Few groups are quicker to claim they are being persecuted than evangelical Christians, and few groups would be quicker to persecute others if given the chance. If you want to see what genuine persecution looks like, . . . hand power to the preachers.
Or if you want to be persecuted for being Christian, go to China as a missionary. There is a huge difference between being persecuted (imprisoned and beaten until you are willing to renounce your faith) and having people call you an a-hole. Even if you are correct in your statements of faith, proclaiming them loudly makes you annoying, not loving. (See 1 Corinthians 13:1-3.)
Well, to be fair, evangelical Christians WERE being persecuted ... by the Roman Empire about 1800 years ago! And still ARE today ... in places like Iran and Afghanistan. But their history in the good ol' USA has been entirely on the other side of the power balance: the oppressors!
You should look into that, it's more myth than reality, there's not really any evidence of widespread persecution of christians back then, there was some but nothing like it's usually portrayed as. So from the beginning, falsely crying persecution has been a thing for them.
My understanding was they didn't give a damn who you worshipped as long as you also worshipped their gods. There were lots of gods to worship back then and it seems none of them were jealous aholes like the christian god so as long as you worshipped them, they wouldn't rain down retribution of Rome which is what the Romans cared about.
Great post, you beat me by a few seconds. I was just going off some stuff I only recently heard from Ehrman and Paulogia videos, good to have a book-length source.
How often have you heard how the Pilgrims came over here to 'escape religious persecution'? It's one of the most popular stories we tell about the early history of this country. And it's complete BS. The Pilgrims had no problem with religious persecution, as they soon proved by engaging in it. They just had a problem when it was them being persecuted. When your faith, at a fundamental level, requires you to believe that yours is the only true faith and that everyone else pisses god off ,and that god has a nasty habit of engaging in some pretty horrific punishments for anyone getting him POed, you kinda have a real incentive to force everyone to behave like good little christians. It's a builtin feature. This is probably why so many of them simply can't fathom that what they're doing IS persecution, or that trying to force everyone else to follow their faith could possibly be viewed as anything but the right thing to do. There ain't much that can be done about that but a good start would be to stop having an exception for behavior that would otherwise be seen as a mental disorder if that behavior was some kind of expression of religious faith or was religiously motivated.
A part of the Pilgrim story that's usually glossed over (if it's not omitted altogether) is that they didn't come straight from England (where they were irritating the hell out of everybody) to America. Instead they took a short hop across the English Channel to the Netherlands, which didn't have an established church. That should be nirvana for any group that honestly objected to religious discrimination, right? But noooooo! Pretty soon the Pilgrims were pissing off the Dutch even more than they had the English, because for some reason the Dutch didn't want to let them run the whole show. (The nerve!) THAT'S when they left for the New World.
My question is *why* doesn't this school have a signature block policy? Especially for official versus private mail. Personal use of an employer's mail system should be severely restricted. Let them use a webmail interface (or mail client) to their private email account like most organizations require.
Very good point. Some years back, I had an email interchange with a client who was looking to retain me for some consulting work. One email I got back from a person in their Accounting department had a bible verse attached to their signature, rather than the simple reference citation used in the case of Hemant's post. I should mention, too, that this was a large and well-known semiconductor manufacturer, though I should also mention that their base of operations was and still is the Lone Star State [groan].
Bottom line: there are companies out there who simply don't give a shit. However, in the case of this article, we're talking about a PUBLIC SCHOOL, operated with PUBLIC FUNDS. Big difference, IMHO.
My employer has very strict policy about e-mails signatures. And about not using job-email accounts for private use. Myself, I would not dream about using my job mail for private use. I have my own domain for that.
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion...”
With that statement, there SHOULD have been a complete and unalterable disconnect between State and Church in this country. Sadly, there are those who are so enthralled with their belief system that they just INSIST that they have to push it in EVERYONE's face, because Jebus. What they forget is that, because they are public employees, it is incumbent on them to be as neutral as regards religion as the government is supposed to be, at least on paper.
I am convinced that there are a great number of public employees who simply 𝗗𝗢 𝗡𝗢𝗧 𝗨𝗡𝗗𝗘𝗥𝗦𝗧𝗔𝗡𝗗 𝗧𝗛𝗜𝗦. I further wonder if, as a part of their orientation upon being hired, they need to be formally instructed as to this particular facet and condition of their employment.
And whether or not corrective action needs to be included as an understood consequence of failure to abide by that principle.
"I am convinced that there are a great number of public employees who simply 𝗗𝗢 𝗡𝗢𝗧 𝗨𝗡𝗗𝗘𝗥𝗦𝗧𝗔𝗡𝗗 𝗧𝗛𝗜𝗦"
There is a pretty large percentage of all christians who really can't comprehend that their religion is just and only that: their religion and not absolute and unquestionable reality. They'll say they're all for freedom of religion, but their religion is different, it's the TRUE one, so they're not trying to force their religion on others, it's not their religion, it's the natural order, the way things simply are.
I am reminded of the guy at work who had Dymo Tape (remember that stuff?) labels on his hardhat and clipboard that said "JESUS IS LORD". I just considered them as public service announcements to tell people that you didn't want to talk this guy unless you really had to.
I remember asking for one of these as a toy for christmas/birthday as a kid. I was upset when the cutting thing broke, but my mom told me to just use scissors.
What do I admire about Governor Sanders? She has all the audacity and none of the shame. She can confidently stand up at the podium and recite lie after lie after lie and then pretend she’s insulted by those that call her out. That she’s deluded enough to think that, once these theocratic authoritarians take over, that she will have a space at the table rather than a headstone.
