A Response to the WBC Site "God Hates Australia" - Afterword

I believe that this is the right term. I thought that this would be useful because there are a few small things that I would like to point out that I had found.

Part of my research into this series did actually see me look at some of the other sections in the "God Hates" site. These were based on possible ideas and arguments that I could make or just an interest in what they thought about other countries based on what I knew about them.

I had assumed that they would mention good things in societies that they claim that "God hates", in the same way that the Skeptic's Annotated Bible has a list of good stuff in the Bible.

It started when I was writing Part 1 my mind drifted to India, a country that I would have thought might have some good points towards it. What a fool I was to assume that. They mention some possible good things, but only because they use it to show what they consider a bad thing. India is known for more socially conservative practices, take a look at what happened to Richard Gere.

The closest thing that I go to a good thing was that they have a low divorce rate. You can find that right here. It's followed in the next sentence by a "you shouldn't have arranged marriage".

I did however find this somewhat ironic gem:

OTHER WHOREDOMS

Can you say Kama Sutra? Yes it goes like this….NASTY! This is an ancient guide book about perverted sex practices with how-to pictures (YIKES)! Here is just a little bit of information about it….brace yourselves…I hope you have a barf bag handy.
The famous Kama Sutra states that homosexual sex "is to be engaged in and enjoyed for its own sake as one of the arts.” There are chapters on conduct of the only wife and conduct of the chief wife and other wives; chapters on advice of the assistants on the choice of lovers, looking for a steady lover, ways of making money, renewing friendship with a former lover, occasional profits, profits and losses; and chapters on improving physical attractions, arousing a weakened sexual power.

If that wasn’t bad enough, don’t puke now, but there are an additional 10 chapters on “stimulation of desire, embraces types, caressing and kisses, marking with nails, biting and marking with teeth, on copulation (positions), slapping by hand and corresponding moaning, virile behavior in women, superior coition and oral sex, preludes and conclusions to the game of love. It describes 64 types of sexual acts.”

Because we all know that sex is dirty. I'm now going to randomly quote from a book:

My beloved thrust his hand into the opening, and my inmost being yearned for him. I arose to open to my beloved, and my hands dripped with myrrh, my fingers with liquid myrrh, upon the handles of the bolt.

See, as I was going to say before that quote was that the Bible doesn't have any sex in it at all. Unless you happen to read Song of Solomon, why not try chapter 5 verses 4 and 5. Why I find the WBC passage funny is that they seem to just conveniently ignore any references to sex in the Bible.

It might not be as explicit compared to the Kama Sutra but it's still there in the Bible. The Kama Sutra might be straightforward, but apparently it also is created for married people, or at least the author spent some time talking about marriage. The quoted parts appear to have been lifted word-for-word, and uncredited from the Wikipedia article.

The second time I looked at another one of these pages was regarding Part 3.

Part three was on the "False Religious Systems" of Australia. They mentioned the Pope. I would have thought that they would have something on the Pope on their "God Hates Germany" page considering that the Pope is from Bavaria.

Again I was wrong.

Their Religion page is primarily about the "Evangelisch" churches (Protestant denominations). But that isn't what I consider to have been the stupidest. It's right on the front page, and the first thing for the Manner Of Life page. There is a subtle difference in the two, the first is from the "front page":

What else is this shameful country known for but the murder of millions and millions of people in World War II? The filthy pervert fag Adolph Hitler was raised to power and then able to convince a people to carry out his plan to virtually eliminate a race. What is wrong with you people to blindly go along with such evil and wickedness? You all are drenched in the blood of those murdered!

Crime/Genocide

What else is this shameful country known for but the murder of millions and millions of people in World War II? The filthy pervert Adolph Hitler was raised to power and then able to convince a people to carry out his plan to virtually eliminate a race. What is wrong with you people to blindly go along with such evil and wickedness? You all are drenched in the blood of those murdered!

I've bolded the subtle difference.

You saw that right, Adolf Hitler, a man whose regime sent between 5000 - 15000 homosexuals to concentration camps, is apparently gay. Never mind that one of the reasons given for the execution of Ernst Röhm was that he was openly gay. Nope. Hitler must have been gay. But the historical revisionism doesn't seem to end there. Notice how they don't mention Jews. I suspect that it must be because God hates them. God Hates Israel apparently.

The last thing is that based on their front page God apparently likes most of Africa and South America, excluding French Guiana, and most of the Middle East (considering that the WBC rants on and on about the evils of Islam) except Iraq, and Israel.

A Response to the WBC Site "God Hates Australia" Part 5.

In this part we look at the last section of the Westboro Baptist Church's "God Hates Australia" site.

If you are joining us late, please start from part 1.

But on with the show. The section in question is "Australia's Poster Children For Sin". Because we all know that sin has to have poster children. So in this case they are talking about celebrities.

Their first "poster child" is of course Heath Ledger. A man who is only here because he played a gay man in a movie. That was it. They even start this page of with the following:

Two words…..BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN!!!!

This is what they have to say on Heath Ledger:

Heath Ledger: Actor, died by an overdose in January of 2008. This young man was raised by parents who were divorced (I know shocker, right) who taught him to chase after every lust in his evil heart. Not only that, but do whatever it takes to be famous because that’s more important than serving God. This is what happens when you spit in God’s face with fag propaganda….you are sent a strong delusion by the hand of your God!

Based on only the laziest of research (I'm putting in a little more then they put in to make this site though) they ignore the fact that apart from being divorced, both his parents had remarried, and neither of them were gay. I don't know what exactly they taught him but I personally doubt that he was taught to "chase after every lust in his evil heart".

Now I would like stress here that the only thing that causes him to be "evil" is because he was in Brokeback Mountain that is his only crime. If he weren't in that movie I would be certain that he wouldn't be on this page.

There is one thing here that I have noticed. Back in Part 3 I pointed out that they used their "religion" page to basically bash Catholics. But nowhere have they mentioned Mel Gibson. I find that a bit odd, but I wonder whether it has something to do with the more fundamentalist views that Mr. Gibson holds, even though he is a Catholic. I suspect that they might consider him to be doing "God's work".

But continuing on, we meet our second "poster child for sin":

Portia de Rossi: Actress, Ellen Degeneres’ so called wife. This lady has a platform that instead of doing her duty and obeying her God, she would rather live in defiance! Shame on you, Australia, for teaching this woman from her youth up that it’s ok to be gay…look at what you’ve done. She will be held accountable for her actions, but don’t think for one second that you are innocent regarding this matter!

Portia de Rossi was born in Geelong, Victoria in 1973. However I really doubt that Australia taught her that it was ok for her to be gay. In Part 4 I posted the paragraph that mentioned that homosexuality was finally decriminalised in all states in 1997. I however didn't really go on about it there. I will here however.

The history of the decriminalisation process for homosexuality started in 1972 in South Australia. For those playing at home you would remember that back in Part 1 I pointed out that SA has the fewest rights for homosexuals compared to the rest of Australia. It's somewhat ironic in a way that a state that led the way is now backwards.

This process started during the time of Don Dunstan (who is one of our greatest premiers) which saw the passing of a "consenting and in private" type of defence, not knowing all of the facts I'd assume it was watered down by the hostile Legislative Council but the Sodomy law was repealed in 1975. It still had to be in private but it was a start. The ACT would follow in 1976 and they also equalised their age of consent.

De Rossi would have been 8 when they finally decriminalised homosexuality in Victoria, in 1981. NSW would outlaw descrimination against people who were, or were considered, homosexual. NT would legalise homosexuality in 1984 and WA, confusingly to me at least, decriminalised male homosexuality in 1989, and set the age of consent for homosexual acts to 21. Queensland repeals their sodomy law in 1991. Finally in 1997, Tasmania repeals the laws preventing you from being gay in private.

Although the law worked like that, public opinion takes far longer to change. Even today I would think it fair to say that homosexuality is only tolerated in Australia, but people aren't as accepting. The gay community is still fighting for acceptance and equality among the wider community.

Lastly, Portia de Rossi was married to Ellen DeGeneres in 2008 in the United States. However I don't know how their marriage has been effected by the passing of Proposition 8.

