Hate Speech and Terrorism

In the midst of the terrible events these past few days in Egypt, Lybia, Yemen and now spreading through other parts of the Middle East, the subject of free speech has come up many times with regards to this so-called movie that has set off so much opportunistic violence and death.

I see the instigators who make these videos intended not to educate but to inflame and these extreme right wing pastors who burn religious texts as hate-driven cowards who start shit from a safe distance and let innocent people suffer the bloody consequenses. I believe completely in free speech, but I don't put what Sam Bacile (or whatever his name is) and Terry Jones and their ilk do in the category of free speech or the extremist Islamists publicly calling for the killing of those who insult their religion. Nor do I condone extremist Islam's use of any excuse to justify attacks on anyone they hate. I would hold them ALL responsible for every death that results from this kind of violence.

I'm talking about intentionally inciting violence as opposed to speaking out against policies or beliefs or situations that cause harm to society or individuals that must be addressed. So often, taking a stance in an ethical manner does cause violent reactions from the opposition, and some argue that even hate-speech is protected under free speech. It's a complicated issue and a slippery slope. But there is a difference in criticizing and insulting. I believe in criticizing what needs criticizing. Including religion. We do this to effect change, hopefully in a good direction. Insulting only results in negative reaction. Insulting is an attack. Criticism is a discussion. That's the difference.

And in light of what we are hearing about this movie and it's maker, that even the actors were not aware of the actual content, which was allegedly dubbed over after the fact, if that is true, I would call on authorities to find him and hold him responsible for putting so many lives in danger, including the lives of those involved in the movie if they truly did not know what was being done. Certainly, absolutely, those who reacted with violence must be held responsible for their own actions and for the deaths they have caused. I think the consequences for this terrorism should be aggressive, immediate and harsh. But I'm addressing the issue of free speech and the boundaries that those of us priviledged to have that freedom should be observing. We have the freedom to condemn and criticize or stand up for any issue or situation we feel strongly about, but we should do it responsibly and honestly.

With that said, I condemn this disgusting video and it's maker and his "message", and I also condemn the attack on the mission in Benghazi by jihadists who murdered Ambassador Stevens and the 3 American staff members, whether that attack was provoked by the movie or was pre-planned. And I agree with the statement issued by the Embassy in Egypt and with Sec. Clinton that we do not condone any effort to intentionally insult any individual or group for their religion. And despite what Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan so opportunistically and idiodically claimed, it is NOT an apology. It is a condemnation of hate speech.

While I'm doing all this condemning, I would like to condemn Romney for claiming the Obama administration is apologising to the jihadists for this movie, for dishonestly twisting words and using it for campaigning purposes and I hope his supporters see it for the lie that it is. I was disgusted by his statement. I hope anyone else who feels the same lets him know that in November.

As for Mr. Bacile (or whatever your name is), why don't you come out of your hiding hole and take your part of the responsibility for this bloody mess. If you did what the reports are saying you did, you owe a lot of people restitution, and you owe everyone the truth. Not that it would even begin to be enough, but you should never forget that you played a part in the deaths of innocent people.

Do not misunderstand what I'm saying. More than anything, I condemn these jihadist groups for using any perceived insult to attack innocent people and hold them completely repsonsible above any other player in this sickening situation because there is NO justification for this kind of reaction.

Period.

What are you really worshipping?

We've all heard Christians claim that Jesus dispensed with the Old Testament laws (even though they like to trot out tidbits when it suits them). They say Christians live by the New Testament and the OT does not apply to them. It's how they get around our questions on the morality of stoning people for any little thing. We have all heard that over and over. And I don't care whether or not Jesus abolished Mosaic Law. What I want to hear is a real justification for worshipping the god of the Old Testament - the immoral, murderous, jealous tyrant who rules with fear and threats. Or did Jesus dispense with him too? The god of the OT and the god of the NT do seem to be two vastly different characters. Jesus's father seems a kinder, gentler version of Yahweh, at least until you get to the book of Revelation. Even so, Christians consider the OT god and the NT god to be the same One True God. And he is a god who loves all his children unconditionally. Just don't piss him off.

