Crazies

To demonstrate the fact that there are clearly crazies on every side of every issue is this young man, Timothy Brown, an atheist who continually harassed a Christian woman by urinating or smearing excrement on her property because she had put a fish sticker on her own car.

Regardless of what someone believes, this is clearly an inappropriate way to communicate with them. This guy is immature and probably needs help, because there is no excuse for this kind of behavior.

Maybe he got tired of just flinging cyber excrement, like a lot of people engaged in religious debate do, and decided to get literal.

There are much better ways to get a point across that do not involve poop.

The Lesser

This will be the first year that I vote in a presidential election and the first year that I have paid close attention.

I will admit that I was of age in 2004, but I was still too young and naive to have a real opinion about it. I was still strongly influenced by my family and religious upbringing and hadn't formed any thoughts of my own on the matter. I figured since I couldn't make an educated choice, I would be better of making none.

I also happened to be in the wrong county when the day came, so that made the decision not to vote easier.

It seems that I'm not the only one who is all worked up about this election "thing", especially after watching the outrageous things being said by the right-wing pundits.

I must admit that it was a lot less stressful not paying any attention to all of this nonsense, but I cannot peel my eyes away. Every day I wake up and read the news, and my mood worsens.

I have been a proud supporter of Obama since the primaries and I will be delighted to vote for him when I get my absentee ballot in the mail.

However, I have gathered that some others in the "atheist community" will be making this choice with less enthusiasm, or possibly making other choices.

I am also disgusted by the blatant pandering of the democratic party to the religious. I am disgusted by it whenever I see it, on either side. Being young, I obviously do not have enough personal experience to see whether it has gotten noticeably worse among the democrats this time around. Regardless, I find it disturbing.

But I also hope that Obama is as committed to maintaining the separation between church and state as he was in the speech from 2006 that you have probably already seen:



This speech gave me hope. And despite all of the religious pandering, I have not yet lost it.

Here is how I see it: the country is filled with religious people. Atheists are a tiny minority. Barack Obama and the democrats want to win, so they are doing what they think they need to do to win.

Is it irritating? Absolutely.

But if it means not having McCain/Palin in the White House, I will be grateful.

Sure it is obnoxious to hear them talking about God constantly, but it is not nearly as obnoxious as it would be to have 4-8 more years talk of decisions made based on "faith" or waging wars against evil. It is not nearly as bad as the 4-8 more years we face under a republican leadership that neglects reason and logic.

I hear many people say, that it will be like picking the lesser of two evils.

I think this statement is ridiculous, because obviously no candidate is going to be perfect, and no candidate is going to represent everything you want in a leader. There will always be something imperfect about them.

But you vote for the person that gives you the most hope.

I have to say I am a little disgusted with the people that I have heard announcing, they will not vote for Barack Obama because of this.

Anyone who does not vote for Barack Obama because he is not a perfect candidate, and because the democrats are not a perfect party, is contributing to the victory of the greater of two evils, in my opinion.

So please, go out and vote.

We all know that atheists have a long way to go before we are no longer ostracized and demonized by our communities.

But I firmly believe that this road will be much easier with Barack Obama as our leader, and much more difficult if we allow McCain to win.

Imagine This

Wish I was there to see it!

Group of atheists, agnostics put up billboards in Phoenix

PHOENIX - Billboards touting freedom from religion and separation of church and state are going up around the downtown Phoenix area.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation, based in Madison, Wis., paid advertising company CBS Outdoor to put up five signs around Phoenix that read Imagine No Religion. Annie Laurie Gaylor, co-president of Freedom From Religion, said the billboards will be in place for a month.

The group of atheists or agnostics promotes free thought and the separation of church and state. They have sponsored similar billboard campaigns in other U.S. cities and so far, Gaylor said, there has been little opposition. She doesn't anticipate any protest in Phoenix.

Religious leaders say they are seeing an increase in atheist activism.

"I don't have a problem with people expressing their points of view in public," said the Rev. Bob Mitchell, senior pastor at Central United Methodist Church of Phoenix.

"I would prefer that there was serious tolerant dialogue that might emerge from this publicity campaign because it is much needed."

Arrogance

I just read an article titled Fundamentalist atheists show arrogance, too, by Paul C. Campos, in which he discusses what he considers to be militant atheists.

I'd like to point out a couple of problems I have with this article:

Needless to say, just as most religious people aren't fundamentalists, the same holds true for atheists. Those who are, however - what we might think of as the Taliban of atheism - often have a prominence well beyond their sheer numbers.

I have a real problem with him comparing some atheists to the Taliban. I have great difficulty understanding the comparison between stubborn and opinionated atheists and a violent and intolerant movement that drastically limited peoples' freedoms.

It seems to be a favorite way to condemn outspoken atheists these days, using such words as "militant" to make it seem like they are dangerous or violent, when all they are doing is letting their opinion be heard and criticizing beliefs they find dangerous.

The intellectual naivete of the fundamentalist atheist is reflected in the sorts of arguments he puts forth when he dismisses religious beliefs as not merely mistaken, but nothing more than childish superstitions that can't be taken seriously by any enlightened adult.

Nobody hesitates to label a belief in fairies or in Santa Claus a "childish superstition". I would like to know what exactly elevates religions above this title, besides the fact that many adults continue to believe them?

