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The Path to Non-Belief

I wasn’t always an Atheist, although like all human beings, I was originally born that way. My family wasn’t particularly religious (my mom was Lutheran and my dad fell into the “none of the above” category), but we did attend church on the usual holidays, and Dad allowed Mom to fill our heads with her particular brand of mythology as we were growing up.

Like a lot of teenagers, I became very religious during high school and started attending church regularly—ironically inspired by the fact I had a terrible crush on one of the guys in my freshman class who also happened to be of the same sect. A year or so later, my mom got it into her head that I had to be confirmed into the faith—and since I was already deep in it—I went along. In the process I met another boy who I ended up crushing on equally hard. (The first guy and I had stopped hanging out together after I’d confessed my true love; go figger.)

Anyhow, my church attendance dropped precipitously after I went off to college, and ended completely once I came out. I still considered myself a “spiritual” person, but the Christian faith just wasn’t cutting it any more. How could I embrace something that so obviously and vocally had no place for me? And the more I read of the atrocities that had been committed in the name of Christ down through the centuries, the more disgusted I became with the whole business.

The first summer back home from college I had what I then considered an almost “religious” experience during my first screening of Star Wars. When Luke stood there looking out on that double sunset, I experienced an overpowering sense of deja vu. I didn’t know where or when, but I knew that at some point I’d once gazed out upon a similar landscape. That led me into reincarnation—and by extension—the whole “New Age” thing.

While I can’t deny that the New Age practice of Reiki played a big part in at least putting my head in a good space during my cancer treatment, in the couple years that followed, even New Age philosophy began to lose all credibility, and I came to realize that none of it could be proven any more than the existence of god, angels and the resurrection of Christ.

When you’re looking death in the face, it causes you to examine your beliefs in detail, and I think that was the beginning of the final turning point into non-belief for me. I thought of all the possible after-life scenarios, and came to the conclusion there was absolutely no way of knowing what—if anything—would follow, and for that reason alone, worrying about it was kind of ridiculous. If our essence, our energy goes off in some form after our body stops functioning, fine.  If not, and we just wink out into nothingness, how can that be frightening? We won’t exist to experience the nothingness anyway.

The only thing I rejected then—and reject to this day—is the crime and punishment view of the afterlife as espoused by the Christian concepts of Heaven and Hell. That’s just batshit crazy. And don’t even get me started on the contradictions, illogic, and outright proven falsehoods contained in the Bible.

But if I am proven wrong and end up burning for all eternity (leaving aside the question of how a soul can burn) because I don’t believe this bullshit and wasn’t a good little Christian and flat out rejected the delusion that passes as “faith,” you can bet I’ll have my non-corporeal middle finger extended upward the entire time, because the Christian god (by his “own” supposed inerrant words) and the vast majority of his followers are psychotic and I want no part of their insanity.

Coming out as an Atheist can be compared to coming out as gay. While I will admit there are truly some folks out there who are attracted to either sex, for a lot of us, labeling ourselves “bisexual” offers a psychological buffer before finally fully embracing what we knew to be the truth all along. By the same token, calling myself agnostic has served as a psychological buffer for many years. But lately—prompted in no small part by the hysterical ranting of those on the far right who are demanding that their own petty hate and prejudice become codified into secular law—I’ve finally reached the point where I can no longer deny it and am compelled to say fuck you to all religions, all gods and in fact all things metaphysical, and wear that big red atheist “A” with pride. I will continue to live my life in a moral fashion and treat others—as much as is humanly possible—the way I would want to be treated, and without the need for a promised reward waiting at the end of my life.

 

 

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This is What Panic Looks Like

From what is not-so-affectionately referred to as The Great Orange Satan by the lunatics on the far right:

Mitt Romney, today

Mitt Romney was never truly tested during the primaries. He ran an exclusively negative campaign, refusing to spend a dime justifying his own existence in the race. Rather, he had his cast-of-clowns opponents systematically felled by the Super PAC funded by his gazillionaire donors.

It is now August, and Romney tried the same tactic—over $100 million has been spent by the conservative Super PACs attacking President Barack Obama, yet the president has remained resilient in the polling. Perhaps more damaging, Romney has been stuck in the low 40s in key battleground states. His personal unpopularity has acted as an anchor around his neck, preventing him from making real gains against Obama.

