to, so I'm going to line up all these fake premises to try to get you there. And I really think that when you start with the pilgrims, I guess the biggest question I have for you guys is, okay, so what does it matter what the pilgrims were? Does it matter? Does it matter to us today that the pilgrims were like Christian? I mean, because we are not all descended

from the pilgrims. We're a nation of immigrants. No, no, no. The Americans that count are descended. See, that's the part that you're missing. I also have to take exception, Cecil, and George. You guys both missed there's clearly he's on a voyage of discovery.

You can tell because he's tying that string around the nails. And that's symbolic of the voyage. And you must have missed that. It's very subtle. He only shows you that same image 47 times during the movie. So I know you may have missed that. Yeah.

I thought he was just redecorating his basement. He's pounding hammer, the nail in, and then he's wrapping his copper wire around it as he's traipsing around the globe trying to find, I don't know, Jesus. I'm not sure. But seriously, like like we're a nation immigrants. Right. So what's the what's the big deal? Who cares what if they were Muslim, who would care? It's not even that. It's like, OK, well, that's one American experience. Like, fuck Jamestown. Yeah. What are those guys know? American experience. Like, fuck Jamestown. Yeah. What do those guys know? You know, or any of the other colonies that were sort of developed over time or the fact that he talks about, you know, 150 years later is when the founding fathers started doing their work. So this is like a

century later. And it just seems it's just a convenient, I don't want to say coincidence, but there are elements to the story of people escaping oppression people who are completely into different kinds of oppression and they're totally fine with it like i wonder how many of the puritanical ideas kirk is okay with in terms of like not allowing his wife to you know, vote or read or, you know, leave the house or talk. You know what I mean? There's all these puritanical rules that, you know, he's holding up the Puritans as this pure American ideal. And if we can revert to this pure American slash religious ideal, everything will be fine.

But it's like how many things that the Puritans were into do we find completely abhorrent nowadays? And it's most of it. But it's pure. It's right in the word. Pure Puritan. It's Pur. It's all about cats. No, they're the Pur water filter

tins. That's what they are. It's funny because, and you know, it's this idea of the golden age, you know. It's this idea of the grand and golden age. And that's what Kirk's, I think, his whole, you know, I was chatting with Cecil about this online a little bit today because we were trying to figure out what the hell this movie was actually supposed to be about. And it's, you know, I agree fundamentally that his idea, his idea, not mine, is that, you know, America has lost its way that we're, you know, in all heaps of shit. And that if only we had some kind of roadmap or blueprint back to the golden age, back to the gilded world that from whence we all came, the Eden from where America sprang, the only problem is that never existed. That the premise is fundamentally flawed at its outset.

That there was no golden age. That there was no better time to be alive. When was it better to be alive in America? This idea that we're going to go back to the Puritans and, well, that's going to solve all of our problems. Well, yeah, unless you're not a wealthy white male, then it's going to actually exacerbate every problem you could conceivably have. Also, you can't drink the water. I think it's interesting, too, that, you know, like he's talking about one belief that they had that they were Christians, right? They show up and they have one belief that they're Christians. But we're not talking about all the other beliefs that they had. I mean,

they probably didn't believe in a germ theory of disease, let's say. But we've thrown that out. We've said, OK, well, that's not something we're going to, you know, we're not going to believe in the fucking humors anymore. We're going to actually think about medicine and science or whatever. And it's this picking and choosing of which beliefs you want to go back to. Just like you said, George, there's this there's this feeling like there's a lot of things that they did that were, you know, misogynistic. But we're not going to roll back the misogyny. We're just going to roll back the things that we're going to pick and choose. Well, you nailed it. It's the myth of the golden age.

I mean, even before he starts his journey to find, you know journey to find information that will fit perfectly with his preconceived premise, he talks about the state of the U.S. and how it's the worst it's ever been, how teen pregnancy is the highest it's ever been, and suicide rates are the highest it's ever been, which is factually incorrect. Like much of this movie. I mean, at the start of the thing. It's just wrong. That's wrong. Like teen pregnancy is the lowest it's been in a long time, and suicide At the start of the thing. It's just wrong. That's wrong. Teen pregnancy is the lowest it's been in a long time. And suicide is the lowest it's been. And pregnancy and all kinds.

It's just like, no, abortion, the rates are low. And it's like, you're beginning preamble before even Aiken shows up to ruin the whole first two minutes of the film. It's just incorrect. So he's trying to go back to something, like you said, that just doesn't exist. Never existed. Yeah.

It's funny when you're two minutes into the movie and everything is already wrong. Yeah. You've started out. You haven't even left the doc yet. You look at this, and I was thinking about this earlier. It's like I hesitate to call this a documentary because it doesn't contain any facts or

document anything. It's actually, other than the fact that it's a fucking moving picture show, it's barely even a movie because it commits the egregious sin of being not only inaccurate, but painfully boring in its inaccuracy. Well, I gotta say, when

the woman that he goes to see to talk about the Puritans, when she's talking about their experience, that was actually interesting, historically interesting. And I had never known the details of their story in terms of that they first went to Holland, and then they came back, and then... I didn't know those details. And that, I gotta say, that was interesting, but the whole

time I was saying, and what's the point? And this is a movie about the history of i was saying and what's the point and this is a movie about the history of puritans no the point of this film is to supposedly put us back on track so what does this have to do what is this 20 minutes of of puritan and pilgrim history have to do with us and it doesn't have anything to do with us apart when he gets to the final at the end that they had the mayflower compact which is okay that's how i felt too it's like like okay dude they signed a thing awesome like that is not a thing that we really pay attention to yeah right which like again if you if that's your point and then you're gonna be you're gonna be wrong about it fine like say hey and they had this mayflower compact and that's and that's what the United States is based on. That's incorrect.

But if that's your point, why would you wait 36 minutes until you say that? Ineptitude. Ineptitude is the reason. Speaking of something that is egregiously boring, I would like to play another clip from the movie. This is where they're talking about the statue. Here they could train them. And you see the lady here in the statue of education, and she is opening the word of God or the book of knowledge. And she has got the wreath of victory. She's wearing about a 25 year old woman. She is educating her children and she is sitting in victory. Why is she sitting in victory? Because she has trained her children up in the way they should go.

And prepared them so that the next generation that came after them would know the strategy of how to carry on the truth and carry on a free civilization. Isn't that amazing? And what's on her side over here? Over here you see her training her child. And she has a book in her one hand, and then he has a scroll where he is writing on the other. And this is youth, trained in their youth. It was the parents' responsibility to educate. And so this would be the mother training up a child in the way he should go.

training up a child in the way he should go. You know, what I think is interesting is that they had just left England and left this top-down government system. So when they got here, their idea of education wasn't send your kids off to a government school to educate them. It was the parents' responsibility to do this, particularly because their worldview

was different than the government's worldview, which would have been, no, you're a nobody, you're a slave, you just lay down on your back and do whatever the king says, which is sort of the attitude that we get in most governments today, is that you just do whatever the government says, whereas they're saying, no, it's our responsibility as parents to educate our kids and to teach them faith and internal morality and to understand the importance of fair, just, and merciful laws. Yes, when the Pilgrims got to the shores of what would become America, they didn't want to send their children to government schools. They didn't like the lunch program they had at the government schools. I want to talk first quickly.

What does this clip say, George? I'm going to ask you this, George. What does this clip say about women's roles? It's very good. It's a very good point. Of course. Well, the woman has to do what we say, what the guys say to begin with. And then it's all about being at home, educating, sort of protecting the tradition,

not being on the forefront, not educating themselves either, but educating the kids in the way that the fathers tell them to, the way that God, the father, and then the father, the father tells them to. It's a great point. Yeah, I love also that all these figures are seated, and he's talking about being seated in victory. Like, have you ever seen that really dramatic painting of someone being victorious while seated?

Like the French Revolution poster with the woman with the big flag, she's waving and she's sitting? What? Sitting in victory? That's a big flag. She's waving, you know, and she's sitting. What? Sitting in victory? That's a, okay, that's a good one. Also, he calls the main guy Liberty Man, which is like the first superhero ever. I was thinking the same thing.

