Cognitive Dissonance - Episode 78: War on Xmas

Episode Date: December 16, 2012

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Today's show is brought to you by Audible. Please visit audiblepodcast.com forward slash dissonance pod for your free audiobook download. This is something that I put together in response to the media response of the school shooting this week in Connecticut. Bury it on the back page, behind the ads for shitty cars and after the wedding announcements. Journalistic hucksterism to glorify monsters, a carefully cultivated breeding program to churn out disaster, as if hate and glory and depravity were an endangered species.

We dress the set like a porno, getting the blue and red light flickering off congealed pools, tight close-ups of wet sloppy faces and fluttering hands, always prepared for that money shot. A broken body is good, but it doesn't even better. Horror reduced to token plot lines. Pale, shaky excuses for the next set of images. Raw and real.

Amateurs and professionals get their turn. Water cooler pundits salivating for a shot of skin. Another savaging. Public, prolonged, and pointless. But airtime sells like hotcakes when the bodies pile up. And we wring our hands. Wipe the sweat from brows. And when the last overwrought tone thunders through studio speakers.

And we are done. Collapsed. Spent. Exhausted. We'll shake empty heads. Suddenly nervous as a maiden maiden and wonder how this could have happened again 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. So Cecil, our first story is from the everywhere. Obviously, this is the story that sort of defined the last seven days, and it's a story I think we'd be remiss not to lead off with. The Westboro Baptist Church is planning to picket the Sandy Hook Elementary School. The Sandy Hook Elementary School obviously is the site of the massacre that occurred last

week in Connecticut. And Westboro Baptist Church is going to show up, or at least they're planning on showing up. Now, Facebook organizations and I've seen other organizations are already planning a human chain to disrupt them from doing this. But you'd be hard pressed, I think, to find an action at this point, like with how raw the country seems to be over this event, that is more despicable right now than picketing in elementary school. Yeah, I do find, though, that through this act of blatant stupidity and I hesitate to call it evil, but certainly trying to incite like they're trying to incite through this act that they're trying to incite other people about. We get, I think, some of the best moments of us coming together and the best moments of us really uniting as a community to tell them to go fuck themselves.

tell them to go fuck themselves. And this is a great way to start a chain of events that are positive in this negative light. The Westboro Baptist Church does this to service funerals all the time, to servicemen who come home, and a thousand bikers will show up and rev their engines to basically encircle these morons and make it so they can't even be hurt. And this will absolutely happen there. This is going to happen. There's no way you could stop people from the counter protest. And there's no reason, obviously there's no reason for violence because it's just speech and they're allowed to do what they want, but you're allowed to do what you want. And if you want to stand

in between you and these families and this Westboro Baptist church to protect these families, I think that's a beautiful, wonderful thing to do. You know, I think you made a good point. When events like this occur, and let's be perfectly clear, they're going to happen. Like terrible, maybe it's not this event, but terrible, tragic shit is going to happen. You got a country full of 360 million people. Terrible, tragic shit is going to happen. And when that happens, you're always going to have a segment of the population who is going to almost, it feels almost intentional to single themselves out as the villain. It feels almost intentional to single themselves out as the villain.

And when they do that, you get this outpouring of support that is incredible. I mean, it's just incredible. We saw this. We've seen this so many times. The United States is a very charitable country. We're not charitable from a governmental level as much as I'd like to see, but from an individual level, from a grassroots level, when the shit hits the fan, people band together. And, you know, the presence of a villain is a wonderful focal point about which to revolve, you know, to push against. And you get something like this happening, like Westboro is going to

show up, you know, that's going to cause, like you say, probably thousands, hundreds for sure, of people to show up. And that's what the families are going to hopefully see. They're going to see the support, this outpouring of support from their community, from communities all over the country. I've seen, you know, this week already a number of, you know, toy drives and other sorts of charitable drives and events. My wife is doing one. These things, I hate to say it, but they do bring out the best in people. It sounds terrible to say that tragedy brings out the best, but it does because it, it, it mobilizes, it focuses, it gives people an opportunity to reassert their basic goodness and their humanity and the things about them as a community that

are worth keeping. And the Westboro Baptist Church is awesome in this regard. I mean, they really are because there's hardly any of them. There's like 30 of them or something. Yeah, it tops 30 of them. And they're going to show up and they're going to be horrible human beings. And they're going to be functionally irrelevant. And they won't even be seen or heard.

I think, too, Tom, this is a perfect opportunity to find the scumbags. Right? This is the moment that we have an opportunity for. that we have an opportunity for – it's like every time a tragedy like this happens, there's – the scumbags just like glow in the dark. And they bring themselves to the fore. So anybody who's clamping onto this to use it so that they can push their religious agenda, who are saying this is why this happens because there's no churches and no prayer in school.

Huckabee's doing this. That fucking dickhead from the American Family Association is doing this. Those people are despicable human beings who are the equivalent to ambulance chasers. I mean, they are disgusting, awful, low-life bottom feeders who all they can do, and that's an ad hominem attack, right? But that's not why they're wrong. They are wrong in doing this because they are profiting off and using this tragedy as a springboard for their own pet project for their own, uh, for their own, not only their own personal, uh, their own personal, uh, what is it? Aggrandizement. I don't even know if that's a word, but I just said it.

So there it is. Um, but their own, their, their, their pushing themselves forward and they're pushing their call, their shitty little cause forward through this tragedy. And you get a chance to, I mean, the fucking spotlight is on them. They're putting themselves in the spotlight. They're saying, look at the fucking kind of despicable human being I am. And you're just like, oh, my God, what a despicable human being. Mike Huckabee, you're an awful person.

Yeah, it really is. Like, I think you hit the nail on the head. It's a litmus test for absolutely. Yeah. And it turns brown. Well, there you go. The strip turned brown. Well, you know, Brian Fisher.

That's his name. Yeah. Brian Fisher came out and said some awful shit. You know, he basically said, hey, God doesn't go where he's not wanted. God's a gentleman. So he didn't intervene. He did. He didn't intervene in the school.

He holds the door for every nun that goes to heaven. He's like, come on in, ladies. Can I pull your chair out for you? Oh, my God. Can I pull your chair out for you? Can I stand by mute while fucking your children are slaughtered at a school? Yeah, no kidding. Because I'm a gentleman.

Yeah, a gentleman. I don't go where I'm not wanted. Can you imagine another gentleman who's like, ooh, I hear gunshots in there. I'd like to go in. I could stop that. In fact, it would be easier than blinking my eye because I have limitless power. So I could stop this from occurring. It means nothing to me.

There's no expenditure of limitless energy to stop this from occurring. But I haven't been invited properly. So, and I'm really going to just let the children die. I'm just going to let them fucking experience terror and death and agony because, you know, their parents didn't let me in their school. That's the kind of God you worship. Doesn't this sort of point out? I mean, when you hear them say these things, aren't you just like, wow, you really don't have any moral standing whatsoever. Like you have seeded that immediately.

That Kent Hovind guy, that younger creationist basically said the same thing. I can't even hear. Like he's like, he's like so fucking down below. I know. He's like one of those, uh, speakers that you can't hear. Uh, you could just feel. It's like lower than 20 hertz. He's like the brown note.

He's the brown note of human speech. He's the brown note, but he's the one who's always taking the verbal shit. Yeah, no kidding, right? Like, that's the thing. He's like, his assholery actually makes him just constantly spew forth bile and shit. You know, this really has become one of those, like, one of those issues that, like you said, people use this for their self-aggrandizement. And they use this for, as an opportunity to push forward an agenda, a moral agenda. And this is not a time to push forward a moral agenda.

