Thinking Unenslaved

It’s the last Wednesday of the month, which means we’re holding a small contest for blog submissions on the topics noted below. This month is a little different, in that I’ll be going to be soliciting some of the big-name atheist, humanist, secularist, and/or liberal bloggers for permission to reference some of their material. Where relevant, each segment of the show will lead off with such content.

In addition to those authors, our panel will read (excerpts of) the entries aloud and discuss (no, not necessarily eviscerate if we don’t agree) them on the air in our Round Table format. We’ll choose one or two recent blog posts from each of the following categories:

Submission Categories:

1. Atheism or Agnosticism (note the change from last month)
2. (Secular) Humanism
3. Religion
4. Sociology
5. Philosophy

Minimum Requirements for Consideration:

1. Article is “recent” (within the past three months ~ exception might be made in deference to kick-ass authorship)
2. Article is comprised of at least 600 words
3. Article contents contain at least 75% unquoted content

Pretty simple, huh?

Authors of the selected articles will be asked to come on the show for a brief interview and to read and discuss their articles. Show participation is not mandatory. There is no monetary award for being chosen.

Submission Guidelines and Deadline:

1. Submit link(s) to blog post(s) in the comments below
2. Maximum of 5 links per contestant
3. Deadline is 10pm EDT April 26, 2011.
4. Selections will be announced by 10am EDT on April 27, 2011 via unenslaved.com and @Synthaetica (twitter).

Join us Wednesday, April 27, 2011 at 10pm EDT for some unique and dynamic show content from great authors around the Internet!

So, last night’s show was a little different than the shows have been for quite some time. You could even say it got a bit acrimonious from time to time when a theist caller offered no more than spurious, callous, judgments as opposed to anything resembling reasonable discourse. I let that portion of the show continue on for about an hour, and I probably should have cut it short. It should have been no surprise to anyone that she was inclined to respond with dogma and the conflation of belief with fact.

Important Links To Important People:

Angie Jackson: youTube | blogspot

Laci Green: website | youTube

After the show, I stayed up for quite some time. I actually listened to it in its entirety again, despite hating how my voice sounds on the air. Having done so, I have some observations I’d like to share. Feel free to denigrate me in the comments, as I have no doubt I will piss off people on both sides of the argument(s) here. Call it my insipid, unreasonable need to attempt to be objective.

1. Regarding Raissa‘s input: The conflation of belief with fact clearly does not serve her cause. She was asked on several occasions to provide evidence to back up (or prop up, as the case may be) her assertions, and willfully resorted to the exclusive expression of her faith. This is unfortunate, because the operative definition of “faith” is “belief in something which can likely be, or has already been, disproved.” There are reasonable, factual arguments which would sustain her position on adoption, for example. Refusing to research (let alone even so much as attempt to reference) the available material, deferring instead to religious dogma while declaiming its inherent “rightness,” made for sadly shallow and dispassionate listening. Unfortunately, she managed to relegate her entire thesis to irrelevance.
2. Regarding what Angie said on the issue of “making a rape victim carry to term is a form of rape.” I’m getting a lot of shit for this one from some acquaintances who happen to be rape victims who chose not to abort. The operative word being missed in the lectures I’m getting is “making” or “forcing” the rape victim to carry to term. The pro-choice stance is about choice. That my friends who happen to have gone through this scenario had the right to choose not to abort is exactly what people like Angie and myself are fighting to sustain. Bringing a child conceived in this manner to term is not being vilified as a perpetual rape. Being forced to do so, however, is.
3. Sciolism, to me, is kind of a cross between the Argument from Ignorance and False Equivalence. Raissa positioned herself as knowledgeable on the entire subject of the subsequent pregnancy of a rape victim. However, her friend’s experience only makes her familiar with her friend’s experience. A woman who is raped (or is the victim of forced incest if you don’t care to apply the term “rape” to that), can a) independently elect to, b) be forced via authority to, c) be shamed/coerced into, d) be encouraged via peer-pressure to carry the fetus to term. Obviously, Raissa’s friend can only fall into one of those categories, thus making Raissa’s experience a mere 25% of the whole, and second-hand at that. Most certainly (and obvious to all), her “experience” as a mere observer is dubious at best, and the argument from presumed knowledge and insistence upon that “knowledge” as “fact” (even though it was really “belief”) was sciolism in its most nefarious form. She was unwilling to listen to very persuasive arguments to the contrary.
4. At its most basic level, I respect the desire to preserve “life”, which presumably sits at the foundation of the pro-life side of the argument. The problem with it is exactly what Laci so brilliantly pointed out: By more than a factor of ten, people throughout the world are starving. By more than a factor of a hundred, people die needlessly, victims of the changing climate, government/nationalist conflict, failure and lack of local resources, and exploitation. If the debate is truly about preserving “life”, the continual focus on one of the relatively smaller contributors to “death” is woefully misplaced. Moreover, as a condition of individual choice as opposed to the results of hegemonic intervention, the anti-abortion manages to undermine its own moralistic basis. In her short time with Raissa, Laci managed to lay bare the oft-ignored hypocrisy of the pro-life movement: It’s not really about “life” at all, per se. It’s about the enforcement of one group’s definition of “rightness” over the populace for the rather petty purpose of possessing the self-referential invocation of the word “right”.

