In case you wonder why I bother to write this blog, or in case you wonder why there are so many freethinkers on the internet with websites dedicated to combatting the fundie threat, then run, don’t walk, RUN! over to God is for Suckers! and read the article called I Told You So.

Raindogzilla reports on “a ground-breaking study on religious belief and social well-being [that] was published in the Journal of Religion & Society.” Most of the findings are not a surprise to any intelligent person who bothers to pay attention. It’s good, though, to have some serious scholarship to back up our observations and to quantify the effects. Raindogzilla describes one significant finding:

[…] secular societies have lower rates of violence and teenage pregnancy than societies where many people profess belief in God.

Another important point from Raindogzilla’s post:

All this information points to a strong correlation between faith and antisocial behavior — a correlation so strong that there is good reason to suppose that religious belief does more harm than good.

We need to stop the fundies, but we also need to keep the fundie-lite community on a short leash. I’m not advocating taking away anybody’s irrational beliefs. I am pointing out that we need to be keenly aware of the damaging effects of all religion upon society.

So go read Raindogzilla’s article. If you want more details, you can read the original analysis published by the Journal of Religion & Society.

I try to minimize the amount of ink (pixels?) I give to the sensationalistic stories that the media blows out of proportion to their true significance. I don’t like to add to the noise that obscures the important stories, so hopefully this will be the only post I ever make on the JonBenet Ramsey case.

(Case in point: Yesterday — August 17th — a federal circuit court ruled that the Bush mis-Administration’s secret wiretapping of American citizens was unconstitutional. This story has huge implications, not only for its effect on King George, but for the civil rights of generations of Americans to come. And what was the lead story on most of the news broadcasts, and what have the 24-hour news channels spent all their time on? An arrest in a 10-year-old murder.)

I read with disgust the latest vile vomited out by Tony Perkins of the “Family” (a.k.a. Fundie) Research Council. His latest email says:

The media has been obsessed with the 1996 murder of JonBenet Ramsey for years.

Which good old Tony has no problem with exploiting himself.

Her parents, John and Patsy Ramsey, endured a decade in the media spotlight.

So let’s increase the sorrow by opening old wounds and seeing how far we can slide on the misery that oozes out, eh Tony? After all, we’re doing God’s work. Sensitivity and compassion aren’t important when there are souls to save! (I sincerely doubt that fundies really care about “saving” anybody — and nobody asked to be saved anyway, except maybe from the fundies — No, I think they’re really more interested in controlling other people’s private lives. Anybody who gets hurt in the process is just collateral damage. Collateral for the LORD!)

Patsy Ramsey died of ovarian cancer in June.

Cancer that maybe — just maybe — we would be able to cure in the future, if we were allowed to do stem cell research? What was that, Tony? You didn’t put that tidbit in the letter to point out how hypocritical you are? You put it in the letter so we’re supposed to feel an extra dose of compassion because of the added tragedy? That’s OK, Tony. I have enough compassion for the two of us, so I’ll carry your load (of compassion, not that other load you’re shoveling). You go right ahead with your crocodile tears and pretend compassion. I’ll do the heavy lifting, by advocating for:

• Medical research to heal the sick
• Protection of all civil rights (not just the ones that you like) of all Americans (not just the ones that you like)
• The rights of all women to control their bodies
• The right to marry the person that you love
• The right of religious freedom, which includes religions other than Christianity

And dozens of others, way too numerous to mention. Somehow (and he must work really hard at this), Tony is on the wrong side of almost all of these many issues. If you doubt this, go check out his “policies”.

Anyway, back to the letter:

[…] media reports point to [the suspect’s] previous involvement with child porn in the U.S.

PAYDIRT!!!! Now we get to the crux of Tony’s little tirade! He’s exploiting the tragedy of a murdered child to further his ridiculous crusade against pornography. Now we have to read the letter very carefully, because here is where he throws cow turds into the pot and calls it beef stew.

