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Are the Gnu Atheists in the market for a theme song? I can’t speak for the Gnus—camels (like me) are apparently not gnus as I just learned from the gnu in this video, who spelled out this point quite explicitly.
Your Thoughts?
Gnu Atheists, Meet the Gnu Muppet
January 22, 2012 at 11:29 am 
Daniel Fincke 
Posted in 12 Responses to “Gnu Atheists, Meet the Gnu Muppet”
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What’s gnu? Not much, what’s gnu with you? Wildebeest!
Trebuchet, who is gnot from gNome.
This is Flanders and Swann and goes back much further than the Muppet Show. If you nose around places where Gnus have written/been written about, you’ll find folks can’t resist bringing it up occasionally.
HA! I had no idea. Thanks, Stewart.
Recursion joke:
Q: What’s “Gnu”?
A: Gnu is not UNIX.
If you weren’t familiar with them, (Michael) Flanders (words) and (Donald) Swann (music) are well worth getting to know. They wrote and performed a great deal of very amusing material and the gnu song was one of many that featured animals. They were so identified with witty songs about animals that they were the original choice to write the songs for the late 1960s Dr. Doolittle movie. I believe they did turn in a score which was, however, not considered suitable for the kind of film the producers had in mind and were replaced by Leslie Bricusse and Tony Newley. What is out of place for FTB is that late in life Donald Swann’s devout Christianity also began to feature in his public appearances.
Possibly Flanders & Swann’s most famous song was “Have Some Medeira M’Dear”:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OW_zi8n4HDQ&feature=related
Flanders & Swann’s most famous song is undoubtedly “The Hippopotamus”, often known just as “Mud, mud, glorious mud!”
Must side with Paul on the “most famous” question, though the one that made me laugh hardest when I first heard it was the one entitled “Happy Song.”
Flanders & Swann – today’s (well, pretty recent anyway) Gilbert & Sullivan and much more broadly appropriate. Great stuff!
And, strange as it may seem to have a parody of something intentionally and successfully hilarious, there’s also “Brabbins and Fyffe” an extremely bawdy and atmospherically precise recreation of the Flanders and Swann performance style by comedians Armstrong & Miller. Not for everyone.
Your Thoughts?
you watched way too much sesame street as a kid?
Thanks for finding this, Dan! I added a link to it to the Gnu Atheism group.
By the way, is there some way I can change my avatar here? It didn’t seem possible from the WP profile settings page. I kind of expected it to pick up my avatar from FB, but I guess not.