Christopher Hitchens: Religion Poisons Everything

Christopher Hitchens doesn't mince words nor beat around the bush. His latest book is called "God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything," and it looks like a doozy. I've not read any of his books before, but I plan to pick this one up. Slate is currently posting excerpts from the book, and for the most part I liked what I read so far. I've added this book to my Amazon.com wish list, and hope to pick it up soon.

Unfortunately, Wikipedia describes him as having a temporary alliance with neo-cons. Well let's hope that this new book of his focuses on atheism and steers clear of politics as much as possible. Neo-conservatism is very high on my political hate list.

Pat Tillman and Christian Bigotry

Austin Cline of Atheism.About.Com has an excellent analysis of the recent issues involving Pat Tillman and the Christian/Government bigotry and insensitivity that his memory, and his family, have had to endure.

Highly recommended reading.

Terminator Meets Jesus

Would it be good or bad to go back in time and save Jesus' life?

Cho = Jesus

Oh no, the cat is out of the bag. Virginia Tech gunman Cho Seung-Hui cited Jesus Christ as an inspiration for his murderous rampage:

"Thanks to you, I die like Jesus Christ, to inspire generations of the weak and the defenseless people."

Cho was already known to have mental problems, and now we know that Cho looked at sacrifice, martyrdom, and the spilling of blood as good and redemptive things. Cho also used, in part, the story of Jesus Christ as an inspiration for, and a legitimization of, his actions:

"Do you know what it feels like to be humiliated and be impaled upon on a cross? And left to bleed to death for your amusement? You have never felt a single ounce of pain your whole life. Did you want to inject as much misery in our lives as you can just because you can?"

Cho mistakenly thought, as Christianity teaches, that two wrongs somehow make a right. Cho, like the God of Abraham, also had a big problem with happiness and success:

"You had everything you wanted. Your Mercedes wasn’t enough, you brats. Your golden necklaces weren’t enough, you snobs. Your trust fund wasn’t enough. Your vodka and Cognac weren’t enough. All your debaucheries weren’t enough. Those weren’t enough to fulfill your hedonistic needs. You had everything."

Cho deemed material successes and pleasurable lifestyles to be corrupting and immoral. And Cho's solution? A massacre! Cho took another lesson from Abrahamic religious thought in concluding that pleasure and indulgence are corruptive and violence is the corrective action!

How twisted of a worldview is it that considers indulgence, pleasure, and material wealth to be bad things? And how sick of a worldview is it that considers pain, death, and violence to be the solution?

It is the Abrahamic religious worldviews (Christianity, Judaism, and Islam) where the sickness lies. The values and virtues contained with Abrahamic worldviews are completely ass backwards. These horrible, anti-human worldviews have served as catalysts for deadly and destructive acts time and time again.

I've said it about ten thousand times, but sadly it bears repeating: Mental instability + religious thought = death.

God is Awesome, YTMND Style

I found these on YTMND and just couldn't resist linking them here:

Our God is an Awesome God YTMND

Thank God for This YMNTD

On a similar note, YouTube banned Francois Tremblay's "Our God is an Awesome God" video. So I hosted it myself on another server and created the embed code for it. This video is too awesome not to keep online:

Do Two Wrongs Make a Right?

Yesterday I wrote an email to the one and only Rev. Donald Spitz of the doctor killing advocate group Army of God. The reason I wrote him an email is because he left a comment at one of my favorite satire blogs, Jesus General:

Eric Rudolph is not a terrorist, but an anti-terrorist fighter. Those who have killed babykilling abortionists have done so to protect the innocent. People use force everyday to protect the innocent and no one has a problem with it, except when it comes to protecting unborn human beings, then they go ballistic. It's very simple, the unborn deserve the same protection as the born. Born people are protected with force quite often. Force that you would be glad if it was to protect your children against a murderer. Force that you yourself might use to protect your own children from being murdered. The unborn deserve the same protection.

SAY THIS PRAYER: Dear Jesus, I am a sinner and am headed to eternal hell because of my sins. I believe you died on the cross to take away my sins and to take me to heaven. Jesus, I ask you now to come into my heart and take away my sins and give me eternal life.

