Strange things are afoot...

Like most of you, I bounded to my computer first thing Friday morning in the hopes of watching the Preaching Your Funeral ding-dongs deliver their promised pre-death eulogy (and burning in effigy) of Brian Sapient from the Rational Response Squad. I rather suspect from their "press release" declaring him to be one of the world's most wicked atheists that they've maybe seen a couple of videos of him on YouTube or perhaps they encountered him in the list of atheists on Wikipedia. They didn't seem to have a lot of specifics on him that you couldn't get from 5 minutes on the RRS website. Maybe they just saw the Rational Response Squad easily deal with Ray Comfort on Nightline a couple of years ago.

Much to my dismay the video wasn't uploaded to YouTube this morning as promised! In fact, I went to their website only to be redirected to some tripe-filled blog about "apostate churches". (Hey man, is your pastor...biblical?) Could it be that PYF is gone? Their main website is still up, and that blog looks like their handiwork, but PYF is apparently gone. A few of the subdirectories on the preachingyourfuneral.com url are still working, so maybe they're just prettying up their hatred for later. Weird.

If you actually wanted to get your daily dose of redneck Christian hatred you could still look at their KingofTerrors.com website. It's the standard eschatology crap you've seen a million times and it isn't nearly as amusing without the hook of a burning dummy with a celebrity's face taped to it. I promise, you've seen it all before - how to protest not-Christian-enough churches, how gay folks wanna eat your kids, and the keys to a great marriage as presented by a guy with no wedding ring. There's also a handy dandy list of companies that are "homosexual supporters". The Gap? Who would've ever suspected?

Also, if you want to get a rise out of these guys, leave them a YouTube comment about how it's weird to you that an unmarried man devotes so much of his free time to talking about homosexuals. That pushes their buttons real quick. I tried it.

Anyway, I'm not sure what's up here. These fellas haven't made much of an attempt to not be as flamboyantly hateful as possible, so I'm not sure why they would've bothered to take down their crazy funeral site. I'm bothered by these guys primarily because they apparently exist in my neck of the woods - they're apparently based in Henderson, Kentucky.

By the way, even though they don't seem too intent on giving their names out, the nasally preacher from the funeral videos is "pastor" Jeff Butler. I haven't seen him call himself by name on any of his videos or his sites, but he's introduced by that name on the marriage video. I've asked him repeatedly on the comments for his YouTube videos whether or not he actually has any theological training - he has not responded to that, but his utterly unsophisticated arguments against, say, the entire field of biblical textual criticism leave me with the impression that he's making it up as he goes along. I've also found a record of him speaking before the Interim Joint Committee on the Judiciary in Henderson, KY urging the local government to institute the death penalty for drug crimes (because China does it) and to urge the legislature to "stop homosexual activity". I'm not kidding.

Sounds like a real swell guy. Website or not, it doesn't thrill me to have crazies like this in my own backyard.

Invoking Poe's Law...

Poe's Law states, and I quote:

"Without a winking smiley or other blatant display of humor, it is impossible to create a parody of Fundamentalism that SOMEONE won't mistake for the real thing."

I think I may be willing to invoke Poe's Law on the guys over at PreachingYourFuneral. Honestly, I'm beginning to think that those guys are perpetrating an elaborate parody of some of the southern super-fundies that skulk around here in Kentucky and in neighboring states. The more I watch their videos (They're up to Rosie O'Donnell now, with Christopher Hitchens on deck and yours truly still apparently out of the running.) the more I expect the nasal redneck up at the pulpit to break down laughing and explain how this was all a remarkably convincing piece of satire.

Only time will tell, I suppose. In the meantime, I still want to be next, so show your support and e-mail these guys every day to remind them what a vile heathen I am.

comment@preachingyourfuneral.com

I wanna be next!

Lookie - here comes a new pack of whackjobs. The fellas at PreachYourFuneral.com do mock funeral services for folks who aren't living their lives the way these guys would prefer, apparently in the hope of frightening people with the threat of hell. Then they burn the "victim" in effigy. They've already done Heath Ledger and Richard Dawkins, and now they want to know who's next.

Here's a hint guys:

Me, me, me, me, me, me!!

Sure there are higher profile atheists out there like PZ Myers, Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris and James Randi, but c'mon guys! You're obviously southern, I'm southern, let's jazz! I'll be e-mailing you daily until you make my dream come true.

Please support me in my quest and e-mail them here.
comment@preachingyourfuneral.com