Then, with the press in a frenzy over his refusal to release more tax returns, and with a conservative base ready to revolt at his convention over his sudden defense of Romneycare, it was clear that Romney was close to the breaking point. Thus, the bizarre and poorly crafted rollout of the Paul Ryan VP pick.

Yet rather than earn him some breathing room in the campaign and a nice honeymoon, the reception has been cold at best. Sure, there’s been a smattering of puff pieces about Ryan’s body fat composition, but the coverage has been more focused on the facts that Romney has moved to the Right rather than the center, that he had to pacify an increasingly hostile base, that Ryan endangers GOP advantages with seniors, that his presence on the ticket is a nightmare for downballot Republicans, and that his budget gives Democrats a treasure trove of material with which to attack.

Indeed, in the last several days, half the questions Romney has gotten have been along the lines of, “Where, exactly, do you disagree with the Ryan budget?”

Romney is on the breaking point. He’s already had to cancel campaign appearances (though not fundraisers!) because of exhaustion. He’s used to being surrounded by yes-men who tell him he’s wonderful. Now that Obama fellow (and even critics on his own side) has the temerity to talk about him!

The president’s campaign has put out a campaign that’s talking about me and attacking me. I think it’s just demeaning to the nature of the process, particularly when we face the kinds of challenges we face.

It’s so demeaning to elections to have candidates talk about each other! Of course, it wasn’t demeaning when Romney accused Obama of not being American. That part was as perfectly all right as was insulting the British prime minister, the cookies at a campaign stop, and the ponchos worn by NASCAR fans. That’s just Mitt being Mitt (IOW, a dick). But to have other people talk about you? That can’t stand!

Thus Romney is on his epic hissy fit today, frazzled and, yes, unhinged. It’s only mid-August, and he’s already lost his composure and spewed crazy shit.

People who are winning don’t act like Mitt Romney is currently acting. If you want to see how winners act, just look at President Barack Obama.

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Okay, Let Me Get This Straight

According to Christian mythology, God is omniscent. God created Adam and Eve (not Adam and Steve, as we’re so often reminded). Eve was tricked by Satan (in the form of a talking snake) into eating of the Tree of Knowledge.

Because of that, we lost our immortality and were cast out of the Garden of Eden to live out our lives in pain and suffering. (And apparently snakes were also stripped of the gift of gab as part of the punishment…just because.)

Let’s stop right there for a moment.

The Christians’ invisible friend-in the-sky is perfect and all knowing. Yet he created beings who—by being omniscient—he knew from the very beginning would be flawed. In other words, humans were built broken (and therefore created imperfectly) to begin with. So if God is incapable of making mistakes, that means he intentioinally created humans imperfect and subject to sin.

WTF? I mean seriously. WTF?

He created imperfect humans so they’d sin and “force” him to cast them out of the Garden.

What kind of sick fuck would do this?

Good ol’ Yaweh, that’s who.

This Christian God sounds like a real asshole.

And if Adam and Eve (and later, their two sons) were the only people on Earth, where the fuck did Cain and Able get wives? Were they screwing Eve? So they married their own sisters? Where in the Big Book of Traditional Marriage does that option appear? (Turns out, more often than you’d think.)

But hah, not this time. Instead they went east into the Land of Nod, where there were apparently already a large group of people living quite contentedly without any knowledge whatsoever this wondrous Garden and its psychotic keeper to the west.

W…T…F?  Where the hell did these people come from if there were only supposed to be four living people on the entire face of the planet up until this point?

If you ask any man of the cloth this question (when he’s not busy raping pre-pubescent boys) the answer is generally, “Some things are just taken on faith.” In other words, shut up and don’t ask questions.

My brain hurts.

But let’s back up even further.

Perfect, all knowing Christian sky-fairy creates everything—including another product of the fevered Christian imagination—angels.  But one of them rebels and is “cast out.” So once again we’re shown that God isn’t perfect, or that he just intentionally creates imperfect things that he enjoys torturing, like a kid with a magnifying glass encountering an ant hill on a sunny day.

Why does the word “psychopath” keep coming to mind?

Later on in the Big Book of Lies (aka the BuyBull), God says “Whoopsie!” and decides that humanity—after being fruitful and multiplying—didn’t turn out exactly like he’d intended again and should be killed…except for one small family who is then tasked with saving a pair of every living creature on earth. Or at least within walking distance of their home.

