This may be redundant, but Helen Ukpabio is an awful excuse for a human being, and she’s also a fervent Biblical literalist. She’s a Nigerian pentecostal preacher who rants and rails about witches, especially those wicked children who are agents of Satan. Her brand of demonization is what has been fueling the mutilation and murder of homeless children in Africa.
She also makes movies illustrating the devilish activities of these witch-children: flying through the air, cursing good Christian families, drinking blood, and just generally being so naughty that they deserve to die, at least if no one brings them to Ukpabio’s ministry to be exorcised, at a price.
She’s also got simple diagnostic tools so that you too can detect a witch.
a child under two years of age that cries at night and deteriorates in health is an agent of Satan.
I am distressed. By this method, all three of my children were witches and warlocks. It also explains a lot about those Terrible Twos. And my kids didn’t grow up in areas where malaria was common!
All joking aside, who in their right mind would beat children to death, set them on fire, or throw battery acid in their faces? As it turns out, people under the influence of Helen Ukpabio think that is reasonable and just.
Third world problems, right? Let’s all close our eyes and not worry about it — we Americans have nothing to do with it.
Wrong. Helen Ukpabio is coming to the US, at the invitation of Glorious Praise Ministries in Houston, Texas. You read that right: an infamous Nigerian witch-hunter, responsible for fomenting a climate of fear and hatred leading to the agonizing death of innocent chldren, is coming to Texas to raise money and support for her reign of ignorance and terror. Here. Sponsored by American Christians.
Madness. This evil, criminal woman ought to be met at the airport and turned right around, if not sent off to trial for crimes against humanity.
Protests are being organized, and money is being raised to support Stepping Stones Nigeria, the organization trying to oppose the violence against children promoted by Ukpabio.
I’m simply stunned — I find it unbelievable that her visit is being tolerated by the state, let alone that she was invited here by a mob of dimwits in Texas.
Taliban? Amateurs.
“a child under two years of age that cries at night and deteriorates in health is an agent of Satan.”
Yeah, stop feeding your spawns and you get a fireball-blasting minion at your disposal in no time.
The first time I read about this kind of abomination, I wondered “why on Earth would even these rabid religionists target children?”
But my cynicism answered: because they are smaller and easier to victimise.
I know you think this is too obvious to mention, but no one ever says it when this topic comes up: there is no such thing as witches, at least as these people imagine them.
Wait…she’s a scarry woman who prays upon children.
And these people…who believe in witches…see her convince parents to kill ch ildren….and come to the conclusion that the children are the witches?!?
Any chance of having her arrested for crimes against humanity when she gets there? I supposed the least we can hope for is that the imbeciles who invited her will have scored a spectacular own goal.
I’m surprised she managed to get a visa. Wanna bet that if she was a Muslim witch hunter she’d never get in?
Why is it so hard to believe? That’s Perry country. The man who thought you can pray for rain. He may not be connect to this, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he was. The only thing I find hard to believe is that they’re bringing in a non-white for religious advice.
True. Africa is saturated with guns and trying to take down an adult witch carrying a pistol with a full clip can be hazardous.
The two year olds just don’t have the same fire power.
In the UK it’s possible for the Home Secretary (roughly equivalent to the Secretary of State in the USA) to ban undesirable foreigners from entering the country. That ability is used not infrequently. Can we do that in the USA?
How long before someone shows up to inform us the we are being cultural elitists for condemning a woman from Nigeria like this? That somehow, our cultural bias is getting in the way of understanding an other culture.
This is because this is what happens if the person in question is a muslim.
I was wondering what religious people have to say about this visit. While googling a bit, I found that this is not the first time she is visiting US. She was there in 2010, and the story was even covered by Ed Brayton on ScienceBlogs :link
Well, it does prove a central feature of the fundies.
They never, ever miss a chance to demonstrate their complete moral and intellectual bankruptcy.
The number of child witches in Africa killed per year isn’t too well known but is thought to be around a thousand.
There are a few organizations opposing them. AFAIK, none of them are other xians. They seem to be seculars.
Vcan we burn her? Cause lady is a Gingerbread house away from being a cartoon
Now, wait, let me get this straight.
You kill fetuses in an abortion clinic –> xians will more or less openly wish for someone to put a bullet into your head.
You are directly responsible of the death of two-year old children –> xians invite you to preach to them and to give money to you.
