I just discovered a great short story over at Atheist Ethicist, entitled “A Perspective on the Pledge”. It puts the Pledge controversy in a different light. I highly recommend you check it out. He also has a PDF version you can download and pass out to all of your annoying relatives.

Here’s just one of the comments left by readers (This one is by somebody calling himself No More Mr. Nice Guy):

Personally, as someone who was born and raised outside the US, I think it’s bizarre that there is a [Pledge of Allegiance] at all. Apart from the US, only totalitarian states have this kind of mandatory patriotic exercise. (Yes I know in theory it’s not mandatory, but…) And I find it surreal that millions of children every day stand up and chant in unison about how free they are. [emphasis added]

In light of the Catholic League’s “successful boycott” of The Golden Compass, I thought it would be worthwhile to see this parody of a controversy that arose over The Life of Brian (via Pharyngula):

(YouTube page is here.)

For more background on the controversy over the earlier film, here’s a good excerpt from Always Look on the Bright Side of Life by Robert Sellers. It includes this depressingly-revealing quote:

Gilliam noted, “In Britain, it was banned in different towns; what that meant was that people in those towns organised charabancs and went to the neighbouring town where it was showing. But in the States they banned it in the Bible Belt area and nobody went. You see, the British can’t be controlled and the Americans can… that’s what we learnt over that.”

That’s exactly what’s wrong with with this country. Americans can be controlled by small-minded self-appointed dictators.

Finally, here’s an excerpt of a documentary about The Life of Brian. The incident that is parodied above starts about two minutes in.

(YouTube page is here.)

One of the most damning comments was this from John Cleese:

You have to remember that Christianity in America is mainly about sex. … These people are operating at a very low level of mental health.

We’re a country of pathetic, repressed, sniveling fools.

The Golden Compass got mostly negative reviews. I haven’t seen it myself, but the consensus, even among freethinkers, is that the movie is at least somewhat disappointing. That’s too bad. The commercials looked good. I wanted to see that Coca-Cola polar bear kick some ass.

It’s hard to really know why a movie does or does not do well. There certainly have been some excellent movies that did poorly at the box office, only to be held in high regard later (Citizen Kane being only the most extreme example).

How much of an effect does a boycott have? The Life of Brian and The Last Temptation of Christ both did fairly well at the box office, but I don’t remember either doing outstanding business (the Internet Movie Database doesn’t seem to give out that information for free anymore). The question is how much business would those films have done without the controversy? I’ve heard numerous people say that they went to see Last Temptation because they wanted to see what the controversy was about.

In the case of The Golden Compass, I think the boycott cut both ways. Who had ever heard of the book? Obviously some people, but the public at large was not aware of it. The boycott raised the public’s awareness, so I’m sure some people saw it who would not have otherwise.

However, there has also been a lot of extremely negative things said about this movie by people who had neither seen it nor read the book. All they needed to know was that it was written by an atheist who wants to kill God. I’m sure all of those people stayed home. If they had remained ignorant of the book’s reputation, at least some of them would have gone to see it.

I’m guessing that the main reason the movie did poorly was all of the bad reviews. (The movie was #1 at the box office this weekend; it just brought in a lot less than anticipated.)

Someone who doesn’t need to guess why the movie tanked is Bill Donohue of the Catholic League. In a press release titled “Boycott Worked: Compass Flops”, Donohue credits himself. He also can’t resist comparing it to Narnia:

‘The Golden Compass’, the atheist-inspired film which sought to replicate Narnia’s success at the box office at Christmas two years ago has flopped by comparison.  Based on the anti-Christian novel by Philip Pullman, Compass took in $26.1 million in its first weekend, whereas ‘The Chronicles of Narnia’ garnered $65.5 million on its weekend debut.
…
The Catholic League, which organized a boycott of the controversial film, as it would lead children to reading the anti-Christian books, saw the poor box office showing as evidence of a successful boycott.

