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Fundamentalist religious believers love to ignore and attack science. Some will claim that there are other sources of knowledge. It is not unusual to hear some religious believer talk about spiritual knowledge or to claim that they can know God through faith. I maintain that without science there is no knowledge.

I guess I am stealing the wording here from the famous (and false) view that without God there is no morality, but I rather like my rewording better. For one thing, it is much more accurate. Science is how we know things. It is the only way we can know things with any accurate level of certainty.

Is this dogmatic? Maybe, but the difference here is that science can support its claims with actual evidence and more importantly with results. Don’t believe me? How are you even reading what I am saying on a computer screen? People built your computer based on knowledge obtained through the scientific method. Your house was built using knowledge obtained through the scientific method. You didn’t pray your home into existence, did you?

In the summer, one doesn’t use spiritual knowledge to stay cool. One uses a scientifically engineered air conditioner. In winter, praying in a group may warm you up a little, but not nearly as much as science can through the use of a heater.

The fact is that when something matters, science is what you rely on and everything else is just amounts to mere assertion. Assertion isn’t knowledge. Any real knowledge can only be understood through the scientific process. We can’t claim to know something unless we can evaluate that knowledge through objective standard.

Religion can only claim assertions. I could claim that I knowledge that there is an invisible pink unicorn in your pocket, but that would just be an assertion unless I could back it up with actual evidence. If I even tried to defend that assertion with evidence, I would be attempting (either successfully or unsuccessfully) to use the scientific method (in this case unsuccessfully). So yes, science does have the monopoly on knowledge.

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Filed under: Alternative Worldview, anti-intellectualism, science | 1 Comment »

The Republican’s say that we should cut taxes on the “Job Creators” because they don’t have enough money to create jobs. However they seem to have a lot of money to buy politicians. Then the Republicans are pushing to drop corporate taxes dramatically for a limited time to “Repatriate” money back into the country. But what they are really demanding is amnesty for billionaires.

First, it should pointed out that if the “Job Creators” need money to create jobs, why do they have all this money socked away in the Cayman Islands? The fact is that these people have cheated on their taxes. They have hid their money away in order to break the law and not pay their fair share. Now they need that money to buy more politicians, but they don’t want to pay their fair share so they are demanding amnesty.

They aren’t going to create jobs, lol. If they really wanted to create jobs, they would just spend less on politicians and/or withdraw money from their Cayman accounts and pay taxes on it. Then they could expand their business, create jobs, and make more money. Instead, they are so concerned with cheating on their taxes to save a few dollars that they can’t spend any of their Cayman money at all.

We should not be giving amnesty to billionaires who have decided to fuck the American people by cheating on their taxes. If they really are “Job Creators” let them create jobs. As it is, they are just rich criminals trying to buy a free ride from the law.

Filed under: Capitalism, debate, language, Politics | 3 Comments »

Unless you have been in a cryogenic sleep, you are no doubt aware that yesterday was the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. The day has been dubbed by then President Bush as Patriot Day. Over the last few days, me and just about everyone else had a lot of things to say about this tragedy. Today, I have some closing thoughts before we open this discussion up again next year.

Shortly after the tragedy, I started writing a series of poems about everything. I think I wrote one a day for four or five days. At the time, I knew that the 9/11 tragedy was like a hole in our collective human consciousness. It was clear to me that the world had changed, but I didn’t know if that change would be for good or ill. It wasn’t until the last in my poem series that I realized that the world had changed for the worse.

Since 9/11, America has been in perpetual war, we have been paranoid about future attacks, we have tortured people, spied on our own citizens, our economy is near collapse, and this nation has become much more fundamental in their religious belief. The only plus side is that people of reason have awoken from our apathetic slumber.

Most damaging of all however is that people no longer look to the future. Now we have become fixated on the past. I remember when space exploration excited people. Now most people see it as a waste of money that could be used toward tax cuts for the rich or in a war fighting someone somewhere for something.

The average religious believer looks to ancient knowledge to get them through the day instead of seeking knowledge through modern science. Education is not a priority any more. Instead of making our education system better, many parents have taken their kids out of the schools. In some cases, I can’t blame them. The schools today don’t take into account a 21st century environment. They don’t take advantage of Google or the internet. Instead, they use flawed text books from Texas.

Now ten years after the 9/11 attacks, America is still fixated on this past event rather than moving forward. Osama bin Laden may be dead, but he got the last laugh. The worst part is that we did it to ourselves. We are no longer dreamers, thinkers, movers, or makers. Instead, we have become like frightened children worried about the monster under our beds.

Filed under: anti-intellectualism, education, Patriot Day, People of Reason, The Future | No Comments »

Over the years, I have often repeated a joke to friends which was told to me on 9/11. The joke is horribly offensive however I do enjoy offensive humor and this joke in particular meant a lot to me at the time. So it being the tenth anniversary of that terrible day, I thought it would be appropriate to retell this joke today.

First, I have to give a little bit of setup and back story. For those who aren’t aware, today is my Birthday. Yeah, my birthday really is 9/11. On the morning of the 9/11 tragedy, I was living in the Philadelphia area and was already at work. My brother was in college at NYU. His dorm was blocks away from the Twin Towers.

When I first heard that a plane had hit one of the towers, my boss brought out his radio and we were glued to it. When the second plane hit, we knew as everyone else did that it was an attack. After the towers came down I tried to call my brother to make sure he was okay. Of course I couldn’t get through because the cell tower was on the top of one of the towers that had fallen.

Eventually, I did get through and he told me the following joke:
“It’s your Happy birthday, so I lite a couple of candles for you… too soon?”

My brother often talks about how it is never too soon to joke about tragedy. A lot of people died that day and I am glad my brother was not one of them.

Filed under: Blasphemy, Patriot Day, Personal | 2 Comments »

Last week, I was listening to a talk radio show in which the host commented about how the title, “Patriot Day” commercializes and trivializes the tragedy of that day. He imagined commercials advertising for Patriot Day clearance sales. But after the events of 9/11, I think America did sell out.

I remember the days after these tragic events I thought that the world was in a position of transition. I even thought that humanity itself might be in such a position. I thought that such a tragedy could inspire people to be better and rise to a new level of consciousness. We could say, “Never again” and work toward being better people. We could embrace the best of humanity paving the way for a Star Trek type future. That was pretty naïve.

Instead, we sold out and became worse people. We became quick to war, more judgmental of people who were different, more isolationistic, less compassionate, and more accepting of torture… among other things. Worse yet, we tried to fight religious conviction with more religious conviction.

I remember all the signs that went up everywhere declaring, “God Bless America,” “God Loves America,” and “In God We Trust.” Very few signs actually had the positive messages I was hoping for like, “United We Stand,” or “E Pluribus Unum.”

After 9/11, America sold out to religion and this country has gone downhill ever since.