That all having been said, I must also say it was very difficult not to get caught up in Angie’s passion, Raissa’s sanctimonious presumption of precedence was beyond offensive, and Laci stole the show with a perfectly executed reduction of the anti-choice mission to control individual action under religious pretense.

I don’t yet know which of our great co-hosts we’ll have around for the show, but the show will be dedicated to discussing the various ways that sciolism defeats discourse.

Two things:

One: that last phrase is willfully plagiarized from my (Synthaetica) old post by the same title, which is basically the inspiration for tonight’s show.

Two: Sciolism: 1. A pretentious attitude of scholarship; superficial knowledgeability. 2. Rare The practice of opinionating on subjects of which one has only superficial knowledge. 3. A superficial knowledge, especially when pretentiously revealed.

You can probably imagine where I’m going with this. I recently was doing some maintenance on my website and came across some old posts on this topic which I did for the Blogswarms Against Theocracy back in 2007 an 2008. The subject matter still rings true today, and in fact, as I have more and more “discussions” with theists hell-bent on saving our godless “souls”, I see it as more and more of a problem: and one that is actually rather multifaceted.

Show Title: The Stupid. It Burns

Who (tentative): Dawnne Gee (@Synthaetica), Paul Fidalgo (@PaulFidalgo), Kile Jones, Zach Garland (@Zachsmind)

When: 10pm EST, Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Where: BlogTalkRadio.com/Synthaetica

What: The Stupid. It Burns.

My previous posts on this subject:

How Sciolism Defeats Discourse
The Roots of Sciolism
Because Theocracy Leads to Permissive Extremism

I hope to gather some additional insight from other authors/bloggers prior to the show. If you’ve got something to say about the subject, please don’t be bashful! Use the comments below!

It’s the last Wednesday of the month, which means we’re holding a small contest for blog submissions on the topics noted below. Our panel will read (excerpts of) the entries aloud and discuss (no, not necessarily eviscerate if we don’t agree) them on the air in our Round Table format. We’ll choose up to three recent blog post from each of the following categories:

Submission Categories:

1. Atheism (note: this category is not open to Agnosticism)
2. (Secular) Humanism
3. Religion
4. Sociology
5. Philosophy

Minimum Requirements for Consideration:

1. Article is “recent” (within the past three months ~ exception might be made in deference to kick-ass authorship)
2. Article is comprised of at least 600 words
3. Article contents contain at least 75% unquoted content

Pretty simple, huh?

Authors of the selected articles will be asked to come on the show for a brief interview and to read and discuss their articles. Show participation is not mandatory. There is no monetary award for being chosen.

Submission Guidelines and Deadline:

1. Submit link(s) to blog post(s) in the comments below
2. Maximum of 5 links per contestant
3. Deadline is 10pm EST on the day before the show airs.
4. Selections will be announced by 10am EST on the show date via unenslaved.com and @Synthaetica (twitter).