And I was like, I don't even know that that superhero would be able to like fight crime in that outfit anyway. I mean, it just looks, just looks a little too revealing, especially for these Christians that are watching it. That's true. Tom, you had something to say about this whole statue scene. I hate this scene so much. This might be the dumbest thing that's ever been filmed. This really might.

And the problems with it are legion. But I'll start with the fact that wandering aimlessly about a statue and pointing out various metaphors that you're explicating as you go does not, in fact, prove any point. Metaphors, by definition, are illustrative, not conclusive. So you cannot prove a point with a metaphor. A metaphor, it cannot do that. So wandering around a statue, explicating the statue's various pieces and deciding, well, this stands for this

and this is this person, as George said, seated triumphantly in victory or gloriously sleeping in victory and reclining in agony. It's it you can't make a point that way. You know, you could never you could never say, well, you know, I'm going to I'm going to defend my views on good and evil by discussing the metaphor of the river and Huck Finn. Like that's not you. Maybe you'll use that to illustrate

a point, but that will not ever, in fact, make a point. That's just not how they work. And the fucking statue came like 150 years after the Pilgrims. The preceding scene to this, he says something like, well, if only the Pilgrims had left us a blueprint.

If only they had left us a roadmap so that we knew what they were thinking and then he's like ah but they did fast forward to a statue built in 1880 not by the pilgrims how did what but and again also built in 1880 where it's like how much of the stuff from 1880 do we believe today also? Like already that's 100 years removed from the, well, 150 years removed from the Pilgrims, 200 years from the Pilgrims. But it's 100 years from us. What do we still buy into from 1880 artistically as represented in people with lion manes over their shoulder? One of the best parts about this is they keep saying, and they say it throughout the entire piece because it's where they keep on making this point or trying to make this point, fumble fucking their way around to try to make this point, which is top-down morality isn't a good thing.

Top-down morality. And I kept saying to myself, like, what is the Bible then? Like, that is the fucking definition of top-down morality. But what they want to say is, well, it's top-down if it's, you know, somebody who's above you who's a man. But if it's God, it's okay. And like you're saying, that's total cognitive dissonance. Like, you're talking about top-down morality as if it's an evil,

and yet you're aggrandizing it through the statue and through all these different pieces of religious history you're pointing out. Well, people don't know. God's a top. Yeah. I mean, God's just – he's a top. And that's – you know, listen, when you're getting it with God, you're the bottom, man. You better be.

That's how that shit plays out. You better be. You might want to like – maybe it's Saturday. You've both had a couple of drinks. Maybe you want to kind of mix it up. No way. No way. God is a fucking top.

And bring a lot of lube. That's all I'm saying. Just a lot of lube. You know what else I love about that sequence is the guy that is describing all this. He comes from, he works at a place which is guilty of the inverse proportion rule of naming. He works at a place called the World History Institute, which is sort of like New York bagel shop. If some place is called New York bagel shop, the last thing you're getting there is a New York bagel. So he works at the World History Institute.

Yeah. The World History Institute. Yeah. The World History Institute. George, don't you remember all those people who got their degrees at World History Institute? Of course. It's like Super Learning Mall. I have a degree from Super Learning Mall. I went to Upstairs Medical College. There's a part of this, too, where they're walking around the statue.

And he says, and here's mercy. And this is how we should be merciful. And I kept thinking of mercy like, say, universal health care type mercy. Is that what we're talking about? Good point. Yeah, like all of God's mercy in the Bible. Like particularly when he was merciful and drowned everybody. Or when he was like, hey, don't turn around and look at this city.

I'm fucking up or I'll turn you into a pillar of salt. You got salted. I fucking Morton's you for nothing. For the sin of curiosity. Yeah. That happened during the Puritanical speech where the woman is talking about the fact that the man got on a boat and the boat went out. And there was a huge storm and they were stuck in this storm for whatever, seven

days or, and then they all prayed and the storm stopped and they were saved. I thought like, yes, please, Lord, save us from this storm that you have sent to destroy us. And I picture like the storm ending and them walking out up on deck and being

like, what the hell was that all about? I love, too, that they wait seven days to pray. They don't get that shit out of the way early. They're not like, they're like, wait, God's going to end this on his own. He doesn't need a subtle reminder. Let it roll. Let it roll. Now?

Not yet. Not yet. How about now? Another day. Another day. It's been four days. No, I know. One more day.

I got a feeling. It's one more day. And I'm thinking it's going to be, all right, all right, all right. Today? You know, I said one more day, but I'm really, I'm thinking like maybe two more. Two more. You enjoy puking. Is that some weird fetish?

Is that what you have? You enjoy vomiting? Is that what this is about? Well, they had such a surplus of food on the boat, I'm sure, that the vomiting wouldn't have presented any problem. You know, God doesn't know you don't want storms unless you ask nice. And you probably have to ask on the Sabbath. That's what you didn't because it's seven days.

So they probably set sail. That's right. And then they had to wait to the Sabbath to ask nice because that's the day that you got like a like a prayer megaphone. So we're going to take a quick break really quick and then we we're going to jump right in for the rest of this movie. So stick around. So Cecil, this show is brought to you by our sponsor. And by brought to you, I mean partially paid for. Hopefully.

Yes. By Audible. And you can get your free audio book from Audible by going to audiblepodcast.com slash dissonancepod. And one of the books that you can get from there is The Moral Landscape by Sam Harris,

which you and I have both listened to. Yeah, we both listened to it recently. And I've got to say, if you're looking for a book that unapologetically goes after the idea

that the only way to be moral is through God, and tries to look at the world, the moral world, through a scientific lens. This is the book for you. This is a book that also, Tom, throws cultural relativism right out the fucking window. Oh, my God. It curb-stomps cultural relativism in the biggest way. You know, this is one of my favorite books.

I actually listened to this book about a year ago, give or take, and then I re-listened to it again recently when you and I were talking about it. I adore this book. Sam Harris narrates it. It's absolutely worth your time because it doesn't take much of your time. No, it's really short. It's like seven hours long, and you can get a copy right now. If you're not an Audible

subscriber, you can go to our website. And on our website is a link. It's on the main page of our website. Click it and go there. If you sign up for Audible, you get a free audiobook download. You can download, say, The Moral Landscape. Or if you don't want to go to our website first, you could just type it in your browser. That's audiblepodcast.com slash dissonancepod. This is one of the rarest books in the world. This little book right here, really delicate. It's done in 1782. This is the first Bible ever printed in English in America.

They printed 10,000 of them. There's 22 left in private hands. This is one of them. So one of the rarest books in the world. What's cool is this Bible, the Bible of the Revolution, was printed by the Congress of the United States. So Congress printed the first English language Bible. They said in Congress that this Bible is, quote, a neat addition of the Holy Scriptures for the use of our schools, end quote. So the founding fathers in Congress

printed the first Bible in English and they did it for the use of schools. I didn't think they wanted the Bible in schools. That's what we hear. That's what we've been told. That was discredited author David Barton. I think his name's David. Who cares what his fucking name is? But anyway, his last name's Barton, and he's talking about the revolutionary Bible.

Now, before I toss this over to one of you, I want to talk a little bit about some of the research I did today to look up to see if that statement that he makes is accurate. But before you do that, hold on one second. You have to set the scene here because you have to realize that Kirk is on this journey of discovery, okay? And Kirk wants to know about the Puritans, the pre-genitors of the Pilgrims. He wants to know. So what does he do? He goes to England, all right? Then he learns that they went from England to Holland,

so he travels to Holland. Now he realizes that once they became Pilgrims, they went to New England and to what became Plymouth. So he travels to Plymouth. Now Kirk has all his information. He's traveled to London. He's traveled to England. He's traveled to Holland.

He's traveled to P. He's traveled to England. He's traveled to Holland. He's traveled to Plymouth, Massachusetts. And now he needs to learn about the founding fathers and the things that they've written. So he's going to go to Texas. Well, that's where David Barton is. Exactly. Yeah, and also to set the scene, Kirk is a sort of hand-on-face thinker style leaning on this table looking at this very old book that's wrapped in velvet.

