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Joe King's avatar

“𝐼𝑓 𝑖𝑡 𝑘𝑒𝑒𝑝𝑠 ℎ𝑎𝑝𝑝𝑒𝑛𝑖𝑛𝑔 (𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑆𝑎𝑡𝑎𝑛𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑠 𝑢𝑠𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑟𝑡ℎ𝑜𝑢𝑠𝑒 𝑙𝑎𝑤𝑛), 𝐼 𝑤𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑏𝑎𝑏𝑙𝑦 𝑣𝑜𝑡𝑒 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑛𝑜𝑡 𝑙𝑒𝑡𝑡𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑎𝑛𝑦𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 ℎ𝑎𝑝𝑝𝑒𝑛 𝑜𝑣𝑒𝑟 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒,” 𝐻𝑖𝑙𝑚𝑒𝑟 𝑠𝑎𝑖𝑑. “𝐼𝑡’𝑠 𝑠𝑎𝑑 𝑏𝑒𝑐𝑎𝑢𝑠𝑒 𝑖𝑡 𝑎𝑓𝑓𝑒𝑐𝑡𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑔𝑜𝑜𝑑 𝑝𝑒𝑜𝑝𝑙𝑒.”

In addition to the bigoted view that anyone not Christian is by default a bad person, there are serious First Amendment issues with this. There is case law regarding "traditional public forums". They may or may not be able to shut down the actual courthouse lawn, but they can't prohibit free speech activity on the sidewalk in front of it.

They claim to support the First Amendment, but they only want its protection to apply to them. Freedom of religion? Their idea is that you are free to adhere to whatever denomination of Christianity you want. Freedom of speech? Only if you will say what they want. Freedom of the press? Get their approval to publish things first. Freedom of assembly? If you are on their political side, you are a peaceful demonstration no matter how many are injured. If you are opposed to them, you are a violent mob that needs to be suppressed and imprisoned, even though the only thing that happened was silent people standing still and holding signs. Freedom to petition the government? They don't even know what that is, so you better not complain about anything.

They really do hate that people they don't like have the same rights.

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Troublesh00ter's avatar

They hate damned near ANYTHING that challenges their faith, that has even the remotest chance of calling their beliefs into question or [HORRORS!] disproving them. They talk about a faith the size of a mustard seed being able to move mountains, yet they shrink before an alternative opinion. Is their deity THAT fragile? Put it this way:

𝑊ℎ𝑦 𝑖𝑠 𝑖𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑠𝑢𝑝𝑝𝑜𝑠𝑒𝑑𝑙𝑦 𝑎𝑙𝑚𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡𝑦 𝑔𝑜𝑑 𝑐𝑎𝑛 𝑑𝑜 𝑎𝑛𝑦𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑘𝑛𝑜𝑤 𝑎𝑛𝑦𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑐𝑎𝑛𝑛𝑜𝑡 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ𝑠𝑡𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑠𝑘𝑒𝑝𝑡𝑖𝑐𝑖𝑠𝑚? 𝐴 𝑔𝑜𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑠ℎ𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑘𝑠 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 𝑎 𝑠𝑖𝑚𝑝𝑙𝑒 𝑞𝑢𝑒𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑖𝑠 𝑝𝑎𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑡𝑖𝑐 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑛𝑜𝑡 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑡ℎ𝑦 𝑜𝑓 𝑟𝑒𝑐𝑜𝑔𝑛𝑖𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛, 𝑙𝑒𝑡 𝑎𝑙𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑠ℎ𝑖𝑝.

-- me

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Maggie JK's avatar

Yes it’s always strange to me that the people who claimed to love freedom would rather burn everything to the ground than share the space with people they hate

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Rachel Baldes's avatar

EXACTLY. It's disturbing to think he feels like that's even an option available to him, because it really isn't. His comprehension of what public areas are for and who they're for and what his job as a local official entails is egregiously flawed.

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Jason's avatar

If I had to identify the "good people" in this scenario, I would point to the people who are fighting to maintain separation of church and state; the people who are fighting to beat back the theocrats and their relentless crusade to infiltrate and contaminate secular government with their religious beliefs.

I would NOT point to the people who are trying to force their religious views on everyone else. I would NOT point to the people who actively persecute LGBTQ+ people for daring to love who they want to love and be who they want to be. I would NOT point to the people who seek to force women and girls to give birth to rapists' babies. I would NOT point to the people whose religiously-inspired hate and intolerance have been making the world worse for centuries.

TL;DR: Satanists good; Christians bad.

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Joe Witkowski's avatar

Himmler or Hilmer?

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Sep 21
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Moon Cat's avatar

They are actually very particular about Christian Denomination also. They have written books with lists of who's Evil listening Mormons, 7th Day Adventist, Unity, Unitarians, Religious Science, Christian Scientists, Catholics of course, and a lot more that you would never suspect. Others to avoid Chiropractors, Yoga Instructors, Applied Kinesiology... Practically everyone except them is evil.

