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Since the number of Mormons in my country is quite small, their role of annoying people in the morning has been taken over by the Jehova’s Witnesses. So I enjoyed this video tremendously!
Though being an Atheist myself, I wouldn’t do this to other people, since I do feel that “do onto others..” is a valid guide to life.
Hilarious! This is why I have a sign on my front door informing the religious to bugger off and shut the gate behind them.
Anyone who disturbs the weekend sleep-in deserves nothing less than termination with extreme prejudice!
Haha.. I loved this. We don’t get many around here. I almost wish we did. I’d do a Bernard Black and invite them in for a debate :D
can’t watch this at work but “evangelical” atheists annoy me as much as evangelical christians do
The term ‘evangelical atheist’ annoys me a hell of a lot. There’s a massive ingrained taboo atheism. That atheists should sit quietly in the corner and not tell anybody what they think… which bleeds over into every atheist who dares to write a book or give a lecture being labelled an ‘evangelical atheist’. Why shouldn’t we tell the world what a crap idea we think religion is?
yeah, which is kinda the point of the video.
Atheists are like Rodney Dangerfield…
They get no respect.
When i was a kid i noticed that most people
follow the religion they grew up in
There are only a handful of Hindu in the USA
and a handful of Christians in Iran.
I thought for sure this glaring inconsistency would make people realize that they dont look at things in a rational way… Eventually… but i thought by now, most people would be atheists.
it certainly isnt happening as fast as i thought it would
but,
atheism is on the rise
and its scaring the shit out of the zealots.
taboo against atheism rather.
Fine. Tell the world. But it will annoy some people, and they might disparage you.
Religion is an intellectual plague, it is a root cause of wars, intolerance, death, and its proponents brainwash children. Best be careful not to speak up too loud against it… wouldn’t wanna annoy anyone.
There are very, very few evangelical atheists, and certainly so in comparison to the evangelical Christians. That’s why this video is so funny, and why it works as satire: because atheists do not do this.
Neither do Mormons. I’ve had Mormons come to my door, and none of them have been as aggressively rude as this guy. To a one, they’ve taken my disinterest graciously and then left me in peace.
Let’s be honest here: he was looking to pick fights with these people to get good footage. In fact, from the looks of it many of them did give him a fair and polite listen, and it wasn’t until he started talking over them that they got angry.
Exactly as MaryAnn said. Atheists don’t DO this. That’s the whole joke. The fellow in the video is just trying to make a point.
I can’t say I’ve ever had one knock on my door on a Sat. Morning, but we do get them trolling the neighborhood sometimes.
Nonsense! This guy was perfectly civil to everyone he talked to, right up until they slammed the door in his face… I think you’re taking his attitude from the earlier bit and projecting it onto his conversations with the people he visited.
They were every bit as upset about being disturbed on a Saturday morning as he claimed to be, which is the point of the video. Why is “we believe there is no god” ruder than “we believe in jesus christ and joseph smith”? This is the ridiculous dichotomy that atheists really need to start fighting a little more aggressively. And I don’t mean by being rude, but it’s time to speak up; somebody’s gotta save those kids… give them a fighting chance at a life that isn’t all meaningless ritual and perpetual fear-mongering.
not even getting a picture at work can’t tell if it’s funny or not
but anyone trying to shove their beliefs down other people’s throats does my head in
I met people who are militantly atheist and they are just as boring and self-obssessed as their christian counterparts
@Newbs:
What dichotomy? Mormons get doors slammed in their faces athiests get doors slammed in their faces.
Religion is just so pervasive, this did make me laugh. Why do the religious think it’s so perfectly all right to wander around foisting their opinions on everyone?
I’ve been told by the born agains more than once I’m going to hell ’cause I reject God by being an atheist. Of course, I don’t believe in hell so it’s not a particular concern of mine, but I do get breathtaken by the arrogance of these people condemning me to hell (it doesn’t matter whether it exists or not, they believe in it and that I’m going there, despite knowing nothing more about me than a polite ‘No thank you, I don’t belive in God’ when they knock on my door).
