But seriously, I hope no atheist was responsible for this vandalism.
Authorities say someone drove across the Oklahoma Capitol lawn and knocked over a Ten Commandments monument that a group has been suing to have removed, smashing it to pieces.
Oklahoma Highway Patrol Capt. George Brown says the person drove into the monument on the statehouse steps Thursday night, abandoned the vehicle and fled. Brown says the vehicle was impounded and authorities are searching it for evidence.
At best, this was a drunk Oklahoman barrelling across public property; at worst; some stupid atheist decided to undermine our cause by carrying out a criminal act. DON’T DO THAT. All you can accomplish is to encourage theists in their sense of martyrdom.
Whoever this person is, they sure didn’t do atheists any favors. And damaging or destroying your vehicle in the process doesn’t seem very smart, if it was a DUI, it sure must have been one hell of a party.
I agree that it shouldn’t have been done, but it shouldn’t have been there in the first place.
Also I have to wonder if the cops will look for the person who did this with more or less effort when compared to when a non-christian monument is destroyed.
Nono. It was a false flag op by theists to make atheists look bad. Because that’s totally what’s happening to all the kewl kidz these days.
Could it have been someone who was trying to actually follow commandment number 2 about not having any graven images?
Bad though that it probably defaced the lawn.
Ah, the problem of Yahweh has with iron chariots strikes again.
“OH! Klahoma, where the cars go whipping ‘cross the lawn… LOOK OUT!!!”
Proably a Catholic who is sick of the Protestant Heretic version of the Ten Commandments.
Maybe it was someone who had read the CORRECT version in chapter 34 of Exodus and decided to clear the way for a new monument.
Or someone who was incensed at the misspelling of Sabbath.
Wikipedia: Ten Commandments: Traditions for numbering
Specifically, Protestants follow Exodus, while Catholics follow Deuteronomy where “thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s wife” is listed before “thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s (other) stuff”, and (like Lutherans) put theological significance in having 3 commandments about the relationship of God and Man, and 7 about the relationships of people with each other.
I saw this story elsewhere. According to the cops the driver moved a ramp to get in the right spot so it probably wasn’t a drunk. Sadly this does look like a deliberate attempt to destroy it. Right now I’m still going with the idea that it was done by a christian who knew the courts wouldn’t make the “right” decision and is trying to manufacture some martyrdom.
Alverant: It’d be nice if that turns out to be the case, but honestly, after multiple years of watching the asshat athiest brigade, I’ve got no illusions about there not being members of the atheist community who are both stupid and thuggish enough to pull this kind of stunt.
Yeah, there definitely are plenty of asshole atheists who would do this. :/
If it was an atheist intentionally vandalizing it, they are fucking terrible vandals. Vandalize it by driving your car into it and then ditch the car? Either their car was worthless, they REALLY hated that monument, or they didn’t quite think their plan through.
God has his minions. We call them losers. They will avenge by wreaking all pagan and satan monuments. They may also show their stupidity by wreaking havoc on Judaic and islamic monuments. Oh, I so much love the religious comedy.
@13ish, anteprepro
I admit, I think a combination of “REALLY hated that monument” and “didn’t quite think their plan through” seems more likely. However, another possibility would be if they had the foresight to steal someone else’s car as a precursor step of their plan.
If the last few years have taught me anything, it’s that when I used to hear things like Phil Plait’s “Don’t be a Dick” speech and think, are there really atheists out there who act like dicks to people about religion in person instead of just internet comments, I was utterly and completely deluded. I expect they’re still a minority of unbelievers, but there are clearly far too many asshole atheists.
abb3w: Though it is the least probable, but I am very entertained by the idea of someone stealing a car in order to ram into the Ten Commandments statue because they just want to vandalize it that hard. Would be a great bit to include in a movie. Maybe someday there will be a satirical movie about asshole atheists and that could be a random side story.
Well at least if an atheist did it most people will be content to just call it vandalism. If a Muslim did it though we can all guess which -ism it would be called.
Over at Raw Story, they’re saying someone’s been arrested who claims Satan told him to do it…and to kill Obama.
Thinking a psych eval is in this person’s near future.
Your Honor, the defendant heard the voice of god telling him to knock down the statue.
An asshat move but I shed no tears. Why not fill in the hole with the Satan statue for a few years just to even things out.
Let’s not “do unto others” for the atheist billboard vandalisms.
I can pretty much lay odds that it was some drunk redneck that hates that “guvmint” and hadn’t a clue some religious nonsense was there.
@20 — whose Scientologist employer used the religious exemption to deny him his psych meds.
Nerd wins the thread!
It was satanists who had a beef with the Okies, since they were not allowed to put up their statue of satan or whoever, so why are we assuming that atheists were somehow to blame?
The story at the link’s been updated with the arrest as well:
The problem now will be all the ignoramuses who think “atheist” = “satanist” and blame us anyway.
#26 Of course Atheists are going to be blamed anyway because we’re convenient targets. Besides stoking the fires of false persecution brings in more money than admitting it was a mentally disturbed man.
