The Litter Box Revisited

Today's Doctor Visit

2011-10-24T18:37:00.000-05:00

Today's doctor visit was about as good as Thursday's lawyer visit was bad. This doctor was very professional, calm, and kind. He was there to do a job and I felt like he was completely honest with me.

To make a long story short, he confirmed my bipolar disorder but as part of schizoaffective disorder. So now I have schizoaffective disorder - bipolar type. I'm going to have to do some studying to fully understand the differences but I'm going to keep posting my mental health stuff under the category "Bipolar."

I'm running on 5 hours of sleep so forgive me for not taking more time to share with you today. I hope to have some information posted tomorrow.

How I Found My Rage

2011-10-20T15:34:00.000-05:00

One of the hardest things to deal with since my life went to crap is how I don't have a lot of genuine feelings any more. Sometimes I get flashes of anger and sometimes I get flashes of fear. I can laugh at something funny but I don't feel the happiness really.

I found my rage today, or rather, someone gave it back to me. And while it feels horrible right now, I think ultimately it will be a good thing for me in my healing process.

I went to my lawyer's office to get prepped for my doctor's appointment on Monday. The gentleman walked me through some questions and encouraged me to be honest and direct. Near the end of the interview, he told me that if I felt sad or needed to cry Monday while talking about my life, don't be afraid to - that it's ok to show what I'm feeling. I remarked that it might be difficult since I felt so empty now and my emotions weren't willing to surface too much any more.

That's when the whole session went to hell.

He sat at the table, looked me in the eyes and said, "Well, there's only one person who can fix that you know?"

I knew what he meant but I sat in shock. I had already explained to him twice how hurt and angry I had felt when the first hospital I went to had told me I needed church and Jesus. Surely he wasn't going to go there. He continued:

"You know who it is, don't you? I'm just gonna come right out and say it. It's Jesus."

Geez, I thought. You can't get away from Jesus in this town. I didn't say anything because I didn't want to encourage him. He mumbled some more about how Jesus could fix my problems - not that he would, necessarily - though he could if he wanted to.

I tried to be polite. "I thought that when I was 14 but it didn't work."

He persisted, "Well, I know you feel Jesus abandoned you but he hasn't. You just need to reach out to him again and he can make it better."

I'd had enough. I said calmly and politely, "No, I don't think he's abandoned me. I just don't think he exists. There's not enough evidence."

"Of course there's evidence all around you!" he exclaimed. "Just look around. You can go down Highway 4 and find evidence of God. I don't mean to preach at you but..."

"Then please don't," I asked.

Then he said it. "Have you ever seen a newborn baby?"

It was like a knife slashing across my heart. I felt raw anger ooze into me. I felt rage.

"Yes!" I snapped. "I saw my newborn son dead in my arms!"

The guy didn't miss a beat. "Well, how did he die?"

I didn't respond. The rage seeped into my throat and closed it temporarily. I saw red. I felt the adrenaline once again.

My poor sweet partner said quietly, "He was stillborn."

I'm not sure what else the man said but he muttered something else about Jesus and not meaning to preach.

I found my voice again and said coldly, "Is there anything else we need to discuss?"

"No," he sneered, "good-bye." And with that, he stood up and dismissed us like we were trash.

I left a message with the firm's owner for her to call me. I'm going to complain and let her know how unprofessionally I was treated. I worry now that my case may be compromised but, more than that, I'm sick to death of religious bullies who think they can shove their religion in my face any time, anywhere, with no regard to my feelings or the tragedies in our lives.

I'm taking a stand against anyone who would twist my son into a weapon against me.

I'm taking a stand against this even if I have to take on the whole town. It ends here with me.

Damage Control

2011-09-30T22:08:00.000-05:00

So much has happened in the past couple of months. I've had to apply for disability. I've come out to my family. I've been attacked and outed by people in the community for my stand against the personhood amendment.

I have a lot of feelings about this.

Yesterday I felt pretty good. I was able to laugh and have a pretty good time. I felt creative. Today, I'm exhausted, angry, and hurt. I feel like I've done something wrong. I feel like other people are after me.

I hate bipolar disorder but I also hate humanity.

My situation with my mom went much better than it could have. She questioned and didn't want to believe it at first. The next day she attacked me, implying that I was a bully and just did stuff to hurt her. She went to great lengths that day to make it all about her which is normal considering her borderline traits. Now she really doesn't want to talk about it any more and wants me to be her best friend.

I reached out to my sister but I think maybe she's busy today. She seemed distracted. I feel guilty for bothering her.