And he unwraps it. Barton unwraps it really, really quickly and says, this is a really old Bible. Oh, it's amazing. And he starts very carefully leafing through this Bible. old Bible. Oh, it's amazing. And he starts very carefully leafing through this Bible. And what I found out today, after looking at a lot of documents that had Fs instead of Ss in them, so it's like Congreff instead of Congress, they didn't actually print this Bible, it turns out. They basically had a chaplain of Congress look it over and make sure it was accurate. They basically had a chaplain of Congress look it over and make sure it was accurate.

But that's the extent that Congress had to do with that Bible. And that line that he says, he says it's, quote, a neat addition of the holy scriptures for use in our schools. That was a line by the guy who made the Bible, the printer Atkin, who made the Bible, not Congress. And it wasn't in any of the documents that I looked at today. So so anyway, so first off, discredited author says something false. Big fucking surprise. But what is this scene sort of set the stage for for the rest of this movie, Tom? Well, I mean, it's it's clearly a let's put the Bible back in our schools. You know, I mean, he never comes out and says anything. Right. It's all this.

It's all this sort of ham fisted. My brain just exploded and I have no word. It's what the fuck? It's ostrich. That was helpful at all. It's he's just all it's this sort of ham fisted insinuation of ideas rather than ever That was helpful at all. It's this sort of ham-fisted insinuation of ideas rather than ever actually coming out and forming one in its entirety. And you watch this scene and it's all, well, you know, Congress wanted the Bibles to be in our schools.

Congress supports the Christian values. Congress supports, you know, Christian morals and, you know, so on and everybody should read the Bible. So let's all have a Bible and anybody who doesn't love the Bible and can't, you know, anybody who takes the Bible's dick out of the back of their throat for one fucking second is going straight to hell and sending America down with it. Here's an old book.

David Barton. But here's the thing. Even if it had been promoted by Congress, how many textbooks were available for education at the time? How many readily available printed books existed at the time that could be used in schools? Say what you want. At least it's printed text. Whether or not the message is one you agree with, at least you can use it to teach someone how to read. You can teach it to kids.

There's enough in there that you can use. Not that they did sort of back this, but even if they did, it's like it's equating, you know, they didn't go to the internet. They decided to print Bibles. It's like, no. It's a completely different social structure. It's a completely different economical structure. So that even if they did print these things and say it was okay and say, yes, this should be in schools. So what? So what? He's making a huge leap between saying that, you know what, we're okay with you printing Bibles and saying that you need to print Bibles because that's for character building. And that's the way you build, you know, that's the way you build a nation and a foundation for society. It's a huge leap. My favorite thing, though, is that he's talking about the opposite.

And he says that he has hundreds of thousands of examples of the founding fathers being religious. And there's only a couple of examples of them being atheists and deists and non-religious people. And there might be some examples, but we have thousands of examples. And he says, what's the document that says the founders had a godless constitution? And I said, the constitution. Why? Out of all that we're looking for statues and we're looking for plaques and we're looking for oars and we're looking for for ship hulls and tobacco boxes and anything that might have some kind of information that relates to Jeebus being the way for USA. Why are we ignoring the actual document that these guys created?

You want to you want to you want to a primer. You want a primer? You want a guide? You want some kind of, you know, some kind of thing that'll tell you what the founding fathers were thinking? How about the fucking Constitution? It's only the most important document, right? Right.

It's only the most important one. Yeah, but then you'd have to refer back to what they said. Zero mention of God in it. Hello? Yeah. We're going to talk about the Mayflower Compact, which is 200 years previous to them because they referenced God in that. So that's obviously way more important.

The influence of the Mayflower Compact is way more important and has a much larger influence on the creation of the Constitution than the actual Constitution. Well, George, when you put it that way, it sounds ridiculous. I'm sure he'll cover that in his sequel, Confirmation Bias. You've got it right. Let's not refer to what they, when he says, like, if only they had put down a blueprint. You know, if only they had, well, they actually very specifically did. That they, that is a thing.

And we use it sort of on a regular basis there, Kirk. We don't refer back to old Bibles and say, well, here's an old Bible. Look, I like how he spends half that clip too extolling the virtues of how awesome he is for owning it, right? It's like, this is very rare. There are very few of these. I've got one. So you need to be paying attention to me. I've got

an old book. And the older the book, the more important the book. Yes. As evidenced by its brown pages. Brown pages are better. It's not on a fucking Kindle, Cecil. So it's on Sepia. It's the Kindle on Sepia.

So, okay, so even if, now I'm going to make a premise here. Let's just presume that he's right about all this stuff. Let's just say that he's right about, you know, them, you know, being Christians and making it a Christian nation. You know, even if that's all true, why does it matter? I mean, the demographics of our nation today are very different than they were then. The makeup of the population is just totally different. So, you know, why should we look back then and say, oh, well, we need to go back to exactly how we were back then? You know, we're allowed to change our minds, even if it was true, which it's not. Right. Well, because statues.

George makes a good point. The founding fathers, though, are treated as Protestant demigods. They're popes. You know, each one of them is a is a is a Protestant pope as an infallible being who sat down in fucking tablet form. Everything that they meant, except for the ones that didn't. We'll just ignore those, you know, because that's uncomfortable. But they're treated the founding fathers, all their ideas. It's it's like, well, I mean, so and so the founding father said, well, fuck me running. I guess I can't.

I got to stop thinking about it now. I'm done. Put it away. They fucking founding father said it a couple hundred years ago. It's not really relevant to today's world, but fuck it. That's what they said. I'm done thinking about that subject. Right.

So, again, it's the genius of these guys that they realized that they were fallible, that they were wrong often, and that history changes over time and opinions change. And so they built it into the system so that you can make, you know, changes and you can modify stuff and you have it with open-ended language so that there isn't, you know, a coronation. There isn't some kind of thing, but something like, look, this is what we're thinking is the way things work right now. We might be wrong, which is like this beautiful scientific approach to politics, which had never been done before. It had never been done before to that extent of saying, we're not sure if what we think is really going to work. So we're going to, you

know, kind of leave it sort of open here that you can amend our ideas, because even if we are thinking 500 years down the road, there's no way we'll be able to know what people 500 years down the road might think is important or 200 years down the road or 100 years down the road. For example, slavery. Yeah. Yeah. No kidding. Right. They were almost not right at all. At all. But I mean, but it was designed so that you could get rid of slavery. Slavery wasn't written into the Constitution. It wasn't it wasn't set up that way. Or even if it were, you could amend the Constitution.

Yeah. And that's that's a that's a huge point that they that they gloss right over is that we thought a lot of things were a good idea. You know, women weren't allowed to vote. That's you know, we thought that was a good idea. Yeah. There was a couple of times in our history where we thought drinking was both good and bad. You know, and we decided to change it twice. So there's a you know, there's a there's a feeling like we can't we can't ever stray from this path that we've been set on by the founding fathers. And yet they they made it possible, like you say, to stray from it. And yet they they made it possible, like you say, to stray from it.

You could make the same argument that Kirk is making and saying that our government needs to wear more wigs. Yeah. Because obviously back then they wore wigs. Yes. And that's the problem. Yes. Can't you see? It's it's fully documented. They wore wigs back then, and they're not wearing wigs today. Right. They're steering us in the wrong direction because of their pantaloons. Maybe the real problem is that we should all have a life expectancy of 39 again. Yeah.

Maybe we should go back to that. Like, if we're just going to go back to shit, let's just go back to that. That's a grand plan. So I'm going to play a clip now of a guy who's talking about, he's at Harvard, but he's basically getting asked a question by Kurt about the United States. A nation that attempts to build a foundation on something other than God's law ultimately will self-destruct because you can't live according to the law as man invents it to be. The remnant of God's law continues in America simply because you can't live by any other rules than by God's rules. And you can't discard those rules. And you can't discard those rules. For example, we hold people responsible for murder,

for theft, even though the dominant view of who man is, is evolutionary. We're only determined by our genes and our environment. And the reason that some people do things that they do is because it's inevitable, it's determined. Yet we can't live that way because we live in God's world, not the evolutionary world of Darwin's imagination, but God's reality. All right, so George, we live in God's world. I know you're not a religious person.

