Tag Archives: haiti

Missionaries in Haiti get off with time served

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Remember a few months ago, when people still cared about the plight of Haiti (you know, before the world lost interest and turned their attention to something else), and a group of missionaries were facing charges of child kidnapping? Well, it looks like despite breaking the law, they’ve been sentenced to time served (which amounts to roughly 3 months and 8 days), and they’ve been released.

Despite strong evidence she knew the children she took all had at least one parent, and despite repeated warnings she received concerning the legality of what she was about to do, it seems as though the fact that she was motivated by religious charity has somehow absolved her and her group of this serious crime. Personally, I think they should have spent a lot more time in jail for it, but I’m sure the country just wants to move on and put this whole thing behind them (they are also probably still busy trying to rebuilt their shattered capital).

In a predictable fashion, Laura Silsby, the “brains” of the group praised God for the ruling. Was this the same God who commanded you to go down to a foreign country and kidnap children to whisk them away to “white people land” to save them from the evils of Haiti (who according to Pat Robertson made a pact with the devil)?

You have to wonder what kind of message the Haitian government sent with this weaksauce ruling. For a country which has a serious problem with children being kidnapped and sold into sexual slavery, this doesn’t make them look very strong on the issue of child endangerment. You also have to wonder: if the people who had done this weren’t religious missionaries, would the court have been so lenient?

Baptist group gets busted for child trafficking

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A group of 10 missionaries with little experience and few braincells have been arrested in Haiti for suspected child trafficking after they attempted to sneak 33 kids out of the country. The 5 women and 5 men are members of a small Baptist church in Idaho, and claim they were merely trying to help these poor kids find new homes and new parents. The problem with their plan is not only did they have no documentation; a significant portion of the children they were attempting to sneak to the Dominican Republic were not actually orphans.

This whole business has caused a huge stir, and the government is worried more children might be taken away from their homes and loved ones and sold as sex workers (it was already a problem BEFORE the earthquake). The president has declared  he must personally approve every adoption to avoid any more potential child trafficking while the dust settles.

Now I’m going to give these idiots the benefit of the doubt; I’m sure they thought they were rescuing the children from a life of both poverty, and more specifically, evil voodoo magic. Unfortunately, since so many aid services are run by similarly well meaning religionists with brains two sizes too small, many locals are distraught that the priority is often on conversion, and not actual welfare of Haitians.

“There are many who come here with religious ideas that belong more in the time of the Inquisition,” said Max Beauvoir, head of Haiti’s Voodoo Priests Association, which represents thousands of priests and priestesses. “These types of people believe they need to save our souls and our bodies from ourselves. We need compassion, not proselytizing now, and we need aid — not just aid going to people of the Christian faith.”

The government hasn’t decided if they are going to prosecute these morons, but this whole affair could have some serious consequences for other religious groups hoping to offer aid. I would put it plainly: we’ll take your money, but you can keep your fucking religion to yourself.

Scientologists arrive in Haiti

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Looks like John Travolta is a man of his word; a few days ago he spoke about flying a bunch of his weirdos in yellow shirts to this devastated country, and a news report has surfaced stating a “private donor” has sent 80 volunteers (along with 50 real doctors) down there.

The problem right now is the huge influx of volunteers in the country has actually slowed down aid relief. Some are just showing up without a plan, and simply end up having to leech off aid that would otherwise be going to Haitians. They need money, not volunteers (especially not the proselytizing kind).

Right now the only thing they’ve done is gone around “touching” people, claiming this has healing properties. This bullshit practice is so ludicrously stupid, I’ll have to let one of their zombies describe it for me:

“We’re trained as volunteer ministers, we use a process called ‘assist’ to follow the nervous system to reconnect the main points, to bring back communication,” she said.

“When you get a sudden shock to a part of your body the energy gets stuck, so we re-establish communication within the body by touching people through their clothes, and asking people to feel the touch.”

You know, Haiti is one of the poorest countries in the world; the last thing they need is a “religion” that charges exorbitant amount of monies to become “clear” of thetans. The 400,000 it costs to send these clowns there could have been better spent on food and water, honestly. When are people going to learn that sometimes, the best way to help is to get the fuck out of the way?

