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Question 25

Do you, as an atheist, watch any tv evangelists?

• Last time I did, it was by accident and the face alone made me almost vomit. I had only one choice: switch channels or redecorate my room with a chair (I get like that sometimes, when I'm forced to watch the utter stupidity of some so-called humans). I decided to remain calm and to swallow my anger. I watched Baywatch with a happy smile on my face. (Don Antropos #1001)

• I have never really seen one like those I hear exists in the US. I live in sweden and the closest things we got is broadcasts from mass in the swedish church on sunday mornings and perhaps christmas mass as well.

  Those broadcasts are very calm and probably nothing like those evangleists trying by rethorics and threats to engage people in their particular brand of faith.

  The swedish state church is extremely tolerant and accepts very wide interpretations of the bible message, as a few examples they do allow female priests, are actually considering gay marriage rituals and also other things which I find interesting. They still call themselves christian.

  They also accept other peoples faith, especially judaism and budhism seems to be widely accepted and I think that I have never heard a spokesperson for the swedish church to point at any other religions group and say: "those people are in error, repent or burn in hell". (Ichimusai #769)

• I don't watch a lot of tv but sometimes I flip on the religion channel just for fun. I think it's pretty good entertainment, actually. I've seen Benny Hinn's show, "This is Your Day" a few times, and it's fun-knee.

  What wasn't funny, though, was when he had some guest person on who had God "talk to him" and he read the message aloud of what God said to him. It went something like this:

  "blahblahblah... Benny, I had your show forseen since the first day of creation...it is all in my plan... blah blah..."

  Then Benny walks over and says to the guest, "I can assure you that these words are from heaven!" Oh, and you can also hear Benny commenting on how God tells him personally to have a prayer group three times a day or something.

  I had never seen such an outright lie before. How does ol' Benny boy live with himself? (drinkthat #1033)

• message 1

  I switched the TV on at 4:30am, and yes, the evil bleater in question is:

  Kenneth Copeland, praise the lord!

  Praise Jesus! Hallelujah!

  Now my TV's worth even less, and I *really* suffer while watching that idiot. He gives me one of those nauseated, crunch-up-your-toes, clamp-your-butt-cheeks-together, wriggle-your-ass-around-on-the-sofa, feelings of unease, not to forget a sense of disgust.

  (but at least he fuels my hatred - that's a good thing. :) )

  message 2

  After Joyce's hateful, pinched face and loathsome posturing disappeared from my now devalued television, yet another god show started. This one starred some bloke whose name I didn't catch, (possibly Robert Tilton or Jack Van Impe) but the first thing that caught my eye was how utterly EVIL he appeared. No kidding, before he'd even uttered a word, I had this sense of unease and I thought, "NO WAY could I ever trust this guy," and if I believed all the christian wank, I'd have sworn he was Satan himself. Beady, narrow little eyes, with an air of a used car salesman, whose pitch was just so obviously contrived and appealing to emotion that it had this kinda foreboding sense about it.

  His gibberish was liberally punctuated with "praise the lord," and "hail jesus," and he flowed from pointless piece of crap to pointless piece of crap without breaking stride - with a "hallelujah, praise the lord" thrown in to sew the nonsense he was barfing together. I watched him for as long as I could stomach, and he was basically trying to justify faith by telling everyone that they were all using the same faith as Jesus Christ. This went on and on and on, and it was easy to see that his style was simply to talk fast, change subject often, and say "praise the lord," with tedious frequency. (Stix #12)

• Once I was switching channels and I went past channel 8 (our local cable company once put out a survey asking which channels we wanted and which we would like removed, when the survey came back, the company explained the changes that we had asked for, and which ones would be implemented. They said that they were required by law to include the christian channel within the first 13, so they would be available even to the old rotary dial TV's. Does this sound right to you?) and saw a fundamentalist "passion play" (I think it was during easter), on it, a bunch of men wearing robes and beards were beating up jesus and shouting "we wish we could kill you ourselves, but the law won't allow it." That's about as much as I could stand before I changed it. And it uspet me so much that I didn't spend much time after that paying attention to the TV at all.

  I once watched a talk show where they described why "rainbow bright" was satanic (she had a sticker of a star on her cheek, and the one they picked up, the star had been pasted on upside down, clearly a penatagram. Also, she slides down a rainbow, which is "necromantic". I guess they don't know what "necromantic" means) and why the new G.I. Joe (the one with built-in weapons, the old one got to be scuba diver when you were tired of killing the japs) was a good clean christian toy. Of course Dungeons and Dragons was right out.

  Actual fundy preachers? No, if I've ever tuned in to one of them, my brain must have vomited up whatever I saw, I have no recollection at all. (Glenn Arnold #20)

• Sometimes I'll flick over to Vision TV (It's the religious channel in Canada - Christianity Monday to Friday, Islam on the weekends) and see what Jack and Rexella(what a name) Va Impe have to say, which is always the same: headline news proves that this is the Endtimes! Buy our book/ tape/t-shirt to find out more!

  I usually can't stomach it for more than five minutes, but it's funny to see just how obsessed televangelists are with death. (no name)

• Sometimes I watch Pat Robertson or whatever is on EWTN to see what they're saying and what they're up to. It's always sad to realize how many people follow these guys and give money to them. No matter how many times they're taken, people go back for more. (Eileen Camilleri #948)

• Sometimes but not often, mostly for laughs and to relieve boredom. Mostly for laughs. I have no preference, although I find Jack van Impe (for his paranoia) and Benny Hinn (for his circus act) a hoot. I think Jack's Rexella is a mutant of some sort. (erikc #2)

• I'd rather eat my own vomit.

  And, depending on the televangelist, I just might find it more palatable to eat *someone else's* vomit. (czar #13)

• gag choke barf ARRG ARRG hack hack ptooie. . . what, are you nuts? Tie me down and make me watch sitcoms or soaps, but I'll try to swallow my tongue if I have to watch those maggots. I see enough ignorant spew on usenet. (Jeff/addesign #1063)