You know, this is a time to, if you want to do anything, this is a time to try to find ways to rally around the people who are affected by this directly. Because the rest of us are affected indirectly. The rest of us are affected in the sense that we read a terrible, tragic story and we feel sad about it. But at the end of the day, our nights don't change. Our days don't change. We open our front doors and we're greeted by the same people as yesterday. And that's not true for some people in Connecticut. and were greeted by the same people as yesterday.

And that's not true for some people in Connecticut. And so the only thing to do right now that's appropriate, the only thing to do is to try to find ways, if you feel like you need to act, to support those people in Connecticut who are directly affected by this and then to wait and shut the fuck up. Yeah. Because it's not a time for moral grandstanding, especially this religious moral grandstanding.

If anything, this highlights the absurdity of the idea of a beneficent God. Yeah, absolutely. And this is also a time to shut off the 24-hour news cycle. This is a perfect time. Yes, it is. The other day, Tom, I got an alert that this happened on my phone from CNN. And between then and when I got home from where I was, I must have gotten 15 different alerts on my phone from CNN. And between then and when I got home from where I was, I must have gotten 15 different alerts on my phone from CNN. Now, CNN used to send out an alert like once a week to me about something big that happened, maybe once a week. I must have

gotten 15 alerts that day. I uninstalled the app on my phone. You don't get to follow me around and force me to hear about this. You don't get to do that. My phone is in my pocket all the time. And I constantly turn it on to check if I have messages and things. And if that's the first thing I see, that may be the story I go to. And they're fucking ghouls by using this to try to get me to their site. And I removed it. I was like, fuck you. You don't get to tell me what I get to think about today. And yes, it's a tragedy. It's awful. But I know literally nothing about it because I chose to separate myself from that information this week.

There's nothing to be gained from it. Do I know that there was a shooting? Yeah. Do I know people died? Yeah. That's all I need to know. That's all I need to know. I don't need to know exactly how he did it.

He stepped between this classroom and this classroom. He followed this path. Oh, here's all I need to know. That's all I need to know. I don't need to know exactly how he did it. He stepped between this classroom and this classroom. He followed this path. Oh, here's the sheriff. Let's talk to him. Okay. The sheriff says he doesn't have any information, but we're going to show you that for on fucking repeat for six hours. It's ridiculous. The news cycle is repeating this process. And what they're doing is they're using our own empathy against us. The people who, the person who did this, and I know nothing about them, but they were trying to hurt an individual. Right. Or a group of individuals. And what they wind up doing is hurting the rest of America because we glom onto this because we're emotional people who are we're we're empathic, empathetic people who try to find ourselves or put ourselves in this story and who grieve for these people.

And they're hurting the entirety of America through this 24-hour news cycle, and they recognize it. And there's a reason why these things keep happening. Is gun control a problem? Yeah, we need to have some gun control. Is mental health issues a problem? Yeah, we need to have some mental health issue things that get looked at. But the media is a problem here here and they are basically procreating these things.

Oh, yeah. The step-by-step recreation of the events, the constant – and let's not pretend too that a certain faction of the media doesn't love it when this happens. This is selling fucking ass tons of advertising. I hate to break that down, but it is. You know, people are glued to the television set and in the vein hope that they'll see something, some ameliorating fact about the event, which can help bring to them some closure, some peace, some sense of, you know, some letting up of the despair. And the constant question that always arises when something like this happens and you become immersed in the story is why. And there is no good why.

The good whys are too complicated. Yeah, fucking A there. So people glue themselves to CNN and MSN and Fox and all these other 24-hour news outlets. And, you know, they don't notice that a bounty commercial is on, and they don't notice that Swiffer Wetjet is advertising, and all these other companies are just absolutely falling all over themselves knowing, knowing there is an explicit knowledge that this is good for business. And I'm not suggesting that it's any kind of conspiracy in order to drive up sales of advertising, but I am suggesting that turning that shit off, refusing to watch that shit,

catch up on the story at your leisure, if you so choose. But finding, looking at this stuff in the way that we do, in the glued to the screen sort of constant 24-hour viewing that we do, helps nobody. And it encourages these events. The year 2012. Some say the last year ever. You could accept the fact that this city is headed for a disaster of biblical proportion. What do you mean, biblical? What do you mean, this Old Testament, Mr. Mayor?

Real wrath of God type stuff. Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies. Rivers and seas boiling. Forty years of darkness, earthquakes, volcanoes. The dead rising from the grave. Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together. Mass hysteria. It is this certain future catastrophe that we here at Cognitive Dissonance want to prepare for. And so we give you your... Cognitive Dissonance's first annual charity drive to prepare for the inevitable Armageddon. Hereafter known as the Apocalypse Without Borders.

From now until December 22nd, 2012, we will hold a Charity Drive and count on the goodwill of all our listeners to give money to the noble and secular cause of Doctors Without Borders. You've never looked at the heavens. Everything in the heavens is here Moving as the heavens move The great conjunction is the end of the world Giving is easy Simply go to the Cognitive Dissonance website

DissonancePod.com On the left side of the page is a button Click it and donate to your heart's content Doctors Without Borders provides emergency medical care To millions of people caught in crises each year in more than 60 countries around the world. This will certainly be a busy year for them. Help contribute before it's too late. Wait, what am I laughing for? Wait, what am I laughing for?

This story is from the Telegraph. China fears the end of the world is nigh. December 21st, the apocalypse. Evidently, the panic of the apocalypse is sweeping China in the sense that some people are buying candles. That's my favorite part of the story. It's like they say candles are selling out by the hundreds with buyers constantly coming to the market. Many stores have run out. And the reason why, Tom, is because there's going to be, it says here,

we heard someone muttering about the continuous darkness, three days of darkness that are going to preclude the apocalypse. And I kept thinking to myself, I'm like, I had no idea candles dispelled supernatural darkness. I had no idea that that was the case. I love that shit too. It's like all the causes are supernatural in essence, but we're going to defeat them with shit we buy at Walmart. Are you fucking serious? I hope there's like a Yankee candle that people are making that smells like despair.

Is there an apocalypse-scented one? I don't know. It would be awesome. It's like a one-wick apocalypse-scented candle. It smells like burning human hair. This one smells like famine human hair. Yeah. This one smells like famine. Oh, no. Like, what is it?

It's just the smell of ashes. It's the worst candle I ever bought. It smells like a four horseman. That's awesome, man. I love the idea that people are going to be huddled around their candles waiting for the end, though. This is how you're going to spend

your last moments, your desperate moments in the apocalypse, is going to be huddled around a tiny candle. Like, buy a flashlight. Buy a Coleman lantern. Hell, you make them over there. You're in China, for crying out loud. You have tons of cheap crap. Don't buy a flashlight.

Buy a fleshlight. Use your time wisely. You got three days of nobody watching you. Right, no kidding, right? Nobody can see. I love, too, that the apocalypse takes several days. Why would that be the case? Why would it take so long?

You know, it's like God is killing everybody. Yeah. That's fast. Wouldn't he just be like, everyone's dead. Yeah, but. And then they're all dead. But, Tom, though, I mean, I think there's a precedent set for him wanting to see people suffer. Yeah.

