AAA (Ask the Atheist Anything)

Last week, I opened up the floor to everybody on my Facebook friends list to ask me any question they wanted regarding my religious beliefs. Fun for me to do? Yes.  Stupid?  Maybe.  Social suicide?  Most definitely.

For the uninitiated, I was born an atheist, converted to Christianity at around 5 years old, became fundamental in my beliefs at 18, and did a complete 180 and became an atheistic humanist at age 24.  A lot of people knew me as the guy who spent a lot of time reading the “Good” Book, praying, helping to lead youth groups, and trying to work Jesus into nearly every conversation I had.  Now completely devoid of any religious belief, a lot of people either like to engage me and discuss why this change occurred, while some completely avoid the topic.  Religion, just like always, is still a subject that I love to discuss, and I figured this would be a good opportunity to not only discuss and engage, but to also share my story.

I received quite a lot of questions that require in-depth answers, so this entry is part one in what will be a two part series.

A disclosure upfront: if you’re offended by the critical discussion of religion, then just stop reading now.  I’m going to have a pretty harsh critique of religion and faith in general and Christianity in particular.  If you’re okay with that – then read on.  If not, go back to your game of Solitaire.  Now let’s get this bad boy started.

And the most popular and obvious question comes from Angela, Claudia, and Bob, was: 

Question #1: What happened to change you?

I grew up in a very loving, supportive, and awesome Christian family.  Although I was born an Atheist, at age 5 I regularly went to this Christian group for boys at my church called Royal Rangers, where they teach you how to tie knots that you’ll never need to use and that you’re going to slowly and painfully be burned alive for infinity unless you believe that a man who existed 2000 years ago was the maker and savior of everything.  Having been mildly burned by an outdoor grill earlier in the year, I was keenly aware of my aversion to heat,  and the thought of feeling that heat forever all over my body terrified me to no end.  So I cried and I cried until fear completely overwhelmed me and I gave in.  This made Jesus happy so he came and lived inside of my heart. 

For most of my childhood, I went to church and believed that this Christian god was the one true God. Not much happened during this period, except my general acceptance of the beliefs of Christianity as explained to me by grownups.  You know, no swearing, no masturbating, etc. Then in 2004 I started taking my faith in god very seriously, taking a literalist view of Scripture, believing that the Bible wasn’t just a collection of stories meant to teach us life lessons, but was literally and historically true.  Adam and Eve really did live and hold a conversation with a snake, Noah really did fit every species on earth into one boat, Jesus really did rise from the dead,  homosexuality is sinful, masturbation is evil, sex outside of wedlock is gross and wrong, women being pastors is unbiblical, etc. etc.  If the Bible said it, I believed it.  I volunteered at my youth group, was a youth leader, lead Bible studies and prayer groups, gave sermons, and studied the Bible on a daily basis and listened to sermons online from morning until night.

Then in 2008, I started doing something very dangerous for any Christian.  I started broadening the media I was exposed to.  My theology started to get fairly liberal.  I started questioning whether or not god was really interested whether people played with themselves or that he really chose to torture humans for eternity just because they didn’t accept the correct set of propositions before they died.

Then something really crazy happened – I started listening to people that didn’t teach me WHAT to think – they taught me HOW to think.  George Carlin and Penn & Teller taught me the fine art of critical thinking.  They showed me that most ideas that you’re presented with in this world are demonstrably wrong and intentionally deceitful and that you need to be intentionally critical of all ideas, especially when it comes to the biggest bullshit story of them all: religion.

