Why is the Alarmist nicknamed that way This happened last week I think. The Alarmist came home and said to me: "Oh my god, I'm so relieved, I thought I had mouth cancer but it turned out OK". Since I've already named her "the Alarmist" on my blog I was well aware of her tendency to be alarmed not alert and my reaction to her comment was rolling my eyes crazily in their sockets and ask perfectly calmly "Why did you figure that?". And her answer was "I had this white patch on the side of my tongue and it wouldn't come off. And a white patch that doesn't come off is usually the first sign of mouth cancer. I was freaking out I wasn't sure what to do. Should I go get a biopsy, should I go to an oncologist, should I go straight to the dental hospital or should I go to my dentist to get a referral to the dental hospital. And then the next day the patch disappeared."
And that is why she is called the Alarmist. _______________________________________________________________
OiNK is slaughtered If you don't know what OiNK is, it's only this tiny community of like-minded individual hell-bent on sharing high quality, often lossless, music files against minor details such as legality and copyright laws. OiNK was actually where leaked albums usually turn up first if they were in high enough bitrate. Anyhow, OiNK got shut down, big surprise there and the people who were on OiNK have been grieving ever since. Me? If I was a member I would have been sad too but sadly, I wasn't. Didn't know anyone who could invite me and besides what's the fuss with high quality MP3 files? If you're downloading illegal music to have a try before buying the actual album why bother with high bitrate? Another OiNK will turn up somewhere eventually. Piracy will never die! In the mean time, let's all flock to Demonoid for our illegal download fix.
GOD is for real. Seriously, want proof? You know the bush fires in Southern California? That is God's work according to some wack-job fundamentalist (via Pandagon). Apparently, that's his wrath going around in California because they approved of a bill that allows same sex marriage. I wonder what was Katrina. Was that also God's wrath? If God was real and was really angry with the gay people he would have burnt down West Hollywood, you know where all the "scary" gay people live. In the latest news, it looks like the Californian police shot dead a "god" and arrested a few more "gods" for setting off those fires (link). See, even "god" can't escape the police for unleashing his wrath on California. Apparently, the police refer to these "gods" as arsonists. See why loony fundamentalists are lunatics? Confusing arsonists' work for god's wrath. Anyway, if fundamentalists' proclamations are to be skeptically considered, I think the fires are gonna burn themselves out soon coz God needs his wrath back to direct it at Tuscany. Apparently they're gonna run this ad campaign which suggests that Homosexuality is not a choice. And of course the Catholic church has something to say about this. Well, several somethings actually: exploitation of babies (gee, what about those child soldiers in Africa?); "bad taste" (dead man on a cross, good taste much?); "erroneous" (hey at least they have some questionable scientific proofs, what do you have?). And the funniest shit I've read today from The Catholic News Agency
The Catholic Church teaches that a homosexual orientation is not sinful, but instead disordered. It is homosexual sex acts that are considered sinful.
So if you happen to be gay it's OK as long as you don't have sex. Awesome! I'll go tell all the gay people that they can go to heaven if they don't have sex.
Somehow the quote makes sense too. Wanting to kill somebody is not sinful, it's "disordered". The act of killing somebody is considered sinful. So just plot away, as long as you're not killing anyone it's ok.
Finally, someone has admitted this: "God is not a person". You have to admit that this is progress, we're a little bit closer to "God does not exist" now. I know I've taken that bit out of context but really that's the only bit that's not ridiculous in this story here. In short, a convict tried to sue God.
A Romanian convict doing time for murder tried to sue God for breaking the contract they allegedly concluded at his baptism and not doing enough to protect him from Satan. The public prosecutor turned down the case -- because God does not have a home address.
I'd like to sue who ever educated this idiot. First, you cannot sue something that doesn't exist. Secondly, IF God exists, doesn't he know God is infallible? If he could get in touch with God and God responds with a definite yes (good luck with that really, God never answers yes-no-questions) to attend the trial he would just go: "I'm infallible you morons whom I spawned, what do you have for brains? Dirt? I designed him that way to kill off the idiots who don't know any better and the geniuses who know too much. Only me, the infallible God with boundless wisdom can do that".
And to end this short rant on a high note, there's a surprise in the full post. You know you wanna click on Read More. Really, trust me, you wanna.
Easter's coming and despite everything, I found myself feeling glad there's a holiday because of Easter. Seriously, I don't mind Easter at all. I even found myself agreeing with Edward Egan, an American Cardinal, this Easter. Strange huh? Before I go on with this, I know that Bread, my friend, wants no more of my atheist rants but, can I at least rant once in a while since I haven't done so for quite some time now? Read on by all mean Bread coz I find this quite funny too.
With that out of the way, let's get on with this yummy, yummy piece of Jesus. It seems Jesus has stolen centre stage this Easter instead of Jesus. Ok, that didn't come out right, what I meant was that this guy
Has stolen the limelight from this guy
The first picture is of a life size, three-dimensional sculpture of Jesus from Cosimo Cavallaro. The sculpture is named, very appropriately, as "My Sweet Lord". And before you ask it, yes, Jesus is naked. Maybe that's why Catholics were outraged, maybe. Personally, I think they should thank Cavallaro, he has made Jesus edible and chocolate is way better than bread and wine.
However, they were outraged nonetheless, my pal Cardinal Egan has slammed this as "sickening" and "one of the worst assaults on Christian sensibilities ever". I just couldn't help agreeing with him.
Firstly, it's just absolutely sickening. The sculpture weighs 91 kilograms. That's 91 kg of dark chocolate. I can't get through one of those chocolate bunnies let alone a Jesus. I get a chocolate overdose if I eat too much chocolate. Here are some symptoms of chocolate overdose (for me): hyperactive, nose bleeds, acne**, fat deposits, weight gain, skinny jeans into the bin. I know, it's just sickening.
Secondly, this has dealt a bad blow to "Christian sensibilities". So bad a blow that Cavallaro has received death threat because of this. Catholics, think sensibly, death threat because of a bloody sculpture out of chocolate? You should be thankful he didn't do a sculpture out of some other materials like onion or bullshit. What can you expect out of the sensibilities that brought about two centuries of Crusades for a bloody piece of supposedly "holy" land? Really, what did you expect?
Miscellaneous information: There's a song from ex-Beatles George Harrison called "My Sweet Lord". I suppose it's only appropriate (mainly because of the name) that this is included in this post.
I've got a comment this week that kinda pissed me off. I'm not a person who gets pissed off easily by a comment. Maybe that's because I don't get that many comments and all of the comments I receive so far has been sort of constructive with the exception of Chuck.
So how did this comment leaver managed to piss me off? Ok, here's "How to piss me off with a comment 101" - Don't write anything, just give me a link to some Christian site - Make sure it's not a hyperlinked text i.e. make me highlight the link, copy and paste it to the address bar. Jeez that's like 2 seconds of my life wasted there already. - Be damn sure that the article I will have to read is long-winded, pointless and subtly insulting as well.
That was what Betsy did to me and that is what I'm gonna do to you, my dear readers, so that you can feel my pain. This is the address: http://www.christiananswers.net/evangelism/beliefs/atheism.html
Ok, I'm not that cruel, the site is here but don't read it. I almost fell asleep reading it and miss the paragraphs where the author insults my intelligence.
