It’s your party and you can preach if you want to

Dear (name removed),

I thought it was a really cool idea when your new wife decided to throw you a surprise party for your 50th birthday. Dude, I thought that it would be great to see you again after so many years and reminisce about the glory days of boozing and the card games you so loved.

I had no idea that Jesus was going to be the star attraction at the event. To be fair, I don’t suppose you knew either, it being a surprise and all. But I guess you would have had no objections, as I learned that day that you had been busy over the years…. becoming a pastor.

When I walked into the hall with a few other friends and glanced at the tables and people already sitting there, I noticed a few vaguely familiar faces; faces that I’d not seen for many years. With the band at the front warming up or something, it appeared [at that instant] that my Saturday evening was going to be fun and entertaining. I was so looking forward to doing some catching up…

Still standing at the hall entrance, I was looked around, trying to spot the bar or some such facility when you walked in, dressed in a suit; I don’t ever remember seeing you in a suit before. When the cries of “surprise” died down, I reached over to shake your hand; it was good seeing you again after so many years.

Failing to spot the bar, we walked over to an empty table right at the front of the hall and sat down. Having being seated for barely a minute, we were asked to rise for an opening prayer. “No sweat,” I thought, “let’s get the obligatory waste-of-time out of the way.”

The opening prayer was followed by a couple of gospel tunes from the band and then a couple of songs of praise for Jesus. We were still standing. I grimaced through it all; at least the band was good, the singing not too bad. And then came another pastor with another prayer.

We were still standing. It was becoming mildly annoying. I glanced over to my companions, and they appeared to be in the same frame of mind.

Thankfully the pastor asked us to sit down, but the party that had degenerated into a crusade for Jesus, continued. The pastor launched into a sermon about family, occasionally reading passages from the bible. The pastor’s patronising, and patriarchal diatribe about how the father was the boss-dude of the family was starting to turn my mild annoyance into anger.

[During this sermon from Proverbs, I was surprised to learn that god hates six things, but positively abhors or detests a 7th thing, namely, sowing discord among brethren; although the pastor adapted it for his particular use. I guess the next time a see a Christian fundamentalist waving a banner that "God hates fags," I will ask him or her " but does God really detest/abhor homosexuals?"]

It was now nearly an hour later.

After that ghastly sermon, a teenager came up to pray and besmirch Jesus some more, in a sort of lilting, but disconcerting tone. That’s when my companions and I decided to leave.

Dude, I really appreciate that your wife cared enough to want you to celebrate a key milestone in your life with friends you had got to know over the years. And I would have been glad to be there, but I should not have had to compete with Jesus for your attention.

For me a party is a party, is a party, preferably with booze – lots of it. Dude, I just have to say it -  proselytizing is a party-killer… for me at least.

I hope you had a good evening and 50th birthday nonetheless. I’m sorry I couldn’t stay to celebrate it with you. Perhaps we’ll get together again, without Jesus this time.

Your secular friend,

Lenny

Red Bull gives you… “wingnuts”

Image via Wikipedia

They’re at it again. Will these wingnuts never learn that the parochial views of a minority of the population cannot be used to hold the majority to ransom?

In the most recent in a long list of attacks on the freedom of speech, Red Bull has been forced to pull an advert from television which supposedly mocks their faith. In a population in excess of 20 million adults, less than 1000 complaints seemed to do the trick. Go figure!

Errol Naidoo, director of the Family Policy Institute (otherwise known as the Self-appointed Guardians of Morality), offered up a typical response* from that side of the fence:

The advert is meant to offend as it depicts the Jesus character in the cartoon using the name of Jesus as a curse word

Red Bull wouldn’t dream of mocking religious figures of other religions. Christianity and Jesus in particular are singled out for mockery by secular humanists and other anti-Christian bigots

FPI is launching a nationwide boycott of Red Bull products in response to this blasphemous attack on the Lord Jesus Christ.

Oh please Errol, fly off that high horse of yours, drink some Red Bull and learn to laugh. It’s called satire.The advert was designed to sell a product, not mock your religion. Your religion does a bang-up job of attracting derision all by itself; Red Bull couldn’t hope to compete with that.

