Born Unplugged Pt. 6

(Click here for Part 5)

In the fall of 2001 I was a sophomore college.   America was attacked by group of religious fanatics and the face of the country had changed politically, economically, and perhaps worst of all, spiritually.  Lines were being drawn as the world’s attention turned to our country and its newly ‘elected’ president.  Spring semester would find me in an introductory philosophy class with the opportunity to study greats like Kant, Descartes, Socrates and so many others.

              

  At one point the instructor began a discussion involving the concept and nature of evil.  We talked about forms of evil, where it comes from (or potentially comes from), and how to truly define it.  With much of the class being of one Christian denomination or another, and mostly (if not all) black, a fair amount of the discussion consisted of either one-way communication (teacher to student) or one or two students professing the unfettered might of their god and his goodness; “All I know is god take care of everything”.  I didn’t know it then but statements like these were a solid indication of the inability to reason hypothetically, especially in the face of Epicurus’ legendary hypothesis.

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able?
Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing?
Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing?
Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing?
Then why call him God?

             

   I was quick to point out that none of us had a sufficient answer to this, nor could my fellow students articulate a reason for their belief (which isn’t to say I had it all figured out my damn self).  They just believed.  It was god.  That was it for them.  Throughout the discussion I maintained that evil in and of itself is intrinsic to whatever was viewed as good.  Each needs the other; if there’s a god and he was the standard for good and the devil was the embodiment of evil, then neither one could or would destroy the other.  They kept each other in business.  That was the gist of my argument anyway.  This earned me more than a few puzzled looks and grumbles.  It also led me to make the acquaintance of a couple of classmates, not necessarily freethinkers, but thinkers all the same.  One of whom was a devout Christian who tirelessly sought to bring me into the fold.

                For anonymity’s sake, we’ll call my friend “Jay”.  Jay was a pretty cool guy out of DC, a real low-key dude who loved golf and hip hop.  He made it abundantly clear that he was committed to his ‘great commission’ of bringing others to the ‘light of the cross.’  Strangely it was this eagerness that prevented me from slamming the door in his face flat out. That plus I don’t like being a dick.  And thus was the first of many days where we sat and studied the scripture. 

             

   Very interesting conversations ensued, enlightening debates that served us both well intellectually.  I even attended a few services just to see what all his excitement was about (that and the weekends could get pretty boring and it was good to have someone to hang with). That entire time I couldn’t help thinking I was something of a pet project. Perhaps I was to be his first actual convert.  With each session Jay and I would constantly come to a stalemate, with him professing his love for ‘the word’ and how he perceived it to work in his life, while I despite not having read the book nearly enough to point out it’s many atrocities, simply countered with sheer common sense.   The conversation that comes to mind most often is the one we had over the book of Job.  The story where god and satan make a wager to see how long an innocent man keep going after receiving one divine screwjob after another, including but not limited to his slaves, animals, and children being killed  (Job 1:13-19). 

                 At that time my knowledge of history, philosophy and science could have been measured as very little, but it turned out to be enough in defending my position.  I raised questions, offered counter arguments and didn’t hesitate to throw out a handful of zingers that were oozing with blasphemy.  “I can tell that you don’t respect this”, Jay once responded.  And why should I?  I loved the guy to death but did he really think I would give him a pass?  “This book has the answer to EVERYTHING."  What?  “We were made from the earth; he took a pile of dirt and made it something glorious” Huh?  ‘Do what I say or burn’… See where I’m going with this?

                Try as my dear friend might his efforts for conversion proved futile.  And it’s not like I didn’t approach this with an open mind or heart; I chewed on for weeks, came at it from almost every angle I could at the time, it was just wooden nickels to me.  All the same, I understand why he got such a kick out of it. If the salesman’s got the right rap, seems like a pretty sweet deal, and it’s “new and hip”, who wouldn’t snag a one way ticket out of reality.  

--Ryan Scales, August 2014

A Letter of Encouragement

Taken from the Thinking Atheist blog page:



A Letter of Encouragement

Over the past year, I've given a speech around the country called, "The Ultimate Question."  It can be viewed on YouTube by clicking HERE.

