Sunday 8 September 2013

Mormons, madness, elves and eccentricity.



The week started off well as I was surrounded by goats, it did begin to slip downhill a little towards midweek as they turned into Mormons. Not that they 'turned into' Mormons, which would have been awesome; more that circumstances changed as time moved on and I seemed to inadvertently exchange one for the other. Not that I would ever swap goats for Mormons.

I was becoming strained by the self satisfied expressions being worn by this milling herd which was noticed by another Gentile, I was informed that I 'have to respect their religion.'

A rosy cheeked fourteen year old was attempting to convince me that joy lingered within the tome he clutched; his partner was entirely more shrewd of eye and cynical about the path of questioning I was merrily skipping along, with them, reluctantly, in tow.
Mormons: Absolutely love it. 

In 1823 Joseph Smith was visited by the angel Moroni, which was nice of him. The voice of the Lord spake unto Joseph, as he would put it, the luminous figure then told him the whereabouts of a golden book which he was not allowed to retrieve. The book had been there for 1400 years so presumably there was no rush; Joseph dug the book up anyway and God immediately took it away, which is fair enough. Fortunately god said the chosen one could have another chance; as long as he came back every year and then married the woman he fancied, which panned out alright.

The father of the girl was perturbed as this was around the point that the prophet was done for fraud by the state of New York, not for anything to do with his religious chuntering, but for telling people he could find treasure by reading crystals. Joseph took quite a bit of money in advance for finding treasure, the only down point being that he never found any.

Emma, the girl that god chose after Joseph realized he fancied her, eventually ran off with the lunatic/con man; this meant he could now have his golden book. The book was written in 'reformed Egyptian' despite not having come from Egypt and being in America; it was very lucky that god provided some 'magic spectacles' that enabled the reader to understand the ancient text. Like the Quran and the Bible, it is for some reason vital that the people of the world have no chance of understanding the message that is being sent specifically to them.    

In more recent years the 'key enemies of Mormonism' have been clearly labelled as 'Feminism and homosexuality'. The people who dwell upon this Earth that have a darker pigment to their complexion are intrinsically evil; the colour was punishment for turning their backs on God. Later in the promised land of America, right next to where Joseph Smith lived thousands of years later, the black people killed all the white people which is why no people of caucasian appearance were there by the time the historical world was able to visit.  Next time the white shirted preachers of madness (wearing their special Mormon underwear, I kid you not at all) have the presumption to offer you a conversion; make sure you bring up the subjects of sexism, homophobia and blatant racism.
Joseph Smith: Like Jesus only less gay. 

I do not have to respect your religion, or indeed anyone's religion. The big three, and all their appropriated spin off series, are based upon the truth of the Old Testament, the downfall being that it hasn't got any in it. Every day new species are found in the world, on continents never visited until very recent centuries, just collecting all the dragon flies from the surface of the world would be unfeasible today. It would be extraordinarily difficult for a man who had no idea that other countries existed at all. A dubiously accumulated book of apocryphal tales that were roughly hammered together long after the event that advocate slavery, the death of homosexuals and the standard second class citizenship of women is not something I have any obligation to respect or even acknowledge.

If your idea is obviously false I have no reason to respect it, your assumption of respect is not enough to make it the case. When I was a student in shared accommodation I returned home in the early hours of the morning minus the trousers that I was sure I had been wearing when I left. I have no memory of the incident but reliable sources informed me in retrospect (very much like a religious text) that I stood in a noble fashion in the front room, in front of the television so as to capture my audience. I moved on to loudly declare that Elves were responsible for the entire thing.
An Elf in a weirdly seductive pose and a Hitler mustache:
The absence of trousers does not necessarily indicate
the presence of  Elves. No matter what I say.


My housemates were unconvinced; they observed that I had misplaced my trousers on numerous occasions, there had, on every occasion been an absence of Elves whereas there had never been an absence of whisky. I was apparently offended by this; I denounced my housemates as unbelievers whilst waving a nearly empty whisky bottle at them. I seemed to genuinely believe in something; this in no way meant that it warranted respect from my reluctant disciples. The fact that I firmly believed in something in no way made it less fucking stupid.