Filed under: culture war, Patriot Day, Personal | 1 Comment »

I always knew Obama was an appeaser and didn’t really buy into his hype (although I voted for him and supported him in the general election). But now he has done the opposite of hope for me. He has disheartened me and discouraged me in relation to politics today. I don’t really see the point any more.

Our system is fundamentally broken and none of our representatives actually represent their constituents any more. Now they only represent the large corporations which have paid them the most money. Even the Democrats are bought off. Almost every politician in office should be impeached on charges of bribery. This is ridiculous and it has gotten out of control.

Regulatory organizations are not only being gutted by the corporate controlled congress, but many of the very regulators assigned to police these corporations and Wall Street bankers end up getting high paying jobs after they leave as a bribe to look the other way while they are regulators.

For a while, I thought we could just use our vote as a hostage to get our representatives and even our President to start cracking down on this stuff. That isn’t really going to work. There will always be large groups of Democrats who will give away their hostage right away without any expectation of getting their demands met. In fact this is so expected that the President is actually basing his entire reelection campaign around that very strategy.

There are also always going to be a large number of stupid Americans who vote for the craziest candidates because they too are crazy and/or stupid. But Democrats seem to be stupid too these days. Our candidates aren’t all that much better and now some of the craziness of the Republicans has started to filter into our candidates too. For example, there is a Democrat running for local county office in my area who is a Creationist.

Oddly enough, it was Sarah Palin who called out the corporate bribery in politics today when she said, “What if anything do their donors expect in return for their investments… Our country can’t afford more trillion dollar thank you notes to campaign backers.” But we still can’t forget her money making scheme of buying mass amounts of her own book with her PAC money and then giving it out to candidates. Still how did Sarah Palin become the voice of the people?

So what do we do to fix the system? I really don’t know any more. I don’t even know if I will bother voting. All the candidates are on the take and it is just a matter of degrees now. Perhaps it has to get worse in order to get better. With that in mind, I might just have to vote for the craziest candidate and hope they just don’t kill us all. Maybe is a Republican wins, the Democrats who would normally be opposed to our current policies would be more motivated to do something instead of giving Obama the pass they wouldn’t have given to Bush on the same policies.

Look, if you have a better idea please let me know. I really don’t see any hope for change any more short of some sort of violent revolution… which I oppose for now. So, don’t complain to me that the Republicans would be worse. Duh, I know that. But unless the people reach a breaking point we aren’t going to do anything. So maybe worse is better. I’m open to alternatives. Suggestions?

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Filed under: culture war, Election, Government, Obama, Politics | 5 Comments »

Christians have created a little trap for people of reason. It is a way they can attack us for whatever answer we give. It is an interesting new rhetoric that I am starting to hear them use more and more. I will call it “The Certainty Trap.”

First they start out with the whole, “it takes more faith not to believe” argument which goes a little something like this: “Unless you know everything in the entire universe, you can’t be certain that there is no God.”

Now atheists are left with two choices. We can claim certainty just as anyone with half a brain would claim to be certain that the Easter Bunny doesn’t exist without having to know everything in the entire universe or like Christians themselves will claim certainty about a host of deities they are certain don’t exist… or we can admit that we aren’t certain and that there might actually be a God.

If we take the first option, we are then labeled “dogmatic” which ironically is a term created specifically for the religious. The religious have now successfully lowered us to their level.

The second option is to admit that we aren’t certain. To some extent this is the more truthful approach but the problem is that it gives Christians the green light to proselytize. In their mind if you admit the possibility you also admit the probability. So by taking this route we have encouraged them in their ridiculous beliefs.

This is where we have to take the time to explain the difference between absolute certainty and reasonable certainty. They have an absolute certainty that their beliefs are true or to use Christianisse that their beliefs are “Truth.” Our certainty however is reasonable certainty. We are reasonably certain that no god exists. That is to say that we admit the possibility, but not the probability. It is in this way that we can turn the tables on their Certainty Trap and expose their dogma for what it is.

Related articles

• Faith In Uncertainty (andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com)
• We Can Make Being Identified as an Atheist a More Positive Experience (atheistrev.com)
• My Bias against Certainty (dilbert.com)

Filed under: Alternative Worldview, anti-intellectualism, Certainty, conversation, Preaching | 4 Comments »

Last week, I went to a Town Hall meeting with my Republican congressman. He spent the first several minutes asking people to be respectful and to not call out or yell. Several times during the event, people started to yell out and he would again call for calm and even put a slide up in his program calling for respect.

That all sounds well and good and people ought to respect each other but, just as there is a time for respect, there is also a time to not be respectful. When congress ignores the interests of the majority of the people and only cares about the interests of the wealthy who donate large sums of money to their campaigns, then it is time to no respect them.

He can’t metaphorically punch us in the face and then right when we are about to fight back, throw-up his hands and say, “Hey, let’s have some respect here.” Sorry, but he should have thought about that before he and his friends fucked us. After this congressman has made it clear that he is on the side of the Health Insurance industry, the fat cat bankers on Wall Street, and any other large corporations at the expense of his constituents, he has shown that he doesn’t respect us and we shouldn’t respect him back. He is lucky we don’t get violent with him the way he plans to violently gut our economy, health care, and general way of life.

The nerve of this congressman and every other congressman who calls for respectful dialog after they just beaten up on the American people through legislation. Fuck them! They swung the first punch, but they did it in a passive aggressive manner. Now they expect us to play nice? They want us to be respectful? I don’t think so.

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• Republicans Feeling the Heat at Town Halls (dangeroustalk.net)
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• Don’t Celebrate on Labor Day (dangeroustalk.net)

Filed under: Authority, culture war, Political Activism, Politics | 1 Comment »

This year, Labor Day carries some baggage. Normally, everyone takes the day off and celebrates the role of workers in this country. This year, Labor Day isn’t a day of celebration, it is ironically a day to work.

With record unemployment and the Republican Party aiming to disband labor unions state by state, Labor Day should be a rallying call to action. Normally, Labor Day is a pretty patriotic holiday in which every politician is expected to make some sort of vague patriotic speech in which he or she thanks workers across America. This year, we have to remind Americans that this holiday is everything Republicans hate and are actively working against.

We cannot allow our politicians to get away with vague patriot speeches thanking workers. It is time we demand that politicians actually focus on creating more job and respecting the rights of workers. We need action not speeches.

Writing letters to our elected officials will no longer do the trick (if it ever did). They are ALL bought and paid for and unless you can pay more, they will not listen to you. Our system amounts to a system of bribery. It is legal only as far as the law makers have made it legal to profit by it.

This Labor Day, we have to acknowledge the problem. Politicians don’t care about your labors. They don’t care about how hard you work or what you care about. They don’t even want your vote. They can buy that when the time comes. Besides, there is no alternative. Enjoy your Labor Day.

