Tag Archives: Islam

Randomness: Bad Idea Style


Posted by Omnipotent Poobah


That God Guy Is Everywhere

Naughty Bits

Commercialism on the March

Square Pegs in Round Holes

Japanery

The Borg Await You With Open Pincers

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Don’t Do Unto Others As They May Decide to Do Unto You


Posted by Omnipotent Poobah
Guns and Bibles

GUNS AND BIBLES - Ameican Christians like to howl about their persecution, but it's hard to feel their pain. Having control over almost all political posts, have unlimited money and influence, and can demonize and run rough-shod over others, it's not persecution...it's the Tyranny of the Majority,

American Christians are quite vocal in the belief they’re oppressed, but it’s hard to feel their pain. They’re the overwhelming majority in this country. Virtually every member of every legislative body and every elected representative is Christian. Their lobbies are as potent as any on K St. The government funds them by not taxing them. They routinely work to defeat bills clear majorities want and that deprive citizens – sometimes other Christians – of their civil rights.

If that’s oppression, sign me up. It sounds like a sweet deal.

However, there are persecuted and oppressed Christians. For example, many countries have real zero tolerance for anything other than their God and prophet. They sometimes force Christians from their homes, turn them into refugees, or kill them.

Popester

NO MEA CULPA - If the Pope thinks Christians are the most oppressed instead of the oppressors, he should take his next vacation in Baghdad. BTW Your Holiness, don't forget the up-armored Popemoblie. The Natives are restless.

Meanwhile, American Christians busy themselves with important issues like the proper etymology of Christmas v. Holiday. Living in their secure homes and working in their secure jobs they feel it’s their God-given right to rewrite history books, let pedophiles escape unpunished, or denigrate science because it doesn’t completely jibe with their Bible.

There’s no doubt the intolerance against Christians in countries like Iraq is awful. It’s the tyranny of the majority directed against the few. But except for the degree of modern persecution (the Christians don’t exactly have a bloodless history either), how is that any different from the tyranny of the American majority against the minority here?

I’m not a Christian and I’m sure there are many Christians who’d argue I have no right to an opinion about their religion. However, I’d point out that by the same logic, Christians have no right to an opinion about Islam or me or Druids. But, they never seem shy about exercising the same freedoms they seem unwilling to share with anyone other than themselves.

It is the Christian Sabbath, the last one before the holiest of Christian holy days. Whether you call it Christmas, the holidays, or Festivus, it seems like a good time for Christians, indeed everyone, regardless of religion or the lack thereof, to borrow the concepts of peace and harmony espoused in the Bible, the Quran, and most other religious texts in the world.

Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

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Arizona Church Dome: Why Hate When You Can Outsource?


Posted by Omnipotent Poobah

Not so long ago, much of the nation looked at Texas as the Loon Star State – a place so weird that  Texans think of Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, and Sean Hannity as dangerous far lefties in league with that socialist Kenyan pretender in the White House.

But, every Empire of Imbeciles must come to an end.

Outsourcing for Freedom

DOMEHEADS UNITE! - "Don't worry, we're really Christians under contract to the international Islamist cabal!"

America, meet the new goobs on the block – Arizonans. As Hunter Thompson used to say, “When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro”…and there’s no place more professional than Arizona.

It surely takes professional crazies to protest a Christian church because it looks too much like a mosque. Damn Mexican Mooslims!

Broken Light of the World
The point of contention for the good Christian folk of Phoenix seems to be that the Light of the World church topped their God garage with a dome. To Arizonans, domes are the illegal aliens of the religious world. Presumably the many Catholic missions doting the cactusophere are equally condemned for featuring domes in their designs too, but somehow I doubt that.

Tonya Somander of Think Progress asked, “…with so many high-profile figures selling unfounded, anti-Muslim fear to the public, is it any wonder that all many Americans can see in Islam is a phantom menace?”  Well Tonya, no, but it does make perfect sense in Arizona. They’re so jelly-kneed they don’t even have to have real Muslims to hate. All they need is a bold, but unsuspecting, church architect and some followers of the same faith most of them adhere to.