I've done some damage control regarding the leak of my name and information. Some of it is already fixed and the rest will hopefully be fixed by tomorrow. I don't know how much damage is done. I don't really care that people know what I said online - I have not lied about anything and I stand by my beliefs. But it's disconcerting to know that someone out there that you do not know is trying to make your life hell while they hide behind their computer and laugh.

For some reason I feel angry and alone. I think the feelings are disproportionate to the events. It would be better, I think, if I could face my persecutor on even terms - face to face. Instead, I feel like he's a sniper and he's taking pot shots at me. I had little respect for this person before this: his dishonesty and complete lack of intelligence were not worthy of much respect. Now that he's done this, I have zero respect. A person who is so hateful and stupid should not be able to make me feel this way.

I know this whole thing is going to blow over in a month when the vote is done. I also know that I don't need to encourage this idiot any more by replying to him in any way. Yet it galls me beyond belief that he will have the last word and think he has silenced me. He has not scared me off - he has made me angry. Yet I do not want to overreact and make a mistake in my anger.

What do you guys think? What's the best way to deal with someone who has leaked your name and information and is telling lies? Is it really weakness to just walk away? And what is best for me and my health?

The Day Has Come

2011-09-27T23:36:00.000-05:00

It's been a long time in the closet and I'm tired. I've really put myself out there since I started writing this blog, the other, and becoming active on several sites. I'm tired of having to keep quiet while people parade their religion and political views. I'm tired of having people use the word "atheist" around me like it's a dirty word. I'm tired of people trying to impose their religion on me through the ballot box.

And most of all, I'm tired of worrying that someone is going to out me to my family.

Now the day has come, it seems, because I've been placed under that threat. That's ok. I haven't said anything that's not true and that I would take back. The chances of my parents finding out this week are extremely high so I've made the first move - the one I've wanted to make for a long time. I wrote my mom a message and told her the truth.

I don't know how she'll react and I can't be responsible for that. I have to be responsible for my life, my actions, and my words. I'm proud that I can now attach my name and face to those words if I so choose. I'm glad that I can be free to speak my mind and, if someone doesn't like it, they can either say so or shut up.

I'm glad that I can finally be me!

My name is Jen. I'm an atheist with bipolar disorder. And I don't care what anybody thinks about it.

Important Changes

2011-09-15T00:27:00.000-05:00

Hi, guys! It's been a while so I want to let you know some important things.

1) I will be blogging about atheism, skepticism, and science from a redneck point-of-view at Deep-Fried FreeThinkers from here on out. My handle there is Tweenky D (long story) and you can expect more of the same content as usual. We plan on starting a podcast as soon as we can get our sound room set up. If you want to continue to follow my work there, please bookmark or follow us at that site. It is a work in progress so it will be changing as time goes by but the content should be quite regular.

2) This blog will remain up and I will be using it to talk about mental illness in general and my bipolar experiences in particular. I've been very lax of late due to this severe depression but I want to recommit myself to the goal of sharing these experiences - particularly now that I've been forced to apply for disability.

3) I hope you will all continue to follow and keep in touch on at least one of the two sites. You are all very welcome and we appreciate your feedback. Any comments or suggestions will be seriously considered.

Love you guys very much (in a very general cybery kinda way)...

The Other

2011-08-31T01:00:00.000-05:00

There was a time when I was young that I could look at myself in a mirror and be amazed at the intricacies of my eyes. As time went by, I lost that ability. I would look in the mirror and instead of seeing blue-green irises, I would see another entity inside me - a dark, mysterious force. Sometimes it seemed that I see that other girl staring back at me malevolently, her eyes flashing with malice and the corners of her lips pulled up in a small smirk. On the really bad days, I could feel her inside me. I could hear her inside my head. It seemed as if all my hurt and rage was concealed in her glare.

Now almost 25 years later, I can see her again. I can feel her in my mind. Since I have no real anger of my own, I guess it's saved up in this "other" I have created. She doesn't share my beliefs or my concern for others. She doesn't care about anyone or anything. She hates and despises the world because she can only see it through my cynical eyes. She has no hope and no vision. All she knows is rage.

Which of us is real? Is she a projection of my repressed anger or am I a projection of her repressed goodness? Why is she in my mind? Why can I feel her strength in my arms? Why can I hear her words coming out of my mouth?

Which of us is in control?

