Bullsh*t!
Dean
Far and away the best thing Showtime has to offer is Penn & Teller's Bullsh*t!, which I was pleased recently to see had received emmy nominations for outstanding reality show and for outstanding writing in a nonfiction show.
This week they were gutsy enough to take on one of the biggest pieces of religious dogma in America: the Endangered Species Act, which has never once saved a single endangered species and actually only helped endanger some species, all while trashing many innocent people's rights.
I'm not sure if they'll make it through this man. Criticizing anything at all in the environmentalist-religion's dogma is to invite the most vicious of character smears and often outright death threats. (It's why a lot of us walked away from that movement.)
A couple days ago, I was watching the local news with the Mrs and some story came on about how item X is bad for you...I gave out my normal, under-the-breath, "bullsh*t"...and the Mrs came back with "you know, Mark, you seem to think that everything is bullsh*t". I hadn't really thought about it, but I guess I do come down hard on the side that most of what we're told is bullsh*t, or at least laced heavily with it.
But it isn't strictly true that I view everything that way - its just, I guess, that having been scammed a few times in my life, I can spot a con a mile away on a foggy night. Sometimes I can't believe some of the nonsense I fell for years ago - and it burns me up from time to time when I see how many people believe things which are easily penetrable lies.
It goes on and on, the stuff we are asked to believe - I know rational, educated people who believe a conspiracy killed Kennedy, that vitamins will make you live forever, that aliens have landed on earth, that the world is dying...all of these things, and more, without an iota of evidence to back them up.
Three cheers for Penn and Teller...but, you're right, Dean; they haven't a snowball's chance in hell of getting an Emmy for trashing environmentalist Holy Writ like the ESA.
This is so true - a trained nurse was telling me about the magical curative powers of some Tibetan tea. She told me that it's expensive, but it "cleanses all of the bad things out of your system"
I asked her how, on a medical/cellular basis, the tea could "cleanse the bad things" from your blood, kidneys, etc. - because as a trained nurse, she should know. She couldn't explain it - I guess she had one form of reasoning for medicine and another for magic. Eventually, she acknowledged that the tea tasted like cr*p.
Ah, so they are libertarians. I wasn't sure. I knew they came down on the right on a lot of issues but their blatant hostility toward Christianity told me they weren't quite Republicans.
I'd watch their show but I can't trust them to give anything with a Christian slant a fair shake. They've already prejudged it as bunk. And looking at their episode list (and descriptions) it's something they seem to touch on often in one form or another.
;-) you have to love it when both sides get offended.
Interesting Quote Kevin:
"They've already prejudged it as bunk."... the right really has started using the language of the left...
"Environmentalism" today is merely a mask for Fabian Socialism, the creeping abolition of private property. Ironically, it originally started out as a conservative movement, the conservation movement, supported by many hunters, fishermen, farmers, and other traditional outdoor folk for preserving wilderness areas. But, in the 1970s, it was taken over by Communists, hippies, and "fuzzy liberals" as a vehicle for their own anti-capitalist agenda. Today, it goes beyond Marxism into "post-modern" nihilism, attacking not only capitalism but civilization as such and man's very existence. "....a rat is a pig is a dog is a boy...." -PETA)
"Bunk" is pretty tame by any standard if that's what you're getting at. And what I've seen about the show thus far tells me that, yes, they're already prejudged Christianity as such. Why is that a leftist statement?
I seriously doubt that this show is truly objective. Mr. Penn and Mr. Teller have a point of view they believe is accurate and want to get across in an entertaining way. That's fine. I'm not expecting straight objective reporting from them. However, they need to be honest and tell they're audience that indeed they've already prejudged the topics they're presenting if indeed they're trying to be objective afterall. The way I see it, they're not.
I seriously don't see your issue with my statement. I see what they present about Christianity and Christian values, I believe they don't give it a fair shake and I call them on it. If using the word "bunk" is a leftist tactic then call me a liberal. For a show called "Bullsh*t!" I think you'd cut me some slack.
Then again, I could be completely misreading your comment.
People just don't like having their comfortable preconceptions challenged.
"However, they need to be honest and tell they're audience that indeed they've already prejudged the topics they're presenting if indeed they're trying to be objective afterall. The way I see it, they're not."
I think they said in the very first show that they're NOT going to be objective, because objectivity is impossible to achieve. They're not going to be fair and balanced - they're going to be biased as hell, the difference between them and the bullshitters they debunk is that they use verifiable facts instead of pulling stuff out of their asses.
I sometimes disagree with them, more often agree - but I haven't caught them in a lie yet. Cheap shots and rationalization aplenty, but no untruths.
Regarding the Endangered Species Act, I guess if they can take on Mother Theresa, they can take on anything.
Speaking of the Mother Theresa episode, has anyone seen it? I've heard about it (Christopher Hitchens was interviewed for it) but never seen it. And I notice my "Showtime On Demand" menu has a conspicuous hole where Episode 31 should have been. Should I be paranoid?
"They have nothing to fear about the Endangered Species Act show. If there was going to be a lynching, it would have been after the "F*ck Recycling" show. And the "All Campuses are Liberal Hellholes" show. And the "Secondhand Smoke is Bullsh*t" episode."
All that is Politically Incorrect -- and therefore right. But the truth is "All Campuses are Communist Hellholes". Communists are not liberals and they never were. Dean is the liberal.
