stephen h

from the tv show penn & teller’s bullshit comes this short clip talking about which biblical commandments so-called fundamentalist christians will pick and choose from. while they make some good points, and i completely agree, two things occur to me: (1) that they’re trying to reason with people who will not be reasoned with, and (2) that they come across as unnecessarily offensive/insensitive. 

so what’s the point in posting this? that many christians i know (and especially the more prominent ones) apparently spend their free time actively looking for something new to be offended by or to declare as an enemy of their faith. but why give them another reason to cry “martyr!” because they feel persecuted? the principle should always be that if you’re going to denounce someone’s religion on the basis of logic and reason, at least employ some basic reason and decency enough to say what you have to say without – for example – kicking a bible at the end of your rant.

the reality is this – that even though they might use their own scriptures as their reasoning for oppressing others even to the point of removing human rights or even committing acts of genocide, you’re only going to incite more hatred and prejudice approaching the situation with insensitivity. while it might appeal to their audience on a sort of childish-humor level, it won’t bridge any gaps or open any dialogues, and shouldn’t that be the point of calling “bullshit” on something?

-h

Tags: bible, bullshit, christianity, Links, penn & teller, Thoughts, video, youtube

tonight while chatting with a friend about the old testament and the ten commandments, we started joking around about reactions people must have had after moses came down the mountain with the 10 commandments… long story short, i felt compelled to take some of the ideas and turn them into a series of comic strips using the wittycomics.com generator.

lately i’ve been thinking of starting either a photographic comic strip or just doing something like this – making a weekly comic using a generator like this one – which would be easier and thus keep creative juices flowing longer as i don’t have to spend more than a few minutes on each strip. of course, i still have an idea for a photographic strip that i think people would LOVE but there will definitely be more work going into that one. in any case, i may be creating more of this style soon…

check out the first ones below…
-aytch

(more…)

Tags: christianity, Images, stephen h

as a quick follow-up to my recent post about the goings-on at oral roberts university, today brings the news that ORU president richard roberts has temporarily stepped down.

interesting how just before this mr. roberts was saying “god told him” to stay and stand up to this, and now he’s stepping aside, and the lawsuit is being expanded to include allegations of his wife spending time with the “underage male” on nine separate occasions and that the university has been shredding evidence related to the case.

this does not look like it will end well…

-aytch

Tags: christianity, corruption, Links, News, oral roberts university, Thoughts