Speaker 1: Welcome to the nonprofits.
Speaker 2: Our second story this week takes us up to New
Speaker 2: Hampshire where some Christians are about to be put on
Speaker 2: Santa's naughty List. We have our man Kelly Laughlin here
Speaker 2: to tell us all about it.
Speaker 1: Kelly well Scott.
Speaker 3: The Satanic Temple, in keeping with their time honored holiday tradition,
Speaker 3: had been putting up boffamet displays on government properties that
Speaker 3: are also allowing Nativity setups.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 3: One such presentation in Concord, New Hampshire's capital, was invited
Speaker 3: to be there by state Representative Helen Reid, who publicly
Speaker 3: calls herself an agnostic. Miss Reid, in constitutional fairness, wanted
Speaker 3: to make sure that Christianity was not the only religion represented,
Speaker 3: so she invited the Satanic Temple to set up theirs.
Speaker 3: But in an act of Christian peace and love, the
Speaker 3: arrangement was only up for two hours before being vandalized
Speaker 3: and nearly destroyed. The city didn't release a statement prior
Speaker 3: to the statue being erected explaining its legal option delegations
Speaker 3: for allowing the display to be erected, and even made
Speaker 3: a note of saying that it would be unattended. The
Speaker 3: Satanic Temple representatives have they keep preparing the exhibit. It's
Speaker 3: been vandalized several times now, and though bruised and battered,
Speaker 3: it still stands guard over the establishment clause in the
Speaker 3: First Amendment, protecting our right to believe or not believe
Speaker 3: in any religion. This story is from The Friendly Atheist
Speaker 3: by HEIMT. Metta, December eleventh, twenty twenty four.
Speaker 2: So, could Kelly, I want to stick with you for
Speaker 2: a second here, could you expand on this a little bit?
Speaker 2: Is do you think this kind of inner group violence
Speaker 2: is a healthy way of interacting with other people?
Speaker 3: No, I totally don't.
Speaker 1: No shock of all shocks.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I don't. And again, this is like, this
Speaker 3: is coming from people who are supposed to be spreading
Speaker 3: a message of love and peace, you know, So I don't.
Speaker 3: I don't know how anybody could think that the are
Speaker 3: going to be doing that and still commit violent acts
Speaker 3: at the same time. But we see this with THEIS
Speaker 3: quite often. It's it's like they believe that the ends
Speaker 3: justify the means. I personally don't believe that. I think
Speaker 3: if you're gonna do something that stoops you down to
Speaker 3: the level of the people, that you're finding against you've
Speaker 3: already lost. So yeah, I don't think I don't think
Speaker 3: this is the way to express your feelings about this.
Speaker 2: Let's jump over to Steven for a second. So what
Speaker 2: do these tell us about the Christian mindset then? I
Speaker 2: mean Kelly was talking about how you know they're they're
Speaker 2: they're acting in ways that don't seem to be in
Speaker 2: alignment with their professed.
Speaker 1: Beliefs and philosophies.
Speaker 2: Do you think do you think that they're just defending
Speaker 2: their their beliefs. Do you think they're just defending their
Speaker 2: faith or is this just basically a temper tantrum.
Speaker 4: Well, like to be fair though, like this is nothing
Speaker 4: compared to global genocide, and that's the model that's been
Speaker 4: set for them, So you know, maybe maybe they're actually
Speaker 4: being actually really gentle compared to what their God does. Yeah,
Speaker 4: Like like for me, I when I tried to understand
Speaker 4: something like this, an attack like this, I tried to see, Okay,
Speaker 4: what was it fear? Was it ignorance or was it
Speaker 4: privilege that that brought this about? Like if the person,
Speaker 4: I think the first person, any of the people who
Speaker 4: have been vandalizing this display actually understood what the statue represented.
