Too Many Questions: religion

Showing posts with label religion. Show all posts

The Atheist's Inevitable Confrontation

A Little Philosophical Armour for The Novice Atheist's Inevitable Confrontation

When 'coming out', many atheists suffer an all too common and unnecessary confrontation as their loved ones show concern for the fledgling atheist's immortal soul.

Many atheists feel guilt and anger because of the hurt they have caused to their kin by coming out, but they should not, it's not the atheist's fault that the loved one is reacting badly to the news. The fledgling atheist is just the messenger of the truth.

It's antiquated beliefs and religious infrastructure - the Scriptures and Holy-men - that continue to cause and perpetuate these confrontations.

If the loved one had never been lied to, the fledgling atheist would not have been made to feel bad, but it's not the loved ones' fault that he or she believes what they've been taught.

In this situation it is very difficult for the fledgling atheist, who may be still too unsure of the reasons for their atheism to sufficiently and successfully explain their 'disturbing lack of faith'.

To those who find themselves victim of this religiously perpetuated confrontation, I suggest you ask questions of your loved ones - discover their understanding of their religion, and suggest why you have problems with the answers.

Be nice though, it's a big wrench to come to the realization that eternal afterlife was never an option and you don't want a war, you want to enlighten.

The TMQ Core are the core conundrums, which I find prevent belief - they are personal to me - my problems with belief in the ancient beardy one, but I have collected them together as a 'core of disbelief', in the hope that they may help any fledgling atheist to explain the never-existence of god to concerned loved ones.
If you're interested in helping someone escape from their ideological prison try Freedom Formula.

Take heart, it does get better!

These are the Core Too many questions

PEACE
Crispy

Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

The Opposite of Equality for ALL

Totally out of the blue, unsolicited and with no context or prior conversation whatever @issu_assenjee sent me a screenshot. (Tweet's link)

My thoughts on its content are marked by ^(x) and detailed below.

It says...

"The question, then, is: Well, did true justice not exist 10 years ago? Were people ignorant of justice 10 or 20 years ago? Was everyone evil and oppressive less than one generation in the past?
⁽¹⁾ If a white humanist atheist 10 years ago, for example, didn't recognize his "'privilege" and paid no heed to making space for women and the transgendered and wasn't sensitive enough to respect the pronoun preferences of others, and opposed gay marriage like 95% of the rest of the population, etc., etc., would he have been correct in thinking of himself as a "good" person? Clearly not, according to today's humanist, social justice standards.
⁽²⁾ Look at the original version of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the historical document from the middle of the twentieth century that was supposed to be the pinnacle of morality as recognized by universal human reason. No mention of sexual orientation, no mention of transgenderism, no mention of racial privilege, no mention of sex positivity, etc.,etc.
Now the humanist might say, these values had to be discovered and now reason has discovered those values and religion had nothing to do with it.
⁽³⁾ But let"s look at that response more closely. It essentially concedes the entire argument because if humanists 10 years ago believed themselves to be "good" and "just" and turned out to be so deeply mistaken, then what guarantees that the humanists who think of themselves as "good"' and "just" today are not equally mistaken? What reason is there to think that 10 years from now, "reason" won't discover new values and new standards of goodness and justice, standards by which the humanists of today would be considered vile monsters?
⁽⁴⁾ The humanist, therefore, has no basis, by his own lights, to claim that he is a good person, much less to claim that he doesn't need religion to be a good person!
One does not even need to appeal to diversity in moral standards over time. Look at the diversity in any instant of history including today. Views of right and wrong vastly differ among contemporary atheists and humanists themselves in mutually exclusive ways.
Which humanists, therefore, are in actuality the good ones, the ones truly living according to justice? Who decides?
⁽⁵⁾ Furthermore, most humanists did not individually and independently and through the power of their own reflection arrive at the moral directives they so fervently believe to be intuitive, unassailable truths. It is not like each atheist/humanist sits and ponders for extended periods of time to formulate his own moral code that he will abide by for the rest of his life.
No, most of those moral commitments, whatever they are, are accepted by the humanist on the basis of outside authority -— the authority of other humanist thinkers or just good ol" cultural or institutional authority and conditioning. So how is that any different than the theist who claims his morality comes from the authority of religion?
Be that as it may, the only way humanists are even able to make their moronic argument in the first place is by focusing on a handful of widely accepted moral claims involving murder and rape. They make embarrassingly condescending yet asinine statements like, "I don't need God to tell me not to rape!" and "If the only reason you don't murder people is because God said so, then you're a psychopath, hur dur durr!"' In other words, the only way for their claim to have any traction is to reduce all of morality to... "

I've asked for the author's name but as yet it's unforthcoming.
If you know, let me know; I'd love to properly credit it.

My comments...
⁽¹⁾ Why single out the colour of the humanist atheist? Neither humanism or atheism have colours. Are you trying to imply humanist atheists are white, or that only white humanist atheists hold those values? What's the purpose of this distortion? Seems racist.

⁽²⁾ When United Nations Declaration of Human Rights was penned, religion had much more power over people's lives; it had repressed acceptance of those values, and still tries to, for thousands of years. Given the level of religious repression of the time, The UNDHR was as egalitarian as it could have been.

⁽³⁾ Where there is a wrong, it can be rectified. The argument, which can be biolled down to "Humanist morals are wholly fluid" will only attain validity if the values listed fall away in a future generation, however, as humanism's core is more or less "ALL are equal", I see no way for them to do so.