How do you know that there is no conscious existence after death? The main reason that people claim to not believe in an afterlife is that they think that the idea is a naive wish-fulfillment in the face of the fear of death.
Credit where credit's due, the author's spot on with these 2 sentences. I do think that God and his paradise should be put in the same box as the Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus as it's all "naive wish-fulfillment in the face of the fear of death". But?
But disbelief in an afterlife could have the same intellectual status. It could be the hopeful wish that there might be no accountability to anyone after we die, and the hope that there is no intrusive authority in our lives before that time.
Now I'm insulted. You're saying I'm a hopeful, sinful coward who's petrified at the prospects of being judged by a supreme being, who created time but is outside of time (wtf?), at the end of days. So petrified that I'm in denial of the said supreme being. Excuse me, I feel the need to go into a corner, wrap myself in my beloved security blanket and whimper with fear of the wrath of God before turning that fear into steely denial of God's existence.
If I'm what you suggested I am, I would have believed, even though deep down I'm always a skeptical, in God and all that crap. There's no evidence that God exists or not but if you choose to believe in his existence you stand to lose nothing and gain everything. Here are 2 scenarios.
Scenario 1: you believe in God even though you're skeptical all your life then you die and find out that there's no God, no paradise, nothing. So what does it mean? You wasted all your life believing in something that isn't there and end up in the same place as the evil atheists, the non-believers and everybody else. You lose nothing but a lifetime of believing.
Scenario 2: you believe in God even though you're skeptical all your life then you die and find out that, surprise surprise, there's a God and there's paradise and everything the Bible says there should be. You stand to gain entrance into paradise because you never denounce God outright.
So I guess the smart choice for me if I'm a coward, who fears retribution at the end of days, would be to immediately denounce my atheism and open my heart to God or so to speak. However I don't find anything wrong with not believing in some outdated ancient beliefs. What's wrong is killing people because they don't believe in the same thing as you or because they are different. What's wrong is believing in some ancient text which approves of slavery and rape and which claims itself to be the exact words of God.
If you're thinking I've finished being pissed off, you're wrong. That was just mild annoyance. Here's what actually pissed me off big time:
Why the Atheist doesn't exist
There can be no such things as an atheist. This is why: Let's imagine that you are a professing atheist. Here are two questions for you to answer: First, do you know the combined weight of all the sand on all the beaches of Hawaii? We can safely assume that you don't. This brings us to the second question: Do you know how many hairs are on the back of a fully-grown male Tibetan yak? Probably not. It is therefore reasonable to conclude that there are some things that you don't know. It is important to ask these questions because there are some people who think they know everything.
Let's say that you know an incredible one percent of all the knowledge in the universe. To know 100 percent, you would have to know everything. There wouldn't be a rock in the universe that you would not be intimately familiar with, or a grain of sand that you would not be aware of. You would know everything that has happened in history, from that which is common knowledge to the minor details of the secret love life of Napoleon's great-grandmother's black cat's fleas. You would know every hair of every head, and every thought of every heart. All history would be laid out before you, because you would be omniscient (all-knowing).
Bear in mind that one of the greatest scientists who ever lived, Thomas Edison, said, "We do not know a millionth of one percent about anything." Let me repeat: Let's say that you have an incredible one percent of all the knowledge in the universe. Would it be possible, in the ninety-nine percent of the knowledge that you haven't yet come across, that there might be ample evidence to prove the existence of God? If you are reasonable, you will be forced to admit that it is possible. Somewhere, in the knowledge you haven't yet discovered, there could be enough evidence to prove that God does exist.
Let's look at the same thought from another angle. If I were to make an absolute statement such as, "There is no gold in China," what is needed for that statement to be proven true? I need absolute or total knowledge. I need to have information that there is no gold in any rock, in any river, in the ground, in any store, in any ring, or in any mouth (gold filling) in China. If there is one speck of gold in China, then my statement is false and I have no basis for it. I need absolute knowledge before I can make an absolute statement of that nature. Conversely, for me to say, "There is gold in China," I don't need to have all knowledge. I just need to have seen a speck of gold in the country, and the statement is then true.
To say categorically, "There is no God," is to make an absolute statement. For the statement to be true, I must know for certain that there is no God in the entire universe. No human being has all knowledge. Therefore, none of us is able to truthfully make this assertion.
If you insist upon disbelief in God, what you must say is, "Having the limited knowledge I have at present, I believe that there is no God." Owing to a lack of knowledge on your part, you don't know if God exists. So, in the strict sense of the word, you cannot be an atheist. The only true qualifier for the title is the One who has absolute knowledge, and why on earth would God want to deny His own existence?
The professing atheist is what is commonly known as an "agnostic" - one who claims he "doesn't know" if God exists. It is interesting to note that the Latin equivalent for the Greek word is "ignoramus." The Bible tells us that this ignorance is "willful" (Psalm 10:4). It's not that a person can't find God, but that he won't. It has been rightly said that the "atheist" can't find God for the same reason a thief can't find a policeman. He knows that if he admits that there is a God, he is admitting that he is ultimately responsible to Him. This is not a pleasant thought for some.
It is said that Mussolini (the Italian dictator), once stood on a pinnacle and cried, "God, if you are there, strike me dead!" When God didn't immediately bow to his dictates, Mussolini then concluded that there was no God. However, his prayer was answered some time later.
Excerpted from God Doesn't Believe in Atheists by Ray Comfort
What I'm wondering is:
- Who the frack decides that the definition for the word "atheist" is "some pain in the ass who knows everything including the weight of all the sand in the world"? The definition from Dictionary.com is "a person who denies or disbelieves the existence of a supreme being or beings" and that is the definition that I use, sorry to disappoint.
- Would it be possible, in the ninety-nine percent of the knowledge that we haven't yet come across, that there might be ample evidence to prove the non-existence of God?
- To say, categorically, "There is a God" is to make an absolute statement. For the statement to be true, you must know for certain that there is a God. No human being has all knowledge. Therefore, none of us is able to truthfully make this assertion.
- Who says atheists are agnostics? They are completely different. Even though I'm no linguist, the origin of the word "agnostic" is the Greek word "ágnōtos" which means "not known, incapable of being known" whereas the Latin word "ignōrāmus" is a legal term that means "we do not know" originally. The word "Ignoramus" has its modern meaning of "an ignorant person" because of a 1615 satirical play by George Ruggle which poked fun at the ignorance of common lawyers. So I guess what I'm trying to say is even if ignōrāmus is the Latin equivalence of ágnōtos it wouldn't mean that agnostics or atheists are ignorant. Who's the ignorant one now?
- This paragraph just kills me:
It is said that Mussolini (the Italian dictator), once stood on a pinnacle and cried, "God, if you are there, strike me dead!" When God didn't immediately bow to his dictates, Mussolini then concluded that there was no God. However, his prayer was answered some time later.
Of course everybody dies eventually. That is not the evidence that there is a God. How about some Christian try saying this: "Zeus, if you are there, strike me dead!"? If you are not stroke dead immediately it doesn't mean that Zeus doesn't exist coz eventually you'll die and it might be because of Zeus.