Speaker 4: Would they have still committed this crime or were they
Speaker 4: just so triggered by what they assumed was an evil
Speaker 4: satanic worshiper looking to get a cloven hoove into society
Speaker 4: that they just needed to take a righteous stand. Like
Speaker 4: what did was did their brain just like click off
Speaker 4: because they didn't understand? And like, I get it. I
Speaker 4: used to be there, Like I remember clearly feeling compelled
Speaker 4: that I needed to set my friend's Ouiji board on
Speaker 4: fire because I just knew. I was convinced that this
Speaker 4: was satanic, this was demonic. No no, no, no, no no.
Speaker 4: And she didn't let me set it on fire, thank god.
Speaker 4: But I can, I can I remember that mindset. Right
Speaker 4: on the other hand, like maybe this is just a
Speaker 4: shitty display of privilege where the month of December can
Speaker 4: only be about one thing, and that is the non
Speaker 4: consensual impregnation of Israelit teenagers by authority figures, Like maybe
Speaker 4: that is the only thing that we're supposed to be
Speaker 4: celebrating this month.
Speaker 1: I mean, isn't that what December means? Isn't that what
Speaker 1: there is? That what the December translates into.
Speaker 2: And I don't know, I don't know from Latin or
Speaker 2: Hebrew or whatever.
Speaker 1: Interesting.
Speaker 2: Interesting, Let's let's jump over to Jonathan here for a second.
Speaker 2: Jonathan to me, you know, I hear what what you
Speaker 2: guys are saying, and I just think hypocrisy.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: We hear mentions just like Kelly was mentioning about Christian love, right,
Speaker 2: and it's it's said sarcastically because it's used in reference
Speaker 2: to these acts of violence. Although, as Stephen pointed out,
Speaker 2: this has scaled quite a bit back, like from things
Speaker 2: that we've seen when the in the Old Testament and
Speaker 2: so on. But is that what we're what we're here?
Speaker 2: Is this just a backfiring Christian love or what's what's
Speaker 2: the deal with this?
Speaker 5: Well, you know they're doing it out of love for us,
Speaker 5: because they don't want us to go in a direction
Speaker 5: that might lead us to away from God and therefore,
Speaker 5: you know, go to help so uh and you know,
Speaker 5: so this way, if they keep us from going to
Speaker 5: Hell where we would have fun with all our friends,
Speaker 5: then and now we're going to have to hang out
Speaker 5: with them, which to me is more like hell. You know,
Speaker 5: it's just you know, they think they're acting in our
Speaker 5: best interests, and that's what they're doing, and it's hypocritical
Speaker 5: because they don't even know what's in our bed. They
Speaker 5: have no way of knowing what's in our best interests.
Speaker 5: This is all made up stuff in their book being yeah,
Speaker 5: being soldiers of Christ. Christ wasn't a soldier, you know,
Speaker 5: so you know, it's like they come up with all
Speaker 5: these weird, twisted views of itinerant rabbi back in the
Speaker 5: two thousand years ago. But it's it's really interesting to me,
Speaker 5: not just the hypocrisy, but the hypocrisy of you know,
Speaker 5: sparing the graven images of the Nativity scene, which they're
Speaker 5: not supposed to make ten commandments people, and only attacking
Speaker 5: the graven image of Baphomet, and they left freedom from freedom, uh,
Speaker 5: freedom from really uh freedom from Religion Foundation. The f
Speaker 5: fr F display of the Bill Wrights was left alone
Speaker 5: as well, So why only TSTs Well, it's a graven image.
Speaker 5: But I guess that wasn't the reason. I'm pretty sure
Speaker 5: it wasn't.
Speaker 3: They were just I'm pretty sure it was because he
Speaker 3: was offering an apple.
Speaker 5: That's it. It's a temptation apple. There. It is still
Speaker 5: I think they're trying to do.
Speaker 3: Six years later, they're still pissed off about thee and.
Speaker 5: It probably wasn't even an apple because apples didn't grow
Speaker 5: in that area, so it's like, okay, whatever, that's what
Speaker 5: makes it probably a pomegranate. Actually, it's just what the
Speaker 5: people in Rome decided it was when they were writing
Speaker 5: this shit down. So you know, it's just a sad,
Speaker 5: sad situation, you know. But these people just generally, they
Speaker 5: I think they justify it in their minds, in their
Speaker 5: man child or woman child minds, that is that they're
Speaker 5: helping us by destroying graven images and blah blah blah.
