Jamie Coots, who starred on "Snake Salvation" — a National Geographic reality show about Pentecostal preachers who handle snakes as part of their services — died Saturday after being bitten by one of the snakes and refusing medical treatment. His son said that Jamie had previously been bitten eight times but never had a reaction like this.
Had he not refused medical treatment, he would have broken the very covenant that he preached and showed it to be false. A definite No-win situation. That said, those folk are bonkers.
ReplyDeleteIdiot! Who goes out of their way to handle venomous snakes and then, when bitten,refuses medical care? In the name of god yet!!!! Idiot.
ReplyDeleteLive by the snake, die by the snake
ReplyDeleteIt was God's will. lol
ReplyDeleteWhen are people going to learn that wildlife / reptiles are not intended to be humans' play things and should not be handled?!
ReplyDeleteI'm a bit - no, a lot! - of an animal rights activist so I don't really have sympathy for this guy who obviously upset the snake and paid the price.
OTOH a 17 foot 8 inch python got itself killed over by Orlando over the weekend.
ReplyDeleteLeast surprising headline ever.
ReplyDeleteCleo is correct on all counts. He couldn't accept help. I guess in a way he died for his faith. I'll tell you this, it's a cold day in Beezlebub town before I willingly go near a snake, much less handle one.
ReplyDeleteStepforded, is it true that you are Lucy Lawless?
ReplyDeleteIf only he'd read the bible. Snakes aren't really our friends, if my memory of Eden serves me.
ReplyDeleteMy trouser snake never bites me.
ReplyDeleteAhahahahaaa!! I <3 you, @FSP! :)
Deleteonce in a while my trouser zipper bites my trouser snake. :(
ReplyDelete@Lurker - no.
ReplyDeleteThere's a horrible story online this morning about a Chinese man who climbed into a tigers' enclosure at a zoo, offering himself as food (which they accepted) - don't look! It's awful! :-(
ReplyDelete(It's in the Daily Mail - front page of 'News' if you do want to look)
Hay rollin, snake handlin' heathens!
ReplyDeleteThat is what you get for being full of sin, right? Nothing to feel bad about here.
ReplyDeleteI shudder to think about the horrible things he must have been up to for Baby Jesus to enforce the death penalty.
Leave the animals alone!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteA word of warning boys. You can go blind handling a snake. Take it from a voice of experience
ReplyDeleteSo, now the truth comes out! :D
DeleteCharlie, you gotta watch out for those spitting cobras...
DeleteSorry Stepforded. Just that someone said you were the other day and then you said you were an animal activist and I thought she was to.
ReplyDeleteZzzz. Im going back to bed.
ReplyDeleteDont like to speak ill of the dead but that is a dumbass way to die. Still sad though
ReplyDeleteGreat story, well deserved! Hope they left the hero to live.
ReplyDeleteYou know, this guy got this idea from the bible. I never understand why people revere the bible so as 'word of god". It was NOT written by Jesus, but by apostles along for ride with him. Then as eons passed, it was transcribed by hand time and time again, in different languages. Would there not have possibly have been a a typo here and there? A translation error? We dont take other books as "gospel", why should the bible be any different? I dont think it is possible it is 100% accurate or true.
ReplyDeleteFurther proof of the theory of natural selection.
ReplyDelete("Jesus enforcing the death penalty" was worthy of a little black laugh, though)
Where my parents live, there's one of those "churches" that believe in faith healing, no medicine at all. A couple of years ago, they went on trial for manslaughter after their teenage son died from a burst appendix. He'd been in pain for a couple of days with appendicitis and the doctors said he would have been fine if they'd brought him to the doctor the day he complained of severe pain. Instead, they brought him to the preacher's house to be anointed with oil and prayed over and - according to the doctors who testified - die in utter agony. It came out in the news that a family in the same cult had a child removed from them after the child had gone nearly blind in one eye from a benign, untreated growth on the left side of the child's face that had swelled to the size of a baseball. While in foster care, the growth was removed, the child received treatment to correct the sight issues from only seeing out of one eye for most of his life, and is thriving. While the case was going on, a baby in the cult died after not being treated.
tl;dr - be stupid and kill yourself but remember: Jesus loves the little babehs, so leave them out of it.
Go to The Light. I hope he didn't procreate before natural selection chose him
ReplyDelete@Stepforded, when I lived in Singapore, there was a case of one of the employees who they reckon committed suicide by climbing into the tiger's enclosure. Not a quick or pleasant way to go. That's why so many use the tall buildings over there...
ReplyDeleteGod helps those who help themselves. Handling poisonous snakes, getting bitten, and refusing available help isn't faith, it's hubris.
ReplyDeleteSevens right, this is Darwinian. Thinning out the idiots. Maybe now one of his flock will get a clue and it'll save some lives in the future by discouraging future religious dumbasses from snake handling, praying away the illness over doctoring it, or whatever else nonsense.
ReplyDeleteHe deserved it considering how horribly he treated those snakes. Snake handlers basically starve and dehydrate the snakes until they are too woozy and half dead to do anything.
ReplyDeleteI won't go so far as to say he deserved it, but Henriette is right--they starve the snakes until they're too weak to put up much of a fight; when the authorities caught this guy w/a bunch of illegally obtained snakes, several of them (the snakes, that is) had to be put down because they were too sick to save. Yeah, yeah, they're just snakes & all, but I hate seeing any living creature abused like that, especially by idiots claiming it's God's will...oh, and hello? I believe that particular Bible verse about being able to take up serpents was meant as a metaphor, you idiots...) Now why do I have the mental image of this guy standing at the Pearly Gates, while St. Peter just shakes his head?...
ReplyDeleteApparently he had been bitten many times before, but this time it killed him. At least he died doing what he loved doing. Religion makes me cringe, but I have to admire someone who sticks to their guns up through the bitter end.
ReplyDeletePreacher says "If the snake bites you, it's because God don't like you." (or however they say it)
ReplyDeleteSnake bites preacher, preacher dies.
If you're in a church and this happens, that's your cue to quit. Why would anyone be in a church that must be so terrible that God would strike down the leader?
PS: The real cue to quit should have come about 5 seconds after you saw them pull out the snakes for the very first time.
ReplyDeleteOne more thing... No-medicine, waiting-for-a-miracle religious groups, they get it all wrong. What if it's God just answering your prayers?
ReplyDeleteIf you believe in God, then you'd believe he created all the people, animals, plants and gases, etc., and gave us smarts and boredom. Maybe modern medicine is God's idea of a giant puzzle to be solved. I can picture God saying "No, you idiots, don't pass the snake around, just harness a little of its venom! It's the cure to that disease you keep praying about!"
I don't think god ment it litterly
ReplyDelete