How do you possibly function every day in God's world when you get to choose your own laws? I was wondering why I have chest pains all the time. You can't do it. He said you can't do it. Yeah. The fact of you doing it does not contradict that you can't do it. He said you can't do it. The fact of you doing it does not contradict that you can't do it. I'm wondering, what's God's rules on how big a gazebo

I can build in my backyard? They're in the Bible somewhere. He tells you how big his ark should be. Is it somewhere in there? We gotta look under gazebo or yard? I don't know which thing. It's in the index. It's all measured in cubits. That's the problem. All of government is man's rules. The entire, every single law is man's rules.

Even if you do suppose that there is a God that has some. I mean, what? You know, we live in God's world, not Darwin's imagination. Now, how do you argue with that? I mean, it's so wrong. I mean, it's not even wrong. Well, it's a total straw man because you're basically saying, you know, the human race cannot function without God's law.

Human race cannot function without God's law. And the only law of evolution or of an evolutionary worldview means that it's like survival of the fittest still. And that neglects the idea that we are social creatures. It completely throws that out the window. We're all only out for ourself, period. That's the only thing that we can do. guy who's talking herb height herb titus is this guy's name yeah and he's a birth yeah hepatitis herb titus is this dude's name and he's a birther yeah oh god he's a complete he's a birther yeah he was sort of he had to pose legislation or

something he posed some kind of stuff to try he was a deposed something but he yeah he was against obama saying he wasn't born in Hawaii. And yeah, complete birther. It's funny when I listen to this and he's talking about how, well, you know, you can't build a society that's, you know, not based on God's laws. And I'm thinking like,

Norway's doing fine. Actually, that's going quite well. As a matter of fact, most of the Netherlands and Scandinavian they're doing quite well. As a matter of fact, most of the Netherlands and Scandinavian, they're doing quite well. Thank you. Their indexes of happiness are greater than ours. All of their measures of wealth and happiness and success are better than ours. And they are aggressively atheistic in terms of their, I mean, they're much less religious in general than our population.

In fact, our population here in the States is incredibly religious, much more religious than any other Western nation, which if you accept that as true, which I mean, it demonstrably is, and then you couple that with the initial premise that America's going to hell in a handbasket, don't you have to say, well, I mean, you can't initial premise that America is going to hell in a handbasket. Don't you have to say, well, I mean, if we're just going to draw correlations, I mean, there seems to be one there. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. That's worth making.

Yeah. And, you know, he's talking about God's law here. Let's talk about the Ten Commandments. Aren't the first three, like, don't look at another god because I'm really jealous? Like, isn't that like the first three commandments? There's only a couple in there that are really useful or worthwhile. The rest of them are kind of throwaway. So if we're talking about God's law, there's no law in our books right now that says I can't worship another god. That doesn't exist, but that's the first one.

Right. Or work on Sunday. Yeah, right. Covet. Our entire economic industry is based upon coveting stuff. It's a covet-based industry. It's a covet-based industry. What he also bags on the material worldview is being deterministic, right? But if God is omniscient,

that God knows everything that is going to happen, if everything that is going to happen is knowable, then it must be determined. So if you're just going to fucking stretch your logic train around, I mean, how is a material worldview any more or less deterministic than a religious worldview with an omniscient being.

No, I'm just saying that the conclusion that they come to in terms of this, you know, that they're saying that the U.S. needs to be more religious. It needs to revert back to its religious so that it could be glorious the way it once was like everything about that is wrong. I mean, the reason that the U.S. has been as successful, I mean, they all say it's the greatest country on Earth. It's the most successful. It's the most successful democracy. It paved the way in terms of what a nation can be. The reason that that is true is because of its secular nature. It was the first time that you had a government that was based upon a secular bunch of rules that

were scientific, the complete opposite of the conclusion they're coming to. And the fact that you had all of these religious-based governments, yeah, they had kings, they had heads of state, but they were still religiously based. They were still teaching out of that same book. All of the kingdoms in Europe were teaching out of the same book, in essence. The kingdoms in Europe were teaching out of the same book, in essence. And the U.S. was formed as something not based on that book.

And then they were successful. And these guys are saying, no, we need to base it on that book and be more successful, like the thing that they went away from because they were being oppressed by kings who believed in the same book. One of the things about this scene, and we're talking about because there's a part of this where they're out in front of Harvard, in Harvard Yard, if you will. They're over there and they look over at this plaque on the wall or this cement plaque that's sort of buried in a brick wall. And they're talking about this bit that Harvard put on the wall and they're saying, well, they used to be religious here and now they're not anymore. And I'm like, great, that's fucking Harvard.

Who cares? It's a private institution. Who cares whether they were religious before and they decided to drop the in God is truth and just go with truth. Who cares that they did it? What's the point of you sitting in Harvard? And I could not figure that out. Yeah, it's just to say that, again, things used to be more publicly religious.

Like, okay, and? So the sculptor put Christ on the thing? The word, you know, Christi on the thing? Christus, whatever it is? Okay, And? And what? No. That means okay?

I mean, they used to write opera house on the opera houses, and they still do. So that's one. That's stuck. That's stuck. You should be music-based because that's the way it – like, what? Oh, that's awesome. Yeah. You look at that and it's like, well, I think the only reason that they do that is because they know that the fucking knuckle dragging cretins who are going to watch this movie with with any kind of a credulous eye nodding their heads to the to the music and watching Kirk, you know, tie those little strings from nail to nail,

the only college they will recognize by name is Harvard, right? Because certainly they will not have attended one other than perhaps Liberty University. So there is no possibility. It's using the credibility of the name to make a point that they never actually make, to insinuate a point to sort of wink and a nudge in the direction of a point which they never come to conclusions are few and far between in this yeah they are but it's it's like well let's let's add some gravity to this

what's that what adds gravity i don't know uh just say harvard can we go to harvard can we look at something in harvard well it's it's the cake and eating it thing where they want to be able to say, look at this esteemed institution that is hundreds of years old, as old as the U.S., even older than the U.S. They used to say they used to have Christ and God in their motto. But then again, getting back to that cognitive dissonance thing, you know what those smarty pant college people are like. See, they've gotten rid of it. They've gotten rid of the Christ and the God in their motto. So you're both relying on the value of the institution and also relying on the fact that it's snooty, you know, northeast liberals that have ruined it. So, like, they want it both ways. Yeah, and isn't this, again, another subtle jab at Obama because he's from Harvard?

Sure. You know, I mean, aren't they? This is, I think, what they're trying to make the case against him without actually saying his name throughout the entire piece. You know, and if you want to torture logic, why not just say, well, you know, they got rid of, you know, in God is truth or whatever it said, because it was redundant. If God is truth, one simply has to say truth.

Right. Why say Christ, God, and then truth? Yeah, Christos, Dios, Veritas, or whatever. Why, yeah, just have Veritas. And shouldn't your truth be strong enough to carry through? If you are actually dealing with truth, why do you need to remind yourself where your truth is coming from? Do scientists have to post the theory of gravity as they're working on stuff, equations? Do you have to constantly have equals MC know, equals MC squared over your computer to

remind you of relativity? Yes, George. Otherwise it doesn't work. Otherwise it doesn't work. The incantation. You rely on the fact that it just doesn't need to proclaim itself. Speaking of things that aren't going to be working, let's, let's play Todd Akin's clip. Okay. Nice trick. You like that Tom? So Let's play Todd Akin's clip, okay? Nice trick. You like that, Tom? So let me play Todd Akin here. We cannot put our confidence in just pure democracy to make sure everything is going to keep running the way it is. You have to remember Hitler was elected with a great majority of German votes. Pure democracy was not viewed with anything other than skepticism by the founders.

They understood that freedom starts at the grassroots level, at the individual citizen, building families of righteous new patriots and citizens. That's what makes it work. Okay, so first off, I want to say that Hitler was not elected by a vast majority of people. That's not factually true. But, you know, we can't expect much less from legitimate rape Aiken. But I want to say also really quickly, too, that even if he was, let's just presume he was, we're all looking at that from the – we're able to look at it in hindsight like like, oh man, electing that Hitler guy was a bad idea, you know, but instead, you know, we're not looking at it as a, as a German in 1940, you know, looking at it and be like, oh, hey, I kind of like

this Hitler guy. I think he's better than the other guy. You know, we're totally looking at it differently. But I want to say, I want to say, George, we're going to go back to you, George. What the fuck is Aiken talking about? How many legitimate elections did Hitler hold after he got office?

