I'm sure you've heard about this:
Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) says she wouldn't be afraid to torture terrorists if she were president.The idea that waterboarding is like baptism is not original to Palin, or even to her speechwriters. The only question is where Team Palin got the comparison.
"C'mon! Enemies who would utterly annihilate America, they would obviously have information on plots. They carry out jihad. Oh, but you can’t offend them. Can’t make them feel uncomfortable, not even a smidgen," Palin said on Saturday during a speech at the National Rifle Association's "Stand And Fight" rally. "Well, if I were in charge, they would know that waterboarding is how we baptize terrorists."
I suppose it's conceivable that they know this history:
In his 2008 article "Torture and Religious Practice," William Schweiker traces the Christian roots of waterboarding, which was used, for example, during the Spanish Inquisition and in the persecution of Anabaptists during the Protestant Reformation. Schweiker argues that waterboarding is religious violence not only due to its pedigree, but because it carries a particularly religious meaning: that it functioned as a kind of baptism.Alternately, Palin or one of her writers might have stumbled across this last year:
Since the Anabapists rejected infant baptism in favor of adult baptism, to take one example, King Ferdinand declared drowning a "Third Baptism,” and an appropriate response to their heretical practices. Schweiker writes that waterboarding-as-baptism was presented as a way to "save" the person being tortured by delivering the accused from his or her sins. Torture became punishment for sins, and punishment became an act of mercy and salvation.
WATERBOARDING : Baptism For Terrorists! #NoIslam #NoShariaLaw #StopMuslimImmigration pic.twitter.com/j5lxHM3bMC
— Sgt. Rock's Scowl (@CaterW) April 28, 2013See also this Tumblr post, this Pinterest post, this post at MemeCollection.net, this post (from "American Pride Eagle") at MemeGenerator.net, et cetera. All of them include the same graphic; all are from sometime last year. (The Religion Dispatches post quoted above is from 2010.)
Hmmm ... which of these is more likely to be Palin's source?
Thinking, thinking...
What a sick and twisted POS Sarah "The Whore of Babblin'-on" Palin is.
ReplyDeleteEither that, or she's the most talented Performance Artist in history.
Nah, she's a sick and twisted POS!!!
I'm sure Palin has no idea where the phrase came from. I'm equally sure she loved the phrase when she picked up the speech from the writer.
ReplyDeleteShe is a very sad,irrelevant character.
Really? You don't think she's like every other right-wing idiot in America, forwarding and liking all this crap? Like the people in Scott Walker's office chuckling over the racist e-mail forwards? I think Palin spends a disproportionate amount of her week on Facebook pages with pictures of tear-streaked eagles standing in front of the burning Twin Towers.
ReplyDeleteI think she does spend all her time on Facebook and Twitter. On the other hand, I'm not sure she reads anything that doesn't mention her by name.
ReplyDeleteJoking. Sort of.
And by the way, how is it possible that "Sergeant Rock's Scowl" isn't a parody account? It really should be.
It dates to The Inquisition, pea, and the forced baptism of heretics and protest-ants (those who refused the Church's birth baptisms).
ReplyDeleteYou really didn't think the dumb broad would come up with something new, did you?
No fear. Don't give a shit.
I'm guessing truck stop restroom.
ReplyDeleteIt's very entertaining that Palin has got a lot of Christian conservatives accusing her of sacrilege by mocking the sacred rite of baptism. That's what happens when your whole schtick is to mock and offend people - sometimes the people offended aren't the ones you expected.
ReplyDeleteIf only someone would baptize Palin that way....
ReplyDelete