The 'Funny (ha, ha)' side of religion

Worztron

Hotblack Desiato

Sad Jesus is sad.

he's not in "grate" form. Badum-tish.

ohnonotgmail

would that cheese grater make the food sacrilicious?

Igotadose

It's Tommy Chong without the eyeglasses.

Worztron

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118574612#Comment_118574612

Without?

Worztron

robindch

Crumbs, I'd completely forgotten about Betty Bowers, but - lo - she's still going strong - good on her!

https://www.youtube.com/user/MrsBettyBowers/videos

Worztron

ohnonotgmail

Tent revivals are funny, right?

https://twitter.com/hemantmehta/status/1493006473940635648?t=EOPkJsluskOrVVbUd4vSRg&s=03

robindch

Tent revivals are funny, right?

Sadder rather than funnier, but maybe that's just me coz I can't think of them without remembering HL Mencken's reporting about them, and much else, during the Scopes "Monkey" Trial of 1925 when a local school teacher, John Scopes, was put on trial for teaching evolution against the wishes of the local school board. For anybody not familiar with the trial, two of the most famous legal-eagles/orators of the day - Clarence Darrow for Scopes, the teacher, and former presidential candidate, William Jennings Bryan for the prosecution, lined up against each other do duke it out. Scopes ended up losing, but creationism lost even more, as the whole country was glued to Mencken's caustic reporting.

Google isn't finding the full reports which were printed in the Baltimore Sun, but they certainly are worth finding, printing out and reading over a few cups of tea - here's a taste:

https://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/disp_textbook.cfm?smtID=3&psid=1077

The trial was dramatized in the 1960 film, Inherit the Wind which, despite the passage of 70 years and some occasionally creaky passages involving two of the leading actors of the day (Spencer Tracy and Gene Kelly), the film remains very, very funny.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpIjRdiUkx4

Hotblack Desiato

Wow, a trailer with no explosions in it!

Igotadose

Vague memories of watching the movie in public school (so, early teenage years) in NYC. The guy that played Samantha's husband in Bewitched played Scopes. Frederic March(?) played the William Jennings Bryan character "Matthew Harrison Brady." Great flick.

robindch

Wow, a trailer with no explosions in it!

All verbal, I can assure you - the film contains some cracking dialog, much of it cribbed, I'd say, from Mencken's reports and the trial transcript. Bryan died from "apoplexy", less than a week after the trial ended.

The demagogic, creationist orator, William Jennings Bryan, spent some of his early years in Nebraska, not far from the Platte River, and some of his early supporters referred to him as "The boy orator of the Platte". Less kindly-disposed individuals agreed, pointing out that the Platte River was "a mile wide at the mouth, and six inches deep".

Hotblack Desiato

You certainly couldn't get a film like that made in Hollywood today - not primarily because of the anti-creationist theme but because of rampant anti-intellectualism which has been building for decades, how else could a buffoon like T***p win many millions of votes? But the rot really took hold with Reagan.

There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge". - Isaac Asimov

To the east of us, similar I'm afraid.

Seth Brundle

To the east of us, similar I'm afraid.

As someone from Dublin, I take offence to that!

smacl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118645717#Comment_118645717

Reminds me of a quote from PJ O'Rourke who we sadly lost earlier this week,

The Democrats are the party that says government will make you smarter, taller, richer, and remove the crabgrass on your lawn. The Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work and then they get elected and prove it.

Considering America as a single country, comparable say to an EU member state, can be a bit of a mistake. Certain parts and people are strongly anti-intellectual and ultra conservative, others less so. Anyway, staying with PJ and back on the topic of religious humour

I think it's been hard for people to understand how Islam can be a good religion, and yet the Islamists are evil. Those of us who have had experience with Islam understand this, just as we understand the difference between snake handlers and people going to church on Sunday morning.

robindch

You certainly couldn't get a film like that made in Hollywood today 

I raise you a "Don’t Look Up" - not exactly pro-intellectual, but certainly anti-moron.

There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always

See the Richard Hofstadter's famous 1964 article, The Paranoid Style in American Politics:

https://harpers.org/archive/1964/11/the-paranoid-style-in-american-politics/

Worztron

Hotblack Desiato

I was looking through the Irish Times archive yesterday for something else entirely and next to the thing I was looking for (from 1979) there was a kind of a "miscellaneous odd and funny things" column. Anyway it contained the following self-contained snippet apropos of nothing else:

When the Pope visited America he got it back to front. He kissed the ground and walked on the women.

Daring enough for 40-odd years ago, no? A swift check of Wikipedia confirms this US visit was immediately after JP² visited here.

Worztron

Worztron

robindch

Nor'n Ire'nd preacher was giving it a bit of welly earlier this evening near the GPO, but nothing compared to his brown-clad nun-friend doing a shouty haka for Jesus.

https://twitter.com/ciananbrennan/status/1506331513721401354

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118821651#Comment_118821651

that has to be a performance art piece.

Seth Brundle

Not sure if this is funny or scary...

https://twitter.com/MollyJongFast/status/1506283139022438422

Hotblack Desiato

Curiously, six or possibly seven of the current nine US Supreme Court judges are catholics.

Catholics make up 21% of the US population (Pew Research, 2020)

This is all to do with the Republicans' obsession with overturning Roe vs. Wade, of course.

oscarBravo

It's also to an extent a retaliation for the questioning Coney Barrett's faced at her confirmation for being a "devout Catholic".

You could make a case that that was fair game, given that Coney Barrett has always worn her devoutness (devotion?) on her sleeve, so to speak, whereas that is by no means the case with Brown Jackson. It's still utterly farcical that she's being asked questions like that at a confirmation hearing, but farcical questions at a confirmation hearing have been par for the course for decades now.

PopePalpatine

NFTs have just reached a new level of cursedness...or should that be blessedness?

https://twitter.com/masonmennenga/status/1507417980476420096

Hotblack Desiato

Twitter comment:

well we've really come full circle on indulgences haven't we

oscarBravo

smacl