Maher: “I lied” about direction of new film to participants
posted at 9:55 am on October 14, 2008 by Ed Morrissey
CNN looks into complaints from people appearing in the new Bill Maher film, Religulous, that filmmakers misrepresented their aims in interviews. Senator Mark Pryor (D-AR) claims to have been taken out of context, but others claim that Maher and director Larry Charles flat-out lied. Both of them admit to it:
Pryor’s complaint seems minor compared to the other allegations in this piece. I would imagine that PBS might have some issues with Maher and Charles posing as members of their news teams to gain the trust of these subjects, as it will make it more difficult for them to get interviews in the future. I imagine CNN would have provided a lot more criticism of this practice had Maher posed as one of their news units, although CNN does a pretty good job of reporting on Maher and Charles in this piece.
Documentaries only have value when they report truth and don’t distort for propaganda purposes. Religulous obviously falls into that latter, Michael-Moore category, and that was obvious from the first time I saw the trailer a month ago. It speaks ill of any documentary filmmaker and the value of their project when they lie about their intentions and misrepresent their project as baldly as Maher and Charles do here. Deception may be needed in investigative journalism when uncovering government abuses or similar practices in the private sector, but how much deception would be necessary to find extremists in the various religions of the world? Most of them constantly clamor for attention.
In the end, a documentary exploiting the extremists in any endeavor for laughs does nothing but feed the smug superiority of the filmmakers. It’s the worst kind of self-indulgence, and in this case exposes the bigotry of Maher and Charles. We already knew that much about Maher, and now we know he’s also intellectually dishonest as well, without the courage to stand in front of his project and have a valid debate rather than lie and then poke fun of billions of people by equating them with the freak show he himself stages.
Update: Yes, CNN still can’t figure out how to create embeddable code for its videos. Yes, they’re incredibly lame. Click the link at the top to take you to the video on CNN’s site.
Blowback
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MadisonConservative on October 15, 2008 at 11:26 AM
Yeah that would be dangerous in the sense that they tend to want to kill them.
ronsfi on October 14, 2008 at 1:20 PM
Yeah that would be dangerous in the sense that they tend to want to kill them.
ronsfi on October 14, 2008 at 1:20 PM
Yeah that would be dangerous in the sense that they tend to want to kill them.
ronsfi on October 14, 2008 at 1:20 PM
ronsfi on October 15, 2008 at 11:34 AM
And it only works if you wear the ruby slippers.
ronsfi on October 15, 2008 at 11:38 AM
Where have I attacked atheism?
So far, you’re the only one that’s attacked any belief.
MadisonConservative on October 15, 2008 at 11:42 AM
You are aware, of course, that the creation of the calendar “system” Anno Domini came some 525 years AFTER the birth of Christ…
…and that it is now common knowledge that the monk who created it made some miscalculations.
Most scholars put Jesus’ birth somewhere between 4 and 7 B.C. (or B.C.E. as it is now commonly known).
Religious_Zealot on October 15, 2008 at 11:47 AM
2. During the Reign of Ceasar
or do you have another monk?
ronsfi on October 15, 2008 at 11:48 AM
Are you talking about Caesar Augustus who reigned from 27 BCE to 19 CE?
Religious_Zealot on October 15, 2008 at 11:58 AM
Don’t worry about Ronsfi…he’s 100% intellectually dishonest. He has ZERO credibility on any historical issue.
Actually….maybe he is exactly the type of person to be worried about.
A person who denies the Divinity of Christ or in rons extreme case of intellectually dishonest rage, denies even the proven historical fact of Christ’s existence…he is not simply some deluded fool but is speaking via the Anti-Christ spirit and not on his own account.
The poor guy is in bondage.
The only thing that will help poor old ronsfi is a good exorcism.
SaintOlaf on October 15, 2008 at 12:00 PM
You are the one who claims I’m demon possesed. LOL.
Bah like all you lemming types you just make it up.
