A personal hero of mine… my favorite cynical comedian, George Carlin has just ‘passed away’, and he will indeed be missed.

George Carlin, 1937 - 2008

I’ll never forget the first comedy routine I ever heard from him, it blew me away.. not just because it was hilarious, but also because he was bashing religion in a way that had me wondering how people might react to this guy… I admired his courage.

You also get the impression that perhaps George isn’t really a comedian, but rather, just a guy sharing his true beliefs… and simply structuring his language so that his world model is funny and provocative.

So anyway, here’s the first Carlin ‘routine’ I ever heard -

George Carlin - Bullshit And Religion

See what I mean? I get the impression that George is not joking when he says this stuff.

Like Carlin, I was also raised as a Catholic boy, with the Baptisms and the Communions and being forced to go to Church every Sunday, and religion didn’t jive with me.

It seemed strange to me that there was this ‘Father’ up there, and His ‘Son’. It seemed ridiculous to me that God would send people to either Heaven or Hell, and how Jesus dies for MY sins… something was off, and I considered my family to be somewhat insane for actually believing this sh*t.

So, I read a few different versions of the Bible - I wanted to judge all of this for myself, and frankly, I found the 1st testament to be a bunch of crap. What got to me was people seemed to believe that all those stories (e.g., Adam & Eve, Noah’s Ark) were real. (Today I understand them to be allegories.)

I also read the ‘book of revelation’ (notice I don’t use capitols, as I don’t feel that book deserves them) and found it to be nothing more than a bunch of paranoid delusions written by a narcissistic (and possibly schizophrenic) fool.

Then I read the NEW Testament, and it was fantastic, and FILLED with true wisdom from Jesus & co. And, I have since re-read the Old Testament (parts of it anyway) and now that I understand those stories are meant to be symbolic, allegorical, the value in those texts are decidedly obvious now.

One thing I couldn’t swallow about Christianity was this whole obsession with Sin. And although the Seven Deadly Sins indeed make a lot of sense, I rejected them as a youth because I was rejecting the idea that God is anthropomorphic (human-like characteristics). In those days, I ‘threw the baby out with the bathwater’, but now that I understand ‘God’ to literally mean CONSCIOUSNESS ITSELF, so now I have begun to study ALL religions with much greater enthusiasm. I’ll be reading the Koran next.

Another part of religion I didn’t like was this idea that God ’spoke to’ Moses, who then wrote the Ten Commandments. Don’t get me wrong, I *liked* the Commandments, as they obviously make a lot of good, logical (as well as spiritual and pragmatic) sense, but the idea that God is this ‘man in the sky’ who only ’speaks’ to a select few people turned me off, for obvious reasons. But since I now understand that God is Consciousness itself, it makes perfect sense to me that God can ’speak’ to someone, particularly is that person has a high level of consciousness. This thing about ’speaking’ is not literal, it’s more like a trasnmission of energy, of consciousness.

Speaking of the Ten Commandments, George Carlin had a HILARIOUS routine in which he compresses them into only two commandments. As usual, it’s a pretty cynical routine, you’ll see him stating that the Ten Commandments were part of some conspiracy to control people (paranoia) but the routine is hilarious nonetheless, check this out -

George Carlin - The Ten Commandments

Now, let’s take a look as some of his earlier stuff. To me, he seemed to have a lot more light in his eyes back then, but over the years that light seemed to have progressively gotten dimmer… Let’s take a look at an older recording, and then we’ll contrast it with one of his later recordings, I think you’ll see that he became a little darker as time went on. He also lost his wife (in 1997, I think) and so I wouldn’t be suprised if her death perhaps ‘changed’ him.

So here’s something light and funny from the 70’s…

George Carlin - Al Sleet, Weatherman

My favorite line is, “Tonight’s forecast… DARK!”

Here’s another older routine from the 70’s, I believe this is the ONE routine that made him famous overnight, and apparently there were Supreme Court rulings to keep this routine off the air -

George Carlin - Seven Words You Can’t Say On Television

He seemed… happier… in those days, but he progressively seemed to get darker and more cynical as time went on. Apparently he struggled with cocaine addictions, which will of course, pump the user full of guilt and shame. He then reportedly gave up cocaine to become a full-time alcoholic. But when guilt & shame are not dealt with, this usually turns into anger… in Carlin’s case, he seems angry at ‘God’ (cynical) and probably never realized that God just means Consciousness. (See ‘Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle’, as well as quantum mechanics [Bohm, and Stapp])

Now let’s take a look at a later routine, this is one of my personal favorites…

George Carlin - A Place For My Stuff

I guess I’ll end this post with Ghita and Greta’s favorite George Carlin routine

George Carlin - Dogs & Cats

Ahhhh, George, you will be missed…

I remember when I first got into his stuff, I was working hard in those days (on my game) and so I listened to his CD’s and videos every single day for like… well, it was over a year. Even when I was completely sick of hearing those same routines, day after day, I still listened to them because I assumed that Carlin’s humor “structures” would rub off on me, and they eventually did.

Thanks George… I’m a better man because of you - you changed my life, man.

Blessings,

Stephane