News » December 27, 2009

Dear ITT Ideologist: Law, Order and Angry Atheists

By Pete Karman

(illustration by Terry Laban)

Angry atheism, or being mad at something that isn't there, is a harmless form of mopery.

Dear ITT Ideologist,

Naturally, our plan at Law and Order for the forthcoming 9/11 Manhattan terror trial is to rip it from the headlines, melodramatize it, ballyhoo its network premier, and then rerun it on TNT for the next three centuries.  We’ve got the prosecution part down, but are having trouble dreaming up a doable defense. I am therefore asking you to act as amicus curiae in the case.

D. Wolf, New York

Dear Mr. Wolf,

I am happy to be of counsel. Coincidentally, I mastered corpus juris by watching 323 episodes of Law and Order after inadvertently subscribing to a cable operator that carries only TNT.

I emphasize that I am offering the following argument advocatus diaboli rather than out of personal conviction.

I suggest a Blackwater-Bush defense. Defense counsel should argue a fortiori that the accused were privately contracted to attack U.S. command and control targets for remuneration (vis Army Air Corps v. Milo Minderbinder). Those actions were taken in accord with the Bush doctrine, which holds that a country may attack any other country that it surmises might do it harm at some future time (vis Bush v. Iraq). The contractor claim of sovereignty for the purpose of invoking the Bush Doctrine is as per stirpes inheritor of the caliphate (vis Mohammed v. Infidels). This is so, whether or not the governor of Alaska was aware of it (vis Gibson v. Palin).

Further, defendants should hold that both the Pentagon and World Trade Center qualify as command and control facilities under prevailing U.S. military doctrine. Civilian casualties resulting from these attacks would therefore be considered collateral damage. “Such damage is not unlawful so long as it is not excessive in light of the overall military advantage anticipated from the attack” (USDOD Joint Publication 3-60). Since contractor anticipated that God’s wrath would guide its thunderbolts in achieving the greatest of earthly victories, collateral damage level was acceptable.

Finally, I recommend that you engage Denny Crane from ABC’s Boston Legal as first defense chair.  The twinkle in his eye and his colorful cravats would be a plus in humanizing the defendants.

Should you have further questions, do not hesitate to contact me at the Professor Irwin Corey Institute for Inchoate Studies at Hudson University.

Dear ITT Ideologist,

I’ve been hearing a lot about angry atheists lately.  Is this something I should get riled about?

M. Huckabee, Little Rock

Dear Governor Huckabee,

Not to worry. Angry atheism, or being mad at something that isn’t there, is a harmless form of mopery, such as exposing one’s self to a blind person.

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• Reader Comments

  While the rest of the article is good, Mr. Karman’s statement that atheists are “mad at something that isn’t there” is trite and silly.  (I am assuming that, as the usage indicates, Mr. Karman actually means “angry” when he uses the word “mad”).  Atheists are not “mad” at god, intelligent religious zealots, or even honest church leaders. No, the angry atheists of which Mr. Karman refers are mad at those things that exist, like widespread ignorance, violent actions and loss of human opportunity that religion (which does exist) can spawn.

  Posted by TeriSmith on Dec 27, 2009 at 10:39 AM

  Karman,

  What’s your beef with atheists?

  God is a fantasy - but religion is very real and serves as a powerful force for reaction and repression in our society.

  And atheists have a right to be hostile to organized religion.

  Posted by Gregory A. Butler on Dec 29, 2009 at 7:36 PM

  Your regrettably poor display of humor with respect to those who deny the obvious existence of a clockwork metaphysics reminds me of a joke encountered in my compulsive perusal of the internets:

  Q: What do you get when you cross atheist with a Jehovah’s witness?

  A: Someone who knocks on doors for no apparent reason.

  P.S. Please remove any reference to my colleague from your argument for the defense, or I will be forced to cancel my subscription to ITT.  This will prove to be a problematic endeavor, since I would be required to initiate a subscription in order to cancel it.

  Posted by Major Major on Jan 7, 2010 at 4:27 PM

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