I’m completely and passionately atheist, I have no religious belief whatsover or any believe in any kind of God, but I don’t in general go around castigating believers the way they seem to think they can castigate me. It’s not something I even bring up unless invited as it tends to cause too much tension. I’d never religion at work, for example, yet I had a colleague who continually tried to get me to go to Church with him.
I’ve been noticing religion cropping up more and more in my TV viewing, reading and film watching and it’s beginning to get on my nerves. Supernatural has started mentioning God and faith far too much for comfort; even BSG turned Kara Thrace into an angel (and despite how much I love BSG I’m not entirely forgiving them for that – fantastic strong well written physical female character, and ooops, now she’s an angel. Gah).
There absolutely is a dichotomy. Newbs is completely correct.
When an atheist does this, the reaction from ‘good honest church going folk’ is outrage. How DARE they push their atheistic viewpoint.
For fuck sake.. an old guy physically assaulted him in that video, are you not seeing this?
The attitude to religious people doing exactly the same thing in the street and at your front door is much more relaxed. it is seen as entirely normal. This is the dichotomy, and it’s utterly appalling. We do need to make our point, because our society is still unfairly influenced by religious values and prejudices.
Door-to-door evangelizers meet with lots of abuse and outrage. I don’t treat them that way, but they do get doors slammed in their faces and cursed at plenty.
Anyone pushing a POV to people that don’t want to hear it will meet with pushback, and it can be rude and even violent. That’s true if you’re an evangelist, a civil rights activist, a pro-democracy demonstrator, an antiwar rallyer, or whatever.
If you believe it’s time for athiests to make their point, then do so, but don’t expect better treatment than others who push an unpopular or controversial POV. You expect it should be different for outspoken athiests, and there’s the dichotomy. Have you been spit on, or sprayed with firehoses, or teargassed, or crucified, or assassinated? If not, try harder.
Oh of course atheists have been brutalised and murdered for their beliefs. We’re vilified across the world. We’re apparently the least trusted minority in the United States… and while you have a point about unpopular points of view, the point we were making is that the reaction to atheists is worse.
“..the reaction to atheists is worse.”
In the U.S., at this time in history, that may be true. Go back to the 1960’s, though…
I dunno know about “vilified across the world,” at least not more than any other group.
In China, your beliefs would fit right in, and outspoken Christians are in hiding or in jail.
People who wear their christianity on their sleeves are usually the worst kind of hypocrites. Look at the Pharisees.
I’m an agnostic – I don’t foist my beliefs on anyone!
Rev. M.L. King, Jr. wore his Christianity on his sleeve…
Might be more accurate to say that people who aggressively promote their faith, to the contradiction or exclusion of actually practicing it, are – by definition – hypocrites.
Like hell! 3:17 – 3:22 the lady clearly states that she is not interested and he goes right on talking.
4:35 – 4:45 same thing.
4:24 – 4:30 “Just imagine if you’re wasting your entire life going to church and it all adds up to nothing.”
4:48 -4:55 he shouts through the door.
I’ve never had a Mormon do any of that to me.
This is what I mean by dichotomy. Those who get doors slammed in their faces are in turn slamming their doors in the faces of others. It’s just funny. I’m sure there were plenty of houses where the owners were very polite, just like there are people who endure the mormons (and all door-to-door salesmen) with longsuffering patience.
Christians are just like everybody else, they want to be left alone when they’re at home. The only problem is they spend so much time trying to fuck with other people. Hence, the dichotomy. Or hypocrisy if you prefer. And, as such, I should have every reason to expect a salesman (such as the mormon teenagers or girl scouts or whomever) to show me some fucking courtesy because they know what it is to have the door slammed in their faces. This is a central tenet of Christianity, if you can believe it. In practice things go far differently than they do in church on Sunday morning.
