From the article:

Farr said the family came to Clark County from Idaho after they were contacted by child welfare authorities.

Jeez, I wonder what the fuck ELSE these overbreeding dim bulbs have done to their kids to warrant “contact” by the child welfare authorities before THIS incident.

10 more potential homicidal whack-jobs who’ll probably end up in jail because the invisible friend their parents taught them to believe in was telling them to commit some atrocity that’s supported by their big book of hooey.

God, please save us from your followers!

The following line sums it all up for me.

The doctor noted Baxter did have “religious fervor that suggested mild delusional thinking,”

“Mild” ain’t the half of it!

I read the story and I had to email the writer:

Stephanie ():

Good gosh. Could you have been any NICER to this bozo? If you’d painted this child-mutilating freak in any rosier terms, you would have had to shed blood on the page.

And judging from the all-too-forgiving people you so generously quoted in your story, your part of the country sounds like a real little hellhole for hapless children.

Hank

All I can say is that it looks like the wrong guy had a botched circumcision.

I wonder if the writer was nice to the guy on purpose - letting the facts of the story make the point without interjecting herself into it.  With a story that bizarre you could hope the reading public would get the point, as it were. ;-D

Sheesh, what a nutjob.

Yet another reason why I like Canada.  When this nut-job fled Idaho child protection services in other states SHOULD have been notified or have some kind of “watch list”.  At least Ned Flanders has Reverend Lovejoy to keep him in check.

I’m glad my pappy never tried this on me!

Originally posted by deadscot:
All I can say is the world would be a lot better place if people stopped adhering to fairy tales.  Can I get an Amen?

Amen!  This guy apparently has not read very far into the new testament because that was entirely unnecessary and idiotic.

Well, if it is unnecessary and idiotic, shouldn’t it be excised from the book?

“I warn every one who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: ... if any one takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.”

You know, I don’t think any (believing) person could excise anything from the book. Perhaps they could get a bunch of atheists to do their dirty work for them and tidy up the bible a little?

Why the fuck is he asking for God’s forgiveness for something God supposedly instructed him to do?

While this is an attempt at a good point, the article never stated that God told Baxter to do what he did, he only did so after reading scripture.  You can’t blame the author of Jack and the Beanstalk if some fanatic reads the story then decides “hey, I’m gonna go cut down a huge tree while somebody is climbing down it.” It doesn’t work that way in my opinion.

Also, the fact that it states “Lowe said Baxter would have had a doctor perform the circumcision but did not have the money,” shows that while he did have an extreme lapse in judgement, he had at least considered the proper option first.

Don’t think that I’m supporting what Baxter did, I am just attempting to point out things others may have been while they were so infuriated by Baxter’s actions.

I always wanted to look up the Jefferson Bible, who did exactly that - excised what he felt was supernatural bunk.

As far as believers excising anything from the book, I maintain that they all do it. For me, the Bible is a package deal, but it appears as if the majority of believers is either ignorant of the sum total of scripture or is every selective in their acceptance of it. The end result is that some Christians inflict atrocities, while other perform admirable deeds - both in the name of their religion. To me it just illustrates that religious affiliation is not a decisive factor in the “goodness” of a person.

As far as the nutjob of the opening post is concerned, he probably should have had one 11 kids or so ago.

chief:

While this is an attempt at a good point, the article never stated that God told Baxter to do what he did, he only did so after reading scripture.

Indeed. The article is all to go by, but it seems probable that Baxter has a mental health issue. He might have picked up any sufficiently gory book with similar results. What really gets me is that this is yet another example where the safeguards that are supposed to protect children failed.

elwed: i believe you have confused Circumcision and Vasectomy.

Also, the fact that it states “Lowe said Baxter would have had a doctor perform the circumcision but did not have the money,� shows that while he did have an extreme lapse in judgement, he had at least considered the proper option first. - Chief

Several years ago the director of a Christian camp located next to the lake that is our neighboring city’s water supply, tried to figure out what to do with 5 old 50-gallon drums of insecticide and herbicide that were stored in a shed on the camp property.

He looked into proper disposal of the chemicals, but found out it would have cost $5,000.  So (as he explained, to exercise “good stewardship") he unscrewed the cap on each drum and sniffed.  None had a strong odor, so he decided that chlordane, atrazine, and pyrethrum (if I remember correctly) had become harmless with age.

He had his maintenance workers use a backhoe to dig a trench and push the drums in, about 150 feet from the average water’s edge.  There was a drought that year, so the water was 50 feet farther down than normal.  This turned out to be a good thing as the water table was way down.