Yes, Preacher Spitz was referring to the same Eric Rudolph that bombed two abortion clinics and the 1996 Olympic Games, and then apologized for the Olympic bombing but not the clinic bombings. All in all, Rudolph is responsible for 3 deaths and over 150 injuries due to his Jesus inspired bombings. Swell guy, to be sure.

At any rate, Preacher Spitz's comment got me all curious, especially due to the fact that he advocates saving an unborn, innocent fetus, but seems to be glad that an innocent Jesus was allegedly sacrificed. Would Preacher Spitz truly advocate the saving of one innocent being, but not another? Where does his standard come from? So I decided to write Preacher Spitz an email:

From: Aaron J Kinney
To: glory2jesus@armyofgod.com
Sent: Tuesday, April 17, 2007 11:48 AM
Subject: Jesus

If you could go back in time and rescure Jesus from being crucified, would you do it?

Aaron Kinney

And wouldn't you know it? This morning his reply was waiting in my inbox! Hallelujah!

From: glory2jesus@armyofgod.com
To: Aaron J Kinney
Sent: Tuesday, April 17, 2007 10:45 PM
Subject: Re: Jesus

Aaron,

If I could go back in time and rescue Jesus from being crucified I would not do it. Jesus came to the planet earth to be die for our sins on the cross of Calvary. That was his purpose in coming, so our sins could be taken away and we could have everlasting life if we turn from our sins and accept Him as our Lord and Savior.

Peter tried to get Jesus not to go to the cross and die, here is what Jesus said to him.

Matthew 16 [21] From that time forth began Jesus to shew unto his disciples, how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day.

[22] Then Peter took him, and began to rebuke him, saying, Be it far from thee, Lord: this shall not be unto thee.

[23] But he turned, and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan: thou art an offence unto me: for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men.

SAY THIS PRAYER: Dear Jesus, I am a sinner and am headed to eternal hell because of my sins. I believe you died on the cross to take away my sins and to take me to heaven. Jesus, I ask you now to come into my heart and take away my sins and give me eternal life.

Wow. Just, wow.

I think that in lieu of further commentary, I will simply end this post by reproducing my email response to Rev. Spitz:

From: Aaron J Kinney
To: glory2jesus@armyofgod.com
Sent: Wednesday, April 18, 2007 09:12 AM
Subject: Re: Jesus

Thank you for your response, Rev. Spitz. It was very eye-opening.

However, I must take issue with your logic. Two wrongs don't make a right. It simply doesn't make sense to fight for the lives of unborn babies, but fail to do the same for Jesus. Sure, unborn babies are fairly innocent, but even they have the stain of original sin on their souls. There was only ever one truly and perfectly innocent man, and that man was Jesus!

The entire world would celebrate me as the guy who saved Jesus from the cross. In a way, I would be Christ's savior! Could there ever be a greater defender of the innocent than that?

Aaron Kinney

Preacher Says God is a Psychopath

Now here's a preacher I can tithe to. The Dean of St Albans, Rev Jeffrey John, recently said that the crucifixion makes God look like a psychopath:

"What sort of God was this, getting so angry with the world and the people he created and then, to calm himself down, demanding the blood of his own son?" Dr John said.

"And anyway, why should God forgive us through punishing somebody else? It was worse than illogical, it was insane. It made God sound like a psychopath. If any human being behaved like this, we would say they were a monster.

"Well, I haven't changed my mind since. That explanation of the cross just doesn't work but sadly, it's one that's still all too often preached."

Unfortunately, the guy is still a Godnut and he thinks he has a better explanation for crucifixion. But whatever. I still like the fact that this preacher sticks enough to his own common sense to realize that two wrongs don't make a right. In other words, spilling innocent blood to absolve the crimes of the guilty is not justice.

Abstinence Doesn't Work for Students

Another nail was hammered into the coffin lid of abstinence programs today as a study was released. CNN.com has the details:

Students who took part in sexual abstinence programs were just as likely to have sex as those who did not, according to a study ordered by Congress.