⁽⁴⁾ What a humanist(or any human) claims to 'be' is irrelevant; anyone can claim to be "good" but only one's actions and demeanour toward ALL others display one's nature. e.g. If one prays to remain supreme above others, is one being "good"?

⁽⁵⁾ Most humanists accept the external authority of the concept of human equality, that is they accept the concept 'ALL are equal' has stand-alone authority; in a field populated almost exclusively by hatefully supremacist dogmas, it stands out as significant.

Finally - Only one who seeks to promote a competing doctrine could create and deliver such a distortion of what it is to be humanist but it's always difficult for an enslaved prisoner of doctrine to properly grasp what it is to be free. The authoritarianism of a religious doctrine functions to hound the less zealous into submission to the full dogma, whereas Humanism functions without compulsion to conform to arbitrary diktats; some humans are free to choose to accept some, or all, values of humanism.

For me, the main difference between humanism and religion is humanism accepts people's differences and expands the category of 'equal' to accommodate them, whereas religion constricts and represses people's differences to enforce intransigent conformity to the arbitrary ideal of a despot.

So, a couple of questions to end...

Do you see the quoted narrative as wholly prejudiced by religious thinking; partisan, biased, ignorant and racist or is it just me who sees those things writ loud and disgustingly proud?

As I stated earlier, I view Humanism's core as "Equality for ALL" so...
Can any doctrine, which is in competition with and opposition to "equality for all", be anything other that "supremacy for some"?

This is one of the Too Many Questions

PEACE
Crispy

Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

Casually Explained: Evolution III - The Human Player Type

I love this...

by @CasuallyE

This is one of the Too Many Questions

PEACE

Crispy

Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

Clearly Not Allegorical

A huge unexploded bomb, left over from a long dead civilisation and ignored by all town residents, because it is town custom to ignore it, is detonated by one who follows the "How to detonate this bomb and totally destroy the entire town and all its occupants" instructions printed clearly, in big helpful lettering, on the device's side.

In the devastating blast almost the whole town is torn from the map.

The only survivor, an old woman, found in a storm cellar two miles from the epicentre, says...

"It probably would have been wiser to get rid of such a dangerous item really but it was the tradition to give Ole 'Divine Retribution' a customary little rub or pat as we went into worship. Nobody ever thought anybody would be mad enough to actually follow the instructions written on the side!"

Cops take her away in handcuffs on a charge of criminal negligence.

At trial the judge decides...

"While the court accepts your whole town sanctioned, by their individual inaction, this unconscionably irresponsible practise, you are the only remaining former resident and as such are culpable, under the law of Joint Enterprise, for the mass homicide, which ensued. For your part then, in the town's residents utter failure to remove or even make safe such a potentially cataclysmic item and for the incompetence of leaving such potentially devastating commands in clear sight, where any old unstable nutter or curious child could easily obey them on a whim and destroy so much, you are sentenced to death. However, as you're a pretender in the same god as me, I want you to sit and think about what your inaction enabled."

So to the question...
Can you see how it's clearly not allegorical?

This is one of the Too Many Questions

PEACE
Crispy

Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

Hopeless Hopefulness

We all know a truth about hope;
we know the patent futility of hoping
for that which currently exists, to exist.

And the converse truth we thereby glean;
One may only hope for things not so,
things not known or knowable.

Hope is a symptom of sentience in the presence of ignorance.
A defensive pretence in the absence of knowledge.
The fearsome battle cry in the face of stampeding destiny,
spawning prospecting premises from which to proceed.

Hope then is the pinnacle of false, the wishfulness climax,
the mental conjuration of a beneficial outcome,
impossibly disconnected from the impending incidence of the causal chain.
An against-all-odds simulation, anticipated in the absence of true solace.

So, when fantastical fables foster fervent false hope,
what hope can there truly be,
for that font of all false to truly be true?

This is one of the Too Many Questions

PEACE
Crispy

Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

Is Atheism A Religion

Atheism: The lack of belief in a god or gods.

1. The atheist position:
What are you talking about? A god? What's that? Eh? Are you drunk? Sounds like you've imagined it!

2. The atheist philosophy:
To silently disbelieve unwarranted, unnecessary & unsubstantiated supernatural claims.

3. The atheist agenda:
To passively not believe all unsubstantiated claims for god or gods.

4. The atheist belief system:
The belief that whomever promotes claims for the existence of god or gods should substantiate those claims.

5. The atheist activist agenda:
To converse with whomever promotes supernatural fables as true and persuade them to simply admit there is no legitimate reason to promote unsubstantiated conjecture as fact. And that those of us too honest to do so, do not vomit projectile ectoplasm while our heads spin around.
Please Note:
Discourse associated with no.5 may only be achieved where the atheist makes points to illustrate how facets of faith have been misjudged.
The religiously indoctrinated often intuit the points made in such debates to be a set of commandments or principles in which the atheist believes (has faith).
This is not so.

I'll attempt to illustrate...

