While I was on vacation, I had made arrangements to have someone blogsit for me but that didn’t pan out due to personal issues. I did receive some interesting guest blogs from other people though while I was absent. Today I present an article entitled “Why Do I Have To Call Myself An Atheist?” by Brother Echo of DegreesofEmotion. It is an interesting way to think about the way labels are applied to us as soon as we declare ourselves atheists, or any other religious affiliation.

I’ve been a Muslim, a Christian,a half-assed Buddhist and an Atheist and from my own experience and looking at things as they are they are all playing the same game.

Subscribing to any label be it Atheist or Christian is really… dangerous and quite frankly rather pompous.

The idea that one takes a stance saying there is a god or not is beyond me.

Nobody knows, nobody will ever know until you die. For me I subscribe to NO LABEL, no Atheist, no Gnostic, no Buddhist… NOTHING.

If someone asks me I tell them I DON’T KNOW… and that is the truth.

The typical argument Atheist bring up with I talk about this subject is well by definition I AM AN ATHEIST… well no you’re not. You don’t have to subscribe to anything… if someone else wants to define you as an Atheist so be it but YOU don’t have to. The moment you say I’m an Atheist you’re drawing a line in the sand, you’re taking a stance, you’re waving a flag and from that point on it’s US and THEM.

This world needs more LOVE not US and THEM. I hope you have an open heart and mind and simply go deep with this topic I think you’ll find you don’t have to be an Atheist… you might as well be a Christian if you’re going to play that game at least you’d get to get go to heaven then…

Peace, Love, Unity and much Respect.

Namaste,

-Brother Echo

P.S.-I am hosting the Carnival of the Godless tomorrow, come check it out!

I discovered this the other day when looking for ocarina tabs(I ordered one the other day and I am quite excited to start playing.). The lyrics are just sung in place of the regular lines of Amazing Grace. I think they are worth memorizing and substituting them in whenever possible. What do you think, is it too much to desecrate such a deep and beloved song?

“Let Go Of Faith”

Let go of ‘faith’
It’s truth we need.
And ‘faith’ steps in the way.

From birth to grave
We must seek truth
Or live as haunted slaves.

If you claim you know
You don’t learn more
There is always more to know

As we live and love
And work for peace
Seeking truth is how we grow.

I was Stumbling the internet today and ran into a site that generates poster sized, multi-page images from any image. I then recalled an atheist poster I once saw, but didn’t buy due to lack of funds. The poster resides over at CommonSenseAtheism and is still for sale as far as I know. What makes it so special? It contains a massive list of Gods most people no long believe in. (I wonder what happens to Gods that are no longer believed in…, but that’s another post.)

Awesome. Considering I still lack the money to purchase this, I am going to give the site a try in the next few days. If you can, consider buying it though. All profits go to a god cause, Kiva.

Edit:

It is turning out to be a major pain in the ass to convert it to a size that can even be uploaded, so I’m just not going to do it. Although my birthday is coming up on the 14th…

This is one of MANY things that just makes me angry. I always overhear things like “Oh we are rasing her Christian”, “this is a Jewish child”. Absolutely bullshit. How the fuck can you decide what a young child is going to think? It just isn’t right. I’m not saying that “atheist child” is alright either. I abhor all forms of indoctrination. Religious/spiritual beliefs aren’t something most people decide lightly and everybody should have a choice. Ideally, I would have children raised Agnostic and when they are old enough let them decide for themselves. Then again, one of the Church’s last weapons is the indoctrination of young children. Religion can act as a bleach that destroys the faculties of logic and reason before they are even developed. Luckily I wasn’t forced to believe anything by my parents. I came to all the conclusions I hold true by myself. It’s only natural for a child to believe all that an adult says, except with Jesus children are never told its make believe like Santa or the Tooth Fairy.

The advertisement put out by the Humanists recently, sums up what exactly what I think. I’d love to see that graphic on some buses in my city.

Recently North Carolina has been in a big debacle over their recent election of an atheist to a public office. It turns out, there are SIX OTHER states which prohibit atheists from holding office. WTF. Most of them are in the South. The states are: Texas, Arkansas, Mississippi, South Carolina, Tennessee and Maryland.These laws are outdated and illegal. Our United States Constitution overrules any of these state’s religious requirements. For more information, watch this video I found.

At least we have atheists getting elected though. It’s a positive step towards a less biased and more accepting future.

According to the WashingtonPost, a newly elected atheist councilman’s political opponents are already campaigning to have him removed from office. Their reasoning is that he is an evil, godless commie of course. The problem is North Carolina’s Constitution is on the side of the opposition.

Article 6, section 8 of the state constitution says: “The following persons shall be disqualified for office: First, any person who shall deny the being of Almighty God.”

Sure the United States Constitution will back up the councilman, but there will be a fight through the court system wasting both time and money.

“The question of whether or not God exists is not particularly interesting to me and it’s certainly not relevant to public office,” the recently elected 59-year-old said.

Isn’t that the truth. Who gives a fuck? Just because somebody doesn’t have faith in your God does not make them incompetent. I wouldn’t vote for somebody just because they are an atheist, that is just stupid. His heinous act was being sworn in without his hand on the Bible. Oooohhhhh. I’m sure he can’t be a good leader. Bullshit.

