Category Archives: Blog

Driving by women is the road to hell!

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What do you get when you mix the backwardness of theocracy with the progressiveness of modern technology? Why, you get Saudi Arabia, of course!

Authorities detained a Saudi woman on Saturday after she launched a campaign against the driving ban for women in the ultraconservative kingdom and posted a video of herself behind the wheel on Facebook and YouTube to encourage others to copy her.

Saudi Arabia is the only country in the world to ban women – both Saudi and foreign – from driving. The prohibition forces families to hire live-in drivers, and those who cannot afford the $300 to $400 a month for a driver must rely on male relatives to drive them to work, school, shopping or the doctor.

Women are also barred from voting, except for chamber of commerce elections in two cities in recent years, and no woman can sit on the kingdom’s Cabinet. Women also cannot travel without permission from a male guardian and shouldn’t mingle with males who are not their husbands or brothers.

Honestly, I’m counting the days before this women either gets gang-raped or somebody throws acid in her face. A few years ago, when one of the Saudi princes tried to reform their sexist laws a little, there were riots. Clearly this country isn’t ready to join the rest of humanity at the grown-up table…

Camping changes date, awaits more failure

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After posting that video of a shocked Harold Camping refusing to give an interview, I was beginning to feel sorry for him. He seemed confused and crestfallen at the idea his buddy Jesus didn’t come down to slaughter 99.9999% of the human race. Truly, a sad day for all of us.

So rather than admit he’s an old fuddy-duddy with a bullshit math formula, Harold instead suggests that the “spiritual” Apocalypse has already begun, but the date of the physical end of the world will come about on October 21st, 2011.

…[H]e insisted 21 October had always been the end-point of his own chronology – or at least his own latest chronology, as a previous prophecy that the apocalypse would strike in 1994 also failed to come to pass.

I guess Harold wants to strike out now, and if you’re in for a penny, you’re also in for a pound with this guy. You might be wondering what kind of advice Camping has for all those followers who are feeling betrayed after having spent their life savings on his failed prediction. Well, he has some “comforting” advice for them:

Asked if he had any advice to offer those who had given away their material wealth in the belief the world was about to end, Mr. Camping said they would cope.
“We just had a great recession. There’s lots of people who lost their jobs, lots of people who lost their houses… and somehow they all survived,” he said.

I think “just cope with it” is the same advice you’d give a person after raping them. Honestly, I doubt this moron feels bad about deceiving folks, since he’s worked so diligently to deceive himself. That’s the problem with guys like Harold: they want their nonsense to be so real they lure the infantilized and gullible peons of religion into their web. So long as religion continues to endorse ignorance, stupidity and superstition, people will lose their money, their family and their lives over this bullshit.

Email question

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I received an email from a fan, and I thought his question was too important for me to answer on my own. I thought I would put it up to have the rest of the community on TGA give their own advice as well:

My mother is a big church lady and heavy devout Christian, her inner ties with high church officials have given her connections in many places all over town. If you live in this area, chances are you know my mother.

Now I know you don’t like preface to questions, but this is important. I am a vocal performer, and it is important to note that classical vocal pieces (songs) and such have heavy religious ties due to the influence of the church during the Renaissance, now to pursue my studies in music I have performed with several church groups and hundreds of religious songs for concert performance and education. I am planning on going to community college as a vocal performance major.

A friend of my mother’s, a pastor at a local church, offered to have the church pay for one half of my college tuition, if I go to this one religious university.

Here is the question. (if you skipped the last paragraph, at least read the line above)
Should I take the money and go to this school, or deny the church’s money and go to a secular college at full cost to me?

I’m probably the wrong person to ask about college advice, since I didn’t go myself. With that said, you’re in a tough spot I’m sure many others have been in. You have a chance to go to school without having to pay a large portion of it. Student debt has reached about 1 trillion dollars (it surpassed credit card debt recently), and it’s quickly becoming clear that personal debt is a new form of economic slavery. To do anything worthwhile, you often have to enter into a vicious cycle of debt, and I can appreciate people’s effort to avoid this vicious trap.

According to a College Board report issued last fall, median earnings of bachelor’s degree recipients working full time year-round in 2008 were $55,700, or $21,900 more than the median earnings of high school graduates. And their unemployment rate was far lower.

