The Scathing Atheist - 633: Narco Rubio Edition

Episode Date: April 17, 2025

On this week's episode: The Trump administration starts their hunt for anti-Christian heffalumps ... A Christian pastor avoids the TSA sexuality trap by demanding a cavity search ... And Don Ford will be here to dig into the post-sassy-gay-Jesus portion of the Bible. --- To make a per episode donation at Patreon.com, click here: http://www.patreon.com/ScathingAtheist To buy our book, click here: https://www.amazon.com/Outbreak-Crisis-Religion-Ruined-Pandemic/dp/B08L2HSVS8/ If you see a news story you think we might be interested in, you can send it here: [e-mail] To check out our sister show, The Skepticrat, click here: https://audioboom.com/channel/the-skepticrat To check out our sister show’s hot friend, God Awful Movies, click here: https://audioboom.com/channel/god-awful-movies To check out our half-sister show, Citation Needed, click here: http://citationpod.com/ To check out our sister show’s sister show, D and D minus, click here: https://danddminus.libsyn.com/ To hear more from our intrepid audio engineer Morgan Clarke, click here: https://www.morganclarkemusic.com/ Help support the show by checking out our sponsors: mintmobile.com/scathing stamps.com  (code: SCATHING) betterhelp.com/scathing --- Headlines: See something, snitch something - State Department’s "anti-Christian bias" witch hunt begins: https://apnews.com/article/state-department-religion-doge-rubio-trump-christian-biden-4fdb73a0cbf5651789b1aced667c2aba ‘Thousands like us’ - couples to take UK government to court over humanist marriages: https://www.theguardian.com/law/2025/apr/11/thousands-like-us-couples-take-uk-government-to-court-over-humanist-marriages American Atheists file briefs in two SCOTUS cases about American education: https://www.atheists.org/2025/04/american-atheists-files-briefs-in-two-supreme-court-cases-to-defend-secular-public-education/ Aiming to limit damages, Catholic hospital argues a fetus isn't the same as a person: https://iowacapitaldispatch.com/2025/04/09/aiming-to-limit-damages-catholic-hospital-argues-a-fetus-isnt-the-same-as-a-person/ James Lankford introduces a bill to gut the Johnson Amendment: https://www.friendlyatheist.com/p/sen-james-lankford-knows-the-irs Christian pastor prefers frisks from male airport security agents because scanners ‘turn you gay’: https://www.thepinknews.com/2025/04/11/andrew-isker-tsa-full-body-scanners/

Warning, the following podcast contains language appropriate to describe the current state of affairs. This week's episode of The Skating Atheist is brought to you by Mint Mobile and by Way More Technology That Should Probably Be Dedicated to Fart Jokes. And now, The Skating Atheist. I don't have anything to promote, but I do have a short story. Years ago I worked for this D-bag trust fund baby who inherited his father's business and bankrupted all but one.

One day D-bag trust fund baby decided to cut costs on that one by removing toilet paper from the bathrooms. The employees responded by throwing their shit all over the walls. Based on the behavior of that D-bag Trust Fund baby, I can assure you that we did in fact devolve from Filthy Monkey Men. It's Thursday. It's April 17th. And it's National Ask an Atheist Day. Yes, no, and absolutely not. There you go.

I'm no illusions. I'm Eli Bosniak. I'm Heath Henwright. And from Aaron Burrs, New Jersey, Ann Arbor, Michigan, and Waycross, Georgia, this is the Skating Atheist. On this week's episode, the Trump administration starts their hunt for anti-Christian heffalumps. A Christian pastor avoids the TSA sexuality trap by demanding a cavity search. And Don Ford will be here to dig into the post-Sasigae Jesus portions of the Bible. But first, the on a theme.

They both got long hair, goatees, tie-dye shirts and Birkenstocks, both of them reeking a cheap body spray and expensive weed. Now it's common courtesy to great hikers that are going in the opposite direction on a hiking trail, but these guys don't return a greeting. Instead, you say hi to them, they smile and they hand over a card on which they have handwritten the following message. Quote, we are observing silence today in a global effort to bring about world peace. Goddess bless." Just thinking back on it, I want to smack the motherfuckers.

But I guess not both the motherfuckers, just the one that was me. Yeah, the year was 2003. I was 27 years old and I had just quit a relatively well-paying job to spend a few months wandering around in the woods and trying to commune with nature. I don't know what the fuck that means. So during this wildly self-indulgent hiatus, the friend that I'd roped into joining me told me about this silence thing. Supposedly hippies all over the world were doing it. There was just one particular day and they were all going to refrain from talking from sunrise to noon. But it wasn't just not talking, there was also imagination.

See, instead of talking, we were supposed to spend that time visualizing a world without conflict. The idea being that so many people all visualizing world peace at the same time could help bring it about. Now, as you may have noticed, it didn't work because it was fucking stupid. Because in fact, what we were doing was literally nothing. Worse, we were convincing ourselves that by doing nothing in just the right way, we'd accomplished something, thus alleviating any misgivings we might have had about our inaction.

And of course, as this memory struck me the other day, I imagined myself, my 49-year-old self walking the other way on that very same trail and how I would react to my 27 year old self if I'd been in the position of any of those poor hikers we'd given our stupid fucking card to. I mean, I'm pretty sure I could refrain from saying, well, that's fucking dumb if I wanted to, but I don't know that I'd want to. At the very least, I'd need somebody to hold my eyeballs still if I didn't want them to roll.

But in all reality, what I'd probably do is I would go, oh, in exactly that tone of voice, right? I wouldn't say fuck off directly, but I'd say it with my tone. I would ensure that they would walk away knowing that I thought what they were doing was silly and useless and that they should be embarrassed by it. Which to be fair, is what most of the people we handed our card to did. Now there's a part of me that wants this diatribe to veer off into a, but if somebody had taken the time to really engage me direction, right?

