God Strikes Down Hitchens

Canis Lupus

Hitchens has cancer

I've really only just started to watch his stuff on youtube and am ordering some of his writing tonight. Genuinely saddened to see he has cancer although from what I gather he likes his drink and cigarettes so can't say I'm surprised to see the area the cancer has struck.

Hope he recovers and continue to rip shreds out of believers. I wonder if they will pray for him

Pittens

God bless the man.

sink

I will pray for him.

Pittens

Enough silliness. Best of luck to him. Reading Hitch-22 at the moment, and he talks about mortality there. I think he knew that he probably is not all the likely to make 80, when he was writing it. His discussion on alcohol is really defensive, and even then, as light a drinker as he says he is now - he is drinking at least a bottle of wine on a weekday, when he doesn't go out. That and smoking are the primary causes of oesophageal cancer.

Lovely writer though.

Dades

Carl Sagan died of cancer too.

Good luck to the Hitch.

Zombrex

sad news. Unfortunately Hitchens' life style (heavy smoker heavy drinker) puts him right in the risk zone for this type of cancer.

checkyabadself

Really saddened to hear this. I have read a lot of his work and found him to be a great writer. As already said, he has lead a full and great life and is under no illusions of living until he is 80.

god rest his soul.

legspin

He isn't dead yet folks

PeterIanStaker

Just got God is Not Great from my local library, then logged on to find this bad news.

Hopefully he'll recover but his lifestyle, and not some imaginary bearded guy in the sky, is why he is afflicted.

Rev Hellfire

science preserve him !

Zillah

Ah shure he'll be grand.

Also, the thread title is way too vague. Clicked it dreading to see that he was already dead.

Coriolanus

Read him before I read Dawkins so really credit him with a lot of my current outlook.
Gl Hitch!

Wacker

I bought God is Not Great a while back, and I thought it was pretty good. But about 18 months back I had been away for a mate's 30th in Amsterdam and I got back into Dublin late on a Sunday. I was absolutely jaded, but when I went on to Youtube, I happened to look up Hitchens, for some reason that escapes me. I stayed up until 5 a.m. that morning watching him. He is about the most engaging speaker that I've ever seen. I wish this man nothing but the best.

magicbastarder

he freely admits to being a bit of a cock, which he no doubt is, but you have to hand it to the man - he defended waterboarding, but put his money where his mouth is, and underwent it. and reversed his position.

sink

magicbastarder wrote: »

he freely admits to being a bit of a cock, which he no doubt is, but you have to hand it to the man - he defended waterboarding, but put his money where his mouth is, and underwent it. and reversed his position.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LPubUCJv58

Highest rated comment says it all.

"I still want to see Hannity man up and go for waterboarding. "

Anyone who argues that waterboarding is not torture should give it a try and then see how they feel.

The Mad Hatter

sink wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LPubUCJv58

Highest rated comment says it all.

"I still want to see Hannity man up and go for waterboarding. "

Anyone who argues that waterboarding is not torture should give it a try and then see how they feel.

"It's annoying to me now to read every time it's discussed ... that it simulates the feeling of drowning. It doesn't "simulate" the feeling of drowning; you are being drowned, slowly."

That quote stayed with me.

ColmDawson

When I was still in the process of dismantling my religiosity, Hitchens' debate against Frank Turek was the first of many religious debates I watched on Youtube.

sponsoredwalk

magicbastarder wrote: »

he freely admits to being a bit of a cock, which he no doubt is, but you have to hand it to the man - he defended waterboarding, but put his money where his mouth is, and underwent it. and reversed his position.

I have a lot of respect for Hitchens when he talks about religion. When he talks about politics I try to find c-span videos prior to 2000 as that's where you'll learn something from him, not now.

I didn't know he criticized waterboarding, that's a shocker. I just thought he underwent it to show it was torture.

The guy became Washington's poster boy circa 2001 but I didn't think he was so ideologically blinkered as to say waterboarding was not torture!

If anyone heard about the Harvard study that was released yesterday you'll understand why I' replying.

Just to quickly clarify;

Waterboarding is considered to be torture by a wide range of authorities, including legal experts, politicians,
war veterans, military judges, and human rights organizations.
David Miliband, the United Kingdom Foreign Secretary described it as torture on July 19, 2008, and stated
"the UK unreservedly condemns the use of torture."
Arguments have been put forward that it might not be torture in all cases, or that it is unclear. The U.S. State Department has recognized
"submersion of the head in water" as torture in other circumstances, for example, in its 2005 Country Report on Tunisia.
intelligence officials, The United Nations' Report of the Committee Against Torture: Thirty-fifth Session of November 2006,
stated that state parties should rescind any interrogation techniques, such as waterboarding, that constitutes torture or cruel,
inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment.
Link

Still, the U.S. redefined the law, narrowing the definition of torture to exclude waterboarding after it emerged that waterboarding was a C.I.A. torture technique.

