# Hate literature placed in my hotel room by the Gideons....what should I do? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [June 1, 2008, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346 "2008-06-01T14:03:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 9
**Author:** ![Cat\_Fight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/90ced4/32.png) [@Cat\_Fight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Fight)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/161 "2008-06-02T19:12:50Z")
I’ve always enjoyed putting notes, corrections and doodles in the margins. ---
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/162 "2008-06-02T19:13:05Z")
[QUOTE=Malacandra] Whuzzat, Dawkins for the not especially literate? [/QUOTE] Yes, It’s a little-known second edition. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Plastic\_Ninja](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f07891/32.png) [@Little\_Plastic\_Ninja](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Plastic_Ninja)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/163 "2008-06-02T19:31:28Z")
Or the God Elision, which can be read out much more quickly because it’s all slurred together. Or the God Delicious, a treatise on transubstantiation. > [@Valteron](#): > > But if Valteron started the thread, it deserves nothing but the contempt of Marley and Tomndebb, I guess. At the risk of sounding bitchy (oh well, it IS the Pit), it is getting mighty crowded up on that cross. Perhaps you did indeed want to debate – and the question as to whether religious documents are appropriate fodder for hotel nightstands is a reasonable debate topic – but your OP read as something I would expect in the Pit rather than GD. You do have a reputation for being stridently anti-religion. You made that reputation all by yourself. If you don’t want that reputation, work to change it. If you don’t care that you have the reputation or are in fact pleased by it, don’t gripe when you’re called on being stridently anti-religion. I realize that personal responsibility should be against everything my religion stands for, but I’m pretty big on it. You have every right to offense, but nobody here has the right to demand a one-sided rant in Great Debates and cry foul when people disagree with your argument and your thread placement. ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/164 "2008-06-02T19:36:18Z")
There’s a great bit in _Screwtape_ where the old devil is advising young Wormwood of the joys of getting his patient to play this game where he gets into the mindset where he’s saying things with the clear intention of giving offence and yet he’s genuinely outraged when offence is actually taken. Any resemblance to posters alive or dead is entirely intentional. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/165 "2008-06-02T19:56:30Z")
[QUOTE=Thudlow Boink] In other words, you’re outraged that God would allow awful things to happen to people who don’t deserve them. [/QUOTE] Actually, I would say there’s a pretty significant difference between “allowing awful things to happen to people who don’t deserve them” and “specifically stepping in to cause an awful thing that would not occur otherwise to happen to people who don’t deserve them”. I would say that hypothetically you could very well accept that it is reasonable for bad things to happen to good people yet keep God as good (thanks to the free will explanation, which I think is fine), yet consider God actually deliberatly causing such harm to be a bit of a sticking point. IOW, that’s not “IOW”. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/166 "2008-06-02T20:17:33Z")
Thanks **Revenant Threshold** , that’s pretty much it. Bad things didn’t “just happen” to Job’s original family, God deliberately wiped them off the face of the Earth in order to test Job. More accurately, according to the story (assuming I’m remembering this correctly), God bragged about Job, Satan messed with God’s head and tempted him, God being gullible and fallible and all :rolleyes: fell for it hook, line and sinker, and killed the whole bunch. Just to show Satan that Job was still his boy no matter what kind of shit God dumped on him. For the record, I do believe in a Creator/God. Just not the limited and flawed versions corrupted by men and presented as truth in their “holy” books. ---
**Author:** ![Weirddave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/919ad9/32.png) [@Weirddave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Weirddave)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/167 "2008-06-02T20:26:53Z")
It’s been a while since I read the myth, but didn’t God simply fail to stop the Devil from killing Job’s family? That’s different than God actively killing them himself. The active bad guy here is the Devil. As I remember it, the Devil kept saying “If I do this, Job will curse you”, God replies “No he won’t”, the Devil does it and Job remains faithful. When the Devil finally gives up, God steps in a rewards Job for keeping the faith with a red haired girl in a Chevrolet. ---
**Author:** ![lekatt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lekatt/32/7269_2.png) [@lekatt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lekatt)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/168 "2008-06-02T20:38:26Z")
Just look upon it as another ad, put there to sell you something you don’t want. Every American tolerates hundreds of unwanted ads every day, it’s a way of life. The Bible was written hundreds of years ago, things change, just ignore it like I do. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/169 "2008-06-02T20:38:54Z")
Well, yes: in the book, it’s Satan who directly does the bad things (i.e. killing off Job’s family), after God gives him explicit permission. People have been discussing and arguing over the book for centuries, so we’re not going to settle on _ **the** _ correct interpretation here. For anyone who’s really interested in Job, I enjoyed [this book](http://www.amazon.com/First-Dissident-Book-Todays-Politics/dp/0679417559/ref=ed_oe_h) by William Safire, which summarizes some of the ways various commentators have read and interpreted the book. ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/170 "2008-06-02T20:58:20Z")