Sometimes I wish I were this oblivious to reality. But alas, I am but a humble sane person with eyes and ears. It cannot be done.
Re your email, Blah blah blah, business stuff, blah blah. Take care, we can talk later at the staff meeting.
Me
My standard signature block:
There's no such thing as magic. No magical beings, no magical people, no magical powers or abilities, no magical books, objects, or magical words. All supernatural claims and beliefs are about magic. People don't use that word because it sounds so embarrassingly childish; that's because it is childish, but it's also the most honest term. Grow the hell up and stop believing in magic. Take care of yourself and others with real actions in the real world. Have a nice day.
I look at their obscene displays of wealth (mansions and jets, all while claiming to follow a man who walked around in a robe and sandals) and I say to myself: Why isn't that money going to take care of the needs of the poor and the sick?
Didn't Jesus send a bunch of his so-called followers to the hot place for NOT feeding, clothing and housing the poor and caring for the sick and imprisoned?
Because, anyone who has flown commercial in, at least, the last two decades, wants their own plane.
Most of us aren't hypocrites who claim to follow a hippie socialist, while living the most egregious sins of the capitalist, though.
I'm someone who is willing to pay taxes to have the government support the poor, sick, and maybe even the imprisoned. But if there's enough left after my share of that burden, I still want the excesses of capitalism.
I have to say that when I hopped an early morning flight to take in one of the MST3K conventions in Minnesota, I had the whole row to myself. I stretched out with a blanket and pillow and read comic books. No crying babies, no loudmouthed Karens or Chads. It was wonderful.
Hey, televangelists might get sick someday too, you know. (I mean physically sick, not mentally. They and their followers already have that one covered.)
U.S. courts said the 2017 city ordinance was unconstitutional.
"The payment is earmarked for Liberty Counsel, a Christian ministry and law firm in Orlando, that successfully sued the city after the Tampa City Council adopted an ordinance in 2017 that barred the controversial therapy practice that tries to change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity."
That is seriously messed up. Conversion therapy has been shown to actually harm kids. The denial of facts is running rampant in all of these BS cases and is behind the justification for a lot of laws like the crap women are forced to go through before they can get an abortion, or the don't say gay. I have a hard time understanding why something like that isn't grounds for impeachment of a judge/justice especially when the facts are obvious. Plus, the legislatures should be arrested for practicing medicine without a license.
The legislatures have to be the ones to do the impeachment and as you just said, they are more corrupt than the judges.
It's de riguer to shit on trans people and by extension all LGBT people, all with the excuse of "Protect the Children". Though, anyone who bothers to look can see they only care about the children when they can use them as an excuse to take away other people's human rights.
They don't give a damn about kids, they think if something normalizes homosexuality in any way that that is tantamount to an admission that their god makes mistakes and they can't have that. You can find examples of them, saying this explicitly. If it was only about kids, you wouldn't see all the moral panic going on about drag performances that are far from bring only about kids. And it's the same aholes behind Dobbs, which was behind a 10 year old girl having to leave the state to get her rapists baby aborted. Where's the concern for that 10 year old? If that wasn't pretty much the norm for christians, why aren't more of them calling out this hateful, bigoted behavior? There are some doing this but it's very few, not enough to keep from making the whole religion look like it's a vile, hateful, bigoted religion. There is one good thing coming from this, as discussed in an earlier Friendly Atheist piece--it's driving more and more folks out of religion, turning them into at least nones, with the higher percentages the younger they are, which bodes well for the future.
OK, it's your fault that I had to see some weird shit. First, I'm an old mfer but still hate to not be able to figure out something like this, so what's DM and the home thing? Searching led me to the lneedyourlove youtube channel which is a shitton of videos, multiples per day, all called dm to df+ some mindless BS, and all just crap ambient/elevator background music and screens full of text of lame saccharine professions of love with really sycophantic comments saying nothing. I really didn't need to see that.
Oh hell, it's personal, never mind. Sorry, and really about your dog, I love animals and have always had a few around which sets you up for a lot of loss, it's tough.
About one of the links in the article: Michael and Debbi Pearl who authored that god-awful book both ought ta end up serving long prison sentences for decades for being directly responsible for the inexcusable deaths and sufferings of many innocent children alongside the cruel parents who follow such heartless tips from their book.
The same empty-headed believers in a biblical upbringing for children probably recoil in horror at the thought of gay people having/adopting children and providing them with a loving environment.
I didn't list that one (though I THOUGHT about it! 😁), but I DID mention the other Ezekiel quote where Yahweh boasts about jerking humankind around with his bogus commandments.
There is some seriously messed-up shit in the bible that we can demand be quoted. Like Psalms 137:9, for example. How many Christians know that scripture even exists in their book?
"Then in verse 9, the psalmist adds further detail to this cry for revenge, claiming, “Happy is the one” who kills the infants of their enemy. The desire is graphically stated, but it is simply a call for the destruction of the entire nation."
Simply?
They do seem to excuse it, so it must come up occasionally if it needs to be explained away. 😇
It's hard to sell that you want to protect children from pregnant people and LGBT when you have a verse that celebrates bashing children's heads into rocks. You have to make that not mean what it says, or at least try.
Shame on you! The Bible isn't YOUR sacred book. Only the people whose sacred book it really is--the people who own the damn thing--have the right to cherry-pick it. And don't you forget it, you godless atheist who doesn't believe in God, you.
