tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-84662852212525946982024-03-13T12:38:40.896-04:00The Misfit AtheistTony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.comBlogger36125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-83152218020787348252016-11-10T16:02:00.001-05:002016-11-10T22:16:00.818-05:00Trump's Presidency: What Do We Do Now?By now, it's all over the news: Donald Trump has been elected to the Presidency of the United States. And not only that, the House of Representatives, the Senate, and the majority of Governors will be overwhelmingly Republican. Already, even after one day of the election, racism-fueled incidents are happening all over and are being broadcasted via social media.<br />
<br />
The reason why this is happening is because Trump won by openly courting and inciting racism and violence against people of color while scapegoating liberals, and now they have been emboldened to step out of the internet forums and do their best to bring back the days of Jim Crow, segregation and lynch mobs. This is scary enough as it is, but it gets worse.<br />
<br />
Already, the new Republican majority has indicated it will completely repeal Obamacare and replace it with something only the middle class and higher could effectively use: Health Savings Accounts. Which is exactly what it sounds like: a tax-emempt savings account that can only be used for healthcare. In other words, healthcare insurance for the poor will literally disappear as an option for the lower classes, which will result in people literally dying from not being able to save enough money in their HSA to cover already skyrocketing health costs.<br />
<br />
But it gets worse:<br />
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The Republicans have long pined for the opportunity to reverse Roe v Wade, which granted the right of women to have safe, legal abortions. Their opposition to abortion rights stems from the right-wing religious "pro-life"(more accurately "pro-birth") doctrines. With Trump and his Republican supermajority, he will be able to pick up to three Supreme Court justices to guarantee a total reversal of Roe v Wade.<br />
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LGBT rights are also on the chopping block as Republicans have opposed civil rights, including marriage, to nonstraight individuals and couples for decades as well. Trump's Congressional supermajority and Supreme Court picks can easily reverse Obergefell and potentially even criminalize being anything other than straight. The core of this anti-LGBT stance, just as with abortion, is solely religious dogma.<br />
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And it gets even worse:<br />
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Trump has said he wants to "open up the libel laws" to allow him, as President, to sue anybody who criticizes him, even if said criticism holds truth. Put quite simply, he wants to gut the core constitutional rights to free speech and free press solely to protect his ego. That would de-facto establish a kind of "blasphemy law" similar to what North Korea has when it comes to criticism of Kim Jong Un.<br />
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And it still gets worse:<br />
<br />
Trump's likely choices for his Cabinet reads as a who's who of anti-intellectualist clowns: Chris Christie, Rudy Giuliani, Bobby Jindal, Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich and others. More fracking, shale oil, deep dependence on fossil fuels, climate change denialism, anti-multiculturalism, anti-higher education and anti-science will become the official government platform.<br />
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And with anti-multiculturalism, Trump has also promised a ban on granting asylum to refugees and openly discriminating against immigrants from countries where there is conflict(which is a quite a legitimate reason to emigrate in the first place). And there's his famous vow to "build a wall and make Mexico pay for it".<br />
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Trump's completely unexpected ascendancy marks a complete 180 degree shift from the increasing progressiveness America has enjoyed since the Civil Rights Act, and threatens the most core institutions of American democracy. So the question becomes: How can we fight this? How can we defend the progress and rights we've fought for since the 1960s against a Republican party that has been completely gutted by white nationalists and Christian theocrats, and headed by a reality TV conman who effectively mobilized hate to launch himself into the White House?<br />
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The answer to that is simple: We play the long game, just as they have. We let enough of their regressive policies and behavior bear their rotten fruit, put it on blast in the news and social media when it hits their voters and their loved ones hard, and then point out that there is a better way while being careful not to repeat the mistakes that cost progressives this election so gravely(looking straight at you, people of the Democratic National Convention who screwed over their strongest candidate). When a Trump-supporting family sees their gay child bullied or assaulted(or worse), when a Trump supporter realizes their HSA is very ill-equipped to handle real health costs, when a Trump supporter sees their friends of color openly discriminated in ways not seen since the days of MLK, when a Trump supporter realizes that jobs aren't coming back to the U.S. just because their strongman gave employers an incentive to keep them out of the States, when a female Trump supporter is unable to get an abortion or reproductive health care, the Republicans and Trump will be unable to scapegoat progressives, and their support will collapse under its own weight.<br />
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It will be extremely tough to endure, but think about this: We suffered two terms under George W. Bush, where in one year he erased the budget surplus Bill Clinton worked hard to leave us with, dragged the U.S. into a second Iraq War under a false pretense and a personal grudge, and promoted the sub-prime mortgage crisis that precipitated the Great Recession of 2008. The Bush Administration's policies and behavior hurt the American economy so bad, that the country had no choice but to elect the first black president in history, and the rest is history.<br />
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So let the Trump train speed towards the cliff. After the inevitable wreck, and the horror of what they have wrought upon themselves sets in, that is where we can respond with our own anger tempered with hope, and offer a better, more rational alternative to racism, xenophobia, jingoism, misogyny and class warfare. We can do this.Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-61066886160843214522016-04-06T00:55:00.000-04:002016-04-10T13:48:54.653-04:00The Alternate Universe of "God's Not Dead 2"<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-RzZQjaeew5Y/VwR3IvbuWEI/AAAAAAAABx0/gEI2u8BVYwUcs5n5JpJUhovI9JlLHlQ9Q/s1600/GND2_Uninterested_Student.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-RzZQjaeew5Y/VwR3IvbuWEI/AAAAAAAABx0/gEI2u8BVYwUcs5n5JpJUhovI9JlLHlQ9Q/s320/GND2_Uninterested_Student.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"Ugh, do I <i>have</i> to review this film?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<br />
I just got back from watching "God's Not Dead 2", and there's quite a bit to talk about. Just as in first film, the movie's events take place in a strange parallel universe where Christians are practically a persecuted minority living in a United States that is seriously hostile to Christianity. Yet unlike the first film, the temper against atheists is slightly softened. Slightly being the key word, however. This isn't the unintentionally awesome non-Christians found in the Nic Cage remake of <a href="http://misfitatheist.blogspot.com/2014/10/religious-movie-review-left-behind.html" target="_blank">Left Behind</a>. But I think it would be beneficial this time around to calmly explore this parallel, alternate universe that GND2 occupies. So buckle up and prepare to have some aspirin handy, because you'll be eye-rolling and facepalming so hard your head will hurt.<br />
<br />
<b>Atheists are people robbed of genuine emotion</b><br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://comingfullcircleblog.files.wordpress.com/2014/12/nothing63.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://comingfullcircleblog.files.wordpress.com/2014/12/nothing63.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The most soul-crushing motto I've ever heard.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<i>Without God in your life, you have nothing to look forward to. Atheism leads to hopelessness and despair.</i>[via <a href="http://atheism.about.com/">atheism.about.com</a>]<br />
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<i>That's the thing about atheism. It doesn't take away the pain, but it takes away the hope.</i> -Pat Boone's character in GND2<br />
<br />
In the first half-hour of the film, we're introduced to high school student Brooke, who is the one whose innocent classroom question gets the ball rolling on the film's main plot. But before that happens, we get some backstory on her: Her brother recently died, and even though she's still grieving, her freethinker parents have already "gotten over it" and they refuse to listen to her thoughts at all. She confides this to her teacher(played by Melissa Joan Hart), who then tells Pat Boone, and he responds with the above quote(which I found particularly offensive).<br />
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What this is, is a propagation of the evangelical narrative that without Christ, you're not "whole" in some way or another. This is a running theme with many of Pure Flix's films. With Brooke's parents, they're practically Vulcans. The first film had Kevin Sorbo's strawman atheist professor having nothing but hatred and trauma without a Christian belief.<br />
<br />
But this narrative, as with the rest of the narratives spun in this film, is debunked when compared to reality. Every human being is more or less capable of experiencing the full range of human emotion regardless of religious belief: joy, happiness, sadness, grief, anger, love, hate, confusion, hope, despair, transcendance and so on.<br />
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<b>American Christians are a hair-width away from persecution</b><br />
<br />
Another narrative in the GND2 alternate universe of <a href="http://www.patheos.com/blogs/godlessindixie/2016/04/01/persecute-me-please/" target="_blank">Evangelica</a>(h/t Neil Carter) is that atheists practically rule the government and Christians are always on the brink of persecution.<br />
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This is the main thrust of the film, and it's one practically built into the core of Christianity to the point of lusting after persecution as a means of faith validation. Melissa Joan Hart's teacher is suspended without pay and is at risk of losing everything if she loses her case. There's a side plot where pastors are legally forced to turn in copies of their sermons to the government, mentioning a real-life similar incident but neglecting to point out that it got shot down in a blink of an eye, followed by a post-credits scene of Pastor Dave getting arrested for refusing to turn in his sermons. Even the Newsboys eke in a song that dwells on this lust for persecution in the name of their faith.<br />
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Reality, however, paints a very different picture. Christians are still a vast majority in the United States, with a Republican dominated Congress that openly panders to and privileges Christianity. In the deep south, there are teachers who openly proselytize Christianity and aren't even told "You might want to ease off the faith stuff".<br />
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But say you're something other than a Christian... especially an atheist, and you're likely to experience some form of <a href="https://www.google.com/search?client=ubuntu&channel=fs&q=shunning+atheist+relatives&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8" target="_blank">shunning</a>, <a href="https://www.google.com/search?client=ubuntu&channel=fs&q=discrimination+against+atheists&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8" target="_blank">discrimination</a> or judgmentalism at some point. And on that note, our next narrative is...<br />
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<b>Freethinkers want to indoctrinate their children</b><br />
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Let's get back to Brooke and her Vulcan freethinker parents. Later on, after her brother's room is emptied out by Salvation Army volunteers, she discovers her brother was a Christian in secret(like the Muslim girl from the first film who converts to Christianity in secret). When she reveals this information in the courtroom, she elaborates on why the secrecy: He feared his family would shun him, and from their behavior in the film, it would seem that fear was warranted.<br />
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This is another reversal of reality. By and large, freethinking parents don't want their children to be indoctrinated at all. The goal of freethought parenting isn't raising atheists, but raising children in <i>how</i> to think critically, not <i>what</i> to think. The distinction is critical.<br />
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<b>Atheists are violent, while Christians are all about nonviolence</b><br />
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In the first film, a Muslim father beats and shuns his daughter Mina for converting to Christianity. The atheist professor openly threatens the main protagonist's academic future. In this film, the father of the Chinese student from the film slaps and shuns his son for converting to Christianity and persuing a pastoral job. The atheist protesters are absolutely seething at the silent, handholding Christian protesters outside the courthouse.<br />
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The subtext of these scenes are clear: On Planet Evangelica, Christians don't do violence to others. <i>They</i> do.<br />
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Reality check: The Crusades, the Inquisitions, the Thirty Years War, the Troubles in Ireland, Christian violence against LGBT individuals and Muslims, the war on women's reproductive rights, abusing children accused of witchcraft in Africa(inspired by American evangelical missionaries), systemic child rape by clergy, etc. I've yet to see the headline "the Atheist Army scored a major victory by blowing up the Agnostic Camp while the Freethinker Brigade took heavy shelling from the Secularist Coalition".<br />
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<b>The ACLU is virulently anti-Christian</b><br />
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From the school attorney who first mentions the ACLU("They've been <i>dreaming</i> for a case like this!") to ominous music playing when Ray Wise says "separation of church and state" and "We're going to prove once and for all that God is dead!", the film does its damnedest to portray the ACLU as an anti-Christian organization.<br />
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This narrative, is of course, <a href="https://www.aclu.org/aclu-defense-religious-practice-and-expression" target="_blank">utter BS</a>. The reason for this narrative is simple: Conservative Christians hate the fact that the ACLU isn't a Christian-exclusive legal entity like <a href="http://aclj.org/our-mission/about-aclj" target="_blank">ACLJ</a>, <a href="http://www.adflegal.org/about-us" target="_blank">Alliance Defending Freedom</a>(who provided much of the source material for GND2) or <a href="https://lc.org/about-liberty-counsel" target="_blank">Liberty Counsel</a>. The ACLU is rather a religiously neutral(read: secular) legal entity dedicated to defending the civil liberties of ALL Americans.<br />
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<b>The legal system moves in mysterious ways</b><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-zSiJWb66rOA/VwSMwHFyFvI/AAAAAAAAByM/BWGIwV1Aoh4eYuWwn1ts6yyY-FXPTxoBw/s1600/WINSTON.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-zSiJWb66rOA/VwSMwHFyFvI/AAAAAAAAByM/BWGIwV1Aoh4eYuWwn1ts6yyY-FXPTxoBw/s320/WINSTON.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<br />
Ok, this isn't exactly a narrative, but rather just pointing out that GND2's portrayal of the legal system is a giant joke to anybody who knows how slow, deliberate and focused the legal system is.<br />
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Instead, with blinding speed it goes from an administrative inquiry to practically a criminal case even though it's crystal clear Hart's character did nothing wrong, to veering off the rails into (surprise, surprise) attempting to prove the existence of Jesus. And Judge Winston Zeddmore is perfectly fine with that. That's Planet Evangelica for you.<br />
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<b>Back on Planet Earth...</b><br />
<br />
When I went to go see the first "God's Not Dead", the theatre I walked into was packed like it was the first midnight screening of "The Avengers". This time, however, the theatre had less than 15 people and they were mostly laughing at the film's lame jokes rather than whooping and fawning over the triumphalism of Planet Evangelica's persecuted protagonists. I didn't come out of the theatre angry or shocked at Pure Flix's demonization of non-Christians like with the last film. In fact, I felt disappointed. It seems Pure Flix is losing it's appeal. And judging from <a href="http://pro.boxoffice.com/latest-news/2016-04-03-north-america-weekend-estimates-batman-v-superman-falls-sharply-but-easily-remains-in-first-place-with-524m-zootopia-holds-strong-with-200m-gods-not-dead-2-opens-modestly-in-fourth-with-81m" target="_blank">the latest box office earnings</a>, it's clear the target audience sees it too:<br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>God's Not Dead 2</i> debuted in fourth place with an estimated
$8.10 million. The faith-based sequel from Pure Flix performed below
expectations and opened 12 percent below the $9.22 million debut of
2014's <i>God's Not Dead</i>. <i>God's Not Dead 2</i> opening below its predecessor was especially underwhelming given that <i>God's Not Dead 2</i> opened in 2,419 locations this weekend, while <i>God's Not Dead</i> opened in just 780 locations.</blockquote>
Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-58735894249889377342015-06-26T09:35:00.002-04:002015-06-28T21:14:21.198-04:00On Bristol Palin's "Big News"<span style="color: red;">(Note: This is an extended version of <a href="https://www.facebook.com/tony.agudo/posts/10207283120940803?pnref=story" target="_blank">a Facebook post</a> I made last night.)</span> <br />
<br />
Dear Bristol Palin,<br />
<br />
I understand that you don't want any
lectures or sympathy over <a href="http://www.patheos.com/blogs/bristolpalin/2015/06/big-news/" target="_blank">your announcement</a> of your second
out-of-wedlock pregnancy, but let's be serious about this fact: You set
yourself up for this, big time.<br />
<br />
You've made a practical career as
an "Abstinence Ambassador", telling teenagers to absolutely not have
sex(especially sex with any form of contraception) until their wedding
night. And yet, you've betrayed your own preaching... twice(at least).