Oh, but I assume she is doing it in good faith, so that’s OK, then.
@raven
Secular doesn’t mean its not run by religious folks…just that religion isn’t their goal and they keep it away from the org. I actually bet a lot of the secular orgs are made up of liberal xian
If we can just get the Christian science that the IDiots want, there’s no reason we can’t burn witches here.
Damn materialists, you just think that everything happens according to “laws” and shit, and won’t recognize how witches cast spells onto good unsuspecting citizens.
Makes as much sense as the rest of IDiocy, anyhow.
Glen Davidson
They are possessed by the devil so they don’t count.
*puke*
Raven, please be more careful about your use of words. These were not child witches that were murdered, these were children accused of being witches being murdered. Big difference.
Ah how I never fail to be disappointed in humanity whenever I hear some of the things theists say…
I don’t know how I am still a quite happy person…
Must be some sort of miracle! =]
Obviously the fact that they can torture child witches to death proves one thing.
They aren’t really witches.
If they were, they would just turn their
xian ministermurderer into a frog and that would be the end.@we are ing: Hey if they’re run secular, and we can’t tell what they personally believe, I don’t really care what imaginary being they talk to when they get home. As long as they stick to reality in the public sphere, then believe what you want. Long as they leave me out of it.
This woman is a sociopath. No wonder the fundies invited her to speak to them.
Maybe she will. Perhaps these Christians are just pretending to be demented loonies and are actually conducting a sting operation.
I can always hope, right?
I have but one word to describe this helen ukpabio. monster. Personally I am surprised this hack isn’t on the terror watch list.
Can we accuse her kids (if she has any) of being witches, and since she therefore hasn’t recognized and exorcised them, then accuse her of harboring witches?
Wrong religion.
Michael,
Or we could not pretend that her delusions have any basis in reality.
arg, i failed at blockquote again.
Is it too much to hope that she was invited by a lynch mob?
I wonder if we can detain her for crimes against humanity and prosecute her at the Hague?
That was a very unfortunate sentence, madscientist. Would you care to take back that lynching line?
I remember in the 1980s or early 1990s, someone telling me that Africa was going to erupt in a religious war because both Christian and Islamic fundamentalists were sending their worst, most radical, least humane missionaries there. I think of that every time I see something like this. I never imagined it could be this vile.
If you google “nigeria child exorcism” you find that there is quite an industry based on the notion that many children are demon-possessed.
From BBC, 2008.
Like many scams, witch-hunting is a lucrative business opportunity for entrepreneurial “pastors”.
Alverant:
-True, but I think even Rick Perry would draw the line at murdering children.
African christian witch hunters and american fundamentalists are hardly a new combination. Just remember Thomas Muthee giving blessings to Sarah Palin in order to protect her from witches.
I think even Rick Perry would draw the line at murdering children.
Don’t count on it. Certainly, I think Rick Perry would have no problem killing a 17 year old convicted, on however dubious grounds, of a capital crime. A two year old might give him more pause. But only a fetus would REALLY upset him.
Here’s your answer: http://gloriouspraiseministry.com/about/
The pastor was raised n Nigeria. A number of African churches have established branches here in the US in recent years – most, I think, in Texas (I wonder why?) – for the expressly stated purpose of evangelizing Western Christians whom they see as “backsliders”, or some damn thing. In other words, our fundies aren’t quite insane enough for these people.
Perhaps this church is one of those transplants. If so, this is colonialism come back to bite us in the ass.
Alverant says:
That’s Perry country. The man who thought you can pray for rain.
It might have WORKED, if he’d picked the RIGHT god. Praise Tlaloc!
Couldn’t she be sued for her crimes while she is in the US?
And she will go back to Nigeria with the added prestige of having been invited to the US, which will make her evil trade even easier to perpetrate.
It takes balls to execute an innocent child.
janine is right, madscientist. No need for the spectacle of a lynching. Surely she can just be quietly ‘disappeared’.
Surely she can just be quietly ‘disappeared’.
Screw that. She committed major crimes against humanity. Call the Hague and get the black helicopters warmed up. She needs a noisy, public trial and conviction*.
*If guilty. I suppose there might be some bizarre way in which she is actually innocent.
janine @ 36
Oh, c’mon, janine, you are too faint in your praise.
@ janine:
Good catch! What a cosy little crowd they have made, indeed.
