You can tell it was a Satan-inspired slave revolt because it was successful. When God is on the side of the slaves, they are doomed to failure, as we learned in the Bible.
And they got together and swore a pact to the devil. They said, "We will serve you if you will get us free from the French." True story. And so, the devil said, "OK, it's a deal."
Pat always makes the Adversary sound so reasonable.
Apparently, it's True
If not the Devil, then the Demiurge.
God is never on the side of slaves. He is, however, in favor of tax cuts for the rich.
Napoleon III. Does PR think Mexico made a pact with the devil too?
It's gonna be sad when we can't masturbate to Pat Robertson anymore. The new generation of Christian nutjobs is too media-savvy to serve up the crazy like this.
Napoleon II get short shrift in the history books.
God is never on the side of slaves.
Oh yeah? Sez who, Pharoah?
Napoleon III. Does PR think Mexico made a pact with the devil too?
Sure, why not? Do you think it's a coincidence that Vincente Guerrero is an anagram for "routing reverence"? And he was both Catholic and against slavery, so that's proof positive right there.
Vincente Guerrero is an anagram for "routing reverence"
I really almost believed this.
Fucking devil, stealing our gay thunder. And stupid Pat Robertson is doing demonic propaganda to undermine what should have been our gay birthright. Bah, I say.
6 gets it right. "True story" indeed. Given that 2000 or something comments later, Apo's Obama-as-Antichrist thread was going strong, we have, I guess, to acknowledge that this kind of crazy is alive and well, but damn, it remains hard to believe.
Creepily, or sadly, the NPR Marketplace coverage of the Haiti earthquake this evening moved quickly from how awful it was for the 10s of thousands, possibly 100s of thousands dead, to what an opportunity for rebuilding this might be. (Shades of Robertson's "I'm optimistic something good may come.")
11 is confusing. Perhaps neb only recognizes "Gun to Irreverence" as a valid anagram?
Huh. No, I just lost track of the "g".
True story.
You know what I do when I'm sad about a slave revolt built on a deal with the devil? I stop being said, and just be awesome instead. True story.
I stop being said
Let no one speak the name of --.
It's gonna be sad when we can't masturbate to Pat Robertson anymore.
When I heard the story, something about the reporter's tone made me fill in the verb after Pat Robertson's name. As in "Earlier today, Pat Robertson _________ ."
My verb was not a very nice thought. Not very nice for Robertson, that is.
I'm all in favor of making pacts with the devil, but in this case I don't think it's true -- Toussaint Louverture's constitution for one thing mandated that Roman Catholicism be established as Haiti's national religion, which would be inconsistent with a satanic pact. Unless of course Pat Robertson means that the Catholic Church is the whore of Babylon and papistry is satanic in which case I guess that's fair.
Toussaint Louverture's constitution for one thing mandated that Roman Catholicism be established as Haiti's national religion, which would be inconsistent with a satanic pact
Let's not be hasty. He made a satanic pact (we're assuming), but he wasn't a devil worshipper. Mandating Catholicism was probably just an attempt to get in good with the man upstairs.
I'm thinking I'd like to re-read Mumbo Jumbo. Where the devil has my copy gone?
An earthquake a couple hundred years later is an inspiring example of grudge holding and wrath. I'm going to have to up my game.
Iirc, Reed puts Moses and the voodoo generals on the same side.
Creepily, or sadly, the NPR Marketplace coverage of the Haiti earthquake this evening moved quickly from how awful it was for the 10s of thousands, possibly 100s of thousands dead, to what an opportunity for rebuilding this might be. (Shades of Robertson's "I'm optimistic something good may come.")
Trent Lott's going to have a fantastic house. And I'm looking forward to sitting on the porch.
