Taking a class on the Historical Jesus to further educate yourself? Good! Listening to the other idiots in your class inflict their uneducated opinions upon you? Bad!
Now before you start calling me a hypocrite, allow me to point out that I have been carefully keeping my opinion in reserve, at least in this class. The reason is that I can’t stand listening to other people’s opinions, so I see no reason to make them listen to mine. I’m there to learn what I can from the teacher and the class materials.
Most of the people in the class are like me, but the few people who are outspoken with their opinions are uniformly stupid. Here’s an example:
Female: Is there any art of Jesus or his immediate family from the first century that we could count as a primary source?
Teacher: Well, technically, no.
Female: Well, how do we know he existed? I mean there’s no evidence that he did.
Teacher: There’s a great deal of literary evidence.
Female: But that’s all hear-say! You can’t trust any of it!
Teacher: Well, the same could be said of any historical figure from antiquity. We have as much, in fact, we have more evidence for Jesus than for Socrates or Julius Ceasar.
Female: But Ceasar left a mark!
Several people in class at once: So did Jesus!!
Female: No he didn’t! Ceasar left a permanent mark that we can trace. Jesus is transparent. There’s no artwork or scientific evidence at all! _I_ don’t think he really existed!
She said this last line very proudly, almost snidely, as though she was just waiting for the rest of us to come to this obvious conclusion and abandon our fool’s quest to prove anything at all.
She brought this same subject up three times over a two-hour class, interrupting the lecture each time. We were discussing portrayals of Jesus in artwork, and she was way off-topic. After three weeks in class, Jesus’ historicity is accepted, and we’re only debating what he actually did, not whether he existed.
There are so many holes in her argument that I’m not even going to point them out. I’ll just leave them for the reader to amaze themselves with.
Three days of class left. Then I’m officially graduated and I don’t have to put up with this shit anymore.
Someday, when I’m a college professor, I’m going to include a gag on the list of required materials, and I’ll refuse to lecture until all the students are wearing them.
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I'm a 30-year-old 