There's a part of me that wants to believe that the right skeptic intervening at the right moment with the right words could have rescued me from years and years of woo and bullshit. And to be fair, they probably could have. But so could the people derisively looking at my stupid fucking card and saying, oh, in a tone specifically calibrated to dismiss the idiocy of my misguided nonsense. And in fact, they did. It was ultimately this repeated feeling of smart people looking down on me that pushed me away from woo. A fact that I try to emphasize every time people pretend that making fun of magical thinking can't change minds. So no, this diatribe is not about how we should have more patience with idiot hippies that

amble up to us on hiking trails and tell us they're going to fix the fucking world with their imaginations. I know that I won't, so I can't ask you to. Instead, this diatribe is about how we should have more patience with our former selves. I'm going to AAcon this weekend, and while I'm there, I'm going to meet a lot of people that grew up Christian and then redoubled their commitment to Christ in their early adulthood and argued with their secular relations and went on missions and studied apologetics and only slowly came to realize the extent to which they'd been lied to. I'm going to meet people who did and defended

terrible shit in the name of Jesus. And I'm going to meet former hippies that thought they could end the war by not returning salutations for a fucking morning. And what's going to unite all of those people other than the atheism is the shame. The abject embarrassment that we feel when we look back at our ignorance. It's the intellectual equivalent of seeing a photo of yourself in those dumbass baggy jeans we all wore in the 90s. And I am far from immune to this show. When I started writing this diatribe, at first I was too embarrassed to be fully honest about what the fucking note we were handing out said.

My subconscious mind kept trying to edit the memory a little bit to make it seem less silly. And even when I finally forced myself to recreate it verbatim, I still kept wanting to stick in a paragraph somewhere about how I didn't really believe that we could end war with our minds. I was looking at my past self and trying my damnedest not to see him. But to appreciate who we are, we need to confront who we were. and trying my damnedest not to see him. But to appreciate who we are, we need to confront who we were. What's more, we need to embrace it. And not just because beating up on your former self

leaves your present self with scars. It's also because we need to see ourselves reflected in the people whose minds we're seeking to change if we want to have any notion on how to change them. And if we're not willing to look our former selves straight in the eye, how will we recognize their reflection? They're talking about you, Jesus. We're going to interrupt this broadcast and bring you a special news bulletin.

Joining me for headlines tonight are the acetaminophen and ibuprofen to my aspirin, Heath Enright and Eli Bosnik. Fellas, are you ready to tackle this fucking headache of a news cycle putting the anal and analgesic since 1987 no allusions and the ick all right well I guess while Heath and I divvy up the leftover G's we're gonna pause for a word from this week's sponsor Mint Mobile I'm putting the tall and you know Barbados it's data no it's data data okay saying it's data. Data. Okay, saying it slower isn't going to make me agree with you. Hey guys, what's with all the brand again? Oh, hey Noah, I want to tell the listeners about Mint Mobile, but he says data wrong.

No, I say data correctly. You're wrong. Wait a second. What's Mint Mobile? Nice. Nice scoop. Solid. Thank you.

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They wouldn't even have a reason. Guys, guys, that sounds great. How do I sign up? No matter how you say it, don't overpay for it. Shop data plans at mintmobile.com slash scathing. That's mintmobile.com slash scathing. Upfront payment of $45 for three month five gigabyte plan required equivalent to $15 a month.

New customer offer for first three months only then full price plan options available. Taxes and fees extra. See Mint Mobile for details. All right guys, way to tell our listeners about Mint Mobile. Or as Heath would say, wadda tell our listeners about Mint Mobile. Okay, you know what? Okay. And now back to the headlines.

In our lead story tonight, in putting the SS in persecutes news. There's two in there. It's hard being a Christian in these United States of America right now. Back in the good old days, a Muslim person or a Jewish person, or God forbid, a dirty athe athe was a strange curio to

be viewed under glass by your family at the midway of the traveling carnival on a nice little Saturday. But then, on January 20th of the Year of Our Lord 2021, something terrible happened. Rabbit atheist and devout Catholic, Joseph Robinette Hussein Biden took over as president and he plunged the country into an era of anti-Christian hate. Well, that's finally coming to an end. As part of Donald Trump's promise

to protect the downtrodden Christians of America, the State Department instructed its employees to start reporting all the anti-Christian bigotry that occurred specifically during the Biden administration. There was nothing. That's nothing. But now there's a narking apparatus for the nothing. — Yeah, and it sure would be a pity if someone called that number and started reporting all the, I don't know, Christian institutions being defunded and robbed of their ability to enforce diversity, equity, and inclusion. Oh, there you go.

I mean, I guess it would at least give the Maytag repairman who checks the message of something to do. Yeah. All right. So let's talk about the person in charge of the State Department. And I thought of another wordplay thing. So in the picture of boring gray news, fantastic. We're going back for sir worth going back to dips all the way.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio is not looking good these days. No, he is not. He clearly got fucked on a deal with some sort of Prince of Darkness about selling his soul, and it's going very badly. Marco started out as arguably the most boring person bot on the planet who once failed the Turing test on national television. Unit must consume water.

Well, check out that video. It's so good with the water. Okay. Well, now Marco is longing for those halcyon days of just being boring. Unlike the sweet deal obtained by Dorian Gray in the Oscar Wilde novel that sent all the signs of aging and evil into a painting, Rubio himself appears to be the painting. And since taking over his new role as America's top diplomatic minion of Donald Trump, we've been watching the life drain from Rubio's face as he morphs into a sad, invertebrate

mannequin held up by ossified regret and possibly a load-bearing lapel pin of the American flag. And just in case anyone's curious exactly what that looks like, I put together a flipbook of the process from before to after. And it even starts with a portrait just like Dorian Gray. It does. It does. It looks like he's transforming into the final boss fight of a video game. Right?

Yeah, it's like he chose medium poorly. Yes, exactly. He's so boring, it just landed on medium poor. Agree. And just a quick reminder, Rubio got confirmed by the Senate with a vote of 99 to 0 and was described as possibly the only sane person nominated for the cabinet of Trump 2.0. So, good times. Yeah, we've reached the point where the Tea Party loons are the sane wing of this party.

Yep. Well, one of Rubio's first instructions as a minion was an executive order by Trump telling all federal agencies to root out anti-Christian bias in coordination with a government-wide task force that Trump apparently created. So in that spirit, Rubio sent a cable to the entire State Department last week saying, quote, The task force is soliciting examples of anti-religious bias, particularly from the past four years. Why?

