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Aug. 30, 2014 - Sargon of Akkad - Carl Benjamin
14:50
Progressively Becoming Fox News
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Kevin Sorbo is in the news again.
Recently he was getting criticised after he called the Ferguson protesters animals who were just angry because they weren't successful and they didn't work hard enough to be successful.
Now paraphrasing, but not much.
But enough.
Ferguson writes have very little to do with the shooting of a young man, Sorbo wrote.
It is an excuse to be the losers these animals truly are.
It is a tipping point to frustration built up of years of not trying, then blaming everyone else, the man, for their failures.
It's always someone else's fault when you give up.
Hopefully this is some reminder to the African Americans.
I always thought we were just Americans, oh well, that their president, the voted in, has only made things worse for them, not better.
And the thing is, it's really easy to see why he said this.
Police say that 32 arrests were made during the chaos.
At least 12 businesses were looted.
One shot was fired at a police helicopter.
Rocks, bricks and bottles were thrown at police officers throughout the night.
Now, I'm not defending any actions on any side here.
But it's just a matter of perspective, Anna.
From his perspective, he happily represents the establishment.
His views may well be slightly antiquated.
He may have a fairly rose-tinted view of what the establishment is or at least should be.
But there's nothing inherently wrong with what he's saying because he's not wrong.
They did act like animals.
And the reason you're complaining about this, Anna, is because it's probably justified for them to do so.
To go back to Sorbo's statements, we can see exactly how he thinks of this.
It's always someone else's fault when you give up.
This shows that he has a very proactive, libertarian sort of view on these things.
He thinks with hard work, you succeed.
And you know what?
I don't think he's wrong.
And I think that if you actually thought about it in a way that wasn't ideologically driven, you would agree.
Now, he decided to go on a Christian radio show.
And yet you're still going to be dumb enough to complain that they're not pro-atheism, aren't you?
That's hosted by some dude named Rick Wiles.
And he wanted to make some comments on atheists.
He felt like atheists were just these angry individuals that needed to be called out.
So let's- Did he say atheists as a blanket term?
Or did he say atheists that appear on Fox and CNN?
Let me give you a sense of what he said.
Why are atheists so angry at something they don't believe in?
They are a small group of people and they get on Fox and CNN and they rant and they rave.
And I pretty much based my character in God is Not Dead off these guys and I see who are just angry.
They are just filled with anger and hatred.
He probably has seen angry atheists on Fox and CNN.
Because I imagine angry atheists bring in better ratings.
And Kevin, don't be an idiot.
Atheists aren't ranting about God.
They're ranting about the institution of the church.
He made a lot of other comments, which we'll get to in just a second.
But he seems to think that atheists are just ranting and raving about religion, but he fails to understand why we do so.
So you are just ranting and raving about religion then?
Fuck why you do so.
He doesn't care why you do so.
He's just seeing atheists rant and rave about religion.
Like for instance the fact that our policy, our domestic policy specifically, is usually influenced significantly through Christian religion.
No, it's just influenced by people who are Christians and hold Christian values.
Unless you actually have priests running for government over there.
And our foreign policy is usually centered around how much we hate Muslim religion.
What a profound lack of understanding of your country's foreign policy you have Ana Kasparian.
I'm absolutely certain that when your country was setting up the Taliban in Afghanistan to fight the Russian invasion, you're all like, yeah, we hate the Muslim religion.
It's about what's politically expedient to grow the influence and power of the United States.
That's it.
You have no friends.
You have no enemies.
You have only interests.
Right?
No.
So maybe that's why atheists get a little frustrated.
Two things, if I could.
No, I have to interrupt.
This is breaking news.
This would better not be you making an idiot of yourself, whoever you are.
Who is Kevin Sorbo and why should I give a shit about him?
Who the fuck are you?
And how did you get this job?
Oh, no, no, no.
I see how you got this job.
You're the foreign policy expert, aren't you?
Marzan or something?
Or was he on Star Trek?
Turkey Lee, did I look at my work?
Okay.
The level of research we can expect from the young Turks.
I was going to say two things.
One, I don't know who Kevin Sorbo is.
Do you literally do no prior research before going on air?
But apparently you had to say it was more important.