- "God doesn't believe in Atheist". Presumptuous much? You are not God, how can you know what he does or does not believe in? Do you hear him talking to you coz really you should see a psychiatrist since it can be a mental illness you have here.
Ok, now I've finished being pissed off. Let's get on with what I wanted to post in the first place. Here's a George Carlin routine for you enjoyment.
I know, I know, everybody knows how prayers work. You say them, preferably in a church, maybe under the Virgin Mary's feet or something, cross your fingers and hope God listens, cross your fingers again and hope God listens and will act to bring about what you ask. But really how do prayers work? Nobody's written a book called "prayers - how they work for dummies" yet. I just find prayers confusing.
I'm not talking about the textbook prayers like "hail Mary", I'm talking about prayers that's more like Christmas wishes but people just do it anytime. You know, the please-let-me-win-the-lottery kind of prayers. Those prayers just don't make sense. Not that I'm saying the textbook prayers make any sense.
Why don't they make sense? Because they're kinda contradicting God. You see,assuming there is a god, he supposedly had this "divine plan" to create the universe. And he did put a lot of thinking and planning into this divine plan of his. The divine plan is supposed to have everything planned, including the apocalypse the Church's been telling us for thousands of years. He liked it and he put it into action. And that is why humans, and their annoying prayers are on Earth.
What I don't get is how do prayers fit into this "divine plan". If God actually makes prayers come true then what's the point of the "divine plan" when anyone can change it with a sloppy request? Then again, not all prayers come true. Maybe it's because some of them fit into the divine plan and some don't. Hence the ones that fit work and the rest of the prayers just go to hell. Which means God would not change his divine plan prayers or no prayers. Then what's the point of praying when God's gonna do what he likes anyhow, with or without your request?
See? It's all very confusing. In the past there has been claims, from religious folks, that the collapse of communism was an answer to prayer. How can religious people be so sure about that? Doesn't that mean God had intended to have communism in his divine plan but due to popular prayer to boot communism from his plan he actually ditched his plan in favour to that of the what people want? Then God wouldn't be omniscient. What kind of an omniscient being that planned for something that went so horribly wrong that all his "children" had to ask him to ditch his plan?
Which is quite callous and too much like reality TV if you ask me. Wait a minute, reality TV might be modeled on God's prayer system for all we know. He might has the idea when he was brainstorming his "divine plan" that human should be able to decide some Idol contestant's future in a similar way to how he decides which prayer to come true.
Anyhow, why should I care? There is no God and prayers are just time-wasting sentimental.
I'm being flooded with comments guys, it's unhandle-able and unbelievable, I've never thought I'll live to see a day when I actually receive a comment.
Ok, I've switched off the sarcastic mode now everything's back to normal so we can actually talk about the "comment of the week".
Today I received this comment from Chuck:
Dude, Chuck Norris is gonna kick your ignorant ass.
Anyone that took on Bruce Lee knows what they are talking about.
It's no wonder why this earn the weekly award for "most stupid comment of the week" which I reduced to just "comment of the week" for promotional reasons. Also, the author of said comment has made it to my list of "people who should be penciled down for a random visit by the Grim Ripper", alright, I'm being a bit too harsh here so I'm gonna rename the above list to "morons who ought to step onto dog shit every time they go for a walk". Happy?
This Chuck is going down for the following reasons:
1. Calling me an ignorant ass. I am not an ass and even if I'll be an ass in the future I will be a freethinking, authority-questioning ass. Ignorant is what you use for people who believe for the sake of believing. Ignorant is what you use to describe people who never spend a second of their lives asking themselves about the logic of their religions. Ignorant is what you use to describe sheep. So never, NEVER make the mistake of calling me ignorant.
2. Nobody can kick my ass let alone my alleged "ignorant ass". Ass kicking is for people who are compensated for their lack of brain tissues with muscle tissues, probably by their alleged God. You're probably thinking that this post is going to be a pompous reply to a comment I didn't want and I'm probably doing it to make my bruised, fragile ego feels better. You are so wrong. I can easily do that by just deleting said comment and never think about it again, but I won't do that. I will even give you the link to the post Chuck commented. How can an "ignorant ass" pass up on the opportunity so show oh-so-wise Chuck more of my "ignorance"?
3. Who the frak is Chuck Norris? Of course I know who Chuck Norris is, I watch movies too. What I meant was: who the frak do you think Chuck Norris is? The intellectual of the universe? A freaking scientist? No. Last time I checked he's an actor. Why should anyone in their right mind take what an actor said about evolution as evidence to refute reputable scientific studies? After reading the article that Chuck gave me I understand why.
Alleged Chuck Norris Fact: "There is no theory of evolution. Just a list of creatures Chuck Norris has allowed to live." It's funny. It's cute. But here's what I really think about the theory of evolution: It's not real. It is not the way we got here. In fact, the life you see on this planet is really just a list of creatures God has allowed to live. We are not creations of random chance. We are not accidents. There is a God, a Creator, who made you and me. We were made in His image, which separates us from all other creatures.
By the way, without him, I don't have any power. But with Him, the Bible tells me, I really can do all things – and so can you.
Yes, I see the errors of my way now. Evolution is a lie because there is a God who made us in his image and who we can't see but we have to believe in his existence just because a book, which allegedly is his words, says so. How convenient. Everything makes sense. What do you think about Chimpanzees, Chuck? They're are so similar to humans in their genetic codes. Maybe they're God's failed human experiment?
Also, there is a God because Chuck Norris was created by him, just like you and me. And without God, Chuck Norris wouldn't be Chuck Norris coz he wouldn't "have any power". What power does Chuck Norris have anyway? X-ray vision? Invisibility? Any amazing superhuman ability that's inborn? Oh, you're referring to his martial arts. Correct me if I'm wrong but was he born knowing all about martial arts or did he learn it along the way? If there is a God, Chuck Norris would have been born knowing every single freaking martial art moves in the world.
What I'm talking about here is credibilities. The fact that Chuck Norris kicked Bruce Lee's ass doesn't have any relevance to evolution. Don't bring up Chuck Norris until he wins a debate against Richard Dawkins on evolution. (Yeah right, like that's gonna happen). Still on the topic of credibilities, whose words would you trust: This ridiculous guy who obviously has no concept of evolution theory:
Or a world renowned ethologist, evolutionary biologist and popular science writer who holds the Charles Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University?
I suppose I can rest my case here but I'll present one more argument. Some people usually use something along the line of: "I prayed to God for (such and such) and I got it so God must exist". What is so wrong with this argument? I used to pray to God too and I didn't get anything. True I might have asked some very trivial things like a million dollars for my birthday present or please let me pass the end of year exams or something like that but people ask for trivial things all the time and some of them get their wishes. I did ask for world peace once and as you know nothing yet. People in other religions ask their Gods for things too and it all comes to this ratio: 50:50. 50% of all the people who prayed for something get what they want, the rest don't. It doesn't matter which deity you prayed to, it's all 50:50. How about this Chuck, try praying to Chuck Norris for a sunny day tomorrow. You might get your wish, you might not. However, praying to Chuck Norris does have an advantage over praying to God though. You actually know Chuck Norris exists.