Indeed, some economists worry that all the news about unemployed 20-somethings mired in $100,000 of college debt might discourage some young people from attending college.

With that said, you might find compromising your school choice for purely financial reasons might make you unhappy and miserable. I don’t know what this religious school is like, but my guess is that you’ll find yourself meeting too few like minded peers, an important part of not only your college experience, but also a chance for you to make new friends that will influence you for a long time to come. A person’s environment has a huge impact on their wellbeing, their happiness, and their general life satisfaction, so never forget that.

I haven’t really given you an answer, but my guess is that there’s still a lot more research on your part that must be done before you make up your own mind. There is so much about your situation that is unknown to me, and as a result, any advice I give would be grossly incomplete, and probably bad. So what does everyone else think of his dilemma?

Rapture failure, Harold Camping a no-show

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Well, the 21st of May has come and gone, and as we all predicted, nothing happened. Now, a number of Harold Camping‘s followers are trying to cope with having been duped.

Some believers expressed bewilderment or said it was a test from God of their faith, after the day passed without event.

Meanwhile, the evangelist at the center of the claim, Harold Camping, has not been seen since before the deadline.

I would lay low for a little while if I was Harold too. I mean, it can’t feel good to fail AGAIN, and there’s only so many times you can cry “Rapture” before none of the other shepherds believe you. It also doesn’t help when some of your followers also spent their entire life savings advertising your stupid shit:

Robert Fitzpatrick, a retired transportation agency worker in New York, said he had spent more than $140,000 (£86,000) of his savings on advertisements in the run-up to 21 May to publicize the prediction.

It’s difficult to ascertain the financial devastation wrought on these poor fools, especially so soon after their little failed End of Days. How many families will lose their homes because of this? How many kids have lost their college fund, and their hope for a better future?

So, did anyone learn a lesson from all this?

…followers said the delay was a further test from God to persevere in their faith.

What a big surprise.

Kirk Cameron thinks Stephen Hawking has “absurd Ideas”

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Guess who managed to weasel his way into the news? It’s everyone’s favorite “ex-atheist”, Kirk Cameron, criticizing Hawking for declaring that Heaven is a fairy-tale. He posted this on his Facebook page:

to say anything negative about Stephen Hawking is like bullying a blind man. He has an unfair disadvantage, and that gives him a free pass on some of his absurd ideas.

That’s not passive aggressive in the slightest. He’s right: science must seem absurd to someone as ignorant as Cameron. Black Holes deteriorating over time? The Universe not needing a prime mover in order to exist? It’s enough to make anyone’s head explode, especially when that head happens to be jam packed with crazy bullshit.

What really irritates me is when clowns like Kirk are given a spotlight for regurgitating the same old tired non-arguments. Faith is not evidence. Belief is not evidence. Yet the likes of Cameron would dilute objective truth to fit their narrow world views, and the media gladly provides them a platform to accomplish this. How many gullible fools have been lured by their promises of eternal life and a paradise awaiting the obedient? Presumably a few more now.

This other passage really irritates me:

(Hawking) says he knows there is no Heaven. John Lennon wasn’t sure. He said to pretend there’s no Heaven. That’s easy if you try. Then he said he hoped that someday we would join him. Such wishful thinking reveals John and Stephen’s religious beliefs, not good science.”

What the fuck does he know about good science? This is the same brilliant mind behind the “crocoduck” anti-evolution argument for god’s sake. And if he thinks Lennon’s “I hope some day you’ll join us” message is religious in nature, he’s only proven how hollow his “ex-atheist” claim is.

No Time for a Party at Rapture

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Saturday is just about to roll around, and as many of you know, the failed prophet Harold Camping has been gathering a following of unbelievably gullible idiots, all of whom look forward to being teleported up into the clouds. Since his beliefs are so fringe, it’s invariably led to family members having strained relationships. This one story, about a Mom losing her fucking mind and dragging her teenage kids all around to tell others about their make-believe bullshit, made me particularly angry.

The three teenagers have been struggling to make sense of their shifting world, which started changing nearly two years ago when their mother, Abby Haddad Carson, left her job as a nurse to “sound the trumpet” on mission trips with her husband, Robert, handing out tracts. They stopped working on their house and saving for college.

