I have to admit, I hadn’t expected the enthusiastic response I go to that comment. I hadn’t gotten anything like that since the time I suggested that Willis put “Dina Summaries” of each in-universe day.
The “Holy than thou” attitude drives me nuts, even when they’re my own religion/political party. But I notice it more with people who are atheist than people who aren’t, though not by a large margin.
I think every group has an equally large percentage of “holier than thou” members, but only by other groups’ standards. Every religion, party, or other group has something its members believe is true but practically nobody else does, so any time people talk about that “truth” they’ll annoy outsiders long before other group members. However, a lot of really “holier than thou” people will cross that line pretty quickly, hence why more rational people like you and I don’t notice a large gap.
You mean you find lots of atheists who think they’re holier than thou? Odd. I’d think it would be significantly easier to find atheists who’re ‘smartier than thou’ – ones who find theistic beliefs to be too problematic at some intellectual or moral level to put up with (or at a less abrasive level, to ‘respect’). I can see that having roughly the same end result though.
Whether they are holy or “smart”, it’s still looking down on others. Also, I’ve found many atheists would be better described as believing there is no God as opposed to lacking a belief in any god, which makes them just as fervent as any Christian about their beliefs.
Fervency is relative; I believe that there’s no Christian god with absolute certainty because of the internal contradictions. This is the same sort of fervent belief I have in 1+1 equaling 2 and in gravity existing. On the subject of many non-christian gods I believe there is no god the same way I believe there are no unicorns. It’s real disbelief, but let me get a good look at one (I have a lab table ready, complete with straps!), and I’ll readily change my tune.
As for looking down on others, yes, some of us do that; I certainly wasn’t saying otherwise. I personally have a tendency to look down on people who cling to silly beliefs, theistic or not. I was merely getting picky about using the term ‘holier than thou’ to describe my particular brand of snobbery.
So in other words your trying to fulfill the stereotype you mentioned.
That makes you the most unreliable source possible. By calling them ‘silly beliefs’, you have proven yourself to be more then a little bit closed minded. Closed minded usually means stupid. Not in all situations, but its a slippery slope. Even if I was an atheist, which in another life I could have been, to assume one is always right is egotistical.
So, as a smarter then thou, do you believe yourself to be smarter then any believers. Its better to admit your egotistical, then to beat around the bush like most smarter then thou’s would.
I don’t have to try to fulfill a stereotype. I am a human. I have human flaws. I am burdened by a hubris that comes easily to one that (believe it or not) actually has found that for periods of my life many things came more easily to my understanding than they did to others.
(That period is over – I’m getting older and my memory has gotten incredibly spotty. But the hubris learned in my youth is a hard-to-shed habit.)
My ego doesn’t make me an unreliable source, though. It doesn’t help my arguments, but it doesn’t weaken them either. My arguments stand alone.
Not that I’m actually *making* any arguments against religion at the moment. I’m just baldly stating that after a great deal of analysis, most of which I did before my brain went, I have come to certain conclusions about the likelihood of various types of deity existing. Some of these conclusions were summarized above.
Having reached these conclusions, I see others to whom these issues seemingly haven’t even crossed their mind. I forget how much deliberation it took me to reach my conclusions and wonder at these people’s abilities to overlook the obvious.
Not that all of these conclusions require a lot of deliberation. Some beliefs are just silly.
And thinking that doesn’t make me stupid. Regardless of how convenient it would be to some people to dismiss my conclusions so handily.
Cronomatt, please improve punctuation and wording before suggesting that another poster with correct writing practices is stupid. It is very difficult to resist posting a long list of errors that need to be corrected, which would make both of us look bad.
To be fair, using ad hominem to discredit someone using ad hominem is a bit backwards. Still, it does prove he’s sloppy at least. Also, non-native isn’t an excuse when you’re trying to have a debate, since there are standards that must be upheld for a debate to exist in the first place. To be fair, using ‘your’ instead of ‘you’re’ is hardly under that
standard.
However, do note that ‘silly beliefs’ isn’t nearly as close minded as you might think it is. Most believers think that those not of their faith are either idiots/ignorant/evil/misguided/close minded/etc – all of which strike me as extremely condescending. Point is we all consider our beliefs to be superior to the other ones, otherwise we’d use those instead. Hence, ‘silly beliefs’ merely uses less sugar to coat the innate condescension mostly everyone has when tackling this sort of debate. This does not take away from his argument, it just makes him less amiable (still a mistake if you’re trying to be convincing though).
@icepyrox largely depends on their environment. I can guarantee that atheists that had/have religion pushed in their faces all day long will be MUCH more acerbic then those that are lucky enough not to have to deal with such. Therefor it is a case of ‘annoyed/angry to the point of rage’ rather then belief. In other words, no – lacking belief still is lacking belief, but some are more angry/annoyed about the fact that it’s considered abnormal to lack a faith in most societies (not to mention consequences thereof, see comic above for just one of the many many situations one can encounter as a atheist).
Anger can create passion, it’s that passion you mistake for
belief.
Yeah, George is right here: every political or religious (or atheist) group has “holier than thou” people in about the same concentration, except of course in a cult scenario where you’re kind of required to be like that. We just tend to notice the ones in groups we disagree with more, because they’re the ones we run into more.
I imagine by and large it’s also more a case of the attitude being more apparent to those outside the clutch of a belief, I will not deny that I’ve come across many internet atheists who lacked any sort of tact of humility for their personal beliefs, but in my experience it has always ‘seemed’ like those professing a belief in the Christian god touted this attitude more, that said, again it’s all a matter of perspective, the amount total with this actual attitude may vary greatly from what is perceived by the individual and what is actual H.T.T tude versus the grey areas of followers to a belief.
Funny thing – ‘tact’ won’t make an argument more or less valid, but humans tend to ignore anything that comes from an aggravating source. Meaning that if you want PEOPLE to care about the sounds you make with your mouth-flaps, you’d better try to be likeable while you do it. Many fall short of this basic hurdle.
“Some people want to live their lives
Within the sound of a church bell
I wan to open a rescue shop
Within a yard of hell.”
Staying away from non-Christians and shunning then is the opposite of what Jesus wanted his followers to do. You’ll never lighten dark places if you don’t go in yourself with a light.
The sad thing is that she’s ignoring the fact that Jesus hung out with tax collectors (the equivalent of extortionists, in the day), whores, thieves, and many other kinds of sinners. These, he said when challenged by the Pharisees for his practice, were those who needed to be saved. Hanging out with the righteous and pure accomplished nothing, they were already saved.
That’s not to say that Christians should hang out with people who are in the commission of sinful acts. Just that associating with a sinner isn’t an evil or sinful act. And avoiding a sinner isn’t in itself a righteous behavior, and is actually contrary to the teachings of Christ.
Alternatively: Mary should be concerned about Dorothy’s and Sierra’s souls, and welcome the opportunity for them to be exposed to the Gospel. Jesus didn’t shy away from associating with ‘bad’ people, after all.
Least’ she’s brave and a genuinely nice person. No matter the brand of crazy she believes in, I’d still hang out with her. Heck, my oldest best friend believes in dozens of conspiracy theories and quasi-magical bullshit ala ‘free energy’ and I shudder to think what other physics-defying nonsense – he’s still a great friend, even if terribly annoying at times due to sed brand of crazy.
He didn’t masturbate, he just didn’t spill his cum into the woman he had promised to make babies with. We have no idea whether he masturbated or not, we just know that in a society that mistreated women, he was cursed by God for lying to a woman he promised to make a baby with. Women were valued for having babies–she wanted a baby, and keeping that from her would be the equivalent of a modern man keeping a woman from going to work. The society was twisted, but God punished the man for shaming that woman in her society–treating her like a whore, instead of giving her what he promised. Onan promised her commitment, but he was just bein a playa. God was concerned about the treatment of the woman. So he smited the man who treated her like a whore. God could have smited the entire society, but he was merciful. THAT’s the story of Onan. It has nothing whatsoever to do with masturbation. Genesis 38.
I get the feeling you were being sarcastic, but it works… Roz is probably out so much that Mary can get her “evil time” easily, so she doesn’t want to complain about it or start anything with Roz because that would mess things up.
Or she isn’t a hypocrite but figures that as long as she has to room with evil it’s better to be with someone even she won’t bother trying to change. I’m betting on the first one, but you never know…
I’m liking her much more in this strip than I did in Roomies!, for sure. She’s just as sheltered and naive, but she seems to have a better attitude overall.
Her biggest strength is that, in *most* areas, she’s willing to try and overlook any prejudices or biases and judge a person based on one or two traits they might have. So yeah, I have to say I like her too.
I liked Joyce-that-shall-not-be-named too, but that’s because she was FREAKING INSANE.
I completely agree. She’s got more extreme views than Mary for sure, but she’s much more open to new ideas and people. I don’t know how people like Mary get through the day, especially at a college campus.
I don’t think Mary was pretending to be nice. She’s nice to people who share her views. She was nice to Sal before she took off and to Danny before he started migrating away from her standards. I don’t think we got a good look at how she gets on with people she doesn’t agree with. I remember her relationship with Joe being strained to say the least, but I’ll have to go back and reread the road trip story arc.
That may be, but I was referring to Grendel eating the Danes in”Beowulf.” Thus, “Danish.”
This was in response to TPman’s comment about Lindisfarne, where the first Viking raid in England took place. Historically, Danes were among the Scandanavian peoples who were known as the “Vikings.”
I like that Mary is like the evil version of Joyce. You get people saying all the time that Joyce is a hateful little fundamentalist (well, I don’t really see that anymore, but anyway), and then Mary comes along to be a genuinely hateful fundamentalist.
I mean, you could say that Joyce is just as bad as Mary, just more innocent about it. But I wouldn’t really buy that.
Yeah… Joyce is a fundamentalist but too nice to really get into the whole “burn the heathens” thing most of them have going on. Sounds like her parents are too, since they’re letting her go to IU which means they can’t be so extreme that even fundamentalist churches disappoint them on a regular basis. Sadly, there are a lot more Marys than Joyces in the world… hence my belief that Joyce is going to be the one the title is talking about. She can’t ignore the b-word gap forever.
Hmm, hadn’t thought that Joyce could be the ‘me’ in the title. Seeing Joyce leave her church (or even gradually become an agnostic/atheist) could be interesting. It’s not something you see all that often, and when you do it tends to be as bad a Chick Tract.
Explains the last pages of Joyce and Walky nicely.
Wait, that actually makes me sort of sexually attracted to Joyce then. Only thing that was really stopping me was her fundy-ness.
But then again, she’s not yet tapable because of sed still existent fundy-ness. Damn, another day Joyce, another day. (Why yes, I do find the prospect of marriage sexually arousing as long as it’s secular.)
Willis has said that he doesn’t plan to have Joyce become an Atheist. While Willis said originally that Joyce was the character most like him, but that was in the other continuity. Moreover, I don’t believe that he said Joyce was autobiographical.
That being said, I’d love to see Joyce break away from Christianity. There’s a lot of things in the Bible that don’t mesh with her personality – genocide and such.
Now I can’t get the idea of Joyce making webcomics with Willis as one of the main characters, occasionally inspiring comments from her fans such as “CURSE YOU, BROWN!” XD
Maybe not in comics, but it happens all the time in real life. Most of the atheists I know were raised religious. Pharyngula has been posting peoples’ “Why I’m an Atheist” stories for weeks now.
Sorry, yeah, that’s what I meant. It’s not often you see a work of fiction showing someone becoming an atheist, unless it’s about how they found their faith again.
What Mary seems to be forgetting is that Jesus spent a great deal of time with people that the religious leaders of his day considered evil (or at least unfavored) that said what is her issue with sieerra
A lot of people think “not devout” is just a tamer version of “athiest” and thus evil. Of course we don’t know if Sierra is devout or not, she just hasn’t shown the same priorities as Mary.
Of course, with people like Mary she could be really devout but if it was at the wrong church it wouldn’t matter… heck, if she was a devout Catholic or Mormon it could make things worse.
I’m an atheist, who is also partially agnostic. A lot of agnostics (though not all) are often atheists as well. All atheist means is “has no belief in a god” so so it’s perfectly conceivable to be an atheist agnostic 🙂
You have your agnostics who are like, “I believe in god, but don’t have 100% logical certainty (because that’s impossible), so I’m a logical agnostic.” Those agnostics are theistic agnostics.
All other agnostics are also atheists, because they don’t actually believe in a god. That’s all it takes to be an atheist nowadays, by the most broadly agreed-upon definition of the term. (There are sub-categories of atheism for the ones who are absolutely certain and/or loud about it, but you don’t have to be one of them to be just an atheist by the definition of it.)
Suffice to say atheism’s a far from exclusive club. We count inanimate objects among our members!
I’m an agnostic as well. We are atheists in every practical sense, the difference is merely technical. Although fully-fledged atheists are more likely to be militant.
People who refuse to wear shoes are evil. Its in the Bible….probably… ok maybe not. Perhaps Mary has a napoleon complex because Sierra is tall? umm penis envy?No thats not it perhaps Her family owns a shoe store? ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm…
Or we could just avoid sexist language and say she’s a jerk, a prig, a pill, an “a-word”, rude, obnoxious, someone who sticks her nose into other peoples’ personal business…
A somewhat ironic comment, since I’ve mostly ever seen the “douche” appellation applied to males. Using it for Mary could actually be seen as an act of gender parity. Now, the C-word. THAT’S sexist, and I hesitated to even use the abbreviated form, and no way in H-word would I have even typed it out. My wife doesn’t even read webcomics, but she would know…
If people who follow Mary’s particular sort of Christianity actually gave a s-word what Jesus actually did or said, their religion would look very different.
But why would you give a sword what Jesus actually said or did?
To whom would you give the sword?
What if you don’t own a sword, do you go out to the local smithy and purchase one just so that you can then give it to somewhat because of what Jesus said?