Also, those who attended one of the four abstinence classes that were reviewed reported having similar numbers of sexual partners as those who did not attend the classes. And they first had sex at about the same age as other students -- 14.9 years, according to Mathematica Policy Research Inc.

The federal government now spends about $176 million annually on abstinence-until-marriage education. Critics have repeatedly said they don't believe the programs are working, and the study will give them reinforcement.

A government sponsored study undercut the government-led abstinence campaign. But of course, these kinds of evidences will never dissuade those who have faith in these programs:

However, Bush administration officials cautioned against drawing sweeping conclusions from the study. They said the four programs reviewed -- among several hundred across the nation -- were some of the very first established after Congress overhauled the nation's welfare laws in 1996.

Officials said one lesson they learned from the study is that the abstinence message should be reinforced in subsequent years to truly affect behavior.

Please, Mr. Bush. Shut the fuck up. You are wrong. This is only one of countless pieces of evidence that shows that safe sex education beats the snot out of abstinence only education. Go pray somewhere and leave us evidence lovers the fuck alone.

Mathematica then did a follow up survey in late 2005 and early 2006. By that time, the average age for participants was about 16.5. Mathematica found that about half of the abstinence students and about half from the control group reported that they remained abstinent.

"I really do think it's a two-part story. First, there is no evidence that the programs increased the rate of sexual abstinence," said Chris Trenholm, a senior researcher at Mathematica who oversaw the study. "However, the second part of the story that I think is equally important is that we find no evidence that the programs increased the rate of unprotected sex."

You abstinence lovers are done. Kaput. Finished. This weekend, I'm going to celebrate this latest victory with lots of safe sex! I suggest my readers do the same :)

Austin Cline Gives His Support

I gotta hand it to Austin Cline of atheism.about.com. He is a class act.

Austin recently posted about the whole fake atheist mess that I've been involved in. He also got a handful of comments about it, which shows that this is indeed a topic of concern.

These fake atheists have been disrupting the works of people who take their atheist activism very seriously. John Loftus of Debunking Christianity, Brian Sapient and Infidel Mike, both of the Rational Response Squad, and many other serious career atheists have had their works negatively affected by these charlatans. It was bad enough for me to be fooled by the fakers, but at least I didn't have to suffer being impersonated like the aforementioned real atheists did.

Thanks for the support Austin, and for helping spread the awareness of this problem! Continuing to expose the fakers will prevent them from getting much traction for their disingenuous intentions.

Our God is an Awesome God

Francois Tremblay posted a video to commemorate Easter. He also put it on YouTube, which I'm reposting here for your viewing convenience.

I actually sang this song at numerous church events back in the day.

Anonymous is a Pedophile

I've got an anonymous Christian troll who is now harassing my blog, and in the comments section of every recent post I make, he brings up the topic of naked children.

It is quite perverse, to say the least. Anonymous will come in here and say things like:

From someone who would rather see children naked I don't think you're in any authority to see who got waxed.

Pray harder? That's better than seeing naked children. Unlike some people.

Now, there is a small problem with his accusations. I never said anything of the sort, and he would be hard pressed to quote me on anything like that. I've already refuted Frank's naked kids claim, and my good friend Olly absolutely blasted these retarded Christians out of the water. Finally, I noted that naked children tend to be found among clergy and Christians, not atheists.

But still, anonymous persists. Why? Because anonymous is projecting. Anonymous constantly thinks about naked kids, and can't wait to take an opportunity at every new post of mine to deflect his own perverse fantasies on to me. This is because anonymous is a Christian, and Christians are used to self-deceit and compartmentalization.

It's obvious by the frequency of anonymous' kiddie trolling that he is obsessed with the topic. Maybe anonymous was molested by his preacher or something. But in any case, anonymous is a Christian pedophile. Wait, isn't that redundant?

I'm also curious as to who this "anonymous" is. Should I force them to at least use a sock puppet account and forbid anonymous commenting on my blog from now on? Who thinks I should require a blogger account for commenting on my blog? Who doesn't?

Sam Harris Waxes Rick Warren

Newsweek sat down recently with Sam Harris and Rick Warren for a friendly fireside chat about everyone's favorite fictional character, God.

