Will Bigotry Never Cease?

Here's a little gem I found over at Townhall.com today. I encourage you as always to check it out for yourself:

Americans Are Right To Resist An Atheist As President
By Michael Medved

To start with, what a wonderfully smug title. I propose a little thought experiment to reveal the true nature of this new attempt to paint fascism in the colors of civility. Let us take all the references to "atheists" and change them to "black". And let us change all the references to other religions to that of race. If it helps just imagine that this editorial was published about 50 years ago. Let us do this and see what it makes you feel like. Then you will see just how slimy Medved is. My alterations will be in red ink. My comments are in italics.

Let's start with the title, "Americans Are Right to Resist a Black President".

"Despite the recent spate of major bestsellers touting the virtues of blacks, polls show consistent, stubborn reluctance on the part of the public to cast their votes for a presidential candidate who is of black heritage."

...

"Of course, some civil rights activists respond to this state of affairs by decrying the American people as backward and benighted, while dismissing our politicians as hypocritical, falsely egalitarian blowhards. These activists point to the huge popularity of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X among others as evidence that the public resistance to racial equality and black candidates may be overstated."

...

"Actually, there’s little chance that blacks will succeed in placing one of their own in the White House at any time in the foreseeable future, and it continues to make powerful sense for voters to shun potential presidents who deny the superiority of the white race. A black may be a good person, a good politician, a good family man (or woman), and even a good patriot, but a black as president would, for three reasons, be bad for the country.

Hollowness and Hypocrisy at State Occasions. As Constitutional scholars all point out, the Presidency uniquely combines the two functions of head of government (like the British Prime Minister) and head of state (like the Queen of England). POTUS not only appoints cabinet members and shapes foreign policy and delivers addresses to Congress, but also presides over solemn and ceremonial occasions. Just as the Queen plays a formal role as head of the Church of England, the President functions as head of the “Church of America” – that informal, tolerant but profoundly important civic religion that dominates all our national holidays and historic milestones. For instance, try to imagine a black president issuing the annual Thanksgiving proclamation. To whom would he extend thanks in the name of his grateful nation –-the slave traders who enslaved his forefathers?"

...

"Skeptics may suggest that a black president would give the nation the long-overdue chance to purge itself of these inappropriate racist trappings in our governmental and public processes, but truly overwhelming majorities cherish such traditions. The notion of dropping segregation to avoid discomfort for a single individual amounts to a formula for a disastrously unpopular presidency."

I could go on, but seriously, why bother with this nonsense? And truthfully the task of rephrasing this malice in terms of race makes me uncomfortable. But the point is obvious isn't it?　The so-called defenders of religious freedom are once again trying to make the cloak of free-speech into a cloak of invulnerability where they can spit malice with impunity and everyone can be expected to jump on the band wagon saying, "Well, of course he has a point..."

Shut this fascist down! Not with violence and not with law. Don't ban him, or cut him out of the spotlight. Instead push him into the merciless light of full attention. Comment, blog, e-mail, respond, protest. Get his name and this vicious attack out into the open. Evil only breeds when it has shadows to hide in.

Sam Harris Strikes Again

I disagree with Sam's views on torture and on some ethical points, but his representation of Islam is spot on. And I can say this having come from an American-Islamic background.
Check it out:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sam-harris/losing-our-spines-to-save_b_100132.html

Another Cool Video

I know I'm throwing a lot of videos up today, but I can't resist just this one more. It's pretty funny so check it out:

An Interesting Video about Atheism

Not much else to say. I saw this and liked it. Just thought maybe some of you would too.
Check it out:

The Cult of God and Ethical Racism

This video made me furious. And the reason isn't because an atheist was discriminated against. What enraged me was that the community was so complicitous that they bound together to cover over any investigation into the charges made. How can you investigate discrimination when the investigators are all bigots? If the reason for my candor here seems unclear, I challenge you to do a little thought experiment. Just imagine that instead of Oklahoma, this story was set in Alabama, and that instead of being excluded for being an atheist, she was being excluded for being black. Then, you would see how horribly unbalanced, how viciously skewed that system is. Religion leads to bigotry and those bigots need to be exposed for the vicious scum that they are. Do Nazis have the right to hate Jews and black people, of course they do. Do they have the right to preach that hatred in the schools and from official office? Hell, no!

Religion leads to cult-thinking. The group amasses and is confident in their moral superiority for no other reason than that god tells them so. Defending their "morality" is a matter of course. Anyone who does wickedness for god is forgiven because doing for god must be noble, mustn't it? It's disgusting. And it underscores how insidious the religious contamination of our infrastructure has become. We need to kick god out of school and out of government. If you live in Oklahoma, write your representatives and senators in Congress. Write the school board of Hardesty, Oklahoma. Challenge any such decisions in your own community. Challenge creationism. Challenge intelligent design. Challenge Islam, Judaism, and Christianity. And speak up! Don't let their propaganda poison the world unanswered any longer. Your voices will help form the future. Get out there and fight! Run for office if you can. At least vote for reason if you can't.

