Very Small Rocks
4 July 2006 by Raindogzilla
Thanks to Lynda for bringing this to my attention.
It started out pretty disgustingly;
“A 15-year old Hardesty student was suspended from school for five days The Oklahoman reported Tuesday.
Nadia Smalkowski told the The Oklahoman her daughter, Nicole Smalkowski, was suspended because the girl refused to recite a prayer with her team following basketball games, the newspaper reported.”
Then, it gets worse(full article here.);
“Information in the case filed by the District Attorney’s office states Smalkowski assaulted (school principal)Buckley, knocking him to the ground and continuing to beat the man after he had fallen.
The affidavit for Smalkowski’s arrest includes a statement by the responding officer noting a boot print on Buckley’s forehead above his left eye.”
I can’t help it, the “boot print on Buckley’s forehead” makes me grin like a fool. American Atheist picks up the story
“After Smalkowski rejected the offer to drop the charges if he and his Atheist family left the state, the charges were raised to a felony. Chuck called American Atheists for help.”
I’ll just let them tell it;
“The true significance of this trial is that this is the first case we know of in American jurisprudence where Atheism has been directly used as a defense in a criminal trial.
Edwin(Kagin) introduced himself to the jury as National Legal Director for American Atheists and asked the prospective jury in the Oklahoma panhandle if they could accept the testimony of an Atheist over that of a professed Christian. When the jury looked at him blankly, the judge asked the prospects if they understood the question. One woman spoke for many in the group by asking “What is an Atheist?” Edwin explained that an Atheist was a person who did not believe in a god or gods or in a supernatural world, and that the defendant and his entire family were such persons. Many of the prospects said they could not believe such a person over a Christian and were struck for cause. To their credit, many members of the jury panel, including two ministers’ wives, told the judge they could not be fair to an Atheist in such a situation and were excused.
Edwin also told the prospective jurors that his co-counsel Tim Gungoll believed Jesus Christ to be his personal savior and that Tim was a practicing Roman Catholic who asked if the jury might feel him a hypocrite to his faith for defending Chuck. Ultimately a jury of twelve was seated who had sworn that they could believe the testimony of an Atheist over that of a Christian.
In closing argument, Edwin told the jury that it really should not be necessary for an Atheist to tell them it is wrong to lie under oath, as he reminded them the Christian school officials and the police had done in their sworn trial testimony. “Thou shall not bare false witness against thy neighbor. Ninth Commandment. Eight if you are Roman Catholic,” Kagin said.
The jury believed the Atheists. Unanimously.
The night of the verdict, tornadoes of unusual violence descended on the panhandle of Oklahoma. The home of the Principal who had brought the false charges against Chuck Smalkowski was severely damaged.
This fact has no relationship whatsoever to the verdict.
A civil lawsuit in Federal Court, with the Smalkowski Family and American Atheists as Plaintiffs, is contemplated.”
They neglect to mention that the severe damage done to Buckley’s house was done by another house belonging to a girl and her little dog, blown in from Kansas.
4 July 2006, on 3:52 pm
I aw this over on the NoGodBlog, but they didn’t reveal the actual location of this fiasco. HArdesty is barely a town!!!
In Texas County? Why am I not surprized? I used to work at a radio station in Guymon, KKBS 92.3 back in 1995. Now, this is not to say that Texas County is worse than others, but they do use the phrase “The Belt Buckle of the Bible Belt” to describe themselves.
*shudder*
Sorry, having flashbacks…
Guymon has no bookstores, but they had FIVE bible “outlets”. Their Main Street had already been snuffed out by Wal Mart, too. They had a record store, but they couldn’t stock anything deemed “sacreligious”. They did have a comic book store, but the townsfolk protested it over X-Men characters like Storm (Only gawd can control the weather, you know!) and yes, Superman.
I got in some trouble, too. I had a Saturday “Classic Rock” show (the station format was “Hot Country” at the time), and I played Alice Cooper’s live version of “Black Widow” with a Vincent Price voice over laid into it. Yes, the Jeebus freaks started calling, and I refused to stop the song.
They called my boss, who stopped short of threatening my job, but implied it nonetheless. Luckily, she was a biker chick that had some sense. However, they did threaten to boycott the station, and that was definitely a big deal.
Funny how the Jeebus Freaks are so good at creating Hell on Earth…
4 July 2006, on 3:58 pm
I hope the family sues the town, schoolboard, and the police. A nice victory for the family and athiests but it never should have happened in the first place.
