Talk:Parody religion

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[edit] Jedi link

Just fixed the Jedi link. Nathyn 10:05, 10 May 2005 (UTC)–

[edit] Question

"A rare example of a parody religion movie is Monty Python's Life of Brian." Do you mean to say "An example of the rare parody religion movie is Monty Python's Life of Brian"?

Now how does your alternative make any sense? (Too many modifiers) No, the first is better, but it means is "A rare example of a movie about a parody religion is..." --Belg4mit 00:26, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Cats

Can someone categorise the list of parody religions, it is a long list and I think needs to be categorised into smaller sections, but I don't know enough about the parody religions to categorise them myself. ~ Ghelæ talkcontribs 15:14, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm so disappointed, when I saw this in the index I thought it concerned the worship of cats. --78.16.16.225 00:19, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] VfD debate

Article has been kept after this VFD debate. Sjakkalle (Check!) 13:50, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC)


Can someone please edit the picture, it is not Flying Spagetti Monsterism it is calld PASTAFARIANISM. Thanks, the FSM will forgive you.

[edit] Christianity

Some idiot has abused a wikipedia-bug: Christianity was on top of th elist, but was not visible in the sourcecode. Fixed it. — 84.168.5.172 22:55, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Scientology

I just deleted Scientology from the list, since its members take it very seriously. — User:84.156.247.133

Well done. It was only added by an anon yesterday, but we get this sort of vandalism/POV pushing from time to time. — Solipsist 22:15, 30 August 2005 (UTC)
For the record, whether or not the "members" take it seriously is not at issue, it's hether it is generally regarded asa joke or parody. Scientology fails this test, and for that reason it was reasonable to remove. --Belg4mit 02:51, 30 June 2007 (UTC)
The founder of Scientology, Ron Howard laughed all the way to the bank. Of course it was a joke. Stupid celebrites. --ChristianKarlsson.se 15:45, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Ethics and Morality of Parody Religions?

What are the different parody religions' perspectives on ethics and moral issues? Do they believe that people who are not members of parody religions can do good things and/or have a pleasant afterlife? What forms of afterlife do members of parody religions seriously believe in, if any? In general, what are the serious beliefs of members of parody religions? Many thanks. — Diamantina 03:54, September 6, 2005 (UTC)

I think you might be missing the point. Nearly all parody religions exist to poke fun at established religions or society. As such few if any of them any have any serious beliefs or systems of ethics. — Solipsist 08:47, 6 September 2005 (UTC)
Although parody religions as such do not have serious beliefs or systems of ethics, I assume that people who belong to parody religions have serious ethical and moral beliefs — it is hard to be a conscious human being without some kind of ethical and moral beliefs. Are most members of parody religions atheists, agnostics and other people who do not profess belief in a supernatural deity? Are most members of parody religions hedonists who doubt the veracity of traditional Christian-based morality, especially in sexual issues? Do parody religions allow their members to also be practicing, conscientious members of "real" religions? — Diamantina 05:59, September 8, 2005 (UTC)
I would expect that for the most part parody religions don't have many real members at all. Few of them extend much beyond a humourous web site and perhaps a signup sheet. They are probably most popular amoungst atheists and the quite majority of no particular belief who aren't particularly fond of organised religions. However many people subscribing to parody religions are quite likely to be simultaneously involved with other traditional religions too.
In the case of Jedi in the UK, nearly 400,000 people professed to follow the religion when asked on the official census. That was mostly the effect of a successful internet campaign that became a meme and a general reaction that the government shouldn't have introduced the question on the census. In the subsequent five years, I would be surprised if any of those people had done anything more Jedi than watch the next Star Wars movie. Nevertheless it is interesting that there are allegedly more people in the UK following Jedi than there are following Judaism. It helps to emphasise the nonsense of the statistics. -- Solipsist 08:10, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
I think many people who "start" parody religions or who enjoy their existence are rather tolerant, humanistic folks who value parody as catharsis and/or a way of humbling the believers in established dogmatic religions (or possibly pushing them over the edge.) Ironwolf 18:06, 28 February 2006 (UTC)
I'm not sure it precisely qualifies, but having cocreated God Hates Shrimp, a parody of either the Phelps gang in particular or the more broad sweep of homophobic fundamentalist Protestantism, I'd say there aren't true "believers" in the parody religion at all, although certainly many people may claim to be a member in a particular context, I very much doubt that they think of themselves as "members." Nonetheless, many of the more ... fervent fans of the site seem to come from a wide range of religious (or non-religious) belief systems, Christianity included, and many of the non-religous, such as myself, still have fairly complex ethical belief systems. It would not suprise me to find the same was true of other parody religions. --Joe Decker 08:03, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Are all the parody religions listed noteworthy enough?