What’s the matter? Isn’t this God quite capable of saving all the animal life he wants on his own? Or is Norman Bates already growing impotent? And what about the plants, for chrissake? If the planet needs a reboot to rid it of the sin that Mr. Invisible created in the first place, why not just send it careening into the sun and start again from scratch? Or is that now beyond his power? I mean seriously…a flood?

And one more question: If all current humanity sprang from that one little family, where did all the races come from?

But going back to the Garden of Eden for a moment. Let’s play a little game and say that Eve didn’t eat of the Tree and humanity was never cast out from the Garden or lose its immortality. Can you imagine what a sty that place would be with fifteen to twenty billion of us trying to squeeze in there now? (Remember, people don’t die, but they sure don’t stop reproducing either!)

Anyway…

Later on, magic sky fairy realizes that he’s fucked up again and Noah’s descendants turn out just as bad their predecessors. You’d think that by now the idiot would realize this, right? (Definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over again while expecting different results.) But this time, instead of flooding the place (or sending it careening into the sun) he’s going to go down there as himself…as his son…to torture and descend into hell so that whoever believes in this ultimate sacrifice latest bit of crap doesn’t have to go to that make believe place themselves.

These fairy tales are fine for iron-age savages who don’t have the deductive reasoning—or scientific history to back them up—that modern men do, but c’mon guys…it’s the 21st Century. We’ve landed men on the moon and have just put a probe the size of a car on Mars. If ever there was a time for the “All Powerful” to come down and say “Great job, guys!” it’s now. But since he’s been conspicuously absent from the goings on of our daily lives going on 2000 years now and from all accounts is a major DICK, I think it’s high time for him to put up or shut up.

This is why I’m an Atheist. Because all these magic stories are pure, unadulterated bullshit.

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TMI, Continued…

1. You accidentally eat some radioactive vegetables. They were good, and what’s even cooler is that they endow you with the super-power of your choice! What is that power?

Personal invisibility and the ability to turn any object I touch invisible at will. Wouldn’t you want to slip into a closed-door meeting of government officials to hear what they’re really thinking? Or expose all the religious hypocrites for who they really are? (And capture it on video!)

2. You can re-live any point of time in your life. The time-span can only be a half-hour, though. What half-hour of your past would you like to experience again?

Assuming that I retain full memory of my present life and actually go back to the age I was at the chosen time, pretty much any Friday or Saturday night circa 1978/1979 at HisCo Disco in Phoenix. I would revel in the company of long-departed friends and dance. my. ass. off.

3. You can erase any horrible experience from your past. What will it be?

I don’t know what it is with these memes and their obsession of things in the past. I’ve had unpleasant experiences throughout my life, but each of them set me on a path that brought me to where I am now. And I wouldn’t change that for the world.

4. You have the opportunity to sleep with the music-celebrity of your choice. Who would it be?

Ew. Why would I want to do that? I’d rather sleep with my Bubba.

5. You just got a free plane ticket to anywhere. You have to depart immediately. Where are you gonna go?

How long could I stay in the destination? If this was just for a short getaway I’d probably say San Francisco. I could sorely use a big fat injection of that city’s energy right now.

6. Do you have any relatives in jail?

Not that I know of.

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Honey, Just Because…

…you sit on the other side of the cubicle wall from me and I can hear you bitching about your computer problems day in and day out doesn’t mean I’m going to do anything about it. My predecessor may have hopped up the moment he heard your whining, but those days are long gone. Get off your fat, lazy, self-entitled ass and put in a ticket—or if that’s just too difficult for you to handle—pick up the goddamned phone and call.

Otherwise, you can just stew in your shit.

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Done With It. Again.

The amount of stupid on Facebook has reached epic proportions. I understand it’s entertaining and fills a need in a lot of people’s lives, but I’m done with it. I graduated high school nearly 40 years ago, and yet on Facebook, it’s like I never left.

So I’ve disabled my account. (Because deleting your account seems to be impossible.) And have vowed to never log in again. We’ll see how long it lasts.

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Just Askin'

Ever have one of those days where you want to tell every single person you come across to go fuck themselves, but you can’t because you’re an adult and supposed to be “courteous and professional” to everyone, no matter how fucking stupid they are?

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