Is this a “beating swords into ploughshares” thing?
. . .
I just realized “beating swords into ploughshares” sounds like a really weird euphemism for masturbation. I apologize.
But he’s not dead yet! (He can dance and he can sing!) Oh, he’s not dead yet! *whack*
…
Well, NOW he’s dead! (You whacked ‘im on the head!) Sure, NOW he’s dead!
You are such a brute, to murder that old coot! You homicidal bastard, now he’s really dead!
There are a great many Christians who miss that lesson entirely and seem to forget the lessons taught by Christ’s interaction with the Pharisees. Far, far too many.
Actually, I’d like to retract that. The lesson Jesus was teaching there was ‘when somebody offends your religious sensibilities, kick their ass!‘ This has historically been a fairly common practice among Christians (and anybody else who got offended about anything, really), but in modern times in ‘civilized’ countries this philosophy has fallen drastically out of favor. (Exceptions to that still exist, though – they tend to make the news.) This is to the credit of everyone involved.
Actually, it was “when you see someone using your religion to exploit people, smash their shit up and scare them off. ” Jesus would have had to do a lot more ass-kicking otherwise.
Damn! I tried to give Mary a benefit of a doubt and look what happens. She reduces different minded people as “those people”. Never mind that they went to church to share in her ideology.
I never understood why Christianity is so splintered. And all the factions seem so weary of each other. You’d think people sharing a common belief would be closer.
They’ve had 2,000 years to find new and exciting ways to hate each other. Monotheism means you can’t change gods when the people at your temple annoy you, after all.
There are many, many, many beliefs they do not share, ranging from the insignificant such as ‘consubstantiation vs transubstantiation’ to the really quite fundamental, such as biblical literalism vs symbolic reading.
To play the devil’s advocate amongst all the Mary-hate in the comments, I’d like to say that the third panel gave me the impression that Mary has some past experience with “nice evil”.
I’m not saying she’s not a bongo or anything. I just think she has reasons for it.
Knowing Willis, Mary probably does have an in depth backstory that explains her behavior here. That still doesn’t excuse the fact that she’s calling Sierra and Dorothy “evil” for believing/behaving differently. That way lies persecution.
She does however, it seems, define evil as “not being Christian” and “not wearing shoes,” so her idea of “evil” is so far out in batshit asshole-land that unpleasant personal experience is not something that can explain it.
There are quite a number of Christians like Mary who define evil as “not being Christian”, solely because that’s what they were taught (by parents and pastors, etc.) from a young age. Of course, there are also those like Joyce, who may not have much experience with non-Christians but certainly don’t consider them evil.
Not really. Mary’s attitude, which she applies to religion, has nothing to do with the religion itself, and could be applied toward anything. Imagine the same behavior with a different subject. She could act that way about charity, or veganism, or philosophy, or social justice, and many people do. You can’t outdo people at those things by being hateful and exclusionary. Well, maybe the vegan thing (j/k). The exceptions would be things like douchebaggery. You could out-douche people all day long like that.
What Mary did, and what others such as Fred Phelps do, is motivated by a particularly nasty kind of religious belief, which says “We are saved, all who disagree with us are damned, let us now gloat about this. Our god loves us and hates everyone else. Our god tortures people eternally – ain’t it wonderful? Let’s go remind everyone of this so we can feel self-satisfied.”
This is a fact, which is not made any less true by the fact that many other religious people are much nicer than this, nor by the fact that people get judgmental and self-righteous about other things.
It’s also a pattern not at all unique to religious thinking. It’s wired into our tribal, pack-oriented evolution to overlook our flaws and dwell on those of strangers.
Religion is just the oldest and most common way of codifying it. Getting rid of religion does nothing to change it.
You’re confusing two separate things. There are Christians who believe the same sick misguided garbage as Fred Phelps, but instead of delighting in being asses about it, they weep for the damned and live with humility and compassion. Being a dick is just being a dick.
We’re all familiar with the “bullying jock” stereotype, right? But shoving nerds into lockers is not a part of sports. Bullies of that sort use sports as an excuse to feel superior, but that’s their own misuse of something unrelated.
…Yes, you’re right. Thank you for clarifying that.
It does seem to me, though, that this kind of abuse is more accepted these days (in the US) than the other kinds you cited, along with a similar attitude held by certain political conservatives that seems practically obligatory among right-wing pundits. A bullying jock or holier-than-thou vegan won’t find nearly as many supporters as will someone who equates liberalism with treason or calls Obama a communist. While the extremism of Phelps & Co. isn’t too accepted, the lesser extremism of, say, Pat Robertson seems to enjoy broader acceptance.
Yes, absolutely. But that’s because right-wing political culture has chosen to pander to fundamentalist Christians. The competitive, confrontational nature of politics lends much more partisanship to people’s sense of piety. The conflation does far more to bring out the dickwads, in ways that neither Christianity nor conservative politics would suggest on their own.
That’s probably because it wasn’t till the New Testament that the focus shifted to “Love thy neighbor.” Jesus was all about not hating people for being different, and swaying them with kindness.
Most of what I got from the Old Testament, however was, “Live and let live. Unless it’s different from you; then beat it to death with rocks. And maybe set it on fire.”
On one hand, as a Christian you should avoid hanging out with people who tempt you to do sinful things. If you don’t think you can resist temptation avoid putting yourself in the situation. On the other hand, Sierra and Dorothy weren’t coming even close to tempting Mary and Joyce to do anything. Yet another reason to not like Mary. I start to feel sorry for her then I realize she’s not real.
For some reason, “Crumplepunch” makes me think of Mrs. Crumplebottom smacking people over the head with her purse — for making out (or worse) in public. ^_^
Enjoying the comics although I seemed to have missed out on something prior with Mary? I’ve only read Shortpacked! and Dumbing of Age, is there another strip I need to power through to get caught up?
I object to the implication that evil is nice. I’m evil, and in no way nice. My disabled girlfriend whom i take care of is clearly a simple case of “Pet the Dog”.
I also object. If Evil is nice, then Good would, by implication, be mean and nasty. And if Good is mean and nasty, then Malaya is a F-wording saint or something.
I absolutely know how this feels. My family had a friend that was living with us for a great deal of my youth. When the price of living in California got too high, he proposed moving out to Kansas where his mother had a house that we could live in. When we did so, and my father stayed behind to see if he might be able to get enough money in California to make it possible to still live there, people saw my mom living with our family’s friend.
The churches nearby assumed, therefore, that our mom was sleeping with our family’s friend, the whole congregation sharing in this distorted view. Later, my father moved down into the same house, and the distorted view continued. So we tried out churches that were a bit farther away, but since we shared a car with our family’s friend, the basis for the whole thing never really left, and we basically ended up being uncomfortable every church we that went to.
So often, we found “Christians” forgetting simple base rules that are the foundation of their religion, “love your neighbor as yourself”, and “judge not lest you be judged”.
Hm. I’ve heard that evil is well-mannered, persuasive, and charismatic, but nice is a new one. So evil is nice, and presumably her own meanness is righteous. I’d love to know what bible she’s been reading. She’s sounding a bit like a pharisee right now.
Bizarro indeed. Perhaps she’s the result of a failed attempt at cloning Amazigirl. She’s hypersensitive to criticism and can only speak in reversals of her statement’s intended meaning. Ultimately she’s just misunderstood.
I think a saturday cartoon about a wacky villians hillarious hjinks.
That or her catholic is actually a fake catholic secretly created by some trolls on the web to see how much crap they can shove in a book, pass off as a bible and see if people actually buy that it’s a legit copy of the christian one.
You know, I initially didn’t like Joyce, what with her interaction with Joe and all, but she’s really redeemed herself.
I don’t believe in god, and used to really be kind of a dick about it whenever the topic came up around believers (and I sometimes helped it come up). I think I’m a lot nicer/more tolerant now, but I lost one good friend who was a lot like Joyce, at least in part because of Joyce.
Mary is such a Jonah, and a Fantasy Role Play Christian. As in her Christianity is about pretending everyone else is evil and oppressing the church, and she’s one of the few heroes willing to take a stand against impossible odds to save the world.
I’m taking a logic class this quarter, which helps me know how goddamn (unintentional punning!) stupid Mary’s argument is, instead of just feeling that it’s dumb on instinct.
Joyce is a bit naive at times, but she actually upholds true Christian values, and can back up her actions with scripture, as seen when she went to the party. Mary is an example of the hypocrits that non-believers always think about when they come across a “fundamental” Christian, which is just not true. Joyce is a fundamental Christian who actually lives WWJD.
I thought thet the point was hanging out with a group of people who you could think of as being your community, your people. Having a social group that you feel is supporting you has positive effects on the psychology of many people: they like being part of an ‘us’, possibly even at a chemical level.
Of course, the downside to that is that for every ‘us’, there is a ‘them’. Some people see adversarialness between the two.
I’ve enjoyed many a well-written sermon. Like other enjoyable activities, I like talking about a good sermon. Sometimes it’s cleverly written but the argument doesn’t hold up well. Sometimes it’s reversed and I feel a solid Truth gets lost in bad writing.
So to answer your question: My kind, I suppose.
I can’t imagine what your life must be like to consider listening to a sermon an enjoyable activity. Maybe that’s the only time you don’t get hatefully buggered by acacia bushes.
While I have certainly included “discussing a church service” as an enjoyable topic to talk about, particularly if it was an enjoyable sermon, I can’t help but believe that Mary had ulterior motives. Given Sierra’s answer a couple days ago, it seems Mary wished to reinforce her holier than thou stance and separatism from the infidels by discussing a sermon that was obviously about such things.
Either that or she’s a closet lesbian who, like Ryan, uses religion to empassion their prey, followed with something to arouse the person enough to victimize into other lustful activites (with Ryan, this was drugs, with Mary I bet it’s the being naked in her dorm room thing).
I love Shortpacked! and have really gotten into DoA. Prompted to post now because this strip reminded me of a friend I lost at the end of college. Up thru three-nights-before graduation, she was Joyce—- meaning “a little naive, incredibly sweet and sincere, only judgy out of well-intentioned habit”, and we were really tight. Just before we graduated, she announced she was moving to China afterwards to help spread The Word. When I got drunk enough to tell her how horrifyingly (a) offensive and (B) dangerous/illegal that was, she basically ended our friendship. And I still feel like a d-bag.
My point? I kinda lost it. I guess that there’s a fine line between “Joyce” peeps and “Mary” peeps, and it isn’t always clear. If Joyce ships off to China to hunt for converts at the end in defiance of Chinese law and common sense, and tells Walky he’s a jerk for not thinking that’s hunky-dorry, I will be extra-bummed.
I don’t want to start flames here, but given the overwhelmingly negative reaction to Mary’s comment, I’m compelled to ask. Why?
The usage of “Evil”? The way it was explained to me, the biblical definition of evil is the condition of being in opposition to or forsaking God, hence why sin is evil, it drives people away from God. Atheists, or at least atheists who used to be christian, are therefore evil as well, since we reject the existance of any god, and we don’t take the bible as a conduit for universal, transcendental truth. So Mary was technically correct from that perspective.
The attitude? Being holier than thou is certainly annoying if not infuriating, and it hurts yourself when you do it, but that’s kind of a subjective gripe. Most people aren’t tolerant to what they percieve to be evil acts either. Case in point: Plenty of comments here about her being a bongo or too extreme, for rejecting and judging people based on ideological considerations.
Questionable logic? Isn’t a large chunk of religious cosmology based on logic not being as important as faith?
The way it was (vociferously, by Christians) explained to me, things like what Mary did up there was correct, if unpleasant. One of the reasons I don’t put much stock on the bible, really.
If you’re compelled to judge the value of people based on what they think will happen after they die by a compilation of books written over 18 centuries ago, when slavery was ok, women were baby factories and domestic serfs and (allegedly) God decided periodically sending emmisaries detailing in lavish detail the horrible ways in which his wrath would manifest if you weren’t praying hard enough, why are things like being bongoy like Mary worthy of condemnation as opposed to, you know, natural and expected behavior?
Unfortunately, it seems that the Christians that explained it to you were of a very similar mind with Mary, there. While there are some evangelical denominations that are practically militant about putting forward their view of the gospel, there are a great many others that prefer to show the love of Christ through their actions, helping in their communities and whatnot.
Trust me, there are plenty of us Christians out there that have no desire whatsoever to go out and convert the heathens with sword and fire. It just always seems to be the militant idiots who shout the loudest.
It might be natural and expected given the way she was raised and her religious belief system, but it’s still worthy of condemnation because the belief that atheists, non-Christians, and differently-minded Christians are evil is an objectively false one. Yes, Mary was correct from her perspective of what evil is, but that perspective is twisted, and does not reflect how the world actually works. And just because her actions are natural and expected due to her upbringing does not excuse them or make them not bongoy. We condemn racists and bigots who were raised to believe that whites are superior, we condemn murderers whose upbringing stunted their empathy for humanity. We can certainly condemn Mary.
If that is your posture, and you are a christian, by condemning her aren’t you falling into the same “hate the sinner” trap she did back there?
If commiting a sin (denying god) doesn’t make me evil, then I understand that actions are worthy of condemnation but people aren’t. So in this case while Mary’s close-mindedness and bigotry are worthy of condemnation, Mary as a person isn’t, even though our natural impulse is to condemn and reject, because as allegedly people with better morality than her we are supposed to judge and act according to our better nature (for atheists) or the laws of God (for Christians), not give in to destructive temptation. Or at least if we do it, aknowledge we’re doing so rather than pretending we do so out of moral considerations.
Well, the problem is that Christianity is an evangelical religion. It’s our literally God-given duty to go out there and reach out to people. That’s why Jesus spent more time among the sinners than among the self-proclaimed holy.