As the gentleman in the video says, people can do whatever they want to themselves and each other, just don’t come banging on my door on Saturday morning! I don’t want you to save my soul. There’s not even any such thing as a soul, or a god, or a hell, so why the frak do I need to interrupt my corn flakes and coffee with your insecure fear-induced bullshit mission?
Just take your bike helmet and go!
:D
But that’s not “dichotomy,” that’s “consistency”…
…but now I digress into semantic hairsplitting.
Who’s “they,” anyway? If all or even most Christians were out knocking on doors you’d never get a moment’s peace and there’d be a line from curb to door at everyone’s house.
Stereotyping, a bit?
Are you sure about that? Dr. King very rarely mentioned Jesus Christ in his speeches; he used a generic “God” to inspire social change, but I challenge you to find some place where he preached about Christ as the Son of God, his crucifixion, or eternal salvation through him. He used religion to meet a secular end.
Here’s a fascinating (and well-researched) article about the subject: http://www.jesus-is-lord.com/king.htm (from a disappointed and slightly outraged Christian perspective).
MLK might’ve worn his religiosity (or a form of it) on his sleeve, but it wasn’t classic Christianity. And if and where it came close to Christianity, it most certainly wasn’t evangelical. Christopher Hitchen’s marvelous book “God is Not Great” has some excellent passages about Dr. King (and Ghandi too); it’s a great read and I highly recommend it to anyone with even the slightest interest in religious discussion.
(PS I love talking about this stuff so I hope nobody is offended or whatever, just engaging in spirited discussion)
:D
Dr. King was an ordained and active Baptist minister throughout his political activism, and that was common knowledge. His speeches were loaded with Biblical allusions and metaphor. “Wearing ones religion on one’s sleeve” does not, to me, necessarily require one to be continuously verbally prosyletizing. He knew the difference between a sermon and a political speech, but that doesn’t mean he set aside his religion for the latter.
As for using religion to meet a secular end, that’s what all Christians who work in the system to change the world are supposed to be doing, and they don’t have to do it by preaching at people.
I don’t know what you mean by “classic Christianity.” Would you include Mormonism, which to this point you have used interchangeably with Christianity? Surely there’s room under that broad umbrella for a Baptist minister?
And had no problem working with those who believed differently to achieve his goals. One of the key organizations behind the March on Washington was the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights (the biggest civil rights lobbying group in the US today), which was founded by A. Philip Randolph–a secular humanist who signed the Humanist Manifesto which said “No deity will save us; we must save ourselves.”
More about Randolph, and King’s humanist influences, here.
Not sure that’s relevant to this discussion but I thought it was interesting. ;-)
I’ve read God is Not Great, and I would also heartily recommend it. I heard somebody call it “Hitchin’s ‘God is Not Great, I Am” the other day on the radio… but I rather doubt he’d read it, since there’s nothing self promoting about it.
Frizzy… yes, villified across the world. As I said, least trusted minority in the United States… we basically exist outside of normal society in Africa and South America… and I have seen Iranian cartoons which portray the Jews as atheists because in the eyes of the fundamentalist Muslim, atheists are actually WORSE than Jews.
It’s really only in parts of northern Europe than atheism is considered particularly acceptable.
Oh, bullshit. You have a valid point. Don’t undermine it with specious claims. And don’t even suggest your plight is as bad as that of Jews in Iran.
Just responding to what you wrote. If that’s not what you meant, choose your words better next time :P
I find it interesting that you can state so authoritatively what Dr. King “knew” or didn’t know. You can talk about what he said, or what he did. You can quote him. But how can you be so confident in his own inner thoughts? He could’ve been a practicing Satanist in his private life, sacrificing baby goats and doing voodoo in his bathtub, for all you know.
But all of this is beside the point… it’s probably best not to hold up any one person as a signatory for an entire religion. They often don’t hold up to the scrutiny. As far as the Atheist who Knocks on Doors, I’ll say this: he has every right in the world to expect to be treated with kindness and respect, regardless of his beliefs, and regardless of his crazy antics. Nobody should ever have a door slammed in their face, or be smacked by some old dude, just for saying something about their personal beliefs, even if it’s unsolicited.
