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My last post was kind of a convoluted mess about free will, age of accountability, and a couple of paragraphs on dinosaurs. I thought it might be useful to restate the age of accountability stuff without all the anti-dinosaur propaganda. So, here goes.

My observation is that most (though not all) modern American Christians subscribe to a concept of something called the “age of accountability”. In its most simple form this belief holds that children (and the mentally retarded) are not mature enough to be held accountable for their sins, so god treats them differently from adults when they die. Basically, the church holds that god is merciful and even though children are stained by original sin, god grants them entrance to Heaven because they didn’t have the opportunity to “undo” the sin through salvation and baptism.

It’s interesting to note that this doctrine appears nowhere explicitly in the actual Bible, and until the Catholic church adopted the idea of Limbo for unbaptized children, doctrine was that unbaptized kids went to hell. The now-apocryphal Apocalypse of Peter, for instance, written sometime around the 2nd-century, clearly shows children in Hell. Nevertheless, I wish to take up the modern Catholic and mainstream American Protestant belief that all children, regardless of baptismal status, will go to Heaven upon their death.

I feel that a modern Christian would say that all of the following are true:

1. Children who die before the age of accountability will go to Heaven.
2. Fetuses that are aborted have souls, and will therefore go to Heaven.
3. If a child lives to the age of accountability, it’s more likely that they will end up in Hell rather than Heaven.
4. If a fetus is actually born, it is possible that its life will be one of hardship.
5. It is always preferable to be in Heaven rather than Hell.
6. Murderers can be saved and can go to Heaven.
7. Women and men who choose abortion for their fetus are murderers. Or, if not “murderers”, they have committed a sin.
8. Women who get abortions can go to Heaven.

Based on the above statements, I contend that abortion is the best possible scenario for a human being. The child will never know the hardships of life, and since they won’t make it to the age of accountability, they have no possibility of making it to Hell. Since Hell is never better than Heaven, and since being born raises one’s chances of going to Hell, dying before birth avoids all possible negativities associated with life as a human. Or, if the child is born, dying before accountability prevents them from going to Hell even if it does not preclude them from having experienced hardship.

In order for this paragraph to be false, either children who die go to Hell, fetuses don’t have souls, or sometimes Hell is preferable to Heaven for a soul.

As far as the adult life goes, so long as they repent for their abortion, and so long as they believe Christ to be their savior, the Bible teaches that they can get into Heaven. The words of Jesus himself would seem to indicate that in actuality it is more likely that both lives will choose Hell rather than Heaven, so even if the mother did not repent before her death, she at least guaranteed the salvation of her own child.

Someone might say “abortion or child murder is wrong because god says it is, therefor you shouldn’t do it”. In reality, that’s irrelevant. If all of my statements above are true, it is 100% likely that at least one soul will get into Heaven. If the adult repents, the likelihood of both souls going to Heaven can also be 100%. On the other hand, if the child is allowed to live into adulthood, the likelihood of both souls going to Hell seems to be better than 50/50. Thus, it doesn’t matter what god says, as his own doctrine leaves an “out”.

In the end, we have a doctrine that either must be false (children do go to Hell), or we have shown Christianity to have a very serious internal contradiction (abortion/murder of children is preferable to letting them live). My own personal feeling is that a perfect god would not allow for an irrational doctrine, so this contradiction furthers the idea that Christianity is not divinely inspired. Or, if there is a god, he’s not perfect and can be irrational.

A friend of mine put up a website a couple of months ago with a pretty active forum. A lot of talk was going on about the concept of free will, so I started a thread on Christianity’s concept of free will and how it pertains to children and the mentally incapacitated. Feel free to check it out here.

My basic premise is that we don’t have free will, and that we’re essentially biological machines operating on autopilot. I argue that the idea of a soul has no merit.