The New Men of Science and Learning

2011-08-30T00:41:00.000-05:00

This post is going to sound petty and mean-spirited. Maybe it is. I've seen so much of this since I moved back home that I almost can't believe myself how much stupider people have gotten since I left. Not a day goes by that I don't read something that among thinking people would be labeled insane but around here is considered normal. Compare this letter to the editor from WND:

So where do things like gravity come from? How do you explain the complexity of the cell? How can the flagellum, a single part of a cell which is itself comprised of around 30 parts, happen by chance? Especially when the absence of just one of those 30 parts renders it useless? The sheer complexity of life makes the belief that it happened by chance borderline lunacy. The earth has exactly the right environmental conditions (water, temperature, oxygen, etc.) as well as exactly the right solar orbit (gravity, axial tilt, etc.) and location in the galaxy for life to prosper. You're saying that all this and more happened by chance. [Huge argument from ignorance but coherent]

Ever hear of Copernicus, Galileo and Newton? They knew the universe was created with understandable, discoverable laws that governed its operation, and their faith was a key driving force in their discoveries. [Argument from Authority but coherent]

with this sampling of responses from a local discussion site:

hell is hot.Thanks for playing

kneel down tonight and ask God if what you(gays) are doing is ok, if he answers yes, then u better pray again because it is not right

You would no nothing of scripture if it hit you right in the face!

God is good all the time all the time God is good!!!

Sorry, your blinded with hatred. If the rich man came out of hell itself and told you its real, God Jehova isreal you still would not believe!

If you was really wanting to know the mind and heart of the True and Living God he would reveal himself to you. I can tell just by some of the few po dunk post you have made you just have alot of hatred in your heart!

...you f'ing nuts if you think there is homosexual acts in nature and animals your just loopy!

As usual you shot off w/out knowing the context on alot of these verses.

The Lord doesnt take human sacrafice. He sent his son to die for us.

You havent proven anything with ur po dunk arguments!

You have the book on how to live,and how not to live maybe if you studied it instead of wasting time posting here.Things might be more clear to you.

Are you mad because we have the bible or are you mad because you cant comprehend it .
If your going to mouth about the bible how about educate yourself a little.

If your going to use the word Yahweh then spell it correctly. YWHW Your welcome

What the hell kinds of arguments are these? Is this really the best we have to offer? We live in an age of great achievement and this is what we are churning out of our schools. These people cannot think, cannot write, cannot formulate any sort of meaningful response yet they think themselves brilliant. They think they have "won" an argument that they can't even begin to comprehend.

How do we deal with this? How do you reach people who are seemingly beyond reach? Why are these people not laughed straight off discussion boards? Is this the best Mississippi can offer? These people think they are the new men of "science" and "learning." What a joke!

These people breed and these people vote. Let's hope the next generation will look at the sheer, blind ignorance of their parents and strive for something better.

Dishonesty on the Personhood Amendment

2011-08-29T03:47:00.000-05:00

The proponents of Mississippi's amendment 26, otherwise known as the "Personhood Amendment," are doing a great job of spreading their dishonest propaganda to the masses. They are targeting churchgoers by appealing to their religious convictions and their natural desire to protect the young.

A "pro-life" group recently gave a presentation at my mother's church encouraging everyone to vote for the amendment. I do not yet know the group's name but my mother reported that the group explained the amendment as a way to end reckless abortion. My mom went home that night with a sign to put in her yard and her mind made up that she would vote "yes" on election day. When we discussed the issue the next night, she believed that a vote for amendment 26 was simply a vote to end abortion as a birth control method. She specifically mentioned that she thought the amendment would hinder those girls "who just sleep around" from having an abortion done.

I explained to her what the amendment really meant and I directed her to their websites at Personhood Mississippi and yeson26.net so she could read for herself. I explained to her that their goals were much larger than simply keeping "sluts" from being responsible for their actions. I showed her how they intend to outlaw oral contraceptives, stem-cell research, and therapeutic cloning. I talked to her about how I feared being forced to carry a child to term should my birth control fail since I am now at a maximum risk. I told her I did not want to die.

The next day, the sign came out of her yard and she decided to vote against the amendment come November. But what of the thousands of others who only know what they heard in church or on the local radio? What will they decide?

An interesting thing that I think is overlooked by people is just how draconian this amendment is. Mississippi already protects the unborn and defines "human life" as beginning at conception for the purposes of certain acts. I quote here from the 1972 amended code regarding homicide:

SEC. 97-3-37. Homicide; killing of an unborn child; "human being" includes unborn child at every stage og (sic) gestation from conception until live birth for purposes of offenses of assault and homicide; "unborn child" defined; intentional injury to pregnant woman; penalties; provisions of section not applicable to legal medical procedures, including abortion.

Now I am not a lawyer and I realize this applies to damage done to the unborn by means other than abortion. But my point is that Mississippi has already laid some groundwork for defining life as beginning at conception. The law regarding abortion in Sec 97-3-3 makes abortion illegal except when performed by a doctor ONLY in cases of rape or to save the mother's life. (Why then do we need amendment 26?)