4 July 2006, on 4:04 pm
Some points: I lived in OK for 12 years. Although I have many fond memories of it, I am seriously surprised that they could find 12 people who could maintain objectivity when it came to atheists. I am absolutely gobsmacked that they found unanimously in favour of the atheists.
As for the tornados, if you’ll permit a bit of whimsy… the tornado does indeed have everything to do with the verdict, for to paraphrase the old Okie saying “The universe abhors mobile homes, that’s why she gave us tornadoes.” I’ll bet dollars to doughnuts the ol’ bastard was a’ livin’ in a mobile.
4 July 2006, on 4:08 pm
Rat: Guymon?!? Oh for cryin’ out loud, honey! I hope you got some good therapy after that, if not at least a freakin’ medal for having survived it.
P.S. I was in Stillwater.
4 July 2006, on 4:14 pm
My therapy consisted of “Rage Against the Machine” every night after work. If I ever meet Zack De La Rocha, I may kiss him! I got the FUCK out after nine months.
Oh, and Tornadoes? That’s NORMAL for that area! We had storm chasers out all spring, and there was some straight winds that tore through the town a few times while I was there.
And yes, Stillwater was a bit better, but I feel for you too, Audrey..
4 July 2006, on 4:38 pm
I live in Springfield, MO and I have had HOOTERS WAITRESSES give me and a friend of mine dirty looks because we’re atheists.
One even called me an idiot.
I suppose I live in the first belt hole of the bible belt.
4 July 2006, on 4:43 pm
Oh don’t you know? You have to be a Rhodes scholar to work at Hooters!
Springfield, eh? Yeah, that’s a notch or two. Yikes. Don’t feel bad though. St. Louis wants to join the belt badly.
4 July 2006, on 4:44 pm
Dear GiFS’ers-
On behalf of reportedly sane and reasonably rational people of faith everywhere, I apologize for this travesty of American and democratic ideals. My only response is to ask who is suing this school over this totally unacceptable practice? If that isn’t religious coercion, I don’t know what the hell is.
4 July 2006, on 4:50 pm
I just love the fact that the kid stomped the principal’s face. Ass-Kicker for atheism!
…
She turned me into a newt! (I got better.)
4 July 2006, on 5:51 pm
“I am seriously surprised that they could find 12 people who could maintain objectivity when it came to atheists. I am absolutely gobsmacked that they found unanimously in favour of the atheists.”
It may not have been so much that they could maintain their objectivity in regards to atheists but more that the claims of the school officials and cops involved were just too much of a reach for relatively sane folks- i.e., not the minister’s wives or the other outright bigots removed for cause.
Me, I’m not sure which excites me more; the verdict, the bootprint, or the tornado. I’d really like to have seen a video from the inside of Principal Buckley’s godstruck, bootprinted head, when first the verdict came down, then the twister. Man, he probably thought he was Job or signed up for the first hairshirt/cilice/self-flagellation workshop in the Guymon area. Sounds like a business oportunity for some enterprising wiseass to open an S&M shop down there for Xians with esteem issues.
4 July 2006, on 6:07 pm
RDZ:Sounds like a business oportunity for some enterprising wiseass to open an S&M shop down there for Xians with esteem issues.
Yeah, good luck on that one. You’d have to tie it in with xian flaggelation. They’d burn it down otherwise.
4 July 2006, on 6:13 pm
Oh, yeah, Rat, that’s what I meant. A “Mortification Emporium”, with, like Kansas Jayhawks logo hairshirts and WWJD barbed thigh wires, sitting right there on the town square(closed on Sundays, natch).
4 July 2006, on 6:14 pm
Sorry, make that Oklahoma State Cowboys or OU Sooners logo’d hairshirts.
4 July 2006, on 6:17 pm
Actually, you’d be better off using the Dallas Cowboys logo. I always thought they wihed Texas Co. was part of TX.
Hey, maybe there’s your low self esteem hook!!!
4 July 2006, on 6:26 pm
I must really need a brain transplant, because I don’t understand this at all. What was the court case about, the assault or the suspension? What would the word of an athiest, or an athiest defense, have to do one way or the other with an assault case? And what did the jurors believe the athiests about? Sorry, but it just doesn’t make sense. If the court case was about the right not to be forced to pray, did the family win that case? Or did the father deny that he had assaulted the principal, and win that case (being believed by a jury of believers)? I’ll be quiet now.
4 July 2006, on 6:30 pm
Oh. I guess it was the father and the principal that got into a fight.
