A (S)pain in Ratzo’s Ass…
8 July 2006 by King Retard
Ratzo’s making a stop in Spain to get on their government’s case for reckognizing civil rights and for rejecting the church’s outdated superstitions. In all honesty, I’m not too familiar with the Spanish Prime Minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, but I like what I’ve heard so far. According to the article:
…besides legalizing gay marriage, Zapatero’s government has made it easier for Spaniards to divorce and halted a plan by a previous, conservative government to make religion classes mandatory in public schools.
Wow, the same country famous for the Inquisition is now a trend setter in modernization and rejecting backwards and superstitious modes of belief. Looks like the church is losing one of its strongholds!
Spain has passed from being a bastion of Roman Catholicism to a predominantly lay society in less than a generation. Statistics show that while 80 percent of Spaniards still call themselves Catholics only 42 percent believe in God and 20 percent go to Mass.
Those are pretty interesting numbers, especially when you consider that people calling themselves Catholic only seem to be doing so as a result of upbringing or cultural identity. How else could you explain why a majority doesn’t believe in gawd but still identifies itself with a religion. Of course, the author, and the church are on the attack!
Benedict visited the city’s 13th century cathedral where he handed the head of Spanish Episcopal conference a letter addressed to the country’s bishops. In the letter, the pope encouraged them in their activity at a time, he said, of rapid secularization. He urged bishops to continue to proclaim that doing without God or acting as if he did not exist undermines the truth about man and compromises the future of culture and society, Castelfranco reports.
Tens of thousands of faithful, waving Vatican flags, clapping and releasing yellow and white balloons, lined the streets of Spain’s third-largest city for a glimpse of the pope as he drove by in his bullet-proof pope mobile.
Maria Luisa Galdon, a 54-year-old housewife with three daughters, said Spain needs the visit because families here are in trouble. “What’s missing is love, understanding and education,” she said.
She thinks the pope should give Zapatero a message to improve relations with the church and give it more support. “I think he will do it politely and necessarily,” Galdon said.
Jose Ramon Gonzalvez, a 38-year-old civil servant who lives in the neighborhood of the subway crash, called the pope’s stopover at the metro station “a very important declaration of his support for all of us and an expression of his love.”
Here we go, the author of the article quotes the inanities of the faithful but offers no thoughtful counter-argument from the opposing point of view. I like how the lady above decries a lack of “education.” Um, it sounds to me that your PM is trying to improve your education by not allowing religion in public schools. I think the lack of “understanding” she mentions is on her part. I also find it ironic that the man quoted only sees “love” from the Pope for visiting after a trainwreck instead of questioning what kind of gawd would let these disasters be routine.
Finally, my favorite part:
The Vatican seemed irritated that Zapatero was not planning to attend a papal Mass on Sunday.
“The Holy See doesn’t invite leaders to Mass,” said papal spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Vals. But he noted that such left-wing stalwarts as Fidel Castro of Cuba and former Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega have attended papal masses.
Look Ratzo, he’s already humoring you by meeting with you, if he doesn’t want to go hear you spout your crap against him to a captive audience, who can blame him?
8 July 2006, on 2:13 pm
Whatever Ratzo is doing with that lady in the pic is making her cry…Stop it Ratzo!
8 July 2006, on 2:27 pm
The human-centered actions here are fine, but until Spain gets rid of the running of the bulls, the torturing of the cows, and the throwing of the goats off the church towers, I’ll continue to think of it as a medieval nation. However, many kudos to Spanish voters for getting rid of the pro-Iraq War Aznar.
King Retard, Will Spanish Catholics be swayed by Ratzo, do you think? The clergy probably will.
And finally: Is the Pope Catholic? Just sayin. . .
8 July 2006, on 2:51 pm
I think that there will be some what of a “reawakening” (or would it be a re-asleep-ening?) because of his visit, basically because of the deep-seated guilt complex associated with catholocism. What I’m afraid of is that there could be a backlash against some of the reforms as a result. We’ll have to wait and see I guess.
“And finally: Is the Pope Catholic? Just sayin. . .”
I’m pretty sure he is, since he is the head of the Roman Catholic church, lol.
8 July 2006, on 4:36 pm
They throw goats off church towers in Spain?
In the running of the bulls, do they kill the bulls afterward? If not, I see no problem with a bunch of people risking life, limb, and body to run with a bunch of pissed off animals with horns longer than my arm.
Although it’s not surprising that this would happen. Whenever equality rears it’s beautiful head religion always shows up to paint a mustache on it.