Filed under: Capitalism, culture war, Current Events, Labor Day, Political Activism, Politics | 3 Comments »

There seems to be this disconnect for many Christians. I have come across it multiple times. When asked why God doesn’t present evidence for his existence, I often hear Christians tell me that God gave us Free Will. I don’t really see how that addresses the problem but it seems that many Christians equate evidence with forced worship.

The view is that God loves us and so he wants us to love him out of a free choice. So I ask, how can I love a God if I have no evidence for the existence of such a being? How does presenting evidence of his existence impede on human’s free choice to worship him or not? If anything, it makes the choice more informed and therefore more meaningful.

This is where I often tell the Christian believer that even if I knew that the God of the Bible existed, I still wouldn’t worship such a being. While I couldn’t consider myself an atheist any longer, I certainly would not be a Christian.

This often blows their mind. But the point of this is not to astonish them in this way, but rather to get them to acknowledge that there is no challenge to free will if God were to have given us all knowledge or at least strong evidence for his existence. We would still have free will to accept and worship him or not.

So why aren’t we all born with absolute knowledge of God? Here Christians sometimes argue that we are, be just don’t know it. Well, if we know it but we don’t know it then we don’t really know it, do we? Duh! These are the word games Christians often try to play in order to get around the obvious problem that they are asking us to make an uninformed choice. This goes beyond free will and faith and into willful ignorance.

Related articles

• More Evidence for Jesus Than for Me? (dangeroustalk.net)
• You’re Not Worthy of The Evidence (dangeroustalk.net)
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• Magical Thinking: a religious deconversion (Atheism/Agnosticism) (renetaxian.wordpress.com)

Filed under: Alternative Worldview, anti-intellectualism, conversation, faith, free will, ignorance, Religious Manipulation | 1 Comment »

Last night I went to my first Town Hall event hosted by my Republican congressman Patrick Meehan. This is Meehan’s first term in office and while I had heard that he was more of a moderate, he was backed by the Tea Baggers. Not long ago I had sent the Congressman a letter concerning Health Care Reform and after a few weeks I got a letter back telling me that he disagreed with me and thinks that the poor insurance companies need more loopholes and more money (okay he didn’t put it exactly like that, but you get the idea).

The Town Hall was the third one that the Congressman hosted yesterday but it was the only evening one. It was packed! Standing room only/people in the hall packed! I got there early so I had my pick of seats and decided to sit in the third row (mainly because I think I would probably gotten arrested if I sat in the first row).

The very first thing that the Congressman talked about was the importance of having a civil and respectful dialog. I’ll get into that topic more next week. Then Meehan went through his talking points which seemed to be given to him by Sean Hannity:

-Unemployment
– Job Creators
– Reducing the Debt
– Competitive Tax Code
– Red Tape kills jobs

When it came to unemployment, he talked about how he was recently at a country club and… that was all he had to say. The crowd erupted. He asked what was wrong with country clubs and the crowd just laughed. He had to repeat his need for respect. Then he stated the obvious that unemployment is high.

He briefly talked about “Job creators” which is code for his corporate donors. He quickly transitioned to talking about the debt and showed Michele Bachmann’s misleading debt chart which doesn’t include the war debt until the Obama administration put that spending on the books. I had to yell out at that point along with many others. A few Republicans shouted back and Meehan again repeated his appeal for civility and respect. He even had a slide for that.

I’m going to skip the other two talking points and go right to the Q&A. The first question was from a Linden LaRouche person. I didn’t realize that dude was still alive, but he has a cult like following that is sort of like the liberal version of Ron Paul. In any case, her question didn’t make much sense and she just took up a lot of time for nothing.

The next question was about the pensions of Congressmen. Apparently a one term congressman gets a large pension for life paid with tax-payer dollars. Meehan disputed that and I don’t really know who is being honest here but I wouldn’t put my money on Meehan.

One woman talked about the EPA and the need for air and water regulations. Meehan at first appeared to be supportive of the EPA and then he tried to argue that EPA regulations are too strict and hurt corporations. He talked about a balanced approach and gave an example about a local corporation that puts water into the nearby river 2 degrees warmer. He said that the EPA fined them for it and that this somehow cost jobs. I would actually like to talk about this a moment. 2 degrees warmer doesn’t sound like much but it is. We just had a hurricane come through this area and that hurricane would have been worse had the water been 2 degrees warmer. Plus, how does fining a corporation cost jobs? It seems like that money should come out of the corporate profits not out of worker. Maybe if the top executives took pay cuts they could same jobs. So I don’t see the connection he was trying to make here. It was just a misleading trick to blame the EPA and to cut regulations. I would be more concerned with EPA regulators getting jobs in the industries they regulated after they leave their post at the EPA.

An obviously gay guy in the first row then got to ask a question. He said that he had been unemployed for nine months and that had never been unemployed before. He said there have been Republican bills against gay rights and Planned Parenthood, but no jobs bills. Where are the jobs bills? The crowd erupted again. People were shouting, “Where are the jobs” over and over again. Meehan again returned to his “respect” slide and tried to calm people down. He said that he has a jobs bill dealing with life science jobs. This is actually something I have a question about but didn’t get called on. I wonder how he expects to get that passed when most Republicans don’t accept the science of evolution. I don’t actually know where Meehan stands on that issue and I would love to find out.

A Christian minister got called on to ask a question. He appeared to be a liberal Christian because he asked if Meehan cared about the poor. The crowd again went wild. Meehan of course said that he cares. He didn’t add anything of any real substance except to that the man for being a minister and then they both agreed that you can’t get rich that way (although I would disagree and I bet Rich… I mean Rick Warren would too).

There was a question about simplifying the tax code and taking out corporate loopholes. Meehan was all for taking out loopholes… and then lowering the tax rate on corporations. To me that seems like a push at best.

One woman asked if he would take the Grover Norquist pledge to never raise taxes. The crowd screamed that he already did. Meehan then confessed that he had signed that pledge. I think the pledge was really to never raise taxes on Grover Norquist, but I’m just say’n.

He was getting a lot of boos at this point so he started to call on people who were obviously Republicans. They asked him some pretty crappy questions and then his time was up. One thing I noticed however was that the banner behind him that said, “Congressman Patrick Meehan” kept falling down throughout the hour long Town Hall. I found that amusing.

Filed under: Current Events, Government, Personal, Political Activism, Politics | 3 Comments »

Often times Christians will ask people if they have heard the “Good News.” They will ask if you have ever heard of Jesus Christ. Once when I was in college, I thought I would try a little experiment and answer the question in a way most Christians wouldn’t expect. I said, “No, never heard of him.”

I wanted to see how a Christian could explain the ridiculousness of Christianity to someone who had never heard it before. Of course, no Christian would even believe that I hadn’t heard of Jesus so I had to make up some story about growing up in a foreign country and just recently coming to America and not knowing any one. I still don’t think anyone bought it, but at least one Christian was willing to go down the rabbit hole anyway.