They had a way of getting rid of him, it turns out. Yeah, with a can of gasoline and a cyanide pill, yeah, and the whole Russian army. See, when it's not a legitimate vote, they have ways of getting rid of him. Excellent. Yeah, it's not a legitimate vote, they have ways of getting rid of it. Excellent.

Yeah. Yeah, it's, you know, I'm glad that it took almost 80 minutes to get to Godwin's Law, you know, to invoke Hitler. Although in the first two minutes of the montage, there were pictures of Stalin, like, burning. Because early on in the film, they're going through that bad documentary thing of you say something and then you show that thing. So you say, you know, the breakup of the family, and then you show an image of a family, you know, a family being broken up or tyrants. And then you show a picture of Stalin. It's like, cause it's otherwise you wouldn't understand. Wait, you would have no idea. Who is this? What? Yeah. Yeah.

You need a visual representation of everything. So that's it's as redundant as possible. Right. I love it when, you know, at the time, he's a senator, congressman. What is he? He's a congressman. He's a congressman. I love it when a congressman or any politician, for that matter, can talk about how, yeah, pure democracy just really doesn't work.

Right. He just really doesn't work. The thing that I've dedicated my life to doing, the fact that I've decided to become an elected official, you know, it's just not good enough. It's just not good enough. Like, isn't that the gig? Isn't that what you're doing? Like, you're going to complain about the government from being inside the government? Right.

George, that's like you hating music. I know, yeah. I mean, I've become a drummer because, you know, I just, it takes more than drumsticks. You know, it takes, I just, it's not enough. It's not enough. Yeah. What?

I have no idea what he's even talking about there. And again, jab at Obama. I know that Glenn Beck does this all the time where they talk about, oh, well, Hitler was elected with a mass majority, even though it's not true. But the idea is to say, yes, you can. It doesn't matter that you elected him. He can still be a bad person. And here's how. That's what they try to do this all the time. And I think this is another jab at Obama.

It's instilling the idea that God is that failsafe. God and the religion ultimately will be that failsafe and that that will provide you with the morals. Yeah, you're right. You're right. And the problem is, is that historically, whenever religion and government are combined, like the first thing that goes out the door are morals. Religion and government are combined. Like the first thing that goes out the door are morals. Yeah. You know, any religious organization that gets some kind of power behind it rarely works out well. Rarely works out well. Tom, what do you think about this guy? I just think it's amazing the idea that you would have this whole movie centered around the idea of let's get back to what the pilgrims wanted.

Let's get back to what the founding fathers wanted. Let's get back to what the founding fathers wanted. Great. They set up a democracy. You know what I don't trust? Democracy. Wait, what? Huh? You don't trust democracy?

You just sucked the dick of every founding father for the last hour and 22 minutes. And now you're going to tell me, well, but that's not enough. Wait, what? What do you mean that's not enough. Wait, what? What do you mean that's not enough? That's the fucking premise of your argument. That is what you have built. That's I'm on. I've been on that train now for an hour and a half. And then all of a sudden you're just like, well, if I can derail that thing. Oh, OK, well, and then they don't propose an alternative. Right. It's like, well, a democracy is not enough. You've got to have God. OK, well, can you I mean, there's no practical example of that, of course, that's given. Right. It's like, well, you just you have to have God. Does God get a vote? Is he coming down?

Is he going to propose a referendum? Is he going to be like, well, you know, Colorado said yes to legalizing marijuana. But God has the ultimate veto and cast a big, his chads never hang. There's never a proposed idea of how this would actually work. I mean, they're implying that families need to be spiritual and religious in order to instill morals within their children. And then those children will be good citizens. Okay. What if you don't want to do that? What if you don't want to believe in that particular God? Or what if you want to believe in another God or no gods or whatever? What happens to those citizens?

Are they allowed to be Americans? They never addressed that issue. They're saying, yes, religion needs to be part of the government and part of the family and part of the education. OK, but I thought this was supposed to be this country where, you know, ideas can be exchanged and you can you can be whatever you want to be and believe in whatever you want to believe. And that's never addressed. What is stopping them from being Christians? Like, that's the that's the question I kept asking myself over and over. I'm like, OK, great.

You want your your wife to stay home because you saw it on a statue and teach your kid about the Bible. Awesome, man. Fucking do it. You're a movie star. Turns out you could fucking do that. But instead, it's just like, well, we need to instill values. Okay, instill them. Who's fucking stopping you?

Nobody's stopping you from instilling any fucking value you want, period. But it's like, oh, we've got to instill this. What are you doing here? Go instill your values. You're not instilling them fast enough. How can you mandate value installation through a government agency? Value

installation. Downloading values. And then who would police that, right? Because of course, if you're going to mandate it, you have toing values. And then who would police that, right? Because, of course, if you're going to mandate it, you have to police it. So then the government would come by and make sure. Now, we don't want a big government. We don't want top-down government. But if you're not instilling values properly, the government will determine whether your values are the right values and whether or not they're properly installed.

And if they have to reinstall them, they'll reinstall them. It's like they come by with, like, a values gauge and they just press it up against your melon. He's off the charts! And yet by every standard that can be measured, people today are way more moral and fair. Right. If you're talking about, okay, can I judge you based on what color your skin is or which dangly bits you have between your legs. Things

like that. You know, the idea of a level playing ground, all those stuff in every way that you can measure it. It's it's a much more fair society, a much more leveled society, a much less racist society, a much less sexist society. Yes, there's still a long way to go in many examples. But for the most part, there's the advances since, oh, I don't know, Plymouth have been pretty amazing. And the thing is, is that they just don't like the gay thing. They don't like the gay thing and they don't like the sex thing. That's what it's all about. That's what it's all about. They show a picture of, you know, he says something like, you know, what's going down at schools, which used to be embarrassed.

Now it's celebrated and they show a girl smoking a cigarette, which you used to be allowed to do in schools in the 50s. And not just that, but like like teen smoking is down so much. Right. It's statistically like not even a problem anymore. Another example of something which is actually better. Yeah. So it all comes down to you are kind of uncomfortable with the gay thing and the sex thing. That's pretty much what it comes down to, because in any other kind of way that you can measure it in terms of morality, really, things are way better and they're the best that they've ever been. Things are way better and they're the best that they've ever been. I mean, but George, does this really come back to, I mean, does this really come back to maybe they like it a little better when the women didn't have such a loud voice? You think?

Yeah, you know, I mean, maybe that's why they're going back to this. Of course. Well, let's finish this up. Well, let's finish this up. Let me play what I guess would be Kirk's closing statements. This jumbled mess of a man is going to say a bunch of stuff. My questions were answered on this journey. I've learned that the solution to the crisis we're in as a nation, economically, morally, and spiritually, is not to blame someone else. The responsibility to secure freedom for my family lies in my hands.

For 400 years, we've had the strategy. We've got the game plan. And it's produced a nation that is healthy and strong and free. And every time we've strayed from it, we've suffered the consequences. The seed that grew this nation was faith in God. That faith produces character, a character that produces great courage,

courage to self-govern, courage to guide and educate our children in the right worldview, and the courage to elect today's liberty men and women who will take the torch from our forefathers. The answer doesn't begin at the White House. It begins at your house. I'm no longer going to sit on the sidelines and do nothing. I'm going to get involved. And I know there are millions who feel like I do. As for me and my family, we're going this way. The way of our heroes who fought against all odds and changed the world. The time is now.

and changed the world. The time is now. Join me, and together, we will secure a monumental future for our children. So, Tom, I'm going to be, by the way, Tom, I'm going to refer to you from now on as Liberty Man. So, Liberty Man, let's make, try to help us make sense of these closing statements.