Join us Wednesday, March 23, 2011 at 10pm EST for some unique and dynamic show content from great authors around the Internet!

On next Wednesday’s segment of Thinking Unenslaved, I’m holding a small contest for blog submissions on the topics noted below. Our panel will read the entries aloud and discuss (no, not necessarily eviscerate if we don’t agree) them on the air in our Round Table format. We’ll choose one (possibly two if it’s too close to decide) recent blog post from the following categories:

Submission Categories:

• Atheism (note: this category is not open to Agnosticism)
• (Secular) Humanism
• Religion
• Sociology
• Philosophy

Minimum Requirements for Consideration:

• Article is “recent” (December 1, 2010 or later ~ exception might be made in deference to kick-ass authorship)
• Article is comprised of at least 600 words
• Article contents contain at least 75% unquoted content

Pretty simple, huh? Authors of the blogs chosen will be asked to come on the show. Show participation is not mandatory. There is no monetary award for being chosen. Submission Guidelines and Deadline:

• Submit link(s) to blog post(s) in the comments on the Segment Website
• Maximum of 5 links per contestant
• Deadline Tuesday, February 22, 2011 at 10pm EST.
• Selections will be announced Wednesday, February 23, 2011 by 10am EST.

Join us Wednesday night for some unique and dynamic show content

Greetings, twitterholics, blogheads, twittervillains, and blogophiles!

O, was that redundant? O well….

On next Wednesday’s segment of Thinking Unenslaved, I’m holding a small contest for blog submissions on the topics noted below. Our panel will read the entries aloud and discuss (no, not necessarily eviscerate if we don’t agree) them on the air in our Round Table format. We’ll choose one (possibly two if it’s too close to decide) recent blog post from the following categories:

Submission Categories:

1. Atheism (note: this category is not open to Agnosticism)
2. (Secular) Humanism
3. Religion
4. Sociology
5. Philosophy

Minimum Requirements for Consideration:

1. Article is “recent” (December 1, 2010 or later ~ exception might be made in deference to kick-ass authorship)
2. Article is comprised of at least 600 words
3. Article contents contain at least 75% unquoted content

Pretty simple, huh?

Authors of the blogs chosen will be asked to come on the show. Show participation is not mandatory. There is no monetary award for being chosen.

Submission Guidelines and Deadline:

1. Submit link(s) to blog post(s) in the comments below
2. Maximum of 5 links per contestant
3. Deadline Tuesday, February 22, 2011 at 10pm EST.
4. Selections will be announced Wednesday, February 23, 2011 by 10am EST.

Last week, we concluded our discussion of Secular Humanism in Western Society. Unfortunately (and as is often the case), the discussion really got going just as the show was ending. Ryan (@NewYorkCreator) joined in with Zach, Paul and myself in a conversation that actually extended well past the end of the show.

So, at Ryan and Zach’s request, we’re going to have another Round Table this week, but a slightly different format. As many of us co-hosts as are available are going to dial in Wednesday night, along with Ryan (and hopefully @AntitheistAngie). We’re going to cover a lot of hot-button topics for between us, and may or may not take callers as time permits. I’m hoping that Zach, Ryan and I can somewhat replicate our post-show discussion from last week. It got pretty interesting.

Some things we’re planning on discussing include, but are in no way limited to:

• Anti-abortion politics
• Intelligent Design education
• Free speech versus verbal masturbation
• Draw Muhammad Day
• Atheist Morality

The last topic there is a segue to next week’s show. I’m setting up an interview with Martin Pribble in regards to a recent poll on about.com which he was leading until it got pharyngulated. The poll results are now meaningless, as they do not inherently reflect the about.com readership, nor do they necessarily accurately reflect the beliefs of those who take the poll as much as they reflect the ability of poll-takers to submit the voting form several times just to make PZ Myers look more popular than he really is. Don’t get me wrong, I have much respect for the man and even consider myself a fan of his. And while online polls are inherently flawed in concept, there’s no benefit for us to prey upon each other even in the most innocuous of forms.