@ cipher:
They’ve also taken root in some European cities. There’s a big Pentacostal church near where I live which does a lot of proselytism in the African and West Indian communities. They are not as bloodthirsty as Ukpabio’s crowd, thankfully, but they are big on faith healing (who needs Western medicine?), prosperity gospel (the most faithful will the richest!) and exorcism.
Of course, in this last venue, they have competition from the Catholic and Islamic clergies, who already share most of the market for the expelling of demons.
Exactly.
janine@19
As if it would have made it any less of a monstrosity if the victims really were (or, at any rate, thought they were) practicing “witchcraft”?
Maybe we need to call for this guy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTGjv8kXzK8
Houston, Texas. It’s close enough to me to consider attending one of those protests.
“-True, but I think even Rick Perry would draw the line at murdering children.”
White Christian children, maybe.
As I was reading this, “Church of Madness” popped up on my playlist. Talk about apropos.
Go away, Helen. We don’t need you here. It’s bad enough we’ve got wastes of flesh like Perry and *spits* Rev. Fred Phelps. I hope I live to see the day you are rightfully tried and convicted of being a blight on humanity.
Seamen have been warned off Ukabio’s home town of Calabar by this seaman’s chanty since the 18th century :
Beware, and take care
Of the Bight of Benin
For one that comes out
There’s a dozen goes in
I’ve always hated Texas.
Unless they’re poor children.
Ugh. No, you really count on people like Rick Perry to balk at the murder of children. If he thinks his god says it’s okay, what reason would he have to object?
@Janine
“Wrong religion.”
I hate to admit it, but that might be the case.
Isn’t there something in your Customs & Immigration guidelines about about people who advocate violence? Or criminals? Or maybe even hate speech?
Any chance that one of those numerous Christian organisations with “family” in the name could campaign against this visit? Because “family” is pretty damn incompatible with murdering your kids, I think.
The Pope & the Vatican are also pushing exorcism–when yet another inconvenient headline about, say, the Church’s pedophile prosecutor being a pedophile pops up, they crank up the supernatural Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt to distract people and convince them that they need the church to protect them.
Perry killed a man people told him was innocent and they could show good evidence for it and left his state on fire to go play cowboy.
I’m not sure why you would think someone like that would have a problem with offing a few children to get his way
I just sent this to my congressman.
I’m not sure if it will do any good, but I felt like I needed to send something.
The body politic of the US is going to have to face up to the fact — and it is a fact — that freedom of religion is being used as a screen to shield fraud and many other crimes. It is, I believe, a crime to incite A to harm B, and if A is Mommy or Daddy and B is little Ookums, A has a particular duty to take proper care of B. This silly fraudulent woman is, by that reasoning, inciting others to commit crimes.
But it goes further than that. Show me a televangelist and I’ll show you someone who has an income beyond the wildest dreams of most of us: Pat Robertson being a good example, who lives in a veritable palace on a mountain top.
The legal system of the US needs to wake up and say, freedom of religion is not absolute, and if you transgress those limits, you will be charged and if convicted required to disgorge ill-gotten gains. I’d say the limits would forbid pushing quack therapies, counseling without formal training, and a host of other evils daily committed, but shielded by “freedom of religion.”
Most importantly, it seems to me that the US would do very well to pass a Religious Financial Transparency Act that would require all religious organizations to keep proper accounts, get them audited, report their financial statements, and make those public. A limit on how much remuneration clergy can get tax free might also be appropriate, say, as an example, 90% of the area’s median income plus $40,000. (Those figures are out of thin air. Other parameters might be much more appropriate.)
It’s time for the false clergy who use religion to make a bundle (the grifters) be brought to heel.
Not being a believer, I’d also go for a Religious Belief Transparency Act which would require all religions to state publicly, in formal reports, just what they “believe”. This could lead, for example, to Scientology being forced to put the notorious NOTS in front of the public. Hail Xenu!
Click on the link to the church. It’s a black church.
Not all crazy fundies are white racists. (And for that matter, not all white racists are crazy fundies.)
@Maroon
Stupid is color blind.
Over at Butterflies and Wheels there are some very good articles by Leo Igwe which really get inside the mindset which creates and sustains ukpabio.
http://www.butterfliesandwheels.org/2010/critical-thinking-and-the-african-identity-2/
Superstition is so ingrained there that even people who have received higher education accept the existence of the supernatural as self evident.