The more I think about it, the more screwed up the concept of free will becomes in the context of religion, Christianity in particular. Although a lot of American Christians do believe in predestination to at least a small extent, most don’t. Their idea is that we have a soul, and that soul has free will to sin, to choose god, and so on. There are certain conditions, like children and the mentally incapacitated, where the free will rules don’t apply.

Let’s think about all of this for a second. You go to a wedding because your stupid friend is marrying someone he shouldn’t, and you have the amazingly good fortune of meeting the hottest—and apparently dumbest—bridesmaid there. You guys dance and even though you swear you’re not gay, you set the floor on fire with your enthusiastic version of the chicken dance. A couple more hours of open bar and you two are riding the no condom train to 3-minutes of pleasure town (I’d be like 2 hours though, because I’m obviously such a stud). Even though she swore she was on the pill, you’re an expectant father by 2 a.m. Congrats. Your ugly horse baby is on its way.

God, sitting up in the clouds, notices that you’ve magically placed an order for a soul and whips one up to come down and inhabit your new fertilized egg. Since Christians feel that the point of this life is to demonstrate our character to god so that he’ll let us into heaven later, we can say that god has just created a soul merely to test it. And, since Adam and Eve sinned in the garden of Eden around 5,700 years ago, your kid is automatically a sinner without ever having had a chance to utter his first swear word (I vote for “boobies” when he does).

So, before your kid is even an hour old we’ve had two problems with free will: we’ve forced god into making a soul, and your kid is a sinner without ever having sinned himself.

Three things can basically happen with the pregnancy. First, it can fail on its own, in which case god made a soul, let it incubate in your dumb girlfriend’s womb for 4 months, and then decided to kill its body and take it up to heaven. Second, you can get an abortion, in which case you killed the baby and it still gets a free ride to heaven. Third, you can have the kid.

If your kid survives the pregnancy, he will either be born retarded or normal. If he’s retarded, he gets a free pass to heaven. If he’s normal, so long as he dies before the so-called age of accountability (which doesn’t actually exist in the Bible), he gets a free pass to heaven. But, if he’s normal and lives too long and then doesn’t accept god, he’ll go to hell.

In short, I’m not sure why the hell anyone would actually want to survive into maturity. Isn’t it better to die as a kid so that you can go to heaven? If the purpose of life is to test the soul to see if it’s worthy to get into heaven, why give kids and the Corkies of the world a free pass? Why even have something called childhood? Why doesn’t god just magically create souls in a coliseum and make them run laps or something to see if they’re good enough for heaven? It seems like he’s just wasting time cooking up kids, inserting souls into them, and then snuffing them out just to take the soul back up to heaven.

Does the retarded kid have a soul? If so, is his soul too retarded to be able to figure out good and evil? I used to work with disabled kids, and the ones with Down Syndrome were always rubbing on stuff. If being retarded means I get to rub my junk on everything and I still get to go to heaven, I’m not sure how retardation is a bad thing.

The logical conclusion of the free pass for kids quite literally is that it’s moral to murder children. It sounds like I’m just trying to be argumentative, but I’m not. If there really is a god and he’s all pissed that I write this blog, wouldn’t I have been far better off if my parents had aborted me or had driven me into a lake or something when I was a kid? They could have asked for forgiveness and had their sins forgiven. Meanwhile, I could be kicking Mother Theresa’s ass in limbo up on a cloud somewhere. Instead, I live to be an adult, watch too many episodes of Aqua Teen Hunger Force, and now I’m the one who gets to go to hell. I’m the one who gets a butt full of flaming hot coals, all because Adam and Eve ate a stupid apple that a stupid talking snake offered to them and because my parents didn’t love me enough to abort me. Thanks a lot mom and dad. Jerks.