I didn’t follow it properly, either. From American Atheist’s site:
When her father Chuck discovered conclusively that public school and law enforcement officials had lied to him about his 15 year old daughter, he and Nicole and her mother Nadia went to the home of principal Lloyd Buckley to attempt to discuss the matter with him. Outside of his front fence, the principal struck Chuck, who blocked the blow. Both men fell to the ground and Buckley sustained minor injuries, the provable origins of which were strikingly contrary to his under oath trial testimony. Buckley then took out misdemeanor criminal assault charges against Chuck. After Smalkowski rejected the offer to drop the charges if he and his Atheist family left the state, the charges were raised to a felony. Chuck called American Atheists for help.
4 July 2006, on 6:43 pm
Yeah, the daughter was supended for her refusal to pray. All of the other incidents were spurred from that.
I didn’t know they asked the family to leave the state, though! they’ve had a problem with prayer at sports events for many years now. I know there was a supreme court case that came out of Booker(?)OK about this, but it didn’t show up when I googled it….
4 July 2006, on 8:05 pm
What a bunch of assholes. It is kind of nice that a tornado took a whack at the principals house. What is that? Poetic justice? These are good lessons for the sanctimonious creeps who call themselves xian. Maybe if they really did preach love instead of hate these fights would end. Remember these lawyers. They may be needed by one of us sometime. I sure would like to be represented by someone who took into account the jurors belief system. Now the civil suit can begin. I hope that if any agents of the court had anything to do with the decision to ask them to leave the state that that person is disbarred. Equal protection under the law? Yeah right.
4 July 2006, on 8:19 pm
[warning: this post has strayed somewhat off-topic, I suspect. Look upon it as a missive from "one of the guys in a land far, far away", if you like. The only people meant to be offended by this are... well, the sort of people GifS pretty much bashes every day, I guess. Enjoy this view from a slightly different cultural perspective.]
… I first read the article a couple of days ago, so I’m already over my amazement of this. Lemme ask a question which is still confusing me, a question I find frankly almost as unbelievable[1] as a tornado smacking down the principal’s house:
Rat Bastid…
… how the hell-damn-fuck does a town in a First World country have a Walmart, five Bible outlets and no bookstores?
The country that produced H.L. Mencken, Mark Twain, Howard P. Lovecraft, Poe and Thoreau, Ambrose Bierce, Gene Roddenberry[2], the Simpsons[3] and the Muppets!?
Damnit, I’ve been spending the last six months reading every book and watching every video in the “Dune” series (yes, including the se/prequels[4]). You have a country capable of producing people with brains like Frank Herbert’s? And the Bell Curve has to squeeze this kind of crap out of the back end of its alimentary canal to balance the sheet?
(I think [and correct me if I'm wrong] most Americans have no conception of how much cultural power they really have. I mean, there’s a popular conception that America is a cultural hegemony, but most citizens probably don’t realise the force that spread is up against. I mean sure, there’s the popular [and errant, I hope] conception that “the majority” of Americans think that America == the whole world, therefore it “makes sense that They’d be just like us” [without even considering the identity of the They]… but there are a LOT of cultures in the world. The Cultural Homogeneity isn’t impressive because it’s all over the world; it’s impressive[5] that it’s all over the world in spite of the cultures which already existed before assimilation.)
(Why is this even vaguely relevant to anything else that gets posted on GifS? Why isn’t it I shouldn’t just STFU now? Because the attitude of Christian Fundamentalism drowning America is now a part of that Cultural Imperialism. Hey, we got Tony Blair and John Howard fighting for breathing room up Bush’s colon now. How do you think we feel about that?)
… oh, and wait: and this town protested Storm and Superman, but didn’t burn the comic store down because of the X-Men (eeeeeeevilution!) overall!? It’s bad enough there are people so stupid it drags them into gross evil; but I suppose all should be grateful that they’re at least not consistent about their condition and its extension.
… is it too late to leave a few copies of “The Spectre” lying around? Or the JLA issues with Azrael in them? Or would they find something to argue about in there too?
Again, speaking as a non-American (and realising that you guys are already doing your best, I’m not bashing you, please don’t bash back): c’mon you guys, do something[6]. I’m getting as scared as I did when I realised Bush had been voted in that first time. Y’know, that first time? That gave him another four years?
(How come his administration can publicly announce they’d like someone to put a bullet in the head of another country’s leader but denounce, jail or Guantanamise[7] anyone who’d want to do the same to their leader?)