At the close of that speech, I read a letter to the audience...a letter of encouragement.  So many people have responded to it that I've posted it below.  Enjoy it.  Forward it.  Change or customize it for those in your own circle who might benefit.  And ultimately, be encouraged by it.  -Seth

____

You learn a lot about people when you declare that you are not going to live your life by their rules.  And many in this room know well the consequences of doing something so shocking as to be an individual: a singular voice, an often inquisitive voice, with its own tenor, its own style, its own song, its own message.

We live in a world where conformity is comfort, and we all know well how comfortable people can become.  So many voices are merely an echo…a hand-me-down from a previous generation, and the generation before, and the generation before.  Breaking the cycle is unthinkable, and why would they ever consider it, as the cloak they inherited feels so warm and safe.

Everyone around them looks like them, walks like them, talks like them.  Everyone…except for you.

They nod in agreement.  You raise an eyebrow of doubt.  They just know the answer.  You just know that the answer raises many more questions.  They take security in staying on the path.  You feel compelled to break out and carve a path of your own. 

But this is not what was expected of you.  They laid out the guidelines for a proper person to live, and they would make sure that you turned out right, no matter what.  So what the hell happened?

At this very moment, mothers and fathers carry embarrassment and shame that they failed as a parent, because you left the straight and narrow, because you were co-opted and corrupted, because you re-wrote the playbook in a language that they consider to be foreign...confusing…ugly.

You had two choices.  You could keep the peace and line up with the others.  Or you could walk at your own pace in your own direction for your own reasons and accept the consequences and rewards that come with being your own person. 

The fallout has been significant.  These days, when they look at you, they only see what they think you should have been, what you could have been, if only you had done it their way.  They speak the words of love, but just barely, and by lacing "love" with distance and disdain, they cheapen the word.  In fact, every time they look at you and say “I love you,” you get a bitter taste, like you've just been schmoozed by a politician whose only real concern is changing your vote.

Yes, they love you.  But the full package, the 100 percent, the unfiltered love is kept on reserve until you straighten up, fit in, conform and stop making waves.  Not until you start acting…normal.

For just a moment, let’s take a look at normal.

Normal is a husband and wife, married per the bible, in a church and under God, condemning non-heterosexuals for ignoring and even desecrating the lawful and ordained marital union that they now enjoy…after two divorces.

It’s a mother telling a daughter that sex is dirty.  That her body is dirty.  That sexual desire is harmful lust.  And that she is cursed by the fall of Eve in the garden, a by-product of sin, designed to gain her worth from a future husband who, according to the book of Genesis and the design of God, will rule over her. 

It’s a teacher frightening a 6-year-old child with torture in a fiery Hell and a devil lurking in the dark with designs on its very soul.

It’s refusing to purchase a new car without first test-driving 15 vehicles from six different car lots, checking the vehicle history, payments, insurance, safety record, resale value and consumer ratings…but accepting the bible as fact without even knowing who wrote the book of Genesis.

It’s a church communion ritual where the men, women and children symbolically eat flesh and drink blood.

It’s thanking God for food grown and prepared by human hands.  It’s giving God the glory for providing the new house that came with a 30 year mortgage.  It’s praying for safety after buckling your seatbelt, locking your doors and loading your handgun.  It’s praying for healing…after you call 911.  It’s Sunday school songs, a bible on the nightstand, a check in the offering plate, an evangelist on the television, a Jesus fish on your car and a t-shirt that reads, “Seven days without Jesus makes one weak.” 

It’s a prison disguised to look like a mansion.  And you’re not going to live like that.

You’ve read the books and seen the history and learned the science and realized that the world is much, much grander that most people ever imagine.  You finally found your own voice, and you’re going to speak in it.  You’ve had the epiphany that you don’t owe it to the rest of the world to keep them happy.  You owe it to you to create happiness for yourself.  And even though, wherever and whenever you can, you say the words and take the actions that build bridges and soften the sharp edges and demonstrate a love for people and a desire for a better world, you aren’t a sheep to be led, an echo to be repeated, a cautionary tale, a bad example, a freak, a pervert…shameful…broken…ugly.