I can’t imagine what it must be like to have a parent turn all “fundy” on you., ignoring your future in the hopes that the End of the World will take care of all their problems.

My mom has told me directly that I’m not going to get into heaven,” Grace Haddad, 16, said. “At first it was really upsetting, but it’s what she honestly believes.”

It should still be upsetting, girl! You’ve just done what everyone else in your position would have done: you decided to ignore the hateful and stupid beliefs of your mother in order to save the relationship. you’re braver than I am, I’ll tell you what.
I love my parents to death, but if they suddenly turned extremely religious, dragged me all over the country trying to “spread” the message about Armageddon, we would invariably have to part ways. Religious dogma is so incompatible with my life. I have no time for such ignorance and blatant stupidity, and have no interest in watching my loved ones get caught up in this kind of dangerous nonsense.

Kevin Brown, a Family Radio representative, said conflict with other family members was part of the test of whether a person truly believed. “They’re going through the fiery trial each day,” he said.

Yeah, don’t forget that Jesus preached that you should abandon your family and friends if they failed to believe that he was in fact a God, so this whole “family division” is something Christians are more than familiar with. After this whole mess is over and a new “End Times” date shows up, will this family again experience more insanity? Let’s hope not…

Creationist Pimp Harun Yahya is back

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Remember Harun Yahya? He’s the Turkish creationist that published a book called “The Atlas of Creation”, his attempt to “prove” that animals were created spontaneously by his personal God. Most of the pictures in this massive 768 page monstrosity are ripped right off the Internet. One picture of a fly is in fact a metal lure. Yes, he’s that fucking incompetent.

Harun Yahya is the pseudonym of Adnan Oktar, 55, a preacher who keeps secret the sources of the ample funds that allow him and a group of followers to produce hundreds of thousands of slick and simple books on Islam under his pen name.

Harun has a following of young, wealthy religious aristocrats that fund his various schemes. He keeps them in line by filming them having sex with his various private prostitutes, and in exchange for their silence, they fund his various enterprises. Although he claims to have written a dozen books, all have been found to be ghost written, and he’s clearly authored none of them. He’s an opportunist, interested in the money, fame and power that comes from “defending the faith”.

Koran-based creationist views are traditional in the Muslim world. Advised by U.S. creationists, Harun Yahya has developed a series of books that have helped spread this view in recent years beyond the Middle East, including to France, whose five million Muslims make up Europe’s largest Islamic minority.

Right now, he’s on tour in Europe trying to “teach” students how to challenge evolution, which he believes is science’s way of promoting atheism. Is it our fault that evolution by means of natural selection does more to explain our existence than a 7th century book of mythology?

Raped Teen forced to apologize before church for being pregnant

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After Christina Anderson was raped by fellow congregationalist Ernest Willis and got pregnant as a result, the pastor of her fundamentalist Baptist church forced her to move to Colorado and read an apology letter aloud to her congregation before she left. Classy.

Ernest Willis is charged with forcibly raping Christina Anderson twice during the summer of 1997, when she was his children’s baby sitter and he was 39. Lawyers for Willis, now 52, say in court documents that he will admit having sex with the girl once but maintains it was consensual.

Ah, the old Polanski defense. Wonder how well it’ll work for him considering Willis’ defense team is also trying to bar Anderson’s testimony that he tried to offer to drive her to get an out of state abortion, and he also offered a “code 3“, effectively a punch to the stomach in the hopes of causing a spontaneous abortion. Why, those sound like the actions of a man engaged in a consensual affair, doesn’t it?

Pastor Phelps claims he helped the police investigation, but he’s obviously a liar since the cops only discovered where Christina was after friends tipped them off that she was living under a different name in Arizona, where she was being home-schooled by other fundy yahoos.

It’s a proud tradition in all Abrahamic religions that girls are to blame for everything. In the Bible, when Aaron and Miriam both complain Moses’ new wife is a foreign chick, only Miriam gets leprosy for her questioning of the prophet. How many females have been tortured, beaten to death, or immolated under the watchful gaze of the Church?