The Personhood Amendment takes away even this little bit of common sense by saying that a small clump of undifferentiated cells has the same or more rights that the rape victim, incest victim, or dying mother who is carrying it. The proponents talk incessantly about this mass of cells (which is smaller than the period at the end of this sentence in the first few weeks) but uses pictures of cute babies and happy, expectant mothers to peddle their product. And while they may be glossing all the bad effects over in their church presentations, they are very clear on their website. They are doing this in order to:

1. Outlaw abortion.

2. End cloning and stem-cell research.

Why do they do this? Here are the reasons they give:

1. Overturn Roe v Wade.

2. Honor God.

Seriously, they aren't doing it to make society better. They aren't doing it protect innocent children - once those kids are born, they don't give a damn. They are doing this because they say it's what God wants (and I suspect that the generation of cheap labor that will be forced to be born because of this is just fine too).

I'm not surprised or disappointed that the big family organizations are pushing this. It's a great fundraiser for them and I've come to expect no better. But it saddens me to see that so many of my neighbors are blindly falling for these lies and distortions. They will vote yes on this amendment and shout "Hallelujah!" until their taxes go up to pay for the increases needed in welfare and medicaid. They will praise the Lord until poverty and crime rates skyrocket. They will congratulate themselves on stopping the bloodshed of the "innocent" and never take responsibility for the child abuse and neglect that the amendment will produce. Then one day they'll look around at the social decay and say, "Damn these liberals. Damn these atheists. Damn these blacks. They are all ruining our state!" Because white conservative Christians here can do no wrong.....

How do you reason with those who do not reason? How do you show something to a person who doesn't want to be shown anything? How do you educate someone who thinks s/he already has all the answers? You can't and so we are fighting a losing battle down here as the Personhood pushers creep into our churches and tell people exactly what they want to hear. They tell them that this law is good and will protect babies from their evil mothers. They tell them this law will make sluts take responsibility - after all, if she's got a kid, she doesn't have time to go spread her legs to all the guys, right? What they don't tell the Amen Chorus is that this law is going give the government power to make medical decisions for their mothers, wives, sisters, and daughters. The law will rob the women they love of their freedom. The law will rape a victim all over again or will force a mother to give birth at the cost of her own life.

These people won't learn until they have suffered greatly. In November, our suffering begins.

I've Never Felt So...

2011-08-27T22:28:00.000-05:00

When I'm depressed:

I've never felt so tired.
I've never felt so hurt.
I've never felt so sad.
I've never felt so angry.
I've never felt so afraid.
I've never felt so ashamed.
I've never felt so weak.
I've never felt so worthless.
I've never felt so powerless.
I've never felt so useless.
I've never felt so helpless.
I've never felt so anxious.
I've never felt so overwhelmed.
I've never felt so small.
I've never felt so scrutinzed.
I've never felt so contemptible.
I've never felt so judged.
I've never felt so boring.
I've never felt so ugly.
I've never felt so dirty.
I've never felt so hopeless.
I've never felt so lifeless.
I've never felt so vulnerable.
I've never felt so disconnected.
I've never felt so human.

When I'm manic:

I've never felt so strong.
I've never felt so beautiful.
I've never felt so desired.
I've never felt so friendly.
I've never felt so powerful.
I've never felt so energetic.
I've never felt so capable.
I've never felt so entitled.
I've never felt so uncontrollable.
I've never felt so vengeful.
I've never felt so contemptuous.
I've never felt so irresistible.
I've never felt so invincible.
I've never felt so plugged in.
I've never felt so helpful.
I've never felt so sociable.
I've never felt so entertaining.
I've never felt so unstoppable.
I've never felt so exuberant.
I've never felt so sexual.
I've never felt so needed.
I've never felt so worthy.
I've never felt so confident.
I've never felt so proud.
I've never felt so divine.

Good Reasons Not to Go to Church

2011-08-24T18:24:00.000-05:00

The local section of our bi-weekly paper is always filled with religious information and preachers' columns. I suppose telling people what to do 3 times a week at church simply isn't enough for them.

After scanning the article warning me not to be left behind because the rapture is coming, I saw another one telling me I had no good reason not to attend church. That's an interesting claim so I read the article to let this preacher make his case.

First he talks about all the excuses believers make for not attending church regularly. Then he told about how much good going to church did him as a kid even though he acted up during the service and paid a lot more attention to the bugs running around than on the preacher himself. Then he basically says that those who go to church regularly love each other while those who do not go to church regularly obviously do not love each other. He said that faithful believers must learn to "reach out" to those who do not - ostensibly to get the noncompliant believers back in church where they belong.