Huh? I’m saying that “religious” isn’t equivalent to “continuously prosyletizing?” In other words, it’s possible for Dr. King – or anyone – to give a secular speech without forfeiting his religion. You disagree? It’s not possible to be outwardly religious without ongoing preaching? An interesting premise. Please explain.
I’m not. I’m stating the fact that he was an ordained and practising Baptist minister, and that he used religious allusions in his speeches. These are established and incontrovertable facts, upon which I base my straightforwardly derived conclusion. I assume nothing. You made the assumption that he wasn’t a “classical Christian,” a statement I said I found puzzling, and upon which I requested you elaborate. It is you, sir, that are speculating on King’s religious beliefs.
I fully agree. That means, then, you shouldn’t hold up Mormons knocking on your door as signatory for all Christians. Agreed?
When you go tell others your beliefs, especially on their property uninvited, you will meet with some who will respond rudely, particulary if you deliberately provoke them for effect after they’ve made it clear they’re not interested in listening, as the guy in the video does. It ought not be that way, but that is the way it is. To expect otherwise is beyond naive.
I’m reading all this, and all I can think of a story a friend told me. When he was too young to know better, some missionaries knocked on their door and he answered it with a Doberman at his side.
Missionary: What a lovely dog. What’s his name?
Little Boy: Satan.
And they left.
Oh, and the guy spent half his video talking to the camera. The man needed an editor.
I don’t like being the recipient of unsolicited religious propaganda either and yet when I look back over all the annoying neighbors I’ve had to deal with in the past, I’d rather put up with the annoying Mormon who knocks on my door at eight a.m. than the annoying secular idiot who plays his car radio full-blast outside my bedroom window at 2 a.m.
And in a world in which Christians are still being imprisoned for their religious beliefs in various countries that are officially atheist, I find it sadly amusing that atheists in this country kvetch about the fact that people continually say bad things about them at the same time they’re describing almost every one who holds a different religious philosophy from themselves as being stupid, ignorant or evil. Heh. Irony.
Geez, you really think there aren’t people out there who also diss Jews and Catholics? And do you really think all those disses are really all that accurate? And aren’t the accuracy of such disses kinda besides the point?
How does that old saying go?
Oh, yes.
Tonio: How do you know the 2 a.m. idiot is secular? Is he playing the audio book of The God Delusion? :-)
This brings to mind a comment I read recently on Jerry Coyne’s site, which argued:
Sam Harris in The End of Faith and Timothy Ferris in The Science of Liberty make similar points.
Food for thought (as I often find myself saying).
@Bitchin Frizzy what I said was…
“and I have seen Iranian cartoons which portray the Jews as atheists because in the eyes of the fundamentalist Muslim, atheists are actually WORSE than Jews. ”
Perhaps I should explain that in a little more detail?
In the Iranian cartoon, there had supposedly been a massacre of muslims in a village by an “evil and atheistic Israeli colonel”
The way I interpreted it was that, from the cartoon’s perspective, calling a Jew an atheist dehumanizes and villifies him more than just calling him a Jew. By extension… this implies that the only thing the script writer respects LESS than a Jew, is an actual atheist.
What the hell is this about?
“And don’t even suggest your plight is as bad as that of Jews in Iran.”
When did I do that?
And I am standing by what I said. It is really only in parts of Northern Europe where being an atheist is considered particularly acceptable. Everywhere else you might be one, there is at least an air of disapproval… the “How can you not believe in God?” The “What’s wrong with you?” situation.
Kenny, bitchen frizzy–Here’s a useful overview:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discrimination_against_atheists
This might also be of interest.
http://gretachristina.typepad.com/greta_christinas_weblog/2008/12/how-to-be-an-ally-with-atheists.html
An excerpt:
The whole thing is worth reading IMO.