I mean, 40 days of rain, and as you're standing there, the rain is sort of slowly covering up your mouth hole. Yeah. I think there's a precedent for suffering. Yeah. It's almost like he's like a theater major. You know, like God is like a theater major. He's like, hmm, I could just kill them all, but not dramatic enough. What happens in the second act?

Yeah, Ethel Merman's got to sing them out. Okay, death, despair, destruction, famine, fire, and jazz hands. It's so ridiculous. It's so ridiculous. And the other thing, Cecil, is if it is the end of the world, why am I trying to survive it? The world is ended when it's over, which means I ain't got no place to live. Like, what am I doing? I'm gaining like, oh, I'm going to live an extra six hours.

And it's like the shittiest time to live. It's terrible. It's the time of live. It's the time of despair. It's the time that people are freaking out. It's the time that people are lighting themselves on fire. The time that people are killing themselves or killing other people en masse. It's the 30 minutes you have before a nuclear bomb hits. It's like the worst chaos you could possibly imagine ever, ever, ever, ever. Like where humanity and societal rules get chucked right out the window and people are like, hey, there's a dog.

I'm going to fuck it. You know? Like it's the worst. It's the worst time to be a human being. Yeah, and you can't survive the apocalypse or it wasn't an apocalypse. Right. Well, yeah. Right? If you survived it, it was a lot of people died.

Yeah. It was a holocaust. Yeah, sure. But they're not calling for a holocaust. They're calling for an apocalypse, which is by definition unsurvivable. Yet people are trying really hard to survive. I'm baffled by this. I don't know, man.

You can't hide in a bunker from God. If you think that there's a God, God can't see inside your bunker? Oh, fuck, he's in the cellar. I got nothing. It's lead-lined, damn it. So, Gutfeld, you're a Wiccan or something, right? What about this war on Christmas deal?

You buying into this? Actually, I'm a warlock, and I live in a tree. And you should know this, being a frost giant. I don't call it a war on Christmas. I call it a war on fun. These people used to be the right wing, was always supposed to be the people that didn't like having fun. Now it's the left.

McGurk, they're denying on the left that there is any war on Christmas at all. I'm making it all up. I'm fabricating. I actually think that I'm like Jeff Dunham. I'm a ventriloquist forcing the governor of Rhode Island to call it a holiday tree. He nearly didn't say that. I made him say it. Right. You know what?

And, of course, yeah, they're saying that. They want to deny it because they don't want you to fight it. But the war on Christmas did start in earnest this year with your debate with the governor of Rhode Island, Lincoln Chafee, who, by the way, to quote the great late Foghorn Leghorn, is about as sharp as a bowling ball. This guy, when he got in the ring with you, Bill, it was like Justin Bieber getting in the ring with Mike Tyson. But the war on Christmasmas is very very real and if you ask me but you know in addition to uh some grouchy uh you know misanthropic uh heathen atheists and so it has to do with uh at the root of it it has to do with two things abortion and and the gay rights agenda because christianity is is against those things and and that's it agenda because Christianity is against those things and

and that's it's subtle but that's why they're there so that's why it's so pronounced in these in recent years in my opinion. I 100% agree I absolutely agree 100 percent that it's the the diminishment of Christianity is the target and Christmas is the vehicle do you agree with that Gutfeller or is this way over your head? Way over my head. In fact, I don't need to warn Christmas has gone far enough.

I hate presents. Presents are examples of capitalistic greed. I think we need to take all of the presents, bring them to the White House, and then redistribute them across the country. Perhaps put them in a blender and make present shakes so everybody can have the equal amount of presents. So this is from, this is actually a clip from the Bill O'Reilly show.

This is from YouTube, but you know, it's really from Bill O'Reilly's show. Bill O'Reilly responds. He gets a couple of dim-witted pundits on and he's got some things to say about the war on Christmas, Cecil. Isn't this the biggest circle jerk you've ever seen? Like, I mean, that's all it is. It's just like three guys beaten off to people hating on Christmas. Like, that's all it is.

And, you know, there isn't a lot to talk about here. I like some of the lines that they use. You know, at one point, like, he's talking about grumpy atheists, you know, at one point. I thought there was some funny lines there. Unintentionally funny lines, completely unintentional. But the best part about it is, is that they're trying to be funny and they epically fail at being funny. Yeah, they do. This is a smug and mug contest.

You know, like it's like who can be more smug and mug better for the camera? That's all that it is. It's a smug and mug. It's almost like he called him up like, hey, you want to get on a smug and mug? We got this thing at three o'clock. It's a smugging mug. It's almost like he called him up like, hey, you want to get on a smugging mug? We got this thing at 3 o'clock. We got a thing we could do. It's especially the guy all the way to the right if you watch the video. The guy all the way to the right is like he sits there with his arms folded across his chest all kind of pouty, which is kind of funny.

And he tries to make these sort of snide comments with the intention of playing a false devil's advocate. And he's awful at it. He's just awful at it. And then Baldy McBalderson in the middle somehow manages to conflate this false non-issue issue of the war on Christmas. He throws in like homosexuality and abortion, and then somebody else chucks in some socialism, and then they're like, well, how about legalizing drugs? And they just throw that in there.

You might as well throw that in there, too. Yeah, because homo clause comes to everybody's, you know, every good boy and girl's house and gives them abortions every Christmas. That's what happens. He's like Dr. Giggles, you know? He just shows up in his little outfit. That's why it's red. Coat hangers for everybody. It's like Dr. Giggles. He just shows up in his little outfit. That's why it's red. Coat hangers for everybody. It's like, hey.

You can actually fashion your ornaments to use them as abortion coat hangers. One, I don't understand what the big deal is, why they have to say there's a war on Christmas because there clearly isn't. I understand that they want to have pushback and they want to have Christ. They want to have like we're going to have Christ everywhere and whatnot. But it really is a governmental holiday that everyone should celebrate, that everyone, you know, in some ways is it's a mandatory celebration. You know, most people cannot work at all that day. So you're going to celebrate it. So great.

Celebrate it. Celebrate it how you want to celebrate it. Why are you, you know, you're first off, you're mand all that day. So you're going to celebrate it. So great. Celebrate it. Celebrate it how you want to celebrate it. Why are you, you know, you're first off, you're mandating the day. But why, who the fuck are you to mandate how I celebrate it? This is, you know, this is another one of those like, well, we want small government as long as you do what we say. Yeah. You know, we want to have, we want to make sure that everywhere around us we can push our religious iconography and messages. And if you push back at all, if there's any kind of suggestion that that this doesn't belong and nobody's suggesting either, by the way, that a store or a piece of private property not say Merry Christmas. Fucking A, man. Do all you want.

The only pushback is that Merry Christmas is not an inclusive message. And stores, because that's what they keep talking about. Stores, they want to sell shit to everybody. They don't want to put an exclusive message on their door. It's in their best interest.

Right. It's just a financial decision. It's not a religious decision except for that it's like, well, I want Jewish people to come here and spend money. And not feel like they need to fucking be like, oh, you're saying Merry Christmas. You know, I don't like that Christ guy. Okay, well, fucking come on in because it's

happy fucking holidays. Right. It's just easier. Like, do we not do not, do we just want to make sure we don't recognize that there is a confluence of religious holidays during this time? Are we that obtuse? Yeah, that doesn't make any sense. And you're trying to regulate how I celebrate Christmas if you put it in the public sphere. The idea that we have Thanksgiving.