He did not mention those of us who do not believe in his religion so I read nothing that explained why I personally did not have a good reason to go to church. Maybe he understands why I don't go since I don't believe. Perhaps he doesn't think there are any "real" atheists in this town. Or maybe he doesn't consider it a high priority to reach out to someone who calls themselves an atheist. It would be interesting to know.

I actually have some good reasons for not attending any churches in this area. First, I do not believe their claims. Second, I have no interest in sitting quietly for 30 minutes listening to a preacher tell me his interpretation of something that I can read full well for myself (and hopefully with less bias). Third, I have no desire to disrespect those churchgoers by attending because I might either laugh (if I were at a Pentecostal church) or else make a noise of disgust (if I were at a Southern Baptist Church). I fully believe that one should be respectful when in another person's territory and so I do not go.

I wonder if this preacher would thank me for that or not?

The Rabbit Hole

2011-08-20T18:45:00.000-05:00

There's only one real question left - how far down the rabbit hole am I going to go? I've been hearing voices on and off (mostly on) since I was 14. Hearing voices was the first symptom I experienced - even before the mood disorder hit. Depression and mania have pushed me into psychotic states where the voices took over completely but even when my mood was closer to normal, the voices were still there guiding me, instructing me, berating me, and so many other things.

I don't like to talk about the voices and I haven't done it very much here. I am ashamed. I can't tell you why because I don't know.

The doctors and therapists I've seen have had a wide range of views regarding my hallucinations. Some doctors think it's a clear sign of DID (having multiple personalities) and a couple have even tried to coax these "personalities" out of me. I've pretty much steered clear of that kind of treatment because I definitely do not need someone planting ideas or personalities in my already fragile mind. Most doctors, however, have disregarded my voices as being either a maladaptive coping mechanism or just fantasy. One therapist even suggested that I had borderline personality disorder and was making it all up for attention. I've tried to steer away from these people too. No matter how much a doctor believes or disbelieves in what I hear, the voices haven't ever really gone away.

Not until, that is, I stated taking Seroquel last year. I was prescribed it for my bipolar disorder but within a couple of weeks it had quieted the voices down to just a small trickle. I spent the past year trying to learn to cope with the silence in my head and how to function in a quiet world where there are no voices to either hurt or help me.

If I miss a dose of Seroquel, the voices come back and they hit hard. Over the past couple of weeks, I've wrestled with this new information. Since Seroquel is an anti-psychotic, I'm wondering if these voices might be symptomatic of something else since they are not solely dependent on my mood. Of course, I cannot know anything for sure without consulting with a psychiatrist but that's not so easy. I don't have a lot of money for a doctor and I'm not getting any extra assistance from the government. Also, I've come to once again fear and loathe the telephone. Taking calls is difficult and making them is almost impossible. I'm also facing difficulty getting my medication since one pharmaceutical company told me I bring home too much money per month to qualify for any assistance. I make less than the poverty level yet that is too much.

I'm having such a difficult time right now doing even the smallest thing. I had really thought I would continue to improve, get back in the work force, and start over. Now I'm not so sure that's even possible. I don't know what to think. This depression is taking me to a very dark place and I don't know what to do other than freeze. It's like being in a horror flick - if I stay quiet and still, maybe the killer won't see me. But the grim truth is that the enemy isn't someone on the outside. The enemy is within. Nevertheless, I refuse to give up.

I think that's why the universe is rapidly expanding. It saw the truth of itself - it saw us - and it's running in all directions just as fast as it can. It's running from the rabbit hole and doesn't even realize that it's just making the hole bigger. If there is a hell, I'm in it now. I would be satisfied for now if I could just write regularly here again. This is my first attempt to do just that.

The Star Within

2011-08-12T02:25:00.000-05:00

I went out tonight to see if I could catch a few meteors despite the full moon. While sitting there waiting patiently for the show, I lost myself in the tranquility of the night. Wrapped in the cool air, enveloped by the chirping of crickets and frogs, caressed by the gentle scent of fresh grass, I allowed my mind to wander just like the giant "wandering" planet Jupiter above me.

I gazed at the brilliant gas ball and thought, "I know you. I've seen you." I looked at each star in turn and thought, "I know how you work. I have uncovered your secrets." I considered what a wonderful time this is to live in for those of us whose lust for knowledge cannot be contained. Where once people stood on this earth and wondered what those pinpricks of light were like, I actually know and understand.

Then I thought of this planet and the life scattered across it. I thought of humankind in all its greatness and its weakness. A brief flash in the sky, like the diamond trail of a dying meteor...that's all we are. I considered our short time here and how we waste it on foolish notions of power and greed. I thought of the lives wasted. I thought of the potential lost. I thought of all the senseless poverty and suffering in the world. I looked at my own misery and I grieved for myself and those like me whose greatest enemy is their own mind. I looked up at the sky and in my head I screamed, "Why?"

