If you don't have anything nice to say...

This is not a new Pat Condell video that I’m posting. It’s from late last year. But this was the first time I’ve seen it and I’m guessing you haven’t seen it yet either.

I have to say the point he is making is outstanding. You might say, well, if you think it is outstanding Mr. Evo, it certainly doesn’t sound much like how you do things. And this would be true. I’ll have to give some thought to the possibility that I’m doing things wrong.

In the meanwhile, I do think I do the next best thing. I rarely debate theists. I mean, I do respond to things they say to me and I think when I do I say it in a strong manner. I don’t go looking for theists to debate and I’m not trying to deconvert them.

You are my reason for being!

It's stories like these that make life so interesting. Homo sapiens never stop being fascinating.

At first I was going to ask Exterminator, do you swear to god you aren't a Brit? But the next to the last paragraph excused him.

What might he have got had he made it to his 5th anniversary? Probably a good thing he left us when he did.

Personally, I'll make it easier than this for my family. Just do to me what the wife did in the last story.

Ahhhh.... (as in, you folks never cease to leave me in awe).

Music break

I may be ancient, but this never gets old to me.

James Dobson - Fascist On The Family

As pointed out in my previous post, it's probably a good thing that all of this religious angst is being exposed during this years' elections. I kind of loved James Dobson coming out with his Jesus guns blazing at Obama yesterday. Here was one response to his accusation that Obama has a fruitcake view of the Constitution.

The People for the American Way had the following to say in a press release:

“James Dobson is certainly entitled to his opinions, no matter how ridiculous they may be, but the media should make clear that it’s Dobson, not Obama who’s outside the mainstream. Dr. Dobson has made a career of using the Bible as a political bludgeon — he’s never been shy to condemn those he disagrees with, and no one should be surprised that he’s doing it now.

“It’s disappointing that Dr. Dobson is so callously abusing the trust that many well meaning people have placed in him.”

An evangelical insider gives this view on why Dobson's attack will actually back-fire due to the fact that millions of Evangelicals have already figured out this Bush boot-licker. I hope it's true, though I needn't depend on it for an Obama victory in November. Nevertheless, it's yet another indicator that the religious folks are at war with each other. We can simply enjoy it, and hope for the best when the smoke clears.

Obama isn't taking Dobson's shit quietly, like so many milquetoast Democrats have in the past. Last night he said that Dobson was "making stuff up", and that he was "deliberately distorting the traditional understanding of the Bible to fit his own worldview."

Keep it up guys. I love it.

Dobson accuses Obama of 'distorting' Bible

This is the video that got Dobson's religious panties in a knot

So, Dobson says (among other things)

"Am I required in a democracy to conform my efforts in the political arena to his bloody notion of what is right with regard to the lives of tiny babies?" Dobson said. "What he's trying to say here is unless everybody agrees, we have no right to fight for what we believe."

Many of us have been quite concerned about what appears to be a heightened insertion of religion into this campaign - Obama's "committed Christian" flyer, Hillary and her association with "The Family", Jeremiah Wright, The Compassion Forum, Pastor Hagee, Reverend Parsley, just to name some of it so far (and it's only June, for "god's" sake)!

Maybe it's a good thing though. Good in the sense that a huge, festering sore being relieved of it's puss is good. This campaign might be something we point back to as the moment when millions of Americans finally woke up to the absurdity of linking religious beliefs to public discourse. Maybe videos like this one will actually be beneficial to our religiously psychotic society - over time.

Tribute to George Carlin

Comedian George Carlin died Sunday, about 2 miles away from where I sit. As Exterminator says:

"Too bad to lose a humorous voice for reason."

This is what I think about when I remember George Carlin -

What Would Jesus Buy?

I’ve said in the past that the Jesus I’ve read about would never own a gun and never vote Republican. My intent is clear when you think about the profile most likely associated with hard-core Christian belief in America. Last year a documentary on ubiquitous American consumerism and the "Shopocalypse" hit the theaters. It was titled "What Would Jesus Buy" and came out concurrent to the '07 Christmas shopping season. I think it was one of the few things that our society didn't spend much money on in 2007. Who wants to go to a mall in December to see a movie that makes you feel bad about shopping?