They separate these two people with the following Bible verse:

Proverbs 16:5 Every one that is proud in heart is an abomination to the LORD: though hand join in hand, he shall not be unpunished.

Well it's a proverb so you can't really quote mine the Bible here, but I would guess that it refers to proud people regardless of sexual orientation. I suspect that the interpretation used by the WBC here is actually a narrowed interpretation of the proverb in question.

The next grouping of people are as follows:

Here are a few more proud, arrogant, rebellious brute beasts!

Peter Allen: Entertainer, died of AIDS related throat cancer.

Peter Allen who died in 1992, did die of AIDS related throat cancer. What puts him on this list would be, I suspect, because he is The Boy from Oz. The musical is based on his life. However, if this were the case then I would have thought that Hugh Jackman would have also been on this list. I would assume that had Brokeback Mountain either really sucked, or was never made, he would be.

Rob Astbury: Journalist, highest paid sports journalist in Australia but is more famous for being the ex-lover of Graham Kennedy; HIV positive.

Was. He was the highest paid sports journo. He also, after Derryn Hinch decided to be a jerk and outed him, his HIV status and claimed that Kennedy (who is considered the King of Comedy/Australian Television, even after his death) was also HIV positive, took a more active role in gay rights and AIDS education.

This is actually the second HIV positive person mentioned in this list. I guess the WBC still believes in the old "AIDS is a gay only disease" argument.

Darren Hayes: Singer of Savage Garden, is currently in a civil partnership with his boyfriend in England…YIKES!

Darren Hayes entered into a civil partnership with Richard Cullen in 2006. He is from Queensland, so it would be impossible to claim that "Australia taught him that it was ok to be gay" because he would have been 20 when the law regarding sodomy and homosexuality was finally repealed.

Anthony Venn-Brown: Evangelist for the Assemblies of God dog-kennel; the original founder of Youth Alive (you know how these fags love to attract children to their filth)!

Anthony Venn-Brown was an evangelist for the Assemblies of God. He is now a gay ambassador (apparently that is the term he uses), and has been since he came out in 1991. He has an autobiography entitled A Life of Unlearning which talks about his struggles within himself and being part of an organisation that considers homosexuality to be an abomination.

I don't know how long exactly this page has been around for, I can't find anything for the main site so I think that it has only appeared in the last 6 months. But this kind of innacuracy is to be honest unacceptable. He hasn't been a minister for 18 years but they still list him as a member.

It should also be noted that the WBC does not seem to think highly of the Pentacostal organisation, we all know that the "dog-kennel" is a dead giveaway.

Lastly, I suspect that Mr. Venn-Brown is only on here because of his past as a preacher, because it reflects badly on denominations that aren't the WBC and for his founding of the Youth Alive programme, because it is "evidence" that "homosexuals are paedophiles", even though there is no evidence that supports that. It is however a view that is used continuously by the WBC.

We finish this look at the last section of this site with a Bible quote:

Isaiah 13:11 And I will punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity; and I will cause the arrogancy of the proud to cease, and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible.

It's actually from a passage relating to Babylon. Not gay people. You fail again Westboro Baptist Church.

A Response to the WBC Site "God Hates Australia" Part 4.

After a brief delay (read: I couldn't really be bothered to write something) we continue our journey into the hatred that is the Westboro Baptist Church.

Today, we'll be looking at "Australia's Evil Government". Now before we start we'll play a little game.

What do you think makes our government evil? Is it:

a) Our involvement in the War on Terror.
b) The transition from a more conservative government to a more liberal one.
c) Gay people.

If you didn't answer c. then you clearly haven't picked up anything from the last three parts of this series.

Of course it's gay people. It's always gay people and this is no exception:

Australia has made it number one priority throughout the last 30 years of the 20th century to make it ok to be a fag. The last law to make it legal to be a fag was passed in 1997. Not only do they say it’s not illegal to be a fag, let’s add on top of that a law to recognize those unnatural relationships.

Tasmania’s The Relationship Act was passed in 2003 stating: A relationships register for significant relationships & caring relationships (same sex couples or heterosexual de facto couples). These “relationships” provide for certain legal benefits such as property division, will, hospital visits, etc.

Let us start with the obvious. Their basis for the determination of "natural" is based on the beloved verse from Deuteronomy. That is it. Never mind that quite a few animals display homosexual behaviour nope.

Because we all know that the Bible is far more knowledgeable then anything that science has come up with...

Their second paragraph I assume is supposed to make people think "those damn Australians, I hope God sends them all to hell" or something like that (WANTED: Fundamentalist Christian to tell me what I am supposed to think here.) . However, all the law states, based on just that paragraph is that homosexual couples are able to get de facto status. Oh dear, gay people have the same rights as a group that this church would hate anyway based on what they think of about sex.

Quite a few places in the world already have such laws. There would be quite a few homosexual couples that would be quite happy to have such a status, in the same way that there are heterosexual couples that are quite happy with that status. But apparently that is endorsing some vague form of sin.

I guess it doesn't help when groups like Evangelicals Concerned Inc. exist that have their own, possibly better interpretation of the Bible which I only know of but can't actually prove to you right now.

When I can I will provide the evidence.

But let us continue

If you think those laws are bad enough…wait for this next part. That’s right ladies and gentleman; let us take a look behind the scenes at certain people who have taken over the Australian Government. These are the best and brightest out-of-the-closet fags and dykes in good old Australia!

Michael Kirby – Justice of the High Court of Australia
Shayne Mallard – City Council
Bob Brown – Senator, First open fag member of the Australian Parliament
Penny Wong – Senator
Andrew Barr – Legislative Assembly
Penelope Gail Sharpe – Legislative Council
John Hyde – Legislative Assembly
Louise Pratt – Legislative Council
Giz Watson – Legislative Council
Gary Singer – Deputy Lord Mayor
Thang Ngo – City Council

Very detailed there isn't it? It's also out of date.

Let's just fill in a few gaps here first, and explain some things for those who don't know much about Australian politics:

Shayne Mallard is a councillor for the City of Sydney.
Gary Singer was a Deputy Lord Mayor, of Melbourne.
Thang Ngo was a councillor of Fairfield in NSW.
Michael Kirby was until recently a HCA justice.
Senator Bob Brown is currently a Greens Senator for Tasmania.
Senator Penny Wong is a senator and also the Climate Change and Water Minister. She is also the first Asian born person and the first openly gay person to be a member of a Federal Cabinet. Incidentally she is also represents South Australia in the Senate, a state which has the fewest rights for homosexuals.
Andrew Barr is a member of the ACT Legislative Assembly, and a member of the ACT Cabinet. He is the first openly gay person to be elected to the ACT Legislative Assembly.
Penelope Gail Sharpe (who clearly prefers to be called Penny) is a member of the NSW Legislative Council.
John Hyde is a member of the WA Legislative Assembly. He is not to be confused with the WA Senator with the same name. He is the first openly gay man to be elected to WA Parliament.
Louise Pratt is now a member of the Senate, she was a member of the WA legislative council.
Giz Watson is a member of the WA Legislative Coucil.

Now based on what I have found, all (with the possible exception of Thang Ngo, I couldn't find anything on him) of these people are openly gay. But wow. Look how well they have infiltrated and "taken over" the Australian government. I guess Bob Brown, Penny Wong and Louise Pratt must be some unstoppable gay Labor-Greens power bloc in the Senate right?

Actually they make up less then 4% of the Senate. There are 76 members of the Senate so they have the potential to be outvoted by 73 other people.

So what we see here is some good old fashioned scaremongering. Except that it is crappy scaremongering. Because based on this 100% of the House of Representatives isn't homosexual. Really good work there huh?

October 10, 2008 – After four days and nights, Australia decides to decriminalize abortion in the state of Victoria. Parliament had such a tough decision to make…should we defy God or shouldn’t we? Yes, ladies and gentlemen, Parliament had a tough time with this one; as a matter of fact, they had a “marathon sitting week.” Don’t worry - in the end they decided to spit in God’s face (shocker, I know) with a vote of 23-17! Shame on you Australia; you think you’re smarter than God about the matters of the womb. Think again. Your final destruction is nigh at hand. PREPARE TO MEET THY GOD!