Debater A has a doctrine of instructions, commandments etc; a seemingly cohesive structure of concepts from which to argue her doctrine's position.
Debater B has no doctrine and so the debate may only proceed by way of presentation of each concept raised in Debater A's doctrine.
As the debate moves forward each point in the Debater A's doctrine is countered by Debater B (Whether or not these are won or conceded by either side, a posit of similar validity is made.) and by the end of the debate each point of doctrine has two explanations, the original doctrinal explanation presented by Debater A and the new alternative explanations to the doctrinal concepts presented by Debater B.
Debater A is confused as to why there even are alternatives, why her 'beloved' doctrine has not won hands-down; "it's the work of a god after all". Undeterred, however, she moves on to debate with Debater C, who also has no doctrine.
This time, when the debate was over, Debater A noticed the concepts offered as alternatives to the key points of her doctrine were almost exactly same set of concepts offered by Debater B. Debater A concludes "Debaters B and C must be following a doctrine of their own! My doctrine details that Good-guy-gramps has a supernatural archenemy with sneaky and bad, naughty, naughty ways; their apparently cohesive doctrine must be an Evil product thereof! Oooooh Spooky!"

Because doctrine has temporarily^* inhibited Debater A's reasoning capacities, she has failed to notice...

1. Doctrines remain unchanging so the same arguments will be repeatedly offered in opposition to doctrinal concepts, in every debate.
2. Many of the concepts for which her doctrine makes claims have actual, verifiable, real-world answers, which wholly differ from doctrinal claims and which cannot be overlooked as alternatives to doctrinal claims because they are facts.
3. All doctrines make a set of claims. In any debate the set of responses countering those doctrinal claims will be perceived, by those taught to perceive everything via a religious framework, as a cohesive doctrine, structured similarly to their own doctrine's religious framework, but this is an illusion born of circumstance.
4. In the absence of a religious doctrine to set a framework, the set of concepts presented to counter that religious framework are not perceived of as a "set" but are merely an unconnected subset of all known concepts/data/knowledge.

Only when perceived through religiously tainted eyes do a subset of concepts look like a religion.
The religionists misapprehension "atheism is a religion" is born solely of the presence of their own religious framework.

For the rational it's clear, when a more reasonable description of atheism might be the ultimate absence religion, any person describing atheism as a religion, may only be viewed as having an agenda which necessitates such dishonesty, so the question here is...

Is the religionists disability of reasoning on this point, in and of itself, clear enough evidence of the terribly insidious influence over followers' honesty and thereby wider society these spurious tomes have?

You can probably guess what I think.

^* If Debater A were to accept that "immortal soul" is not fact but pretence she would be able to recover full reasoning capacities.

This is one of the Too Many Questions

PEACE
Crispy

Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

Faith Or Democracy

Oxford English dictionaries online defines religious faith as...

"Strong belief in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual conviction rather than proof"

... but that seemingly simple definition is not so simple. If one investigates the meanings of the words in the definition, applying the meanings most suited to their purpose within the definition given for faith, it reveals much...

Belief:
(1) An acceptance that something exists or is true, especially one without proof.
(1.2) Religious conviction.
OED - Belief.
Spiritual:
(1) Relating to or affecting the human spirit or soul as opposed to material or physical things.
OED - Spiritual.
Conviction:
(2.1)The quality of showing that one is firmly convinced of what one believes or says.
OED - Conviction.

Faith:
(2) Strong belief in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual conviction rather than proof.
OED - Faith

So, as I said, taking the most suitable components we arrive at...

Faith: : Strong acceptance that the doctrines of a religion are true, based on the human spirit or soul as opposed to material or physical things, showing that one is firmly convinced of what one accepts as true, rather than by proof.
I think that's fair; if you think otherwise, let me know in the comments.

... Which is incredibly tangly and seemingly meaningless because of it, so let's attempt to untangle it...
"human spirit or soul as opposed to material or physical" is a very convoluted way of saying "the immaterial part of ourselves", commonly known as mind, where feelings are registered. So, in the context of the definition...

Faith:: Accepting the doctrines of a religion as true, based on feelings, to show that one is firmly convinced of the religion's truth.

"to show one is firmly convinced of the religion's truth" is disturbing, isn't it? Is it just me or can you almost hear the screams of those tortured under inquisition? Does it not suggest oppression will befall those who do not sufficiently display adherence?
Anyway, it adds nothing to the first half of the sentence so...

Faith: Accepting the doctrines of a religion as true, based on feelings.

Which is just a longer way of saying ...

Faith: Accepting a doctrine as true because it makes one feel good.

Which means, when it comes down to it, it's merely...

Faith: Feeling a doctrine is true (because you like what it promises and/or fear what it threatens).

And, as far as I'm concerned, feeling a doctrine is true because it makes you feel good/bad, is of no more value than pretending.
Further though, if one views the definition of faith through a sensibly more suspicious lens it can be transposed into..

Faith: Submission to non-negotiable, doctrinal rules because doctrinal promises both please and terrify one.
If there was to be a replacement for a current dictionary definition of religious faith, I think this would be close to my preferred wording.

Or, to go a stage further, based on the textually evident behaviour of the scriptural figurehead of the faiths humans have created and, mostly...

Faith: Unconditional adherence to unproven, undemocratic authoritarian overlord's wishes for unconfirmed and deferred, discretionary reward.

Freedom, to me, seems inherently votey and faith, by this definition, is at best woolly wishes for the weak or intellectually inept and at worst capitulation to a despot.
Not for this Democrat.

What about you... faith or democracy?

This is one of the Too Many Questions

PEACE
Crispy

Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

All About Peace

So they, the sycophants of the various brands of pretendsies, each claim "MY religion is peaceful" but on the evidence below... Not so much, eh?

So, ALL about peace?
Seems to me seeking to impose one supremacist brand as a monopoly all across the globe is not an act of peace, it's the act of those who want global war forever.