Speaker 5: But what they're really doing is just showing that they're juvenile.
Speaker 1: Well, I agree.
Speaker 4: It's also that idea of like it was like, look
Speaker 4: at Abraham, right, if he knew that sacrificing Isaac was wrong,
Speaker 4: but God told him to do it, well, then he
Speaker 4: doesn't have a choice now because of this authoritarian mindset,
Speaker 4: it is right for him to kill his child. And
Speaker 4: that's that's what you need religion to do. You need
Speaker 4: religion to give you permission to do evil, wicked, wrong things,
Speaker 4: because then you get to you know, distance your I
Speaker 4: would say, well, man is God who wants it?
Speaker 5: It's not me so and that way I get to
Speaker 5: I get to do harm to people I don't like
Speaker 5: because God wants it that way.
Speaker 2: It's funny how that works out, Steven. I want to
Speaker 2: stick with you here. I want you to expand a
Speaker 2: little bit on what you were talking there. Let's let's
Speaker 2: look under the hood a little bit here and look
Speaker 2: into the mind of these Christians. And so, what do
Speaker 2: you think that this this need? Because because we've seen
Speaker 2: these type of things happening more and more often, this
Speaker 2: type of violence in the name of love and you know,
Speaker 2: torture in the name of togetherness, and you know, you know,
Speaker 2: stuff like that. What do you think that tells us
Speaker 2: not only just about about the Christian mindset, but about
Speaker 2: the human mindset? Does this can we can we generalize
Speaker 2: this at all to humanity? Or what do you think
Speaker 2: is motivating this, uh, this ease with which these people
Speaker 2: are jumping to violence?
Speaker 4: I think I think we're in a time of shifting.
Speaker 4: I think we're in a time of change and things
Speaker 4: have been Well know, anybody who was alive in the
Speaker 4: nineties and is able to look at now and look
Speaker 4: at then we know that the world is changing, and
Speaker 4: it is changing faster than it has ever changed in
Speaker 4: the past. And I think for especially for those people
Speaker 4: who have a very well developed i want to say amygdala,
Speaker 4: the ones who are really motivated by fear like having
Speaker 4: so much change, such drastic change, and especially for older
Speaker 4: generations who aren't able to adapt to change as easily,
Speaker 4: this can be a really scary time and they've got
Speaker 4: to cling onto something and what is that going to be?
Speaker 4: And yeah, if we can for them, if we can
Speaker 4: get back to the good old days and to a
Speaker 4: time that is less fraught with change, time that is
Speaker 4: a bit more familiar, and if we can feel righteous
Speaker 4: while we're doing it, then yeah, absolutely, of course that's
Speaker 4: going to have appeal. But I think that that's one
Speaker 4: of the big batteries in that engine is just this
Speaker 4: need define stability again, because now we've got AI and
Speaker 4: the Internet and mask mandates and just trans people and
Speaker 4: suddenly like there's just so much more information. And if
Speaker 4: you find that scary, then it makes sense that you'll
Speaker 4: want to cling to something that is not scary and
Speaker 4: even fight for something that is less scary.
Speaker 2: So do you think that we need to watch out
Speaker 2: for this type of reaction to make sure that we
Speaker 2: don't kind of go down the same route.
Speaker 4: Yeah, absolutely, Like we're fally if we think that we
Speaker 4: are somehow immune to the stupid traps that other people
Speaker 4: fall into, right, we always need to be cognizant of
Speaker 4: that possibility. But luckily for some people who have that
Speaker 4: wherewithal to be able to break free of that authoritarian
Speaker 4: mindset where no, we don't need to just do what
Speaker 4: we're told, we can actually think this through. Hopefully we're
Speaker 4: also able to put that introspective lens flipped around and say, Okay, well,
Speaker 4: if I'm not doing this because I'm being told to
Speaker 4: do this, why am I doing this? And what is
Speaker 4: motivating me?
