A very good movie with afew new additions. The commentary and deleted scenes were very very good.
Ah yes, I love getting lectured on science by a guy who doesn't believe that germs cause disease or that vaccines prevent it. :)
Wha???
Quote from: PlayMSTie on February 22, 2009, 03:34:11 PM
Ah yes, I love getting lectured on science by a guy who doesn't believe that germs cause disease or that vaccines prevent it. :)
Check out this persons profile picture before reading whatever he says. Shows how full of shit he is.
I just watched the movie and there is no lecturing about science. It's about doubt and insanity.
Quote from: Destin on February 22, 2009, 05:06:20 PM
Quote from: PlayMSTie on February 22, 2009, 03:34:11 PM
Ah yes, I love getting lectured on science by a guy who doesn't believe that germs cause disease or that vaccines prevent it. :)
Check out this persons profile picture before reading whatever he says. Shows how full of shit he is.
Way to show tolerance toward others,
Destin. Although I want (and intend) to see
Religulous, there's no denying that Maher has some baggage. At the same time he (rightly) criticized the Family Resource Council's evil, inhuman stance against the HPV vaccine, he also said nonsense like this. (http://skeptico.blogs.com/skeptico/2005/12/drinking_the_an.html#comments)
The fact that he's on the board for dada comedy outfit PETA doesn't exactly speak well for Maher, either.
damn I tried to add this to my rental queue but there is no listing for it, I wonder if it didn't even get a theatrical release over here in NZ.
Yeah and Maher is certainly not without baggage.
Quote from: gbeenie on February 22, 2009, 05:31:51 PM
he also said nonsense like this. (http://skeptico.blogs.com/skeptico/2005/12/drinking_the_an.html#comments)
I don't understand being against vaccines, I mean I'm not too keen on loading them all up in a single shot but then I don't do that with my dogs either (plus there's a specific medical history reason why I might be cautious about doing a single shot vaccine on any of my kids), but vaccines in of themselves there shouldn't be any debate over their effectiveness.
Unfortunately, Maher has bought into the celebrity-idiot campaign that vaccines cause autism (a thoroughly disproven notion).
And a big hug to you too, Destin. ;D And that's "she," not "he," thank you.
Gbeenie, thanks for standing up for me. But I think someone may have led you up the garden path, as the saying goes, about the Family Research Council. They were never against the vaccine, they only had certain concerns about its effectiveness and potential side effects, and they were hardly alone in that. (As one would hope, seeing that it's being encouraged for every teenage girl in the country, not to mentioned forced on immigrants to the country.) I had this straight from the horse's mouth: A good friend of mine worked there at the time and was exceedingly frustrated by gossip, rumors, and outright lies about the organization's position, which they had stated clearly, and was almost the exact opposite of what the press made it out to be. They did not oppose the vaccine's development.
Yes, Destin, old chum, I'm conservative, but I always, always do my best to check my facts. It's a rule with me.
This isn't in the movie.
Quote from: gbeenie on February 22, 2009, 05:55:09 PM
Unfortunately, Maher has bought into the celebrity-idiot campaign that vaccines cause autism (a thoroughly disproven notion).
See I'm not even sure there is a single cause of autism, I'm not completely sure they're all the same condition, the spectrum seems to be a series of similar conditions with disparate causes. Amongst the autistic kids I use to work with, you could randomly pick ten and find very little commonality in their case histories.
But yeah the vaccine thing is pretty unlikely.
wow............. so, how 'bout that Religulous huh? pretty funny stuff
Oh like that one part, where he was all like "shut up". That was great.
I saw this at the "Galaxy Cinema" and the only other patrons were old people. But I don't think they were there in protest, they seemed to be enjoying themselves. I live in a rather red area which sucks for me. Of course, I think living in a rather blue area would suck an equal amount.
Move to on of the nation's mauve states. :P
I saw the interview about this on the Daily Show. It's vaguely interesting, but not a movie I'd spend a netflix slot on at 1DVD at a time unlimited.
Usually I can't stand Maher. I somewhat liked his old show Politically Incorrect, but the guy himself just irritates me. And when he does his stand up, it isn't so much "comedy" as it is "smugly berating those who think differently from me".
And I know Religulous isn't a stand up special, but I'd rather watch an unbiased account of what he's investigating.
Watch George Carlin's Back In Town for a thoroughly awesome stand up about how ridiculous the republican party can be.
Quote from: TripeHoundRedux on February 23, 2009, 05:09:26 AM
Quote from: gbeenie on February 22, 2009, 05:55:09 PM
Unfortunately, Maher has bought into the celebrity-idiot campaign that vaccines cause autism (a thoroughly disproven notion).