What we see here is really nothing more then a temper tantrum from a four year old.

That is really all it is. Here we see the member of the WBC who wrote this complaining that they didn't get things "their way" even though they have no actual right to demand any change in Australia whatsoever.

But on to some bad science:

According to the Human Rights and Equal Opportunities Commission in Australia, there is need for a third gender. Not only can you mark female and male on official documents, you can mark "intersex" if you are transgender. WTF, mate?!? Here's a thought…how about if you just be thankful for what your God gave you. You can defy God and spit in His face all you want, but guess what? You can't change your chromosomes. Go ahead and mutilate yourselves and call your gender "intersex" it doesn't change the fact that you were either born with two X chromosomes or an X and a Y chromosome…you silly unthankful brutes!

People are either born with two X chromosomes or an X and a Y. Well yes, most of the time.

Women with Turner Syndrome don't fit in the XX/XY definition of male and female because they are XO. Yes, they don't have a second chromosome. They are women, but they don't fall into the classification given by the WBC.

Then there is XX male syndrome. This is where the sex chromosomes have a partial crossover during meiosis. They look like men. They may have the chromosomes of a woman but they look like a man.

It raises an interesting question here. Would a group like the Westboro Baptist Church call an XX male who is homosexual an abomination even though under the XX/XY system he is a woman?

The same line of reasoning would follow for a woman with Swyer syndrome only in this case it's a person who looks like a woman but has XY sex chromosomes.

Then we can talk about more abiguous ones like Klinefelter's Syndrome. This is an anomily where you get a man who is XXY.

What I am getting at here is that things are never as simple as you want it to be. I don't actually know the official stance of transgender people, I would have assumed that you would let them tick a "transgender" box, because there actually are intersex people in this world.

But I'm going to conclude with the bible verse they mention in the article. It is just before the tantrum:

Job 12:17 He leadeth counsellors away spoiled, and maketh the judges fools.

I'm actually confused here. I wonder if they mean "He" as "God" as the passage mentions or do they mean "he" as in "Satan" who only appears at the start of the book. I'm sorry to say that based on the context of the page either is technically a valid interpretation.

I do, however, get the funny feeling that this verse was only chosen because it mentions both councillors and judges.

A Response to the WBC Site "God Hates Australia" Part 3.

Welcome to Part 3 of my "response" to the Westboro Baptist Church.

If you're tuning in late, please read part 1 and part 2.

Part 3 today deals with "Australia's False Religious Systems".

I'm sure that most people are aware that by "False Religious Systems" the WBC really means "religions and denominations that don't follow our specific interpretation of the Bible".

70.28% of Australians are considered Christians, with the majority of that number being Catholics…which brings us to World Youth Day 2008!

We'll start with the obvious. Since a majority of Australian Christians are Catholics they have given a majority of the page to Catholic-bashing.

On the statistics as far as I can tell this number is wrong.

According to this pdf from the Australia Bureau of Statistics, according to the 2006 census the number of people who followed a Christian denomination was 63.8%.

They did actually get the majority religion right though. 25.8% of the population are Catholic. But if you followed a more traditional "Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox" breakdown of denominations, you would get 25.8%, 35.3% and 2.7% respectively, so there are more non-Catholics then there are Catholics but Catholics are the largest united denomination in Australia (5 126 900 Catholics of 12 685 800 people calling themselves Christians).

A point that I noticed that they didn't bring up was that there was actually an increase of 0.8% of Christians in general between 1996 to 2006, of which there was a 6.8% increase in Catholics but a -4.7%, -14.9% and -11.7% difference in that decade among the Anglicans, Uniting and "Presbyterian and Reformed" churches respectively.

You goofy Catholics think that if you go to an outside fair worshiping an old man that you will get to heaven. Stay away from idols! Stop worshiping the creature more than the Creator!

This is a common opinion of certain Protestant denominations of Catholics. In this case however the "idol" isn't actually Mary, it's the Pope.

Catholics don't worship the Pope, the belief is that he is the head of the organisation that was created by Jesus and that the Pope is the legitimate successor of St. Peter, who is considered the first Pope.

Quite a few denominations claim such apostolic succession some of whom are closer to the"truth" then others while others use it to give themselves an air of legitimacy.

Catholics do believe that they are worshipping the Creator, as they put it, but so does every other religion that claims that they are "the one true religion".

It is quite possible to claim that the WBC itself is guilty of the exact same thing, the difference being that their idol is none other then Phelps himself. As far as I can tell it appears that the members of the Church are strongly required to blindly follow and not argue with the interpretation and dogma that is created by Phelps. In esscence it seems that he sees himself as some sort of "Jesus" figure a view that technically contradicts his own interpretation.

Hello, can you say biggest pedophile machine in the world? Anyone with an ounce of sense would see that World Youth Day is an easy way for those old, ugly men to hook up with those young kids. Priests Rape Boys, people; the only reason you put your children in the hands of pedophiles is because you hate them. It doesn’t take a genius; keep your kids away from Catholic Priests!

I don't know whether it's the biggest paedophile machine in the world. I have been around priests before, I know quite a few people who have, and I do not know of a single person that has been abused by a member of the clergy.

Incidentally the logic from the page doesn't seem to follow. You give children to a paedophile because you don't like paedophiles?

But as pointed out before the WBC seems to be of the opinion that homosexuality leads to paedophilia, an opinion that has no basis at all but is not uncommon among the anti-gay community.

Don’t worry, for the other part of the Australian population (16.48%) they are considered to be non-religious or agnostic. These are some high-quality people in the great Down Under! WTF mate?!?

See, again, if they had bothered to do their research they would have been able to use the latest statistics then they would have made a better argument. It's actually 18.7% now. And that is an increase of 25.7% between 1996 to 2006.

But they are right, us non-religious or agnostic people are actually very nice and high-quality people unlike say Michael Guglielmucci a Pentecostal minister who pretended to have cancer and tricked people out of thousands of dollars.

The last thing that I don' t understand is why they didn't mention non-Christian denominations? Between 1996 to 2006 they had a whopping 79.3% change. Which Buddhism, Islam, and Hinduism having a 109.6%, 69.4% and 120.2% increase over that period.

I honestly don't know why I'm mentioning this, but I guess it has to do with their intellectual laziness, or perhaps a lack of creativity, in trying to explain how Australia is evil religiously.

Lastly, the city that I am from, Adelaide, is known as the "City of Churches". About 24% of us have no religious affiliation. I think that says it all.

I'm skipping the Bible quotes because there is actually very little to say about them.

Stay tuned for Part 4, where we'll talk about their page on the Government. Which you can find here.

A Response to the WBC Site "God Hates Australia" Part 2.

In other news before I start, I thought I might point out that it seems that they never actually managed to make it to Australia. Considering that they had a single protester there on the 21^st I guess means that they wanted to go UK --> Australia and then figured out that they couldn't bend time (takes about 14 hours to get to Kuala Lumpur International Airport, and it took us an extra 7 to get to Adelaide, I guess that it would be longer to Melbourne).

Anyway, I'm not going to just give up on what I started so we go onto part 2 of our "response" (it's really more of an analysis. That's what I get for writing it at around 2 am). Part 1 may be found here.

The entire section is called "God's Wrath Revealed Against Australia".

I suggest that you go to it this time. This page is the reason why I'm thinking "Poe's Law". They have a youtube clip from The Chaser on there. Unless they are part of "God's wrath" then hopefully he can wrath us with more funny stuff and less terrible stuff.

I'm sorry to say it but you will have to read that page. I'm just going to post snippets.

We'll start with "Bible Quote Context Time":

Judges 2:15 Whithersoever they went out, the hand of the LORD was against them for evil, as the LORD had said, and as the LORD had sworn unto them: and they were greatly distressed.

1Sa 12:15 But if ye will not obey the voice of the LORD, but rebel against the commandment of the LORD, then shall the hand of the LORD be against you, as it was against your fathers.

The first quote is from a passage about the unfaithfulness of Israel. Apparently the people turned away from God and he got annoyed, incited a bunch of enemies to attack the country and kind of supported those enemies by making it so that Israel would lose.

