It's the 500th birthday of John Calvin.

[TheMightyFavog]

Let's all take a moment to reflect on how much better off American society would be had the asshole never been born.

[sasquatch]

1. If it wasn't for him the Catholic church would be so far up our asses

We wouldn't have had the glorious revolution, which wouldn't have led to the American revolution.

[Strong Atheist]

2. Not to mention no

Calvin and Hobbes...

[TheMightyFavog]

4. I think Martin Luther took care of that.

End of Line.

[sasquatch]

8. Not for the Anglo-Saxon's it didn't, when the Stuarts took the thrown they were Catholic

and practitioners of absolute monarchies. The Calvanist movement was one of the things that helped in the overthrow of the overthrow of Stuart crown. Lutheranism aided in changing northern european faiths but not so much that it changed the complextion of the nations' governments.

[arbusto_baboso]

3. Remember what Greg Proops (comedian) said?

"America got the boats full of Puritans, and Australia got the boats full of convicts. Australia got the better end of the deal."

[sasquatch]

13. Not really, our problem stems from the fact we got boats full of dumbasses that fought for-

the bonnie prince Charlie.

[Deep13]

5. I would like to join all the women he put at the bottom of Lake Geneva...

...in wishing him eternal damnation.

[CreekDog]

6. We would have 5 fewer points

:think:

[undeterred]

7. Wow, he's old.

[Adsos Letter]

9. This thread is predestined to end badly...

:D

[GreenPartyVoter]

10. *snarf*

[SidneyCarton]

11. John Calvin was an asshole.

Yet history often progresses due to the actions of assholes. Calvin himself was a monster, and Calvinism has brought us a puritanical streak that causes no end of trouble. But it also brought us Oliver Cromwell, the supremacy of Parliament over Kings, and the beginning of democracy through such institutions. As much as I wish Hitler had been shot in the trenches in WWI, or that Stalin's drunk father had beat him to death as a child, I realize that the future may have been no better for their lack, only different.

[sasquatch]

12. Exactly