So, if the Old Testament is mostly a book of history for Christians, let's look at the character of Yahweh and some of his accomplishments as told in the books of the OT. These are a few highlights as I found so many examples it would make this post much too long.

Genesis:
Chapter 3: God curses all of mankind for a sin committed by Adam and Eve. Interestingly, eating of the tree would have "opened their eyes and made them as gods, knowing good and evil." If Adam and Eve didn't know good and evil before, how can God blame them for disobeying him? They were innocent, ignorant, uninformed, and even misled by God himself. He didn't bother giving them enough information to make a right decision, but instead, created them with human curiosity and weaknesses and placed the temptation there for them then allowed the serpent to seduce them, knowing in advance what would happen. He is omniscient, after all. They were set up and there is no other way to spin that. Then they were punished for something they were hardly responsible for - a punishment that certainly didn't fit the crime! The entire human race cursed, forever.

Chapter 6: God commits global genocide, destroying every living thing on the planet except Noah and his family and the animals on the ark. He regretted creating humans because they all turned out evil. (Really? ALL of them?) But being omniscient, didn't he know that was going to happen? And if he did, he created it that way to begin with. So, again, Yahweh punishes humans for HIS own mistake. And for good measure, he kills all the other living creatures as well.

Chapter 19: God's angels visit Lot in Sodom to warn him that God is going to destroy the city. The men of the city surround Lot's house, demanding he send the angels out so they can "know" them but Lot (the only man God finds righteous in the city) "righteously" offers to send his virgin daughters out intstead for the mob to rape. God doesn't care about this, but later turns Lot's wife into a pillar of salt only because she looked back at the city as they were leaving. Can't spin that one to make Yahweh look good no matter how thick those Holy Spirit glasses are!

Chapter 22: God commands Abraham to kill his only son Isaac to show his obedience. Of course the angel stops Abraham just in the nick of time. Christians think God was merciful for not having Abe go through with murdering his son. I wonder how Isaac felt about that.

Exodus:  God sends plague after plague upon Egypt, even after Pharoah said he would let the slaves go. It was God who kept the slaves in Egypt as he "hardened Pharoah's heart" quite a few times after Pharoah consented. Most of the death could have been avoided when Pharoah first agreed. But apparently, Yahweh wasn't done killing.

Leviticus 26: God lists all the punishments for not doing what he says including "sending wild beasts among you, to rob you of your children" and "ye shall eat the flesh of your sons and the flesh of your daughters ye shall eat". He really seems to enjoy punishing innocent people, especially children, for something someone else did.

Numbers and Deuteronomy: With Yahweh's approval, the Israelites slaughter city after city, men, women, children and animals. Including the poor guy who picked up sticks on the sabbath. He also personally killed tens of thousands with fire, plague, venomous snakes and caused the earth to open up and swallow men, women and children (because the MEN were rebellious).
He also commands Moses to kill all the male Midianite children, all their women who were not virgins, but tells the Israelites they can keep all the virgins "for themselves". Overall, they ended up with 32,000 virgin girls and women.

Joshua: Yahweh helps Joshua slaughter everyone in Jerico, Ai, Makkedah, Libnah, Lachish, Eglon, Hebron, Debir, and the Gibeonites. At the Waters of Merom, God commanded Joshua to "hamstring their horses and burn their chariots."

And this interesting nugget:
Joshua 11:20 - For it was of the LORD to harden their hearts, that they should come against Israel in battle, that he might destroy them utterly, and that they might have no favour, but that he might destroy them, as the LORD commanded Moses.
That one certainly says alot.

Judges: More slaughter by the Israelites under God's command.

I Samuel: God kills 70 men for looking into the Ark of the Covenant. More men, women and children slaughtered by God's command.

