The trips to Egypt, China and India each took a little over two weeks. Teller and I were so uncomfortable. I’m embarrassed by us eating canned food and washing our hands every ten minutes. We were so scared of these foreign countries. The people we were working with weren’t. They had done documentaries on Ebola and had gone into hot zones to shoot. They said Penn & Teller were more of a pain in the ass than Ebola. I tried to get some women to dance topless for us in China, and I ended up uncovering some sort of Chinese-Russian prostitution slavery ring that the Canadians did their next documentary on. If there was something about other countries to not be understood, I think I’m the man to not understand it. It was an awful time for me. While I was watching all this misery, my mom was dying back home and I felt alone and cut loose in the world. I was not at my best. I was confused enough that maybe if there really was a difference between racial pride and racism, I couldn’t understand it. I couldn’t learn to say even one sentence in Mandarin and I tried.
We came back from overseas in time for my mom to die. What a treat. World travel was supposed to broaden us, give us more understanding of the world, but it didn’t feel that way. I couldn’t stop thinking about the hotel full of Americans adopting baby girls, the women dressed like Batman, the stinking poverty, and those fucking tortured bears. It felt like our country of stupid fucking situation comedies and Dunkin’ Donuts was a paradise island floating in a nightmare world.
That’s when we decided to burn the American flag. We wrote a bit for the live show in Vegas that we call “Flag” or “Flag Burning.” The idea was that we’d take the American flag down from a flagpole fold it properly, wrap it in the Bill of Rights and then burn it. Then we’d restore it. Then we’d show how the trick was done. We’d do the trick again with what we call the Chinese Bill of Rights (clear acetate with nothing on it). We’d show how the flag was switched out and it was flash paper that was burned. We’d end with vanishing the flag in another burst of fire while I recited a verse from “The Star-Spangled Banner.” We’d end with the flag magically appearing back on the flagpole. We found the only verse of “The Star-Spangled Banner” that didn’t mention god, and even though it was pretty pro-war, we used that.
When we were working on the flag burning, our crew became pretty freaked out. They had not signed up to be part of a show that burned the flag. I told them that the patter was all about the Bill of Rights and freedom, and it was going to be patriotic. I was on G. Gordon Liddy’s radio show and I told Gordon that we were going to burn a flag and he was going to cheer. He attended our show and he did cheer the flag. I’m not sure that Liddy is our best example of a patriot, but at least he thinks he is. Our crew was proud.
Then the terrorist attacks happened on September 11, 2001, and all of a sudden our burning of the flag got much too patriotic for our taste. The burning of the flag was ignored and all of a sudden the trick was just waving the flag. This bit that was supposed to be about our complicated reaction to being American overseas became this rah-rah-rah pro-American thing. It was getting the biggest reaction in our show, but it wasn’t the right reaction. There was too much applause and cheering. We were afraid maybe they weren’t cheering for our ideas; maybe they were just cheering for the flag. What had we become? We cut it from our show for a while.
Things calmed down and we put “Flag Burning” back in. At the time, Lawrence O’Donnell was writing for that liberal-porn show The West Wing. He loved our flag burning and asked to use it as the B story on an episode. We did it. We played our real selves and did the trick in their fake White House. The story was about some controversy around the president burning the flag, and we gave some of my lines from the bit to Martin Sheen, the pornographically liberal president. People seemed to love it, and then they started saying it was nice of The West Wing writers to let us use that bit in our live show. That’s socialism, I guess.
We’ve been doing the “Flag Burning” since the end of the last century. We’ve settled into it. People don’t just cheer for the flag anymore, and they gasp a little when we first burn the flag. Our audience seems to understand it. But I don’t know if I really understand it anymore.
It celebrates the First Amendment. It’s about the enjoyment and privilege of living in a country where we can burn the flag in protest. I get that part. Part of my patter while we perform the trick includes me saying that Teller and I consider ourselves patriotic. When we wrote that, it was true, but I don’t know if it is anymore.