It seems ilke many have been added by the specific people who created the religions in order to popularize it. For example, Christianity to the Extreme is currently being VfDed because it's an extremely obscure hometown religion added as a vanity article, and only gets a handful of genuine google hits. But many of the others listed don't seem to get many Google hits either. Here's the current stats, in order of hits:

Additionally, some of the other religions, like Bokononism, have just as many people who seem to take the religion seriously as Discordianism, Church of the SubGenius, and Brianism, and why should the fact that some people have recently begun to claim that they're real religions make any difference if they were originally created as parodies, which is the subject of this article? Instead of saying "these parody religions are universally 100% always considered parodies by their followers" and "these parody religions aren't", why not just state above the list that some members of many of the below religions take the religion quite seriously, or at least claim to? And then we can list them all together, which is much more convenient, orderly, encyclopedic, and sexy. -Silence 22:39, 2 November 2005 (UTC)

Given that these days Parody Religions are primarily an internet thing, only getting 37 Google hits is pretty damning. I suspect this article is one of those that attracts self publicists and could probably do with pruning. -- Solipsist 08:23, 3 November 2005 (UTC)
Anything below Brianism with its own article should probably be VfD'd as non-notable. Also, I have merged the list. Andre (talk) 03:15, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

Why not seperate the list into:

  1. notable ones with brief discriptions and links to their main article, down to about Brianism.
  2. minor religions with brief discriptions and no article, down to about Church of Dolcett.
  3. very rare ones, just a name & maybe a link, but no discription or article.

JeffBurdges 22:16, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Discordianism

Now, Discordianism is certainly not meant to be taken seriously, Eris forbid, but I don't really think it's a parody... So I've been bold and removed it! -- 65.118.187.102 21:21, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

"Parody religion" means a humorous or satirical religion, not necessarily one that's a technical parody. That's why "mock religion" is mentioned as a synonym in this article. If we removed all religions in the list that weren't technically "parodies" of a specific, exact phenomenon or movement, we'd have almost none left listed at all; but just removing Discordianism while ignoring and leaving behind tons of similar religions (like MOOism) merely causes arbitrary inconsistency. -Silence 01:57, 9 March 2006 (UTC)
I'll probably move the page to "Joke religion" later (I don't have time now), then, and fix up some of the wording in the article, unless anybody disagrees. "Joke religion" would work much better, and allow more to be accurately listed. -- 65.118.187.102 18:59, 9 March 2006 (UTC)
No, don't move it. The name may not be perfect, but 'Parody religion' is the term commonly used. -- Solipsist 19:59, 9 March 2006 (UTC)
Yes, parody religion is the common name, joke religion and postmodern religion ought to redirect here. JeffBurdges 22:18, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

Weluvducsoha currently has at least fifty members.

Discordianism is no joke. Although peopled with pranksters and worshiping a prankster Goddess, discordianism is a serious faith in the Goddess of Chaos. There is simply no reason to list it as a Parody or a Joke when a perfectly suited category "Hellenic polytheism (modern revivalist forms)" exists. It is the Goddess and the adherents who are jokesters, the religion is not a joke, they take their mischief making seriously. Eleventius 22:54, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
Categories are not mutually exclusive, if you want to append discordianism to that mouthful of a category that's fine, then feel free to do so. However, you should realize that the majority, and many authorities (see the references I provided on the discordian page), do indeed paint it with the "parody religion" brush; whatever that means. To not do so is delusional, and your professions of devotion to the faith of Chaos benefit no one. The categorization is not grossly incorrect (we're not saying bacon is Kosher) and so little to no harm can from this, indeed it can increase the exposure of this spit-polished, teeth-cracking apple. --Belg4mit 01:27, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] flying spaghetti monster

It is untrue that the flying spaghetti monster is a parody OF A religion; it is simply a "parody religion". That is to say that it is a religion which takes the form of a parody. The flying spaghetti monster brought us his message in the form of satire and parody, because he so loves laughter. I think that there should be a section explaining this discrepancy from the other parody religions.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 146.244.137.240 (talk • contribs)

   Well said I wholeheartedly agree.

[edit] proposed new link

I think www.therightreverendrabbijudah.com should be added to the list of parody religion sites. The Reverend Rabbi is a former Jewish porn actor who "saw the light". He now promotes clothing-optional worship of Yeshua Christos, ministers in Porn Valley to save America's pornstars, and believes that Tofu is a Communist Chinese plot to weaken America. The site's got some funny content, and a featured link to real christian sites that might be even more entertaining.

[edit] The Church of Cheesy Rice and Rattley Snakes

There is also "The Church of Cheesy Rice and Rattley Snakes" which is an inside joke for "The Church of Jesus Christ and Latter Day Saints" among Mormons. One can fill in the blanks of what is mainly served at food events in the CCRRS.

[edit] Content at Alcoholism#Religion gone...