I was so afraid that we were going to go on with the subject and I was never going to fulfill the mystery of who the hell is Kevin Sorbo and why do we care about what he's saying?
Which is actually exactly what everyone's saying about you, jiggles.
Kevin Sorbo watches CNN and Fox.
By the way, it says on Wikipedia he describes himself as politically independent.
Well I can use Wikipedia too.
And I couldn't fit Kevin Sorbo's body of work onto one screenshot without cutting it up.
Weirdly though, yours didn't even fill the entire screen.
Let's have a quick look, shall we?
Oh, you professional Korean reporter for a minor TV station.
Joined another one.
Serves the anchor of the Times.
Oh, very good.
Very good.
What film appearances have you made?
Cameo appearances in the movies, The Bling Ring, and White House Down.
Oh, bravo.
Who the fuck is Kevin Sorbo?
No, you're not.
And then so he goes out and he complains about all the atheists they have on.
Because he's upset by the 6,742 to 1 ratio of Christians to atheists that they have on CNN and Fox.
Let me give you a sense of what he said.
Why are atheists so angry at something they don't believe in?
They are a small group of people and they get on Fox and CNN and they rant and they rave.
And I pretty much based my character in God is Not Dead off these guys and I see who are just angry.
They're just filled with anger and hatred.
He didn't complain about anything.
He was making an observation and he never said anything about the number of atheists other than that atheists are quite a small group in the United States, which is true.
I've literally never seen an atheist on CNN.
What?
You've never been on CNN?
You're such a big name.
I can't believe they haven't had you on there.
I actually have a funny story about Kevin Sorbo.
No.
Just recently I was on the CSUN campus, Cal State University Northridge, and I had to do a bunch of paperwork because I'm teaching a class there, right?
And as I was like walking through campus, I'm in a hurry.
It's hot as hell because it's a San Fernando Valley.
I just don't want to talk to anyone.
I want to get my work done and get the hell out of there, right?
I get approached by these two dudes.
And they're like, excuse me, excuse me.
And I was like, all right, let me just be nice and see what they want, right?
Why did you have to justify that?
Could have just said, and I stopped and turned to them and they said, And the first thing they say is, we work at the church right on camp.
And then I stopped them immediately because I'm out of time.
I gotta go.
And I was like, oh, I'm atheist.
Oh, I'm atheist.
And they were like.
What?
And I was like, I'm atheist.
You know, like Presbyterian or Catholic.
I'm not an atheist because it's some kind of movement that I'm going to build an identity around.
And they're like, why?
And it looked like they were so appalled.
If they were Christian proselytes, they probably were appalled.
They have the same reaction you'd have if people assumed you were, I don't know, anti-abortion and anti-gay marriage.
It would go against everything that you base your worldview on.
That this, like, pleasant-looking woman who might, you know, who would probably be, like, God's number one fan, has had the audacity to be an atheist, yes.
The audacity to be an atheist, and they think you have cloven hooves.
I don't actually think they were as judgmental as you from your own description of them.
They seem quite naive and sheltered, actually.
They don't seem to be excessively judgmental and thinking you're the child of the devil.
I think you're projecting onto them.
And so I was like, I gotta go.
And I walked away, but they were just totally befuddled by what I had just told them.
See?
This seems like they lived in a very sheltered, cloistered community, didn't really have any experience meeting people who didn't believe in God.
And then the idea that one might not believe in God was a real shock to them from your description.
I believe that.
I totally believe that.
That's the thing.
And it's not personal because I don't know if I'm an atheist, which I guess technically makes me agnostic.
You know, if you're an atheist, whatever.
But when he talks about angry atheists, who's angrier than religious zealots?
Yeah.
Not the people.
Yeah, totally.
Yeah, no, absolutely.
Uh...
Hmm.
Oh, what?
What?
Oh, Muslims?
I don't know.
When you have evangelicals going to Uganda and pushing for legislation that would literally murder people for homosexual acts, the legislation isn't going to literally murder them, Anna.
The people carrying out the legislation are.
That sounds pretty freaking angry to me.
I don't know.
Crusades.
Those are some angry Christians.
Yeah, they were myth.
Yeah, maybe it was something to do with the Muslims conquering Spain and Jerusalem.
And the angry atheist is not a real thing.