One of the things I love about the USA is that it’s built on an idea. Other countries were built on everyone having the same heritage, the same ancestry, but this country was built by neophiles who wanted to get away. Wanted to live an idea. No matter how long you live in Italy, you’re not really Italian, but once you become a U.S. citizen, you’re an American. I’ve talked a lot about how the USA was the first country built on technology. The idea of freedom of the press is based on the printing press, freedom of speech and freedom of and from religion. All that is groovy, but . . .
Every Fourth of July I worry. I worry that we’re just a sports team. I worry that I’m American not because I love the ideas, but because of an accident of birth. I hate clubs. I’m not a joiner. I’ve played on the same team with Teller for my entire adult life, but I’m not a team player. I never wanted to be part of a team; I wanted to work with Teller. There’s a difference. Just like I never wanted to do a Broadway show or a Vegas show—I wanted to do our show. Venue never matters to me.
I can sit and tell you all the things I love about this country. I carry the Bill of Rights with me. It’s called the “Security Edition” and it’s the Bill of Rights printed on a piece of metal. We give them out at our show. They are designed to set off metal detectors. It turns anyone who has a “Security Edition” into a freedom-fighting performance artist. It sets off the metal detector and then you look the TSA person in the eye and say, “Here take my rights” and hand them the metal Bill of Rights. I’ve had a lot taken away from me, but I always replace it so I have those words with me. But I didn’t move here because I believed in the ideals of this country. I didn’t move here at all. I was born down in this dead man’s town; I was born in the USA. Born in the USA. When the real patriots broke from England, there were real philosophical reasons, but would I agree with them now? If England had won our revolutionary war, would they have freed all the slaves? We won a war that was, among many other things, a war to keep slavery. I believe in the free market, but there’s no free market here. We have government entitlements on one side, and crony capitalism on the other; it’s all just using the government to move money around. We wouldn’t know a real free market if the lowest bidder bit us in our ass. There’s no real separation of church and state. Obama brags that he prays about the decisions he makes in the White House. We have bloody wars against common nouns—drugs, poverty and terrorism.
I imagine two asshole Indian magicians coming to the USA to see the magic done for locals. I imagine them staying in five-star hotels and going to our worst slums, looking for the “Cups and Balls” in Appalachia. I don’t even know where the worst poverty in the USA is, but it’s certainly in every city. I just don’t go there. I think about some smart-ass who can’t pronounce the word “hello” after a week of practice in his bus, freaking out that we still have the death penalty and kill people who kill. I think about the culture shock of walking into a casino where we do our shows and seeing people pissing in their pants while waiting for the slot machine to pay off and get them back to even. I think about our Indian Penn & Teller pouring sanitizer over their hands and eating canned curry (I know that’s an English invention, and just makes my point even stronger). I go back and read what I wrote about Egypt, China and India, and it sure seems like it was written by an asshole. Maybe the Canadian producers were right about Americans not understanding. Maybe there is a difference between racial pride and racism, which I just can’t see. Maybe I am a white devil.
Richard Dawkins makes the argument that if religion
were true, it wouldn’t be geographically determined. People tend to follow the religion they were born into. That’s not true of scientific theories. There never really were speed-of-light pockets. I hear Christians make arguments for how Christianity is true, but it’s hard not to just hear them saying that they believe it because they were born into it.
When we do our bit that turns flag burning into flag waving, what are we really celebrating? When I take my children to eat hot dogs and hamburgers and watch the fireworks, what do I teach them about the country of their birth? Is it just their birthplace, or did they just happen to be born into a really good idea.
I don’t know.
Maybe we’re just celebrating that we don’t have those fucking bears.
Listening to: “Born in the U.S.A.”—Bruce Springsteen
MY SON’S MORALITY DOES NOT COME FROM GOD
THERE WAS A BIG ATHEIST SHINDIG IN WASHINGTON, D.C., IN 2011. There were about 20,000 people on the mall getting together in the rain to be recognized as atheists. I wanted to be there, but I was contracted to do a magic show in Vegas that day. I couldn’t get there, but I sent a video and made a few jokes.