This tragic case points to several alarming facts. First the increase in such shocking cases corresponding to the availability of hardcore porn on the Internet.

I agree that there is a lot of very hardcore porn on the Internet, and it is disgustingly easy to get (and some of it is just plain disgusting).

But he’s making an assertion here: the “increase in such shocking cases”. Which shocking cases, specifically? There’s only one case with all of these dreadful characteristics. Does he mean it in a more general sense; that is, child murder? Pedophilia? He isn’t clear. He leaves it up to you to choose whatever you find most heinous about this case, and then he leads you to assume that there is an increase in incidents. This is a do-it-yourself shocker.

Let’s assume that he had a particular type of crime in mind, and that he’s just a poor writer and is unable to convey what he had in mind (BTW, unclear writing is usually a sign of unclear thinking). OK, then, prove to me that whatever crime you had in mind is really on the increase. Where’s your data? Show me some statistics.

He also says that this unsubstantiated increase of undefined shocking crimes “[corresponds] to the availability of hardcore porn on the Internet.” Big leap here. Does he provide any evidence that there is a link? No. You are supposed to take it on faith.

Also, the suspect was nabbed in an area of Bangkok notorious for the availability of children for sex.

OK, the guy was a perv. Not all of them are priests, you know. Notice the connection that Tony is starting to form here. First he tells you how much pornography there is, then he tells you that the guy is a pedophile. The implication is that normal, legal adult pornography turns people into pedophiles. No it doesn’t! There is no credible evidence that this occurs!

News reports have said that the suspect was previously arrested for possession of child porn. Here’s how it works: Pervos are drawn to kiddy porn. In fact, they’re unable to get their rocks off with adult porn. Adult pornography doesn’t create child molesters. Readers of adult porn have a normal sexual response to healthy adult porn. That’s as far as it goes. The tiny percentage of the population that has something wrong with their brains doesn’t respond to adult pornography. They seek out perverted illegal kiddy porn.

Pornography isn’t the cause; it’s the symptom! Furthermore:

• Adult pornography ≠ child pornography
• Adult pornography ≠ pedophilia
• Adult pornography ≠ child molesting

Continuing with his letter:

I hope this arrest, with cooperation of local authorities, signals a new resolve by the Thais to address the sexual exploitation of children and will prompt greater enforcement of obscenity laws in our country.

Whoa! Total disconnect. By obscenity, does he mean the smut that really is illegal? I’m not aware of any law enforcement agency that takes that stuff lightly. They pounce hard (poor choice of words!) and fast on the pervs and sickos when they find them.

What Tony is really trying to do here, though, is connect the horrible murder of a six-year-old girl to the sorts of legal free expression that he personally defines as obscene. Yes, Tony. Save us from Janet Jackson’s nipple! I’m sure the 100 million people (or whatever the number is) who saw the Super Bowl are now ticking timebombs, waiting for the final trigger to molest and murder.

Naomi, over at Rage against the Pretty Hate Machine, has an enlightening article on the origins of Christianity. She starts with:

Thus I have heard that the Cult of Jesus began in Palestine, but wherever or however it started isn’t as important as what happened to it when it came to Rome where it met, and whose doctrine it eventually adopted, a rival cult that had existed for more than a thousand years before Jesus was said to have been born, dedicated to the Roman God Mithras.

She then goes on to describe some of the ways that Christianity stole the magic and miracles of Mithras and pasted them onto the story of some two-bit, second-rate preacher. Check out the whole article.

The Watcher, over at Fundie Watch, enjoys reading movie reviews written by fundies. They always display a warped view of reality. Their latest assault on common sense comes from a fundie review of the current Will Ferrell comedy, Talledega Nights. The Watcher has a few choice words for the reviewer:

Yeah, you’re right […]. It really is much worse to make fun of the Christian majority in this country that holds all the power in Congress and 80% of the citizenry than it is to smart off about a persecuted minority. When are you people going to wake up, realize how much power you have in this country, and stop claiming that you’re “persecuted?”