See I'm not even sure there is a single cause of autism, I'm not completely sure they're all the same condition, the spectrum seems to be a series of similar conditions with disparate causes. Amongst the autistic kids I use to work with, you could randomly pick ten and find very little commonality in their case histories.
But yeah the vaccine thing is pretty unlikely.
He later went on to talk about why he believed what he believed about medicine and vaccines. That if you lived a healthy life you didn't need most of those things. And he didnt meen that to people who just rolled the dice and were born with something horrible. He understands why they would need medicine for that. I don't agree with his stance because healthy people can still get cancer. He just has a idea that he says every now and then and doesnt seem to effect his thought process at all when it comes to critical thought.
Quote from: Ebichu on February 23, 2009, 05:35:21 AM
Oh like that one part, where he was all like "shut up". That was great.
I saw this at the "Galaxy Cinema" and the only other patrons were old people. But I don't think they were there in protest, they seemed to be enjoying themselves. I live in a rather red area which sucks for me. Of course, I think living in a rather blue area would suck an equal amount.
My family is a bunch of half ass bible thumpers who take offense to alot of things I say about religion. But each and everyone of them enjoyed the movie, and made them think a little. The seed is planted muahahhaa
Quote from: SmilinJackRoss on February 23, 2009, 08:50:30 AM
Usually I can't stand Maher. I somewhat liked his old show Politically Incorrect, but the guy himself just irritates me. And when he does his stand up, it isn't so much "comedy" as it is "smugly berating those who think differently from me".
And I know Religulous isn't a stand up special, but I'd rather watch an unbiased account of what he's investigating.
Watch George Carlin's Back In Town for a thoroughly awesome stand up about how ridiculous the republican party can be.
His old show, and some of his new shows, the Panel he talks to would just be so polar opposite that it would just un enjoyable. Especialy when one side is a jesus freak who believes the world was made 6000 years ago. You cant really fight that crazy with words. Some torches and pitchforks would do better :p
Quote from: PlayMSTie on February 22, 2009, 09:32:53 PM
I think someone may have led you up the garden path, as the saying goes, about the Family Research Council. They were never against the vaccine, they only had certain concerns about its effectiveness and potential side effects,
Bullshit,
PlayMSTie. I read an op-ed piece by one of their creatures (I hesitate to call someone like that a
woman) at the time the vaccine was released, where she stated, pretty unequivocally, that the FRC's position on the matter was that it was preferable for your teenage and adult daughters to DIE FROM CANCER than to safely conduct their sex lives in a way the FRC doesn't approve of. The only word I can possibly use to describe such an attitude is "evil."
Quote from: Ebichu on February 23, 2009, 05:35:21 AM
Oh like that one part, where he was all like "shut up". That was great.
I saw this at the "Galaxy Cinema" and the only other patrons were old people. But I don't think they were there in protest, they seemed to be enjoying themselves. I live in a rather red area which sucks for me. Of course, I think living in a rather blue area would suck an equal amount.
Hey, I work for Galaxy Cinema! Where's yours located?
cool, this never got a cinema release over here, looking forward to seeing it.
Quote from: gbeenie on February 22, 2009, 05:31:51 PM
Quote from: Destin on February 22, 2009, 05:06:20 PM
Quote from: PlayMSTie on February 22, 2009, 03:34:11 PM
Ah yes, I love getting lectured on science by a guy who doesn't believe that germs cause disease or that vaccines prevent it. :)
Check out this persons profile picture before reading whatever he says. Shows how full of shit he is.
Way to show tolerance toward others, Destin. Although I want (and intend) to see Religulous, there's no denying that Maher has some baggage. At the same time he (rightly) criticized the Family Resource Council's evil, inhuman stance against the HPV vaccine, he also said nonsense like this. (http://skeptico.blogs.com/skeptico/2005/12/drinking_the_an.html#comments)
The fact that he's on the board for dada comedy outfit PETA doesn't exactly speak well for Maher, either.
I don't know if I've ever had a flu shot. I'm sure my Dad was always against them. I've stayed healthy and my Parents would make us take vitamins, along with the usual food that was mostly healthy. I've had the flu only once, a couple of years ago. Word is, someone at work brought it in with him, and several people caught it. I'm not sick very often, and I'm thoroughly opposed to the culture of prescriptions. Honestly, the way they talk, you'd think humans couldn't survive without talking to your doctor about a prescription for every little thing in the world.
To me, Maher is funny sometimes, but he's just too one-sided to keep me entertained. I don't know why he's so personally attached to animals, but when he was on celebrity Who Wants to be a Millionaire, his charity of choice was for animals.