The department targeted anyone for their religion, including discrimination, harassment, exclusion, disciplinary action, adverse security clearance determinations, or any other adverse action, or in retaliation for exercising their religious rights. What the fuck would that be? Great question. That was my question. He continues, he explains, this includes taking mandatory vaccines or observing religious holidays and mistreatment for refusing to participate in events and activities that promoted themes

inconsistent with or hostile to one's religious beliefs, including policies or practices related to preferred personal pronouns. Were you oppressed by not being able to oppress? Call now. Yeah, right. So they put out a notice saying, So we're looking for cases of anti-Christian bias, and since there is none, here's what we're pretending those words mean for the purposes of finding some. So the response from members of the department was mixed. Christian lunatics in the department were very happy to finally feel seen. Lots of others shut the fuck up because they don't want to get fired. And then a few honest people

reported their negative thoughts about the narking directive. One official told AP News it's very handmaid's tale-esque. Of course, that person spoke on the condition of anonymity, lest the commanders of Gilead get angry. And in chat groups, staff members questioned the move, especially considering the timing. The new directive came immediately after a junior officer named Lou Alowski got a strange, unwarranted promotion, putting him in charge of the entire department's HR office. And during his first speech to the staff, Olavsky cited Bible verses and religious-themed quotes from Abraham Lincoln.

Olavsky also said a bunch of weird shit about religion in his own words. For example, quote, oaths and words are different. Words are for talking. Dolphins can talk. Oaths are co are different. Words are for talking. Dolphins can talk. Oaths are covenants. What? I have no idea. Animals do not covenant.

Only God and man can make covenants. Also, dolphins can't talk. But you get it. I don't know that they do. I don't know that he's using. That was the first speech. That's your new boss. You're just like, what the fuck is happening? Dolphins.

Alowski also added, quote, The Constitution is our commandment. Its words are like the Word of God. And the words of the oath are our creation as officers. And these words are our beginning. In the beginning was the Word. And the Word was with God and the word was God

Endquote so that guy who said all that is in charge of HR for the entire State Department and by some crazy Coincidence the State Department narking line is being handled by a person named Heather Olowsky Wait a second. Some relation. Yeah. They're married. That's his wife.

And Heather is in charge of the Office of Civil Rights for the State Department and the NARGNIA. Okay. Sorry. I want to change my direction. Everybody do not call that hotline to talk about Christian stuff. I need you to call it and pretend to be a dolphin. Okay.

All right. So yeah, let's not just focus on the devastating funding cuts to these vital government departments, right? Let's also keep in mind that what's left over has been tasked with vendetta's bigotry, enforcement and snipe hunts. Yeah. So, OK, pretty much everybody agrees we should not be punishing thought crimes. Here's why that's wrong. It's interesting. Interesting.

Okay, stay with me. I'm not saying anyone should go to jail for believing something, religious or otherwise. I'm very glad to hear that. I'd like to at least consider jail sometimes, but I'm willing to let that go. Only behaviors can be a crime. But you should definitely be allowed to not hire someone depending on the situation. Okay. to not hire someone depending on the situation. Okay, so let's say I'm hiring a person to tile my house and during a phone call they're like,

God said the floor is lava. I don't have to pretend the floor might be lava. If you believe the floor is lava, that's a thought crime in the world of tiling and you're not hired for my job that involves thought and tiling. One more quick example. Let's say, I don't know, top of my head,

I'm in charge of hiring the person in charge of public health for the entire country. And let's say one of the applicants believes that vaccines are conspiracy to create an army of autistic people. I'm not hiring that person. Now let's say they sincerely hold that conspiracy theory because it's in the holy book of their religion. Nothing changed for me just now.

If your belief is going to lead to a bad behavior, which is so often the case when it comes to religion, you don't get the job. That's not religious persecution. It's bad at thinking persecution. The first thing is a subset, but that's not my fault. That's your fault. Right. Yeah, exactly. It's just nice to hear Heath give this speech to someone else, podcast listener, after so many years.

And in I'm only humanist news. Imagine Dragon's fans out there loving that one. I don't know that they are. They're loving it. They're loving it. They're loving it. My fellow Dragos, fellow drag kings and queens. Not all of us. They're out there loving it.

That's what Imagine Dragons fans call ourselves. Drag kings and queens. A lot of confusing concerts. In many ways, our motherland of jolly old England is vastly superior. confusing concerts. In many ways, our motherland of jolly old England is vastly superior. They have universal healthcare, a parliament that openly roasts while other people are talking and, for one final time this October, the best skeptical conference ever. But in many ways it's also far worse.

They have an official state religion, that religion runs most of the schools, and they can be painfully slow with certain forms of social change. Which is why this week two couples are taking the government to court over their failure to legalize humanist marriage in England and Wales. Five years after a ruling that the lack of recognition was discriminatory. Okay, it's one of those rare times when the entire speech from the lawyer can be, Oxford English Dictionary defines discriminatory as, well, you can read it and we're done. Yeah, no, the case of the Crown v. For reals, though.

The court will count to three. Right. Right. No, and Eli, by the way, I had to Google it to make sure I wasn't the one who was wrong with. That's not a imagine dragons song. No. Who is it? Rag and Bone Man, apparently. That seems like imagine dragons just using different names. Those fans call themselves rag queens. So you're close. Yeah, there you go. So yeah, while humanist marriages are legal in Scotland and Northern Ireland, way back in 2020, the High Court ruled that the lack of legal recognition for humanist marriage in England and Wales, quote, gave rise to discrimination with Mrs. Justice Edie saying

the then Justice Secretary Robert Buckwald, quote, cannot simply sit on his hands, end quote. Well, that's exactly what the government has done so now they apparently have to be taken to court again to follow the court's decision and it's gotta be exhausting if you have to just keep going to court to like get things done over and they have to repeat themselves yeah yeah and if you're wondering what the government has had to say about this a Ministry of Justice spokesperson said, quote, it is right the government takes the time to consider the

important issue, including the Law Commission's 2022 report, and will set out its position in due course, end quote. We'll stop being bigots and turn on your cable on Friday between 11 and 8 or I don't know next week or the following year late yourself the important issue they're taking five plus years to set out their position on is is Discriminating based on religious status good or bad to be clear right exactly Yeah, one other thing I want to mention about this story But whenever I talk about stuff like this or I mentioned that I'm a humanist minister,

people always sort of half jokingly ask why anyone bothers with the full humanist version of ministry. Why not just, you know, be part of the Universal Church of Kiddit Online. But for many, including many listening to this podcast, leaving faith behind was a defining moment of emancipation. And having to check back into the former belief system for a major moment of connection with a partner really kind of ruins that. My point is, we should have all the rights, even if the we know it's secular if you look the other way options exist and hopefully this lawsuit will finally make that happen. And in putting the cuss in amicus news, American Atheist filed briefs in two upcoming SCOTUS cases that we're keeping a close eye on.