You don't want <span class="text_exposed_show">any lectures? Okay. But
don't expect anyone to take your lectures seriously anymore, because
what good is the Christian principle you preach when even *you*, a very
committed Christian, can't adhere to it? Even teenagers can smell the BS
in that.</span><br />
<br />
<span class="text_exposed_show">Don't get me wrong: Anybody who can genuinely adhere to abstinence before marriage deserves my respect. Abstinence does work, but realistically people will tend to not stick with it because it demands going against natural human behavior(as you certainly can relate firsthand). Comprehensive sex education recognizes that reality and offers contraception in various forms as an acceptable and practical alternative. There's nothing "sinful" about facing the realities about sex honestly, frankly, and responsibly like an adult.</span><br />
<br />
<div class="text_exposed_show">
Let me offer this
advice: Stop lying to yourself and your audiences about sex. You didn't
have sex out of "weakness" or "sin", but out of the very human need to
physically express love with the person you chose as a partner. That's
not a sin at all. You don't have to apologize for it. You don't have to
"ask God for forgiveness", nor do you have to have anybody's approval of
it. You're an adult woman, Bristol. Own it, with honesty. Otherwise,
you'll become the newest face for the argument in favor of comprehensive
sex education(if you haven't already).<br />
<br />
Nevertheless, congrats on
going to become a mother again. Nothing but health and happiness to
you, your family and the father of the child(whoever he turns out to
be).<br />
<br />
Sincerely,<br />
<br />
Tony Agudo<br />
<br />
<span style="color: red;">Update 6/28/2015: It seems now I stand somewhat corrected about Bristol Palin's hypocrisy. See <a href="https://www.facebook.com/tony.agudo/posts/10207309367276945?pnref=story" target="_blank">this Facebook status update</a> for details. </span></div>
Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-42471546643978632122014-10-08T19:09:00.000-04:002014-10-08T19:09:05.796-04:00On the Eschatology of "Left Behind"On a typical night at work while doing my sweeping rounds about two years ago, I noticed a little book sitting next to a garbage can. It was titled "BIBLE PROPHECY HANDBOOK" by Carol Smith, one of those books you'd find in a "Choice Books" display at a bargain store. Since it seemed that nobody was looking for it, I decided to keep the book. It was a book that covered four different <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eschatology" target="_blank">eschatological</a> views in Christianity. While I don't believe any of it, of course, I can certainly appreciate that the book simply lays out the different views in good detail for the reader to objectively study.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wL-TjLoIwMg/VDXA4GCW8UI/AAAAAAAABUo/mVO633brOrE/s1600/JohnNelsonDarby.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt=""JohnNelsonDarby" by Contemporary photograph - http://freemasonry.bcy.ca/texts/dispensationalism.html. Licensed under Public domain via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:JohnNelsonDarby.jpg#mediaviewer/File:JohnNelsonDarby.jpg" border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wL-TjLoIwMg/VDXA4GCW8UI/AAAAAAAABUo/mVO633brOrE/s1600/JohnNelsonDarby.jpg" title="" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This guy invented the Rapture. I kid you not!</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<br />
I mention this because after <a href="http://misfitatheist.blogspot.com/2014/10/religious-movie-review-left-behind.html" target="_blank">my movie review of "Left Behind"</a>, I realized there was so much material to explore, starting with the eschatology that's behind the movie, known as <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dispensationalism" target="_blank">Dispensational Premillenialism</a>. While the book is excellent at laying out the basic details of Dispensationalism, it did not say anything about the very human origins about it. Dispensationalism was created by John Nelson Darby in the 1830s, and later popularized by Cyrus Scofield's Reference Bible. Today it's wildly popular amongst rural Christianity, Fundamentalists and the Baptists. What's interesting about Darby's creation is that in developing this eschatology, he is the one who invented the concept of the "Rapture". However, try telling this to Dispensationalists and they'll fiercely deny it.<br />
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The basic details of Dispensationalist eschatology are these: Believers will be "taken up to heaven"(aka raptured) to be with Christ, signalling the start of a seven-year "Tribulation" in which the Antichrist will appear and reign over this period of persecution and misery until Christ returns. This, just before the Antichrist appearing, is precisely what is depicted in "Left Behind".<br />
<br />
<b>Somebody call Daryl Dixon</b><br />
<br />
But here's the part about Dispensationalism that didn't make the cut in both film iterations of "Left Behind": As part of the Rapture, dead believers will be resurrected.<br />
<br />
A zombie attack in the Bible. <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+27%3A51-53&version=KJV" target="_blank">Again</a>. Why wasn't this depicted in the film? Because in this day and age, we know that zombies are nothing more than pure fiction, like "The Walking Dead". To depict zombies, despite it being canonical to Dispensationalism, would expose it as the twisted fiction that it is.<br />
<br />
But let's be kind and suppose for a moment that they would not be zombies but fully restored to life. Doesn't that mean that despite their belief, they've come back just to suffer the misery of Tribulation? That's a decidedly evil move by the Biblical God, and it's not the only one.<br />
<br />
<b>Welcome to God's Slaughterhouse of the Babes</b> <br />
<br />
In one scene of "Left Behind", Chloe goes to the hospital in her dire search to find her little brother, who has been raptured. She wanders into the maternity ward to discover that all the newborn babies have been taken away, too. Even worse, according to Dispensationalism and many Bible churches that believe in an "age of accountability"(which answers my earlier question about belief and babies), <i>babies will be ripped from their mothers' wombs</i>. Cribs emptied. Kindergartens shuttered. Would-be parents' lives are shattered in an instant. God becomes the biggest abortionist and child abductor in history. And apparently, any children conceived and born after the Rapture will suffer the same as their parents.<br />
<br />
<b>What about those Not Left Behind?</b><br />
<br />
Everywhere in Dispensationalism, the focus is on those not taken in the Rapture and their subsequent misery from it. The film is no exception.<br />
<br />
Yet, isn't it worth a look to ask "What would Irene Steele think of the fact that she just got ripped from her daughter and husband, and now they're caught in a meat grinder while the all-powerful, all-knowing and all-"loving" God does nothing? How about little Raymie Steele getting taken as he's hugging his big sister?" Wouldn't they rather be there for them at the very least, to help lessen their suffering? What would they think, let's imagine, if Rayford and Chloe couldn't bring themselves to truly believe during the Tribulation? It's fully possible that they could believe that God exists, but they cannot love Him(this would be misotheism, as atheism at that point would be proven false). Would Irene and Raymie write them off and enjoy the rest of eternity in heaven?<br />
<br />
Or would they raise hell(no pun intended) to make God get off his Almighty ass and stop the suffering?<br />
<br />
<b>Dispensational Politics: Poisoning the Well of Reasonable Policies</b><br />
<br />
Dispensationalism is really popular in right-wing America. And it has effectively poisoned our foreign policies. Dispensationalism also has "plans" for Israel, and politicians who subscribe to it are staunch Zionists. They have effectively forced the United States government into supporting Israel no matter how brutal they treat their neighbors, the Palestinians. Why? Because they believe that in ensuring Israel wins, no matter what, it will hasten the coming of Darby's end-times prophecies. So they lust after controlling the Middle East <i>solely for a religious belief, not reasoned politics</i>.<br />
<br />
<b>Disposing of Dispensationalism</b><br />
<br />
So how do rational folks fight this toxic ideology? For politicians, force them to admit their support for Israel is not based in reason but religious fever. Let them expose how toxic they are towards rational politics. For folks in general, point out that their "right" way of interpreting the Bible didn't even exist until mid-19th century. Let them know that their beliefs have zero basis in reality and that it's all a delirious form of wish thinking that will lead to nothing more than... a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Disappointment" target="_blank">Great Disappointment</a>.Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-73734070730622434272014-10-06T04:40:00.001-04:002014-10-06T12:28:14.748-04:00Religious Movie Review: "Left Behind"<span style="color: red;">(Spoiler Warning: In this review I will be spoiling quite a lot of the movie. If you plan to see it without spoilers, stop reading after the first paragraph. Otherwise, enjoy the review.)</span><br />
<br />
Up until this past Saturday, I have only watched two religious movies this year: "<a href="http://misfitatheist.blogspot.com/2014/03/the-misfit-atheist-movie-review-gods.html" target="_blank">God's Not Dead</a>" and "Noah". While GND still holds the crown in unabashed vilification and offensiveness towards atheists, "Noah" actually stepped up and delivered a film that's a treat for cultural Christians and nonbelievers alike(thanks to "card-carrying" atheist director Darren Aronofsky).<br />
<br />
On Saturday afternoon, after reading the first review of the rebooted religious apocalyptic film "Left Behind"("<a href="http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/movies/2014/10/02/tusk_kite_and_left_behind_movie_reviews.html" target="_blank">Score one for Satan</a>", says the Toronto Star) I knew I had to see this film, if only to see just how bad it truly was. And as I found out, the Toronto Star only exposed the tip of the iceberg in describing how awful it is... for Christians.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-gENCCTYL6e0/VDLC4Dxes1I/AAAAAAAABUI/NPz9xAgymLY/s1600/Nic_Cage_honest_pose.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-gENCCTYL6e0/VDLC4Dxes1I/AAAAAAAABUI/NPz9xAgymLY/s1600/Nic_Cage_honest_pose.jpg" height="149" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Even Nic Cage knows how bad it is.</td></tr>
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<b>"Left Behind" as the antidote to "God's Not Dead"</b><br />
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A month ago, Willie Robertson of "Duck Dynasty" and "God's Not Dead" fame announced he had signed on as Executive Producer of the film and <a href="http://www.christiantoday.com/article/willie.robertson.encourages.christians.to.take.their.non.believer.friends.to.see.new.nicolas.cage.movie.left.behind/40410.htm" target="_blank">released a video</a> where he said that "<i>['Left Behind' is] a warning to those, if it happened today, would be
left behind, and I believe people are going to make that life-changing
decision to follow Christ on the way home from the theater on Oct. 3.</i>"<br />
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In other words, he believes the film will convert atheists and other non-Christians. That's a pretty bold claim, considering that the makers of nearly every other Christian film thought the exact same thing and yet the number of nonbelievers continue to rise. This film is unsurprisingly no exception, but with one peculiarity: This film achieves the opposite effect of what the faithful audience expects. At least in the theatre I went to, the crowd was dead silent all through the film and walked out looking somber and angry, unlike the big triumphant reactions I witnessed when watching GND. It is, in fact, an antidote to GND. How? Let's take a look.<br />
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<b>Nonbelievers are portrayed without caricature</b><br />
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In GND, nonbelievers are portrayed as one-dimensional, unempathetic evil people while believers are supposed paragons of virtue and righteousness. Both portrayals were incredibly unrealistic. In "Left Behind", however, we don't see nonbelievers coldly dumping girlfriends and and viciously threatening students' futures.<br />
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Instead we see a surprisingly honest conversation between two main characters(Chloe Steele and Cameron "Buck" Williams) about belief, disasters and "divine intentionality" in the beginning of the film. The conversation establishes them as skeptics, but it also establishes them as actually decent human beings.<br />
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After the Rapture, we see Buck comforting a druggie heiress, and playing negotiator when an unstable mom(played by Jordin Sparks) grabs a handgun and starts threatening people(How she managed to smuggle it, nobody knows).<br />
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Even the lone Muslim character is portrayed as a kindly guy, despite being treated with suspicion and menaced by an angry Little Person. I actually smiled when he offered to hold the elderly lady's hand during the landing sequence.<br />
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<b>God is not good all the time, and all the time God is Not Good</b> <br />
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Original "Left Behind" fans will be <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9gC1GiSDDA" target="_blank">very disappointed</a> to find that Nicolai Carpathia is nowhere to be found here. There is a villain in this film however, but it's not who you think it is, and despite the poor execution of the movie's religious propaganda message, He comes off as more evil than anybody else in the film.<br />
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It shows immediately as the Rapture occurs. In a blink of an eye, Chloe's little brother is taken while hugging her, leaving her to go crazy trying to find him. Through Chloe we see disaster, death, and misery everywhere directly caused by God taking not only adult believers, but children and newborn babies as well, leaving parents in horrific agony(which raises the questions: If genuine belief were the criteria for being raptured, then why do newborns who have zero beliefs get taken? And what about babies born post-Rapture? Are they going to suffer the tribulation merely because they were born too late?).<br />
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Misery, in fact, is the obsessive theme of the movie. Even though the main characters plod towards their "come to Jesus" moments, they are justified in placing the blame for the world's misery on omnipotent, omnisicient and supposedly omnibenevolent God. Not even the Biblical Devil could pull off something so cruel.<br />