“He wants you, too, Malachi…he wants you, too.”
You are a sick puppy.
ronsfi on October 15, 2008 at 12:05 PM
Dude, you’re the mirror image of him. You claimed that a gay agenda is coming together to put straight people into FEMA death camps.
He’s claiming that Christians want to kill non-believers.
You’re both absolutely nuts. You just hold opposing faiths.
MadisonConservative on October 15, 2008 at 12:22 PM
In 1435 Pope Eugene IV condemned the enslavement of peoples on the newly colonised Canary Islands. He commanded the faithful to give freedom to those they had enslaved without the reception of any money.
In 1537 Pope Paul III described enslavers as allies of the devil and he said that slavery is unjustifiable. Successive Popes decryed slavery and other injustices.
The Catholic Church may not have had the political power to end all cases of slavery, but this is entirely different from stating that there was no European opposition of slavery until “long after” the 16th century.
aengus on October 15, 2008 at 1:33 PM
Abraham Lincoln was himself much preoccupied with Genesis 3:19, “In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread.” In May 1864 he wrote to a delegation of Baptists, “To read in the Bible, as the word of God himself, that ‘In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread,’ and to preach there-from that, ‘In the sweat of other mans faces shalt thou eat bread,’ to my mind can scarcely be reconciled with honest sincerity.”
aengus on October 15, 2008 at 1:35 PM
No, though Michael Moore and others like to imply that he was.
Its far more complicated than that. You could study Irish history all your life as I have and it is still difficult to disentangle.
The rebellion of 1641 and the uprisings of 1798 and 1916 could not be characterised as religious conflicts.
The Thirty Years War on the Continent would perhaps serve as a better example.
aengus on October 15, 2008 at 1:41 PM
I haven’t seen the film but the reviews and the trailer suggest that Maher interviews a man who believes he *is* Jesus Christ.
aengus on October 15, 2008 at 2:07 PM
For some reason this reminds me of an argument I had with a classmate in algebra. Are negative numbers real? They don’t exist in any tangible sense. You can’t point to any physical object and and say, “there’s a negative number of that object.” But consider the effect of the idea of negative numbers on the suffering of the human race; think of all the problems that were only solvable with the strangely metaphysical idea of negativity.
Does love exist? Hate? Pain? Each is tangible; an unmistakable physical sensation that uniquely defines our world in unmistakable terms of things that are good and things that are bad; or evil, if you prefer. We have moral reasoning because we have an emotional substance – that other animals lack – that binds us together as a species. I think this idea is consistent with a naturalistic world.
You’re right that morality, or at least morality in practice, can change. That’s a good thing. Look at the arc of history, see how even Christians refined their moral outlook – without any external stimulus. Democracy is the most sublimely moral idea that any human has had, but where is it in the first 1700 years of Christian history? 1700 years from now, we’ll be still more moral as a species; and it won’t take any verses added to the bible, or papal decrees.
RightOFLeft on October 15, 2008 at 4:16 PM
1. People did not always live on the surface of the earth. At one time people and animals lived underneath the earth with Kaang (Käng), the Great Master and Lord of All Life. In this place people and animals lived together peacefully. They understood each other. No one ever wanted for anything and it was always light even though there wasn’t any sun. During this time of bliss Kaang began to plan the wonders he would put in the world above.
ronsfi on October 16, 2008 at 2:42 AM
First Kaang created a wondrous tree, with branches stretching over the entire country. At the base of the tree he dug a hole that reached all the way down into the world where the people and animals lived. After he had finished furnishing the world as he pleased he led the first man up the hole. He sat down on the edge of the hole and soon the first woman came up out of it. Soon all the people were gathered at the foot of the tree, awed by the world they had just entered. Next, Kaang began helping the animals climb out of the hole. In their eagerness some of the animals found a way to climb up through the tree’s roots and come out of the branches. They continued racing out of the world beneath until all of the animals were out.
ronsfi on October 16, 2008 at 2:44 AM
Kaang gathered all the people and animals about him. He instructed them to live together peacefully. Then he turned to the men and women and warned them not to build any fires or a great evil would befall them. They gave their word and Kaang left to where he could watch his world secretly.
