Recovering From Metaphors

Those who try and teach things that can't be put into words use metaphors, parables, and analogies as approximations. But, for too many these are seen as exact equivalents, and with individual connotations that are automatically inserted they get them wrong without an ability to recover.

No Cash Gifts

For those who won't give money to homeless people directly, saying in defense of their position that they would give someone a sandwich but not cash because they will misspend it otherwise, do the same for your favorite charity. Don't sent them cash but ask what they need and buy that instead, a gift registry of sorts. The same logic that applies to one situation should apply to the other.

On Not Debating Believers

On not debating believers: It's the same reason you wouldn't ask a post-graduate student to debate a 6th grader--the advanced information can't be regressively translated to the lower level and make sense. Calculus can't be understood if your highest level of achievement is long division and you believe that's as good as it gets.

Handcuffs Of Belief

Ironically, breaking free from religion is like getting out of Chinese handcuffs...you have to relax in order to free yourself. Well, it's not a totally accurate analogy (none are, really), but I find it helps. The more energy that's put into someone's belief--sourced either from one's self or others--the harder it is to get out.

All the former believers I've spoken with seem to have become free by not trying to do so. They were hit with an 'ah ha' moment while not expecting it, or (like myself) just one day realized that all the silliness wasn't true after years of small things building up to an inescapable conclusion. Those "small things," however, aren't thrown at people; they were discoveries made by one's self or overheard.

It's sad, but the mind of belief is almost always cracked slowly and alone.

Public Government

Religious conservatives claim the rest of us are looking to take religion out of the “public square,” being sure to emphasis public, misdirecting the actual complaint against government meddling in religion. Yet, when it came to health care reform, use of the term “public option” was not allowed, pushing for “government takeover,” a flip-flop on the terms.

Public Better Informed Than Government

Isn't the directive by the government for its employees to not look at WikiLeaks documents like telling religious believers to not read science books?

Equality and Entropy

Equality and freedom are apparently subject to the Second Law of Thermodynamics as much as anything else in the universe.

Christmas Is Never Merry

I will not be wishing any of you a merry Christmas, no matter how much you insist on it and say you feel insulted otherwise. Here's why.

The overwhelming majority of Christians strongly believe that everything happens for a reason set forth by their god; all that occurs is their god's will, perfect and loving in its form and purpose. This idea is taught to their children and pushed on adult non-believers. They try and make others feel better when the horrors of life keep coming in a never-ending cycle with this sales pitch. The moments of joy are not continuous because their god has "a plan"--that no one will ever understand--and that plan includes pain, lots of pain for lots of people that has been going on for thousands of years.

But, eventually, if you do all the right things and believe in just the right way, you will be rewarded with the ultimate gift for you pain and suffering at the hand of this god: Being in the presence of this being for all time and praising him for simply existing. That gift is what you need to strive for, you are told. Being in the unending presence of a being that won't give up the secret of his Plan of Pain until your post-life begins is the ultimate reward and you need to be glad to be offered the chance to accept it. This god's will for your pre-death existence is for you to put up with whatever he decides to dish out and for you to deal with it--without any proof of the eventual gain that is supposed to come with pain.

If this is your view of the human condition there is a simple speech that you should give to each new class of elementary school students.

"Before many of you reach adulthood, or even puberty, you will be abused in a manner that you cannot now even imagine. Someone you trust and have been told is a good person, maybe even a 'man of god,' will do things to you that you will not understand. This person will put his hands under your clothes. He will touch your body in places you've never been touched by a stranger and in a manner that will not be loving, even though you will be told otherwise. You will feel strange, maybe even sick. You will not know what to do. You will want to cry, but be told not to do so. The will do many things to you that you know aren't right. He will not only touch you, he might even put his penis in your mouth and push it down your throat. He might even put it between your legs and put it inside your body there, too. Your feelings won't matter. Your desire for it to stop won't matter. You only need to remember that it is the will of your god to endure this experience, which may happen many times. All things happen for a reason and only our god knows why. You just have to believe that this will be happening to you because our god wants it to happen. He is all powerful, as you've been told, but has decided to use his powers to give you pain, not stop it. We don't really know why. You need to believe that we all have to accept the decisions our god has made on our behalf.

"But remeber, too, that our god has taught us that it is he who is the universe's most injured party, no matter what pain and confusion you experience. Your birth automatically made you a sinner and our god will not put up with sinners. The abuse you suffer matters not. You must apoligize to our god with heart-felt repentence for your existence as a sinner. You do not get to make the same assertion against our god for his plan that calls for you to endure pain and suffering. He is perfect in all of his decisions and actions, no matter the pain and hurt being caused. Nothing evil and vile that happens to you as part of our god's plan can be considered even close to the most minor action you commit as a sin against our god. When you bleed and suffer in torment, remembering that pain for the rest of your life, it is nowhere near as bad as breaking any of our god's most minor rules. Telling a small lie like when you say someone did a good job when they didn't hurts our god even more than anything you will feel. Your suffering is not relevant at all to our god; your sins against him, however, are hurtful to our god and he never forgets. Being a jealous and vengeful god, you have no choice but to just accept the situation our god has designed for you and trust that our god is always right."

Asking that anyone see this belief system worthy of merriment is similar with asking the victims of the Abu Ghraib prison system to wish George Bush supporters a "merry" time on his birthday. Anyone with any sense of decency would never do such a thing. Asking someone to wish another a "merry" time on any Christian holiday is not only an insult to humanity but a lie being told to one's self. To hold a position that this belief system should be attached to any emotion even minimally related to joy is a joke.

So, no, I won't be wishing anyone a "merry" anything having to do with Christmas or any of the other of this religion's holidays. I might just throw up on someone.

No Time Like The Present

It's amazing how similar today's power brokers act to those of the most brutal regimes of history; just change a few references and the horrid actions taken by those in power could be from today's news reports. Those in power do whatever they need to justify its continuation; the century matters not.

Concentrated Wealth Fails

Unlimited access to, or accumulation of, wealth--and, therefore, power--should never be a principal on which a society is based. How this has been turned into a virtue in today's culture is going to provide a great many doctorate degrees among future generations of people studying past societal failings.