I remember what Seth MacFarlane said when he was taking flack from Christians over his depictions of Jesus in "Family Guy." He told them the following: "Hey, he's your savior. Not mine." :)
When on occasion I've had christers demand that I not "take my God's name in vain," I snap back, "He's my God too, and I'll use his goddamn name any way I goddamn want to,"
OT: Senator Tim Scott (& Rep. Ashley Hinson)was just at my local library for a 'roundtable' with homeschool families....very few regular folk present, a plethora of national & local journalists. He's hyping his book and announced his formation of an exploratory committee for his upcoming/ongoing POTUS bid.
No, he didn't coordinate with the library in advance...they accommodated him anyway.
They admitted they were wrong and knew so when they mentioned the establishment clause. The teacher’s emails come with an assumed school letterhead, meaning her correspondence from the school’s server is official school correspondence. The school is bound by the constitution to not establish a religion, or not to favor one religion over others. The teacher including a Bible verse is implying, intentionally or not (and we do know it most likely is intentional considering her running to Liberty Counsel over it), the school supports her brand of Christianity.
As someone who works in customer service through emails, when I see the pronouns listed I do not immediately think “left wing crazy LGBT pushers making everyone transgender”, I am grateful they clarify who is on the other side of the email. Many names are used by any gender, that was the whole joke for “It’s Pat” from SNL, Pat and Chris are common, but names that a lot of folks don’t realize are unisex are common, Kelly, Carrie, Kim, Max, Alex. And then there are the names from cultures I don’t belong to that I am unsure of the naming conventions, we have a Russian IT person whose name ends in an A, which in English leans toward feminine names, but this person is a male. Providing the pronouns in correspondence helps when responding to emails or discussing the person. Focusing on the LGBT aspect of pronouns really shows how ignorant a person is, and how they’re trying very hard not to be a decent person, not really a quality effective schools look for in teachers. She is really saying, “hi, I’m an asshole and if your child does not conform to my strict interpretation of what they ought to be, I will refuse to give them the basic human respect all people deserve.” The Proverbs verse she’s considering as an alternative has far too much abuse connotations to be appropriate in any setting designed for children. Aside from the fact that it has the very same issue the torture porn verse she started with. For god so loved the earth he sent his only begotten son to be tortured and killed. Not the beautiful sentiment they think it is.
The newer to this is to make a policy that removes any superfluous flotsam in the signature blocks (pronouns are not superfluous and I will die on this hill, they also are not an LGBT agenda). No more quotes, or smiley faces or little pictures, just Name, title, contact information, school website and done. Assholes like her are why we cant have nice things.
I'll admit I find it a little (ridiculous is really too strong a word) when I see he/him or she/her (Especially when I've seen it used in TV ads)(mostly a duh reaction), but for those who like to use different pronouns or find that their names don't give many of the correspondents appropriate clues, I also find it helpful. I certainly have no problem with a policy that allows that in a signature block.
It's certainly not "standard" for us old fogies, so maybe we gripe about it to ourselves. But like you, I don't really have a problem with it beyond "it's not the way I'm used to doing things." :)
I predict the next faux fundie outrage will be over sig block nicknames. Robert "Bob" Doe is fine with them, but Huong "Cindy" Nguyen is going to bring out the racists and Josephine "Jo" March would be "against their religion". But I also predict that outrage will fail. The practice is so standard, reasonable, and (like pronouns) accepted far beyond the trans usage that hopefully 99% of school districts will not listen to such complaints.
We have a "Young Chow" restaurant right next to a Gentleman's Club a few miles from me. Tell me that wasn't planned (also absolutely insensitive. But given the business next door, not at all surprising).
Don't forget the mandatory disclaimer. My employer's policy specifies verbiage, font size, lack of logo. (I don't remember if it said anything about pronouns) But nowhere could I find where it said you were required to have a signature block, so I don't.
My last two employers provided me with the signature block I’m supposed to use. I didn’t create it nor could I add a quote to it. My current signature offers an opportunity to choose between five microscopic pictures (photos of the slides we produce). I have a few different signatures for different purposes and mailboxes so I used different pics for each.
My only other input was to confirm the spelling of my name.
My type-A tinpot dictator instincts want to both require it, AND require it on replies. I hate needing someone's phone #, pulling up an old email reply they sent me to get it, and it's not there.
It's not set up on the computer I bought to use for work when they first sent me home 3 years ago. After two they gave me a laptop, that I think has that, but I don't use it.
It's not like I want to talk to anyone on the phone anyway. The 8 years I sat in the office, the only people who called me on it were sales people.
Allow me a moment to second the naming/gender issues you've highlighted.
For years, Ashley was a name for a boy, full stop. These days, anyone named Ashley is likely female, and there are soooooo many other names that fall into this particular trap. Heck, Whitney is one of them; again, for years it was a name given to boys, but these days, it's crossed the gender line. I had a female coworker named Aubrey, too. At this point, it would be stupid to assume anything about a person's gender based on their given name, and if you work any kind of customer service, you'd better be aware of that. We haven't even mentioned the whole Francis/Frances thing, or the number of names that sound the same but swap genders like Aaron/Erin. (I was in telephone customer service, so it was an issue at times.)
Connecting someone's name to the gender is a pointless exercise; there are very nearly more exceptions to the rules than there are names that follow the rules.
My guess is that some teacher could append an entire sura to an e-mail and neither Virginia parents nor Liberty Counsel would recognize where it came from.
Few groups are quicker to claim they are being persecuted than evangelical Christians, and few groups would be quicker to persecute others if given the chance. If you want to see what genuine persecution looks like, . . . hand power to the preachers.
