Shit that Pissed me Off this Week – 8/31
Apologies to those hoping for lots of stuff from the Republican National Convention. I just can’t get to riled up about a bunch of rah-rah speeches meant to serve as a sort of infomercial for the Republican product. I get as annoyed by the Republican convention as I get excited by the Democratic convention.
Not much at all.
Boy, that Paul Ryan is a lying douchebag, though.
Mitt Romney Pandered to the Birthers?
I have to hand it to Romney. Up to this point in the campaign, I haven’t given a shit about what he’s had to say because he’s been so unerringly dull. He finally said something (sort of) interesting when he pointed out that nobody has asked to see his birth certificate.
You know why that is, right Mitt? It’s because you are white.
Hey Mitt – if you could only ask to see one of these two guys’ birth certificates, which one would you ask?
I think we should start asking to see Mitt’s birth certificate, don’t you? Hey Mitt, where the fuck is your long form birth certificate? How do we know you aren’t Canadian? Or from some Nordic country? WE DEMAND TO KNOW!!!!
Some Stuff for Guys to Think About
Hey guys – this post is for you. I know that some of us atheist guys don’t know what to think about the feminist movement in atheism right now. Some of us might feel a little bit threatened by it. Being a guy, I think I have a pretty good idea where you are coming from.
Ladies, I’m afraid this isn’t for you. I’m going to be talking about guy stuff. I don’t want you to feel excluded, though. You are totally welcome to read if you want.
But this is really something that I need to share with my boyfriends out there. We’ll be talking about football and swimsuit models and stuff. You probably wouldn’t be interested.
Are the ladies gone? I’m pretty sure I just passive aggressively got rid of them…
Atheism Plus What?
I’m an atheist. We all know that. When it comes to activism and atheism, I’m on the fringes. I consider myself a comedian and because of that, I take what is going on in the atheist movement just seriously enough to joke about it.
Because what is going on right now is pretty serious and, to my way of thinking, you need to be able to joke about it just to get past all of the vitriol.
Alphabetical Movie – Irma La Douce
I realize it isn’t universal but why are so many movies about prostitution a romanticized version of the profession? Is it that we can’t deal with the fact that the reality is pretty ugly? Being a prostitute is nothing like the world of Pretty Woman. Or The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas.
Irma La Douce is interesting because in it, I can see Billy Wilder hinting at the ugliness that surrounds prostitution while staying carefully within the confines of the slowly disintegrating Hayes code. Yes, it is romanticized, but it also shows us an abusive boyfriend/pimp and the unhealthy mental programming most prostitutes accept without even realizing it.
Shit that Pissed me off This Week – 8/10
Creationism Craziness
(Sorry folks – the link is broken)
Not content to simply ignore any research showing that evolution is real, this creationist has studied the bible to determine that – wait for it – plants are not alive!
Among other reasons plants aren’t alive: they don’t have blood and apparently you need blood for a sacrifice to god. Since plants can’t be bled out to show god how awesome he is, they aren’t living creatures.
Try telling that shit to the Whomping Willow, asshole!
If you are reading this right now and thinking anything except “what a complete loon,” please don’t tell me. I want to believe that the only person on Earth who is that messed up is the guy who wrote the original piece.
Shit that Pissed me off This Week 8/3
Climate Change Denier Releases Study that, in Effect, says “I was Wrong”
I know, why would this piss me (someone who has long accepted the Global Climate Change is happening and is largely caused by humans) off?
Because it won’t change anything. No amount of data proving that climate change is happening will convince those who believe otherwise.
Not even when that data actually convinces a skeptical scientist. Unless 100% of scientists agree on climate change, the deniers will always have someone on their side. No matter that 97% (or more) of climatologists – the people whose field of expertise most closely focuses on climate change science – believe climate change is real and caused by humans. If one climatologist says differently, we still have a “controversy.”
I don’t blog much about climate change science because I know a lot of deniers and they are smart people who, I believe, are completely wrong on this one topic. My fear is the longer we argue, the more damage we are doing. That is a fear shared by many scientists who know a lot more about this shit than me.
New Geeks Without God Episode!
We were fortunate that Rebecca Watson made time for us to interview her at CONvergence. Rebecca is a polarizing figure in skeptical circles and that is too bad because whether you agree with her on most issues or not, she is funny and smart. If you actually make the effort to engage her instead of attacking her, you will find good conversations to be had.
Fortunately, we were able to record one of those.
She talks about misogyny on the internet all the time and frankly, that is really important. We offered her the opportunity to talk about other stuff, though, because we figured she could use a break. The result was a fun geeky podcast.
So take a listen if you would! Learn about a great podcast that Rebecca does as well as her favorite sandwich!
Shit that Pissed me Off This Week – 7/27
Some guy kills a bunch of people in a Movie Theatre and Some other guy on Facebook has a Solution
So first off, thanks for taking a horrible tragedy and making it all about your agenda. Well done.
This is not a guns are awesome/guns are awful thing. I’ve talked about that before. This is a “what are you – stupid?” thing.
You don’t know what the fuck you are talking about because the guy released tear gas into the theatre and then opened fire. If you were in that theater with a gun, you would have needed to get a clear shot at the killer so that you wouldn’t kill any of the panicking crowd that is all around him. In a theatre filled with tear gas. Your odds of killing an innocent bystander are probably just as high or higher than your odds of killing the bad guy.
It’s great to think that if you were there, you would have saved more people. We all want to believe that. It’s bullshit. John McLean is a character in a movie.
A guy walks into a packed theatre, fills it with smoke and starts shooting, a bunch of people are going to die. If you were there and you had a gun, you wouldn’t have stopped it from happening. You are not Rambo.
Alphabetical Movie – Inglourious Basterds
I was at a panel about Tarantino films at CONvergence this weekend. Because the convention theme was Wonder Women, the panel was about Tarantino as a “feminist” filmmaker.
I’m not going to rehash the entire panel but the question of Tarantino as a feminist filmmaker is a complex one. Some of his films pass the Bechdel test but by no means all of them. Inglourious Basterds, for instance, does not.
Grail Diary 