You’re not ugly.  You’re beautiful. 

You figured out what so many billions of others have missed.  That this life is too precious to spend in someone else’s shadow.  That when others judge everyone and everything that is different, they only indict your own shallow heart and cheat themselves out of amazing depth, breadth, color, culture and humanity out there that’s so much more wonderful than the tiny rooms people lock themselves into, and the narrow tunnels they walk.  That believing in things without evidence isn’t a virtue, but something to be pitied.  That sexuality isn’t shameful, but something to be celebrated.  That the condemnation of what is wrong, even when it’s called sacred, is the obligation of any moral creature.  That your hopes, dreams, desires, loves, pursuits and passions belong to you and you alone.  That you have stepped out of the crowd.  To stand forward.  To stand out.  To stand your ground. 

To know that, even though you occupy a tiny speck upon a tiny speck inside this vast universe, and even though you don’t believe your father is a divine king and your mission is written in a magic book and you have an eternal mansion in the heavens, your life is wonderful and amazing and precious and so much more satisfying.

Is that kind of life easy?  Nah.  Is it popular?  Maybe not.  But be encouraged, my friends, because inside this 13.7 billion year old universe, there has never been anyone exactly like you, and there never will again.  You’re simply living a life that honestly reflects that fact.  And while others laugh at you because you’re different, you can laugh at them…because they’re all the same.

-Seth Andrews

To suffer or endure

There are some that believe success is the end result of suffering. That suffering is a gift, handed down from some unseen and benevolent master. I would ask these individuals to carefully re-examine the words “suffering” and “benevolent”. Suffering is not a virtue, nor is success always its end result. Those who would extol it as such and claim their success is the result sufferance serve to promote complacency and passivity and I for one find this insufferable.

I choose instead to endure. I am not, nor have ever been (and safe to say will never be) a praying man but were I such, it is doubtful that I would be the type to “give thanks” for the suffering that I encounter in what is unquestionably a difficult life. I would however, as a great man once suggested, pray for the strength to endure that life.

While I am aware that the words ‘suffer’ and ‘endure’ share very much the same meaning, as with any arranging and usage of words, the true implication of my statement lies in its context. For me, to endure is to be active amidst the opposition, to stand when forced to kneel, to speak when silence is insisted, to be ready once the offense has exhausted itself in the effort to overrun your barricades.

To endure is to stand immovable, to bend without breaking, to accept the flow of current without being confined, diverging when the necessity and/or opportunity arises. Not to be trampled, not to be battered, not to be stagnant. Suffering not a gift, it is not the parent of success, and it is nothing to be thankful for. Endurance is a choice, one that can be made without needing gods to beg or thank. A choice that can result in the strength, knowledge, wisdom and courage that comes from knowing YOU have done this and that you can do it again.

--Ryan Scales

June 2014

"We are unique in that we create ourselves"  --Han (Shih Kien), Enter the Dragon, 1973

Born Unplugged pt. 5

(Click here for PART 4)

In 1997 HBO aired a tribute to comedian George Carlin called 40 years of Comedy.  The special included clips from many of his classic routines such as ‘The seven dirty words’, ‘Football vs. Baseball’, and ‘The hippy-dippy weatherman’.  The program went on to feature the guest of honor himself performing a bit from his most recent special at the time, You’re all Diseased.  The finest moment of the show came at the midway point and would go on to be known as “Religion is Bullshit.”  This was the sincerest, most crucial turning point in my journey and the crux of this entire blog.

The set was mirroring almost the same exact words that were bouncing around in my head since grade school.  With this man on the screen saying it loud and proud, this is pretty much where the switch got flipped.   At first I was shocked and a little afraid. I remember thinking. ‘He’s allowed to say this stuff?’ but as he went on, the words just sunk in.  And I mean REALLY sunk in. Before all of this, I was always told about god and the devil, and while I never gave it any real credence I never questioned it either.  By the time that show had ended I had come to the somewhat partial understanding that A) I wasn’t wrong for thinking the way I did, and B) I was not by myself.  There was a great deal of comfort in knowing there was at least one other person who wasn’t “drinking the kool-aid”. 