The second from Samuel is a farewell address from Samuel. Essentially it's one of the many passages where they aren't actually screwing around with the context in any way. It really is a passage that says "worship God or suffer" and goes on to have Samuel ask God to show his might by sending a storm during the harvest.

Their first example of the supposed "Wrath" of God is of course the Victorian bushfires. As I mentioned here they are claiming that it's because of gay people, while others claim that it isn't.

In traditional WBC showing of empathy they have this to say about the 209 people who have died:

The news reports claim that this is Australia's deadliest brush fire! It makes our hearts rejoice to see that you generation of brute beasts are getting rewarded based upon the fact that you spend your days chasing your lusts. The Lord is at the door and He WILL NOT allow you to continue to live in your filth without executing His justice! We have been warning you for years that your filthy manner of life is pissing God off, now OPEN YOUR EYES and see the destruction that you have laid upon yourselves because you absolutely REFUSE to just OBEY!

I'm sure that everyone else's hearts will rejoice when something bad happens to their "church".

In typical fringe religion style "refuse to just obey" means that Australia as a whole has refused to obey the "interpretation" of the Bible by Fred Phelps.

The reason for the Chaser clip is as follows:

You treated the servants of God terribly, sending one of your dirty fag bastards to interrupt our peaceful protests by sexually molesting one of our members and video-graphing your shameful conduct. You then, to add insult to your criminal injury, showed that video to thousands on Youtube around the world (see below), thereby desecrating the sacred worship of the temple of God at Westboro Baptist Church.

Notice how they, like other denominations of Abrahamaic faiths consider themselves to be "servants of God".

They also call Charles Firth, the man who "sexually molested" one of their members a "fag bastard" ignoring the small fact that he is actually married. To a woman. But I guess because she is an ALP supporter they probably wouldn't like her because she must be a communist or something.

The clip in question is below:

Now they claim that they "showed [it] to thousands on Youtube". Well what exactly are they doing? Whoever actually goes on to that section of the "God Hates Australia" website will see it as well. Seems a bit hypocritical to me but then again I don't expect the WBC to actually be logical.

Also note how they consider the picket to be "sacred worship". Under such logic I could create a church where I can beat the utter crap out of someone and call it "sacred worship". Firth encountered the people on a picket, not in their church. But I guess they are trying to play some sort of card regarding religion that doesn't apply anywhere outside their own little "congregation".

Continuing on:

And, it is written, “If any man shall defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy,” 1 Corinthians 3:17.

Notice how they are linking themselves to the "Temple of God", and yet their interpretation is utterly wrong. On top of that they've managed to actually quote mine the bible. You can find the verse here to check.

It states fully:

¹⁷If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him; for God's temple is sacred, and you are that temple.

The verse, as you can see, might not refer to any physical building at all. I don't know the current interpretations of the Bible, but in this case the interpretation might be that the temple is either a human, or the Corinthian Church. It could be the church in general, and I'm sorry to say it, but it's more likely to be an organisation that the WBC hates then themselves.

The rest of the page lists certain disasters that have happened over the years, including the heat wave before the fires, storms in the Hunter Valley in 2007, the bushfires on the Eyre Peninsula in 2005, the Bali Bombings (which isn't even in Australia so I don't know why it counts), Thredbo in 1997, fires on the East Coast in '93, and an earthquake in '89.

I do note that they didn't say anything about Stuart Diver, the only survivor from the Thredbo landslide, but the way they word it they make it sound like he's dead. I think someone should tell him. For those unaware, the landslide killed 18 people, including Sally Diver, the wife of Stuart, it turned out to have been caused by water from a leaking water main. In a way I think it might be for the best because of the implication that it would have.

The last thing that I will say about this page is that it appears that the way WBC see things is that people who die don't have to be gay, or tolerate gay people, instead God is punishing Australia in general. But the question remains, why is it that if God is actually punishing Australia for it's stance on homosexuality then why isn't God using more directed punishments? Why bother punishing in a rather random and inconsistent pattern?

Continue on to Part 3.

A Response to the WBC Site "God Hates Australia" Part 1.

Before I begin, as far as I can tell the following is actually a site that belongs to the Westboro Baptist Church. Looking up on whois gives me the same result for the following site and the American counterpart (which is linked to from their main site). Otherwise it is the most elaborate form of Poe's Law that I have ever encountered.

Without further adieu I shall introduce you to God Hates Australia part of the God Hates the World website.

At the moment I'm going to write about this.

Their first section on why God apparently hates Australia.

The first subsection is, and no surprises here, is entitled "Fags":

FAGS

When you throw the standard that the Lord your God set since the foundation of the world right out the window, what you get is a country that has NO morals! Every year that evil country known as Australia holds numerous Fag Pride Parades. Here are just a few examples of how these arrogant beasts roll: Pride March Victoria, Melbourne, Australia; Pride March Adelaide, SA, Australia: Gay Mardi Gras Parade, Sydney, Australia.

Psalm 81:12 So I gave them up unto their own hearts’ lust: and they walked in their own counsels.

Let's start with the obvious here. Morality is quite subjective. What one society considers immoral may be considered to be moral in another society. We can see throughout different societies similar themes appear, justice for example, not killing someone as another. The main "morals" that Phelps and his ilk are going on about refer to the Biblical laws regarding sex. I do not believe that I have ever seen, heard, or read, about the WBC going on about people wearing clothes of two different materials, or eating prawns. If someone can show me evidence to the contrary I will gladly point it out. WBC "morals" appear to be ones where you can't divorce, be abstinant until marriage, and Leviticus 18:22.

For some fun according to Wikipedia the US has 141 LGBT events (if I counted correctly), Australia has according to Wikipedia 13 of them. I don't really have a comment here, I just thought it would be interesting to point it out.

By the way WBC, there are groups in Australia that hate gay people as much as you do, I find it interesting that you don't talk about them. Perhaps that might destroy the image of the "oppressed religious sect with outspoken views" that you like to try and press.

The verse from Psalm 81 is a psalm entitled "God's Appeal to Stubborn Israel".

The next section please:

DIVORCE/REMARRIAGE

46% of Australian marriages end in divorce. What is wrong with you people!?!

De 22:22 If a man be found lying with a woman married to an husband, then they shall both of them die, both the man that lay with the woman, and the woman: so shalt thou put away evil from Israel.

Take that and smoke it on your barbies!

Do you think the Lord was kidding when He said: What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder (Mark 10:9)? Here’s the answer, NO, He was not kidding; now what?

From the Australian Bureau of Statistics the crude divorce rate in Australia was 2.3 per 1000 in 2007, from the excel document provided they state as a comparison that in 2006 the crude divorce rate was 3.6 per 1000. According to this site the Australian and US divorce rates (as a percentage in 2002) were different by 0.2%. Why not work on fixing the divorce rate in your own country instead of bashing someone elses.

The Deuteronomy verse applies to adultery, which is relevant to the WBC because they don't believe in divorce. Funnily enough according to the Bible the very verse they quote is actually grounds for getting a divorce as well. They are basing their divorce opinions most likely on Matthew 5:31-32 which actually contradicts Deuteronomy 24:1 which basically says that a man can divorce his wife "if he finds something objectionable about her", gives a pretty broad range of reasons for divorce for at least a man there.

As for Mark 10:9, that is just the same as the verse from Matthew that I mentioned, except with the "adultery" part removed. So which one is it? Do we listen to Deuteronomy, which gives really broad grounds, Matthew which gives a single ground, or Mark which gives no grounds?

ABORTION

This may shock some of you, alright maybe only the ones that have their heads in the sand, but abortion is legal in all circumstances even when a reason is not given.

That’s right dear friends; when you live in Australia you can fornicate your brains out and when you’re done with all your filth, just kill that child that occurred because of your nastiness!

You don’t mess with the matters of the womb…at the end of the day it is still murder. You killed that child…their blood is on your hands! You are murderers plain and simple.

John8:44 Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.