More specifically, friend of the show and man who can crack open a coconut with his thighs Jeffrey T. Blackwell filed amicus briefs in the case of Oklahoma Statewide Charter Schoolbird B. Drummond, a case we've talked a lot about on the show wherein the state Blackwell filed amicus briefs in the case of Oklahoma Statewide Charter School Board v Drummond, a case we've talked a lot about on the show, wherein the state of Oklahoma is trying to publicly fund a straight-up fucking Catholic school, and the case of Mahmood v Taylor, a case we haven't talked about, wherein homophobic parents are asserting a right for their kids to never ever hear about gay people. Cool.

Another case for the large dedicated section of the docket called Oklahoma phobia. Love it. So I'm glad they're getting input from Jeff, but I feel like he should be allowed to make it very clear. I am not a friend of your court. I'm not your amicus. This is a costus brief. Yeah.

Acquaintance brief? Yeah, right, right. So we're going to start with the charter school. Like I said, we've covered this one several times before, beginning on episode 524, but also on episodes 538, 591 and 601. A point I bring up both to emphasize how on top of the secular news we keep you and to explain why we don't have fresher jokes about it. Do you know how many goddamn times I've had to come up with a funny fucking way

to introduce the bizarre name of Oklahoma attorney general, Gentner Drummond? Yeah, attorney general. Also the diction coach for Foghorn Leghorn. He is, yeah. Named after the sound of dropping a juggling club down a mine. Yeah, right. So, but anyway, so this is the story of a would-be statewide Catholic charter school called St. Isidore of Seville Catholic Virtual School. And it would be fully taxpayer funded and unapologetically a Catholic school

that couldn't violate the First Amendment more without raping it. No, please. The First Amendment is way too old for the Catholic Church to raise. So anyway, so last summer, the state formally rescinded its contract with the school at the heavy urging of the state's attorney general.

And now the school, the would-be school anyway, is suing. And despite the fact that this is some day one law school to make sure you didn't wander into the wrong fucking class level shit, it's being heard by the goddamn Supreme Court, which to this point has given no indication that they'd take issue with forcing non-Catholic Oklahomans to pay for Catholic indoctrination. Yeah. non-Catholic Oklahomans to pay for Catholic indoctrination. Yeah, in other news, we're working on a charter in Oklahoma for the Seth Andrews Atheist Institute of Caramel Thunder Fuck Talking. Yeah.

It's gonna be great. I'm teaching an elective on cum gutters. Oh, nice, nice. Yeah. That's a call back to GAM for those who don't listen to all the shows. No, if you listen to GAM, that joke's funnier, but I think it's still funny. And it works, it works no matter what, even without context, you're right.

I feel like if you listen to this show enough, you're not surprised I'm teaching you how to play on Kum Gutters. So now this other case, Mammo D. Taylor. Just everything Eliza ever said is a context clue for Kum Gutters, if you didn't know. Yeah, exactly. Oh, really, oh, yeah, exactly.

Someone sees me on the other side of the street and they're like, if that guy says come gutters, I will be unsurprised So now this other case Mahmood v Taylor involves parents whose children were egregiously exposed to the existence of LGBTQ people without an opportunity to opt out which they claim violates their parental rights They want as Jeff puts it in his amicus brief, quote, an a la carte system of education wherein every parent may pick and choose each individual lesson plan for their child based on their personal religious beliefs, end quote, a system that would be as unworkable as it would be undesirable because, and we pointed this out on the show before,

there's literally no true thing taught in schools that doesn't in some way contradict religious claims. literally no true thing taught in schools that doesn't in some way contradict religious claims. I mean, I'd say math, but if you take the Bible at its word, 3.14 minus three is almost exactly zero. So right. And three is one and all kinds of shit. Yeah.

And look, there are plenty of threats to secular education in this country and just fucking education in this country and just fucking education in this country, but the erosion of these limitations, this guarantee of secular education might be the most dire because it's genuinely the only thing ensuring that there's even a correlation between what's taught in schools and what is true. And while we seethe about that for a minute, we're going to hand things over to my lovely wife Lucinda. A man wrote the Bible? A horse, which one?

If it's a legitimate race. It is a race. What, right? Cooking can be fun. Hey! I'm proud of a man! This Week in Massage. As you're probably aware, the latest Surely They Won't to crumble before the harsh reality of anti-abortion crusaders avarice is surely they won't start arresting women for having miscarriages.

But of course, we crossed that rubicon last month and we did it just down the road from my house in a small town called Tifton, Georgia. The woman was Selena Maria Chandler Scott. She was picked up by an ambulance on March 20th after somebody reported an unconscious bleeding woman. Turned out she'd had a miscarriage, which isn't illegal per se,

but because she disposed of the fetal remains in a dumpster, she was charged with concealing the death of another person and abandoning a dead body. Think about the trauma of that. This was a pregnancy she intended to bring to term as far as we know. So at the same time that she's dealing with the psychological trauma of a lost pregnancy

and the physical trauma of a miscarriage, they suddenly pile on top of that the incredible stress of being arrested for damn near murder. Now, ultimately, those charges were dropped when an autopsy revealed that she had a natural miscarriage, but no doubt a ton of damage was already done. And what if the autopsy hadn't shown that? What if it had been inconclusive? What if it had shown she'd taken an abortion pill? What would have happened then? Like so many other aspects of American life at the moment, we're very close to a worst case scenario with this shit.

And just because this is the case I'm talking about, don't assume it's isolated. In 2023, the most recent year we have data for, 210 women were charged with some form of bullshit pregnancy crime that didn't exist before the Dobbs decision. That number has risen since then and will continue to rise. But you know what number is also rising?