There wasn’t a lot I could do to keep my mother from pissing money away when the collection plate came around or tuning into Bobby Jones gospel on BET which was a show that every now and then would feature half-baked musical acts that were offered as an alternative to mainstream music. I can recall one Sunday where I was called away from an episode of Biker Mice from Mars to hear a ‘rousing’ rendition of a gospel remix of the hip hop song “Jump” (FYI, having the exact same beat and rhyme flow, peppered with ‘god’ and ‘jesus’ and bible quotes isn’t all that original).  Fortunately artists like LeCrae (of whom I will unreservedly admit to being a fan) bring the subgenre of holy hip hop some artistic credibility.

It wasn’t until I sat reading the letters page of a comic book called The Savage Dragon that I finally learned the word for what I was: Atheist.  And that was it. There was no huge epiphany, no “I hate god for making the world this way or that”; as far as I was concerned there was no god to hate.  So I graduated high school and entered my adulthood perfectly comfortable not having a god, not going to church, very few worries and no fear of getting burned or jabbed with a pitchfork.  You’d think everything from there on would be smooth sailing.  Even when Bush thugged his way into white house there was no way things could get any more screwed up, at least that’s what I was thinking.  In my sophomore year of college I couldn’t have imagined how much the world around me would change when I woke up for class that one Tuesday morning (can you take a wild guess at what I’m talking about here?).  From then on it was more or less the circus Carlin predicted it would be.  Muslim and Christians muscling up to go at each other’s throats overseas, gas prices shooting into the mesosphere, the patriot act, etc…and at age 19 all I could honestly say about the situation was “What the fuck?”

I got 99 problems and 'hovah ain't about to be one.

I remember the first time I ever encountered a jehovah’s witness. I was about nine and my dad had picked me up from school.  I got out of the car to unlock the door and two elderly black men stepped out of their car and approached me asking for my father.  These men were wearing dark suits and overcoats and appeared to be fairly intimidating, sinister even.  I was taught what to do if a stranger approaches you and I was ready to do just that; I wasn’t fast but I knew the block, I knew what doors to knock on.  Two blacks against over a dozen Latinos? (I think we were the only black family in that neighborhood), nobody’s that stupid.  But I’ve digressed.  I was told to go inside by my dad but instead I stayed at the bottom of the stair case. I thought these guys were like bill collectors or gangsters, two sets of people I didn’t particularly care for, and wanted to make sure I heard everything in case they turned out to be the latter.  The point I’m trying to make here is that I didn’t like them.  No reason yet, just a feeling.  I didn’t get all the details, I just knew they were from a church and tried to get my dad to join them, and in the nicest way possible he told them to kick rocks.

               

Last weekend I had a jehova's witness drop by, middle-aged/elderly fellow, just a few years behind my dad. It was the same vulture that swooped by when he got sick a while back, and I had half a mind to tell to piss off, but the initial silliness that he vomited nearly crippled me with laughter:

"You know son, even to this day scientist don’t understand why people grow old and die.  Because, you see when god created adam and eve, he created them to live forever….”

And that’s where he turned into the teacher in a Peanuts TV special, (“wah wah waah, wah”).  For the next five minutes it took everything I had not to cut him off and ask, “I know this is the south, I know I’m a black man, and thus born into a culture that is all but incurably religious, but really? REALLY? How stupid do I truly look to you?? What scientists have you been talking to? Did you even go to college?” I’ll bet you’ve only read one book in your life, haven’t you?  And it’s getting you chewed out on a total stranger’s doorstep right now.” Just a few key questions I might have next time.  

This makes the fourth time this joker’s been by.  I don’t make a fuss because I sincerely try to respect my elders and I don’t see the point in a throwing away 20 minutes of my life on an impromptu debate when I can let the monkey chatter for 5 minutes and then watch him scurry away and give someone else a headache.  I know he’ll be back.  He can come back as often as he likes, he can leave a stack watchtower journals as tall as I am,  that just means I’ll save some money on toilet paper.  Just sayin’. 

