This probably doesn’t apply to that cult, but in conventional Judaism the Talmud carries a rabbinic prohibition to a man shaving armpit or pubic hair, apparently in connection with the Torah condemnation of trans-dressing.
I don’t claim to understand their psychology, but I strongly suspect that they are also looking to curry favor with their fellow religionists, and to do something which makes them feel better about themselves by “fighting evil.” I find it hard to believe that their motivations are entirely disjoint from those of other, non-religious protestors.
I visited Seattle in 2013 and saw a street preacher. The preacher was a black dude dressed in an all black cowboy outfit being castigated by a man in a full body frog outfit telling him, “Jesus loves everyone. Even the gays and potheads!” Never change, Seattle. Never change.
I am an American. I support freedom of speech and of religion.
When it comes to public evangelism, I find it hard not to empathize with the Sentinelese.
I mentioned him in another thread recently, but here in Toronto there’s a street preacher referred to by the locals as “the Believe guy” because he stands on the northwest corner of Yonge and Dundas holding out leaflets and muttering “…only through the glory of Jesus will you enter the kindom of heaven…”, and every once and a while will bellow “BELIEVE!” He’s been there for as long as I’ve lived in Toronto. He’s always had some kind of southern/eastern European accent, but about a decade ago he had a very visible lump the size of a baseball on the side of his neck. That got removed and his speech got even more slurred.
I know that my atheism makes me more cynical than most about this guy and those like him, but this illustrates to me the double standard western society puts on religious expression. If I were to stand on the street corner and yell “Aliens have kidnapped my ottoman couch!” for hours at a time, the understandable reaction would be “this guy’s nuts.” But for someone to yell, with equal fervor, about Christian salvation, many look at them and just accept that they’re very devout. But there’s gotta be a line over which that crosses into mental illness. For someone to wake up every morning and feel that the best use of their time as a human is to stand on a street corner shoving tracts into people’s hands is somone divorced from reality. And this guy obviously has enablers: some church group, or carer, is providing him with his supplies. “This’ll keep Ed occupied while we get on with actual work. The photocopying costs are worth it.” The ongoing double standard is one of many reasons I still distance myself from, and hold deep distain for, organized religion, even when friends of mine whom I truly love and respect are people of faith. Because I suspect in the back of their minds, maybe only in the far recesses, but still there, they think the Believe guy is serving a purpose.
Good point. I fell for the excluded middle a bit there. Thank you.
The point of any protester is
I’m unhappy with the status quo and believe strongly enough that am willing to accept personal hardship and ridicule to point out the errors of all you folks’ ways.
Which makes them feel good about themselves for caring enough to take concrete action, and also engenders in-group support if they are part of an in-group.
Regardless of whether they’re protesting in favor of the Peoples Judean Front (PJF) or the Judean People’s Front (JPF). Or even the People’s Front of Judea (PFoJ).
Regardless of the cause espoused, the most ultra of ultra-partisans tend to be loners. Mental illness or at least monomania is like that; off-putting to folks who might be your co-believers or co-protesters if you were a bit more mainstream.
Q: What’s the difference between a cult and a religion?
A: Cults don’t get tax breaks.
“In a cult, there’s somebody at the top who knows it’s a scam. In a religion, that person is dead.”
Anyway, I think it’s part performative as people have said, but I also think it’s the pre-electronic version of email spam. It lets them spew out their beliefs to a very large number of people for minimal cost to them and is very annoying. But it can still be worth it from their viewpoint, because despite the low chance of it convincing any one person by speaking to a very large number of people at a low cost they get to roll the dice a great many times and thus have a fair chance of getting lucky eventually.
Q: What’s the difference between a street preacher and a raving lunatic?
A: At least some street preachers get donations put in their bucket.
And if the video has such poor sound quality that I can’t understand what the people are saying, then I’d advise not posting it at all. – maybe the section being referred to has clearer sound; I have no idea. When I realized how long the first one was I closed it; and didn’t open the others.
People have a right to rant in public. The public has a right to tell them to keep it at a reasonable noise level, and not to block or otherwise interfere with others going about their business.
I don’t know if the law agrees with me on this, but IMO if the preacher’s calling out individuals, that’s harassment.
The objection might just have been to the public mention of “private parts”.
Do they ever consider the possibility that how they do what they do might drive people away?
I got called out in Tunbridge Wells in Kent - a very posh place. There were a couple of guys on a bandstand we were passing - I assume my guy was calling out someone or other about being a sinner (or whatever) constantly (at least, I hope that was the case! 
), and relying on peer pressure to keep his targets quiet. Certainly he looked stunned when I shouted back that he could go fuck himself. Who knows, maybe I even did some good in the world?
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My guess is that they don’t really think about people much. They are most likely convinced that God has commanded them to do this, no matter what, and their important intercourse is interior, with God alone. A certain amount of overlap with insanity.
I would be tempted to shout back ‘God told me to do [whatever he was on against.] God didn’t give us all the same instructions; and you’re reading yours wrong!’
But then keep walking. Wouldn’t really want to get into a theological discussion with the guy.
When I was in college in the Eighties, we used to get Brother Jed and Sister Cindy doing their yelly evangelism thing on our campus. I was surprised to see he kept it up well into the 2010s (he died in 2022). These two were quite entertaining.
I see somebody tried to make a reality show about his family. I feel very sorry for his daughters. I’d put the link in here but I can’t figure out how to include a link to a YouTube video.
I hate that they do that, and am not above heckling the egregiously obnoxious ones a little, but grudgingly accept public preaching as part of our freedom of religion.
Yah. I thought of that when writing the post. It actually hurts just to read that word. I probably shoulda hit up ol’ Roget. Or just use “surpass”.
I would not say religious fanaticism per se, but a lust for power that is cloaked in fanaticism to give it the appearance of legitimacy. Grievances, repression, discrimination, bigotry, narcissism, and desperation look to religion for legitimacy of real or imagined lack of power. The differences are found in the history and personality of the fanatic.
That wouldn’t have been “Mad” Max Lynch, would it?