Wednesday’s show will be another round table with Kile, Paul, Zach and myself. The general theme is Secularism in Western Society: I’m hopeful that we can … er … “faithfully” represent the European perspective and not make the mistake of equating “western society” with “the silly stuff we Americans do.”

Perhaps we’ll get lucky and have one of our European friends dial into the live show. I’ll be twitter-begging for participants throughout the next couple of days. Other topics we may also address include: the problem with religious-based public education, and relationships between theists and non-theists.

Please listen in for a lively discussion of pertinent topics this Wednesday night at 10pm EST. We’d love to take questions and comments from persons of alternative points of view, so don’t be bashful! Give as a call and join in the discussion!

Who: Dawnne Gee (@Synthaetica), Paul Fidalgo (@PaulFidalgo), Kile Jones, @Zachsmind

When: 10pm EST, Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Where: BlogTalkRadio.com/Synthaetica

What: Round Table: Theificationisms

See you there!

This week, I’ve planned a “solo” show, which is actually designed to elicit callers-in. Yeah, I’m sneaky like that! You’re stuck with me, in other words, but you’re not really just stuck with me. Luckily, though, thanks to the not-so-mysterious workings of my brain, my famously notorious co-hosts will probably be dialing in anyway. That’s because I’m focusing the show recent articles by some of my favorite bloggers, a couple of whom are, guess what….Paul and Kile!

As I set up the show, I have selected recent contributions from Paul Fidalgo ( http://bit.ly/fpRvbO ), Martin Pribble ( http://bit.ly/gGE4Va ), and Kile Jones ( http://gawd.us/hEl7Lx ). I’ve asked these contributors to dial in while I’m discussing their content. Martin may not be able to join us since he’s in Australia, though.

A good portion of the show will be a follow-up to the end of last week’s show, which we didn’t get enough time to spend on. I’m working on cleaning up the “management” portion of what I do, but in the mean-time, I felt the combined topics of Raising Hellions and Atheist Evangelism (under the general umbrella of Teaching Atheism) were worthy of more formative discussion. The articles I’ve selected play heavily into this topic.

Please join me at 10pm EST this Wednesday for a healthy discussion of these topics!

Ah, it’s good to be back! I apologize for the long hiatus, but I had to work my way through some things, most of which had to do with doing too much. In the week before the show, I’ll be frantically working on getting some things together (like a piece of intro music and some interstitial stuff that I’ve been threatening to do for the past fiscal quarter), but to be quite honest, the simple act of the getting the show scheduled for next Wednesday is a cathartic act in and of itself. I’m truly looking forward to it.

Wednesday is the day after the first Day of Ones for this eleventy-ish year (if you ignore the glaring “20″), which I suppose makes it fitting for a solo show with some very special guests. We’ll do some one-on-one conversations with persons whom I feel are influential in our world, taking on subject matter that is currently pertinent to the Atheist, Humanist, and Secularist communities. I’ll update this description with details when they’re solidified with my guests: I hope to have @Zachsmind, Paul Fidalgo, and Kile Jones with me, which, I suppose, means I should probably invite them!

Please note: “Thinking Unenslaved” is now an hour earlier: 10pm Eastern, and after a recent split vote on whether to continue on Wednesdays or switch to Sundays, I cast the tie-breaker and decided for Wednesdays. I pulled it back by an hour because I no longer dedicate Wednesday afternoons to my kids: we get to see each other frequently throughout the week, now.

from the show description: “It’s Father’s Day here in the United States, so tonight will be all about fathers and fatherhood. We’ll start off with our Founding Fathers and talk about the wonderful gift they gave us of a country established on principles which clearly distinguish religion and government. From there, we’ll talk about past and current church fathers and how they obfuscate the vision of the Founding Fathers. We’ll conclude with fatherhood/parenting issues for those of us who are atheists, agnostics, and/or secular humanists. “

HEAR THIS EPISODE ON BLOGTALKRADIO

Participate in the ThinkAtheist Radio Show Group.

