Living in liberal western Massachusetts often feels quite like existing in a vacuum of liberalism and humanistic ideals. It's always a wake-up call when reality strikes through the news. backyard.
This morning it struck like a thunderbolt. I was driving to work and heard an NPR piece entitled
In Quiverful Movement, Birth Control is Shunned. The headline itself is not particularly drastic news from Christian fundamentalists but the news story that unfolded was, to me, one of the more offensive and disturbing I've heard in a long time.
It's nothing new that many fundamentalist Christians like to procreate as many Christian babies as they can. What was shocking to me were the words of some of the people interviewed for the piece.
Nancy Campbell, a leader of the Quiverfull movement and author of Be Fruitful and Multiply had this to say: "The womb is such a powerful weapon; it's a weapon against the enemy."
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Showing posts with label fundamentalists. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fundamentalists. Show all posts
Wednesday
Talking About Religion And Absurdity ...
... things could not get any worse in this respect - to whit (emphasis added):
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Bill in Texas would allow creationists to grant Masters of Science degreesHere's what "M.Sc." means:
If a private college doesn't receive funds from any governmental organization, should they have to be held to any standards or requirements when they award degrees? No, one Texan lawmaker is insisting.
Texas State Representative Leo Berman has proposed House Bill 2800, which would exempt any private non-profit institution that requires students to complete “substantive course work” from having to acquire a certificate of authority from the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board(THECB). “If you don’t take any federal funds, if you don’t take any state funds, you can do a lot more than some business that does take state funding or federal funding,” Berman says. “Why should you be regulated if you don’t take any state or federal funding?”
Because creationism isn't science, critics argue.
Berman admits that his 'inspiration' for the bill was the Institute for Creation Research Graduate School, a Young Earth Creationism institution that has been trying to achieve certification in Texas for two years. Young Earth Creationism, much more popular than the recent Intelligent Design Creationism, is essentially Biblical literalism – Earth is 10,000 years old, Noah's Flood occurred, Adam and Eve were real people. ICRGS insists that they teach more than just “Biblical Creationism," which is based only on the word of the Bible; they also have incorporated tenets of “Scientific Creationism” into their bylaws. Most of these relate to origins of Earth and the evolution of species. Originally the creationist research branch of Christian Heritage College in San Diego, the ICRGS was forced to split from that college when California regulators threatened to take away its certification. Now, the ICRGS operates mostly online, and its Masters of Science Degree is recognized by California and federal law. According to its website, however, Texas residents cannot receive a degree.
Degree-granting colleges and universities in Texas currently must be issued a certificate of authority by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. The certificate allows the holder to grant a degree that a graduate would need to apply for a teaching position in a Texas public school. If House Bill 2800 was made into law, only state-funded colleges and universities would have to report to THECB; everyone else would be free to design their curriculums without any regulation.
A Master of Science (Latin: Magister Scientiæ; abbreviated MSc, M.Sc., M.S. or S.M.) is a postgraduate academic master's degree awarded by universities in a large number of countries. The degree is typically studied for in the sciences.It bears repeating: creationism is not science.
Creationism in fact belongs in theology (at best). Period.
And yet - here we are with such an absurd and ludicrous proposal to allow "private" (i.e. unregulated/unsupervised) institutions to give out M.Sc. degrees in non-sciences, in non-scientific religious/paranormal/supernatural beliefs.
What's next? B.Sc.'s in prayology? M.Sc.'s in demonology? Ph.D.'s in Spiritology?
A chiropractician who understands little about science as a Minister of Science and Technology?
I say again: welcome to the Semi-Dark Ages of superstitious ignorance.
And to think that, in the end, it's all in our heads.
Looks like constant vigilance on our part is de rigueur indeed if we are to prevent our modern, civilized nations from slowly and gradually becoming scientific/technological backwater societies ruled by parochial religious/supernatural beliefs ...
(More such absurdities can be found here, here and here, folks)
(Cross-posted from APOV)
Thursday
8 Prop
I'm sort of weak in my enthusiasm for complicated legal matters, you know? So the title of the Prop 8 video immediately caught my eye: Proposition 8 Made Simple. If you haven't seen this, you have to.
This is the latest from the courts on overturnings Prop 8.
And then I want you to take a look at this video of this yes on prop 8 counter-ad.
This is the latest from the courts on overturnings Prop 8.
And then I want you to take a look at this video of this yes on prop 8 counter-ad.
Wednesday
The Primitive Mind-Thinking Syndrome
Here is the primitive mind of Sarah Stillson Palin the parochial theocon at work:
So instead, I'll let Dr. P.Z. Myers speak my mind:I am appalled.
This idiot woman, this blind, shortsighted ignoramus, this pretentious clod, mocks basic research and the international research community. You damn well better believe that there is research going on in animal models — what does she expect, that scientists should mutagenize human mothers and chop up baby brains for this work? — and countries like France and Germany and England and Canada and China and India and others are all respected participants in these efforts.
Yes, scientists work on fruit flies. Some of the most powerful tools in genetics and molecular biology are available in fruit flies, and these are animals that are particularly amenable to experimentation. Molecular genetics has revealed that humans share key molecules, the basic developmental toolkit, with all other animals, thanks to our shared evolutionary heritage (something else the wackaloon from Wasilla denies), and that we can use these other organisms to probe the fundamental mechanisms that underlie core processes in the formation of the nervous system — precisely the phenomena Palin claims are so important. To be frank, I am far from surprised - because that is how intellectual sloth-afflicted primitive minds think - of which Sarah Stillson Palin constitutes a "fine" example:It never ceases to amaze me to what levels of utter irrationality the fundamentalists, neocons and other right-wing madhaters are willing to descend into.
They lie, they misrepresent, they use decoy arguments and make ad hominem attacks. For them, the use of duplicity, of secrecy, of arguments of (non-existent) conspiracy, of fact (and non-fact) selectivity/cherry-picking, of quacks/fake experts, as well as putting forth logical fallacies, are simply means to an end.