Who needs food and medicine when you have “The Proclaimer”?

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Haiti is still suffering  from the aftermath of a devastating earthquake, and by all reports, there still isn’t enough food, water, and medicine to go around. Luckily, an organization called “Faith Comes By Hearing” has a solution for these desperate people; they are sending them 600 audio Bibles. The Proclaimer, as it’s called, is a solar powered / crank operated device that can blast out 15 hours of the New Testament for everyone to hear.

Peoples’ houses are crumbled, their families are shattered and they are living in ruins. Haitians will need that long-term hope and comfort that comes from knowing God has not forgotten them through this tragedy,” said Wilke

If you feel sick to your stomach from the fact that this organization is effectively using this tragedy to proselytize their stupid religion, you aren’t the only one. Aid delivery is by all accounts painfully slow, so these morons are taking up people’s valuable time delivering radios to people who need blankets, food and medicine rather than “the good word”.

There will be plenty of time for them to try and convince a population devastated by continual earthquakes that an invisible deity did this for some fucking reason (“He” works in some pretty mysterious ways, don’t you know), but now is not the fucking time. Stay the hell out of the way and let organizations that are actually helping people do their jobs properly. If you still think they need your stupid radios, this quote might help you gain some perspective on the situation down there:

“We were forced to buy a saw in the market to continue amputations,” the group’s Loris de Filippi told the Reuters news agency in Cite Soleil.

Does your fucking radio play loud enough to drown out the sound of screaming?

More religious scumbags think Haiti is full of evil

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It’s not enough religious wackos like Pat Robertson claim Haiti is suffering because the country made a pact with the devil; now other morons are coming out and saying similarly insensitive and terrible shit. The latest scumbag is Dr. Wesley Stafford, who had this to say:

Haiti … has been a disaster in almost every way long before this ever struck. And it is a nation, between you and me, I guess, that Satan has had absolutely free reign in that nation. And while the missionary effort and the church effort has been enormous, this is a nation that you can literally feel the evil in it. But then as the church lives out its faith, having come through this deep, deep valley, my great prayer is that there will be a great wave of healing and change in the nation of Haiti … that could only come about through an interruption like this and only happen through the glory of God.

Here’s the thing: Stafford’s organization is apparently on the up and up (receiving a high rating by an independent charity watchdog), and beyond teaching kids their idiotic beliefs, they seem to do good work. That doesn’t mean, however, he can say such hateful shit without consequence. He’s blaming Haitians for being so poor, suggesting the reason that country lost 200,000 people in a tragic natural disaster is because God is punishing them in some way.

This is what I detest about American Christians; they equate prosperity as God’s way of rewarding good people. They can’t seem to fathom that there may be far more complicated geopolitical reasons for poverty; mainly, their own country supported terrible dictatorships that only exacerbated the poverty and desperation of Haiti. Sure, his organization helps desperate people in the third world, but this could also be done without his smug hubris that these same impoverished nations are cursed by his sky deity for not “following the Lord’s words properly”. I feel embarrassed for the human race when such ignorance is so rampant.

Pat Robertson is insane

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I guess once you surrender your mind to the corrosive influence of religion, your grip with sanity is bound to slip eventually. How else can you explain his insane comment that Haiti signed a pact with the devil to gain their independence from the white man? Does he believe everything the little voice in his head tells him? Pat, you need to take medicine for the kind of mental illness you’re obviously suffering from.

I have to wonder if perhaps he’s not being influenced by some kind of deep seated racism. Does he consider Haiti’s independence a bad thing? Would he have preferred they remain a fiat state and the population be subject to the despotic rule of the French? Right now this small poor country is suffering, and all he can do is blame the devil. Does this moron even understand why earthquakes happen? It’s not because an invisible man in the sky gets angry every once in a while. That’s what our primitive and uneducated ancestors used to believe. Now we all know better, except of course for old dinosaurs who don’t have the common decency to die.