Some Easy Reading in a Not So Easy World

I've been pretty contemplative and more than a little sad about the Gabrielle Gifford's shooting, and became even more upset today when I read that the suspect was an "ardent atheist" according to an article I just read. It's sad because the media will probably try to spin him and his motives a thousand different ways, but it seems like he wasn't a right-wing nutbag, but just a mentally ill individual. Seems like he was full of conspiracy theories and hated all government. For some reason or other, he became fixated on Rep. Gifford.

Certainly, we'll all be inundated with reports on this shooting, and all I can say is that it's extremely troubling and depressing. So, since I'm a little too sad about the whole thing to say much else on the matter, here's an oldie but goodie... "Advice God" meme from GOP to you.

Faith, Politics, and the 2010 Election (NPR)

NPR did a story today on the Brookings Institutes study on religion and its effect on the 2010 elections.

Do you think that Obama's religious views are similar to yours? Here's what the study said:

The survey found that 51 percent of Americans saw the president’s religious views as different from their own, including 16 percent who saw them as “somewhat” different and 35 percent who saw them as “very different.” Only 40 percent see the president’s religious beliefs as similar to their own, including only 12 percent who saw them as “very” similar.  This question sharply divides Americans along racial lines: 74 percent of African-Americans see the president’s religious views as similar to their own, compared with just 35 percent of white Americans.

We do not want to exaggerate the importance of these new religious divisions. Views on the nature of President Obama’s religious faith parallel political attitudes toward the president.  Voters who are hostile to him on political grounds are likely to distance themselves from his views on other matters, including religion.  In the PRRI survey, 94 percent of those who said Obama’s religious views were “very similar” to their own had a favorable view of the president.  Among respondents who said his religious views were “very different” from their own, 78 percent had an unfavorable view of him.

What does this even mean? I guess since Obama states that he is a Christian and believes in God, I would have to say that his views are "very different" from my own. But I have a generally favorable view of him. I just don't get it. If you're a theist, and you claim to be a Christian, I guess your views are pretty similar to people who make similar claims. I just don't get it all of this fuss over IMAGINARY CHARACTERS!!!!

Coincidentally, American Exceptionalism was also mentioned in the report. A shocking 6 in 10 people believe America is a chosen nation, singled-out by God for a special mission in the world. Wow. That's kind of scary. I mean... that's clearly embedded in our national psyche and that freaks me out. What is our mission? What is it that we are supposed to do out there? And are our current engagements even copacetic with that idea? Is a war in Afghanistan and Iraq conducive to a special mission in the world? If this is what a majority of Americans believe, how come we aren't doing more to make the world a better place???

What scares me is that a large part of these surveyed people might actually believe in Armageddon. Is that what our mission is really all about? Spooky.

Guest Post #2: National Exceptionalism and Religion

 Guest Post #2 from our friend Zach. Anyone who wants to submit ANYTHING is welcome! Videos, photos, cartoons... we want it!

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The US really has one export that it has traded on for about the last 150 years that has driven it like no other.  Regardless of what we sell or what we make, the thing we have really been selling since we got to the Pacific is the idea that the United States of America is special.  We have pulled people here in droves, and still do today with the promise that somehow this country, this place, these people here are going to give them a better shot than they had back home.  I will get to the merits of the idea later but right now it's the manifestation of this idea that gives me pause. Every country believes it's special somehow and that's fine.  They wouldn't have developed themselves as a country if they didn't. Where this becomes dangerous is when it's God telling you you're special.  Right now in the world there are three perfect examples of the dangers of God picking one nation over another.

1: Iran.
Iran is considered the world's only theocracy (I don't know why the Vatican isn't considered one but whatever).  President Ahmadinejad is only the head of the government.  The head of state is the Ayatollah Khamenei is the actual leader of the country and NOTHING gets done without his say so.  He had to certify the last contentious elections and Ahmadinejad serves at his pleasure.  Under the theocracy, Iran has alienated the larger international community, taken steps to develop nukes, and oppressed the freedoms of its people and their rights to choose their own leaders.  All unilateral actions taken without regard to the larger world in which they reside because Allah is on their side. 