Or if you want to be persecuted for being Christian, go to China as a missionary. There is a huge difference between being persecuted (imprisoned and beaten until you are willing to renounce your faith) and having people call you an a-hole. Even if you are correct in your statements of faith, proclaiming them loudly makes you annoying, not loving. (See 1 Corinthians 13:1-3.)
Well, to be fair, evangelical Christians WERE being persecuted ... by the Roman Empire about 1800 years ago! And still ARE today ... in places like Iran and Afghanistan. But their history in the good ol' USA has been entirely on the other side of the power balance: the oppressors!
You should look into that, it's more myth than reality, there's not really any evidence of widespread persecution of christians back then, there was some but nothing like it's usually portrayed as. So from the beginning, falsely crying persecution has been a thing for them.
"We will torture you until you accept Zeus as your lord and savior."
Yeah, that happened. My Sunday school teacher said so. /s
I prefer Epimedes.
The Romans were actually quite tolerant of other religions, unless they caused trouble.
My understanding was they didn't give a damn who you worshipped as long as you also worshipped their gods. There were lots of gods to worship back then and it seems none of them were jealous aholes like the christian god so as long as you worshipped them, they wouldn't rain down retribution of Rome which is what the Romans cared about.
Were they?
https://www.amazon.com/Myth-Persecution-Christians-Invented-Martyrdom/dp/0062104551/ref=sr_1_1
Great post, you beat me by a few seconds. I was just going off some stuff I only recently heard from Ehrman and Paulogia videos, good to have a book-length source.
𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘔𝘺𝘵𝘩 𝘰𝘧 𝘊𝘩𝘳𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘪𝘢𝘯 𝘗𝘦𝘳𝘴𝘦𝘤𝘶𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 - 𝘊𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘪𝘥𝘢 𝘔𝘰𝘴𝘴 𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘷𝘪𝘦𝘸𝘦𝘥 𝘰𝘯 𝘙𝘦𝘢𝘴𝘰𝘯𝘢𝘣𝘭𝘦 𝘋𝘰𝘶𝘣𝘵𝘴
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0L7Oeae5_OQ
Can't recommend that book highly enough.
How often have you heard how the Pilgrims came over here to 'escape religious persecution'? It's one of the most popular stories we tell about the early history of this country. And it's complete BS. The Pilgrims had no problem with religious persecution, as they soon proved by engaging in it. They just had a problem when it was them being persecuted. When your faith, at a fundamental level, requires you to believe that yours is the only true faith and that everyone else pisses god off ,and that god has a nasty habit of engaging in some pretty horrific punishments for anyone getting him POed, you kinda have a real incentive to force everyone to behave like good little christians. It's a builtin feature. This is probably why so many of them simply can't fathom that what they're doing IS persecution, or that trying to force everyone else to follow their faith could possibly be viewed as anything but the right thing to do. There ain't much that can be done about that but a good start would be to stop having an exception for behavior that would otherwise be seen as a mental disorder if that behavior was some kind of expression of religious faith or was religiously motivated.
A part of the Pilgrim story that's usually glossed over (if it's not omitted altogether) is that they didn't come straight from England (where they were irritating the hell out of everybody) to America. Instead they took a short hop across the English Channel to the Netherlands, which didn't have an established church. That should be nirvana for any group that honestly objected to religious discrimination, right? But noooooo! Pretty soon the Pilgrims were pissing off the Dutch even more than they had the English, because for some reason the Dutch didn't want to let them run the whole show. (The nerve!) THAT'S when they left for the New World.
My take is that they were convinced that not being allowed to persecute others meant that they were the victims of religious persecution.
Isn't that the default for them?
If only Sarah Palin had been there to lead them...
My question is *why* doesn't this school have a signature block policy? Especially for official versus private mail. Personal use of an employer's mail system should be severely restricted. Let them use a webmail interface (or mail client) to their private email account like most organizations require.
Very good point. Some years back, I had an email interchange with a client who was looking to retain me for some consulting work. One email I got back from a person in their Accounting department had a bible verse attached to their signature, rather than the simple reference citation used in the case of Hemant's post. I should mention, too, that this was a large and well-known semiconductor manufacturer, though I should also mention that their base of operations was and still is the Lone Star State [groan].
Bottom line: there are companies out there who simply don't give a shit. However, in the case of this article, we're talking about a PUBLIC SCHOOL, operated with PUBLIC FUNDS. Big difference, IMHO.
Agreed.
My only guess is that Loudon doesn't have a policy because it hasn't been an issue that required oversight...up until now.
My employer has very strict policy about e-mails signatures. And about not using job-email accounts for private use. Myself, I would not dream about using my job mail for private use. I have my own domain for that.
I use a second email client at work to contact my personal mail server.
About the only "personal" uses I make of my employers email is to arrange lunch with co-workers and send the PDFs of my paystubs home.
So you are the master of your domain?
https://youtu.be/awIWO9Z0_qQ?t=44
Several actually. But I hadn't seen that one before.
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion...”
With that statement, there SHOULD have been a complete and unalterable disconnect between State and Church in this country. Sadly, there are those who are so enthralled with their belief system that they just INSIST that they have to push it in EVERYONE's face, because Jebus. What they forget is that, because they are public employees, it is incumbent on them to be as neutral as regards religion as the government is supposed to be, at least on paper.