It's not everyday that you catch me terribly confused. I can be mildly confused on a regular basis when it comes to statistics calculations or whether I have to use the mortar and pestle or a beaker when mixing solids and semi-solids or when it comes to paradoxes like "I always lie". Anyhow I found myself terribly confused today all thanks to a fundie.
Since getting broadband internet Youtube's become my favourite site, true you can find weird stuff on Youtube like this Japanese game show. But then you can also find quality stuff like the entire Jonathan Miller's Atheism series from BBC4. And let's not forget my favourite ABC show at the moment: "The Chaser's War on Everything". Yay, Youtube rules.
Ok, I think I've gone off the topic considerably. I was terribly confused about this. Back when I was still a Catholic I've always take comfort from the fact that "God loves everybody". Really, that particular fact was instilled in my mind since forever. I think if you ask any Christian they'll tell you that. What get me confused is how someone, who's a self-proclaimed Pastor,can say with absolute certainty that God hates everybody (with the exception of said pastor and his family).
The pastor I'm talking about is Fred Phelps of the Westboro Baptist Church. My "terrible confusion" started when I saw this Chaser segment a while back.
At the time it just seemed funny coz that's what the Chaser gang do, they make fun of politics, religions and everything else especially Naomi Robson hence the name of the show: "The Chaser's War on Everything". So strictly speaking my "confusion" didn't start then, it started when I read a post from Deep Thoughts featuring an awesome interview with Shirley Phelphs Roper.
Yup, that was the exact moment when it started. What do you mean "god hates everybody"? So all those Catholic nuns were lying to me when they told me that God love everybody including me and especially me if I make it to confession at least once every month and say at least 50 Hail Mary's every night? My goodness! My childhood teachings from the nuns are lies. Who could have known?!
So to resolve my confusion, I researched this extraordinary claim made by the Phelphs. Where could I go? Where else but their own website Godhatesfags.com. I'm gonna be completely unbiased here and say this, the site is one of the worst badly designed site I've ever seen. If you know anything about the web it's that graphics attract. That site is just full of words, it's just a big turn-off. And that is before I even read the contents of what's actually there.
So what is on that site? A lot of bullshit of course. Take "God loves everybody - the greatest lie ever told" for example. While I was reading it I couldn't help but wondering is this guy nuts? All he succeeds in doing is presenting a picture of a malevolence God who hates everyone except for the members of the Westboro Baptist Church. Seriously, I thought the "good" pastor was trying to persuade people away from God. And I must say, he's quite persuasive. If I was a Catholic still I would have renounced the Christian God after I read the first 5 pages of the file. Who can believe that such ghastly individual can claim to be a Christian? Ok, I know, bad rhetorical question. It's not like every Christian is a peace-loving person, the majority of them are anyhow.
Fred Phelphs picks a fight with everyone not just "fags". Let's see, his other websites include GodHatesAmerica.com, GodHatesSweden.com, GodHatesCanada.com and coming up very soon GodHatesEveryoneButMeAndMyFamily.com. I'm just wondering why he hasn't pick a fight with Muslims yet maybe he did learn something from September 11. Something like the cause of 9/11 isn't "the wrath of God on a perverted country" but it's just a plain simple hate crime on a massive scale. Here's Fred Phelphs picking a fight with televangelists. I must say here, he's quite right to some very small extent though. Televangelists and faith healers are just ridiculous. How can giving money to someone who's already rich get you into heaven? And what's with the touchy feely stuff to cure people of incurable diseases? I'd say it's ridiculous anyone would believe that but I wouldn't go as far as to say "you're pastor is a whore" though.
Fred Phelphs isn't the only one who's sprouting bullshit like this. All of the people from his "church" are like this. It's quite understandable really since there are only 70-something people in this so-called church, it's more like a hate inciting club than a church if you ask me, and I suspect they're all his family. See, the thing is the "good" pastor has 13 children, 54 grandchildren (to date) and 5 great grandchildren (to date). Yeesh, 13 children! Have these people heard of birth control? You know the plastic thingy you slip on so that your wife doesn't have to get pregnant every year? So 13+54+5 = 72. Wow, I don't know why he bothers calling it a church. It's a family, why not call it a "family"? How do I know there are 70-something people in his church? Well, I got it right from the horse's mouth, or in this case from the horse's daughter's mouth.
That video is just too damn funny. What else is better than people yelling over other people? the whole time I was watching that I was hoping for a cat fight, wouldn't it be fun watching 4 women fight it out on TV? I myself wanna strangle that Phelphs woman. I would have if I was the host. Ok, I'm getting serious now. That video is just sad. I feel sad for the daughters. They said it themselves, they don't have friends outside of their "church" which consists of their psycho grandfather, their equally psycho mother and their various uncles, aunts and cousins.
So there I think I've resolved my "confusion". God doesn't hate everybody, so everybody who believes there's a god can relax now. It's just a psycho family inciting hate. For the atheists out there, I don't suppose it would make any difference if god does or does not hate everybody. What I get out of this is frustration. How can people stand by and let psychotic fundies like these terrorising grieving families of dead individuals? I don't have to tell you how pleased I was when I watch the guy from the Chaser gang flirting with Fred Phelps' son. We need a round of applause for that performance even though it's original purpose is to make fun of weird people. If you're not from Australia or you've never heard of the Chaser, Micheal Moore took on Fred Phelphs too and I must say it's really really REALLY satisfying to watch this video.
That's what you are if you're a Christian and you have a Christmas tree in your house. Hey don't go leaving hate remarks for this post, that didn't come from me. That's the "word of God" taken right out of the Bible.
Jeremiah 10:2-8 Thus saith the Lord, Learn not the way of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them. For the customs of the people are vain: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe. They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not.... They are altogether brutish and foolish.
Christians should boycott Christmas tree since having one in their house is against the will of God already. However I suppose no one takes the Bible that seriously.
Of course there is no way to verify all the contents of this book. After all, only Jesus has ever come back from the dead and he couldn't have gone to hell could he?
I stumbled upon this title while looking for new fantasy titles on amazon. That should tell you something about the validity of this. It isn't exactly endorsed by the Vatican or anything so please don't take it seriously.
So what exactly is in this book? I can't tell you really since I haven't read it. Trust me, I want to read this book but my local library doesn't offer much choices when it comes to anything that's nonfiction and is gonna remotely undermine any popular religions, Muslim included. Illegal ebook channels are worse, they don't have anything that has anything to do with religion except some old essays from the 19th century. However, from what I can scrape off half-hearted reviews, this book is a collection of "facts" about hell from different religions.
So what's going down in hell? Nothing much really, just some presents for the bad kids. Some dismemberments, some snake pits (I'm just wondering, since they're inventing these up, couldn't they put a bit more imagination into it and make it dragon pits or dinosaur pits?), some huge warm boiling bathtub cauldron full of relaxing oil. No biggie.
And the presents are pretty specific to the type of bad kids too. For example, all the 7 deadly sins have customised punishments (source: Wikipedia).