I'm all in favor of making pacts with the devil,
I just lump it all under 'transactional lawyering' and don't pay much attention
||
I'd sell my soul to get out of listening to the Disney Channel during hockey practice.
|>
20: Unless of course Pat Robertson means that
Pat Robertson doesn't mean a goddamned thing. The hippie voodoo-sex-dancers made a pact with the devil, which is perfectly obvious to anyone who's seen a Hollywood movie or two.
It's much easier than that, CC. Just puncture your eardrums.
Wasn't Robertson the one who said 9/11 was a punishment of NYC for DFHness? I know he said something similarly fucked-up about Katrina. I'm thinking he deliberately says these things to repulse decent people and thereby burnish his base-cred. (Was that obvious?)
Actually it was even easier. I just had to knock off flirting with the hockey moms and go outside.
The Disney Channel really is awful, though.
30: Kind of obvious, yeah. I forget what 9/11 was punishment for. Gayness, maybe. Or maybe that was Katrina. Whatever, sinful people who do voodoo sex stuff, including dancing, which is practically the same as gay sex, since it confounds the mind and the senses, until a person just doesn't know what he might be doing.
It's just kind of amazing that that rhetoric still finds an audience. I'm not sure it could without the accompanying god/devil talk.
So, did the patriots make a deal with the devil to win the American Revolution? Is Pat Robertson our punishment?
No, the patriots were white. God was on their side.
WHEN I MADE A DEAL WITH THE DEVIL, ALL I GOT WAS A STUPID GOLDEN FIDDLE THAT TURNED OUT TO BE MADE OF BRASS.
Vince Wilfork's pact with Shango gave him wealth and fortune, but God is now smiting him with monstrous obesity.
I forget what 9/11 was punishment for. Gayness, maybe.
It was Falwell who blamed the ACLU, abortionists, pagans, and feminists besides, of course, teh gays. Robertson merely said he "totally" concurred. Fuckers.
34: Jesus was white too. {snicker}
I'm sorry, I just can't take this shit seriously. I usually manage to keep my disgust for it at a low key, but this Robertson crap is really setting off my "Fuck you Fuck you Fuck you" meter.
No, the patriots were white. God was on their side.
Thanks for making that explicit.
Is joining the Masons a sign of the pact with the devil? I'm amused to learn from wiki that Toussaint L'Ouverture was a member, something I never knew about the man. I'm beginning to see a trend between successful revolutionaries. Dan Brown should write a book.
24 comports with my recollection, but I lent my copy to a friend doing a research project about Henry Ford and the ethnic (European) folk music movement in the '20s, so I can't confirm.
When I was a kid I remember learning, from somewhere, that if I asked, Satan would come into my soul. I remember thinking that a great way to resolve my burgeoning doubt in the whole religion business would be to ask for Satan to come into my soul to see if it would happen. Not for free, mind you; I stipulated that I would allow Satan to come into my soul in exchange for worldly superpowers of some kind (I can't remember which--probably teleportation, telekinesis, or Flash-like super-speed). Nothing happened (so it seems...) and now I'm an atheist without superpowers, ho hum.
Oh yeah, fuck Pat Robertson.
Neither Hitler nor Jimmy Carter was a Mason.
Is Pat Robertson our punishment?
It might be argued that Pat Robertson's value lies in forestalling the hate-mongering cleric gap between us and the islamofascists (we must not allow a mineshaft hate-mongering cleric gap!). But certainly others would fill in, so the devil take him.
Inhaling an evil spirit can give you super karate-chop strength.
The patriots generously offered to help out refugees from the Haitian revolution. The slave-owning ones, at least.
44: What? Do you mean that Pat Robertson is distracting me from hating someone I should be more rightfully (righteously) hating? I'd buy that, but -- the islamofascists? What?
I'm a little slow, I imagine, having spent the last 10 minutes determining that my roommate has eaten pretty much all of the very nice holiday chocolate in the house. It's like things have an expiration date around here.
My question to Pat Robertson: if God is that big an asshole, what does it say about you that you've devoted your life to Him?
You're not thinking straight, NPH. God is not an asshole, by definition.