The stars looked down then like cosmic observers upon the arena of earth. They answered, "Who are you to judge? And who are you to be judged?"

I looked back at them, into their twinkling depths, and I replied, "I am you."

And the universe silently carried on.

Depression Is...

2011-07-28T01:16:00.001-05:00

Photo by Noel Zia Lee

Depression is not having enough energy to do anything, even the things you used to enjoy. It's struggling to get out of bed in the afternoon. It's thinking that fixing a sandwich is just too much trouble. It's looking at the toothbrush and knowing you should use it but the whole process of putting toothpaste on the brush and moving the brush around in your mouth is exhausting. It's wearing the same clothes for three days straight. It's going two or three days without a shower when the shower used to be your favorite part of the daily routine. It's not picking up after yourself so that you have no room on your desk for another soda can and trash is overflowing from the garbage can that you just can't seem to get motivated to empty. It's having your car covered in bird crap, filthy on the inside, with an expired tag but you don't care because you don't drive it anyway. It's having to have medication given to you and meals fixed for you because you don't care whether you eat or whether you even live. It's having really important mail pile up on the counter because you feel like the world will end if you open it. Bills don't get paid. Nothing gets done unless someone else does it. You'd feel guilty about it except it's really hard to care when you're just numb inside.

Depression is avoiding your friends and family. It's not that you hate them - far from it - but that you don't want them to see this dark side of you. You don't want them to look into your eyes and see the continual shift between apathy and despair. You don't have the energy to keep up with their conversation because your brain moves so very slowly. As for email or blogs, it's so much work to think of a response, to write it down, to pretend you have something useful to say. After all, you don't want to be a killjoy but you know you are. When you do make the effort to go somewhere (say shopping) with the family, you have trouble keeping up as they walk around. You don't show any interest in anything. You don't let anyone buy you anything because you just don't care. All you want is to be back at home in bed where it safe and comfortable.

Depression is just existing - not living - because you don't have the energy or will for anything else. Everything looks literally bleak since colors don't appear as vibrant as they once did. It's like walking and talking underwater. Each movement, each thought, is difficult. Each breath is labored. It's a ton of bricks on your shoulders. It's phantom pains and worries. It's looking back at the manic times and wondering if you ever really had that much energy. It's being unable to remember that feeling. It's feeling jealous and angry of everyone else's "normality" in the few moments that you can scrape some energy together. It's thinking that if your mom says something about getting more sunshine, losing weight, making friends, going to church, taking more meds, quitting meds, or that you could get up if you "really wanted to" just ONE MORE FREAKING TIME, that you'll lose your mind. And then you say, "Screw it" and shrug it off because it's too much effort to get mad and you don't care enough to even swear any more.

Depression is the closest thing to emptiness a working brain can know. It's having your heart scooped out and tossed into the trash. It's being so listless and apathetic that you don't even consider suicide because it's too much trouble. Death isn't worth the effort. Life isn't worth the grief. But none of it matters because there's no energy to do any of that anyway. It is drifting. It is waiting. It is zero.

Southern Signs: When All Else Fails, Try Prayer

2011-07-21T23:15:00.000-05:00

Proving once more that anger is one of the most powerful motivators we have, I've returned to you from the battlefield of depression to tell you about a sign I saw in my doctor's office today. It looked something like this:

If all else fails, TRY PRAYER

Believe and receive

Doubt and do without

Can you believe that something this unimaginably dim was actually posted in a frame against a hot pink background in my actual examination room? Now let me be clear. If I had been in someone's home, church, or faith-based center then this sign would have been ok - still goofy to me, mind you, but ok. But this sort of thing is absolutely not acceptable at a professional, licensed medical clinic where science-based medicine is supposed to be the treatment given.

Would you ever really want your doctor or nurse to throw up their hands and say, "Well, the medications don't seem to be helping so just go home and give it to the Lord in prayer." Of course not because reasonable people understand that prayer is the expertise of preachers and medicine is the expertise of doctors. Only the tragically dead or those on the path of such a tragic, faith-based death don't understand this.

Why am I making a big deal about this? What harm is there in suggesting prayer when "all else fails"? I do this because I have been the victim of this kind of magical thinking. At age 17 I was sent to a supposedly science-based, licensed psychiatric hospital with what I now know to be symptoms of bipolar disorder and psychosis. After a week of testing, my doctors threw up their hands and said, "There's nothing wrong with you so go home, get back in church, and PRAY. Stop sinning and get right with God again." That path not only failed but drove me to several suicide attempts. And if my anecdote isn't enough, check out this site and see for yourself what kind of harm pseudoscience and magical thinking can do, especially when it's presented as a real solution by a so-called professional.