Some of these punishments, may I say, are unjust. Take Gluttony for example, why would you want to punish someone who like to eat with more food? Don't you know that toads, rats and snakes are delicacies in some other cultures? Foreign cultures' delicacies all you can eat for free in hell? That is no punishment, the guy would be enjoying it. The just punishment, may I suggest, should be starving for all eternity. And what's with the punishment for wrath? Anyone who has reached hell, assuming there is such a place, is dead already. How can you dismember anyone alive when they're dead? Besides, when people are dead and their soul traveled to this supposedly parallel plane, they wouldn't have a body to be dismembered alive or dead. Stop contradicting and confusing yourself and while you're at it, make up you mind about hell too!
Worried about life after dead? Worried that you're heading for hell? Don't be because there is a simple pain-free test to determine your destination after life that you can take here. It's pain-free enough else I wouldn't be here to tell you about it would I? Seriously, there's been only 8 questions and with only that you can know if you're heading towards the light or eternal damnation. (If you ask me, that's too little information to damn anyone to anything.) Anyhow, I got through the questions easily enough until I reached this:
I was thinking 'holy shit, what's the first commandment again? it has something about me being banned from doing 10 somethings but I can remember what the heck they are' and then I saw that life-saving link. Now, I couldn't really determine if I've broken the rule about not talking about fight club, oops, I mean the rule about not worshiping any other god. Really, I didn't go and worship some other god. I just stop worshiping any god at all so technically I didn't break the first commandment right? Anyhow, I answered yes.
I bet you're all wanting to see my score so here it is:
Oh man, these guys aren't judgmental at all! So I just have to judge myself huh? Being the comedian that I am I clicked on innocent.
Was I saying something about not being judgmental? Remind me later about never count my chickens before they hatch! By the time I saw this I was thinking 'you judgmental bastard, can't you just come out and tell me I'll go to hell instead of asking me politely to click on the answer?'. Still being the comedian I clicked on heaven and got this:
These guys, apart from being judgmental, are actually funny! I was cracking myself up reading this. Does it concern me that I'm heading for a fictional plane of existence? Of course no.
By this time, I was reeealy scared out of my wits with the prospect of heading for hell, lots of sarcasm intended. So I wondered what would have been if I had clicked on 'guilty' instead of 'innocent' so many steps away? So I used the magic of the back button and find out this:
What?! No praise for choosing the correct answer? How about I answer correctly 2 times in a row?
Oh man, screw this, these people have no appreciation for my honesty. I've been answering all their ridiculous questions honestly and I still go to hell? I'm out of here.
Yessss, it's time for another of my atheistic rants. This time it's about televangelists. You know, those late night shows that nobody who has a job would watch? Anyway, I think I should give full credits to the guys on Chaser's war on everything because they're the people who made this clip.
There, televangelists and faith healers are sent from god. And god, even with his infinite power and wisdom, just needs YOUR money to give you a miracle.
I haven't post anything that has anything to do with religions lately so it's about time I post something. That was what I thought this morning, however I had nothing to write about. I had nothing until I came across this post by James Love at the Huffington Post.
A week ago, Joe Scarborough asked, "is Bush an idiot?" With the world reeling toward ever increasing intolerance, hate and violence, led by persons who express knowledge of "God's will," we might ask, "Is God an idiot?"
George Bush, the person running the US foreign policy like an idiot, claims that God is directing his actions.
Tony Blair, who never seemed like an idiot before, has thrown his career and reputation away, reportedly because of his deep religious faith. Why is God telling Mr. Bush and Mr. Blair to invade and occupy Iraq? Why is God telling Mr. Bush to sanction torture, or degrading the use of diplomacy?
Terrorism, as is defined these days, is much about people carrying out "Gods will." Osama Bin Laden claims to speak on behalf of God when he urges attacks on civilians.
Mahmood Ahmadinezhad, the devout Shia who is president of the Islamic Republic of Iran, appears to be pushing for new nuclear arsenals, and raising the prospects for war in the middle east.
Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, the "deeply religious" leader of Hezbollah, is now a hero among many Muslims for provoking a shooting war with Israel. "If you hit Beirut, the Islamic resistance will hit Tel Aviv and is able to do that with God's help," he said.
Israel's aggressive bombing of Lebanon, including countless civilian casualties, is yet another chapter of recent warfare that is based upon religious differences.
Iraq is falling apart, as warfare between Suni and Shia populations are killing thousands per month.
If these conflicts are motivated and directed by persons who pray and listen to God, what does it say about God these days? Or about anyone who claims that God is helping or urging them to wage war or kill?
How is it, that in 2006, we see political leaders of all types claiming that brutality, murder and warfare are "God's will"?
Why are we so defenseless in challenging such ridiculous claims? How have we let religion become a tool to justify the least productive, most foolish, and least moral courses of action?
Do we need a "smarter" God? A "smarter" public? Leaders who can discuss the consequences of hatred, intolerance, violence and warfare in a world that is searching for moral outcomes?
I don't know about you but I'm just sick and tired of politicians claiming that God directs their actions. Is it because they want to appeal to the religious population or is it just a way to say "if anything goes wrong, blame God coz he told me to do it?". By the way, can you sue anyone who claims that God directs his actions? Let's say, for example, I go out and kill an atheist and then claim that God told me to do so. Can I be persecuted? I certainly will be. Bush is getting away with it and we normal people can't. Where's the justice in that?
Yeah, it's the Middle East conflict again. Is there anytime when there isn't any sort of conflict in the Middle East? I wasn't gonna do a post on this topic since I was convinced that no good would have come out of this conflict. However, my sauces point out to me that this is an oportunity to rant about religions without using my usual approach of religions = illogical hence God doesn't exist.
What happened to God will protect his people? I don't see any god protecting anyone in the Middle East and I mean on both sides. There's been a few Lebanese civillians killed, and there's been a few Isreali killed and I doubt the reason for those deaths would be because they didn't believe in their god enough. The reason, I suppose, is they were at the wrong place at the wrong time.
From as far as I can remember, there's always been some sort of conflict between the Arabs and Isreals. I always thought that the whole conflict was about the "holy" city and the West Bank [or was it the South Bank?] that Isreal took from the Palestinians. That's a very simplified reason, I know, I got it from my sauces, hence it can't be 100% true.
[before you point out the typo, it's not exactly a typo. I have my sauces you know, fish sauce, tomato sauce, barbecue sauce... I'm no professional journalist hence I ain't have sources, I have sauces, see I'm sooo witty :D]
So I went on searching for the answer, just out of curiosity and also to confirm my possibly-wrong assumption that all this ugly bloody war is a holy war for a holy city. And man was I wrong.
There is no exact reason. Or rather, I couldn't find an exact reason. Some sources say that this started since the crusades in whenever as depicted in that movie with Orlando Bloom [what was it? city of heaven? Oh, Kingdom of Heaven]. Other sources say that this all started in the 1920s with some Palestinian riots at, guess where, Jerusalem. So this might not be a holy war for a holy city but it sure looks like that and it did start in the stupid holy city.
See what havoc religions can wreak by just labelling some piece of land "holy"? Especially when 2 religions label one piece of land holy. People can't share, it's in our instinct, we're all selfish primates born full of ID like Freud said.
