13 April 1949 – 15 December 2011

Where as sacrificing your own son is the pinnacle of love.

The wrong trousers?

“Just hope that as we remember Servicemen and women today we remember the Australia they fought for – wasn’t gay marriage and Islamic!” – Jim Wallace, Managing Director, Australian Christian Lobby.

Lest we forget.

I was inspired by this story.

Over the past few weeks we have seen a number of events which highlight the amazing sensitivity religious people have.  Mindless mayhem over some backwater church’s plan to burn the Quran, the hysteria surrounding the Islamic Mosque on ground zero (which is neither a Mosque nor on ground zero), and a Brisbane lawyer possibly losing his job because he smoked his own copies of the Quran and Bible in a tongue in cheek scientific study. Amongst all this madness you might easily forget it is not just the fringe elements that are prone to such hypersensitivity.  Main stream religion and society have it in spades, and societies in general seem to pander to it.

Take Antonio Federici, an Italian based gelato manufacturer founded in 1896, are facing a ban on their latest advertising by the British Advertising Standards Authority because some overly touchy religious zealots may find them offensive.  One of the advertisements contains an image of a pregnant nun with the words “immaculately conceived”, while another has two priests engaged in a suggestive embrace with the slogan “we believe in salvation”.

While I am certain some in the community may find these images and phrases offensive to their medieval, backward, and illogical superstitions, there are many who will see the lighter side of these advertisements.  It is interesting to note that many of those who find such advertisements offensive see no problem with blaming all humanity for the “sins” of some long dead ancestor, eternal damnation if you do not meet impossible standards, and accepting perfect human blood sacrifices to gain entry to a totalitarian celestial dictatorship.

A spokesman for Antonio Federici stated the Advertising Standards Authority seemed to

“…be upholding the views of a bigoted minority over the majority.”

If every fractional (or factional) group were able to successfully ban advertisements, or subversive commentary against their precious ideas, then communication within societies would totally cease.  I am no expert, but these do not seem to be the ideals on which to build a progressive and free society.  Free speech cannot be sacrificed because a handful of mystical simpletons have their ideas challenged.

At least Antonio Federici have managed to get some good publicity out of this.  As Oscar Wilde once said:

“The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about.”

From the incomparable Crispian Jago.

Yeah, that makes sense.

]]> http://www.godless.biz/2010/03/15/photo-caption-competition/feed/ 41 http://www.godless.biz/2010/03/03/this-is-what-christians-really-believe/ http://www.godless.biz/2010/03/03/this-is-what-christians-really-believe/#comments Tue, 02 Mar 2010 16:00:17 +0000 askegg http://www.godless.biz/?p=2494

]]> http://www.godless.biz/2010/03/03/this-is-what-christians-really-believe/feed/ 8 http://www.godless.biz/2010/03/02/crawl-before-the-fantasy/ http://www.godless.biz/2010/03/02/crawl-before-the-fantasy/#comments Tue, 02 Mar 2010 05:39:06 +0000 askegg http://www.godless.biz/?p=2491

Proof we share a common ancestor.  My wife say “it proves you are all animals.”

What would you think if you returned to your car to find that attached to it?

A sexy bunch aren’t we. Possibly the sexiest podcasters in the world, apart from Cali Lewis of course. From left to right, Oliver (childless), Andrew (askegg), Nige (thats me!) and Jim (from Tasmania)

In the foreground is Jim’s mixing desk rig, and on the table are our computers. Andrew and I have great taste and use MacBook Pros.  Olivers taste is obviously questionable, and Jim  appears to have a direct connection to the internet with his brain. You will see we enjoy drinking coffee, just like Mr Gruff. There may or may not have been alcohol in those glasses, and you can not quite see the empty beer bottles in the shot.

Jesus shows up in the most unlikely of places. There was once a time when he would appear directly as an apparition or burning bush, but I guess the economic crisis has hit everyone hard. Now all Jesus/God can seem to manage is appearing on a lid of jar of Marmite, or as a vague rendition in a cheesy snack.

What those who experience these miracles fail to recognise is our brains ability to find patterns in data – it even find patterns where none exist. For example, no one is suggesting that a race of Kermit the Frog’s inhabited Mars, but I defy you not to see his image carved into the rock.

It’s the same mechanism that turns :) into a smiling face. People see what they want to see.

Look closely.

WTF Jesus, originally uploaded by jeber. ]]> http://www.godless.biz/2009/01/12/wtf-jesus/feed/ 0 http://www.godless.biz/2008/12/20/portable-commandments/ http://www.godless.biz/2008/12/20/portable-commandments/#comments Fri, 19 Dec 2008 22:05:32 +0000 askegg http://godless.biz/2008/12/20/portable-commandments/

Attention Lunatic Atheists, originally uploaded by Chairman Meow. ]]> http://www.godless.biz/2008/12/13/attention-lunatic-atheists/feed/ 1 http://www.godless.biz/2008/12/02/prayer-vs-real-work/ http://www.godless.biz/2008/12/02/prayer-vs-real-work/#comments Tue, 02 Dec 2008 06:40:35 +0000 askegg http://godless.biz/?p=875

From http://miscellanea.wellingtongrey.net/2008/12/01/prayer-vs-hard-work/

Satanic Jesus Fishes, originally uploaded by Xurble. ]]> http://www.godless.biz/2008/11/17/satanic-jesus-fishes/feed/ 0 http://www.godless.biz/2008/11/14/the-1992-rapture/ http://www.godless.biz/2008/11/14/the-1992-rapture/#comments Thu, 13 Nov 2008 23:00:09 +0000 askegg http://godless.biz/?p=774