One of the workers was a friend of mine, and drew a map on the back of a placemat - which I then faxed to the Illinois EPA.  They came in and cleaned up the contaminated site.  The director was charged with something but got off with a slap on the wrist for some reason.

So my question is, exactly how does “considering the proper option first” mitigate the dumb-assedness of what the guy did? Doesn’t it make it worse?  As in; “You knew the right thing and deliberately did the wrong thing?”

<blockquote>While this is an attempt at a good point, the article never stated that God told Baxter to do what he did, he only did so after reading scripture.  You can’t blame the author of Jack and the Beanstalk if some fanatic reads the story then decides “hey, I’m gonna go cut down a huge tree while somebody is climbing down it.â€? It doesn’t work that way in my opinion. While I tend to agree in most cases, I believe this is a tad different.  The bible has been proclaimed by many to be the inerrant word of God and somewhat of religious cookbook to eternal life.  If the bible is so open to misinterpretation, it should be relegated to the fairy tale’s section with Jack and the Beanstalk.

Most, if not all, True Believers^TM pick and choose which scriptures they are going to apply to their lives and Baxter seems no different in that regard.  He just picked an extreme verse to adhere to but it’s the same concept as those Christians that condemn homosexuality.

I’m almost sure this guy read the scripture in the old testament where Abraham is instructed to circumcise all of his decedents and slaves lest they be cut off from their people.

So, in regard to the bible, I am more of the mindset that if it is going to be used as some sort of divine guide-book, it needs to be drastically edited because too many people like Baxter are getting the wrong message.

Mr. Death: A botched circumcision or a vasectomy, same difference.

elwed,

it appears as if the majority of believers is either ignorant of the sum total of scripture or is every selective in their acceptance of it. The end result is that some Christians inflict atrocities, while other perform admirable deeds - both in the name of their religion. To me it just illustrates that religious affiliation is not a decisive factor in the “goodness� of a person.

Hear, hear! 

Moving on....  As much as I hate to say it there are some people out there who make me think that eugenics might not be such a bad thing....

Just to remind you guys, we Christians aren’t all as stupid as this guy.

Dante,

No worries, I don’t think that even the most anti-religious among us would think that any great portion of the members of any group (besides the group picked out by the name “idiots") let alone Christians are that dumb.  I’m still shocked that anyone could be dumb enough to think that they should hack off a part of their kid’s penis without proper medical knowledge.  I’m actually still trying to figure out how the man’s wife let him get away with that. 

My partner would never let me do anything like that.  She has the common sense to realize when I’m doing something dumb, and she normally has the courtesy to let me know as well.  It seems to me that’s why guys end up domesticated by our better halves, we need people to prevent us from doing the dumb stuff that we seem predisposed to do.  The wife mentioned in the article was definitely in severe dereliction of her duty to prevent the manifestation of her husband’s idiocy (indeed, considering that she’s married to him, she should know him well enough by now not to let him anywhere near the kids, let alone near them with a sharp object).

Forgot to mention that parental Circumsicion shold be banned altogether. If the parents decide to circumcise the kid at birth, he has to live with that choice that he did not make for the rest of his life. However, I think a guy deserves the option of wether he wants his foreskin or not.

The bible is a collection of stories about how to live life; where the fuck do people get all this crap about “gays are evil” and “we should circumcise people” from? They must read it backwards.

SS, that’s why they’re called Women. ‘WO, man! What are you doing?’

Let’s see, now. Ten kins in twelve (maybe fifteen) years - Tammy is much too tired to make a rational decision, so cut her a little slack. And maybe she was hoping Edwin would make a mistake and reduce the possibility of any more offspring from this screwed-up family. Then, too, didn’t Abraham try to kill his only son a few years after circumsizing him? Why would any sane man want to emulate that kind of strange behavior? Why would any sane man believe in that fairy tale? So many questions, so few answers.

{quote] DoF queried: So my question is, exactly how does “considering the proper option first� mitigate the dumb-assedness of what the guy did?

I hadn’t joined this thread until now, because commenting on this guy’s dumbassedness seemed superfluous, but I have to compliment DoF on his perfect example of the same sort of irresponsibility.

Dante: Just to remind you guys, we Christians aren’t all as stupid as this guy

Thank Darwin.  Most of us atheists (I think I can safely say) are not anti-religious per se; it’s just that some religious types feel the need to infringe on the civil liberties of all of us, and we object to that.