If you're still unconvinced that this pointless bloody war is a "holy" war, I'll leave you with this, Hezbollah, the group of people who Isreal is eradicating with some collateral damage, can be translated into Party of God.
Should there be a separation between religion and politics?
I said yesterday that I was out of ideas. However, I didn't know that I'd find my muse for yet another atheistic rant. So we have established that god and science don't mix well. God is used to explain everything that we, silly humans, can't explain scientifically.
Before we knew why the sun rises in the East and sets in the West we've come up with a very original answer: god did it with his divine power. The Greek, smarty pants they were, came up with another neat god idea: Helios and his chariot. And then there was the lightnings. We attributed lightnings to gods again. But then how could a loving god created something so devastatingly evil as lightnings to kill his children? And along came yet some other smarty pants who said that lightnings were the way god carried out his wrath upon the heretics. That argument created a hilarious situation. The thing is before we knew that lightnings are just massive electrical pulses, lightnings seemed to hit exclusively on churches. I wonder how did the Church persuade the people at the time that they were not devil worshippers.
So for hundreds of years, god is THE answer, the ultimate answer for everything from big questions like why the universe exists [god wants it to], how the universe came to be? [god created it], why are humans intelligent [god created us this way] to the not so big questions like why are donkeys so dumb and why do women have periods [apparently because Eve persuaded Adam to sin hence descendants of Eve have to be 'punished' every month, unless they're pregnant of course. However, this explanation can be cut short to God hates women so he punishes them every month]. We now know how to answer those question scientifically, well, except for that question "why does the universe exist", it's always easier to answer the how's or the what's. People now demand scientific answer, not generic religious answer [well except for those fundemantalists who would still insist on the existence of a god even if someone came up with the scientific proof for the nonexistence of a god, those stubborn fundamentalists].
So some smarty pants again came up with the idea that if they can prove scientifically that god exists they'll persuade people back to the righteous way of life. They even use the 2nd law of thermodynamics to prove their point.
So what does the 2nd law of thermodynamics say? It says something along the line of any closed system will tend towards disorder. Sort of like my room, if I don't exert force [ie. clean it every week] it will definitely be in a state of total chaos [ie. disorder]. Anyhow, these smarty pants argue that the 2nd law of thermodynamics contradicts the theory of evolution. Since the 2nd law of thermodynamics is always right hence the theory of evolution must be wrong, hence god created humans.
Without looking at what's right and what's wrong, I must say that it's a very big leap from 'the theory of evolution is wrong' to 'god created humans'.
Now, let's look at what's right and what's wrong. The 2nd law states that any closed system will tend towards disorder. These smarty pants forgot to think about closed system. The thing is, we're living in an open system with energy constantly come from the Sun. So does the 2nd law of thermodynamics contradicts evolution anymore? No. End of argument.
I was reading this article on about.com about angry atheist. The article was just trying to resolve the myth of angry atheist. I was hoping the reason was something like atheists aren't angry, they're so hyped up about not believing any crap that they appear to be angry. Surprise surprise, the article didn't mention anything about that. The whole thing boils down to atheists are angry and there are many reasons why they're angry and by the way there are some non-angry atheist too, the end. The whole article kinda defeat the purpose of the word "myth". So that article got me thinking, am I just another angry atheist? Of course I am, look at this blog, three quarters of the recent posts are about how ridiculous christianity is and how absurd the bible is. And that leads to the second question, what am I going to do about this? Don't get me wrong, I'm proud to be an atheist and even an angry one but being angry all the time just can't work. It's gonna do something to my moods. So, today I'm gonna have a break from the absurd existence of a God and talk about something else.
Let's talk about the current crises [weird word, crisis, the plural form of crisis is not crisises but crises, weird] in the world. So North Korea has finally showed the US how much it loved the US of A huh? What a fireworks show for Independence day! Too bad your fireworks show was a big dud. Even the people in Alaska couldn't see squat of your fireworks. May be some Japanese fishermen might have seen something of NK's big bad Taepodong-2, a supposedly deadly long-range missile that can reach Alaska and/or LA. What is the deal with those North Korean anyway? They pretty much advertised to the whole world that they have a missile that can strike the US and the said missile failed 40 seconds into the test. Talking about big overture, little show!
That wasn't much of a crisis for the US in my opinion. Now they can laugh their head off about how stupid the North Koreans are and cut all sanctions to NK. Oh and persuade the rest of the nations to cut all sanctions to NK in the process too. May be the North Koreans have something up their sleeve, may be they're trying to lure the US into some false sense of security and then kaboom, a few nuclear missiles to all the US's buddies near NK. Just my humble theory.
What's other crisis? Oh, that new Isreal airstrike that killed Palestinians. I figure this should be ranked higher on the crisis scale over that long-range dud crisis since there were actually some human casualties. However, it didn't make it to the front page. May be it's what I call the the-boy-who-cried-wolf complex. No, I'm not implying that they're lying about people dying in the middle east. It's like you hear too much about the Palestine-Isreal conflict and you figure there are always some kind of airstrike or terrorist attack going on over there so you tune out anything that has anything to do with middle east. Or may be it's just me.
Any other crisis? Of course there are, people dying in Africa, people starving in Asia, Falun Gong practitioners being killed and their organs harvested for sale in China, ... Oh well, it's just another day. And tomorrow is yet another day.
Talking about tomorrow is another day. I suppose I've always been a bit cynical and pessismistic but I really don't get those people who blogs about "tomorrow is another day". May be they're all positive all the time and they're just super hyper positive. But you can't be positive all the time. There is no way that anyone can be positive all the time. It's just like you can't be negative all the time. Me? I might have a the-glass-is-never-full view of everything but I manage to be positive sometimes so those the-glass-is-never-empty people have to be negative sometimes. I suppose I need to find out about what those people write in their tomorrow-is-another-day blogs. It's a shame that those people always have to write in Chinese or some other language. I rarely come across similar blogs in English that's talk about similar things and manage to not try to sell me some obscure self-help books on how to be positive.
The 3vil g3nius's extremely short guide to be positive: Tatoo positive signs (ie. plus signs, do not, I repeat DO NOT tatoo crosses, 3vil g3nius does not condone the practice of tatooing religious signs) all over your body. Then you can always be positive or at the very least, remind yourself to be positive.
So this person asked me if I could prove that God doesn't exist. I'd love to say that I gave him one hell of a good answer for that question. But I didn't. I asked him if he could prove that God exists thinking that offense is the best defense and he gave me a few answers that I must say are extremely stupid. They went something like these:
The bible proves that God exists
My family believed in God for generations, therefore God must exist
See this world, this universe? Aren't they complex? Only God can make them so complex. Therefore God exists.
Miracles happen. There must be a reason for those miracles. Therefore God must exist.
No one saw the Big Bang. Therefore it didn't happen. Hence God created the universe and God exists.
Communists do not believe in God. Communists are wrong. Therefore God exists.
Nothing has meaning without God. Therefore God exists.
etc.
Aren't those reasons just going from one absurdity to another? Even me, a person who don't know too much about philosophy or science and who aren't very good when it comes to writing persuasive essays, can counter those idiotic arguments.