No offence to you guys (and I hope everyone realises I’m being sincere here), but from the perspective I get this far away from your country… it looks pretty friggin’ scary. Of course, it’s not like my country or the UK look a lot better thanks to the idiots who voted in our political leaders…
… whole world’s going to frigging hell-in-a-handbasket. I just wonder how much further the pendulum has to swing before it finally starts arcing back.
Hey: what’s wrong with the idea of starting up a new country? Y’know, kinda like Sealand but with a charter based on ideologies?
—
[1]: No, seriously. What would the odds actually have been? I mean, wide swathe of destruction and probably tornado-country, versus the amazing timing…
[2]: Granted, he didn’t work on “Doctor Who”, but classic Trek was pretty cool.
[3]: No, seriously. Anything that casually subversive requires some fairly decent powers of insight.
[4]: Which make even modern “Star Trek” look pretty good, actually.
[5]: read: “downright scary”
[6]: Although don’t ask me what. Half of Hollywood, the country’s intelligentsia and the probably-the-only-Eminem-song I can respect, yet the Decerebrate Commander-in-Chief and his old-man-face-shooting sidekick still got in. You guys are playing against a seriously, seriously, seriously stacked deck. All jokes aside: my hopes and thoughts are with you guys. Good luck.
[7]: … “Gitmize”?
4 July 2006, on 9:14 pm
Troff
Rub it in why don’t ya. LOL
It’s freedom of speech as long as you don’t say too much. And in the wrong place. (Freedom of speech zones developed by anti-americans)(anti everything good)
4 July 2006, on 9:26 pm
Troff says:
Again, speaking as a non-American (and realising that you guys are already doing your best, I’m not bashing you, please don’t bash back): c’mon you guys, do something[6]. I’m getting as scared as I did when I realised Bush had been voted in that first time. Y’know, that first time? That gave him another four years?
We’re trying our best. And it no longer requires a conspiracy theorist to believe this fucktard may never have been elected legitimately at all.
We’re fighting these bastards, Troff. Please don’t give up on the U.S. yet.
And by the way, I have a number of European ex-pat friends who still love it here. An English friend says he finds home more oppressive than here and would never move back. Of course, he lives here in San Francisco among the saner population.
4 July 2006, on 9:31 pm
And thanks for remembering we are the country that produced people like Mencken and Twain. There are many of us who care very deeply about preserving a culture that can still output such greatness.
4 July 2006, on 9:38 pm
Troff, I’ve been on the verge of a one-way trip to Canada for about the last six years and, yet, here I remain among the resistance. I remain hopeful that this particular American Taliban will be stopped in it’s tracks by common sense- I know, I know, it’s in short supply in these parts- but the question remains.
Like with global warming, will there be a “tipping point” where no amount of wrong-righting and undoing will be able to correct the damage to this nation that Bush, Cheney, DeLay, Abramoff, Ken Lay, Robertson, Falwell, Santorum, Fred Phelps, etc., ad nauseam, will have done before they’re inevitably strung up, hoisted on their own
Picards, er, petards (”petard”- puh-tard’, n.sing- a developmentally disabled animal that lives with humans)? No, George W. is not a “petard” but a “FUCKTARD.”“Welcome, Flight 714 to New Jerusalem National Airport, Fuktardistan. Please divest yourselves of any and all sexual devices, contraception, thong underpants, impure thoughts and Cheetos*. Please, assume the position and prepare for robotic cavity search and don’t forget to pick up your complementary handgun on your way out.
We hope you enjoy your visit to joyous Fucktardistan and remind you to behave within the perameters set by the roving bands of morality police or risk being “born again” via chemicals! Ladies, please don your stars and stripes burqas before exiting the airport. Thank you and Gawd Bless Fuctardistan!
*- Due to the mass exodus from these shores of scientists of all stripes but, most importantly, those ingenius and atheistic chemists responsible for the development of that most perfect and seriously cheesy of snacks(and who alone posess the priceless formula for them), we here in Fuktardistan are suffering a crippling shortage of Cheetos and are forced to confiscate those brought here by emissaries from “The Rest of the World”. We apologize for any inconvenience but you can’t possibly grasp what it’s like for a poor christian pundit to go cold turkey off the “orange gold” that sustains him or her. The government issued “fried-corn/cheddar” patches are woefully inadequate.”
~~~~~
4 July 2006, on 10:19 pm
Troff said:
… how the hell-damn-fuck does a town in a First World country have a Walmart, five Bible outlets and no bookstores?