It will require a total mind shift within Africa, something which isn’t a magic bullet but will come slowly painfully and require a thousand different small steps. It will not be accomplished in any of our lifetimes but we must start or the misery will never be stopped.
Isn’t murder still illegal in Nigeria, or has it gotten that bad there that no one enforces the law without being forced into it ?
Are there no federal prosecutors with balls in Texas, or are they all playing golf with Halliburton execs?
Wowsa, you’d think this there might be more sympathy for the children, and some condemnation of Ukpabio.
Browsing the Gorious Praise Miseries I find, these people is NUTS!
And also noted that it’s pastor is a native-born Nigerian.
Check this comment:
It’s a good thing they’re also anti-abortion. It ensures a fresh supply of the nocturnal satanic cries of the wicked children. Witch(pun intended) reminds me; isn’t toilet paper a recession proof investment?
Better.
@68
Please tell me that’s a Poe , pretty please
Yes, it’s a Poe — from Jesus’ General.
PZ, you were here in Houston a couple months ago. Did you wander into any of the Little Nigeria enclaves? Did you ride in a cab? There are a ton of Nigerians here, enough that there are Nigerian stores and services.
But seriously DHS should put her on the no fly list as a terrorist. She really has led to children’s deaths. I’d forward info about her to DHS but then I’d be on the list too.
@ Markita
Speaking of exorcism, a movie obtained by badly mixing the series CSI and the movie The Exorcist is coming out soon. I saw the rushes last month in a theater. Plenty of possessed people, including a young girl going all dislocated and wall-climbing.
It’s just an horror movie and I shouldn’t make mountains out of it, but.
Helen and her Texas pals may go see it as a documentary.
Motto: “between science and religion”.
“science”? My mom taught me it’s rude to yell swearwords in a theater, and I didn’t want to frighten my girlfriend, but I was very tempted.
Turning it around, think about the levels of faith in Africa if we are sending missionaries back to the West! And think about what the situation is like for atheists here… I still remember one woman asking what church I went to and I replied, “I am an atheist.” She looked puzzled and said, “I don’t know that church, maybe I should come worship with you on Sunday.”
Thank you to PZ for running the blog! It inspired my wife and I to start one. We don’t use our real names, we lack the courage of PZ, but we also have higher levels of religious fervor in our community.
All the best from Kenya!
http://www.change.org/petitions/united-states-department-of-state-deny-entry-to-the-usa-for-helen-ukpabio?share_id=MqRqERZPOG&
Petition to stop her entry into the USA!!
Wait .. WHAT?! What century are we living in again?
(Checks calendar to confirm it is 2012 not 1200 CE.)
This is like something out of the Dark Ages or 1700’s. Scary.
Un-bee-freak’n-lee-vable.
Babanani @ 74:
I’d argue that African preachers are moving to the US to preach because it’s the world’s most lucrative market for fleecing Xian fundagelicals. Does that make it sound like money (i.e. greed), or at very least selfishness, is a motivation for them? Does the Pope shit in the Vatican?
Anecdotal evidence – I’m FB friends with one such tithe-leech. Her family was able to emigrate from here (South Africa) to the USA quite easily because her husband is a preacher. This was during the G.W. Bush years, and I vaguely recall US law at the time made it easier for preachers to get their Green Cards.
So it’s not a case of Africa is exporting preachers – I’d say it’s more a case of individuals exploiting immigration loopholes in an opportunistic manner, to secure themselves a better life in one of the world’s greatest nations.
(And if anyone doubts the ability for religious people to be selfish, let’s talk about heaven. Surely the primary motive to be a good Xian is to get yourself into heaven (rather than hell)? If that’s not looking out for number one, then nothing is!)
Pity the US is not a signatory to the International Criminal Court conventions. That way decent Christians could make out an indictment and have her arrested on arrival and sent to the Hague to be tried for crimes against humanity.
This coverage of 15-year old boy allegedly murdered by his 28-year old sister and her boyfriend for being a witch seems germane to the thread. The family is of Congolese decent.
@CapeTownJunk: (And if anyone doubts the ability for religious people to be selfish, let’s talk about heaven. Surely the primary motive to be a good Xian is to get yourself into heaven (rather than hell)? If that’s not looking out for number one, then nothing is!)
That really is all there is to it. They are the most selfish people in human history. Nothing more need be said.
CapeTownJunk:
What genius in the US government thought “you know, what this country really needs is more preachers, to correct our desparate shortage of churches?”