I am convinced that there are a great number of public employees who simply 𝗗𝗢 𝗡𝗢𝗧 𝗨𝗡𝗗𝗘𝗥𝗦𝗧𝗔𝗡𝗗 𝗧𝗛𝗜𝗦. I further wonder if, as a part of their orientation upon being hired, they need to be formally instructed as to this particular facet and condition of their employment.
And whether or not corrective action needs to be included as an understood consequence of failure to abide by that principle.
"I am convinced that there are a great number of public employees who simply 𝗗𝗢 𝗡𝗢𝗧 𝗨𝗡𝗗𝗘𝗥𝗦𝗧𝗔𝗡𝗗 𝗧𝗛𝗜𝗦"
There is a pretty large percentage of all christians who really can't comprehend that their religion is just and only that: their religion and not absolute and unquestionable reality. They'll say they're all for freedom of religion, but their religion is different, it's the TRUE one, so they're not trying to force their religion on others, it's not their religion, it's the natural order, the way things simply are.
I know a few of those...
I am reminded of the guy at work who had Dymo Tape (remember that stuff?) labels on his hardhat and clipboard that said "JESUS IS LORD". I just considered them as public service announcements to tell people that you didn't want to talk this guy unless you really had to.
I remember asking for one of these as a toy for christmas/birthday as a kid. I was upset when the cutting thing broke, but my mom told me to just use scissors.
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/-zkAAOSwI~xj7k00/s-l1600.jpg
Flashbacks.
Remember? I still have one. It's a little dusty, but still.
Ah, the days before every office had a P-Touch.
I have a P-Touch in some dusty forgotten box in my basement.
Is it in the same box as you Dymo? I never bought one as I rarely label things. (I'm a pile organizer)
I think we threw out the Dymo when we got the P-Touch.
OT: Sarah Huckabee Sanders is requiring people to sign what amounts to a loyalty oath *to her personally* when they apply for state jobs. Not even Donald Trump was brazen enough to require that, not in writing anyway. https://www.thenewcivilrightsmovement.com/2023/04/sarah-sanders-asks-applicants-to-write-500-words-on-what-they-admire-about-her-most-while-applying-for-a-state-board-job/
What do I admire about Governor Sanders? She has all the audacity and none of the shame. She can confidently stand up at the podium and recite lie after lie after lie and then pretend she’s insulted by those that call her out. That she’s deluded enough to think that, once these theocratic authoritarians take over, that she will have a space at the table rather than a headstone.
Sometimes I wish I were this oblivious to reality. But alas, I am but a humble sane person with eyes and ears. It cannot be done.
I loved that one of the first things she said to the WH press corps was that she wouldn't lie to them. Then did nothing but lie.
You'd think that being a spokesliar for the Liar In Chief, maybe she'd slip up and tell the truth about something. I guess that's her superpower.
Name me one of these people with any shame. I'll wait.
jim bakker. Somewhere very deep, he is ashamed of having been caught for one of his previous cons.
Only of being caught though. 😇
You asked for a right winger feeling shame, you didn't specified a criteria 😁
You left a k out of his last name.
It's a shame that Sanders is Governor. Does that count? ; )
No. She's not ashamed at all. 😇
Haven't you heard? Lying for Jesus is okie-dokie. The bible says so (see Romans 3:7).
𝑊ℎ𝑎𝑡 ℎ𝑎𝑟𝑚 𝑤𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑖𝑡 𝑑𝑜, 𝑖𝑓 𝑎 𝑚𝑎𝑛 𝑡𝑜𝑙𝑑 𝑎 𝑔𝑜𝑜𝑑 𝑠𝑡𝑟𝑜𝑛𝑔 𝑙𝑖𝑒 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑎𝑘𝑒 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑔𝑜𝑜𝑑 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝐶ℎ𝑟𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑖𝑎𝑛 𝑐ℎ𝑢𝑟𝑐ℎ ... 𝑎 𝑙𝑖𝑒 𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑜𝑓 𝑛𝑒𝑐𝑒𝑠𝑠𝑖𝑡𝑦, 𝑎 𝑢𝑠𝑒𝑓𝑢𝑙 𝑙𝑖𝑒, 𝑎 ℎ𝑒𝑙𝑝𝑓𝑢𝑙 𝑙𝑖𝑒, 𝑠𝑢𝑐ℎ 𝑙𝑖𝑒𝑠 𝑤𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑛𝑜𝑡 𝑏𝑒 𝑎𝑔𝑎𝑖𝑛𝑠𝑡 𝐺𝑜𝑑, ℎ𝑒 𝑤𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑎𝑐𝑐𝑒𝑝𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑚.
-- Martin Luther
Luther, being religious, has trouble with the truth.
If you have to resort to lying, your argument is built on sand.
She has out awfuled her dad.
Only 6 words. Not exactly admirable. I don't want a job in Arkansas.
Can you say, "Insecure," boys and girls? I knew that you could!
Beat me to it as I was typing it.
Is there 499 synonyms of stupid ?
Well, there are 222 Republicans in the House, and 49 in the Senate = 271. That's a start.
Just write:
Very
very
very
very
...
...
...
very
stupid.
I can write this with one word in Provençal "Fada".
Hello Muddah, hello Faddah
Here I am at Camp Grenada
Camp is very entertaining
And they say we'll have some fun if it stops raining
You really need 300 synonyms for liar.
Demand personal loyalty? Then you are a weak, weak person.
Next, she'll tell us all she's a very stable genius.
And we all know what's on the floor in stables.
A typical business email:
From: Me
To: Joe, fellow worker
Subject: Business stuff
Dear Joe,
Re your email, Blah blah blah, business stuff, blah blah. Take care, we can talk later at the staff meeting.