This was good because I got to play Socrates and ask the really obvious questions without being confrontational. You can’t really do that normally. Normally, if you question any part of the ridiculousness of Christianity the Christian will get offended right way.

Unfortunately, I think I blew my cover too soon to really get a good conversation going, but I still think it is an interesting strategy to help to show just how ridiculous Christianity really is. If a Christian can explain it to someone who has never heard the story before, they start to put themselves in “your shoes” and imagine what they would think and how they would feel if someone was telling them this story for the first time. It like you are getting them to think about the story from a backup of their brain that never actually existed. It cuts through the indoctrination.

I would be curious to know if anyone is willing to try this strategy and let me know how it goes.

Filed under: Alternative Worldview, conversation, discussion, ignorance, Personal, Religion | 3 Comments »

Often times when I demand that religious believers present evidence for their claims they try to find some way to avoid doing so. One of their most common tactics is to claim or insinuate that I am not worthy of the evidence.

If only I already believed then they could present me with the evidence that would convince me to believe. As circular and ridiculous as that sounds, that is exactly the tactic many Christians actually take.

As a point of Biblical fact (meaning that according to the Bible not according to reality), Doubting Thomas demanded evidence and because he doubted he received the evidence he asked for. So why would I be less worthy than Doubting Thomas?

If there were any valid evidence for the ridiculous claims of religious believers why wouldn’t they present that evidence? Why wouldn’t they present that evidence especially after I make it clear that I am certainly willing to believe if presented with valid evidence? It is really easy to convince most atheists. All a believer has to do is present valid evidence and yet they claim that they want to convince us but we aren’t worthy of the evidence.

This claim of worthiness is especially odd given the Christian view that we were all created special and that we are all equally evil sinners. Yeah, that too is pretty contradictory but that is just one of the paradoxical set of beliefs they are trying to convince us of. If only I were worthy of the evidence they could present it me so that I too might believe. Oh well.

Related articles

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• The Problem of Divine Hiddenness (foxholeatheism.com)

Filed under: anti-intellectualism, discussion, ignorance, Religious Manipulation | No Comments »

Last week Sam Harris gave his tip on how to lose blog readers. What the hell, I’ll give it a shot. He said that the best way to lose blog reader is to advocate for higher taxes on the rich (which actually seems like a pretty reasonable and obvious idea). Today, I want to talk about the libertarian plot of economic eugenics.

I coined this phrase to describe what I think must be the end goal of the Right and Libertarian Wing. The idea seems to be to kill all the poor people. The method for this type of eugenics isn’t as in-your-face as ovens, but it is much worse. Poor people need to suffer first.

By shifting the tax burden from the people who can afford it without even noticing to those who feel every penny, the Right/Libertarian Wing is slowing torturing and murdering the lower classes. This is the idea behind the so called “fair tax.”

The rhetoric is that taxing the rich is a punishment on success. But if the rich don’t even notice except on paper, how are they really being punished? On the other hand, each penny in taxes on the lower classes is felt profoundly. Still, most people on the lower economic spectrum understand that they are being asked to contribute to the general society and even though they suffer from every penny, they are happy to pitch in and pay their fair share.

They see the services that taxes pay for and while they often disagree with some of what their tax dollars are being spent on, they often consider taxes as dues paid to live, work, and remain safe in this nation. But it seems that the rich (who consider taxes as a punishment) want to punish everyone else. Their view is that if you are not successful, you are a failure and ought to be punished. If they punish the poor for being poor, this will either encourage the poor to success or it will kill them. Those who can’t make millions of dollars don’t deserve to live. This is economic eugenics in the nutshell, a sort of survival of the richest. More than merely describing a fact about the world, these people have taken it to a social/economic philosophy of how the world ought to be.

Related articles

• Sterilizing the Poor: Eugenics in the U.S. (abcnews.go.com)

Filed under: Alternative Worldview, Capitalism, communism, culture war, Government, humanism, morality | 3 Comments »

Yesterday I wrote an Examiner article about Rabbi Yehuda Levin’s claim that homosexuality caused the East Coast Earthquake. So today I was thinking about Jen McCreight’s boobs… I mean boobquake and thought maybe we need a gayquake to try to prove Rabbi Levin’s theory before we go and teach it alongside the scientific Theory of Plate Tectonics.

How do we do this gayquake thing? I was thinking that we could just have gays, lesbians, and transgendered couples take photos of themselves kissing. They could then upload those photos to the facebook group I just created. Let’s see what happens.

In addition, I think we should set a specific date and time in which everyone in the gay community kisses their partners and we can see if that has an actual correlation with an earthquake. So what date and time would be appropriate?

How about 8:46 am on September 11th? That’s a good random time that might make some fundamentalist heads explode.

Related articles

• Was Today’s Earthquake Another Boobquake? [Boobs] (gawker.com)
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Filed under: Alternative Worldview, anti-intellectualism, culture war, facebook, Gay Issues, global climate change, god | 3 Comments »

Roger Barr is an atheist who up until recently worked at Walmart as a greeter. Despite his positive job performance, he was fired because he posted controversial opinions on his facebook page.

While it wasn’t Roger’s atheist in particular that got him fired, I am sure it was a contributing factor. Roger is known for encouraging debate and discussion on his facebook page on a range of topics and it was on the topic in which he questioned whether living longer is indeed living better that was the direct cause of his firing.

Apparently Walmart has a social media clause which can only be read by employees on their lunch break in the store. In other words, Walmart makes it difficult for employees to be informed about this policy and yet they expect their employees to follow it.

In an age where social media has become part of most people’s lives, what rights do employees have to privacy and what rights to employers have in policing the lives of their employees?

In Florida recently, a teacher was fired for making an anti-gay remark on facebook. Now, my first reaction was that there is no room in the public school for anti-gay teachers but then I had to think about it in an unbiased manner. The only real difference between what happened to Roger at Walmart and what happened to this teacher in Florida is the content of their opinions.

So, should employers care about their employee’s online presence? It may not be as clear cut question after all.

You can read a more detailed summery of Roger’s situation HERE.

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Filed under: Blasphemy, censorship, conversation, discrimination, facebook, free speech | 4 Comments »

I have argued with many Christians who insist that there is more evidence for a historical Jesus than there is for various other historical figures. While I think they are wrong and that the best a knowledgeable Christian could really say would be that there is an equal amount of evidence for a historical Jesus than for other historical figures (depending on those figures), one Christian recently took this argument over the top. He claimed that there was actually more evidence for Jesus than there is evidence for me.

Wow, that is so stupid that I really had to think about it and waste brain power. So the fact that he was responding to something I wrote (clear evidence that I exist) is less evidence than he claims to have for the existence of Jesus.

To be fair, he hasn’t really seen either of us, but at least I can produce a photo. Jesus can’t even present that level of evidence. I have written things (like my conversation with this Christian) while Jesus has written nothing. There are people who are alive today who could testify to have spoken to me, seen me, etc. And I can also testify directly that I exist. How about Jesus? I’ll call him to the witness stand and let’s see if he shows up.