Seriously, how is abortion a bad thing? It’s a free ticket to eternal bliss, and there’s no risk of ever having to experience starvation, thirst, genocide, drug abuse, depression, or freaking progeria. Why would we want to solve birth defects that result in mental retardation? Wear a helmet and a diaper as an adult and you and your retarded soul also get into heaven. None of it makes a lick of sense. We should be praying for failed pregnancies. We should be encouraging mothers to drink and smoke and snort their lunches. Muslims should be totally stoked when the Jews kill one of their kids. Instead they get all like “kill the infidels” or “may Allah’s sweaty balls rub on your Jew face”.

In conclusion, if you love your kids, you should abort them. Or maybe do copious amounts of pot while you’re pregnant. Anything less means you want them to go to hell. Ass.

Ok. Now, i know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, “no way is he going to write a blog about sex with animals and how it’s kinda sorta ok”. You’d be wrong though, because I am. Before you go back to watching Malcolm in the Middle or whatever other dumb show you’ve got on, hear me out for a second.

I was reading a story about a guy who pleaded guilty—for the second time—to having sex with a female dog. The lawyers in the case were deciding whether to charge him with a sex crime and put him on the sex offender registry.

To put it simply, I hate the sex offender registry in this country. Actually, a better way to say it is that the sex offender registry idea has merit, but the way in which it has come to include nearly every possible crime there is is beyond stupid. In some states, you can be charged as a sex offender and forced to be on the registry for life because your drunken ass really had to pee after a party and an alley was the only place to go. Nevermind that your willy was nowhere near another human being, you’re somehow a sicko who can no longer live near schools or playgrounds.

Our society has decided that sex crimes are worthy of special infamy, and I’m cool with that. Molesting kids is possibly the best way to ensure that their life is one of misery and confusion. Do something worse to a kid beyond simple molestation and you’ve basically guaranteed that that kid will suffer every day of their life. Sex offender registry. Done. Make the bastard have the worst life possible.

Another story I read the other day was about a female teacher or school coach or administrator or something who was accused or found guilty of having sex with a male student who was 17 years and like 361 days old. Four more days and he’d have been 18. Guess what? That female is now on or bound for the sex offender registry, which is ridiculous. There should be some bloody common sense in the system. Maybe you put her away for a little while for abusing her position of authority. But in no way does having sex with someone who is 4 days shy of an arbitrary “legalizing” birthday merit lifelong stigma and punishment. It’s insane.

Anyways, back to the guy and the dog. You know, maybe the guy has some screws loose if he feels the need to give his dog the ol’ heave-ho. I’m not a trained psychologist, but I would bet good money that a paraphilia like bestiality has little to no relationship to sexual aggression towards humans (children or otherwise). People who are into things like scat and whatnot don’t get put on the sex offender list, and that’s about as screwed up a fetish as you can get.

Here’s what I find particularly ridiculous about our society. Let’s say that you and that female dog were in like a warehouse, and an earthquake knocked it down. You two are trapped in it, and rescuers are having trouble locating the two of you. After like a week, you could reach over with your knife and slit the dog’s bloody throat, consume its raw flesh, and when they dig you out, it wouldn’t count against you. You just murdered your dog and ATE it, and more than likely, that would just make your ordeal sound that much more harrowing and add to your heroic triumph over adversity. But, if you get a little lonely while you’re buried and decide to try and make puppies, when they dig you out you’re f’ed for life.

We kill, murder, and otherwise slaughter millions of animals every day, and that’s totally cool. We take their bloody lives in inhumane and cruel ways and it’s looked at as another 9-to-5. But, the second you let your male dog try the ol’ donkey punch on you you’re completely hosed.

Now, I’m not saying that you should give in to those come hither glances your golden retriever is always giving you. I’m just saying that this world would be a better place if we used some common sense every once in a while. Maybe let the dog guy talk to a counselor. The teacher with the 17.96-year-old student? Maybe she abused her authority, but given my 12 years’ experience as a teenage boy, I’m pretty certain that kid had an erection when they were having intercourse.

Seriously people. If you want a sex offender registry, go nuts. But, if you’re going to destroy the rest of a person’s life in putting them on it, just consider whether they really need to be there or whether some other solution would work better.