Yesterday, in an email interchange with a friend of ours in which we were discussing the notion of success defined as having more possessions, including money. I told him, “Having more would be nice… but only to the point of being free of want. Anything beyond that is superfluous. Being poor (but not hopelessly so) and content, is the key to satisfaction.”

I also linked him to this article. It deals with the dirty little truth that lies just out of view of our problems – unnecessary and illegal wars, dogmatic religion, abuse of the Constitution, the “corporatization” of politics, ignoring the ecological morass, denial of wisdom gleaned from the sciences. We might think of these as tangentially related to each other, but I submit that there is a common thread running through all of these and many more societal scourges. Consider yourself urged to read the article.

Women for McCain

The guy dumped his disabled wife after he got back from Viet Nam and married a rich, young, politically connected hottie. He has promised to put Justices on the Supreme Court who would roll back women's reproductive rights. But at least he's a gentleman.

How certain are YOU that there is no god?

Most theists don’t understand that atheists (or at least most of us) do not claim to be 100% certain that there is no god. Worshippers think atheism is an arrogant position of claiming omniscience about the possibilities in the Universe, but this isn’t it at all. First of all, being a rational thinker, and a person who accepts the scientific method as being the single most effective tool for learning facts about nature, instructs one to avoid dealing in absolutes. Secondly, we simply say that we think there is no supernatural gods in the universe. I shouldn’t talk for other atheists. It's what I mean when I say I’m an atheist.

But there is a continuum, along which you can find degrees of certainty for any given proposition. For instance, I rate my “certainty” that there are no highly intelligent beings (besides Homo sapiens) buzzing about the Universe in advanced transportation vehicles, at about 75%. Hey, the Universe is huge. My certainty that such beings are not making regular clandestine visits to Earth, on a mission to observe our culture, is more like 99%. When we talk about these issues in terms of probabilities, it might make it a bit easier for the theist to understand the atheistic mindset.

So I’ll give a short probability example of what I’d tell theists about my atheism, so that they could get a strong grasp on what I mean when I tell them that I am an atheist.

If someone who was widely accepted as a world renowned spiritual person (think, I guess, the Pope or the Dali Lama) approached me and offered me two choices: (1) Simply say that I accept their version of god (even if I find it nearly impossible to believe) and, if there is an afterlife, I will be guaranteed to participate in the more pleasant aspects of it or (2) receive a gift certificate for a Happy Meal at McDonalds, and if there is an afterlife I will either not be able to participate or, if I do, it will be to receive the most horrible punishments associated with such – I’d immediately grab my free meal. That’s how certain I am. On the other hand, if my “gift” in Choice 2 were a brand new shiny penny, I’d say, “I accept your version of god, my friend”.

I hope this clarifies exactly what I mean when I say I’m an atheist. I’ve simply never heard a notion of “god” that is worth 2 cents. I invite readers to leave their own probability examples of how certain they are that there is no god(s).

Towards a more secular America

I promised, in my post Why the Gods are not Winning, that I’d have more to say about this same-titled article. I was a little distracted by the media ignoring Rep. Dennis Kucinich and his Articles of Impeachment. But, hey, it’s been 36 hours and I’m ready to move on too. That’s the way we Americans are.

Early in the article, the authors state:

"It is well documented that Christianity has withered dramatically in Europe, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Japan. The failure of the faith in the west is regularly denounced by Popes and Protestant leaders. Churches are being converted into libraries, laundromats and pubs. Those who disbelieve in deities typically make up large portions of the population, according to some surveys they make up the majority of citizens in Scandinavia, France and Japan. Evolution is accepted by the majority in all secular nations, up to four in five in some."

Notice that America is not one of the places where “Christianity has withered dramatically”. You knew that, of course. We are all very well aware of it. But why not? We started this whole democratic society thing. Why would religion still have it’s claws so much deeper into American culture than all of those (and many more) mentioned above? Is it possible that America somehow much more accurately reflects the trend of religious belief in the future than these others? Let’s see what the authors say in this regard:

"The mass loss of popular faith in the Eurocultures is often waved away as an isolated aberration in a world still infatuated with the gods. After all, who cares what the "old Europe" of France and Sweden is up to? This is a big mistake. Such a thing has never been seen before in history. And where it has happened is critical to the future of faith. Aside from constituting proof of principle that religion is dangerously vulnerable to modernity, that secularism and disbelief do best in nations that are the most democratic, educated and prosperous directly falsifies the Shah and Toft thesis that these factors are the allies of religiosity.

