Mock, Paper, Scissors

36 Responses to “Tengrain Presents…”

1. Blue Gal: February 9th, 2008 at 5:51 pm

   *sniff* Thanks for the dedication, Honey.

2. commander other: February 9th, 2008 at 6:34 pm

   excellently portrayed, as always, Tengrain!

3. Comrade Kevin: February 9th, 2008 at 8:11 pm

   According to South Park, Heaven is only populated by Mormons anyway, and it’s really boring.

4. Infidel753: February 10th, 2008 at 4:08 am

   Who cares that we won’t get taken up to Heaven? The moment all those people are gone, Earth will feel like Heaven.

5. distributorcap: February 10th, 2008 at 4:23 am

   so i guess we should ask Chimpy to stay

6. freidabee: February 10th, 2008 at 6:31 am

   If the rapture doesn’t happen, maybe a colonization of the moon could have the same effect. I hear the Kmart blue-light specials are fabulous on the moon!

7. Elspeth Ravenwind: February 10th, 2008 at 8:59 am

   Freida – don’t dare suggest ruining the moon!!!
   Send ‘em back to where they came from, the planet “Their-anus”!
   Elspeth

8. darkblack: February 10th, 2008 at 9:05 am

   And when we waterboard in our prison, it’ll be with West Texas Intermediate crude, not H20.

   ;>)

   Top work, Ten.

9. freidabee: February 10th, 2008 at 2:11 pm

   I’m sorry Elspeth. You’re right. I’m just desperate.

10. Tengrain: February 10th, 2008 at 2:40 pm

    Friedabee – we are all desperate.

    Regards,

    Tengrain

11. Pissed in NYC: February 10th, 2008 at 8:13 pm

    Thing is, they leave all their shit behind and given how they dress in public, you know it really is shit. Now if we can get them to leave and take their crap with them, I’m in.

12. Batocchio: February 11th, 2008 at 12:28 am

    What’s scary is how many folks actually believe in the Rapture. I remember reading some site where a a poster was really, really excited – I think when Israel bombed Lebanon. He or she thought it was a sign of the end times.

    What’s also funny is how the Rapture crowd has its own myths, many of them quite separate from the Book of Revelation, or based on later visions and what-not.

13. nobody asked… » Beam Me Up, Jesus…: February 11th, 2008 at 3:45 am

    [...] [Wave of the campaign collection plate to Crooks & Liars for bringing to us this nugget from the collection over at Mock, Paper, Scissors] [...]

14. capt: February 11th, 2008 at 5:21 am

    The rapture is happening – just WAY slower than expected. One person at a time.

15. Todd: February 11th, 2008 at 5:29 am

    Pretty funny, but you should rethink the Immaculate Heart of Mary painting. Catholics don’t believe in the Rapture.

16. John Forlenza-Bailey: February 11th, 2008 at 5:31 am

    Great mock, paper, scissors!

    My religion has perfectly prepared me for the 15 th century. Unfortunately, I’m living in the 21 st century. See “there will be blood” a great line from the Eli Sunday minister character when forced to utter convinicingly for the almighty buck, “I am a false profit, and God is a superstition.”

    My belief is like the cleric in the 14 th century, Pascal, who is credited for the mathmatical theory of probability. When question about his religion and existance of God, Pascal stated four probables 1. There is a God and my religion is true, I live that way I am ready for eternal blessings in the afterlife (rapture). 2. I live my religion with honesty and willingness to do good. I am wrong. Have the longest sleep like Plato thought, but at least I’ve been part of a solution, not a problem. 3. I’ve lived a life of dishonesty, selfishness, not loving, and impure. I die. Go for the big sleep. No heaven (rapture)or no hell for me, I’ve been a problem to others, no one’s solution. 4. I live like # 3, and find out the myth was really the gospel (truth). There is Satan and God. Opps, eternal damnation.

    For me I believe, I want to believe. It is the ‘road less traveled,’ but the best road I know.

17. In our name, in our time: February 11th, 2008 at 6:24 am

    Cool John FB, you stick on that road in the 14th century. The rest of us and the scientific theory’ll be hanging out up here…ah the bliss of ignorance.