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<b>"A Thief In The Night" Reborn</b><br />
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It is this overindulgence of watching humanity's agony that is this movie's undoing as a method of converting rational adults. As I mentioned before, the theatre audience left very somber and angry. I even overheard someone saying "If they make a sequel, it'll be stupider than this". But then a revelation hit me as I recognized the first song playing in the closing credits: This isn't a movie for adults. This is a modern take of "<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QnsXGkx4FWU" target="_blank">A Thief In The Night</a>". I've never had the displeasure of watching that film, but I did hear "The Thinking Atheist"'s Seth Andrews talk about it in detail in chapter 6 of his audiobook "<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Deconverted-A-Journey-Religion-Reason/dp/B00AWD5IHK/ref=tmm_aud_title_0" target="_blank">Deconverted</a>". "A Thief In The Night" is a Post-Rapture film meant to literally scare the hell out of kids into "accepting Jesus into their hearts". It was actually psychological child abuse cloaked in religion. And "Left Behind" is the same exact thing, down to even brazenly using the same closing song. Grown adults could laugh it off, but show this sort of misery porn to young, impressionable and easily frightened groups of children... It's sickening. Thankfully, this movie is a total turkey at the box office so far and <a href="http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/left-behind-2014" target="_blank">other</a> <a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/movies/left-behind-movie-review-article-1.1959634" target="_blank">reviews</a>(even from <a href="http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2014/october-web-only/left-behind.html?start=3" target="_blank">Christian sites</a>!) have <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/10/03/left-behind-review-nicolas-cage-s-bible-movie-is-god-awful.html" target="_blank">panned it</a> so hard, it's possible we might be spared from something much, much worse... a sequel!Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-84726112569138706132014-10-04T01:48:00.001-04:002014-10-05T01:48:10.933-04:00The Official Atheist Response to Carrie Underwood's New SongEarlier today, I noticed a specific story popping up on my Facebook feed. The article is titled "<a href="http://www.thepoliticalinsider.com/carrie-underwoods-brand-new-song-making-atheists-mad-hell/" target="_blank">Carrie Underwood's Brand New Song Is Making Atheists MAD AS HELL!</a>". I was intrigued because I've heard Carrie Underwood's "Jesus Take The Wheel" song and found nothing even remotely offensive to me. Then I heard her newest song "Something In The Water" via the article, and again I found her song totally inoffensive. I'm certainly not mad or angry. Maybe I'm in a minority amongst non-believers?<br />
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So I did a little digging around to see what fellow heathens think, since the article(nor any of the other right-wing and Christian news sites that picked it up) didn't actually point to a single instance of atheist outrage. Ed Brayton of Freethought Blogs <a href="https://www.facebook.com/ed.brayton.3/posts/10153218038373642" target="_blank">chimed on Facebook</a>: "I so love being told what I'm outraged about. I can't imagine how I
could possibly get outraged about a song I've never heard and almost
certainly never will. That would require giving a shit in the first
place what Carrie Underwood -- or anyone else, for that matter -- sings
about." <br />
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A little dismissive, admittedly, but clearly not offended or angry over it. Unfortunately, I could not find any other article in the "atheo-sphere" that remotely resembles outrage. What I did find in the comments to Ed's post and in the articles by atheists, is mostly a reaction of "meh" and similar bewilderment over how Underwood's song could somehow be offensive to them.<br />
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So, while I cannot in all honesty claim that the following is a unanimous response from the atheist community, nor can I attempt to claim myself as a representative of it, I can say the following seems to be a loosely general consensus on Miss Underwood's song:<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Really, we just don't.</td></tr>
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Seriously, this rates even less than the internet hoax spun a couple years ago that Koran-burning preacher Terry Jones wanted to burn copies of "The God Delusion". Nobody gives a hot shit. The only thing that could remotely be construed as offensive here is <strike>Miss Underwood's publicist</strike> those douchebag conservative bloggers manufacturing such a cheap click-bait campaign to drum up interest in the song. I would expect such cheapness from the political arena, but not in the music industry.Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-66953224074838403842014-09-13T16:58:00.001-04:002015-02-03T14:29:17.033-05:00Dear Mr. Creationist,...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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In the past few months, a certain loud-mouthed Christian evangelist named Joshua Feuerstein has become quite popular in Christian circles and infamous in atheist circles for his phone camera videos attempting to disprove atheism and the scientific theory of evolution, mostly by repeating long refuted creationist tropes with the delivery of a used car salesman.<br />
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His <a href="https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=513241702111850" target="_blank">latest video</a> is no exception. But before you click on that link and watch Joshua's video, please take a few moments to read this transcript of the video along with my response afterwards. It may save you from facedesking too hard:<br />
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"Josh Feuerstein here. I've been issued a challenge to publicly prove that God exists, and that atheism and evolution are illogical and just don't plain make sense. And, without using the Bible, so here we go:<br />
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You know, it's funny because a lot of times people that don't want me to use a Bible, say things like "Oh my gawd,I mean, that's just so illogical. I mean, evolution is the only logical explanation!" But let's really look at how logical evolution really is.<br />
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I mean, imagine that you've never read a history book and all of a sudden you're driving through South Dakota and you see a mountain with four big faces on it. Well, we know it's Mt. Rushmore, but say you didn't. Then all of a sudden you see it, would you just assume that that was a product of evolution? That the mountain had just evolved that way? Or would you think that maybe there had been an artist or a designer that had somehow carved those faces into that mountain? I mean, I want you to really think about it, think about the house that I live in or that even you live in. Think about the car that you drive. Those are complex beings, and yet each one of them has a blueprint. I mean, do you really think that the human body was built without a blueprint? Especially looking at DNA, the fact that inside of you there's a three billion letter code? That specifically tells exactly how you're made up? Doesn't that prove intelligent design? The fact that your body has a blueprint? How can it have a blueprint if it doesn't have a designer?<br />
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I mean, think about the Earth that we live in. Think about the fact that it's 8,000 miles in diameter. Think about the fact that it's 93 million miles from the Sun. If it was any larger, well the air would be far too dense and turn into water and cover the Earth. If it were farther or closer to the Sun, we would either freeze or burn to death. Think about the fact that it's tilted 23.5 degrees, which allows the seasons. Think about the fact that it's the right distance from the Moon, that when it spins, that it's able to control the tides. Think about the fact that the atmosphere is 78% nitrogen and 21% oxygen. I mean, even Stephen Hawking, the great physicist, had to admit that the universe and its laws of physics seem to be specifically designed for us.<br />
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Now think about this: When it comes to evolution, the one reason that evolution can never match up with science, is that an organism has never been shown to gain genetic information. So how can something evolve from an atom, well, to a human being? How could it become molecule to man? You know, I realize that there's a lot of people out there who draw pictures of apes, and "there's evolution into humans", but I can do the same thing with a flower and a windmill. But it doesn't mean that it's true. It's a good artist, and a good story, but the fact is, is that there's not one organism that has ever shown us that it has added genetic information. In fact, science has proven that organisms lose genetic information over time. So how can something evolve when it's actually in the process of "devolving"?<br />
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Another nail in the coffin of evolution? Well, this is just plain and simple: "It has never been proven that life can come from non-life!" End of story!"</blockquote>
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The rest of the video is just preaching drivel and self-promotion, so I won't include that here. To Josh's credit, he does attempt to make his argument without a single quote from the Bible. But that's the only credit he's going to get.<br />
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Josh's first mistake is equivocating complex, man-made structures and machines with biological evolution. Evolution applies to biological lifeforms, not sculpted mountains, houses, and cars.<br />
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His second mistake is his misrepresentation of DNA. DNA doesn't live in a vacuum. It is susceptible to modification via mutations, radiation, epigenetic factors, and selection pressures. Also, DNA contains large swaths of "junk DNA" and genes for traits that aren't beneficial to the organism anymore. Genes for molar teeth and sickle cell anemia are such examples. That's not design, that's biological history. And evolution is about changes in DNA, in both gaining and losing genetic information.<br />
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His third mistake is an intentional distraction by spouting off irrelevant facts and half-truths about the Earth that have zero bearing on evolution, capped with a quote mine from Stephen Hawking.<br />
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Josh then misrepresents those who accept evolution by claiming their evidence is "drawings of apes into man". Go to a museum, Josh, and ask to see evidence of human evolution. You'll see fossils of early hominids such as Australopithecus afarensis("Lucy") up to Homo sapiens(modern man). There is even genetic evidence for evolution when comparing the human genome against any other species on the planet.<br />
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Josh's final mistake is the oft-repeated creationist mantra that "life cannot come from non-life". That's true, if we're talking about expecting a human to come directly from mud. But, the origin of life isn't the question that evolution answers. Evolution answers the question of why life on Earth is so diverse. The event that began life on Earth, generally called "abiogenesis", is still a mystery to scientists, but it's clear that it likely had to do with gradually forming the first replicating organic molecule under the right conditions, and then evolution began directly afterwards. That is "life coming from non-life", because if abiogenesis didn't happen, then the Earth would still be just like all the other planets in the Solar System: barren and dead.<br />
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So Josh, drop the act and <a href="http://deadstate.org/christian-pastor-offers-atheists-100000-to-prove-god-doesnt-exist-atheist-proves-pastor-is-dumb/" target="_blank">take a real challenge</a>: Stop reading hack articles from Answers in Genesis and the Institute for Creation Research, and <a href="https://www.google.com/search?client=ubuntu&channel=fs&q=scientific+theory+of+evolution&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8" target="_blank">read a few articles on evolution</a> from genuine, reputable science sites such as the National Center for Science Education, The National Academies and Encyclopedia Brittanica. It'll take only about five to ten minutes of your time, and it will make you do the one thing you keep telling your audience to do but not do for yourself: THINK!<br /><br />Update February 3, 2015: It appears that Mr. Feuerstein has learned absolutely nothing in the time since this blog post was published in September 2014. His <a href="https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=571182479651105&fref=nf" target="_blank">latest video</a> is a complete rehash of the arguments debunked above. I think this is evidence that Mr. Feuerstein doesn't care about facts whatsoever, and is more concerned about pushing his false beliefs and social media rankings.Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-53059359248556640432014-09-13T12:30:00.004-04:002014-09-13T12:30:55.776-04:00"God's Not Dead" Review Part 2: Racism and Poor Apologetics<div dir="ltr">
<i>(Note: Sorry for taking so long to release this part of the review. Real life problems got in the way of blogging for a bit.)</i> <b><br /></b><br />
<b>Racism's Not Dead</b></div>
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"God's Not Dead" also suffers from some bits of racism, of both the ethnic and religious kinds.</div>
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The racism is apparent when you notice the attitudes of the parents of the non-white students: The Chinese father is so busy and paranoid, it seems like he practically lives in his limo. The Arabic Muslim father is an outright bigot, telling his daughter that everyone else at the college is evil. And then we have an actual trope: the pastor's missionary friend as the token black person.</div>
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Next, there's the conversation between Wheaton and the pastor when he asks how many students go to church. Wheaton answers "Probably none". Based on... what, that all of them wrote three words on a piece of paper for any easy grade? In reality, the religious makeup would be the majority of students would be Christian.</div>
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Speaking of religious diversity, why aren't any Jewish people represented in the film? Or Buddhist? Mormon? Apparently in this alternate universe, they are treated like the Loch Ness Monster: heard of but never seen.</div>
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<b>Worst Philosophy Class... Ever!</b></div>
