I didn’t get to watch the Golden Globes ceremony. To be honest, it’s not really the kind of show I enjoy. But completely by chance I tuned in right at the very end, when host Ricky Gervais said the show was over and started his own thanks. And he closed with –

And thank you god for making me an atheist.

While my facial muscles were still working of forming the smile, my head was already wondering how the quote would sit with some of the theists who would be watching. I immediately started a search on Twitter and the very first tweet I found was –

“TY God for making me an atheist” now that was just bad taste!

The tweets that followed were more or less equally divided between those very similar to the one above and others agreeing with me that this was the best closing line ever.

I wonder how you can possibly consider it bad taste though. I mean, if you’re an atheist, the quote is just funny. If, however, you believe in a god, then he’s just thanking it for something. He might as well have said, “thank you god for making me a comedian.”

You can’t really have it both ways. Either god doesn’t exist or god exists and made Ricky Gervais an atheist. Actually, there are other alternatives, but the people who would be offended belong to the team that believes in a personal god who does this kind of things.