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I don't know about that. Are they really that wide-spread? I have never seen or heard of them outside of hatrack. Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
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I've never seen them, either. I have heard of them outside of Hatrack, but not by anybody who wasn't making fun of them.
Posts: 2292 | Registered: Aug 2003
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I guess that according to these, I guess I'm double damned. Is that like a double negative? Please?
Posts: 16551 | Registered: Feb 2003
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I actually saw a real live paper copy of one of the tracts laying out at a pizza joint here. I was shocked that someone would actually use them for recruiting purposes!
Posts: 5422 | Registered: Dec 2001
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Read the Harry Potter one, Katie. You'll love it.
*scours the books for instructions on how to work Ouija boards and Tarot cards and to summon spirits*
Posts: 1903 | Registered: Sep 2003
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Oh, Katie! There are SO many people I want to email that link to (The Harry Potter Condensed versions, I mean).
Posts: 1664 | Registered: Apr 2004
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And the Harry Potter Chick Tract is actually MUCH funnier if you note Uncle Bob's resemblance to John Cleese, and give him an outragious French Accent:
Spirit, I rebuke you!Your father smelt of elderberries!
Posts: 1664 | Registered: Apr 2004
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The thing that really cracked me up is the box to check at the bottom of the tract. :I have acccpted Jesus Christ as my Savior;Yes No check one". That is so tacky.
Posts: 2711 | Registered: Mar 2004
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I recently came across the Bad Bob tract and one of the "kiddie" tracts lying around in the Cracker Barrel office. I was wondering who it was that thought they were any use--then I found that someone had cut out the dude who was talking about all the drugs Bob could get them and put him up on the wall--evidently a joke about someone working there. Posts: 1114 | Registered: Mar 2004
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If I bought the Harry Potter DVDs and books does that mean I am in twice the trouble.
Well, at least I am not a Mormon and I never played D&D. I guess I am safe there. Though I did play Doom way back when it was big...and I loved Team Fortress and Quake.
I wonder if they have ever had pamphlets on the evils of judging others. My guess is no.
Posts: 1901 | Registered: May 2004
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People like this guy are precisely the reason organised religion should be forbidden. Alas, it's been tried. But it may be withering on the vine, at least in sensible countries like Norway. There's even talk now of getting rid of our state church - and about time, too.
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Our state church? What country are you posting from?
Jack Chick isn't an organized religion. He's an idiot with the a very correct right to a publisher. An absense of religion won't produce an absense of idiots. The only way to shut him up would be take away more than a few of his rights. Surely you're not suggesting that?
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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I'm always amazed when I run into people who haven't seen Chick tracts. Clearly, you have not lived in Indiana.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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Norway has a state church, toothless though it is. And a priest for Prime Minister (us and Iran), though at least the latest polls look like he'll get chucked out. None too soon; between that and the oil, I've been waiting for the US to invade for some time now. Maybe Bush has us confused with Sweden, or something.
Absence of religion won't provide absence of idiots, true. But it will be one less thing that non-idiots can have in common with idiots. If Christianity were an illegal fringe cult, how large a market would Chick find for his propaganda? Scum like him are still subject to the laws of the marketplace; if there were no Christians, he would soon have to shut up - free speech or none.
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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Being a fringe cult or not doesn't make Chick any more or less right.
And I've yet to see anyone here announce their faith in his rantings - probably because the people who do believe haven't figured out how to work a computer yet.
Or anyone believe his ranting because he claims to be a Christian - I suspect most of them are thinking, "not in any church I attend - you nut."
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I'm not saying Chick is mainstream in any way. I'm saying that he preys on the gullibility of people who are mainstream Christians. Sneer all you like, there are plenty of people out there who buy his tracts, in the apparent belief that they are doing good works. If Christianity were not so popular, that market would not exist.
As for not knowing how to work a computer, I would note that it doesn't take 1337 hax0r $ki11z to vote, with the possible exception of Florida.