The number of abortions. That's right, despite all their draconian, Margaret Atwood bullshit, America is still aborting more fetuses than ever before. That's according to, well, all available data, but most recently a study from Guttmacher Institute, a pro-abortion group that's been correlating data on how the landscape of abortion in America has changed since Roe was repealed. One interesting finding I had to dig into in the survey, one that's leading a lot of

headlines about it, is the fact that the number of people crossing state lines for abortions has decreased. And anti-abortion zealots are using that to try to say that the state bans are working and that people are changing their minds rather than crossing state lines. And while I agree that some people who need abortions

aren't getting them, when you dig into the particular number, it turns out that it's because many of the states people were fleeing to also banned abortion in the past couple of years. So like all of the people who had been traveling to Florida for abortions stopped doing that when Florida's six week ban kicked in.

But it's not all bad news this week because as bad as the abortion numbers are looking, the lesbian witchcraft numbers are looking better or at least they will be, according to anti-abortion zealot Seth Gruber. He has a silly little YouTube show where he spouts misogyny. The most recent nugget of which praised Pat Buchanan

for saying that feminism, quote, "'encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism, and become lesbians.'" End quote. Of course, if you know you're your misogynist like I do, you know that was Pat Robertson, not Pat Buchanan. Get your antiquated homophobic dead patch right, Seth.

But hey, if this is all just painful period, we've got to get through to get to the part where lesbian witches destroy capitalism. I'm way more okay with it than I thought. And on that tiny wisp of hope, I'll wrap things up and hang you back over to Noah, Heath, and Eli. Thank you, Lucinda.

And in Schrodinger's Catholic News, a Catholic health care provider got sued for malpractice involving the death of a fetus, and now they have to make the legal argument that a fetus is both a human being and also not a human being. Right now it's not, is what they're claiming. And yes, they were the ones who put a fetus in a box

with a glass vial of poison that might break open at any time, which is a crazy thing to do and makes the job of an OBGYN in their hospital system completely insane, but it's their poison fetus box and other people aren't allowed to look inside. Only they can look and they checked and right now the fetus is not a human during this lawsuit and therefore not the victim of a death by malpractice. That's a real argument that's happening in the Iowa court system right now.

Yeah, and I bet it's not even the dumbest one. Yeah, no, but now that we all know that they'll do it, I say we charge them with unlawful imprisonment and make them argue in court that the flesh is just a cracker. Yes! Right? Can't keep them in a box like that. Kidnap your God! And a big thanks to Stormy D for sending the link to skatingnews at gmail.com and for

Schrödinger's Catholic great work. Monday was World Quantum Day and for that amazing wordplay and festive timing Stormy does and does not get a gift of their choice from Eli every year on that holiday. Yeah gotta open the box to find out though. Don't open it Stormy it's a dead radioactive cat. I know it is. Never open a box presented by Eli Bosnik. I learned that early. It's a great idea. It's a good, very important, valuable lesson. Also Don Ford, voice of fantasy and adventure. True story. Wasn't radioactive, but it was dead. So here's what led to the lawsuit. Miranda Anderson of Iowa was 34 weeks pregnant and

experiencing symptoms of preeclampsia, a condition that sometimes requires early delivery. She was taken to Mercy One Medical Center in Des Moines, and after two days of monitoring, she was discharged. After several more days of checkups, it was tragically discovered that the fetus no longer had a heartbeat. So Mrs. Anderson and her husband filed a lawsuit against the provider, Catholic Health Initiatives,

and Mercy One, claiming there should have been an early delivery. According to Iowa State law, malpractice damages are capped at $250,000, except in the case of loss or impairment of mind or body. So now Catholic Health Initiatives and the Catholic Hospital are making the argument that the financial cap still applies

because there was no loss of a human life and in Quantum fashion here's what's also true Catholic health initiatives is a tax-exempt nonprofit and their stated mission is providing health care in the spirit of the gospel According to their own ethical guidelines quote We respect the sacredness of every human life from the moment of conception until death. Huh.

Okay. Honestly, we respect the lives that we didn't personally end is a great motto for most of the hospitals. I know. All right. I see how this is confusing, your honor, but you have to understand that considering a fetus to be a human being for purposes of malpractice suits doesn't help us control women at all. So what would be the point? I don't get it. I don't get it. Yeah, that's what's happening. Here's some of the actual arguments we got in court filings from the Catholic health care provider and the Catholic hospital. They claimed a fetus should not be considered a patient or a person, arguing, quote, finding

an unborn child to be a person, person was in quotes there, would lead to serious implications in other areas of the law. Oh, would it? So our lawyers tell us. And they cited a court ruling from 1971 from the Iowa Supreme Court that said, there can be no recovery of damages on behalf of or for a non-existent person. Your Honor, I present the argument from we're liars and hypocrites. Also, while we're at it with respect to some molestation charges,

we'd like to argue that nine-year-olds aren't people either. Thank you. Someone said it. And just in case it wasn't 100% clear that these Catholic providers are liars who don't actually believe their own stupid dogma, they also argued that the Iowa legislature's decision to cap the awards for malpractice was meant to quote increase the affordability and availability of medical care and protect the public treasury or in other words the Catholic understanding of this

Medical issue is completely insane and untenable and it's horrible for society We're Catholic the defense rests right and in pulpit fiction news. Fantastic. Thank you. Perfect. Oklahoma Senator and man who somehow looks like he's mid-sneeze in every photograph ever fucking taken

of him, James Lankford, introduced a bill that won't pass and wouldn't matter even if it did. And then he went on a hate groups YouTube channel to get his dick sucked over it. Okay. I looked him up a little bit. I saw a whole bunch of, yeah, sneezes happening. But then to where he was very clearly like frowning really hard and holding it.

One picture that looked a little bit different. Okay. All right. I didn't I didn't go as deep. I only went to page two of his images on Google. So. Okay. All right. I didn't, I didn't go as deep. I only went to page two of his images on Google. So, so the bill in question is the free speech fairness act, a name that could only be applied to a bullshit bill. And it would basically castrate the Johnson amendment.

That's the amendment that forbids tax exempt organizations from endorsing political candidates. Of course, his his thing would only change that if the organization in question was a church. And of course the hate group YouTube show in question was Tony Perkins' Washington watch and the blow job in question was the nibble. And that actually might be a sex crime because Langford is 57 years old

but he's also very clearly Owen Wilson's fetus and like I don't know how the law would apply that. He looks like if Flann pulled off being a guy in a chicken boo situation. And then sneezed, yes, exactly. So yeah, so as all of our regular listeners know, the Johnson Amendment is a favorite boogie man of the right, even though it's essentially never been enforced.