[QUOTE=Chimera] I was born and raised conservative Baptist, but the God of the Old Testament is not someone I have any desire to worship. My God is not a monomaniacal psychopath. [/QUOTE] Yet Jesus calls that God “Father” and claims to be His Representative. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/171 "2008-06-02T21:33:42Z")
[QUOTE=Weirddave] It’s been a while since I read the myth, but didn’t God simply fail to stop the Devil from killing Job’s family? That’s different than God actively killing them himself. [/quote] I beg to differ. If someone asks you for permission to kill your children, and you say, “Go ahead,” does that make you innocent? ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/172 "2008-06-02T21:41:15Z")
[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic] I beg to differ. If someone asks you for permission to kill your children, and you say, “Go ahead,” does that make you innocent? [/QUOTE] It wouldn’t make you an innocent, but it would, as **Weirddave** said, be different than actively killing them yourself. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/173 "2008-06-02T21:43:27Z")
[QUOTE=Miller] It wouldn’t make you an innocent, but it would, as **Weirddave** said, be different than actively killing them yourself. [/QUOTE] I call this the Charles Manson defense to the Book of Job. In what way is it morally different? ---
**Author:** ![Contrapuntal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e274bd/32.png) [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/174 "2008-06-02T21:46:28Z")
[QUOTE=Miller] It wouldn’t make you an innocent, but it would, as **Weirddave** said, be different than actively killing them yourself. [/QUOTE] It’s different, agreed, but if I could effortlessly prevent the killing of my children but chose not to because of what is essentially a wager, it would be hard to argue any moral superiority to someone who actively killed his children. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/175 "2008-06-02T21:52:47Z")
Plus God created Satan with full, prescient knowledge of everything Satan would do, so everything Satan does is God’s responsibility – his _idea_ even. By the way, it deserves to be mentioned that Satan is not an evil character in the Hebrew Bible (and in Judaism in general). he is a serveant of God. He does nothing except on God’s behalf and request. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/176 "2008-06-02T21:53:34Z")
[QUOTE=Contrapuntal] It’s different, agreed, but if I could effortlessly prevent the killing of my children but chose not to because of what is essentially a wager, it would be hard to argue any moral superiority to someone who actively killed his children. [/QUOTE] I’d say it’s easy to argue his moral superiority to the guy who actually does the killing. Arguing his morality _in general_, on the other hand, would be a much harder sell. But I think there is a clear moral difference between comitting an evil act, and allowing an act to be committed through your own inaction. Neither is a good thing, but one is definitly more evil than the other. ---
**Author:** ![Kythereia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e8c25b/32.png) [@Kythereia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kythereia)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/177 "2008-06-02T22:00:13Z")
The problem with Satan being responsible for Job’s many, many, many misfortunes is that when the Lord speaks directly to Job out of the storm, he doesn’t say “Satan did it, not me” or “I’m deeply, truly sorry about all of this, I know you must have suffered greatly”, but “I’m God, I created the universe, I can do whatever I want, so shut your face.” And Job does, and gets his reward. So the message is, weirdly enough, like Jesus’s ‘turn the other cheek’ in a way: lots of bad shit goes down in people’s lives, sometimes permitted by–or caused by–God. But as long as you keep believing and have faith in God, no matter whatever happens–sometimes in defiance of all logic and reason–good stuff will eventually happen. It’s a really difficult, uncomfortable book, looking back on it (I hauled out my copy a minute ago). I’d like to pick up that book **Thudlow Boink** linked to earlier. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/178 "2008-06-02T22:01:43Z")
[QUOTE=Miller] I’d say it’s easy to argue his moral superiority to the guy who actually does the killing. Arguing his morality _in general_, on the other hand, would be a much harder sell. But I think there is a clear moral difference between comitting an evil act, and allowing an act to be committed through your own inaction. Neither is a good thing, but one is definitly more evil than the other. [/QUOTE] It’s not just inaction, but explicit permission. Is pimping a child morally superior to raping a child? ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/179 "2008-06-02T22:07:37Z")
[QUOTE=Paul in Saudi] Funny we never get that book in our hotel rooms. [/QUOTE] When I was working in Cairo, I wanted to get a bumper sticker (in Arabic) that said “Honk if you love Jesus”. It would have driven the poor buggers nuts. The security officer vetoed the idea. ---
**Author:** ![Contrapuntal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e274bd/32.png) [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2008, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346/180 "2008-06-02T22:08:18Z")
[QUOTE=Miller] I’d say it’s easy to argue his moral superiority to the guy who actually does the killing. Arguing his morality _in general_, on the other hand, would be a much harder sell. But I think there is a clear moral difference between comitting an evil act, and allowing an act to be committed through your own inaction. [/QUOTE] I’m not sure that granting permission counts as inaction. It’s certainly an act, rather than the lack of one. > [@](#): > > Neither is a good thing, but one is definitly more evil than the other. We’ll just have to disagree. At least, unless you mean that one is infinitesimally more evil than the other (and don’t think that you do.) Especially when the one permitting the murders is the Arbiter of Justice in the Universe. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346.md?page=8) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hate-literature-placed-in-my-hotel-room-by-the-gideons-what-should-i-do/451346.md?page=10)