Again, it's, it's the faulty premise, right? That, I mean, the very first thing that he brings up is America's in a crisis. And as George pointed out, and as I pointed out earlier, no, it's not, no, that's not, that's not a true, you missed the true in that, but you know, the idea is America's in a crisis. And what idea he's his idea is america's in a crisis and what we've got to do is revert back to you know his selective dream vision that he's conjured up in this hallucination of a movie about how the world used to be and it's uh you listen to this and it's like well come join me and it's like, well, come join me. And it's like, join you. Are you fucking kidding me? The day I look at Kirk Cameron as my fearless leader peering squinty eyed off into the brave distance.

Uh-uh. No, I have forfeit everything important to me the day that I fucking follow in that idiot's footsteps. The thing is, within that same statement, though, he says how awesome America is. So he says there's an American crisis. And then he says we have to fight for our freedom. And I think, okay, what freedom don't you have? How are you not free?

The freedom to reduce your freedoms. And then he says, you know, that we've built this country to be the most amazing country ever in the history of anything. It's like, well, which is it? Yeah. You can't have all those things. I mean, you can't either.

We are crappy and we need to get better or we're not. And it's OK. And you just don't like the gay stuff. Yeah. That's what it's like. He doesn't like gays. You don't like

seeing your non-wife's boobs and the gay because maybe you actually do like seeing non-wife's boobs and the gay.

Yeah. Yeah. That's exactly it. I love that he says in there, he's like, every time we've strayed from this

ideal, we've suffered the consequences. And I'm thinking, what does that even mean? Point to a point in history where we've suffered the consequences of what you're saying. It doesn't exist. You're making shit up again like you have for the last hour and 20 minutes of this movie.

And this is such a won't you think of the children moment, right? Like won't somebody think of the children? Me and my family, we're going off here to the left. Won't you follow us around? Well, not to the left. Not to the left at all. We are actually going far right, very far right. Yes.

All right. I'm not sitting on the sidelines anymore. You know all those YouTube videos and Ray Comfort stuff that I've been doing for the last 10 years? That's, you know, that was sitting on the sidelines anymore. You know all those YouTube videos and Ray Comfort stuff that I've been doing for the last 10 years? That's, you know, that was sitting on the sidelines. Now I'm really going to get into it. I'm going to step it up and make a direct-to-DVD movie. That'll teach him. I used to hold up pictures of crocodiles.

No longer. I think it's a mistake or a miscalculation to call him stupid, to call Kirk Cameron stupid, because it's the guy's not stupid. The guy is very misdirected and the guy is very earnest. And I think he absolutely has, you know, his kids future at heart, you know, in his mind. I mean, in the beginning, one thing that I thought was interesting was he says, you know, my friends that I attend church with, we watch the world and the world is going to hell in a handbasket. He actually uses that phrase, hell in a handbasket. And some of my friends that attend church with us say, hey, this is great because this means that Jesus is coming.

And I say to them, well, wait a minute, I have kids and I want the future to be bright for my kids. And I thought, you know what? Again, cognitive dissonance. Like which is it? Right. Totally. Which is it? If you know that God has this plan to bring Jesus back and to have the apocalypse in Armageddon, then this should be exciting on some level. But do you deep in your heart of hearts realize that that's bullshit and that you want things to be better?

So there is this glint of potentiality and possibility and actual thinking that could be within him. And I think we just do a disservice to ourselves also when we just say this is an ignorant motherfucker. Because he's not. He's not. He's not. I mean, he's he's he put this thing together. And again, the conclusions that he comes to are just completely wrong. And there's an ignorance and a sort of a celebration of ignorance, which is abhorrent. But I hesitate to call the guy just stupid, you know. So, George, you're a musician.

What what did you think about the music in this movie? Yeah, you know, I've never scored a film, and I have incredible respect for it. I've never tried to do it, and in the little kind of pseudo back-of-my-mind way that I've thought about, you know, scoring a movie or whatever, it's a very daunting kind of idea. So I don't know the particulars,

and I wouldn't want to necessarily call call it out but it was shit you have to be very careful of of you know when there's a dramatic moment and you just play the absolute lowest note that you can on your synthesizer you know it's like okay And then that kind of rock rock, too. I thought there was a little bit of a discord between the historical setting of some of the stories and some of the moments and then the kind of modern rock setting of some of the stuff. But, you know, it wasn't it wasn't I have heard much worse music in movies and documentaries that are independently done. So, again, I was pleased at the just recording quality of it. And it wasn't too obtrusive. There were a couple of chuckle moments where you get drama, drama moment.

Oh, yeah. Or the twangy sort of westerny rock thing that they were playing over and over. It's almost like there's going to be a gunfight. Yeah, I think it's kind of going for that Tarantino drama. Something's about that. Like your mind's about to be blown, man. Never did that happen. So I'm going to give you guys the floor if you have any other comments you want to say about this film.

I'm going to give it to Tom first. If you have any other comments you want to say about this film, I'm going to give it to Tom first. Tom, anything else you want to say? I just want to emphasize this. The premise is just wrong. The premise, the very notion. And it really does bother me. It bothers me a lot. This idea of going back to that grand old time in America where everything was gay and better.

Well, not gay. But everything was gay and better and well, not gay, but everything was better and everybody was happier and everybody's ships rose. And unless you were poor or a child, you know, a laborer or an African-American or a Mexican or a Chinese or an Irish. OK, fine. Everything was good for, you know, everything was, there was never a time in America that was better than right now. This is the best it has ever been. And it is likely to continue to be the best it has ever been. Tomorrow will very likely be better than today. That's the way progress works. And I look at this and, you know, I know George, you said, you know, he's not, he's not an idiot. He's not a dumb guy. And I think that maybe you're right. Maybe he's not an idiot. Maybe he's not a dumb guy, but he's not intellectually honest at all. He's not even a fragment. He's earnest. His heart is in what he perceives as the right place. I think he genuinely

cares for himself, for his country, for his family. You get a sense of caring. You get a sense that this is a guy who would help you jumpstart your car in the middle of the night on the side of the road. But this is not a man who's honest. He is not being intellectually honest. There's no way that he approached history, that he approached the world, that you can't look back at the last hundred years and point to a 10 year span and say, that was better. You can't look back at the last 400 years and point to a 10-year span and say, that was better if I was a poor person or a black person or a woman or a child or a person who was ill. You know, it's such a myopic worldview that this movie appeals to that when I watch it, I shudder to think of the people who are sympathetic to it.

It's a movie that I would discourage our listeners from even watching on YouTube for fear that it might have some perceived popularity. It is that useless. George, do you have any final comments? The thing that struck me is that the argument that's being made in this film has been made again and again throughout all of history. And just like you said, I mean, at every point in history, people think it's the worst it's ever been.

And by sheer fact, it's the best it's ever been. So people were making the same argument 30 years ago, 50 years ago, 100 years ago, that things are awful. We need to get back to a more of a puritanical kind of a pure religious thing. We need to get back to what the founding fathers intended. This argument was being made during the Civil War. This argument was being made in the 50s when the civil rights movement was happening. And it just, to presume that somehow this generation is immune from that same kind of lack of vision and understanding is awful.

And the other thing that really bugged me is that the film, when you look at kind of the box that it comes in, it's sort of sold as as this is like a real life national treasure movie. You know, with what is running around, looking at the cage, you know, looking on the back of that, it's kind of like we're going to go and we're going to examine documents and and these monuments. I mean, yeah, it's called monumental. So we're going to look and we're going to find this sort of secret message that has been left to us. And basically he went two places. He went to England and then he went, you know, and looked at the statue. Yeah. He hit Texas because the guy happens to have a lot of old Bibles. Great. George hosts a podcast called the Geologic Podcast. George,

if people were going to find your podcast, where would they go? a podcast called the Geologic Podcast. George, if people were going to find your podcast, where would they go? You can go to georgehrob.com. That's the portal for everything, my music, my podcast, everything else. Or just go to geologicpodcast.com.

George, thanks so much for joining us. We really appreciate it. Yeah, George, thanks for being on. This was a great time. My pleasure. Anytime, anytime. All right, so Tom, we're going to burn through some email here, but first we're going to play a couple of things that we got. We wound up getting something from the AKA, the Australian Kookaburra Association.