Much of the Gospels contain stories about Jesus interacting with the latter group in which they would make great showings of their piety and look down at others who were not as “holy” as them. A lot of what Jesus said was a criticism of that attitude of not loving your neighbors as your own brothers and doing all you can to care for them. And he also spent several sermons on the fact that it is not the role of men to judge one another. “Judge not, lest you be judged yourself.” We are not meant to look down on others but to offer them a hand up — to show God’s grace by example rather than to spit on those who have not embraced it. After all, we’ve all got our flaws.
What Mary is saying here is following right into the footsteps of the Pharisees of His days. If you aren’t “Good,” then you don’t deserve a chance to be. The irony is worsened by the fact that Christianity is a religion of redemption and forgiveness. But people like Mary think that what that means is that their flaws are excused, but everyone who doesn’t live just like they do is scum, unworthy of the grace of God.
TL;DR. The problem is that when Mary sees someone coming to church for the first time, she reacts with disgust and condemnation instead of joy and hope. And that’s wrong on so many levels.
As has been said before and more eloquently by smarter people than I, if more Christians acted like Jesus did, there would be fewer atheists as militantly opposed to religion as many of us are.
You mean when Jesus threatened people with everlasting fire if they disbelieved, preached that the world was going to end imminently and that they should give no thought for the morrow, and told them that credulously believing his claims without evidence was a commendable virtue?
No, I’m pretty sure there would still be plenty of atheists.
Don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t want to give the impression that I think Jesus said nothing good at all, (the golden rule is a fine ethical dictum, though certainly not original to him) but I am compelled to challenge the assumption that everything he said was an unimpeachable source of moral wisdom.
As an aside, bear in mind that everyone on this thread who has tried to define good as “God’s will, and nothing else” needs to make a serious effort to reconcile the above statements with their moral compass.
Zap didn’t technically say there would be fewer atheists. He said fewer would.be as militant.
There are also very strong arguments that Jesus didn’t actually preach most of what you say, especially when those interpretations only seem to have taken a firm hold starting with Augustine. The major issue of faith over evidence would remain, but remember that not everyone who disbelieves in gods is a rationalist.
It’s true, I misspoke in saying “there would still be atheists” rather than “atheists would still be as militant”, but I think the argument still applies.
As for Jesus not preaching these things, if you don’t wish to believe that Jesus said the things he is quoted as saying in the bible, then you will find little argument from me, but in that case I don’t see on what basis you can claim to know his teachings in any meaningful sense. Moreover, “give no thought for the morrow” was the fundamental tenet of the early church, long before the birth of Augustine.
There is indeed a long tradition of irrational atheists. Neitchze and Schopenhauer spring to mind most prominently. I would never claim that such people do not exist, nor that they can find ample reason to sustain their beliefs. I shouldn’t really have to point out that I feel no obligation to agree with them on every point.
A lot of it is a matter of translation and interpretation–especially if the translator or the reader already has certain assumptions in mind. Pedantic stuff below. Skip to the last paragraph for my actual point.
The phrase in Matt 6:34 that can be translated “give no though” and also be translated as “do not be anxious” which lacks the same connotation of irresponsibility, and squares much better with 2 Thess 3:10 that way.. KJV is pretty, but it’s crap as a translation.
A strictly literal reading of Matt 25 would indicate an enduring fire, but it would also indicate that Jesus is talking about goats and sheep, which we know he is not. Obviously, some allowance has to be made for at least some figurative language, and that leaves open a lot of doors. Even a great many conservative orthodox scholars who believe in an eternal hell do not believe the flames to be literal, but to represent extreme suffering. Many interpret that suffering not as deliberate torment, but as a natural consequence of removal from God’s presence. Whichever case, it’s worth pointing out that the Greek “aionios/aionion” does not literally mean “eternal/eternity.” Concepts such as annihilationism, universalism, and others have been around for a very long time and can make a strong scriptural case for themselves… although of course a “universal” church that wishes to teach through fear will naturally suppress such schools of thought.
Apart from argument over the concept of Hell itself, the judgement criterion of “whatever you did for the least of these” draws a lot of discussion, since most translations would seem to imply that the condition for salvation is not counscious belief in Christ, but in *being Christ-like* and compassionate, regardless of belief in Jesus.
Augustine wrote about universal reconciliation and the idea that Hell is a temporary state, and makes it sound as though these ideas were fairly common. Certainly they were around earlier than his writing, at the least. While he refutes these ideas, he refers to the disagreement as “amicable controversy” and dismisses it as a mere “error” of very kind-hearted Christians–esentially the beliefs were around and were tolerated as benign. Occasional figures of authority within the Catholic church and the Eastern Orthodox church express universalist ideas themselves, which should make it clear enough that these interpretations are not particularly unorthodox at all. The most likely to strongly insist on eternal flames of torment for all unbelievers would be the various flavors of Baptist that popped up in the United States.
Supposing that there’s a divine being worth worshipping (yeah, I know, but humor me), scriptural interpretations that view Hell and/or the soul as temporary, or that view Hell as entirely figurative, make much more sense than a “just” deity that punishes finite transgression with infinite torment, regardless of how uncommon they are among noisy American Christians. If the texts can be read that way (they can) and there is at least as much support for these readings as for unconscionable literalist readings (and there is), it seems to me that any of these are more likely correct than the literal view. But *any* position on Hell, etc. is going to be bullshit to almost any atheist anyway, so…
Considering how much of the venom toward Christianity is a direct result of persecution by Christians, doesn’t it stand to reason that some significant number of atheists would be less inclined to go on the attack if they were never attacked themselves? If Christians didn’t try to force their beliefs into law, blame the poor for their own condition, and spew hatred? If they treated everyone with kindness and respect, regardless of faith or creed? I’m sure some rationalist atheists might still bash Christianity for being irrational, but wouldn’t fewer find it worth their time? Richard Dawkins seems to think so… http://richarddawkins.net/articles/20-atheists-for-jesus
There is really very little I can offer in response to your scholarship, having already pigeon-holed myself as a vengeful and militant rationalist. I would point out, however, that the extreme breadth of interpretation you demonstrate in Jesus’ teaching is a mark in it’s disfavour as an article of revealed truth.
On whether atheists are merely responding to oppression I can only relate my own experience. I was born and raised in a small, predominantly secular European nation, and have never been in the least inconvenienced by religious oppression, attempts to convert me are thin on the ground at best, and religious hatred has never been spewed at me (at least in my presence). Still, I am, as you have certainly guessed, opposed to religion.
Why? Well, I made some rather mordant comments towards a claim of psychic powers a few pages back. I think anyone who is either deluded or dishonest enough to make such a claim should immediately pay a price in the undisguised scorn of their peers. I feel the same way about those who say they have encountered ghosts or secret alien incursions, those who think that Elvis is alive, and those who claim to know the instructions of the creator of the universe.
This is, I must stress, a very different thing to dismissing Jesus’ merits as a moral philosopher, which I think are considerable, (I think this is Dawkin’s main point, mixed with a dash of intentional provocativeness,) I just don’t think he should be emulated in all things. In a mirror universe, if the Church of Plato had lost it’s way, and the suggestion was raised that we would be all better off if we were to just emulate Plato, then I might say that while the we would do better still to avoid the pederasty.
No doubt a kindly apologist would point out to me that Greek translation is difficult, and he only meant we should love young boys in a platonic sense.
“I would point out, however, that the extreme breadth of interpretation you demonstrate in Jesus’ teaching is a mark in it’s disfavour as an article of revealed truth.” There are several possible resolutions to that as well, although none that would likely satisfy you. The most woo-tastic is that the Holy Spirit is required to divinely inspire the *reader* and not just the writer. The most sensible is that humans are stupid or at best imperfect, and no matter what God says, loads of readers (and writers too, if you’re a heretic like myself) are going to get it completely wrong anyway. I’m not sure what criteria a strict rationalist could set for divine inspiration anyway.
“On whether atheists are merely responding to oppression I can only relate my own experience…” Of course. And it was never my insinuation that atheists are “merely” responding to oppression. However, it is a very common reason given by militant atheists in the United States, for reasons you can probably imagine. Believe it or not, I take their side more often than otherwise.
From a rational standpoint, I understand your point of view very well. If not for some profound personal experiences despite an otherwise clean bill of mental health, I would be right there with you. I don’t care to relate the specifics, and I doubt they would be of any relevance to you. Suffice to say, the difference between me and a more typical theist (other than my rejection of any strict dogma or superstition) is that I am not under any illusion that empirical evidence can or should bear my beliefs out as rational. For analogy as to why it shouldn’t… A good author seldom inserts himself into his books, and writes his worlds to be internally consistent and sufficient cause for their own existence. An intelligent character in such a story would be able to use Occam’s Razor to deduce that there is no author, and that’s as it should be.
Philosophically, we all must make an intuitive leap from “cogito ergo sum” to the necessary assumptions that our cognition is grounded in an actual reality, and that our sensory experience *generally* approximates that reality with some acceptable degree of accuracy. We can’t explicitly relate to others what our experience is like or empirically prove that we perceive our own cognition–only that our descriptions tend to be similar. I make one more intuitive assumption about the reality of one more aspect of my internal experience (that certain “spiritual” experiences such as free will are real rather than illusory) and make no claims about it to anyone, as it is unverifiable inherently. In all other things, I take a naturalist, skeptical view, including claims of miracles, ghosts, demons, etc.
Put one more way: If a rationalist were to actually see Russel’s teapot first hand, and found no evidence of being delirious, it wouldn’t be irrational to believe in it… but if they forgot to bring their camera they’d never go around claiming to have seen it nor expect anyone to believe them if they did. I think that’s exactly consistent with the point of Russel’s thought experiment, and outside of conversations like this one, that’s where I see myself. I mention my experience in these cases only as an example, which to you might as well be merely hypothetical. All of this is to illustrate my position, not to convince you of it. That’s about all one can do with intuitive leaps and internal experience, and it makes characters like Sarah Connor or James Cole eerily sympathetic. If that’s worthy of ridicule, please accept my, uh, apologies.
“No doubt a kindly apologist would point out to me that Greek translation is difficult, and [Plato] only meant we should love young boys in a platonic sense.” I see what you did there!
Whatever my opinions of the original message of the bible, I am inclined to agree that it’s interpretation has been thoroughly imperfect. I must question, though, why an omnipotent god would make his revelation in a way as to assure such divisive misinterpretation (I am assuming here you favour the latter of your two explanations). Something so small as manifesting in a more literate part of the world, of which there were many at the time, would surely have aided the consistency of the message.
These are minor scruples, however. I am not sure what would constitute divine revelation, because, being an atheist, I have never, in my estimation, encountered it. It has been suggested by others that Jesus would have had more credibility if he had made advanced scientific predictions, such as “energy equals the the speed of light squared.” This, in my opinion, would be insufficient, but it certainly wouldn’t hurt. Laying the groundwork for a comprehensible science of morality would have been better still.
Your illustration of Russel’s Teapot is revealing; such a rationalist would be quite unable to rule out the possibility that their senses had been somehow confounded or that the situation was otherwise deceptive. To take a slide into literalism for a moment, were I, as a deep space astronaut, to find a teapot floating in orbit between Earth and Mars, I would naturally assume that somebody had launched it up there as a elaborate practical joke at the expense of the humanities academics they send into space. As you point out, anecdotal evidence is vulnerable to interpretations of this sort.
I would hate to give you the impression that I was demanding an apology from you. Making as you do no claim to empirical evidence, I cannot see that we have grounds for disagreement, as this is no time for a discussion on the role of evidence in epistemology. So… sorry that you’re sorry, I guess? Good talk.
You’ve hit pretty close to my position on revealed truth already, I think. Supposing a universal God exists, all of theology is an attempt to understand an infinite, perfect, incomprehensible reality in finite, imperfect, understandable terms. Every possible position is wrong. In that case, it MUST be acceptable to be wrong. Any revealed truth. Would be limited by this, so I think the important questions are whether the moral teaching is intact, and it conveys what relationship we are to have with this incomprehensible being. On these, the Gospels leave little to interpret.
What speaks to me about Jesus is that instead of offering rules and cosmology, he shows by example what universal love is. I prefer to think this illustrates an acknowledgement that more than a minimum of theology would be lost and that law-giving would be subject to obsolescence. Lots of other stuff, but too much to go into.
In all honesty, it doesn’t really matter how Mary’s comment is interpreted. She wanted to enflame the masses and she succeeded. She wanted to separate those she feel is evil and she did. We are mostly negative towards her as a reaction to her negativity towards us. While she is a comic character and she had directed (indirected?) her words towards Dorothy and Sierra, she was really speaking broadly, as to any of not her beliefs.
Honestly, while one could point out the hyprocicy that we treat her as the hypocrit, it still doesn’t reeally matter as obviously she doesn’t want our sympathy either. We have already seen Joyce attempt to bridge the gap and I know that if she is shut out then I don’t see a point in trying.
Many of us gave her a chance with this entire arc, and it’s clear to most, if not all, present that she is a b-word.
Do you mean you have a problem with people who murder abortion doctors, or a problem with abortion doctors who also murder people on the side? In either case, the murder solution is to just murder people who are doing the things that bother you until nobody’s doing those things anymore. Pretty simple, really.
I like this contrast between Mary and Joyce – because Mary seems like who Joyce is supposed to be at first and Mary is like how Joyce might have been without good character development. It’s contrasting the initial reaction to Joyce vs who Joyce really is.
The problem is, it’s all too easy for people to become like Mary because of the nature of most organized religions. When you have a religious tradition that teaches that it is good, therefore other religious traditions are bad, you end up fostering an us vs them attitude. For example, a lot of Christians believe in the No True Christian fallacy – if you stop being a Christian at some point, for whatever reason, you must have not ever been a Christian in the first place, even when you truly and honestly believed you were. This comes directly from the us vs them attitude; if someone stops being part of “us”, they are naturally part of the multitudes of “them”, and probably were “them” all along.
So wait does that mean in her twisted little mind people don’t bother with Good because people like her are mean?