Imagine if a state had the requirement that all who ran must be Catholics. Wouldn’t that be a foolish requirement and one that is against the very idea of American democracy? This seems to be a similar situation to that. What would be so wrong with an atheist councilman? I imagine the other side is pissed that they lost. Now they are making a feeble attempt to reverse it by grasping at straws.

“I mean there are state laws against spitting in the street,” he said. “Why spend the time?”

But the battle is important to Silverman, who says there are scores of other atheist politicians afraid to “come out of the closet.” He cited U.S. Rep. Pete Stark of California, the first and only congressman to publicly acknowledge he doesn’t believe in God.

“We’re trying to change our culture to the point where it’s not political suicide,” Silverman said.

This little excerpt is exactly what I agree with. In America it is practically political suicide to deny God. Stupid shit like the law in North Carolina make this even more difficult. Plain and simply, it violates our Constitution. I see absolutely no chance of them removing him from office with this attempt. A lawsuit will simply find this is a discriminatory law and it will get removed from the books. Doesn’t stupidity like this piss you off?

Asshat O’Reilly is at it again. His newest article “Have Yourself a Godless Little Christmas” accuses atheists and humanists of simply being jealous of the joy of the season.

Why spend money at Christmas time to spread dubious will among men? The reason, I believe, is that the atheists are jealous of the Yuletide season. While Christians have Jesus and Jews have the prophets, non-believers have Bill Maher. There are no atheist Christmas carols, no pagan displays of largesse like Santa Claus. In fact, for the non-believer, Christmas is just a day off, a time to consider that Mardi Gras is less than two months away.

What? Christmas day is not simply a day where I sit on my ass waiting for Mardi Gras. I spend it with my family exchanging gifts and generally just enjoying the day. Yes it is called CHRISTmas, but it does not bother me. Obviously the whole religious aspect is something I do not participate in.

Worse, his article says that not only are we taking the Christ out of Christmas, but we are destroying the joyful and happy aspect of it as well. How? By telling people to be good without god.

But there is a serious side to this, and the American “humanists” should listen up. Christmas is a joyous time for children; that’s the big upside of celebrating the birth of Jesus. Why, then, do people who want to “be good” spend money denigrating a beautiful day? Could it be that the humanists are not really interested in good at all? Maybe.

I’m confused as to how we are “denigrating a beautiful day”. Especially since the general message is to be a good person without fear of God. It makes me think of an Einstein quote. “If people are good only because they fear punishment, and hope for reward, then we are a sorry lot indeed.” How is this a message of evil?

The head humanist guy, Roy Speckhardt, says the anti-God signs are worthy because they send a message that atheists shouldn’t be vilified as immoral. Well, old Roy needs to wise up. The signs actually create resentment and hostility toward atheists.

Once again he tries to compare different things. The messages are against the stigma that atheists are immoral. True they will probably provoke some controversy between people, but I don’t see how it would make us seem MORE immoral. The general, blanket descriptions continue.

What many non-believers enjoy doing is mocking those who embrace theology. I guess that makes some atheists feel better, because there is no other reason to run down Christmas. It is a happy day for most human beings.

What? Personally I do NOT get my kicks from putting down theists. Sure, it happens but this is not something I do just for the sake of being evil. It seems like he is trying to bring up that old argument that belief deserves an extreme amount of respect. Christmas IS a happy day for me…

I wouldn’t be surprised if he switches to the other groups who protest Christmas based on how materialistic it is. Never mind, I’m sure they are simply evil atheists. Only an atheist would like to run down Christmas, it is clearly the only real and important holiday tradition. What an asshole.

Yesterday I was using StumbleUpon and I found an incredible site. The site is: TheArrogantAtheist.com. Basically they sell atheist attire. Look at some of the shirts:

“A lie is a lie even if everyone believes it. The truth is the truth even if nobody believes it.”

What would Nessie Do?

The text has the Betrand Russel quote that starts off “I believe that when I die…”

The Jesus Fish meets its match, the barbecue.

Pretty cool stuff if you ask me. And they also have bandannas, pins, and hats. One thing I really liked was they sell feet to put on your Jesus Fish. Could be a fun present to give to a theist friend. They also sell the barbecue image printed on an apron. If you are looking for some sweet atheist gear I would highly suggest taking a look. You will probably be able to find atleast something you like.

Apparently the School Board in Indianapolis has forgotten that the Constitution applies to them. The FFRF has sent a letter to them in complaint of this. And of course here comes the kicker, you can still visit Christian sites.

This policy does not prohibit or even mention religious views such as Christianity. A website like FFRF.org, which educates on freethought and nontheism, would, however, be blocked under this policy. This promotes religion over nonreligion, which is forbidden under the Establishment Clause.

Christianity is obviously the religion of the good, faithful, conservative American. Those evil atheists are unacceptable though. It does block other various sites though. According to the policy, atheistic views, Satanism, Witchcraft, spells and the like all fit into this category. Although as long as you direct your spells to Jesus and call them prayers, it is a OK. I see another flaw in this too. Wouldn’t Christianity be a form of mysticism? Google gave me this definition: “a religion based on mystical communion with an ultimate reality”. I’ll assume you can probably still visit the Methodist Church’s homepage though. For another kick in the crotch, they have also banned all LGBT sites. Hopefully this will be resolved without a trial, but if it goes that far the school will most likely lose. It is a pretty clear violation of the Establishment clause and of freedom of speech. Ridiculous.