And this "end" is the following: to promulgate, support and defend their beliefs or their ideologies.
Truth be told: these are the only things that truly matter to them.
Why else would they try to censor science, attempt to control it, seek to falsify it or rewrite it, quietly hide it, brazenly deny funding for it, attempt to change its mission/purpose, actually lie about it, use spin games to deny it, go to great lenghts to confuse people about it, attempt to dismiss it as a matter of differing beliefs or philosophies, or go as far as to demonize it?
Why else would they use the politics of fear, ignorance and lies? Now, here's why they do so:(...) the fundamentalists, neocons and other right-wing madhaters are very much alike the people from the allegory of the cave, and somehow made flesh and blood.
They are indeed living in a cave, their backs to the entrance while facing the sunlit cave wall, seeing only shadows of reality. And it is from watching these two-dimensional shadows that they construct myths and stories to comfort themselves - because they not only fear the shadows that they see, but they also fear even more what these shadows represent.
Thus, they find themselves frightened to the deepest levels of their fragile souls by the glorious truth of the multi-dimensional reality in which we live, whenever they get out of their cave. Their intellectual sloth-driven, ignorant and fearful minds simply can not, or flatly refuse, to comprehend it.
That is why their beliefs and ideologies are not only parochial, but adamantly intractable.
Consequently, at the end of each day, the fundamentalists, neocons and other right-wing madhaters return to the safety and comfort of their cave, vowing to say and do everything in order to transform our multi-dimensional reality into the simpler, two-dimensional one made of shadows that they are accustomed to.
Hence, my conclusion is that the fundamentalists, neocons and other right-wing madhaters are the same ignorant, fearful and surperstitious primitives that our ancestors were, thousands upon thousands of years ago - except that they now use newspapers, magazines, television, radio, politics, and the internet, to spread their intellectual sloth-driven non-understanding of the world and, consequently, working hard at bringing us down to their level of ignorance. To which I add: that, coupled to their pathetic inhability to accept - or deal with - reality, along with their typical shameless hypocrisy in trying to justify any and all duplicity on their part in the face of whatever self-deluded moral ground du jour that they claim, make them not only nothing more than primitive minds, but utter incompetent modern human beings as well.
The result is the fierce undercurrent of anti-intellectualism, anti-science and tribalist-racism that bubbles up increasingly to the surface (especially thanks to the recent strategy of the McCain-Palin campaign), despite these modern, scientific and technological times of ours. It's what I've come to call our "Semi-Dark Ages". A few cases in point:Congressman Rohrabacher's Floor Speech on Global Warming: "(Are we to believe) buffalo farts have more socially redeeming value than the same flatulence emitted by cattle?"
Bachmann Calls For McCarthyite Investigation Into Anti-American Activities Of Liberals;
Sarah Palin Says She Open To Teaching Creationism In Public Schools;
Palin Claimed Dinosaurs And People Coexisted;
Palin Explains What Parts Of Country Not "Pro-America";
Bachmann: ‘Not all cultures are equal’;
Palin: Iraq is a task "from God";
Conservatives Call Obama’s Correct Pronounciation Of Pakistan ‘Exotic’ And ‘Annoying’;
Palin Sees America As Wealthy And White: New Hampshire And Alaska Are ‘Microcosms’ Of The Country;
Another McCarthyite Republican: Rep. Robin Hayes says “liberals hate real Americans that work and achieve and believe in God";
Bachmann tells Pelosi to give up on global warming because Jesus already saved the planet;
McCain: Washington D.C. and NYC = Fake America;
Racism, hate bubble up yet again at Palin's rally in Vegas. Thus I give you primitive mind-thinking at work - and I could go on and on and on with further examples, just for this year alone.
Oh - and the fruit fly thing? Here's but one example of how useful the knowledge of its cellular and molecular biology as a scientific, experimental animal model has lead to a better understanding of human diseases:
New Treatment Strategy Possible For Muscular Dystrophy, Mouse Studies Show. In case you would want to know more, instead of being a primitive mind like Sarah Stillson Palin, you might want to begin here, here, here and here - and from there, you may go as deep as you want.
(And be most welcome to my world, as well as that of all cellular and molecular biologists, geneticists, biochemists, etc.)
Feed your mind, eh?
(Cross-posted from APOV)
This morning, Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) gave her first policy speech urging the federal government to fully fund the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), “a law ensuring services to children with disabilities throughout the nation.” In the speech, Palin cited the need to do more for children with disabilities such as autism:
For many parents of children with disabilities, the most valuable thing of all is information. Early identification of a cognitive or other disorder, especially autism, can make a life-changing difference.
Palin claimed that the amount that Congress spends on earmarks “is more than the shortfall to fully fund IDEA.” She then ridiculed some of the projects — such as “fruit fly research” — saying they have little or no value:
Where does a lot of that earmark money end up anyway? […] You’ve heard about some of these pet projects they really don’t make a whole lot of sense and sometimes these dollars go to projects that have little or nothing to do with the public good. Things like fruit fly research in Paris, France. I kid you not.
Watch it:
So instead, I'll let Dr. P.Z. Myers speak my mind:I am appalled.
This idiot woman, this blind, shortsighted ignoramus, this pretentious clod, mocks basic research and the international research community. You damn well better believe that there is research going on in animal models — what does she expect, that scientists should mutagenize human mothers and chop up baby brains for this work? — and countries like France and Germany and England and Canada and China and India and others are all respected participants in these efforts.