As evening approached the sun began to sink beneath the horizon. The people and animals stood watching this phenomenon, but when the sun disappeared fear entered the hearts of the people. They could no longer see each other as they lacked the eyes of the animals which were capable of seeing in the dark. They lacked the warm fur of the animals also and soon grew cold. In desperation one man suggested that they build a fire to keep warm. Forgetting Kaang’s warning they disobeyed him. They soon grew warm and were once again able to see each other.
ronsfi on October 16, 2008 at 2:49 AM
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China
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In the beginning , the heavens and earth were still one and all was chaos. The universe was like a big black egg, carrying Pan Gu inside itself. After 18 thousand years Pan Gu woke from a long sleep. He felt suffocated, so he took up a broadax and wielded it with all his might to crack open the egg. The light, clear part of it floated up and formed the heavens, the cold, turbid matter stayed below to form earth. Pan Gu stood in the middle, his head touching the sky, his feet planted on the earth. The heavens and the earth began to grow at a rate of ten feet per day, and Pan Gu grew along with them. After another 18 thousand years, the sky was higher, the earth thicker, and Pan Gu stood between them like a pillar 9 million li in height so that they would never join again.
ronsfi on October 16, 2008 at 2:52 AM
When Pan Gu died, his breath became the wind and clouds, his voice the rolling thunder. One eye became the sun and on the moon. His body and limbs turned to five big mountains and his blood formed the roaring water. His veins became far-stretching roads and his muscles fertile land. The innumerable stars in the sky came from his hair and beard, and flowers and trees from his skin and the fine hairs on his body. His marrow turned to jade and pearls. His sweat flowed like the good rain and sweet dew that nurtured all things on earth. According to some versions of the Pan Gu legend, his tears flowed to make rivers and radiance of his eyes turned into thunder and lighting. When he was happy the sun shone, but when he was angry black clouds gathered in the sky. One version of the legend has it that the fleas and lice on his body became the ancestors of mankind.
ronsfi on October 16, 2008 at 2:53 AM
In the beginning there were only two: Tawa, the Sun God, and Spider Woman, the Earth Goddess. All the mysteries and power in the Above belonged to Tawa, while Spider Woman controlled the magic of the Below. In the Underworld, abode of the Gods, they dwelt and they were All. There was neither man nor woman, bird nor beast, no living thing until these Two willed it to be.
In time it came to them that there should be other Gods to share their labors. So Tawa divided himself and there came Muiyinwuh, God of All Life Germs; Spider Woman also divide herself so that there was Huzruiwuhti, Woman of the Hard Substances, the Goddess of all hard ornaments of wealth such as coral, turquoise, silver and shell. Huzruiwuhti became the always-bride of Tawa. They were the First Lovers and of their union there came into being those marvelous ones the Magic Twins — Puukonhoya, the Youth, and Palunhoya, the Echo. As time unrolled there followed Hicanavaiya, Ancient of Six (the Four World Quarters, the Above and Below), Man-Eagle, the Great Plumed Serpent and many others. But Masauwhu, the Death God, did not come of these Two but was bad magic, who appeared only after the making of creatures.
ronsfi on October 16, 2008 at 2:56 AM
And then it came about that these Two had one Thought and it was a might Thought — that they would make the Earth to be between the Above and the Below where now lay shimmering only the Endless Waters. So they sat them side by side, swaying their beautiful bronze bodies to the pulsing music of their own great voices, making the First Magic Song, a song of rushing winds and flowing waters, a song of light and sound and life.
“I am Tawa,” sang the Sun God. “I am Light. I am Life. I am Father of all that shall ever come.”