This complete farce was approvingly justified by the intelletual choir of the U.S. & I'm so shocked to find Hitchens was among them for any length of time whatsoever.

Taken from the study released yesterday;

"From the early 1930s until the modern story broke in 2004, the newspapers that covered waterboarding
almost uniformly called the practice torture or implied it was torture:

The New York Times characterized it thus in 81.5% (44 of 54) of articles on the subject and
The Los Angeles Times did so in 96.3% of articles (26 of 27).

By contrast, from 2002‐2008, the studied newspapers almost never referred to waterboarding as torture.
The New York Times called waterboarding torture or implied it was torture in just 2 of 143 articles (1.4%).
The Los Angeles Times did so in 4.8% of articles (3 of 63).
The Wall Street Journal characterized the practice as torture in just 1 of 63 articles (1.6%).
USA Today never called waterboarding torture or implied it was torture. In addition,
the newspapers are much more likely to call waterboarding torture if a country other than the United States is the perpetrator.

In The New York Times, 85.8% of articles (28 of 33) that dealt with a country other than the United States
using waterboarding called it torture or implied it was torture while only 7.69% (16 of 208) did so
when the United States was responsible.
The Los Angeles Times characterized the practice as torture in 91.3% of articles (21 of 23) when another country was the violator,
but in only 11.4% of articles (9 of 79) when the United States was the perpetrator. "

It's good to see Hitchen's changed his mind eventually, unfortunately he was so willing to appease U.S. interests, especially when he became a U.S. citizen, that he would make such a callous mistake.

Hope he comes through this relatively unscathed


The NYTimes reply to that study is funny, they question the validity & state that they refrained from using the word
in order not to take sides :rolleyes: The whole point of dropping the word is to take sides! So transparent...

panda100

For me Hitchens writings on Mother Teresa were just eye opening. I always had my niggling doubts about whom the RC church bestowed honours on. They always seemed to be friends of the establishment that ensure poverty,hunger and famine remains in our world.

Slating Mother Teresa is one of the most heinous things you can do in our society. Frindss have looked at me in agahast when I have questioned her saintliness. For Hitchens to do this on a puplic platform I think is very brave.


"This returns us to the medieval corruption of the church, which sold indulgences to the rich while preaching hellfire and continence to the poor. MT was not a friend of the poor. She was a friend of poverty. She said that suffering was a gift from God. She spent her life opposing the only known cure for poverty, which is the empowerment of women and the emancipation of them from a livestock version of compulsory reproduction. And she was a friend to the worst of the rich, taking misappropriated money from the atrocious Duvalier family in Haiti (whose rule she praised in return) and from Charles Keating of the Lincoln Savings and Loan. Where did that money, and all the other donations, go? The primitive hospice in Calcutta was as run down when she died as it always had been—she preferred California clinics when she got sick herself—and her order always refused to publish any audit. But we have her own claim that she opened 500 convents in more than a hundred countries, all bearing the name of her own order. Excuse me, but this is modesty and humility?
The rich world has a poor conscience, and many people liked to alleviate their own unease by sending money to a woman who seemed like an activist for "the poorest of the poor." People do not like to admit that they have been gulled or conned, so a vested interest in the myth was permitted to arise, and a lazy media never bothered to ask any follow-up questions. Many volunteers who went to Calcutta came back abruptly disillusioned by the stern ideology and poverty-loving practice of the "Missionaries of Charity," but they had no audience for their story. George Orwell's admonition in his essay on Gandhi—that saints should always be presumed guilty until proved innocent—was drowned in a Niagara of soft-hearted, soft-headed, and uninquiring propaganda. "

robindch

panda100 wrote: »

Slating Mother Teresa is one of the most heinous things you can do in our society. Frindss have looked at me in agahast when I have questioned her saintliness. For Hitchens to do this on a puplic platform I think is very brave.

Two friends of mine spent a total of around two years with MT in Calcutta, perhaps 10-15 years back and both of them invited me to go there and work for a while. I dithered, but ultimately declined and ended up doing similar part-time work here in Dublin instead. In retrospect, it would have been interesting to have gone and seen exactly what was happening since neither friend spoke much about it once they returned home, and neither said why.

strobe

sponsoredwalk wrote: »

"From the early 1930s until the modern story broke in 2004, the newspapers that covered waterboarding
almost uniformly called the practice torture or implied it was torture:

The New York Times characterized it thus in 81.5% (44 of 54) of articles on the subject and
The Los Angeles Times did so in 96.3% of articles (26 of 27).

