He only has a few radio and television programs, his own university, tens of millions of dollars to throw at his political causes, and a few million voters in his pocket, so Jerry Falwell* is just a marginal nut, right? We can just ignore him when he says things like this:
It is apparent, in light of the rebirth of the State of Israel, that the present day events in the Holy Land may very well serve as a prelude or forerunner to the future Battle of Armageddon and the glorious return of Jesus Christ.
Those rapture freaks who are cheering on the bloodshed in the Middle East certainly don’t have any real clout…at least, not as much as us influential atheists, I’m sure.
(via DefCon)
*Grade A Demented Fuckwit.
“may very well serve as a prelude ”
Awww, c’mon Jerry you’re copping out. A guy like you should know for sure.
let me be the first!
HE’S A DEMENTED FUCKWIT OF THE FIRST ORDER!
Is it wrong to wish the Rapture involved a mass suicide?
I wonder how many times Falwell has uttered ‘the end is near’ isn’t that one of the usual threats along with the eternal damnation and hellfire
Holy Jesus, that guy is crazy.
Are we ranking demented fuckwits now? Grade A, Grade B…are there specific criteria?
Yea, but he’s a scary nutcase that some delusional people listen to. Apparently, he may also have ties with the man with his finger on the red button. In the past, to see what he was about, I have tortured myself and watched his drivel. He’s like a talking TV marionette of religious hate and bigotry.
I do have to thank him for one thing though. Sometime in the 80ty’s he was rambling on and on about those “Secular Humanists”, and the values they live by. I’d never heard of a Secular Humanist before, but the values he rambled on about were absolutely exactly what I believed important. Thanks to him, I read up on the subject, and have confirmed I am indeed a proud Humanist, and Atheist.
Thank you Jerry!
Liberals oppose both sides’ bloodshed. Pro-Israelis oppose Hezbollah’s bloodshed. Pro-Hezbollah people oppose Israel’s bloodshed. Apparently, wingnuts oppose neither bloodshed, which is especially insane given that they don’t even try to mount a serious-looking “but this really promotes peace / but the other side’s people are really bloodthirsty barbarians!” argument.
Students of this particular form of dementia may be interested in a new web site dedicated to analyzing (& opposing) its “theopolitical” manifestation: http://www.christianzionism.org/ (Otoh, the “group of evangelical pastors, academics and mission executives” behind this have no interest in curing the problem of christianism per se…)
For a somewhat wider view – though one still punctiliously respectful of religion in general – the http://www.talk2action.org/ site has new investigative reports on the christocrats just about every day.
Dimensional Punk may be onto something…maybe we can “rediscover” an ancient version of Revelations that says that the faithful must die in order to be raised up in the Rapture.
On second thought, the fundie leaders probably wouldn’t endorse that idea. There’s no profit in it.
Jerry Falwell is a human being, and as a human being he deserves respect, but the words that come out of his mouth resemble the ravings of a demented fuckwit.
(trying to satisfy A.Vargas)
Appeasement, George? Vargas hasn’t even shown up yet and you’re already making concessions.
Falwell deserves to have his demented fuckwit opinions publicly refuted at every turn. Anything less is at least negligence, and might constitute crimes against humanity.
“Grade A Demented Fuckwit.” Um, can you tell us how you really feel?
History has shown that Ishmael became the father of the Arabic people, while Isaac became the father of the Jewish people. Thus, the enmity that began between these two boys continues today.
It seems to me that political analysis by use of an antiquated book doesn’t do much good.
Besides, Falwell and his end time crowd are really, at least secretly, hoping things continue to go badly. They want Christ to return. If there’s peace doesn’t that stop the whole process? So I say Falwell doesn’t want peace nor his asking of prayers for peace is valid. He’s actually a bad advocate for Israel, wouldn’t ya think?
Yeh, don’t sugar coat it, how do you really feel.
Dang it, I hate when a comment sneaks in while you are typing.
Oh well,
Yeh, don’t sugar coat it, how do you really feel.
No. This is a family blog.
Um… Where exactly is he “cheering on the bloodshed in the Middle East?” Oh, that’s right. NOWHERE!
Tell me, PZ. Are you this dishonest when teaching your students or do you [supposedly] keep that separate from your work, too?
He’s hedging an awful lot: “may very well serve.” Has he talked to God about this or not?