It's a national holiday in this country. You don't get to tell me that I have to say a Thanksgiving prayer. You don't get to say that. So you also don't get to say that I have to call it Christmas because it's not a Chris, it's not Christmas. It's, it's no longer Christmas because we are a nation full of people who are not all Christians. So if it's a national holiday, let's call it something else and let's just move on. And yeah, we still fucking call it Christmas. It's not like we call it the holiday. It's not like fucking, yeah we still fucking call it Christmas it's not like we call it the holiday it's not like fucking hey here comes the holiday

no we still call it Christmas so you at least have that just stop you know what's the big deal that somebody doesn't want to celebrate your holiday the way you want to celebrate it right you called it a different thing than I call it yeah well we have some different thoughts on that unacceptable

oh god why don't we just put all the presents in a blender? You want to legalize all the drugs! Wait, that has nothing to do with what I just said. Oh, my gosh, why don't we get little Barbie on Obamacare? In the name of Jesus,

we speak that. Oh, my God! Oh, my God! Oh, my God! we speak that. Oramana Shandakaraba. No kore menebele. Jere kede burushida. Kiliberasana. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka.

Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka.

Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka.

Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka.

Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka.

Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka.

Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka.

Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. Uka chaka. I'm high on believing This story, there was a glut, Cecil, of arc stories this week. There were three arc stories this week. Three arc stories, I love them.

This story is from the BBC magazine. Modern Day Noah Rebuilding Arc in Maryland. I think that's maybe a little grand for what's actually happening in Maryland. This is not a modern day Noah, and there's not much of a building. Because there certainly is no ark yet. I love that. He's rebuilding the ark. You're like, well, maybe.

Maybe he is. At this point, it looks like girders. And it's not even a full ark. It's not even a full ark. It looks like it could be a fucking pole barn at this point. Like, that's what it looks like. There's no—you could not discern an arc shape out of this. No.

And he spent 40 years and $3 million. What? Oh, my gosh. I can't believe this. 40 years and $3 million. Remember when Noah had $3 million worth of building materials? I love that they're building an ark in the middle of Arkansas or Maryland or wherever the hell that is. It's got to be.

It's Arkansas, right? No, it's Maryland. They're building this ark there. Why don't you just make a ship? I don't know. Why don't they actually make a ship that floats? This thing is not going to float either. No, no.

You know, there were three different stories this week of idiots building arcs, and none of them were seaworthy. No, no. None of them were arcs that could actually, you know, be an arc. They were just like shapes. They're just random shapes. be an arc. They were just like shapes. They're just random shapes. This, this thing is, is all, you know, metal and fucking welded together and does not bear any resemblance whatsoever to the biblical arc other than it may eventually be a boat. This is the only thing about this, Cecil, that is similar to the actual arc

is that they're both fucking myths that never happened right well and the guy said he's like i'm 75 years old i just hope it's it's i'm around when it's finished and i was and i even said to you before we started well if he lives to know his age he will be but he's got to live to be what 600 years old in order for it to even be remotely finished by that point. Because at this point, he's been spending a lot of time on it, and you got a couple girders crossed, bro. I know. $3 million.

Somebody has taken your money, sir. Oh, my gosh. And, Tom, I want, you know, this is something that obviously comes out. People want to fashion a building after Noah. People want to talk about the Noah story. The Noah story is an awful fucking story. It's so bad. It's your worst PR moment.

Right. You're not reaching out to anyone at that moment. This is like the Santa Claus song. It's like, well, if it would be good for goodness sake, or God will flood the entire world and kill babies and children and little puppies. All of them. Every one of them. You're right. That's a terrible PR moment.

It's like a Dove commercial being like, Dove, because fuck your children. Klaus and Pickles, now with more poison. Like, what the fuck? Who's eating this? The Ark is a terrible story, but it's always like, it's always the subject of children's plays. It's like, it's got all the happy animals. Right, because they're looking at like, oh, look at the fucking wolves are living with the fucking tortoises and everybody's happy.

Oh, look at that. That's awesome. The sloth made his way over to the Middle East. They can't make their way to another tree. It takes them like a fucking decade. Yeah. That's awesome. Noah's got all the other animals, but's like I gotta go get that fucking sloth

I'll be back in a very very long time No he employs other animals to bring it over So a sloth on the back of a cheetah Is just as fast as a cheetah The cheetah is the express train Of the ark movement Yeah there you go. It's just running around.

This is ridiculous, goddamn. And he says in this story, he says, in 1974, God spoke to him and said, quote, Richard, there was an Ark, and so shall it be. Now build it as your new church. It doesn't even make sense. There was an Ark, okay, past tense, and so shall it be, future tense. Okay, so there should be a new ark like the old ark? Build it as a church. But the ark wasn't a church.

God, I'm confused by your message. So today's show is brought to you by Audible. Audible is the leading provider of digital audio books featuring over 100,000 titles available for download. If you want to get your free audio book download, you could go to audiblepodcast.com forward slash dissonance pod. If you're not a subscriber, you could subscribe and get a free audio book download through us. If you're not a subscriber, you could subscribe and get a free audio book download through us. And this week, Tom, we want to talk about a book that you introduced me to, a book called – it's a little-known guy by the name of Richard Dawkins. Some of the listeners may have heard of him, and he wrote a book called The God Delusion. Yeah, I love this book.

This was one of the first – in fact, no, this wasn't one of. This was the first new atheist text that I had been introduced to. And it is – if you're getting into this sort of thing, if you're interested in a book that really kind of lays out some of the arguments for God and then just destroys those arguments, this is your pony. I think this is a pretty good book. It's narrated very, very well. It's a thoughtful, well-written piece. This is narrated by the author. There's a couple points where I think that he uses a woman's voice in this, but it's mainly narrated by the author.

And I think that's probably the best way to listen to a book. They know where their high and low points are. They know where the emphasis should be. And that's always something I look for in nonfiction is trying to find when the narrator is the person who wrote it. I think this is a great book and you can get it right now for free. If you're not an Audible subscriber, go to audiblepodcast.com forward slash DissonancePod and sign up there. You get a free audio book download. You could also go to our website, dissonancepod.com. There's an Audible link on that page that will take you directly to the page you need to be. You sign up for it. You might want to download a book. The book might be The God Delusion. I do believe that atheists are parasites in the sense they're benefiting from everything that religious culture is built in

America, but they're doing nothing to add energy into the system. So Cecil, this story is from catholic.org, the Catholic online website. This is, atheists provide answer to big Obama election mystery. I refute this premise at the very beginning. There is no Obama election mystery. What is the mystery? Obama got elected. Obama know, right? What is the mystery? Obama got elected. Obama was predicted to be elected.

Right? Like, there was not, there were very few polls that were showing Mitt Romney in the lead beforehand. But the other side seems to be,

I mean, there's still, still flabbergasted that it occurred. It's like, but we didn't want it. Yeah. And it still happened. Well, and then the way they talk about it makes it seem like it's some sort of conspiracy, right? I'm goingabbergasted that it occurred. It's like, but we didn't want it. Yeah. And it still happened. Well, and then the way they talk about it makes it seem like it's some sort of conspiracy, right?

