On another discussion forum which I haunt, we were going over the current silly-season SCOTUS case regarding the Hobby Lobby religious zealots' attempt to get their religion stuck firmly into LAW. I find that this is so blatantly against the Constitution, the First Amendment in the Bill of Rights, and the traditions of this country as to be impossible to miss for what it is - a religious zealot's bid to be taken seriously instead of laughed at for slavish obedience to a rather cheesy bed-time-story.
When pinned down about why a "closely-held" corporation should have any sort of power over the health-care choices of a REAL, LIVE, BREATHING HUMAN, all my opponents in the debate could come up with was nitpicking about the definition of "closely held." (Sorry, an IRS definition is subject to law, not the other way around; that definition is for the tax code and not for anything else. But I will concede that there is a generally-accepted definition in regards taxation. So stipulated. There. Happy?)
And to continue.... (But first, an orange Cheesy-Poof, for your enjoyment!)
What precisely has that to do with health care policies?? WHY does being deluded by a religion give someone, even another HUMAN (vice corporate) person the right to wage war against a woman's health? To come between her and her doctor, a person who is trained in the field and whose advice is to be sought and obeyed?
Remember, these Hobby-Slobbies are NOT trying to stop just contraceptive prescriptions and abortion/abortifacients. They are trying to stop a woman from being covered by her insurance policy for ANY DRUG, DEVICE, OR PROCEDURE, which a doctor has prescribed for ANY reason at all, including NON-CONTRACEPTIVE USES. Things such as using hormone-based birth control pills for controlling menstrual problems and ovarian cyst inflammation. The woman could be virginal and celibate, and they would STILL be trying to get between her and her doctor and deny her this treatment.
To get past a not-too-important point, I told my opponent in the debate that I would even WITHDRAW any mention of the "closely-held" distinction regarding corporations, DESPITE the probability that "closely" or "privately" or "publicly" would soon make NO difference in the FLOOD of demands to treat ANY ANY ALL possible law as being in contravention to some religious doctrine.
Moving along, though, precisely WHO, if this insanity is made law, WHO is going to be made the judge of how religious you must be before you get to shaft your employees out of medical care?
When do we get "religious fervour judges" to ascertain whether we're out there in wacky-land far enough for our pet-peeve-du-jour to be "strongly-held"? And how "strongly" is "STRONGLY HELD?" Oh, my aching head! That bucket can't even hold ITSELF!
Is this not an obvious, blatant, egregious case of putting a religion IN the courts? Are judges going to be needing to hit Divinity Schools for ten or twelve different schisms, PLUS become an Imam as well, so that they can fairly evaluate religious zealotry??
What happens when a "firmly-held belief" in midichlorians comes into play? Does a judge need to be conversant in JEDI Doctrines???? (Hey, one mythology is just as (in)valid as any other, in my opinion!!)
And to go on, the justification for all of this is supposedly the COST to the "closely held corporation?" But just WHERE is the monetary gain, in any case? Can you point to a "Religious Zealots Discount" health care policy? Me neither....
Then came some really idiotic comments about this being a "Constitutional" question. These people are continually giving lip service to the Constitution and Bill of Rights, but only so long as it can be twisted around to make some point on their side. When I apply the First Amendment to support FREEDOM FROM RELIGION, it all goes pear-shaped and they get weird on me.
WHY in the name of all that stinks in D.C., would ANYONE who continually harps about "Constitutional this" and "Second Amendment that" and "Founding Fathers something else,"ever SUPPORT this bigoted religious crap? Is it not a clear enough violation of the separation of church and state?
Has all the Second Amendment NOISE being blathered about numbed everyones' ears to the
FIRST AMENDMENT???
Or does the First one only apply when it protects the right to yell about the SECOND Amendment? Maybe it doesn't cut it in heavy traffic, like Corporate Greed? The Separation Doctrines get nowhere whenever they are applied to MY rights to keep religion -out- of my government?
And then came the personal attacks... Apparently I am NOT, as an agnostic, entitled to any opinions about religion or to discourse with "people of faith." I am to sit down, and shut up whenever this subject comes up, because when I object to their crazy talk it makes me "a vitriolic and angry little man." (THAT came about because I have taken the time to study a lot of different religions, and I knew more about their cult's doctrines than THEY did.) (Mormons... AND LDS "history." "Mountain Meadow Massacres," anyone?)
"Vitriolic"? For not drinking your brand of Kool-Ade? "Angry little man"?? SERIOUSLY? You fools are going there? So be it. Here goes. "Angry little man" indeed. You ain't seen nothin' yet.
And yet, I'm STILL not angry.