This is one of the Too Many Questions

PEACE
Crispy

Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

Your Country Hates You

There has always been two Britains.
There's the majority, everyday Brits who have always been too busy getting-by to have time for Babylon's rules, no matter what shape Babylon took. The ordinary Brit's position of "I couldn't care less about what you pretend happens after you die, as long as you don't bore me with it or try to impose your Babylon-monkey on me", bears no resemblance to the minority Britain of Kings and Nobles; those whose legitimacy to rule has long been entwined with this foreign church.
That Bible is still the doctrinal heart of the state religion of the UK. Our head of state, the Queen, is also know as 'the defender of the faith' and, on days of Royal events, the whole world sees the backward looking traditions of the ancient establishment's pompous ways; it sees a state legitimising itself through Christian rites and, consequentially, the tacit approval of Christianity by the state.

This ancient foreign tome is held high-most in this land as the paragon of righteousness! The land's establishment hails the book as evidence of its legitimacy. Yet, if a faithful follower of that fable were to actually follow many of the verses within, that follower would contravene the laws of the land.
The law of the land permits that which the book does not
and prohibits that which the book promotes. And, further, the state encourages promotion of this fable, which inspires followers to at best, contravene the state's laws, and at worst, if followed to the letter would return our hard fought civilization into a medieval chaos similar to that wrought by ISIS.
I suggest this paradox is something of a constitutional problem; a crisis, even.
We, the people, the true owners of this United Kingdom of Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland and England, our laws, practices and government, are in conflict with much of the foreign religion, which ancient invasions imposed on us. This ancient interloping fable, widely promoted, in faith and secular schools alike, as "good" contains commands by a fabled divine being who demands, under pain of eternal torment, the persecution, even, when circumstances demand it, to death of unbelievers.
How is it not disrespectful, to me and the other great many who identify as unbelievers, to have a state religion that views so many of the state's citizens in varying degrees from second-class human to actual living anti-christ?

As many Brits, I'm an 'unbeliever';
... it's disrespectful that the state religion judges us to be spoiled. (Colossians 2:8)
... it's discriminatory that the state religion commands our ostracisation. (Romans 16:17)
... it's divisive that the state religion judges us wicked! (1 John 5:19)
... it's disrespectful that the state religion judges us to be deceiver & ultimate evil! (2 John 1:7)
... it's disheartening that the state religion commands our deportation! (2 John 1:10)
... it's absurd that the state religion wants us dead! (Exo 22:20 Deut 13:6-10,13:12-16,17:2-7,17:12-13)
(These are not ALL of the instances of supremacist hatred or commands to contravene the laws of this land. And unbelievers are not the only minority group targeted.)

Makes one wonder why politicians have not noticed the divisiveness inherent in all such supremacist fables. Perhaps because so many of them have been indoctrinated with fable that they do not see it as a problem. One further wonders, if they were on the other side of the persecution fence, for how many seconds would they be able to remain unaware?

I'm sure I've heard it said that our Members of Parliament are supposed to look out for the rights of ALL their constituents so, if an MP fails to raise this issue, can that MP be said to be doing so?

I would like something to change.

To the cobweb ridden establishment,
If you must keep this ancient fable as some sort of token head-nod to your ancestors, or to give your reign an air of legitimacy, so be it, but at least accept the reality of our present. Edit from this Bible of yours the hate that is commanded against born and bred UK owners, whose generational ancestors' blood, sweat and tears helped raise this world from primitive hovel to World wide web.
For our state to be still seen as promoting these primitive, supremacist, hate-fables demeans us all before the world and our descendants.
With this fable flying as a banner above our society, held high like that notorious black flag, what are we?

So the question here is...
Is it not time for we the people to demand a purge of ALL the hatred from the fable at the core of the UK?
I mean it's not as if a monarch has never introduced an new standard bible; it's called King James version for a reason, why not a peace laden Queen Elizabeth version?
Or, better yet, purge the fable entirely?

This is one of the Too Many Questions

PEACE
Crispy

Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

Freedom Formula

Ancient method
prevents any human becoming a religious extremist.
Now available
FREE.
Ten part process, handed down from before recorded time,
completely eradicates any possibility of religious extremism.
GUARANTEED

1. Avoid baptism or any other religious branding.
2. Remove all religious text books from the home.
3. Do not visit any place of religious worship for the purpose of worship.
4. Do not teach the child to worship.
5. On the event of the death of a family member, loved one or friend, do not tell the child "they have gone to a better place" or "are with the angels" the child will accept they are gone; there's no need for that injection of fantasy.
6. Make it clear that the notion of 'immortal soul' is an utterly unsubstantiated wish.
7. Make it clear that never once in the history of all our discovery has that which we once thought natural, actually turned out to be supernatural.
8. Explain that All proponents of magic are merely tricksters and charlatans using a technique called Cold Reading, which is designed to rest money from you.
9. Explain that at the heart of the religious texts' and spiritual charlatans' ability to manipulate a person, is that person's own erroneous belief in immortal soul.
10. Explain that those who pretend they have this magical core are permanently susceptible to being manipulated into believe anything; even to the hideously corrupt extreme of wholeheartedly 'knowing' that killing another human because that human thinks differently is the most righteous thing a human can do!

For best results begin the method before any of the purveyors of magical thinking have cast their brand of spell over them. If you can prevent the child from ever learning to pretend they have an immortal soul, this ancient remedy guarantees the child will never become a religious extremist and may even avoid the seemingly inevitable supremacist attitude, which is the most common consequence for they who pretend in these magical concepts.