Every time these bigots try to draw attention to their imagined plight by forcing banning and censorship, they actually wind up creating more publicity for that which they attack. Here is the advert which has been uploaded to YouTube, for the more broad-minded people out there:

* Another response from Chantell in the comments column of the article: “I have told many people that did not even see the ad about the mockery, they immediatly said they wont buy red bull again!” Sound familiar? Yes, that’s typically what the religious do – believe what they’re told.

Admit it, the Pagan Roots of Christmas is what makes it so festive

A whole lot of us, mostly non-Christians and atheists delight in calling Christmas the silly season; I’m no exception.

However, I’d venture that even the most die-hard atheist, anti-theist, or hater from another religion will admit that this time of year is the most festive, particularly those days between Christmas and the Julian New Year. Seriously, you’d have to be pretty psychotic not to enjoy Christmas.

By now, it should be common knowledge [see video below] that the celebrations usually associated with Christmas are in fact of pagan origins, and have been borrowed or annexed by the Church to satisfy various agendas of their own. But that’s what makes Christmas so enjoyable; all the things that are so un-Christian.

I just love the music [yes, the Christmas carols], the parties, the food, ungodly amounts of alcohol, and the fact that we get to spend time with friends and family, who usually reside miles away. And let’s not forget the time off work, the annual bonus, and the chance to spend wildly on things you usually wouldn’t. Only the pathologically pious shy away from these simple pleasures to commemorate a dour tale of religious improbability.

So, whether you’re a Christian or not, indulge yourself this Christmas; god knows [or not] that it’s one of the rare times for partaking in true pleasure we’re allowed in this harsh world.

Apartheid Resurrected

Apartheid is dead! Long live apartheid!

 

 

Sounds corny, right? But if you’re living in South Africa in these turbulent times, that

prospect is very real, very terrifying. Who could have imagined apartheid being resurrected by the very people who took it down less than twenty years ago.

It took less than two decades for the liberators to figure out that apartheid was perhaps not so bad after all. It could in fact be quite useful if:

1. Almost every member of your political organization has his or her hands in the nation’s cooky jar and you needed to make sure when caught, that they’re free from prosecution
2. Those same members have a pathological tendency to be arrogant, and habitually, if hysterically, shoot themselves in the foot when caught out
3. You need to silence the press who have this rather annoying habit of exposing the rampant corruption, laziness, incompetence, arrogance, nepotism, and sheer stupidity of the members of your political organization on a daily, even hourly basis
4. You need to satiate your unbelievable greed and love of bling, by either raiding the treasury or setting up elaborate kick-back schemes that are designed to enrich friends, family, sycophants and possible back-stabbers
5. You have a repressed hatred of White people who you still blame for the original apartheid
6. You want to rule until Jesus returns

That’s half a dozen reasons I can think of, off the top of my head.

But here’s the events that are unfolding right now in South Africa which lends credence to the need to revive apartheid:

1. The Protection of Information Bill [POIB] introduced by this organization is to be put to the vote before Parliament tomorrow, 21 November. Its passing in the National Assembly is assured because this organization makes up the majority in government. This Bill seeks to muzzle the press and the citizens of this country by ensuring that government’s sordid activities can be blanketed in a shroud of secrecy. This Bill seeks to kill free speech.
2. The Presidential spokesperson has just laid criminal charges against a major newspaper and two of its reporters for having the temerity to expose some of his dodgy dealings in the arms scandal that occurred some years ago. If anything raises alarm bells about POIB, this one act will make your ears ring.
3. The so-called youth wing [ANCYL] of this organization, a morose bunch of unemployable, arrogant, disrespectful misfits, seem hell-bent on turning the country into an economic dung-heap by demanding that businesses that keep the economy going, be nationalised and handed over to them to be sucked dry and land be expropriated Zimbabwe style to realise the revolutionary’s dream of being a landowner. These same morons idolize the fallen dictator Gaddafi, very publicly.
4. Nobel laureate Nadine Gordimer, a stalwart of the anti-apartheid movement speaks out strongly against the direction being adopted by this organization: “The corrupt practices and nepotism that they [politicians] allow themselves is exposed if we have freedom of expression. When we all voted together, which was a great moment in my life, [we thought] everything would be alright. That was a childish idea.”
5. Meanwhile, the President of this organization and the country, has very little to say about these matters, but seems to be pre-occupied building an extravagant Hitler-style bunker on his estate.