Yeah, we were admonished to say it properly, so I'm going to give it hell here. Okay, go. Kangaroo. Close. I think that was close. That's probably the closest you've done. I'm going to give it hell here. Okay, go. Kangaroo. Close. I think that was close. That's probably the closest you've done. I'm going to try now. Koala.

No, no, no. You're way off. It's pronounced platypus. Okay. We're assholes. You know that? So anyway, we're going to play that. Dumbass sent us a voicemail.

We also got something. We got a song from Carlos, and I want to say straight away that if you're listening to this outside on speakers somewhere, you may want to put in your earbuds before you play it because he drops a lot of different racial words. He drops all the bombs. And I don't mean cracker. I don't mean honky. I mean he drops other racial words that you might want to, I don't know, put your fucking earbuds in for. So the last thing we're going to end up with here is a voicemail from a young atheist who does not leave his name.

We're going to finish up with that, but there's four of them right in a row for you. Hey, Phil. Hey there, Gilly. What's you up to this Sunday or Monday, depending on when it's uploaded? Well, I'm going to listen to Cognitive Dissonance. Cognitive Dissonance? What's that? It's a skeptical podcast that I love to listen to.

Here's a song about it. Guy. Whenever it kicks in. Where am I? I think I shit in my pants. Oh, there it is. Cognitive dissonance. It's so fun to listen to.

Oh, oh shit, here comes the breakdown. Oh, yeah. Swag, swag. Where my niggas at? Swag, swag, yeah. Whereas at? Swag, swag, yeah Where my bitches at? Cognitive dissonance Get your dick sucked when you listen to that shit

Man, get them bitches all up on your dick Fuck your niggas, bruh Fuck your niggas, bruh Fuck your niggas, bruh Bass guy, nigga Bass guy, nigga Swag, swag, swag Yeah

Now you know Well, I'll be sure to listen to it. Hey, guys. It's your friendly neighborhood dumbass here from dumbassguy.info. Listen, I have a little something that I want to talk to you about. You see, I've had this tune running through my head for a little while, and I couldn't figure out exactly where I heard it. It went like this.

Hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm, hmm. And I just kept on going over and over in my head, and it was driving me crazy. I just couldn't figure out what it was. Then I listened to your second-to-last podcast, and I realized what the song was. Who's that guy on the other side of the globe? It's Jesus. So, first of all, what I want to say is, fuck both of you for putting that in my head. But that being said, there's a little question about this that maybe you can help me out with. Now that I remember what the song was, I can't help but wonder. In this song, is Jesus on the receiving or the giving end of the glory hole?

This is the kind of thing that keeps a dumbass awake at night, and I'll understand if you no longer want to have anything to do with me after this, but hear me out. I mean, they say God giveth, right? So, since Jesus is God, maybe he's the one giving the pleasure. But then I got to thinking that maybe there's a clue in the song itself. It starts off with the question, who's that guy on the other side of the glory hole? So the glory hole is working as it was intended to preserve anonymity. But then, all of a sudden he knows. It's Jesus. So what happened to tip him off?

It's Jesus. So, what happened to tip him off? Now, hear me out. What if Jesus wasn't the one giving, but the one receiving? And the reason that I figured it out was because he was suddenly squirted with holy, glowing Jesus seed, and it cured his jealousy or something. Then, don't mistake about it. It has to be Jesus.

I think I might be onto something, but I thought I'd ask you guys and see what you think. Maybe you can consult Hillbilly God for the answer. Let me know. Thanks. Who's that guy on the other side? God damn it! Oh, I forgot to hang up. G'day.

This is Michael Farrell from the Australian Kookaburra Association, aka, aka. It's been brought to our attention that on the last episode of your podcast, Cognitive Dissidence, that you disparagingly used Kookaburra in a bad way. By the way, we nearly missed it because you said kookaburra or something stupid like that. It's kookaburra. All right.

Anyway, the Australian Kookaburra Association, aka, aka, has had an emergency committee meeting and we think you should apologise to the native Australian kingfisher. We consider that your penalty should be twofold. One, on your next podcast, you should correctly pronounce the word kookaburra. It's kookaburra, not kookaburra or something stupid like that. So, you should apologise for using it in a disparaging way. Alright you arseholes, don't do it again. Wankers. Don't do it again.

Wankers. Hello, Cecil and Tom. This is a young atheist who lives in a very, very, very Christian-y household. And I just wanted to call to tell you I love the show. It's really quite wonderful. And also, what would you suggest for people who are young and atheists in very, very Christian-y households such as myself? Once again, I really like the show. Hope to see you guys keep doing it for a long time. Goodbye. So let's talk to the young atheist first, Tom. What kind of advice would you give to somebody who's growing up in a very, very Christian-y household, as he says? Nothing you can do, man.

Suck it up. Stay at home while they're supporting you. I mean, you've got two choices. Stay at home or leave. Those are your two options. You're not going to convert them to atheism. They're not probably going to soften. You know, if you're a young person and you're not financially viable out in the world on your own, you do what your parents tell you to do until the day that you don't need to.

Then you go off and make your own life in the world and establish yourself as an adult. I really don't see another option. So let's talk a little bit about Dumbass. Dumbass, thank you very much for listening and sending in a voicemail. I will say that when that guy says, who's that guy on the other side of the glory hole? It's Jesus. I think you're missing the point. I don't think he's any of the participants. I just think he's a voyeur. Because God, I mean, God is the largest voyeur. I mean, he's watching you all the time. He's watching you touch yourself all right now. If you're touching, which you probably are. How did you know? Look, I channel hillbilly God once in a while. No, but, uh, but he,

but he knows, I mean, he's like, he's like a, he's like a, an old person, Santa Claus. He knows when you're naughty and nice to your privates. So, so, uh, so I think that's, he's like an old person Santa Claus. He knows when you're naughty and nice to your privates. So I think that's the key here, dumbass. I think you're missing it. I think you are presuming that there's not a crowd watching. And actually, I think you've got a good point because Jesus, over the last 2,000 years, give or take, has not proven himself to be terribly participatory. participatory. Yeah.

I want to talk, I want to thank Carlos for the song We Will Not. Carlos will be using that as a new theme song. But we want to, we want to thank you for creating it,

I guess. And, and also, Kookaburro. That's all I'm saying. That's, that's true. Yeah,

Kookaburro. Kookaburro. I think that's, I think that about sums it up. So we got a couple more emails we want to burn through, but I want to talk quickly about a comment we got on Facebook. Someone had mentioned this was on our page, and I think they listened because they talk a little bit about the show. They said, why did we laugh at the person who got nutritional information from their chiropractor and wound up killing their fucking kid?

got nutritional information from their chiropractor and wound up killing their fucking kid. Why do we laugh at them when there's 300,000 people a year die in doctors, regular medical doctors custody or under the supervision of medical doctors? That number was a little off. I looked it up. It's actually according to Wikipedia, which could be wrong, although they source things out. I didn't check their sources, but it was 225,000 people was the number they were using. But in any case, I left a message to tell you why, and then you left a novel for me to respond to, which I'm not going to write a

response to. I just want to quickly respond. You left a lot of anecdotes there. Basically, you used to work as a person who was a receptionist in a place where they did alternative medicine and you saw people get better, that's all well and good, but that doesn't prove anything. That's not science. That's just anecdotes. So just because some people get better when they think they're being treated doesn't necessarily mean that it actually works.

The placebo is a big thing, and there's other things that could be taken to effect that could be misdiagnosed. There's lots of things to take into effect. There's no science behind what you said. It's just your experience, which I really can't do anything with. And that is, like I said before, there's alternative medicine and then there's medicine. Alternative medicine is the stuff that doesn't work. You said that's a cute statement, but it's a true statement. We use willow bark to get rid

of headaches. We don't call it willow bark. We call it aspirin. So there's a there's a, you know, the holistic approach to medicine that pardon me, that the natural the natural cures and things that we find we incorporate into medicine. You know, one of the things that she also mentions is that, you know, it's the old big pharma conspiracy comment that, you know, if a cure for cancer were to be invented, there's too much money to be made in treating cancer for that to leak into the public. So it's actually more cost effective for cancer to stay untreatable. I have heard this argument so many times and I dismiss this argument. I dismiss it because it's false on its this argument so many times and I and I dismiss this argument. I dismiss it because it's false on its its face for so many reasons.