Oh, I mean, if you just declare it, then it must be so.
And Kevin Sorbo is not a real thing.
Whoever he is is totally full of shit.
Jesus, you're such a fucking simpleton.
He has seen atheists on TV.
He perceives them to be angry.
This is his experience with atheism.
You're literally in no position to say that anyone's full of shit, mate.
But it's not like you have somebody here who knows a lot about movies, so I'm sure I'm just missing something.
We have Sorbo audio.
Oh, goody.
All right, let's go to that.
The atheists that are, you know, such a small group of people in our country, but so well organized, and they get on TV all the time on Fox and CNN, and they rant and they rave.
And I pretty much based a character off of these guys that I see just, you know, angry, filled with just hatred and anger.
And, you know, on one hand, I feel sorry for him, but on the other hand, I kind of laugh at him.
I'm going, why would anybody spend so much time ranting and raving about something that they don't believe in?
See, he's an idiot, but he's not a dick.
He just doesn't understand.
I think I might have been wrong about how he wasn't complaining about the number of them being on CNN.
It does kind of seem that he was here.
You know, I go back to all these, you know, these past decades that you mentioned about with us chipping away at religion and how it's, you know, brought the country down.
We're not the same country we used to be, and we're not looked upon the same way we used to be.
And that's sad to me.
This is not the country that our founding fathers created.
I think they're turning over in their graves right now as we speak.
Well, that's probably true.
I know these guys must believe in something.
Otherwise, they wouldn't get so angry about it.
And they don't like the fact that there's a higher power out there that's judging how they live their lives.
I think they believe in their ideology.
I think it's progressiveness and feminism and social justice and all this sort of thing.
That's their new God.
That's what I think it is.
Sorbo telling us what our country was founded on, right?
Like something like separation of church and state, right?
Which is something you heard sometimes, somewhere, and it sounds like it might be applicable now.
I mean, he...
Religious freedom.
Religious freedom.
When did he argue against religious freedom?
Exactly, and also, he seems like he's getting really angry about something that he doesn't believe in, right?
No, he believes atheism exists.
He's just not an atheist.
What you're doing is trying to use his own argument against him because it sounded good and you failed to rebut it.
It seems like he's getting really angry about atheism.
Yeah, there's no organized atheist movement.
Sure, there is.
Speak to Anna.
She's atheist and not simply an atheist.
It's not organized.
You know why?
Because it couldn't be.
It just doesn't, like, it doesn't happen.
There's no, there aren't, uh, there aren't angry atheists on CNN and Fox all the time, although Fox presumably finds them and put them on.
Atheism sure got a good propaganda network considering it's not organized.
If you didn't even know who Kevin Sorbo was, I don't think you've done the research into Fox's scheduling and found out what atheists they have had on.
He, by the way, of course, feels that because he didn't vote for Obama and there's negativity.
I'm reading a story about him from 2012.
There's a negativity toward Christians in Hollywood and a negativity toward people who believe in God.
Does he think that that's the case because he personally didn't vote for Obama because that's what you just said, you moron?
And that's why Kevin Sorbo doesn't work more.
Sorry, did you say doesn't work more?
Do you think you're in a position to be making snide remarks?
But since you evidently can't be bothered to actually read the Wikipedia article on him, I'll do it for you.
Kevin Sorbo started acting in films in 1992, then in 1994, then in 1995 to 1999 on Hercules, then 97 and 98, and 2000 to 2005 on Andromeda, and then 2007 on five different projects, then 2008 on four different projects, 2009 on seven different projects, 2010 on three different projects, 2011 on two different projects,
2012 on two different projects, 2013 on two different projects, 2014 on three different projects.
That's not bad for someone who is now 55, is it?
That's why it must be.
For any other reason.
Whatever other reason you think it is, you fucking dipshit, it's not because he has worked very, very hard and consistently on his projects.
Yeah, they're like family-focused films.
They're not my sort of thing.
He's a bit wholesome and clean-cut for me, but I've got nothing against Kevin Sorbo, and I don't think his opinions are particularly inflammatory or offensive.
And I am an atheist.
I don't believe in God, and I still don't think that what he said is particularly inflammatory or hateful.
I think you fuckers have disappeared right up your own asses, and you have no idea that you've disappeared up your own asses.
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