But my favorite line in his article is when he tells the reviewer:

Now stop drinking out of the toilet and join the rest of the human race.

Go on over to Fundie Watch and read the entire article.

I make the occasional funny picture for this website (and sometimes for other sites). I have decided to collect them all in one place and make them available to other websites for free use.

Why am I doing this? Because all of these images cleverly have the Bay of Fundie URL on them! Oh, I’m a crafty one! I’m hoping that at least a few people will find them funny enough to want to place one or two on their own web sites. This is called viral advertising. The mad trickle of the new reader this generates will boost my Technorati ranking above a million! Woohoo!

Anyway, feel free to look at the new Graphics Resources pages. If you want to use a few of the images on your own site, please follow the conditions listed.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is holding its annual convention in San Francisco this year, on the weekend of October 6–8, 2006.

It promises to be an enthralling event for all. Among the guests will be everybody’s favorite atheist, Julia Sweeny. She’ll be performing one of her monologs, “Letting Go of God”. I haven’t seen this one or her earlier monolog (“God Said, Ha!”), but everybody I know who has seen one of them has had nothing but praise for the performance.

Other notables on the agenda are:

• Michelle Goldberg, author of Kingdom Coming, which is about the fundie threat.
• Wafa Sultan, who pissed off a billion Muslims by criticizing religion on Al-Jazeera TV.
• Mike Keefe, political cartoonist of the Denver Post.
• Philip Paulson, the plaintiff in the Mt. Soledad Easter Cross case.
• Dr. Richard Sloan, author of the forthcoming Blind Faith.

There will also be an optional non-prayer breakfast on Saturday morning and an optional banquet dinner Saturday night.

For full information about the convention, go to the FFRF website.

I will be somewhere in the audience. If you attend, try to find me. We can have a mini-BoF gathering.

In a stunning development, embattled Christian extremist and foe of the Establishment Clause, Senator Rick Santorum has come out publicly against religious extremism! What’s this? Has he managed to jump-start his brain so that more than the usual two neurons are firing? (“Yup! Old Rick is firing on all eight brain cells today!”)

Hardly. As I’ve said before, fundies are the most irony-impaired people on Earth. Ricky has been spending time of late railing about the evils of Islamic extremism! Oh, Rick, Rick, Rick! Dost thou not own a mirror?

Santorum spoke to the National Press Club in July. I agree with Santorum’s assertion that Islamic fundamentalism is one of the greatest threats facing the United States today. It’s just very funny to hear somebody like him talk about how bad religious extremism and theocracy are.

Santorum’s Mistake

Santorum also made a tactical error, and it generated a lot of controversy from both liberals and conservatives. Santorum said we should stop calling our current situation a “war on terror”, because terror is a tactic not an enemy (This idea is not original with Santorum.). He said we should call it what it is: a war on Islamic fascism.

His assertion is mostly correct. It would be more accurate to say “Islamic fundamentalism”. Fascism requires state control. It is certainly true that in many Islamic countries, mosque and state have merged into one fanatical entity. However, al Qaeda and numerous other terrorist organizations are stateless, but no less dangerous (more-so, because they’re harder to find and fight).

Fundamentalism is the enemy here. It breeds extremism, intolerance, hatred, and violence. If left unchecked, it will result in theocratic fascism in every nation that doesn’t actively try to stamp it out.

Santorum’s mistake was using the phrase “Islamic fascism”. Yes, that’s more accurate than “terror”, but it’s a loaded phrase. The Muslims will only hear that Santorum is calling for a war against Islam. It’s like shortly after September 11, when Bush called for a “crusade” against terror. That’s a nasty word to the Muslims. They’re still pissed off about the original Crusades. That was over 700 years ago! Get over it already! (The Islamic fundamentalists’ perpetual anger over the Crusades is more understandable when you realize that these people want to return the world to the 13th century. In that frame of mind, the Crusades were literally yesterday!)

