Wake up, everyone!

A few little videos by way of the marvelous Kevin Hayden:

  • Ladies, did you know that you are just like a cardboard box? We’re supposed to treat you delicately and with respect, just in case you’ve got something in your uterus. If you’ve had a hysterectomy or you’re menstruating, though, and we know the box is empty, well, we don’t have to worry about you so much.

  • Guys, did you know that you are followed everywhere by a mob of enthusiastic, hyperactive sperm? I love how both sexes can be objectified by the functions of our gonads.

  • I’ve shown the video for this one before, but I’m going to do it again just because I love the New York Dolls and this will put you in a happy mood for a Monday morning. Here are the New York Dolls performing “Dance Like a Monkey” live:

Judgment Day liveblogging

The new PBS documentary on the Dover trial, Judgment Day (optimistically reviewed by NCSE! The Discovery Institute in frantic denial!) starts here in the midwest in about a half hour. I’ve got my diet coke, I think I’ll pop some popcorn, and maybe I’ll take a stab at liveblogging the show. Let’s hope it’s lively!

Feel free to chime in with comments as we go.

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One if by theater, two if by DVD

It must come with the name that Revere has to sound the warning — we’ve got anti-god/anti-religion movies available now, and more on the way. I’m a little surprised that movies that preach moral responsibility (don’t torture people, don’t imprison them without trial, don’t ship them off to countries that will torture them), sympathy and tolerance (gay people feel love and suffering, too) are considered anti-Christian, but if that’s the way they want it, that’s fine with me.

I’m also a little puzzled why they would find a documentary like Jesus Camp anti-Christian. It simply describes the activities that go on in a kids’ camp dedicated to religious indoctrination. Shouldn’t they instead be condemning hysterical dogma as practiced in that camp, rather than the movie that merely reveals it?

The one movie mentioned that I’m looking forward to seeing is The Golden Compass, even though I hear they may have toned down the anti-religious sentiment that’s present in the book. There is a little misconception there, though: the book condemns an institution dedicated to preserving dogma and that willingly sacrifices individuals to achieve its aims, and it is associated with religion, but it isn’t quite as flamingly anti-religion as some of the critics portray it, and I’m beginning to suspect that many of the religious fanatics who hate Pullman’s books haven’t actually read them.

I mainly want to see it because I like the polar bears and witches, myself.

Halloweeny, good and bad

The other night, I made the mistake of going to the local theater to see the horrible new version of Halloween by Rob Zombie. It sucked. Unimaginative, tedious, unrelievedly grim, plodding, with no insight or interesting ideas, and it wasn’t even scary. There was no story except ‘serial killer marches through movie murdering people.’

I’d hoped for something frightening for Halloween, and was disappointed.

I should have just stayed home and read the Little Professor, since she has provided a nice assortment of century-old horror stories. The real thing. Stories with some imagination and style. Skip the bad slasher movies, read Fanu or James or Stevenson — they’re much more satisfying.

“The topic of religion is so inherently funny”

How strange that I haven’t heard anything about this new movie coming out this Spring — I guess I need to watch more TV.

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It’s a heretical documentary/comedy by Bill Maher called Religulous, combining “religious” and “ridiculous”. I’m not seeing much of a buzz for it on the web just yet — a brief mention by Chris Hallquist, placeholders at IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes, a quick blurb on RD.net, and this short interview with the ever-annoying Larry King.

I’m so disappointed, though. They didn’t contact me through a proxy and interview me for a movie with a different name. Don’t they understand how these things are done?

Old pulp crumbles into cultural irrelevance, alas

Prehistoric Pulp, my source for all pop culture with dinosaurs, reveals that there will be a new direct-to-video (not promising) animated (could be bad) movie of Turok, Son of Stone (awesome!) And it’s not the stupid bastardized version that was corrupted for video games to include cyborg dinosaurs!

Yeah, yeah, it looks a bit cheesy and cheap and it’s got cultural stereotypes run amuck, but it’s personal. Back when I was a tiny young fella and my father was a blue-collar wage slave working long hours, when he got home he’d sometimes ask me to read to him, and there were two things we both got into: Edgar Rice Burrough’s Mars stories, and Turok comic books. Both of those have faded considerably from the Great American Memory Collective, you have to be of a certain age to actually appreciate them, and they just seem a little quaint and peculiar and dated if you read them now, but hey, they were part of my childhood landscape, so I like ’em.

I’d also like to see A Princess of Mars made into a movie, but I think it’s impossible. The special effects are doable, but the tone couldn’t survive: they were all about old-fashioned gallant heroism, naked people with swords and radium pistols, and exotic, unbelievable Martian landscapes, and nowadays the casual chauvinism would get in the way, and nobody could write it straight as Burroughs did. The titular Princess is a voluptuous Martian mammal … who interbreeds with a human and lays eggs. It couldn’t be done now without cracking a joke.

Turning the tawdry into poetry

I think we’re going to have to name Cuttlefish the Pharyngula Poet Laureate. Since so many people liked the sweet little poem about Gary Aldridge left in the comments, here it is for more to admire. (If you have no idea who Gary Aldridge is, here’s a reminder).

We gather here to eulogize
The Pastor and the Man
Old Gary Aldridge, often wise,
Though not his latest plan.

A member of the Christian nation,
Friend of Jerry Falwell,
His last attempt at masturbation
Didn’t go at all well.

For fifteen years, he’d preached the word
A Southern Baptist minister
His death–now, is it just absurd
Or something rather sinister?

How does a person come to wear
Not one wetsuit, but two?
(Although, I know, I should not care
I’m curious–aren’t you?)

I tend to think that, years ago,
He spied a rubber glove,
And wondered “Should I–well, you know–
When God and I make love?”

He tried it on, and found a tube,
Half hidden on his shelf,
Of KY–smiled, and murmered “Lube
Thy neighbor as thy self.”

And minutes later, hard at work,
He felt a little odd
Was this a sin, or just a quirk?
He talked it out with God.

“Is what I’m doing here a sin?
Or is my pleasure Thine?
Is this as bad as skin on skin?
Lord, please, give me a sign!”

So God produced a pamphlet: “Your
Vacation in Aruba!”
And pointed out–right there, page four–
The wetsuits used for SCUBA

See, God’s not really how you think
A deity might be
He’s got a wicked bondage kink
(Just ask His son, J. C.)

So Gary died, not steeped in sin
But following God’s plan;
So straight to Heaven–come on in!
And bring the wetsuits, man!

A story, sure, but it may yet
Explain what happened then.
The moral is, please don’t forget:
Your safeword is “Amen”.