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Julie Duggan's avatar

Chiropractors.....lol

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Ethereal fairy Natalie's avatar

Jimmy Carter actually left the southern Baptists because he said they lost their way.

https://religionnews.com/2015/05/01/jimmy-carters-essay-on-cutting-his-southern-baptist-ties-goes-viral/

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The Moonface Kid's avatar

The Satanists were reading from a book that explains the sacrifice of their central figure, Jesus Christ, far better than their salaried “pastors”.

It’s sadly expected that many have probably never heard of it - and it’s taught in depth at the local “Marxist” college.

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Joe King's avatar

I read part of it as a high school freshman. If they are unaware of it, the education system needs some serious reform.

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Black Hole and DM mourner's avatar

I never read it, we barely read white men who are not French, except for Jack London or Arthur Conan Doyle, but at the minima, their name were mentioned.

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The Moonface Kid's avatar

That’s unfortunate, and like Shakespeare, it’s considered “difficult language” when both are in clear English, and the poetic forms more closely mimic thought.

The themes may be “large” but that’s why we have trained teachers. But when the meaning become apparent, very few experiences, to me, are so sublime in life to match.

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Black Hole and DM mourner's avatar

Both were studied in 7th grade... in French, mais quand même.

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David Burkett's avatar

I read Paradise Lost as part of the "Great Books" curriculum at an Orthodox Christian college. It's hilarious that Iowa officials have tied themselves up in knots over people reading an epic poem, which is studied in Christian colleges, on the courthouse lawn. I'd love to see the Satanic Temple hold a Bible reading event. Maybe go with stuff like the books of Job and Revelation where Satan is given power approaching that of Yahweh (Job) or Christ (Revelation). That would be epic level trolling.

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Straw's avatar

It would be excellent trolling, but would they understand any of it?

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Lynn Veit's avatar

Unlikely. If they grew up hearing that this shit is totally normal, they won't even notice. In all of the sermons I ever heard re: the atrocities of Yahweh, the smiting of "enemies," and so forth, it was always presented as the"justice of a righteous and holy God," so no harm, no foul.

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Dianne Marie Leonard's avatar

Batshit crazy religious texts always do make good trolling! I remember reading some in a graduate seminar back decades ago. The seminar participants were in stitches over the nonsense. The presiding prof got twitted about teaching that section by everyone from the dept chair to the secretaries. (As I recall, it was some ahistorical and ascientific nonsense. One wit suggested the prof send his six-year-old son out with a fly swatter to test the truth of the scriptures. He finally swore he'd never teach that part of the text again. He was an ordained Conservative rabbi in addition to being a tenured prof. Just because he was religious didn't mean he didn't have an excellent bullshit detector.)

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NOGODZ20's avatar

Quick OT before I forget:

Happy 77th Birthday to Stephen King. I'd proudly read aloud from King's works any day. His fantasy is far-better written than any hole-y book.

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cdbunch's avatar

May there be at least 20 more.

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larry parker's avatar

Birthdays or books. : )

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Bagen Onuts's avatar

Both

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NOGODZ20's avatar

I'm a little concerned that he has nothing new in the works right now. He ALWAYS has something new cooking.

Uh-oh. Hope he's OK. Cancer runs in his family.

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Ethereal fairy Natalie's avatar

Indeed, he's a home-boy!

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NOGODZ20's avatar

To Gov. Reynolds...

The oath of office for any state governor contains the following:

a) A PLEDGE to SUPPORT both the US Constitution and the state's constitution and laws.

b) A COMMITMENT to perform the duties of the office FAITHFULLY and IMPARTIALLY.

c) A PROMISE to take the oath freely, WITHOUT RESERVATION and WITHOUT ANY INTENT TO EVADE THE OATH.

Pretty cut and dried. Did you willingly and knowingly lie when you took that oath of office? Did you have one hand on the bible and the other hand behind your back with your fingers crossed? If you cannot do what the oath says you must do, then step down and become a pastor.

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larry parker's avatar

A woman pastor? Don't be ridiculous.

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Bagen Onuts's avatar

Rare as priests raping little girls?

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Stephen Brady's avatar

Perhaps the Satanists should schedule a bible reading and then start reading all the verses where the bible advocates violent, sexual, and simply odious behavior - anyone want to sacrifice their child? I am quite certain there are lots of verses from Psalms and Song of Solomon that the xtians never hear in church.

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Black Hole and DM mourner's avatar

The last one would be hilarious, from their fucked up "obscenity" criteria, the Song of Solomon is a Schrodinger text.