Deprogramming an adult religious sycophant who has already learned to pretend in immortal soul is more difficult because it depends on the sycophant's ability to assimilate a new way of viewing ancient trusted fables, which the sycophant may have relied upon to inform numerous life choices. As a consequence the adult religious sycophant must, in every case, find the will to choose to deprogramme themselves by accepting that the new information, supersedes the old. This more difficult process is not guaranteed because it is so heavily dependent on the adult religious sycophant having retained some semblance of a mind, which is still open.

1 Ask the religious sycophant in question "what is at the core of your beliefs?" Most will erroneously offer "God" in answer.
2. Explain that while 'god' is at the core of their religious text it's not the core of belief, and instead is only a symptom of the emotional desire which is at the core.
3. Explain that the core of most faiths is the pretence that humans have an immortal component, which allows the survival of biological death.
4. Illustrate by explaining that Heaven and Hell ONLY have meaning to those who pretend they have an immortal soul. And by extension God and Satan also have no meaning. The fable of the immortal soul, is the foundation of all supernatural pretending. They will likely sense the truth in the logic and deflect, claiming their book promotes otherwise and their book is true because it says it is.
5. Explain that it is not possible to judge the truth of a text by reading the text alone. Properly structured and unbiased investigation and experimentation is an absolute necessity in confirming the truth of a text.
6. Explain that as all the religious texts are written with immortal soul as an a priori accepted fact, it is immortal soul that must be investigated before anything any of the books' claims for that 'spiritual core' has even the potential for meaning.
7. Ask the religious sycophant in question to prove to you, without referencing their favourite fable's rule book, that human consciousness can remain an intact personality after biological death.
8. Ask the religious sycophant in question to prove to you, without referencing their favourite fable's rule book, that there is sufficient reason to assume human consciousness is not generated by the biology in which it evidently emerges.
9. If they cannot prove these but still proclaim "I have an immortal soul" explain they they are choosing to be dishonest.
10. Explain that, with the level of evidence for 'immortal soul', the only honest claim one can legitimately make is "I like the idea of immortal soul so much that I choose to pretend it is a fact."
11. Make it clear choosing to pretend one's wish is a fact, in no way moves the notion of the wish out of the 'unsubstantiated hypothesis' category.
12. Urge the religious sycophant to admit, for the good of their mental health and for the sake of society, in an homage to honesty, that when they say "I believe", what they are actually doing is pretending.

If the adult religious sycophant is so indoctrinated that they keep pretending after the above steps have been taken, there is nothing further you can do to inform them of their erroneous thought processes.

Advisory:
It is suggested that all those who fail to accept that they merely like to pretend they have, or are, an immortal soul, should be monitored for signs of supremacist hatred.
Use your best judgement to discern if you should distance yourself from what maybe an extremely dangerous magical thinker. It is highly likely that such a person, with such a disability, may go full warrior-of-god and inflict what they pretend are righteous acts against those whom their pretending ways inform the now psychotic sycophant are unrighteous.

All hate speech should be reported to the authorities.

So the question here is...
The Abrahamic texts are cram packed full of supremacist hate speech, it's arguably their raison d'être, so why have those texts not been hauled in front of the bench for hate speech?

Does anyone else smell religious privilege?

This is one of the Too Many Questions

PEACE
Crispy

Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

End Religion For Peace Sake

Rival Supremacist books are penned.
Their fables cause a war.
Hundreds die.
The defenders are vanquished.
The war subsides,
but there is no peace.

Rival Supremacist books exist.
Their fables cause a war.
Thousands die.
The attackers are vanquished.
War subsides again,
but there is still no peace.

Rival Supremacist books exist.
Their fables cause inter-cultural ructions.
Multi Millions die every day for hundreds of years.
People weary of the fighting and atrocities.
The wars subside,
but the dream of peace evades.

Rival Supremacist books exist.
People awaken to the problem.
These fables cause wars!
People wage war on Supremacist books.
Billions live.
There is Peace.

Why is this not obvious to the various supremacist factions?
Too busy navel-gazing to notice the beheading bloodbath pooling around them?
Or maybe they're all equally convinced that it matters not how many die, just as long as their team wins?

This is one of the Too Many Questions

PEACE
Crispy

Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

Much Compulsion In Religion

I don't know if you've heard of Mubarak Bala, 29 year old Nigerian from Kano, who was beaten and dumped in a psychiatric ward for 18 days for merely declaring himself to be unconvinced by any of the hypotheses for god(s) - that's all - just an insignificant thing like saying out loud, "I don't think there's really a Chief Wizard"!

The person saying "religion is fiction" is clearly not the one in need of psychological evaluation!!

Mubarak is free now so I'm going to pick up on the theme of Mubarak's imposed dilemma and talk more generally about about the supremacist mindset, which enables, if not compels, and justifies, within the confines of the twisted morality of the cult, this sort of imprisonment "for one's own good".

Mubarak's confinement reminds me of similar programs, called 'interventions', that are designed to help a drug addict get off their addiction, not, as in Mubarak's case, 'persuade' a reformed addict to rejoin a hive of users. A reverse-intervention, really.
The imprisonment or punishment for one who leaves the cult, is seen (within the cult) as for the benefit of the subject. A kindness! It is seen this way because the sacred text of cult proclaims itself as "the perfect word of god" and anything less than complete compliance with that god's "perfect way to live" is seen by its multitude of enthralled sycophants as inferior; inadequate in the eyes of the second-rate author promising to burn the subject forever!