(Update: Ernest Willis was found guilty and sentenced)

Rome braces for urban myth Earthquake

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Hey, if you’re going to be superstitious, you may as well embrace all the crazy and stupid shit you hear, right? That includes an urban myth floating around Rome that an earthquake is supposed to destroy them today. This quake was apparently foretold decades ago by a famous scientist by the name of Raffaele Bendandi, although there is no evidence that he actually did so. So basically, a number of citizens have “called in sick” believing today is their last day on Earth.

There are reports of an 18% increase in the number of city employees planning to stay away from work. “I’m going to tell the boss I’ve got a medical appointment and take the day off,” barman Fabio Mengarelli told Reuters. “If I have to die, I want to die with my wife and kids, and masses of people will do the same as me.”

All of this is pretty silly, since earthquakes can’t be predicted so far in advance. Turns out our mantle is a lot more unpredictable than we think. Just ask Japan. Point is, this is just another example of how gullible people are when they have such a poor understanding of science. I bet most of these people can name more patron saints than they can scientists. Is it any surprise that you would have a large radius of ignorance when the Vatican is next door?

Lame Pastor lies about being in Navy SEALS

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After being interviewed for a piece on the armed forces by the Patriot-News – a scrappy little Pennsylvania Newspaper that despite its small readership still manages to win accolades – it was discovered that Rev. Jim Moats was not in fact a Navy Seal, and that he had fabricated a story based on the movie “Under Siege”.

“We deal with these guys all the time, especially the clergy. It’s amazing how many of the clergy are involved in those lies to build that flock up,” Shipley said.

I guess when you’re trying to impress your new flock, you’re bound to embellish things a little. In Moats’ case, he had his two sons make him a fake Navy Seals plaque and simply didn’t correct people who assumed that he must have fought in Vietnam as a special op. He didn’t, and when a real newspaper actually bothered to check up on the story, they found out that they had been duped. So they went back, confronted this lying moron, and got him to confess he’s been pretending all this time to be a hot shot when he’s merely a cowardly liar. Do you expect anything else from guys who make their living spewing nonsense professionally?

Derek, I hardly knew you

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It’s a terrible shame when your only opportunity to know someone is on the day of their death. Derek Miller, an atheist blogger not unlike myself, died of cancer recently. His last post, from “beyond the grave” is a reminder of the fragility of life. Derek had been fighting a losing battle to colon cancer, and passed away a few days ago. Reading his archive, it also reminded me there are still tons of great atheist bloggers out there that haven’t been discovered. If you know of any we haven’t talked about in the past, and you would like others to know about it before these people expire, be sure to let me know!

*(Update: His site exists only in the web archives now)

Pastor busted for selling off baby formula meant for poor

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Isn’t it hilarious how religious people are utterly convinced believing in the absurd makes them better people? Despite plenty of proof to the contrary, it never seems to register that for the most part, religion makes people more xenophobic, more racist, more likely to support torture, and more ignorant. How are you supposed to be more moral when that’s the case?

If Christianity is supposed to make you more law abiding and moral (I chuckle every time I actually say that out loud), then we should expect the so-called “experts” in its theology to be shining beacons of moral rectitude. Of course, we all know that’s not the case. If they aren’t shoving their penises in inappropriate places or beating the crap out of orphans, some of them are just trying to get paid:

A 67-year-old Roman Catholic priest was arrested at his Queenstown church mission for allegedly selling baby formula meant to be given free to underprivileged children.

The priest was arrested on Thursday afternoon while allegedly selling the milk to the public, after police and the Eastern Cape health department were alerted to the trade, Daily Dispatch reported on Friday

Nice job, dude. Guys like you make disparaging religion easy.

William Lane Craig tries to defend Biblical genocides

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A few weeks ago I posted a video of a debate between Sam Harris and William Lane Craig. The video made it clear that Craig is no dummy, despite believing in absurdities. He’s been particularly busy recently defending the faith, and one of his latest articles tries to justify the genocide and infanticide in the Bible. It’s pretty messed up, actually:

According to the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Old Testament), when God called forth his people out of slavery in Egypt and back to the land of their forefathers, he directed them to kill all the Canaanite clans who were living in the land (Deut. 7.1-2; 20.16-18). The destruction was to be complete: every man, woman, and child was to be killed.