Yeah, Jason. What he meant to say was:
“the present day events in the Holy Land may very well serve … the glorious return of Jesus Christ [but I’m not approving of them just because of that possibility, mind you]”
No American is entitled to respect for their beliefs, no matter what they may be. Our Constitution entitles us to respect only for our right to personal conscience respecting religion. It most definitely does not entitle anybody to respect for any of those beliefs, simply because their nature is religious.
Falwell deserves nothing but contempt for his religious beliefs. Contempt is due as well to every media outlet propping him up and deferring to him as an authority immune to criticism because his toxic snakeoil is labelled religion. Do you suppose Falwell thinks PZ or any of us have the right as Americans to be atheists? Does he respect our right to the counsel of evidence, reason and personal conscience, if as a result we reject his brand of religion? Certainly not. Grade A demented fuckwit, remember? To him, we’re either the marks– the suckers that don’t deserve an even break, or, if he’s so insane as to believe that shit he’s been smoking, we’re all the minions of the antichrist, suitable only for target practice. Our perpetually burning flesh will be incense to his rosacea-veined snout for eternity.
Falwell’s fuckwittery unfortunately isn’t sufficiently beyond the pale in America. There’s a huge market for it. Nobody needs to look very far to find those who are seriously giddy about endtimes because of the latest news from Israel.
During the Gulf War, with SCUD missiles flying over Israel, I overheard Walt Disney Feature Animation co-workers hard at work animating The Beast, debating about how many times the Temple on the Mount needed to be destroyed and rebuilt before they could set their watches in anticipation of The Second ComingTM. Just how much blood would have to be shed before it would rise to the height of a horse’s bridle, and they’d be magically zapped up to Hebbin? Not one prayer was wasted on behalf of any of those poor schmucks dying. Some of those co-workeres were recent converts to Christianity, at least one had cynically faked conversion just to be on that team to further his career.
Such people may not be in the majority, but compared to those of us who reject such madness, they may as well be.
Handwringing twits cluck that we must maintain civility– if we call names, we’ve lost. As far as the demented fuckwits are concerned, we’ve already lost for opposing them at all, for calling their bullshit for what it is. They deserve all the mockery, scorn and contempt we can muster. They must, somehow, be shown for the contemptible slime that they are. Civility? They seriously don’t plan on taking prisoners.
Jason writes: “Um… Where exactly is he ‘cheering on the bloodshed in the Middle East?’ Oh, that’s right. NOWHERE!”
I don’t know, man– this thread over at RaptureReady.Com seems to be chock full of “rapture freaks who are cheering on the bloodshed in the Middle East,” though, to be fair, they seem to be cheering on just the bloodshed caused by Israeli military operations.
Apparently, they turn up their noses at bloodshed when it’s Israeli blood being shed. They require the blood to have the right pedigree for their prurient and demented interests to be adequately satisfied.
Jason, are you this much of a troll in daily life?
As a human being he has the duty to act like a human being. Not some grade A demented Fuckwit. This Rapture Crapture (http://tinyurl.com/gfgoe) has gotten out of hand. I wish god would stop talking to these people he’s making them seem really crazy.(sarcasm) On a happy note. Apparently only 144,000 are getting raptured. Man that sure is a lot of disappointed Grade A demented Fuckwits. I’ll bet that is what starts Armegeddon. All those disappointed assholes who just can’t believe they have been left behind.
We need more of this
PZ: As I’ve said before, one can live ‘on the fringe’ but that doesn’t make you marginal. Falwell still has enough clout that John McCain, who should know better, feels obliged to make ‘nice nice’ with him. How sad.
Scott
“Every new advance and every step taken by science confirm not evolution but the Genesis account of creation. Yet
evolution still continues to be taught as fact…. Thus, the honorable place that had been given to human beings by
God is surreptitiously aborted, and they are dragged down into the slime.”
Character & Destiny: A Nation In Search of Its Soul, (Zondervan Publishing House, 1997) (written
with Jim Nelson Black)
The above is by Dr. James Kennedy. Falwell’s buddy. Once again I say none of them deserve respect. They’ve proven that they are unable to be honest human beings. They sure do like our money though. Don’t they?
Classic Jason. If the thread is about science, say nothing. If the thread is about rightwing religion, drop one turd in the middle of the thread, preferably 2 lines with his patented petulant, whiny fratboy “Oh yeah? Oh yeah? Real MATURE, PZ! Way to paint with a BROAD BRUSH, PZ!”