2: Israel. 
Israel is not technically a religious state.  However, any Jew who steps on their soil is immediately a citizen, and they are preparing legislation right now to force all non-Jews who want citizenship to sign a loyalty oath.  A Christian or Muslim or Atheist born and raised in Jerusalem could potentially lose their citizenship if they didn't sign.  The Jews like to refer to themselves as the chosen people and if that doesn't smack of divine exceptionalism, I really don't know what does.  It is evident even as far as Jews of OTHER nations are concerned:  ex.  I have a very close devout Jewish friend.  We often get into debates about Israel.  In the last one she said something that disturbed me to the point that I have spoken to her little since (to my own discredit).  Debating the flotilla and the "ground Zero Mosque,"  she accused me of anti-semitism and then said that she would "Support Israel whatever they did, because it was the [homeland]."  This girl loves the US and would never show it such blind deference nor should she nor anybody.  This type of support can only be engendered by God and is EXTREMELY DANGEROUS.   

3: Speaking of Extremely Dangerous...The USA. 
Since Manifest Destiny there has been a sense that the US should be an empire.  We quail at calling it that but displacing entire native and colonizing populations in a land grab to take hold of an entire continent really reeks of such an attitude.  Our last president spoke openly of being "Chosen by God" to lead us through the trials we face and Reagan liked to refer to Russians as the "Evil Empire" indicating that we were inherently good.  Conservative with a simple and unexamined view of the Constitution, tend to have an equally simple and unexamined view of the Bible.  What they believe in is God's will and they believe in America. This perspective is dangerous because America doesn't have to do anything to BE exceptional aside from be the place where these people live and can vote Republican. We can claim to be against Torture and Nation building while doing THOSE EXACT THINGS, yet we are the USA and God says we are special.  We can act out of fear and protectionism and seal our borders and kick out all the illegal immigrants without exception (even if they were brought over the border as infants and have never known any other country but ours), but we are the land of opportunity: open the poor, the tired and the huddled masses, because we are the USA and God says we are special.  We can forget the poor and accept a prosperity gospel despite it being EXACTLY the OPPOSITE of what democracy, our country and CHRISTIANITY are founded on, because we are the USA and GOD says we are special.

I believe the US is special. We can provide opportunities. We can welcome all who love peace and we can say whatever we want.  But like it or not we are not alone in these things anymore. We are special because we a nation strong enough to be able to stand by our ideals.  We are powerful enough and brave enough to stand firm and say WE DON'T TORTURE in the face of fear stay fast to that. We are special because we have the power to say WE BELIEVE IN FREEDOM FOR ALL and fight to expand those freedoms at home and abroad. We are special because we have the wealth to say NO ONE SHOULD GO WITHOUT BASIC NEEDS.  And work to pull people out of degradation and poverty. We are special because we have the influence, the wealth, the strength and the avenues in place to lift not just other nations but our own towards ever greater heights.  But if we don't use those exceptional qualities, if we don't constantly strive to be better and less compromising for the good of all.  If we rely on some god to tell us that we're special.  We won't be anymore. 

Avoiding Church With the Parents OR Religion at "Home"

I hope the decision isn't reversed!

One half of GOP is out of Los Angeles at the moment, and that half is me. Our most regular contributor. I'm in Iowa right now, feeling especially sad about the liberal Supreme Court justices getting booted out of a job. I just flipped through the local paper and saw a cute engagement photo for two men... I hope they still get to marry in the next year.

And speaking of weddings, that's why I was back in Iowa. One of my cousins was getting married! It was my kind of ceremony. One of their best friends became an officiant through the Universal Life Church (you can be atheist and register with them) and there was ZERO mention of a god or religion. It was short, sweet, and very personal. They had a focus on a eco-friendly reception, which was very cool.

The wedding was far enough away from where my parents live that they had a motel reserved for that evening. The next morning was Sunday. They were, of course, going to church. With my EXTREMELY religious grandmother. What was I going to do?