Visit ThinkAtheist.com

listen to the most recent episode:

from the show description: “A bit of an open forum tonight. I have a few topics I’d like to discuss, and some plugs for the good works of a few of my friends.”

HEAR THIS EPISODE ON BLOGTALKRADIO

Participate in the ThinkAtheist Radio Show Group.

Visit ThinkAtheist.com

listen to the most recent episode:

from the show description: “It’s Wednesday again. The crazy meter has been leaning far to the right on Twitter of late, and it is now quite likely that the ecosystem of our entire planet has been irreversibly compromised as the byproduct of amoral, conservative politics. Lots to discuss, and I’ll be experimenting with a slightly revised format. We’ll see how it all goes starting at 11pm EDT.”

Participate in the ThinkAtheist Radio Show Group.

Visit ThinkAtheist.com

listen to the most recent episode:

from the show description: “We’ll continue the discussion from Wednesday about some of the crazy stuff going on. I also have a (potentially) interesting analogy regarding the Gulf of Mexico oil spill and the way people act in the public discourse. If some of the regulars come by (hint-hint, nudge-nudge, wink-wink, no what i mean?), we’ll hopefully put some plans behind upcoming episodes and other things. I owe ThinkAtheist.com a bit of a plug as well, so I’ll try to briefly walk us through some of the things going on at the site. After that, I’ll strive to also split other infinitives, like that one. As we discuss some of the religious/atheist interactions going on online, I’d REALLY like to have a caller or two to faithfully (pardon the pun) represent the religious side. Remember, we CAN work together to keep such interactions respectful and above-board. I’d like an honest, open discussion tonight, not a pissing match, please. I hope you’ll join us!”

LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE

Participate in the ThinkAtheist Radio Show Group.

Visit ThinkAtheist.com

the most recent episode:

from the show description: “Synthaetica is on a mission. Things will be said. I figure it this way: if the religious right
can ‘wage war’ on atheism, then atheists can come out fighting. ”

LISTEN TO THE SHOW

Participate in the ThinkAtheist Radio Show Group.

Visit ThinkAtheist.com

This player plays the most recent ThinkAtheist Radio Show Episode:

from the show intro: “Synthaetica is back after a a brief hiatus. Some hardware problems had to be tackled, along with some scheduling issues. Tonight, we’ll talk about the Texas Board of Education and the general dumbing-down of the American education system: something which should be of importance to us since it stems from fundamentalist religious roots. We’ll also cover some recent events, not the least of which is the creation of self-replicating synthetic cellular life, the Westboro Baptist picketing of the Dio funeral, and other “fun stuff”. We look forward to your participation and have high hopes for some diverse participation tonight. The education issue alone should be of grave interest to persons of all (non)religious persuasion. I’ll explain why tonight.”

LISTEN TO THE SHOW

Please visit ThinkAtheist.com and if you’re not a member, join our growing community of free thinkers, movers and shakers.

The player below produces the most recent episode:

Yes, “unenslaved” is a metaphor.

I have no delusions, illusions, or conclusions that the type of “slavery” I refer to when using this metaphor in any remote way correlates to the various forms of tribal, racial, and societal forms of slavery which have been committed upon people throughout humanity’s inglorious history. By using the word “unenslaved”, my intention is not to demean anyone who is, or has ever been, subjected to the crime we commonly refer to as slavery.

That having been said, I want to apologize for the dearth of posts over the past nine days. for what it’s worth, I was in the hospital with pneumonia from June 11-15, and sick for several days before that. It was the first time—ever—that I have been brought so low, and that’s including being quite sickly as a toddler, shot in combat in Panama, and having sustained back injuries during Desert Storm, along with the relatively typical respiratory issues from the same. At 42 years of age, I’m still young enough to be grossly opposed to feeling helpless. It was not a fun week, and I’m still not at 100% yet.

Now, why my guest bloggers didn’t do anything, I can’t tell you. Lazy bums they are, off with their own domains and such! Bums, I tell you! BUMS!

Anyway, let me take a moment hear to explain what this site is REALLY about.