Or more likely, it’s evidence of a bad movie. But then Donohue starts to get really cocky:

Donohue concluded: “Let this be a lesson to militant atheists like Pullman: keep your hollow beliefs to yourself.…

Donohue has warned you. Don’t mess with the Emperor Pope!

Finally, Donohue ends with this brilliant statement:

…And ease up on demonizing Catholicism—no other religion has done more to promote human rights, science and goodwill.”

I don’t even know where to begin to respond to that statement!

I heard recently that Pat Robertson had told his minions to not get so upset over Christmas trees being referred to as “holiday trees” and other ridiculous terms. I actually disagree with him. It’s not surprising that I disagree with Robertson. It’s just surprising that we have opposite opinions on this subject.

You can wish someone “happy holidays”, because there is more than one holiday this season. That’s just being inclusive. But a Christmas tree is a specific symbol belonging to a specific holiday (Yes, its origins are pagan, but it was co-opted by Christmas.). What the hell is the point of having a tree if it isn’t for Christmas? What does that make a menorah—a “holiday candelabra”?

Some fundies want you to boycott any retailer who uses the term “holiday tree” instead of “Christmas tree”. That’s just plain stupid. Why don’t they put their energy into feeding the homeless or toys for tots instead?

Nevertheless, I wanted to see if there really is an epidemic of holiday trees suffocating good, God-fearing Christmas trees, choking them out like some sort of secular kudzu. I typed “holiday tree” into Google. Some of the ads that appeared were for Christmas trees. Some ads were for “holiday plants” (presumably mistletoe and poinsettias). There were a few for holiday trees. The biggest retailer promoting these is Target. However, even though the headline of the ad was “holiday trees”, the actual text said “Shop Christmas decor at Target.” This shows they still haven’t abandoned Christmas. Boycotting them would be stupid.

I went in search of Robertson’s comments, and I found it on YouTube.

(YouTube page is here.)

It’s refreshing that Pat actually understands a little bit about Christian history and the pagan roots of at least a little bit of the Christmas celebration. Now if we can only get him to understand the non-Christian roots of the rest of his religion.

Here’s another video, brought to my attention by ParrotLover. I wasn’t going to include it originally, because it isn’t funny in a bad way. I finally decided to show it to you, because it’s so appalling. The self-righteous sense of entitlement this guy shows is sad. This season is all about the Christians. Everyone else be damned!

(YouTube page is here.)

Thanks to PZ Myers for pointing me to an article on the website of Archaeology magazine. It’s called “Raiders of the Faux Ark” by Eric H. Cline, who is a real biblical archaeologist.

The article addresses the problem that the field of biblical archaeology has many crackpots, cranks, and kooks. The author says that it’s time for the legitimate archaeologists to speak up and refute all of the junk science that the crackpots are passing off in the popular media.

I recently reviewed a documentary on the National Geographic Channel, called “Curses of Ancient Egypt”. A couple of readers questioned the relevance of my article. The bulk of the evidence (or lack thereof) indicates that the Exodus fable never happened, so why even look at a possible scientific explanation for the ten curses? My answer is that many Bible fantasies are based upon earlier legends that may have been inspired by real events (a localized flood being retold as Noah’s flood, for example). The more we learn about what is real or plausible or unreal or impossible, the better we can understand that book and its followers.

Furthermore, there are a lot of people making claims about biblical archaeology, and I want to examine whether those people and their claims are credible. This latter point is the focus of the Archaeology article. The author states:

We are also living in a time of widespread biblical fraud, dubious science, and crackpot theorizing.…Every year “scientific” expeditions embark to look for Noah’s Ark, raising untold amounts of money from gullible believers who eagerly listen to tales spun by sincere amateurs or rapacious con men; it is not always easy to tell the two apart.
…
And so the professionals are allowing a PR disaster to slowly unfold: yielding a field of tremendous importance to pseudoscientists, amateur enthusiasts, and irresponsible documentary filmmakers.