Don't humor the madness thinking that well, the person spouting improbabilities is basically a "decent" person. If they had the opportunity and the influence they would have us all committed to that same madness. Wherever people of faith hold sway they create places like Hardesty or Saudi Arabia or Nazi Germany or Stalinist Russia (if you include religious-like faith in society as a god). A society based on reason is a free society. A society based on god is totalitarian by definition. Why? Well, the only writer I've ever seen suggest a "Republic of Heaven" is Philip Pullman author of The Golden Compass, but he doesn't believe in god now does he? No, for all intensive purposes, the "army of the faithful" fights for the "Kingdom of Heaven". Well, we have no need of kings in America. Don't let them trick you into apathy or inaction. What religion represents in unabashed evil. And the horror is that it is an evil that smiles and promises you pretty things while asking you to sacrifice your soul and your mind to an impenetrable fog of fantasy and faith.

Don't be fooled! And don't give up! What we need now more than ever are rational leaders, men and women who will stand up to the challenges posed by wide-scale religious indoctrination in our communities and fight to keep those powers in check. Apathy will only hasten their victory. Action, even just at arm's reach, may be enough to tip the scales the other way. Don't let us be sucked into another dark age without a fight. We can't afford to risk the passive loss of all we have gained for reason in the last several centuries simply out of a misguided dedication to the tolerance of bad ideas. Anyways, check it out for yourselves. I hope it angers you as much as it did me. Thank you, Nicole for not giving in. You're an inspiration to us all.



And here is some info that could be useful for raising a fuss:

Hardesty School Board

P.O. Box 129
Hardesty, OK 73944
Texas County

PH: (580) 888-4258

District 3 Congressional Representative Frank Lucas


Senator Jim Inhofe (website was unreadable when I tried)

DC Office:
453 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510-3603

Phone: 202-224-4721
Fax: 202-228-0380
Web Email
Website

District Office - Enid:
302 North Independence, Suite 104
Enid, OK 73701
Phone: 580-234-5105
Fax: 580-234-5094

District Office - McAlester:
215 East Choctaw, Suite 106
McAlester, OK 74501
Phone: 918-426-0933
Fax: 918-426-0935

District Office - Oklahoma City:
1900 Northwest Expressway, Suite 1210
Oklahoma City, OK 73118
Phone: 405-608-4381
Fax: 405-608-4120

District Office - Tulsa:
1924 South Utica Avenue, Suite 530
Tulsa, OK 74104-6511
Phone: 918-748-5111
Fax: 918-748-5119



Senator Tom Coburn

DC Office:

172 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510-3603
Phone: 202-224-5754
Fax: 202-224-6008
Web Email
Website

District Office- Lawton:
711 Southwest D Avenue, Suite 202
Lawton, OK 73501
Phone: 580-357-9878
Fax: 580-355-3560

District Office- Oklahoma City:
2250 West Modelle Street, Suite C
Oklahoma City, OK 73102
Phone: 405-231-4941
Fax: 405-231-5051

District Office- Tulsa:
3310 Mid-Continent Tower
401 South Boston
Tulsa, OK 74103
Phone: 918-581-7651
Fax: 918-581-7195

An Index of Creationist Claims and their Counter-arguments

I just wanted to bring this link to your attention. It's a wonderfully useful site set up by Mark Isaak, which lists creationist arguments by category. When you click on them, you can see all the flaws and counter-arguments. It's really user friendly and the arguments are impeccable. I highly recommend it.

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/list.html

Al-Qaeda laughs as Yemen government appeases terrorists

Yep, the Yemen government has yet again demonstrated its unwillingness to cooperate in bringing the architects of the USS Cole bombing to justice. For the full story follow this link:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24449741/

It shouldn't be surprising to anyone studying the situation in the Middle East that these terrorists are not being brought to justice. The religious front hold all the political power there and secular authorities can only challenge it on threat of death. Its no small wonder that they roll over at the first opportunity and let their prisoners go, make deals, try to curry their favor while they're free to run around blowing up US soldiers. After all, they HATE us. Not just Al-Qaeda but the entire religious establishment over there. Of course they hate us. They hate that we try to represent reason over superstition, that we stand for something greater than who can be the most effective snake-oil salesman in the room. We have, despite all our problems with our own politics, a demand for evidence, a demand for the support of fact to prop up our leaders and to give them legitimacy. That is why Bush's lies about Iraq have so seriously undermined the respectability of his office and our status in the western world.

But in the Middle East it is lies backed up by violence which forms the basis of legitimacy of power. And were a system like ours to gain popularity there it would spell the end of all the petty power brokers and dictators' reigns of terror. Most Americans may hate Bush, but we won't have to worry about him next year. But nutcases like Bin Laden will have the Muslim world in their sway long after they are dead, and for generations to follow, until the day (if ever it will come) when religion is dethroned from respectability and its public voice is reduced to the attention we grant to daily horoscopes and the carnival fortune telling of Madame LaZomba.