She is one of those people that will be evil in the name of doing good and then be shocked if she wakes up in Hell going? What throwing my kids out of my house for being Gay was evil?
That’s a good habit, actually. I wish I had that kind of self-contro. Unfortunately, I’ve been potty-mouthed since middle scholl, and it’s a hard habit to break.
To be entirely fair, this all depends entirely on your definitions of “evil” and “good”. God may well hate bare feet and people who don’t kowtow to him. (The latter point is well-supported biblically, in fact.)
He also said that you should treat others as you wish to be treated. Therefore, Mary should not ostracize Dorothy and Sierra because their beliefs are different than hers.
…and so you have the scary part of religion. Thankfully I’ve never met anyone like that, but the thought still scares me. To love something THAT MUCH. To the point where all others who do not share your love are in some way…evil. I understand belief and faith are things that can keep a person going in life…but it has such huge consequences for some. If someone is to believe thier religion – truly believe it – then all the others have to be wrong. That’s just terrifying.
Agreed. Girl’s been a model Christian, not to mention overall good person. Have I missed a line in Leviticus about wearing shoes all the time or keeping your belly covered?
(There might be. A lot of early commandments – circumcision for instance – were “dude we live in the desert you’ll die if you don’t do this” commandments. Covering your body and feet are important to survival in the desert, so there might be commandments for them.)
To be fair, Mary is also interesting, and has depth. Otherwise nobody would care about her OR her beliefs… Yet the entire comments section today is about her and what a b-word she is.
If she was truly as one-dimensional as she seems, most people would probably just say, “Meh,” and move on, not caring.
People like it when there is an obvious choice for how to feel about a character; then they can all say the same thing and experience the camaraderie of agreeing with pretty much everyone.
*Continues to studiously avoid reading or making a comment on a DOA strip until this religious themed story arc is over*
*Will check back tomorrow*
*realizes that by leaving this comment, she is breaking the promise she made to herself when this storyline started, and contradicting the statement in the first sentence*
I want to hate Mary. I do. But I love her wrist bands. I also like that she’s mostly naked at 3pm. And still wears her wrist bands. Dear Cheese! I think I have a fetish! 🙂
I agree, the only reason they think she is a bongo is because they are jealous of those bongoin’ wristbands. I mean, they match her outfit and everything. They just fashion haters.
If you want to kill a church, put Mary in charge of outreach. Even after 5 years holding the line for organized religion, these people never cease to amaze me.
I sense that Mary has an interesting back story which led to her being this way. That expression in panel 3 may have simply been disappointment with Joyce, but I’d sooner believe the former and leave a little room for Mary to redeem herself in my eyes. I’m not quite ready to write her off as a B-word.
Some of the comments for this comic are in the ‘TL; DR’ category. (Too Long; Didn’t Read)
I suppose it’s commendable that a comic is raising such debate. Yet I wonder whether people are reading too much into four or five panels. Today’s comic might have been simply to show that Joyce does not prejudge people based on their religion, while Mary does. As a writer (not an author, since I’m not published), I am always amazed how stories take on a life of their own, far beyond what the author intended.
The big irony is both sides are missing the fact that Jesus’ being the prophecized messiah was IRRELEVANT to the Gentile converts (at least at the start of the whole business). The people who cared about Jesus being the prophecized one were JEWS. You know, the people who formed the start of the church.
No, seriously, I swear this is a major problem in my area. Huge swaths of the churches around my area seem to dislike acknowledging the early Christians were Jews and sort of go like, “Yeah, the Romans were the first real Christians. Forget the other guys. Oh and they weren’t Italian either.” I wish I were kidding.
I’m going to be very disappointed if Joyce doesn’t abandon her faith by the end of this series AT LEAST. The REAL irony is Joyce is just as bad just a few frames ago with the Mormon girl. She’s only hang out with Dorothy because she thinks she has a chance to “Be a good Christian influence” on her, whereas just like Mary she eschews the presence of those who don’t conform to her beliefs AND have no chance of conforming in the future.
She can grow into a more rounded individual without abandoning Christianity altogether. The fact she acknowledges a bit she’s not good with a lot of real world stuff but tries anyway is good. Maybe Willis wants her to follow his own path into atheism, but I’d kind of expect that’s not really where he’s going. But then, I’m not him,
IT’s not quite the same I guess, but I knew people at my boarding school who would attack me some of the time for being christian. They weren’t Mary’s level of ‘B-word’, but when I said that I was a chrisitian and believed in evolution and the big gang, I was told that I couldn’t possibly be telling the truth and so I just said I was christian to cover my back or something. I didn’t like those guys a lot of the time.
Shunning people you think are nice because your scripture says they’re evil. If there’s one right way to do religion, this might be the exact opposite of that.
Um no…it’s hard to be a good person without having a nice side. It can hidden, but total assholes are generally not good. Questioning things isn’t “evil” and neither showing your midsection. When did Jesus ever say to snub all non-believers?
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To many Marys in this world.
Like I said, it’s people like her that give religion a bad name.
“Shot through the heart, and you’re to blame.”
YOU GIVE GOD A BAD NAME!
some one did this joke yesterday i think it was kernator.
Yup!
I have to admit, I hadn’t expected the enthusiastic response I go to that comment. I hadn’t gotten anything like that since the time I suggested that Willis put “Dina Summaries” of each in-universe day.
The “Holy than thou” attitude drives me nuts, even when they’re my own religion/political party. But I notice it more with people who are atheist than people who aren’t, though not by a large margin.
I think every group has an equally large percentage of “holier than thou” members, but only by other groups’ standards. Every religion, party, or other group has something its members believe is true but practically nobody else does, so any time people talk about that “truth” they’ll annoy outsiders long before other group members. However, a lot of really “holier than thou” people will cross that line pretty quickly, hence why more rational people like you and I don’t notice a large gap.
You mean you find lots of atheists who think they’re holier than thou? Odd. I’d think it would be significantly easier to find atheists who’re ‘smartier than thou’ – ones who find theistic beliefs to be too problematic at some intellectual or moral level to put up with (or at a less abrasive level, to ‘respect’). I can see that having roughly the same end result though.
Whether they are holy or “smart”, it’s still looking down on others. Also, I’ve found many atheists would be better described as believing there is no God as opposed to lacking a belief in any god, which makes them just as fervent as any Christian about their beliefs.
Fervency is relative; I believe that there’s no Christian god with absolute certainty because of the internal contradictions. This is the same sort of fervent belief I have in 1+1 equaling 2 and in gravity existing. On the subject of many non-christian gods I believe there is no god the same way I believe there are no unicorns. It’s real disbelief, but let me get a good look at one (I have a lab table ready, complete with straps!), and I’ll readily change my tune.
As for looking down on others, yes, some of us do that; I certainly wasn’t saying otherwise. I personally have a tendency to look down on people who cling to silly beliefs, theistic or not. I was merely getting picky about using the term ‘holier than thou’ to describe my particular brand of snobbery.
So in other words your trying to fulfill the stereotype you mentioned.
That makes you the most unreliable source possible. By calling them ‘silly beliefs’, you have proven yourself to be more then a little bit closed minded. Closed minded usually means stupid. Not in all situations, but its a slippery slope. Even if I was an atheist, which in another life I could have been, to assume one is always right is egotistical.
So, as a smarter then thou, do you believe yourself to be smarter then any believers. Its better to admit your egotistical, then to beat around the bush like most smarter then thou’s would.
I don’t have to try to fulfill a stereotype. I am a human. I have human flaws. I am burdened by a hubris that comes easily to one that (believe it or not) actually has found that for periods of my life many things came more easily to my understanding than they did to others.
(That period is over – I’m getting older and my memory has gotten incredibly spotty. But the hubris learned in my youth is a hard-to-shed habit.)
My ego doesn’t make me an unreliable source, though. It doesn’t help my arguments, but it doesn’t weaken them either. My arguments stand alone.
Not that I’m actually *making* any arguments against religion at the moment. I’m just baldly stating that after a great deal of analysis, most of which I did before my brain went, I have come to certain conclusions about the likelihood of various types of deity existing. Some of these conclusions were summarized above.
Having reached these conclusions, I see others to whom these issues seemingly haven’t even crossed their mind. I forget how much deliberation it took me to reach my conclusions and wonder at these people’s abilities to overlook the obvious.
Not that all of these conclusions require a lot of deliberation. Some beliefs are just silly.
And thinking that doesn’t make me stupid. Regardless of how convenient it would be to some people to dismiss my conclusions so handily.
To summarize Begbert, you made an ad hominem attack, and this ain’t a debate on morals.
None the less really a debate.
Cronomatt, please improve punctuation and wording before suggesting that another poster with correct writing practices is stupid. It is very difficult to resist posting a long list of errors that need to be corrected, which would make both of us look bad.
If cronomatt has writing errors I would hardly think that makes her arguments less valid. She could very well be a non native english speaker.
Ease off my brother. He’s intelligent, but he’s not the grammar and spelling guru of the family.
That’s called hypocrisy, man!
To be fair, using ad hominem to discredit someone using ad hominem is a bit backwards. Still, it does prove he’s sloppy at least. Also, non-native isn’t an excuse when you’re trying to have a debate, since there are standards that must be upheld for a debate to exist in the first place. To be fair, using ‘your’ instead of ‘you’re’ is hardly under that
standard.
However, do note that ‘silly beliefs’ isn’t nearly as close minded as you might think it is. Most believers think that those not of their faith are either idiots/ignorant/evil/misguided/close minded/etc – all of which strike me as extremely condescending. Point is we all consider our beliefs to be superior to the other ones, otherwise we’d use those instead. Hence, ‘silly beliefs’ merely uses less sugar to coat the innate condescension mostly everyone has when tackling this sort of debate. This does not take away from his argument, it just makes him less amiable (still a mistake if you’re trying to be convincing though).
I think most people believe contradictory and/or unproven things.
@icepyrox largely depends on their environment. I can guarantee that atheists that had/have religion pushed in their faces all day long will be MUCH more acerbic then those that are lucky enough not to have to deal with such. Therefor it is a case of ‘annoyed/angry to the point of rage’ rather then belief. In other words, no – lacking belief still is lacking belief, but some are more angry/annoyed about the fact that it’s considered abnormal to lack a faith in most societies (not to mention consequences thereof, see comic above for just one of the many many situations one can encounter as a atheist).
Anger can create passion, it’s that passion you mistake for
belief.
Yeah, George is right here: every political or religious (or atheist) group has “holier than thou” people in about the same concentration, except of course in a cult scenario where you’re kind of required to be like that. We just tend to notice the ones in groups we disagree with more, because they’re the ones we run into more.
I imagine by and large it’s also more a case of the attitude being more apparent to those outside the clutch of a belief, I will not deny that I’ve come across many internet atheists who lacked any sort of tact of humility for their personal beliefs, but in my experience it has always ‘seemed’ like those professing a belief in the Christian god touted this attitude more, that said, again it’s all a matter of perspective, the amount total with this actual attitude may vary greatly from what is perceived by the individual and what is actual H.T.T tude versus the grey areas of followers to a belief.
Funny thing – ‘tact’ won’t make an argument more or less valid, but humans tend to ignore anything that comes from an aggravating source. Meaning that if you want PEOPLE to care about the sounds you make with your mouth-flaps, you’d better try to be likeable while you do it. Many fall short of this basic hurdle.
“Some people want to live their lives
Within the sound of a church bell
I wan to open a rescue shop
Within a yard of hell.”
Staying away from non-Christians and shunning then is the opposite of what Jesus wanted his followers to do. You’ll never lighten dark places if you don’t go in yourself with a light.
The sad thing is that she’s ignoring the fact that Jesus hung out with tax collectors (the equivalent of extortionists, in the day), whores, thieves, and many other kinds of sinners. These, he said when challenged by the Pharisees for his practice, were those who needed to be saved. Hanging out with the righteous and pure accomplished nothing, they were already saved.
That’s not to say that Christians should hang out with people who are in the commission of sinful acts. Just that associating with a sinner isn’t an evil or sinful act. And avoiding a sinner isn’t in itself a righteous behavior, and is actually contrary to the teachings of Christ.
She doesn’t strikes me as the sort of person to have Joyce’s courage. Or a nice person.
So many Marys ruining it for Joyce =(
SO many “Marys” in this world that ruin it for all us “Joyces” 🙁
Mary should worry about her own soul and stay out of Joyce’s business. But then, how often do fundies do that?
Alternatively: Mary should be concerned about Dorothy’s and Sierra’s souls, and welcome the opportunity for them to be exposed to the Gospel. Jesus didn’t shy away from associating with ‘bad’ people, after all.
Not to mention that as bad people go, the athesit who doesn’t speak up a lot about it and the girl with no shoes are pretty low risk associations.
Seriously. How the hell is no shoes but religious girl even that off putting? She’s a sanitary concern at best, not a spiritual one.
I guess Mary is that anal?
Joyce is also crazier than most of the religious people I meet in real life.
Yeah, it’s like Mary exists here to make Joyce not look so bad by comparison, but Joyce is still way out there herself.
Least’ she’s brave and a genuinely nice person. No matter the brand of crazy she believes in, I’d still hang out with her. Heck, my oldest best friend believes in dozens of conspiracy theories and quasi-magical bullshit ala ‘free energy’ and I shudder to think what other physics-defying nonsense – he’s still a great friend, even if terribly annoying at times due to sed brand of crazy.
As of today, your gravatar is Mary making a disgusted face complaining about the number of Marys in the world.
First? First for me.
Well done.
Shoeless = Evil?
all those pictures of satan do you see him wearing shoes? no cause he’s rockin hoofs. Blessed be to Adidas, Nike and Reebok.
Don’t forget Converse! 😉
Converse in league with Satan!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Well, not Nike. That whole goddess of child labor thing…
BLASPHEMY!!!!!!!!! 🙂
MADNESS!!!
ONANISM!!!
TRIBADISM!!!
ONAN! My god that man was great!