Atheists will not have their Stonewall riots. Unfortunately, gays needed to riot. There were draconian laws preventing them from just living their lives. They were attacked and beaten. They were killed. They are still oppressed by the government. Obama “evolved” to the point that he thinks he feels okay about people loving each other, but not okay enough to help them get the freedom to do that. There are comparisons between gays in the sixties and atheists today, but we have to be careful not to exaggerate those comparisons. Yes, gays and atheists are pitied, shunned and insulted. There are some awful stories of atheists being beaten up in the USA, but I think many fewer than gays. Twentieth-century atheist pioneer Madalyn Murray O’Hair was put on the cover of Life magazine as “The Most Hated Woman in America.” Ms. O’Hair’s family was beaten and some very bad things happened to her directly as a result of her lack of belief. It’s possible the worst things that happened to Madalyn (kidnapping and murder) had nothing to do with her atheism, but she might have gotten more help if she had been a believer. Atheists lose jobs and too often lose the love of their whole families when they come out of that huge benighted closet.
I’m afraid that the main reason I’m proud to be an American is that I was born here. That’s the way that our tribal shit is wired, and it’s hard to fight. But there are things I like about the USA apart from the built-in patriotism. I love “Yankee Doodle.” I love that the British made up a song to make fun of the American rubes with their bad wigs and bumpkin ways, and the asshole Americans adopted it as their fight song and sang it while kicking ass. One of the most successful businesses in my hometown area of Massachusetts is Yankee Candle, and there are books of Yankee wisdom in all the gift shops. “Yankee” began as an insult for all Americans and ended up an insult for New Englanders, but we all use it with pride.
I’m a little bummed by the word “gay” for gay. If I had been in charge of the gay movement they would have done it more “Yankee Doodle” style. Of course if I were in charge of the gay movement, we’d be listening to Sun Ra instead of Lady Gaga and we’d have way worse haircuts.
If I had my way, we would be using “queer” (not “fag” because it excludes women) or even “homo.” I love when those words are used with pride. Let them name you with hate, and come back with love. I’d be a homosexual infidel before I’d be a gay bright. I gave a very small amount of jingle to the “brights.” They were trying to find a term to make atheists a more marketable brand. “Bright” seems as good as “gay,” but it didn’t catch on. You can argue that “gay” doesn’t really work either. “Gay” is now used as a negative term that doesn’t quite mean “homosexual” but is close enough to be creepy and bum my shit. “Atheist” is like “homosexual” and I like that more. It’s the term I like the most. I way don’t like any of the “humanist” names for atheists; it’s like if gays tried to pretend that sex wasn’t really part of who they are. We atheists don’t only love humans, we also don’t want religion. I would love to adopt “heathen” or “infidel” and say them with pride. I’d love to call myself a “Yankee Heathen,” more than an “American Bright.” But “heathen” and “infidel” in this country are a little too goofy.
Madalyn Murray O’Hair went with “American Atheist,” so I’ll go with her. O’Hair sure was nutty, but I’m okay with her as our leader. Atheists have always been a little ahead of the curve on feminism. In a list of the superstars of modern atheism, you have Ayn Rand, Madalyn Murray O’Hair, and Ayaan Hirsi Ali right at the top. So much of the oppression of women comes from religion, so that shouldn’t be a surprise, but it’s still something we godless heathen infidels can be proud of.
My son was born May 22, 2006. Since the birth of my Moxie and Zz, it takes all my willpower to write and talk about anything other than my children. Every word they speak, everything they do, seems to cry out to be recorded and shared, but I try to leave my camera and my notes in another room. An unexamined life is not worth living, but an electronically recorded life is not lived at all.
Zolten Penn Jillette took his first steps walking toward the porn star Nina Hartley. She was visiting our home and Zz was just under a year old. His standing was still wobbly, but as Nina and I sat talking on the couch, Zz pulled himself up and toddled over to her arms. When Moxie was one, Bob Dylan let her bang on his keyboard and lick his guitar. Our children have privileged lives.
When Zz was about two, he was playing by himself one day as I sat on the other side of the room, reading or something. I don’t know where Mox was. Because our children are eleven months apart and best friends (for now), they’re always together, but for some reason Mox and Emily were out of the room. At least that’s the way I remember it now. It’s possible I wasn’t even there and my wife witnessed it and told me about it, but when I hear a great story, my memory often puts me in the middle of the scene.
