The Ben Stein Letter (sort of)

You know, you guys have got to stop forwarding stuff all over the Internet. Most of it is stupid. The people who go ga-ga over every forwarded piece of junk mail to come down the pike are the same people who, if they found it in their snail-mail box, would toss it into the recycling bin without even opening it, knowing it is something dumb. But if you absolutely MUST forward something because you find it funny or interesting or enlightening and you wish to share it with your friends, follow two rules. Read carefully, because I'm not repeating this for the slow learners in back of the class.

1.) Don't add your own shit to it. First of all, you are ruining someone else's written material, which you are probably distributing without attribution or permission to begin with; and secondly, nobody cares. Nobody wants to read your pithy little one-liners about God, angels, or heaven tacked onto what could have been a decent story if you'd kept your mitts off it.

2.) For the love of pants, VERIFY IT. I am sick to death of researching stuff, only to discover that it has been altered from its original state by people who think they know how to be clever. Worse yet, most of the forwards I have received are outright lies about events that never happened, asking me to put my "signature" on a petition for some cause that doesn't exist. THIS WOULDN'T HAPPEN IF YOU MORONS WOULD QUIT FORWARDING EVERYTHING. Got it? Good. Now, on to the letter.

As you might expect from my ranting, this is another bit of flotsam that landed in my e-mail from who-knows-where. It is so poorly written that I almost flushed it down the e-toilet, then decided it was worth looking into just so I could get pissed off at someone for not doing the research which I ended up doing. The first place I looked was Snopes.com. This is a valuable resource for finding out the truth of stuff you read on the Internet, because unlike the dinkuses who hit the Forward button without utilizing so much as a brain cell, the people at Snopes do their research. If everyone had Snopes.com bookmarked, AND USED IT, there wouldn't be so much trash circulating. Of course, I wouldn't have so much to rant about then, either, so forget I said anything. You probably already did, anyway.

As is often the case with these things, there is some truth and some fiction. Ben Stein wrote part of the letter, but the other half was added in 2006 from a speech by Billy Graham's daughter, Anne. I guarantee you this thing is still circulating in the form you see here, and that not one person in a thousand knows what you now know. Remember that when it comes tumbling into your inbox one fine day. I will use different colors of fonts to differentiate the different parts: Ben's in blue, Anne's in green, mine in black.

My confession:

I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was Jewish. And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees, Christmas trees.. I don't feel threatened. I don't feel discriminated against. That's what they are: Christmas trees. It doesn't bother me a bit when people say, 'Merry Christmas' to me. I don't think they are slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it It shows that we are all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year. It doesn't bother me at all that there is a manger scene on display at a key intersection near my beach house in Malibu . If people want a crïeche, it's just as fine with me as is the Menorah a few hundred yards away.

I wonder if it would bother him if the local Islamic community wanted some kind of public religious display at that intersection--or the pagans, Wiccans, or atheists.

I don't like getting pushed around for being a Jew, and I don't think Christians like getting pushed around for being Christians. I think people who believe in God are sick and tired of getting pushed around, period. I have no idea where the concept came from that America is an explicitly atheist country. I can't find it in the Constitution and I don't like it being shoved down my throat.

Who said that America is "an explicitly atheist country"? I would like the evidence that anyone ever said this. I have, however, heard a great many Christians blather on about how this is a Christian nation. Setting aside for a moment that many of our Founding Fathers were deists (they believed in God, but not the biblical God), let's address the fact that you can scarcely turn a corner without bumping into a church. Have you ever seen any atheist meeting halls anywhere? There are gift shops and book stores pedaling merchandise just for Christians. When was the last time you ran into a gift shop just for atheists and agnostics? Christians have Trinity Broadcasting Network all to themselves. Where is the Atheist Broadcasting Network? This notion that Christians are being persecuted, beat up, pushed around, and abused is simply unfounded. According to a recent poll, atheists are the least trusted minority in America. Christians, comprising 75% of the population, are not a minority at all. So where, exactly, is this "pushing around" taking place? When you are in the majority and can worship God however, whenever and wherever you please, you have nothing to complain about; but then, Christians, by and large, seem to enjoy complaining about nothing.

Or maybe I can put it another way: where did the idea come from that we should worship celebrities and we aren't allowed to worship God as we understand Him? I guess that's a sign that I'm getting old, too. But there are a lot of us who are wondering where these celebrities came from and where the America we knew went to. [Note that the wording here is changed from Stein's original commentary--see the Snopes link above.]

I've never heard anyone say we should worship celebrities, so I don't know what he's complaining about. It IS human nature to admire, and attempt to emulate, those who are perceived to have power and authority, and celebrities generally fall into that category, however superficial that power might be. What this has to do with the downfall of the America he knew 50 years ago, I haven't a clue. I think he just needs to quit whining about nothing.

In light of the many jokes we send to one another for a laugh, this is a little different: This is not intended to be a joke; it's not funny, it's intended to get you thinking.

Yeah, it gets me to thinking there are a lot of people who need to go visit a poverty-stricken African country and spend some time with people who have REAL problems. "People disagree with me and my feelings are hurt" is not a real problem.

Billy Graham's daughter was interviewed on the Early Show and Jane Clayson asked her 'How could God let something like this happen?' (regarding Katrina) Anne Graham gave an extremely profound and insightful response. She said, 'I believe God is deeply saddened by this, just as we are, but for years we've been telling God to get out of our schools, to get out of our government and to get out of our lives. And being the gentleman He is, I believe He has calmly backed out. How can we expect God to give us His blessing and His protection if we demand He leave us alone?'