It's not terribly difficult dealing with jw's.  It only takes three to five minutes to let them sit there and yak and it's an interesting exercise in discipline.  I try to see how long I can go without snickering or just flat out calling 'bullshit'.  Once they leave they don't come back for months.  The main thing is DO NOT LET THEM INTO THE HOUSE, otherwise they'll be more and more comfortable stopping by.  That's the last thing you need.

Born Unplugged Pt. 4

(Click Here for PART 3)

“It’s Easter Sunday and the majority of my family is likely in church. It’s the final day to celebrate a man being brutally killed and becoming a zombie three days later.”

That was going to be my opener when I started writing this a few weeks ago.  Then I kept getting sidetracked and it turned out to be longer than I expected.  Easter is the big day where most folks pile into the pew to shout and cry and fall to their knees and give what little they have to ‘sew the seed’, all in hopes of receiving forgiveness for the crime of being born as well as for the death of a scrawny half-naked hippie tacked to a pair of 2 x 4’s.  A death that supposedly happened 2,000 years ago. 

When I began this blog its sole purpose was to recount my journey to realizing I was an atheist.  I wrote briefly about what it’s like being dragged into church and having to listen to broken-record sermons and about the near-robotic call and response bible readings.  The order and structure of the service would eventually break  down into an uproar of squeals and spasms and expressions of thanks for ‘blessings’ like paying the light bill on time or finding your keys or landing a job and a bunch of other day to day stuff Jesus tends to get credit for. The congregation would go into these fits, jumping out of their seats, and convulsing, losing near total control of their motor functions.  Some even started dancing, doing little variations on a basic two-step.  I wish I had better words to paint this picture but all I can tell you is that these people were going straight up guano.

What vexes me even to this day, is how whenever anyone (christian) finds themself in a fucked up situation, they are utterly convinced that they are MEANT to be there.  Either that or some external force is trying to ‘steal their joy’.  The best example I can offer for this point is my mother.  You would’ve had to be dead to see that she and my dad were just flat out wrong for each other.   Much of their communication consisted of yelling at each other or yelling at me.  (I was a kid, they were parents, that’s kind of how it went.)  Being a book-smart 90’s kid, I could tell they had serious personal and interpersonal issues and had tossed out the idea of therapy, but that wasn’t happening.  I mean after all who needs a licensed professional when you have church? ‘The lawd gonna work it out’ right? That was usually mom’s solution to a problem.  She wasn’t what you would call a thinking individual (or she didn’t think enough.)  But yeah, that was the shtick for most folks in my family; get on those knees, put them hands together and stay there.  “Pray fuh ya daddy.”  Don’t ask for the respect you deserve, “Pray fuh’im”.  Don’t stand up for yourself, “Pray that devil out of’im.” Don’t educate yourself, don’t try to work on yourself or use better judgment, just “Pray for your enemy”, “Love your enemy”, “love that devil out of him” and it will all work out.  Years, YEARS of wasted time and breath all while he plods around the house in the seemingly effortless act of stamping out the little self-worth you actually do have.  Don’t take your medicine, don’t cut back on the Mickey D’s and eat some fruit, or get the minimum 30 minutes of exercise, “Just pray on it and claim yo’ healin’ in the name of tha lawd!” 

While this is a very specific reflection, I believe it be an adequate microcosm of the overbearing role religion plays in black America; it causes a vast amount of individuals to insist that “prayer changes things”.  Both church and home were filled with phrases like “The Devil is a lie!” and “Look/Turn to your neighbor and say…” and let’s not forget the ever popular “The lawd got a plan for everything.”  Everything, eh?  Like the kid on the schoolyard that gets beat bloody for no reason other than getting the high score on the test?  That’s part of god’s plan right?  Or that stroke that turns you into an invalid because you weren’t eating right or dealing with your stress.  There’s a plan there, sure.  Or what about staying in a relationship/ marriage and raising or being raised in a family with a verbally abusive asshat.  That’s his plan for her? For him? For you or me or whoever he decides to squat over on that particular day??  And that’s just the light stuff in my view.  Child soldiers, sex trafficking, Boston anyone?  Here I am a grade schooler/ teenager/grown motherfucking man hearing all of this and thinking ‘You’re shitting me right??’