Relief came in the form of my cousin. Most of the younger crowd from the wedding planned to go out that evening for drinks, and I wanted to join in. My cousin offered to let me stay at her place and my parents agreed to pick me up from her apartment the following afternoon. THANK YOU! Win win. I got to hang out with my cousins a bit more and was saved from the awkwardness of Catholic mass.

My parents know that I am a non-believer. I don't think the word "atheist" has ever been uttered, but they know that I don't go to church and don't believe in many of its tenets. If I'm at home, they let me sleep in and don't harp about mass. Even at Christmas, and they've taken it considerably well. But if I were at a hotel that needed to be checked out of.... I would have been forced to go out of necessity unless I was stubborn enough to insist at being dropped off at a Starbucks. But that would have led to really uncomfortable discussions with my grandmother whose heart would be broken that I refuse to attend church.

Does this make me an atheistic coward or just a considerate person who doesn't want to crush the expectations of an 87 year old lady?

On another note: businesses close REALLY early on Sundays in Iowa. This is annoying. However, the cafe I tried to eat at gave me a free cup of coffee to go. That was nice. More on businesses and Sundays another day.

Sam Harris and Morality

Sam Harris was on 89.3 KPCC today promoting his new book, The Moral Landscape. He tries to argue that science can define morality based on assessing the effect of an action on the well-being and ability to flourish of humans and animals. He argues that we don't need God to tell right from wrong. He's been pushing the book like crazy. Sam Harris hasn't posted on his web page for ages and all of a sudden, BAM! Four posts in one day!

jurvetson/Flickr (cc by-nc-nd

Of course, I agree that we don't need a god or religion to tell right from wrong. Some would argue that I have a moral compass because my mother is religious and I was raised in a religious household. However, I do not believe in God now and follow no religion. The Bible is DEFINITELY not the basis of my morality. I definitely don't believe in slavery or the subjugation of women or stoning....so, you know, I DON'T believe the Bible or any other Holy Book is a good basis of morality. Certainly, there are people who do great harm and incredibly immoral things in the name of religion. So where's their moral compass? Clearly, the God Compass isn't working right in them!!

I follow a philosophy of "Do Least Harm." I try not to bring hurt or pain to others, and try to limit the hurt and pain I place upon our environment. I don't eat animals, I recycle... this is a part of my morality. I don't think that using fear of god or the threat of hell or the reward of heaven is a good basis of morality. This promotes IMMORAL behavior, I think... If you think you can be an asshole all of the time, but at the last minute go to confession or "find" Jesus, that's not very moral. So, you kill a person? No big deal! Repent, and all is forgiven! BULLSHIT. The victim's family will not forget and there will be plenty of people who won't forgive.

Occasionally, I'll consider doing something "immoral"... like, taking the $10 left in the self check-out machine. But, *sigh* I would want someone to turn it in if I forgot it, so I hand it over to the supervising cashier. Maybe he pocketed it, but that's on him. I'm an extremely honest person because I am extremely empathetic. How would I feel if I were in their place? I found another server's book, forgotten, left lying around and filled with money. Guess what? I returned it. Even though I didn't care for that person. I would hate it if that happened to me. Sometimes my morality is based on guilt, but not on God's... it's based on my mother. Sometimes her voice just pops up in my head.

The Sam Harris interview was interesting, but I don't know (based on this interview) that he made a strong argument for science as a basis for morality. I doubt that religious people who listened to it were particularly convinced. When the subject of promiscuity was brought up, I thought that I could have added more to the conversation.

Sam Harris argued that pair bonding and stable relationships are most fulfilling and conducive to well-being for most people, therefore there is an argument in its favor based on scientific studies. I would also argue that promiscuity puts one at a higher risk for STDs and emotional stress, therefore it isn't the best choice to make. I know that I would use these facts when discussing sexuality with my own children. But I also don't think that remaining a virgin until your wedding day is a moral/immoral choice. I think it's an unwise choice. Relationships last longer and are more successful if the partners involved are well matched sexually, so it makes sense to "test drive" (so to speak) before making long term commitments. And hey, six years of monogamy has worked for us and *GASP* we're atheists!