It’s odd that Christians – who are somewhere between 75 and 85 percent of the American population – are always worrying about atheists and Muslims trying to kill Christendom with a combination of dastardly Wars on Christmas and autographed baseball cards featuring Madalyn Murray O’Hair. This is especially true in Arizona where there are fewer Muslims than black people -  currently numbering about 6 people who must carry their papers at all times. But, there’s not a racist in Arizona, so who’s counting?

However, maybe this does make sense. Clearly there are too few actual Muslims in Arizona to absorb all the fear Arizonans have for those tricky Islamists. It’s hard to get worked up over a bunch of New Yorkers who prefer titty bars to houses of worship in Lower Manhattan. After all, the titty baristas don’t get too exercised over Mexicans leaving piles of dead bodies at the Tuscon city limits, now do they?

A state as proud as The Grand Canyon Crackpot State must have it’s own Muslims to persecute. Period. Doing it vicariously through castoffs from Jersey Shore is just no fun at all.

So why not outsource Islamic fear?

It’s a Win-Win for Arizona
Arizona already has a surplus of Christians on hand. They represent a trained workforce that could easily make the transition from law abiding Jeezlets to evil burka wearers with little trouble. They have the religious training. Christian churches always need money to Save the Children in all those countries they’d never be caught dead in. It’s a win-win and best of all, Americans could corner the market on faux Muslims before the Indians or Chinese could get a foothold.

So it’s settled. Light of the Worlders, stop by Home Depot and hire a few illegal immigrants to get that dome up as fast as possible. Maybe even add a minaret here and there, nothing too ostentatious. And you can find someone who yodels to simulate the calls to prayer can’t you?

As for pay, $2 an hours seems fair – and no benefits, because they’re a socialist plot. We’d like to pay more, but we just can’t pay minimum wage because, well, we could get the Mexicans to work cheaper and we don’t want to create a monetary imbalance in the Arizona economy. There’s no way strings of varnished chillies could make up the shortfall.

Muslims, our people will call your people. We’d like to talk outsourcing Christians to Yemen.

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What Do the Religious Know? It Turns Out, Not So Much


Posted by Omnipotent Poobah
Jesus Christ!

DUH-O! - Athesists and agnostics are found to be the most knowledgeable about religion, but that's no reason for atheists and agnostics to break out the confetti and dance on the table in celebration.

I’ve debated hundreds of religious people over their preferred Tome of Enlightenment™ and found it interesting that a new poll by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life validates my own anecdotal evidence – that some of the most pious are also some of the most ignorant of their own religion.

In fact, the study finds that not only do religious people often exhibit a shocking ignorance of their Bible, Quran, Torah, et al, but agnostics and atheists like me actually know more about them than those who depend on them for their moral guidance.

I’m what you might call a friendly atheist. I don’t get too worked up over many things believers think they’re divinely empowered to do, because in many cases, it doesn’t really matter. For example, is a dollar with “In God we Trust” worth less than a dollar without?

Believers as Aggressive SOBs?
On the other side of the fence, agnostics and atheists sometimes look at the religioned as aggressively ignorant SOBs who won’t stop discriminating against their fellow humans until they get to dance around the infidels nailed to the biggest cross around. But, that doesn’t mean everyone on both sides is an argumentative crapweasel intent on converting their opposites to a life of enlightenment and wisdom with extreme prejudice.

However, I can get worked up when it comes to believers imposing their beliefs on not only atheists and agnostics, but believers of religions not their own. It’s as harebrained for Muslims to assume Christians are, to a person, supporters of the most insane beliefs about Islam as Christians feeling divinely justified in depriving Muslims if all manner of Constitutional rights.

As a former Christian, I’ve come to believe the Bible is a wonderful work of literature, and on the whole, not a bad checklist for leading a morally good life. I know, and support, that others may differ. The biggest differences I have with most Christians are that I see the Bible as the work of man and where we’ll each end up when we die. I try to stay tolerant of views that oppose my own because that’s the compact I’ve made with myself – to allow believers the freedom to believe anything they want, so long as they respect my freedom to not believe.

I don’t believe I have the corner on biblical wisdom by virtue of answering more questions on a survey form, but I do think there is meaning – even non-biblical meaning – in how believers sometimes conduct their own religions.