These are the types of ridiculous Christians that are out there arguing for their faith.

Related articles

• The Historicity of Jesus (new.exchristian.net)
• The Historicity of Jesus (faithisfiction.blogspot.com)

Filed under: anti-intellectualism, Jesus, Religion | 2 Comments »

It seems that many religious believers can’t understand a life without authority figures. When arguing with a Christian recently, he told me that Richard Dawkins believes in Intelligent Design therefore I ought to accept it too.

What he did was he took a clip from the ridiculously edited film Expelled in which Dawkins says that it is possible that perhaps aliens might have planted the first seeds of life here on Earth. My Christian friend then used this clip to justify his claim that Richard Dawkins believes that aliens did in fact plant the seeds of life here on Earth and intelligently designed the human race.

Aside from the fact that this wasn’t Dawkins’s belief or opinion, it wouldn’t matter if it was. What I tried to explain to my Christian friend is that Dawkins isn’t the boss of me nor is any other famous atheist. There are no real authorities in atheism. Sure, when it comes to particular subjects some people carry more weight than others in virtue of having studied a great deal on the subject, but their authority only goes as far as their evidence can carry them.

Stephen Hawking is an author on Cosmology, by when he said that any alien race could come to Earth would be hostile; everyone recognized that as his opinion merely. Hawking’s speculation may be worth slightly more than most on the subject, but it is still speculation based on no real evidence.

For many religious believers, authorities are absolute. If the Bible says it, it is true because the Bible is the authority. God and Jesus are authorities figures and back in the day the head of the house was an absolute authority too. But for people of reason, evidence is the only real authority not Dawkins, Hawking, Darwin or anyone else.

Related articles

• Exclusive: Richard Dawkins Converts to Christianity (or not) (futuretwit.com)
• Has Science Disproved God? (choiceindying.com)
• Hitchens to receive Dawkins award (whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com)

Filed under: anti-intellectualism, Authority, People of Reason, Religious Manipulation, science | No Comments »

A few weeks ago, I wrote a blog post about words that particular minorities find offensive and asked what label atheists might consider offensive. Over the weekend, I discovered the answer.

I guess it has been a pet peeve of mine for a while, but I just didn’t think of it at the time I wrote that blog post but it always pisses me off when theists call people “Darwinists.” This is an attempt by creationist to lower the scientific theory of evolution to that of a cult follower.

No, I don’t worship Charles Darwin and I don’t accept everything he said without question.  I do acknowledge that Charles Darwin was the first to make an observation which changed the way we think about biology. At a time when religious believers were even more violent than they are today it took great courage on his part to publish his theory knowing that it would refute many claims made by the religious and would certainly cause great hardship to him and his family. But I still don’t worship the guy.

Christian apologists like Ray Comfort and his boy toy Mike Seaver try to discredit Darwin with claims of racism, being anti-women, and even being a Nazi sympathizer are not only not true but also irrelevant. Hitler could have discovered the theory of evolution and it wouldn’t make a bit of difference. The fact is that mountains of data show that evolution is a fact and that only thing disputed in science by actual scientist who study this type of thing are the details.

So from now on when a Creationist call you a “Darwinist” stop them right there. Don’t let them get away with it. Make them identify you as someone who accepts the massive amount of scientific evidence in support of the theory of evolution. Don’t let them use the D-Word.

Related articles

• Ron Paul doesn’t believe the theory, but what about the fact? (sandwalk.blogspot.com)
• Darwin, the rock star (itsasmallweb.wordpress.com)
• Evolution Is a Fact and a Theory (sandwalk.blogspot.com)

Filed under: anti-intellectualism, atheism, Atheism NOT Religion, Authority, Creationism, culture war, evolution, language, Offensiveness | 2 Comments »

According to the Bible, one cannot serve two masters. So my question to politicians is, “Are you a public servant or a servant of God?”

I think it is time for the greater community of reason to start throwing our weight around in politics. We need to start making it clear to politicians that we will not tolerate the God talk.

Politicians are free to talk about whatever they like of course, but there will be a price to be paid. We should no longer tolerate a politician’s use of religion and any such use will not only be grounds for criticism and will result in a lack of support and votes for that politician.

This will put politicians in a difficult spot. If they use religion, they may gain votes from the religious (especially Republicans) but in doing so they will lose votes from people within the greater community of reason which is about 10 to 15 percent of Americans. Democrats will be forced to weigh this cost carefully and even Republicans might lose a few votes too. Those few votes could cost elections especially then the Republican knows that the religious will vote for him or her religiously anyway.

While the Constitution demands that no religious test is required for public office we all know that there is a religious test imposed by the public. It is time we impose our own public religious test and insure that our politicians are secular. If a candidate uses religion in their political rhetoric, we should call them out on it and withdraw our support.

On the local level that would be very effective. Local politicians need every vote and usually take criticisms like this very seriously. This will say in their minds as they run for higher offices. When dealing with candidates for higher office, we will need to set up letter writing campaigns to voice our criticism.

We must hold these politicians accountable!

Related articles

• Are politicians asking voters to test their religion? (secularnewsdaily.com)
• Tea Party bait in the NYT: “You are white, Republican, and racist. Oh, and theocratic, too.” (lawafterthebar.wordpress.com)
• In God We Vote (Guest Voice) (themoderatevoice.com)
• You Get What You Vote For (margaretandhelen.wordpress.com)

Filed under: culture war, Election, People of Reason, Political Activism, Politics | 7 Comments »

It started with some punk Christian asserting that without God there can be no moral grounding. We have all heard that one before and so I responded with my Atheism 101 article on the subject (which is now out of date, but still useful).

Then the Christian responded with this:

“As far as your argument that Christians do not, that is simply not true. We base our morality on what is revealed in the Scripture. The fact that people interpret the Bible differently does not necessarily discount the fact that (a) there are prescribed moral rules and (b) that Christians generally believe the same about MOST things.”

So I responded with a lengthy response which I will try to shorten here:

That is just not true. Different Christians have different ideas about some of the biggest moral issues of the day. On topics like abortion, stem cell research, gay rights, condom use, giving to the poor, capital punishment, corporal punishment, torture, etc., Christians disagree. In the past they even disagreed on slavery and women’s rights. I think I made the case pretty strongly that there is no moral grounding to be had in “scripture.” I asked this question in the article and I will ask it again here. If God said that rape was morally good, do you believe it would be so? Now for me that is a no brainer. No, rape is morally wrong. Why you ask? Because we can empathize with the person being raped and we can understand that it isn’t a compassionate thing to do. For you however, that question gets tricky. What does God say about rape in the Bible? What are the relevant passages? What context are they in? Have you taken into account other passages which might alter that view or put in into some other context? Are you sure you have the right translation? Do you know if the Original Bible (which doesn’t actually exist anymore) said the same thing? Has there been an alteration to the text? Could there have been a mistranslation somewhere? There seems to be a lot of calculations you have to go through before you can claim that rape is immoral and even then, other Christians could interpret the Bible in a different way and come to a very different conclusion. So I ask you again, where is the moral grounding here? Can you really tell me that the Bible is absolutely clear that rape is immoral? I don’t think you can. In fact, I can come up with verses that actually justify rape as being the moral thing to do. Yet we all know that rape is immoral. How do we know that? Because we can empathize with the person being raped and see that it is not a compassionate thing to do. That realization has nothing to do with your God or any other god. It is a realization born out of secular thinking.