In short, Harris waxed Warren something wicked. The fat burly preacher couldn't hold a candle to Harris. Warren got the last word in, and promptly served his Christianity something special with a horribly ignorant Pascal's Wager appeal. It is truly glorious to see Warren do almost more damage to his own fairytale worldview than Harris did.

But perhaps my favorite part of all is early on in the debate, where Warren proudly displays his ability to see faces in the clouds passing over his head:

RICK WARREN:
I see the fingerprints of God everywhere. I see them in culture. I see them in law. I see them in literature. I see them in nature. I see them in my own life. Trying to understand where God came from is like an ant trying to understand the Internet. Even the most brilliant scientist would agree that we only know a fraction of a percent of the knowledge of the universe.

Yes, Warren. We all see a butterfly when we spill coffee on a piece of paper and fold it in half. But some of us have come to realize that it is merely a coffee stain. We even developed a word to describe this phenomenon: Pareidolia. Hopefully, someday, you will realize this too.

I can only imagine what kind of bozo Rick Warren would come off as if he were in another field of study, like, say... astronomy!

More Fake Atheists

Fake atheist blogs seem to be popping up with increasing frequency as of late. Not too long ago, I witnessed the exposing of a fake atheist blog by the name of Discomfiting Christianity, which was designed to harass and make fun of the Debunking Christianity crew. Admittedly, that blog didn't try very hard to hide the fact that it was a parody/satire, and John Loftus figured out the scam pretty quickly. Similarly, there was another fake atheist blogger by the name of Brother Blark, who I eventually convinced to stop his antics (read the comments in this post to see how that went down).

Well, it looks like the fake atheists are at it again. This time they directly involved me in their shenanigans, and I think they are due to be exposed for the fakes that they are. It was this post that first got my attention, and you can see in the comments of that post how I was suspicious from the get-go.

In fact, a little more digging revealed that they have two nearly identical blogs. The Infidel Mike blog is authored by the "Rational Response Squad Jr." profile, while the Atheism Sucks-Sucks blog is authored by the "Frank Walton Sucks" and "Frank Walton Sucks" profiles.

It doesn't take a genius to figure out that these blogs/bloggers are almost certainly fakes. They came into the comments section of a previous post of mine where one declared the other a fake. The funny thing is that they both post nearly identical entries on their respective blogs, and they both misinterpret my argument with Frank Walton while pretending to give me props.

Look at the similarities between their two posts, and come to your own conclusion. First up is a quote from the Infidel Mike blog:

So if Frank Walton wants to ridicule Aaron because he would rather live in a nudist colony than in a burkha town, one must wonder... Would Frank rather live in a place where religious oppression reigns supreme? Would Frank rather live in a town where all the women are forced to wear burkhas? We think you must assume the answer to those questions is "yes." You know why, because we at "Rational Response Squad" already assume that all forms of religion are a form of suppression anyway.

We tip our kool-aids to you Aaron, just like what happened at Jamestown where a bunch of fundies drank kool-aid in a mass suicide. No parallel between them and us but we have the kool-aid! Thanks, Aaron, for wasting your time on such a dishonest moron so that we don't have to! We love you! And contrary to what Frank Walton said you are not a sexual deviant. Since you would rather live in a nudist colony rather than a burkhatown, then by definition you would rather see children naked than in burkhas! That is not perversion!

Now look at what was written at the Atheism-Sucks Sucks blog:

So if Frank Walton wants to ridicule Aaron because he would rather live in a nudist colony than in a burkha town, one must wonder... Would Frank rather live in a place where religious oppression reigns supreme? Would Frank rather live in a town where all the women are forced to wear burkhas? We think you must assume the answer to those questions is "yes."

We tip our kool-aids to you Aaron, thanks for wasting your time on such a dishonest moron so that we don't have to! We love you!

My bullshit detector is off the charts. What about yours?

There are two possibilities here. One is that these blogs are both fakes run by one or more Christians and/or sympathizers of Frank Walton, in which case I want to expose their little scam. The other possibility is that these are very stupid atheists who don't understand my arguments, in which case I don't want them to be my cheerleaders.

Somehow, I suspect the former.