The command to kill all the Canaanite peoples is jarring precisely because it seems so at odds with the portrait of Yahweh, Israel’s God, which is painted in the Hebrew Scriptures. Contrary to the vituperative rhetoric of someone like Richard Dawkins, the God of the Hebrew Bible is a God of justice, long-suffering, and compassion.

We’ve obviously read a different book. God doesn’t strike me for one second as having any kind of compassion at all. He kills people for burning incense improperly. He commands his “people” to kill all the other tribes who happen to live around them. This whole “God is love” shit is a pretty recent phenomenon. Just ask Pope Innocent III.

According to the version of divine command ethics which I’ve defended, our moral duties are constituted by the commands of a holy and loving God. Since God doesn’t issue commands to Himself, He has no moral duties to fulfill. He is certainly not subject to the same moral obligations and prohibitions that we are.

In other words, if the commands of an all loving God sound evil, it’s only because good and evil are not really concepts he has to worry about, since he’s not subject to his own moral laws. In other words, if God does something we consider evil, like command the Jews to slaughter innocent people, it only seems that way to us because we’re subject to moral laws, not God.

So the problem isn’t that God ended the Canaanites’ lives. The problem is that He commanded the Israeli soldiers to end them. Isn’t that like commanding someone to commit murder? No, it’s not. Rather, since our moral duties are determined by God’s commands, it is commanding someone to do something which, in the absence of a divine command, would have been murder. The act was morally obligatory for the Israeli soldiers in virtue of God’s command, even though, had they undertaken it on their own initiative, it would have been wrong.

Wow. So if I kill my neighbor, I’m committing an evil act. However if a voice in my head told me to do so, it’s kosher. Good to know!

God taught Israel that any assimilation to pagan idolatry is intolerable. It was His way of preserving Israel’s spiritual health and posterity. God knew that if these Canaanite children were allowed to live, they would spell the undoing of Israel.

Yeah, clearly little children who remember nothing of their parents equally stupid religious beliefs would have been a major threat. Better that they should all be smashed against rocks, right?

Moreover, if we believe, as I do, that God’s grace is extended to those who die in infancy or as small children, the death of these children was actually their salvation.

See, that’s the kind of ignorant shit that drives us crazy. You’re literally suggesting they were in fact saved by being brutally murdered. That’s just fucking ignorant.

Muslim actress threatened over Playboy pictures

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When I think of someone famous taking off their clothing for money and more attention, it’s rare that I compare their actions to those of great revolutionaries. Of course, that’s probably because I live in a society that values freedom of expression, and where the female form isn’t something we like covered up (which is why winter sucks so hard). That’s why I had to take a few moments to appreciate the fact that a German Muslim actress named Sila Sahin has received death threats after posing nude for Playboy.

Her Turkish parents are apparently uber-conservative and called her all kinds of nasty names for doing what she wants with her own body.

“For years I subordinated myself to various societal constraints. The Playboy photo shoot was a total act of liberation.”

You know you’re on the side of good when you’re trying to defend a society that has citizens who feel liberated when they show people their naughty parts!

Kiwi youths uninformed about Easter

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How did your Zombie Jesus Weekend turn out? Personally I stuffed myself with food and partied way too hard, but it’s pretty much the only way most people I know tend to celebrate. In fact, it looks like most of New Zealand has no fucking clue what the holiday is actually about. According to a super unscientific survey they did, kids are generally ignorant as to the history and purpose of Easter. It’s hilarious:

The 10-question survey, which asked basic questions about Christ’s death and resurrection, returned a mean test score of 5 out of 10…The question as to whom betrayed Christ confused a number of others, with one young respondent believing it was his dog who was disloyal. Another was hazy about the entire concept of Easter.

I remember that part in the Bible when Old Yeller betrays Jesus too. Bastard.

A 16-year-old believed Christ was referred to as “King of the World”, and was crucified wearing a “halo made of bunnies”.

A halo made of bunnies.. How does that even work?

All of this is a positive sign that no one really gives a damn about Christianity enough to pass on their stupid stories to the next generation. So while some may lament about this, the rest of us secularists can take comfort that the world is slowly losing its religious flavor. It might take a while, but it looks like we might be on the winning side after all.