About the same quality as Larry King.

That's a bar low enough even Piers Morgan can cross it.

Larry King was the guy you go to after a coke fueled sex scandal and professional failure so that you can only be asked questions about your charity work and release dates.

Quality handle-stealing you got there. :P

Just before this clip starts they played Ricky's farewell speech from the golden globes, and his last line was "...and I'd like to thank god for making me an atheist", pretty much his least offensive joke of the night.

So this clip basically starts from there. The sneer that erupts from the host in incredulity from Ricky's simple answer to his silly question had me leaping for the submit button. His later pointless grilling of Gervais for answers to about life-after-death was just icing on the cake.

I agree, the last thing the world needs is yet another comedian who thinks that since people laugh at his jokes he can stop being funny and start lecturing people about politics.

What? Answering accusations is now considered lecturing?

"Actively trying to piss people off"

FUCKING HELL. That's not what atheists are trying to do. Even the atheists who piss you off by telling you things you don't want to hear.

That's like be saying that Christians oppose gay marriage initiatives "Just because they like being douche-bags". Or the Amish shun technology "to fuck with everyone's head". The lack of empathy obvious in these kinds of assumptions is just staggering.

Atheists who oppose religion do it for the same reason that you'd tell a 16-year-old who still believed in Santa that it was all bullshit. No one would do that "just to piss the 16-year-old off".

While this is probably true of a good number of atheists, I find it terribly naive to assume that a lot of people -- religious and atheist -- don't get off on the sense of superiority their beliefs give them. It's almost an inevitable side effect of any belief (or non-belief) system. Even you do it when you compare the world's 5 billion or so believers collectively to a developmentally stunted teenager who thinks Santa is real.

So yes, plenty of people on all sides do it to be dicks, and often don't even realize they're doing it.

The sad part is that the group that Xenocide is describing makes up the majority of the "noisy" representatives from both sides of the fence. Because the loudmouths get all the exposure, the discourse rapidly gets driven into name-calling and extremism.

I didn't mean pissing people off just for the sake of it. I'll try to clarify.

I drive by anti-evolution billboards daily (in the NE corridor, FFS) but I've never once seen an atheist one. Yet I know they exist, and why? Because every time one goes up, it's national news.

Atheists aren't seen as offensive because they're loud, but because they're a minority that has the audacity to exist. That a few atheists are loud doesn't change that. The religious fuck up elections, legislation, education, and the law, but I doubt Piers had anyone on to ask them whether thanking Jesus in their acceptance speech was a risky move.

When people expect atheists to act in unison, it's once again evidence of their minority status, and shouldn't be justified with a response. (Is there a gay agenda, beyond wanting fair treatment? If there is, are those who don't advance it "bad gays"?) Ricky's answer is heartening, but the question shouldn't have been asked.

* in the area of the northeast corridor. I don't drive on train tracks

Seconded

Tim Allen.

That whole thing at the Golden Globes was just flirting.

D33P.

The more you "piss off believers" the less likely they are to ever disbelieve. So good work there strengthening their faith, Amazing Atheist.

So do you go around raping and killing people because you're an atheist?

Not BECAUSE I'm an atheist, no.

I avoid this conversation because I live in the DEEP South. It's only after you accidentally recognize another atheist that you can talk freely. Sort of like being gay, I suppose.

I like that. I'm in Tennessee and Louisiana (depending on the time of the year) and I can't decide which is worse. But, it sort of is like being gay. Plenty of closeted people still going through the motions.

Yeah, raping and killing is something you do for the love of your art. (joking, FBI)

I get what he means about the working class family bit. My family's a lot like that. I don't begrudge them so much for what they believe, because their belief is but a symptom of a much greater problem. Many of them are alcoholics. They have such precious little imagination or creativity. They will break their backs for next to nothing all their lives, and at the end of the day they really don't want to think about the deep questions of life and the universe. They just want some beer, dinner, a shower, maybe for their wives to break them off a piece, and to go to bed so they can start all over the next day. They don't even read their Bibles, or much of anything, for that matter. They have no clue what their faith is about. They've just got to stick with the team, same as football, same as politics. They let the other guys do all the thinking for them. Why shouldn't they? They're on the same team.

Pretending that there is ever really time for meaningful conversation with them, about any subject, is self-delusion. If I brought religion into the mix, I'd just be setting off landmines. Even if I could get through, maybe somehow convince someone there's no Jesus and no reward waiting for them in Heaven, it would just lead them to a profound sense of depression. The truth would be too crushing. They wouldn't know what to do with themselves, let alone these new thoughts. They would become isolated from their friends and loved ones, even as they wrestle with their new world view. For all my good intentions of trying to liberate someone from their religious shackles, the best I could do is make someone even more miserable. There's no guarantee that they could recover from this, or turn themselves around to some good, or eventually learn to accept that death isn't something you worry about because the worrying, itself, is such a poor choice of ways to spend your time.

I guess I gave up on imagining a sane, rational world a long time ago.

Ricky wants to say "I stopped being 8 years old" a minute in but doesn't.

sorry not a reply

He's a right bellend that is often used as the budget simon cowell.