Dudes, once again, I totally get it: athiests in America are outside the mainstream and sometimes meet with the treatment the mainstream often gives those who are different. But a little perspective doesn’t hurt, eh? Do athiests get pulled over for Driving While Athiest? Do they often get the crap beaten out of them by athiestphobes? Have they ever been required to sit in the back of the bus, or been turned away from a business that had a sign saying “No dogs or athiests”? And what the heck do Iranian cartoonists have to do with how athiests are treated in the U.S.?
Bluejay, your article is relevant to the U.S., but Kenny is taking this worldwide; and, hell yes, there are still places in the world where Christians are thrown to the lions, so to speak. And, I’m sorry, but the reference to how Jews are treated in Iran really set me off. In Iran, Jews are treated with all kinds of discrimination on a level that he won’t ever face in Europe or America, and all Kenny can see is how the cartoon applies to him as an athiest. It’s the Jews in Iran that the cartoonist is hating on. It’s not all about you, Kenny.
Sure, lots of people are too ignorant or intellectually lazy to make the distinction between ideological athiesm characteristic of communism, and intellectual athiesm of the West. Got it. But, then again, a lot of athiests – including some right here on this thread – are too lazy to bother with distinctions between Christians that knock on your door and those that don’t, or between Mormons and Baptists. Yeah, yeah, religion is religion, they’re all equally bad, can’t be bothered to learn the differences, yada yada; but it comes back at you. Do unto others and all that.
1. He isn’t playing religious music such as gospel, Christian rock, etc.
2. He chooses to play songs very loudly that are in a genre most religious people often either avoid listening to or overtly criticize.
3. He chooses to play songs with the type of profane language that isn’t much heard in the religious music I’m familiar with.
Then again, an idiot is an idiot is an idiot is an idiot. As far as I’m concerned, the guy could be playing excerpts from Handel’s Messiah at that time of the morning and he would still be an idiot.
I have no problems with the intellectual atheism of the West. My late father used to be an atheist and so for a long while was my middle brother. To this day, my middle brother will give impromptu sermons on the evils of organized religion which make even MaryAnn seem kinda soft-spoken on the subject.
What I have issues with is the mentality that any one group–including my own–is exempt from the vices of human nature and that any one group would somehow be automatically immune from succumbing to said vices if it ever took power. It’s not that simple and it never was.
Apart from that, what Bitchen Frizzy said.
As a Hispanic Catholic whose Mexican-born father–a former migrant worker, btw–once lost a job because he refused to pass for Anglo or Italian, I’m sure glad I’m part of the privileged class. ;-)
Intersectionality, everyone. Please remember to mind the gap.
And women and minorities who were once outside the mainstream sure didn’t gain acceptance and equality by being quiet about it.
No, but a black man can be elected President (as long as he professes some kind of [Christian] faith). Openly admitting one’s atheism effectively kills or severely diminishes one’s chances of holding public office in the US. And probably cuts you off from other social or career opportunities as well, depending on the attitudes of the people in your town.
Look, no one is saying that atheists have it worse than any other oppressed minority ever, but that doesn’t diminish the validity of our complaints. Just as you can’t trivialize the grievances of LGBT folks by saying that, hey, at least they were never kidnapped from their homelands and made to endure centuries of slavery.
Kenny is pointing out that atheists are discriminated against around the world. And why not? Read the Wiki article again; it’s true. Ask Salman Rushdie and Ayaan Hirsi Ali.
Come on, this isn’t fair. That wasn’t “all” Kenny could see; he wasn’t dismissing Iranian discrimination against Jews; he just saw an extra layer of meaning that was relevant to atheists, and commented on it. He wasn’t comparing the actual treatment of atheists to the actual treatment of Jews in Iran, but was, rather, commenting on statements made by the Iranian media that suggested that Iranians harbor intensely negative feelings about atheists as well. This is actually in keeping with the fact that people tend to use “atheist” as a pejorative, to make a group of people seem extra-nasty; there are people who still claim, incredibly, that the Nazis were atheist. Far from it.
