They were only athier, we’re the athiest!

Historical perspective certainly does change one’s views of our current little struggle with theism. Kieran Healy identifies the original atheists—those horrible people who were defying cultural mores and denying the traditional deities.

It was those uppity Christians.

Matters were very different with the Christians, who had ex hypothesi abandoned their ancestral religions … The Christians asserted openly either that the pagan gods did not exist at all or that they were malevolent demons. Not only did they themselves refuse to take part in pagan religious rites: they would not even recognize that others ought to do so. As a result … the mass of pagans were naturally apprehensive that the gods would vent their wrath at this dishonour not upon the Christians alone but on the whole community; and when disasters did occur they were only too likely to fasten the blame on to the Christians.

So, if they had a poll around 250AD, the most untrustworthy group in the Empire would have been those Christians? At least this is a historical example that shows the atheists can take over! Let’s just be sure we don’t make the mistake the Christians did.

Part of Ste. Croix’s larger argument is that pretty soon the boot was on the other foot, the persecuted became enthusiastic persecutors.

Restricting abortion is just another way to put women in chains

The only thing you need to read today: the first hand account of an doctor, explaining why he does abortions: it’s because someone has to give those oppressed by circumstance a choice.

By 1967 I was a third year medical student, still with no visible means of support, and we were pregnant with our third child. It was the spring of that year and I was ending my rotation in the Ob-Gyn Service clinic. I was assigned a 40 plus year old, poverty stricken mother of several children. I think she was unmarried but I am not sure of that now. This care worn mother-of-several had a large abdominal mass that I rapidly determined to be a well advanced pregnancy. I asked my resident to come and break the news to this woman; it was very obvious to me that she was not going to be happy about the news of another pregnancy. When told that she – already unable to adequately feed and clothe her family – was again pregnant, she looked up at me and the resident. There we stood, two white males, well clothed, well feed young men with superior educations. We were, in her eyes, stunningly blessed and obviously going places in the world. She began to weep silently. She must have assumed, for good reason, that there was no way that we would understand her problems; she knew also that there was nothing that we could or would do to relieve her lacerating misery.

“Oh God, doctor,” she said quietly, “I was hoping it was cancer.”

It’s powerful stuff. Remember, the people who want to end abortion aren’t really pro-life—they are out to control women, nothing more.

Ted Storck is an inconsiderate, arrogant jerkwad

Hey, I’ve got this wonderful forum that’s read around the world, so I’m going to use it to unload on one of our local idiots, Ted Storck. Storck is one of those insufferable self-important Christians who makes the whole religion look like a lobotomy ward. His wonderful contribution to the cultural life of Morris is that he donated a set of ghastly electronic chimes to the nearby cemetery. And he writes letters to the Morris Sun Tribune.

This Memorial Day weekend, the chimes will play more hymns and patriotic songs at the cemeteries here in Morris.

We hope the few who dislike chimes will tolerate them as we honor the brave men and women who gave their lives to protect this great country.

Ted Storck

U.S. Navy, retired

Morris

Let me count the ways in which Ted Storck is an obnoxious jerk.

  1. Pushing a button to play amplified, sterile hymns over a cemetery honors our dead about as much as slapping a magnetic yellow “I support the troops” ribbon on a hearse.

  2. He knows that there are residents here who find the chimes loud and annoying, yet he announces that he’s going to fire those suckers up anyway.

  3. This cemetery is next door to the university, six blocks from the center of our town, and only a block away from my house. It’s well-positioned to annoy a large number of people.

  4. Ted Storck lives nowhere near the chimes.

  5. He didn’t just start ’em up for Memorial Day weekend. They’re playing this weekend, too. He’s probably hoping to drive us mad all summer long.

  6. And the major reason Ted Storck is a contemptible hypocrite and curse on our community: they’re playing these damned hymns and patriotic songs EVERY FIFTEEN MINUTES. ALL DAY LONG. LOUDLY.

I also live two blocks away from the Catholic church in town. They ring their bells — real bells — a couple of times a day on Sunday, I presume at the start of Mass or something. That’s no problem. It’s even a pleasant sound, and I rather like hearing it—it’s a classic reminder of small town America.

But I want you to imagine this. Even if you are a devoutly religious person who thinks Christianity is the essence of all that is good and true and loving about humanity, try to imagine spending a quiet weekend at home with your family, out on the deck with the barbecue or relaxing in the easy chair with a good book, and every 15 minutes a set of cheesy chimes blares out “Onward, Christian Soldiers” or “Stars and Stripes Forever”. Now imagine being atheist or Jewish or anything other than a blithering Christian sheep and getting slammed with the same noise incessantly.

Ted Storck’s legacy to our community is that he is going to have conditioned lots of us to puke on your shoes if we hear you humming “Rock of Ages.” Thank you, Christianity, for training your members so well to be insensitive, inconsiderate, pushy, arrogant dimbulbs. And thank you, Ted Storck, for personifying one reason why I despise your religion. I still wish you’d shut those damned things off.

I’ll be at City Hall tomorrow to complain, not that I have much expectation that anyone there will do anything.

You can have him

Hey, theistic evolutionists, you have a new pal and representative: Dinesh D’Souza. Doesn’t that just make you want to reevaluate your philosophical foundations?

Don’t worry too much about it. D’Souza is a spectacular twit of a theistic evolutionist. He reveals his endorsement of evolution because he likes Sam Brownback (Strike 1!). He’s not at all informed about the debate because he thinks there are only two possibilities — you either accept evolution, or you’re a Young Earth Creationist (Strike 2!). And he endorses a particularly shallow form of NOMA—”Evolution provides a convincing account for transitions from one life form to another, and God breathed souls into us humans, just like the Bible says,” in which he accepts biblical authority without much thought (Strike 3!).

Maybe it’s hasty to call him a theistic evolutionist—there’s no sign that he’s put a moment’s thought into either the “theistic” part or the “evolution” part. I hate to say it because it is extremely slanderous, but perhaps we just ought to label him a — don’t say these words aloud if there are children about — “conservative pundit.” Bleh, ick, ptui.

The swooning begins

Just in case you had any doubts about how the Intelligent Design creationists would react to the denial of Gonzalez’s tenure, here’s how Uncommon Descent illustrated it:

i-cd1c1612b851afe4ba887bcf274e36b8-martyr_gonzalez.jpg

I like the little sign above his head: he’s being burned at the stake because he “believes in God”! I assure you that the fact that someone goes to church does not play any role in tenure decisions, nor does the penalty for failure to get tenure involve immolation, or even singeing. The reality is that Guillermo Gonzalez is being politely shown the door because he “believes in pernicious pseudoscience,” and more pragmatically, because he didn’t bring in enough grant money.