Yes, scientists work on fruit flies. Some of the most powerful tools in genetics and molecular biology are available in fruit flies, and these are animals that are particularly amenable to experimentation. Molecular genetics has revealed that humans share key molecules, the basic developmental toolkit, with all other animals, thanks to our shared evolutionary heritage (something else the wackaloon from Wasilla denies), and that we can use these other organisms to probe the fundamental mechanisms that underlie core processes in the formation of the nervous system — precisely the phenomena Palin claims are so important. To be frank, I am far from surprised - because that is how intellectual sloth-afflicted primitive minds think - of which Sarah Stillson Palin constitutes a "fine" example:It never ceases to amaze me to what levels of utter irrationality the fundamentalists, neocons and other right-wing madhaters are willing to descend into.
They lie, they misrepresent, they use decoy arguments and make ad hominem attacks. For them, the use of duplicity, of secrecy, of arguments of (non-existent) conspiracy, of fact (and non-fact) selectivity/cherry-picking, of quacks/fake experts, as well as putting forth logical fallacies, are simply means to an end.
And this "end" is the following: to promulgate, support and defend their beliefs or their ideologies.
Truth be told: these are the only things that truly matter to them.
Why else would they try to censor science, attempt to control it, seek to falsify it or rewrite it, quietly hide it, brazenly deny funding for it, attempt to change its mission/purpose, actually lie about it, use spin games to deny it, go to great lenghts to confuse people about it, attempt to dismiss it as a matter of differing beliefs or philosophies, or go as far as to demonize it?
Why else would they use the politics of fear, ignorance and lies? Now, here's why they do so:(...) the fundamentalists, neocons and other right-wing madhaters are very much alike the people from the allegory of the cave, and somehow made flesh and blood.
They are indeed living in a cave, their backs to the entrance while facing the sunlit cave wall, seeing only shadows of reality. And it is from watching these two-dimensional shadows that they construct myths and stories to comfort themselves - because they not only fear the shadows that they see, but they also fear even more what these shadows represent.
Thus, they find themselves frightened to the deepest levels of their fragile souls by the glorious truth of the multi-dimensional reality in which we live, whenever they get out of their cave. Their intellectual sloth-driven, ignorant and fearful minds simply can not, or flatly refuse, to comprehend it.
That is why their beliefs and ideologies are not only parochial, but adamantly intractable.
Consequently, at the end of each day, the fundamentalists, neocons and other right-wing madhaters return to the safety and comfort of their cave, vowing to say and do everything in order to transform our multi-dimensional reality into the simpler, two-dimensional one made of shadows that they are accustomed to.
Hence, my conclusion is that the fundamentalists, neocons and other right-wing madhaters are the same ignorant, fearful and surperstitious primitives that our ancestors were, thousands upon thousands of years ago - except that they now use newspapers, magazines, television, radio, politics, and the internet, to spread their intellectual sloth-driven non-understanding of the world and, consequently, working hard at bringing us down to their level of ignorance. To which I add: that, coupled to their pathetic inhability to accept - or deal with - reality, along with their typical shameless hypocrisy in trying to justify any and all duplicity on their part in the face of whatever self-deluded moral ground du jour that they claim, make them not only nothing more than primitive minds, but utter incompetent modern human beings as well.
The result is the fierce undercurrent of anti-intellectualism, anti-science and tribalist-racism that bubbles up increasingly to the surface (especially thanks to the recent strategy of the McCain-Palin campaign), despite these modern, scientific and technological times of ours. It's what I've come to call our "Semi-Dark Ages". A few cases in point:Congressman Rohrabacher's Floor Speech on Global Warming: "(Are we to believe) buffalo farts have more socially redeeming value than the same flatulence emitted by cattle?"
Bachmann Calls For McCarthyite Investigation Into Anti-American Activities Of Liberals;
Sarah Palin Says She Open To Teaching Creationism In Public Schools;
Palin Claimed Dinosaurs And People Coexisted;
Palin Explains What Parts Of Country Not "Pro-America";
Bachmann: ‘Not all cultures are equal’;
Palin: Iraq is a task "from God";
Conservatives Call Obama’s Correct Pronounciation Of Pakistan ‘Exotic’ And ‘Annoying’;
Palin Sees America As Wealthy And White: New Hampshire And Alaska Are ‘Microcosms’ Of The Country;
Another McCarthyite Republican: Rep. Robin Hayes says “liberals hate real Americans that work and achieve and believe in God";
Bachmann tells Pelosi to give up on global warming because Jesus already saved the planet;
McCain: Washington D.C. and NYC = Fake America;
Racism, hate bubble up yet again at Palin's rally in Vegas. Thus I give you primitive mind-thinking at work - and I could go on and on and on with further examples, just for this year alone.
Oh - and the fruit fly thing? Here's but one example of how useful the knowledge of its cellular and molecular biology as a scientific, experimental animal model has lead to a better understanding of human diseases:
Palin did not specify what fruit fly research earmark she was referring to (presumably a grant for olive fruit fly research), but she is apparently unaware that scientific research with fruit flies has led to valuable discoveries that have boosted autism research, as a study at the University of North Carolina demonstrated last year:
[S]cientists at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine have shown that a protein called neurexin is required for ... nerve cell connections to form and function correctly.
The discovery, made in Drosophila fruit flies may lead to advances in understanding autism spectrum disorders, as recently, human neurexins have been identified as a genetic risk factor for autism.
The study of fruit flies has also been used for other autism research and “revolutionize[d]” the study of birth defects.
Other animal models, such as laboratory mice, are likewise extremely useful in understanding our own genetics, physiology and diseases. Just two cases in point among countless others:First-ever Genetic Animal Model Of Autism;New Treatment Strategy Possible For Muscular Dystrophy, Mouse Studies Show. In case you would want to know more, instead of being a primitive mind like Sarah Stillson Palin, you might want to begin here, here, here and here - and from there, you may go as deep as you want.
(And be most welcome to my world, as well as that of all cellular and molecular biologists, geneticists, biochemists, etc.)
Feed your mind, eh?
