So Isaac Hayes quits South Park? Big deal. I never really dug South Park and I don’t much care who plays Chef and who doesn’t:
Hayes, who has played the ladies’ man/school cook in the animated Comedy Central satire since 1997, said in a statement Monday that he feels a line has been crossed.
‘There is a place in this world for satire, but there is a time when satire ends and intolerance and bigotry towards religious beliefs of others begins,’ the 63-year-old soul singer and outspoken Scientologist said.
‘Religious beliefs are sacred to people, and at all times should be respected and honored,’ he continued. ‘As a civil rights activist of the past 40 years, I cannot support a show that disrespects those beliefs and practices.’
In all honesty, however, I had written an entirely different post yesterday about this. In it I wrote that I thought Hayes was probably a hypocrite, at least according to these people:
‘South Park’ co-creator Matt Stone responded sharply in an interview with The Associated Press Monday, saying, ‘This is 100 percent having to do with his faith of Scientology… He has no problem - and he’s cashed plenty of checks - with our show making fun of Christians.’
Last November, ‘South Park’ targeted the Church of Scientology and its celebrity followers, including actors Tom Cruise and John Travolta, in a top-rated episode called ‘Trapped in the Closet.’ In the episode, Stan, one of the show’s four mischievous fourth graders, is hailed as a reluctant savior by Scientology leaders, while a cartoon Cruise locks himself in a closet and won’t come out.
Stone told The AP he and co-creator Trey Parker ‘never heard a peep out of Isaac in any way until we did Scientology. He wants a different standard for religions other than his own, and to me, that is where intolerance and bigotry begin.’
I also wrote that he is almost certainly a moron, just like everybody who believes in the kind of stuff that scientologists believe in. But then I started wondering: Is there any difference between believing that we are inhabited by the souls of billions of aliens who were murdered 75 millions of years ago and believing that Jesus’s mother was a virgin when she gave birth to him?
Both are clearly made up stories, the only difference being that one is recent and the other one is 2000 years old, not that this lends any more credibility to it.
So, if Isaac Hayes is a moron for believing in ancient galactic ruler Xenu, what should we say of the millions of Catholics who believe in the virgin birth, to say nothing of the idea of Mary giving birth to God. Are you kidding me, right?
Obviously, all religions are based on unproven statements that must be believed on faith alone, suspending all rational discussions. It’s not that Christianity is special in this regard.
In the end, the question in the subject of this post is largely rethorical: All religion is indeed moronic and I couldn’t agree more with PZ Myers when he writes:
Theology is sophomoric, attempts to rationalize the absurd with reality, the glorification of foolish beliefs that will be dignified by pretending they are serious. Nice team-building, too; it’s the usual cluelessness of the majority that doesn’t realize that their assumptions hold no validity and that they are relying on the mutual gladhanding of their fellows to hold up their illusions.
Technorati Tags: religion, hayes, south park, christianity, scientology.
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