ONAN! He loved to masturbate!
His name was Onan! That man he was a jewel!
ONAN! He tended to his tool!
(Lyrics to my favorite song about a Judeo-Christian hero figure.)
He didn’t masturbate, he just didn’t spill his cum into the woman he had promised to make babies with. We have no idea whether he masturbated or not, we just know that in a society that mistreated women, he was cursed by God for lying to a woman he promised to make a baby with. Women were valued for having babies–she wanted a baby, and keeping that from her would be the equivalent of a modern man keeping a woman from going to work. The society was twisted, but God punished the man for shaming that woman in her society–treating her like a whore, instead of giving her what he promised. Onan promised her commitment, but he was just bein a playa. God was concerned about the treatment of the woman. So he smited the man who treated her like a whore. God could have smited the entire society, but he was merciful. THAT’s the story of Onan. It has nothing whatsoever to do with masturbation. Genesis 38.
Our house… in the middle of our street!
Sierra wears her Sunday best!
This conversation thread gives me an idea…
Create a pair of shoes that shout out “HAIL SATAN” with every sixth step!
Or every 666th step, and don’t even advertise it! That way it scares the crap out of whoever gets them!
All you have to do is venture over to the Order of the Stick… Belkar the resident evil halfing… self proclaimed “A Sexy Shoeless God of War”
http://www.giantitp.com
Joyce’s all like bongoes be crazy! and Dorothy’s like word.
Word.
B-Word.
If you’re havin’ girl problems I feel bad for you, son. I got 99 problems but a b-word ain’t one.
To your mother
For a nickel
With her penis
On her FAAACE
How do you live with Roz as your roomate with that attitude?
Rampant nudity?
It solved all my problems so far.
I get the feeling you were being sarcastic, but it works… Roz is probably out so much that Mary can get her “evil time” easily, so she doesn’t want to complain about it or start anything with Roz because that would mess things up.
Or she isn’t a hypocrite but figures that as long as she has to room with evil it’s better to be with someone even she won’t bother trying to change. I’m betting on the first one, but you never know…
In a simmering cloud of passive-aggressive mutually intolerant scorn?
That just reeks of hatesex to me.
Joyce just gave an awesome Buuuuuuurn!
She gave the OTHER b-word!
Sup, B-words!
Joyce has her short comings, but she tries. So much character develpment with her. Hats off to you Willis.
So very much agreed.
I’m liking her much more in this strip than I did in Roomies!, for sure. She’s just as sheltered and naive, but she seems to have a better attitude overall.
Her biggest problem is her unhealthy attitude towards sex. Other than that, she interacts fairly healthfully with everyone.
Her biggest strength is that, in *most* areas, she’s willing to try and overlook any prejudices or biases and judge a person based on one or two traits they might have. So yeah, I have to say I like her too.
I liked Joyce-that-shall-not-be-named too, but that’s because she was FREAKING INSANE.
She was fun-insane though. Mmmm…. sexy insanity.
I completely agree. She’s got more extreme views than Mary for sure, but she’s much more open to new ideas and people. I don’t know how people like Mary get through the day, especially at a college campus.
Fuckin’ Presbyterians.
Why? Are they better at it than other religions?
I think there was a Cracked article about that….
Jeez, she’s even worse than Walkyverse!Mary. At least that one could pretend to be nice for a while.
I don’t think Mary was pretending to be nice. She’s nice to people who share her views. She was nice to Sal before she took off and to Danny before he started migrating away from her standards. I don’t think we got a good look at how she gets on with people she doesn’t agree with. I remember her relationship with Joe being strained to say the least, but I’ll have to go back and reread the road trip story arc.
You know, I have to wonder. If “Evil” is nice, what does mean about Mary anyway?
Plus, all I remember about Mary from Roomies! was the word hypocrite. Nothing else comes to mind.
Of course she’s not going to say B-words, it’s too damn vague.
Barbarians? That’s why I left my last church.
It was a nice church up in Lindisfarne.
Hey, some of us like Danish for breakfast!
I think it’s called smørrebrød.
That may be, but I was referring to Grendel eating the Danes in”Beowulf.” Thus, “Danish.”
This was in response to TPman’s comment about Lindisfarne, where the first Viking raid in England took place. Historically, Danes were among the Scandanavian peoples who were known as the “Vikings.”
Mine was a joke, too. “Smørrebrød” is “Danish for breakfast”, get it?
Anyway, thanks for the explanation, I guess.
For what it’s worth, I got both jokes.
For what it’s worth, I appreciate both extrapolations. I wouldn’t have gotten either one without them.
I like that Mary is like the evil version of Joyce. You get people saying all the time that Joyce is a hateful little fundamentalist (well, I don’t really see that anymore, but anyway), and then Mary comes along to be a genuinely hateful fundamentalist.
I mean, you could say that Joyce is just as bad as Mary, just more innocent about it. But I wouldn’t really buy that.
Yeah… Joyce is a fundamentalist but too nice to really get into the whole “burn the heathens” thing most of them have going on. Sounds like her parents are too, since they’re letting her go to IU which means they can’t be so extreme that even fundamentalist churches disappoint them on a regular basis. Sadly, there are a lot more Marys than Joyces in the world… hence my belief that Joyce is going to be the one the title is talking about. She can’t ignore the b-word gap forever.
Hmm, hadn’t thought that Joyce could be the ‘me’ in the title. Seeing Joyce leave her church (or even gradually become an agnostic/atheist) could be interesting. It’s not something you see all that often, and when you do it tends to be as bad a Chick Tract.
Joyce becoming an atheist? Inconceivable! What’s next? An interdimensional cheesehead robot with godlike powers?
I realise you’re being sarcastic, but I’d just like to point out that Willis has said Joyce is autobiographical.
I was actually trying to be funny, but I get those confused in my head a lot, sorry.
No need to apologise. By sarcastic I meant ‘joyfully poking fun’, not, like, ‘trying to destroy my soul with bitterness’ or anything.
He has? Missed that. That’ll be some interesting developments, then.
Explains the last pages of Joyce and Walky nicely.
Wait, that actually makes me sort of sexually attracted to Joyce then. Only thing that was really stopping me was her fundy-ness.
But then again, she’s not yet tapable because of sed still existent fundy-ness. Damn, another day Joyce, another day. (Why yes, I do find the prospect of marriage sexually arousing as long as it’s secular.)
Willis has said that he doesn’t plan to have Joyce become an Atheist. While Willis said originally that Joyce was the character most like him, but that was in the other continuity. Moreover, I don’t believe that he said Joyce was autobiographical.
That being said, I’d love to see Joyce break away from Christianity. There’s a lot of things in the Bible that don’t mesh with her personality – genocide and such.
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2011/comic/book-1/04-the-bechdel-test/gasp/#comment-17029
‘Joyce is autobiographical.’
Anyway, disappointing, but understandable if he didn’t want to do that.
Now I can’t get the idea of Joyce making webcomics with Willis as one of the main characters, occasionally inspiring comments from her fans such as “CURSE YOU, BROWN!” XD
“WITH OUR PENIS!”
Maybe not in comics, but it happens all the time in real life. Most of the atheists I know were raised religious. Pharyngula has been posting peoples’ “Why I’m an Atheist” stories for weeks now.
Sorry, yeah, that’s what I meant. It’s not often you see a work of fiction showing someone becoming an atheist, unless it’s about how they found their faith again.
“Wow, I left it behind the sofa this whole time! “
No there are more Joyces than Marys, the Marys just tend to be the ones you notice more.
She did tell Sarah that she was the best-socalized of her homeschool group.
http://www.dumbingofage.com/2010/comic/book-1/01-move-in-day/socialized/
Joyce is basically early Ned Flanders. A bit overly invested in her religion, but ultimately a nice person.
Thank you for that comment. Now I’m seeing Joyce in a tight-fitting ski suit.
Joyce + good character development = good Christian who isn’t all about “all heathens shall die forever”.
Mary is basically Joyce, sans character development – if Joyce didn’t meet good people who weren’t church-goers she’d probably be more like Mary.
I think Joyce came from a family that also rejected Mary’s way of thinking; hence the changing of churches.
Mary’s such a B-word.
Willis is gone, let the kingdom of terror begin!
I prefer Tim Burton’s ‘Batman’ to Michael Bay’s ‘Transformers’!
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!
I don’t even know why I’m laughing evilly!
MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Probably because it fits so well with that avatar.
Yeah, why are you? If you were truly evil, you’d obviously prefer Michael Bay.
The point of view I’m expressing is intentionally the opposite of Willis’.
What Mary seems to be forgetting is that Jesus spent a great deal of time with people that the religious leaders of his day considered evil (or at least unfavored) that said what is her issue with sieerra
A lot of people think “not devout” is just a tamer version of “athiest” and thus evil. Of course we don’t know if Sierra is devout or not, she just hasn’t shown the same priorities as Mary.
Of course, with people like Mary she could be really devout but if it was at the wrong church it wouldn’t matter… heck, if she was a devout Catholic or Mormon it could make things worse.
I’m a devout Agnostic. Which people confuse for Atheism all the time.
I’m an atheist, who is also partially agnostic. A lot of agnostics (though not all) are often atheists as well. All atheist means is “has no belief in a god” so so it’s perfectly conceivable to be an atheist agnostic 🙂
Thou is not alone, brother.
Personally I’m atheistic about all religions, while being agnostic about the possible existence of a omni-deus.
You have your agnostics who are like, “I believe in god, but don’t have 100% logical certainty (because that’s impossible), so I’m a logical agnostic.” Those agnostics are theistic agnostics.
All other agnostics are also atheists, because they don’t actually believe in a god. That’s all it takes to be an atheist nowadays, by the most broadly agreed-upon definition of the term. (There are sub-categories of atheism for the ones who are absolutely certain and/or loud about it, but you don’t have to be one of them to be just an atheist by the definition of it.)
Suffice to say atheism’s a far from exclusive club. We count inanimate objects among our members!
I’m an agnostic as well. We are atheists in every practical sense, the difference is merely technical. Although fully-fledged atheists are more likely to be militant.
Not really ‘fully-fledged’. It’s more a matter of rage or seeing it as a personal cause/crusade. Someone’s gotta’ rah-rah fight-da-powah.
People who refuse to wear shoes are evil. Its in the Bible….probably… ok maybe not. Perhaps Mary has a napoleon complex because Sierra is tall? umm penis envy?No thats not it perhaps Her family owns a shoe store? ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm…
Fuck it Mary is just a douche.
Don’t you mean “D-word?”
how unbecoming of me I apologize for my foul tongue
allow me to restate my opinion in more gentleman/lady like way
f-word it Mary is just a d-word.
Or we could just avoid sexist language and say she’s a jerk, a prig, a pill, an “a-word”, rude, obnoxious, someone who sticks her nose into other peoples’ personal business…
A somewhat ironic comment, since I’ve mostly ever seen the “douche” appellation applied to males. Using it for Mary could actually be seen as an act of gender parity. Now, the C-word. THAT’S sexist, and I hesitated to even use the abbreviated form, and no way in H-word would I have even typed it out. My wife doesn’t even read webcomics, but she would know…
I usually use the word to describe a male who is being a-word as well sometimes I forget what d-word is okay to apease tuhula
F-word.it Marry is just a a-word
“Douche” is french for shower. Just thought I’d share that.
Much like ‘dude’, it’s become gender-neutral over the years, especially online.
If people who follow Mary’s particular sort of Christianity actually gave a s-word what Jesus actually did or said, their religion would look very different.
A sword?
But why would you give a sword what Jesus actually said or did?
To whom would you give the sword?
What if you don’t own a sword, do you go out to the local smithy and purchase one just so that you can then give it to somewhat because of what Jesus said?
Is this a “beating swords into ploughshares” thing?
. . .
I just realized “beating swords into ploughshares” sounds like a really weird euphemism for masturbation. I apologize.
I beat that joke into the ground until it was dead.
Here lies The Joke, brutally murdered before its time.
And then you took an arr-*THUK*
O_O
GYAAAAAAAH!
So I kicked him in the head ’til he was dead!
But he’s not dead yet! (He can dance and he can sing!) Oh, he’s not dead yet! *whack*
…
Well, NOW he’s dead! (You whacked ‘im on the head!) Sure, NOW he’s dead!
You are such a brute, to murder that old coot! You homicidal bastard, now he’s really dead!
I used to make Skyrim jokes like you
Now I Seeeerve the Flaming Fist!
I’m gladius you dropped it.
(See what I did there?)
You have a rapier wit, sir.
Broadly speaking, anyway.
I just katana help myself.
I’ll take “Swords” for 800 Alex!
Saber begins with a bloody ‘S’!
Matthew 10:34
“Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a s-word.”
There are a great many Christians who miss that lesson entirely and seem to forget the lessons taught by Christ’s interaction with the Pharisees. Far, far too many.
A lot of them learned the lessons taught by his interaction with the temple merchants instead.
Actually, I’d like to retract that. The lesson Jesus was teaching there was ‘when somebody offends your religious sensibilities, kick their ass!‘ This has historically been a fairly common practice among Christians (and anybody else who got offended about anything, really), but in modern times in ‘civilized’ countries this philosophy has fallen drastically out of favor. (Exceptions to that still exist, though – they tend to make the news.) This is to the credit of everyone involved.
Actually, it was “when you see someone using your religion to exploit people, smash their shit up and scare them off. ” Jesus would have had to do a lot more ass-kicking otherwise.
Well, at least Joyce has become a better judge of character.
People like Mary make me mad.
People like Mary help to open the eyes and hearts of people like Joyce.
There’s something about Mary…
Ah-hah. Hah. Ha. No.
People like Mary don’t have much (if anything) to do with opening eyes and hearts.
Dorothy, you just DID say “B-words”
Hoisted by her own petard!
That B-word’s really F-worded up in the head.
Seriously, F-worded all to H-word.
Watch your F-wording language, buster.