Because My Bible Tells Me So
In all my personal religious debates I’ve ended up in the same place. I offer logical and scientific reasoning to explain things and, faced with the disagreement, almost every Christian explains away events or beliefs by saying, the Bible tells me so.

I have a feeling that part of this rhetorical impasse comes as a result of selective readings of religious texts – in other words, believers simply pretending Biblical quotes to the contrary aren’t there…when it’s convenient. The result is a disincentive to learn more about their religions. After all, if you only believe that parts of a religious text apply or that they apply differently to those you don’t like, what’s the point in digging further to find the inconvenient and inconsistent things hiding in the dense text?

There are many believers who dig hard and try to reach a level of religious understanding that clearly many of the people in this survey have no use for. And there are plenty of hypocritical muttonheads among the non-believers. I’d caution the non-believers to not do any fist-pumps over the survey though.

The poor showing of the believers isn’t doing believers OR non-believers any good. Without finding some middle ground where we can all learn to coexist, our philosophical culture wars and quite real hot, shooting wars, will continue unabated.

And, that is a situation that science can’t tolerate and isn’t what God wants.

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Dear Marty, The First Amendment is Not Optional


Posted by Omnipotent Poobah
Not a Fixer-Upper

WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE? - A Sharia-like movement is afoot to deprive Muslims of everything from the right to build religious centers to their First Amendment protections. Burning Korans is not the answer to violent Muslim extremism.

The Anti-Mosque That Ain’t a Mosque crowd seems to be going all Sharia on America’s ass. You’d think the possibility – not the certainty mind you – of building a Muslim community center amongst the strip clubs and bars of Manhattan is a worse offense than knocking the WTC down to begin with.

We have idiots closing community centers in Kentucky ostensibly for lack of parking because according to the property owner, Muslims can’t be trusted to adhere to no parking signs. Florida’s Dove World Outreach Center, a violation of truth in advertising laws if there ever was one, is reaching out to Muslims by burning Korans. Now, New Republic editor-in-chief Marty Peretz says Muslims are unworthy of First Amendment protection, presumably regardless of whether they are citizens or not.

Marty the Magnificent Sez…
Says Marty the Magnificent, “…frankly, Muslim life is cheap, most notably to Muslims. And among those Muslims led by the Imam Rauf there is hardly one who has raised a fuss about the routine and random bloodshed that defines their brotherhood. So, yes, I wonder whether I need honor these people and pretend that they are worthy of the privileges of the First Amendment which I have in my gut the sense that they will abuse.”

Gee Marty, my gut – hell, every fiber of my being – tells me you would abuse First Amendment protections too. No, wait! You already have by suggesting the First Amendment is an option like the automatic transmission on your Ford Crown Vic. The same goes for your toxic brethren like the book burning “Doves” and the spreading community of knotheads elsewhere around the country.

Marty, can you not see the irony of exercising your First Amendment rights by saying someone else should be deprived of theirs? Screeching Doves, can you not see the same by the light of your Constitutional bonfire?

Whether Muslims “raise a fuss” is their call, not yours. To speak or not to speak are both protected rights. Besides, my gut also tells me that condemning their “brotherhood” wouldn’t make one iota of difference in your opinion.

The Lonesome Doves and Tim McVey
And Lonesome Doves, would you be burning Bibles if an inbred clan of Timothy McVey wannabes had rammed the WTC? I’m an atheist and I’d be quite happy if someone burned all the holy books, regardless of whatever holier than thou sect dreamt them up.

But wait! No, I wouldn’t! I believe in the First Amendment.

It isn’t optional because I despise you and what you’re saying. It isn’t optional because some lunkhead’s book isn’t as holy as you believe yours is. It isn’t optional because your gut tells you they don’t value human life. It isn’t optional because they are Muslim, Baptist, or Druid nor because some of their members were bat shit crazy and wanted to kill people for things like, gee, I dunno, disrespecting the Koran (see David Petraeus). In this country, people can say what they want and worship or not worship as they see fit – despite cockamamie faux “wars on Christmas” or people being gay in the privacy of their own homes or carbuncles on the ass of humanity who think their shit is infinitely less odoriferous than others are.

THE FIRST AMENDMENT IS NOT OPTIONAL!

…and the day it becomes so is the day we lose the privilege of calling ourselves American.

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