Homophobia is Deadly

By now, I'm sure everyone has heard about Tyler Clementi, the Rutgers freshman who committed suicide after his dorm roommate publicized a video of his private sexual encounter online.

I hope, hope, hope that the young man who was Tyler's roommate thought of his harassment as just a prank. I hope that his behavior was not the result of bigotry, but just immaturity. However, since Tyler committed suicide, I think that all kinds of anti-gay rhetoric has bubbled to the surface. I do love that celebrities like Neil Patrick Harris are calling out to gay teens to be strong and be proud.

As someone who was pretty depressed as a teen, my message to young people is that it GETS BETTER. Leave your home town, leave the people who make you sad, form your own family of close friends, go to a town that's friendlier to you. Plus, as you grow older, you'll find that you become less sensitive, events seem to affect you less. You gain a little perspective.

What happened to Tyler though, was enough to ruin any adult. The breech of trust, the invasion of privacy. I'm sure Tyler felt like he'd been violated. That would be enough to deeply disturb any individual. And for Tyler, with all the anti-gay rhetoric in the media, it would seem like life wouldn't get any better. I'm sure that he thought that college would be 10x better than high school. I'm sure he went in with a lot of hope, only to be completely let down.

I saw a video over at The Friendly Atheist with an interview between Anderson Cooper and the Michigan Assistant Attorney General, Andrew Shirvell. For the past 6 months, Shirvell has been blogging against the openly gay student body president at Michigan University. He's called him a Nazi, a bigot, and the servant of Satan. Shirvell claims he's not against the young man because he's gay, but because of his "radical homosexual agenda" to petition for gender neutral housing at the university. What a great idea, especially considering what happened to Tyler Clementi. My first year of college, I had a lot of friends who had to change roommates because of issues surrounding their sexuality. Even if they weren't open, they knew that their roommates would be difficult if they found out.

I know this post is a little redundant because it's been talked about so much in the blogosphere, but I just felt like I had to comment on it because it upsets me so much. So-called "Christians" attacking gay people and feeling like they have a moral imperative to do it. It's so much god obscuring perception that I just can't stand it.

Life After Death

I think one of the hardest things to let go of as I came to terms with atheism was the idea of an afterlife. As a child, my gut instinct was to believe in reincarnation. Even before I ever saw the movie Fluke (a chief influence on my beliefs, I assure you), I thought it was most likely that I would come back to life as a squirrel or dog. Despite my weekly catechism, I just had this idea that reincarnation made more sense than a literal Heaven.  Imagine my shock when I got older and learned about Karma and Hinduism. You mean I didn't come up with that on my own???

As I got older, and wasn't sure what I believed in, I found that it was easier to let go of the idea of Heaven than Hell. It was so satisfying to imagine that rapists and child molesters, spousal abusers and murderers, Hitler and the like, were all rotting in this imaginary place... suffering for the crimes of their life on Earth. That's something that was really difficult to let go.

My LP had an even harder time imagining the lack of an afterlife. It can be a really scary idea. Moreover, it was pretty sad to abandon the fantasy that we would be able to spend eternity together after we died. That's a really nice fairy tale.

I think that one can achieve immortality, to a certain degree, in the memories of the living. Because I don't think anything happens when we die (other than decomposition), I don't care too much what happens to my body after death. I'd like it to be as eco-friendly as possible, but also bring comfort to whoever cares about me when I'm gone. That's why, when I heard about "And Vinyly" on NPR the other day, I was totally intrigued. Basically, they press your cremated ashes into vinyl records and you can have whatever song or message you want. Now, is this the most practical idea ever? Absolutely not. But I do think it's pretty cool. Will anyone even own record players once I'm dead? Unlikely.

I don't think that I would actually have my family pay the money for something like this. The funeral industry is pretty evil in its manipulation of the emotions of the grieving. But I'd love to find more options like this... something a lot more interesting than having an ugly urn on your fireplace mantle for 50+ years.

