Two Mass-ive Scandals for the Vatican

The following Daily Show clip illustrates quite clearly (yet again), the utter hypocrisy, foolishness, and danger posed by this titan of religious organizations. How is it that followers so willingly accept that their spiritual leader is infallible when practices that he  condones (or at the very least does not act upon) violate not only the same religious dogma he represents and to which he demands adherence, but also violate nearly universal standards for moral/ethical behavior?

For my part, I could care less about what consenting adults do behind closed doors--with or without pay--but I have a major problem with adults behaving in the same way with children.

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-march-16-2010/holy-sh-t

Quote of the Day:

"Of all possible sexual perversions, religion is the only one to have been scientifically systematized."

--Louis Aragon

U.S. History, Texas-style

Recently, the Huffington Post ran an article about the latest round of public school textbook standards adoption controversy occurring in the state of Texas. Apparently, the ultra right-wing Christian conservatives on the board overseeing the standards for that state have made it their personal mission to rewrite American history, government, and even economics to suit their own factually distorted, religious worldviews.

The reason I bother to pass this information on, despite the fact that I do not live in Texas or have children who will attend the public schools there, is that as the largest consumer of public school textbooks in the country, what happens to textbooks and/or curricular standards in Texas influences textbooks/curricula for the rest of the country. To see what changes have been initially approved by the Board, follow the link below. It's enough to knock the powder right out of your wig.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/13/texas-textbook-massacre-u_n_498003.html#s73775

Quote of the Day:

"Strongly guarded as is the separation between Religion and Government in the Constitution of the United States...practical distinction between Religion and Civil Government is essential to the purity of both, and as guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States."

--James Madison

The Flintstones is NOT a Documentary

I stumbled across this YouTube video of Lewis Black, which I found to be pretty funny, so I thought I'd share.



Quotes of the Day:


"The only way we can determine the true age of the earth is for God to tell us what it is. And since He has told us, very plainly, in the Holy Scriptures that it is several thousand years in age, and no more, that ought to settle all basic questions of terrestrial chronology."


--Henry M. Morris


"In retrospect, this magazine's converage of so-called evolution has been hideously one-sided... Why were we so unwilling to suggest that dinosaurs lived 6,000 years ago or that a cataclysmic flood carved the Grand Canyon?... As editors, we had no business being persuaded by mountains of evidence...Nor should we succumb to the easy mistake of thinking that scientists understand their fields better than, say, U.S. senators or best-selling novelists do. Indeed, if politicians or special-interest groups say things that seem untrue or misleading, our duty as journalists is to quote them without comment or contradiction. To do otherwise would be elitist and therefore wrong."


--Scientific American, Editorial, April 2005

Just One More Example of the Wisdom of Our Founding Fathers

Despite the Religious Wrong's hijacking of America's Founding Fathers for their own narrow purposes, (i.e., the indignant claim that the U.S. was founded on the basis of Judeo-Christian values, and therefore all law should be based on Scripture), the writings of many of these learned men and great thinkers speak rather frankly about their true intentions regarding religion's role in government--both in terms of its founding and functioning. I have provided the following few examples before, but I think they bear reiterating, given the kinds of crazy-ass public appeals some elected officials (and many a pundit on Fox and elsewhere) are making with regard to important Federal legislation.

"The United States of America is in no sense founded on the Christian religion."
--John Adams, Treaty of Tripoli (1797)


"In every country and in every age the priest has been hostile to liberty, he is always in allegiance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection of his own... History I believe furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government... Political as well as religious leaders will always avail themselves [of public ignorance] for their own purpose."


"State churches that use government power to support themselves and force their views on persons of other faiths undermine all our civil rights...  Erecting the 'wall of separation between church and state,' therefore, is absolutely essential in a free society."
--Thomas Jefferson

The Daily Show has done many segments in the past regarding the inappropriateness of religion in government. I personally find satire one of the absolute best ways to illuminate just how dangerous it is for all of us when religion crosses into the realm of government. Here is the latest regarding health care reform.

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/thu-march-4-2010/the-med-menace

You Just Can't Compete Against Jesus

This past weekend, my school district held their Golden Apple Teacher of the Year awards banquet. Amazingly, 2 of the 5 finalists were teachers with whom I work. One in particular is a young man who teaches the Emotionally/Behaviorally Disordered middle schoolers in a self-contained class. He is very devoted to his kids and is a really great teacher.

Well, unfortunately (in my biased opinion), this particular teacher didn't win. The guy who won is a music teacher who claimed that he never wanted to even go into teaching until Jesus "opened his eyes" and showed him "the way." Now, whether he is a more exceptional teacher than my colleague I leave to the judgment of the panel who evaluated each finalist, but as another colleague pointed out to me on Monday morning, "You just can't compete against Jesus."

Quote of the Day:

"Bribes, believe me, buy both gods and men."

--Ovid

Atheist Humor--Part 3: Signs of the Times

And my personal favorite.....

Religious Views of Life

Taoism

Shit happens.

Confucianism

Confucius says shit happens.

Buddhism

If shit happens, it isn't really shit.

Zen

What is the sound of shit happening?

Hinduism

This shit happened before.

Hare Krishna

Shit happens, rama lama ding-dong.

Islam

If shit happens, take a hostage.

Jehovah's Witnesses

Knock, knock....shit happens.