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Right from the first class session, it struck me just how little philosophy is actually taught in the movie. The audience is first primed with a list of atheistic philosophers provided by Radisson, though the list is incorrect in including Richard Dawkins, as he is a biologist, not a philosopher. However this is later explained by the writers giving Radisson an almost religious obsession with Dawkins. Then Radisson tells his class to skip all debates and discussions and write down "God Is Dead" for a passing grade. That is not philosophy. The discussions and debates, however meaningless it may seem to Radisson, are the lifeblood of philosophy. Then when Wheaton refuses to do what Radisson wants, and suggests that the class judge his lectures at the end, Radisson asks "Why would I want to empower them?". If this were reality, that would certainly have been the point where at least some students would have reported Radisson to the Dean. A college professors' job is to empower students, and anybody who wants to deny empowerment to students does not belong behind a teacher's desk.</div>
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After the class, Radisson further displays why he's not fit to be a teacher by threatening not just Wheaton's class grade but also his future aspirations. This, more than anything else, should have compelled Wheaton to report Radisson. But, this is the bizarro world of Christian persecution and propaganda, so Wheaton lets it slide despite being very rattled.<br />
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The three debates that happen afterwards have very little philosophical content and literally the only question that is asked by a student during the debates is "What's a theist?". And Radisson proves to be a piss-poor debater in the final debate as he's easily goaded into revealing his misotheism. So what does the audience learn about philosophy? Nothing, except really bad arguments and barbed quips to use on atheists to avoid engaging legitimate criticism of their religious beliefs.<br />
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(Tune in for part 3, where I explore who comes out worse in this movie, atheists or Christians.)</div>
Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-29803119932764502172014-07-21T16:19:00.000-04:002014-07-21T16:19:16.948-04:00This Video Is Not Dangerous To My AtheismThe other day I was checking up on my Klout score(something I'm finding to be a fairly useless measure of social media influence), and I seen this blog post listed in the create tab: "<a href="http://godsnotdeadthemovie.com/blog/atheists-hate-video/" target="_blank">Warning: This Video May Be Dangerous To Your Atheism</a>".<br />
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Oh, joy. A blog post from the original writer of "God's Not Dead", Rice Broocks. Let's see if we can analyse this blog post, paragraph by paragraph:<br />
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"The discovery that the universe had a beginning is a relatively recent
realization in the scientific community. The implication of this
discovery is that in one moment, all of space and time came into being.
In fact, one such scientist named the event the "Big Bang" as a
derogatory term, since <i>he feared that the idea was allowing "the divine
foot in the door</i>""[emphasis Broocks'].</blockquote>
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The last sentence is the first mislead in the blog post. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georges_Lema%C3%AEtre" target="_blank">Georges Lemaître</a>, the scientist who first proposed the Big Bang model, described it as the "the Cosmic Egg exploding at the moment of the creation". Fred Hoyle, who was the one who coined the theory "the Big Bang", criticized it mainly because it competed with his favorite, but now obsolete, "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steady_State_theory" target="_blank">Steady State</a>" theory. While Hoyle did fear the "divine foot in the door", his fear was unnecessary. The Big Bang theory does not imply an intelligent or supernatural cause, despite Broocks obviously trying to paint it as such. It may allow for a possibility of such a cause, but then such a cause must first be proven before plugging it as anything beyond a hypothesis.<br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"Further,
the notion of a beginning for everything was resisted by certain
scientists due to the fact that it pointed people toward a Creator. The
fundamental laws of physics appear to have been carefully designed to
allow for a life-permitting universe. This evidence of “fine-tuning”
further points to a personal, super-intellect creating the universe with
life in mind."</blockquote>
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Again, this fear was totally unnecessary. And in this paragraph is an appeal to the long debunked "<a href="http://wiki.ironchariots.org/index.php?title=Fine-tuning_argument" target="_blank">fine-tuning</a>" argument for the existence of God. Unfortunately for Broocks, as the previous link shows, "fine-tuning" can actually be a great argument for the non-existence of God. Consider that we live in a universe that is estimated to be only 2% baryonic matter, and just on Earth biomass is only .00000000117% of Earth's total mass. This seems more like a universe fine-tuned for black holes and dark matter than for life. Moving on:<br />
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<blockquote>
"The naturalist (one who believes nature is all that exists) asserts that the universe came into being from nothing, by nothing, for nothing. The theist believes the universe came from nothing, by Someone, for something. Naturalists attempt to explain away this evidence by appealing to the existence of multiple universes (the multiverse). However, such claims are based mainly on wild speculation and blind faith, so they are not as reasonable as an eternal, uncreated, personal Creator."</blockquote>
And here is where Broocks engages in projection and metaphysical cherry-picking. Broocks projects that naturalists believe the universe was created <i>ex nihilo</i>(from nothing) without an effective cause. However, all of humanity's experience shows that things that exist within the universe are created <i>ex materia</i>(from materials) with some sort of effective cause. Yet Broocks clearly states that theists believe the universe came into being <i>ex nihilo</i> by a supernatural sentient creator being, based on the same blind faith and wild speculation he accuses naturalists of having. Broocks can't demonstrate or point to an act of creation <i>ex nihilo</i> within the universe, and we certainly haven't found a way to observe anything outside the universe, so <i>ex nihilo</i> itself is nothing more than a hypothesis at best.<br />
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But scientists aren't dogmatically naturalists. Scientists are bottom-up evidentialists and empiricists. Until evidence can reasonably show otherwise, Broocks' argument can't advance any further than a hypothesis. And let's be clear, Broocks does not have any evidence to support his claim, just his religious beliefs. He's working top-down by starting with his conclusion and cherry-picking what he can use and ignore what breaks his conclusion. If it were discovered that Big Bang was caused, say for the sake of argument, by an act of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_particle" target="_blank">virtual particles</a>, would he call those particles "God"? I highly doubt it. He'd probably just move the goalposts and claim "God" made the virtual particles that caused the Big Bang.<br />
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The last paragraph of Broocks' piece doesn't really matter, so I'll just say this about the video in the article which was supposed to be "dangerous" to my atheism: The Kalam cosmological argument is not an argument for God at all. It can only claim at best that the universe had a cause. Religious apologists merely jump to "God" from Kalam without any reasoning or evidence to bridge that gap. The most honest answer that can be given at this moment is simply: "We don't know what caused the Big Bang yet, but it seems it will be something that is very crazy to our minds". For a more in-depth refutation of the Kalam argument, I leave you to watch philosophy buff, soap actor and YouTube atheist Scott Clifton do so with ease:<br />
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<br />Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-20137046427953774932014-07-12T18:32:00.000-04:002014-07-13T14:33:31.023-04:00"Persecuted": The False Persecution Con of ChristianityIn the Christian propaganda film "God's Not Dead", all of the Christian characters are portrayed as "persecuted for their faith" while "godless atheists" run the house until one reluctant protagonist is thrust into the spotlight and triumphs over all in the end. This plot device, while having no basis in reality, has become a popular theme in many Christian propaganda films lately.<br />
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Later this month, a new Christian propaganda film will be coming out, and it couldn't have a more blatantly fitting title: "<a href="http://www.persecutedmovie.com/" target="_blank">Persecuted</a>". The basic plot is this: an evangelistic politician(played by James Remar) is framed for murder after he opposes a sweeping religious reform bill. He must fight to clear his name and take down the bill because it would supposedly persecute the rights of Christians if it passes.<br />
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On the movie's <a href="https://www.facebook.com/persecutedmovie" target="_blank">Facebook page</a>, all of the posts are meant to elicit vacuous "Amen" comments, promote the movie and it's blog, highlight genuine persecution abroad, or make the audience feel that their rights to be Christians in America are being or about to be taken away.<br />
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This movie is not meant to simply pander to Christians, but propagate and reinforce a popular notion that everyone who is a Christian will soon be actively persecuted and they must fight against the "godless politicians" to "bring God back into the government".<br />
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However, anybody with a sharp, observant mind will see the fake persecution complex for what it is. The movie itself contradicts it: Here we have a multi-million dollar Christian film, starring popular Hollywood actors, being distributed and shown in theatres throughout the nation, with a guaranteed audience filled with church groups and other believing Christians. If Christian persecution in America existed, this film would not have made it as far as it has. It seems, however, that the opposite is true, as the following video shows:<br />
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So why is this false persecution complex propagated? Ironically, it's <i>not</i> used to describe when actual persecution is taking place. It's used when a privilege that's been historically granted solely to Christianity is granted to another faith or by nonbelievers in order to preserve the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment in America. "We are being persecuted!" is the cry when <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZ9To30Hz7A" target="_blank">a Hindu priest delivers an invocation</a> in the U.S. Senate, or when <a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/atheists-unveil-monument-nonbelief-god-article-1.1386919" target="_blank">an atheist bench</a> or <a href="http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2014/05/07/satan-statue-should-welcome-oklahoma/QtZFYK4ab9bLyosi9Y88IN/story.html" target="_blank">Satanic statue</a> is placed alongside a Ten Commandments statue on public property. Basically, to American Christians who take the false persecution complex to heart, persecution is seen as being forced to play on a level playing field with everyone else, and they do not want to give up their privilege.<br />
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So they recast their loss of privilege as a form of rights persecution, even going as far as <a href="http://blog.persecutedmovie.com/why-is-pope-francis-increasingly-worried-about-persecuted-american-christians/" target="_blank">inventing a new yet nonsensical term</a> in an attempt to validate their faux outrage and try to regain their lost privileges.<br />
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Yet "Persecuted" doesn't seem to go that route in propagating the persecution complex. From the trailers and plot summary, it seems that the "persecution" takes the form of a government conspiracy to take away religious rights of Christians. Apparently, in this alternate universe, the Republican Party and the Religious Right don't exist and nearly everybody except the protagonist is anti-Christian or completely agnostic. In reality, Christians are the vast majority in the U.S., <a href="http://www.pewforum.org/2012/11/16/faith-on-the-hill-the-religious-composition-of-the-113th-congress/" target="_blank">including Congress</a>. So just as in "God's Not Dead", this movie sacrifices even superficial reality at the altar of propaganda.<br />
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So if you're planning to watch "Persecuted" and expect to see a movie that doesn't misrepresent reality, you'll be wasting your time and money. Better to spend it on a movie that makes no bones about it being purely fiction, like "Transformers: Age of Extinction" or "Rise of the Planet of the Apes". At least those movies aren't out to convince you there's warring factions of giant robots or intelligent apes armed with rifles at your doorstep.<br />
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Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-12931135647182229742014-07-11T14:21:00.000-04:002014-07-11T14:21:00.740-04:00The Cannabis Oil Con: When New Age Woo Attacks, Part 2The other day on Facebook, a relative of mine posted <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheMindUnleashed/photos/a.434569209933563.103142.432632306793920/674809135909568/?type=1&theater" target="_blank">a link</a> from the psuedoscientific New Age woo page "<a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheMindUnleashed" target="_blank">The Mind Unleashed</a>". In the link was a <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">NOT a cancer cure.</td></tr>
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picture(see left) of 7 tubes of cannabis oil, with the caption "-CANCER CURE- A 60 gram supply of Cannabis Oil is recommended for those suffering from serious dis-ease such as cancer. Each tube is 10 grams. Pictured here is enough to treat one cancer patient. And only $600-$1,200 TOTAL. The health care industry would charge you that much for your first night in the hospital. Cure your cancer or lose your home and pay for chemotherapy".<br />