Me
My standard signature block:
There's no such thing as magic. No magical beings, no magical people, no magical powers or abilities, no magical books, objects, or magical words. All supernatural claims and beliefs are about magic. People don't use that word because it sounds so embarrassingly childish; that's because it is childish, but it's also the most honest term. Grow the hell up and stop believing in magic. Take care of yourself and others with real actions in the real world. Have a nice day.
From: Joe
To: Richard
tl/dr
: )
I demand that someone inform this teacher that the gospel of John has been declared a fogery.
Liberty Council? Will she be personally represented by Mat Staver, the man who has yet to win a single case in front of an actual judge and jury?
Liberty for me and not for thee Council.
Far more accurate.
This just in: Ron DeSantis has started a new 'go fund me' web site for victims of Christian persecution. All proceeds go to DeSantis for President.
Let's face it: Religion is a scam, so why not get in on the action, eh?
Damn morals. I want a plane, Zeusdammit.
I look at their obscene displays of wealth (mansions and jets, all while claiming to follow a man who walked around in a robe and sandals) and I say to myself: Why isn't that money going to take care of the needs of the poor and the sick?
Didn't Jesus send a bunch of his so-called followers to the hot place for NOT feeding, clothing and housing the poor and caring for the sick and imprisoned?
Because, anyone who has flown commercial in, at least, the last two decades, wants their own plane.
Most of us aren't hypocrites who claim to follow a hippie socialist, while living the most egregious sins of the capitalist, though.
I'm someone who is willing to pay taxes to have the government support the poor, sick, and maybe even the imprisoned. But if there's enough left after my share of that burden, I still want the excesses of capitalism.
I have to say that when I hopped an early morning flight to take in one of the MST3K conventions in Minnesota, I had the whole row to myself. I stretched out with a blanket and pillow and read comic books. No crying babies, no loudmouthed Karens or Chads. It was wonderful.
I did and I have no problem with flying commercial but I am kid sized and used to noisy environments.
Hey, televangelists might get sick someday too, you know. (I mean physically sick, not mentally. They and their followers already have that one covered.)
I recall what Jesus was written to have said about the rich getting into heaven.
Something to do with needle eyes and camels.
They are sick of being poor. There, resolved.
𝐓𝐚𝐦𝐩𝐚 𝐩𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐬 𝐭𝐨 𝐩𝐚𝐲 $𝟗𝟓𝟎,𝟎𝟎𝟎 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐟𝐚𝐢𝐥𝐞𝐝 𝐛𝐚𝐧 𝐨𝐧 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐩𝐲
U.S. courts said the 2017 city ordinance was unconstitutional.
"The payment is earmarked for Liberty Counsel, a Christian ministry and law firm in Orlando, that successfully sued the city after the Tampa City Council adopted an ordinance in 2017 that barred the controversial therapy practice that tries to change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity."
https://www.newsbreak.com/tampa-fl/2981505683018-tampa-to-pay-950-000-for-failed-ban-on-conversion-therapy
They won't be happy until every LGBT child suicides before their 18th birthday.
That is seriously messed up. Conversion therapy has been shown to actually harm kids. The denial of facts is running rampant in all of these BS cases and is behind the justification for a lot of laws like the crap women are forced to go through before they can get an abortion, or the don't say gay. I have a hard time understanding why something like that isn't grounds for impeachment of a judge/justice especially when the facts are obvious. Plus, the legislatures should be arrested for practicing medicine without a license.
The legislatures have to be the ones to do the impeachment and as you just said, they are more corrupt than the judges.
It's de riguer to shit on trans people and by extension all LGBT people, all with the excuse of "Protect the Children". Though, anyone who bothers to look can see they only care about the children when they can use them as an excuse to take away other people's human rights.
They don't give a damn about kids, they think if something normalizes homosexuality in any way that that is tantamount to an admission that their god makes mistakes and they can't have that. You can find examples of them, saying this explicitly. If it was only about kids, you wouldn't see all the moral panic going on about drag performances that are far from bring only about kids. And it's the same aholes behind Dobbs, which was behind a 10 year old girl having to leave the state to get her rapists baby aborted. Where's the concern for that 10 year old? If that wasn't pretty much the norm for christians, why aren't more of them calling out this hateful, bigoted behavior? There are some doing this but it's very few, not enough to keep from making the whole religion look like it's a vile, hateful, bigoted religion. There is one good thing coming from this, as discussed in an earlier Friendly Atheist piece--it's driving more and more folks out of religion, turning them into at least nones, with the higher percentages the younger they are, which bodes well for the future.
"Where's the concern for that 10 year old?"
Like every person born with female genitalia she asked for it.
Isn't harming kids what organized religion is all about?
I look at that photo and I think: "Are they trying to be the new 3 Stooges?"
It's that woman isn't it? The over married government servant who wouldn't do her job?
Yup, that's her. The multi-married, multi-divorced woman who claims to believe in the sanctity of marriage.
Well, ALL of her marriages were sacrosanct. Yahweh himself whispered it in her shell-like ear. How can you have a problem with that?
Wonder if she ever cried out the wrong name during sex.
And now I need my Neuralyzer to erase that image.
She believes in it, "Une fois à chaque fois"*.
* I don't know how it will translate but in French this saying is heavy on sarcasm.
"Once Every Time" according to goggle.
OT : DM is finally at home.
Great news.
The bad new, they still don't understand what triggered her allergic reaction.
Yeah, that is definitely bad news.
