Hate Mail and Comments
Buona sera. Here is something that I am stealing outright. But it's OK, I'm doing it for my critics.
Some of my hate mail (I include comments in this) is, frankly, lame. Yes, I have had a few that had a bit of life to them, and some imagination. Some have been dull, predictable and forged in the feeble minds corrupted by methamphetamine and the fungus on the walls of Mommie's basement. Others have been profane and obscene, so I simply delete them.
Matt Slick of CARM to the rescue! He has created a form letter, a Pick-Your-Insult Page:
Instead of cogent arguments refuting my alleged errors, the responses I usually get amount to nothing more than a barrage of abuses, accusations, and attacks on my character. This is all fine and dandy except that the various insults are often poorly written, not very logical, lack imagination, and are riddled with various grammatical and spelling errors. Sometimes I cringe as I read the diatribes penned in poor writing, so much so that the full impact of the insult is lessened, sometimes even lost. So, in an effort to help the offended find a particularly appropriate and well written retort and put-down, I offer these pre-developed insults for your viewing (insulting) pleasure.
Although he has an apologetics ministry and deals with more subjects than I do (which includes false religions and heresies), it is still very useful. So, I am going to steal it. Well, sort of. Click here, follow the instructions on his page, come back here and leave your insult. No, Norman, you do not e-mail him the insults intended for me, you put them in the comments of this Weblog.
Comments
This would be better
GUARD: You don't frighten us, English pig-dogs! Go and boil your
bottoms, sons of a silly person. I blow my nose at you, so-called Arthur-king, you and all your silly English kaniggets. Thppppt!
GALAHAD: What a strange person.
ARTHUR: Now look here, my good man!
GUARD: I don't want to talk to you no more, you empty headed animal food trough whopper! I fart in your general direction! You mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries.
GALAHAD: Is there someone else up there we could talk to?
GUARD: No, now go away or I shall taunt you a second time-a!
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Your brother in Christ's name...
Darryl.
At that stage people, like me, will start to engage with whatever you're putting forward and question it.
Sometimes we will do that robustly.
The simple truth is that it is religious bigotry, and you people are playground bullies. Some of us do not believe in getting kicked in the face by atheism, and stand up to the militant disciples of Daffy Dawkins, philosopher to the feeble minded.
Excellent - we can actually argue about something else aside from Theism.
In this case - legislation.
This deserves a full response, so I'm probably do that on my blogand post a link here.
As for your cartoons - well, they really move the debate forward. All that happens is that atheists then create their own about Christianity and all sides descend into their trenches.
I always post as me.
Those were the days. :-)
I was trying out my new "creation" for size and did not realize how persnickety Blogger/Google profile stuff can be. And I can't write on it because I don't have it all figured out.
70s hard rock... Oh, boy. Most of the best came from your side of the Atlantic. Some of my favourite groups are listed on my Blogger Profile page (the real one lol), most are Brits. "Sunset Superman" by the late great Dio was where "Piltdown Superman" was drawn from. I still miss Cozy Powell on drums, played "Mars, the Bringer of War" by Emerson, Lake and Powell last week (wonder why they didn't do more than one album together).
Big fan of other British things, Monty Python (as you know), Patrick McGoohan in "The Prisoner", "Dr. Who" (I had a fifteen foot scarf...), theologians Stott and Packer, tea and shortbread, &c. Lived in Loughton, Essex in 1975 for six weeks, my father was a pastor and the Loughton pastor traded homes.
See what you started lol. I'll stop boring you and the rest of the world now.
The cartoons came from here and here (toward the bottom).
It was thought that the main source of danger would be from Christian fundamentalist groups setting up schools eg The Emmanuel Foundation.
As it turns out the danger was far more insidious - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11799713
This was all made possible by reforms introduced by Michael Gove, Conservative Party Education Secretary using legislation.
The law of unintended consequences in action.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXjLI5Y-EHY
either way - it's very funny.
We have freedom of religion, but you are not allowed to cut out someone's heart to the Aztec sun god. Fine with me. But it's a tough balance between actually practicing a religion (or giving a "specialized" education) and obeying the laws. The laws can become oppressive and infringe on the beliefs, and the beliefs can be weird and dangerous. Nobody seems to stop the occult groups from having wild sex orgies in the moonlight, however. Not that I ever was able to find one during my pre-Christian days.
So anyway. In the apologetics debates circles, the "fundamentalists" of each type have indeed met many times, but there are no fisticuffs. In fact, I have some material on how to share the gospel with Muslims, and it talks about being nice and all that stuff that I don't like doing online. (Kidding, but what do you expect from a 1974 Deep Purple album title?)
On that 70s rock bit, I did this thing three years ago. It's short.