II Samuel: Uzzah reaches out to steady the Ark when the oxen stumbles. God kills him for touching the Ark. More slaughter by David and his armies under God's command. God sends a plague on Israel that kills 70,000 innocent people to punish David for sinning.

2 Kings: Elisha curses 42 "little children" who made fun of his bald head. God sends 2 she-bears to kill the children.

God's punishment for Babylon:
Isaiah 13: 9 Behold, the day of the LORD cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate: and he shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it.
11 And I will punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity; and I will cause the arrogancy of the proud to cease, and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible.
15 Every one that is found shall be thrust through; and every one that is joined unto them shall fall by the sword.
16 Their children also shall be dashed to pieces before their eyes; their houses shall be spoiled, and their wives ravished.
18 Their bows also shall dash the young men to pieces; and they shall have no pity on the fruit of the womb; their eye shall not spare children.

Job 1 & 2: God allows Satan to kill Job's children, destroy everything he owns and curse him with boils to prove to Satan that Job would still worship and obey God even if God cursed him.

Hosea 13:16  Samaria shall become desolate; for she hath rebelled against her God: they shall fall by the sword: their infants shall be dashed in pieces, and their women with child shall be ripped up.

That is just a smattering of examples from the Old Testament that describe Yahweh's character. And I didn't even mention those immoral Mosaic laws! (other than the poor guy picking up sticks on the Sabbath). How much twisting of the scriptures does it take to make that god appear as one who loves all his creation "unconditionally" instead of the disgusting, immoral, genocidal, baby-killing, woman-hating, jealous, petty, murderous tyrant that is described in those books? How can a single drop of goodness be wrung from the fabric of Yahweh's character as the OT describes him? And yet, not only do Christians claim him as their god, they don't have a problem with any of the atrocities he commited. They see those horrible acts as good and moral because if God did it, it MUST be good and moral. And because of the Original Sin caveat, we apparently all deserve to be slaughtered if God sees fit because we can't possibly know his REAL reasons for doing those things and those things are automatically, unquestioningly righteous and just, because it's God.  William Lane Craig said when God kills children, it's actually an act of love because they get to go straight to heaven. WHAT KIND OF WARPED MIND AGREES WITH THAT???!!!

It doesn't matter if the Old Testament doesn't apply to Christianity. Yahweh is still the Christians' God. They are still worshipping a character who makes Satan himself look like a Cub Scout. And they really don't see that?

Prophets: A Dime a Dozen

Prophesy pronounced /prä-fə-ˌsī/

transitive verb

1: to utter by or as if by divine inspiration

2: to predict with assurance or on the basis of mystic knowledge

(Mirriam Webster)

Someone recently told me their son had been "prophesied over" in church. The "prophecy" about the young man was that he would become a preacher - that he was called by God to go into the ministry. (I don't know why people tell me these ridiculous things, knowing I'm atheist. Obviously they have no idea what I actually think about their stories.)

So, I'm going to prophesy something about this situation: the kid believes his preacher has had a revelation from God that he is going to become a minister. The knowledge gets downloaded into his brain and begins to work on his mind. His mother and other church members continue to remind him of the prophecy and constantly reinforce it. Everyone involved are determined to help that prophecy come to pass, come Hell or high water. One of three things happens:

 1) He doesn't feel any real desire to become a minister, but has this prophecy gnawing at his psyche. Being a believer, he is tormented by his conflicting feelings of thinking God is calling him to preach and of not wanting that for himself. He tries to force himself into the role anyway since it is apparently God's will and he has to pray constantly for God to give him the desire to fulfill what God has called him to do, but unless he manages to completely brainwash himself, his prayers don't work and he is miserable for the rest of his life because some idiot said something stupid in church one day. If he doesn't go into the ministry, he's even more miserable. If he forces himself to do it, then everyone will think God had actually spoken through this prophet and what he said has come to pass. Praise the Lord!