CapeTownJunk at 77.
No doubt there are people like you describe. But I can also tell you of two men in Kenya, one in my office, who went to the UK just to preach. And both of them have come back to Kenya.
I also met a preacher family that had lived and preached in Florida for about ten years, but chose to return to Kenya. Why? They were afraid they would be charged with child abuse as they spanked their children.
There are plenty of greedy believers out there, but there are also plenty of true believers and they see the moral decline of the West needing attention. Things like gay marriage, female equality and child raising practices are pointed to as barbarisms that need correcting. And there are always believers who are willing to go and tell other people how to live their lives…
@babanani: And there are always believers who are willing to go and tell other people how to live their lives…
I haven’t met the Christian yet who was qualified to tell another how to live his/her life.
The tragedy is that you’re so brainwashed you can’t see how everything you’ve just said proves our collective point.
@sc_7b414abbd9012e461437c024368cefd6 : 11 January 2012 at 1:34 am
Thanks for that. Just signed.
sc_7b414abbd9012e461437c024368cefd6: Also signed and shared on Facebook.
Why is there no mention of Ukpabio on gloriouspraiseministry.com website?
~wjs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zktMwd6xLg&feature=related
I hope that Opkabio bitch fucking dies.
Ukpabio is an evil religious fanatic, a vile and sadistic purveyor of cruelty, an accessory to murder who should be arrested and tried for her crimes. She’s not a bitch; being female is not/should not be used as an insult – she’s not evil because she’s a woman, she’s evil because of everything she says and everything she does and everything she believes.
saguhh00 @ 87;
Please refrain from the use of gendered insults. Yes, Ukpabio is frankly a monster, but there are other epithets that you could use to describe her that do not carry a gendered connotation. By all means insult the individual, but do not do it by denigrating the entire gender.
For myself, I think she should be arrested the second she sets foot on US soil, tried for her many and hideous crimes, and once found guilty imprisoned for the rest of her natural life. At least then she will find it difficult to harm any more children.
For myself, I think she should be arrested the second she sets foot on US soil, tried for her many and hideous crimes, and once found guilty imprisoned for the rest of her natural life.
Agreed, but she should be tried at The Hague and executed, publicly.
You know, we don’t have to go all medieval on her just because she started it. I would be happy enough with a big Hague trial and imprisonment for life.
Ukpabio is evil because of what she does, not because she is a woman. I called her a bitch because she is evil. I also call evil men bad names, like man-whore, so what? If I say an evil man deserves to have his balls ripped off, does that mean I want all men to have their balls ripped off?
If god were a witness, he would say that Scooter is all over this one.
They might allow freedom of religion in them liberal Yankee states, but it’s not hard to rile up some rednecks and get some shit started around these parts.
Stay tuned.
saguhh00,
Gendered insult are frowned upon here. We can agree she’s evil and should be arrested and imprisoned, so let’s just also agree that she’s an evil asshole and call it a day.
saguhh00 @ 92;
The term itself is problematic because of its social history and context – ‘bitch’ is an explicitly dehumanising term that likens a devalued woman to an animal, thus denigrating womanhood itself. As for your example, ‘man-whore’ is a term that denigrates a man by comparing him to a class of women who have been historically (and unfairly) viewed as being immoral and undesireable in our society. Thus this phrase also has unfortunately sexist undertones.
Your antipathy toward Ukpabio is not at issue here, it is the form of words that you used that is problemtic. As general rule of thumb, it is best to avoid the use of gendered insults in order to avoid the further normalisation of a lexicon that constructs women and womanhood as being somehow ‘lesser’.
cipher @ 90;
My opposition to capital puishment holds, even in cases such as this. Killing this woman would do nothing other than reinforce the idea that court mandated murder is ethically acceptable. It would do little to tackle the ideology and worldview that shaped her toxic delusions with regard to so-called ‘witchcraft’. Imprisoning her protects society from her ongoing crimes. Beyond that, only education can tackle the ignorance and anti-intellectualism that gives rise to such beliefs.
Nonsense. The traditional way to execute people like her is to wait for her to check her fire and then shove her in the oven
saguhh00
How about this:
if you call someone a “bitch”, the only thing your readers can understand is that you disapprove of that person.
“bitch” alone does not convey any information at all about what you don’t like.
Be more specific or detailed and you may find that you don’t need the word “bitch”.