Speaker 1: Right? Yeah? Well said? And well said. I like, I
Speaker 1: agree with you.
Speaker 2: I think that being able to engage in self reflection,
Speaker 2: I think that's the sign of a more mature mind.
Speaker 2: And and but you know, I might be you know,
Speaker 2: I have a biased opinion, of course, but but yeah,
Speaker 2: I think that's a that's.
Speaker 1: A sign of progress.
Speaker 2: If you can if you can turn that mirror safely
Speaker 2: onto yourself and and look at what and look at
Speaker 2: yourself as you are, I think it's you know, I
Speaker 2: think that's definitely a sign of progress.
Speaker 1: And but you know, but we're still human, right, We're not.
Speaker 1: We're not. Evolution doesn't move that fast. You know.
Speaker 2: We're still the same basically the same uh you know,
Speaker 2: walking apes that that we were, you know, ten thousand
Speaker 2: years ago, and we still have those same kind of
Speaker 2: urges and those same kind of.
Speaker 1: Tendencies.
Speaker 5: There's one one exception to that though, lactose intolerance has
Speaker 5: gone away. We did make that mutation within the last
Speaker 5: ten thousand years.
Speaker 1: All right, So so lactose good, We got that covered. Violence.
Speaker 2: That's next, right, I want to have I want to
Speaker 2: see the violence and tolerant people.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I was one more thing. Remember Alvin Toffler's Future Shock,
Speaker 5: the book from the nineteen seventies. A lot of what
Speaker 5: he talked about in that book is what we're experiencing now.
Speaker 3: That was pretty prophetic book. Actually, yeah, I thought it
Speaker 3: was fun because this story was kind of fun in
Speaker 3: a way because we got well we didn't, but the
Speaker 3: Satanic temple got enough peep Christians upset over a freaking mannequin.
Speaker 3: It was a mannequin, right that they committed sins in
Speaker 3: the eyes of their own God.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 3: That, That's what I think is fun about this, And
Speaker 3: I think this is what you were talking about, Scott,
Speaker 3: is what causes you know, a human being to go
Speaker 3: against everything that they've been taught, everything that they built,
Speaker 3: that they've been that they actually believe in. I'm supposed
Speaker 3: to be good to people, right, and to do an
Speaker 3: act of violence, to commit a crime, and I don't
Speaker 3: know what would cause somebody to do that. It really
Speaker 3: blows me away that somebody would stoop to that idea,
Speaker 3: And it makes me wonder, like, what would have happened
Speaker 3: if this wasn't the Christian God? What if it was
Speaker 3: a god like men Hit, the Egyptian lionhitded war goddess
Speaker 3: who wanted us to go out and massacre people. Can
Speaker 3: you imagine the reaction that this would have gone would
Speaker 3: have brought about if we went against men Hit, who
Speaker 3: was worshiped by everybody, you know, none of us would
Speaker 3: even be alive today. So it's kind of scary in
Speaker 3: a way that people will throw away all their morals
Speaker 3: to go for a better, bigger religious good, you know,
Speaker 3: or what they think is a better, bigger one.
Speaker 2: So, Kelly, then, do you think that the Satanic Temple
Speaker 2: was being intentionally provocative?
Speaker 1: With this.
Speaker 2: You know, we talk about things like taking the high
Speaker 2: road or when they go hot low, we're going to
Speaker 2: go Hi. Do you think they were taking the high
Speaker 2: road when or do you think they were being petty
Speaker 2: and intentionally provocative and maybe even maybe even hoping for
Speaker 2: this type of violence because it would get them in
Speaker 2: the news.