There was a lot more that I wanted to respond to, but for brevity’s sake I limited to this quote.
Troff, I wish I had all the answers. I’m just as upset as you are. I knew, since 2000, what W would mean to the world, not only this country. I had never even volunteered for a political campaign until 2000 because of the hatchet job Bush did on Gore.
We falied. Shit, I failed. I knocked on doors, made phone calls, worked for Howard Dean (then fuckwad Kerry), the union, anti war and pro choice groups, the whole nine yards.
I put everything I had into defeating these fucking Nazis short of committing violence. And I failed the planet.
Ther are no good answers, only excuses. I’ll spare you that pity pot.
I wish I had a good answer for you for why this happened. It’ll haunt me til the day I die. I’m…sorry. I couldn’t stop them…I tried, I really did.
can’t talk about it anymore….
4 July 2006, on 10:24 pm
WE NEED OUR OWN FUCKING COUNTRY. A COUNTRY THAT IS IMMUNE TO THIS BULLSHIT! IF NOT A COUNTRY, THEN A STATE OR A CITY THAT CAN FUCKING STOP THESE DOMINIONIST FACISTS OUT OF THE POLITICAL SPHERE OF INFLUENCE!!!
There is no sanctuary for Atheists on this continent.
If there was, I’d move.
Right. Now!!!!
I’m sorry troff. I did try….
4 July 2006, on 10:48 pm
Oh for cryin’ out loud, RDZ! Just get on up here to Canada already!
Canada: The original “kinder, gentler nation.”
4 July 2006, on 11:57 pm
For what it’s worth; considering the original reason for the 4th of July’s concept of Freedom and Independence; …I offer my kudos to all you true ‘Freedom Warriors’ here on this Freethinking, Atheist Site called ‘GifS’!
“DRB”: I guess you’d be one deserving of a special, ‘Beyond the Call of Duty’, award.
Thanks for all the ‘Brave Resistance’ against the ‘Fuctard NeoFascists’!
Audrey: Are there any LOW rent apartments up in Canada!
[I, and my companion, are semi-retired on Social (In-)Security]
Also, [any of you Canadians]: I’m reminded of Michael Moore’s segment in Farenheit 9/11 [?], regarding Canadians (unlike Americans) NOT being concerned about locking their doors; and …the comparatively low murder rate; inspite of rather common gun ownership! …Is that true, by the way?
4 July 2006, on 11:58 pm
Audrey,
I know the Southern Baptist dialect and I may prove useful down in the Lower 48 once the walls go up both North and South around Fortress Amerikkka.
I will play the “Left Behind” video game and learn how to kill which heathen- and how to distinguish just a winged Unitarian.
I shall cut the sleeves from my T-shirts, acid-wash my jeans, and wear a Skoal ring into the backpocket by hand.
I shall train myself to speak in a drawl like Ron White’s.
I shall trade in my minivan for an F-150 with a winged “3″ on the back window.
I shall cut my hair into a Mullet..
I shall have my Egyptian friend remove two thirds of my brain via my nose and I’ll still have to watch my mouth among them.
I shall change my name to “Joe Don”, no last name, need to know and all.
Or not.
5 July 2006, on 12:08 am
Meanwhile, right now they are setting off massive amounts of M-1000s outside of my apartment and my nerves are shot all to hell. If you have never heard one of these fuckers go off, you ain’t missing anything. It’s been going on for weeks, in fact — but tonight is, of course, out of control.
Happy fucking I.D. I can’t wait till it’s over now.
5 July 2006, on 12:11 am
Da Rat Bastid Says:
It’ll haunt me til the day I die. I’m…sorry. I couldn’t stop them…I tried, I really did.
can’t talk about it anymore…
The world forgives you.
5 July 2006, on 12:34 am
Meanwhile, here’s a little schaedenfraude.
5 July 2006, on 1:06 am
Bush’s foreign friends fading fast
Sean — What’s the “Lone Idiot” going to do now?
5 July 2006, on 1:09 am
I wish I could say “Go back to his village,” Star. But we’ve got a ways to go.
5 July 2006, on 1:39 am
RDZ said:”I shall train myself to speak in a drawl like Ron White’s.”
I already speak with a drawl and I enjoy it but that does not mean we are all stupid down here. I tried to get rid of my southern drawl as a teenager but instead I have come to terms with it.
When I visit New England the friends I stay with pay no attention to my accent but, when I go out into Boston people look at me like I am dumb. Needless to say I do not like the southern drawl being used as a discription for stupid.