Then disappear when everyone else on the board points out the idiocy of your statement. Repeat the process the next day.
Remember everyone, this is the same guy that, in 1999, said the Antichrist is probably already alive and is (of course) a male Jew.
What does a fundamentalist Christian Chicken Little run around screaming, anyway? “Jesus is falling”?
I think it would be appropriate to classify demented fuckwits (DFs) according to standard biohazard containment levels, according to the infectivity and pathogenicity of their ideas. The infectivity is a measure of the patho… sorry, DF’s financial assets, media reach, organisation membership figures etc. and the pathogenicity is simply the harm caused to others as a result of believing in the DF’s ideas.
Now, is Falwell more like HIV or Ebola? :-D
On his PZ-stalking blog, Jason posts revisionist accounts of his exploits on pharyngula (commenting disabled, of course). About this thread, he writes:
Part of Jason’s charming hubris is that he imagines no atheists were ever apostates.
Of course Falwell encourages us to pray for the peace of Israel. According to all the endtimes nutjobs I ever talked to, only the Antichrist can establish it, and peace in the Middle East makes Jeezoids ditch their calendars for hourglasses, counting down the minutes till their dead and resurrected god comes back to take names and kick ass.
Does anybody still read Hal Lindsey’s 36 year old book, The Last Days of the Late Great Planet Earth? or is it too original gangsta for today’s Left Behind crowd? I sincerely doubt that Falwell’s eschatology varies overmuch from it (other than the timeline, of course).
In a chapter titled, charmingly enough, World War III, on page 152, Lindsey writes:
That’s the reason fundies pray for peace in Israel. You can’t establish a miraculous peace without prior horrendous bloodshed. Who among the true believers would view the subsequent seven year tribulation as a bad thing, no matter how high the bodies will have to be stacked?
Not Jason, I fear. Please Jason, tell me where I’m wrong about Falwell’s and your contemptible religious beliefs.
Jason’s blog brings up a very important philosophical question: If a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it, does it make a sound?
Jason has a really unhealthy obsession.
Poor widdle Jason. PZ the evil liberal atheist has huge numbers of people on his blog. Jason the Virtuous Fundy Wingnut sets up a whole website to stalk PZ and shrilly whine about him, and no one visits and no one gives a shit.
I can see how this would give him quite an inferiority complex. But not a life, clearly.
Jerry and his cronies are the Jerry Springer”s of religion. And sly as a fox. Wanna bet he’s gonna stir up and ride the middle east war all the way to the bank, with his listeners paying him heavily for their own ticket to heaven on Jerry’s 144000 seat bus to salvation.
Big profits in the Snake Oil business, PT Barnum was right, but ya can’t fix stupid.
Jason either doesn’t allow, or doesn’t know how to allow, comments. It’s entertaining enough, since now any time I want to show somebody a meticulously and thoroughly documented series of pathological lies and hideously maladroit arguments, typical of a particularly loathsome variety of fundie, I can point out Jason’s dishonest little wankfest.
Jason’s blog brings up a very important philosophical question: If a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it, does it make a sound?
In Jason’s case we should just ignore the falling tree.
How many times can Fundies like Falwell claim to be privy to the end of the world before they lose credibility? Are “true believers” that dense?
A Brief History of the Apocalypse
http://www.abhota.info/end1.htm
Forty-Four End-of-the-World Prophecies—-That Failed
http://www.randi.org/encyclopedia/appendix3.html
Why is that the only website you clowns ever refer to when it comes to Christians’ belief in the so-called “End Times?” Oh, right. Because that’s the only site with people who fit your false portrayl of all Christians as far-right extremist loons.
Hardly. Expressing support for the nation of Israel during this difficult time is hardly “cheering on the bloodshed.” I see no joyfulness over the deaths on either side in that thread. You know, maybe if you took off your bigotry-colored glasses, you’d see that.
Classic George. Just make up lies and other crap about my supposed posting habits here, then disappear when called on it. Repeat the process whenever I make another comment at a later time (which may be several days away).
I debate some science, but that’s not my main focus. I’m primarily concerned with the lies about and bigotry against Christians that PZ so often vomits out (and you all hungrily lap up). I’ve made several replies in many threads, George, but I never expected you to be honest and admit that. However, I don’t have either the time or the inclination to reply to all comments and there are always new blog entries to comment on, so I move on.
So God is asking us to pray for the coming of the Antichrist, since Falwell is simply reminding us what the book of Psalms says? Man, what kind(s) of drugs are you smoking? Yeesh!
