I just glanced at the front page of deadstate.org, and then I had to close the window before the rage overwhelmed me.
We’re doomed. As long as Christians, and especially evangelical fanatics, have any influence at all in this country, they’re going to destroy us.
Stupid twats ,serve them right if they all come down with it ,lets see if the big sky daddy cures them .
Feel sorry for any brain washed kids that suffer from their parents stupid beliefs .
It’s inevitable that these oogedy boogedy idiots are going to kill a whole lot of people.
They already have.
One fundie xian pastor who told his followers that this was merely God testing the faithful. Pastor Ronnie Hampton, ofShreveport, Louisiana. “They’re gonna come up with a vaccine and in that vaccine, everybody is gonna have to take it … and inside of that vaccine there’s going to be some type of electronic computer device that’s gonna put some type of chip in you and maybe even have some mood, mind-altering circumstances,” he said. “And they’re saying that the chip would be the mark of the beast.”
A week later, Pastor Ronnie Hampton died from Covid-19 pneumonia.
A list of people that the oogedy boogedy xians have killed would take many pages by now.
A partial list.
.1. The main spread of Covid-19 in South Korea was a fundie xian cult.
A good share of the victims were their own members.
.2. The main start to the pandemic in France was a fundie megachurch in Alsace. It was traced back to one large church service.
.3. A church in Arkansas had most of its members infected.
.4. A choir in Skagit county Washington state had 45 of 60 members infected.
Two have since died.
.5. NoLiberty U. opened to returning students.
Twelve now have Covid-19 symptoms.
To be fair, in some of these cases, it wasn’t willful murder-suicide. They didn’t have enough information, took a chance, and guessed wrong i.e. Washington, Arkansas, France.
The current Covid-19 reality deniers don’t have that excuse.
What they are doing is murder-suicide and they will inevitably kill some people.
@1, I’d not disagree, save that they’ll also insist upon sharing their wealth of misery with the lot of us.
@2, “One fundie xian pastor who told his followers that this was merely God testing the faithful. Pastor Ronnie Hampton, ofShreveport, Louisiana.”
Sure, no problem. Allow me to introduce you to the National Guard, note that they’ve been ordered to dispense with mattock handles in favor of their firearms and destructive weapons. You are ordered to disperse peacefully immediately. Please resist with force of arms, the Air National Guard wants to practice napalm runs.
For the life of me, I never did figure out why the State Department refused to hire me for diplomatic missions, can you figure it out? ;)
And yeah, I’m serious about the National Guard and use of weapons, pick up arms against your government, earn what you deserve. Collateral damage, for once, accepted, as the lot of them are doing that which will kill hundreds to thousands of others.
For every service announced, the local police or sheriff needs to send one or two officers with Tasers to talk with the pastor in advance until he no longer wants to have a gathering.
Easter is 10 days away. I’m predicting a spike in COVID-19 infections in the Deep South about 2.5 to 3 weeks later. I can’t wait to see how they rationalize why their beloved Jesus didn’t protect them.
I was in a sorta honeymoon state with DeSantis in that it is refreshing to not have to look at Voldemort anymore. But he oddly waited to take his cue from Trump’s newfound seriousness to issue an executive order that doesn’t seem to be quite radical enough for my sense of personal well-being and the part about religion as an essential service is very offputting. I hope the socially responsible pastors, rabbis, imams (&c) outnumber and collectively shame the reckless 1st amendment shield-wielding monsters. Doesn’t gov’t have an overwhelming interest in shutting that shit down in the framing of a critical public health necessity? People can worship via streaming. Didn’t Jesus emphasize praying in private? In Islam if you have a rug and a pointer to Mecca (qiblah compass) isn’t that sufficient? In Judaism they kvetch which can be done at any place or time. I think I’m doing it now.
Surely there will be less religious people at the end. They aren’t near you, right?
it is completely predictable that in time of fear and calamity be it disease, war or economic collapse, people reach for something to protect. many turn back to superstition and magic in vain hopes of rescue.
there are always some unscrupulous a******* waiting close by to take advantage.
uncle frogy
@5: Kinda like that idea. @6: They can rationalize anything and everything. Self-delusion is its own answer.
Not sure if our Premier is religious or not—I am not sure he is Homo Sapien—but Ontario has declared liquor stores, bike shops and pot stores essential. I do not remember anything about places of worship.
This is mainly a characteristic of the all of the various Right-wings around the world. They want single powerful beings to blame and credit for what happens.