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After pointing out to her that cannabis oil does not cure cancer, she then claims but doesn't link that a study was done in the 1970s that shown that cannabis oil cures cancer, but it was "suppressed" by the government and pharmaceutical industry so they can make money. That's classic conspiracy theory talk. <a href="http://scienceblog.cancerresearchuk.org/2009/08/19/cannabinoids-for-treating-cancer/" target="_blank">One article</a> I found earlier that mentions cannabinoids used in cancer treatment links to a study showing the slowing effects of two synthetic cannabinoids on lab-grown prostate cancer cell lines and on mice. Now, that is a far cry from a "cure". Human trials aren't even in the picture. Not to mention that there's anywhere between 100 to 200 different types of cancer in humans, with different pathophysiologies, genetics, prognoses, causes and treatments(credit: <a href="http://www.skepticalraptor.com/skepticalraptorblog.php/marijuana-cancer-what-facts-smoke/" target="_blank">Skeptical Raptor</a>). In short, cancer isn't some monolithic disease with a single cure-all for it.<br />
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Yet, here we have a website that features articles such as "<a href="http://themindunleashed.org/2014/03/15-tips-empaths-highly-sensitive-people.html" target="_blank">15 Tips For Empaths</a>" and "<a href="http://themindunleashed.org/2014/03/can-reprogram-dna-heal-frequency-vibration-energy.html" target="_blank">Can We Reprogram Our DNA and Heal Ourselves With Frequency, Vibration & Energy?</a>" boldly claiming that cannabis oil is a cheap, real cure for all cancer without real evidence to back it up, and you should choose it over proven treatments(chemotherapy). That's recklessly dangerous and can cost lives. But then, this <a href="http://misfitatheist.blogspot.com/2013/01/when-new-age-woo-attacks.html" target="_blank">isn't the first time</a> New Age proponents have made dangerous medical claims and I doubt it will be the last.Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-11965732708352506982014-05-02T12:46:00.001-04:002014-05-03T14:22:06.012-04:00What's wrong with Christian films these days?<p dir=ltr>I am currently writing up Part 2 of my review of "God's Not Dead", but I want to share some thoughts on what I've noticed about Christian films today and an idea that may vastly improve the quality of future Christian films so believers won't have to be totally embarrassed by them.</p>
<p dir=ltr><b>Preaching to a dwindling choir</b></p>
<p dir=ltr>Many Christian films today aren't made for a general audience. They cater to strictly Christian audiences of a specific type. But in times past, Christian films were made with the intent not simply to depict Biblical stories, but also to genuinely entertain a wider audience. "Jesus Christ Superstar" immediately comes to mind as an excellent example. Even if you weren't Christian, you'd find something enjoyable about the film.</p>
<p dir=ltr>Today's faith-based films focus more on drilling conservative evangelical "values" and horribly poor attempts at proselytizing/evangelization. Take a look at "God's Not Dead", "Revelation Road"(and it's sequel), or the "Left Behind" movies. All they do is reassure believers with a pat on the head and foster a toxic sense of superiority coupled with a persecution complex. Today's films(with the exception of Darren Aronofsky's "Noah") are too high on the preaching and too low on enjoyment. Anybody who isn't an evangelical Christian with a persecution complex will roll their eyes and walk away first chance they get. How can Christian filmmakers fix this problem?</p>
<p dir=ltr><b>Want better Christian films? I "Noah" guy...</b></p>
<p dir=ltr>Ideally, if Christian filmmakers want to really make their movies respectable, they should do as Darren Aronofsky did, and treat their myths as exactly that and not take themselves too seriously.</p>
<p dir=ltr>But since that's out of the question for the majority of Christian film companies who treat Scripture as "truth", here's <a href="http://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtube_gdata&v=FZcfqw0ywso">an alternative idea</a> suggested by "The Thinking Atheist"'s Seth Andrews that may give Christian filmmakers the perspective they sorely need when making a film that intends to proselytize:</p>
<p dir=ltr>Before releasing the film to the general public, host a free screening specifically and only for atheists . When the screening is over, ask every member of the audience two questions over a live television stream: 1) Has this film changed your views on Christianity? 2) Are you more interested in becoming a Christian? And please explain your answers.</p>
<p dir=ltr>I guarantee the answers and their reasoning will be quite eye-opening, to say the least.</p>
Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-76009728846194758722014-03-25T05:13:00.000-04:002014-03-25T05:13:09.367-04:00The Misfit Atheist Movie Review: "God's Not Dead" Part 1This past Saturday, the much-hyped Christian melodrama "God's Not Dead" was released to select theatres, starring Kevin Sorbo(TV's Hercules: The Legendary Journeys), Dean Cain(Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman), Willie Robertson(Duck Dynasty), Shane Harper and Christian music group Newsboys.<br />
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That day, after reading "Camels With Hammers" author Dan Fincke's <a href="https://www.facebook.com/danfincke/posts/10152275165124764?stream_ref=10" target="_blank">short yet scathing first thoughts</a> of the movie on Facebook, I decided to plunk down $14.50(highway robbery!) and check it out for myself. It turns out Dan was right, and I can easily say this was the most despicable Christian movie I've ever seen.<br />
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<b>Worse than "The Genesis Code"</b><br />
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Quite a while back I did a <a href="http://misfitatheist.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-misfit-atheist-watches-genesis-code.html" target="_blank">somewhat sloppy review</a> of "The Genesis Code", which is another Christian film that caricatures academia as persecuting Christians. There was quite a lot of dishonesty and insulting portrayals, mostly by the protagonists' "scientist" brother who concocts a poor hypothesis to reconcile the Genesis creation story with science, and Catherine Hicks' laughably unrealistic portrayal as a college guidance counselor. God's Not Dead(GND from here on out) goes way further, by demonizing anybody in the movie who is not a Christian as one-dimensionally evil and barely even human.<br />
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<b>The Main Plot</b><br />
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The main plot goes like this: The main character Josh Wheaton(Shane Harper) enrolls in a philosophy class taught by dictatorial atheist Professor Radisson(Kevin Sorbo). On the first day, Radisson instructs the class to "skip all the meaningless and time-consuming discussions" by writing down on paper "God is dead" to count as a passing grade. Wheaton sheepishly refuses, and Radisson challenges him to argue the antithesis in three debate sessions to be ultimately judged by the rest of the class. Wheaton winds up winning the debate with a trap so obvious and easy to avoid, anyone who wasn't eating up the propaganda was rolling their eyes. After winning the debate, all the characters go to a Newsboys concert, Radisson gets fatally hit by a car and given a pretty ghoulish deathbed conversion, the credits roll and the makers of the film claim the movie was inspired by several court cases(listed in the credits).<br />
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<b>The Subplots</b><br />
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There are several subplots, which seem very random at first but, as I've seen in "The Genesis Code", are either connected with other characters or used to further the main propagandic theme of the movie. There's the female blogger who ambush-interviews Duck Dynasty's Willie Robertson just before getting diagnosed with cancer. Then we're introduced to her hotshot businessman husband(Dean Cain). Next we see a woman taking care of her dementia-ridden mother. She calls up her brother, who just so happens to be the same hotshot businessman, and implores him to visit her mother. And as we later find out, she also happens to be dating Professor Radisson. There's the Chinese student Martin who becomes interested in Christianity, but his paranoid father doesn't want to hear because "someone might be listening". Yeah, I don't get it either. Next there is the female Muslim student who secretly converts to Christianity and is thrown out by her overbearing father after finding out. And finally there is the pastor(played by the bland David A.R. White) and his missionary friend, who provide the only humor in the movie in the form of a running joke that they just can't get a working rental car so they can take a vacation.<br />
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Oh, and there's also Josh's girlfriend who dumps him after he takes up Radisson's challenge, because apparently it will ruin her already mapped-out 60 year life plan with Josh. We thankfully never see her again after that.<br />
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<b>The Writers Apparently Don't Know Real Atheists</b><br />
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The biggest, and most visible problem with this film is that the writers willfully portray atheists and academia as one-dimensional, evil, and/or sociopathic. The blogger is comically annoying(but set up as the easy "redeemable" person at the end), Radisson belittles his girlfriend(who is a Christian, of course) in front of his colleagues(who are apparently also atheist because none of them stand up to help her), and Cain's character coldly dumps his wife on the spot when she reveals her cancer diagnosis.<br />
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But the audience didn't see this glaring problem and ate it up like red meat.<br />
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Also, the movie propagates the myth that atheists are really anti-theists who had some kind of bad religious experience. "I asked God for something and I didn't get it, so now I'm an atheist and I hate God". The only thing the writers got right was Radisson's claim that "atheists tend to come from religious backgrounds". Every other aspect of the portrayals of atheists seems to stem from the writers looking at atheist vs. theist Internet flame wars and picking the worst of the atheist comments.<br />
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Had they consulted with actual atheists, then they would discover that atheists and theists get along nicely 99% of the time in real life. They have friendly conversations, can become friends, get romantically involved and even marry and still happily maintain their beliefs(yes, this does happen!).<br />
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<b>Think... Roman Colosseum</b><br />
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At the beginning of the film, when Wheaton signs up for the
philosophy class, the student counselor tries to dissuade him after
noticing his cross necklace.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Wheaton: "Come on, it can't be that bad."<br />
Counselor: "Think... Roman Colosseum. People cheering for your death."</blockquote>
What the writers of the film apparently do well is how to make a specific audience(white evangelical fundamentalist Christians with a <a href="http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Persecution_complex" target="_blank">persecution complex</a>) feel validated at the expense of everyone else. The theatre I went to was actually full(church groups most likely), and well over half the audience reacted exactly as the counselor character warned, but predictably cheering for the deaths of those "evil atheists". How did I feel? Slandered. Disappointed. Angry, even. In fact, even angrier than when I watched "The Genesis Code". Pure Flix managed to create a film that gives white evangelicals a hearty pat on the back while gleefully flipping off everybody else. A reverse Roman Colosseum, if you will.<br />
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In Part 2, I will explore the racism on display in GND. So stay tuned, folks!Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-87931462276250208682013-11-06T21:13:00.001-05:002013-11-06T21:13:22.630-05:00Meet David Rives, "Creationist Astronomer"<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/HR9ZEsy80v8" width="420"></iframe><br />
Meet <a href="http://www.wnd.com/author/david/" target="_blank">David Rives</a>. David is a contributor to World Net Daily(a flaming conspiracy theory "news" site) who runs a Young Earth Creationist ministry and claims to be an astronomer. David was featured a while ago on Eric Hovind's show "Creation Today", where he claims that the Big Bang theory is "bad science" solely on the basis that it contradicts the Bible.<br />
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He then further claims that if we look at the science behind astronomy, it matches up with the Bible.<br />
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<b>The Bible on Astronomy</b><br />
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According to the Bible, the universe is geocentric, with a flat Earth and shaped like a tent(Isaiah 40:22). To maintain this view, David would have to reject: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heliocentrism" target="_blank">heliocentrism</a>, the fact that our Solar System exists on the Orion-Cygnus Arm of the Milky Way galaxy(which we're fairly certain is nowhere near the center of the universe), the discovery that <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spherical_Earth" target="_blank">the earth is round</a>, and that current data has eliminated the "tent" hypothesis for the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shape_of_the_Universe" target="_blank">shape of the universe</a>. And the results of these scientific, empirical discoveries have helped enable us to walk on the moon, GPS, send rovers to Mars, discover exoplanets and eventually have the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voyager_1" target="_blank">first interstellar space probe</a>.<br />
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<b>Big Bang vs. The Bible</b><br />
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Now let's go for the jugular of David's claims: that science backs up literal Biblical creationism. First, it must be noted that the Bible has two incongruent creation stories(Genesis 1 and 2). But we'll focus on the first story for brevity. The first problem we see is that planet Earth is created first, before anything else. No sun, moon or stars. No light-producing objects at all. From what we've observed in the <a href="http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2011/10/alien-solar-system-disk-reveals-birth-of-a-planet-1st-ever-observed-1.html" target="_blank">formation of solar systems</a>, this is impossible without a light-producing object undergoing stellar nucleosynthesis first and then ejecting the new elements, which eventually coagulate into planets and moons. And from the same observation linked above, it's obvious that it takes so much longer than a single day. And of course, the Bible runs into major problems with the creation of plants and animals. On the third "day", plants are created. But there's no sun to drive their photosynthetic processes until "day" four. Then on "day" five, all the sea animals and flying animals are created - simultaneously. This directly contradicts observation of the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fossil" target="_blank">fossil record</a> indicating that sea life came first, then land animals and finally flying animals.<br />