18. Matt C.: February 11th, 2008 at 8:01 am

    John FB. If you’re smart enough to read and understand how pointless the beliefs you hold are, you are irreversibly on the path to abandoning them. I spent 10 years “believing” stuff that I didn’t believe, and that meant busting out Pascal’s wager a lot. You know, as well as I do, that God only wants true faith; the kind that fundamentalists have. The kind of faith that never questions, that serves unblinkingly.

    I stuck around for the same reasons. I wanted a better world, and I wanted to live a good life. I realized that the only guidance I was recieving from the Bible (and from other Christians) was how to hate people, myself, and the world. One day I just suddenly realized that if I hadn’t had “Yahweh Worship” drilled into me since childhood, I would not believe it now. There’s no evidence, no support. Sure, there are things I want to believe in there, but they’re stuck in the context of a religion that’s either bullshit or the worship of a rogue, insane god.

    You’re going to die and rot in the ground like every other animal on this planet. So did your ancestors, so will your children. We have such a brief window of conciousness: a gift so rare and great in this vast emptiness that is the universe, that there’s no room for destructively false beliefs. Live to live, not to die.

19. Val Chism: February 11th, 2008 at 8:12 am

    Thank you. Until it happens I need all the laughs I can stockpile

20. LanceThruster: February 11th, 2008 at 8:29 am

    When the Rapture comes, can I have your stuff?

21. Norbert: February 11th, 2008 at 8:36 am

    uh, Pascal is 17th century.

    pedantically yours,

    Norbert

22. mascmen7: February 11th, 2008 at 10:14 am

    Evangelicals are whistling Dixie if they think they are worthy to be raptured. Why would God rapture people who are dissenters from the Church he established led by Peter, the Catholic Church. Also,the greed exhibited by these Fascist Nativists may drag them down to the fiery pits of Hell to be with the abortionists of both parties.

23. Karrie: February 11th, 2008 at 10:28 am

    Todd: “Pretty funny, but you should rethink the Immaculate Heart of Mary painting. Catholics don’t believe in the Rapture.”

    Oh crap, Todd, does this mean we’ll still be stuck with Bill Donohue – even after the rapture??

    Can we convince Satan to have a rapture?

24. Michaelis: February 11th, 2008 at 2:16 pm

    John: You are so clever that I think you’re being snarky. Your reference to the movie “There Will be Blood” might confirm that, unless you’re so deluded (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jCX0JJ16dFM) that you actually take strength from the pronouncements of certain characters in that flic.

    Your creative distortion of Pascal’s Wager contains two errors, one yours and one Pascal’s.

    First you assume that “doing good” requires belief in the hideous Jeebus portrayed in the Apocalypse of John of Patmos. The bible itself refutes this claim. (Familial loyalty, societal concern, care for the poor are all represented without a redeeming/avenging Jesus.) I would say that morality is (sorry) evolutionarily beneficial, and that people are “good” by nature and always have been. I’ll not go into the forces that break that natural goodness, but they include the coercive enforcement of other people’s ideas through the mechanism of uncritical and ignorant “faith”.

    Second, you and Pascal assume that since you can propose a question like “there is either a god or there is no god” that there is an exact 50/50 probability that god exists. This is a mere verbal trick and a thinking error. Bertrand Russel proposed that he himself placed a teacup between the orbits of Jupiter and Saturn. Is there a 50% probability that that teacup exists? Is there a 50% probability that Bertrand Russel has such powers?

    Please, John, this is 2008 and you should be prepared for such counter-arguments when you (honestly credited, I’ll grant) invoke and distort Pascal’s Wager.

    A simple faith? the faith of a child? We don’t let children drive, drink or vote for very good reasons. I’m not saying you shouldn’t be allowed to vote. I’m just saying that you should not be so child-like before you do so.

25. Michaelis: February 11th, 2008 at 2:24 pm

    Todd: I’ve found that most Catholics are not as mentally damaged as the evangelical “rapture ready.” But I’ll just say that most of those naturally good people don’t register the difference between the pronouncements of The Catholic League and the decisions of Vatican II. Just sayin’

    Also: ain’t all those saints and marys and josephs Graven Images? Just askin’

26. leslie: February 11th, 2008 at 4:17 pm

    I can’t wait. There will be seats on the Metra and the young lady who
    tries to convert me will be gone. I will finally have a stress-free commute to work.