Firstly, in Australia abortion is a State, not a Federal issue. The only consitancy throughout Australia is that abortion is legal when circumstances arise where the health of the mother is at risk. The only state where you can argue that abortion is legal with no questions asked is in Victoria up to 24 weeks (thus the rubbish pouring out of Danny Nalliah's mouth) and it is also legal in the ACT. In NSW and WA it is legal only for health issues surrounding the mother, economic circumstances, fetal defects, mental health issues, rape and apparently social factors and also in WA up to 20 weeks. In SA, NT, and Tasmania the law does not allow abortion for economic and social factors. SA allows abortion for those factors up to 23 weeks. Finally Queensland, which has the strictest abortion laws in the country does not allow an abortion for fetal defects, the only exception is if the baby would die soon after birth anyway.

Each state has other requirements like mandatory counselling in WA, to the abortion must be performed in a hospital and be approved by two physicians (SA).

Seriously, it takes 5 minutes to even do the most basic search on the subject.

PROSTITUTION

In Queensland, private sex work and prostitution in a brothel are legal; however, unlicensed brothels and massage parlors used for prostitution are strictly prohibited….oh now you pretend to have a standard! You aren’t fooling anyone!

In New South Wales, prostitution is legal except near churches, schools, hospitals and similar venues. Does anyone else see the big elephant standing in the middle of the room here? Anyone….anyone? You upside down people think that if you keep it from the eyes of church-goers and children that the Lord can’t see you? Oh, how totally wrong you are!

Hebrews 4:13 Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do.

What idiocy we see here. In Phelps' world there wouldn't be prostitution possibly. That's assuming that his secret sex stopping police aren't corrupt or anything. If the crime world has taught us anything it's that no matter what you do you will still have crime, even in the most puritanical society that you could conceive of.

The fact is that in Queensland has a standard, and it would work a hell of a lot better then a WBC "standard". We know that organised crime will find a way to take control of illegal business, just look at the US during Prohibition, and they have far fewer standards then the Queensland government would.

I honestly would have thought that they would have mentioned SA here. Just to clarify, wheras our interstate counterparts have a vague idea of what should be done we don't. Essentially the police ignore the law regarding prostitution unless the brothels do something illegal that isn't prostitution and then they do something. It's all because we have a large enough section of parliament who want to keep it illegal and the Rann government doesn't want to revisit the issue.

Until last year WA had a strange situation where the brothels were located in certain places with the tacit approval of the police, then they passed legislation that decriminalised it.

Your "big elephant" only seems to apply to those who believe in a God. What a stupid elephant. Then again this is the WBC, what do you expect?

ADOPTION

Fags are allowed to adopt children in the Australian Capitol Territory and Western Australia. Stepparent adoption is allowed in Tasmania….um…..ok!?! There are still certain provinces in Australia that don’t allow same-sex couples to adopt children….it won’t be long before that will change! These evil beasts aren’t satisfied until everyone bows down to their disgusting lusts!

Isaiah 1:4 Ah sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a seed of evildoers, children that are corrupters: they have forsaken the LORD, they have provoked the Holy One of Israel unto anger, they are gone away backward.

Firstly, we don't have provinces, we have states and territories. Get it right, we aren't Canada.

Second, I can see that you seem to be talking about SA (NT is no apart from "exceptional circumstances"). Of course you are, since we are backwards land. We must be some sort of ideal state for you, if only we weren't part of that fag loving rest of Australia right?

And why shouldn't it change? I don't see the problem at hand, and I think that it is wrong that we aren't doing something about it here in SA. Many of the other states have laws that allow adoption of some sort or another, so why shouldn't we?

By the sounds of this it seems that WBC believes that gay people are also paedophiles, I had no idea. I thought paedophiles were paedophiles.

Bible quote wise I'm guessing that they consider us to be Judah, the nation that the verse is referring to.

So we've reached the end of this first page of filth, just four more to go. Part 2 may be found here.

Australian Customs and Lines

I honestly think that it is easier to leave Australia then it is to enter it. Leaving Australia is as follows:

1. Fill out a customs form.
2. Wait about 3 mins in a line.
3. Customs person plays on computer and says that you are ok to leave.
4. Go to waiting room and wait for plane.

However, entering Paris from Charles de Gaulle Airport is as follows:

1. Go to foreigner line and wait about 5 mins.
2. Get passport stamped.
3. Enter the EU.

It was 5 am when we entered France, there was one booth open with two people in there stamping passports.

It was even easier leaving from Frankfurt. We waited about a minute and then got our passports stamped and then left.

Malaysia was interesting.

KLIA has a very large customs area. I think there were about 20 of the two people booths open and about half of them were staffed. No waiting in line at all. You filled out your customs form on the flight, they stamped your passport you entered the country.

Leaving was about the same. Most of the customs booths were open (and this was during the Chinese New Year as well, you'd be amazed how empty Kuala Lumpur was considering how many people there aren't Chinese) no lines, no waiting, a couple of stamps and you were out of there.

Then I arrived back in Australia.

My customs form was already filled out on the plane. I had to wait about 10 mins in line because I didn't know (and I guess nearly everyone else didn't either) that you could go to a "self service" thing. They had about 10 booths but they could only hold one person. There were three open booths helping Australians and two for foreigners. In typical Australian fashion everything was slow because of the bureaucracy.

I could understand if this was the proper customs section. That bit was surprisingly efficient. We went in, answered a few questions, and left. That was it. But this was the bit where you get your passport checked before you go and get your bags. That was frustraitingly slow.

It seems to be an Australian phenomena. I had to go to the Centrelink office recently and I learned that they had renovated it. Before they had many sections each with at least one person there to help you (there were places for more but usually it was one person). No more. Now they've changed it to one counter for the elderly and carers and two for everyone else. They melded three sections into one "general enquiries" section just to increase the amount of time you waste in lines.

That sums up dealings with the Australian Government. You spend far more time waiting in lines here then you would over in other countries.

Bravo Australian Government. Bravo.

Tarquinia

If you are in Italy and you have your own way of getting around I really suggest that you take a trip to Tarquinia. Tarquinia is along the coast of Italy, and was one of the major Etruscan cities.

There is a Necropolis there with some of the finest decorated tombs in Tuscany.

If you leave Rome head out towards Sutri (the road isn't an autostrada though) and spend some time looking at the amphitheatre there. It might not be as fancy as the Colosseum but it is one that was hewn out of the tuff. There are some tombs there of a different variety and a church that was converted from a Mithreaum.

As I stated before the tombs in Tarquinia are very finely decorated. They have a few recurring elements. Feasting scenes for example are popular for tombs built when times were good. There are other scences though, one is decorated as if it were a forest. Another, known as the 'hunting and fishing tomb', is decorated in hunting and fishing motifs. There was one tomb that was influenced by Bacchic rites with one picture of a woman being whipped (Etruscan S&M?).

Many of the tombs have a happy/peaceful feel to them. There was one though that was built when the Romans started to increase pressure on the Etruscan cities. It had a family being led into the underworld by an Etruscan spirit of the dead. It seemed out of place and sad.

But it is worth seeing, however you need plenty of time since they close at 2pm. We needed to move on so we only saw the tombs, but there is a museum as well.

Jason Spiehler - Tour Guide

So, you're in eternal Rome, and you want to go for a tour. So you need to find yourself a guide. The best person to guide you around Rome is an American from Louisiana.

No, you read that right.

The man in question is named Jason Spiehler.

He is an art historian and theologian and is quite possibly the best tour guide in Rome.

He is even recommended by name by the New York Times.

Finding him starts at the end of our first day in Rome. We had been to the Colosseum, and we were wandering around the Forum when, a tour appeared near the Rostra Divi Iulii. The man, an American, was both informative and entertaining, something that is very important when it comes to a tour. The tour was free, so we tagged along and got to learn more about the Forum.

As a side note, when one of the people outside the Colosseum said that there were no signs in the Forum he wasn't kidding. There were a few signs, but they only said what the things were. For someone who doesn't know anything about the forum you would be hard pressed to know who the hell Phocas was, and why did he have a column in the forum, or what the hell most of the buildings were. It makes a really good selling point for the tour guides, because you are forced to pay a more expensive price for a tour. I'm not lying here, I saw nothing for an official tour of the forum, and the Colosseum official tour is €4. It probably works out cheap if you are not an EU citizen, but not if you are eligible for the discount.

Anyway. We learned about Phocas and at the Curia we learned about the cheap, corner cutting technique used to build it. There was quite a bit of stuff we learned, and it all culminated with him reciting Shakespeare at the foot of the Temple of Jupiter.