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Now let's take a look at the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bang" target="_blank">Big Bang Theory</a>. Quoting straight from the Wikipedia entry(emphasis mine):"The Big Bang is the scientific theory that is <b>most consistent with observations of the past and present states of the universe</b>, and it is widely accepted within the <a href="http://www.blogger.com/null" title="Scientific community">scientific community</a>. <b>It offers a comprehensive explanation for a broad range of observed phenomena, including the <a href="http://www.blogger.com/null" title="Big Bang nucleosynthesis">abundance of light elements</a>, the <a class="mw-redirect" href="http://www.blogger.com/null" title="Cosmic microwave background">cosmic microwave background</a>, <a class="mw-redirect" href="http://www.blogger.com/null" title="Large-scale structure of the cosmos">large scale structure</a>, and the <a class="mw-redirect" href="http://www.blogger.com/null" title="Hubble diagram">Hubble diagram</a></b>."<br />
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To be sure, there are <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bang#Problems" target="_blank">some problems</a> with the Big Bang Theory, but that doesn't mean it's disproven and we should adopt the already disproven creationist dogma, as David suggests. It just means there's some problems that need to be accounted for. And even if we never get these problems solved, there's still more than enough evidence that the Big Bang or a similar theory is the most likely explanation of the origin of the known universe.<br />
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<b>Why "creationist astronomer" is an oxymoron </b><br />
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So why does David lie if he's supposedly a "real" astronomer? The answer: He isn't a real astronomer. He's an invested creationism peddler who uses the fact that he owns a telescope to fool people into thinking he's a qualified authority on the subject of astronomy. It's a common tactic in creationist circles: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iv7A5FBafAQ" target="_blank">Dress up in safari gear</a> and people believe you're a paleontologist or archaeologist. <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1msS71xL00" target="_blank">Dress up in a lab coat</a> and you look like a physicist/biologist/scientist. Show off a telescope and you're automatically assumed to be an astronomer. Right, David?Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-55359224790533939592013-11-06T16:56:00.001-05:002013-11-06T16:56:50.661-05:00The Misfit Atheist on the Sunday Assembly/Godless Revival SplitEarlier this year, British comedians Sanderson Jones and Pippa Evans started the first "atheist church", called the <a href="http://sundayassembly.com/" target="_blank">Sunday Assembly</a>. It started out as an experiment, but quickly caught fire in the UK. On a very hot June summer day, coinciding with the gay pride parade, the first Sunday Assembly in America happened in a small bikini bar in Manhattan, complete with an actual protester next to the bar. I attended this event and found it wildly fun. From there, future assemblies started all over the United States. Things were going swimmingly well... up until last month.<br />
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Sanderson Jones was recently quoted as saying "I’d like to make this as un-atheistic as possible. Atheism is boring. We’re both post-religious." This, along with several anti-atheist ideas he agreed with, did not go over well with a majority of folks within the SA-NYC board of directors. The minority that did agree with Sanderson decided to relaunch the Sunday Assembly as something more of a general nontheistic congregation.<br />
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In response to Sanderson's apparent shunning of the word "atheist", the former board of directors decided to launch their own alternative to the Sunday Assembly, the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Godless-Revival/532305740178434" target="_blank">Godless Revival</a>.<br />
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I recently attended the relaunch of SA-NYC, and aside from the venue change(at the <a href="http://www.nysec.org/" target="_blank">NY Society for Ethical Culture</a>, which actually bills itself as a humanistic religion) and that the post-service socialization had tea and cookies rather than beer served(though afterwards many people went to a nearby bar for further socializing), there's virtually no change from previous assemblies. I plan to attend the first Godless Revival meeting later this month, but at this point I'd like to offer my thoughts on the split and where I currently stand on it.<br />
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While I understand why Sanderson would want to de-emphasize atheism in favor of greater inclusion, I think he should have used language such as "We'd like to make this more inclusive to where it's appealing not only to atheists, but anybody looking for a nontheistic celebration of life. Sunday Assembly isn't only for atheists, despite the media labeling us as an 'atheist church'". What he did say though certainly came off sounding anti-atheistic. <br />
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As for the folks organizing the Godless Revival, I totally get why the split is needed. Atheism is still treated like a toxic word in the United States, and for the founders of SA to bury it as "boring" after successfully showing that atheists can celebrate life just as(and arguably even more) positively as religious people, is a slap in the face to those of us(like myself) who find atheism as anything but boring.<br />
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But, I've seen a few conversations between certain GR and SA organizers(I won't name names, but you know who you guys are) on Facebook and I'm dismayed at the bitterness and mud slinging on both sides on display. I'm quite worried that this bitterness may harm the success of both SA and GR. So I'm suggesting both sides take a step back, cool down, get over it and work it out amicably. The last thing I'd want to see is either group devolving into something like what happened with "Atheism+" or worse. There's more than enough room for both endeavors to thrive with their similar yet distinctly different goals, and maybe some fences could be mended down the line.Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-49296460790209157122013-03-06T00:20:00.001-05:002013-03-06T00:20:21.988-05:00I Guess They Didn't Have Enough Faith, Right?I've written previously on <a href="http://misfitatheist.blogspot.com/2012/11/faith-healing-dangerous-scam.html" target="_blank">the dangers of "faith healing"</a>, but I've just come across a video that says a hell of a lot more than I ever could:<br />
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Faith-healing practitioners, please... If you want to medically neglect yourselves for your beliefs, go ahead. That's solely on you. But do not, I repeat, DO NOT medically neglect your children in deference to your insane beliefs!Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-10421542164489127932013-01-22T01:43:00.001-05:002013-01-22T01:43:52.863-05:00When Lousy Comedians AttackDuring New Year's Eve, while tagging along with my friend from work up to the Bronx, we first stopped off at his family's house to watch the ball drop. While waiting, they turned the TV to Showtime, where they were showing Katt Williams' <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=asngiU5-aLg" target="_blank">final comedy special</a> "Kattpacaypse". He was doing pretty good... until he said this: <br />
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I'm here to tell my people to stop believing bullshit. Just because a motherfucker tells you bullshit, with a straight look on their face... We're too old, we're too smart, we're too motherfuckin' good to believe shit that make no fucking sense. You're too old to be believing in evolution, with your stupid, motherfucking ass! Evolution says people came from monkeys, and the question is "Why is there still monkeys, you dumb motherfucker, you"? Are they some retarded monkeys, they ain't turned into people just yet?... You better believe something! If there's any atheists in the house, let me say "You stupid motherfuckers". I don't care what god you believe in, you got to be a special kind of retarded to be too stupid to make up a god if there wasn't one! Poor thing, who do you even pray to? Nobody. You can't even come. What do you say when you come, atheist? "Oh. Oh. Oh..." nothing. That's right. 'Cause that's what you believe in.</blockquote>
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At that point, I stopped laughing and fought the urge to yell at the screen "Oh, that is such bullshit!". After about 10 more minutes of flaccid attempts at jokes, one of my friend's relatives said "When the fuck is this guy going to start telling jokes? Change it". I was glad he said it, because that's what I wanted to say but I didn't want to risk possibly coming off as rude, since I was a guest.<br />
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After I got home and thought about it, I realized that there actually was a good joke in that rant, just not the one Katt Williams was trying to deliver: Here's Katt Williams, looking like Huckleberry Hound with the ugliest hairdo I've ever seen, telling us not believe stuff that doesn't make any sense, and in the next breath pushing the exact kind of stuff he implored the audience not to believe in. Katt Williams himself is the joke. And what makes it more hilarious is that it would take him no more than 5 minutes to look up the scientific theory of evolution and the mountains of evidence supporting it.<br />
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But that still leaves his atheist-bashing comments. He's basically calling atheists "retarded" because atheists don't believe in the existence of gods. But wait a second here, "too stupid <i>to make up a god</i> if there wasn't one"? Did Katt just unthinkingly admit that gods are made-up? Why yes, I think he did.<br />
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Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-89118615019049563942013-01-21T16:48:00.001-05:002013-01-21T18:35:57.095-05:00When New Age Woo AttacksLast night, one of my cousins on Facebook shared a YouTube video called "<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fmMNlmn1DPc" target="_blank">Gregg Braden on Curing Cancer using our own Technology of Emotion</a>". He shared this video because he thought the video was a demonstration of the power of positivity, and he actually believed the claims of Gregg Braden. I watched the video, and almost immediately my woo alarms went off.<br />
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After just a <a href="https://www.google.com/search?client=ubuntu&channel=fs&q=gregg+braden+skepic&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8#hl=en&client=ubuntu&hs=u0i&tbo=d&channel=fs&spell=1&q=gregg+braden+skeptic&sa=X&ei=_JX9ULf5Labp0gHNmYDgDg&ved=0CDIQvwUoAA&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.r_qf.&bvm=bv.41248874,d.dmQ&fp=fc1824b472b7f9e9&biw=1535&bih=779" target="_blank">single Google search</a>, it turned out my skepticism was <a href="http://skeptico.blogs.com/skeptico/2005/04/zero_point_to_g.html" target="_blank">well-founded</a>: Braden, seen by many as a "prophet" in the New Age movement, has been exposed as a very deceptive woo peddler by many skeptics(videos below). He abuses and manipulates scientific facts, makes stuff up and calls it science, and many of the "evidences" he cites turn out to be fraudulent or misleading.<br />
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What makes Braden so dangerous is how charming he is when peddling New Age woo. Even those who were previously fans of Braden and don't label themselves skeptics at all <a href="http://www.energygrid.com/spirit/guide/gregg-braden.html" target="_blank">had to admit surprise</a> at how much deception Braden pumps out with a straight face. A perfect example(as shown <a href="http://www.energygrid.com/science/2004/03ap-godcode.html" target="_blank">here</a>) is how he makes the claim that our DNA spells out "God Eternal within the body" and backs it up with nothing more than contrived and unscientific numerology and then claim it's "scientifically proven".<br />
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Now, I'm all for spreading messages of positivity. Being positive never hurts and spreading positivity is a noble goal. Even in some rare instances "mind over matter" certainly does work, such as my cousin's example of how he got rid of his migraines. That's a real phenomenon known as "the placebo effect". But hitching positive messages with dangerous, unproven and unscientific woo, such as "Positive thoughts cure cancer" is a recipe for a lot of pain, and I can't let that slide.<br />
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Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-67075787019839771582012-12-08T13:51:00.001-05:002012-12-08T13:51:42.156-05:00My New Gig: A-News ReportsJust a quick post to let everyone know: I now have a writing gig for a site called <a href="http://anr.apartmentj.com/" target="_blank">A-News Reports</a>, which does little news articles geared towards the atheist, agnostic, and freethinker communities. I've already done three articles, and so far all feedback has been very positive:<br />
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<ul>
<li><a href="http://anr.apartmentj.com/?p=90" target="_blank">The Non-War on Christmas</a></li>
<li><a href="http://anr.apartmentj.com/?p=141" target="_blank">Megapastor Rick Warren and Uganda's "Kill the Gays" bill: What do they have in common?</a></li>
<li><a href="http://anr.apartmentj.com/?p=267" target="_blank">Bad Religion in Africa: Witchcraft belief in the 21st Century</a></li>
</ul>
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Feel free to check out the whole site, and if you're interested in becoming a writer for the site, you can contact us <a href="http://anr.apartmentj.com/?page_id=40" target="_blank">here</a>.Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-56782148211390471842012-11-14T13:37:00.001-05:002012-11-14T13:37:41.810-05:00In memoriam: My grandmotherThis past Friday, <a href="http://obits.nj.com/obituaries/starledger/obituary.aspx?pid=161026469#fbLoggedOut" target="_blank">my grandmother had passed away</a>. She was 84 years old. On Monday, the family gathered at the Condon Memorial Home in Harrison, where practically everybody in the Agudo family goes to after they pass on. Of course, there were a lot of tears and sadness, but also a lot of discussions, and even some smiles and laughter. Even when death is in the room, life goes on.<br />