This is where another Christian jumped into the conversation:

“What about the guy that sells drugs to an elementary or middle school kid who ends up doing something stupid that hurts himself or others around him? Immoral, right? We punish the drug dealer for stuff like that, right? But what if we look at the fact that the drug dealer is only doing what he needs to do to survive? The sole bread-winner in the house just got laid off; they already didn’t have enough food to feed the kids, and can’t get a job anywhere else… so he’s only doing what he needs to do in order to survive. Empathy for his situation would let him off the hook, right? But this is a situation that I’ve struggled with as it relates to moral relativism”

So here is my response:

I didn’t say that was immoral. Like I said in the article, some issues of morality are principle based (i.e. rape) and others are more situational based (i.e. lying… and perhaps this situation depending on how the drug dealer is dealing). But taking a situation into account does not equal moral relativism. Morality is complicated and the Ten Commandments just doesn’t cut it. Moral choices are just that, choices. Some of those choices are easier than others, but it really pisses me off when religious believers claim to know it all when they obviously don’t. There is a whole field of study within Philosophy called Ethics. Like I said in the article, I advise people to go to a bookstore or library and find a good intro to ethics book before they make ridiculously absurd statements like, “only religion has the basis for a moral system.” Such statements are not only arrogant and ill-informed, but they also show a surprising ignorance about both religion and ethics.

Now, getting to the drug dealer situation; is the drug dealing merely providing drugs to those who want them or is he or she actively pushing drugs on those who don’t? If he or she is actively pushing drugs (especially to minors) then he or she is doing something immoral. Now, that doesn’t mean it is all the drug dealer’s fault but he or she is morally responsible. It goes back to the idea that people don’t do immoral things because they are evil, but rather they do immoral things because sadly it is all they know. This is a slap in the face to Christianity which claims that people do in fact do immoral things because we are all evil sinners. I take issue with that view and see the world somewhat differently. The way I see it, we are all trying to be heroes in our own story and get sidetracked along the way.

Your example supports my point or view. The drug dealer isn’t trying to be immoral because he or she is evil, but rather because he or she is trying to help out the family the only way they know how. The trick is to teach the drug dealer a new way to help their family without acting immorally. People don’t exist in a vacuum. We are all in this together. We live in an interconnected world and that is my atheistic view of spirituality and humanistic ethics.

Related articles

• The immorality of the Christian religion (secularnewsdaily.com)
• Good without God, from USA Today (2000lies.blogspot.com)

Filed under: anti-intellectualism, conversation, debate, discussion, humanism, morality | 7 Comments »

There is a fine line between being overly emotional in an argument and using emotion to strengthen an argument. Often time’s people confuse the two. More often however, people tend to be overly emotional in arguments rather than merely using emotion to strengthen their argument.

So what’s the difference? Well, when someone is overly emotional, they tend to argue illogically. They tend to ramble on and on without focus. They insult without making a point. Put simply, they are out of control. Their emotions are controlling them rather than the other way around.

When someone uses emotion to strengthen an argument, the argument tends to be more focuses, logical, and on point. However, the argument is passionate and full of life. The emotional components to the argument are used to give a boost to the already logical points being made. If one were to take the emotion out of the argument, the argument would still stand on its own. The use of emotion simply calls attention to certain points and adds passion and energy to those points.

Generally speaking, I have found that theists are quick to lose control of their emotions and tend to argue emotionally while atheists tend to either stay clear of emotions all together or to use emotions to strengthen their argument. I should point out that it isn’t always that way. I have seen a few atheists who let their emotions run over them and a few theists who were able to control their use of emotions to strengthen their argument fairly efficiently.

Related articles

• Reason and the Passions, How do I make one control the other? (ask.metafilter.com)
• How to Argue Effectively & Win (kaushikinfo.wordpress.com)

Filed under: Ad Hominem, debate | 3 Comments »

Whenever I criticize President Obama for giving the Republicans everything they want and not getting much if anything in return, Party line Democrats will attack me by saying that there was nothing Obama could have done because those damn Republicans were blocking him from doing what he really wanted to do. They tell me it isn’t Obama’s fault, it is the Republicans fault.

They are partially right. Of course the Republicans are to blame for blocking the President. But does anyone really expect that the Republicans would not try to win politically? That’s what you would expect from your opponent. In any competition one much expect that each competitor is going to try to win. To say that it isn’t Obama’s fault because the Republicans were doing their best to beat him is silly and naïve.

The problem is that I don’t think Obama is trying to win (or if he is, then he isn’t a very good politician). If he were, he would have expected the Republicans to try their best to beat him and he would have planned ahead. That is called strategy. Obama not so good at chess, me thinks.

So how would I do it? It is easy to talk, but what would the plan be. Well, let’s look at health care reform for example. This was Obama’s big issue early on when he had control of both houses of Congress. He could have started with the strong Medicare for All plan. He gave a great speech on health care in which he said that this time will be the last time we have to deal with this issue and that we would get it right. The problem was that he got it wrong and it certainly won’t be the last time we deal with this issue.

He could have found out which Democrats supported him and which opposed him. If someone from his own party opposed him, he could have found out why and if the issue was minor enough he could have adjusted the plan or traded support for something his fellow Democrat wanted. For example, if Congressman X supposed this plan, Obama will support Congressman X’s proposal on issue Y.

Another trick the President can use to get his own party in line is to play hardball. He could remind the Congressman that his popularity is high (and at the time it was) and that he would not campaign for the Congressman if he or she didn’t get on board. Further, if the Congressman wanted to play harder ball, he could inform the Congressman that he would support a primary challenger over the Congressman if the Congressman didn’t get on board.

How to sway Republicans? That is trickier, but not impossible. Find moderate Republicans in swing districts and offer to not campaign for the Democrat in that district as much. Or again trade support for a minor proposal (within reason).

More than that, the President can make his case to the American people. In order to get news coverage, all the President has to do is open his mouth. So he could have made the case for his proposal to the American people and gone on a speaking tour the way the Tea Party did that entire summer. He didn’t and all most heard that entire summer was, “death panels!”

If all else failed, he could have compromised with the Republican leadership. Instead of a Medicare for all plan, he would be willing to accept a compromise of a Public Option which would still keep the insurance companies in business.