I think there was one occasion where a church did lose their tax exemption for like, taking out a full page ad for a particular candidate. But the idea that pastors are losing their 501c3 status for endorsing a politician in a sermon is just straight up horseshit. It has never happened. It should happen, right?

That's what the law says. But even when pastors send videos of themselves intentionally violating that rule en masse, the IRS doesn't follow up on it. So it's kind of like America's commitment to fight climate change in that way, right? Like it exists, it's not really doing anything, conservatives are terrified of it, and it would still really matter if we got rid of it. Yeah, and everyone trying to get rid of it is deathly afraid of Greta Thunberg.

Yeah, that's true. Right. A lot of commonalities. So am I, but not because of their reason. Because of her physical strength. Right. Yes. But getting rid of the Johnson Amendment is exactly what Langford is out to do with his bullshit bill. And even in a conversation with Tony,

I'll play along with whatever persecution fantasy you want to spout, Perkins. He had to admit that not one single fucking pastor has ever been punished for directly endorsing a candidate. But in his telling, pastors still live in fear of it happening, so they self-censor, and that is a violation of their free speech. Except, of course it isn't, because it's a blanket rule that is applied to all tax exempt organizations and creating an exemption for Churches would be a violation of the establishment clause So he's literally trying to violate the First Amendment in the name of the First Amendment

All right. Well, that that's cool. If you let me kill the Second Amendment with a gun But yeah Even after admitting that anybody afraid of this rule is jumping at shadows any fucking way, Langford paints this dire scenario where pastors are worried about, quote, an IRS agent sitting in their congregation, monitoring their speech to make sure

that they don't mention something in politics in their sermon, end quote. And some pastors might be afraid of that, sure, but some pastors might also be afraid of fucking werewolves and we don't make laws exempting pastors from fucking werewolves. Yet? Wait, yeah. Gotta call that hotline.

And finally tonight in LGBTSA news, Christian pastor and man who proves the universe simulators are just fucking with us at this point, Andrew Isker, took to his podcast this week to tell us that he doesn't use, or allow his son to use, the TSA airport scanners because... Why? They turn you gay. Do they? Yeah. And when we get a lob over the plate that beautiful, you know we're going to talk about

it. Wait, is that why we're all gay now? I guess that's good to know. Well, the tricky part is that they just switch your sexual orientation. So as long as you go through them an even number of times, you're always going to be what you started as when you get home. That's right. And that's why whenever I go on vacation, I just suck so many dicks. Oh, exactly. Exactly. Right. That's right. And that's why whenever I go on vacation, I just suck so many dicks.

Oh, exactly. Exactly. Right. That's it. So first things first, big thanks to listener Alicia, first time submitter for the story and to Stormy D for the so good you know somebody else had to write it pun to our inbox at scathingnews at gmail.com. You can send us atheist news to scathingnews at gmail.com, but you can't send us flowers there because that's not how email works Scathing news at gmail.com you could send us flower emojis That's true. All right. Now one thing before we get to the actual quote here, which is amazing I have to point out that iskir's podcast is literally called Contra-mundum which means against the world in Latin, but in use it basically

means against common sense or against the general opinion. His podcast is called Ixoth being wrongeth. Yeah and thanks to an x-ray at the dentist he delivers that podcast through his gay mouth that he's not even aware of. That's true. Unless he got an even number of x-rays. So to the quote here's what Isk'ur had to say about his He's not even aware of. That's true. That's true. Unless he got an even number of extra days, I guess. Right. So, to the quote, here's what Iskair had to say about his recent trip to the airport. Quote, I had to be molested at the airport to go to Florida just to get on an airplane because I'm not going to go through the gay beam machine.

I didn't let CJ do it. I wouldn't let him do it. I said, you're going to get patted down too, buddy. I don't want CJ do it. I wouldn't let him do it. I said you're gonna get patted down too, buddy I don't want them turning you gay time for a good old-fashioned heterosexual caress from a grown man, son See now I'm glad you bring that up Noah because I know what you're thinking You're thinking isn't being groped by choice by another man gayer than walking through an x-ray machine. What's that? No, you weren't thinking that because you're not a fucking nutbag. Well, okay, apparently I am a nutbag. Answer the question. Yeah, same.

Okay, well, Iskarr is so glad you asked. Quote, It appears that having a guy touch you all over the place on its face seems worse, but you don't really know what's going- Prima Gaesia. What- what those things are doing to you. So, yeah, they could take a picture of me naked? Like no. All right. Well, good news there, Andy.

If you accidentally go through the gay beam, just go back through again and ask for a lady to take the naked picture and that would turn you straight. Right? Yeah, there you go. And I know what you're thinking, listener, because it's what I spent a full half hour researching before the record. But no, he's not a Poe! Or if he is, he's the most dedicated Poe in history,

playing a multi-year long con that includes becoming an ordained minister and writing a best-selling book on Christian nationalism. Got us. I feel like we could do that. If we shaved off my beard and I wore a fake beard to every live show and then smooth shaven me was a Christian right nationalist, I bet I could get appointed to Trump's cabinet before he's gone.

All right. All right. Good challenge. I like it. Matri on goal. Bet taken. All right. So this is all very silly, but that means it's time for another important mission.

That's right. This is for you, Podcast Listener. If one of our listeners works at the TSA and you see Andrew Iskher and you get a chance to pat him down, I need you to moan like your life depends on it while you do it. So many Heath points are available if you can pull this off. All right. Well, I guess while I get to the bottom of how Eli has so many Heath points to throw around, we're going to wrap the headlines for the night.

Heath, Eli, thanks as always. Jumanji. And when we come back, it'll turn out that scratching sound you heard earlier was Don Ford trying to get in. I sold Eli a strategic stockpile and he got him on the bounce. I caught him on the bounce. Caught him on the bounce. Okay. Think of it this way. Are there any numbers you can think of between

.999 repeating and one? Exactly. No, but there aren't any numbers between three point nine nine nine repeating and four either. Correct. Right? Yeah, you see? No, no, you see. You are the one who needs to do the seeing. Hey guys, are you ready for Bible Peace Theater? You mean the part of the show where we act out the Bible so our listeners don't have to read it? We sure are. Don, when did you get here?