8 July 2006, on 4:47 pm
I thought the question was; Does the Pope shit in the woods?
And, ATM, just where is Ratzo’s other hand?
Didn’t Ratzo’s predecessor draw crowds in the hundreds of thousands rather than merely the “tens of thousands of faithful” to see the Hitler Youth all grown up? This poor fuck still thinks he’s relevant.
8 July 2006, on 5:55 pm
catherine Says:
The human-centered actions here are fine, but until Spain gets rid of the running of the bulls, the torturing of the cows, and the throwing of the goats off the church towers, I’ll continue to think of it as a medieval nation. However, many kudos to Spanish voters for getting rid of the pro-Iraq War Aznar.
Hey, they legalized gay marriage.
8 July 2006, on 6:06 pm
Sean said:
Hey, they legalized gay marriage.
That’s where I’m coming from. They may do some odd things, like Catherine pointed out, but in a lot of ways, they’re lightyears ahead of us.
8 July 2006, on 7:10 pm
In a place that’s technically closer to having a State religion- Catholicism- than we are, it is remarkable that they’ve legalized gay marriage and that those poll numbers are as intellectually positive as they are. If they can do it, there’s absolutely no reason we can’t. Maybe if Oprah came out of the closet…
8 July 2006, on 7:17 pm
to continue to proclaim that doing without God or acting as if he did not exist undermines the truth about man and compromises the future of culture and society
What, that man invents gods? The truth of our existence will only be fully realized when we throw off the yoke of superstition and reach for something higher.
Just like our recent Catholic poster boy Mr. Moneybags, these people who are spouting intolerance have the gall to say that what is missing in the secular world is “love.” And a hearty hi-ho fuck you, ya self-righteous hypocrites.
I think it’s awesome that Zapatero refused to attend Herr Ratzo’s bully pulpit babblefest. Those Spaniards can be a kick. I loved it when King Juan Carlos said “Buenos dias, Arroz” to Condoleezza Rice. She probably thought he was calling her a rose. Arroz by any other name is rice?
8 July 2006, on 8:25 pm
“They throw goats off church towers in Spain?”
Yes, it’s some sort of unbelievably cruel ritual. And I don’t know if the bulls are killed that day but you know they all end up in the bullring eventually.
“Hey, they legalized gay marriage.”
Yes, I tend to forget that because it seems so, so, unSpanish (so unCatholic is what I really mean). Good on them.
Yes, my bad, it’s “Is a bear Catholic?” and “Does the pope shit in the woods?” Or, perhaps, “Is the pope a bear?”
Also, could someone explain how one gets something into ital on a comment. I notice that my format icons are covered up when I have a comment screen open.
8 July 2006, on 8:41 pm
For ital it’s “” and “” without the quotes and no spaces. Replace “i” with “b” for bold or “strike” to strike through.
8 July 2006, on 8:47 pm
Shit, that didn’t work. It’s: “less than/lowercase “i”/greater than” to start and: “less than/forward slash/lowercase “i”/greater than” to close. lowercase “b” or lowercase “strike” still applies.
8 July 2006, on 9:18 pm
20% go to mass. Well I guess there is hope afterall. Now if they could just get Mexico to do the same there might be a happy ending in this someday. I too love the part where he is not going to Papist mass. This story makes me smile. After all the horseshit of the past week this is HAPPY news.
The Pope is Irrelevant. Hell yeah.
8 July 2006, on 11:13 pm
Okay, trying it out.
The pirate said, “Arrrrrgh.”
Oh, I can see it down below. But now everything is in ital. WTF!
8 July 2006, on 11:44 pm
Because you have to close the ital tag, Catherine. HTML is all about opening and closing tags.
<i>Writing this</i>
results in:
Writing this
And then going back to a normal font style, until you…
<b>Open and close another set of HTML tags</b>
Open and close another set of HTML tags
Hey. How’d Sean show the code like that?
Why, he’s a warlock, don’t ya know?
9 July 2006, on 11:07 am
Sean,
I thought that’s what I did, but apparently, sadly, perhaps not.
Anyway, thanks.
9 July 2006, on 11:13 am
Ve call him ze Ratman
9 July 2006, on 11:16 am
I looked at the source just now and there is no close ital until the end. WordPress probably inserted that automatically when it didn’t see a close tag, like the “p” tags you see… It enters those when you create a hard return and line space.
<p>Okay, trying it out.</p>
<p><i>The pirate said, “Arrrrrgh.”</p>
<p>Oh, I can see it down below. But now everything is in ital. WTF!</i>
Anyway, you get the picture. It’s easy. Have fun!