Instead, the President did none of those things. He agreed with the Republicans right away that his own compromise plan of the Public Option was extremely liberal (which it wasn’t) and said little to nothing during the summer that the Tea Party was going around talking about death panels. He didn’t try to strong arm any Blue Dog Democrats or any moderate Republicans. Instead he used some of those tactics to strong arm Progressive Democrats who wanted a stronger health care reform bill.

So what did we get? Obama passed a bill that has tons of loopholes and rather than changing the existing system, his bill reinforces and entrenches the existing system giving more money and power to the insurance lobby. It is the same with every issue across the board. Even when Obama wins, we all lose and if Obama loses, then we lose even more.

Related articles

• Senate Democrats fault President Obama for not using presidential bully pulpit (politicore.wordpress.com)
• The Republicans Want to Lose! (dangeroustalk.net)
• The Empty Bully Pulpit (robertreich.org)
• Obama’s approval ratings fall heavily (exministries.wordpress.com)

Filed under: Authority, Obama, Politics | 2 Comments »

As I was watching the Iowa Republican Debate the other day I kept asking myself, “Who does Roger Ailes want to win?” The idea is to see who the Fox Hosts were brutal towards and who they gave a pass to. What I realized is that the Republican establishment doesn’t really want any of them to win. The Republican candidate for 2012 is Obama!

Sure they may call Obama a secret Muslim, a secret Socialist, and even a secret Nazi but the reality of the situation as Bill Maher pointed out is that he is a secret Republican.

The game is fixed and we all lost. If a Republican was President, Democrats would be arguing against the two wars we are fighting, the attacks on Social Security and Medicare and we would be demanding real health insurance reform. We would be fighting against off shore drilling, the illegal warrantless wiretapping of US citizens, and tax cuts to the rich. We would be making the argument that the Republican President should be talking more about job creation than about the debt. But we have a Democratic President and so aside from a few Progressive (labeled extremists by Obama and the mainstream media) no one is talking about those things.

The Republicans get everything they want including massive tax cuts to the top two percent and while some Democrats are unhappy about it, Obama assures us that he had no choice and most Democrats accept it. The Republicans never had it better. They get everything they want and Democrats get the blame when it destroys the country. Why would they possibly want anyone else as President?

So they pick the craziest bunch of wackos and whisper into their ear’s that they can become President. So these wackos (being wackos) run for President thinking that they are going to be “the” candidate and that Obama is so unpopular with his progressive base that they can win. What they don’t realize is that in the general election, the Republican machine of Fox News will be secretly working against them in favor of Obama. The large corporations will be giving money to Obama because his own base won’t and on Election Day, the corporate Republicans will be casting their vote for Obama (while telling people they voted for the crazy person). The Independents will vote for Obama because the Republican candidate is crazy. And the Democrats and Progressive will vote for Obama because what else are they going to do; vote for the crazy Republican? Some Democrats might even still think that Obama is a Democrat and has their best interest at heart, lol.

Ron Paul is still in the race and doing well, but if he becomes the Republican candidate, he will get no support from the Republican Party. He is unpredictable to them and not part of the game. In some cases he would be great for the large corporations. He wants to get rid of all regulations. That’s like taking the referee out of the game. But then he is against the war and that will cut profits to the war profiteers so they won’t have that. Ron Paul is uncontrollable and that is the problem. In some ways he is the craziest of the bunch in that some of his ideas are really good and make sense while other ideas of his are so batshit crazy that even Bachmann can’t compete. He is the type of crazy that can fool people into thinking he is sane for a little while. So they take him out of the institution, into their homes, and then he kills someone for eating toast with the crusts still on.

Related articles

• Obama is a failure but what do Republicans offer? (capitolhillblue.com)
• Obama Reelection Campaign Counteroffensive Launches This Week (huffingtonpost.com)
• Farrell Files: Bachmann would be GOP’s McGovern – WTSP 10 News (news.google.com)
• Ron Paul Grabs More Attention in the GOP Debate (manolith.com)

Filed under: Obama, Politics | 10 Comments »

As the 2012 Presidential election come near, it is important to know where candidates stand on “the most important questions of life.” How did we get here? Where did we come from?

As a candidate for President of the United States of America will you sign the following pledge?

1.    I swear to God, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit that I believe the world was created by God.
2.    I swear to God, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit that I believe that the world is roughly 6000 year old.
3.    I pledge to actively promote Creation science in public schools across this Christian Nation.

May the Holy Spirit guide you to sign this pledge.

Filed under: Creationism, Politics | 4 Comments »

There are a lot of Republican presidential candidates out there and the Republican base has been really into coming up with wacky pledges for them to sign. For example in one pledge, candidates had to agree to restrict porn. Lately there is that pledge that is anti-gay marriage too (it might even be the same pledge, I’m not sure). Why should the religious have all the fun?

So with that in mind, tomorrow I am going to introduce a pledge that I want all the Republican candidates to sign. Okay, I don’t really want them to sign it. I really want them NOT to sign it. But what I really, really, really want is clarification and accountability. I want them to put their yes or no on this issue so that we are all clear just how wacky they are.

There is a problem however. I don’t know any of the candidates personally. I can’t seem to find their personal cell numbers in my phone. So I need my Dangerous Talker army to help me get tomorrow’s message out. We need to get the media to talk about this so that the religious will see it and get divinely inspired by it. So tomorrow after I post my pledge, I am counting on you to help me to get it out there. I’ll need you to Tweet it, Google Plus it, Facebook it, YouTube a video about it, Reddit, Digg it, send it to your media contacts, friends and family (especially if they are religious). Let’s get these politicians on the record for all to see and some to laugh. Can I count on you?

Related articles

• My Pledge Is Bigger Than Your Pledge (themoderatevoice.com)
• Letter: No New Pledges (nytimes.com)
• Romney, Bachmann, Santorum Sign Onto NOM’s Bigotry Pledge (pinkbananaworld.com)
• Bill Maher Demands Candidates Sign “The American Eagle Liberty Bell Ronald Reagan You’re A Homo If You Don’t Sign It Pledge” (mediaite.com)

Filed under: Creationism, culture war, Political Activism, Politics, Religion | No Comments »

I am going to warn everyone that today’s blog I am going to use words that most people consider horribly offensive. I will however not be using them in an offensive manner, but I don’t think it is appropriate to use a euphemism instead. Louis C.K. put it best when he said that the “N-word” is offensive to him (as it is to me). So I will not be using it.

It seems that these days every minority has a word that is theirs alone. What I mean is that there are words which it is only acceptable for those within that minority to use. It started with the word, “nigger.” Black people can use that word freely, but only black people. I get that it is an offensive insult and I would never call anyone a nigger. I don’t think black people should call each other niggers either.

Then Sarah Palin stepped in to the game and insisted that no one use the word, “retarded.” As a retard herself, I am guessing she wants exclusive rights to that word. That is where I started to get uncomfortable. But since Sarah Palin is… well… retarded, I didn’t think much about it.