That being said, I'm not really intrigued by a movie that seeks to show how religion cripples the world. There are countless things that cripple the world, and organized religion is just one of them. There are extremes in everything. Yet, there are countless people in the world who are alive today thanks to the belief that there is a higher power or powers that can provide happiness. Always look on the bright side of life - Monty Python.
In my opinion, few people are more crazy (or funny) than crazy christians.
Quote from: ScottH on February 23, 2009, 07:30:11 PM
In my opinion, few people are more crazy (or funny) than crazy christians.
Like these (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24032149/) people?
(whom I find mildly disturbing... and it's not just the clothing!)
I'm glad this is finally out! I can't get enough atheism from the internet alone
My girlfriend and I saw this movie on our first date :P It was good. Pretty funny, but the part with the pot guys was kinda boring, although the dude's hair catching on fire was good.
That being said, you do know that what Maher said about the "Alzheimer's" connection to Larry King was a joke, right? It's hard to grasp someone's tone through a text transcript... which is why to me, that blogger's reaction is the funniest part.
I'd have an easier time believing that, TP, if there weren't already plenty of celebrity idiots who've gotten on-board with the "vaccinations=autism" bandwagon (for which, I feel I must once again mention, there is NO evidence whatsoever), and if Maher himself were never aligned with any celebrity idiocy of his own (c'mon... PETA? I'd be more likely to believe THAT was a a joke on his part, given that he doesn't seem dumb enough to belong to that organization). Do you have any other examples to indicate that he was joking about the vaccine thing?
He's on the PETA board of directors. There is no God but chicken lives are holy.
(https://forum.rifftrax.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fb2.ac-images.myspacecdn.com%2F01145%2F26%2F52%2F1145582562_l.jpg&hash=a4f004f94263c5b14153230c1a96b49ac73a92ce)
I have seen this movie and dub it Mediocre.
There are some good points and counterarguments, but he uses more stock footage than Teenage Caveman, he completely ignores religions that aren't offshoots of western monotheism, and at the end he pulls a ton of barely-supported conclusions out of his ass.
Bill Maher destroys my faith in secular humanism.
So you think that if Maher had simply gone to Japan and talked with someone about Shintoism then his arguments would have hit a wall?
All religions have the same basic argument, and Maher's counter-arguments work on them just as well as they work on western religions. So that's a non-issue. Your stock footage complaint is silly. Every time the movie shows stock footage it is part of a joke or gag. There is plenty of film of them at these different places. Shots of the Vatican, Jerusalem, that trucker church, London, etc.......I guess I don't know what more you want.
Which conclusions were pulled from his ass? You can't just pull that out of your ass and complain about him doing it. Specifics?
All that aside, I still don't think it was as entertaining as his tv show. I'd give it a B-minus.
But that's my point. If your argument is that ALL RELIGIONS ARE THE SAME, then you should probably look at a broader range of religions than WESTERN MONOTHEISM OFFSHOOTS. I'm not saying they would have proved him wrong, but it would have helped his arguments if he actually addressed them.
Eastern religions also tend to have a very different outlook. Maybe his ideas about Apocolyptic tendencies wouldn't have held the same sway there. Why not look at the linear time/circular time duality and see how belief that everyone is somebody you knew sooner or later affects human morality and views on murder?
He makes a big leap from "there are lots of crazy religious people" to "religion is the only thing keeping us from a super-duper utopia and it will destroy all life on earth."
I was also infuriated by how shallow some of it was. He brought in that neurotheologist essentially so he could have somebody to say "religious people are crazy" to. The scientist said he'd done studies on what parts of the brain light up during religious experience, and he's studied speaking in tongues, and mentioned "they weren't speaking an actual language," but it just stopped there. WHICH PARTS of the brain light up according to these studies? Parts that are rarely used elsewhere? Parts that light up in schizophrenic patients? Parts that light up when you want to grab some nachoes? What about this speaking in tongues? Is it the same part that lights up when we dream, or is it just the part that lights up when people make up random sounds?
Alright, I admit the stock footage was used to comedic effect. I just found some of it started to grate on my nerves with its force-the-irony-down-your-throat flavor.
It's too shallow to be a good documentary and too un-entertaining to be a good comedy.
Not all people like to be called wrong without being crushed ^Example^
Quote from: Fuzzy Necromancer on March 30, 2009, 11:07:29 AM
But that's my point. If your argument is that ALL RELIGIONS ARE THE SAME, then you should probably look at a broader range of religions than WESTERN MONOTHEISM OFFSHOOTS. I'm not saying they would have proved him wrong, but it would have helped his arguments if he actually addressed them.