Since I first heard of Mubarak's plight, I have been watching a stream of Muslims addressing Mubarak on Twitter and offering hellfire laiden threats, thinly veiled as best wishes.
I find it utterly repulsive and abhorrent in the extreme that people, who are supposed to love peace, are so twisted by the text imposed upon them by their ancestors that they do not recognise that their 'well-wishing' coercive urging of a loved-one to "make the right choice, restart your addiction and return to the haze of pretendsies", as compulsion! How can anyone not recognise, "Have you forgotten you will burn forever in hell if you leave the gang?" as an imposition, designed to coerce and compel?
If their favourite fable did not claim itself to be supreme above ALL other life paths and did not, at its core, utterly disrespect ALL other life paths, do you think we would have ever heard of these violent, inhumane and anti human rights reverse-interventions being perpetrated on those with a different point of view on the existence of Jinn, Satan, Angels, God(s) or Casper?
You can probably guess what I think.

As with all cults, there is mass hypocrisy in Islam; indeed, "Let there be no compulsion in religion"(Qur'an: Surah 2:256) must be the most transgressed of their idol's commands!
The reverse-intervention perpetrated by Mubarak's family is not the only one! This religious oppression happens on a daily basis to numerous victims of religion around the world.

Before one of these reverse-intervention "treatments" kills one of the victims let's
End religion for peace sake.
Big thanks are owed for the #FreeMubarak campaign to...
Godlessmom.com, Virtuarat.com and iheu.org and kudos to godless_mom, QuranifyMe, Deezer234, IHEU, Virtuarat, NancyDrewPI, Naradee12, ABCHammerstein and numerous others for getting the word out.

This is one of the Too Many Questions

PEACE
Crispy

Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

In The Before Is The Void

It occurred to me, as it probably has to many atheists, that all of our world's many creation myths are pretty rubbish.
That is to say, given what science has revealed, the texts of any of the scriptures, of the various "god(s)" we've imagined, could have been more "accurate" in their portrayal of "creation".
It's been argued, by various creationists I've had discourse with, that "knowing too much" would have left "us" nothing to discover.
It made me wonder if it would be possible to write a creation myth, which would not only be comprehensible to an ancient goatherd and have some elements that such an audience would deem "prophetic" and "answers", but also be sufficiently descriptive so as to approximate what a 21st century theoretical physicist might comprehend about the universe, whilst avoiding the "spoilers" point the creationists highlighted. I further considered that such a myth must also omit any hint of a deity, be written so that it could apply to any sentient species, existing at any time, across the cosmos and, as so many previous creation myths have an overly patriarchal tone, attempt to render it all in a gender neutral way.
So I've had a crack at it and, after having done this exercise, whilst I'm not holding up what follows as an exact representation of how the cosmos came about, it's based on what I've understood about current science, I'm not a scientist, so it's an artist's impression, I am saying, that for me to take any religious scripture seriously, that religious scripture's creation myth would have to proclaim pretty closely to what I've mused here and be almost identical to that which I've mused in bold.
So without further etcetera...

The Void

In the before is the void,
unvarying, dim and shapeless, limitless plain of nothingness.
And the still, silent void remained void for moments without measure,
when thought was still unfounded and time was still unknown.

Then a near spent echo of a timeless tiny tremble,
whose innate nature allowed then to be now, became,
emerging throughout all moments as one.
The echo caused a tiny fault, piercing the peace of that void,
a single, negligible splash of immaterial near-nought,
displacing the absence unto which it sprang.
In a newborn primary arrow of time
the tiny became spirals, loops and twists,
rippling and spinning all throughout,
birthing new facets of the void with their travel,
mingling with each other and acting alone,
their making of space for themselves, shaped the void about them.
And the void was becoming absent,
and the tangled, trembling, turmoil of the tiny was beginning.

The Turmoil

An unknown number of moments passed
and a timeless tiny tremble echoed again,
far weaker than the merest twitch of butterfly's wing,
the cause of a maelstrom,
it splashed into the turmoil, still rippling without end,
churning further its new chaotic home.
Another while passes then another of the tiniest of splashes.
Then another, and another, as light as the gentlest of rainstorms,
but each splash whipped up the turmoil about it with twists and loops and tangles.
Then a clash, on the tiniest of measures, in that which had become most restless.
And far from the deathly peaceful void it had once been the turmoil had become.
And all through its tiny, sprawling, entirety was clashing and churning and striking.
And from this trembling twisting turmoil of the tiny,
sprang the very first of the smallest.
And for the first time one circled another,
as if inseparably entranced, compelled to forever dance,
to a tune forged by the rules born in the first fruitful moment.

Eons passed then, in that turmoil of dark, came a clash with a bang,
more powerful than the most violent thunder clap and more silent than the long dead.
And the first bright light shone, where none had been before.
And it was the largest,
and it drew in all the smallest
and burned them all so fiercely and all at once, and another greater bang became,
and, in this fire, the greatest ever, the largest burned itself up also,
and its form burst and, as its fire died,
a great dark cloud, of all there ever was, was thrown out
and it grew and became widespread, making space for itself with its travel,
like a great spider's web, growing ever larger but without measure.