    YESSSSSSSSSSS !!!

27. Tengrain: February 11th, 2008 at 5:59 pm

    Folks -

    No personal attacks, please. I’m not going to censor anyone, but let’s play nice. Free speech zone and all that.

    Regards,

    Tengrain

28. Michaelis: February 11th, 2008 at 6:25 pm

    Matt C says:

    “We have such a brief window of consciousness: a gift so rare and great in this vast emptiness that is the universe, that there’s no room for destructively false beliefs.”

    You write so much better than me, and I sincerely appreciate the positive point of view you have come to in that one sentence. Seriously, I’m gonna carry that line along with me for quite some time.

    (It’s OK to post maudlin love letters in these comments, right? KTHXBAI.)

29. Tengrain: February 11th, 2008 at 7:00 pm

    Michaelis:

    Of course it is! In fact it is encouraged!

    Regards,

    Tengrain

30. FranIam: February 11th, 2008 at 7:05 pm

    Clearly I have been away from your blog for two days too long!!

31. Michaelis: February 11th, 2008 at 7:12 pm

    Since I seem to have the floor here, (I really thought the Crooks and Liars link would totally “slashdot” the site and comments), I’d like to say that I came here because of the brilliant artwork, and I’d like the conversation to stick to that (despite my earlier toying with fundies).

    There have been innumerable attempts at addressing that tasty question “what if” Teh Rapture [sic] really really happened. I dunno, likely that something along those lines showed up in The Onion (www.theonion.com). This “strip” (can I call it that?) gives us a great portrait of certain players in that imaginary heaven.

    I love being reminded of Pelosi’s Failure in the last frame. (Pelosi’s Falure is to become as canonical as Pascal’s Wager.)

    That “Katrina victim” frame was shocking and brutally raw to me. But I’m always thankful for being awakened like that. After my coffee.

    What other reactions have people had? (I mean beyond “this makes baby jesus cry”)

32. Pissed in NYC: February 11th, 2008 at 7:20 pm

    Matt C: Great post.

33. Tengrain: February 11th, 2008 at 7:26 pm

    Welcome to MPS, Michaelis – this is what this site is like.

    The reaction is usually pretty positive when I post a Tengrain Presents, though sometimes I get my troll telling me I’m a fraud. I only moderate comments when someone gets really hostile, or if someone uses a fake email or blog address. If they are not brave enough to leave some real ID, then I don’t waste bandwidth on it. I want to encourage discussion in the comments. I was not kidding when I said MPS is a free speech zone.

    My sensibility is to use laughter to make a point, or to see a truth. Yes, the Katrina thing is a shock, but when the fundies say they wish this thing to happen, I think we need to be clear that they are wishing for death and destruction, and we already have lots of that.

    Regards,

    Tengrain

34. Michaelis: February 11th, 2008 at 7:38 pm

    Tengrain: Thanks for the introduction to the site and the work. Not quite used to that on most sites. I’ve seen positive links to your work before, but this one screamed “brother/sister-mind” to me. Sorry if I entered awkwardly. Definitely adding the site to my regular visits. Keep up the good work and I’ll try to behave.

    What’s that zen or psychological statement that says laughter equals enlightenment. I think a corollary might be laughter LEADS to enlightenment. So thanks for your work, especially in these hot and pained arenas. You’re giving us a dose of enlightenment with devastatingly appropriate pretty pictures.

35. Ed Weston: February 21st, 2008 at 6:44 pm

    Tengrain you also got a link from a mediamatters poster. Yah we gots trolls, send them over.
    Very good work, I hope to remember to come back.
    For Michaellis the evolutionary mechanism for making nice is called mutual altruism, per Drew Westen’s The Political Brain. Its been used by other social animals.

36. Ed Weston: February 21st, 2008 at 7:49 pm

    Oh, I forgot when in all of this do the meek inherit the earth?

Leave a Reply