If any atheists out themselves in Iran, then maybe we can see how they’re treated, and compare. (At the moment, according to the Wiki, they have no recognized status, and must declare themselves to be some faith or other “in order to claim some legal rights, including applying for entrance to university.”)
I certainly don’t agree with this. I think everyone, including atheists, should be as religiously literate as they possibly can. It’s just too important a cultural force in the world to ignore or have misconceptions about…and the same is true of atheism.
Touché, Tonio. To be fair to Greta Christina, she clarifies that statement about religion and privilege:
This attitude should, ideally, go both ways. Not that I’m always perfect about observing it myself. :-)
Why is that? What should be done about it?
I already said that Kenny has a valid point. I don’t think Iran is a very useful example. First, we’re not in Iran. Second, everybody is treated like crap in Iran.
Grrr. One missing tag. I’d edit it if I could. Sorry.
Look, the Dr. Kings, Ghandis, and Harvey Milks of the world didn’t change things by becoming what they beheld.
Spewing indiscriminate bile and hate at all religion… well, that is what it is.
@Bitchin Frizzy and Bluejay
First of all, thankyou Bluejay, you rather calmly reinforced and paraphrased my points.
Bitchin… I brought up the cartoon to illustrate attitudes towards atheism in a specific part of the world. I was ‘taking it worldwide’.
You’ve assumed that I am a resident of the United States (or at least that is the impression I got). This is not the case. I am Scottish.
At no point did I imply that Jews do not suffer terribly in Iran, etc. In fact I know from a recent report that there are just 8 Jews now resident in all of Iraq.
I was pointing out that the word atheist is used as an insult to rob the recipient of their humanity in the eyes of the one who delivers it. It is therefore strongly implied that the only thing worse than a Jew, in the eyes of fundamentalist Muslims, is an atheist.
As Bluejay said, atheism effectively bars a person from holding political office in the United States. In Iran, as he said, being an atheist isn’t even an officially recognised status.
Even here in Scotland, there are public sector jobs I cannot hold as an atheist, since about a third of our state funded schools are Catholic faith schools and will not employ a non-Catholic in a promoted post, or as a teacher if there is a Catholic candidate available.
You cannot tell if somebody is an atheist by looking at them Bitchin. That is the reason we have never had to deal with being told to sit at the back of the bus.
But we have been burned at the stake. We have been tortured. We do endure discrimination and it is almost worldwide.
@Bitchin
I did not use Iran in isolation. It was one example from a list, illustrating that discrimination against atheists is a worldwide phenomenon. This is why Iran was a useful example.
Also, I am religiously literate. As a teacher in a primary school, I have to be so that I can teach the subject… but I am also widely read, and I don’t think it’s terribly unfair of me to say that, unlike many, if not a majority of Christians, I have actually read the bible.
All religions promote themselves as the one true faith, and all the others as a lie that in some cases will take you straight to hell, do not pass go, do not receive two fluffy white wings.
I do think religion is a bad idea. I said crap before. I don’t think this is discriminatory at all. I don’t hate religious people, I simply strongly disagree with their beliefs on logical and moral grounds. I would never discriminate against somebody based on their beliefs. My girlfriend, for example, is a Jew. (Her family, by the way, are very accepting of my atheism.)
Because, as Kenny pointed out, atheists are the least trusted minority in America. From the Wiki:
What should be done about it? Lots of things, I suppose; probably similar things to what other marginalized groups are doing to promote their causes. More atheists should speak up, for starters, and show their neighbors they’re godless and good people. Organize more, to strengthen our voice and be counted in national conversations. Point out where and when discrimination against atheists does occur, and not keep silent about it. Reach out to religious groups to form partnerships to accomplish mutual goals. Be more visible as a force for good. Fight to maintain the separation of church and state. Fight to keep public education secular. Increase science literacy–because, I think, a more scientifically literate public will be more tolerant and accepting of skepticism and atheism. And so on.