Obviously it does, since you’re talking about it.
I myself like to think of it as “the falling of small stones.”
Oh. Webhits. Whoop-dee-shiznit. I don’t care how many people visit. I care about making sure PZ’s bigotry is confronted.
I like that bit though: I’m “stalking PZ.” But PZ isn’t stalking Christians to the near-exclusion of all other religions. Oh, no. Of course not.
And obviously you do give a shit because you just can’t stop talking about it.
Um, that’s Jehovah’s Witnesses, not Christianity. Seriously, if you’re going to denegrate religious people for their beliefs, at least keep the religious beliefs straight. You’re like that guy in “Porky’s” (yep, I’ve seen it, kids) who kept calling the Jew a “kite.” I liked the response: “You know, you’re too stupid to even be a good bigot!” A line that could very well be used here.
umm, JW’s are Christians. They get the number right there in that there book bubba.
Please a little respect, with 10000 sects of this religion alone one cannot comment all at once. what you don’t ever seem to do is denounce this stuff for what it likely is irrational delusion. I mean you clearly don’t have a handle on your own religion.
The people he comments on are Christians. Just because you may not agree with them they are no less Christian than you.
How is it bigotry to call people crazy when they act crazy? The bigots seek to prevent people from doing things like getting married not call a spade a spade.
Geez Jason, should you be here? It sure seems like supporters of Israel lament the deaths on the Israeli side and either celebrate or downplay the deaths on the other sides. That would be true for the Christians and closet atheists supporting war in the middle east – any war will do…
The Decider says terrorists are afraid of democracies, but we were cheering the Lebanese democracy when they were protesting against Syria and now we’re telling Israel to keep killing that democracy for at least a couple more weeks. Let’s see, it’s Israel (a democracy?) vs Lebanon (a democracy?) and Shia vs Sunni in Iraq (which The Decider says is a new democracy) – the two hottest spots in the middle east. And we shouldn’t forget Israel’s continuing war against newly elected Hamas (who Israel helped build to counter the secular Palestinians in the PLO – we reap what we sow).
http://thinkprogress.org/2006/07/26/kill-em-all/
Iraq, Lebanon, the Palestinians – let’s just wage war against the most secular people in the Arab world and push them into the open arms of the fundamentalists – and I don’t mean the self-proclaimed Christians…
Seems like this is simply a place for Christianfascists AND Muslimfascists to get angry at all the free thinking you call bigotry…
Falwell says, “Second, we should purify our lives.”
What the hell does that mean?
“Give money to J. Falwell”, of course.
So God is asking us to pray for the coming of the Antichrist, since Falwell is simply reminding us what the book of Psalms says? Man, what kind(s) of drugs are you smoking? Yeesh!
Jason, you lying little weasel, you know what a load of DFs you’ve signed on with. The Antichrist is all part of gawd’s plan, and his arrival heralds the rapture. You do want to be raptured, don’t you?
Notice this delightful “heads I win, tails you lose” aspect of biblical prophecy. War in the middle east? Why, that’s signs of the endtimes, rapture’s comin’! Peace in the middle east? Antichrist is the only one who coulda done it. Why, that’s signs of the endtimes, rapture’s comin’! Blood, peace, it’s all good, just make sure that temple gets destroyed and rebuilt, and Jesus’ll be here to open a can!
Is this Jason troll our dear old chum from TO, Jason Gastrich by any chance? Similar shrillness, similar MO.
Jason, whilst I agree with much if not all of what PZ and others have said here, I get the meaning in their posts which is that they are having a crack at Falwell and other christians like him. They, and I, will be the first to admit (and have done so many times) that not all christians are like Falwell.
Do we really need to paste a disclaimer with every post? Not all christians are rapture ready, endtimes nutjobs praying for armageddon. Shock horror. However, some christians are. People like PZ and myself recognise the plurality of christian thought (such as it is) and belief. Granted there ain’t much of it we like, although there are bits I don’t mind, but you are seriously deluded if you think that PZ and others are claiming that all christians in the world are like Falwell/Gish/Torquemada etc, because no one is or has said that.