But the real rock in front of the tomb of my Christianity was actually reading the Bible thoroughly for myself without using the lens and interpretations of others.  Most Christians cherry pick which verses they pay attention to.  They love to read verses about Jesus healing the sick and giving self-denying sermons, or Paul giving encouragement to struggling churches.  But here are some passages that they either ignore purposefully or are blissfully ignorant of.  Do you know that if you actually read your bible, you’d find that this morally monstrous Iron Age God of War commanded, approved, and condoned of:

●      Rape.  God commanded

○    The rape of all the Midianite girls who were virgins (Numbers 31:7-18 NLT)

○    That a female rape victim be forced to marry her attacker if her attacker paid for her (Deuteronomy 22:28-29 NLT)

○    That captive women have their head shaved and be raped if her owner was attracted to her (Deuteronomy 21:10-14 NAB)

○    A man may keep a woman against her will for the sole purpose of having sex with her (Exodus 21:7-11 NLT)Pillaging

●      Murder of non-believers.  God commanded his people to kill:

○    Homosexuals (Leviticus 20:13 NAB)

○    People who don’t listen to priests (Deuteronomy 17:12 NLT)

○    Witches (Exodus 22:17 NAB)

○    Fortunetellers (Leviticus 20:27 NAB)

○    Members of other religions (Exodus 22:19 NAB)

○    Nonbelievers (2 Chronicles 15:12-13 NAB)

○    Fornicators (Leviticus 21:9 NAB)

○    Adulterers (Leviticus 20:10 NLT)

●      The ritual sacrifice of one’s own children

●      Human trafficking

●      Ethnic cleansing

●      Bride-price

●      Indiscriminate massacre

And by the way, God’s personal kill count in the Bible would put any Call of Duty player’s to shame, coming in at 2,301,427.

A lot of Christians will try explain these verses away by saying that God was constrained to work within the customs of the people and culture of the time.  But how can God, who is supposedly omnipotent, have his hands tied by these barbaric desert wandering ancient lunatics?  He’s either not omnipotent, or he’s not benevolent and kind.  He’s either impotent or he’s evil.  Or it’s all been made up by crude uneducated morally reprehensible patriarchal brutes thousands of years ago. 

Christians will also claim that most of these atrocities happened in the Old Testament and Jesus came to change all of that in fulfillment of the Law and Messianic prophecies.  So what happened?  God was a little angry and rash and was responsible for the pain and suffering of millions of abused, raped, murdered, and enslaved people, but now he’s starting to develop some moral character and mature a little bit so he came down to sacrifice himself to himself in some barbaric ritual sacrifice?  Ridiculous.

I have plenty of issues and grievances with religion and Christianity in particular, but these purely evil verses are without a doubt my biggest grievance.  After thoughtfully considering these verses, it became an issue of conscience.  How could I support and affirm such an evil, vile, and morally reprehensible book?  I couldn’t.  And to ignore these verses and discount them means that I’m constructing my own religion that isn’t really Christianity.  And where’s the truth in that?  As Paul said in Corinthians, it’s time to put away childish things.  So I did just that.

Jayson asks

Question #2: Which atheist philosopher/thinker/writer has most inspired you and why?

Like I mentioned before, George Carlin and Penn & Teller are the dudes that really initiated change in me.  Carlin is famous for completely trashing ideas that we’re told not to question, and he challenged authority and gave it the finger and that was really appealing to me.

Watching Penn & Teller’s Bullshit! was another huge stepping stone for me.  Episode after episode, they demonstrate how a popular and pervasive idea is false and most of the time harmful.  I didn’t agree with everything they said necessarily, but again, it was a great lesson in thinking critically about ideas and how just because it’s popular and supported by people who are intelligent, doesn’t mean it has any merit.

The author who finally put what I was thinking into very concise, hard-hitting, and elegant words was Sam Harris.  I read his book The End of Faith:  Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason and it was life changing and beautiful, and was finally what brought the shackles of religion crumbling off of me.

And finally, who I enjoy listening to most now is Matt Dillahunty of The Atheist Experience (he’s very popular on YouTube).  His story is very similar to mine and he’s a brilliant thinker.

Question #3: Which theist author/thinker/writer do you think provides the strongest case for theism?

Without a doubt, for me it’s Lee Strobel and C.S. Lewis.  Strobel because he claims to bring journalistic integrity to his work and because he interviews so-called experts in their field who support his message.  His books are very flawed of course and heavily criticized, but he certainly had me convinced for awhile.