Yes folks, apartheid is once again all the rage in South Africa.

Just to see the expression on the scumbag's face…

According to Christian fundamentalist Harold Camping, the world is about to end in less than two hours at 6PM…in this time zone at least. The event better known as the Rapture will herald the return of Jesus.

In a South African context, with the local elections just completed and the ANC still retaining a fairly large majority, the Rapture will have special appeal to all those facing the prospect of another 5 years of self-indulgent rule, and remembering the moronic statement President Jacob Zuma made a while back that the ANC will rule “until Jesus comes back.”

While most of us will not qualify to ascend to a Christian Heaven, I’m sure we would like the to Rapture to occur nonetheless, just so that we can see the silly smirk wiped off the face of the prat. I’m giggling hysterically right now just thinking of how utterly stupid Zuma and his unquestioning followers will feel as Jesus reappears to end their victory celebrations, just 3 days after maintaining their majority at the elections.

Off course, being a rational person I’m not expecting Jesus or the Rapture but I guess I should just be happy with the small consolation that the opposition DA not only won the Western Cape outright, they have made significant inroads elsewhere in the country. I’m sure many ANC big mouths who predicted that they would win all Provinces convincingly, are feeling like sheepish twats right now.

If that’s the only pleasure I’m going to get from this election, I guess it’s enough.

Cometh the hour, cometh the Rapture

According to Harold Camping who predicted that all righteous Christians in the world will be Raptured on 21 May 2011, 6PM is the magical hour when it will start.

While Camping didn’t elaborate in which time zone it would occur, we would have to assume that he either meant 6PM local time California where he is based, or 6PM simultaneously around the world. I’m sure all of you who don’t qualify to ascend to Heaven on May 21 because you’re ridiculously rational, will immediately see the problem with the magical hour put forward by Camping. Those of you who are non-Christian believers shouldn’t even bother.

But rather than spoil the last moments on Earth for the selected few by posing these scientific questions which you no doubt have no appreciation for, I would just like to wish you well on your flight upwards to Heaven. May you get great service and an open bar.

I would like to dedicate the song Rapture, by Blondie to all you good Rapturees. I hope you take one last listen to some good earthly tunes before you subject yourselves to an eternity of harp music. This particular version which is a clever mix of Blondie and Jim Morrison of the Doors, may not be to your purist tastes, but just live a little before you depart.

I’m sure those of you who will remain behind like me to face the Tribulation, will appreciate this too while we party on regardless.

Aurora Borealis vs The Star of Bethlehem

Thanks to a Facebook friend who provided the link, today I watched the most amazing video of the aurora borealis over Kirkenes and Pas National Park near the Russian border, by a really gifted photographer. Terje Sorgjerd used time-lapse photography to capture the stunning images you are about to see, in some very inhospitable conditions too.

This awesome display of lights is a natural phenomenon that occurs in the sky at the polar regions due to the collision of charged particles under the influence of the earth’s magnetic field.

After watching the video I got this strange notion that had the author’s of the bible known about this beautiful visual phenomenon, they would surely have opted to script Jesus being born under such an awe-inspiring light show. Instead we get a supposed divine entity being born under a very bright star, among billions of other very bright stars not visible to man.

Wouldn’t you rather have Jesus being born under something spectacular like the aurora borealis, than a common bright star?

A police lineup in South Africa. I kid you not!

How many countries in the world do you know of that could potentially pack a police lineup with policemen only? And not because it’s a ruse to uncover a false witness!

Not many, I’ll wager. But how many countries do you know of where the government proudly packs the police service with people of known ill-repute and deviant, often criminal disposition?

Introducing the proudly South African Police Service…or Force or whatever weasel word the government spin-doctors will dream up:

Zapiro, M

Now, if you think that was shameless, consider also that South Africa’s National Police Commissioner, Bheki Cele, whose own character is rather dubious to put it mildly, has been reported recently to have stated publicly that it’s just dandy to have criminal elements in the Police Services. And no, not because it’s shrewd to set a criminal to catch a criminal…no, no, no. Cele thinks it’s perfectly all right because Jesus had a criminal among his disciples. And the mythical Garden of Eden had two people who committed a crime.