"The Bible proves the existence of God". If the Bible proves anything, it proves that the Bible is an outdated, self-contradicting work of fiction. To say that the Bible proves the existence of God is just the same as saying "the Da Vinci Code" proves the existence of the marriage between Jesus and Mary Magedalene or saying that comic books prove the existence of Superman and Spiderman.
"My family believed in God for generations, therefore God must exist." Yeah, your family also told you that Santa Claus and Tooth Fairy exist. Go figure!
"See this world, this universe? Aren't they complex? Only God can make them so complex. Therefore God exists." Of course the universe is complex. It took million of years for the Universe to get to this point. The complexity of the universe doesn't have anything to do with God. He didn't just snap his finger and the universe came into existence with all its complexity! Contrary to the popular Catholic belief that God created the univers/world in 6 days, he didn't. Creationism didn't happen, the Big Bang did. Can you prove that creationism happened? No. Can I prove that the Big Bang happened? I can't but someone already did. Link.
"No one saw the Big Bang. Therefore it didn't happen. Hence God created the universe and God exists." Again, offense is the best defense, did anyone see God created the universe? I rest my case.
"Miracles happen. There must be a reason for those miracles. Therefore God must exist." What sort of miracles are we talking about? The I-had-cancer-and-was-about-to-die-but-then-I-had-chemotherapy-for-2-years-and-was-cured sort of miracles? Of course it is a miracle! It's a miracle because without the medical advances we had nowadays you would have died. You should thank the scientists who researched for a cure for that miracle.
"Communists do not believe in God. Communists are wrong. Therefore God exists." This argument probably came from that period of time when the USSR banned all religions in Russia without much success. The other communists countries learned from the USSR and didn't outright ban all religions, they just go about killing religious practitioners of a particular religion secretly. However, let's not get into freedom of religious practice now. The argument above is wrong in so many ways. First of all, "communists do not believe in God" is absolutely bull. They ban religions because they are/were afraid that religions might get more followers than their party and thus can stage a revolution if needs be. Therefore, banning religion or secretly eliminate some particular religions is a way to ensure their party's hold on the country, it's the communist version of pre-election campaign. Secondly, to say that "communists are wrong" or communism is bad is just like saying "capitalists are always right" or capitalism is always good. It's a generalization and it can't always be true. Hence the whole argument just go out the window.
"Nothing has meaning without God, therefore God exists". I must admit, God can be the answer for many unanswerable questions, a very lazy, unoriginal answer. As I posted in FKAB's post, whatever we cannot easily understand we call God: this saves much wear and tear on the brain tissues. I must also admit that when I became an atheist I was plagued with questions about the purpose of life if there is nothing afterwards, no rewards, no punishments. I'm still looking for the answer but it's not important is it? I'm living and that's all that matters, not what's gonna happen after I die. Back to the argument, everything has a meaning with or without God. It's just that without God, you'll have to think harder, look deeper to find the meaning.
So there, my humble attempt at disproving some absurd proofs. Does it persuade you to become an atheist? I think not. I was, am never good at persuading anyway.
Is god logical? Of course not! That was a rhetorical question. I suppose everyone knows about the story of Creationism? No, I don't mind giving you the gist of it. Source: Wikipedia
First day: Light is created. ("Let there be light.") This light is not the sun or stars, as these are created later. It is described by some as a primordial light. The light is divided from the darkness, and called good by God. The statement in verse 8 that there was evening and there was morning is often cited as the reason that the Jewish day starts at sunset.
Second day: The firmament of Heaven is created. The waters above it is separated from the waters below.
Third day: Land is created, separated from the waters, and named. The water is also named. Grass, herbs and fruit-bearing trees are created.
Fourth day: Lights are made in the firmament of Heaven, to appear regularly, aiding time-keeping. Two particularly large lights are made, the lesser one the Moon and the greater one the Sun.
Fifth day: Air and sea creatures are created, including "great sea-monsters". They are commanded to be fruitful and multiply.
Sixth day: Land animals are created, and God calls them good. Man and woman are created in God's image. They are told to "be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it." Humans and animals are given plants to eat. The totality of creation is described by God as "very good".
Now, I'm trying to be perfectly logical here, Creationism just doesn't make sense. Here are a few points that defy high school science.
God created light and separated light from darkness and day from night on the first day. However, he didn't make the sun (ie. those little things that produce light) until the fourth day.
Plants were made on the 3rd day, before the sun were made to drive photosynthesis.
Clearly God wasn't very big on logic or science for that matter. See, the wonderful, best-selling book that we call "the bible" fails to mention anything about the Earth being round or the Earth revolves around the Sun and not the other way around. At least we humans heeded his message of "be fruitful and multiply", there are only a few billion of us sinful creatures on this On the other hand, the Bible has a lot to say about everything else, like sex, oral sex, hand job, and some strictly 18+ stuff.
Oral
I sat down under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste. -- Song of Solomon 2:3
Hand job
My beloved put in his hand by the hole of the door, and my bowels were moved for him. -- Song of Solomon 5:4
No comment stuff
There she lusted after her lovers, whose genitals were like those of donkeys and whose emission was like that of horses. -- Ezekiel 23:20
I guess God was serious about "be fruitful and multiply", else, sex wouldn't be mentioned so much in the bible. For a full list of Genesis reference to sex click here.
Archeologists near mount Sinai have discovered what is believed to be a missing page from the Bible and loosely translated reads: 'All characters portrayed within this book are fictitous and any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental'.
Only there's no such news. Aren't you disappointed? Wouldn't it be fun if one day we find out that the Holy Bible is just fiction and we've been worshipping a fictitous character for over 2000 years? Yeah, that'll be fun.
Luke 14:26 Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple.
Therefore to be a disciple, you have to hate everyone and everything including life itself. Am I reading the bible or some terrorist groups' manual?
Isaiah 13:13-16 Therefore I will make the heavens tremble, and the earth will be shaken out of its place, at the wrath of the Lord of hosts on the day of his fierce anger. Like a hunted gazelle, or like sheep with no one to gather them, all will turn to their own people, and all will flee to their own lands. Whoever is found will be thrust through, and whoever is caught will fall by the sword. Their infants will be dashed to pieces before their eyes; their houses will be plundered, and their wives ravished.
Let's praise the Lord because he's soooo merciful
Deut 22:13-21 Suppose a man marries a woman, but after going in to her, he dislikes her and makes up charges against her, slandering her by saying, 'I married this woman; but when I lay with her, I did not find evidence of her virginity.' The father of the young woman and her mother shall then submit the evidence of the young woman's virginity to the elders of the city at the gate. The father of the young woman shall say to the elders: 'I gave my daughter in marriage to this man but he dislikes her; now he has made up charges against her, saying, "I did not find evidence of your daughter's virginity." But here is the evidence of my daughter's virginity.' Then they shall spread out the cloth before the elders of the town. The elders of that town shall take the man and punish him; they shall fine him one hundred shekels of silver (which they shall give to the young woman's father) because he has slandered a virgin of Israel. She shall remain his wife; he shall not be permitted to divorce her as long as he lives.
