The Great Desecration

[Sgent]

PZ Myers, Associate Professor of Biology at U Minnesota Morris, carried out his threat to desecrate the Eucharist, as well as the Koran and a "The God Delusion" by Dawkins.

From his blog: http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/07/the_great_desecration.php#more

It is finished.

I wonder how many of our Catholic friends have heard of the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215? This is the event where many of their important dogmas were codified, including the ideas of Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus, that the Eucharist was the sacrament that only properly ordained priests of the Catholic church could give, and that the Jews were a pariah people, who could hold no public office, had to pay a special Jew tax for their right to exist, and were required to wear special clothing to distinguish them from Christians. The yellow badge marking the Juden was not an invention of the Nazis, but a decree by faithful Catholics in the Middle Ages. That's an interesting juxtaposition, that a symbol of Christian exceptionalism was formalized at the same time that they formally decreed the Jews to be inferior, and a target of hatred.

...

'm sorry to say that I only aspire to be a teeny-tiny bit evil, and my target is a handful of virtually inedible crackers in my possession. It's not much, and all I can say in my defense is…it's a start. A very small start. I'm going to need lots and lots of people to rise up and follow suit, subjecting old, dishonest institutions of hardened dogma to our chief weapon of ridicule and deris…our two weapons of ridicule, derision and laughter…no, three weapons of ridicule, derision, laughter, and skeptici…oh, never mind. You know what I mean. Get to work.

OK, time for the anticlimax. I know some of you have proposed intricate plans for how to do horrible things to these crackers, but I repeat…it's just a cracker. I wasn't going to make any major investment of time, money, or effort in treating these dabs of unpleasantness as they deserve, because all they deserve is casual disposal. However, inspired by an old woodcut of Jews stabbing the host, I thought of a simple, quick thing to do: I pierced it with a rusty nail (I hope Jesus's tetanus shots are up to date). And then I simply threw it in the trash, followed by the classic, decorative items of trash cans everywhere, old coffeegrounds and a banana peel. My apologies to those who hoped for more, but the worst I can do is show my unconcerned contempt.
desecrated.jpg

By the way, I didn't want to single out just the cracker, so I nailed it to a few ripped-out pages from the Qur'an and The God Delusion. They are just paper. Nothing must be held sacred. Question everything. God is not great, Jesus is not your lord, you are not disciples of any charismatic prophet. You are all human beings who must make your way through your life by thinking and learning, and you have the job of advancing humanity's knowledge by winnowing out the errors of past generations and finding deeper understanding of reality. You will not find wisdom in rituals and sacraments and dogma, which build only self-satisfied ignorance, but you can find truth by looking at your world with fresh eyes and a questioning mind.

[ColbertWatcher]

1. Holy crackers!

LOL, I love me some PZ.

I can't believe some of the comments, though.

Such hatred. It seems all 20% of the GOP faithful are posting to Pharyngula!

Thank you for posting!

[TechBear_Seattle]

2. His last line is excellent

So good, I have made it my sig. :hi:

[beam me up scottie]

3. I know, isn't it?

Shades of the late great Carl Sagan.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

4. I like this guy. I truly do. -nt

[Occam Bandage]

5. "You desecrated a symbol I hold dear! Of course I will now accept your message as reasonable!"

:eyes:

I think in honor of PZ Meyers, I'll start all future political discussions by pissing on the other guy's shoes.

[Az]

6. The problem is that PZ is not at the start of discussions

It was already beyond a pissing match. There have been death threats and all manner of piss flying back and forth already. PZ was just reacting to the insanity of it all by shouting out "Its just a fracking cracker".

The truth of the matter is that the comment about desecrating one was an off hand comment of his. It was not the primary intent of his initial post. But of course since there was already no reason being utilized in the global conversation he had plopped himself into the opposition forces latched onto the most emotionally inflammatory bit and came back after him. At that point what became a toss away statement was turned into the focus of his intent. And being caught up in the moment he had no means of backing down without losing face. So he upped the challenge by adding the Koran to his act of desecration. But he also added the book The God Delusion in order to show that his intent was to show that nothing material is sacred. Its just crackers and books. But even that attempt at reason was lost in the mix.

He even down played the hoopla around the situation. He tried to get both sides to ease up on their positions. But as the mental state of both sides was emotional rather than reasoned he found no purchase and fell into the mess with the rest of the crowd.

[Occam Bandage]

7. "That attempt at reason" was obviously going to be lost in the mix, as he launched himself into

the discussion by claiming that he was going to commit an act that practicing Christians find horrendously offensive, for the stated reason that they found it offensive. It was obviously inflammatory, it was intended to be inflammatory, and the reaction was expected. It quickly a pissing match, yeah, but neither person in a pissing match really wants a reasonable discussion--they want to prove to the world that the other guy's a jackass.

At the end of it, the PZ side declares, "Look! Look how upset they get when you're mean to a cracker! They're so unreasonable!" The fundie side declares, "Look! Look how this juvenile shock artist is trying to offend people just to get a reaction!" As could have been reasonably predicted by anyone, the net result of this stunt was escalating shouting and preening, not rational discussion. And, as could have been reasonable predicted by anyone, the people involved all word their defenses of the situation so as to make it look like it's all the other guy's fault for acting so unreasonable.

[Az]

8. Take a close look at PZ's site

And pay attention to how it played out. PZ was not looking for this to become what it did. In fact he tried to play it down (while not backing down) at every turn. He begged his readers to back down a bit when the religious death threats started flying in. He lost control early on in the matter. Yes he bungled it. But the point remains salient. It is unreasonable to receive death threats for doing things to a cracker. Yet the focus of attention from the religious side has ever been on the cracker. At no point was there ever a mia culpa concerning the death threats that either PZ or the student that stated it all received. And that is the same intensity of hatred that created the problems in the distant past where in people were actually killed. All because of a "fracking cracker".

PZ was outraged by this intense hatred generated by the cracker. And he vented on his blog. Which is what most blogs are for. He spoke out emotionally and was dragged into the frey because of his emotional words. Yes he made a mistake. So did his mistake warrant death threats and the end of his career? Did it warrant threats against his child? Was the reaction to his words warranted?

The thing that is amazing to me is that if those who believe the wafer to actually be the body of Christ actually listened to the teachings of Jesus this entire incident would have blown over. For they would have forgiven PZ. They would have turned the other cheek. But instead they repeated the hatred of history and called for his persecution.

[Midwest_Doc]

9. All of this fuss ...

... over cannibalism and crackers.

[Az]

10. Thats the power of belief

To you and me its crackers and odd notions of immortality through cannibalism. To them it is the holy sacrament and connection to their lord. And there are those who are prepared to die defending their beliefs and those who are prepared to kill in the name of their beliefs. Strong stuff belief.