An old friend of mine sent me an e-mail the other day, and as he does each time we talk, he reminded me that god still loves me. We hadn’t talked in a while, so I told him that I was increasingly more happy with my choice to reject Christianity as time went on. As you can imagine, this isn’t exactly ideal news to someone worried about your eternal soul.

Since moving past Christianity, I’ve actually studied the religion and its holy book far more in depth than I did when I was a believer. When one studies how Christianity and the Bible developed in the first centuries following the death of Jesus, it becomes increasingly obvious just how much a work of mankind the Bible really is. Thus, when i read the Bible as a work of man, I’m actually pretty impressed with it. It’s an amazing work of human ingenuity and imagination, and a historian like me finds a wealth of information on how ancient cultures lived and related to one another.

On the other hand, when I read the Bible as though it’s supposed to be the word of god, I find it so stupid as to be ridiculous. This person called god is the most amazing being to have ever existed, and yet he’s obsessed to the point of murder over the most retarded and inane minutia of human existence. Every time I read the Bible, I’m glad that I left it all behind.

To help illustrate my point about how ridiculous it all is, I’ve decided to write a little play about Deuteronomy 22:11. In this verse, god commands the Israelites not to wear garments made of both linen and wool.

The part of god will be played by me, Tom Selleck, and the part of Gabriel the angel will be played by you.

Scene opens. God is sitting on a sofa, eating a bag of Doritos. Gabriel enters from stage right.

Gabriel: Hey God, what’s up?
God: Oh, not much. Just chillin’.

God crunches loudly on a single Dorito.

Gabriel: You know, I was just thinking God; remember the time you invented space-time? Remember how there was nothing, and then you, the most powerful and rational being ever, simply thought it into existence? I mean, this is even before the planets, which are totally easy for you. But seriously, inventing the very fabric of space-time? That was pretty cool.

God smiles and blushes a little.

God: Yeah, I guess that was pretty cool.

Gabriel, excitedly: Or, remember how humans weren’t around yet, and so you took dirt from the earth and made DNA out of it? Freaking DNA! You took dirt and made a DNA chain for Adam that was like, what, 4 billion molecule pairs long? I gotta give it to you God, you’re pretty rad.
God: Thanks Gabriel. You’re pretty alright yourself.

God and Gabriel go quiet for a moment, considering how rad God is. God puts a Dorito in his mouth and chews it loudly. Gabriel smiles, thinking about something else totally rad that God did. God puts another Dorito in his mouth and looks slightly up, as if looking off in the distance. All of a sudden, he throws his bag of Doritos down and stands up excitedly, pointing.

God: Holy shit Gabriel. Holy SHIT. That man has just made a shirt of both linen and wool. Together!

God paces quickly back and forth as he mutters “holy shit holy shit holy shit”. He appears to be thinking. Gabriel looks worried, in stark disbelief that a man made a shirt of linen and wool. God stops and looks determinedly at Gabriel.

God: Gabriel, I want you to take 50 of your best invisible angels and go down to earth. You’re going to have to do battle with like, 70 of Satan’s invisible demons who are obviously taking over this man’s very soul. Fight them, and make me-damned sure that you don’t leave any of those me-damned demons standing. I want the oceans to run red with their invisible demon blood! Now GO!

Gabriel quickly assembles the best 50 invisible angels he can find, including Esteban, the Latin angel with the sexy accent that all the invisible girl angels would totally die for if they knew they were girls and liked boys.

God sits down on the sofa again, elbows on his knees and his hands holding his head. He worriedly strokes his long hair.

God, very quietly: How could it have come to this? How could I possibly have let someone make a shirt out of both linen and wool? I mean, I created a hundred billion stars with the sweep of my very hand. I wished bloody gravity into existence. And yet, I can’t keep someone from making a shirt out of linen and wool together? Oh, whoa is me. They’ll take away my god card for sure. I’m ruined. Ruined!!!