The Dark Cloud

And the widespread dark cloud remained dark but the rules still ruled,
and clashes and strikes and turmoil was rife all amongst the cloud,
and on one special day, that was a great clashing, a shining ball of fire appeared.
Its presence kindled further fires across the cloud,
as was its nature, born of the rules of the first fruitful moment.
And all across the cloud, in each new fire, new mixtures became.
And their newborn natures mixed and clashed,
And many more began to circle many more.
and the new forms burst out from their shining globes and became thrown out.
And that which was thrown out became widespread.
And the widespread was drawn together, the large drawing in the small.
And dust formed into rocks and shaped the cloud further.
And the pulls of all of the larger threw the smaller spinning through the cloud,
and they clashed with each other, and caused further larger discord in the cloud.
And the elements of the cloud increased their number and intricacy and were becoming.
and all the time the large stirred the small.
Everywhere, spinning rocks, heavy with heat and light,
pulled smaller, cooler, darker rocks, spinning in circles about them,
until there was much quiet throughout,
and what was once void and turmoil and dark cloud had become cosmos.

The Cosmos

And all across this cosmos were great collections.
It was the greatest multitude of groups of rocks, spinning and circling,
each around its own great shining globe of heat and light.
And uncountable the number of bodies of the cosmos had become,
and its form, like fine bejewelled necklaces,
was spread to the widest measure in all ways.

Eons passed and, as had happened many times before, all across this cosmos,
around one shining globe, in one corner, of one group, of the great multitude of the cosmos,
dust collected into great balls of rock and balls of cloud and some were large and some small,
and the large drew in the small, until each found a place,
spinning and circling around that shining globe.
And a new group had become, tiny against a cosmos beyond measure
but of a glorious magnificence of import.

The New

Eons passed and in one enormous sea, on one tiny spinning ball of rock, in that new group,
the smallest of the cosmos became joined together in ways as never before.
With constant churning of the powerful sea and unending lightening storms above,
the new became no longer rocks and dust and clouds.
No longer were rocks, dust and clouds alone in the cosmos.
the new had become, wholly different from all that had gone before.
And their new nature was winding and twisted as a labyrinth.
And their new labyrinthine form was the cause and they were with purpose.
The new forms needed.
And these were the first Life,
the tiniest plants and tiniest beasts had become.

The Life

Eons passed while the need drove Life,
to seek that which their form's nature urged them to seek.
They grew and changed and multiplied to fill all of the space on this tiny rock.
And their experience of their growth and change,
that they had gained through their daily lives,
became ingrained in their descendants for many generations.
And, with each circling of their rock around its globe,
their ingrained experience took on new twists,
until great forests covered the land,
and an uncountable multitude of tiny beasts populated all their roots, stems and branches.
And Life was fruitful all across this rock,
and populated all the ocean, grazed over all the lands, and took to the air.
And Life was the master of its domain,
and terrible bloody was the daily battle for survival.
But the many changes, forced on one and all, by the rules,
and by their battles with each other and their surroundings,
forged them into shapes better suited to surviving their days.
Life overcame all the changes in the nature around them,
and each generation spawned a generation better suited to their new surroundings.
With each passing millennium, each animal became more aware of their domain,
and all their great changes and awareness and their struggle for survival,
had brought forth a new form for Life.
No longer was ingrained experience the only means of survival;
all of Life's struggling had brought forth thought.

And on that glorious day, what was new, had became old and Wise.

The Wise

And the Wise climbed down from the trees,
where they had lived happily for an eon,
while they were still animals without thought,
and they thought they would walk upright,
to gain better awareness of their surroundings.
And this they did,
and they found their thought was true.
And the Wise mastered fire and skills with tools.
And they thought they could shape and change their surroundings to better suit their desires,
and this they did for a thousand generations,
and oft they found that their thought was true.
And their bodies and thoughts changed,
to better suit the surroundings they had created.
And after many years, of many bloody wars,
over which way of thought was most true,
they thought a way should be thought
for all the Wise to live in peace together,
and act fairly in all dealings, with one and all.
And so they toiled to forge rules,
fair for all, for all to live by.
And the Wise saw that they were good,
and again they found their thought was true.
And their collected knowledge and experience of their surroundings grew.
And they gained mastery over the beasts, turned the wild plants to their needs,
and farmed their animals and lands tirelessly and with great care,
and the Wise thrived by their thought and toil
and ate plentifully each and every year round.
And the nature of the Wise changed, their lives became of many more days,
and not so soon would the dark, silent, end of each become.
But the Wise knew the end of each, would always lay before each.
And the Wise thought of those darkest of days, known to all, of sorrow and pain,
when the end of each brings all that they were and knew to be lost.
And so that all that they were, all their best thoughts and deeds and toil, would not be lost,
the Wise made ways, to pass to each new child of the Wise, all that the Wise ever knew,
so all generations of the Wise would remember their thoughts and deeds and toil, and, for all the days ahead, the Wise would prosper by it.

The Truth

And, if the thoughts and deeds of the Wise hold true,
the journey before those of the nature of the Wise
is as wide, tall, deep and long lived as the cosmos itself.

The Tomorrows

And thus, as time passes, the Wise will learn,
to forge the rocks into shapes of their will.
And their number will grow to a great multitude,
and they will group together in great throngs,
and live in fine cities of crystal, all across their domain.
And the Wise will learn to ride on giant wings,
able, with ease, to race ahead of the rising sun.
And, in time, the Wise will learn skills with the smallest of the cosmos,
so they may better shape their domain.
And so wide will be their reach across the world,
that they will set their thoughts on travelling the cosmos.
And great will be their power,
to both grant life and destroy it.