Recently however I was listening to one of my favorite radio talk show hosts and he (as a gay man) took ownership of the word, “faggot.” He puts this word in the same category as the word, “nigger.” I can see his point of view here. I would never call a gay person a faggot just as I would never call a black person a nigger. I still will call Sarah Palin retarded however. But why can’t we use these terms in a more clinical manner like I am using them here? Why is it that some people can use these terms and some people can’t? It is in these aspects that I take some disagreement.

However my disagreements aside, why can’t atheists join in this game too? What word can we own exclusively? Obviously we use the term “atheist” already and we often also use terms like “godless” and “heathen.”  Should we insist that only atheists can call each other atheist and everyone else must call us something else? Or maybe atheist is equivalent to “black” or “gay” and we should get offended by being called, “godless” by anyone except ourselves of course.

I want to point out that offense is taken and not given. So in my mind, we choose what words offend us. However, as it is with all things it is the thought that counts. So obviously if someone intends offense it is more likely that I will take offense. In other words, almost any time a religious believer refers to us by any name with the intent of being offensive or mean, we would be well within reason to take offense. Still, I want a word just for our community that no one else can call us. I want to join in these reindeer games. 😉

Related articles

• Louis Black Feels Sarah Palin Is Not A Joking Matter (pinkbananaworld.com)
• Tracy Morgan … From Gays to ‘Retards’ (tmz.com)
• Fag, Nigger, Spic, Chink, Kike & Retard = “Not Acceptable” Choice Words; PSA (redbeardedoctopus.wordpress.com)

Filed under: atheism, censorship, free speech, language, Offensiveness | 18 Comments »

For some reason the question of whether or not the 17 foot tall 9/11 Cross should go into a federally funded museum has become a controversy within the atheist community. It has actually gotten pretty heated and I have taken the obvious position that Christians have over stepped their bounds and are once again trying to use the tragedy of 9/11 to push their agenda.

I make this case in two Examiner articles:
9/11 Cross: In opposition
‘9/11 Cross’ turns museum into church

However, I think the more important story is that in defending American Atheists’ lawsuit, Blair Scott received not just the usual amount of death threats, but also thousands of death threats on facebook by Christians who were stupid enough to put their names on their threats. In fact, this is the first article I wrote which deals with this controversy: Christian death threats aimed at atheist

The only case that seems to be made in favor of the 9/11 Cross by atheists is that the cross is made out of actual debris from the twin towers and that people worship it. Interestingly enough, I think the very fact that people worship it is one of the main reasons why it doesn’t belong in the museum. But I digress.

I do wish American Atheists would make a better case in the court of public opinion for their position. I hope my articles will help them to do that.

Let’s get this debate going and let’s keep in reasonable and respectful.

Related articles

• Fox News Facebook Page Gets 8,000 Death Threats (allfacebook.com)
• FOX News Facebook Page Gets 8000 Death Threats After Segment On World Trade Memorial Cross (thenewspundit.com)
• American Atheists Sue Over World Trade Center Cross (abcnews.go.com)
• Atheist Group Wants 9/11 Cross Removed from Museum (msnbc.msn.com)
• American Atheists in desperate need of a competent PR person (skepacabra.wordpress.com)

Filed under: atheism, church/state, culture war, Preaching | No Comments »

Last week, I was at my parent’s house and my mother bought a Berenstain Bears book for my 2 and a half year old son. She remembered that I used to enjoy those books when I was young. However, upon reading it to my son, my mother noticed that it was full of Jesus talk.

Interestingly enough, a week earlier, my wife discovered the same thing when she had to do some work involving the Berenstain Bears. She also remembered the books when she was young and was certain that they were not religious when we were growing up; so I had to find out when and why this child book series became religious propaganda.

The books series was created by Stan and Jan Berenstain. Stan was Jewish and Jan was Christian, but it seemed that neither were particularly religious and religion was not part of the book series at all. However, as they got older they let their son Michael work on the books. He eventually took over the series completely and on a side note also became a born again Christian during adulthood. So guess what this douchebag did? Yup, he pushed his religion into the book series.

This really pisses me off. This is why we need to have more books out there that support science and critical thinking for young kinds. Aside from Curious George (which my son loves) there really isn’t that much out there. There certainly isn’t anything which encourages kids to question religious and/or superstitious claims. I know Dawkins is coming out with a book, but let’s face facts here. That is not going to be read by the general public; it is only going to be read by vocal atheists.

I guess the point of today’s blog is to let everyone know that the Berenstain Bears is religious propaganda and to say that Michael Berenstain is a giant douchebag for ruining my childhood. Fuck you Michael!

Related articles

• The Berenstain Bears Bible: A New Low for Christian Publishing? (bethanyseeley.wordpress.com)
• Daily Doing of the Peaceful Religion of islam: (doesitallmatter2.wordpress.com)
• Study shows split between kids of Christian, Muslim immigrants (canada.com)
• Ever wonder why your school age children are so ignorant about history? (barenakedislam.wordpress.com)

Filed under: Bears, Current Events, Parenting, Personal | 20 Comments »

Religious believers love to try to lower science to the level of faith. They love to talk about how science requires faith and some will even say that it requires more faith than… actual faith. Faith is dogmatic by nature and so religious believers like to claim that science is equally as dogmatic. It isn’t! There really is no equivalency here.

Science lays out a method for trying to understand the world. That method is based on observation, analysis, and reason. Science starts with the evidence and ends with a probable conclusion which is open to peer-review and can be re-examined in light of new information and evidence.

Faith… or religion is based on dogmatic assertions. It starts with a conclusion which is unquestionable and then tries to find any evidence which might be used to convince people that their conclusion must be true. Any evidence to the contrary is ignored, buried, and/or attacked. Religion is based on authority and information is dictated from that authority.

Science encourages curiosity, learning, questioning, and critical thinking. Religion demands obedience, conformity, indoctrination, and rhetoric. There is no equivalency between these two diametrically opposed methods for understanding the world around us.

This is such a ridiculous assertion by people of faith that it really doesn’t even deserve this level of discussion. In fact, even discussing this absurdity elevates the ridiculousness of faith to a level it does not deserve and has not achieved. When religious believers make these types of claims, we should just laugh in their faces and call it a day.

Let them survive twenty-four hours without science and force them to depend on their faith alone. That means no laptops, no cell phones, no internet, no television, no cooking, no driving, and no flush toilet bowl, among other comforts. Science built their houses, grew their food, and put clothes on their backs. What has faith done? Oh, it allows them to hear voices in their head (usually telling them that someone is evil). That’s swell!

It is time for religious believers to put up or shut up. Put their money where their mouth is. Stephen Hawking put it best when he said, “There is a fundamental difference between religion, which is based on authority and science, which is based on observation and reason. Science will win because it works.”

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