The alternative to fundamentalism involves embracing the idea that the world is a deeply complex and mysterious place, which human beings have in all likelihood barely begun to understand.

I don't know many atheists who would claim to have the universe figured out. All that is claimed is that religion's explanations are inadequate and/or false.

The non-fundamentalist atheist recognizes that many religious beliefs are just as rationally defensible as his atheism...

Why should an atheist recognize that many religious beliefs are just as rationally defensible as atheism, when they clearly are not?

What is so rational about believing in the virgin birth or a divinely inspired book that is filled with flaws and contradictions as the inerrant truth of god?

...and that indeed he might well hold those beliefs if his genes or his upbringing or his education had made him a slightly different (but equally rational) person.

It is my rationality above all, that led me to my atheism, more so than my upbringing, education, or genes. I was, in fact, born into a Christian family and raised as a believer. My rationality led me to doubt these beliefs, and my education helped me to find the answers.

Given the same rationality, but with different genes, upbringing, or education, I would have had the same doubts about my beliefs, although perhaps I wouldn't have been as free or as equipped to reject them for atheism.

It's in the Water!

Here's a book review I stumbled upon. The book is Heaven Without Her by Kitty Foth-Regner, the story of an atheist turned believer after her mother's death. This is a clear illustration of the fact that people do not turn to religion out of rational thought, but out of pure emotion. Because there is nothing rational about it.

But what particularly struck me is the opening line of the review:

We've all heard the charges: Secular colleges and universities negate the need for a Creator by teaching that evolution accounts for the universe, expose students to anti-Christian worldviews, and then teach tolerance as the highest virtue.

Could these charges possibly be true?

Say it isn't so! Our children are learning science, differing viewpoints, and tolerance in school? The horror!

It really is a shame that a lot of Christian families fear even the prospect of their children being exposed to other ideas. Simply the closed-mindedness and ignorance of that is enough for me to have a basic disgust for their type of belief.

Are they that insecure in their faith? Deep down do they realize that their beliefs can't hold a candle to science and rational thought?

My family also has this fear of education. It reminds me of the tree of knowledge in the Bible. I always wondered, why on Earth is it such a bad thing to have knowledge?

Because knowledge is power and religion thrives on the powerless.

I remember times when I would learn something new in school. Excited, I would share it with my parents when I got home, only to be disappointed by their response.

"That's ridiculous. Your teacher doesn't know anything."

At first I was a little hurt and confused by their response. Why didn't my parents appreciate the new information I had to tell them? I began to realize that my parents did not value science or rational thought. They did not value new ideas or anything that opposed their way of thinking. They were more content to keep believing whatever it was their parents had tought them, regardless of the evidence.

As an adult I am still shocked and dismayed by their reactions.

When I discussed with my brother a little while before I became an atheist how amazing it was to watch orangutans and to see the similarities we have with these relatives, my mother overheard and said, "But what about what the Bible says? That can't be true."

I replied, "But you can't take the Bible literally, Mom."

"Of course you can."

This was the first time I realized to what extent she was willing to ignore reality.

I was upset that so many people that I trusted as a child actually taught me ridiculous stories out of the Bible as literal truth. Did they really believe it themselves? How could these seemingly intelligent adults that I trusted actually believe such nonsense?

Even more recently I informed my grandparents that I had been in Berlin and had heard Obama's speech. They were disappointed when they realized I had made a trip there especially to hear Obama, and wasn't just in Berlin "by coincidence".

My grandfather warned me not to believe everything I had heard to which I replied,

"Don't worry, I don't believe everything I'm told."

But they only want me to believe certain things I'm told, they just wish they could censor the rest. Just as amusing (and/or depressing) was when they were saddened to discover that no, I unfortunately do not get the Fox News Channel in Germany. Apparently it's too risky watching other news channels because I might be brainwashed by the liberals that "run the media"! Terrifying thought, I know.

This is a fundamental problem I see with religion. It is so closed-minded that the potential of differing viewpoints even being overheard causes them genuine distress.

Of course there are people on every side of every issue who want to censor opposing viewpoints. I am in opposition to this idea no matter what viewpoint they support. But I feel that religion is especially eager for this type of censorship.

I do not oppose intelligent design in school because I fear my children will be converted to creationists. I oppose it in science class because it does not meet the requirements of a science. I oppose it because I am afraid it will lead to the total removal of critical thought and real science from the classroom and that my children will never hear about evolution. I have absolutely no problem with my children hearing about intelligent design and about religion in the appropriate venue. But that appropriate venue is not science class.

There is no fear of their children not hearing about their god and their creation story. They hear it at church. I wish they would be content to leave it at that. But the fear that their children might actually hear another side to the story is what leads them to try to censor and condemn differing viewpoints.

Who's That Girl

The Atheist Spot has a series on their blog where they interview atheist bloggers so we can all get to know the atheist community a little better.

I was lucky enough to be asked to contribute, and here is my interview!

Check it out, and please read the other interviews. Two of them are from two of my favorite bloggers Adrian and Vjack.

I am looking forward to getting to know the others and to having the opportunity to meet new ones!

If you have an atheist blog and would like to be included in the series, you should leave a comment on the blog asking.

And you should also check out The Atheist Spot while you're at it, a place where you can share and rate atheist articles.