2) He may actually want to become a minister, in which case he is encouraged by the prophecy and its constant reinforcement from family and peers to go ahead a do it, not realizing it was a self-fulfilling prophesy to begin with since he knew about it beforehand and thought that's what God wanted him to do so he did it, at which point everyone will think God had actually spoken through this prophet and what he said has come to pass. Praise the Lord!

3) He wants to become a minister, or he doesn't, but there's that prophecy, so he goes into Seminary and while taking bible history courses, realizes the bible is not what he thought it was and begins to have doubts and questions and his intellectual curiosity kicks in and he starts studying more and more about the subject until he wakes up one day and realizes the whole thing is bullshit and declares himself an atheist rendering the prophecy null and void. In which case, everyone will think that Satan had been attacking this kid because he would have become a great preacher and done awesome work for God and Satan had "temporarily" won. They, of course, know this because someone prophesied something and they'll all be praying for him even if they've shunned him and told him he's going to hell and cut him out of their lives and have been treating him like a leper since he quit Seminary and came out as an atheist.

I feel really sorry for this kid. I can't completely imagine what kind of burden those words of prophecy put on his mind, but it must have. And the likelihood that it will fulfill itself because of that pressure and because of his perceived expectations of his family and church peers, not to mention his perceived expectation from God! seems very high. I remember people being "prophesied over" in church when I was younger. Then, it just seemed creepy. Now, I find it disgusting.

In my experience from every church I've ever attended (all Pentecostal), prophesying isn't an act performed only by the pastor. Any member of the congregation can do it. Anytime anyone feels overcome by emotion (sorry, I mean "filled with the holy spirit") and some thought pops into their head which they "interpret" as coming from God, they can blurt it out and everyone will automatically take it as prophecy. They have to. They would risk possibly denying a word from God if they didn't. Even if someone had doubts, they would dare not speak it out loud! I won't go into the silent jealousy factor when many of them think "why did God pick him to prophesy and not ME! I want to prophesy too! I could prophesy just as good as that guy!" But the thing is......people are saying shit in church and claiming God is speaking through them and everyone believes it. And in the case of this poor kid, possibly laying some ridiculous burden on them that may screw them up for the rest of their lives.

Just another mindfuck, courtesy of your friendly neighborhood Lord of Hosts.

Dinosaur Discomfort Syndrome

How many fundamentalist Christians who claim Evolution is false and Creationism is the truth really believe that, deep down? I know many fundamentalists don't really know the facts and details of Evolution due mostly to their willful ignorance of the subject, but they all know at least something about it. I'm sure there isn't a single citizen of this country who doesn't know about dinosaurs and the fact that they lived hundreds of millions of years ago. Many know about Homo neanderthalensis and Homo erectus. Who hasn't heard about Neanderthal Man? Most everyone has at least a small bit of knowledge about Evolution. Enough, possibly, to make them feel a twinge of discomfort when they think about the story of Genesis. Or at least, it should.

How many fundamentalists protest the fact of Evolution simply because it is what they're expected to do in order to maintain their biblical infallability/literalist views? How many really feel - somewhere deep in their own minds- how shaky that argument really is? How many KNOW that something isn't quite right?

I know of at least one person who has admitted just that very thing. I don't think she even realizes what she was actually admitting, but it came out, nonetheless. This is a person I know very well so I won't name her. She told me that it always bothered her "about the dinosaurs". She said she had always loved seeing drawings of dinosaurs and reading about them when she was a child and that they facinated her all her life. After she reaffirmed her Christianity in her older years (after she was 50 or so) she said knowing the dinosaurs existed millions and millions of years ago "bothered her." Then, amazingly, she said "So I just decided not to think about it." I said something about evolution and she (again, amazingly) said, almost hatefully, "That's just a theory." And then she quickly changed the subject.

Decided not to think about it.