Catholicism

If shit happens, you deserve it.

Protestantism

Let shit happen to someone else.

Judaism

Why does this shit always happen to us?

Rastafarianism

Let's smoke this shit!!

Agnosticism

What is this shit?

Atheism

I don't believe this shit.

The Seven Universal Laws

On my last trip to New York, we took a train to Times Square. As we were walking through the station towards 42nd Street, a group of 4 young men (Hasidic Jews) approached us and asked if we were Jewish. When I said no, one of the young men handed me a card and told me that on the card I would find the seven universal laws, and if I would just follow them, they would lead to true peace. Believing that now is as good a time as any to get started down the path of true peace, I decided to check them out and share what I discovered. "The Seven Universal Laws" are as follows:

Believe in G-d and renounce idolatry. (Wow...Simon Cowell is so screwed!)

Honor the Almighty by not blaspheming. (Well, how in the hell do you expect a godless heathen to follow a goddamn rule like that?!?)

Respect all human life and not commit murder. (Hmmmm....It might be tough, but I'll try.)

Refrain from immoral conduct; adultery, incest and homosexuality. (Adultery? Check. Incest? Um...like 1 million times check! Homosexuality? Check for me, but that "law" might be a bit difficult for whole sections of NYC. And why is "immoral" behavior confined to sexual behavior? I guess Yahweh must have a one-track mind.)

Respect the property of others by not stealing. (That's a given.)

Respect G-d's creatures and not partake of flesh from a living animal. (Well, duh...living animals squirm too much.)

Foster justice by supporting honest courts of law. (As opposed to the courts of law we have now??  i.e., corporations = individuals = freedom of speech = the right to spend billions to ensure that laws remain entirely corporate-friendly)

Alright...so those are the Seven Universal Laws. Please bear with me as I submit these "laws" to my own unofficial test of universality.

• Believe in G-d and renounce idolatry.
• FAIL! This law is only universal if one assumes that everyone who is not Jewish has a belief in some sort of deity and engages in idolatry. It completely leaves out the pantheists, agnostics, and atheists of the world.
• Honor the Almighty by not blaspheming.
• FAIL! What is blaspheming to one religious group is honoring by another...and those who don't believe in the existence of any "Almighty" blaspheme them all.
• Respect all human life and do not commit murder.
• PASS! First of all, not committing murder is rooted more in ethology than "law", but makes complete sense when you consider that wiping out the human species via murder would not be in the best interest of the human species. It is also my humble opinion that respecting all human life is another universal precept that transcends religion or religious belief...however, it is one that does not seem to EVER be followed by believers of any faith, as they continue to show disrespect to anyone who does not believe as they do, and even go so far as to commit that very act of murder, which is universally condemned.
• Refrain from immoral conduct: adultery, incest, homosexuality.
• FAIL! First of all, adultery is defined differently between different cultures, and even within the same religious groups. At one time, having multiple wives and/or conjugal relations with your slaves (for men only, of course) was not considered "adulterous" behavior within Judaism. As cultural norms changed, so too, did the definition of adultery. Incest has physiological repercussions that make that taboo unattractive enough to most but not all cultures...and homosexuality is a law of nature (check out the many other species that engage in homosexual behavior) that cannot be eliminated by instituting laws of man (or god) forbidding it.
• Respect the property of others by not stealing.
• PASS/FAIL?  This one is tricky because it assumes a material-based system and philosophy of life. What one considers stealing, another may simply see as taking one's turn using available resources. In that case, I suppose the intent to not maliciously take the property of others could be considered universal. Of course, if one were to exist in a cooperative state, this law becomes moot.
• Respect G-d's creatures and not partake of the flesh of a living animal.

• FAIL! Ok, while I am philosophically sympathetic to the viewpoint of those who are vegetarian or vegan, as far as grotesque human production of meat products is concerned, science does not support the argument that humans were meant to (and should) refrain from consuming meat products. One obvious example in favor of a more omnivore lifestyle includes the existence of "canine teeth" in humans, which like the four-legged animals whose teeth they resemble, were never intended to be used to eat tofu. Having said that, my personal belief is that there is a significant problem with mass-producing animal products and I think if people worldwide could manage to curb their consumption of meat by even 10% per year, perhaps we could get a little bit closer to the ideal of respecting our fellow creatures.
• Foster justice by supporting honest courts of law.
• PASS! In theory, it's difficult to imagine how anyone could argue against honesty and justice for those who seek it, even in the most localized or tribal courts.

Well, by my count, that makes just 2.5 out of the 7 laws that met my unscientific criteria for universality, and all of those were related to concepts that promote social cohesion and universal prosperity, thus eliminating any need to identify with Judaism, or any other religious belief system.

With regard to promoting "true peace", again, only 2.5 out of 7 stand a chance of accomplishing this. The others remain "true" only in the eyes of the believers themselves and if they accomplish true peace for them, I am all in favor, as long as it is not at the expense of others, like myself.

As for the 4 young men freezing their beards off in the 42nd Street subway station while attempting to hand cards out to tourists who mostly ignored them, I hope they find their own sense of peace....but more importantly, I hope they find a warm place to be when their mission is over.

Quote of the Day:

"If a man would follow, today, the teachings of the Old Testament, he would be a criminal. If he would follow strictly the teachings of the New, he would be insane."

--Robert G. Ingersoll