There is nothing "profound and insightful" about the notion that God lets little children die in horrible, frightening ways because their PARENTS rejected him, or that he kills the innocent along with the guilty in a fit of rage. Thousands of faithful, believing Christians died or lost everything, including family members, in the destruction by Hurricane Katrina. Why would God "calmly back out" from protecting those who put their trust in him?

In light of recent events... terrorists attack, school shootings, etc. I think it started when Madeleine Murray O'Hare (she was murdered, her body found a few years ago) complained she didn't want prayer in our schools, and we said OK. Then someone said you better not read the Bible in school. The Bible says thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal, and love your neighbor as yourself. And we said OK.

Morals have been around since long before the Bible was written. How else did the human race survive for hundreds of thousands of years? Morals are simply codes of behavior that enable us to get along with each other in a social group so that we can cooperate to find food and shelter, protect each other, etc. Prohibitions against stealing, killing, and other anti-social behaviors would have come about very early so that the group could feel secure and united against outside threats. No Bible is necessary for that. How would making children read the Bible help eliminate school violence, anyway? The Bible is replete with tales of violence committed by God against man, or by men against other men at God's command. How will that make children be less violent? Someone explain it to me, because it makes no sense. If you want to pray, what is to stop you from doing it at home? Jesus said not to pray where you can be seen by others, but to do it in private, so that only God will know. Don't believe me? Read Matthew 6:6.

Then Dr. Benjamin Spock said we shouldn't spank our children when they misbehave because their little personalities would be warped and we might damage their self-esteem (Dr Spock's son committed suicide). We said an expert should know what he's talking about. And we said OK.

So, who forced you blithering idiots to do what some random guy told you to do? This is proof that Christians will believe any old thing they are told. Frankly, I think Dr. Spock had a point. Surely, if we are to curb violence among children, then the place to start is by not being violent to them? The Bible makes no such suggestion, but instead recommends beating children with a rod to force obedience from them. (Reading the Old Testament, you get the impression that there was little difference in the way that slaves, cattle, and children were treated.) Oh, and the claim that Spock's son committed suicide is false. RESEARCH, people, RESEARCH. A quick search on Google would have put this to rest long ago. What happened to "Thou shalt not lie"? I guess it's okay when you're lying for Jesus.

Now we're asking ourselves why our children have no conscience, why they don't know right from wrong, and why it doesn't bother them to kill strangers, their classmates, and themselves.
Probably, if we think about it long and hard enough, we can figure it out. I think it has a great deal to do with 'WE REAP WHAT WE SOW.'

There are multiple reasons for these issues, and attributing it all to "they don't read the Bible enough" is the conclusion of the simple-minded.

Funny how simple it is for people to trash God and then wonder why the world's going to hell. Funny how we believe what the newspapers say, but question what the Bible says.

People who believe everything they read in the paper probably also believe everything they read in the Bible. Those who question the Bible also question everything else. It is all about what your mind-set is. If you don't question everything, you will never learn anything.

Funny how you can send 'jokes' through e-mail and they spread like wildfire but when you start sending messages regarding the Lord, people think twice about sharing.

I have seen this freakin' e-mail at least three times, and I guarantee that everyone else has, too. I have also had the misfortune of reading a lot of other sentimental Christian claptrap that circulates endlessly on the World Wide Web like rubbish circulating on the ocean currents, picking up more trash as it goes around. Ms. Anne does not get out very much, does she?

Funny how lewd, crude, vulgar and obscene articles pass freely through cyberspace, but public discussion of God is suppressed in the school and workplace.

Funny how Christians claim not to read "lewd, crude, vulgar and obscene articles," yet how else would they know about them? Discussions about God do not belong in schools or the workplace. Schools are for learning USEFUL information ("God did it" not being useful), and the workplace is for getting your work done. There are plenty of other places where you can discuss God to your heart's content, so what is the problem?

Are you laughing yet?

Yep. I'm laughing AT you, not WITH you.

Funny how when you forward this message, you will not send it to many on your address list because you're not sure what they believe, or what they will think of you for sending it.

I am one of the smart people who did not forward it to anyone. If I forward something, it is because it is truthful and/or funny. This letter is neither. It is sappy, whiny, and dumb. I am 100% certain that this letter will be forwarded to me yet again sometime within the next couple of years, probably with several scriptures, a few flowery quotations, and some sparkly, animated angel gifs attached to it. At the end will be instructions for me to send it to at least ten people in the next ten days and I will receive an unexpected blessing.

Funny how we can be more worried about what other people think of us than what God thinks of us.

I don't worry about what God thinks because A.) I haven't seen any evidence for the existence of God; and B.) IF he exists, he hasn't complained about me yet--at least, not to my face--so I take that as a sign that I'm doing alright.

Pass it on if you think it has merit. If not then just discard it... no one will know you did. But, if you discard this thought process, don't sit back and complain about what bad shape the world is in.

If the world is in bad shape, then there are a multitude of reasons for it, many of them difficult to pinpoint and define. It would take a library to house so much information. The simple-minded gimboids of the world think it can all be boiled down to "God is mad at people for not reading the Bible." They paint the world in black and white, allowing for none of the million or so shades of gray that provide texture and interest to the human race. They cannot even define what they mean by "in bad shape." People have made that complaint for thousands of years, and it's all a matter of perspective. If all you ever look for is misery, then that's all you'll ever find.