thank you, american family association

And there you have it folks. A religious right group called the American Family Association has announced (pronounced?) that Tillikum, the killer whale who killed a trainer should be put to death, preferably by stoning.

Yes, stoning.



And here, exactly, is where we can see the idiocy of following the teachings of bands desert-dwelling nomads who were so ignorant about the workings of the universe that they needed to create a big boogeyman in the sky to tell them not to eat shellfish or kill each other or drive on saturdays. I will be interested to see these same people come out in favor of fathers enlisting their neighbors in the murder of their daughters if they are found not to be virgins on their wedding nights:

"But if ... evidences of virginity are not found for the young woman, then they shall bring out the young woman to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her to death with stones..." (Deuteronomy 22:20,21)

Or to start (finally!) following this dictum from Corinthians:

"Women should be silent in the churches, for they are not permitted to speak, but should be submissive, as the law also says." (1 Corinthians 14:34)

Those mouthy broads!

You can't have it both ways, folks. Either the bible is the literal words of god, ALL OF IT, or none of it is. This is the danger, hypocrites who say they know what the Great Leader in the Sky wants based on some of the words in the bible--which was written by dozens of ignorant nomads across hundreds of years and cobbed together by corrupt church leaders interested in consolidating their power--and who demand utter fealty to those particular phrases, but who pretend other words just don't exist.

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While we're on the Tillikum thing, guess what, maybe keeping an intelligent, social, sentient creature in the equivalent of blank and empty prison cell for decades, then periodically prodding it into performing tricks in return for snacks is basically idiotic and barbaric. Just a thought.