When I started unenslaved.com, the thoughts in my head revolved around many subjects, ranging from a simple celebration of not being bound by traditionalism, religion, and other forms of social oppression through to wanting to be a resource for people who are in the process of freeing themselves from the various forms of institutionalized social repression (which includes some forms of education, religion and sociological circumstances). Ultimately, I think I’ve settled on the former, with a willingness to help those who want it, in terms of the latter. As well, if something I manage to bust out happens to pique someone’s interest to the point that they begin to at least toy with changing the way they think, then I would be a happy man indeed. This is also why I’ve invited others to post here: more opportunities to get more neurons firing, after all.

You should be aware that I, and my guest-bloggers (at least I believe I can safely speak for them on this level), are all smart-asses, but we are are passionate about the things we have come to know as true. For myself, as a “de-convert” of original Christian upbringing, I often have a difficult time not belittling those whose thinking is woefully clouded by delusion, because my de-conversion was a function of my personal maturation process. While I have every intention of continuing my patented smartassery, I also intend to improve upon not talking like a smarmy asshat, or even internally believing that I’m “better” than someone else who lives under the veil of delusion. I doubt I’ll be perfect at it, but I’ll honestly try.

Anything else, after all, would be me imposing a particularly insidious form of mental slavery on myself: a belief that I am “better” simply because I corrected an error. Such things don’t truly make anyone better, they just make one less gullible. Just as many bad things can happen by virtue of one’s transfixed skepticism as by virtue of one’s gullibility, after all.

So here’s the challenge: I hope that those of us that blog here will continually challenge ourselves and each other to be true to the premise above: We are not inherently better than anyone else. Now, we might be better at some things than certain other people: things like critical thinking, analysis, etc. But we’re not inherently better, or more superior at least I don’t believe we necessarily are. Let us educate without belittlement, and let us communicate without condescension. I realize this is no easy task. The easy stuff isn’t really worth doing, though.

The challenge for those who come here to read these things is to at the very least attempt to be non-judgmental. You are neither expected to nor desired to agree with everything we put out to be read. You are certainly not expected to think like we do, believe what we believe, or frankly to be as self-reliant as we are.

Some are going to read that as a sidelong put-down, but that’s not the intent of that statement. Most people who believe in a deity are actually not quite as self-reliant as they tend to envision themselves. This is precisely where communications tend to get bogged down. The only thing I ask is that we make honest attempts to communicate as opposed to simply vociferating, pontificating, and jumping feet-first into the ad-hominem grab-bag of oneupmanship.

Thanks for your time.

(the following is a re-post from the otherwhirled. i felt like being snarky this morning.)

photo credit: Holyland Imports/ny

Are you tired of wearing the same old thing to church on Sunday mornings? Frustrated by losing your headscarf in strong winds? Wish you could have more dramatic effect when berating your children for not living up to your arbitrary, self-contradictory standards?

