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Religulous is a 2008 American comedy/documentary film written by and starring political comedian Bill Maher. According to Bill Maher, the title of the film is a portmanteau derived from the words “religion” and “ridiculous”; the documentary examines and satirizes organized religion and religious belief.

A range of views on the various world religions are explored as Bill Maher travels to numerous religious destinations, such as Jerusalem, London, the Vatican, and Salt Lake City, interviewing believers from a variety of backgrounds and groups, including Christians, Muslims, Mormons, and Jews.

Maher begins by talking about how the three monotheistic religions - Christianity, Judaism and Islam, each have an ‘end-of-the-world’ myth perpetrated through them and then proceeds to tell the viewer how in the 20th century, it became possible for the prophecies in these religions to be self-fulfilling. From there he begins a rant showing how silly people who believe in God really are.

As a piece of entertainment, it certainly brings out a few good laughs! The people who believe in religion certainly do look really ridiculous. Maher is at his best as we can make out from his smiles and grins even as he simply asks fair questions about talking snakes and virgin birth and evil in this world! Fair indeed!

Now it worth noting that Maher uses normal on-the-street guys to build his case against religion! He approaches them with an underlying assumption that everybody who is part of any religion is as well versed about it and equally equipped to answer even the tough questions as would be an expert in that religion! Fair indeed?

I hope someone is not planning a similar spoof on the so called 16% of the US population who are agnostics (claims Maher), and thus make a fool out of them by showing them as shaking their heads all through the documentary saying “I don’t know”, “I don’t know”. If they really claim that they “don’t know”, how do they know that religion is ridiculous!

I suspect that if we ask Bill Maher who he is, he might reply, “I don’t know!” In 2002 he said he was not an atheist. In 2005, he announced that he was an agnostic. In 2007, he declared that he was not an agnostic but an apatheist. I think, the answer is evolving!

Noticeably absent from the film are philosophers and thinkers who are more in the “weight class” that Maher is desperately trying to project himself as being a part of. Rick Warren would have been a better person to answer some of the tough questions on theology, but he is such a media-savvy evangelist that perhaps the hunter would have become the hunted! Sound bites from Ravi Zacharias, Norman Geisler or Lee Strobel may have been less easy to mix up into hodgepodge of mirthful derision. These experts could never have been as amusing a target as the men on the street in his documentary! Fair indeed?

Now if you watch the trailers, it is pretty evident that solid answers to Maher’s questions were lost in the editing. Editing makes it more convenient for Maher and team to make the “unsuspecting” volunteers look like morons! See for yourself.

Yes, “unsuspecting” volunteers. As we research more on the facts, the case of religulous only gets more apalling. Maher goes on record and states that he used a fake title for the film to obtain the interviews in the first place: “We never, ever, used my name. We never told anybody it was me who was going to do the interviews. We even had a fake title for the film. We called it ‘A Spiritual Journey.’ It didn’t work everywhere. We went to Salt Lake City, but no one would let us film there at all!!” So, as a key ingredient, while collecting the inputs for his documentary, Maher used “Deception”!! Fair indeed?

Now all though the documentary, it is evident that Maher is not looking for answers to his simple questions from any of his unsuspecting victims. He can actually get all kinds of viewpoints and answers in half a second on Google! Actually, he is just asking a gotcha question or making a gotcha claim aimed at making these people look stupid! That he is not asking the questions in good faith is also evident from the fact that he never waits for the answers but rather jumps to the next stumping question! Fair indeed?

Guys like Maher, despite their enlightenment and superior secular sophistication, seem to be unable to muster the simple virtue of being courteous, polite and chivalrous. Maher comes out looking like a bully!

So what? With an investment of about 2.5 million USD, “Religulous” grossed over 13 millions USD. So what if you are not fair?! You have unthinkable money flowing into your treasure chest encouraging and equipping you for more!! So why not?

When Maher builds a “religion is the problem” case, he sadly overlooks a huge mountain of compelling evidence. Mao’s China, Pol Pot’s Cambodia and Stalin’s Russia were supposedly “No-God-allowed” societies, but the millions of corpses who died at the hands of the fully secular state stand as evidence against Maher’s central thesis. Which makes me reiterate that Maher should perhaps only stick to the central aspect of his worldview and say, “I don’t know” and only continue doing his stand up comedies.

Eradicating religion does not necessarily make a kinder, gentler society. Are we not overlooking the hospitals, universities, schools, soup kitchens and social service agencies maintained by religious organizations? The agnostics so far have not built 16% of the US’s charities (unless we consider voting for Democrats as charity!).

As always, he perhaps deserves only what perhaps all stand up comedians deserve, a hearty laugh in reciprocation of his utterings and a standing ovation if he can make us laugh for more than half an hour, period.

Maher’s gallantry is certainly a gift for atleast some of the religious. An opportunity to once again see themselves as others see them and an opportunity to see how ridiculous they might look if they do not have the right answers.

Maher certainly doesn’t have the answers.

I am sure that the documentary is not convincing enough for people to go and empty their God shaped holes and refill it with licentiousness, peddling and gambling. Rather it is good for some of those who believe, to see this film, painful as it is and reconcile to the fact that they do believe some very amazing things.

There is a humbling tonic to have seen their faith through the eyes of someone profoundly hostile and uninterested in sparing their feelings!

FAIR ENOUGH. Or shall I take the liberty to create a portmanteau - MAHERENOUGH!!

*Part of this compilation derived from Tim McNabb’s review on the same topic.

Tags: agnostic, Bill Maher, Religion, Religulous, spoof

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 24th, 2009 at 2:34 am and is filed under Articles, Geo, Jokes, New Findings, Politics, Purpose of Life, Society. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.