She’s the most F-worded person I’ve ever heard of. She’s being an A-word to Joyce for no reason. She can go QQQQ herself.
Mentally replace that last sentence with ‘Joyce should tell her ‘QQQQ!’
maybe i’m just old, but “QQQQ”? what the F-word does this even mean?
Say it out loud. Preferably really loud, near your grandmother or some nuns.
Four Q. Four Q. Four Q.
You want Mary to fork herself?
And I thought pitchforks were outdated.
Word.
F-word that F-wording T-word right in the F-wording A-word, the F-wording C-word.
What the f-word are you on about? 🙂
Ok, I can’t figure out the T-Word
I think it is related to the C-word.
Something something British something.
Dark Side!
“Your highness.”
“Go F-word yourself!”
I believe they are referring to a fruit filled pastry also known as a T-word.
D-word to the Licious!
Word to your mother.
For a nickel.
Yeah, w-word that z-word.
%-WORD!!!
Womanize that Zionist? Sounds like a job for Joe!
Wash that Zombie?
Wait… Is it a complete zombie, or just a zombie head… on a stick?
Romero Zombie, Zombieland Zombie, or Deadpool Zombie?
Worship that Zeus!
Wiggle that Zipper!
Evil doesn’t have to be nice. It’s sexy.
I’ve decided that I don’t like Mary.
a wise decision.
to paraphrase the guild. I certainly don’t want to date my gravatar…
Damn! I tried to give Mary a benefit of a doubt and look what happens. She reduces different minded people as “those people”. Never mind that they went to church to share in her ideology.
Her ideology of a church with a live band.
I still don’t exactly know which denomination that church is.
Based on my very limited research, based on trying to make a relationship work about ten years ago, I’d say Independent Baptist.
I never understood why Christianity is so splintered. And all the factions seem so weary of each other. You’d think people sharing a common belief would be closer.
They’ve had 2,000 years to find new and exciting ways to hate each other. Monotheism means you can’t change gods when the people at your temple annoy you, after all.
Family feuds are the worst: it works the same with religious sects with too.
now? sure. but back when richard dawson was the host, family feud was awesome.
Religious sects? Is that a jab at Catholicism?
Oh, wait… You said sects, not…
nevermind…
No, that would be religious sex.
It’s because a lot of people understand the revealed truth differently!
That should tell you something: It was revealed very badly.
All Christians share 1 belief.
There are many, many, many beliefs they do not share, ranging from the insignificant such as ‘consubstantiation vs transubstantiation’ to the really quite fundamental, such as biblical literalism vs symbolic reading.
Counterpoint! There are Christian Atheists, who don’t believe in God but do follow the principles, the Bible, and the general religion.
Weird, I know.
Other than Unitarian Universalists, you mean?
There are other, minor things too. like what color the carpet should be.
or other, trival stuff that matters about as much theologically.
I am curious as to how much more of Mary’s views of others would have been revealed if Agatha came along
D’aww good for Joyce. I have nothing substantial to say, but I just want to get a comment in which is under #70
Your comment is number 60473. Even assuming the first three digits are just coding you still failed. Sorry.
To play the devil’s advocate amongst all the Mary-hate in the comments, I’d like to say that the third panel gave me the impression that Mary has some past experience with “nice evil”.
I’m not saying she’s not a bongo or anything. I just think she has reasons for it.
Counterpoint: She wasn’t going to discuss the service with Sierra because she wasn’t wearing shoes.
The fact you have a Mike icon makes this work.
Ruth does to but that doesn’t stop people from hating her. but you have a point.
Just for the record i do not hate Ruth
I’m not sure if it is a “past experience” or a current battle with (and guilt over) her own actions/short-comings.
Knowing Willis, Mary probably does have an in depth backstory that explains her behavior here. That still doesn’t excuse the fact that she’s calling Sierra and Dorothy “evil” for believing/behaving differently. That way lies persecution.
She’s so extreme that it would have to be really horrific… oh God, what does Willis have planned???
Ryan flashback? 🙁
Ryan is the root of all evil.
/takes toys and goes home
She does however, it seems, define evil as “not being Christian” and “not wearing shoes,” so her idea of “evil” is so far out in batshit asshole-land that unpleasant personal experience is not something that can explain it.
I’m sorry, I meant “bat s-word a-word hole”
What do I have to do to win the Bat Sword Award? I want one!
I believe Guano Anus would also work.
/Adds to list of cool prospective band names
I’d be surprised if there really is no explanation for her current behavior.
There are quite a number of Christians like Mary who define evil as “not being Christian”, solely because that’s what they were taught (by parents and pastors, etc.) from a young age. Of course, there are also those like Joyce, who may not have much experience with non-Christians but certainly don’t consider them evil.
I figured more that she was just misapplying worn platitudes to her own biases.
yikes, I thought she was gonna say Bronies. Ok not, poor Joyce, Mary is a very weird girl
She’s sotally a b-word.
Wow! Did Joyce just get out-religioused?
No. Please do not mistake what Mary did for religion. It’s an all too common mistake.
Still religion!
She was out extremist…ed.
How about out-nutjobbed?
Not really. Mary’s attitude, which she applies to religion, has nothing to do with the religion itself, and could be applied toward anything. Imagine the same behavior with a different subject. She could act that way about charity, or veganism, or philosophy, or social justice, and many people do. You can’t outdo people at those things by being hateful and exclusionary. Well, maybe the vegan thing (j/k). The exceptions would be things like douchebaggery. You could out-douche people all day long like that.
What Mary did, and what others such as Fred Phelps do, is motivated by a particularly nasty kind of religious belief, which says “We are saved, all who disagree with us are damned, let us now gloat about this. Our god loves us and hates everyone else. Our god tortures people eternally – ain’t it wonderful? Let’s go remind everyone of this so we can feel self-satisfied.”
This is a fact, which is not made any less true by the fact that many other religious people are much nicer than this, nor by the fact that people get judgmental and self-righteous about other things.
It’s also a pattern not at all unique to religious thinking. It’s wired into our tribal, pack-oriented evolution to overlook our flaws and dwell on those of strangers.
Religion is just the oldest and most common way of codifying it. Getting rid of religion does nothing to change it.
You’re confusing two separate things. There are Christians who believe the same sick misguided garbage as Fred Phelps, but instead of delighting in being asses about it, they weep for the damned and live with humility and compassion. Being a dick is just being a dick.
We’re all familiar with the “bullying jock” stereotype, right? But shoving nerds into lockers is not a part of sports. Bullies of that sort use sports as an excuse to feel superior, but that’s their own misuse of something unrelated.
…Yes, you’re right. Thank you for clarifying that.
It does seem to me, though, that this kind of abuse is more accepted these days (in the US) than the other kinds you cited, along with a similar attitude held by certain political conservatives that seems practically obligatory among right-wing pundits. A bullying jock or holier-than-thou vegan won’t find nearly as many supporters as will someone who equates liberalism with treason or calls Obama a communist. While the extremism of Phelps & Co. isn’t too accepted, the lesser extremism of, say, Pat Robertson seems to enjoy broader acceptance.
Yes, absolutely. But that’s because right-wing political culture has chosen to pander to fundamentalist Christians. The competitive, confrontational nature of politics lends much more partisanship to people’s sense of piety. The conflation does far more to bring out the dickwads, in ways that neither Christianity nor conservative politics would suggest on their own.
I vote for “out-nutjobbed” too
That’s probably because it wasn’t till the New Testament that the focus shifted to “Love thy neighbor.” Jesus was all about not hating people for being different, and swaying them with kindness.
Most of what I got from the Old Testament, however was, “Live and let live. Unless it’s different from you; then beat it to death with rocks. And maybe set it on fire.”
Be fair, you’re only supposed to do that if the booming voice from heaven says so.
And if you don’t slaughter the people the voices tell you to, you get exiled for a couple decades until you repent.
And if you’re told not to look at the town being burned by fire from the heavens and you do it anyway, you’ll be turned into a pillar of salt.
Most of what I god from the Old Testament
is “God is a dick.”
But only because he loves us and is a jealous God.
So, the archetype you’re looking for isn’t “dick”, its “abusive spouse/parent”.
Here I thought the proper term for God in the Old Testament was”spoiled child”.
The Gnostic demiurge, Yaldabaoth, basically?
bongoes.
Word, yo.
On one hand, as a Christian you should avoid hanging out with people who tempt you to do sinful things. If you don’t think you can resist temptation avoid putting yourself in the situation. On the other hand, Sierra and Dorothy weren’t coming even close to tempting Mary and Joyce to do anything. Yet another reason to not like Mary. I start to feel sorry for her then I realize she’s not real.
Mary would get an ear full from me
So “evil” is atheists and Christian hippies.
…right. Have fun in college, kid.
I said this above, but I have no idea how Mary manages to get through the day at a college campus. Yeesh!
I for one am glad that Joyce took a dislike to Mary so quickly this time.
I for one really like your username.
‘Crumplepunch’. Just rolls off the tongue so easily.
For some reason, “Crumplepunch” makes me think of Mrs. Crumplebottom smacking people over the head with her purse — for making out (or worse) in public. ^_^
Thank you! I thought so, myself.
Crumplepunch is actually a minor character from Planescape: Torment.
Everyone needs to play Planescape: Torment right now.
Holy crap people respond to these comics quickly!
Enjoying the comics although I seemed to have missed out on something prior with Mary? I’ve only read Shortpacked! and Dumbing of Age, is there another strip I need to power through to get caught up?
I object to the implication that evil is nice. I’m evil, and in no way nice. My disabled girlfriend whom i take care of is clearly a simple case of “Pet the Dog”.
I also object. If Evil is nice, then Good would, by implication, be mean and nasty. And if Good is mean and nasty, then Malaya is a F-wording saint or something.
If Evil’s nice I would prefer to go to h-word.
Well… Mary is supposedly good…
I absolutely know how this feels. My family had a friend that was living with us for a great deal of my youth. When the price of living in California got too high, he proposed moving out to Kansas where his mother had a house that we could live in. When we did so, and my father stayed behind to see if he might be able to get enough money in California to make it possible to still live there, people saw my mom living with our family’s friend.
The churches nearby assumed, therefore, that our mom was sleeping with our family’s friend, the whole congregation sharing in this distorted view. Later, my father moved down into the same house, and the distorted view continued. So we tried out churches that were a bit farther away, but since we shared a car with our family’s friend, the basis for the whole thing never really left, and we basically ended up being uncomfortable every church we that went to.
So often, we found “Christians” forgetting simple base rules that are the foundation of their religion, “love your neighbor as yourself”, and “judge not lest you be judged”.
Or at least most of the congregation.
Not to mention that whole bit about bearing false witness.
Very similar to a situation that was part of what drove my wife away from Christianity altogether quite a few years back.
Hm. I’ve heard that evil is well-mannered, persuasive, and charismatic, but nice is a new one. So evil is nice, and presumably her own meanness is righteous. I’d love to know what bible she’s been reading. She’s sounding a bit like a pharisee right now.
She’s also sounding like Miko Miyazaki. So… I’m expecting her to kill the king and then lose her status as a paladin.
Sooo, Evil is nice, and Good is mean?
What kind of bizarro world does Mary think she lives in? The Twilight Zone?
Bizarro indeed. Perhaps she’s the result of a failed attempt at cloning Amazigirl. She’s hypersensitive to criticism and can only speak in reversals of her statement’s intended meaning. Ultimately she’s just misunderstood.
A world where Malaya is Pope.
Good Is Not Nice
ARRRRRRRH why would you link to that? I have work I need to do today!
Be strong!
So that makes Dorothy Affably Evil?
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from TVTropes.
I think a saturday cartoon about a wacky villians hillarious hjinks.
That or her catholic is actually a fake catholic secretly created by some trolls on the web to see how much crap they can shove in a book, pass off as a bible and see if people actually buy that it’s a legit copy of the christian one.
“You’re so nice.
You’re not good you’re not bad you’re just nice.
I’m not good I’m not nice I’m just right.
I’m the witch.
You’re the world.”
You know, I initially didn’t like Joyce, what with her interaction with Joe and all, but she’s really redeemed herself.
I don’t believe in god, and used to really be kind of a dick about it whenever the topic came up around believers (and I sometimes helped it come up). I think I’m a lot nicer/more tolerant now, but I lost one good friend who was a lot like Joyce, at least in part because of Joyce.
Damn, “because of it.” (as in my behavior) is how that last sentence should end.
Mary is such a Jonah, and a Fantasy Role Play Christian. As in her Christianity is about pretending everyone else is evil and oppressing the church, and she’s one of the few heroes willing to take a stand against impossible odds to save the world.
And I bet you’re just thrilled to be stuck with her as your avatar.
Oh god I love that term. I might have to use it in the future.
Looks like she rolled up a level 10 prostelyte with a +4 Bible Of Bashing
I’m taking a logic class this quarter, which helps me know how goddamn (unintentional punning!) stupid Mary’s argument is, instead of just feeling that it’s dumb on instinct.
You mean, how stupid it is that she refuses to hang around with the unwashed heathens, when her religion says she’s supposed to convert them?
I think it’s more the “she’s applying fundamental logical fallacies x and y in the course of a single statement!”
Well, she wasn’t exactly a font of logic and moral consistency in her Roomies! iteration, either.
Glad Joyce recognized the type right away, and acted accordingly. I wonder who Mary’s going to sway into hypocrisy this time?
Joyce is a bit naive at times, but she actually upholds true Christian values, and can back up her actions with scripture, as seen when she went to the party. Mary is an example of the hypocrits that non-believers always think about when they come across a “fundamental” Christian, which is just not true. Joyce is a fundamental Christian who actually lives WWJD.
What sort of a nutter wants to discuss a church service anyway?
If you care about what’s being said, you might want to discuss it. Otherwise, what’s the point in going to church?
There never is one.