By contrast, from 2002‐2008, the studied newspapers almost never referred to waterboarding as torture.
The New York Times called waterboarding torture or implied it was torture in just 2 of 143 articles (1.4%).
The Los Angeles Times did so in 4.8% of articles (3 of 63).
The Wall Street Journal characterized the practice as torture in just 1 of 63 articles (1.6%).
USA Today never called waterboarding torture or implied it was torture. In addition,
the newspapers are much more likely to call waterboarding torture if a country other than the United States is the perpetrator.

In The New York Times, 85.8% of articles (28 of 33) that dealt with a country other than the United States
using waterboarding called it torture or implied it was torture while only 7.69% (16 of 208) did so
when the United States was responsible.
The Los Angeles Times characterized the practice as torture in 91.3% of articles (21 of 23) when another country was the violator,
but in only 11.4% of articles (9 of 79) when the United States was the perpetrator. "

"Our liberty cannot be guarded but by the freedom of the press, nor that be limited without danger of losing it." --Thomas Jefferson.

The man must be spinning in his grave.

dazza_480

he is a great man so stop mocking him it's disgusting how your making fun of him, he is not dead yet. he could thrash any of you in a debate

The Mad Hatter

I disagree with Hitchens' politics, but he's the only person I've seen make pro-Iraq war arguments (a) coherently and (b) consistently. He also thinks North Korea should be attacked to remove its tyrannical dictator, and I don't know of another Iraq war supporter who says the same.

MrPudding

dazza_480 wrote: »

he is a great man so stop mocking him it's disgusting how your making fun of him, he is not dead yet. he could thrash any of you in a debate

Are you drunk?

MrP

Dades

dazza_480 wrote: »

he is a great man so stop mocking him it's disgusting how your making fun of him, he is not dead yet. he could thrash any of you in a debate

I can only assume you haven't actually read this thread.

I suggest you do before posting again.

Zillah

panda100 wrote: »

"This returns us to the medieval corruption of the church, which sold indulgences to the rich while preaching hellfire and continence to the poor. MT was not a friend of the poor. She was a friend of poverty. She said that suffering was a gift from God. She spent her life opposing the only known cure for poverty, which is the empowerment of women and the emancipation of them from a livestock version of compulsory reproduction. And she was a friend to the worst of the rich, taking misappropriated money from the atrocious Duvalier family in Haiti (whose rule she praised in return) and from Charles Keating of the Lincoln Savings and Loan. Where did that money, and all the other donations, go? The primitive hospice in Calcutta was as run down when she died as it always had been—she preferred California clinics when she got sick herself—and her order always refused to publish any audit. But we have her own claim that she opened 500 convents in more than a hundred countries, all bearing the name of her own order. Excuse me, but this is modesty and humility?
The rich world has a poor conscience, and many people liked to alleviate their own unease by sending money to a woman who seemed like an activist for "the poorest of the poor." People do not like to admit that they have been gulled or conned, so a vested interest in the myth was permitted to arise, and a lazy media never bothered to ask any follow-up questions. Many volunteers who went to Calcutta came back abruptly disillusioned by the stern ideology and poverty-loving practice of the "Missionaries of Charity," but they had no audience for their story. George Orwell's admonition in his essay on Gandhi—that saints should always be presumed guilty until proved innocent—was drowned in a Niagara of soft-hearted, soft-headed, and uninquiring propaganda. "

I listened to a God Is Not Great on audiobook, narrated by the man himself, and I cannot read his writing without instantly hearing his voice in my head clear as day.

Pittens

Slating Mother Teresa is one of the most heinous things you can do in our society.

No it isnt, and he isnt in our society, she was a relatively easy target in the UK.

Not that Hitchens is a coward, as he showed during the Rushdie affair, and other places: Iraq, Lebanon, and occasionally forays into Fox news.

I heard an English friend of mine describe him as right-wing. Thats bollicks, he is a lefy wing supporter of the Iraq war and he supported that - however wrongly - based on facts he picked up from being in Saddam Hussein's Iraq. He has a moral mind, but the immorality of Hussein;s rule does not justify the Iraq war ( and wasn't even the major pretext for it) . All of that is easy for me to say, but Hitchens got to know and care for the fear-drenched people of Iraq whilst Hussein lived, so his personal concern occluded his political sense.