Bewildered, confused that you cannot see the beam in your own eye, irritated that cognitive dissonance doesn't penetrate the zealotry of otherwise seemingly-sane and intelligent people.
But angry? Nah. Mythology is NOT worth the blood pressure points.
What it is, is that I keep being completely FLUMMOXED by the sheer amount of cognitive dissonance and the total causational disconnect in that forum; all of which is so glibly glossed over as being "vitriol," and "little," and MY "FAULT" My personal failure to bow to some mythos is a character flaw?!?!?!
And it is NOT the "people of faith" with whom I have issues, other than the charlatans at the front of the auditorium that are fleecing them. The "people of faith" are NOT the issue AT ALL.
It's the "FAITH" part that is the root of all this CRAZINESS, not particularly the people!
(Tell me with a straight face, that it's not all, from the Belfast bombings, to the Jihads, by way of the Pogroms, and Crusades, and Inquisitions, via the Mayan torture-sacrifice-killings back to Baal and the other baby-burning idols, tell me that ALL of that, ANY of that, tell me that it is NOT sheer insanity!!)
There is a constant push for proving a statement here, with loads of sniping about this logical fallacy and that incongruity, in that other forum; ALL of that philosophy and logic becomes null, and void, of NO consequence or application whatsoever, when it comes to the application of those same exact standards to RELIGION, where there is precisely
ZERO
rigorous, definable, repeatable, provable, irrefutable scientific evidence of ANY sort whatsoever supporting it, but instead LOADS of sheer insanity involved in its tenets.
(It's not nuts because it's YOUR religion? Step back, open one eye at least, think logically for just a paragraph here. Let's start with "virgin birth"? Bodily "resurrection" of the dead?? "The Afterlife." "Divine intervention"?? "Divine" ANYTHING!??
Now let's go all the way across the aisle to JIHAD! and martyrdom which is on the face of it all just NUTS; and then back over to The Inquisition, and The Crusades; and then on to golden books in made-up 'languages' and funky translator spectacles (and that's also a short step WAY around the twist), by way (opposite aisle again) of flopping down on a mat and banging your head on the floor five times a day (or is it SEVEN a day? Three is enough?? Choose your schism, step right up!)?
And once again, HOW many years old is the earth? 5000-some odd? Less than that?? The three biggies fighting and killing the most people per year for the last two, two-and-a-half-thousand years, are almost able to get together on this one, as GONZO an idea as it is....
Dinosaur fossils are all FAKES? Yeah, and the earth's flat, too.
Global flood? WHAT flood? When? About 3500 years ago? Less than that? More? Nope, sorry, archaeology says "Wrong answer!"
And an "ARK"? You have about 2 million-odd species, and they're all available on short notice, within perhaps fifty miles of this ONE small boat? And they all FIT in there? As Bill Cosby said, "Who's gonna clean up down there?" That's sure a load of dreck alright! And people "BELIEVE" this junk? This kind of thinking isn't CRAZY??
But somehow there isn't any cognitive dissonance when the religious "people of faith" look at those tales, and turn on the "religion" track in their heads. It doesn't even bother them that every bit of it is mythology and completely unfounded in actuality.
You take it on "Faith"? Phooey! What a dirty word.
Whither all of the demand for FACTS!, PROOF!, for SCIENCE!, for RIGOUR!, for LOGIC!? That all goes right out the ninetieth story window as soon as anyone says "religion?"
There isn't any >dissonance< in your skull when this is pointed out? It doesn't say "DOINGGG!!!!" in there? No?
Nothing but anger at the person pointing it out? (Me, obviously.) Now why would that make you angry? If you're so sure you're right, you just get to watch me sizzle in "Hell," correct? Skin off your nose somewhere? I don't see it, yet you're probably smoking mad right now.
And all I've truly said, repeatedly, in all my prior debates with this entire group is, "SHOW ME ONE FACT THAT SAYS YOU'RE RIGHT," no? Is it because you CAN'T that it makes you so irrationally angry at me?
No, you can't even show me ONE teeny, tiny, I'll even go as far as MINUSCULE, shred of actual, real, scientifically-valid, repeatable, documentable EVIDENCE of your religion. If you could, you would have done so.
That all being demonstrably so, WHY should you -demand- of me that your opinion about the subject be so much more valid than mine? Than my opinion which IS based on FACTS??
Facts that can be fairly plainly stated:
"Until there is evidence for such a thing as a deity, evidence proving the tenets of ANY religion, proof (other than "FAITH," which is NOT proof of anything at all except willful self-delusion) which can be validated rigorously, using scientific methods, I categorically refuse to be taken in by it and urge you to do the same. Science can adequately explain enough of the sidereal universe that I can wait for the explanations of the rest which we don't yet know, without recourse to mythology. There is sufficient evidence to support a non-theological basis to this universe.