@ babanani:
Is that what they told you?
Because seeing the kind of home-grown “Spare the Rod, Spoil the Child” evangelical Christian groups legally operating in the USA, I’d bet it was more than just spanking if these people were afraid to be charged with child abuse.
Ever think maybe they should be?
Skepticism 101: Move the question back one step.
Okay, now the only insult I’m gonna use is “big meanie”.
I’m going to do a radio show on this tomorrow, with female guests, and the word BITCH will flow freely and it won’t be my fault, because we know how foul mouthed those women can be when they get all bitchy.
Women get all out-of-control when children are being tortured and murdered, it must be a gender thing.
@Gregory Greenwood: Killing this woman would do nothing other than reinforce the idea that court mandated murder is ethically acceptable.
I have no problem with it. I’m also in favor of it in cases of female genital mutilation.
@We Are Ing: Nonsense. The traditional way to execute people like her is to wait for her to check her fire and then shove her in the oven.
Heh!
Step 1: Accuse her of being a witch.
Step 2: Allow “spectral evidence”.
Step 3: Standard witch interrogation techniques.
Step 4: There is no Step 4. No one survives Step 3.
I’m more concerned about witch-hunters than witches, and for good reason:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-16434523
Damn our emotional primate brains. When we feel outraged, anything goes, from using sexist slurs to fantasying about torture and murder – while feeling justified because the object of our hatred is so evil.
Never mind that the Ukpabios of this world use the same kind of logic to feel righteous about killing children. ;_;
We Are Ing @ 97;
Ha! Got to love the classics…
——————————————————————
cipher @ 104;
You are entitled to your opinion, of course. I guess this is one of those ‘agree to disagree’ moments.
Someone said that the minister of the church that’s inviting her to speak is African. I wonder if he’s African by descent of by birth, and if the latter, can he still be deported for encouraging this kind of incitement to violence.
“by descent OR by birth”
@sc_7b414abbd9012e461437c024368cefd6 #75
Hm… Nigerian…
Tomorrow on Faux News: “Nigerian Obama supports Nigerian murderer of babies!!!”
I can see that happening.
I’ll do what it takes to raise some awareness about this here in Austin and rally some of my troops to head to Houston to protest this evil woman. It is truly disgusting that this kind of vile worldview is espoused anywhere in the 21st century.
cipher, like anyone else who supports the “death penalty” (read “state-sanctioned murder”), can be written off as an authoritarian wingnut with violent fantasies.
As for Ukpabio being tried in the Hague, we can say with certainty that this will not result from her visit to the US, since the US is not a party to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, and the Court’s prosecutors cannot conduct investigations in US territory. Plus, I’m not sure she’s committed an offence within the ICC’s jurisdiction (which is limited to genocide, crimes against humanity – which are very narrowly defined, being a “widespread or systematic” attack against a civilian population pursuant to a “State or organizational policy” – and war crimes).
However, she could, of course, be put on trial in the ordinary courts in Nigeria, since it seems pretty obvious that she’s committed various acts there which are serious crimes under the domestic law of any nation.
Seriously. Try thinking about it for a minute before you spout this kind of xenophobic stupidity.
Assuming that he is a foreign national, what good would it do to deport him forcibly from one part of the Earth’s surface to another? Then he’d just be inciting hatred in Africa (where he’s more likely to do harm and to get away with it) rather than America. Are American children more important to you than African children?
Anti-immigration sentiment is something for which I have no patience. Immigration restrictions are institutionalized racism, and come at an absolutely appalling humanitarian cost. If you think that the current system of immigration law, which discriminates against people on the arbitrary basis of birth and nationality, is defensible, then you are either a racist bigot or an idiot.
cipher, like anyone else who supports the “death penalty” (read “state-sanctioned murder”), can be written off as an authoritarian wingnut with violent fantasies.
Yes, that’s an accurate description of me.
Idiot.
Walton, like anyone who supports, monarchy (read “state-sanctioned elitism and classism), can be written off as an authoritarian wingnut with fascist fantasies.
What disgusts me most about this monster is she is just another mentally ill psyhchopath given a free pass because her abuses masquerade as religion. Why don’t we do the African kids a favor and make a complaint to police upon her arrival as having fomented violence against defenseless kids and an accessory to murder? Anyone know of a lawyer versed in intermational rights laws who wants to do a pro bono on behalf of African kids?