Yeah, i like Hitchens a lot. He is clearly not a group-thinker.

strobe

Pittens wrote: »

I heard an English friend of mine describe him as right-wing. Thats bollicks, he is a lefy wing supporter

Or without lables..... a human being. Like most human beings, one that opposes coercion.

Agricola

Terrible news. Hope he gets through this. Hes a unique character.

MagicMarker

Sad to hear, a very entertaining character.

I lent a mate God Is Not Great but I'm downloading the audiobook now, somehow I think it would be more enjoyable being narrated by himself.

MikeC101

Hope he recovers!

As others have said, it's not like he was unaware his lifestyle wasn't the healthiest.

rccaulfield

poor Fella- hope he makes it- World needs established personalities like his!

blue_steel

panda100 wrote: »

For me Hitchens writings on Mother Teresa were just eye opening. I always had my niggling doubts about whom the RC church bestowed honours on. They always seemed to be friends of the establishment that ensure poverty,hunger and famine remains in our world.

Slating Mother Teresa is one of the most heinous things you can do in our society. Frindss have looked at me in agahast when I have questioned her saintliness. For Hitchens to do this on a puplic platform I think is very brave.


"This returns us to the medieval corruption of the church, which sold indulgences to the rich while preaching hellfire and continence to the poor. MT was not a friend of the poor. She was a friend of poverty. She said that suffering was a gift from God. She spent her life opposing the only known cure for poverty, which is the empowerment of women and the emancipation of them from a livestock version of compulsory reproduction. And she was a friend to the worst of the rich, taking misappropriated money from the atrocious Duvalier family in Haiti (whose rule she praised in return) and from Charles Keating of the Lincoln Savings and Loan. Where did that money, and all the other donations, go? The primitive hospice in Calcutta was as run down when she died as it always had been—she preferred California clinics when she got sick herself—and her order always refused to publish any audit. But we have her own claim that she opened 500 convents in more than a hundred countries, all bearing the name of her own order. Excuse me, but this is modesty and humility?
The rich world has a poor conscience, and many people liked to alleviate their own unease by sending money to a woman who seemed like an activist for "the poorest of the poor." People do not like to admit that they have been gulled or conned, so a vested interest in the myth was permitted to arise, and a lazy media never bothered to ask any follow-up questions. Many volunteers who went to Calcutta came back abruptly disillusioned by the stern ideology and poverty-loving practice of the "Missionaries of Charity," but they had no audience for their story. George Orwell's admonition in his essay on Gandhi—that saints should always be presumed guilty until proved innocent—was drowned in a Niagara of soft-hearted, soft-headed, and uninquiring propaganda. "

Bravo. My wife's sister spent time working in MT's calcutta "hospice" and said the kids were kept in filthy squalid conditions while cheques for enormous sums donated to the hospice were forwarded to Rome unspent. Disgusting individual by the sounds of her. Have never read Hitchens but am a big fan of Dawkins and will check him out having read that piece. Hope he recovers.

Professor Plumb

ColmDawson wrote: »

When I was still in the process of dismantling my religiosity, Hitchens' debate against Frank Turek was the first of many religious debates I watched on Youtube.

I too found it fascinating

Professor Plumb

robindch wrote: »

Two friends of mine spent a total of around two years with MT in Calcutta, perhaps 10-15 years back and both of them invited me to go there and work for a while. I dithered, but ultimately declined and ended up doing similar part-time work here in Dublin instead. In retrospect, it would have been interesting to have gone and seen exactly what was happening since neither friend spoke much about it once they returned home, and neither said why.

It would have been fascinating to know what they saw and didn't say anything about.
It was a pity you didn't go there because you might have found out what they saw and didn't say anything about.

Professor Plumb

strobe wrote: »

"Our liberty cannot be guarded but by the freedom of the press, nor that be limited without danger of losing it." --Thomas Jefferson.

The man must be spinning in his grave.

Thomas Jefferson was a great man

guybague

hope he's ok/

Fanny Cradock

Agricola wrote: »

Terrible news. Hope he gets through this. Hes a unique character.

Actually, his brother is made from the same mold. While they happen to be on opposite sides of the fence when it come to God, they both share the same mannerisms.

BTW, Robin, have you ever considered asking your friends again about their experiences with Mother Teresa?

Improbable

Here's hoping that he recovers. He truly is someone who doesn't make any excuses for his beliefs and is rigorous in fighting for what he believes. I can definitely commend that.

Elliemental

I'm genuinely sad to hear this. I have just discovered his writings and have recently finished God Is Not Great. So witty, clear and concise. Best of luck to him.

