Unwelcome party

Yuk. Argh. etc. Riding on the back seat of the international interest in the atheist bus campaign, “christians” are trying to take some advantage. Here was the deeply unpleasant committed “christian” George Hargreaves in the Guardian.

(I put “christians” in quotes because I don’t recognise any of the positive aspects of the traditional christian denominations in these ranting zealots. I still cling to a wishful-thinking belief that christianity isn’t always just about being a twat. )

Hargreaves toned down his message for his audience, of course. So he only exposed Guardian readers to a criticism of the money spent on bus ads. He failed to spot that it was shooting himself in the foot to then say that the “christian party” were about to do the same. Plus, he got in a jibe at the BNP, knowing full well that any Guardian reader will be spitting blood at their very existence, so he tries to trade on the “enemy of my enemy is my friend” effect.

The christian party, huh? Who are these christian politicos? Followers of Martin Luther King, Philip Berryman, Pastor Niemoller, Paolo Freire, maybe?

I think you’ve maybe already guessed it, no.

It turns out that their politics is as subtly nuanced and intelligent as their concept of christianity (*heavy sarcasm alert*) Look at how they greeted Obama’s election for instance:

But the greatest black politician the world may YET see – or the greatest black scientist, greatest black artist or the greatest black sportsperson – could under Obama’s presidency never have the chance to be seen – because Barack Obama would have had them aborted before they ever had the chance to be born (from http://-insertedcrap- www.christianparty.org.uk/cmsparty/ website)

Wtf? There’s plenty more.

…Within days of the election, his welcome statements … are already making way for the vicious anti-life agenda of Washington’s abortionist elite.

I have the sensation of being in a room where everyone else present is living in an alternate reality, where the inconvenient real world never intrudes. But this maniac – who somehow thinks it’s totally reasonable to say that Obama plans to abort all future foetuses, at the behest of some secret elite annihilation cadre – was giving “an English perspective” on Obama’s election for CBS..

I have spent most of the past four weeks in the USA following and filming the historic US presidential election for my TV programme, The Politics Programme on Revelation TV. I was there on election day giving an English perspective on the election to the CBS Channel 7 News.

Wtf, again.

Revelation tv, lol. I bet the combined IQ of its all viewers wouldn’t reach triple figures. But CBS? Isn’t that supposed to be a real channel? Obviously not.

Revelation TV. Blimey it’s a Sky channel, apparently. (Another good reason for sticking with cable only.) They portray Obama as a threat to the unborn and to marriage.
(Doesn’t extending the boundaries of who can marry whom imply the exact opposite of a thretat to marriage. Outlawing marriage would be a “threat to marriage”. Maybe I’m just being too literal here. 😀 )

This is good to read …..

Will the Republican Party decide that conservative Christians are just too troublesome for the party and see the pro-life movement as a liability?

One can but hope.

Not much of a joke, but

Atheist bus slogan

Atheist bus slogan

One of the oldest and lamest jokes that I know, in a slightly topical atheist bus format.

The Guardian website has a link to the atheist bus slogan generator, here.

Back on the bus

Buses have really stepped up their game in the culture wars recently. It’s getting so that, if it’s not written along the side of a moving public service vehicle, it can’t be true. The Atheist Bus campaign may have accidentally tuned into previously unsuspected 21st zeitgeist.

It turns out there’s a Florida version of our own bus debate. It’s quite a bit uglier, though. And it doesn’t involve atheism. It’s an advert for Islam. The Sun Sentinel from Broward County (yes, me neither) said

Muslim ads on county buses drive Jewish group to protest
Muslim group says reference to Abraham, Moses and Jesus not intended to offend, but Americans Against Hate activist says message is misleading

There’s a picture of an Islamic advert bus showing the words “ISLAM: The Way of Life of Abraham, Moses, Jesus and Muhammad.”

It would be quite hard to spot any hate-crime in that sentence. The “Jewish group” that sees this apparently innocuous piece of meaninglessness religi-drivel as hate speech is not just any old “Jewish group”, of course. It seems to be even less representative of the average Jewish person’s views than Christian Voice is of the average Christian. (If that is indeed possible.)

Both the advertisers and the protestors accuse each other of terrorism.

Kaufman notes the U.S. Department of Justice labeled CAIR an “unindicted co-conspirator” in a Dallas case which last November saw five leaders of the Holy Land Foundation, a Muslim charity, convicted of providing more than $12 million in support to the Hamas terrorist organization.
Ali, who lives in Pembroke Pines, counters that Kaufman is affiliated with the Kahanist Movement founded by Rabbi Meir Kahane, who advocated removing all Muslims from Israel.
Because of its terrorist activities, the group was banned in Israel and its U.S. assets were frozen.
Kaufman writes for the right-leaning Web publication Front Page Magazine, and once called for nuclear attacks on Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq. Since founding Americans Against Hate as a terrorism watchdog group, he wrote that “pure merciless force” was the only way to deal with Muslims. (from the sun-sentinel)

Can someone define “terrorism” for me please, because I think my dictionary must be broken?

Driver prefers Pepsi, refuses to drive coca-cola bus

Hampshire bus driver, Richard Head, 42, today refused to drive a bus advertising Coca-cola.

Richard Head, from Southampton, Hampshire, responded with “shock” and “horror” at the message and walked out of his shift on Saturday in protest. (from the Jakarta Daily News)

Mr Head told Radio Prague: “I was just about to board and there it was staring me in the face, my first reaction was shock horror.
I’ve always been a pepsi-drinker myself. So you can imagine how I felt” (from the Jamaican Daily Gleaner)

He walked off the job rather than advertise a product that he didn’t wholeheartedly endorse.

His employers said they would do everything in their power to make sure that Mr Head was never forced to drive a public service vehicle with any adverts that he couldn’t personally add a recommendation to.

A passenger told the Kiev Times “I was a bit upset when my bus to work didn’t turn up but I am very pleased that I don’t need to worry that I might be travelling on a vehicle that doesn’t express the driver’s philosophy.”

The decision to give Mr Head editorial control over the sides of his vehicle was welcomed by taxi drivers in Bristol, who have been in dispute with their local council over their having to show passes with photographs that they often see as “unflattering”.

h/t Nullifidian, Raytheist, the BBC et al…..