Speaker 3: Well, you know, that's an interesting question. I don't think
Speaker 3: that they were trying to be petty. I do think
Speaker 3: that they were trying to be provocative, and I think
Speaker 3: they were trying to be provocative to show that, Look,
Speaker 3: the government, the constitution says we're not the government is
Speaker 3: not supposed to choose a religion. So when you let
Speaker 3: these nativity scenes up and you're just letting them up,
Speaker 3: you are choosing a religion. And that's maybe not a
Speaker 3: provocative message. And maybe it didn't have to be such
Speaker 3: a provocative way to get that message across. I'm kind
Speaker 3: of glad it was, because, as you said, it got
Speaker 3: them into the media. It got them the attention that
Speaker 3: they needed, that this issue needs and deserves for people
Speaker 3: to read about it, to see it in the papers,
Speaker 3: to see it on TV, and to make people think
Speaker 3: about it and maybe show those people who aren't hardcore
Speaker 3: Christians that our ideals might be in danger by violent Christians.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean it is pretty effective as far as
Speaker 2: being being a tool for exposing that kind of violent tendency, because,
Speaker 2: like you said, it's a mannequin, right, And they seemed
Speaker 2: like they got that thing fixed really fast, So I
Speaker 2: think they I think they were expecting it. Definitely they
Speaker 2: did from history from.
Speaker 5: The first time it was from another organization. I think
Speaker 5: it's Freethinkers of what was it, Freethinkers of Ohio or
Speaker 5: something like that, that came in and fixed it the
Speaker 5: first time, but it's been several times. I think they
Speaker 5: just have some money to do that. The interesting thing
Speaker 5: to Another interesting thing to me though, was that we might,
Speaker 5: well not interesting, we might want to turn this into
Speaker 5: a positive by making this an annual tradition to make
Speaker 5: a display like this and then ritually that ritually vandalize
Speaker 5: it to remember the old days when Christians were assholes,
Speaker 5: you know. So I mean, you know, we could turn
Speaker 5: this into a satanic ritual, you know, and make it
Speaker 5: more popular that way.
Speaker 1: Kelly, did you have anything more to say on that?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I just wanted to mention because John mentioned the
Speaker 3: money that was. It costs money to set this up.
Speaker 3: It costs money to repair it every time. I know
Speaker 3: it was vandalized at least three times, right, so every
Speaker 3: time it took money to read to fix it back up.
Speaker 3: And I just want to give a shout out and
Speaker 3: kudos to the people who put up that money and
Speaker 3: and the time to go out there and fix it.
Speaker 3: And it just goes to show you you just can't
Speaker 3: keep a good man nickin down.
Speaker 2: All right, I'm just kidding, Steven.
Speaker 1: I want to hear a little bit more from you.
Speaker 2: I want to do you think that, I mean, what
Speaker 2: would be the ideal outcome with this? Would is the
Speaker 2: is the goal of the Satanic Temple too to have
Speaker 2: them ban all you know, types of of these types
Speaker 2: of displays, because that has happened in some places. Or
Speaker 2: is it their goal to have you know, true equality
Speaker 2: and uh you know had and open it up to
Speaker 2: to everyone.
Speaker 1: You know what? What? What do you what do you
Speaker 1: think the ultimate goal is with this?
Speaker 4: What do I think their ultimate goal is? And what
Speaker 4: do I think the ultimate goal should be? Might be
Speaker 4: two different things.
Speaker 1: Let's hear a little bit of both.
Speaker 2: I like a little bit from column a a little
Speaker 2: bit from Coluin B from Steven Today.
Speaker 4: Like I know that I like, I I feel like
Speaker 4: there that I think it's wonderful if people I'm glad
Speaker 4: that people have the freedom to display things that are
Speaker 4: important to them. And if churches want to set.
Speaker 1: Up these little scenes and.
Speaker 4: Hey, then go right ahead. But if our government is
Speaker 4: a religious if if our government does not support any
Speaker 4: one religion, and and for very very specific reasons, then
Speaker 4: I don't think that any of our public money should
Speaker 4: be used to to celebrate, to promote any any religion
Speaker 4: at all, and especially especially such a toxic, problematic religions
Speaker 4: such as Christianity, like like like I I cannot personally
Speaker 4: divorce the Nativity story from sexual assault like that, that's
Speaker 4: that is what this story is about. And it kills me, guys.