I was completely dumbstruck by that comment. That isn't even cognitive dissonance! She was willfully, consciously denying something she knew was true to somehow salvage her young earth creationist belief! And she has been denying it for a couple of decades now. I've never encountered that before. I have known a lot of people who are in denial about one thing or another, but they don't seem to be quite conscious of that. At least, they would deny being in denial! But to deny a fact on purpose? She didn't even try to convince herself that dinosaurs must have existed more recently, alongside humans. She just decided not to think about the subject at all. How the hell do you even DO that? How do you take something we know is real, that we have undeniable evidence for, and weigh it against something for which there IS no evidence, and choose on the side of no evidence? Choose no evidence when you already accept the side with the evidence? She had already accepted the dinosaurs existed millions of years ago, and she still does. But at the same time accepts that the earth was created 6,000 years ago. And this is actually a sane, fairly intelligent woman. She is forcing herself to believe something that contradicts facts she also accepts. I don't even know what to call that. Desperation?

But this also made me wonder about how many other fundamentalists feel the same way she does? How many are actually aware that their beliefs don't stand up to what we actually know about our world and our universe and our origins? And how many make a conscious decision to just not think about it instead of doing what we non-believers did when we realized the facts of nature don't match what the bible says? Is it that they want so desperately to believe God is really there that they can somehow seperate reality from their beliefs?

That would seem like enough to drive someone insane. Maybe it eventually does.

Angels and Anecdotes

"I was praying about it, and suddenly I heard God's voice just as plain as I'm hearing you, and he said....blah, blah, blah, blah, and blah."

"When my grandfather was dying, he looked over at something in the room and started smiling and I asked him what he was smiling about and he said he could see an angel!"

"I was having doubts about my faith and I went into my bedroom and for some reason I decided to clean out my closet. I hadn't planned on doing that at all, but I just suddenly felt like I needed to. And as I was taking junk out of the top shelf, I found an old bible! I knew that God had put the thought in my head that I needed to clean out that closet so I would run across the bible! I just knew it in my heart!"

"God put a burden on my heart to pray for So and So. I prayed for him and I found out the next day he had been in an accident! It was a miracle he wasn't badly hurt! I knew God had told me to pray for his safety!"

These are some of the anecdotes I've heard from people when they find out I'm atheist. They tell these stories as if it will make me suddenly think, "Wow! I am SO wrong about not believing a god exists!" As if that one story could tear apart the very fabric of my reality. As if it could undo the years of seeking knowledge about our world and universe and our origins and history and the evolution of religion and all the information I have accumulated that led to my rejection of supernatural claims. As if it could transcend my reason and critical thinking and erase everything I've learned in one fell swoop.

You can look in their eyes and know that if you said, "David Hume," they would have no idea who you are talking about. Or Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation. Or Australopithecus afarensis. Or Cassini. Or Aboigenesis. Or a strawman fallacy. Or Pascal's Wager. Or Botticelli. Or Franz Schubert. Or phylogeny. Or theoretical physics (or any physics), Or Thomas Paine. etc., etc......

So how do you even begin to comment on these anecdotes? How do you have a discussion about supernatural beliefs (or anything else) with people who don't care about anything outside their tiny fortresses of faith? I find myself starting to respond and then giving up before a single word comes out. It seems pointless and completely futile and so I end up keeping everything to myself. In my particular work environment and the area of the state where I live, these are my peers. It's almost like a scene from "The Village." Many of the folks never leave the county, much less the state. And no, I'm not kidding.

(I need to write another blog entitled, "How the Hell Did I Get HERE!"

Maybe I just need to move to the city.

Marionettes and Amendment 1

61% of North Carolinians think they have the right to take others' rights away. Amendment 1 passed yesterday. It only adds to the already discriminatory language of our state constitution and I suppose reflects the attitude of the intolerant majority here. Certainly it goes deeper than that. A political move in an election year intended to divide voters? No doubt. And at the expense of many families. Potentially at the expense of many children. But the end justifies the means, right?