Nothing happened ... and now I'm an atheist
I've got bad news for you, currence.
Amazing! WiFi @ 35119 feet and 624mph and I am typing on a shirt pocket computer. I am glad to have seen these wonders.
Droid. Stupid name & the touch screen is too twitchy but still an amazing device for someone first introduced to technology via WW2 electronics.
From an account of the Haitian slave revolts:
The carnage that the slaves wreaked in northern settlements, such as Acul, Limbé, Flaville, and Le Normand, revealed the simmering fury of an oppressed people. The bands of slaves slaughtered every white person they encountered. As their standard, they carried a pike with the carcass of an impaled white baby.
That is hard core.
Demon possession and satanic activity has enormous explanatory power. The atheistic model is deeply unsatisfying in this regard. Shit just happens is so much harder to come to terms with than the notion that one is under attack by demons. It's also personally satisfying to believe oneself to be a player in a spiritual war as opposed to merely a victim of circumstance.
I think one of the key issues with treatment of mental illness in non western cultures (referenced in a previous thread I'm too lazy to look up) is that if someone you love is possessed by a demon the essence of the person is still good, they are merely under control of a malign entity temporarily, and if they start to improve the previous relationship can be restored. If the person suffers from organically based mental illness then the person is intrinsically defective, and the only relationship you can have is with a broken person in various stages of jury-rigged approximation to normality. I prefer the demon model myself, having been visited by the Black Dog more than once.
Also, "non western" above is wrong. Should be some phrase that refers explicitly to cultures that see the world as populated by spirits, which includes a bunch of western subcultures, and excludes some non western ones. No doubt there is a pithy word for this that I have forgotten.
55: The demonic view also encourages some potentially helpful humility on the part of others. That is, on seeing someone in trouble, you are more likely to think "There but for the grace of God go I" and not "My brain, let me show you how fucking cool it is compared to yours."
That said, antipsychotic medications really do tend to work for a significant subset of people. The side effects are often horrific, but they do work.
57.1: This is part of a larger dynamic in which the suffering of others is used as a gauge of ones own merit. It has a particularly ugly manifestation in some peoples' take on prosperity theology.
57.2: The advances in psych meds just over the past two decades have been extraordinary. I'm hopeful that progress will continue and eventually we'll have some that really work well but do not have the unpleasant side effects. I've only taken antidepressants, but they worked incredibly well at taking the edge off. The side effects get old pretty quickly, though.
57: If I'm reading you right, you're suggesting that we should rebrand them as "antidemonic medications"?
59: No. Just thinking outloud on what togolosh said.
58: Yes, I suppose the demonic view could get you to "God loves me and not you, asshole." From a Christian point of view, I've never understood how you can pull that out of the text even assuming an exceptional talent at selective reading. I suppose if you only read a single passage and then put down the Bible. I have very little idea what any religious outside of the big three monotheisms would have to say on the matter.
61: I agree that the attitude is hard to pull out of the Bible, but somehow a lot of people manage to do it. It's an attractive approach, since actually doing all the stuff Jesus said to do is really fucking hard. Much easier to play word games and selective quotation than to actually be nice to people and give a shit about the poor and downtrodden. Let's face it, the downtrodden are kind of annoying. And smelly.
Let's face it, the downtrodden are kind of annoying. And smelly.
Smoking can help deal with both of those problems, but I had to stop that.
No doubt there is a pithy word for this that I have forgotten.
Surely not animist?
64: I think that is just a subset. I propose metamaterialism.
I think 'animist' is a little too tight -- a monotheist with a strong belief in demons and guardian angels would qualify for what tologosh is talking about, but wouldn't really be animist as such.
I hear churching can instill a wonderful ability to read, e.g., Matthew 25:34-46 and either ponder its meaning or let it pass by, without once taking it at face value - even without prior aid in interpreting.
64: That's the word to describe many programmers' view of their universe.