I don't like these pithy phrases and slogans that believers use but perhaps it's time to fight fire with fire. So I'm going to propose my own version of this for all you skeptics out there who see this nonsense on your Facebook and so forth and want to respond. Try this:

Nothing FAILS like prayer

Believe and be deceived

Doubt and work it out

Bad Medicine

2011-07-06T04:59:00.000-05:00

Now that I've sat down here at 4:30 am and committed to writing a post, I find that I've lost track of my thoughts. That has become a huge problem for me lately - remembering things. It goes with the depression, I'm told.

Unlike most people with mental illness, I'm only on one type of medication for my particular condition. It is not uncommon for people to be one four or five different kinds of pills to deal with things. I'm on only one because there are few medications I can take. With most meds, either they do not work at all or else they have such vivid side effects that I cannot continue taking them. There is little middle ground.

These are the antidepressants/anti-anxiety meds that I have tried over the past fifteen years and had to stop taking (in no particular order):

Celexa (no effect)
Lexapro (was the best of the lot but too expensive even with insurance)
Paxil (no effect)
Prozac (no effect)
Zoloft (caused severe migraines that almost sent me to the ER)
Effexor (no effect)
Wellbutrin (no effect other than feeling a sense of derealization)
Xanax (extreme sleepiness)

These are the meds I've tried specifically for bipolar disorder over the past five years:

Lithium (built up in my bloodstream)
Depakote (caused nightmares and anxiety)
Abilify (drove me into a serious manic episode)
Seroquel (which I am still on)

A few years ago I was given valium to help relax me before I had to get some blood drawn. The doctor told me to take one at a certain time and, if it didn't get me fully relaxed, I could take one more. By the time I arrived at the hospital for the procedure, I had taken both pills and was in such a heightened state of anxiety that we almost didn't get the procedure done. It took 5 sticks and I expect people all over the hospital wondered about the girl who was screaming for help so loudly that she must have been being tortured.

So I said all that to say this...I've tried so many kinds of meds that I feel lucky to have something that works even just a little bit now. But Seroquel is a mixed blessing. When it works, it really works. The trouble is that it doesn't work consistently for me. When I'm closer to normal, I can take the medication before bedtime, get a good night's sleep, and then wake up at a reasonable hour in the morning. During this depression, the medication has not always kicked in on time. Most nights, I am awake until the sun comes up wishing I could sleep but totally unable to wind down. My mind races and I eventually have to get up, like I'm doing now, and finding some way to distract my mind. If I don't - if I just lie there and try to force myself to go to sleep - I'll end up feeling anxious, having dark thoughts, and then eventually crying. It's much better for me to just stay up and do something.

My mother asked me yesterday if we could go shopping out of town one morning this week. I told her I would very much like to go spend time with her but I didn't feel like I could get up in order to do it. She remarked that she thought I'd be able to get up if I "just wanted to." She doesn't understand that my sleep schedule is not dictated by my choices but by how my medicine works on any given night.

Case in point, my ability to participate at the Lake Hypatia event this past weekend was hampered by my non-ability to go to sleep and wake up as I wished. In retrospect, I feel very fortunate that I was even able to go at all. Certainly I would not have been able to had it not been for my partner. Even though he was not feeling 100%, he drove the whole way there and back while I slept. We were not able to go to the early morning events and we even missed the night events on the last day because I had pushed myself too hard that morning and had to nap that afternoon. I was highly motivated to attend these events but I simply could not do it all.

This concerns me a lot because I'm not sure how to fix the problem and I don't see any way I can hold down a "normal" job and function like this. Obviously, I don't dare go off my medication but I do need to find some way to either fix the sleep problem or learn to live around it. Since I don't have the answers, I expect a consultation with my doctor is in order. But medical appointments cost money and clinics are only open in the daytime and, honestly, I feel so tired.

So tired, in fact, that I haven't done any shopping in a while. Not proper, take-your-time, have-some-fun shopping. I miss not being able to go to events or meals with my family. I miss not being able to go to my favorite restaurant for lunch. It would be nice to be able to get back on track.

So when I don't post everyday like I should, please forgive me and know that I'm struggling right now. Some days it is hard for me to get the willpower to eat, much less blog. But I'm not giving up and I do really appreciate those of you who drop by to read what I have to say. I've just got to keep taking my meds and working to find a way to a better life.

To Answer Your Question: Why More People Don't Participate

2011-07-04T00:10:00.001-05:00

As I wrote late last night, atheists and skeptics spend a lot of time wondering why more people don't go to meetups, speak at conferences, or form communities. In particular, we scratch our collective heads wondering why women and minorities don't stand up to be counted. I have a partial answer to that today based on the fallout from Rebeccagate. If you want to know why more people - particularly women and minorities - don't join in the fun, then look no further than the comment sections on the most popular blogs.