HolyShit! Technologies. Your #1 supplier of JESUS CRAP™ nation-wide! We make the stuff that makes the rest of the world nervous!

~~~~

one of my favorite groups when i was a younger lad was Echo & the Bunnymen. at least until they went and got all religious about life. back in 1984, on the album, “Ocean Rain”, they produced a song called “Thorn of Crowns”, hence the title of this post. yes, i do know the two things are distinctly different. nevertheless, i include a video version of the song below, because the one reminded me of the other. my favorite line is the opening:

You set my teeth on edge
You set my teeth on edge
You think you’re a vegetable
Never come out of the fridge

greetings.

i am Synthaetica. i have blogged in many places, under at least a few names, to the point where i felt enslaved by the practice of blogging. my participation in such places was sporadic at best, and those places largely just served to piss me off about how much i didn’t get done.

as well, the reason why i tended to fail at those endeavors was because their focus was never quite solidified. sure, i love photography, but not with the same frenzied passion that so many do, so i’d wander off on other tangents. and i also love being a smartass, but at 40-something the constant acerbity sets my own teeth on edge. not to mention that the one-trick-pony approach was pretty lame when the trick was essentially photo-caption snark. well before the last elections, i managed to burn myself out on that.

so from the outset, this site is something a little different. you’ll find that my being a smartass is a little difficult to avoid, but it won’t consume what i do here. the intent of this site is to address my true passions, which are, summarily:

• working against the establishment, especially the indirect enforcement of supporting legislation, of a theocratic state
• fighting against all forms of religious involvement, entanglement, and decision-making in the realm of public education
• offering insight to those people who want to receive it, regarding the process of disassociating oneself from delusional thinking in terms of religious beliefs, spirituality, and emotional dependency.

so, that’s what this is about. this takes up from where i only briefly touched upon in the written form, on a few occasions, at the otherwhirled. i hope you enjoy it as much as i believe i will.

I believe it is relatively clear that our European allies, especially Great Britain, live in more secular societies than we do here in America. Especially where Great Britain is concerned, there’s a significant amount of irony involved in such progressivism: our founding families fled such places because of religious oppression at great personal risk, and a couple of hundred years later elements of our own government desire a steadfast adherence to religious edicts, and already have systems in place by which non-Christian business and organizations are disallowed participation in certain government-sanctioned areas of business. It’s ironic, and of course from my perspective, it’s considerably depressing. I believe the story of the American Revolution—pretty much all the stories of the American Revolution, in fact—is a grand tale of personal commitment, courage in the face of imminent threat, and indeed, the fundamental precepts of honor, perseverance, and integrity.

Of those, it is integrity which bothers me in this seemingly continual struggle for religious domination of our government. For the desire for religious domination is promoted as Americanism when it is, in fact, one of the most extreme of un-American acts that can be perpetrated on the populace outside of mass murder. The lack of self-integrity that it constitutes is also troubling for me, because the individuals who promote the redefinition of America as a “Christian Nation” are those who set themselves as examples of good behavior to the rest of us. Setting aside the fact that dogmatic belief in biblical stories is a nefarious form of delusion (and self-delusion, to boot), they cherry-pick their own religious doctrine in the attempt to make their desires real.

I once considered running for a local political office. After two days of discussions with local Party officials, I was finally contacted by the State Democratic Party and told in no uncertain terms that they would not support me as long as I refused to attend church. In other words, unless I was willing to violate my sense of self-integrity, I wasn’t a solid enough candidate in their minds to support. I lacked the personal funds (and the time, to be honest), to aggressively compete against the individual who sponsored the anti-abortion legislation that was so controversial on the national circuit (South Dakota’s Proposition 6), and even though the state party abhorred both the policy and the man, they simply weren’t willing to fight him from the opposite religious extreme. And as an already-established dynamic member of my community, heaven forbid that I would have brought some logic, critical thinking, and personal insight to the matter (the personal insight being that I was adopted and had a child placed for adoption and was in contact with my daughter from a previous relationship, whom i didn’t get to raise).

While I found this personally offensive, the concept wasn’t hard to understand. Even a cursory view of politics today shows how intrinsically it is tied to religion. Political candidates take great pride, it seems, in opportunities to speak at churches, and are generally careful to show themselves as supposedly-honorable members of their religious communities. Beyond that, in many locations, voting is done at the local church, although I don’t protest this too much, for in many small communities, the local church also serves as the community center, and hosting elections there is a more than just a matter of convenience or even preference. And yet, as a self-proclaimed agnostic atheist (I don’t view atheism as a religion, in other words, nor do “practice” atheism dogmatically), one of the things that I wish candidates wouldn’t do is pander to this presumed need. There are, after all, over 30,000 separate Christian denominations in the world. Pandering to one offends another, and I think, shows a that a supposed leader is incapable to effectively lead, resorting instead to the appearance of conformance to a relative minority of the voting public.