67: It does, after all, say that those on the left are doomed to eternal fire, and those on the right are blessed.
69: O.K. We'll need something that doesn't imply deliberate cruelty to others as a goal in life.
66: Yeah, that's why I offered it in the negative.
68: I actually thought of that word, but I don't think it means anything like what we're discussing.
67 is exactly the passage I was thinking about in 62. That and 1 Corinthians 13.
Shit just happens is so much harder to come to terms with than the notion that one is under attack by demons.
See, I truly don't understand this. /earnest
I've always been amused that my birth-religion takes this verse literally, but regards this one as having been intended figuratively.
74: Belief in demons is strongly and positively correlated with belief in a power that can control demons. With "Shit Happens," you get a t-shirt.
75: While mine takes both of those figuratively, but really loves this one.
74: What Moby said. It's the illusion of control, that you can somehow influence the outcome of events, which people find comforting.
I would its more about "consolation" than "control," but that may just be me.
I think that "knowing" that all the senseless shit that happens in the world really isn't senseless, i.e. it's part of some plan or happens for a reason, can be very comforting if you can get yourself to believe it. And "knowing" that you can have some influence over such events via prayer or sacrifice or ritual or the like can also be very comforting, probably all the more so the less actual control one has over one's conditions and circumstances.
Our brains are wired to seek patterns and tend strongly to apply order, structure, and reasons to events even when there isn't any.
I believe there's a lot of work showing that people who experience traumatic events but have some notion of control about the experience have much less PTSD than people who felt a total loss of control during the traumatic event. Like, for example, a kid who is being abused and barricades off some portion of their internal self as being untouchable by the abuser experiences a degree of control over themselves during the trauma.
Our brains are wired to seek patterns and tend strongly to apply order, structure, and reasons to events even when there isn't any.
Everybody is bashing the economists right now.
I hear churching can instill a wonderful ability to read, e.g., Matthew 25:34-46 and either ponder its meaning or let it pass by, without once taking it at face value
I understand that some people who pride themselves on their literal reading of the bible interpret this text as only applying to what happens during Christ's reign of the Millennium, whereas before that you just have to recite a spell say the believer's prayer, and you're cool, so fuck anybody else.
I reserve my contempt (mostly) for the people who teach this BS.
83: Yup! And we don't need no priests interpreting the Good Book for us, nosiree.
It's the illusion of control, that you can somehow influence the outcome of events, which people find comforting.
Right, like if your ancestors didn't make pacts with the devil, you'd be an 11th-generation slave but, hey, no earthquakes.
There's also the Aztec view which was, IIRC, that the gods exist, but they really don't like you very much at all, so the only way to stop them doing horrible things to you is for you to do horrible things to other people first. Kind of like throwing someone else off the troika for the wolves. An Aztec priest would just be saying "huh, well, you see, the Haitians just fell behind on their human sacrifices and look what happened."
This view is, apparently, not altogether extinct.
"Every ten years or so you have to pick up some crappy little Mesoamerican tribe and throw it against the wall, just to show Xipe Totec you mean business", as the great Aztec sage, Tlacaecel, wrote. (Codex Friedman)
85: Leaving aside Pat Robertson, it works better.
I was also surprised to learn that Robertson was actually referencing (with his own errors added) a previously existing tale.
86: The God of the Old Testament doesn't seem to particularly like most humans, even his Chosen Ones.
86: As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods;
They kill us for their sport.
His Chosen Ones, by the way, are secretly promoting sodomy as directed by the Talmud (at 3:25).
86.last: That's Codex Goldberg, IIRC.
I have to admit that I found the realisation that shit happens and there's not necessarily anything anybody, let alone yourself can do about it incredibly liberating.
We live in a no fault universe, basically.
That's going to lead to an awful lot of litigation with Universal Insurance companies.
91: Actually I think it's Codex Ledeen.
The Haitian ambassador puts the smackdown on Robertson.
