The Cracked Thread

You know, I actually haven't read any of Dawkins' works.

Is he really that much of an aggressive anti-theist, or does he just hate fundamentalists?

Dawkins once said at a skeptics rally, in regards to religious people, to "mock them, ridicule them in public", and regularly belittles Islam in a douchey and judgmental way on his Twitter.

And he called agnostics "bloody fence-sitters", which quite frankly pisses me off since I'm an agnostic. It's because of him and the fundamentalists I grew up with that I'm even agnostic in the first place.

edited 30th Jan '16 7:09:50 PM by AdricDePsycho

Well. That's not very nice.

He's the kind of guy who, if you agree with him, you feel kinda shitty for it. Cracked made a similar observation towards Christopher Hitchens, another asshole from the New Atheist movement.

I remember one classic Cracked article (back when the site was still good) saying that whichever belief you hold onto, being a dick probably wouldn't help your cause.

It might have been in reference to Bill Maher's "documentary" Religulous.

The site was never "good" it had shitty articles, great articles and pretty ok articles. much like its current state.

edited 30th Jan '16 7:31:44 PM by MrAHR

I once saw Dawkins' brand of atheism described as "no, actually, an atheism where we're all still Christian", for what it's worth.

Not quite sure what was meant by it. Maybe being atheist while still adhering to a Christian norm of sorts? I've heard Dawkins has said some rather unpleasant things about Muslims? In any case, I don't know how accurate that was.

It probably refers to how it's basically the same judgmental preachiness under a new coat of paint. I mean, I've literally seen atheists on Facebook say "we don't need freedom of religion, we need freedom FROM religion". It's horseshoe theory in motion: the side that Dawkins is on has become just as bad as the side he opposes.

A lot of aetheists from fundamentalist backgrounds use the same fundamentalist techniques in an attempt to "convert" people to aetheism. It's an observation Fred Clark has made frequently.

I do not know who this Fred Clark is, but I'd have to agree.

I mean, Cracked already had a couple articles on how some atheists are assholes. David Wong wrote one back in 2008 or so where he talked about how both sides were assholes. Hell, he even showed a thread made when Jerry Fallwell passed away where a bunch of atheists were saying "hooray!". I don't like the guy but saying "hooray" to someone's death isn't generally a good thing.

He's the one that coined the term "slacktivist" and a Christian blogger which analyzes fundamentalist culture.

Is he controversial?

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/

Among fundamentalists, I guess.

http://www.cracked.com/video_19720_7-celebrities-who-have-clearly-lost-their-minds.html

This... was disappointing. I mean, talk about low-hanging fruit, and they still manage to miss. It reminds me of "Louis CK is ignorant because he thinks vaginas are pretty" levels of missing the point.

• 7: Okay, spot on. Great start.
• 6: Seinfeld's jokes there... are admittedly really unfunny, but if you don't get "gay" means "flamboyant" in that context that's problematic.
• 5: I more agree with the "why did they choose Marky Mark at all?" thing. Given what he had to work with, there wasn't a lot he could do...
• 4: "This sports commentator misused the word pun once! And another time, kinda rambled! Also, all athletes are dumb!" Worst thing is he's probably right about the quality of the commentator, but given he only lists two unrelated mild gaffes, it's so clearly cherrypicking it's hard to listen to his point.
• 3: Okay, fuck you for making me defend her, but she had as valid a goddamn point as you're going to get on The View and it got shut down because "oooooooooooh racism!" No, not all latinos are maids. But all the "durn illegals!" that Trump is planning on murdering are the people doing shit grunt work because no one else wants to do. All the fear of "they're stealing our jobs!" is ridiculous because we don't want those jobs.
• 2: ... seriously. That's how we're saying Gwenyth Paltrow is out of touch. Because she included several limes in that picture. Not... literally every thing else she's done.
• 1: Okay, that was kinda funny.

edited 1st Feb '16 11:11:42 AM by Larkmarn

http://www.cracked.com/blog/6-ugly-things-you-learn-about-donald-trump-reading-his-books/

A Trump article that is not shit, no points for guessing who didn't write it.

This photoplasty made me laugh.

Plus a genuinely hilarious article:

http://www.cracked.com/blog/the-8-most-common-ways-to-die-as-playable-mario-levels/

Ooooh, new Rom.com starting tomorrow. That's exciting, I do enjoy that show.

I feel like dating websites are ripe for comedy. Best part of Series.A To Z was the fact the Hopeless Romantic guy worked at one.

Still find it hilarious that any comment that includes the name of the show is instantly deleted. That's an Epic Fail, Cracked.

Even that link deletion function is half-assed. It can be bypassed simply by editing your post. That's probably how the wallstreet34 spambots operate.

Except when people are just trying to talk about the show, they just wind up with their posts gone.

In other words, it's a system that only helps the spambots and screws over anyone actually trying to post about their show.

Is there something past epic fail?

No no no, if you submit a comment and leave blanks where you mean to write "Rom.com", then edit it and fill in the blanks, it will go through just fine. Comments are checked for links only when you first post them, not when you submit an edit.

edited 9th Feb '16 8:28:17 AM by Aetol

But my point is that the people just trying to casually discuss the show are not going to know that, because that's a pointless exploit.

Seriously, I had several posts just disappear into the ether and I had no idea why.

Made a page for Rom.com, by the way.

http://www.cracked.com/video_19806_4-movie-heroes-who-would-be-villains-today.html

... have we mentioned about how awful this list was? I'll give them American Pie, but that kid in Superbad was creepy in the context of the movie.

But... Dirty Harry.Oh lord, Dirty Harry. First off, he manages to completely miss the point of the movies that Harry isn't supposed to be emulated (you can blame Misaimed Fandom and Flanderization for those, though. But really, the amazing thing was how he included scenes that 100% undermined his points. The whole basis of "Harry is racist!" is based off of a side character saying he hates black people... and white people... and other white people... and explicitly everyone. And then the whole "do you feel lucky?" scene is undermined by the fact that he's not threatening an unarmed, wounded black man. He's trying to bluff a cornered black perp who still can reach his shotgun. This guy actually has the advantage because he's got a loaded gun, Harry doesn't.

edited 11th Feb '16 1:31:09 PM by Larkmarn

http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-ways-your-life-changes-when-you-marry-foreigner/

Interesting read, but I'm biased because I'm planning on marrying a foreigner. First one's worrisome because we're not both white. I've been seeing the third one in action this past week. She's Vietnamese, and the lunar new year is a huge deal for them. I'm part-Chinese myself, and even I wasn't quite aware of the cultural significance of it for them.