I thought thet the point was hanging out with a group of people who you could think of as being your community, your people. Having a social group that you feel is supporting you has positive effects on the psychology of many people: they like being part of an ‘us’, possibly even at a chemical level.
Of course, the downside to that is that for every ‘us’, there is a ‘them’. Some people see adversarialness between the two.
I’ve enjoyed many a well-written sermon. Like other enjoyable activities, I like talking about a good sermon. Sometimes it’s cleverly written but the argument doesn’t hold up well. Sometimes it’s reversed and I feel a solid Truth gets lost in bad writing.
So to answer your question: My kind, I suppose.
I can’t imagine what your life must be like to consider listening to a sermon an enjoyable activity. Maybe that’s the only time you don’t get hatefully buggered by acacia bushes.
Have you ever enjoyed a class where an extremely knowledgeable teacher was talking very intelligently about a very interesting subject?
It’s probably like that for them. Remember, they see nothing problematic about the subject or content.
Plenty of Christians find plenty of problematic things in interpreting Christian theology, but that can be interesting and enjoyable too.
While I have certainly included “discussing a church service” as an enjoyable topic to talk about, particularly if it was an enjoyable sermon, I can’t help but believe that Mary had ulterior motives. Given Sierra’s answer a couple days ago, it seems Mary wished to reinforce her holier than thou stance and separatism from the infidels by discussing a sermon that was obviously about such things.
Either that or she’s a closet lesbian who, like Ryan, uses religion to empassion their prey, followed with something to arouse the person enough to victimize into other lustful activites (with Ryan, this was drugs, with Mary I bet it’s the being naked in her dorm room thing).
Or both.
Same sort that wants to discuss a comic strip.
I know that feel, Joyce.
I know it all too well :[
Oh well, at least Joyce is quite tolerant with other people. I wonder how well Mary react toward people with different religions.
So far, it seems like she just tries to avoid interacting with them.
Honestly? Not the worst response to thinking someone’s evil.
True. This is a strategy that produces relatively few corpses.
I think she means babes.
Yeah definitly babes.
Babies. Mary is so babies.
First time poster. Pls be nice.
I love Shortpacked! and have really gotten into DoA. Prompted to post now because this strip reminded me of a friend I lost at the end of college. Up thru three-nights-before graduation, she was Joyce—- meaning “a little naive, incredibly sweet and sincere, only judgy out of well-intentioned habit”, and we were really tight. Just before we graduated, she announced she was moving to China afterwards to help spread The Word. When I got drunk enough to tell her how horrifyingly (a) offensive and (B) dangerous/illegal that was, she basically ended our friendship. And I still feel like a d-bag.
My point? I kinda lost it. I guess that there’s a fine line between “Joyce” peeps and “Mary” peeps, and it isn’t always clear. If Joyce ships off to China to hunt for converts at the end in defiance of Chinese law and common sense, and tells Walky he’s a jerk for not thinking that’s hunky-dorry, I will be extra-bummed.
Love your work, Willis.
I wonder if Mary has dealt with someone like Ryan.
That could explain the way she said what she said in the 3rd panel.
I don’t want to start flames here, but given the overwhelmingly negative reaction to Mary’s comment, I’m compelled to ask. Why?
The usage of “Evil”? The way it was explained to me, the biblical definition of evil is the condition of being in opposition to or forsaking God, hence why sin is evil, it drives people away from God. Atheists, or at least atheists who used to be christian, are therefore evil as well, since we reject the existance of any god, and we don’t take the bible as a conduit for universal, transcendental truth. So Mary was technically correct from that perspective.
The attitude? Being holier than thou is certainly annoying if not infuriating, and it hurts yourself when you do it, but that’s kind of a subjective gripe. Most people aren’t tolerant to what they percieve to be evil acts either. Case in point: Plenty of comments here about her being a bongo or too extreme, for rejecting and judging people based on ideological considerations.
Questionable logic? Isn’t a large chunk of religious cosmology based on logic not being as important as faith?
The way it was (vociferously, by Christians) explained to me, things like what Mary did up there was correct, if unpleasant. One of the reasons I don’t put much stock on the bible, really.
If you’re compelled to judge the value of people based on what they think will happen after they die by a compilation of books written over 18 centuries ago, when slavery was ok, women were baby factories and domestic serfs and (allegedly) God decided periodically sending emmisaries detailing in lavish detail the horrible ways in which his wrath would manifest if you weren’t praying hard enough, why are things like being bongoy like Mary worthy of condemnation as opposed to, you know, natural and expected behavior?
Unfortunately, it seems that the Christians that explained it to you were of a very similar mind with Mary, there. While there are some evangelical denominations that are practically militant about putting forward their view of the gospel, there are a great many others that prefer to show the love of Christ through their actions, helping in their communities and whatnot.
Trust me, there are plenty of us Christians out there that have no desire whatsoever to go out and convert the heathens with sword and fire. It just always seems to be the militant idiots who shout the loudest.
It might be natural and expected given the way she was raised and her religious belief system, but it’s still worthy of condemnation because the belief that atheists, non-Christians, and differently-minded Christians are evil is an objectively false one. Yes, Mary was correct from her perspective of what evil is, but that perspective is twisted, and does not reflect how the world actually works. And just because her actions are natural and expected due to her upbringing does not excuse them or make them not bongoy. We condemn racists and bigots who were raised to believe that whites are superior, we condemn murderers whose upbringing stunted their empathy for humanity. We can certainly condemn Mary.
If that is your posture, and you are a christian, by condemning her aren’t you falling into the same “hate the sinner” trap she did back there?
If commiting a sin (denying god) doesn’t make me evil, then I understand that actions are worthy of condemnation but people aren’t. So in this case while Mary’s close-mindedness and bigotry are worthy of condemnation, Mary as a person isn’t, even though our natural impulse is to condemn and reject, because as allegedly people with better morality than her we are supposed to judge and act according to our better nature (for atheists) or the laws of God (for Christians), not give in to destructive temptation. Or at least if we do it, aknowledge we’re doing so rather than pretending we do so out of moral considerations.
This got a little long-winded, but here goes.
Well, the problem is that Christianity is an evangelical religion. It’s our literally God-given duty to go out there and reach out to people. That’s why Jesus spent more time among the sinners than among the self-proclaimed holy.
Much of the Gospels contain stories about Jesus interacting with the latter group in which they would make great showings of their piety and look down at others who were not as “holy” as them. A lot of what Jesus said was a criticism of that attitude of not loving your neighbors as your own brothers and doing all you can to care for them. And he also spent several sermons on the fact that it is not the role of men to judge one another. “Judge not, lest you be judged yourself.” We are not meant to look down on others but to offer them a hand up — to show God’s grace by example rather than to spit on those who have not embraced it. After all, we’ve all got our flaws.
What Mary is saying here is following right into the footsteps of the Pharisees of His days. If you aren’t “Good,” then you don’t deserve a chance to be. The irony is worsened by the fact that Christianity is a religion of redemption and forgiveness. But people like Mary think that what that means is that their flaws are excused, but everyone who doesn’t live just like they do is scum, unworthy of the grace of God.
TL;DR. The problem is that when Mary sees someone coming to church for the first time, she reacts with disgust and condemnation instead of joy and hope. And that’s wrong on so many levels.
As has been said before and more eloquently by smarter people than I, if more Christians acted like Jesus did, there would be fewer atheists as militantly opposed to religion as many of us are.
You mean when Jesus threatened people with everlasting fire if they disbelieved, preached that the world was going to end imminently and that they should give no thought for the morrow, and told them that credulously believing his claims without evidence was a commendable virtue?
No, I’m pretty sure there would still be plenty of atheists.
Ouch. Sorry, what I get for going by word of mouth and reputation rather than reading it myself.
Not that I will, mind you, I’m not MADE of time.
Don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t want to give the impression that I think Jesus said nothing good at all, (the golden rule is a fine ethical dictum, though certainly not original to him) but I am compelled to challenge the assumption that everything he said was an unimpeachable source of moral wisdom.
As an aside, bear in mind that everyone on this thread who has tried to define good as “God’s will, and nothing else” needs to make a serious effort to reconcile the above statements with their moral compass.
Zap didn’t technically say there would be fewer atheists. He said fewer would.be as militant.
There are also very strong arguments that Jesus didn’t actually preach most of what you say, especially when those interpretations only seem to have taken a firm hold starting with Augustine. The major issue of faith over evidence would remain, but remember that not everyone who disbelieves in gods is a rationalist.
It’s true, I misspoke in saying “there would still be atheists” rather than “atheists would still be as militant”, but I think the argument still applies.
As for Jesus not preaching these things, if you don’t wish to believe that Jesus said the things he is quoted as saying in the bible, then you will find little argument from me, but in that case I don’t see on what basis you can claim to know his teachings in any meaningful sense. Moreover, “give no thought for the morrow” was the fundamental tenet of the early church, long before the birth of Augustine.
There is indeed a long tradition of irrational atheists. Neitchze and Schopenhauer spring to mind most prominently. I would never claim that such people do not exist, nor that they can find ample reason to sustain their beliefs. I shouldn’t really have to point out that I feel no obligation to agree with them on every point.
A lot of it is a matter of translation and interpretation–especially if the translator or the reader already has certain assumptions in mind. Pedantic stuff below. Skip to the last paragraph for my actual point.
The phrase in Matt 6:34 that can be translated “give no though” and also be translated as “do not be anxious” which lacks the same connotation of irresponsibility, and squares much better with 2 Thess 3:10 that way.. KJV is pretty, but it’s crap as a translation.
A strictly literal reading of Matt 25 would indicate an enduring fire, but it would also indicate that Jesus is talking about goats and sheep, which we know he is not. Obviously, some allowance has to be made for at least some figurative language, and that leaves open a lot of doors. Even a great many conservative orthodox scholars who believe in an eternal hell do not believe the flames to be literal, but to represent extreme suffering. Many interpret that suffering not as deliberate torment, but as a natural consequence of removal from God’s presence. Whichever case, it’s worth pointing out that the Greek “aionios/aionion” does not literally mean “eternal/eternity.” Concepts such as annihilationism, universalism, and others have been around for a very long time and can make a strong scriptural case for themselves… although of course a “universal” church that wishes to teach through fear will naturally suppress such schools of thought.
Apart from argument over the concept of Hell itself, the judgement criterion of “whatever you did for the least of these” draws a lot of discussion, since most translations would seem to imply that the condition for salvation is not counscious belief in Christ, but in *being Christ-like* and compassionate, regardless of belief in Jesus.
Augustine wrote about universal reconciliation and the idea that Hell is a temporary state, and makes it sound as though these ideas were fairly common. Certainly they were around earlier than his writing, at the least. While he refutes these ideas, he refers to the disagreement as “amicable controversy” and dismisses it as a mere “error” of very kind-hearted Christians–esentially the beliefs were around and were tolerated as benign. Occasional figures of authority within the Catholic church and the Eastern Orthodox church express universalist ideas themselves, which should make it clear enough that these interpretations are not particularly unorthodox at all. The most likely to strongly insist on eternal flames of torment for all unbelievers would be the various flavors of Baptist that popped up in the United States.
Supposing that there’s a divine being worth worshipping (yeah, I know, but humor me), scriptural interpretations that view Hell and/or the soul as temporary, or that view Hell as entirely figurative, make much more sense than a “just” deity that punishes finite transgression with infinite torment, regardless of how uncommon they are among noisy American Christians. If the texts can be read that way (they can) and there is at least as much support for these readings as for unconscionable literalist readings (and there is), it seems to me that any of these are more likely correct than the literal view. But *any* position on Hell, etc. is going to be bullshit to almost any atheist anyway, so…
Considering how much of the venom toward Christianity is a direct result of persecution by Christians, doesn’t it stand to reason that some significant number of atheists would be less inclined to go on the attack if they were never attacked themselves? If Christians didn’t try to force their beliefs into law, blame the poor for their own condition, and spew hatred? If they treated everyone with kindness and respect, regardless of faith or creed? I’m sure some rationalist atheists might still bash Christianity for being irrational, but wouldn’t fewer find it worth their time? Richard Dawkins seems to think so…
http://richarddawkins.net/articles/20-atheists-for-jesus
There is really very little I can offer in response to your scholarship, having already pigeon-holed myself as a vengeful and militant rationalist. I would point out, however, that the extreme breadth of interpretation you demonstrate in Jesus’ teaching is a mark in it’s disfavour as an article of revealed truth.
On whether atheists are merely responding to oppression I can only relate my own experience. I was born and raised in a small, predominantly secular European nation, and have never been in the least inconvenienced by religious oppression, attempts to convert me are thin on the ground at best, and religious hatred has never been spewed at me (at least in my presence). Still, I am, as you have certainly guessed, opposed to religion.
Why? Well, I made some rather mordant comments towards a claim of psychic powers a few pages back. I think anyone who is either deluded or dishonest enough to make such a claim should immediately pay a price in the undisguised scorn of their peers. I feel the same way about those who say they have encountered ghosts or secret alien incursions, those who think that Elvis is alive, and those who claim to know the instructions of the creator of the universe.
This is, I must stress, a very different thing to dismissing Jesus’ merits as a moral philosopher, which I think are considerable, (I think this is Dawkin’s main point, mixed with a dash of intentional provocativeness,) I just don’t think he should be emulated in all things. In a mirror universe, if the Church of Plato had lost it’s way, and the suggestion was raised that we would be all better off if we were to just emulate Plato, then I might say that while the we would do better still to avoid the pederasty.
No doubt a kindly apologist would point out to me that Greek translation is difficult, and he only meant we should love young boys in a platonic sense.
“I would point out, however, that the extreme breadth of interpretation you demonstrate in Jesus’ teaching is a mark in it’s disfavour as an article of revealed truth.” There are several possible resolutions to that as well, although none that would likely satisfy you. The most woo-tastic is that the Holy Spirit is required to divinely inspire the *reader* and not just the writer. The most sensible is that humans are stupid or at best imperfect, and no matter what God says, loads of readers (and writers too, if you’re a heretic like myself) are going to get it completely wrong anyway. I’m not sure what criteria a strict rationalist could set for divine inspiration anyway.