(Cross-posted from APOV)
Thursday
Just Say No to Abstinance-Only Sex Education
Comprehensive sex education and abstinence-only sex education for adolescents actually have a lot in common. Both strive to teach teens the benefits of delaying sexual activity. However, in abstinence-only curricula, the emphasis is on delaying sexual experiences until marriage. Both warn of the dangers of HIV and STDs as well as unplanned pregnancy. Again, the methods by which the respective approaches differ in protecting the health of teens, are different.
Comprehensive sex education strives to teach that if teens are going to engage in sexual activity, they should take measures to protect themselves from HIV and other STDs as well as accidental pregnancy. Abstinence only teaches only what the name implies: abstinence.
But that rate peaked eight years before abstinence-only education came to the fore and has been declining steadily ever since. And children born to teenage girls still account for 11.5 percent of all births in the United States
The Mathematica Policy Research study on abstinence education looked at four different abstinence education programs that were selected as subjects for a long-term evaluation. This study reported that teen participants in these abstinence programs did not abstain from sexual activity more than non-participants, when measured 2½ to 5½ years after the program ended.
Further, in December 2004, a report released by Representative Henry Waxman (D-CA) surveyed many of the curricula used in the programs reviewed by the Mathematica study and found that they contain false, misleading, and distorted information about the risks of sexual activity. The report examined the accuracy of the most popular curricula used by federally funded abstinence-only education programs and found more than two-thirds of these programs distort information and mislead young people by giving them false information about abortion and contraception, particularly about the effectiveness of condoms.
How do American teens, parents and teachers feel about abstinence-only sex education programs? This from International Planned Parenthood:
Surveys of teachers, parents and young people consistently show little support for abstinence education. In the US a recent major survey found overwhelming support for sex education in school and little local controversy about its provision and organisation within schools. However, the survey did find some differences in parental views on the focus it should have with 46% preferring an abstinence-plus approach, 36% a comprehensive approach and 15% abstinence only.
Advocates For Youth takes this position:
Each year, U.S. teens experience as many as 850,000 pregnancies, and youth under age 25 experience about 9.1 million sexually transmitted infections (STIs). By age 18, 70 percent of U.S. females and 62 percent of U.S. males have initiated vaginal sex. Comprehensive sex education is effective at assisting young people to make healthy decisions about sex and to adopt healthy sexual behaviors. No abstinence-only-until-marriage program has been shown to help teens delay the initiation of sex or to protect themselves when they do initiate sex. Yet, the U.S. government has spent over one billion dollars supporting abstinence-only-until-marriage programs. Although the U.S. government ignores it, adolescents have a fundamental human right to accurate and comprehensive sexual health information.
In the face of these findings, President Bush proposed a 2008 budget of $204 million for abstinence only sex education programs.
I found some hope in this Salon article:
As evidence of the ineffectiveness of abstinence-only programs stacks up, a growing number of states are saying: "Keep the money, please. We don't want it!" At least 14 states are taking a stance against wasting federal funds on sex education programs that not only don't work but are potentially harmful, and are rejecting their share of the $176 million annual budget. As Ned Calonge, chief medical officer of the Colorado Department of Health, put it: "Why would we spend tax dollars on something that doesn't work?"
Let's hope the trend continues and get down to the work of teaching kids what's right for them, rather than what's right for the fundy-Christians' distorted view of sexuality.
Wednesday
The Age Of The President-Pontificate Of The U.S.A.
Last week's Saddleback Civil Forum on Presidency, quite appropriately dubbed "The Faith Forum", heralded a new age for the Presidency of the U.S.A. - that of the President-Pontificate.
EXPAND THE POST +/-
For decades now, especially since the late 70's-early 80's, it has become a ritual of sorts for candidates seeking the Office of the Presidency of the U.S.A. (POTUS) to make profuse declarations of faith while seeking the public support of pastors, preachers and priests.
Pious demonstrations of belief in God (the Christian one, of course), humble statements of abundant praying for guidance from the Divine Will, public displays of church attendance, etc. - all such things have become nothing more than par for the course in the (democratic) process of choosing the next POTUS.
Through it all, the political/governing functions of a POTUS have likewise become intimately intertwined with all matters of faith - whether it is the expected utterance of the incantation of "God Bless America", frequent references to God on any and all subject matter (policies, decisions, etc.), the White House prayer breakfasts, the lighting of the White House's Christmas Tree, attending Christmas mass, yet more public displays of piety and praying/church attending, and so on and so forth.
In short - the POTUS has come to acquire an increasingly preeminent function of "Christian faith representative" in the eyes of Americans throughout the years.
Why else would Americans have elected three openly-declared Born Again Christian Presidents (Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush) out of the last five who have held office since the 1976 elections?
No wonder then that so-called "moral values" and "moral issues" have come to dominate the American political landscape in the last three decades or so - especially with regards to school praying vs. no praying at school, a woman's right to choose vs. criminalizing abortion, same-sex marriage allowance vs. interdiction, teaching safe/protected sex vs. promoting abstinence, teaching evolution vs. also teaching creationism/intelligent design, etc., etc., etc.
And I will spare you the all-too-known details of the (waning) George W. Bush administration's embrace of fundamentalist Christian "values" and consequent attitudes/actions with regards to all things secular and scientific (see also this recent post of yours truly).
(I remember cringing at that little piece of news when I first read about it some three years ago - that one as well)
Then came 9/11 - and since that tragic day a majority of Americans have apparently locked themselves in a mentality of "Christianity vs. Islam" - what some like to call the "Clash of Civilizations" - a mindset which appears to stubbornly persist to this day, overriding all rational considerations (one more recent example here).
Indeed, 9/11 was in good part responsible for the re-election of George W. Bush, the "War President" fighting the evil islamofascists ...
Which brings us to this year's primaries and the current contest between John McCain and Barack Obama for the Presidency of the U.S.A.
Never before have I witnessed such profusion of declarations of faith from candidates left and right, being asked questions on all matters of Christian faith, morals and values, including whether they believe in evolution or not.
