Selling Religion

April 28th, 2009

Rafael nailed it in his latest post about why people buy religion.  It’s hell… without that, heaven doesn’t have a chance.  He ends by saying:

Religion is a tricky sale, but Hell is what a sales person would call the perfect closer. As soon as people want to turn away from religion, they pull out the Hell card, and you’re locked in. Another soul saved. Which is the ironic thing, they believe they are doing you a favor, they are saving your soul, and for that you need to give them money.

Having been in sales, and having attended a Southern Baptist church, he’s not kidding.  Basically a restatement of Pascal’s Wager.  It’s shameless and bizarre once you step outside of the circle and see it for what it really is… Control.

Atheism, History, Religion , , , , , ,

Comic Sans on American Idol… WTF?

April 23rd, 2009

OK, this is slightly off topic, but still a major sacrilege… apparently Fox can’t do any better than Comic Sans (serif) for their weekly graphics.  My jaw dropped.  And if you think the still is bad, you should have seen the way they were animating it the 30 seconds prior to that.  Horrific.

american-idol-comic-sans-wtf

Idol fans and fans of good taste not pleased… real-time displeasure from Twitter.

Graphics, History, Religion, Video , ,

Good Lord… That’s Some Serious Jesus Flash

April 21st, 2009

I am totally blown away.  Almost makes me want to believe in myths.  Based on the creator’s bio (not THE creator… the creator of the website, Marcus Shepard), he has been doing this since 1999.  Not that the guy doesn’t have talent, but it’s a bit of a one-trick-pony sideshow.

It’s like Judge Dredd meets the Matrix meets World of Warcraft meets the Terminator meets Ted Haggard (with a dash of Denzel Washington).

judge-dredd-jesus-matrix-haggard-wow-terminator-salvation1

Take a look at the SharperFX web site… look for the “WEBSITES” link — it has a “NEW SITES” sign sticking out of it with a pop-up laser shield behind THAT (wait for it…) contains eight pages of MAXIMUM FLASH… for God. Crowd favorite seems to be ICCM-1 (dash 1?). Ah, turns out all the other “good” ICCM website URLs were taken.

What would be amazing is if someone spoofed it and went WAY over the top — with flash animation, spinning logos, swords, lightning, voiceovers, random steel foundry noises…  aw crap.  He already has all that in there.  How do you spoof a caricature?

Anyway, in the spirit of the WWE, please to enjoy some wacky propaganda for… The Holiest of Holies… The Alpha and the ChrOmega… The Master of the Universe… The reigning Heavyweight champion of the world… (closest challenger is Islam the Destroyer)…  the ONE… the ONLY…  CHRISTIANnnnnn… FAITHHhhhhhh….  [CROWD CHEER].

Graphics, Religion , , , , , , , , , ,

Heaving Dead Cats (and Cremation)

March 17th, 2009

Great name for a blog post… even better name for a blog!

http://www.heavingdeadcats.com

Way to go, Neece.  I really liked your recent post. One of the more frustrating aspects of being a non-believer is being a minority:

The very fact that we have atheists today, in growing numbers all over the planet, shows that if you take away the dogma and expose the lies and myths, some people will shrug off the mantle of religion even though in most societies, it means putting oneself outside the supposed comforts of society. It turns them into an outsider, to some degree.

I can assure you that here in the deep south, I am a minority, but not quite an outsider.  I am not an outsider, because I keep my atheistic beliefs fairly quiet. When asked directly, I am always forthcoming, but generally it doesn’t come up.  What is stunning is the number of times per day that people will refer casually or tangentially to their faith.

Just today I was talking with a coworker about a recent death of a friend. I inquired about upcoming services because it was important to him, but seemed to be taking a while. He mentioned that the friend had opted for cremation. He went on to say that this person’s family does things a “little differently”. I said, “Whatever do you mean?”  He went on to say that “Uhh…cremation has never been practiced in Judeo-Christian tradition and only pagan religions cremate.  Look it up… throughout recorded history… blah blah”.

I can count on one hand the number of times the word “pagan” has ever come up in a conversation. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that atheists tend to opt for cremation as well. You can well imagine where this person stands on the issue.

Anyway, if you were not already aware, here is some additional reading, statistics, and fun facts on the topic of cremation.

Oh, and keep up the great work, Neece (and Butch).

Atheism, History, Religion, Science, Statistics , , ,

Why do we believe in GOD?

March 15th, 2009

Rafael… Dude, you rock. Welcome to the blog world.

whygod.weebly.com

Thanks for coming out for non-belief. You are on my list of favorites already.

I’m just an average Joe. I do not believe in any dogma or any powerful being. I don’t like labels but I guess I’m an atheist, although I think of my self as just plain rational. I don’t claim to disprove God’s existence, I make no such claim because I cannot prove that God doesn’t exist. No religion can prove that he does either. It’s all faith. I know that I cannot compete against faith. I am just talking about having reasonable doubt.

I think that’s fantastic… if we took God to court, he would surely lose on that basis alone.

Update: Weebly sucks and Rafael’s site may be down.

2nd Update: Weebly still sucks but whygod is back up with minor damage.  Why would they have taken every weebly site down for several hours during peak US surfing hours?  Idiots.


Agnostic, Atheism, Polling, Religion, Science , , , , ,