9 July 2006, on 11:27 am
More on Spain’s barbarity compared to the U.S.:
Death Penalty: Abolitionist and Retentionist Countries
1. Abolitionist for all crimes
Countries whose laws do not provide for the death penalty for any crime
ANDORRA, ANGOLA, ARMENIA, AUSTRALIA, AUSTRIA, AZERBAIJAN, BELGIUM, BHUTAN, BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA, BULGARIA, CAMBODIA, CANADA, CAPE VERDE, COLOMBIA, COSTA RICA, COTE D’IVOIRE, CROATIA, CYPRUS, CZECH REPUBLIC, DENMARK, DJIBOUTI, DOMINICAN REPUBLIC, ECUADOR, ESTONIA, FINLAND, FRANCE, GEORGIA, GERMANY,GREECE, GUINEA-BISSAU, HAITI, HONDURAS, HUNGARY, ICELAND, IRELAND, ITALY, KIRIBATI, LIBERIA, LIECHTENSTEIN, LITHUANIA, LUXEMBOURG, MACEDONIA (former Yugoslav Republic), MALTA, MARSHALL ISLANDS, MAURITIUS, MEXICO, MICRONESIA (Federated States), MOLDOVA, MONACO, MOZAMBIQUE, NAMIBIA, NEPAL, NETHERLANDS, NEW ZEALAND, NICARAGUA, NIUE, NORWAY, PALAU, PANAMA, PARAGUAY, PHILIPPINES, POLAND, PORTUGAL, ROMANIA, SAMOA, SAN MARINO, SAO TOME AND PRINCIPE, SENEGAL, SERBIA AND MONTENEGRO, SEYCHELLES, SLOVAK REPUBLIC, SLOVENIA, SOLOMON ISLANDS, SOUTH AFRICA, SPAIN, SWEDEN, SWITZERLAND, TIMOR-LESTE, TURKEY, TURKMENISTAN, TUVALU, UKRAINE, UNITED KINGDOM, URUGUAY, VANUATU, VATICAN CITY STATE, VENEZUELA
4. Retentionist
Countries and territories which retain the death penalty for ordinary crimes
AFGHANISTAN, ANTIGUA AND BARBUDA, BAHAMAS, BANGLADESH, BARBADOS, BELARUS, BELIZE, BOTSWANA, BURUNDI, CAMEROON, CHAD, CHINA, COMOROS, CONGO (Democratic Republic), CUBA, DOMINICA, EGYPT, EQUATORIAL GUINEA, ERITREA, ETHIOPIA, GABON, GHANA, GUATEMALA, GUINEA, GUYANA, INDIA, INDONESIA, IRAN, IRAQ, JAMAICA, JAPAN, JORDAN, KAZAKSTAN, KOREA (North), KOREA (South), KUWAIT, KYRGYZSTAN, LAOS, LEBANON, LESOTHO, LIBYA, MALAYSIA, MONGOLIA, NIGERIA, OMAN, PAKISTAN, PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY, QATAR, RWANDA, SAINT CHRISTOPHER & NEVIS, SAINT LUCIA, SAINT VINCENT & GRENADINES, SAUDI ARABIA, SIERRA LEONE, SINGAPORE, SOMALIA, SUDAN, SYRIA, TAIWAN, TAJIKISTAN, TANZANIA, THAILAND, TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO, UGANDA, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, UZBEKISTAN, VIET NAM, YEMEN, ZAMBIA, ZIMBABWE
Look at the company we keep. Other than Japan and South Korea, you would think we are a Third World country. When Turkey and Cambodia have moved beyond their recent past and left you in the dust, you know you have serious problems.
10 July 2006, on 4:55 am
Well, killing bulls in cruel manners is bad, but not comparable to the barbarities in fucking GUANTANAMO you american morons.
10 July 2006, on 8:51 am
ABOOGA Says:
Well, killing bulls in cruel manners is bad, but not comparable to the barbarities in fucking GUANTANAMO you american morons
<begin rant>
Thanks for the support, Booger. This is the umpteenth incident of calling all Americans morons that I have seen on this board in the past week. Is the world finally starting to show some cajones and gathering to beat the Great Satan in one fell swoop? Otherwise, fuck you. We live here and we’re fighting for our Constitution, our secular government, our right to a free and constructive education for our children, our right to universal health care, our right to a sturdy wall between state and church. We aren’t the morons, asshole. We’re the good guys, and drive-by America haters like you can be just as offensive as the bastard American jingoists that we fight every day. We are proud of our heritage. The founders of this country may have been slave owners and dickheads to some degree, but they did write the greatest Constitution in the history of the world at the time. And those who say there is nothing to learn from us forget that true democracy started here. The French Revolution, which spasmed and attempted democracy before falling back under the yoke of an emperor (Napoleon I), was inspired by our revolution. And the same could be said about most every other fledgling democracy over the past 200 years.