What HAS been said is that it is only a quantitative difference between “Nice, unintrusive, pleasant christian” and “Falwellesque, bible thumping, gay bashing, doctor killing, evilushunist hating fundy rapture lovin’ christian”. In just the same way as it’s only a quantitative difference between “Chairman Mao” and “Bill Clinton”. The trick is that the “Bill Clintons” vocally kick the “Chairman Maos” out of their tent and won;t have anything to do with their methods and naughtiness. What has been sometimes observed is if you cut one christian, they all bleed. If you are one of the “Nice, unintrusive, pleasant christians” (of which I know many) then it is your secular and sacred duty to cast out the “Falwell Fundy christians” out of YOUR tent. Reoudiate their lies, calumny and methods. Point at them and make it clear where the distinction is, because dude, it’s becoming LESS clear, not MORE clear.
If I were a christian, which I’m not, I would be appalled that anyone thought Falwell spoke in my name, and I’d make damned sure no one did. I wonder why you don’t do that?
You debate ‘some science’, Jason? Name one place. And defending Bush’s stem cell ban doesn’t colunt. Name one place where you post where it’s not some shrill fratboy pro-Bush whining. You never post unless you can make some rightwing bitch about how evil PZ’s antireligion or antireligion stance is. You never post unless you can attack PZ or ‘liberals’. THAT is why people here call you a troll. You’re just here to be shrill and complain.
I’m primarily concerned with the lies about and bigotry against Christians that PZ so often vomits out (and you all hungrily lap up)
No lies, wingnut boy, you just don’t like your heroes being portrayed in a negative light. It speaks volumes about you that you see fit to defend Falwell as you do, and with a bunch of nonsense as well.
I’ve made several replies in many threads, George, but I never expected you to be honest and admit that.
You do suffer, so, Jason. You’re ever so misunderstood. When you called Lewinsky ‘chubby’, I’m sure there were all kinds of intellectual/spiritual subtleties there we were just too oblivious to catch.
However, I don’t have either the time or the inclination to reply to all comments and there are always new blog entries to comment on, so I move on.
No, you make one or two stupid whines per comment, insult PZ, then run away, provided there’s some way to bash liberals. Like you’re doing now.
BTW, your obsession with PZ is getting much worse, Jason. You should get that looked at. As your honey Coulter would say, it seems to be becoming a ‘religion’ with you.
Jason either doesn’t allow, or doesn’t know how to allow, comments.
Yeah, which is it, Jason? Too dumb to figure out your computer, or afraid of having to debate people who disagree with you?
Too dumb to figure out your computer, or afraid of having to debate people who disagree with you?
Yes, both of those, and: so divorced from reality that he posts mangled misrepresentations of PZ’s posts and our comments that would never stand up to an honest challenge.
It’s like the frat boy whose come-on to a female nets him a boot in the crotch. Jason’s blog is where he tells the world, “See? She’s totally into me!”
Actually, Jason allows comments on his other main blog. (The last time I checked, which was a long time ago, he even had comment moderation enabled on his main blog.) So it’s not a matter of not knowing how to enable comments. It’s a matter of not wanting his false claims refuted.
Yes, I posted a comment to Jason’s mainblog several months ago. Then he never permitted my followup response thru his moderation.
You think that expressing support for the nation of Israel doesn’t necessarily entail support for the nation of Israel’s actions? (In case you haven’t been paying attention, the nation of Israel’s actions constitute roughly 90% of “the bloodshed”.)
Supporting the Israeli _people_ is one thing, but supporting the _nation_ of Israel is quite another. Supporting the nation implicitly includes supporting its actions and policies unless you make it quite clear, explicitly, that you do not support them. And at present, prominent among the nation of Israel’s actions is the intentional killing of several hundred people, many of them innocent civilians (a fact known to, and disregarded by, the present political and military leadership of Israel).
This does not make them particularly different from Hezbollah, except for being better armed; I’m certainly not saying that _all_ Lebanese are innocent victims. But a lot of them are and unrestrained use of heavy weapons is at least as terroristic a tactic as suicide bombings.
Atheist activists have been willing to ostracize Larry Darby, an atheist activist who has been a shameless bigot and an opportunist. So where are the Christians who are willing to do that to the Larry Darbies of their creed?
Though he now claims that “I agree with moral precepts put forth by Jesus of Nazareth and I am Christian in a sense that Jesus of Nazareth would approve.”
For more, see Larry Darby Finds Jesus, closes Atheist Law Center.
Gee, if the Antichrist is supposed to “seduce the Earth,” I wish he’d get on with it already. I’m not geting any younger, and my grandmother would be thrilled if I finally hooked up with an influential, brainy Jewish guy.