God continues to fidget nervously with his hair. He considers eating another Dorito, but decides that he’s sick to his invisible God stomach over the invisible battle going on on Earth right that very moment. As the curtain closes, God wipes away a single small tear, not so much for the soul of the guy with the shirt made of wool and linen, but because he could have had it all, including Stacy and the new Camaro. He might have even been captain of the track and field team. He’s not sure what will become of him now.

-Fin-

Link of the day: The Old Testament test for female adultery was forcing her to drink dirt water. If she got sick, she was obviously an adulterer. Kind of reminds me of the Monty Python witch test.

So, did you hear the one about the polar bear, the rabbi, and the Chinese guy that walk into a bar? Yeah, me either. I don’t think there is one like that. But, that’s besides the point. You know what else is besides the point? What the heck is a “one”? Why don’t we say “did you hear the joke…? ” Or for that matter, why the hell is “one” pronounced “wun”? Stupid English.

You know what’s not stupid? Polar bears. You’ve probably heard about this already, as I’m pretty much yesterday’s news, but there’s been a lot of fuss lately over whether to put polar bears on the path to being recognized as an endangered species. In a nutshell, here’s the deal: global warming (whether man made or not) seems to be prematurely melting large swaths of ice where the bears live, depriving said bears of hunting grounds, places to lay their eggs, and so on. So, rather than chilling on big pieces of ice, the polar bears have to float around on comically small blocks of ice where they basically starve to death. Their numbers are expected to decline precipitously in the coming decades if trends continue, so the thought is that we can put them on some list which gives them protection somehow.

I didn’t know this until about 10 minutes ago, but apparently polar bears are still hunted, with the US being the largest destination of bear pelts. I’m guessing the penises go to Asia, as Asians will turn any penis into a soup. As you can guess, the powerful bear penis lobby has those fat cats in Washington wrapped around their little fingers, so any attempt to put the bears on a protected list naturally rubs up against some stiff opposition. Also, penis.

In all seriousness, people who benefit from the hunting of polar bears are concerned about what a protected status would do to their livelihoods (this is primarily a problem with native tribes). In addition, since the die off is being caused by climate change, it’s not inconceivable that businesses that contribute to global warming (i.e. “everyone”) or which have commercial operations in areas where bears live could find themselves inundated with lawsuits blaming them for bear deaths.

I’m a veteran of at least several world wars, so as you can imagine, I’m a big fan of polar bears. Accordingly, I make sure my carbon emissions only kill off ugly animals and plants that no one wants. Like poodles. Or tree sloths. I certify that none of my carbon emissions have been used to kill polar bears. So please don’t sue me.

Now, finally getting to my point: it sucks that we can’t just have a legitimate debate about whether what we’re doing is in fact killing off the bears. It seems like we should ask two questions, and two questions only: are the bears in danger of extinction in the reasonably near future? If so, are we big enough assholes to say that our commercial interests are more important than the continued survival of this bear? I don’t care which way you argue the second question (there’s merit to both a “yes” and “no” answer), but it’s dumb to look at the question from a point of pure self-interest. If we’re killing off the bears and we want the bears to stick around, let’s find a way to protect them. If we like the bears but don’t care if they die, just say so. If drives me nuts that we dance around the issue. Human beings are such pussies.

I encourage you to write your congressman and tell them how you feel on this issue. You’ll probably get a nice form letter back with no real insight or human touch, but at least you’ll make me feel better about ending this blog abruptly because I don’t really know how to end it.

Edit: if you want a legitimate, mature opinion on this, here’s a story by some woman who actually has the training and fancy pants qualifications to write a good article.

In doing homework on the facts behind Zeitgeist (or lack thereof), I came across a lot of Christians saying things like “ZOMG!!11!! Atheists are so stewpid, invisible demons have taken you over and teh antichrist is going 2 eat ur soul, like next week. 666!” Maybe that’s not an exact quote, but if I recall correctly, that’s basically the gist of it.