Yes, if it’s alright for a mythical religious ideology to have criminals, then why shouldn’t the SAPS have them too!

Well folks, that’s the kind of childish, backwards logic and just plain criminality we are dealing with in South Africa.

Horror from Japan excites horrid little minds

As the true extent of the damage from the massive earthquake that struck Japan begins to be realized, the crazy warped minds of the world’s religious lunatics are working overtime churning out ignorant theories about the wrath of the gods, the end times, the return of Jesus, and the power of the Supermoon.

Every time there is a natural disaster somewhere around the world, you can bet your bottom dollar that some religious looney-tune is going to mouth off about god’s wrath against gays, lesbians, heathens, Atheists or whatever conflicts with their warped sense of morality.

String together a series of natural disasters, political revolts and other forms of turmoil such as economic downturns, and the horrid little minds of these god-botherers goes into myopic overdrive.

The earthquake in Japan follows the recent heavy flooding in Australia, and earthquakes in Chile and New Zealand and citizen revolts in North Africa. The aftermath of the earthquake resulted in tsunami’s causing destruction elsewhere, a nuclear power plant about to go into meltdown, and a volcano eruption. This much chaos seems to have gotten the religious doomsayers into a monumental frenzy.

Just this weekend I’ve read that god is punishing the Japanese for killing and eating whales, the end-times is very close, Jesus is about to make another appearance, the bible predicted everything, and that the poor old moon is responsible for setting off the whole catastrophe.

But somehow, while god is supposedly laying on the death and destruction everywhere, he’s positively smiling down on South Africa’s favorite convicted fraudster. Schabir Shaik who was released from prison apparently because he was terminally ill, seems to become livelier by the day, as he goes about his way assaulting and intimidating reporters and even worshippers.

Go figure!

All hail Julius, the Caesar of the economy

Julius Malema, President of the ANC Youth League, devil-child of the ANC, should be the undisputed twit of the new millennium; but considering their aspirations to rule until Jesus returns, I suppose it’s not inconceivable that they’ll produce a few other dumb-asses.

Julius has been mouthing off again; nothing unusual for a blow-hard of this magnitude, but this time he’s surely gone off the deep end.

Remember how he grabbed every opportunity to tell everyone what a big-shot revolutionary he was? And how together with the other ANCYL brats, they were going to transform South Africa into la-la land by banishing imperialism and implementing the ideals of the antiquated Freedom Charter.

Well, it seems that we’ve seriously under-estimated this lard-arse. He’s been hard at work, not at improving his woodwork grades, but at adding some new words to his stunted vocabulary. Julius now has pretensions to becoming an economic freedom-fighter too. He’s now taken to threatening the owner’s of mines with seizure of 60% of their shareholdings. Last Friday while spewing the usual clichéd rhetoric at a gala dinner about political freedom being useless with economic freedom, he stunned everyone with this ripper:

We’re now economic freedom fighters. The revolution started to get food. We don’t have to apologise, or be shy about this struggle.

But that’s not all. It’s been reported that he went on to encourage people to keep the revolution going by having as many babies as possible. Apparently:

Having babies is a revolutionary thing. You must reproduce!

Some logic! I guess these ANCYL bright-sparks figured that 60% of all the mines in South Africa should be enough to feed, clothe, educate and keep millions of new babies happily on Social Welfare…until Jesus returns. I wonder if they’ll run this show from Luthuli House, also known as Loot Freely House by ANC detractors; or as Julius likes to call it Revolutionary House? Maybe they’ll even consider renaming it Treasure Island.

Off course, it’s a no-brainer why Julius didn’t bother to explain to the masses ever-eager to hear his vitriol, why he and the rest of that scummy lot in the ANC have temporarily delayed the “revolution to get food,” to help themselves to fancy cars, houses, liquor, clothes and other bling.

So for now we render unto Caesar that which he thinks is his, but real revolution is not far on the horizon to start the next chapter in the history of South Africa…