A Hate Mail Poe?

A 7 year old dying of cancer, doesn't this help to prove natural selection?

Tsk tsk... That's not very Christian language.

There are times when reading a particular sequence of words causes me to soil my monitor with whatever happens to be in my mouth at the time.

This one seems to have soiled my monitor from the inside. I can visualize the spray from the author and the foam that remained upon his(?) lips.

It saddens me to no end that 1) there are still apparently large segments of the population afflicted by this particular brand of ignorance, and 2) that they seem to have learned how to use the Internet.

Sounds like something Robert Byers would have written. Minus the profanity.

It's amazing how vicious Christianists get when faced with the fact that some people simply don't believe their fairy tales.

The Saturday Daily Kos hate mail is a highlight of my week.

I have read posts on other sites with the identical substance, and much of the same structure as "Evolution is a Lie." So, while I would like this to be a Poe, I think it is a real creationist.

Bill said: A 7 year old dying of cancer, doesn't this help to prove natural selection?

It's the astonishing complete inversion of logic, not the common abuse, that fascinates me. Anyone can use abuse. To aver that a seven-year-old's death of cancer invalidates evolution and confirms the existence of God requires... help me here, what does it require?

Is this Poe, or Poe's corollary? I can't tell. The hall of mirrors confuses me. The only datum I can make out is that if I'm in the hall of mirrors, then this must be the Funny House.

So very angry. There seems little room for negotiation, a dialogue, time-out, reflective thought, shared opinion, respect,conciliation, or even, god forbid, talk. Oh wait a minute, he/she is one of god's creatures, with infinate room for love of one's enemy, and forgiveness, tolerance and patience.

Gottal love those religious types, hypocracy is their middle name!

You can also find a lot of weird stuff with this bizarre set of videos.

Here is more.

Sick! Even Fox News is offended.

Oops, here.

This is the one where Fox News is offended.

I feel sorry for people like this. The vitriol must come from some tragedy they can't understand, like a 7 year old dying of cancer. They don't understand the circle of life, wherein micro and macro-organisms compete for their places in the food chain. "God's Will" is apparently something these people can cling to, as opposed to accepting how random mutations can create creatures ill suited for life, or random chance can doom the healthiest of us. The concept of evolution operating statistically through the entire biosphere is just too massive for their minds to comprehend and thus it is all a lie. Then, since science has no pablum to feed their sorrow, we get the anger.

Understanding begets peace. Fear begets anger.

I'm pretty sure you're looking at an example of Poe's Corollary here, not Poe's Law.

robert van bakel said: So very angry. There seems little room for negotiation, a dialogue, time-out, reflective thought, shared opinion, respect,conciliation, or even, god forbid, talk. Oh wait a minute, he/she is one of god's creatures, with infinate room for love of one's enemy, and forgiveness, tolerance and patience. Gottal love those religious types, hypocracy is their middle name!

Tiger! Heh:)

So, a 7 year old dying of cancer is evidence for God. I must say I have heard more convincing arguments.

Dave Luckett said: It's the astonishing complete inversion of logic, not the common abuse, that fascinates me.

eric said: Ignoring the religion part for a second, I think its a pretty common error among scientifically uneducated/illiterate people to think that evolution means individual organisms changing and adapting to their environment. Lots of creationists have some sort of Edgar Rice Burroughs ‘Land that time Forgot’ view of evolution, where a single individual should go from ape to man or have some different species offspring. So I’m not surprised at this at all. I don’t think this sort of miseducation exists in our school systems any more, so my guess is its coming from their spiritual leaders.

This is a misguided person who was deeply affected by a tragic event. One can be affected by a tragic even in a friend's family.

This person is looking for someone or something to blame. That is natural.

Mockery is an appropriate response when dealing with weasels. It is probably not an effective response here.

My response is -

1) Scientists and scientifically educated people who accept the theory of evolution are not liars, nor are they stupid. Some of them are religious.

2) The theory of evolution does not deny the existence of cancer, infectious disease, and parasitism, but in fact, helps to explain the natural mechanisms by which they arise. Whether or not these things are "God's will" is not the purview of science.

3) Biomedical science is struggling to cure pediatric cancers, and a vast amount of progress has been made. Religion may help people, personally, to deal with tragedies like the death of children. However, religion alone has never made any progress in the treatment of cancer. Even if someone believes that a very modest number of recorded miracles have taken place, this is still true.

4) The evolution of birds from their earlier dinosaur ancestors is, in fact, strongly supported by the fossil record.

"Evolutionists Evangelicals have got to be the dumbest fucking retards this side of scientology."

Fixed it for him.

eric said: Lots of creationists have some sort of Edgar Rice Burroughs 'Land that time Forgot' view of evolution, where a single individual should go from ape to man or have some different species offspring.

I don't think this sort of miseducation exists in our school systems any more, so my guess is its coming from their spiritual leaders.

Paul Burnett said:

Eric said: I don't think this sort of miseducation exists in our school systems any more, so my guess is its coming from their spiritual leaders.

You haven't been reading the Freshwater threads, have you?

Gleef said: I'm pretty sure you're looking at an example of Poe's Corollary here, not Poe's Law.

Alex H said: Seriously, this letter reads more like a teenager wrote it as an attempt to troll more than anything else.

Paul Burnett said: (snip) Noah's Ark landed on Mount Ararat in 2348 BC, and all the "kinds" of animals were released. The speed-up of evolution to get from the extremely limited number of species available in 2348 BC to the many millions of species available today means that single individuals of the longer-lived species must have changed species several times in their lifetimes to get to where we are today. (snip)

I've seen this sort of argument made a lot: Surely, "by this time", everything would have "evolved enough" that all organisms would reproduce (not to mention that all humans should have wings, laser vision, and never feel pain. I'm only barely joking; that's the tenor of some arguments).