I’ve long wondered why Christians try so hard to keep evil at bay, or why they are so resistant to the adoption of the mark of the beast. If the world decays into evil, and if we hurry up and pass legislation to shoot our kids up with microchips, doesn’t that mean end times will get here faster? Won’t everyone who makes it through the Tribulation get to fly up to heaven that much sooner? The J-man and his party mobile are waiting for the saved, darnit!

I tell you, if I were Christian I would do two things tomorrow:

1. Call my congressman and tell him that I want anti-Christian legislation passed yesterday! Got a pledge of allegiance? I want god ooooooooooout of it! Money with “In God We Trust”? No way! Trust some other guy!
2. Start giving everyone free abortions. After all, the faster a baby dies, the sooner they get to heaven! This will make god really happy, but also probably really pissed off. Everybody wins!

In short, I would form a group called Christians for Satan and I would hold bake sales and provide free mark of the beast implants for all heathen kids under 12! After all, heralding the return of Christ and casting all the unbelievers into unending torment and anguish should be every Christian’s loving Christian duty.

Link of the day: Order of the Occult Hand

A good friend of mine recently asked me why, if I was an atheist, I spent so much time making fun of religion. Given that I’m terrible at responding to e-mails, I haven’t told him yet. Instead, I’ll waste time writing about it here and then write back to him in a week after I do more pressing things, like organize my safety-pin collection.

At first I thought the answer should be obvious. Atheists make fun of religion because we consider religion to be silly and backwards. As I considered it further, however, I realized that I’m just kind of a jerk. Most atheists I know don’t really ponder the big questions of life all that much. They don’t believe in god, and they’re ok with that. Beyond that, they go to school or work, come home to their family, and fantasize about my wicked safety-pin collection. Existence is just existence, and there’s no reason to think too hard about the whys or hows of the universe.

Actually, I don’t think I’m a jerk. It’s hard to describe, but I feel that my atheism is a mission of morality and liberation. I’ve come to understand it not just as a rejection of the imaginary supernatural, but the rejection of all things superstitious and irrational. My interest in dethroning religion comes from the same place as outrage against racism, bigotry, and oppression of any kind. It’s ridiculous to me that someone can be against the KKK, for example, and yet provide the same kind of baseless evidence to support their own religious beliefs (which are often full of hostility towards other groups).

As another example, what’s the difference between me saying that Western Civilization means that whites are inherently better and me saying that an invisible sky wizard listens to telepathic conversations I have with him and then rearranges the rules of the universe in order to help me pay my rent (even though the next guy to ask the same thing won’t get help paying his rent)? Both of them are based on nothing. The KKK guys are retards with no idea how genetics work and don’t realize that many blacks have closer genetic ties to whites than they do other blacks. Religious people don’t seem to realize that they get the same odds with prayers to god as they do if pray to a gallon of milk.

My atheism wants to raise mankind up. I want every man and woman to be able to shake off the chains of bondage placed upon them by millenniums of corruption, self-interest, and superstition. My atheism tells me that every life on this planet is worth something, and that no amount of prayer, bigotry, or false community will ever help mankind be free of the fear and evil that these same groups and ideologies spread. I make fun of religion because religion deserves to be ridiculed along side groups like the KKK. Education and enlightenment are the salvation of mankind, not the empty promises of ancient tomes written by primitive a-holes who probably couldn’t even see the value of a world class safety-pin collection if it bit them in the goddamned nose!

As I was walking into Target—or, as I like to call it: the thinking man’s Kmart—this morning to buy some quality Tupperware, I noticed a table and tent setup outside with a large “Register to Vote” sign. There was another, smaller sign taped to the table that I couldn’t read because someone was standing in front of it. I made a mental note to stop by the table on my way out, as I probably needed to re-register as a legitimate voter this year.