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During the second wake session, the pastor of the Pentecostal church that Grandma went to in her later years(She was previously Catholic, then Mormon, then a Jehovah's Witness, until she settled on a Pentecostal faith) came by to deliver a sermon for. Even I appreciated this because Rev. Cruz has known our family for at least a decade now, and his sermons are very family-oriented. While my Spanish is very rusty, he gave a very comforting sermon, stressing that she had a long life, had many children and even more grandchildren. Her legacy lives on in our memories, and literally within us.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-UTkfwk0UB3I/UKPelI_TM5I/AAAAAAAAAMI/RgyWTRH2kqQ/s1600/grandma.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-UTkfwk0UB3I/UKPelI_TM5I/AAAAAAAAAMI/RgyWTRH2kqQ/s320/grandma.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Abuelita and me on her 84th birthday</td></tr>
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Of course, he is a priest, so at the end of the sermon it came time to pray. I should note that while some of my relatives know I'm an atheist, my grandmother was not one of them(Though I suspect now that this is published, word might get out pretty quick and I might catch some hell for a while). However, when everybody bowed their heads, closed their eyes and prayed along, I did something slightly different. I bowed my head, but instead of praying, I let my mind drift into my fondest memory of Abuelita(as we affectionately call her): When I was a kid, Abuelita lived in an apartment above a small grocery store with a big comic book section. Every time I came over, I asked "Abuelita, dame un peso, por favor?"(Grandma, can you give me a dollar, please?). She happily always said yes, and I always used it either towards a comic book, or a soda, or a pack of <a href="http://www.topps.com/entertainment/garbage-pail-kids/garbage-pail-kids-flashback" target="_blank">Garbage Pail Kids</a> trading cards(C'mon, they were hilarious). I thanked her for spoiling me so much then, and thank her again now.<br />
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Yesterday morning, we said our last goodbyes and buried her in the cemetery where my grandfather, her husband, is buried as well. Before we embarked to the cemetery, Rev. Cruz gave another sermon. While still stressing the family bonds, it was a bit more heavy with religious language. Even more so when a chaplain came up afterwards and delivered a sermon in English, saying that "Jesus is with us" and whatnot. So I did what I did the night before and drowned out the religious talk with memories of Grandma, because that's who it's really all about, not a 2,000 year old carpenter or a religion.<br />
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After we buried her, we all went to a Spanish Pavilion(literally named "Spanish Pavilion") at the edge of town, ate a ton of food, talked more, and then went back to our normal life routines. Normal, except when the holidays hit us soon. While we'll be okay in years to come, this year things will be quite different without Grandma at the Thanksgiving table or handing out the presents on Christmas Eve. But, we'll still manage to have a good time and enjoy life, because that's what Abuelita wanted us to do. Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-44423337520245889932012-11-06T13:27:00.001-05:002012-11-07T23:32:40.889-05:00Faith Healing: A dangerous scam<div>
Quite a while back, the <a href="http://www.facebook.com/groups/anews.discussions/" target="_blank">A-News Discussions</a> Facebook group got spammed by <a href="http://bradreddekopp.com/?p=349">a Christianity-addicted evangelist</a>. Upon perusing this young man's timeline(before he blocked me), I came across a video of the African "faith healer" Dag Heward-Mills, where his spokesperson in the video claims <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wbQxifBzho">he healed a "hunchback"</a> through prayer.<br />
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I immediately decided to take a look at Mr. Heward-Mills' other videos supposedly showcasing "healing miracles" he performed. Unfortunately, all the other videos suffer the same fatal flaw as the hunchback video: They provide absolutely no real evidence a healing actually occurred, just mere assertions. The best, and most laughable videos are the ones where they bring up <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-e5vaDHhRY">a boy who was supposedly born with only one visible testicle</a>, where they claim to heal a man who is <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfSI_piAWjs">deaf in one ear</a>, and to complete the trifecta, a man who was <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxUy0kivcgk">blind in one eye</a>. On each of those videos I left an appropriate comment(they've long since removed them) calling out the obvious(and quite frankly, very poor) deceptions being played out.<br />
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What dismayed me in watching these videos, is that virtually all the people in the audience cheered the obvious scam with extreme gullibility. They, like the Christian spammer I encountered on Facebook, truly believe that faith can heal any illness, while never stopping to think that they're getting fleeced.<br />
Unfortunately, faith healing isn't a scam confined to third world countries. Particularly in the Pentecostal, Evangelical and fundamentalist communities, faith healing scams happen every day in the United States, as magician and skeptic Derren Brown <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYjgeayfYPI">investigated and exposed</a> a few years ago. These "faith healers" justify their scams with what is labelled the "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosperity_theology">prosperity gospel</a>", which is basically "give me your money and God will make you several times richer in wealth and/or health". Of course, when that doesn't happen, the person is accused of not having enough faith. The worst cases are when a person's health declines because they stop taking medications or treatment because they are convinced that their session with a faith healer cured him/her. Death can even occur as a result of this delusion.<br />
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But there's an even worse situation when <a href="https://www.google.com/search?client=ubuntu&channel=fs&q=faith+healing+deaths&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8" target="_blank">children are conscripted into it</a> by their believing parents. And the worst part of it, when these children suffer serious physical harm and even die from their parents' refusal to get proper medical treatment in favor of "prayer", is that in many states the parents are legally protected from prosecution(even after a death is the result of the faith healing act), citing "religious exemptions". And when <a href="http://www.atheistsforhumanrights.org/child.htm" target="_blank">folks challenge these exemptions</a> to bring about reasonable protections for the children of faith healing parents, resistance from misguided politicians and unmerited charges of "You're just here to bash religion" invariably comes up as attempts to derail and slime what is really just a sober, rational discussion about the dangers of faith healing to children.<br />
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So until the law finally catches up with reality, the best things we can do are to raise awareness, speak out, lobby for opposition against faith healing exemptions(such as through the <a href="http://www.secular.org/" target="_blank">Secular Coalition of America</a> and <a href="http://www.au.org/" target="_blank">Americans United</a>), and just say no to faith healing(or alternatively insist on having it in conjunction with proper medical care).</div>
Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-6742869753496100352012-11-02T03:36:00.002-04:002012-11-02T21:35:43.266-04:00Post-Sandy RecoveryIn my <a href="http://misfitatheist.blogspot.com/2012/10/hurricane-sandy-atheists-and-douchebag.html" target="_blank">previous post</a>, I blogged about my experience enduring Hurricane Sandy as it was clobbering the Northeastern United States. It's been almost three days now since then, and there's a hell of a lot to talk about.<br />
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First, what surprised many of us(particularly folks in places safe from flooding like myself) was just how badly we underestimated Sandy's destructive power. This was due primarily from the Northeast's relative inexperience with hurricanes compared with states around and below the Mason-Dixon line, and basing our expectations of Sandy against what we experienced last year with Hurricane Irene. Even I had thought Sandy wouldn't be a serious problem. As you'll read just below, I had no clue how dead wrong I was.<br />
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On Tuesday, I was expecting a jump in business at the store, due to people from downtown and Hoboken suffering from flood damage. But then I went to go grab something to eat over on Central Avenue. Nearly every building in Central Avenue was closed because there was no power at all. The only two food places open besides Stop & Shop were the Chinese fast food joint(they had a generator) across the street and Dunkin Donuts(which was quite a few blocks up the Avenue). Also, I was floored when I seen that one of the mainstays of Central Avenue had literally collapsed under Sandy's fury.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-tDJEq5y849k/UJNK3z1VT4I/AAAAAAAAALk/4Dsxd3DscI4/s1600/IMG_20121030_143309.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-tDJEq5y849k/UJNK3z1VT4I/AAAAAAAAALk/4Dsxd3DscI4/s320/IMG_20121030_143309.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Kennedy Department Store is just smashed.</td></tr>
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I decided to go to my workplace to grab a microwavable meal, since it was the only place with stable power. That's when I was greeted with a scene straight out of a nightmare: There were virtually no shopping carts in the corral, hordes of people were charging their cell phones(and laptops!) everywhere they could find an outlet on the sales floor(they even used power strips), every line to the registers were all the way down the aisles constantly and we were getting customers not only from Jersey City, but folks from Hoboken, North Bergen, Nutley, Union City, and possibly other places. As it turns out, the Stop & Shop on Central Avenue was the only major supermarket store for miles that wasn't flooded and had power. There were widespread utility outages everywhere. It was the most serious state of emergency I had ever seen. After work, Central Avenue was literally pitch black.<br />
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And to make matters worse, no grocery or perishable deliveries could get to us until Wednesday and Thursday, thereby stripping the store of essential supplies to offer to customers. Also, we're actually a very small store(just nine aisles), with no full deli, seafood, pharmacy, bakery or even florist departments. And we have the only working ATM on the Avenue(that I know of). So we were the most ill-equipped to meet our customers' basic needs during the extreme crisis, thanks to a combination of horrific damages and really bad luck. To our credit though, we've been sticking it out like real troopers and we're still doing our damn best to help speed up local recovery.<br />
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On Wednesday, I had found out that the city government had initiated a 7pm curfew for the whole city. However, I was beginning to see signs of slow but actual recovery. We were still getting chaotic business, but I noticed a significant decrease in register line length as the day passed. We finally got a grocery delivery, bringing in much needed water, canned food, juices and other essential foodstuffs.<br />
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On Thursday, some businesses on the Avenue opened up, albeit sans power or running off generators. I managed to get a BLT sandwich at a deli across the street, and after subsisting on relatively little amounts of food the past two days, eating something with bacon in it really helped get me through the day. We're also finally getting perishable and ice deliveries, which helps even further.<br />
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Tomorrow, the curfew will be lifted(*), as at least some sort of power will be restored to the Avenue and there's news of two supermarkets finally opening back up, helping put a lot of pressure off us. But we've still got a long ways to go before full recovery. For example, I was speaking to the driver of the perishable delivery that finally came in, and he said that his next stop is in Connecticut. Yup, that is how seriously extensive Sandy's damage is: His next stop is in another state!<br />
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So that's what's happening so far where I'm at, and I've been hearing rumors that we may be getting a snowstorm next week(Seems very unlikely though). But snowstorms are something New Jerseyans know quite well and can get through fairly easy.<br />
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*Correction: I found out that the curfew won't be lifted for at least another 2-3 days, as it is estimated that that is how long it will take to restore power to the Heights area at least.Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-54673956320527289432012-10-30T02:15:00.003-04:002012-10-30T02:53:15.035-04:00Hurricane Sandy, Atheists and Douchebag PreachersAs I'm typing this, it's just past midnight and Hurricane Sandy is <a href="http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2012/10/29/youtube_is_telling_us_what_twitter_can_t_right_now.html?fb_action_ids=10151225104704941&fb_action_types=og.likes&fb_ref=sm_fb_like_chunky&fb_source=other_multiline&action_object_map={%2210151225104704941%22%3A479915565388648}&action_type_map={%2210151225104704941%22%3A%22og.likes%22}&action_ref_map={%2210151225104704941%22%3A%22sm_fb_like_chunky%22" target="_blank">still whipping the New England area pretty bad</a>. I'm relatively safe despite being right in Sandy's path, thanks to a combination of a few things: The house I live in shares an entire wall with the next door neighbors, making it structurally tough; there's no trees right in front of my house, so there's no risk of tree damage, and I live in a neighborhood that is comfortably above sea level, so there's no flooding danger. The worst I've gotten so far is two minor power outages that lasted no longer than a minute(Yay for study electrical infrastructure!) and the crappy plastic storage shed in the backyard is demolished(It's my not-so-bright uncle's shed and I didn't have anything in it, so it's not a worry for me at least). <br />
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During my continuing hunkering down in the house with my aunt and cousins, I've been seeing some pretty good hurricane survival advice being shared by fellow atheists on Facebook. Some good tips include: "If you're fairly certain that your water may get shut off and you have a bathtub, clean it good, rinse it, put a drain stopper in it and fill it up before the storm hits", "fill up gallon sized freezer bags with water and freeze them. That way if the power goes out the frozen bags can help keep the fridge cool and you'll have fresh water when the bags melt", "virtually all canned foods can be eaten straight from the can", "If you have a gas grill, you can use it to cook and boil water" and "If you see a zombie, always either cut off the head or destroy the brain"(okay, that last one is made up). Even David Silverman <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3nqusrn4pg" target="_blank">laid out some basic, solid advice</a> to folks last year when Hurricane Irene came around, despite the bullying attempts by the host and guests.<br />