I also own a full size Dodge Ram and a Jeep Wrangler but these do not make me stupid either. Neither of my vehicles have a 3 on them anywhere because I hate racing as the idiots drive in circles for hours never getting anywhere.
5 July 2006, on 4:58 am
RDZ the list did not make me mad or any such nonsense I just wanted to make sure that ya’ll know some of us down here are not as stupid as others.
5 July 2006, on 8:46 am
Da Rat Bastid says: “Don’t feel bad though. St. Louis wants to join the belt badly.”
Funny thing, I was born and raised in St. Louis until I was 14.
5 July 2006, on 9:03 am
PC, sorry, I didn’t intend to imply that the drawl made one stupid-I’m from North Georgia, myself, round Dahlonega way, I just meant it would help me blend in for, despite my origins I speak sans accent. No offense intended.
5 July 2006, on 9:07 am
RDZ how did you lose the drawl man? I took no offense I just wanted to clear the names of people like me down here.
5 July 2006, on 9:27 am
PC, I was just short of five when we moved up to Ohio and essentially started mimicing the bland, accentless speech of the Midwest. I still slip right back into it, just about when i cross the KY/TN border headed south. You’re already in place for the Resistance and I nominate you to be a Kentucky Colonel!
5 July 2006, on 3:10 pm
All of this capitalizing of “atheist” and “atheism” is giving me a headache. It’s not a bleeping religion.
5 July 2006, on 3:16 pm
Correct. It should not be capitalized.
5 July 2006, on 5:22 pm
Raindogzilla, P.C., I’m pretty much a chameleon when it comes to accents both in Spanish and English (my French is pretty much Parisian). I tend to slip into whatever accent I’m hearing the most around me, so needless to say, I speak a lot of Spanglish here in the ol’ American banana republic (South Florida)!
5 July 2006, on 6:47 pm
Eve I grew up 30 miles north of Orlando but, in the sticks of Lake County. You are lucky to be able to get the accent of a foreign language down wish I could but that drawl always creeps in.
5 July 2006, on 7:40 pm
The South will rise again! Provided we treat their drinking water with Rush Limbaugh’s shaving kit.
5 July 2006, on 11:23 pm
After racking my brain, I believe I’ve determined where the “asscrack of the bible belt” is; Lynchburg, Virginia!
6 July 2006, on 4:30 am
As depressing as it may be there is no point trying to found our own country. No way to create some place immune to – free from – this stupidity. Not without the continual effort of education that may as well be done where we are. From Greg Egan’s story Silver Fire (because it says so well what I want to),
But as the countryside materialised around me – the purple-grey ridge of the Black Mountains to the north starkly beautiful in the dawn – I was slowly beginning to understand. This was not my world any more. Not in Herodotus, not in Seattle, not in Hamburg or Montreal or London. Not even in New York.
In my world, there were no nymphs in trees and streams. No gods, no ghosts, no ancestral spirits. Nothing – outside our own cultures, our own laws, our own passions – existed in order to punish us or comfort us, to affirm any act of hatred or love.
My own parents had understood this perfectly, but theirs had been the first generation to be so free of the shackles of superstition. And after the briefest flowering of understanding, my own generation had grown complacent. At some level, we must have started taking it for granted that the way the universe worked was now obvious to any child, even though it went against everything innate to the species: the wild, undisciplined love of patterns, the craving to extract meaning and comfort from everything in sight.
We thought we were passing on everything that mattered to our children: science, history, literature, art. Vast libraries of information lay at their fingertips. But we hadn’t fought hard enough to pass on the hardest-won truth of all: Morality comes only from within. Meaning comes only from within. Outside our own skulls, the universe is indifferent.
Maybe, in the West, we’d delivered the death blows to the old doctrinal religions, the old monoliths of delusion, but that victory meant nothing at all.
Because taking their place now, everywhere, was the saccharine poison of spirituality.
6 July 2006, on 5:47 am
Still, poetic justice is very satisfying. And I am very fond of the values on which your nation was founded (though I resent any attempt to claim them as uniquely american) and hope desperately that it and the rest of the world return to sanity soon. As if they were ever there.
28 July 2007, on 1:26 am
[...] An atheist in a town of believers By Stardust I don’t watch television very often, so missed this segment that was shown on ABC’s 20/20. Many of you, particularly those who live in Kansas, Oklahoma and southern states can relate to what this atheist family has had to deal with being surrounded and far outnumbered by fundies. Raindogzilla posted about this story last year in a post titled Very Small Rocks. [...]