Hmmm. Seems we're both basically right:
Jonah Goldberg, Ledeen's colleague at National Review, coined the term "Ledeen Doctrine" in a 2002 column. This tongue-in-cheek "doctrine" is usually summarized as "Every ten years or so, the United States needs to pick up some small crappy little country and throw it against the wall, just to show the world we mean business," which Goldberg remembered Ledeen saying in an early 1990s speech. The term "Ledeen Doctrine" is often mistakenly attributed to Michael Ledeen himself. Goldberg himself has stated that he is "not sure" if Ledeen ever actually said this or thinks along these lines.[27]
95: But see, the Haitian's pact with the devil lead to the Louisiana Purchase. That's where New Orleans is.
74: "Shit happens" gives you nothing specific to direct your anger at. Having someone/something to blame can be very comforting.
Although the only reason I remembered that quote was associated with Ledeen was because it was used in a famous song.
97: yeah, that actually makes Katrina a lot easier to understand. I was puzzled when I thought it was primarily the fault ofthe gays, but it makes more sense now.
98: that's probably why it's so cold there.
North Dakota is sunny and 72 degrees. They pay-off national media outlets to report the wrong weather. Those people didn't come all that way from Norway (sunny, 75) just to get crowded-out of another perfect climate.
I hear churching can instill a wonderful ability to read, e.g., Matthew 25:34-46 and either ponder its meaning or let it pass by, without once taking it at face value - even without prior aid in interpreting.
Dean Acheson mentioned Matthew 25:34 et seq when explaining why he would not turn his back on Alger Hiss. His critics on the right didn't buy in - they wanted him fired/impeached/out as Sec of State.
North Dakota is sunny and 72 degrees.
Kelvin?
including dancing, which is practically the same as gay sex
Neighba, please. The dance floor at a gay bar is for foreplay.
now I'm an atheist without superpowers
I invited Satan into my soul but all I got was this Elder Sign t-shirt.
66: a monotheist with a strong belief in demons and guardian angels
I would submit that folks who believe in angels and demons aren't actually the monotheists they may claim to be.
107: Isn't it possible to believe in many spiritual beings but only one God?
It's my impression that one major reason Haiti's always been such a disaster of a country is that it was the one place in the western hemisphere with a successful slave rebellion - and there was no way the European powers were going to let a successful country arise from a slave revolt, so they did all they could to keep it from succeeding. Can more historically informed commenters confirm/refute that?
Belief in demons and angels was completely standard through the middle ages, and a demonic theory of disease was common. All of the disciples, Paul, Augustine, etc. all believed in the reality of demons as did their contemporaries. But, for Christians, demons and angels they were just a part of the physical universe created by God, not gods themselves (and surely not appropriate objects of worship).
109: This is a pretty good examination of the many reasons for Haiti's grinding and unrelenting misery.
Yep. One of the things Jesus was best known for was casting out demons. He was apparently quite good at it.
Also:
Haiti agreed to make reparations to French slaveholders in 1825 in the amount of 150 million francs, reduced in 1838 to 60 million francs, in exchange for French recognition of its independence and to achieve freedom from French aggression. This indemnity bankrupted the Haitian treasury and mortgaged Haiti's future to the French banks providing the funds for the large first installment, permanently affecting Haiti's ability to be prosperous
The link in 111 is very informative.
So M/tch, if I'm reading you correctly, you think Pat Robertson was right.
115: You are not reading me correctly.
I gather that pf was characterizing the reparations-for-recognition scheme as a deal with the devil.
France = Satan would appear to be generally consistent with Pat Robertson's views.
118: Also probably the views of your average early 19th century Haitian.
And anything that Pat Robertson and 19th century Haitians agree on has got to be gospel, right?
120: Don't know about that, but if I ever time-travel to 19th century Haiti, I certainly wouldn't argue the point.
One of the things Jesus was best known for was casting out demons.
Yeah, if you were a pig. Lucky Pat.