User Comments Make My Brain Hurt

I once read in a magazine article that a New Year's Resolution should be to STOP READING USER COMMENTS. On every Yahoo News article or YouTube video, there are dozens of idiots espousing opinions that they would never dare to voice in person. If the topic at hand happens to be about religion or politics, you can throw all logic and reason and basic civility out the window.

Recently, I stumbled upon this article that stated that the majority of Republicans believe that Obama sympathizes with Islamic goals. A whopping 59% believe that Obama favors Muslim Americans over other groups. I don't even know how this "reasoning" occurs.

According to the poll, 14 percent of Republicans said that from what they knew of Obama, they thought such allegations were "definitely true"; 38 percent thought the allegations were "probably true." Meanwhile, 33 percent of Republicans thought they were "probably not true" and 7 percent thought they were "definitely not true." Asked whether Obama favors the interests of Muslim Americans over other groups of Americans, 59 percent Republicans said yes, whereas 34 percent said he has "generally been evenhanded."

For realsies????? The article was bad enough, but then when I went down to read the comments... OH, MAN. I really wanted to punch myself in the face so I could forget what I had read. This is the one that made me throw my hands up:

I voted for this knucklehead since the primaries and have regretted it for a while. He is a muslim sympathizer. He reaches out to the Muslim world by saying a Mosque is o.k, by hosting Ramadan dinners at the White House. This imbecil bowed to the Saudi king. How pathetic!!!!

Thanks "Steve." What really surprises me is that he voted for Obama when he has such ridiculous views. Um, yeah, of course a Mosque is OK. They are allowed to build anywhere they want, zoning restrictions considered. And if you want to talk about a President that was good buddies with Saudi Arabia, look no further than the darling Bush family.

From http://archive.popandpolitics.com/tag/religion/

But the thing that gets me about this is that President Obama has been adamant from the beginning that he is a Christian. But honestly, I think he is a Christian/Theist for political reasons only. Given Obama's life experiences and religious history, I've always had the gut reaction that he is a bit of an agnostic...perhaps the sort of humanist that Thomas Jefferson was. I love the Jeffersonian Bible. It takes out all the mysticism and leaves only the nice, pleasant philosophy of the New Testament...the "love your neighbor" kind of stuff that Jesus supposedly preached.

Most importantly, I just appreciate having a President who doesn't inject his religious beliefs into everything he does. Unlike certain leaders, I'm relieved that Obama doesn't believe that he's on a mission from God. I'm glad that he doesn't believe that military involvement in the Middle East will bring about the Apocalypse so that all good believers can go to heaven. I don't care if Obama is a "real" Christian... but to fear him and believe that he favors Muslims over all other Americans??? It's on such a level of absurdity that I don't even know how to deal with it.

According to this, I was Wise in Kindergarten

This has been bugging me for almost a year.

I pass by this congregation almost every day on my way home from work. It's in West Hollywood in a heavily Orthodox Jewish part of the city. For almost a year now, this sign has been bugging the heck out of me.

So, does this mean I was becoming wise at the ripe old age of FIVE? Because that's when this god character really started to spook me. He was like Santa Claus, only instead of deciding whether I got presents or coal, he decided whether I went to Heaven or HELL. Whether I got to hang out with angels in the clouds or be tormented by devils with pointy sticks in the eternal fire. To me, every little infraction was worth confession. When I received First Communion in the 2nd grade, my catechism teacher told us that if we prayed with our hands folded and fingers pointing down....we were pointing towards HELL! If we kneeled with our little butts rested against the pews... Baby Jesus would CRY!

I also started to worry as I got older that God/Jesus was some kind of pervert. If he was always watching... was he watching me in the shower???? Now, I understand that my childhood ideas of god and religion were...well... childish. But some people do interpret religion literally. 

But my real question is, why would anyone want to believe in a scary, vengeful god? Why not believe in the lovey-dovey all-is-forgiven, try-to-be-nice-to-everyone god? It seems like hypocrisy to only behave "morally" because you're scared shitless that your god will smite you. And what a terrible way to live anyway. If god is omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient... you should theoretically be OMNIFRIGHTENED! And that just doesn't seem very wise to me.