I'm going to read directly from the article. It says, that secret coalition served as Obama's fifth column in the election, propelling him to victory, even in those states where Catholics and Protestants soundly rejected him. The coalition was made of atheist agnostics and those who consider themselves religiously unaffiliated or spiritual, but not religious. And you're like, no, what, what fucking glom those people together. And let me tell you something. I know a lot of Catholics who voted for Obama. I know a lot of Protestants who voted for Obama. I know a lot of atheists who voted for Obama. The reason why I know those people is because they're all socially liberal like me. That's why I know them. I don't know them because of their beliefs. I know them because of the policies that they agree with on this.

That's why they voted for them. I mean, there's no fucking mystery here. It's not like the atheists are pushing their atheist God up on the fucking pulpit. They're just they just agree with this. It just so happens that most atheists are socially liberal and don't find a reason why we should hate gays and don't think that women should be forced not to have abortions and things like that. And they vote for people who support those beliefs. None of those things are religious unless you make them religious. And I got to say, too, that as a member of the secret atheist cabal and a leading member, I'm on the board.

Right. Absolutely. Yeah. secret atheist cabal and a leading member. I'm on the board. Right. Absolutely. Yeah. When in November, when we all met in the star chamber and we're deciding the fate of the earth. Right.

This issue actually did not come up. No. You know, no. Surprisingly, because Obama already had that shit in the bag. We were looking at we're looking at Congress, you know, we're looking at battleground states at that point. We had we had other we had other issues on our plate at that moment, other races that were a little tighter that we had to mobilize our vast political force of atheism. And it really just misses the point about what government is because what you're trying to say is that the reason why people vote should only be religious.

People are only religiously motivated to vote. And that's short-sighted. That is saying so much about what you think and so little about what the American people think. Because I know very few people that are utterly, that are completely religiously motivated when they vote. And they're religious people. And the reason why is because a lot of times their religious ideals don't conflict at all with everyday policies. They just don't. I love this story. This is from thinkprogress.org. Investigation looks for Muslim bias in Texas schools.

Finds Christian bias instead. No kidding. This is fantastic. This is basically Texas responded to a chain email. That's what prompted all this. One of those crazy alarmist. No, no, it's not at all surprising. You know, one of those crazy alarmist emails that doesn't make any sense. It says like, you know, Muslims are eating your babies right now.

Like, go check on them. There will be a Muslim munching on their left foot. You know, like if you don't forward this to somebody, you know, you'll get a crescent moon burned into your forehead. You're going to be a Muslim within a week. You stand in front of any mirror and say Allah Akbar three times and bloody Islam will suicide bomb you to death. They're actually building a mosque in your living room right now. With federal dollars. Or, you know, every carpet sold in America has a secret prayer rug woven into it.

You could actually imagine that. We should write this letter. That's awesome. We should write crazy changes. Yeah, and then just send those fuckers out and see how many school districts take them seriously. So the district and school board officials in the Dallas area, they got together like a committee to check and see if there really was a Muslim bias. Right. In Texas's school books.

Right. Now, Texas is one of the largest purchasers of school textbooks in the country. So Texas, in large part, decides what textbooks are going to be purchased throughout the country. Because if you're McGraw-Hill and you're going to sell textbooks, you're going to test the market first. You test the market with one of your biggest markets, which happens to be Texas. So Texas is very influential in the textbook market industry. So what they say go to oftentimes becomes what's available for the rest of the country to choose from. So they took a look and found out that, in fact, there was not a Muslim bias, but there was a heavy Christian bias.

I wonder if they're going to try to excise that out of the books. I don't doubt that. This is so funny. This would be like Rick Perry responding to an email that somebody sent him a chain email that says, Texans don't have enough guns. And then he goes out and he's like, oh, no, no, we got we got plenty of guns. No, we're good. We got we got enough guns. We got enough guns for everyone.

Turns out. Yeah. It's, it's so obvious. I can't imagine that all you would have to do is open a textbook and be like, let's find some pro-Muslim stuff in this Texas text. But no. And I'm fine. I'm fine, Tom, with them not having pro-Muslim stuff.

I mean, I'm absolutely fine with it. Don't have pro-Muslim. Of course. Don't have pro-Christianity stuff either. Yeah, that's the problem. Because that's the problem. You're right. It's like, okay, well, all the kids in the class that are not of faith or that are of

a different faith suddenly have to sit through fucking Sunday school in school. And that's bullshit. That's forcing a kid to learn something that is not fucking necessary. Not in the curriculum. You're forcing kids to that are not religious to spend time with religion that their parents think could be spent better elsewhere. since September 11th, but it's part of that hyper-vigilance against this idea that America's going to suddenly become subject to Sharia law and that we're going to fall victim to the Muslim invasion. It's like the British invasion, except for instead of catchy pop tunes,

it's going to be suicide bombers. And there's just no evidence of that at all. And it's longer beards and different hair. Different haircut. Longer beards. Because they did not have the same haircut at all. And they're in different suits. It's true. It's actually nothing like the British invasion.

There are screaming women, though. Oh, no! So we're going to take a quick break, give you some information on how to contact us, how to email us and all that stuff, call us, whatnot. And then we'll be back right after this. Want to contact Cognitive Dissonance? Visit them on Facebook. You can find the link at the website DissonancePod.com or type it in the Facebook search bar.

Be sure to follow the guys on Twitter. Their handle is at Dsonance underscore pod. The guys also post to Google Plus now too, so check them out there. And if you'd like to email them, you can do so at dissonance.podcast at gmail.com. You can also leave a comment on the blog at their webpage or give them a call at 740-74-DOUBT. That's 740-743-6828. Long distance rates apply. And to everyone who listens, shares, retweets, or rates the show, Cognitive Dissonance would like to cordially thank you for all of your fucking support. So Cecil, this story is from MSN.com. Judge says victim's body can prevent rape. Superior Court Judge Derek Johnson said that if somebody doesn't want sexual intercourse, the body will not permit that to happen.

That's a little bit of a – I mean that article, that headline kind of sucks. That sub-headline kind of sucks. He does say that a woman can still be raped against their will. The body will permit it, but the vagina will be torn to shreds is what he later goes on to say. So if you're coerced or drugged or your vagina is otherwise not shredded in the act of a rape, then it's just not a rape, according to Judge Derek Johnson. I like that all these people will say stuff like, well, the body just don't, the woman's body just don't let any old man come on up and saddle on in there. They got to, you know, you got to do stuff to make sure the woman's ready for it. Yeah, and make sure she enjoys it, you know.

Right. Yeah, I mean, sure, you got to fucking, yeah, you do have to lubricate the old engine to make sure that it runs smoothly. But if you don't give a fuck how the engine is running, then why do you care? And all these guys all have the same, like, oh, the woman's body won't prevent it. Women don't have dicks, dude. I don't understand. Like, it's like these people don't get it. They're like, you know, I really don't touch women and know a lot about women. But, you know, to really be involved, their balls have to be in the right place, right?

You know, don't their balls kind of have to be moved around in the right position? Is that how sexual activity works? Do they have to have an erection before they can have intercourse? You know, and that's the thing that drives me crazy. Just pay attention to a little bit of biology and understand that rape is a possible thing. I know that he's trying to, when he says in this article is something about how he's trying to get the prosecutor to be more forceful and come up with better evidence or whatever, but that's not saying something hurtful

about all rape doesn't help this case. Yeah, it's crazy. I read a little more about this one. And in this instance, the instance that he was responding to, he was frustrated because the prosecutor was pushing for a 16-year sentence. And the judge wanted to give a lesser sentence because the woman was raped by her boyfriend who threatened to burn her genitals with a heated screwdriver. Her genitals and her face with a heated screwdriver. So, you know, if that is not a coercive act, like if that's not, if that is not a rape, then that word ceases to be a meaningful word. And if that's somehow deserving of a lesser punishment than somebody else who uses a different form of violence or intimidation, then this guy has no business being a judge. He clearly, like you said, he just doesn't understand how women work.