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Dianne Marie Leonard's avatar

Oh, yes. They ought to have read to them all of those stupid, violent, obscene parts of their holy books--and the batshit crazy parts as well. I say "read to them" because they likely lack the reading skills, lack the vocabulary, lack the experience to determine what constitutes a good translation, and their eyes just skim over the text without comprehension. Commentary and discussion of context would be nice too. (As in, "scholars are pretty unanimous that this never happened".)

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Lynn Veit's avatar

Song of Solomon 5:4 KJV: My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my bowels were moved for him.

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Joan the Dork's avatar

"...𝘶𝘯𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘶𝘯𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘭𝘺, 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘍𝘪𝘳𝘴𝘵 𝘈𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘥𝘪𝘤𝘵𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘴 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘸𝘦 𝘤𝘢𝘯 𝘥𝘰 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘤𝘢𝘯’𝘵 𝘥𝘰."

...and would that happen to be the First Amendment, of the 𝘉𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘰𝘧 𝘙𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵𝘴 Amendments, of the 𝘜𝘯𝘪𝘵𝘦𝘥 𝘚𝘵𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘴 𝘊𝘰𝘯𝘴𝘵𝘪𝘵𝘶𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯? Yeah, we're familiar. Funny how a whole bunch of people back when that little bitty Amendment was written thought we wouldn't need such things spelled out and codified in law, but... 𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘶𝘯𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘭𝘺, enough others realized that we actually did, because someone like your shit-stupid backasswards bumpkin self would eventually come along and miss the 𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘪𝘳𝘦 𝘧𝘶𝘤𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘱𝘰𝘪𝘯𝘵 of this little experiment in democratic governance. So... there you stand, foiled by that dastardly little gem of a concisely-worded document yet again!

Too bad, so sad. Now go to your corner, sit your tin-pot tyrant ass back down, and have a good pout.

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larry parker's avatar

We would have gotten away with it too if it wasn't for that pesky First Amendment.

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cdbunch's avatar

Velma was busy taking the dog to the vet. Daphne was shopping, Shaggy was getting baked, and Fred was fixing his hair.

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Lynn Veit's avatar

👏👏👏

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Rachel Baldes's avatar

What a bunch of fuckwit twatwaffles to imagine they're fulfilling their elected duties by disallowing use of a public space full stop rather than letting First Amendment protections apply to everyone equally.

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Bagen Onuts's avatar

And I caught the wrath of many for using "republicunt."

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Black Hole and DM mourner's avatar

Republicon*, about the same but with a French touch.

* Before meaning idiot, con meant women sex, it may be how cunt entered your vocabulary.

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NOGODZ20's avatar

You can always use 'Republican't.' It's certainly accurate enough.

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Lynn Veit's avatar

If they don't get to make the rules, then nobody is allowed to play. They are like vicious, bratty, spoiled little children when they don't get the deference and special privilege they are entitled to by birthright, if not by "man's law," the latter being faulty, given it's human origins, and therefore non-applicable to King Them.

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Rachel Baldes's avatar

The irony is these are the people dumping on the "horror" of nothing burgers like participation trophies and respecting pronouns etc. It's not even slightly entertaining anymore that every accusation is really a confession, not if they're incapable of living in a shared reality.

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Lynn Veit's avatar

Reality sometimes bites. May it bite them in the ass repeatedly from now til kingdom come.

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Val Uptuous NotAgain's avatar

The good people!?!?

Yeah, their rules do affect the good people, but that is what they intended by them. The Satanic Temple is protecting the first amendment and that protects the Christian’s as well. Whether they realize it or not, allowing the governmental properties to be taken over by only one religion will end up giving way to allowing the government to pick which sect of that religion is the right sect.

Like it or not, the constitution protects all of the people of the United States, not only the good, not only the so called righteous, not only the white, not only the male, not only the straight. All the people.

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Troublesh00ter's avatar

The last I looked , "We the People" has no excluding qualifiers.

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Val Uptuous NotAgain's avatar

Well, technically, the founding fathers were only intending the we the people to be white landowning men, but they were unable to completely disenfranchise all the men who didn’t own land. Besides, the history of the USA was based on fighting for everyone else to be covered by the constitution. Still, there’s only a handful of states still needed to pass the ERA making women officially and unequivocally a part of we the people.

On its face there are no qualifiers.

Sorry, I’m being a little salty, no personal grievance intended.

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cdbunch's avatar

Actually, 38 states *HAVE* ratified the ERA, but the original that Congress passed had a time limit of 7(?) years. Apparently there was an effort to get the time limit removed, but...

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Troublesh00ter's avatar

Yeah, I hear you. There remains a considerable distance between 𝑑𝑒-𝑗𝑢𝑟𝑒 and 𝑑𝑒-𝑓𝑎𝑐𝑡𝑜, but at least some of us continue to try to bridge that gap.

