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One of my favourite youtubers is theramin trees, his videos are always coolly narrated and punctuated with slick visual animations that always manage to highlight how incredibly toxic religion is. He recalls how his questions got him in trouble… and the terror of growing up as curious child. So many alarm bells with this video – the stunting of critical thinking, the mental abuse and the emotional blackmail all in the name of believing in magic.
A short film that uses repetition to make a very good point. :)
“This is touted as a compelling reason Christianity is believable, but I find it sorely lacking. People convert, even antagonistic people. It happens all the time. Some people even call them traitors. Such conversions prove nothing. It’s even a Hollywood trope, yet notice how none of the plots of those movies felt the need to invoke the supernatural to explain the protagonist’s change.”
On a more cinematic note I think the above trope is one of the reasons why I found the latest Mad Max movie so refreshing – a complete lack of a dude centric plot. It was a nice change of pace not having to watch drama unfold through the bog-standard white male perspective.
There is no morality to be found in religions and their scriptures. It is a human being who interprets the words and it is human being that makes the decision to x or y – no religious magic involved. So what is happening in Palmyra with ISIS is a testament to how religion enables truly shitty human behaviour.
“ISIS militants have blown up two ancient tombs they consider sacrilegious in Palmyra, a 2,000-year-old UNESCO World Heritage site in central Syria, the ultra hardline Sunni Muslim group said on Tuesday.
The report was the first of any damage being done by the militants to buildings in Palmyra since they seized control of the city, also known as Tadmur, in May. Syrian forces have bombed the city, and the militants camped within it, since then.”
Destroying world history because someone interpreted the tombs to be sacrilegious. This is some zany shit we are dealing with here – the lesson here is quite clear, and quite obvious: When the religious are in charge all bets are off and nothing is safe, not even history from the perverse ideals of radical religious thought.
Boiling down all the hoo-haa we can see that, at least in the case of ISIS, the religious piece is there for the sole reason of keeping people in line and most definitely not thinking for themselves. What reason can be supplied for destroying tombs that isn’t irrational?
Of course, destroying archaeological, is small potatoes in comparison with the recent acts of violence in France and Tunisia. How much more evidence is required before the West will decisively act and put an end to ISIS and their extremism?
I should have known! Sometimes I just bite off more than I can chew. It’s that damned hope…but I’m getting ahead of myself.
For those of you still unaware, John Zande has just put out a new book. Further, in an unimaginable act of generosity, he has been gracious enough to share some of the basic groundwork concerning his case for an omnimalevolent creator in a few recent posts over at The Superstitious Naked Ape. Briefly, all the suffering in the universe points to a creator that is all knowing, all powerful, and all malevolent. It is a surprisingly polished theology, surpassing all others before it in terms coherency and elegance.
Reading through these delicious teaser-trailer posts, an idea arose that I may have uncovered a fatal flaw in Zande’s otherwise brilliant reasoning. It came to me while I was reading through his latest post, “Before there was Light: A Functional Proof for the Omnimalevolent Creator“. Even before I finished reading the post, I had named this flaw ‘The Problem of Good’. I even had clear cut example to demonstrate it: Me. Read the rest of this entry »
Almost all of us have had one. You race away from what you happen to be doing we the grand expectation of someone you know coming to pay you a visit for a coffee or whatever. But no, it isn’t like that at all. It is a stranger and their goal is to test your politeness and patience while they ramble on about trying to save your soul and getting to know Jebus and all that hullabaloo.
Another unhappy feature of this is that these proselytizers are usually so damned nice about the whole thing. So despite the fact you happen to be imagining opening one of your own veins and spraying them with your blood while commanding your high-lord Beelzebub to rain hell fire down them, instead one tends to smile back and politely nod and just wish that they would go away.
I find the door knocking proselytizers to be such a troublesome situation to deal with appropriately. Of course inappropriate responses cost more socially speaking, but seem to be a touch more satisfying.
I’ve always gone the polite route, but does anyone else have some slam dunk suggestions for dealing with situations like these? I’d like to increase the size of my bag of tricks, so to speak.
Religion and patriarchal bullshite usually go hand in hand. The Quiverfull movement proudly leads this toxic parade of misogyny, combining the worst of religion and misogyny all into one neat corrosive package.
Witness how much grievous stupidity can be gleaned from just one biblical verse:
“Children are a blessing and gift from the Lord.
Having a lot of children to take care of you in your old age is like a warrior with a lot of arrows.
Psalm 127:3-4″
Let the fun begin…
It appears TLC is quite aware on which side its toast is buttered. Look what they were airing a couple weeks before the Duggar scandal broke:
Feminists beware: the new TLC special “Submissive Wives’ Guide To Marriage” is sure to stir a hot debate by showing marriages in which the woman caters to her husband’s every need and allows him to be the king of the castle.
And that means he gets plenty of sex, too—even when she’s not in the mood.
sigh… anybody remember when it was The Learning Channel, and showed actual educational programming?
bleatmop
Mystro
Dead Wild Roses 
Your opinions…