After stumbling around the store for a little while, I headed back outside, cheerfully thinking of all the voting I could do once I got myself on the winning team. A vote here, a vote there, there was no election I wouldn’t be ready for! Watch out, Washington fat cats!

To my great surprise, the sign that I had been unable to read was now visible and said “Keep marriage between a man and a woman”. So that was their secret! They had someone stand in front of the sign to try and hide their craziness from me! They might as well have put up a sign that said “vote Republican or we’ll punch your mom in the nuts”. I don’t know about you, but I hate it when people punch my mom’s nuts.

I made a mental note not to go to Target in Yorba Linda in the future, and went on my merry way. As I drove, however, I began to ponder the brazenness of that sign. Despite being an atheist, I’ll admit that for a while I had trouble accepting the idea of gay marriage. This was a remnant of my many years as a Christian, and I eventually overcame this prejudice. That makes it all the more apparent to me when I witness it now.

In the modern US, there really are only two kinds of prejudices allowed anymore. The first is prejudice against fat people. How many times do you hear an insult prefixed with “big fat” or “hey lardo” or “hey fat tits, your fat man tits are getting sweat all over my baby”? In all seriousness, fat people pretty much get the shaft in our society, as I think there’s an inherent belief that people who are overweight are somehow more stupid, unable to control themselves, or are more unsightly to look at.

The second kind of prejudice is against gays. Lesbians generally get a pass because straight Christian man don’t have to worry about random lesbians putting a penis in their butts. Gay men, what with their random penis attacks and all, generally get even more of a shaft than fat people (ba-zing!). Even people who are otherwise liberal will often feel some kind of hesitancy about granting ‘mos full rights; how else do you explain surveys that frequently show a majority of people in favor of keeping marriage between a man and woman?

Can you imagine if that same tent had a sign saying something like “Keep the chinks out of our schools”, or “Stop Interracial Marriage Now”? The people in the tent would be ridiculed, if not immediately bested in a round of fisticuffs. Instead, this kind of anti-gay crap actually gets people to come over and register!!

Now, I understand why these people do this. They feel they have a mandate from the big gay hater in the sky, which I suppose is a perfectly rational conclusion if you accept the premise of a big gay hater in the sky. This in turn got me to thinking about the idea of “harming” god. I don’t mean harm as in punching him in the nuts, but I mean harm as in causing some kind of distress or insult to.

If god commands us to prevent homosexuality and to punish those who practice it, it must offend him in some way. That is, it causes some kind of emotional deficit in him that needs to be corrected vis-a-vis punishment of gays. It seems to me that being perfect and able to be insulted are contradictions in terms. If god is perfect, he cannot be insulted, as this would imply that he can suffer some kind of short term imbalance. On the other hand, if the actions of mankind can upset him it means god is less than perfect, as mankind is able to directly influence his emotions and mood, giving them power over him.

If Christians (or Muslims or whoever) want to admit that their god is less than perfect, cool. A non-perfect god could possibly have irrational prejudices. If they want to admit that god is perfect, so therefore homosexuality doesn’t bother him, that’s cool too. A perfect god would be above insult. I just have a problem with them believing that they can have their penis, and eat it too. It’s a contradiction in terms.

If god really does get offended by gays, it makes him a whiny bitch, as it makes no sense whatsoever that such a trifling action should throw the all-mighty creator of the universe off balance. If a little prostate stimulation is all it takes to get god in a tizzy, Vishnu help us if he finds out about furry fetishes.

I’m not sure why it came to mind, but I found myself pondering Genesis 38: 8-10 today as I rode my bike up Telegraph Canyon Rd. For those of you too lazy to click the link, it says this:

8 Then Judah said to Onan, ‘Go in to your brother’s wife and perform the duty of a brother-in-law to her; raise up offspring for your brother.’ 9 But since Onan knew that the offspring would not be his, he spilled his semen on the ground whenever he went in to his brother’s wife, so that he would not give offspring to his brother. 10 What he did was displeasing in the sight of the Lord, and he put him to death also.