Well, they just want to compartmentalize rape into all this one sort of box. And you can't do that because rapes happen in different ways. Sometimes you're raped by someone you know. Sometimes you're drugged. Sometimes you're coerced into it. Sometimes you're, you know, there's a lot of different things that happen with rape. It's not just one, it's not just this is a rape.

This is exactly how all rapes go down. And when you try to stuff them all in the same box, you're going to make sweeping stupid generalizations. And you just proved that you could make sweeping, stupid generalizations. So just shut up. This story is from the New York Daily News. This is a story.

Satmar Crusader against molestation says bleach was splashed in his face following. I'm going to mispronounce it. I'm sorry. Neshima Weberman's landmark sex abuse conviction. It's pretty good. Not bad. Yeah, not bad. You know how to pronounce words, Tom.

You're pretty good at this. This basically is a story about a crusader against sexual violence within the Jewish community who was attacked by somebody for his crusading against sexual violence. Yeah, and you know the worst part about this is that he used to have a black beard, and then they threw this bleach on him, and now he kind of looks like Santa Claus. But on the plus side, he's

springtime fresh, because they followed it with fabric softener. They threw bounce in his face. There you go, friend. In the burn unit, they're wrapping him in those fabric softener. Yeah, no, like that's what they added him to wipe his eyes out. Like, here you go. She's one of these. Terrible. Fucking

snuggle bear is his doctor. Oh, you've been hit with a bleach. Anyway, it's an awful thing because this guy is, what this guy does is he goes out and tries to to help uh expose these people these people that are that are committing heinous crimes in his community

and uh and in certain communities we've seen this happen several times there is a tight-lipped sort of you know in more ways than one a tight-lipped uh they're tight-lipped they don't want to come out and say you know they don't want they want to try to keep it in-house, so to speak, and punish people in-house or not punish people in-house as ever they see fit. And this is great that this person is sort of a crusader for this, but, you know, this is equal to an acid attack. He's lost vision in his eye. Right, yeah. I mean, we're laughing because it's bleach, but it's not

funny at all. And this guy, you know, look at his beard. He's not a young man. So chances are his vision wasn't very good to begin with. I just fail to understand it's sad enough that we need anybody to crusade against sexual violence. Right, yeah, that's a sad

thing to do. That's not a good. Like, it's a great thing that he's doing it. It's fucking awesome that he's standing up within the Hasidic community and putting his fucking foot down and helping the victims

of sexual violence get some sort of justice. That is a fucking good. But the necessity for people like him is unnerving. And that the community, instead of supporting

the person who supports the victim, instead of supporting the person who supports the victim, because one has to look at yourself, one has to look at your family and your community and say, man, I would not want that to happen to my friends and family. And because I don't want that to happen to me, I can extrapolate that out and say it shouldn't happen to anybody within my community. And so here's this person in my community who's working hard to keep us safe, to keep fucking perverts and criminals, you know, to find justice for the victims of their acts. And to turn against them can only happen within the insulated world of these micro-communities, these religious micro-communities.

You're all dead! Oh, be nice! Oh, my son doesn't stand a chance. The whole world's gone gay! Oh my God, what's happening now? We work hard. We play hard. Everybody stand up! This story is from pinknews.co.uk. Pope uses peace day message to attack same-sex marriage.

I like the way that this article was titled. Uses peace day to attack. In a message for World Peace Day 2003, Pope Benedict XVI has described same-sex marriage as a threat to justice and society, adding that it will spark harm for society. Says the guy who's never been married. Right. Says the guy who can't get married. Says the guy who's in charge of all the other people in the world who can't get married. Yeah.

Cool. Well, you seem to know nothing about the subject. So why are we even listening to you? Because of the hat. It's the hat. It's the hat. It's the marital hat that he wears. As soon as you see, as soon as somebody walks around wearing that, wearing a gilded hat, gilded headwear should automatically preclude you from serious speech.

It totally looks like a really fancy turtle shell that he wears on his head. It's the best turtle ever. Oh, yeah. That turtle went to heaven. All turtles go to heaven, but that one went to heaven super fast. It's just exhausting that people are gathering together to listen to somebody who, like you say, has no experience on the subject whatsoever and who really is going to look at all of the things that are happening in global society and say, yeah, two people loving each other, there's your problem. Yeah, right. Well, there's going to be a time, I think, hopefully in our lifetimes, Tom, where they get somebody up there with a moderate voice.

Somebody in the papal seat, you know, when Palpatine dies in 30 or 40 years. Oh, no. I know, right? That's a horrible thing to think about because he is clearly dead right now. He's clearly a dead person when you look at him. But when they get somebody in there with a moderate voice, it's going to be a breath of fresh air because there's so many people that I know, I'm surrounded all the time by moderate Catholics who do not think that this guy has anything special to say, who do not agree with the policies that this guy puts forth, who is against him saying some things because he's clearly saying harmful things. And that voice is going to grow louder and louder and louder.

You're not going to be able to silence that voice eventually. Eventually that voice is going to grow louder and louder and louder. You're not going to be able to silence that voice eventually. Eventually that voice is going to overcome the entire group because you can't stop the progression. There's nothing you can do to stop the progress of the Catholic Church, of other churches, to move forward in the world and finally just be like, yeah, like the Mormons who have been like, well, we were wrong. We were wrong about that. Yeah, you know, there was somebody who sent us an email or somebody who posted some shit about the Mormons about how, you know, how awful and despicable they are. Yeah, absolutely. But you know what?

They're one of the first few major religions to come out and be like, we were wrong. Yeah, and that doesn't happen often enough. It doesn't happen often enough, but it will. I think it will. I think there's going to be time in the future when a moderate voice takes over the papal seat and comes out and says, you know, look, that whole gay marriage thing that fucking Pope Palpatine was doing, not a good thing. That guy – Well, the Catholic Church doesn't feel as uniform. No. You know, it feels like there's a tremendous amount of schism within the church itself over a variety

of these social justice issues. And I think it's going to be a great day for moderate Catholics when they can finally sort of breathe a sigh of relief and say we're represented properly. Yeah, absolutely. You want answers? I think I'm entitled to them. You want answers? I want the truth!

You can't handle the truth! So this story is from the Friendly Atheist blog. This was supposed to be the story we were going to talk to David Silverman about. Yeah. Turns out David Silverman wasn't able to make the show this week. We're hoping we can reschedule with him for another week.

We still did want to talk about this. Bill Donahue, American atheists want to draw blood with its latest billboard. Catholic League blowhard in chief. I love that. That is awesome. Bill Donahue seriously said this in response to American atheists' latest billboard. Cecil, what are your thoughts on this billboard?

Now, I will say that the one thing that pops out at me is the myth part because it looks like at the bottom it says the image is Santa Claus on the top. It says, keep the Mary. And then underneath it has Jesus dying and it says, dump the myth, AmericanAtheist.org. The first thing I note is that this seems like a departure from a lot of the other billboards that we've seen that are atheist-based. The atheist-based billboards a lot of times are, you're not alone. They're basically a message to the person in the community who feels isolated, who looks up at a billboard and says, hey, I'm not alone. Evidently, there's other atheists out there. Maybe I can connect with them. This particular one is the fuel that people use when they say, is there a war on Christmas?