Never before have I witnessed a democratic party presumptive nominee speak more like a pastor as Barack Obama has been speaking throughout this election year - even more so than the born again Christian Jimmy Carter (and I remember a good part of Carter's campaign and his Presidency, because I had "come of age" enough as a teenager to start paying attention to such things already then).
Never before have I witnessed such lingering (ill-informed, uninformed, or deliberately mendacious) questions concerning the "purity" of the Christian faith of candidates - especially regarding Barack Obama ("Is he Muslim or Christian?", "Is he Christian enough?").
Then came last week's Saddleback Civil Forum on Presidency, whereby McCain and Obama got to be vetted on matters of Christian faith, morals and values by an "influential" evangelical pastor, Rev. Rick Warren, in a live broadcast to millions of Americans to see, hear and judge.
Since then, many have parsed through the questions posed by Warren in this so-called Faith Forum and the answers given by McCain and Obama - however, it appears that the sheer precedent enormity of such an exercise has been lost entirely.
Think about it - before McCain and Obama got to face each other for a first time to debate their political ideas, ideologies, visions and solutions, they got to be quizzed/tested by a pastor first about their Christian faith, morals, values and visions.
In other words: they had to demonstrate first and foremost their Christian credentials to the American people above all other (political) considerations.
Talk about separation of church and state, no?
Since 9/11, the American people, through their Congress and Senate, have granted monarchical powers to the Office of the President of the U.S.A. - the Military Commissions Act and the Patriot Act quickly come to mind as but two examples.
In short, the POTUS can spy indiscriminately, detain indefinitely and torture - the pretense being that all of this is necessary in the name of temporal security of the Homeland.
Not unlike the British Monarchs of old.
And now, thanks to the precedent of last week's Faith Forum, the POTUS has become the de facto Spiritual Leader and Keeper of the American Christian Faith.
Again - not unlike British Monarchs who still retain to this day (since Henry VIII) the title and function of Head of the Church of England.
So after some 230+ years after the Declaration of Independance, the Americans managed to give themselves a bona fides British-like Monarch in all ways, shapes and forms.
Makes me wonder what the hell the American Revolution was for, then.
Yet, the conclusion nevertheless remains: thanks to the fear, ignorance and, yes, hate of Americans regarding things non-christian, all still driven by 9/11, the Age of the President-Pontificate of the U.S.A. has officially arrived.
God Bless America indeed.
(and whenever I hear born again Christian Stephen Harper, Prime Minister of Canada, throw "God Bless Canada" whenever and wherever he can, I keep wondering whether my country is slowly but surely going the same way as our neighbors to the south ... but I digress)
In the meantime, all I can do is wish - and hope - that enough people out there will never forget the necessity of keeping church and faith fully and completely separate from state.
But in this new Age of the President-Pontificate, I shan't be holding my breath ...
(Aftermath: go read this and that as well - both are definitely worth the click).
(Cross-posted from APOV)
For decades now, especially since the late 70's-early 80's, it has become a ritual of sorts for candidates seeking the Office of the Presidency of the U.S.A. (POTUS) to make profuse declarations of faith while seeking the public support of pastors, preachers and priests.
Pious demonstrations of belief in God (the Christian one, of course), humble statements of abundant praying for guidance from the Divine Will, public displays of church attendance, etc. - all such things have become nothing more than par for the course in the (democratic) process of choosing the next POTUS.
Through it all, the political/governing functions of a POTUS have likewise become intimately intertwined with all matters of faith - whether it is the expected utterance of the incantation of "God Bless America", frequent references to God on any and all subject matter (policies, decisions, etc.), the White House prayer breakfasts, the lighting of the White House's Christmas Tree, attending Christmas mass, yet more public displays of piety and praying/church attending, and so on and so forth.
In short - the POTUS has come to acquire an increasingly preeminent function of "Christian faith representative" in the eyes of Americans throughout the years.
Why else would Americans have elected three openly-declared Born Again Christian Presidents (Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush) out of the last five who have held office since the 1976 elections?
No wonder then that so-called "moral values" and "moral issues" have come to dominate the American political landscape in the last three decades or so - especially with regards to school praying vs. no praying at school, a woman's right to choose vs. criminalizing abortion, same-sex marriage allowance vs. interdiction, teaching safe/protected sex vs. promoting abstinence, teaching evolution vs. also teaching creationism/intelligent design, etc., etc., etc.
And I will spare you the all-too-known details of the (waning) George W. Bush administration's embrace of fundamentalist Christian "values" and consequent attitudes/actions with regards to all things secular and scientific (see also this recent post of yours truly).
(I remember cringing at that little piece of news when I first read about it some three years ago - that one as well)
Then came 9/11 - and since that tragic day a majority of Americans have apparently locked themselves in a mentality of "Christianity vs. Islam" - what some like to call the "Clash of Civilizations" - a mindset which appears to stubbornly persist to this day, overriding all rational considerations (one more recent example here).
Indeed, 9/11 was in good part responsible for the re-election of George W. Bush, the "War President" fighting the evil islamofascists ...
Which brings us to this year's primaries and the current contest between John McCain and Barack Obama for the Presidency of the U.S.A.
Never before have I witnessed such profusion of declarations of faith from candidates left and right, being asked questions on all matters of Christian faith, morals and values, including whether they believe in evolution or not.
Never before have I witnessed a democratic party presumptive nominee speak more like a pastor as Barack Obama has been speaking throughout this election year - even more so than the born again Christian Jimmy Carter (and I remember a good part of Carter's campaign and his Presidency, because I had "come of age" enough as a teenager to start paying attention to such things already then).
Never before have I witnessed such lingering (ill-informed, uninformed, or deliberately mendacious) questions concerning the "purity" of the Christian faith of candidates - especially regarding Barack Obama ("Is he Muslim or Christian?", "Is he Christian enough?").