And on one special day, when the Wise gain enough knowledge and skills,
they will collect all the Wise thoughts, of some millions of days,
and in a place of high mountains, by their collected will,
the Wise will mine a giant cavern,
and it shall be a great, long loop in the bowels of the Earth
and they will cause it to be filled with lightening.
And beneath those high mountains the Wise will watch,
with tireless patience and for as long as it shall take,
as their great lightening loop brings forth its offspring,
the turbulent tremblings of the tiniest of the cosmos,
And with the deepest truths of the nature of the cosmos rising before their eyes,
and with their great power of group thought, which has brought them to that place,
they will piece together the nature and form of all of the history that ever there was.
And their effort will be fruitful and the Wise will discover a great bounty,
many of the greatest of their questions shall be answered but it will pose many more.
And the Wise will rejoice in this,
because it is in the nature of the Wise to seek knowledge.

And all the time the Wise observe the offspring of their lightening loop,
and all the time they are learning answers to their questions,
the lightening loop, unforeseen and unknown, is bearing timeless tiny tremblings,
whose innate natures allow now to be then,
and echo throughout all moments,
and excite an unvarying, dim and shapeless,
limitless plain of nothingness.

There you are, that's my artist's impression of a more 'accurate' scripture, which could have been "revealed"; a possible "received word", fully formatted for any potential Bronze Age wannabe prophet to set up his very own snake-oil stall, though I sense no prophet could profit from it. It's clearly not perfect but, as a non-omniscient, fairly fallible chap, I'm quite chuffed with it.

Now, the question is...
Given the unbelievably inaccurate load of old fantasy fables we have ended up with, how can anyone consider it possible, let alone likely, that an all-knowing god dictated, inspired or revealed any one of them?

If you like the idea behind this post maybe you will also like this one too?
The sections of the creation myth above that are not in bold are my speculation.
If you are interested, the reasoning behind that speculation is here.

Footnote.

I'm guessing that those who pretend in some magic or other, a soul, spirit, god or what-have-you, will likely suggest that "In the before was the void" is what I "believe". For those of you who can't imagine reality without your fictional friends, I just want to point out that it is not what I "believe". I need not "believe" it, there is no need or compulsion to do so. It's just a composite of what I understand of the evidence uncovered by science, with a sprinkling of speculation on top.
"Belief" is not required.

This is one of the Too Many Questions

PEACE
Crispy

Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

Presentation for 3rd Annual International Day of Protest against Hereditary Religion

Not broadcast (because of technical issues) but written and animated for Presentation on the 3rd Annual International Day of Protest against Hereditary Religion.
Thought you might like to see it.

I watched about 17 hours of the protest including the time was live on air.
I learned a lot, it was all interesting and I was never bored. That's some feat!
Congratulations one and all.
Thanks to Richard Collins for thinking up the mad & brilliant protest in the first place but also for the invitation to take part and his encouragement along the way. Thanks to Lance Seivert for making it all so easy, and to all involved, from backroom staff to featured guests, kudos, but greatest kudos of all to Ryan Burkhart from Hammer of the Gods for a superb 24 hours of hosting. Respect.

If you want a look at a very interesting 24 hours, the whole protest is recorded on Youtube starting...
I'm on at about 6 hours and 53 mins into the 3rd part and some of the 4th part.

This is one of the Too Many Questions

PEACE
Crispy

Please leave a comment - Anything will do
The best communications are often,
THREE WORDS OR LESS
OR ONE OR MORE FINGERS!

3rd Annual International Day of Protest Against Hereditary Religion

Make a space on your calendar for the 20th January - The 3rd annual International Day of Protest Against Hereditary Religion is on. You've got a whole 24hrs to tune in and lend and ear; maybe even contribute via social network.

Come and Joins us for some or all of it - the audience is everything. No doubt you'll be interested, amazed and entertained. Oh and I'll be on at about 8pm GMT (20:00)

Vulnerable naive children all over the world are routinely consigned by their parents to faith organizations to be groomed as members of the parent’s faith. Toddlers are led into religious houses of worship and surrounded by hundreds and perhaps even thousands of emotional adherents. The experience often overwhelms and frightens children who have no way of processing what is happening. Most adults commonly encounter difficulty understanding supernatural bizarre religious ideas and rituals. Accordingly, children can suffer emotional trauma and anxiety as a result of practices fostered by the cultural acceptance of endorsing hereditary religion. Universally, civil authorities are oblivious to the way the practice violates a child's human rights and the emotional damage it can inflict. Although civil libertarians have long objected to childhood indoctrination, perpetrators unfailingly offer the defense of free will. They argue a child is always free to choose a different faith, or no faith, when they reach their majority, (usually 18 years), and leave the family home. This is an incoherent argument because determined and repeated efforts are made during the child's formative years to insure they will never leave the faith. Furthermore, recent brain science research reveals conclusively that constant repetition of the same inputs to the brain results in permanent neuronal configurations that are nearly impervious to change without great difficulty. Moreover, leading researchers increasingly question the age old assumption that free will is a fact. Instead, they assert that free will is a convenient illusion. Rigorous and prolonged religious grooming that happens to children before their brains are completely developed can shape their thought processes for life. Such abuse ignores children’s human right to an open future free of wanton manipulation and interference and can set them on a path of rigid dogmatism. On January 20, 2014 the third international protest against hereditary religion will take place involving thousands of participants around the world. The event is being staged in cyberspace and will feature a virtual rally stage with nationally recognized presenters exploring the protest themes and leading real time discussions using internet communication resources. The event announcement is on facebook: facebook.com/events/