The Fundie Head-Explosion!

Remember the title of my post the other day, about the National Day of Prayer?  About the fundie head explosion?  Well, it's happened, although it seems to be rather small in scale right now.  The Family Research Council's Tony Perkins released a statement Friday that's rather headdeskifying.  Here it is, with commentary.

"Had Judge Crabb consulted the Constitution she was sworn to uphold, she might notice that Americans enjoy religious freedom – not by virtue of the courts, but in spite of them.  Contrary to her opinion, this ruling does not promote freedom, it crushes it.

What freedom is being crushed, exactly?  Judge Crabb specifically said that her ruling was in no way a discouragement of prayer.  Or did you miss that bit of reality on the way as you raced toward your persecution fantasies? 

Americans pray voluntarily.

Not all Americans, kthx.  And even of those who do, not all of them pray in a way you would recognize as prayer, nor do they all pray "to God" as you do.  So this sweeping statement?  Pure bullshit.

And exercising that right together, as a willing nation, is exactly what the Founding Fathers intended.  To imply otherwise, is to suggest that the Constitution is unconstitutional.

Is it, really?  That's awfully cool, that you have a psychic link to people 200 years or so in the grave.  Given that the National Day of Prayer didn't originate with the Founders, but was put in place in its current form during the 1950's (at the same time the Pledge of Allegiance was amended to insert "under God", and for the same reason of anti-godless-communists fervor) there's no other way you could know that the Founders intended *anything* to do with prayer.  While you're at it, can you ask Marie Antoinette if she ever actually said that line about eating cake?  I've always wondered.


I'll also point out that when Benjamin Franklin asked the delegates to the Constitutional Convention to pray together, his suggestion was met with polite embarrassment and they adjourned without voting on the motion.  So I'm thinking perhaps these Founders weren't so much the praying-together-in-government type as they're often made out to be.  If you have any evidence to the contrary, of course, I'd love to hear it.  

Religion cannot be banned in America because it was never imposed – not by the Founding Fathers, and certainly not by the National Day of Prayer.

I'm sorry, you seem to have lost the thread of reality again.  This ruling didn't "ban religion", any more than the end of school-sponsored prayer banned Christian students from praying.  Can you people please get straight the difference between officially-imposed and -sanctioned religious activities, and privately organized religious activities?  They are two very different situations, and two very different sets of rules govern them.  And for the love of all the gods, in her ruling, Judge Crabb specifically addressed this idea, noting that her ruling would not prevent private groups from organizing their own prayer days, nor that her ruling was intended as disapproval of prayer at all.  It was only the constitutionality of requiring it as law that her ruling addressed.  Also, the idea that the NDoP didn't impose religion is idiotic.  What else does a call for "all Americans" to "unite in prayer" do, but attempt to impose religiosity on us all, whether we are religious or not?  That's a serious question.  I'd like to know what else it does, if not that.

 While this is one of many instances in which the courts have tried to banish God from the public square, this case reveals a level of supreme arrogance.  Ultimately, Judge Crabb is inferring that she found something in the Constitution that every President and Congress since 1775 has not: a hostile treatment of religion in public life.

"...hostile treatment..."?  Really?  Here's a homework assignment for all those who would agree with this: you are to write lines.  Specifically, you are to write "Having a tiny modicum of my privileged position at the top of the heap challenged is not a hostile act, nor is it oppression."  Write that, oh, about eleventy bajillion times, and maybe it'll finally sink in and I won't have to waste so much of my time and energy explaining this concept to you over and over again, every time the government stops treating you as Teh Sooper Special-est Religion Evar for a moment or two.  (Oh, and the "every President and Congress since 1775" bit is nothing more than an ad antiquitatem fallacy; just cause it's "always been" that way doesn't mean it's the right way of being.  Learn to logic plz.)

We call on Congress to start the impeachment proceedings for Barbara Crabb, as she violated her sacred oath of 'administering justice... under the Constitution and laws of the United States.'  What she has done to repress, we will use to revive.  When the great men and women of our past bent their knees to God on behalf of the 'sacred fire of liberty,' it was often during the nation's darkest days.  My friends, it is time we join them." 

Now you're just getting testerical.  Impeachment proceedings, just because she decided a way you don't like?  Get over yourselves.   

Let's hope there's a better head-explosion still to come, cause this one was laughably easy to take apart.  I need a challenge, fundies!  Step up!