There was a night tour but we didn't go on that. Instead we decided to forgoe the Palatine Hill (the ticket is valid for two days) and check out some of the other well known sights in Rome (Trevi fountain, Spanish Steps, Castel Sant' Angelo etc.) and go to the Vatican for his Vatican tour (which did cost money though). Firstly it was worth it. It decided to rain about the time the tour started, so it worked out alright since we were inside. Secondly, after the partial tour that we went on with him in the forum it seemed like a really stupid idea not to take up the offer.

An interesting tour followed, and we never noticed that we spent three hours in the Vatican Museums and the Sistine Chapel. Someone with the credentials that Jason has makes it really interesting to look at and understand the artwork that is there.

I now understand far better then I ever would works like Raphael's School of Athens or the symbolism of the fresco of the Sistine Chapel (hint: Jonah = Jesus). Or a rather funny tale involving the painting of The Last Jugement where Biagio de Cesena insulted the painting Michelangelo portrayed him as Minos, in the hell part of the picture with ass' ears and a snake biting his penis. When Cesena complained to the Pope the response was that he couldn't do anything because the Pope is not in charge of hell.

If you ever get a chance to go on a tour of the Vatican (or find him in the forum, or on a night walk) go. Do it. You won't regret it.

[The title is there because of laziness, I can't think of a decent one. So this crappier one will have to do, sorry.]

Catacomb and Ossuary

Take a look at this interesting picture that I took in Paris.

"So what Wildy? It's just a bad picture of a street sign, why are you wasting my time?" most likely what you are thinking, but bear with me.

Like the sign below it, these were taken in Paris. However I was under the street when I took it.

Welcome to a picture from the Catacombs of Paris.

I don't know how many people know of it, but there are tunnels underneath the Paris. Initially they were used for quarrying limestone which went into the construction of the city above. Yes, you heard me right, they used the very rock that the city was built on to build the city. Doesn't sound very logical huh?

In the 1800s when the city started to collapse from the tunnels they sent workers down there to reinforce, and strengthen the tunnels. These street signs were a useful way to allow a worker to find his location in the labyrinth of tunnels.

Over time the catacombs have been used as a quarry, some tunnels, a hiding place during the revolution, transport tunnels for the Resistance and the Nazi troops during WWII a church and an Ossuary.

When the tunnels were being strengthened the government also thought it would be a good idea to empty out the cemeteries, which were getting too full, and pile the bones into the catacombs. They did, and along the way they consecrated the area and made a chapel.

The remains of about 6 million Parisians lie within these catacombs, which are lined with skulls and femurs mainly, along with plaque things with stuff that I can't understand in French, and Bible quotes that I can't understand in Latin.

Somewhere among these bones are also victims of the Terror, nobles, a lawyer to the King, a handmaiden of the Queen, enemies of Robespierre and also Robespierre himself. When the cemetery was emptied the remains of Robespierre were moved to the Ossuary as well and were lost among the remains of other Parisians including those who he had sent to their deaths.
The catacombs are located on Avenue du Colonel Henri Rol-Tanguy and the walk through the catacombs takes about an hour.

There are two spiral staircases that you have to walk on and the area before the Ossuary shows you the reinforcing work that was undertaken as well as some sculptures of palaces on an island somewhere.

On the way out you can see areas where the tunnels had caved in and subsequently cleared, leaving a bell shaped roof.

If you do what I did, go see the former site of the Bastille first. Then walk across the Seine and check out their Natural History Museum (with a statue of Lamarck...) If you don't go to the other museum there, go to the metro stop outside the McDonalds and head to the Catacombs. They are right across from the Metro station (but you have to go above ground first).

Finally, sorry for the crappy pictures. I used my phone on night mode. I wasn't the one carrying the camera.

Travel Observations

Well I spent the past two months travelling a bit and I have observed a few things that I'm going to write about right now. I'm not going to bother writing too much detail at the moment, you will have to travel yourself.

It's also "part one" of a "series" of more then one parts that I will write about based on this trip.

Firstly, if the Parisian parking inspectors started to enforce parking laws in the same manner that you see here in Australia the government would be a hell of a lot richer, and the number of available parking spaces would be at least halved.

Incidentally French people seemed rather willing to speak English. It also helps if you know how to ask if they can in French. Will be writing more on Paris.

Brussels is rather boring but if you go in the off season you can find really cheap, good three course meals for about 10 Euros (about A$20). It's one of those choose from a set number of choices menus but one of the choices was a pepper steak.

Den Haag is nice and rather relaxed and unlike Amsterdam is far more car friendly.

If you are an Australian never, ever think of food portions in Australian terms when in Germany. I ordered a "kleine portion" at the Deutsches Schiffahrtsmuseum in Bremerhaven and was given three plates of food.

Prague is quite nice in the winter. The only problem is that since all the touristy things are located close to each other you will be surrounded by tourists.

Insurance companies in Europe are far more understanding then Australian ones. Until they offer you a hire car which comes standard with summer tyres. Does not help when you want to cross the Alps.

Germany has many cigarette and gumball machine things that you see along the side of the roads. If they did that here the machines would be stolen within minutes. Also cigarette packets only tell you that smoking can kill you. No pictures.

The same goes for pedestrian malls. There were no bollards protecting the Mac shop in München from being ram raided because they don't seem to do that thing there.

If you happen to head over the Brenner pass and you stop at the Europabrücke to look around, don't go to the McDonalds at the rest stop. Honestly, take the time and go to the restaurant instead.

The roads in Italy have along the sides of the roads either a) rubbish, or b) prostitutes.

I have many things to say about the Italian version of Wheel of Fortune, but I'm going to write a whole post on that.

The Forum Romanum is not very well signed, and the Colosseum has no signs at all. The official Colosseum tour is only 4 Euros, the other tours from some group thingy include the Colosseum and the Forum but are far more expensive.

For a tour guide for Rome (and the Vatican) one name: Jason Spiehler. Will definitely write more.

Incidentally Rome is quite expensive, and Roman pizza leaves a lot to be desired. (Time and the fact that Naples was flooded are the reasons why I didn't get to see Pompeii, or eat pizza from the birthplace of the food).

15 Euros to climb the Leaning Tower. So I didn't.

If you go to the Königsschlösser I personally think you shouldn't bother seeing Hohenschwangau. The tour is very rushed. Neuschwanstein however is far more relaxed.

I do wonder if Wagner was somewhat annoyed that they stopped work on the castle, considering that it was designed to be an embodiment of his operas.

Malaysia is ok to go to at the end of the wet season, except if you want lots of humidity. More will be written here as well.

Creationist Claim: Death Before the Fall

This will look a bit more formal then most posts, but I think it would be better to do it this way then in a more informal post.


Introduction

Those of us who have encountered creationists online or perhaps in real life will have encountered the claim that "There was no death before the fall". Examples of this claim may be found on blogs such as this one, internet forums (my chosen reference seems to have disappeared, sorry) and is the main viewpoint for Answers In Genesis (AIG). This viewpoint also appears in their Creation Museum. However, such a claim is blatantly false, and is, in fact, not supported by scriptural interpretation.

Assumptions, Bible Version and Notation

The following are the assumptions made in this post:

1. The Bible is 100% accurate (i.e. non contradictory)
   
2. The Bible is infallible
   
3. The Bible interprets itself (Sola Scriptura ^wiki)

I will state that these assumptions are not my personal beliefs, but are being made to show the thought process.

The Bible version used is the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV), all links to scripture sources (in superscript) will take you to an online copy of the NRSV.

Citing will be done by superscript link. For ease, links to bible verses will be lettered while links to sources will be numbered.

Background

The idea of "the Fall" bases itself on the "second" account of creation in Genesis 2^[a]. This second account is considered to be non-contradictory and is in fact a more detailed description of the creation of mankind.^[1]. In it God creates man^[b], creates woman when God thinks that it is not good that man should be alone in the garden^[c], and then created animals for man to name^[d].

The event known as "The Fall" starts with Genesis 3^[e]. In this event we see woman being tricked by the serpent, which in modern Christianity is said to be Satan in disguise^[2]. Man and woman eat the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, and are punished for their transgression by being banished from Eden.