Speaker 4: It kills me that every year churches get the kids
Speaker 4: from their congregation and say, here we go, we're going
Speaker 4: to put on this, We're going to use these kids
Speaker 4: to glorify this story that is centered around the non
Speaker 4: consensual impregnation of a teenage girl. And they're like, why,
Speaker 4: why why do we have to be so oblivious to this?
Speaker 4: And and for our governments and for for just cultural
Speaker 4: in general to be like, yeah, this is cool, this
Speaker 4: is fine, we want to celebrate this. Like, no, if
Speaker 4: you want to do that, you go ahead, but let's
Speaker 4: draw the line. Leave my money out of this. I'd
Speaker 4: much rather my money be used on I don't know,
Speaker 4: feeding people, keeping people warm.
Speaker 1: It's crazy, right, crazy?
Speaker 4: So but whatever. I'm a big fan of professional sports either.
Speaker 4: Why are we spending all our money on that?
Speaker 3: Good question? And you know what gets me is high
Speaker 3: school and college sports. Why are we sending spending so
Speaker 3: much money on that?
Speaker 4: I just recently understood, Like what high school football means
Speaker 4: to you? People?
Speaker 1: You're crazy? What are you doing?
Speaker 4: So?
Speaker 3: What did the donkeys say to the sheep? There's a
Speaker 3: baby in my salad?
Speaker 1: Boy, Kelly, you're hot tonight. You're hot tonight.
Speaker 2: We got red hot Kelly Laughlin here tonight, Ladies and gentlemen,
Speaker 2: that's awesome.
Speaker 5: The investigator the evabalism, though, the representative got the police
Speaker 5: to start looking into it.
Speaker 1: So we'll tell somebody, Well, we'll see, we'll see what
Speaker 1: happens there.
Speaker 2: I just have one quick question, and whoever whoever has
Speaker 2: an opinion on this can jump in here.
Speaker 1: But we saw that the like.
Speaker 2: We mentioned earlier that the statement the City of the
Speaker 2: Conquered issued this statement that was kind of a you know,
Speaker 2: a not apology kind of thing. Right, Hey, we got
Speaker 2: to do it. We're being forced to do it. It
Speaker 2: would be a shame if something were to happen to
Speaker 2: this year. Do you think that that attitude from the government.
Speaker 2: I mean, the government's supposed to represent the people, right,
Speaker 2: But do we think that that is an indicator that
Speaker 2: local governments are becoming more and more brazen and more
Speaker 2: willing to take risks because the because maybe the atmosphere
Speaker 2: of that kind of thing is changing. Anybody have an
Speaker 2: opinion on that? Do we Is this a sign that
Speaker 2: things are getting worse, that maybe inclusiveness as an ideal
Speaker 2: is on its way out.
Speaker 3: I think that's true. I don't know that this is
Speaker 3: a sign of that. Go ahead, John, you looked like
Speaker 3: you had something really important to say, so.
Speaker 5: I was just going to say something that Kelly and
Speaker 5: I have discussed before is that this is sort of
Speaker 5: the last gasp of a dying philosophy, and they managed
Speaker 5: to stir up people's They use serious rhetorical and propaganda
Speaker 5: techniques and marketing techniques to get all these people all
Speaker 5: riled up, and if they start losing people's emotional attachments
Speaker 5: to things, then they find another one. You know, you
Speaker 5: can look at what happened over the last five ten years,
Speaker 5: and you can see every time whatever they were saying
Speaker 5: was bad started not being so bad, they had to
Speaker 5: come up with another one or another group of people
Speaker 5: to assault, you know, and that way they can keep
Speaker 5: their power because it's bleeding away from the churches are
Speaker 5: emptying out.
Speaker 3: You know, there's nothing more dangerous than a cornered animal.
Speaker 2: So yeah, right, good analogy, And there's nothing more dangerous
Speaker 2: than a cornered nonprofit its fan