@11: “the atheist community”
I’m increasingly feeling like there’s no such thing; it’s a granfalloon. There’s people who value reason (and as one consequence, reject the idea of gods as false) and want to make the world a better place for humans in the here and now (a.k.a. Secular Humanists), and there’s self-important assholes who think they’re terribly clever and edgy for rejecting a certain popular superstition, and get all self-righteous and supercilious about it. They’re only superficially similar.
All the same, I’m just as glad the guy turns out to be neither of those.
Jimbo2k7 @ 25:
I want you to look at the timestamp of the first comment here and the time of the update on the website linked to in the OP. I think you’ll find out that no one was blaming atheists in spite of the evidence. It was merely hope that it would not be one responsible for the act.
“blaming atheists in spite of the evidence”
What evidence?
Well, he may have claimed to be a Satanist, but he doesn’t sound too much like the New York Satanic Temple who are the ones working to get their monument on public property right next to that one for another mystical being that just got smashed.
Since I have no proof for either being, or any others, all should be allowed, including one that says none of them exist. Personally I’d like all that silly stuff off of the lawn!
Hey god, get off my lawn!
Replace “in spite” with “in lieu” to get the desired effect.
Just to make it crystal, my meaning was that no one was blaming atheists in spite of the evidence that it was not atheists. If I could rephrase: “No one here was blaming atheists. There was no evidence that it was not an atheist prior to the update. What people were doing was hoping that the evidence would reflect what it eventually did – that it wasn’t atheists.”
According to this story:
Apparently the authorities can confirm that Satan was behind it:
frankly, if that was the only problem atheism faced in the US, there would be no problem.
Does the USA have an extradition treaty with Hell? Even if it does, doesn’t Satan have diplomatic immunity as a Head of State?
Tomorrow on Fox and Friends we’ll hear all about how a Liberal Atheist done did it.
UnknownEric @6, I have giggled at your comment every time I’ve checked this thread today, and I figured it’s high time I tell you how much I’ve enjoyed it. I’m gonna sing those lyrics next time I hear that song, I know it.
Hee hee hee!
A Liberal Atheist Communist Muslim!
A Liberal Atheist Communist Muslim Satanist!!!
In other Oklahoma news: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/22/abortion-pills-oklahoma_n_6030038.html
At best, this was a drunk Oklahoman barrelling across public property; at worst; some stupid atheist decided to undermine our cause by carrying out a criminal act.
I see nothing in either clause which excludes anything in the other.
News reports here lead me to guess is that the guy likely has some sort of delusional disorder.
The Anti-Obama Satanist did it. He urinated on and hit and ran the Ten Commandments, and now is threatening to assassinate Obama. I honestly gotta say I was not expecting this (though I will also admit that “Anti-Obama Satanist” is not too far from “Asshole Atheist”, in America’s religious and political landscape, sadly).
http://www.koco.com/news/ten-commandments-monument-smashed-to-pieces-near-state-capitol/29316430
No, actually, it was Jesus. He was going to drive the vehicle through the monument as a stunt to upload to YouTube, but at the last moment he had to go pay for his wife’s dinner and so he let the whole thing go smash.
Soooo … Flip Wilson strikes again.
@38 Nick Gotts
AFAIK they think they do. Texas seems especially eager to honor the unilateral agreement.
@32 #NotAllSatanists?
I’d have gone with “Don’t do that because vandalism is wrong.”
Jacob Schmidt:
That’s a good point. It’s roughly equivalent in ethical reasoning to gamergaters telling each other to tone down harassment because it reduces their collective credibility. It’s very self-centered, focusing more on how our actions might not be beneficial to ourselves rather than focusing on the harm we cause to others.
That said: I’m not sure if “vandalism is wrong”, universally. Even when it is, it usually isn’t that bad or falls into a gray area. This case is a fairly dark gray. Blatant destruction, causing a rather large amount of property damage. It sure ain’t banksy.
I want to remind all that the original set of Ten Commandment tablets were broken by Moses himself. So this vandal is only following his Bible like a good True Christian ™.
@52, clearly it’s not always wrong. There are instances when I’d encourage it, but I have an illegalist bent about me, so I wouldn’t necessarily take my word for it.
@53 Oh man, he’s the second coming of moses.
@Jacob Schmidt, 51
Setting aside the already mentioned fact that vandalism isn’t always wrong, it’s also ineffective to use that as an argument. If the person is already willing to destroy the thing in such a blatant way I don’t think appealing to ethics will work. Appealing to practicality might.
Moses wasn’t a Christian.
@56 Stop with your true Scotsman. Wait…
Jesus wasn’t a Christian, either.
That’s actually what I was thinking of. I’ve seen it so often from them, seeing what looks like an example from someone with whom I largely agree was a little grating.
1) I really didn’t care about the minutia of vandalism ethics, particularly when I was trying for concision.
2) I’ve seen the same argument for a wide variety of shitty behaviours. I think it under estimates how strongly we abide by the standard of our social group. Even if we can’t convince the vandal (which I’m not willing to grant), convincing the vandals friends would be beneficial.
Maybe the vandal was a Gnostic working on behalf of the Demiurge?
Also, they should ask Melek Taus to protect the monument.
Nikc Gotts@38:
Extradition to the US would be hell….