They don't get that the Malthusian ratio of high population to low resources is always there; barring some hypothetical enormous technological advance (which initially requires the very risky investment of complex brains), no multicellular species can "out-evolve" things like cancer, any more than they could "out-evolve" gravity.

Anyway, I'm wondering if this guy thought to provide any photos of himself at exactly 127/150ths of his current age. It's only fair.

When I first started seeing "Poe" and "Poe's Law" referred to in forums, I didn't bother to google it. I just guessed at the meaning from context. Since I saw "poe" as a stand-alone noun first, based on the way it was used, I thought it might be an acronym for "position of enemy," as in "a person who mocks his enemy by pretending to hold the same position, exposing its absurdity."

Kind of a fun definition, even if it's wrong.

My friend’s seven year old nephew died of cancer two months ago. How the fuck is that evolution?

Oclarki said: ...and 2) that they seem to have learned how to use the Internet.

Re: The Sean Hannity/Fox News outrage over the Phelps family. Their outrage is when the Phelps family protests at a military funeral. If they protested only at the funerals of homosexuals, I'd bet Fox News would never mention it.

rufus said: Re: The Sean Hannity/Fox News outrage over the Phelps family. Their outrage is when the Phelps family protests at a military funeral. If they protested only at the funerals of homosexuals, I'd bet Fox News would never mention it.

I guess now we know what the “H” in Jesus H. Christ stands for.

1) Scientists and scientifically educated people who accept the theory of evolution are not liars, nor are they stupid. Some of them are religious.

— harold

The Founding Mothers said: S/he/it didn't have to learn. God made them that way.

Oclarki said:

The Founding Mothers said: S/he/it didn't have to learn. God made them that way.

Dang...I forgot about that bit. So if God made creationists to be adept at internet use, does that mean that He also designed all of the maladies tied to excessive keyboard and video monitor use?

Stanton said: Well, you know the wages of sin, in that everything bad about design is the fault of Adam and Eve screwing everything in the Universe over.

Oclarki said: ...And as a bonus I will suck out your brain so that you are no longer capable of independent thought. A clever approach.

Frank J -

Actually, that was pretty good.

However, a true creationist of that type would never spell "because" or "religious" correctly. Also, although they love all caps, they never seem to use underline (or italics or bold).

Oclarki said: So if God made creationists to be adept at internet use, does that mean that He also designed all of the maladies tied to excessive keyboard and video monitor use?

Obviously, I disagree, but I did think this was funny:

"Evolutionists have got to be the dumbest fucking retards this side of scientology."

That's going to be my new standard of dumb retards from now on; which side of scientology they are.

harold said: Frank J - Actually, that was pretty good. However, a true creationist of that type would never spell "because" or "religious" correctly. Also, although they love all caps, they never seem to use underline (or italics or bold).

Dave Luckett said: It's the astonishing complete inversion of logic, not the common abuse, that fascinates me. Anyone can use abuse. To aver that a seven-year-old's death of cancer invalidates evolution and confirms the existence of God requires... help me here, what does it require? Is this Poe, or Poe's corollary? I can't tell. The hall of mirrors confuses me. The only datum I can make out is that if I'm in the hall of mirrors, then this must be the Funny House.

I've sent many a Poe hate mail, but to my trained eye, that's probably not one.

After following posts on sites like FSTDT.net ("Fundies Say the Darndest Things") for years, I'd be really skeptical of my ability to catch a Poe. There are so many lunatic-fringe science-haters posting on heavily-moderated and heavily-censored fundie sites consistently expressing similar sentiments without being banned or locked out that it's pretty hard to call "Poe" on almost anything this relatively mild.

Stanton said: That already happened to them before creationists even heard of computers.

there are so many lunatic-fringe science-haters posting on heavily-moderated and heavily-censored fundie sites consistently expressing similar sentiments without being banned or locked out that it’s pretty hard to call “Poe” on almost anything this relatively mild.

JDE said: Allowing these people to commandeer the political process has been our undoing. This is the reason we need mandatory testing for intelligence and sanity as a prerequisite for voting.

I believe Alexander Hamilton was keen on some sort of 'means test' but not 'mental test' for the registering of voters. He obviously and rightly did not get his way; a mental test however, I'm all for that I even have some questions:

1.) Is the universe,
a- big
b- really big
c- really rellay big
d- so big it is difficult for our limited human brains to proparly comprehend.

2.) Is the world,
a- 6000-10,000 years old
b- greater than 10,000 years but less than 100,000 years. (Why 100,000? I don't know, seems a nice factor.)
c- Like really, really old.
d- Beyond the comprehension of Denise O'Leary, old.
e- None of the above.

3.) 'Science tells us all life evolved over time, using the observable processes of Random Mutation/Natural Selection,Sexual Selection, and Gene Transfer, to bring about the diversity of life we see today:'
Is this statement,
a- True
b- Unknowable with present scientific knowledge
c- False
d- The ravings of atheistic homosexuals who want to kill babies, murder kittens, rape Mary, and generally drink human blood, like the Jews used to do.

JDE said:

there are so many lunatic-fringe science-haters posting on heavily-moderated and heavily-censored fundie sites consistently expressing similar sentiments without being banned or locked out that it’s pretty hard to call “Poe” on almost anything this relatively mild.

Leaving aside denial and cognitive dissonance, the amount of deeply entrenched insanity and hatred there is among Christian fundamentalists is astonishing. I don't think most people outside of that world really understand how pervasive it is. Allowing these people to commandeer the political process has been our undoing. This is the reason we need mandatory testing for intelligence and sanity as a prerequisite for voting.