“On whether atheists are merely responding to oppression I can only relate my own experience…” Of course. And it was never my insinuation that atheists are “merely” responding to oppression. However, it is a very common reason given by militant atheists in the United States, for reasons you can probably imagine. Believe it or not, I take their side more often than otherwise.
From a rational standpoint, I understand your point of view very well. If not for some profound personal experiences despite an otherwise clean bill of mental health, I would be right there with you. I don’t care to relate the specifics, and I doubt they would be of any relevance to you. Suffice to say, the difference between me and a more typical theist (other than my rejection of any strict dogma or superstition) is that I am not under any illusion that empirical evidence can or should bear my beliefs out as rational. For analogy as to why it shouldn’t… A good author seldom inserts himself into his books, and writes his worlds to be internally consistent and sufficient cause for their own existence. An intelligent character in such a story would be able to use Occam’s Razor to deduce that there is no author, and that’s as it should be.
Philosophically, we all must make an intuitive leap from “cogito ergo sum” to the necessary assumptions that our cognition is grounded in an actual reality, and that our sensory experience *generally* approximates that reality with some acceptable degree of accuracy. We can’t explicitly relate to others what our experience is like or empirically prove that we perceive our own cognition–only that our descriptions tend to be similar. I make one more intuitive assumption about the reality of one more aspect of my internal experience (that certain “spiritual” experiences such as free will are real rather than illusory) and make no claims about it to anyone, as it is unverifiable inherently. In all other things, I take a naturalist, skeptical view, including claims of miracles, ghosts, demons, etc.
Put one more way: If a rationalist were to actually see Russel’s teapot first hand, and found no evidence of being delirious, it wouldn’t be irrational to believe in it… but if they forgot to bring their camera they’d never go around claiming to have seen it nor expect anyone to believe them if they did. I think that’s exactly consistent with the point of Russel’s thought experiment, and outside of conversations like this one, that’s where I see myself. I mention my experience in these cases only as an example, which to you might as well be merely hypothetical. All of this is to illustrate my position, not to convince you of it. That’s about all one can do with intuitive leaps and internal experience, and it makes characters like Sarah Connor or James Cole eerily sympathetic. If that’s worthy of ridicule, please accept my, uh, apologies.
“No doubt a kindly apologist would point out to me that Greek translation is difficult, and [Plato] only meant we should love young boys in a platonic sense.” I see what you did there!
Whatever my opinions of the original message of the bible, I am inclined to agree that it’s interpretation has been thoroughly imperfect. I must question, though, why an omnipotent god would make his revelation in a way as to assure such divisive misinterpretation (I am assuming here you favour the latter of your two explanations). Something so small as manifesting in a more literate part of the world, of which there were many at the time, would surely have aided the consistency of the message.
These are minor scruples, however. I am not sure what would constitute divine revelation, because, being an atheist, I have never, in my estimation, encountered it. It has been suggested by others that Jesus would have had more credibility if he had made advanced scientific predictions, such as “energy equals the the speed of light squared.” This, in my opinion, would be insufficient, but it certainly wouldn’t hurt. Laying the groundwork for a comprehensible science of morality would have been better still.
Your illustration of Russel’s Teapot is revealing; such a rationalist would be quite unable to rule out the possibility that their senses had been somehow confounded or that the situation was otherwise deceptive. To take a slide into literalism for a moment, were I, as a deep space astronaut, to find a teapot floating in orbit between Earth and Mars, I would naturally assume that somebody had launched it up there as a elaborate practical joke at the expense of the humanities academics they send into space. As you point out, anecdotal evidence is vulnerable to interpretations of this sort.
I would hate to give you the impression that I was demanding an apology from you. Making as you do no claim to empirical evidence, I cannot see that we have grounds for disagreement, as this is no time for a discussion on the role of evidence in epistemology. So… sorry that you’re sorry, I guess? Good talk.
You’ve hit pretty close to my position on revealed truth already, I think. Supposing a universal God exists, all of theology is an attempt to understand an infinite, perfect, incomprehensible reality in finite, imperfect, understandable terms. Every possible position is wrong. In that case, it MUST be acceptable to be wrong. Any revealed truth. Would be limited by this, so I think the important questions are whether the moral teaching is intact, and it conveys what relationship we are to have with this incomprehensible being. On these, the Gospels leave little to interpret.
What speaks to me about Jesus is that instead of offering rules and cosmology, he shows by example what universal love is. I prefer to think this illustrates an acknowledgement that more than a minimum of theology would be lost and that law-giving would be subject to obsolescence. Lots of other stuff, but too much to go into.
Agree, good talk. Thank you.
That’s Matthew 6:34, Matthew 25:51 and John 20:29 should anyone care to look it up.
Ah, gotcha
In all honesty, it doesn’t really matter how Mary’s comment is interpreted. She wanted to enflame the masses and she succeeded. She wanted to separate those she feel is evil and she did. We are mostly negative towards her as a reaction to her negativity towards us. While she is a comic character and she had directed (indirected?) her words towards Dorothy and Sierra, she was really speaking broadly, as to any of not her beliefs.
Honestly, while one could point out the hyprocicy that we treat her as the hypocrit, it still doesn’t reeally matter as obviously she doesn’t want our sympathy either. We have already seen Joyce attempt to bridge the gap and I know that if she is shut out then I don’t see a point in trying.
Many of us gave her a chance with this entire arc, and it’s clear to most, if not all, present that she is a b-word.
It is. It’s natural, expected behaviour and totally worthy of condemnation.
Say it!
If murder is evil, and Mary thinks evil is nice (but abstains), therefore Mary thinks murder is nice. Logic!
Murder is the solution to every problem, except underpopulation.
What about murdering abortion doctors?
Do you mean you have a problem with people who murder abortion doctors, or a problem with abortion doctors who also murder people on the side? In either case, the murder solution is to just murder people who are doing the things that bother you until nobody’s doing those things anymore. Pretty simple, really.
Neither. I mean murdering abortion doctors might be a case where murder solves underpopulation.
Murdering murderers could also help to prevent underpopulation.
I like this contrast between Mary and Joyce – because Mary seems like who Joyce is supposed to be at first and Mary is like how Joyce might have been without good character development. It’s contrasting the initial reaction to Joyce vs who Joyce really is.
The problem is, it’s all too easy for people to become like Mary because of the nature of most organized religions. When you have a religious tradition that teaches that it is good, therefore other religious traditions are bad, you end up fostering an us vs them attitude. For example, a lot of Christians believe in the No True Christian fallacy – if you stop being a Christian at some point, for whatever reason, you must have not ever been a Christian in the first place, even when you truly and honestly believed you were. This comes directly from the us vs them attitude; if someone stops being part of “us”, they are naturally part of the multitudes of “them”, and probably were “them” all along.
Oh Mary…*shakes gigantic head*
Mary, Mary… She’s certainly being quite contrary.
So wait does that mean in her twisted little mind people don’t bother with Good because people like her are mean?
She is one of those people that will be evil in the name of doing good and then be shocked if she wakes up in Hell going? What throwing my kids out of my house for being Gay was evil?
Oh my god, my girlfriend totally says “b-words” too!
She’s a teacher though, not a Christian. She just likes to be in the habit of not cursing.
That’s a good habit, actually. I wish I had that kind of self-contro. Unfortunately, I’ve been potty-mouthed since middle scholl, and it’s a hard habit to break.
…What? All the cool kids were doing it!
And NOW I remember why I always look over my posts before hitting “send.” >_<
Potty-mouth? Try being in the army.
A lack of belief in the divine does not predicate evil. Nor does the belief.
And having bare feet is wrong, I don’t want to be right.
…Nor does the belief translate into good.
To be entirely fair, this all depends entirely on your definitions of “evil” and “good”. God may well hate bare feet and people who don’t kowtow to him. (The latter point is well-supported biblically, in fact.)
He also said that you should treat others as you wish to be treated. Therefore, Mary should not ostracize Dorothy and Sierra because their beliefs are different than hers.
Or at the very least she shouldn’t be such a “B-word” about it.
…and so you have the scary part of religion. Thankfully I’ve never met anyone like that, but the thought still scares me. To love something THAT MUCH. To the point where all others who do not share your love are in some way…evil. I understand belief and faith are things that can keep a person going in life…but it has such huge consequences for some. If someone is to believe thier religion – truly believe it – then all the others have to be wrong. That’s just terrifying.
Mary proves that evil will always triumph because good is dumb.
… I can’t believe nobody else already posted this in over 200 comments.
my ex-girlfriend was like this, and this is why we had to sit alone at lunch
If Sierra’s behavior qualifies her as evil, there’s a low admittance threshold.
Agreed. Girl’s been a model Christian, not to mention overall good person. Have I missed a line in Leviticus about wearing shoes all the time or keeping your belly covered?
(There might be. A lot of early commandments – circumcision for instance – were “dude we live in the desert you’ll die if you don’t do this” commandments. Covering your body and feet are important to survival in the desert, so there might be commandments for them.)
I want to congratulate Willis for making DoA Joyce an interesting character with a surprising amount of depth.
To be fair, Mary is also interesting, and has depth. Otherwise nobody would care about her OR her beliefs… Yet the entire comments section today is about her and what a b-word she is.
If she was truly as one-dimensional as she seems, most people would probably just say, “Meh,” and move on, not caring.
People like it when there is an obvious choice for how to feel about a character; then they can all say the same thing and experience the camaraderie of agreeing with pretty much everyone.
*Continues to studiously avoid reading or making a comment on a DOA strip until this religious themed story arc is over*
*Will check back tomorrow*
*realizes that by leaving this comment, she is breaking the promise she made to herself when this storyline started, and contradicting the statement in the first sentence*
*mocks relentlessly at failure*
*posts comment surrounded by asterisks*
Grav + Comment = Fitting
Not quite a win, but it’s something, eh?
*comment about my penis fitting in your mother, for a nickel*
*compares one of the previous four commenters to Adolf Hitler*
YAY JOYCE! I didn’t think I’d say it when it comes to her and her faith, but I really I’m uber happy with her today and that response.
I want to hate Mary. I do. But I love her wrist bands. I also like that she’s mostly naked at 3pm. And still wears her wrist bands. Dear Cheese! I think I have a fetish! 🙂
I agree, the only reason they think she is a bongo is because they are jealous of those bongoin’ wristbands. I mean, they match her outfit and everything. They just fashion haters.
Did anyone see the shameful way that Randy Milholland is insulting our dear David Willis while David is away and can’t defend himself?
Imagine…calling David a “wonderful people”?
Randy responded to an email of mine once, so I can never be anything but thrilled by whatever he does.
If you want to kill a church, put Mary in charge of outreach. Even after 5 years holding the line for organized religion, these people never cease to amaze me.
I think arsehole fits better.
Mary is a heated dog.
Sadly, this is true. There are alot Holier than thou jerks in the world.
Heated… hot… a hot dog…
Mary is a frankfurter?
Today in the world of Mary, the proudest boast is “Ich bin ein Frankfurter!”
I so want that last panel as a t-shirt.
This is why Joyce works as a main character~! :3
I sense that Mary has an interesting back story which led to her being this way. That expression in panel 3 may have simply been disappointment with Joyce, but I’d sooner believe the former and leave a little room for Mary to redeem herself in my eyes. I’m not quite ready to write her off as a B-word.
Some of the comments for this comic are in the ‘TL; DR’ category. (Too Long; Didn’t Read)
I suppose it’s commendable that a comic is raising such debate. Yet I wonder whether people are reading too much into four or five panels. Today’s comic might have been simply to show that Joyce does not prejudge people based on their religion, while Mary does. As a writer (not an author, since I’m not published), I am always amazed how stories take on a life of their own, far beyond what the author intended.
The big irony is both sides are missing the fact that Jesus’ being the prophecized messiah was IRRELEVANT to the Gentile converts (at least at the start of the whole business). The people who cared about Jesus being the prophecized one were JEWS. You know, the people who formed the start of the church.
No, seriously, I swear this is a major problem in my area. Huge swaths of the churches around my area seem to dislike acknowledging the early Christians were Jews and sort of go like, “Yeah, the Romans were the first real Christians. Forget the other guys. Oh and they weren’t Italian either.” I wish I were kidding.
I’m going to be very disappointed if Joyce doesn’t abandon her faith by the end of this series AT LEAST. The REAL irony is Joyce is just as bad just a few frames ago with the Mormon girl. She’s only hang out with Dorothy because she thinks she has a chance to “Be a good Christian influence” on her, whereas just like Mary she eschews the presence of those who don’t conform to her beliefs AND have no chance of conforming in the future.
She can grow into a more rounded individual without abandoning Christianity altogether. The fact she acknowledges a bit she’s not good with a lot of real world stuff but tries anyway is good. Maybe Willis wants her to follow his own path into atheism, but I’d kind of expect that’s not really where he’s going. But then, I’m not him,
IT’s not quite the same I guess, but I knew people at my boarding school who would attack me some of the time for being christian. They weren’t Mary’s level of ‘B-word’, but when I said that I was a chrisitian and believed in evolution and the big gang, I was told that I couldn’t possibly be telling the truth and so I just said I was christian to cover my back or something. I didn’t like those guys a lot of the time.
Shunning people you think are nice because your scripture says they’re evil. If there’s one right way to do religion, this might be the exact opposite of that.
Um no…it’s hard to be a good person without having a nice side. It can hidden, but total assholes are generally not good. Questioning things isn’t “evil” and neither showing your midsection. When did Jesus ever say to snub all non-believers?
“If Evil weren’t nice, nobody’d bother with it”
That’s actually pretty accurate.
…So has Mary never seen Star Wars? Her comment makes no sense otherwise.
Oh Mary. Still the Whore of Babylon, I see.