Another Theist author which I still respect is C.S. Lewis.  His book Mere Christianity had a pretty powerful impact on me as a teenager, and had me absolutely convinced that there was a logical foundation to my beliefs.  If any Christian should try and make an effort to re-convert me however, they should use the Chronicles of Narnia books, as they’ll forever have a poetic and narrative hold on my cold dead atheist heart!

Question #4: What do you find to be the strongest case against the existence of god?

There are countless of great arguments against the existence of a god.  But the strongest argument to me is that even if there were no criticisms against the existence of god, the proposition that there IS NOT a god CAN NOT be proven.  You can’t disprove the existence of something.  You can only PROVE the existence of something.  If I said that I had an invisible alien following me around everywhere I go, there’s absolutely no logical process you can go through that would definitively prove my statement false. 

To claim that there is an invisible god creator who controls everything, you need consistent, rational, and evidentiary support, to which there is none.  Belief in a creator, and belief in Christianity, is accepting an inconsistent, illogical, and completely groundless claim.  If there’s no reasonable criteria for which an idea can be disproven, then the proposition is flawed and should be thrown out.

However, many believers love to say that their beliefs are logical and supported by evidence.  But in my experience, there are certain key theological areas that you can apply logical pressure to, and EVERY SINGLE TIME, no matter if I’m talking to somebody academically trained in theology or a complete ignoramus, they eventually say that what they believe requires some measure of faith (believing in a proposition without any legitimate or compelling reasons).  And since faith is not a good thing (you could only prove that faith is a good thing through what?  That’s right: reason and evidence.  It all comes back to reason and evidence), the theist argument loses all credibility.   Faith isn’t a good thing.  It’s gullibility and it’s stupidity, and I don’t condone either.  This guy is a great example.  His gullbility has led him to have faith in the reality of professional wrestling, and shuts off his mind to any possiblity otherwise.

Sorry buddy.  "It's real to me, dammit!"  couldn't and shouldn't carry weight with anybody else.

With that being said though, I would never say for certain that I know that there is no god.  Realistically, nobody can really say anything for certain.  Could there be a super intelligence in some other galaxy or realm of existence?  Actually, there most likely is.  With the discovery of the fact that there are trillions of galaxies and that we live in a multiverse, who can say anything for certain?  But I’m as certain as anybody can reasonably be about anything that the Christian god DOES NOT exist.

Question #5: How has becoming an atheist changed you, as a person?

I’m free from the belief that both myself and the people that I love are vile, wicked, evil people to the core and that we all deserve to be tortured endlessly forever.  I can’t convey in words how absolutely liberating the absence of that belief is.  I can now look at myself and other people and see inherent value and worth, whereas before, all I could see were “dirty menstrual rags” who needed Jesus.

I’ve become more appreciative of my life and more hungry to squeeze in as many awesome experiences as I can before my time on this earth expires.  Before, when I believed that I had all of eternity to experience joy, I lived my life complacently.  “If I don’t get around to making that painting I wanted, oh well.  I’ll be able to paint and realize this idea fully when I’m basking in the presence of god”.  Since that belief is no longer there, I don’t take the time that I know that I do have for granted.

It’s made me rely on myself and my own intuitions, skills and sensibilities.  I still have this knee-jerk reaction when faced with crisis: I still find myself starting to pray.  Praying gave me comfort as well as the belief that things could never get too bad, because there was a god out there who loved me and had a plan.  Now that I believe that not to be the case, I find myself making more of an effort in all areas of my life, because I know that there’s no metaphysical safety net.  It’s a harsh reality, but I’m relying on myself and dealing with reality on reality’s terms.

And finally, my atheism has made me angry.  Angry that people I love have been programmed, most from a very young age, with poisonous and divisive beliefs.  And their minds have been so controlled and manipulated and deluded to the point that they believe that their beliefs are beautiful and inclusive and not destructive and divisive.  I know people that are teaching their young children that they are rotten and depraved to the core and that if they don’t accept the correct set of propositions, then they’ll be tortured forever.  And they believe that teaching them this is a good thing.  That kills me, and it makes me angry and it makes me sad and it makes me compassionate, and reaffirms for me that this anger is valuable, valid, and necessary.