I’m not an archaeologist, but I do have a skeptical eye. I like to watch these documentaries and try to detect which ones make sense to me. In the case of my recent article about the 10 Curses, I concluded that the explanations proposed were plausible, even if the proponents’ motivations were somewhat dubious.

What About Bob?

What I find especially satisfying about the Archaeology article is what it says about “Dr.” Robert Cornuke. For this tale, we need to roll back the clock one year, to a review I wrote on a similar documentary, “Exodus Revealed” (see part 2 of that article for the bit about Cornuke).

That documentary looked at more of the Exodus fable, including the bit where Charlton Heston drowned Yul Brynner’s army in the Red Sea. The program profiled Robert Cornuke (whose Ph.D. makes chiropractors look overeducated), who runs his own special Bible Explorers Club. Cornuke claims that he has found a few things that look like artifacts, therefore Exodus is true. That seemed like a leap of logic to me, and I said so.

Now here’s where it gets funny. Just two weeks ago, one of Cornuke’s supporters somehow found my article, and he left an offended comment. I replied to his accusations, reiterated my belief that Cornuke’s scholarship appears shaky, and challenged him to support his assertions.

(Sound of crickets)

For some reason, he chose not to respond.

So today, I read this in the Archaeology article:

For example, in 2006, Bob Cornuke, a former SWAT team member turned biblical investigator—and now president of the Bible Archaeology Search and Exploration (BASE) Institute in Colorado—led an expedition searching for Noah’s Ark. Media reports breathlessly announced that Cornuke’s team had discovered boat-shaped rocks at an altitude of 13,000 feet on Mount Suleiman in Iran’s Elburz mountain range. Cornuke said the rocks look “uncannily like wood.…We have had [cut] thin sections of the rock made, and we can see [wood] cell structures.”

But peer review would have quickly debunked these findings. Kevin Pickering, a geologist at University College London who specializes in sedimentary rocks, said, “The photos appear to show iron-stained sedimentary rocks, probably thin beds of silicified sandstones and shales, which were most likely laid down in a marine environment a long time ago.”

Ah, poor Cornuke! The data doesn’t fit his pre-conceived conclusion!

Chronic fundie doofus Bill Johnson was on CNN last Friday talking about under-dressed mannequins. You can see the video here (You’ll have to watch a 15-second commercial first.).

BJ matches wits (if it can even be considered a match) with Debbie Wolf. CNN says she’s with “Americans Against Censorship”. No such group exists. That’s one fact CNN got wrong. She’s really with People Against Censorship, which is a new organization.

Overall, the CNN report is biased. Apparently this is some sort of magazine program, where the hosts are allowed to express an opinion. The host, Mike Galanos, is clearly in BJ’s corner. In fact, he’s almost as extreme as BJ.

Another problem with the report is that during much of the time that they are talking about scantily-clad mannequins in store windows, the video that they run is of the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show, which depicts actual models wearing only bras and panties. Showing the video of the fashion show unfairly biases the viewer.

If Victoria’s Secret had real models in the windows, BJ would have a point, but there’s a fundamental difference between a plastic dummy and a flesh-and-blood woman. Here’s an actual quote from BJ on the CNN interview:

There are guys who are getting set off by this stuff!

That tells us more about BJ than we really care to know.

Fundie “news” site One News Now is always reporting one moral outrage or another. A recent article is titled “Family activist says studies show damaging effects of porn use”.

Legal adult pornography, in most cases, appears to have little in the way of negative consequences to society. Therefore, it comes down to a matter of personal choice. The fundies have no right to interfere with other people’s entertainment choices.

Nevertheless, I am always interested in new data. If studies begin to find strong negative effects upon society, then I think it is worth having the discussion of how we, as a society, should respond to the new information. It was with this interest in mind that I read the One News Now article. It says:

A pro-family attorney says a recent study confirms that pornography has devastating consequences.

Well, I’d rather hear from the study’s authors. Attorneys are usually poor social scientists. In fact, they’re the last people you want running the country and making laws!