I moved on past the milling Mormons to an evangelist and then on to a stall advocating Islam; they had Qurans in English. I was under the impression that this was not allowed; the word of the Quran is protected by god from corruption. I inquired about this and was told that some Muslims do believe that the book has to be in Arabic. In fact some branches of Islam would be very cross about it indeed. Islam broke into two as soon as Muhammad was cold; whether people should follow the family of the prophet or should another prophet be chosen. This resulted in the Sunni and the Shia and there has not been a moments peace between them since. I feel that God could have been clearer on a couple of points.

If you are in this position, standing at a religious stall in the main though fair of a town, if you have a line of preachers from the different segments of true belief bellowing over the heretic nearby. I find that if you observe that they all follow the same religion, and then suggest that they 'all have a talk' then the atmosphere cools noticeably. I think in the west we can judge Islam on this point; lets face it, Catholics and Protestants have always got on.

There are nearly 41,000 denominations of Christianity and numerous Islamic schools, the Jews believe the Old Testament which we can definitely say is not based upon fact in itself. There is no mention of Mary ascending to heaven in any bible and this branch of belief that supports Catholicism is genuinely referred to the assumption. Among the splendid buffet of evidence for the false nature of modern monotheism, the fact that no two groups agree, to the point of foaming anger, on the exact desires of the deity prove that it is a manufactured concept open to the whims, madness and ignorance of the consistently fallible human.

The joy of conversation has been riddled with bullshit over the previous week; there have been offered statements of fact that distinctly lacking in the fact department. I was discussing the concept of military intervention in Syria and the difficulties involved in actually bombing a chemical weapons plant; one of the key problems is that the chemicals tend to come out. The idea of Exocet missiles hitting installations containing sarin gas without causing collateral damage seems a little far fetched. As we know from recent events, once there is a collection of collateral damage then the collateral that is still moving around and intact starts to get understandably irritated by the amount of damage that there has been and one ends up with a form of insurgency.
Minnows: Know more than you because they love the cock. 

The idea of puncturing chemical storage units with a none explosive charge and scattering tungsten rods over a sixty foot area on a day that is not particularly windy seems ambitious; mainly due to the history of friendly fire incidents and general fuck ups that have formed the global image of international relations for the last decade. I felt a hand land gently on my shoulder and heard words spoken through a smile: 'Obviously you are not a mother.' This, in all fairness, is a good point. 'If you were a mother, you would want to invade Syria.' Which I'm not sure is.  

I, for some reason tried to explain the interventions in the late 19th century into Afghanistan, which was not an invasion at the time, but just installing a friendly government. (To protect the route to India which was important at the time) The Arabic world is much more aware of the western intervention through history than we tend to be and it colours their view of the present interactions of the modern western world, as well it should. Also the technological difficulties of bombing such targets is enormous and needs a great deal more thought and planning than an immediate attack would have. Starting an aggressive movement towards a middle eastern target without an exit strategy would be really embarrassing. Like losing your trousers more than once.
Highlander: Lives in your vulva. 

None of this mattered, if you have children you apparently understand the importance of the suffering of children in a greater way than someone who has been more cautious. You immediately understand the history of international relations when the crying starts and you had no compassion up until that point. As soon as the placenta hits the rubber matting you are filled with the knowledge of the universe as though you vagina was in some way highlander.

I was told that my degree was a much lesser qualification than breeding: My degree took three fucking years, when I was sixteen I got a girl pregnant in a massively shorter period of time. A really short period of time now I think about it. The more children grotesquely spat out into an unwelcoming and overflowing world the better apparently, the wiser the bearer of the magical cervix becomes. Minnows have the capacity to produce thousands of offspring at a time, this in no way indicates that the proud parent should work for the U.N.

I was more recently informed that 'If you were a parent you would believe in capital punishment, you would understand that some people deserve to die.' I am fairly certain that bit isn't true, there are various parents I know personally that breeding did not have this effect upon. Breeding does not stop you from being a dick, breeding is not, in itself, an achievement.

I miss the goats. Sometimes it is just nice to know where you stand.

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