Atheist Cartoons

Ah, the white man rescuing the brutal savages from their primitive ways!

In 1956, American Anthropologist published a paper called Body Ritual among the Nacirema, which is arguably the most important anthropological paper ever published, at least for beginners. At the risk of SPOILER ALERT, the point is that human animals share some basic psychological characteristics, including language, social organization and religion. Sometimes it’s hard to understand that the crazy ways of the savage tribes are, in fact, our ways.

For a similar violent jolt of perspective from an Austrialian perspective, I can highly recommend 1986’s Babakiueria. It concerns the Australian colonial situation, but some of the themes are universal, and it’s very entertaining.