"It goes on and on, the stuff we are asked to believe - I know rational, educated people who believe a conspiracy killed Kennedy, that vitamins will make you live forever, that aliens have landed on earth, that the world is dying...all of these things, and more, without an iota of evidence to back them up."
I'll just note once again that a Communist (Lee Harvey Oswald) killed President Kennedy.
Okay. That's good. I'm glad they've said something like this. But since they have... I cannot see a reason to trust their show. "Fact" have a way of bending toward one's worldview instead of the other way around. Hell, you should see the debate we're having on evolution vs. intelligent design! We're all looking at the same "facts" but coming away with far different conclusions. That their facts are verifiable is of little comfort when everyone involved disagrees what exactly those facts mean. Now, I'm not one to embrace relativism but the "fact" that their show is so openly hostile toward Christianity tells me that, for them, "facts" are as plyable as they wish them to be. They're playing the same game they accuse and attack others about.
I think all the other conspiracy theorizing was started up to head off this obvious conclusion. That's my conspiracy theory.
That is absolutely true.
Metal Gear Solid 3 tells me this is false. It should be known that my worldview is exclusively formed by video games. So, yes, if I see a potted plant on someone's porch I will smash it hoping to find gold or an elusive healing item. I will eat food off the ground on the chance that it will restore my health. I will walk into stranger's homes just to have pointless conversations with them. While there I may go through all their drawers and break all vases they own to, again, find money or healing potions.
They're openly hostile towards Christianity, but only the segment of Christianity that claims the Bible to be a font of immutable truth; they do this by pointing out inconsistencies within the Bible, and the contradiction with empirical evidence by the historical accounts found within the bible.
No one asks you to 'trust' them - by all means, fact check their asses. Religion, by definition, requires 'trust', because there's no way to verify or disprove religion's claims. Pointing out that PETA lies, PETA kills animals, PETA funds ecoterrorists, recycling is bunk, gun control is bunk, cold reading is bunk, and yes, creation 'science' is bunk - doing this by publically broadcasting verifiable facts that are not known to the general public - that transcends any bias on their part.
They've also said frequently that you shouldn't believe what you're told - by anyone. Go out and verify it. If it's not verifiable, it's a matter of opinion. Their opinions of Christianity may be poor, but they didn't create a metaphysical debate show.
Facts aren't plyable. You can surely rationalize (or reason, it's not really the point) the inconsistencies of the Bible away, but most people don't even know that the inconsistencies exist. Yes, they're proselytizing libertarians. So what.
A wooden Noah's ark holding two of every species of animal is IMPOSSIBLE to build unless God changed the laws of physics for the occasion. If you take the story as a parable, fine. If you shout it from the rooftops as the God's honest truth, it's hardly constructive to say that because of their anti-Christian viewpoints, P&T are 'plying' the fact that the combined weight of every species of animal would sink any boat you built, and wouldn't fit inside any boat feasible to be built TODAY, let alone in Biblical times (hell, I don't even remember if they talked about Noah's ark, but the point applies nonetheless).
I think Penn and Teller are doing society a HUGE service, and fulfilling a role that SHOULD be the job of the press. You know, debunking urban legends, myths, quacks, and swindlers.
I could care less about objectivity - in a marketplace of ideas, there's always someone on the other end saying the opposite - the facts will end up supporting one of them, and it should be the job of the press to report facts and debunk untruths.
I probably have much more in common with Ann Coulter's readers than Al Franken readers, and I think Al Franken is a shrill leftie - that doesn't change the fact that after reading Slander and Lying Liars Etc., and doing some fact-checking on both sides, it's clear to me that Coulter is full of sh*t and Franken is merely being intellectually dishonest in his rationalizations. Franken may ignore facts that don't fit his world-view, but he doesn't make up facts that do.
It's completely possible for someone you agree with to be more dishonest than someone you disagree with - editorializing does not change facts into fiction and vice versa. Facts are facts and fiction is fiction. Penn and Teller consistently side with facts in their admittedly biased editorializing.
If I had ever met her in person after having seen her sick rooms, not only would I have the balls to say something, I would have punched her in her fucking face.
The Queen is a Catholic, by the way. I never liked "Mother" Teresa either, and I hated the way the media puffed her up all the time, as the "saint" of altruism. I'll be even more Politically Incorrect. I don't like Gandhi either. Churchill called him a "naked fakir". I also don't like Desmond Tutu and Nelson Mandela altogether. Push me hard enough, and I'll find some things to say about Martin Luther King's questionable politics. I distrust anybody the mass media throw up to us, and I like those whom they cast as arch-villains (e.g., Nixon, McCarthy, etc.) I agree with Orwell that "saints should be presumed guilty until proven innocent."
I do, however, admire such medieval Catholic saints as Jeanne D'Arc (Joan of Arc), who was a holy warrior, Thomas Aquinas, who was a true intellectual, and Francis of Asissi, who was a poet on the level of Walt Whitman.
You obviously know something I don't. I'll hit Dean up on the subject.
SMA:
A show taking on Penn and Teller, huh? I'd be happy with a show that simply presents each side honestly and lets the folks decide.
I've also decided to put words in Dean's mouth and add the she also ate babies. This point has yet to be conclusively disproven.
Yeah, Kevin D. That'd be real entertaining. (cough cough). Kinda like normal, everyday life.