                Still as child I felt the adults knew more simply because they were adults (at least this is what I acquiesced to, the alternative being a slap in the mouth.)  Sunday school, where there was nothing even remotely scholastic taking place to give legitimacy to such a title, was a protracted story-time where the few children there did shit else other than parroting the scriptures shoved down their throats and beat into their heads by the time they were old enough to know what their own farts smelled like.  I remember the ‘classes’, the simplicity of the curriculum and how the recitations yielded smiles and applause from parents and elders; I felt like a damn circus monkey.  “Jesus was born when god put a piece of himself in Mary.” …If only I knew then what I know now…Should I quote Goldilocks and the three bears as well, Bishop? Or Deacon or whatever you like to be called while your ego is stroked.  A little blonde girl found in the youngest male bear’s bed, I’m sure there was bit of rape taking place in that book just like in yours.  By age nine, after all of the regular Sunday services and choir rehearsals every other week, I had had enough. It wasn’t the suits and the dresses or the goofy-ass hats or the endless singing and wailing. It wasn’t even the fact that my own mother was ready willing and able to BEAT ME DOWN THE STAIRS AND INTO THE CAR.  No, my reason for putting the juke moves on the jesus-freaks was the distaste for the mindset they embrace.  The mindset that they are innately weak, that they are born fucked up (Yet more fuel for a future blog). 

So there I am my newly won “freedom”, my Sundays now spent watching WWF All-American Wrestling, and whatever I could find on cable as well as the occasional football game with the old man.  Even so, I still held a flimsy belief in god; you could call it a cultural formality.  I didn’t know that you were allowed to not believe.  Black folks not going to church was one thing but black people and god in general were supposed to be tight.  When I was fifteen HBO held a week long tribute to comedian George Carlin to honor his then 40 years in comedy.  George was everything you love in a comedian, not just quick-witted but masterful with his wordplay.  He was irreverent, he cursed like a sailor and thanks to the exceptional teachers in my social studies classes his political humor was never lost on me.  My exposure to his work gave a very profound peek into the world of adults and helped me learn to do what my parents constantly insisted upon even if they themselves could or would not: THINK.  As far as my remaining ties to Christianity, this was pretty much the beginning of the end….

(More to Come...)

Born Unplugged Pt. 3

(Click here for PART 2)

Ever since my old man kicked off, the one thing that picks at my brain is the question of whether or not he was an atheist.  I doubt he knew what the word meant, but he was never one to prattle on about god or how great he was or how thankful we should be.  The main thing that leads me to think he was a non-believer was the fact that he never went to church when everyone else in the house was required to go.  Even at a young age I knew my dad hated church for almost the same reasons I did: It was a waste of a Sunday and furthermore, a waste of financial resources.  I always wondered why he got to stay home.  Because he worked and needed rest? But it was church; he had to go, right? In any case, that was one of my main issues about these Sunday outings.  Why was it ok for him to stay home? Why wasn’t it ok for me? Why was it that he and I were the only ones that understood how this was sucking away our money, our time together, and causing so much static in the home?

It wasn’t until sometime last year, while my father was bedridden with a stroke; he and my mom had a pretty heated argument where the exchange was something along the lines of my father saying he would go to heaven when he died and she said “you ain’t goin' ta heaven 'cause ya don’t believe!”  I could tell by the way he got quiet, that had hurt him.  But it struck a nerve in me as well.  Like all interactions that parents have in front of their children, this one left its mark. Even at the age of thirty their arguing was a cause of agonizing emotional stress and those words just burrowed into my brain and stayed there right up until he died.  At this juncture of my life where I’ve recently become open about my atheism, I have spent the past few months wondering who else in my family believes as I do.  How many are positive that all the screaming and shouting and sheer guilt that they have to listen to every week is 100% bullshit. How many of them are either too uneducated or too ashamed to admit that they don’t know what the answers are, but those answers aren’t in the big pretty building, the preacher, or the book?  Do I have the balls ask? Again, this is perhaps the one question I regret not asking my father. I’m just happy I was able to answer the question for myself.

--R. S.