If you want to argue in favour of the death penalty, come out and say it. If you don’t, stop handwaving.
Supporting vengeful killing should be no more socially acceptable in any circle of intelligent people than supporting bigotry, and there is no excuse for meeting it with any less strong condemnation.
There are jurisdictional issues. The US courts can’t, in general, assert jurisdiction over a Nigerian national for alleged crimes that occurred on Nigerian soil. There are, however, various complicated exceptions; in particular, there are some crimes (piracy, genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes) which attract “universal jurisdiction” so that any state’s courts can prosecute them, irrespective of where they occurred. But as I said above, I doubt that the allegations against Ukpabio, though horrifying, meet the narrow international legal definition of “crimes against humanity”; and clearly none of the other offences apply.
Says the Walton, supporter of monarchy. Here is a fucking question for the Walton, how many of the ancestors of the monarch that Walton gets dreamy about, used state-sanctioned murder to gain and maintain rule. Shit, how many use state-sanctioned murder just because they were annoyed.
Sometimes, ythe Walton’s sanctimony get teeth grindingly overbearing.
(Speaking as a person who opposes the death penalty.)
The Walton does not get to choose who he can disregard. It can be really fucking easy to use that against him, seeing him ideal form of rule is.
Ciper @ 83. Follow the conversation before you start calling people brainwashed. Check 74 for context to my reply in 82.
I am an active atheist and the point I was making is that some believers are in it for the money and some actually do it for the faith. Simplifying and saying they are all just greedy misses the point. It also displays a lack of exposure.
If you have money, living in Africa can be much more comfortable than living in the West. I would wager that most of the posters in this forum make more money than me, but how many of you have household staff? Things are different here. Putting aside the obvious issues of social inequity for a moment, consider the question of what life in Africa is like for people with means. If a preacher can have a big house, servants, high social status, decent weather and near universal respect, why would they move to the West where they will likely have a small house/apartment, no servants, moderate social status, horrible winters and patchy respect?
Irene Delse@99 Yes, they told me specifically they left because they were afraid of arrest. They are fire and brimstone preachers, so I believe that particular couple is largely motivated by fear. I found their statement credible. That said, I acknowledge my own point above and they may have come back for a better lifestyle. They were successful preachers. Life for those without means can be horrible.
We are Ing@100 suggests I should wonder if they should be arrested. Yes, I have wondered a lot about the right way to raise my child. I had already drawn some conclusions and tried to have a civil conversation about them with the couple. The conversation ended with them telling me was going to hell and me calling them child abusers. It felt like I was in the comments section of an internet forum…
If you oppose the death penalty, I don’t understand what point you’re trying to make.
(Monarchy is utterly irrelevant to this thread, and I’m not going to derail the thread, or distract from the actual important issue at hand, by talking about it.)
I made my point very fucking clear, Walton. I will make it even more clear. Your fucking beloved monarchy used state-sanctioned murdered for many centuries. And the only reason why it is not used is because most of society is slightly more civilized and forced monarchy to change.
Monarchy used state-sanctioned murder to establish and maintain itself.
Fuck but you can get really fucking dense.
The death penalty is archaic, a vestage of our barbaric past.
It has long out-lived it’s usefulness (if it ever had any) and should be abandoned.
@chigau #124
So, kind of like monarchy? *laughtrack.mp3*
I’ll be here all week, folks.
Of course that’s mostly true, but it doesn’t have a damn thing to do with this thread. For the record, I oppose the death penalty just as vehemently when monarchies use it (as Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf states do, for instance) as when republics use it. Plenty of monarchies have shitty human rights records, and you will never see me defending that. (Indeed, I’ve circulated Amnesty letters here before about the dire human rights situation in Bahrain and the detention and torture of activists by Bahraini police, for instance.) No state should ever get a free pass on killing or abusing those under its control.
Sir Shplane #125
Good catch.
Keep swinging looking for fights if your goal is to loose all your friends here!
You get so much fucking slack as hard as people are on you regarding the monarchy that you’re hard-lining dismissing every view someone has because of this is hypocritical.
Of course it does. You’re being unwavering and strict in your acceptance of people while being extremely liberal for monarchies. You’re using a double standard and you’re treating the peasents harsher than the lords for it.
Email sent to the Secretary of State’s office with some details and url’s explaining why this person should not be allowed a visa to visit the US. I don’t know if it will make a difference but perhaps better than nothing.