Patriotism, as Mark Twain said, is the last refuge of a scoundrel. I have no place for it. I am a one-worldist. But I do get a little defensive when you lump me together with a large group of people and call us all morons, knowing nothing about us, our passions, what drives us, what we see as our affinity with our fellow humans, what kind of world we are trying to build. Killing bulls in a cruel manner may well be bad, and the prison at Gitmo is quite likely also bad… But guess what? None of us here have anything to do with either of those fucking things. Blaming people for their government ignores the fact that many governments are illigitimate and working against the will of the people, even in a democracy. And no, before you start spouting it, “we” did not elect this government twice. Many, many of us fought against it from day one of the 2000 campaign. And it is quite likely that this government has stolen its power both times now.
I’m sick of it being suggested that we have just laid down and taken this. That we don’t care.
Look at Cindy Sheehan.
Look at Ehren Watada.
Look at International Answer.
Look at MoveOn.org
It goes on. These are all American organizations made up of Americans of diverse backgrounds, all fighting for the same thing. To make the most powerful nation in the world also its greatest democracy. I know we have lost some of that status, but to tell those of us who have been here, who have been voting, who have been getting out the vote, who have been marching in the protests, who have been fighting the corruption and vote fraud, who have been working to educate all Americans about the dangers our democracy — and therefore, by extenstion, the security of the world — is facing… To do all that and to get comments as we have seen here lately like “America had it’s chance, I’m giving up on you.” Or just calling us “morons” like you did. I want to say: “Hey, fuckers, why don’t you come here and fight on the frontlines against the Xian evangelicals who want a Christian Republic of the United States, a return to Manifest Destiny, a permanent policy of preemptive war? ”
Because it’s gonna be landing on your doorstep in the next 10 years if we don’t stem the tide. And we’re here fighting the battle with every tool at our disposal, this web site included. So stop fucking bitching at the half of America who is actually trying to do something about this, roll up your sleeves and pitch in. Right now, I think we secularists are dealing with the fact that we will probably have to team up with the Christian Left to make a difference. That’s fine. So bite your pride and do the same. How can you help us push forward and change things? Because this is affecting us all, not just those who live in the States. Come on. Put up or shut up, as they used to say in the school yard. If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem.
<end rant>
10 July 2006, on 5:51 pm
Hey. How’d Sean show the code like that?
Now I HAVE to know…how DID you show the code in those lines?
10 July 2006, on 6:14 pm
Stardust:
For most characters that HTML sees as code — such as pointy brackets — there are HTML special character equivalents. So you can write those things and have the browser see it as regular text instead of code.
To do it quickly, I used BBEdit, an HTML editor, to translate my text (which was in fact code) into HTML, thus rendering it in the browser as just text.
The special character for an open pointy bracket is an ampersand followed by lt followed by a semi-colon. The special character for a closed pointy bracket is an ampersand followed by gt followed by a semi-colon.
& l t ;b & g t ; Here is how I showed a pair of opening and closing bold tags. I put spaces between the characters on either end to keep it from rending here as code. & l t ; / b & g t ;
Take those spaces out and you will get this:
<b>Here is how I showed a pair of opening and closing bold tags.</b>
Many special characters are expressed with an opening ampersand and a closing semi-colon. Handy also for accents, fancy punctuation and some symbols. Here is a reference chart.
10 July 2006, on 8:23 pm
KR quotes: “The Vatican seemed irritated that Zapatero was not planning to attend a papal Mass on Sunday.
“’The Holy See doesn’t invite leaders to Mass,’ said papal spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Vals. But he noted that such left-wing stalwarts as Fidel Castro of Cuba and former Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega have attended papal masses.”
Of course Castro and Ortega went to papal mass; in the face of international accusations of civil rights violations, Castro was trying desperately to give the impression that Cuba enjoys freedom of religion, and Ortega was currying favor with the Nicaraguan voters, who like most Latin Americans are still overwhelmingly catholic – and expect their leaders to be as well, socialist or not.
Zapatero, as the secular head of a secular government of an increasingly more secular country, may have to humor the still-politically-influential Vatican for the sake of international diplomacy, but clearly sees no need to go so far as to actually kiss the pope’s ass.