Oh, Heath told me you guys were recording Bible Peace Theater and that this time worked for me. So... Wait, we can do that? Yeah, man. Why did nobody tell me right? So I trapped on in a Ghostbusters box one time I I remember anyway We're on the book of acts cool. What's that? It's the sequel to Luke

Seriously, there's a sequel in the book. That's already a sequel. Yep Why Jesus is already dead. Right, yeah, so there's obviously a lot of arguing about that throughout history, but there are sort of two main reasons the Book of Acts exists. The first is to tell ancient Christians how Christianity spread after Jesus' death.

Right, because they couldn't like Google it. Right, exactly. And there were almost certainly counter narratives that were going around as well. So this is sort of Luke setting the record straight. Got it. All right. And what's the other reason? Well the other reason is to justify Christianity to the Romans who were still very much in power when this shit was written. Okay, why do they need to justify their religion to the Romans? Yeah, so contrary to the popular Christian

persecution narrative, Rome did have protections in place for religious minorities, as long as those minorities weren't advocating the overthrow of the Roman Empire. So while Luke is very clear that Rome's power comes from Satan, he's trying to be equally clear that he's not trying to like take away Satan's power. Huh. That feels like a tricky line to walk. Yeah. No, it turns out to be so.

So let's get started with Jesus's ascent to heaven. And so don't be sad at my absence for soon you shall be visited by the Holy Ghost. Oh, okay. Who's that? Oh, I'd like to keep it vague. Oh, okay. So long, Jesus. Bye. Man, what a guy.

Right? Why are you guys looking at the sky? Who are you? Nobody, just a random passerby in white. Anyway, this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven. I mean, the son of God literally just flew up to heaven in front of us. Yeah, we're going to look for like a second.

Right? No, yeah, that tracks actually. Also, what does that thing you just said even mean? He's gonna fly back in He's or in reverse and he's gonna come back to the exact same spot. Um I'd like to keep it vague sure So now Peter is gonna clear some stuff up for the remaining Apostles Hi everybody, thanks for coming wonderful to see see all the apostles here. I am Peter. You're the guy who cut off that other guy's ear, right?

Okay, we did not make a plan. I mean, yes, that was me. Anyways, a couple of announcements. Idiot. Okay, well, we'll get to it. You all know Judas betrayed us. Boo. Yes, absolutely. Boo indeed. Well, good news. Turns out that he exploded. He what? He exploded. He bought some land with the money he got from the Romans,

and then he fell and he unequivocally exploded. Wow. Yeah, weird. It is weird. It is weird. Thank you. Anyways, I guess we have to replace him. Eleven Apostles doesn't have quite the same ring to it.

So I just wanted to get up here and nominate Joseph and Mathias. Okay. Okay, Joseph, pick a hand. Sorry what? We got to choose the new disciples. So pick a hand. Seriously? Jesus isn't here, man.

I don't have power. I don't find that one. Okay, wrong. Mathias, you're the 12th disciple. Oh, nice. Motherfucker. You have got to be kidding me. See language like this is why God didn't choose you to be a disciple. Oh, nice! Motherfucker, you have got to be kidding me! See, language like this is why God didn't choose you to be a disciple.

Oh, oh! Go cut off someone's ear, Jack. He was the son of God! Why would we not have thought about this? Don't rise! I'm not rising! I'm making my point. Shaman the Devil!

Shaman the Devil! Shaman the Devil! Shaman the Devil! Shaman the Devil! Shaman the Devil! Shaman the Devil! Shaman the Devil! Shaman the Devil! Shaman the Devil! Shaman the Devil! Shaman the Devil! Oh man, the Christians must all be drunk. Must be. Drunk, yeah.

Hi, excuse me, hi everybody. Hi, hi, Chris, Chris, do you mind? Sorry. Yeah, read the room then. Anyways, no, we are not drunk. We all just got struck by the Holy Spirit and we are now speaking languages. Yeah, I noticed you were speaking all possible languages. Yeah, I noticed that too. Yeah, just one of the many benefits of being Christian.

Christian you say? Yes, why don't I tell you all about it? So Peter converts 3,000 people and these early apostles are super communists. Sorry, super what now? Super communists. They have magic powers and they save people and everyone shares everything and nobody owns anything. And they sold all their stuff and gave the money to everybody according to their need.

Communist. Huh. I'm guessing Christians ignore this part of the Bible. Sure do buddy. Sure do got it. So, uh, what's next? Peter heals a lame man nice Um, excuse me, i'm an adult man who asks other adults not to swear in front of me wrong kind of lame I'd uh, oh and my leg is messed up too. Oh no problem my friend.

By the power of Jesus! Well I'm cured thank you. Of the leg or the swearing thing? Oh both. Nice. Excuse me sir but um that was amazing just now. Yeah well you know that's's the power of Jesus. Jesus, you say?

Seriously? You guys just killed him. I don't really follow the news. I don't listen to podcasts. Okay, fine, fine. There was this guy named Jesus. He was the son of God. He predicted by the prophets and you should convert and worship him. Okay? Wow, how did we miss this?

I don't know, man. The sun went out when he died. Oh, I do remember that. I don't really follow the news. Heard you the first time, Craig. Not on Facebook either. So as you can imagine, the Cetaceans are not thrilled at this, so they call Peter and John before the council.

Peter and John, you have been witnessed doing miracles. In whose name do you do this? In Jesus' name, that's who. Yeah! Sorry, um, who is Jesus? Seriously, you guys just killed, like you specifically, and when you did, the sun went out. No, no, no, that was Moabus.

No, it was the other guy. Oh, was there another guy? Oh my god, yes, Jesus Christ! Okay, would you be willing to stop talking so much about Stivusves maybe do some state-backed miracles his name is jesus and no it's it's super duper important that it's all you know about jesus yeah okay well that's an answer all right you you guys are free to go. Wait, we are? Yep. You're not going to kill us?

Why would we kill you? We don't kill people for miracles. You just killed Jesus! Doesn't sound familiar. Oh my god. Oh my god. No. Let's see, more selling possessions and giving it to God.

Man, why don't more Christians talk about this part of the Bible? It's great. Well, not so fast with the praise because it's about to get real murdery. Yeah, that tracks. Hey, Aeneas, how's it going? Hey, Peter.

