Sheer comedic genius.

Jesus Christ: The Musical

Perhaps the dumbest web service I’ve seen in a while, youvebeenleftbehind.com, will send emails to the friends and relatives (up to 62 addresses) of devout Christians, after the Jesus-Freak has been whisked to heaven via the Rapture—all for just $40 bucks a year. I mean, what price is worth the ability to thumb your nose and gloat at all those damned heathens, right?

That’s not all! The site also provides 250 MB of storage, 150 of which can be “encrypted” (there’s zero information on what exactly they mean by this or what method is used), so you can upload those important documents that you want to pass on to your loved ones.

The site suggests storing sensitive passwords, banking, brokerage information, locations of hidden valuables, and power of attorney documents. Their reasoning? You won’t need it, you’re in heaven! You can either give them your entire financial life to “hold” and keep “safe” for your loved ones, or risk the Antichrist getting it all. (I’m feeling like an opposing site, for donations to the Antichrist needs to be built, right now.)

Why entrust them all your information, you may ask? Simple, they say. Because they’re Christians. That should be all the credentials you’re average God-fearing, bible-humping idiot should ever need. Never mind that their contact info consists solely of a PO Box and a Gmail address. The domain registrar is a proxy, giving jack-shit for info as to who your money or your private financial information is going to. But hey, they’re Christians, it’s all good!

<sarcasm>This seems too good to be true! How do I know my information and messages will be delivered once I’m strumming a harp in heaven? Didn’t they say they were all Christian too? That means they’ll be in heaven with me! It’s so confusing, my head hurts! I better have an exorcism!</sarcasm>

Actually, according to these true believing heroes, there are five Christian people, scattered around the United States who must check in to the system on a regular basis. Should any three of these God-loving people fail to log-in over a three day period (presumably because they are now in heaven, not jail, mind you), the system will be triggered. An additional three days will be given as a failsafe and then like mana from heaven, all your important stuff will be delivered to the people you care most about on earth.

On one hand, it stinks to high hell of a total sucker scam. People who pay for this service are not only going to be $40 poorer, they’re likely to have their identities stolen and have their money cleaned out, pre-Rapture.

On the other hand, I’m all about abusing Christians.

These Virgin Mary urinals Rule! I really, really need one.

I hope that somewhere, out there in the world, there’s also some Jesus urinals as well.

This bitch needs meds and a Jesus vaccine. Either that, or she needs to be ground into dog food to shut her ass up.

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Jesus freaks have the lamest video games for kids:

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Not to mention the lamest superhero shows:

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The Power Rangers would totally flatten Bibleman and his douchebag posse.

I was just reading about the “Celestial Teapot“, an analogy coined by Bertrand Russell to refute the argument that the burden of proof lies with the skeptic or non-believer in regards to religion. As a somewhat aggressive atheist, it really hits the mark as far as I’m concerned.

“If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is an intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. If, however, the existence of such a teapot were affirmed in ancient books, taught as the sacred truth every Sunday, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time.”

The instant I hear “Jesus”, “God” or “Faith”; I start hating.

Way back in the days of ancient Greece, a brass worker named Perillos invented a contraption known today as a brazen bull. A large, hollow brass casting in the shape of a bull with a door set in it’s side, it’s purpose was to execute criminals or other such undesirables by roasting them alive.

A condemned individual was shut inside the bull and fires were stoked underneath till the metal was red hot and the prisoner was roasted alive, leaving nothing but scorched bones. An elaborate series of horns-like tubes and stoppers built into the head served to transform the person’s screams of terror and agony into something reminiscent of a really pissed off bull. Smoke and fumes from the roasting were forced out through incense burners so as not to offend anyone’s sense of smell or kill their appetite.

Perillos designed this wacky killing machine for a really ill-tempered man named Phalaris, ruler of Agrigentum (an area in modern Sicily). Upon seeing the finished product, Phalaris was pleased but desired to hear the sounds it was supposed to make so he had Perillos sealed inside and the fires lit beneath. Satisfied with the transformation of the man’s screams into bull sounds, he had him pulled out before he could die. However, the reprieve of Perillos didn’t last long as shortly thereafter, the king had the inventor tossed from a hill and killed. Phalaris himself was fed to the brazen bull after he was overthrown by Telemachus. Call it karma.

The Romans liked to use the brazen bull as it made for a highly entertaining way to dispose of those pesky Christians. Notable roasted Jesus-lovers include Saint Pelagia of Tarsus, Saint Eustace (along with his wife and children) and Saint Antipas.

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Here and there, in my spare time, I’ve been picking away at Julius Caesar’s “Commentarii de Bello Gallico” (literally translated as “Commentaries on the Gallic War”) [Link to the full book at Project Gutenberg], his account of the nine years he spent at war in Gaul (named by the Romans, a large area of western Europe, comprising modern day France, Belgium and parts of Italy, Switzerland, Germany and the Netherlands). It’s a great read, well worth the time if you dig history, romans, warfare, extreme violence and freaky pagan cultures (I mean, how can you go wrong with a recipe like that?). It’s full of battle and observations of a people that very little written account of exists. Druids are all over the place with all kinds of weird customs. My favorite tweaky little practice so far is the wicker man, a method of mass sacrifice, employed by the druids on behalf of the Celtic people to appease gods and ward away disease, or some other misfortune that has befallen them. A giant, hollow effigy of a man was made from sticks and then filled with human undesirables. Thieves and other criminals made the best stuffing material, though in a pinch, the average Joe might be used. The whole thing was then set alight, roasting those inside in one big bonfire.