Well, we just started the war. This is the first salvo, right? You know, this is where we throw something out there to say, you know, we're not for Christmas. We're not for this particular brand of Christmas that you're throwing out. I think the problem that a lot of people are going to have is with the word myth. Now, I don't think that people think about that word in the right context, because if you're a Catholic, you probably think that the Hindu religion is a myth. You almost certainly think that the Norse religion, you know, from old timey days is a myth. You certainly think that the Roman gods and the Greek gods are myths.

So you look at other religious traditions and call them myths, but you don't want to call your own a myth. And that's fine, but understand that other people think your your own a myth. And, uh, and, and that's fine, but understand that other people think your shit's a myth. So, um, so knowing that and learning about that should not be a shock. This shouldn't be a shock, but I do think that there is some interesting juxtaposition of images and the language on it is interesting too. Yeah. I gotta say, I don't, I don't love this for the language. Um, the reason I don't, I't love this is, again, it says, keep the merry, dump the myth. And this is on a billboard. The reason I don't like it is starting off,

and this is going to get a little picky, I think, but starting off with a verb, keep. It's an admonishment to do something. One of the things that the atheists as a community, like if you want to say that there is such a thing as an atheist community, one of the things that we've been able to do as a community that's been useful is to not admonish, to not demand, to not tell people how they should or should not act when it comes to their religious ideas, right? I mean, that's one of the hallmarks of intellectual honesty within the atheist community that it strives for is to say, hey, everybody's got a right to think what they want to think. Let's let the war of ideas play out. Let's discuss these ideas.

Let's let the best idea win. I think using this particular set of verbs, keep the merry. It's an admonishment to do something. It tells you to do something. Dump the myth. Again, an admonishment to do something. It tells you to do something. Dump the myth. Again, it's a call to action. And it's not the same thing as, hey, atheists, you're not alone, right? There's no active verb admonishing you, the audience, to do something, to perform an action.

I do have a problem with that. I think that that is counterproductive. to perform an action. I do have a problem with that. I think that that is counterproductive. I think that that is also antithetical in some ways to a lot of the other message statements that have been put out by atheist communities across the country. I don't think it's useful. Yeah.

I think it's polarizing. I think you're right. I think it is a little polarizing. I mean, we were just getting down on the people who are in war on Christmas for telling us how they want us to celebrate Christmas. And we're telling them how to celebrate Christmas. Yeah, I think that's problematic. I think you're right. I think a different way. And also, I think that this picture is a little problematic of Jesus. You're showing Jesus the time of death. Can't you show Jesus in the manger? I mean, this isn't about Easter. This is about Christmas. So Jesus in the manger is what Christmas is about supposedly,

or at least the modern interpretation of the Catholic slash Christian Christmas is about Jesus in the manger, Jesus birthday. So why not show an image like that? Instead, we're showing a different type of image, an image of Jesus crucified, which, you know, I don't know that I, I don't know that that image, I think that image is there to evoke some sort of emotion. And I, you know, if David Silverman were here right now, I would ask him a couple of questions about this for sure. Because I think that there are, there are some serious problems with, with the way in which this was put out. I want to know what the purpose of this is. Is this about awareness? Is it about conversion? What's the purpose of this billboard? You know, because you, whenever we think about this podcast, Tom, we think about our audience, right? We think about

what does our audience want to hear? Well, what's the audience for this? There's an audience. What are they and what are they doing and why are they looking at this billboard and what are they supposed to get out of it? Yeah, I think that's an important point. Any text automatically must address an audience. And I'm unclear as to the audience for this thing at all. And you're right. Showing the moment of martyrdom of your God, that is not a smart choice. It's just not.

It's being, I mean, look. It's being incendiary. And we're incendiary all the time. So don't send us a message and be like, you fucking guys are insane. Yeah, we're incendiary in a group of atheists. We know our audience is a group of atheists that are all getting together in a back room chuckling about shit. Okay? We are not a fucking outreach podcast.

Okay? No, we are not. We're not a billboard for atheism. That's not what we are. So don't send us letters and be like, well, you guys are incendiary. Well, yeah, we absolutely are. But that's totally different. We are on a different wavelength than David Silverman. They are the forefront. They are the face of atheism. And, uh, and you have to have a kinder face, I think. Yeah. It's not a high road. I don't feel like this picture

is the high road. So I'm going to play a couple of voicemails for the audience right now. Thanks to everybody who called us via voicemail and left a message. Hey, what's up, guys? This is Steve. I'm sitting in my tow truck waiting for your podcast to come up. It's Monday. I'm waiting. I miss you guys.

I can't live every week without hearing you guys. Please, just release the podcast. Thanks. Talk to you later. Hey, Cecil and Tom. My name is Kyle.

I'm from central New Jersey. And I've got to say that about a million times because I was listening earlier this year. But I'm crying in wake of the tragic Connecticut shooting that happened earlier today. And I'm absolutely outraged and I know best that you guys are gun owners and that's totally cool.

It's not something that I would ever do, but I respect that people have them and want to do them safely, but I just thought you might want to take a couple of minutes and express your opinions on how absolutely deplorable, fucking deplorable, this whole situation is because 18 kids lost their lives for, well, 18 right now.

18 kids, maybe more, lost their lives for what? And do you believe that there should be a national conversation for the Trayvon Martin thing earlier last year? I don't know. To me, it seems like it's a glaring issue, and I figure you guys have some half-baked opinions about that. And that's the show. Thanks for taking it. Thanks, man.

Hey, this is Random Medical Student from East Tennessee again, and I just wanted to make a commentary on commentary. Meaning that I still don't get why people take the time to write you an email saying that they don't like aspects of your show.

Because it's obvious that your show is just to have some fun and make fun of the silly religious shit that's out there. And that's it. That's all it is. It's entertainment. It's fun.

It's to give atheists or free-thinking people an avenue to laugh at the stupid shit. So, I don't get it. I think they're nerds. They're like, I don't know what Asperger's Vulcan fucking place they come from, but goddamn, dude, just change the fucking podcast. You have

the freedom in your hands. That's all. Just my rant. Peace out. Do a good job, guys. I want to talk quickly, Tom, about one of these voicemails. Obviously, we talked about the Peace out. Do a good job, guys. why do people call you up or ask you questions about why you should change your show? Then we also got an email basically about this as well. And the person who sent us an email was Steven. And Steven said, I want to commend you guys for standing up for yourselves

and being unapologetic for who you are and what you do. I am donefounded by the spoiled, self-centered morons who listen to your show and then complain that it doesn't fit into their perfect little world. Your then-don't-listen attitude is inspiring. The fact that we are willing to write off or even push away listeners and not apologize or pander to them is encouraging. And I think one of the things that Tom and I did when we first started this show, Tom, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, but we did seek out people's opinion. We weren't sure how this show was going to really take off. We didn't know what was going to happen. We didn't know how it was going to evolve.