J C

Very sorry to hear that Christopher is ill.

I will pray for his recovery (and Salvation).

Pygmalion

J C wrote: »

Very sorry to hear that Christopher is ill.

I will pray for his recovery (and Salvation).

I'm sure he's delighted to have your prayer.

magicbastarder

despite the irony, it's a bit churlish to take the piss out of what appears ot have been a genuine expression of concern.

J C

magicbastarder wrote: »

despite the irony, it's a bit churlish to take the piss out of what appears ot have been a genuine expression of concern.

I don't know Christopher Hitchins personally, but I know off him and I am naturally sorry, that as a fellow Human Being, that he is ill and I wish him every good wish for his recovery.

Teclo

Canis Lupus wrote: »

Hope he recovers and continue to rip shreds out of believers. I wonder if they will pray for him

Ripping shreds out of people will not help him now.

I know he doesn’t want me to and I know he thinks it is useless but, Christopher Hitchens, I am praying for you.

Christopher Hitchens can be smart, acerbic, funny, mean, insightful, and thick. He defends Western Civilization while, via his outspoken atheism, semantically chipping away at the Christian pillars that support it. In short, Christopher Hitchens is a frustrating person. Christopher Hitchens is also very sick. He writes…

I have been advised by my physician that I must undergo a course of chemotherapy on my esophagus. This advice seems persuasive to me. I regret having had to cancel so many engagements at such short notice.

There are no good cancers to have, but if you were forced to make a list of ‘good’ cancers to have, esophageal cancer would not be on the list.

I know he doesn’t want them, but he needs our prayers.

It is understandable that many have seen Hitchens as the enemy, a leading proponent of a proud and energetic atheism. He has often used his considerable wit to mock religion and in particular Christianity. In doing so, he has been an intellectual enabler of many non-intellectuals helping them to be grossly comfortable with their own impiety. These are not good things.

But Christopher Hitchens is not the enemy. God created him because He loves him. We need to love him too. We should continue to oppose his wrongheaded and destructive ideas at every turn using our gifts, to whatever degree we have been granted them, to undo what Hitchens has done with his.

But we can and should do something more. Something that he can’t or rather won’t do. We can pray for him. And pray for him some more. Let’s love him as much as we can. Let’s us love him with a patient unrequited love.

For him I will pray for very different things.

I pray for his healing.

I pray for his soul.

I pray he doesn’t suffer much while knowing suffering is unavoidable.

I pray that that he realizes the redemptive power of suffering when united with the suffering of our Lord.

I pray that in whatever times he has left, and I pray that is a long time, that he puts his myriad gifts into the service of the Lord.

I pray that he realizes the love of the God who created him.

I must confess that I smile when I ponder what a wonderful Christian Hitchens would make if ever he were to believe. I hope he doesn’t take offense at that. I often wonder the same thing about myself.

http://www.ncregister.com/blog/praying_for_christopher_hitchens

Ickle Magoo

That made my skin crawl. Do you think they could sound any more insidiously duplicitous, if they tried?

magicbastarder

i'd say it gave him a good old chuckle if he saw it.

Zillah

magicbastarder wrote: »

i'd say it gave him a good old chuckle if he saw it.

Yep, I'd say he'd find the whole thing ridiculous and amusing.

robindch

Pat Archbold wrote:

We can pray for him. And pray for him some more. Let’s love him as much as we can. Let’s us love him with a patient unrequited love. For him I will pray for very different things. I pray for his healing. I pray for his soul. I pray he doesn’t suffer much while knowing suffering is unavoidable. I pray that that he realizes the redemptive power of suffering when united with the suffering of our Lord. I pray that in whatever times he has left, and I pray that is a long time, that he puts his myriad gifts into the service of the Lord. I pray that he realizes the love of the God who created him.

The unctuous Mr Archbold, together with Ms Christina Odone, have either forgotten, or never read Matthew 6:5:

Matthew 6:5 wrote:

And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full.

Zillah

Just so people know, almost no one survives esophageal cancer. If he's getting chemo it probably means its too big for surgery which makes the prognosis even worse. Luckily he'll be able to throw money at them for the best doctors and treatment in the world, but it is very possible that our dear Mr.Hitchens has written his last book.

Ickle Magoo

It really depends on what stage the cancer is at as to his prognosis. Chemotherapy is often used to shrink tumours prior to excision, especially in area where bulk removal is not possible, such as the throat, so is not necessarily an indication that it's inoperable...altho the survival rate of oesophageal cancers are low, they are improving year on year - one of our very own boardsies is an oesophageal cancer survival....