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What you won't see from atheists is crap like this: "<a href="http://www.gaystarnews.com/article/christian-preacher-blames-gays-hurricane-sandy291012" target="_blank">Christian preacher blames gays for Hurricane Sandy</a>". I should note that Mr. McTernan's irrational and laughable views are not an isolated incident at all. Just yesterday my friend Lee Moore of <a href="http://a-news.apartmentj.com/" target="_blank">A-News</a> noted that street preachers were out in force in NYC, no doubt using the fear of Sandy's imminent arrival as a method to get people to believe their religious propaganda. Every time there is a major disaster, such as <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Katrina_as_divine_retribution" target="_blank">Hurricane Katrina</a>, the <a href="http://mikeb302000.blogspot.com/2011/04/liberal-viewer-on-glenn-beck-on.html" target="_blank">Japanese earthquake/tsunami and power plant meltdown</a>, major earthquakes and other natural disasters, there are preachers of all faiths who will blindly assert that it's not nature behind the disasters, but divine judgement for whatever issue the preacher and his/her religion is currently against(homosexuals, Israel, contraception, abortion, unbelief/apostasy, you name it). Telling people to "pray to be saved" does nothing to help the situation. It only serves to scare people into thinking they are doing something when in fact they aren't. If it did actually do something, then <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=church+destroyed+by+tornado&hl=en&client=ubuntu&pwst=1&channel=fs&prmd=imvns&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=Mm6PULntO-yH0QH34IDAAg&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAQ&biw=1600&bih=680" target="_blank">these churches</a> might have still been standing.<br />
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So the next time a natural disaster comes your way, remember what Mr. Silverman said: Act like an atheist; be prepared for the worst while hoping for the best. Two hands working are better than a thousand clasped in prayer.Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-21450488188709444522012-10-08T05:20:00.000-04:002012-10-08T05:20:01.492-04:00The Misfit Atheist watches "The Genesis Code"The other night after my work shift was done, I checked the Redbox machine in the store to see what was new. Redbox is known to not only carry major box office titles, but also craptacular B-movies and equally crappy Christian propaganda films(like Ben Stein's "Expelled"). That night, I seen that "The Genesis Code" was "new" and in stock. I never watched a Christian propaganda film before, so I figured to rent it and review it. As I write this, I've just finished watching it and quite frankly, my head hurts from all of the blatant dishonesty emanating from it. Nevertheless, I will endeavour to give as much of a rational review of it as possible.<br />
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<b>The Plot </b><br />
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"<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Genesis_Code" target="_blank">The Genesis Code</a>" is a religious film surrounding a romance story between a college hockey player and a college student journalist. The movie opens on a college hockey game, where the local team win the game thanks to their new star player Blake. After the game, Blake is approached by Kerry, a college journalist assigned with writing a story on Blake. When Kerry rebuffs Blake's initial advance by telling him that's she "chaste", he instantly picks up that she's a Christian. Later in the movie, we find out the reason why: She's a preacher's daughter(who also happens to be the movie's executive producer).<br />
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The titular theme of the Genesis story is introduced via Blake's teammates poking fun at her religious beliefs, citing the Genesis creation as Bronze Age fairy tales(which they are, but I'll save the detailed criticisms for later in this post). Blake doesn't believe the Genesis story as well and challenges her to prove the Genesis story correct as a condition of telling her anything she wants to know for her story. So she enlists her geeky brother and his friends to cook up a pseudo-scientific theory to prove that the Genesis story of creation is correct and in accord with science.<br />
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While this is going down, we discover Blake's harsh dilemma: His mother is in a coma, dying from cancer. His grandparents want to honor his mother's wish to die mercifully by putting her off life support, but he refuses to allow it. On this, I can sympathize with both Blake and his grandparents.<br />
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Anyways, later on we hit on the third theme of the film, which is the theme most likely to make any reasonable person stand up and point out as utter bullshit(again, as I'll critique later in the post): Kerry's faith gets challenged by her intellectually-vapid academic advisor, played by Catherine Hicks.<br />
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Each of the themes are then "resolved" in turn, while steadily amping up the religious overtones, culminating in Blake's team prayer for his mother and the inevitable "miracle" of his mother having a temporary reprieve and being awake. And then the credits roll with the preacher reading off the Genesis creation story.<br />
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<b>Critique</b><br />
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For starters, there's the "Genesis Code" pseudo-science involved. The explanation is actually a sleight-of-hand trick. It relies on using the natural phenomenon of time dilation to sound scientific, and hopes nobody looks up anything other than Wikipedia's entry on time dilation(in other words, it's a lie fed to scientifically illiterate people). For example, the theory states the age of the universe at 15.75 billion years. This is incorrect(it's 13.7 billion with 0.13 billion years, give or take), and was likely stated that way to make the "POTS" math fit. But that's a niggle compared to what comes up next.<br />
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The most glaring problem, to me, is when they redefine Day 4 in Genesis to read as when the moon, sun and stars "appeared". But <a href="http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis+1%3A14-19&version=KJV" target="_blank">Genesis 1:14-19</a> clearly state that's when God <i>created</i> the sun, moon and stars. Yet the Earth was already basically formed. However, astrophysics and cosmology tell us that in order to have planets(including the Earth), stars must come first. Planets come into play after a star goes supernova, releasing all the elements created during stellar nucleosynthesis, then having the resulting accretion disks coagulate into planets, moons and stars. So right there, science and religion completely disagree, thereby making "The Genesis Code" a failed hypothesis. But wait, there's more.<br />
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The movie also gets the Cambrian Explosion(Day 5)dead wrong. <a href="http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis+1%3A20-23&version=KJV" target="_blank">Day 5 in Genesis</a> claims that every type of land and air creature appears at the same time. However, anybody who studies the Cambrian Explosion will know that only sea life dominated the planet. No land animals at all. Yet the scientist character claims that land animals appeared at the same time. It's obvious the makers of the film couldn't be bothered to take even 5 minutes to fact-check the actual science they so blatantly misuse. And yes, there's more.<br />
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If the movie sets out to prove Genesis correct, shouldn't they also address what comes after the creation? Like Adam & Eve, the talking snake, and all that? Nope, we don't get that because even the creationists know they can't try to square that circle.<br />
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Since I've thrashed the movie's main selling point enough, there's one thing about this movie that simultaneously pisses me off and amuses me to no end: Catherine Hicks' role as a blatantly bat-crazy mischaracterization of academia. Through Hicks, you can see just how divorced from reality the people behind the movie are. Hicks is actually portraying the creationist fantasy of what they wish academia would be like. But she overacts it so much, that I wonder if she did it on purpose to clue in the otherwise oblivious audience that "this movie is bullshit".<br />
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And finally, there's the end-of-life decision theme. This is the only theme I would say they explored even-handedly up until the literal <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deus_ex_machina" target="_blank">deus ex machina</a> at the end. The grandparents were trying to do the right thing by their daughter's wishes(and I would side with them), but again, I do sympathize with Blake wanting his mother to hang on as long as possible. However, it's clear the writers use this situation as a catalyst to set up Blake's "come to Jesus" moment in a group prayer.<br />
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<b>Conclusion</b> <br />
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So I'll end this badly written review and critique with a bit of advice for potential viewers: If you must watch this film(most likely as a punishment), bring something you can safely vent your frustrations on, because this movie <i>will</i> test your patience with dishonesty. Otherwise, avoid this film at all costs.Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8466285221252594698.post-16905461943932581492012-10-07T15:18:00.001-04:002012-10-07T15:18:34.391-04:00Why I am not for "Atheism+"Before I go into detail about why I'm not in support of Atheism+, I'd like to preface the post with a statement in advance of a potential flood of Atheism+ supporters: My objections to Atheism+ does not mean that I am opposed to the platforms of social justice, gender equality, women's rights, LGBTQ rights and racial equality espoused in Atheism+. I very much support these things, but I recognize that these are not borne of atheism at all but rather basic human empathy and compassion. So do not assume that I am somehow a "misogynist", "evil", "privileged" or an "asshole" merely for being critical. Now, on to business.<br />
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The first reason why I am opposed to the Atheism+ movement is the intentional conflation of atheism with issues that do not have a logical progression from it(As I hinted at above). Nor does it follow that these issues necessarily flow into atheism(perhaps <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misotheism" target="_blank">misotheism</a>, though), since there are theistic groups that support many issues in the Atheism+ platform. This does not mean that atheists should not support these things at all. On the contrary, these issues should be encouraged and we have done this with great success. But it is not a good idea to take one thing and attach so many non-relevant issues to it that it essentially becomes an ideological platform, which can so easily turn into dogmas. And having dogmas in a group can be a telltale sign of religious or cultish behavior.<br />
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Secondly, this conflation of atheism with so many issues politicizes and obscures atheism to the point of, well, obscurity. The atheism movement is still facing the issues of: society's still-dim views of atheists/agnostics/freethinkers, theocratic encroachments and woo-peddling. To put these issues on the backburner and say "We shouldn't be doing A as much because A is taking too long, so we should be doing X,Y, and Z because I think they're more important" is inviting disaster because although we've made progress, it is progress that can easily be erased by creationists, theocrats and fundamentalists if we don't keep challenging them. In shorter words, the Atheism+ platform tends to treat atheism and it's direct issues as peripheral rather than integral.<br />
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Thirdly, because I don't accept the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equity_and_gender_feminism" target="_blank">gender feminism</a> and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radical_feminism" target="_blank">radical feminism</a> practiced by the vast majority of the Atheism+ movement. They claim egalitarianism or equity feminism, but <a href="http://atheismplus.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=64#p350" target="_blank">their own visceral responses</a> to legitimate men's rights issues and men's rights activists put the lie to that. You can also see misandry and androphobia in Atheism+ when they've adopted socially destructive theories such as "<a href="http://kateharding.net/2009/10/08/guest-blogger-starling-schrodinger%E2%80%99s-rapist-or-a-guy%E2%80%99s-guide-to-approaching-strange-women-without-being-maced/" target="_blank">Schrodinger's Rapist</a>"(<a href="http://atheismplus.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=968" target="_blank">forum link</a>) and Patriarchy. It's even been suggested that Atheism+ is more accurately described as "feminism+" or "A+theism".<br />
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There is also the problem of the "<a href="http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Special%20Snowflake%20Syndrome" target="_blank">special snowflake</a>" and "<a href="http://sporeflections.wordpress.com/2009/01/22/the-victim-complex/" target="_blank">victim complex</a>" cultures developing within the Atheism+ movement(See "Schrodinger's Rapist" again and <a href="http://atheismplus.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=740" target="_blank">this link</a> as examples). These cultures are destructive to the stated goals of Atheism+ and generates conflicts where there shouldn't be. As a result, the group has become quite isolated and insular.<br />
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And finally, I cannot in good conscience join a group that is so willing and eager to do unethical things such as <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iw97kToqIKU" target="_blank">plagiarism</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ujtf10ykUxM" target="_blank">copyright infringement</a>, smearing and attacking others for dissenting thoughts, and unthinkingly committing credulity all in the name of "social justice" or "the greater good". In fact, it is this continuing unethical behavior, above all else, that is why I cannot support Atheism+.Tony Agudohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04354721288594254330noreply@blogger.com2