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Without Religion, We Wouldn’t Have This

23:55 Thu 23 Oct 2008. Updated: 17:28 28 Jan 2009
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Somehow, I can’t bring myself today to write about something other than a completely ridiculous call to action from some religious nuts. Via Who is IOZ comes this piece of utter insanity, opening of course with a classic spam-like statement:

Dear friends:

THIS IS EXTREMELY SERIOUS.

Minutes ago I spoke with friend Dr. Norman G. Marvin, M.D. and he is so concerned at what he has learned about Barack Obama’s family in Kenya that he is calling a special prayer meeting in his home to pray against the witchcraft curses attempted by them against John McCain and Sarah Palin.
Block African witchcraft curses against McCain and Palin NOW!, Jim Bramlett, Sep 28 2008


Even without the content per se, I think that there are a bunch of stylistic points that would mark this as extremely dodgy. The first, obvious, giveaway is of course the all-caps line. The second is probably “Dr. Norman G. Marvin, M.D”. Okay, fine, he might be a real doctor. He might even be a real medical doctor with a Ph.D. But its seems common among people who are trying to sell totally implausible crap to insist on impressive credentials. Because, you know, if a doctor, indeed a doctor with doctor both before and after his name, is concerned, then it must be serious. Just like the all-caps bit says. You didn’t argue with the all-caps line, did you? I hope not, because now you’re on the wrong side of the doctor, and that, my friend, is not a good place to be, not at all.

There’s something else, too, that I can’t pin down as precisely, but there’s a “breathless” style here too… “Minutes ago”, for starters. You clearly get the impression that the author, for all intents and purposes some random guy, met with his friend, for all intents and purposes (and despite the highlighted credentials) another random guy, who heard (from yet another random source) something that’s so compelling that he had to… to… well, he had to call a special prayer meeting. In his home!

If we knew the doctor, perhaps that would make this more impressive. Perhaps it’s well known that Dr. Norman G. Marvin, M.D., despite being a staunch Christian who every day heeds the call of Jesus, never, ever, ever holds prayer meetings in his home. Perhaps he never holds prayer meetings at all.

Conversely, maybe he holds prayer meetings at his home all the time, regularly scheduled, so reliably and frequently that they clearly delineate the passing of time for the members of his community, and the unprecedented news is that he’s going to alter his schedule, to depart from the Monday 11:15 discussion on 1 Pet 3:2 to instead pray on this serious matter.

Following that excerpt from Jim’s call to action, the insanity continues, first by reassuring you that next in the chain of sources is Flo Ellers, who is “credentialed with the International Fellowship of Ministries which is based in Washington State” and is also “a member of EndTime Handmaidens and Servants of Jasper, Arkansas”. Well. That puts paid to any doubts we might have had, yes? This person then tells us that the rest of the information comes from “Bree Keyton, a young woman evangelist who had just traveled to Kenya and visited Obama’s home village”.

So Jim heard from Dr. Norman G. Marvin, M.D. that he heard from Flo that she heard from Bree that… wow. I mean, what’s with the intro? Why doesn’t Jim just cite Bree? No, the whole chain has to be called out, apparently.

After that, it’s mainly just paranoid rantings about Obama’s “tribal people” being pagan Muslims… yes, Muslims who pray to genies, apparently. I somehow don’t see how that fits in with Islam. Incidentally, the Satanic pagan Muslim of the piece, Ralia Odinga, himself claims to be an Anglican, but maybe that’s not so far from Islamic paganist Satanism in the eyes of people like Jim, Dr. Norman G. Marvin, M.D., Flo, and Bree.

Some final gems. First, after all of that: “Dick Morris of Fox News was sent to Kenya to help Odinga run his campaign! I find that unbelievable.” Yes, clearly that’s the most unbelievable part of the entire thing.

And lastly, this really has to be the ultimate in self-delusional defensive thinking:

The occultists are “weaving lazy 8′s around McCain’s mind to make him look confused and like an idiot”.

One Response to “Without Religion, We Wouldn’t Have This”

  1. monika Says:

    Well, you know, McCain does look confused and like an idiot to me, so those lazy 8′s must be working…

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