No, it doesn't.

Not if you're a thinking person. Not if you care about other people and about truth. Not if you're AWAKE. Not if you rise above the Us and Them mentality and stop allowing yourselves to be manipulated and told what to think.

Otherwise, voters, your puppet masters' strings are showing.

Extremist Islam vs The Old Testament Israelites

 

I've been re-reading the bible. In the process, I'm creating my own list of "Bible WTF Moments". It's quite long already and I'm only up to I Samuel. To say I've been completely disgusted by the barbarism and savagery of the Isrealites and their god is putting it mildly. I've lost track of how many cities they have already attacked and how many men, women, children, babies, oxen, sheep, camels and asses they have slaughtered and David isn't even king yet. As we all know, their enemies consist of people who worship other gods and people who have land they want (which of course, their god promised to them, so it's ok). I won't even go into the grotesque ways people have died in these stories. We all remember those.

But then today, I read the news report about the British doctor who was beheaded (allegedly) by the Taliban in Pakistan. The comments by readers that followed the news story consisted mostly of people saying how barbaric and savage the Taliban is and extremist Muslims are. They were outraged. I don't usually entirely equate the Taliban with Islam. I think their leaders only use the Muslim religion for their own gain, but their followers ARE extremist Muslims. And I believe those followers are acting according to the teachings of their version of the religion. But I was very much reminded of the Isrealites in the Old Testament - of their hatred of people who worshipped other gods and even how their own god views those people and all the slaughtering of their "enemies" at their god's command.

And I wondered, how DO Christians and Jews feel about their own religious history? (the history according to the bible) I remember when I was still in the Christian faith that I never heard anyone talk about how terrible it was to go around slaughtering people who didn't believe in their god. In fact, it must surely have been justified. I remember sermons that addressed it in that very way. God could NOT tolerate any people who worshipped other gods and for that sin they deserved to be slaughtered. And now they call Islamic terrorist organizations barbaric and savage. How ironic, not to mention hypocritical! I think they all need to go back and re-read the Old Testament. THOSE are their religious roots, whether they accept it or not, whether they can justify it in their minds it or not.

Christians and Jews, look closely at the war on humanity in the Middle East, in Africa and elsewhere - the slaughter and abuse of human rights that disgust and horrify us at every turn. THAT is what it would have looked like for people who were the "enemies" of the Israelites' god if those stories were true. But it's ok, right? It was moral because it was your god who commanded it. It was justified because it was YOUR god. Can you really allow yourself to form a clear mental picture of the Israelite armies slaughtering women, children, babies and animals - to see in your mind what that REALLY would have looked like - and still call it moral? Or see your god as benevolent? Or even consider YOUR religion as preferable to Islam?

I couldn't.

The Hello Kitty Demon is Alive and Well

I could write a book on the ridiculous things my co-workers actually believe. The latest involves the old Hello Kitty hoax, myth, whatever you want to call it. One of my co-workers asked me the other day if I had heard about the Hello Kitty demon story. I thought everyone had heard that one - the parents of a child with cancer made a pact with the devil to heal their daughter and in return they would create a character in his honor and anyone who bought the toy would be inadvertently worshipping him or a demon would reside in the toy and anyone who played with it may become possessed, etc., bla, bla, bla

The co-worker's story was quite different (very creative and detailed) than all the others I had heard, but the most amazing part of her story was that she claimed it was her priest who told her about this! Yep, she's Catholic. I don't know if this was part of a sermon, but he apparently was telling this to a group from what I gathered from her weird articulation of the whole thing. Of course now, she is terrified of everything Hello Kitty. I told her it wasn't true, that it was a ridiculous story that had been floating around for a long time and she needed to actually look it up for herself but by the way she seemed to blow that off, I imagine she would rather believe the story is true so she can have something spooky to talk about with all her superstitious friends.