On a final note – please don’t listen to anything I say.  If I can get one point across to anybody reading this, it’s THINK FOR YOURSELF.  Consider my ideas, but pursue true knowledge, open your mind, and criticize ideas.  Don’t take my word on anything.  Stay tuned for part two coming soon!

Looking A Disappearing Gift Horse in the Mouth: What I Hate About Skyrim

Chicago?  Not anymore.  For the past month, I've been living in Skyrim.  I've climbed the slopes of the Throat of the World, I've fended off Dark Brotherhood assassins who randomly make pitiful attempts on my life.  I've crushed rebellions, looted dungeons, and ripped apart dragons limb from limb.  I've even shouted "Dovahkiin!!!" from my bedroom window as packs of birds flew off the roof of my garage in a startled frenzy.

It's been a wild fantasy joyride so far, and I'm sure to put many more hours into Skyrim before all is said and done.  As great as the game is though, I'm not without my complaints.  As a fan of open world games and Bethesda's games in particular, there are many aspects of Skryim that are lacking and leave me wanting to put the controller down and just sit tight waiting for the next Mass Effect game.  Let's discuss.

An all too familiar sight in Skyrim.  What you'll spend about
88% of the game looking at

TOO MANY DAMN DUNGEONS FOR THIS DRAGONBORN

Okay.  I get it.  One of the primary reasons that people play The Elder Scrolls series is to stumble across a cave or a crypt, slay whatever asswipe skeleton warrior or necromancer that gets in your way, and find really great loot.  But c'mon, Bethesda.  When I go to a place like The Bard's College, I expect to have quests that involve - you know, being a bard.  NOT FIGHTING MY WAY THROUGH COUNTLESS DUNGEONS FINDING FLUTES OF SUMMONING AND DRUMS OF ILLUSION.  A better option would be to, I don't know, break up the tedious dungeon crawling mechanic that you rely so heavily upon and put the player in some interesting situations that, you know, a BARD might find himself in - considering I signed up at a fucking bards college, not an archaeological dig.  Maybe I have to impress somebody with a song and dance, maybe I have to master some sort of musical instrument before an inn will let me play there.

At the start of nearly every quest, I know how it's going to end before I even begin.  It will end with me standing 4 levels below ground in some spooky Dwemer crypt over a boss corpse with a train of dead enemies running all the way back up to the surface while a shortcut door in the back of the room gives me quick access back to the surface world.  Break up the monotony guys, that's all I'm asking.  Actually, no it's not.  I have a lot more to ask.

Look in those beautiful eyes.  She's as
cold and lifeless as the mountains of Winterhold.

CARDBOARD CUTOUT COMPANIONS

Since The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion came out, we've seen two installments of the brilliantly innovative Mass Effect series hit store shelves.  One of Mass Effect's strong points is how interesting they make your companions.  They have personalities, histories, quirks, strengths, weaknesses - all making them not only helpful in a fight, but absolutely fascinating to interact with.  This was never a strong point in Oblivion, but Bethesda still had interesting companions using the same engine in Fallout 3 and even when it handed the franchise over for New Vegas.  Each companion had a story and a history, and the more you talked to that character, the more you learned about them.  Each character even had their own special quest that gave you more insight into who they are.  As far as I can tell, that's completely absent from Skyrim.

There's no character in Skyrim that's on par with Garrus or Grunt or Miranda.  My companion, Lydia, who is required to follow me as I'm the Thane of Whiterun, is nothing more than a mule to carry my loot.  I wish I had an actual mule, because that jackass would be a lot more interesting than this poor stone-faced bitch Lydia.  She repeats the same tired dialogue again and again, and as far as I can tell, has no unique ways in which she can be interacted with.  Again, dynamic companions have never been a strong point for The Elder Scrolls series, but if Fallout 3 and New Vegas can make interesting companions, then I expect the same from Skyrim.

So that's what he's been up to...