Basically, for not impregnating his dead brother’s wife, god killed Onan. At least god was kind enough to wait until after Onan was finished to put him down. I wonder how long god gave him? Did Onan and Tamar get to cuddle for a while first?

This passage cracks me up, as it’s another example of how obvious it is that the Bible was written by man. Or, if not written by man, how big of an indifferent bastard god really is. Seriously, think about the implications of this passage: a man was ordered to ejaculate inside his sister-in-law. He didn’t, and god killed him for it. On the other hand, men like Hitler, Stalin, Hussein (and so on) can kill and torture with impunity, and are not killed by god in the same fashion. Apparently, god feels that the ejaculatory fluids of a single man were more important than ending the lives of some of the most terrible men in world history. God can’t save the lives of children burning to death on their way home from church camp, but boy does he hate it when you pour your hot, steamy cup of DNA on the floor.

I realize that I’m skipping around the actual point. Onan was killed because he failed to do a duty to his brother as commanded by law. Even so, this is so bloody trivial as to be laughable. How important are we really when Onan is good enough to strike dead for not performing vaginal ejaculation, but your sister being touched in a “this is our little secret” kind of way by your uncle doesn’t merit so much as a broken leg? Thank Allah god has his priorities in order.

P.s. If you have no idea what the heck the title or the banner have to do with this story, peep this link.

Link of the day: A way better game than the one I linked you to last time

So tonight I find myself in a bit of a quandry. There’s a story out about a post-op transsexual that is suing a Catholic hospital because said hospital won’t give this individual fake breasts. The hospital argues that gender reassignment goes against their operating principles, while the plantiff argues that it’s a violation of California law to discriminate against her because of her sexual reassignment.

I’ve always more or less felt that individuals that wanted to have surgery to switch genders were suffering from a psychological disorder that should be corrected psychologically rather than physically. Ultimately though, I’m a live and let live kind of guy, so I’m not necessarily opposed to individuals getting the surgery if they have the money and really desperately want to.

I don’t think that anyone can argue that this isn’t a psychological problem of some sort. Clearly, there’s a disconnect between reality (being male), and what the brain desires (being female). That’s black and white. Mentally, this individual feels that they would be happier if they underwent surgery to change visible sexes (I say visible, because genetically that individual will not actually change sexes). In this case, science gives in to the urges of the mind and rearranges the body.

I’m not certain, but as far as I can remember, this is the only situation in which the medical establishment will allow someone with mental discomfort to actually modify themselves in this way. For example, there are people who have mental disorders in which they desperately want to have a limb or two amputated. Many, so I’ve read, report that they’re much happier once they do have the limb removed (via illegal channels). I can’t imagine that this is a surgery a hospital would do, or that psychologists would support.

I’m not sure then, why the amputation of the penis or the permanent destruction of the vagina are treated differently. If counseling is preferred in the case of limb amputees, I wonder why the medical establishment has determined that the two are different. Why not treat people with gender dystopia in the same fashion?

In any event, I find myself having a hard time picking a position on this. If the surgery makes people feel better about themselves (like breast augmentation for a “regular” woman might), I’m not sure I can really oppose it. On the other hand, if I feel that the medical establishment is correct in its psychological, medicinal, and therapeutic treatment of people with other mental dystopias, I’m not sure how this is any different.

I’m no fool, and understand that the mental constructs of gender are complex, to say the least. I just hate to see someone undergo irreversible surgery to satisfy a condition that would be treated very differently if it did not involve gender. Then again, what do I know?

On a different note, it would be interesting if mankind died off overnight, and in a thousand years aliens land and start exhuming bodies. I wonder what the hell they would make of all the silicon, mismatched genes (i.e. transsexuals), and so on?

Link of the day: The worst video game…ever