OK, it's your fault that I had to see some weird shit. First, I'm an old mfer but still hate to not be able to figure out something like this, so what's DM and the home thing? Searching led me to the lneedyourlove youtube channel which is a shitton of videos, multiples per day, all called dm to df+ some mindless BS, and all just crap ambient/elevator background music and screens full of text of lame saccharine professions of love with really sycophantic comments saying nothing. I really didn't need to see that.
DM = Dear Mother, as in BHm's mom
Oh, ah, ...still clueless, OT, DM and now BHm?
Look at the initials of my nym.
Edit : just in case Black Hole was my dog, Aria, nickname.
Oh hell, it's personal, never mind. Sorry, and really about your dog, I love animals and have always had a few around which sets you up for a lot of loss, it's tough.
Black Hole mourner. I think you need an espresso IV.
Ask cdbunch for some brain and eyes bleach.
YAAAAY! *hugs*
DM : merci.
I couldn't tell her before. She was exhausted and took a loooong nap.
About one of the links in the article: Michael and Debbi Pearl who authored that god-awful book both ought ta end up serving long prison sentences for decades for being directly responsible for the inexcusable deaths and sufferings of many innocent children alongside the cruel parents who follow such heartless tips from their book.
The same empty-headed believers in a biblical upbringing for children probably recoil in horror at the thought of gay people having/adopting children and providing them with a loving environment.
It's the religious who are immoral.
I guess it's a bit late and someone's already come up with this? I'll have a look later when my eyes are functioning properly.
http://i1.wp.com/thechurchsofa.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/There-she-lusted-after-her-lovers-whose-genitals-were-like-those-of-donkeys-and-whose-emission-was-like-that-of-horses.Ezekial-23-20.jpg
I didn't list that one (though I THOUGHT about it! 😁), but I DID mention the other Ezekiel quote where Yahweh boasts about jerking humankind around with his bogus commandments.
They need a better pic. That could be a gelding.
Probably needed to be SFW. 😇
Always good to bring this one up.
There is some seriously messed-up shit in the bible that we can demand be quoted. Like Psalms 137:9, for example. How many Christians know that scripture even exists in their book?
"Then in verse 9, the psalmist adds further detail to this cry for revenge, claiming, “Happy is the one” who kills the infants of their enemy. The desire is graphically stated, but it is simply a call for the destruction of the entire nation."
Simply?
They do seem to excuse it, so it must come up occasionally if it needs to be explained away. 😇
It's hard to sell that you want to protect children from pregnant people and LGBT when you have a verse that celebrates bashing children's heads into rocks. You have to make that not mean what it says, or at least try.
Shame on you! The Bible isn't YOUR sacred book. Only the people whose sacred book it really is--the people who own the damn thing--have the right to cherry-pick it. And don't you forget it, you godless atheist who doesn't believe in God, you.
"...you godless atheist who doesn't believe in God, you."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-syQ2lOCr4
I remember what Seth MacFarlane said when he was taking flack from Christians over his depictions of Jesus in "Family Guy." He told them the following: "Hey, he's your savior. Not mine." :)
When on occasion I've had christers demand that I not "take my God's name in vain," I snap back, "He's my God too, and I'll use his goddamn name any way I goddamn want to,"
I don't remember who marriage. Her brothers were so happy they killed everyone.
Was that the bibble or GoT? Sorry, GoT is MUCH less bloody than the bibble.
Because Arya Stark wasn't married*
* In the books, I don't know for the show.
OT: Senator Tim Scott (& Rep. Ashley Hinson)was just at my local library for a 'roundtable' with homeschool families....very few regular folk present, a plethora of national & local journalists. He's hyping his book and announced his formation of an exploratory committee for his upcoming/ongoing POTUS bid.
No, he didn't coordinate with the library in advance...they accommodated him anyway.
Hopefully it didn't conflict with Kirk Cameron.
No sign of him here yet. His contemporaries from Morons4Lunacy and such, yes.
Is Ashley Hinson his drag name, then?
Sadly, Hinson is the Trumpublican Rep. from Iowa's 2nd Congressional District.
(Don Henley sung about her... Bubble-Headed Bleach Blonde who comes on at five ...)
The simple solution is for the district to craft a policy that says no quotations whatsoever in the signature block.
Heh. Just imagine if the tag line was a quote from the Church of Satan. Yeah, we'd see some quick action right then. I guarantee it!
Hundreds of parents would have complained. Probably tried to get said teacher's head on a silver platter.
I suspect the whole reason the school became aware of this, is one parent (non-Christian) complained.
"Head on a silver platter" is straight up Old Testament biblical!
Even faster if from the Q-ran.
They admitted they were wrong and knew so when they mentioned the establishment clause. The teacher’s emails come with an assumed school letterhead, meaning her correspondence from the school’s server is official school correspondence. The school is bound by the constitution to not establish a religion, or not to favor one religion over others. The teacher including a Bible verse is implying, intentionally or not (and we do know it most likely is intentional considering her running to Liberty Counsel over it), the school supports her brand of Christianity.