Then came last week's Saddleback Civil Forum on Presidency, whereby McCain and Obama got to be vetted on matters of Christian faith, morals and values by an "influential" evangelical pastor, Rev. Rick Warren, in a live broadcast to millions of Americans to see, hear and judge.
Since then, many have parsed through the questions posed by Warren in this so-called Faith Forum and the answers given by McCain and Obama - however, it appears that the sheer precedent enormity of such an exercise has been lost entirely.
Think about it - before McCain and Obama got to face each other for a first time to debate their political ideas, ideologies, visions and solutions, they got to be quizzed/tested by a pastor first about their Christian faith, morals, values and visions.
In other words: they had to demonstrate first and foremost their Christian credentials to the American people above all other (political) considerations.
Talk about separation of church and state, no?
Since 9/11, the American people, through their Congress and Senate, have granted monarchical powers to the Office of the President of the U.S.A. - the Military Commissions Act and the Patriot Act quickly come to mind as but two examples.
In short, the POTUS can spy indiscriminately, detain indefinitely and torture - the pretense being that all of this is necessary in the name of temporal security of the Homeland.
Not unlike the British Monarchs of old.
And now, thanks to the precedent of last week's Faith Forum, the POTUS has become the de facto Spiritual Leader and Keeper of the American Christian Faith.
Again - not unlike British Monarchs who still retain to this day (since Henry VIII) the title and function of Head of the Church of England.
So after some 230+ years after the Declaration of Independance, the Americans managed to give themselves a bona fides British-like Monarch in all ways, shapes and forms.
Makes me wonder what the hell the American Revolution was for, then.
Yet, the conclusion nevertheless remains: thanks to the fear, ignorance and, yes, hate of Americans regarding things non-christian, all still driven by 9/11, the Age of the President-Pontificate of the U.S.A. has officially arrived.
God Bless America indeed.
(and whenever I hear born again Christian Stephen Harper, Prime Minister of Canada, throw "God Bless Canada" whenever and wherever he can, I keep wondering whether my country is slowly but surely going the same way as our neighbors to the south ... but I digress)
In the meantime, all I can do is wish - and hope - that enough people out there will never forget the necessity of keeping church and faith fully and completely separate from state.
But in this new Age of the President-Pontificate, I shan't be holding my breath ...
(Aftermath: go read this and that as well - both are definitely worth the click).
(Cross-posted from APOV)
About That Whole "Defining Reality" Thing ...
Remember this (emphasis added)?
READ THE REST OF THE POST +/-
Then again, what else can you expect from people who indulge in echo chamber legalese gymnastics in order to justify uncivilized barbarism and savagery, or who "reason" that simply buying a piece of paper saying "diploma" equals the same as, you know, actually studying and developing expertise to earn a bona fides degree? Indeed (emphasis added):
Hence, my previous conclusion that the fundamentalists, denialists, neocons and other assorted right-wing madhaters are the same ignorant, fearful and surperstitious primitives that our ancestors were, thousands upon thousands of years ago - except that they now use newspapers, magazines, television, radio, politics, and the internet, to spread their intellectual sloth-driven non-understanding of the world and, consequently, working hard at bringing us down to their level of ignorance.
That, coupled to their pathetic inhability to accept - or deal with - reality, along with their typical shameless hypocrisy in trying to justify any and all duplicity on their part in the face of whatever self-deluded moral ground du jour that they claim, make them not only nothing more than primitive minds, but utter incompetent modern human beings as well.
Q.E.D. - yet again.
In the meantime, perhaps it would be wise on the part of the rest of us to dwell seriously on how much overall "progress" exactly we have achieved with our "modern" religions and today's current "belief" systems ...
(Originally posted at APOV)
(...) The (Bush) aide said that guys like me were "in what we call the reality-based community," which he defined as people who "believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality." ... "That's not the way the world really works anymore," he continued. "We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors … and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do."This of course brings to mind what I wrote last year:
It never ceases to amaze me to what levels of utter irrationality the fundamentalists, neocons and other right-wing madhaters are willing to descend into.Well then - here's that whole "defining/creating reality" thingie in action again, folks (emphasis added):
They lie, they misrepresent, they use decoy arguments and make ad hominem attacks. For them, the use of duplicity, of secrecy, of arguments of (non-existent) conspiracy, of fact (and non-fact) selectivity/cherry-picking, of quacks/fake experts, as well as putting forth logical fallacies, are simply means to an end.
And this "end" is the following: to promulgate, support and defend their beliefs or their ideologies.
Truth be told: these are the only things that truly matter to them.
Why else would they try to censor science, attempt to control it, seek to falsify it or rewrite it, quietly hide it, brazenly deny funding for it, attempt to change its mission/purpose, actually lie about it, use spin games to deny it, go to great lenghts to confuse people about it, attempt to dismiss it as a matter of differing beliefs or philosophies, or go as far as to demonize it?
Why else would they use the politics of fear, ignorance and lies?
Why else would anyone one of them (along with so many others of his ilk) have the gall to repudiate on television the very same President whom they supported relentlessly until a month or so ago - with the "ex-supporter" base even applauding such repudiation?
Why else would they still seek to implement a "missile defense shield" while tests keep proving that it is junk?
Why else would they be comfortable enough to advocate more renditions and more torture ... with the audience actually cheering and applauding?
Why else are they capable of scolding others about democracy while they have been proven as authoritarians by their own words and actions?
Why else do they disassemble so easily, obfuscate swiftly, or use disinformation and propaganda?
Why else do they use euphemisms to hide/conceal their true intentions ("surge" in lieu of escalation, "enhanced interrogation techniques" instead of torture, etc.)
Why else do they promulgate confrontation and war, using overt and duplicitous means, as the solutions for everything?
(And I could go on and on and on ...)
Bush Cronies Tried To Redefine ‘Carbon Dioxide’ To Save Power Plants From Emissions RegulationsTalk about the ends justifying the means in order to promulgate, support and defend their beliefs and/or their ideologies.