Death in the Garden

The fall is considered to be the point in time where death is said to have started and all of the worlds ills appear. According to Tommy Mitchell of AIG:

"To have been very good, God’s creation must have been without blemish, defect, disease, suffering, or death. There was no “survival of the fittest.” Animals did not prey on each other, and the first two humans, Adam and Eve, did not kill animals for food. The original creation was a beautiful place, full of life and joy in the presence of the Creator."^[3]

This is based on Genesis 1:31 in which it is stated:

"God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good... "^[f]

In the article Two Histories of Death by Ken Ham^[4], Ham questions whether creation can be considered "very good" if there was so much death. The article, although presenting two sides and "letting the reader decide", makes the answer obvious. The nature of God is good, therefore you cannot have a creation that has death.

The idea that death came after the first sin is also mentioned in Romans 5:12 :

Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death came through sin, and so death spread to all because all have sinned—^[g]

What could be considered to be the last verse that supports the claim that there was "no death in Eden" is Genesis 1:29-30:

"God said, “See, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit; you shall have them for food. 30And to every beast of the earth, and to every bird of the air, and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so." ^[h]

This also gives rise to the claim that carnivores in the garden were herbivorous.^[5]

Verses Verses Verses

When arguing using Sola Scriptura this is what the argument can end up becoming. Since a literal Bible is also one that supports itself arguments will end up being ones with verses thrown around. This argument is no different.

The first question is "do we know that life in Eden was immortal"? Based on scripture the answer is no.

As Glen R. Morton said in Death Before the Fall: The Theology^[6], why would life need to reproduce if it was immortal?

God says in Genesis 1:22 that animals should "be fruitful and multiply"^[i]. Logically, as well as using scripture, this would seem to be contradictory. Under the "no death" argument, had the fall never happened all animals on Earth would reproduce while never dying. This would start to cause stress on the flora, which would be the food source for all life and would cause suffering due to food shortages - the exact opposite of what the concept of "the Garden of Eden" is supposed to be about.

The closest non-biblical modern example would be the Koala population of Kangaroo Island. Without any natural predators on the island (and the reason for putting them there in the first place) they have been able to reproduce at a much faster rate then they normally would, only dying of old age or from various accidents. This has put much stress on the ecosystem of the island.^[7] This is what is being suggested by AIG, except on a larger scale.

Next we have an interesting passage in Genesis 3:22:

Then the Lord God said, “See, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil; and now, he might reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever”—^[j]

.

A tree of life would be redundant in a place where there is no death to begin with, so why would God fear man reaching out and eating from this tree?

It appears that the tree of life is a once off, possibly hereditary way of becoming immortal.

This really is the strongest piece of biblical evidence that there was death before the fall.

Other Views

The majority view from a theological perspective is that the "fall" was not a physical death, or the appearance of death, but a spiritual one.[8][9]. However, it should be noted that this is not a literal literal interpretation, which states "death" which would imply physical.

The second view, which I share, is that it's a very nice story, but none of it is true.

Conclusion

The claim of "no death before the fall" does lead to an interesting conundrum. Had there been no fall, would that mean that God would have a more active role in the world because he would have to feed a large number of immortal beings? And would he be a loving God if he didn't?

The answer to the second question would be no, he wouldn't be a loving God.

But, the clear answer is that no, there was no immortality before the fall, because the Bible itself states that there was an additional requirement for man to become immortal. It forces a literalist to accept that there would be death before the fall, however that creates a contradiction in their view of God. The result from the literalist side is that there is a group of people who have picked and chosen their verses that supports what they want to support, but left out the verses that show they are wrong.

Christophera - Visual Analysis

This is the second part of the x many long part series about Christophera, the first part of this may be found here.

This part deals with a cut & paste post dealing with his claim of either:

1. Visual Analysis is only needed
2. It looked like an explosion
   

This claim is a simple one, he posts pictures which will be reproduced below, and claims that they "prove" an inside job.

The following pictures are the ones that he posts, in reality they are in varying states of appearance (for some reason he thinks that the Myspace forum is pure BB code, even though it supports HTML):

As you can see from these pictures he is claiming "the collapse of the WTC looks like an explosion, look at this picture along with these explosions and you will see that the collapse of the towers were, in fact, an explosion."

Unfortunately when you look at reality this does not seem to be the case.

Do you remember this picture from the last post on this subject?

This picture was created because of this very series of claims.

Also take a look at this after reading this post.

What we are seeing here is a problem in the thinking of Christophera. Photos can be a reliable way of ensuring that an event can be remembered very clearly.

However they do have limitations. The photo captures an event at a specific period of time, in the case of 9/11 the collapse of the towers.

Because of this you will get pictures that when static look like something that they aren't. The reality of the incident may be completely different to the photo in question, or may be a part of a bigger picture.

Unlike, a posed photo, photos of 9/11 are more like taking photos of a birthday party. Each photo tells a small part of a bigger story.

Amanzafar has an excellent set of photos from 9/11. (Although it is somewhat sad to note that there are CTists out there who use them as "evidence" for their claims.)

The collapse of the towers is one of those events where it looked like an explosion but it wasn't.

Take a look at these pyroclastic flows:

These photos are of various eruptions. The USGS one is from Mt. St. Helens (US), the one below it is from St. Augustine (Alaska, US), the one to the top right is from somewhere while the bottom right is from Mayon Volcano in the Philippines.

Compare these pictures to the quarry blasts, or the picture of the tower. They do look kind of similar don't they?

Logically we can say that based on the picture the tower looked like an explosion, in the same way we can say that these pictures of pyroclastic flows look like explosions if we didn't know what a pyroclastic flow is.

It is grossly incorrect to claim that "only visual analysis is needed" or draw the conclusion that "the towers looked like an explosion therefore they were blown up".

The "Mt. St. Helens was an inside job" photo uses the same logic as Christophera used, since the pyroclastic flow looked like an explosion it must mean that explosives were used and only the government could have done it.

It is quite clear that the Mt. St. Helens picture makes an absurd claim, but it is no more absurd then the one Christophera makes.

Christophera and His "Phenomena"

If you ever happen to chance upon Chris Brown, a conspiracy theories, online who goes by the name Chris on Myspace, but has also been known as Christopera on the JREF forum and a variety of other names online, you would have seen this before.

This post has been created for two purposes, firstly, to put together links and other sources that show, or contradict what he says, and so, if you ever encounter him online, you can just link directly to this when he starts resetting the argument.

One final note before I begin. Christophera and his "concrete core" "theory" is a fringe "theory" of a fringe group, you don't hear too much of this in mainstream 9/11 CTs, but even the Loose Change Forum has banned him at one time for spouting his theory, but online he is still as verbose as other "truthers".

INTRODUCTION

His opening changes depending on who/what he is responding to, when in agreement he will mention "5 phenomena", when posting in response to a debunker, he will probably insult the person first, his content starts with the follwing five links (spelling/grammar/punctuation has not been changed). Beyond this point is where the standardised post begins:

free fall
total pulverization.
superfine, heated particulate
smooth, square cut column ends x the 1,000's
heavy steel assemblies heaved hundreds of feet

(Link to NIST FAQ, Link to plaguepuppy video, dead link, the last two are links to pictures on his site).

(Note, at this time I cannot find a working link to the video, it's a clip with Joe Casaliggi talking about the towers collapsing to dust, Myspace has a stupid linking thing, kind of like a really long tinyurl.)

The only comment I can make of these links is that the presence of a dead link shows how it is used to make cut and past arguments.

The next section before the "evidence" is as follows:

"With the FEMA, steel core column lie, nothing can be explained. It is all impossible and that is what the counter truth movement wants.

Support for the steel core columns is support for the impossible to obscure the possible.

All five of the above phenomena, that NONE of those who believe in the FEMA lie can even approach, can be explained with the use of the true structure, the steel reinforced cast concrete tubular core in the center of each tower.."

Ok, got that? The claim is that everything, including NIST, which is his very first link, is wrong. We also see here a rather typical argument from all kinds of people on the CT side of the fence, that there is some sort of organisation out there designed to censor the "truth".