Eastern religions also tend to have a very different outlook. Maybe his ideas about Apocolyptic tendencies wouldn't have held the same sway there. Why not look at the linear time/circular time duality and see how belief that everyone is somebody you knew sooner or later affects human morality and views on murder?
He makes a big leap from "there are lots of crazy religious people" to "religion is the only thing keeping us from a super-duper utopia and it will destroy all life on earth."
I was also infuriated by how shallow some of it was. He brought in that neurotheologist essentially so he could have somebody to say "religious people are crazy" to. The scientist said he'd done studies on what parts of the brain light up during religious experience, and he's studied speaking in tongues, and mentioned "they weren't speaking an actual language," but it just stopped there. WHICH PARTS of the brain light up according to these studies? Parts that are rarely used elsewhere? Parts that light up in schizophrenic patients? Parts that light up when you want to grab some nachoes? What about this speaking in tongues? Is it the same part that lights up when we dream, or is it just the part that lights up when people make up random sounds?
Alright, I admit the stock footage was used to comedic effect. I just found some of it started to grate on my nerves with its force-the-irony-down-your-throat flavor.
It's too shallow to be a good documentary and too un-entertaining to be a good comedy.
All you're complaining about there, really, is that he didn't cite in the movie where he got his information from. You're not even saying he is wrong. It's a movie. You can't spend a whole lot of time citing sources. You can do it a little, but it's not the right format for that. This is more about making you think about things. It's not supposed to be an in-depth analysis of why religious people believe things. You can look these facts up online later. You can read the bible, torah, and the koran later for the same reasons. Before going in to this kind of movie you already know what to expect, so if you like Maher you will like the movie. If you don't like Maher, you won't like the movie. It's as simple as that.
I like the movie, but it isn't the funniest thing Maher has ever done. That's for sure.
I just didn't find it satisfying. The stuff that was really interesting got skimmed past in favor of mundane, seen-it-a-thousand-times stuff, like the guy in Puerto Rico who thinks he's Jesus got so little attention. Of all the weird and crazy shit about that guy, the bit they really choose to lampoon is that he's nationality? They didn't even think him claiming to be christ, the antichrist, AND the reincarnation of John the Baptist, all in one, was worth mentioning?
Watching this movie was like reading a magazine with the last page of every article torn out.
Quote from: Fuzzy Necromancer on March 31, 2009, 04:45:44 PM
I just didn't find it satisfying. The stuff that was really interesting got skimmed past in favor of mundane, seen-it-a-thousand-times stuff, like the guy in Puerto Rico who thinks he's Jesus got so little attention. Of all the weird and crazy shit about that guy, the bit they really choose to lampoon is that he's nationality? They didn't even think him claiming to be christ, the antichrist, AND the reincarnation of John the Baptist, all in one, was worth mentioning?
Watching this movie was like reading a magazine with the last page of every article torn out.
They
did talk about him claiming to be Christ and the Anti-Christ. I don't remember them talking about him being John the Baptist though.
Quote from: bettertomorrowamy on March 31, 2009, 05:45:48 PM
Quote from: Fuzzy Necromancer on March 31, 2009, 04:45:44 PM
I just didn't find it satisfying. The stuff that was really interesting got skimmed past in favor of mundane, seen-it-a-thousand-times stuff, like the guy in Puerto Rico who thinks he's Jesus got so little attention. Of all the weird and crazy shit about that guy, the bit they really choose to lampoon is that he's nationality? They didn't even think him claiming to be christ, the antichrist, AND the reincarnation of John the Baptist, all in one, was worth mentioning?
Watching this movie was like reading a magazine with the last page of every article torn out.
They did talk about him claiming to be Christ and the Anti-Christ. I don't remember them talking about him being John the Baptist though.
Bill Maher said he wished they had more time to show more about other religions. But its funny how he rather would see more of the guy who calls himself the anti christ then other stuff. The movie was meant to be entertaining. Not as much of a lecture about pros and cons. Maybe there will be a Religulous 2 =)
If it was just meant to be entertaining, then it failed at that too. The pacing was off, and it felt like watching a video in class where the teacher fast-forwards through all the good parts.
Bill Maher has the subtlety and comedic timing of John Kerry.
Quote from: Fuzzy Necromancer on April 01, 2009, 07:10:20 AM
If it was just meant to be entertaining, then it failed at that too. The pacing was off, and it felt like watching a video in class where the teacher fast-forwards through all the good parts.
Bill Maher has the subtlety and comedic timing of John Kerry.
So....you did or didn't like it?
It's not out here yet but from what I've seen it looks hilarious, but then I find all religious people strange at best.