But if it's true that her priest was the one who told her this (and my co-worker swears he did) it really blows my mind. I don't know why I'm surprised, considering all the bizarre crap we hear from idiots like Pat Robertson, et al. I've been out of the loop of superstition and religious delusion for a long time so I guess it's hard for me to understand how people can be so gullable even though I know so many are. And it really makes me angry that priests and pastors are busy constantly reinforcing all that ignorance and stupidity.

If people can so willingly believe Hello Kitty is demonic, the preacher's job must be an absolute breeze.

And here we go again

Yesterday a co-worker was telling me that she had been taking some religious class at her church and they were discussing that Jesus had to be physically sacrificed and his blood literally shed in order that all the wretched sinners could be saved from eternal damnation. Her teacher commented that she felt this concept was too "bloody" for young children. My co-worker told her teacher she completely disagreed and thought that all children should be taught even the harshest "truths" about this blood covenant; that blood must literally be shed to account for people's sins, and they just had to know everything the bible has to say about blood and sacrifice and damnation, no matter what their age.

She went on to say that she had to stand up for what she believed so she had adamantly argued her point with the teacher, who may have been gaping at her in horror (as I was at that moment), while she rattled off this insanity. I wanted to grab her and shake her and tell her she had no RIGHT to psychologically abuse children, but I realized she is only passing on what had been done to her. And I felt sick to my stomach thinking about it. I didn't even know how to respond especially considering we were at work! She was totally oblivious to how disgusting and vile her comments had been - and how revealing they were combined with some of the other things she has said in the short time we have been working together.

Now, I'm kicking myself for not saying this, or that, or responding much beyond a dropped jaw and just being purely dumbstruck. But I'm over that. Now, I'm just pissed. And I feel violated. I was hearing this while I was trying to work. She has known I'm atheist all along, but until recently, she has mostly kept her beliefs to herself and so have I. I don't know why she has suddenly decided to start talking about it, but now, if she does this again (and I'm sure she will) I have to deal with telling her she needs to keep her religious opinions to herself while we are at work (one of those things I wish could have come out of my mouth yesterday).  

So I guess we'll see how today goes since she seems to be on a roll.

Introduction

I have titled this blog The Everyday Atheist because that is what I am, an average, everyday American who happens to be atheist. Many of the coming posts will be my thoughts and experiences as a non-believer surrounded by Christians. I live in a rural farming community in North Carolina. I live an average life as far as work, home and family go. It doesn’t feel so average, however. It feels, very often, isolated, at least when it comes to my views and beliefs and knowing that they are not shared by 99% of the people I come in contact with each day. In a community this small, and in the small town where I work, non-believers are basically non-existent. So, I decided to start a blog. I can spout my blasphemous opinions here without being fired from my job or the townsfolk showing up at my house with torches and pitchforks and I won’t drive my daughter crazy because she is my only sounding board. I can get it all out.

I am “out” as an atheist at my place of work and with my family, who are all Christian. I don’t discuss my beliefs at work because I feel it’s inappropriate, although my co-workers don’t hold to that same workplace rule. That is another reason for this blog: my responses to the constant barrage of religious commentary I hear on a daily basis while I try to do my job. I work with over a hundred people and my position involves me interacting with every department, every day. So, when I say “barrage”, I’m not really exaggerating all that much.

I don’t intend to attack people personally or bash Christians, though I can’t promise it won’t ever happen. But I guarantee I will bash Christianity and other religions as the need arises. It’s my blog and I can bash if I want to. Also, it won’t only be a place for me to vent. It will be a place to think, discuss issues, raise awareness and hopefully offer support to other remote non-believers who feel isolated in their own communities. Maybe we’ll actually discover we weren’t as alone as we thought.

-Linda

"We must question the story logic of having an all-knowing all-powerful God, who creates faulty Humans, and then blames them for his own mistakes."
--Gene Roddenberry