The Right-Wing Reaction

Santorum was justifiably vilified by the Left for using that phrase. Don’t give the wacko element of the Muslim world any more reasons to hate us. What’s interesting is the reaction from the Right.

As is typical of the right-wing media, they distort the issue, misquote their foes, and throw around a lot of their favorite buzzwords about the Left. A very good and amusing example was an op-ed piece just published by a Philadelphia newspaper, the Evening Bulletin. It’s titled “Islamic Fascism: A Fair Assessment?”, and it was written by Leo Knepper. Let’s look at a few fun quotes.

At a National Press Club event Sen. Rick Santorum highlighted the threat posed to America and Democracy by Islamic fascism. Immediately the Political Correctness police and the Head-in-the-Sand Apologists railed against the Senator for daring to use “fascism” to describe a segment of the Islamic world’s fanatical dedication to the construction of a modern theocratic regime.

Don’t you love the way he paints everybody who expressed any concern as a “Head-in-the-Sand Apologist”? Well, at least we know from the start that this guy isn’t capable of detailed analysis of a complex situation. He had to call up Home Depot and ask if they had any broader brushes.

In the Spring 2003 edition of Free Inquiry Magazine, Dr. Lawrence Britt compiled a list of 14 defining characteristics of fascism (“Fascism Anyone?”). It should be noted that The Council for Secular Humanism publishes Free Inquiry Magazine, not an organization one would associate with modern American Conservatism. Dr. Britt, a political scientist compiled this list of qualitative characteristics after studying notable fascist regimes (e.g. Hitler, Mussolini, Franco, etc.).

Wow. This guy actually reads something other than the crawl at the bottom of the Fox News screen. But here’s where it gets funny. Let’s look at how this guy interprets the article.

The Fourteen Defining Characteristics of Fascism, reported by Dr. Britt:

• Powerful and Continuing Nationalism - Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on clothing and in public displays.
• Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights - Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of “need.” The people tend to look the other way or even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long incarcerations of prisoners, etc.
• Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause - The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial , ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists, etc.
• Supremacy of the Military - Even when there are widespread domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized.
• Rampant Sexism - The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Divorce, abortion and homosexuality are suppressed and the state is represented as the ultimate guardian of the family institution.
• Controlled Mass Media - Sometimes the media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is very common.
• Obsession with National Security - Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses.
• Religion and Government are Intertwined - Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government’s policies or actions.
• Corporate Power is Protected - The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite.
• Labor Power is Suppressed - Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely, or are severely suppressed.
• Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts - Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts and letters is openly attacked.
• Obsession with Crime and Punishment - Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego civil liberties in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations.
• Rampant Cronyism and Corruption - Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions and use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders.
• Fraudulent Elections - Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times, elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against or even assassination of opposition candidates, use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections.

Again, this list of 14 items was originally published in the humanist magazine Free Inquiry. Mr. Knepper is merely reproducing it here to support his argument, which is:

Clearly and to the consternation of the American Left and Apologists, the term Islamic fascism is accurate and warranted as a description of the new “evil empire” the world confronts.

I can’t speak for others, and I haven’t read many of the articles this clown is railing against, but I have no quarrel with the assessment. I just think it isn’t the sort of phrase we want to be throwing around right before we send diplomats to the Arab world to try to get cooperation in our “war on terror”. You think the Arabs won’t read between the lines and slam the door in our face?

Here’s the funny/sad part. Almost every item in that list applies to the United States! Admittedly, it’s all a matter of degree, but this country is exhibiting most of those traits to a large extent. Mr. Knepper is right to be worried, but he needs to put the telescope down. The other enemy is about to swallow him whole.

He ends the article with the perfect synopsis of right-wing irony impairment:

Perhaps those speaking loudest in opposition to Sen. Santorum’s characterization of the enemy we face would do well in examining the history of fascism. An open-minded review of the facts would reveal startling parallels to fascist regimes for those who have eyes willing to see it. [emphasis added]