As someone who works in customer service through emails, when I see the pronouns listed I do not immediately think “left wing crazy LGBT pushers making everyone transgender”, I am grateful they clarify who is on the other side of the email. Many names are used by any gender, that was the whole joke for “It’s Pat” from SNL, Pat and Chris are common, but names that a lot of folks don’t realize are unisex are common, Kelly, Carrie, Kim, Max, Alex. And then there are the names from cultures I don’t belong to that I am unsure of the naming conventions, we have a Russian IT person whose name ends in an A, which in English leans toward feminine names, but this person is a male. Providing the pronouns in correspondence helps when responding to emails or discussing the person. Focusing on the LGBT aspect of pronouns really shows how ignorant a person is, and how they’re trying very hard not to be a decent person, not really a quality effective schools look for in teachers. She is really saying, “hi, I’m an asshole and if your child does not conform to my strict interpretation of what they ought to be, I will refuse to give them the basic human respect all people deserve.” The Proverbs verse she’s considering as an alternative has far too much abuse connotations to be appropriate in any setting designed for children. Aside from the fact that it has the very same issue the torture porn verse she started with. For god so loved the earth he sent his only begotten son to be tortured and killed. Not the beautiful sentiment they think it is.
The newer to this is to make a policy that removes any superfluous flotsam in the signature blocks (pronouns are not superfluous and I will die on this hill, they also are not an LGBT agenda). No more quotes, or smiley faces or little pictures, just Name, title, contact information, school website and done. Assholes like her are why we cant have nice things.
I'll admit I find it a little (ridiculous is really too strong a word) when I see he/him or she/her (Especially when I've seen it used in TV ads)(mostly a duh reaction), but for those who like to use different pronouns or find that their names don't give many of the correspondents appropriate clues, I also find it helpful. I certainly have no problem with a policy that allows that in a signature block.
It's certainly not "standard" for us old fogies, so maybe we gripe about it to ourselves. But like you, I don't really have a problem with it beyond "it's not the way I'm used to doing things." :)
I predict the next faux fundie outrage will be over sig block nicknames. Robert "Bob" Doe is fine with them, but Huong "Cindy" Nguyen is going to bring out the racists and Josephine "Jo" March would be "against their religion". But I also predict that outrage will fail. The practice is so standard, reasonable, and (like pronouns) accepted far beyond the trans usage that hopefully 99% of school districts will not listen to such complaints.
I once worked with a guy whose first name was "Hung".
Don't forget the Donger
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088128/characters/nm0913797?ref_=tt_cl_c_6
"I once worked with a guy whose first name was "Hung".
Was he? :)
HR frowns on finding that out about a co-worker.
Buncha wet blankets. ;)
I don't know, but he 𝘸𝘢𝘴 Hmong. No kidding.
Hmong is pronounced the same as the term for something disgusting or offensive, or to spoil/ruin/destroy something.
Whoops.
(FWIW, it's also pronounced the same as a small round green bean) :)
We used to have a restaurant in St. Pete named Hung Won.
This is from Honolulu:
https://dining.staradvertiser.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/hung_20140525_03.jpg
We have a "Young Chow" restaurant right next to a Gentleman's Club a few miles from me. Tell me that wasn't planned (also absolutely insensitive. But given the business next door, not at all surprising).
I like Pho King.
Don't forget the mandatory disclaimer. My employer's policy specifies verbiage, font size, lack of logo. (I don't remember if it said anything about pronouns) But nowhere could I find where it said you were required to have a signature block, so I don't.
My last two employers provided me with the signature block I’m supposed to use. I didn’t create it nor could I add a quote to it. My current signature offers an opportunity to choose between five microscopic pictures (photos of the slides we produce). I have a few different signatures for different purposes and mailboxes so I used different pics for each.
My only other input was to confirm the spelling of my name.
My type-A tinpot dictator instincts want to both require it, AND require it on replies. I hate needing someone's phone #, pulling up an old email reply they sent me to get it, and it's not there.
I work from home 3 days a week. My office phone number wouldn't do you much good. E-mail or IM are the best ways to contact me.
Office phone calls forward directly to our computers, wherever we work. Are you stuck in the 20th century or something? ;)
It's not set up on the computer I bought to use for work when they first sent me home 3 years ago. After two they gave me a laptop, that I think has that, but I don't use it.
It's not like I want to talk to anyone on the phone anyway. The 8 years I sat in the office, the only people who called me on it were sales people.
Allow me a moment to second the naming/gender issues you've highlighted.
For years, Ashley was a name for a boy, full stop. These days, anyone named Ashley is likely female, and there are soooooo many other names that fall into this particular trap. Heck, Whitney is one of them; again, for years it was a name given to boys, but these days, it's crossed the gender line. I had a female coworker named Aubrey, too. At this point, it would be stupid to assume anything about a person's gender based on their given name, and if you work any kind of customer service, you'd better be aware of that. We haven't even mentioned the whole Francis/Frances thing, or the number of names that sound the same but swap genders like Aaron/Erin. (I was in telephone customer service, so it was an issue at times.)
Connecting someone's name to the gender is a pointless exercise; there are very nearly more exceptions to the rules than there are names that follow the rules.
I know a guy named "Ashley Joanna" who has a little something for people who make fun of his name.
https://th.bing.com/th/id/R.8fafa14f5b1b22f98aa62e757260275b?rik=cKlOLTrVnJqL1g&pid=ImgRaw&r=0
Btw, Aaron/Erin isn't a problem since "Aaron" is pronounced A-A-ron.
ASH (to the boy named Sue): "Let me show you how it's done when somebody mocks you for your name."
https://youtu.be/X-hYLL7Gpos
He performed this version at San Quentin. :)
Written by none other than Shel Silverstein. And the part that was bleeped was "Son of a bitch."
It would be interesting to ask "Liberty" Counsel if they would also push to allow a Muslim teacher to have a Koran reference on their signature block.
My guess is that some teacher could append an entire sura to an e-mail and neither Virginia parents nor Liberty Counsel would recognize where it came from.
Or a Jewish teacher cite the Midrash...
Scanners.