If candidates approached this issue logically, I don’t think they’d stoop to the church-hosted photo-ops. To the critical-thinking crowd (many of whom, in certain terms, actually exist in the religious crowd, too), the demonstration of a limited world-view, a relatively intolerant mindset, and a dependency on rote superstition should be quite unattractive. As well, the explicit deference to a minority (and active, participating Christians ARE a minority in this country) should be no more acceptable to the logical mind than the undue influence by any other political lobby. And the critical-thinking crowd shouldn’t be afraid to ask pointed questions to their candidates. Why should we allow such candidates to lead us? Why must we invest our own forms of faith in the good behavior and ethical conduct of those who show, time and time again, the willingness to defer to delusional thinking? Should we ever have to define the “best” candidate in terms of the admirable qualities that they lack? In many ways, those are unfortunately rhetorical questions. The status quo, after all, is a difficult thing to circumvent, let alone redefine. But I fear that if we do not manage to do some day, that even under progressive or liberal control, we will find ourselves living in a Christian State, rife with intolerance and dedicated on converting the world. And when that day comes, we will have no one to blame but ourselves.

And to bring this back to the title, the real problem with this is basically just visual. On the left side of the political aisle, you know these aren’t the types of people hell-bent on changing the Constitution to make this a Christian Nation, or even personally dedicated to “saving” all the people of the world. But as such, the very appearance of their deference to these ideals, the very appearance that they take the teachings of their religions seriously, creates a logical disconnect from which it is almost impossible for the likes of me to step aside. I respect and even admire their personal faith, but the mere appearance of a need to even make religion an issue in today’s world is simply silly to me. Even when I was a steadfast, devout conservative Christian (yes, I was, once upon a time), I still had many questions and problems voting for candidates whom I didn’t think I could trust to uphold our rights and protect our freedoms simply on the basis of our citizenship, which is exactly how it’s supposed to be.

Technorati Tags:
1. blog against theocracy
2. anti-theocracy
3. religious hegemony
4. separation of church and state

cross-posted to Mock, Paper, Scissors under my other pseudonym, “commander other”. coming up next: Easter celebrations in the otherwhirled!

Look, this is a real simple thing. The country was founded by mostly-Christian individuals who were possessed of the foresight, maturity, and wherewithal to understand that the edicts of the religions and religious denominations had no place with an operable role in government. In fact, they made incredible sacrifices to distance themselves from their European church-states. In fact, they made great sacrifices, including their livelihoods, the lives of their family members, and in many cases their own lives, to ensure the separation of Church and State. The Mike Huckabees in the world that want to interject specifically religious dogma into the the Constitution have it exactly wrong, and every time they spout those desires, they prove that their eclectic version of America is not what America was founded to be, or has ever been. It’s not the America that our soldiers have fought and died to preserve. And it’s not an America that would have any hope of participating in a future in which the human race survives.

The Blogswarm Against Theocracy starts today and ends this Sunday. I will be attempting to have unique posts on these four blogs:

1. the otherwhirled
2. perpetual dawnne
3. synthaetica
4. mock, paper, scissors (thanks, Tengrain!)

{this opening post has been cross-posted to my three blogs as a way of saying “yes, i’m here, and no, i’m not going to let the bizarre mortgage triangle we currently living under adversely affect my ability to post this weekend!}

Subscribe to the Blogswarm’s official feed here:

Technorati Tags:
1. blog against theocracy
2. anti-theocracy
3. religious hegemony
4. separation of church and state

…why i am disdainful of organized religion.

when the organizations basically only exist for reaping profits despite their non-profit registrations—and when a duplicitous jackass like Benny Hinnpecker attempts to do so off the goodwill of the people of one of the most impoverished nations on the planet—that acrid, bitter taste in my mouth probably isn’t “joy”.

via Crooks & Liars….

above: but one of the faces of True Evil^®.

the first-hand account:

My only thought is that if Mr. Hinn takes so much a single Ugandan schilling [sic] from the desperately poor and sick people longing, begging, for a miracle it will make him a spiritual predator, a spiritual terrorist.

photo credit: Brooks Kraft / Time

“Okay, ladies. After these photos, let’s head back to my hotel and get it on! All except that one lady with the beard, anyway!

Oh! Damn, that’s great! You bring along some o’ them little altar boys for the VeePee, then! Helluva deal!”

i really, honestly, hate how these guys pander to Graham and the rest of the holy rollers. bah! humbug!