According to the study, published in the Journal of Research in Personality, 60 percent of males said that if they thought they would not get caught, they would be willing to force a woman to do something against her will, or even rape her.

First of all, I haven’t seen the study, so I don’t know how accurately this is reported. Nevertheless, this is a disturbing statistic. Could 60% of all men be that primitive?

Mary Anne Layden, co-director of the Sexual Trauma and Psychopathology Program at the University of Pennsylvania’s Center for Cognitive Therapy, attributes those findings to prolonged pornography exposure.

OK. She still isn’t one of the study’s authors, but at least she works in the field and has some direct knowledge of these issues. The problem is, all this article does is tell us that she “attributes those findings to prolonged pornography exposure.” Is this attribution soundly based, or does she just have a hunch? One News Now refuses to tell us.

Pat Trueman is with the Alliance Defense Fund.

Trueman is the lawyer mentioned in the first sentence.

He says the wide availability of pornography has been especially harmful to college students.

At this point, the article veers off into left field. Trueman goes on and on about college students and porn, but there is no indication that the study mentioned at the beginning of this article is related. Rather than let him derail us, let’s jump down to the last sentence.

Individuals who have a porn addiction, he says, are prone to mistreating their spouse.

OK. Finally, we have a statement that might somehow be related to the study mentioned at the beginning of the article. Did the study indicate that pornography was the cause of 60% of men wanting to rape women? I don’t know. Nowhere was that ever discussed in the One News Now article.

It’s an incredibly bad article that actually had no facts in it, but it was nevertheless very well crafted to give the impression that pornography causes rape.

Reader Comments: One News Now Indecently Exposed

The comments section is moderated. They will not publish your comment unless it passes a litany of “thou shalt not’s”. That’s why I thought it amazing that they would print a reader comment that pretty much shot their article full of holes.

Reader Bret Fuller had this to say:

The only recent article in the Journal of Research in Personality dealing with pornography is a 1993 article entitled “Sexually Violent Pornography, Anti-Women Attitudes, and Sexual Aggression: A Structural Equation Model” by Demaré Dano, Lips Hilary M. and Briere John.

Wait a minute! You mean to tell me that these fundies are trying to pass off a 14-year-old study as “recent”? Something that pretends to be a news article should have a much narrower definition of “recent”!

In this article they talk about men who watch sexually violent pornography and the sample was university undergraduate men. So, the article above is misleading in that it states that “60 percent of males said that if they thought they would not get caught, they would be willing to force a woman to do something against her will, or even rape her.” This is only true of the males in the sample that watched sexually violent pornography and not those watching pornography that depicts regular sex acts. [emphasis added]

Fuller finishes with:

So the article above 1) doesn’t cite its source 2) uses old data, 3) overstated the conclusions of the study.

Once again, the enemies of pornography are shooting blanks.

Additional Note

The article I pulled the top image from is quite interesting. I recommend you check it out. Among the choice tidbits:

If the supporters of censorship were right, we should be seeing an unparalleled epidemic of sexual assault. But all the evidence indicates they were wrong. As raunch has waxed, rape has waned.

and:

Perhaps the most surprising and controversial account comes from Clemson University economist Todd Kendall, who suggests that adult fare on the Internet may essentially inoculate against sexual assaults.

In a paper presented at Stanford Law School last year, he reported that, after adjusting for other differences, states where Internet access expanded the fastest saw rape decline the most.

Last Sunday’s American Dad was custom made to piss off the fundies. I expected to get an irate email today from BJ, popping a blood vessel in his brain over the episode. He disappointed me. Not a word. Maybe he was too busy being seduced by the underdressed mannequins at Victoria’s Secret to notice.

Anyway, the episode involved Francine acting as surrogate to carry the gay neighbors’ baby. Hilarity and fundie-unsafe antics ensue. You can now watch the episode on the Fox website, in case you missed it.