The way I remember it, Zz was playing quietly by himself and I was reading on the other side of the room. He was oblivious to me. He tried to grab something with his teeth and instead must have bitten his own arm. There are coordination issues at that age. Zz’s bite hurt him a little. He made a distress sound, which got my attention and then he said to himself, “No biting. Time-out.” He put down the toys, stopped playing and walked across the room. He stood, sadly and quietly, in the corner for a couple of minutes and then said, “Okay,” walked back to the center of the room, got happy, picked up his toys and went back to playing.
My son was perpetrator, victim, witness, police, prosecutor, jury, judge, jailer, parole board, and rehabilitated citizen. He had learned the lesson of not biting. He didn’t need me, and he certainly didn’t need any god. Zolten’s morality gets more sophisticated every day, but it doesn’t need to. He was pretty much there at two years old. He had the basic principles in place. Don’t cause pain.
I’d like to say this story is evidence that my son is a moral genius, but I don’t believe that. I believe he’s a normal child (yeah, most children take their first steps into the arms of a porn star), and all normal children understand the moral code at an early age. Children are cruel, children are violent, children have no patience, children are moody, and children can’t seem to understand that sneaking under Daddy’s desk when he’s lost in thought while writing his book and grabbing his feet is going to scare the living shit out of him. Maybe they do understand that last one. Children have a lot of work to do on impulse control, but morality takes its place early on. There are studies about normal children knowing the moral difference between a teacher saying it’s okay to stand up during circle time and a teacher saying it’s okay to lie and hit. They know the teacher can’t turn something that is morally wrong into something right by just saying it. They understand that right and wrong are separate from authority.
Years ago, I brought a date to hear an atheist speaker (I knew how t
o pitch the old woo, huh?), and during the Q&A a stranger sitting next to us stood up with a question, “If there’s no god, what’s stopping us from just raping and killing all we want?” Before the speaker onstage could give his answer, my date raised her hand, stood up and asked, “Quick question: may I change my seat please?” She got a huge laugh and had made the philosophic argument perfectly. If you rape and kill, people will move away from you. That’s all.
I do rape and kill all I want. The amount I want to rape and kill is zero. I completely condone murder fantasies—there are no thought police—but I don’t have those thoughts myself. “Didn’t you want to punch Clay Aiken in the face?” Nope. Not once. I just wanted to get back to my real business partner, Teller, and back to my real team, my family. When I’m pissed off at people, I have no desire to kill them or even hurt them. I don’t even want to yell at them. I don’t want to talk to them. I just want to get away from them. Whether rape is a crime of hate or a crime of sex, it doesn’t ever cross my mind. I don’t want to fuck when I’m angry, and there’s nothing sexy to me about someone who is not attracted to me. I take it as sexual rejection if my wife pauses for a moment to pull back her hair before she kisses me. We have sickening evidence that not everyone feels the same way about rape and murder, but I believe my lack of desire for violence is typical. Many religious people seem to think that it’s nothing but faith that stops them from committing three-state killing sprees with a side of forced sodomy.
It’s not fair to say all Christians are murdering rapists being held back by fear of hell, or desire for heaven, but as unfair as it is, it’s bothersome how many Christians lead with it. The argument that the only reason you’re not killing and raping me is that your magic book teaches you not to is not reassuring, and I don’t think it’s even true. Christians defend the insanity of the Bible by saying how good, kind and peaceful Jesus was in the New Testament, even though he negates none of the Old Testament’s horrors. What do they mean by “good” about Jesus anyway? If all morality comes from god, isn’t all of the Old Testament’s genocide, slavery, rape, incest, torture, and ignorance good by definition? If all morality comes from god, what does it mean to believe “god is good”? Wouldn’t that be a tautology? If Satan were to win the final battle (the spoiler says he doesn’t), defeat god, and become the most powerful force in the universe, wouldn’t he be our god? We’d meet the new boss, and he’d be the same as the old boss—good, by definition. Would we just replace the cross with heavy metal horns and start fucking our sisters’ assholes on beds of goats’ blood in the name of all that is unholy, while listening to Slayer? Wouldn’t that be community service?
Every Day is an Atheist Holiday!: More Magical Tales from the Author of God, No! Page 24