We didn't know what it was going to turn into. And we wanted people to give us feedback on what worked and what didn't because this show was actually part of another show. So we didn't know how it was going to be on its own. Is it a standalone product? Is it going to work? Are you going to be interested for a full hour? Listen to us dumb fucks talk about stuff. And, and it turns out people were, but the time for criticism and the time to tell us that the, that you think our show is, it should be something else was episode five. You know, that's a long time ago. You know, look is what it is And it's not going to change

Really at this point We're You know We're over three quarters of We've only got like Less than 25 episodes Before we get to 100 episodes We've been doing it

For a couple years I think it's going to be The way it is Well and you know We have no incentive To pander to our audience Because our audience Doesn't pay us a money

Right Right It's not like any other product where it's like, oh man, I got to, what would happen if I lost listeners? You know what happened is nothing would happen. Yeah. Yeah. There's a great, there's a great point you made to me a while back. It's like when people listen, the only way we know is that there's an extra download number on, on Libsyn. That's the only way we know that you listen a lot of times. Sure. We get email from people, but we don't, you know, people listen. Okay, well, they listen. And if they don't listen,

they don't listen. The product is still there, whether they listen to it or not. We got an email from New Zealand. That was sort of a talk a little bit about this show. And but specifically, Tom, one of the things that we wanted to talk about was the 100 mile race that's coming up in Utah. Yeah. One of our listeners, Cameron, is running a 100 mile race in Utah. We just want to say, you know, best of luck to you. Yeah, I could not win a hundred mile driving race. I would get exhausted halfway through. I'd be panting for breath. Right. Just from the effort of pressing the pedal.

I would have to stop at least six McDonald's on the way. A hundred, a hundred, at least six. I wanted to say good luck. And if anybody in magical underwear starts chasing you, run faster. Absolutely. Good call. We got an email from Cecilia who mentions the dog and diabetes. She says, I'm guessing the dog can smell the ketonic breath that indicates hypoglycemia.

I want to thank you for sending that in. I guess I hadn't considered that. I think, you know, you could even just have a human helper around that could smell that. This is the worst job ever. I just got to smell stink breath. Take them.

Use a fucking smit for Christ's sakes. Tom, we got a letter from Alabama from Tony. Yeah, Tony sent us a letter from Alabama. We just wanted to say hi, give you a quick shout out. It cannot be easy to be an atheist in Alabama. So, man, bravo to you. It's pretty easy for me here in the Chicagoland area. Pretty liberal, pretty simple to do.

But in Alabama, that's going to be pretty tough, Tony. So keep it up, man. Mark sent us an image, and the image is about basically what people have been posting to Facebook walls. And the image shows, I think it's a t-shirt. It says, Dear God, why do you allow so much violence in our schools? Signed, a concerned student. And underneath it says, Dear concerned student, I am not allowed in schools. Signed, God. And really, this has sort of been, I think, people's Facebook mantra for the past couple days.

There's been other things that have popped up on my wall about gun control, a lot of stuff about gun control recently. This is a time for people to use their Facebook wall to talk about their political and religious views as best they can and trying to manipulate the story to fit into their little slot, their square peg into the round hole of this story. I love the idea that God isn't allowed somewhere. God has to follow a civil law. God's writing back like, I tried to get in, but man, the school

handbook says no dice. They turned me away. I had a gun. What do you know? Man, I know that I'm an all-powerful, all-knowing deity, but I can't get there. He was busy because he was cleaning his pistol. That's right. The Auto Smite 2000.

The Auto Smite 2000. He was so busy. He was like, you know what? I had all the gun cleaner out. I had to take it down. I just got a brand-new deer antler gun rack that I put all my stuff on. Deer antler gun rack? Dear Antler Gun Rack that I put all my stuff on. Dear Antler Gun Rack. Yeah, I just – I mean I think that somebody who posts that doesn't understand one, their own god or two, that you're their friend.

I know. Well, if I saw something like that on my wall, they would quickly become not my friend. Yeah, either not my friend or just completely hidden. I'm sure I have a dozen people that would post something like that, but I saw something like that on my wall, they would quickly become not my friend. Yeah, either not my friend or just completely hidden. I'm sure I have a dozen people that would post something like that, but I would never see it. It would never pop up on my wall. Isaac sent us a message, Tom, asking if we're going to do a Crazy Predictions for 2012 episode. We're going to try to do that. I think maybe on the 27th or maybe the 3rd.

Yeah, that's always fun to do, so we'll definitely do that. We got an email from Jamie, Tom, that we're going to read because we think it's hilarious. Hey, guys. I'm a very big fan of the show. I listen while I work on video game art assets, frequently laughing out loud to the annoyance of my coworker who shares the cube adjacent to mine. So it's taken me a while to remember to send you guys this email by the time I get home from work. you guys this email by the time I get home from work. A few episodes back, you answered a listener mail about somebody who was annoyed by the kitschy,

pun-laden, deep south church signs, and mentioned in your response that you found the, y'all going to hell signs far more annoying. The reason I had to drop you guys a line is because I have encountered the perfect and hilarious synthesis of the two signs. While living in rural western

North Carolina, yes, 15 miles from where they filmed Deliverance. Oh, God. God, I can't even. That makes my anus tighten just thinking about it. I drove past the church every day on my way to work, whose sign for over six months proudly proclaimed, if you don't believe hell is real, you should come hear our preacher on Sunday.

The English language nerd in me very much wanted to knock on their door and politely explain, I do not think that means what you think it means. You see, the sentence structure leads to the implication that, you know what? Never mind. But I was fairly certain I'd be killed and buried under the septic tank. Anyway, thought y'all would enjoy the tidbit and never fail to brighten my morning drive. That's awesome. Thanks, Jamie. Thanks for sharing. That's hilarious. And you know, if you don't want to, if you don't, uh, if you don't believe hell

is real, you should listen to this podcast. That's all I'm saying. Wouldn't it be funny? Like you go down there, you're like cognitive dissonance is playing. Huh? Huh? This is pretty bad. I wonder why they chose a church for this. Yeah. You know what it would be? It would be the unedited version of this show. Oh, yeah. Oh, that's an abomination to man and God.

In your hell, you'd have to edit it all over again. Well, we missed David Silverman this week. We're hoping that we can get him on in the future. We'll see. Thank you, everybody who posted questions. And when he does come on, if he does come on, we will read some of those questions to him and have him answer them. But that's not this show. But until next time, because we missed it last time, Tom, I'm going to throw on ye old skeptics creed.

So we'll leave you with that until next week. Credulity is not a virtue. It's fortune cookie cutter, mommy issue, hypno Babylon bullshit. Couched in scientician, double bubble toil and trouble, pseudo quasi alternative, acupunctuating, pressurized, stereereogram-Pyramidal-Free-Energy-Healing-Water-Downward-Spiral-Brain-Dead-Pan-Sales-Pitch-Late-Night-Info-Docutainment. Leo Pisces. Cancer Cures. Detox.

Reflex. Foot Massage. Death in Towers. Tarot Cars. Psychic Healing. Crystal Balls. Bigfoot. Yeti.

Aliens. Churches. Mosques. And Synagogues. Temples. Dragons. Giant Worms. Atlantis. Dolphins. Truthers. crystal balls, Bigfoot, Yeti, aliens, churches, mosques, and synagogues, temples, dragons, giant worms, Atlantis, dolphins, truthers, birthers, witches, wizards, vaccine nuts, shaman healers, evangelists, conspiracy, doublespeak, stigmata, nonsense. Expose your sides.

Thrust your hands. Bloody, evidential, conclusive. Doubt even this. The opinions and views expressed in this show are that of the hosts only. Our poorly formed and expressed notions do not represent those of our wives, employers, friends, families, or of the local dairy council. Outro Music