"You are without any evidence at all to support the theological underpinnings of your "belief system," evidence which has been sought after for more than 2000 years (and perhaps as much as 4000 years for some "faiths") yet is STILL, remarkably, absent.
"Absent any microscopic snippet of reality, religion then is an opinion, no more. A strictly unfounded opinion and of no real value other than entertainment."
So, prove me WRONG, PLEASE!! Just show me a FACT, any fact, even JUST ONE, no matter HOW tiny! And by "GOD" I'll BELIEVE IT.
But show me instead "faith" and "emotionalism" and "supposition" and "holy scriptures," and I'll look at you like you've grown a second head, and it looks like a lobster.
That is my "belief."
Why should religion not be ridiculed like every other similar topic (which isn't classed as a religion) whenever it pops up?
WHY does religion get a 'bye' when it comes to having to validate and prove what it keeps yammering on about?
And why, without ANY proof, with instead many centuries of DISPROOF (Utter lack of proof though it is being CONSTANTLY sought, for demonstrably MILLENIA now, is to me as good as DISPROOF!), why does it still manage to continue?? Are people really that dense?
Look, suppose I started going on about the sky being Kelly green, and I tell you that the reason that I know it is green, despite the evidence of my own eyes as to its blueness, is because the Purple Monkey from Perspiratsia said so. No, I had never SEEN any sign of this Purple Primate, only somebody else, who has no reason to be thought to be trustworthy, told me it was true. That telling was good enough for ME!
If I did that, well, you would have me committed in short order. AND IF I HAD TRIPPED MY BREAKERS TO THAT EXTENT, I WOULD WANT YOU TO!
To pick a very touchy subject on purpose, is a green sky and a deified purple ape any less bizarre than a story about somebody:
getting beaten nearly to death,
then immediately thereafter scourged nearly to death with a whip,
then made to drag a wooden beam, of great weight, across town and up a hill, all while being pelted with stones by a crowd,
then hung on that hunk of wood (which is made into a Roman gibbet known as a crucifix),
hung there with nails, in such a fashion as to cause positional respiratory collapse,
later stabbed in the heart with a spear,
yanked off the nails,
tossed into a sealed stone tomb (temp of caves in that area is around 8 degrees Centigrade, which is real good on you when you're dead since it keeps the meat from stinking too badly, but kind of rough on a mostly-naked at BEST nearly-dead
, but probably most sincerely dead, person),
sealed in tight linen cloths wrapped around all my exremities and bound to my abdomen,
all of that is over a lot of olive oil and perfumes which, being mostly alcohol-based (wine or brandy) would have burned like FIRE in all those wounds, had the victim of this brutality actually been alive....
The brutal treatment? That is the easy part; easy simply because it is connected with a RELIGION, and religion is the primary motivator in the history of human brutality.
But then you want me to swallow some tale that he gets up after all of those injuries, and three days in that cold rock hole with no water on top of all this, rolls a 3-ton stone out of the way all by himself, and walks off, as healthy as hogs?
Or was that FLY off? That is not any more of a stretch, by this point, flying away it shall be then.
Oi. Bring on the purple monkeys, they're a LOT easier to choke down.
The same goes for the Islamic mythology, or Teutonic and Norse "deities," Asian and African animism, ancestor worship (Ye hounds! You've never met my mother when she was alive! Her running things when she's DEAD? No Thank YOU!); even deifying plants! Or all of the other myths with which priests have been avoiding real work for thousands of years.
But there is still not one shred of anything remotely resembling a fact. Nothing other than the willful self-delusion called "faith."
So when someone comes up with another unproven, unprovable, tautologically false and semantically null, mythological OPINION, and then asserts that they have a boat-load (ARK-load?) of rights because of their "belief" in these tales, why must I be forced to take them at all seriously?
Why should I not seek to have them put in the same hole as the sweaty-monkey-worshippers under their Kelly-green sky? Can I at least laugh uproariously at their ludicrous fictions?
So, there is not, has never been, and (seeing that there has been four thousand years of failure searching for it, the odds say) there never WILL be, any single scrap of evidence to prove ANY ONE of the myriads of religious "beliefs;" there is not so much as a grain of SAND in support.
And yet here are all of these monstrous mega-million-dollar edifices, with their pompous priests, and tub-thumping preachers, all avoiding a good day's work yet -demanding- that I take them and their "beliefs" seriously? Demanding we change laws to accommodate their "beliefs"? INSISTING that the laws of physics be set aside so that nothing interferes with their little fantasy worlds.
Seriously??????