We are also introduced to his most important point. That the Twin Towers did not have a steel core, and in fact has a concrete one.

Now, I will provide some links, but the best place to see a debunking of a "concrete" core is on this thread from Above Top Secret.

Other places that say that it was a steel core include:

• The University of Sydney
• Skyscraper.org
• NYC-Architecture.com

Some of the commonly posted pictures that prove him wrong include:


















PARAGRAPH 1

His next section is the "evidence". This will be broken down into the paragraphs he posts.

"free fall
Concrete can be fractured instantly to fall freely by a small amount of properly placed explosives. With C4 coated rebar and C4 poured into the floor corrugations that also acted as cutting charges for the interior box columns, the only full height columns that existed, free fall was assured. The security phone lines were used to distribute an audio tone to digital counters on every floor and every 40 foot of core. Floors were timed with 75 millisecond delays and core sections of 40 foot at 300 milliseconds."

(NIST again).

This paragraph introduces the second idea that makes up this argument, C4 coated rebar.

But first, let us see what NIST says about free fall:

"NIST estimated the elapsed times for the first exterior panels to strike the ground after the collapse initiated in each of the towers to be approximately 11 seconds for WTC 1 and approximately 9 seconds for WTC 2. These elapsed times were based on: (1) precise timing of the initiation of collapse from video evidence, and (2) ground motion (seismic) signals recorded at Palisades, N.Y., that also were precisely time-calibrated for wave transmission times from lower Manhattan (see NCSTAR 1-5A). "

What they say here is that they don't actually know the exact time but they make a good estimate based on the evidence they have, and there was quite a bit.

However, if you look at pictures, like the one shown here, you can see that there are sections of the building that fell faster then the building itself. Debunking911 has a section talking about free fall that also shows how Christophera (and any other CTist that claims free fall) is wrong.

Next, we come to the C4 coated rebar. The explosive used in C4 is Royal Demolition Explosive or RDX. It is something of an unusual choice to use C4 since the "official" line of thinking is that it was therm*te.

According to Chrisophera this was coated on the rebar, and was used to blow up the towers.

There is a problem with this line of thinking to begin with. According to a supplier, C4 lasts about 10 years under good conditions, not the 30 needed for this "theory" to work. The common counter that I have seen involves him either changing the definition of the word "about" to "up to and including 30" or claim that concrete is a better container then say mylar in a well ventilated area.

We see two problems here. Firstly, if there are any bacteria that were on the rebar before the concrete core was poured, and they happen to be mentioned here, and survive, then they would start to consume the RDX. The counter was that the conditions were too alkaline. Unfortunately there are plenty of scientific articles out there that show that RDX can degrade in an alkaline environment, such as the following:

• Potential for Biodegradation of the Alkaline Hydrolysis End Products of TNT and RDX
• Alkaline hydrolysis of the cyclic nitramine explosives RDX, HMX, and CL-20: New insights into degradation pathways obtained by the observation of novel intermediates
• Contribution of Hydrolysis in the Abiotic Attenuation of RDX and HMX in Costal Waters
• Determination of Key Metabolites during Biodegradation of Hexahydro-1,3,5-Trinitro-1,3,5-Triazine with Rhodococcus sp. Strain DN22 (another bacterial related one)
• Kinetics of RDX degradation by zero-valent iron
  

As you can see, there aren't any that are related to the topic at hand, but the evidence is quite clear that it will degrade either bacterially in anaerobic conditions, or will degrade through chemical processes at high pH.

Funnily enough, once you take care of these two points, there is very little left to argue. Even if his first premise, that the WTC towers had a concrete core, his second premise, that it was C4 coated rebar, doesn't stand up to the evidence at all.

PARAGRAPH 2

"total pulverization
The above free fall explanation takes care of the building but it needs to be said that when the floors blow and the 300 milliseconds delay of the core blast occurs, the contents of the building are subjected to an outward blast of hard stone aggregates that shred everything and blow it out the windows explaining the 3-5cm bone fragments on roofs 400 feet away."

(The link is the one that I don't have the proper url to).

This section follows on from the first paragraph. When you take away the possibility of it being explosives, you are left with a re-worded version of the "squibs" argument.

Debunking 9/11 has a section on this.

The simplest explanation for what Christophera is claiming was caused by the same process that created the "squibs". The compressing floors during collapse forced air outwards, smashing the windows creating the "squib" effects.

The compression of the floors forced the air out at a speed fast enough to fling bone fragments great distances.

PARAGRAPH 3

"superfine, heated particulate
With an engineered explosive container made from concrete having the explosive coating on the centralized rebar, the pressures from optimum containment are absolutely maximized. Optimized pressures create a maximum shock wave lending to the total pulverization described in the above paragraph but also creating the 10-100 micron sized particles that are super heated to rise and form the distinctive pyroclastic flow. This also causes some of the iron of the rebar to be bonded to molecules of silica and calcium as seen in the dust analysis."

(The dead link)

Another rewording of an old CT argument, "superfine, heated particulate" is a more elaborate way of saying "pyroclastic flow", which is what he says anyway.

The problem is that trying to claim that there was a pyroclastic flow means very little unless you are arguing that volcanoes took down the towers. Just remember if the towers collapsing looked like a quarry explosion which is also a pyroclastic flow, it leads to only one conclusion, the Mount St. Helens eruption was an inside job.

(By the way, if you were the guy on Myspace who created this picture which I nicked, say something, I would like to give you credit for this picture.)

PARAGRAPH 4

"smooth, square cut column ends x the 1,000's
The C4 filled corrugations died out into special corner plates that were described in the 1990 documentary as stiffeners for the floor to column joint. There were 6 plates per column, installed in 2 layers all the way around the tower every 3rd floor made from tempered steel, 3/8 thick I think. If these were high pressure gas guides a collapsing plane of high pressure gas would surround the column and slice through it performing as an optimized cutting charges. Good evidence is shown with a ruptured Column. This also provides a very good explanation for the large quantity of iron microspheres as dark columns of iron particulate seen in images are blown out the tops of the severed but still standing interior box columns inside the clouds of debris in the surrounding demolition."

("optimized cutting charges" is a dead link, "ruptured Column links to his own site", the long link is to a picture of one of the towers collapsing.)

All I can say here, not working in the construction industry, but from what I have heard from people who know what they are talking about, all that is here is absolute rubbish.

The 1990 documentary that he mentions either never existed, or does not support what he claims. Likewise, he has claimed before that the C4 coated rebar thing came from an article he read in the 70's, another source that cannot be verified.

On the JREF forum, a poster called Chainsaw has a far more logical explanation of any microsphere. Unfortunately this is another area where I am lacking in knowledge.

PARAGRAPH 5

"heavy steel assemblies heaved hundreds of feet
Some of the cutting charges failed due to exposure to bad weather during construction. When this happened, large assemblies were intact and the webs of floor "I" beams against the core; still connected to floor beams going out to the perimeter columns, still connected by spandrel plates in the 3 story panels delivered for assembly; were subjected to the expanding debris wave of the concrete core detonating which cause a billowing of the web of an "I" beam showing huge pressure applied horizontally"

(Both links go to his own site) This is the last paragraph of the "evidence". The problem we have here is that it ignores other possibilities like the "I" beam billowing due to pressure from the collapse, instead being put down to "cutting charges failing due to bad weather".

By this time there is very little left to counter, since the argument collapsed four paragraphs ago.

CONCLUSION

His conclusion is as follows:

"Every phenomena explained in detail. All it depends upon is the infiltration of the US government before 1966 by a faction capable and secrecy adequate to design and construct such buildings for the purpose of eventual demolition."

Clearly, all the "phenomena" were not explained in detail, at least not in a fashion that is acceptable by any scientific standard. There is plenty of evidence out there that at this time I have not found, or encountered from other people arguing with him (or hasn't been purged by the new N&P mod on Myspace).

In a way his "all it depends" claim could be considered true, unfortunately, there is no way to prove it, and also ignores the fact that you have to believe that he is right, and everyone else who thinks otherwise (including the people who built the towers) is wrong, some very unsatisfactory excuses about the lack of evidence, and the suspension of belief about the shelf life and ideal storage of RDX.

Which version of events looks better? His or what actually happened?