“XVI.–The nation of all the Gauls is extremely devoted to superstitious rites; and on that account they who are troubled with unusually severe diseases and they who are engaged in battles and dangers, either sacrifice men as victims, or vow that they will sacrifice them, and employ the Druids as the performers of those sacrifices; because they think that unless the life of a man be offered for the life of a man, the mind of the immortal gods cannot be rendered propitious, and they have sacrifices of that kind ordained for national purposes. Others have figures of vast size, the limbs of which formed of osiers they fill with living men, which being set on fire, the men perish enveloped in the flames. They consider that the oblation of such as have been taken in theft, or in robbery, or any other offence, is more acceptable to the immortal gods; but when a supply of that class is wanting, they have recourse to the oblation of even the innocent.”

Julius Caesar’s book is the only written record of this practice. The veracity of his account has been criticized by several historians for different reason, chief being that Caesar does not claim to have witnessed the sacrifices himself and that in trying to drum up support among the citizens of Rome for his campaign, he might have exaggerated or invented the ritual in order to further paint the image of the Celt as barbaric and uncivilized.

But, if it were true, how insane a picture would that have been? Bodies writhing and screaming, stuffed into a wooden cage built in the shape of a man. Fat and fluids dripping to the ground as blackened skin curls and organs burst. Talk about a fucking Kodak moment to show the grandkids when they misbehave. I wonder what they did with the remains after all of it was burnt?

This morning, I’ve been reading about Xipe Totec, the flayed god of the Aztecs. Presiding over disease, the seasons, agriculture, goldsmiths and a few other things, Xipe Totec flayed his skin to bring food to the people, symbolic of a maize seed, shedding it’s outer layer prior to germination. Naturally, he is often depicted as not having any skin, or as wearing skin like a mask and clothing (check here and here. Note the flayed skin from the hands, hanging off his arms). Sweet. Some interesting points concerning sacrifice to “Our Lord, the Flayed One”:

“Annually, slaves were selected as sacrifices to Xipe Totec. These slaves were carefully flayed to produce a nearly whole skin which was then worn by the priests during the fertility rituals that followed the sacrifice. Some accounts indicate that a thigh bone from the sacrifice was defleshed and used by the priest to touch spectators in a fertility blessing. Paintings and several clay figures have been found which illustrate the flaying method and the appearance of priests wearing flayed skins.” [Link]

“Xipe Totec is drawn as a large figure wearing human skin from another person, symbolizing the “new skin” the earth wears every spring. The skin usually has an incision where the heart was removed, ties in the back to hold it on, and no penis. Statues of Xipe Totec may have at one time had outfits made from human skin, but as they are they are immediately recognizable by the puffy skin, double lips, and exceptionally sunken eyes, all designed to mimic a figure wearing someone else’s skin.” [Link]

“During Tlacaxipehualiztli (“Flaying of Men”), the second ritual month of the Aztec year, the priests killed human victims by removing their hearts. They flayed the bodies and put on the skins, which were dyed yellow and called teocuitlaquemitl (“golden clothes”). Other victims were fastened to a frame and put to death with arrows; their blood dripping down was believed to symbolize the fertile spring rains.” [Link]

“A prisoner was taken in battle. Traditionally he was paraded around town by his captors and greeted and congratulated by the citizens, who gave him gifts of food and drink and fine clothing. After a period of celebration, the prisoner—this essential cog, after all, in the ordering of the universe that thus the crop might thrive—was taken to the temple, dosed with drugs, and skinned alive.”

“Semi-conscious from the drugs, bathed in incense, the victim was first scorched, presumably to separate the skin from the bone. Cuts were made around the neck, the arms, and the legs, and down the back so the skin could be ripped away from the body. The carcass, bloody Xipe Totec-red, was thrown over a ceremonial stone and the heart was cut out by the Youallauan, the high priest, who offered it to the gods. The skin, dyed yellow and called teocuitlaquemitl or “golden clothes”, was thereupon donned by the warrior who had originally taken the victim prisoner who then proceeded to dance feverishly, crying to heaven for new life and new strength. He wore a mask made from the victim’s face.”

“After a few days, the dead skin would dry up, crack and fall to pieces. It had of course begun to decompose, and the smell was considered disgusting but absolutely necessary, as the breaking of old skins must come to every seed of maize that had planted by the reverent tribe.” [Link]

Xipe Totec was worshipped for over 2,000 years. You gotta figure…that’s a lot of skin. Awesome.

I really want to visit the new Creation Museum [wiki]. Unfortunately, it’s in Kentucky and you couldn’t pay me to go to some fucked up place like that. Still, Creationists are head-up-the-ass retards and a museum dedicated to a serious display of such a ridiculous and pathetic theory deserves a good laugh.

Luckily, I came across this Flickr set where some brave individual forged deep into the bible-thumping, fat-head, Jesus-humpers and paid the museum a visit with their camera.

This photo of Eve and a velociraptor has to be my favorite. Fucking idiots.