Earlier this month, former EPA official Jason Burnett wrote to Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) with explosive revelations on how the White House has neutered climate change science to protect corporate interests. For example, OMB general counsel Jeffrey Rosen asked for multiple memos on whether carbon dioxide (CO2) from cars and plants could be regulated differently.
In a Senate hearing today, Burnett further explained that under the Clear Air Act, “after a pollutant is a regulated pollutant, controls are required on a variety of sources.” During the “inter-agency process,” Burnett said, OMB officials looked for ways to define CO2 from power plants as different from CO2 from automobiles, in order to shield industrial power plants from regulation under the landmark Supreme Court decision Massachusetts v. EPA:
BURNETT: There was quite a bit of effort and interest to see whether the Supreme Court case itself and regulation of CO2 and other greenhouse gases from automobiles be restricted to just automobiles. … So there’s an interest to determine whether we could define CO2 from automobiles as somehow different than CO2 from power plants, for example –
SEN. KLOBUCHAR: Do you think that’s possible?
BURNETT: Clearly it wasn’t supportable.
It is common knowledge that carbon dioxide is the same chemical regardless of what source emits it. But for the White House, which unabashedly asserts its anti-environment agenda, the definition of CO2 can change to help big polluters.
“I must say that it was sometimes somewhat embarrassing,” Burnett admitted, “for me to return to EPA and ask for my colleagues to explain yet again that CO2 is a molecule and there is no scientific way of differentiating between CO2 from car and a power plant.”
Then again, what else can you expect from people who indulge in echo chamber legalese gymnastics in order to justify uncivilized barbarism and savagery, or who "reason" that simply buying a piece of paper saying "diploma" equals the same as, you know, actually studying and developing expertise to earn a bona fides degree? Indeed (emphasis added):
Report: White House Adviser, NSA Employees Bought Phony College DegreesNow take the following for consideration (emphasis added):
A senior military adviser working at the White House and two National Security Agency employees with top-secret security clearances were discovered among a list of nearly 10,000 people who purchased phony college degrees from a Washington state diploma mill, according to documents obtained by the Spokesman Review newspaper.
“William R. Church, a senior military adviser working in the White House, and George Michael Navadel, a U.S. State Department computer systems negotiator, who paid $5,400 for a doctorate in network engineering,” the Spokesman Review reported.
Information on Church could not be found on the White House website. An Internet search about Church’s military career and background also failed to turn up relevant information. A White House spokesperson did not return calls for comment.
The newspaper reported that the Department of Justice refused to publicly release the list once it completed an investigation. The Spokesman Review independently obtained the list of 9,612 individuals, who collectively spent $7.3 million on bogus degrees from a Spokane diploma mill, and posted the information on the newspaper’s website.
“A preliminary analysis of the list by The Spokesman-Review shows 135 individuals with ties to the military, 39 with links to educational institutions and 17 employed by government agencies,” the newspaper reported. “Those numbers were derived from e-mail addresses that are part of the list obtained by the newspaper. However, the exact number of individuals with ties to the military, government and education is believed to be far greater because many of those buyers used their personal e-mail accounts.”
(...) Stone Age people did have an understanding of simple cause and effect: I drink water and my thirst goes away; you hit me and I hurt; I sleep and I awake rested; I eat this root and I become sick. They were skilled in the techniques of hunting and gathering. Beyond these immediate realities they invented explanations as to how the world worked. It was through stories that people thought they understood the world around them - stories that passed from generation to generation. People, it seems, wondered about the world around them, as bright children do today. Stone Age people let their imaginations run. Stone Age people did not believe in skepticism or suspended judgment. They had no idea of progression in discovery and knowledge. They did not believe in progress.This sounds disturbingly all too familiar with today's "modern world":
Their stories merely changed. Their stories were often fanciful and impulsive rather than systematic. Within a tribe might be variations on the same story. With free imagination as the source of the stories, across generations their stories were embellished and altered. Stone Age people told their stories without demand for consistency or empirical verification. The element of free imagination would make their stories appear to people of later ages as childlike, incomplete or absurd. But Stone Age people accepted the stories as true because these were the explanations of their mothers, fathers, grandparents and clan or tribal leaders.
Stone Age people believed that they were living at the center of the universe, that the earth was a disk extending not far beyond known neighbors, mountains, or shorelines. They believed that all movement was the product of will. They saw insects as moving by will. They saw the sun, moon and stars closer than they were and as moving by will. For Stone Age people, will was spirit, and they saw their world as filled with many spirits. Or, to use another word: gods. This was the original polytheism.
When a person saw his reflection in the water he believed he was seeing his spirit - the invisible made visible by the magic of the water. (In modern times, Stone Age people might believe that a photographer had captured something of their spirit and for this reason object to being photographed.)
Seeing the lifeless bodies of those who had died, people believed the spirit of that person had left their body and gone to an invisible world where the spirits of the dead dwelled. And they believed that invisible spirits hovered around them.
People saw spirits as able to penetrate human bodies through the skin, nostrils, mouth, ears or other openings. Dreams, not being willed, were seen as invasions by a spirit during one's sleep. Sickness was seen as an invasion by an evil spirit, and cures were sought in the form of having the invading spirit exorcised from oneself - a practice that survived into modern times.
People saw spirits as able to invade things as well as persons. If a rock happened to have a shape that reminded one of a dead uncle it might be because the spirit of the uncle had invaded and become a part of that rock. Spirits were imagined to have taken up residence in stone or wooden idols. Spirit, they believed, was invisible and in everything.
Not yet interested in strict categories, people did not think about the difference between what they saw as spirit and what was later to be called materiality. And not having defined the difference between spirit and materiality, they believed that if one ate a portion of the body of a strong beast, such as a bear, one might acquire the spirit of the bear, or, if one ate a portion of the body of a deceased king one might acquire the special qualities of that king. The flesh of timid animals might be avoided in fear of ingesting timidity.
