I read an interesting article today it suggests that the media uproar about Ricky Gervais and his disrespectful (but funny) hosting of the Golden Globe film and television awards in Los Angeles last week wasn't really about poking fun at the fat-cats of Hollywood and their excesses, it was about God and his chosen people, you know, Americans.
This is a slightly different spin on the event in the closing moments of which Gervais says "And thank you, God, for making me an atheist.", cue lots of angry Americans from Bangor, Maine to Corpus Christi, Texas; how could the word "Atheist" be broadcast to the heartland like this without being bleeped, and on the Sabbath too!
An NBC executive is quoted as saying,
"You can roast any celebrity you like. Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp can take it. And Ricky can be rude about creationists on his HBO [cable channel] specials, because only the coastal elites can afford to watch HBO anyway, and it's pretty routine stuff for a New York or LA club. Lenny Bruce paved that way 40 years ago, although he suffered for it.
"But only a Brit would be naive enough . . . no, arrogant and stiff-necked enough, to flip off God in a family-oriented TV show that is going into the American heartland on the sabbath. We did not think we had to tell Ricky that."
Seems like God can't take a joke, or Americans, or maybe both?
6 comments:
From the nation that gave us Scientology - the biggest religious joke yet.
CB, ah yes, the PT Barnum of religions. I wish they were just funny as in "ha ha" and not additionally funny as in "leave my kids alone!".
Dear Steve,
I stumbled across your blog and read a few of your posts. Unfortunately, it's not hard to find the religious intolerance, hypocracy, narrow-mindedness and plain stupidity you rail against. As I'm sure you know, you're in "good" company. According to the Gospels, Jesus spent a significant amount of time railing against the very things you rail against.
But did he really say these things? The majority of contemporary historians think he did.
A good overview of what contemporary historians do think about the historical Jesus is the new book, "Jesus of Nazareth" by secular historian Maurice Casey. A more readable, less expensive (but no less rigorous) alternative is "The Historical Figure of Jesus" by EP Sanders.
I'm guessing you're the type of person that likes to make up their mind on subjects based on the available evidence. You might then be interested to see what contemporary historians have to say about Jesus and his early followers - based on the available evidence.
Best wishes,
Derek McIntyre
Hi Derek, thanks for your recommendations - I'm pretty open minded on the historicity of Jesus, although with such a tiny amount of indirect historical evidence seemingly available it's hard to have any confidence in the story. Perhaps there was someone, perhaps the stories were an amalgam of several similar characters however even if we concede there was a real person wondering around at that time espousing a particular philosophy, believers still have all their work ahead of them to show that he was who they say he was and that any of the specifics of the story are actually true, never mind the rest of the Bible (or indeed any of the books of that ilk).
Dear Steve,
Thanks for the response to my note. You mention that you're open-minded on the historical Jesus, but that there isn't much historical evidence available to draw any meaningful conclusions. I was pretty much of a similar view - until I started digging into the subject.
As I said in my original note, contemporary historians (specialising in first century, middle eastern history) have some interesting things to say about the historical Jesus. As an evidence type of person, you too might be interested in what they have to say.
Best wishes,
Derek
D, from what I read it's mostly "it's true because it says so in the Bible" kind of stuff, if there were any verifiable, independent sources of contemporaneous evidence for any of the detail of story it would be well known and would not require the interpretative contortions that theologians seem to cling to do dearly. if I must buy a book to see it then one of my personal "acid tests" has failed, something so obvious and well known would simply be that, i.e. obvious and well known.
The other side to this of course is that there are plenty of Bible stories that are demonstrably wrong including most of the foundational ones, so I fear supporters of these ideas seem to have a bad case of confirmation bias when seen from my perspective.
Even if skeptics conceded that Jesus was a real person (and that would be a stretch), you still have all your work ahead of you to show that the Christian story is actually true, or even desirable. This is particularly germane when one considers the plethora of alternative and equally poorly verifiable "stories" out there. For example Joseph Smith was a real person, does this mean his stories of angels and gold plates is true or would you agree that it's more likely persuasive characters and groups have invented and maintained cults of various kinds supported by mythology and fear throughout history (including non-religious ones), long before Christ and long since. Christ is neither unique or even unusual in this regard.
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