At this point I was still furiously scratching my head. Are we not modern? Of course we are! Educated? Somewhat more problematic, but we are still well educated when seen on the grand world scale. How about prosperous? Most would argue that we are, but maybe we are closing in on some key differences between The United States and other “Western style” democracies. What is it that is going on “over there” that’s maybe a little different:

"Nor is it all that surprising that faith has imploded in most of the west. Every single 1st world nation that is irreligious shares a set of distinctive attributes. These include handgun control, anti-corporal punishment and anti-bullying policies, rehabilitative rather than punitive incarceration, intensive sex education that emphasizes condom use, reduced socio-economic disparity via tax and welfare systems combined with comprehensive health care, increased leisure time that can be dedicated to family needs and stress reduction, and so forth.

"As a result the great majority enjoy long, safe, comfortable, middle class lives that they can be confident will not be lost due to factors beyond their control. It is hard to lose one's middle class status in Europe, Canada and so forth, and modern medicine is always accessible regardless of income. Nor do these egalitarians culture emphasize the attainment of immense wealth and luxury, so most folks are reasonably satisfied with what they have got. Such circumstances dramatically reduces peoples' need to believe in supernatural forces that protect them from life's calamities, help them get what they don't have, or at least make up for them with the ultimate Club Med of heaven. One of us (Zuckerman) interviewed secular Europeans and verified that the process of secularization is casual; most hardly think about the issue of God, not finding the concept relevant to their contented lives.

"The result is plain to see. Not a single advanced democracy that enjoys benign, progressive socio-economic conditions retains a high level of popular religiosity. They all go material."

OK. Now we are getting somewhere. So what the hell is the problem here in the Untied States?

"Because they are afraid and insecure. Arbitrary dismissal from a long held job, loss of health insurance followed by an extended illness, excessive debt due to the struggle to live like the wealthy; before you know it a typical American family can find itself financially ruined. Overwhelming medical bills are a leading cause of bankruptcy.

"In part to try to accumulate the wealth needed to try to prevent financial catastrophe, in part to compete in a culture of growing economic disparity with the super rich, the typical American is engaged in a Darwinian, keeping up with the Jones competition in which failure to perform to expectations further raises levels of psychological stress. It is not, therefore, surprising that most look to friendly forces from the beyond to protect them from the pitfalls of a risky American life, and if that fails compensate with a blissful eternal existence.

"The effect can be more direct. For instance, the absence of universal health care encourages the utilization of faith-based medical charities. The latter, as well intentioned as they are, cannot provide the comprehensive health services that best suppress mortality at all ages. But charities extend the reach of the churches into the secular community, enhancing their ability to influence society and politics, and retain and recruit members."

I teased this post by saying that it all has something to do with Darwin. Not biological evolution but, unfortunately and ironically, the fact that while Christians hate the notion of evolution, and use the examples of the horrors they think occurred during the 20^th century being due to the evils of “social Darwinism”, we live in an American society that is deeply a social Darwinian one.

So I think I have the answer to our problems here, though I know a lot of people won’t like it. We have to move towards a more socialist society. We can still be a capitalist society, but it can’t be simply a free-market economy. We have to veer towards what I’ll call Capitalistic Socialism. Until the under-classes are secure in all aspects of their lives, religion will thrive. We have to have a culture in which adults can expect a decent paying job (that rather than being moderately likely to lose, would be extremely unlikely that they will be fired), have themselves and their families assured that their health problems will be taken care of without lose of home, and that their children will receive a top-rank education without making other sacrifices. This is what other democracies have done and those countries are now much more free of religious influence.

We certainly aren’t likely to move in this direction with Republicans in the White House and controlling the Congress. I’m not a Democrat and I’m not saying that voting Democratic is the only way to get to where we need to be. But we have to start somewhere and we need to do it immediately. Barack Obama has made universal heath care one of his top platform issues. That would be a great place to start.