Humorless goons out to wreck Halloween


They’ve always been around. I remember trick-or-treating as a kid, and there were always those houses where you knew you’d get a Bible tract instead of candy, or worse, a lecture or an attempt to pray with you. Unfortunately, I wasn’t the kind of kid who would TP their trees or egg their windows in retaliation, even though they deserved it.

It’s not surprising that Ken Ham is into the game. He wants us to share Jesus Christ with trick-or-treaters by handing out A Biblical and Historical Look At Halloween by Bodie Hodge, which will cost you only $29.99 for a pack of a hundred. So not only do you get to annoy children with sanctimony, Answers in Genesis gets more shekels for their coffers. Win-win! Except for the kids.

If you’re too cheap for that, you can get 100 Dino-Bucks for only $5.99.

Hey, and you can also leave these as a tip next time you’re at a restaurant! I don’t quite understand the point of this strategem — Ray Comfort does it too — where Christians try to lure you into reading their dogma with fake money. It’s as if they intuit that the rubes they want to appeal to are naturally drawn to wads of cash.

You can also buy the DVD for $9.99, or read the contents of this noise online. What I find amusing is that it complains about cultures that ‘celebrate’ death — how dare they?

Death is a terrible reality for all of us—not something to celebrate or treat as fun. Death is the punishment for sin. Since all of us are sinners (Romans 3:23), we must realize that death is coming.

That’s funny stuff coming from proponents of a death cult. I think they’re most annoyed by people who flip off and mock death, rather than worshipping it.

Comments

  1. gijoel says

    Maybe you should print Darwin bucks, with tracts explaining evolution and fun facts about dinosaurs?

  2. says

    I’m Finnish and we didn’t have any Halloween traditions until very recently but we have virpominen in Easter when kids dress as witches and trade blessings and decorated branches for candy.
    And there were always some people who’d complain about the pagan traditions and not give you any candy. But usually those people would just not open their door at all.

  3. rietpluim says

    Leaving fake money as a tip comes close to counterfeiting imo.
    And it won’t win you the waiter’s/waitress’ heart.

  4. What a Maroon, living up to the 'nym says

    So what sin did my tomato plants commit, to die such a slow death so young?

  5. Jeremy Shaffer says

    Speaking of “celebrating” death, I finally got my copy of this the other day and can’t wait to start reading it.

  6. birgerjohansson says

    Speaking of books about (the cause of) death, try: “Death on Earth: Adventures in Evolution and Mortality” by Jules Howard.
    It’s got evolutionary explanations (alas, he makes a mistake about the laws of termodynamics).

    BTW tell the death-worshippers they have got it wrong. Death is a rather nice sibling of Dream, Destiny, Delirium et al. She is not interested in being worshipped. if you do not believe me, ask Neil Gaiman.
    — — — —
    Re. deities, If you have read Aaronovitch’s “Rivers of London” you will be familiar with the concept of Genius Loci, the deities of places. The deity of Beverley Brook seems rather nice.

  7. birgerjohansson says

    If they give out pamphlets, retaliate with short summaries of “American Gods” and explain in great detail why Loki is such a bastard, and go on at great lenghts about the differences between Niefelheim and Midgard.

  8. Ogvorbis: Swimming without a parachute. says

    What a Maroon @10:

    Ok, but why did the squash have to suffer?

    Because Squash is but a pale imitation of handball, the game of kings and broken fingers.

  9. methuseus says

    I’ve never understood this. I worked at an amusement park where we weren’t allowed to take tips, and I got more than one of these. Each one was ceremonially burned out behind the building during my break (away from sprinklers of course). Even a couple Christians I worked with that were annoying in what they talked about agreed with me on that course of action.

  10. Ogvorbis: Swimming without a parachute. says

    When I delivered pizzas, I saw those. One house in particular ALWAYS gave those as a ‘tip’. Or Chick Tracts. Or other religious born-again porn. Considering tips were where we made our money, not a bright move.

    Sister, when waiting tables at a high-end restaurant, dreaded one particular couple — they ate expensive food, drank expensive wine, and tipped with Christ bucks.

    The scary thing is, the ones who give these as treats, or tips, really do think that they are doing the right thing. What is more important to a struggling family? Enough money to make the rent? or making sure that god will accept them into eternal life? For Hammites and Hovindites, the answer is easy. Starving is fine, as long as you believe!

    As a Hallowe’en treat, though, it seems rather candy-esque. Candy rots your teeth. This shit rots your brain. I think candy is healthier.

  11. erichoug says

    My favorite halloween conversation between myself and some guy I kinda know in the Elevator
    me:”So, you taking the kids out trick or treating tonight?”
    Some guy: With a look of ultimate disdain for me. “My family doesn’t celebrate pagan holidays.”
    me: “Really, wow! So no Halloween, no Christmas, no Easter none of that?”
    SG: “Uhhhh….”

  12. indianajones says

    The point of the stratagem is to sell the worthless pieces of paper to christians on the lower end of the ‘thinkin bout stuff’ spectrum. Apologist says this is a good idea, and even does it themselves. Low end of the spectrum guy/gal buys worthless crap. Profit! Unless of course you are, well, examples above…

  13. microraptor says

    I’ve always wanted to find the houses that give out this crap on Halloween in my area and start handing out eggs a couple of doors down from them.

  14. Curious Digressions says

    @ gijoel
    As long as you tape it to some candy!! Won’t somebody think of the children?!?*!

  15. blf says

    Wait a momemt, yer supposed to give something to the masked menaces? I thought it was the local atheist butchers shop displaying some of their merchandise for the upcoming holiday season — analogous to the Dish of the Day at Milliways.

  16. chrislawson says

    So Answers in Genesis is putting out “DinoBucks” labelled “Jurassic Reserve Note”…even though they don’t believe there was a Jurassic period?

  17. lumipuna says

    Lieju Lepakko:

    I’m Finnish and we didn’t have any Halloween traditions until very recently but we have virpominen in Easter when kids dress as witches and trade blessings and decorated branches for candy.
    And there were always some people who’d complain about the pagan traditions and not give you any candy. But usually those people would just not open their door at all.

    Huh, did you grow up in an area with many first generation Orthodox refugees from Karelia? Or maybe Pentecostals? I can’t imagine many other people being so…orthodox.

  18. rwgate says

    Surely, if any culture celebrates death, it is the Christian culture. I find it amusing that Christians, for all their piety, their preaching about how wonderful Jesus is, their ardent desire to spend eternity worshiping the Lord, are in no particular hurry to make his acquaintance anytime soon.

  19. lumipuna says

    even though they don’t believe there was a Jurassic period?

    No, they just believe the conventional dating is off by a few orders of magnitude.

  20. thirdmill says

    For Halloween I was going to dress up as a Republican but I didn’t want to frighten the children.

  21. ajbjasus says

    Copy apart, the artwork on that Dino buck is really cool !

    Look at the nice vegetarian T-rex !

    What a set of idiots. I’ve got to tell you – here in the UK it’s pretty hard to find anyone you could tell about AIG, without having them think you are just winding them up.

  22. ajbjasus says

    PS PZ

    I don’t quite understand the point of this strategem,

    It allows fundies to be mean, but with a clear conscience