19 July 2010

You Can't Make This Stuff Up

U.S. Atheists Reportedly Using Hair Dryers to 'De-Baptize' (NewsCore, 7/17/10)
American atheists lined up to be "de-baptized" in a ritual using a hair dryer according to a report Friday on U.S. late-night news program "Nightline."  
Leading atheist Edwin Kagin blasted his fellow non-believers with the hair dryer to symbolically dry up the holy water sprinkled on their heads in days past. The styling tool was emblazoned with a label reading "Reason and Truth."

13 comments:

Brit said...

I like the idea that that the hairdryer is marked 'Reason'.

David said...

You've got to admit that there's a lot of hot air blown in the name of Reason, though that's not an insight I would expect these folks to have.

Susan's Husband said...

Perhaps the hair dryer is needed to provide something to fill their heads.

Harry Eagar said...

I guess none of you guys were raised Catholic. This sort of thing seems completely normal to me.

It's as silly as baptism but at least not an insult to human self-respect.

When you stop to think about it, why would people who make such a big deal about individual responsibility mock un-baptism, but not baptism?

David said...

Harry, so we're agreed. Christianity and Atheism are identical

Susan's Husband said...

Because Baptism makes internal sense in Christianity, but this makes no internal sense for atheism. We like to mock that kind of incoherence.

Hey Skipper said...

Per what SH said, David, are you sure you didn't fall prey to the Onion News Service?

This can't be true, can it?

Peter said...

I love the "Leading atheist". I'll bet it takes a lot of study to be one of those, not to mention spiritual exercises.

Of course, your average wishy-washy, middle-of-the-road atheist is content to rely on natural evaporation.

Harry Eagar said...

'Harry, so we're agreed. Christianity and Atheism are identical'

I'll agree to that when the proportion of atheists getting unbaptized reaches the proportion of Christians getting baptized.

More generally, people feel a need of rituals to alert their community to events they feel are important. That seems to be universal.

Getting unbaptized is no different than making a fuss about 'reaching the big 4-0' or sending out black cards to announce the completion of a divorce or holding a party to burn a mortgage.

Peter said...

I must say I've never been to a mortgage burning party where the homeowner dressed in monk's robes and recited Latin incantations.

Harry, there is a very long history of this kind of stuff, from Soviet and Mexican museums of atheism all the way to Dawkins's buses. What they all have in common is that they come to bore and embarass most non-believers very quickly.

David said...

Skipper: This is the definition of too good to check.

Harry Eagar said...

They bore me, too, but I didn't take that as the thrust of the first post.

My first friend who was both a conservative and an atheist (I didn't know before that that a person could be both) used to say that there was something illogical about proselytizing for atheism.

But that is not the same thing as saying that people who are already atheists somehow lose their human yearning for markers of life events.

The question, why should the devil get all the good tunes? was poorly conceived. Conservatives might ask, who is their Dylan?

Barry Meislin said...

File under: Atheists (continue to) rail against God.

Now if these geniuses could come up with a model that de-circumcises....