The parody religion content at alcoholism has disappeared, I'm removing the link for now. Can someone please find the content and create (a separate) article? Mikker (...) 00:34, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Weaselish opinionating

Removed the following insertion by Wacuthbert/194.105.160.77:

Many who are not members of such 'parody religions' argue that the whole concept of 'parody religions' is heretical and has the deliberate purpose of creating agravation and social tension. It has also been added that such followers of (with a lack of an appropriate word) such religions have very close to no social life and are trying to find an easy way to find similar (dull and boring) people. One can only hope that they do not mate. for the obvious reasons of lack of citation and unencyclopedic POV; although it would be nice to include bona fide reactions (if any) from the various religious organizations that are being "skewered" (other than just simple lack of recognition). --DWIII 07:28, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
I'm always suspicious of any wiki article when I scroll to the bottom and see NO references. I'm not even sure how this article is different from a blog entry. What is the basis for removing ANY opinion from this page? None of the views currently expressed are sourced at all and thus are all opinions of the various editors. This is, IMO, the worst kind of wikipedia article. One that exists because people have a POV to push even as they claim they don't.MikeURL 17:32, 12 February

2007 (UTC)

Meh, untwist your panties. There may not be any citations, but a lot of this stuff is certainly verifiable, much of it from related entries. Feel free to hunt them down and provide the necessary cross-linking. (Note that today is my first visit to this entry) --Belg4mit 01:49, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
The idea of parody religions is a pretty offensive thing to people who take these beliefs seriously, and they are out there. Does Landover Baptist belong here? They are a parody religious website, not a religion at all. Some of these don't seem to be fitting the guideline set forth "Groups that poke fun at other religions or religion in general" as they pretty well leave other religions alone. Are the authors here saying that some religions are making fun of other faiths by simply existing?! This entire page should be removed for lack of sources, offensiveness, opinionating and high handed bigotry!
Furthermore the "poking fun at other religions" is or was a common practice in all Abrahamic religions, that is when they weren't just practicing the wholesale murder of followers of competing faiths. Once more, this is a bad category, meant to belittle those groups without the numbers or money to defend themselves. Eleventius 22:47, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
The idea of genocide is also offensive, but that's not a reason to remove the article on it. Same for parody religions. --Vaughan Pratt (talk) 22:28, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but that's not the same at all, it's not the concept of parody religion that is offensive, but it has the potential to be if applied to what are claimed to be genuine beliefs, (and it would be OR, and POV, to make an assertion to that effect for that matter). Likewise it would be potentially offensive to assert that something equates to genocide that does not.Number36 (talk) 02:17, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Rename/Merge/split

Besides what constitutes "Notable parody religions", there's a lot of overlap between this and the relatively small (and inconsistently named) Joke Religion category. These issues probably ought to be addressed somehow. I also suspect that there are a few other uncategorized entries tucked away somewhere in the maze of wikipedia. --Belg4mit 01:49, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Athorism

The theist might say "No one can prove that God doesn't exist, therefore an atheist is exercising faith by asserting that there is no God." Dawkins argues that by replacing the word "God" with "Thor" one should see that the assertion is fallacious.

Though I'm a nontheist myself, I don't see how "no one can prove that Thor doesn't exist, therefore an athorist is excercising faith by asserting that there is no Thor" is absurd. When a Christian (or other monotheist) claims that his God is the only true God, and that Thor, et al. are false gods, he's basing it on his religious faith Nik42 07:56, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

it's a bit of an old post but i'll reply anyway. He's not saying that you can prove thor doesn't exist he's saying that the burden of proof must be with a religous person. No religous person believes in all the gods they could so if they want to convince others then they must give reasons why their god is any more believeable than any of the other infinite possibilities. 129.67.19.252 (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 14:40, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Mechanism

I'd like to suggest adding something about a religion called Mechanism. I noticed it wasn't mentioned in the article on The Machine Stops and there are no articles about it on the disambiguation page for Mechanism. Not to be confused with the other subjects, This particular Mechanism is a religion created by E.M. Forster in his short story The Machine Stops. He uses it to demonstrate, and possibly poke fun at, the way people rely too heavily on technology. In his story the people start worshiping the machine in which they live. They also eventually reverently read the book of the machine and treat it as a sacred text. Mechanism in Forster's story also has break away sects dedicated to the worship of different parts of the machine.

134.250.60.193 17:39, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

I think you need to distinguish between parody religions, which exist in the real world, and fictional religions, which exist within a fictional universe. Rhialto (talk) 06:12, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Question about Requirements for a Parody Religion to get onto the page

What does a parody religion need to get a mention on the Parody Religion page as I've attempted to put about Pieism before but it was soon deleted. Pieism has over 2400 links on Google and lots of followers (almost 50 have signed the Pieism petetion on Petetion Online and over 20 more are known who haven't) . There are many different Pieism sites including http://www.jojo-pieism.tk . If this isn't enough to get a mention, what is would a parody religion have to do? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.79.190.241 (talk) 15:05, 28 May 2008 (UTC)