“I am Kokyanwuhti,” the Spider Woman crooned. “I receive Light and nourish Life. I am Mother of all that shall ever come.”
“Many strange thoughts are forming in my mind — beautiful forms of birds to float in the Above, of beasts to move upon the Earth and fish to swim in the Waters,” intoned Tawa.
“Now let these things that move in the Though of Tawa appear,” chanted Spider Woman, while with her slender fingers she caught up clay from beside her and made the Thoughts of Tawa take form. One by one she shaped them and laid them aside — but they breathed not nor moved.
ronsfi on October 16, 2008 at 2:57 AM
“We must do something about this,” said Tawa. “It is not good that they lie thus still and quiet. Each thing that has a form must also have a spirit. So now, my beloved, we must make a mighty Magic.”
They laid a white blanket over the many figures, a cunningly woven woolen blanket, fleecy as a cloud, and made a mighty incantation over it, and soon the figures stirred and breathed.
“Now, let us make ones like unto you and me, so that they may rule over and enjoy these lesser creatures,” sang Tawa, and Spider Woman shaped the Thoughts into woman and man figures like unto their own. But after the blanket magic had been made, the figures remained inert. So Spider Woman gathered them all in her arms and cradled them, while Tawa bent his glowing eyes upon them. The two now sang the magic Song of Life over them, and at last each human figure breathed and lived.
“Now that was a good thing and a mighty thing,” said Tawa. “So now all this is finished, and there shall be no new things made by us. Those things we have made shall multiply. I will make a journey across the Above each day to shed my light upon them and return each night to Huzruiwuhti. And now I shall go to turn my blazing shield upon the Endless Waters, so that the Dry Land may appear. And this day will be the first day upon Earth.”
ronsfi on October 16, 2008 at 3:01 AM
Odin is the All-Father. He is the oldest and most powerful of the Gods. Through the ages he has ruled all things. He created heaven and earth, and he made man and gave him a soul. But even the All-Father was not the very first.
In the beginning, there was no earth, no sea, no sky. Only the emptiness of Ginnungagap, waiting to be filled. In the south, the fiery realm of Muspell came into being, and in the north, the icy realm of Niflheim. Fire and ice played across the emptiness. And in the center of nothingness the air grew mild. Where the warm air from Muspell met the cold air from Niflheim, the ice began to thaw. As it dripped, it shaped itself into the form of a sleeping giant. His name was Ymir, and he was evil.
ronsfi on October 16, 2008 at 3:07 AM
As Ymir slept, he began to sweat. There grew beneath his left arm a male and a female, and from his legs another male was created. These were the first frost giants, all of whom are descended from Ymir.
ronsfi on October 16, 2008 at 3:08 AM
…One day, as they walked along the shore of the great sea, Odin and his brothers came across two logs. Odin gave them breath and life; Vili gave them brains and feelings; and Ve gave them hearing and sight. These were the first man, Ask, and the first woman, Embla, and Midgard was their home. From them, all the families of mankind are descended.
ronsfi on October 16, 2008 at 3:10 AM
Faith means not wanting to know what is true. – Friedrich Nietzsche
ronsfi on October 16, 2008 at 3:27 AM
Wow. Copying and pasting only other people’s words into 12 consecutive posts.
That takes skill. Obviously, only a real book-reader has that ability.
MadisonConservative on October 16, 2008 at 9:03 AM
That’s the best you can do? Heh.
ronsfi on October 16, 2008 at 9:28 AM
Funny – that’s the same thing I was thinking about you.
That along with the thought that I don’t know if I’ve ever met someone with such a pathological need to get in the last word.
Religious_Zealot on October 16, 2008 at 9:31 AM
We have never met but thanks for the free analysis. Have a nice day.
ronsfi on October 16, 2008 at 10:34 AM
-heh-
Thanks for proving my point!
Religious_Zealot on October 16, 2008 at 11:05 AM
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