And not having defined a difference between spirit and materiality, Stone Age people believed that in preserving a corpse they were helping to preserve the spirit of one who had died. And they believed that they could nourish the spirit of the corpse by putting gifts of food alongside it (...)
As much as we are fortunate to live in this modern era of ours, which is defined by the continuous technological and scientific advances that are meant to increase the chasm between us and our primitive, superstitious outlook of the world and the universe, the overwhelming prevalence of ignorance and irrationality in our supposedly civilized societies leaves us mired in tribalism, intellectual sloth and the constant search for instant gratification.Not quite convinced? Then try this on further for size while replacing "spirit" with "angel", "demon", "saint", "miracle", etc. (emphasis added):
Indeed, and more than ever, too many among us prefer to wallow in superstition and the super-natural in order to sustain a so-called spiritual need for guidance in life – the sustained prevalence of seers, astrologers, mediums, and other quacks, illustrates well this tragic state of affairs. The same goes with regards to the belief in ghosts, haunts and spirits. Ditto for pseudo-sciences (e.g. homeopathy, crystals, pyramids, chelation, etc.) and the quacks who keep making a fortune in selling their placebo-remedies which are supposed to be miraculous. And let us not forget about everything related to "new age" religions and religious fundamentalism (whether Christian, Muslim, or any other).
(...) Not knowing how the world worked, Stone Age people attributed everything to the magic of the spirits. Birds flying or hovering on an updraft of air without falling to the ground was magic. Lightning, thunder, rain, the tides, and procreation were magic. Fire was magic and it was spirit, for it moved itself, and, when water was thrown upon it, it uttered a cry like a slain animal.Once again: sounds eerily and disturbingly familiar, no?
Seeing everything in nature as spirit they respected it in its many forms. Also, they recognized their dependence on some of what the spirits had to offer. They feared the power of the spirits and deprivation. People saw spirits as having emotion. Lightning, thunder, strong winds high seas and floods were anger. People feared the anger of the spirits and hoped to placate them with kind words and gifts through a magic of their own.
How the world came into being was explained in stories about the doings of the spirits, a common story being of a male god of sky and the mother god that was earth giving birth to gods that were atmosphere and other phenomena. The imagination of those who created the stories was limited to the world that they could understand. They spoke of gods having created humanity out of earth, tree bark and other ingredients. A god was described as having created plants, beasts and humans, and a story described why the spirits were immortal and humans merely mortal.
They believed that their gods had made the world what it is and that their society and the world would always be as the gods had made it. They had no sense of social progress or image of humanity's capabilities. The imagination of those who had a biological potential for genius, and others of normal intelligence, was limited by their culture. Had it been otherwise, modern times would have come much sooner than it did.
Limited in their view of the breadth of the world, people believed the gods had made their surroundings especially for them. The gods were their gods, and seeing their most powerful god as having their interests at heart they tended to see this god as good. When something went wrong, as in failures at hunting or sickness and death, a society might engage in a ritual to make things good again by waking up the Great Spirit. In another society, calamity might be believed to be the product of people disobeying their gods.
Unrestrained in self-confidence, they believed that if the gods could perform magic so too could they. The earliest form of religious ritual was an attempt at magic through imitation - such as painting a face on the belly of a pregnant woman in hope that the magic of the drawing would encourage birth. There were also ritual fasts or trances that were believed to invoke magic, done in order to receive from the spirits the skills needed to be a good hunter or warrior.
Also common were rituals that we call funerals (...)
Hence, my previous conclusion that the fundamentalists, denialists, neocons and other assorted right-wing madhaters are the same ignorant, fearful and surperstitious primitives that our ancestors were, thousands upon thousands of years ago - except that they now use newspapers, magazines, television, radio, politics, and the internet, to spread their intellectual sloth-driven non-understanding of the world and, consequently, working hard at bringing us down to their level of ignorance.
That, coupled to their pathetic inhability to accept - or deal with - reality, along with their typical shameless hypocrisy in trying to justify any and all duplicity on their part in the face of whatever self-deluded moral ground du jour that they claim, make them not only nothing more than primitive minds, but utter incompetent modern human beings as well.
Q.E.D. - yet again.
In the meantime, perhaps it would be wise on the part of the rest of us to dwell seriously on how much overall "progress" exactly we have achieved with our "modern" religions and today's current "belief" systems ...
(Originally posted at APOV)
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In an article from The Nation, which I discovered at QuiverFull.com, I quote this passage about the Quiverfull movement:
They refuse any attempt to regulate pregnancy. Quiverfull began with the publication of Rick and Jan Hess's 1989 book, A Full Quiver: Family Planning and the Lordship of Christ, which argues that God, as the "Great Physician" and sole "Birth Controller," opens and closes the womb on a case-by-case basis. Women's attempts to control their own bodies--the Lord's temple--are a seizure of divine power.
Another Quiverfull warrior by the name of Mary Pride is quoted in The Nation article as writing: "My body is not my own." This rebuttal of the feminist health text Our Bodies, Ourselves is deliberate. Quiverfull women are more than mothers. They're domestic warriors in the battle against what they see as forty years of destruction wrought by women's liberation: contraception, women's careers, abortion, divorce, homosexuality and child abuse, in that order.
A evangelical pastor:
"Some people think that what I'm doing--having eleven children--is wrong. I don't really get into that much. The Bible says 'be fruitful and multiply.' That's my belief system. They don't believe in God, so they think we have to conserve what we have. But in my belief system, He's going to give us a new earth." Overpopulation isn't a problem in a universe where God promises a clean global slate."
It's doubtful they'll have the large-scale impact they think they may have. But joined with other fundamentalist Christian churches, these people are going to be a constant thorn in the side of those of us who are pro-choice and support marriage equality. Look at the extent to which the Mormon community has grown, flourished financially and taken up the battle against marriage equality in the state of California.