There are also evangelical Christians such as Jimmy Carter, whose values are in line with the values the Bible depicts Jesus Christ of having.
But Right-wing Christians hang their hats on blame. This leads them to search the wrong places for solutions. With their leaders getting rich.
Oh, I forgot. Québec has a Hasidic community in Monteal in quarantine, apparently at its own request. Québec is distinct.
https://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/boisbriand-releases-plan-to-enforce-quarantine-among-tosh-community/
Very American to have churches and gun stores in big demand while health care is being further eroded by Trump. Americans seem much better at fantasy than reality.
Will corp-dems shout down Jesus because all of his followers are clearly assholes? No, that privilege is reserved for Bernie Sanders.
I was thinking of people on a beach seeing the water recede before a coming tsunami but I now think this scene pretty much sums up what the looming growth curve impact may have in store:
https://youtu.be/4Hf_XkgE1d0
Churches having mass kumbaya fests only makes that frickin’ wave heading our way hurt even more.
@3 Raven sez
To their credit the members of that Jesus Cash Cult immediately went to the hospitals when folks started getting sick. If they didn’t the government here in SK wouldn’t have been able to get as quick of a handle on the spread of the virus as they did.
I haven’t heard about any of the manyJesus Cash Cults here defying the social distancing and mask-wearing requirements like those fucknuts in PZ’s post but I find in general even the culty Koreans have a much better sense of risk assessment than many Americans (and my fellow Canadians) do.
William George@17–
It’s hard to know exactly how much blame to put on the Shincheonji cult. Quite possibly it was just bad luck that COVID19 got a foothold in their gatherings when it could have been any of a hundred different groups who got hit first. BUT, it’s hard to have much sympathy for a doomsday cult that recruits people secretly (i.e. does not tell the new recruits until after they’ve become socially attached), infiltrates other churches to siphon off members, and so on. While none of this automatically makes them more likely to spread COVID19, but it certainly ties in with cult behaviours that are antagonistic to public health such as lying about having no COVID19 in their ranks because (of course) their faith protects them, and refusing to co-operate with the health department’s contact tracing.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/feb/28/were-treated-like-criminals-south-korean-sect-feels-coronavirus-backlash
@Raven, #3:
While this is completely true, it’s not really an example of fundies spreading the virus. The choir in question is a community choir with no religious requirement. They practice in a church, but that’s just where they rent space. Community (non-religious, or at least not-specifically-religious) choirs are a pretty big thing in some places in the country, especially where religiosity is low. Some people just like to sing with others, and if you don’t do church you need another option. The Skagit Valley Chorale is one of those options.
I can also kind of understand their decision making. I wouldn’t have done it, I thought it was a bad idea, but apparently they did do research on how many cases existed and where they were and whatever. Based on the information that they had, they thought that they could continue with practice. They had bad information and/or irrationally ignored important parts of that information (or both), but they did actually try to consider the risks. So that, too, doesn’t seem like the fundies who insist that they can ignore the virus b/c their gods will protect them or whatever.
So, sure, the fundies are disproportionately spreading the virus, but they aren’t the only ones, and in the one particular case of the Skagit choir it doesn’t appear that fundies or fundie thinking are responsible for that particular local outbreak.
The last panel: “It’ll be like Woodstock”. What a bunch of fundamentalist plague spreaders high on drugs rolling naked in the mud while filled with the un-Holy Spirit.
#20, yeah, the Woodstock thing had me gasping. I don’t even have to wonder what fundamentalists of the time said about Woodstock. Now, some descendant even MORE batshit rightwing promises to deliver exactly that…
So i was here reading the blog where the latest post was “jesus is going to kill us all” and it was perfectly reasonable and and justified, and then i went to reddit where the top post on the site is currently a nytimes article “jared Kushner is going to get us all killed”, which is also no doubt reasonable and justified despite it being a Times piece.
And now i’m just sitting here thinking alot about that proverb “May you live in interesting times”. Whether or not it actually was an ancient chinese curse, it damn well would have been a good one.
@18chrislawson
You won’t get any argument from me about how messed up they, and all of the other cults here, are. Their rituals definitively made things worse really quickly. But everything I’ve seen in the media here suggests they complied with the efforts to stop the spread. Like I said, credit where it’s due.
And blame where it’s due to those mega church pastors… and the Trump administration for that matter.