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Anri's avatar

Sure it does - "People".

If someone genuinely thinks their political or doctrinal opposition is sub-human, there's no dissonance.

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Dianne Marie Leonard's avatar

Hmmmm. Wonder how long *that* will last...

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Black Hole and DM mourner's avatar

OT : about the same than yesterday, she is down to a dialysis a day and they continue to diminish the meds for her blood pressure.

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Guerillasurgeon's avatar

So Santa Claus wants to kill the baby Jesus? One doesn't exist and the other one is been dead for years. Is this Christian logic?

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NOGODZ20's avatar

SANTA (about to smother baby jesus with a pillow):

"There can be only one."

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larry parker's avatar

Santa Claus never died. ; )

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NOGODZ20's avatar

Jesus wants you to burn in hell for eternity if you don't slave yourself to him.

Santa just leaves you a lump of coal in your stocking for being naughty.

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Guerillasurgeon's avatar

That was our Christmas movie last Christmas I think. Loved it. :)

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cdbunch's avatar

I'm looking forward to this one this year:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8XH3W0cMss

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Mr.E's avatar

I enjoyed watching that movie as well. Think that I will add that to my list of Christmas movies I watch once a year

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Maggie JK's avatar

I’ve always found the label “God fearing” so bizarre.

I thought these people were part of his flock, his special little children, beloved and perfect despite their “sin”. Why do they fear their father, the shepherd that leads them as sheep? What are they afraid of?

Or is this because they know they sin with their perversions against little children and women so they should be afraid of God?

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cdbunch's avatar

Good fathers would be horrified to learn their children feared them.

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xenubarb's avatar

You know what shepherds do to sheep, right?

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Crowscage's avatar

Shear, milk, molest and consume them. Sounds like christains in operation to me.

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xenubarb's avatar

Exactly! When I had to go to Sunday School until I was old enough to say, "Nope, not doing this any more!" I really, really resented being lumped in with sheep. Even as a kid, I identified more with wolves than sheep!

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Crowscage's avatar

Sheep are some of the stupidest creatures on earth. It's no accident that christains want people to be exactly like them.

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xenubarb's avatar

I always thought of them as food, not friends. I like wool clothing, too.

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Bagen Onuts's avatar

Their gods have shown them they must fear them. Floods, genocides, mass abortions, infanticide, firestorms of flaming rocks, multiple mass murders, hurricanes, earthquakes, tsunamis tornadoes, etc. The list of atrocities by gods is endless.

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Zorginipsoundsor's avatar

️🎵 Taught to fear Jesus in a small town ️🎵

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Kay-El's avatar

My daughter and I went to a local Pride event yesterday and a group of religious crazies with the usual signs were there. As some guy was yelling his nonsense, I went up to him and told him he should be ashamed. Then I walked away. He started sputtering. My daughter asked why I can’t leave that shit alone. I just can’t because it’s drives them nuts, at least for a little bit.

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Bagen Onuts's avatar

Ask "Why can't omnievedrygoddamnedthing god tell us?" It really frosts their gonads seeing such heathen sinners happily being and doing what they hate so much in themselves.

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Richard Wade's avatar

"Finally, the new agreement prohibited any events inside the Capitol that might be deemed “obscene,” which could open the door to future free speech lawsuits."

Okay, one man's divinity is another man's obscenity. One man's certainty is another man's absurdity.

So let's have a public reading of selected excerpts from the Bible. The sexy parts, the naughty parts, the dirty parts, the mildly disgusting parts, the ghastly parts, and the horrific parts, all with citations of the books, chapters, and verses. There's quite a lot of material. No commentary included, just read it; it all speaks for itself.

Let those same censorious Christians find some way to object to reading from their own favorite book without making bigger fools of themselves than they already have.

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Straw's avatar

Do you really believe they would be able to recognise the foolishness?

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Richard Wade's avatar

Most of them no, and the smarter ones who could recognize it would quickly distract themselves from their embarrassment with resentment of whoever brought the embarrassing absurdity/hypocrisy to their attention. Blame the person holding the mirror.

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Rachel Baldes's avatar

I read naughty as "thought" and I was like, that's a good description of some things. Even some things in the Bible.

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avis piscivorus's avatar

If they can't handle the members of The Satanic Temple reading "Paradise Lost" and “The Revolt of The Angels", imagine how they would have [over]reacted if drag queens had asked permission to read children's books.

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cdbunch's avatar

Somebody would have threatened to blow up the courthouse or a rifle and clock tower would get involved.

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Lynn Veit's avatar

I would pay handsomely to watch their heads explode.

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cdbunch's avatar

If you do, you may go to jail. If you don't you may lose your license. Yeah, that's not unclear at all.

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