The first of which is let's not forget that the people who work at pharmaceutical companies are still people. The scientists are humans. They're researchers, the lab assistants. It's not one guy invents the cure for cancer and tucks it in his pocket and sneaks up to the boardroom and tells the CEO and the CEO. That doesn't sound. That's how that works. It's also not the case that pharmaceutical companies are the only ones doing research. Universities, of course, do a tremendous, tremendous amount of research, as do some independent hospitals. So research is done. And also, of course,

all across the world, we're not the only country that does medical research. So this idea that America's big pharmaceutical industry, their complex is hush hushing the cure for cancer. It just it doesn't really make a whole lot of sense. It doesn't take into account all the other avenues for research. It also doesn't take into account that these are people whose wives and daughters and sons and dads and maybe themselves may develop cancer at some point. And it would be advantageous for them personally, selfishly to get that out. And if you invent the cure for cancer, I'm sorry, I keep going. But if you invent the cure for cancer, all the cities, all the streets and all the statues are named after you tomorrow. Right. You can go to any subway and get a footlong sandwich free any time for the rest of your life.

You are a hero amongst heroes. You make Jonas Salk look like fucking Hitler. That's that's what a hero you are at that point. So I I just don't I just don't buy that argument. I don't think it's reasonable. And also, I mean, I think it throws out the idea, too. You're saying that only these people are in it. These people are only in it for the money. Obviously, this big pharma is only doctors are only in it for the money.

First off, that's a cynical worldview. There's a lot of people who get into medicine and medical research to help other people. I know, I know a couple myself and I don't know a lot of doctors, but I know a few myself. And so specifically that doesn't make any sense. These are just like you said, they're people, but also the alternative medicine people are not giving away their services for free. They are charging people. And then sometimes an immense amount of money. This Brzezinski clinic that you bring up charges people $20,000 a month for treatment. So don't try to say that they're these saints that are giving away these cures for free. First off, they're not curing anything because there's no physical proof that they're actually curing anything. And secondly, they're definitely not giving it away for free because they have house payments and boat payments and, you know, they got to put their kids through college. So

they're not giving anything away for free either. So I don't understand even why that even gets into the conversation. And Brzezinski's neoplaston therapies, you know, they are unproven therapies. You can decide otherwise, but they are unproven therapies. He has not submitted papers to peer review journals. He has not submitted his evidence. He's not submitted any of his documentation through the normal channels for research to be verified. He has he can't be shut down because he's holding clinical trials, but he's been doing clinical trials now for years and years and charging crazy money for it. It's a scam to make money. These people aren't getting better.

If he wanted to go the right route, he would publish his results in a paper, allow them to be replicated and verified and get that treatment out into the world. You want to talk about a cynical money making worldview. This guy is that. I also want to say, too, that this might not be your show because we are never going to stop making fun of quacks, chiropractors, Reiki people, acupuncturists, holistic medicine. We're never going to stop making fun of that because until they prove, until they come out and prove, and we've said this before, if there is a medical journal that comes out and says this stuff is legit, we will fucking eat our hat. But at this point, I'm not going to be pulling punches on somebody who gets their nutritional advice from a chiropractor, even though I don't know exactly what happened between the chiropractor and the patient. It's not about that. It's about the fact that this woman chose to wait until the very last second to take her child to a doctor who could easily fix the problem by giving the child an IV.

So we got an email, and the title of it is Atheism, Nillism, Anarchy, and Dolphins. So, Tom, first, in the Skeptics Creed, this is a question I had too. What the hell did the dolphins ever do to you? It's all the fucking dolphin nutters, man. You want to see some weird shit, Google around for the dolphin nutters, man, that believe that dolphins communicate with intergalactic

beings telepathically and all this crazy... Oh, come on. That's from the Hitchhiker's Guide. It's crystal pyramid bullshit. I mean, it's... They don't really think that, do they? Yeah, you gotta Google that shit. That's spectacular. I'm not bullshit. I mean, it's they don't really think that, do they? You got to Google that shit. That's spectacular. I'm not going to. I've had my dose of anger for the night.

So are we all nihilists in denial, Tom? No. This email I'm going to read real quick because I don't want to paraphrase. This person is having an argument with somebody. She argues that without a God to defer our morality to, we are like the blind man and the elephant making choices based on a very limited scope of perception. Once ethics and morality are turned into opinions, they lose their meaning. I would agree if ethics and morality were turned into opinions, they would be less meaningful, perhaps. But I don't agree that ethics and morality are a matter of opinion.

For a great reason example, I would refer you to Sam Harris's book that we just talked about, The Moral Landscape. He puts forward an incredibly persuasive argument about how ethics and morality are not relative. They're not subjective opinions, but they are real consequences of thoughtful decisions made by people with an eye toward bettering their world around them. So we got an email from George, not George Harab, a different George. George says the title is a profanity. He says, love the show. I think you guys are wrong to completely dismiss the impact of profanity. I don't mind it in your show.

However, liberal use in everyday interaction severely degrades one image of one's image of others. In short, it is a thing, a very bad thing, if not taken seriously. Keep the good work. Hey, I agree. I don't use I don't use profanity when I'm around my in-laws, it turns out, because they don't like profanity and they don't say it. And so I don't do it. I don't use profanity. A lot of times if you listen to our show, sometimes when there's guests, especially guests I'm not familiar with, I won't swear.

I will I'll be very careful with it when I'm at work. I rarely swear once in a great while. So I recognize and I think Tom and I recognize that there are there is a time and a place for profanity. But I will say clear as day here that I am comfortable talking to Tom. And when I when I talk to him. And, uh, when I, when I talked to him, we just have a comfortable conversation. That means I can let my guard down and I can swear whenever I want. And I do. And that's, and that's, that's what you're getting. So this show, while it is a public show is also a private conversation. That's what it starts out as.

You guys get to hear the finished product, but it's a private conversation that we happen to share. So that's why you're hearing profanity from us, and that's why we use it in a great amount because Tom and I are very comfortable with each other. So we want to thank George from the Geologic Podcast for coming on and doing the show. Geologic Podcast for coming on and doing the show. George has a wonderful podcast called The Geologic Podcast that you can find at georghrab.com. We're going to link to this. George is also a musician, so if you want to listen to some of his music, maybe buy some of his music, he sells it through his website.

His podcast, Tom, whenever I listen to it, I am always smiling. The man is an excellent entertainer. Uh, he's wonderful at it and everything he does on his show is just entertaining. It's just an entertaining show. So if you like George on this show, give him a shot on his show. He's incredibly talented and I'm so generous with his time. We're so lucky to have him on the show. I really do genuinely mean that. What a cool guy. We're going to have a show early before Thanksgiving, we hope. This show's coming out a little early. We're going to put the next one up

I think probably on Thanksgiving. Stay tuned for that. Be fucking thankful for it. Thankful. You're not going to be thankful for our show. That's the one thing you're going to be not thankful for. We thank everybody. We're sorry we didn't get to all the email this time. We're going to be thankful. You're not going to be thankful for our show. That's the one thing you're going to be not thankful for. But we thank everybody. We're sorry we didn't get to all the email this time.

We're running a little long this time. We apologize for the long show. Ben, as always, we're going to leave you with the Skeptic's Creed. Credulity is not a virtue. It's fortune cookie cutter, mommy issue, hypno-Babylon bullshit. Couched in scientician, double bubble, toil and trouble, pseudo-quasi-alternative, Thank you. 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, Atlantis, dolphins, truthers, birthers, witches, wizards, vaccine nuts, shaman healers, evangelists, conspiracy, double-speak stigmata, nonsense. Expose your sides. Thrust your hands.

Bloody, evidential, conclusive. Doubt even this. The statements made on this program do not express the views or opinions of anybody, not even the host. Any resemblance to coherent thoughts or ideas is purely accidental. Cecil and Tom are committed to minimizing all such misunderstandings. Bye.