@18 chrislawson
History is going to repeat here in America in 10 days. Just on a much larger scale. If the states don’t shut down the churches on Easter Sunday, there is going to be an explosion of infection among the faithful.
This is a real rock and a hard place. DJT will never be the President who closed church on Easter. Most states in the deep south won’t do it on their own. Even if it could be done, the hard right would use it as a rallying cry to claim the government is infringing on Freedom of Religion.
It’s going to get ugly and I’m glad I’m up here in the PNW.
This shit is exactly why humanity is doomed. There’s that certain percentage of the population who, no matter how bad things are, and no matter how reasonable the requests to do (or not do) things to keep things from getting worse, are going to shrug it all off and go about their business as usual, thus spreading the bad thing further.
I suppose that their outreach efforts are working. The stupidity of those headlines did make me exclaim, “Jesus Fucking Christ!”
@24
so in thirty days give or take the shit will clearly hit the fan which should leave no doubt how dumb is dumb
makes feel kind of sad
uncle frogy
@27
Me too. Ignorance is costing lives in real time and it sucks.
On the plus side, I can now get a note from my doctor that says I don’t have to talk to fundies.
@#11, jkrideau:
I can sort of see declaring bike shops essential, actually. In some places, there are a lot of people who can’t afford to keep cars (either the up-front cost or the upkeep and fuel and parking) and bikes are usually the go-to alternative for a lot of them, and bikes are weirdly fragile in some ways, and can require specialized tools and parts to fix, so it’s not fair to expect people who can’t afford a car to be able to do their own repairs.
I don’t get it…can’t they and all their followers be arrested for public endangerment and civil disobedience?
Maybe even before the fines are issued forced into house arrest?
Or better yet, let them all go to jail… all in the same cell as they clearly want to do, under strict quarantine for 14 days.That way they infect each other and leave the rest of us alone!
FWIW, most of the churches and religious organizations I know of are continuing to have services.
Via YouTube and Zoom.
The sad and infuriating thing is that after 100’s of thousands die because of world class stupidity, their religion will come back stronger. The death and suffering will be manipulated in a way to keep the grifting preachers in bigger homes and planes.
“Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they’re sure trying to do so, it’s going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can’t and won’t compromise. I know, I’ve tried to deal with them.”
~Barry Goldwater
@34 When you can’t reach compromise with Barry Goldwater from the Right you know you have a problem..
So scumbag Hobby Lobby owner who is a multi billionaire refuses to pay his employees. This Covid 19 has completely revealed how religion is the worst.
I’m one of those scientifically literate christians . I can’t stand these ignoramuses and I’ve been saying for decades that they’re gonna get us killed because they’re ignorant and seem to be stupid . Smh
@34 sherylyoung and @35 nomdeplume
If we’re quoting Goldwater:
“Every good Christian ought to kick Falwell right in the ass.” just extend that to that particular Falwell’s asshole demon spawn presently. Or the somewhat progressive: “…you don’t need to be ‘straight’ to fight and die for your country. You just need to shoot straight.”
But OTOH Goldwater is in no small way at least distally responsible for what the GOP has descended into now. He was no progressive saint. He just happened to say some tolerably libertarian things that put him at odds with intolerant conservatives. He still was an asshole when it came to civil rights per LBJ (also asshole) and molded a very toxic reactionary force that reshaped the political landscape.
@ 30 The Vicar (via Freethoughtblogs)
I can sort of see declaring bike shops essential
Oh, same here. I was crediting our Premier with much more sense than I thought he had—he is listening to his advisors. Bikes are a major transportation mode where I live. They can help maintain physical distances for people going to work or shopping and reduce pressure on public transport. I have been a utility cyclist for many years for all kinds of travel in-town. I often go months without getting in an automobile. For short distances say up to 5km, my commute time, even in winter is often less than it would be by auto and I can carry 15–20kg of shopping at times.
Keeping the liquor and beer stores open make more sense. We do not need otherwise harmless alcoholics in violets withdrawals that tie up health resources or an increase in crime to get alcohol. I think the pot shops were for those who use it as a medicine.
@39- jrkrideau
If I gotta deal with the Spectacle of more Trump pressers where he blames Obama for his own pandemic incompetence and ineptitude that will surely increase the need to co-opt icerinks and refrigerated trucks the fucking government its fucking self should park a beer hauling semi in front of my house so I can drink myself to death and avert the inevitable viral pneumonia. I see the wave heading my way. I can’t surf for shit.