If, however, this charge is true, that evidence of the young woman's virginity was not found, then they shall bring the young woman out to the entrance of her father's house and the men of her town shall stone her to death, because she committed a disgraceful act in Israel by prostituting herself in her father's house. So you shall purge the evil from your midst.
And let's praise the Lord for his word is fair, for men only.
Tim 2:11-12 Let a woman* learn in silence with full submission. I permit no woman* to teach or to have authority over a man;* she is to keep silent.
The Lord is also a male chauvinist
Lev 20:13 If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall be put to death; their blood is upon them.
And a homophobe to top it all
Ex 21:20-21 When a slave-owner strikes a male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies immediately, the owner shall be punished. But if the slave survives for a day or two, there is no punishment; for the slave is the owner's property
Who promotes slavery and cruelty towards slaves
Deut 25:11-12 If men get into a fight with one another, and the wife of one intervenes to rescue her husband from the grip of his opponent by reaching out and seizing his genitals, you shall cut off her hand; show no pity.
Seems like the Bible has a rule for everything. If your wife stop a fight to save your ass by grabbing the other man's genitals, she shall have her hand cut off. What if she grabs somewhere else? Is there a rule for that?
Ex 35:2 For six days shall work be done, but on the seventh day you shall have a holy sabbath of solemn rest to the Lord; whoever does any work on it shall be put to death.
A bit harsh I suppose, capital punishment for working and not wasting time worshipping some imaginary god!
I'm a catholic turn atheist if you haven't quite figure that one out yet. I was unfortunately born a catholic and family tradition dictated that I would be christened as a catholic. No input from me on the matter whatsoever. No, you don't ask a newborn if it wants to be in a particular religion. Extremely inconsiderate of my parents of course. Why couldn't they just wait a few years and ask me if I want to be a catholic or not. I mean, if only you can test drive a religion before you decide to be a part of it.
I was still a Catholic, albeit a little skeptical, two years ago when I met this guy. He's a Buddhist-turn-Christian and he was fanatical about spreading the word of the lord to all his classmates. That's a bit scary for anyone in highschool. Just think what people might think gives me shudders. Anyway. He was way beyond enthusiastic and he had these wristbands with abbreviations on them stuff like WWJD or PUSH. The guy gave me a wristband, you know fellow Christians and all. Now that's what I call enthusiastic. Not like those Jehovah's Witnesses ladies who came to our house a few years ago and had an argument with my mother that Jesus died on a pole and not a cross. And I mean actually arguing. Their faces were red when they finished and I'm not even sure it was from exertion or humiliation or some kind of medical conditions. The whole thing was so wrong in so many ways:
First, you don't go barging in other people houses and announce that they've been worshiping a wrong representation of your god.
Second, you don't go starting arguments about anything that you have absolutely nothing back your claims up except some artist impressions of your vision. Even though the picture of Jesus dying on a pole can be artistic and pretty, it doesn't mean that it is true. Having said that I'm gonna say this too: Catholics don't have any proof that Jesus did die on a cross and not a pole. So it goes both way but those Jehovah's Witnesses ladies started it and that's what is wrong with this picture.
Third, what kind of impression would you leave behind? Crazy fanatics trying to impose your religion on other people's religion? Way to recruit new members ladies.
Ok, back to the friendly Christian guy. I got a wristband with WWJD on it. It was cool. Not because I really believe in the message behind those abbreviation. By the way, WWJD stands for "what would Jesus do". The message was kinda good I suppose. It reminds you what you should do in sticky situation like:
You see a bag containing 5 million bucks and don't know what to do. (grab it and make a run for the hills or the casino s or an electrical store or wherever people like to spend their money these days. Or grab the bag and walk into a police station)
You got slapped in the face and not sure how to react. (run away, turn the other cheek to get slapped at or go on the slap the other person back and while you're at it, punch him in the jaw too?)
You really want to bash that annoying guy on the train. (do you have enough muscle to go on such a campaign?). Or
You really want to have unprotected sex with a stranger on the street.
Yes, Jesus can guide you in such situations even though common sense is way faster and a lot less complicated.
So I got the WWJD wristband and most of the time when I wore it, I pretended that WWJD stood for "we want jelly doughnuts". That message is cool too, isn't it? There are other messages and PUSH was one of those. The enthusiastic Christian couldn't remember what PUSH stood for so I didn't get that one and hence PUSH remains a mystery to me until yesterday.
Discovering what PUSH stands for is really a mind blowing experience for me. Previously I thought it meant one of these things:
Push if you want to get ahead in life [which is quite true on some levels]
If you push people the right way you'll get what you want.
Push if you want that baby to get out of your uterus [this is induced by watching too many policemen having to play midwives on those cop shows]
No, PUSH doesn't have anything to do with the verb "push". PUSH stands for "pray until something happen". Oh, god. What that is one hell of an abbreviation. Pray until something happen? I reckon pray until anything happen is easier. What if nothing happens? What if you pray and pray and pray and pray and nothing happen? This is kinda like waiting for an answer for a rhetorical question. A scenario springs to my mind:
You keep praying and praying and praying and a hundred years later you're all but a skeleton in some corner of a church somewhere new generations walk pass your remains and wondering what happen to that guy. And there, in the corner, a message is carved in a stone. "Here kneels the remains of [insert a name] who had enough courage to PUSH. Too bad nothing happened"
I reckon they should sell those PUSH wristband with a big red warning: don't hold your breath while you PUSH.
This happened last week I think. The Alarmist came home and said to me: "Oh my god, I'm so relieved, I thought I had mouth cancer but it turned out OK". Since I've already named her "the Alarmist" on my blog I was well aware of her tendency to be alarmed not alert and my reaction to her comment was rolling my eyes crazily in their sockets and ask perfectly calmly "Why did you figure that?". And her answer was "I had this white patch on the side of my tongue and it wouldn't come off. And a white patch that doesn't come off is usually the first sign of mouth cancer. I was freaking out I wasn't sure what to do. Should I go get a biopsy, should I go to an oncologist, should I go straight to the dental hospital or should I go to my dentist to get a referral to the dental hospital. And then the next day the patch disappeared."
If you don't know what OiNK is, it's only this tiny community of like-minded individual hell-bent on sharing high quality, often lossless, music files against minor details such as legality and copyright laws. OiNK was actually where leaked albums usually turn up first if they were in high enough bitrate. Anyhow, OiNK got shut down, big surprise there and the people who were on OiNK have been grieving ever since. Me? If I was a member I would have been sad too but sadly, I wasn't. Didn't know anyone who could invite me and besides what's the fuss with high quality MP3 files? If you're downloading illegal music to have a try before buying the actual album why bother with high bitrate?
Seriously, want proof? You know the bush fires in Southern California? That is God's work according to some wack-job fundamentalist (via Pandagon). Apparently, that's his wrath going around in California because they approved of a bill that allows same sex marriage. I wonder what was Katrina. Was that also God's wrath? If God was real and was really angry with the gay people he would have burnt down West Hollywood, you know where all the "scary" gay people live.
And of course the Catholic church has something to say about this. Well, several somethings actually: exploitation of babies (gee, what about those child soldiers in Africa?); "bad taste" (dead man on a cross, good taste much?); "erroneous" (hey at least they have some questionable scientific proofs, what do you have?).
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