IT'S THE LITTLE THINGS

How hard would it have been to include a barber shop or salon or whatever they called it back then where you can edit your character's hair?  Why do I spend 1000 gold pieces on a horse only to have it disappear on me and never return?  Why do characters constantly repeat the same lines over and over again ad nausea?  Why can't I have different weapon layout lists to add to quick equip list?  Why isn't there a survival mode like in Fallout where I have to drink and eat?

I DON'T THINK SHE'S THAT PRETTY

For being released a half a decade later, Skyrim doesn't seem like a huge leap in graphical quality over its predecessor.  I'm not gonna rag on Bethesda here too much because I don't know what kind of graphical limitations they were working with.  But when you get the chance, go up to a high vantage point and look down at the surface of Skyrim.  Do you see how you can very obviously see a pattern repeating itself over and over again?  The grass, snow, and rock textures very obviously repeat once you get high enough, breaking the illusion.  Which isn't a huge problem but I'm really surprised they didn't find a way to mask texture repetition.

The shadows tend to act really wonky too, sometimes convulsing and appearing jagged before correcting itself again.

Don't get me wrong - I love Skyrim and I don't mean to look a randomly disappearing fellating gift horse in the mouth, I just expected a little more from a studio and game series that I respect so much.  Bethesda - when you begin developing The Elder Scrolls VI, do us all a favor and pay more attention to what the Mass Effect series is doing - because what few things you're doing dead wrong, they're getting wonderfully right.

"If you don't like America, then leave!" Okay. Maybe I will.

I’ve somehow managed to ignore politics for most of my life - because most of the time it’s just a bunch of boring bullshit.  It’s a giant group of crooked, slightly overweight, old, irrelevant and out-of-touch white guys sitting around proposing bills, ratifying amendments, ironing out deficits, having sex with little boys, soliciting male prostitutes…yadda yadda yadda.

But let me tell you, all of a sudden, I’m starting to pay real close attention.  I don’t know whether it’s because I’m getting older and maturing (yeah right) and paying attention to this kind of garbage happens naturally, or because shit’s about to hit the fan in a big bad way.  But over the course of the past year or so, it seems that the U.S. government has been waging an all-out war on the freedoms of the American people.  From the violent opposition to the peaceful ‘Occupy’ protests, to SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act), and to most recently the National Defense Authorization Act, this year has been an all-out assault on the rights and freedoms of the American people.  As my hero, the late great George Carlin once said: “That’s all we’ve ever had in this country: a bill of temporary privileges. And if you read the news, even badly, you know that every year the list gets shorter and shorter.”  It seems that statement has never rung more true than it does now.

This National Defense Authorization Act is a very scary thing because it seems to obliterate our rights completely.  It’s tricky, because there are two parts of this bill that seem to contradict each other.  It’s very cleverly worded at first making you think that it doesn’t apply to U.S. citizens, because in the first part of the bill it says that people who are declared to be “enemy combatants” can be arrested, detained, interrogated, held without access to an attorney or trial, tortured, and even killed.  But end of the bill essentially says it can apply to American citizens “if we want it to.”

WHAT!?  My government, the same government that has drilled this idea that I’m a free citizen into my head my entire life, now has legal precedent to arrest, detain, interrogate, torture, and kill me simply by suspecting that I’m a terrorist!?  And with SOPA, I can possibly go to jail on felony charges for streaming so-called copyrighted content?  And the Department of Justice can shut down my website and stop vendors from doing business with me even on SUSPICIONS that the site in question is streaming copyrighted content and expose me AND the hosting site to unlimited liability?

This isn’t even North Korea or China that we’re talking about here.  This is the UNITED STATES!!!  How pathetic and oppressive have we become?  The future isn’t very bright for this country, folks.  And it’s getting darker every single day.  You often hear patriotic nutjobs respond to people who criticize this “great” nation with awe-inspiring ignorant phrases like “Well, if you don’t like *blank* about the U.S., then you can leave!”  Well, let me tell you, for the first time I’m seriously considering it.  Time to bring Canada into my job search.