Nah, I'm good, I'm good. How are you? I'm good, doing great, doing great. Hey, quick question, Mr. Ryu. I noticed that when you sold all your stuff, you and your wife gave us some of the money, but you kept some of it for yourselves. Oh, yeah. I guess we did. Right. So I guess my question is like, why Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Ghost?

Sorry. Sorry, sorry what? Yeah, I know you thought you were lying to us, the apostles of Jesus, which like most people wouldn't do, but just so you know, for your information, you were actually lying to God when you did that. Oh my, no. Oh, would you look at that? He died.

Excuse me, Peter. Oh, hey, Sophia. How's it going? Um, have you seen my husband? It's been hours and I haven't seen him. Oh, yeah. No. Um, I meant to tell you, he lied to the Holy Spirit. So he died. Uh, yeah. So the Gravediggers are still here.

And since you both lied to God, would you like them to bury you too? Oh my gosh! I'll take that as a yes. Man, I can't believe we got thrown in jail! You think it's because we killed those people for not giving us all the money when they sold their possessions? Nah, nah, it's probably because the Jews are jealous.

Oh yeah, no it's probably that. What up Chodes? An angel? Yep, angel. Here to bust you out of prison. You guys kill a dog by the way? What? No. Oh okay, because lots of a dog by the way. What? No.

Okay. Okay. Because lots of completely chill people do that. Right. Anyway, God wants you to go to the temple and preach. Okay. But won't we just get arrested again? I don't know. Probably.

Okay. Sure. Whatever you say. Wait a second. Yeah. So you guys want to run a train before you leave? Okay, sure. Whatever you say. Hey, wait a second. Yeah. So you guys want to run a train before you leave? No, I think we're good.

Sure? Lot of RB special sauce in this roast beef today, if you know what I mean. I might throw up. Yeah, I get that a lot. Apostles, you are called here before the High Court for preaching and escaping jail just now. We hereby sentence you to death.

Oh no! We're gonna die! Gentlemen, if I may. Yes, Gamaliel, what is it? Some time ago a man named Theodos recruited about 400 men. After that a man named Judas of Galilee did much the same with the same result. So what is it your point? My point is that if these guys power comes from God there's nothing that we can do.

But if it comes from men it'll sort itself out. I suppose that twacks. Can we still kick their asses? Oh yeah, I guess. Nice. Peter, Peter. Yeah, Disciple, what's up? We are doing much good,

but there are still many who are starving, especially widows. Oh, okay. Yeah, so we were thinking maybe we could use our magic powers to feed the starving and help the needy. Yeah. Like, like everybody do that? Yeah.

It's actually pretty important we tell everyone about Jesus. Right, right, right. Cool. Yeah. So how many people would you like to allocate to feeding the starving with our magic powers? Right. Oh, that's a great question. We have like 3000 followers right now. OK. Is seven

enough? You'd like seven people to feed the starving. Yeah. well, you know, three pairs and then an alternate if someone gets sick, was I thinking. So, um, three tables? For the starving. While everyone else uses their magical powers to just talk about Jesus? Yeah, yeah, that seems good to me. Does that sound good?

Does that sound good? Oh, well, all right, can we do eight though so we can have four tables? Ah, what if somebody gets sick? No, no, seven's fine. Fine. Good, good. And the acts don't get any more moral from there, which we'll find out more about

on the next installment of... Bible Peace. Before we seal this episode for freshness, I have some exciting news. Our very own Anna Bosnik has a new album coming out. The album is called Fable. It's fully instrumental. It'll be available for purchase on April 26th. We're going to have more details for you, including links to buy it as soon as they're available, But mark your fucking calendars. Anyway, that's all the blasphemy we've got for you tonight. We'll be back in 10,022 minutes with more. If you can't wait that long, be able to look out for a brand new episode of our sister show, The Skeptocrat, debuting at 7 a.m. Eastern on

Monday and an even newer episode of our sister show, Hot Friend God of a Movie, debuting at 7 a.m. Eastern on Tuesday and an even newer episode of our half sister show, Citation Needed, debuting at noon Eastern on Wednesday. Obviously, I can't call call this an episode if I neglected to thank Heath Enright for still bringing the class a funny 11 plus years in. I need to thank Eli Bosnik for the 82% as impressive feat of still bringing class a funny nine years in. I also want to thank Lucinda Lujans for more things than I have room for in this outro or even this episode. I need to thank Don Ford, Voice of Fantasy and Adventure for always getting the hard-to-reach voices for us. I also want

to thank Josh for providing this week's Farnsworth quote. Curious if that trust fund baby you were talking about was ever elected president. But most of all, of course, I need to thank this week's best bipeds, but I can't do that by name yet because we recorded this in advance. Sorry, I had to fly out early to make it to AAcon, but I will thank you by name on next week's episode. Thanks for your patience and your money. And speaking of money, if you have some of that that you'd like to give to us, you can

make a per episode donation at patreon.com slash scathing atheist Whereby you own early access to an extended ad free version of every episode or you make a one-time donation by clicking on the donate Button on the right side of the home page at scathing a DS comm and if you'd like to help but your 401k was just Wiped out by a presidential hissy fit and you can't commit to a financial donation at the moment You can also help a ton by leaving a five-star review telling a friend about the show and following us on social media and speaking Of social media Tim romperson handles that for us and our audio engineer is Morgan Clark, who also wrote all the music that was used in this episode, which was used with permission. If you have

questions, comments or death threats, you'll find the contact info on the contact page at scalingadds.com I do not even have Bible Peace Theater open. Oh my god. This is how much of a fucking hurry I was in. Wow. Wow. Started here. This is good to get. If I hadn't been almost an hour late for our record. Yeah, right. It was more than an hour late for our record last week. Yeah, right. It was more than an hour.

Keith, do you have how late I was written in blood in the wall in front of you? No. Each minute is carved in. I remember it. It's someone else's blood. I don't need blood. It's cum. Well then you're welcome. Yeah, really. The later I was, the better a time you had.

Yeah, honestly, like, Eli not showing up does it for me too, man. Let me tell you. Yeah, yeah. Wow, I never realized. The preceding podcast was a production of Puzzle and the Thunderstorm, LLC, copyright 2025, all rights reserved.