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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So you're solution to this idiot is to make Christianity a persecuted fringe religion? Setting aside the fact that that's been tried before, at least Jack Chick is just trying to change people by knocking them on the head with lies, not with laws.
If you're saying that Christianity is the province of idiots, then...that's the same problem Jack Chick has.
Idiots are fairly determined. If it's not thing, it'll be another. No one's ever been successful at legislating away human nature.
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It has been tried, but that was when Christianity was a vibrant young religion offering sanctuary from an utterly chaotic and deadly world. Also, you will note that it didn't really strike it big until the Emperor converted. These days, Christianity is big business, an old and tired organisation that offers nothing new. And the world is quite a bit more controllable and knowable than it used to be. Who knows?
As a matter of tactics, it might be better to just let religion quietly wither on the vine - why revitalise it by letting people perceive themselves as heroic fighters for the underdog? On the other hand, that didn't work real well for slavery, absolute monarchy, or the other evils of the medieval past. So I don't know. Legislation might indeed be necessary. Ask me again in twenty years.
Religion is not the province of idiots, but it does make it so much easier for idiots to prosper. Consider : It is explicitly based on non-rationality, to wit, belief without proof. How can you make it any easier on the idiots than that? No argument other than reference to the Bible / Koran / whatever is needed.
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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Wow. Evidently there's a Bible verse were it says God made Dinosaurs and men on the same day. *giggles*
Hooo Boy!
I also have no faith in organized religion, because some people will ALWAYS come to see the details of their church's practices as more important than actually caring for each other. Note I said "some."
The last time I went to church, I broke out in hives, and that was just for a Christmas play. I think I'd have to be heavily medicated not to have serious flashbacks.
Edit: But there is a big difference between organized religion and a State Religion, which I think most of us agree is a bad idea in general.
quote: It is explicitly based on non-rationality, to wit, belief without proof.
The problem isn't that believers have no proof-- obviously, they do. No sane person believes and acts on any belief without some type of rationale.
The problem is recreating the proof for another individual.
It's like cold fusion-- until I can make you see that it's been done, you can't believe it's been done. But just because you haven't seen it, doesn't mean it hasn't happened-- just that you haven't seen it.
Posts: 14554 | Registered: Dec 1999
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A proof that cannot be reliably reproduced for another person ain't no proof.
And cold fusion is a remarkably bad example, because it is testable in principle. Many people tried to reproduce the cold fusion results; they were very bright people, and they did their best, and they failed. That is a good way to test something, and the reason we don't believe cold fusion occurs; it could not be reproduced. But there were definite signs one could look for : Excess heat, excess neutrons.
Religion is not testable even in principle, because it has no external results. There are no excess neutrons, no useful energy, to be gotten from religion. The 'proof' you offer is the same as that for Communism : Many people both living and dead have believed that Communism was the answer to their troubles, have worked and died for that belief. They had no external proof either, only faith in their prophet. Do you hold them as a good example?
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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Ralphie's MST3K tracts haven't been lost to Hatrack obscurity, have they? HAVE THEY??!?!?!?
I just can't wait till JC writes a tract about a somewhat left-leaning mormon girl who likes rock music, harry potter, and RPGs. Cuz seriously, there's no way someone like that will *ever* go to heaven. Posts: 4089 | Registered: Apr 2003
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I wonder what they'd do if they got in a slip with the box for 'no' ticked? It must happen once in a while, people's sense of humour being what it is.
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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quote:As a matter of tactics, it might be better to just let religion quietly wither on the vine - why revitalise it by letting people perceive themselves as heroic fighters for the underdog? On the other hand, that didn't work real well for slavery, absolute monarchy, or the other evils of the medieval past. So I don't know. Legislation might indeed be necessary. Ask me again in twenty years.
Wow. Never has a poster gone from the "I don't know what to think about this guy" to "What a raving lunatic" in one short post.
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