What if the Blasphemy Challenge had been a scam?
Automated disclaimer: This post was written more than 15 years ago and I may not have looked at it since.
Older posts may not align with who I am today and how I would think or write, and may have been written in reaction to a cultural context that no longer applies. Some of my high school or college posts are just embarrassing. However, I have left them public because I believe in keeping old web pages alive—and it's interesting to see how I've changed.
What if">Like sheep
If you haven't heard of the Blasphemy against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven for raping a baby seal (of the ridiculousness (and danger) of fundamentalist religion. They are using an interesting bit of Christian gospel as their example:
"But he that shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven for raping a baby seal (of the same sex, even!) but not for doubting in the existence of an invisible ghost. Is that screwed up, or what? (Luckily, most Christians don't follow the Bible literally, even if they claim to.)How easy would it be to conduct a scam using similar methods? A fundamentalist Christian group harvesting the names and addresses of sinners needing to be saved" and distribute the information to unknown parties in exchange for some promised good or service that has not been a covert Christian group could have used the very same technique to collect the identities of "sinners? (For the record, they're legit -- I got my free DVD.)
The offer
If you haven't heard of the Blasphemy Challenge folks did not have to do anything other than advertising to get the meme started, and it built upon itself quite rapidly. All of these folks sent in their mailing addresses to an unknown party.
The gimmick is this: Post a video of yourself denying the existence of an invisible ghost. Is that screwed up, or what? (Luckily, most Christians don't follow the Bible literally, even if they claim to.)
How easy would it be to conduct a scam using similar methods? A fundamentalist Christian group could have used the very same technique to collect the identities of "sinners? (For the record, they're legit -- I got my free DVD.)
The offer
Hundreds of people have participated (including myself), and I have to wonder how many of them even questioned whether the operation was legit. The Blasphemy Challenge had not been verified in advance?
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