Look at the responses of skeptics on both sides of this thing and give me one good reason why I (or any other sane woman) should want anything more to do with this community.

I've spent several hours reading hundreds of comments about this whole affair, really trying to put my own prejudices aside and listen to what the people were saying. I learned more than perhaps I wanted to know.

I learned that there is a mostly-young, male subset of the community that mistrusts women - period. They tend to perceive women as hysterical gold-diggers whose only possible value lies in being "sexy" or "hot." I've seen this group a lot on YouTube and I wrote them off long ago as products of their age and culture. I don't consider them serious participants for the purposes of this discussion.

But I also learned that there are some people who are very serious participants in our community who hold ideas that are just about as bad. Here are some ideas put forth by these people (both men and women) that have seeped their way into my consciousness since this started:

You women are all about drama (usually implied by those who are creating even bigger drama over the issues). You all just want attention.

You women think you're so sexy that men are just lining up to try to rape you. Most of you are fat and ugly so we wouldn't bother.

You women are stupid or insane if you live in a manner to minimize sexual assault.

You women blow everything out of proportion. You're all so paranoid.

You women don't have anything to offer us skeptics if you don't have a degree or if the degree you do have is not in something serious like science or math. Degrees in women's studies or such aren't really worth anything.

You women want equality but you don't really want to be treated as equals. When push comes to shove, you expect a man to protect you and defend your hurt little feelings.

You women label everyone who disagrees with you as a stupid sexist or misogynist.

You women hit on us men all the time. You want sex as much as we do.

You women inflate rape statistics all the time in order to justify your hatred of men.

You American women are so brainwashed to be scared of everything.

There were a lot more nasty things said, quite a few about men, but I'm not including them here because I can't personally speak on how they would make me feel since I'm not a man. Let me also reiterate that some of the things listed above were stated and reinforced by some women as well as some men. I don't want to go over these line by line and say whether they are right or wrong. I want you to read them and imagine that you are an atheist or skeptical female newly come out of the closet and considering participating in meetups, conferences, and events. Read those and ask yourself, "If the community feels this way about women, would I join?"

Most likely you would not. Most likely you would not perceive that community as being a "safe place" for you. And most likely you'd just keep your mouth shut or maybe even go right back into your closet because you knew that a significant number of people in that group didn't really value you or anything you had to say. I would guess that if you were a sexual assault survivor, the chances of you joining would be even more greatly reduced.

Now you may say, "But skeptics are all about questioning things and challenging ideas. It's not supposed to be a safe place, a circlejerk, where everyone can get petted." You'd be quite right. But the problem here as I see it is that we've confused a place of safety for people with a place of safety for ideas. No pet idea should be immune from criticism but people themselves need some amount of safety in order to grow. We all need some measure of respect, courtesy, and, yes, safety so that we can find our feet and our voice. That is NEVER going to happen as long as we act as abhorrently as we have done. We might as well take down the tents now, pack up and go home. We've already lost if we don't want to do any better than this.

The one ray of hope I've seen in this whole mess is how quickly some people disagreed with Richard Dawkins' take on the affair. Forget what he wrote and focus for a second on the fact that it didn't matter that he was the guy who wrote it. People still took a strong stand against him when they disagreed. This should forever lay to rest the myth that Dawkins is the god of our "religion" and we all obey him unquestioningly. This should show the world that he is not our prophet, our priest, or our king. He is just a man - sometimes right, sometimes wrong - and we are all free to disagree with him.

That's the ray of hope I'm clinging to because, frankly, I've little hope left for the atheist community after nearly drowning in this cesspool of hatred and name-calling. How can we seriously claim to have any solutions when we our own society is so broken? How can we pretend that religion is the root cause of so much grief when we ourselves are behaving in ways that promote heartache, fear, and mistrust? Do you really think a believer is going to read all these comments and say, "Oh, those atheists are such warm and welcoming people!" Do you really think in-the-closet atheists are going to read this stuff and say, "Oh, this looks like a great time to come out. I'm really going to find a good home here." Of course not. Believers can point to their scriptures to make excuses for their bad behavior. What is our excuse?

And maybe that doesn't matter to some of you. Maybe some of you are focused on your own personal atheism and don't give a rat's ass about forming atheist/skeptical communities to change the world for the better. That's fine - it's your business. But for those who claim to want to make a difference, we've got to start living up to our values. We've got to stop doing the things that we criticize the theists for doing - the needless insults, the ad hominems, the gross mischaracterizations of others' positions, the terrible strawmen. This has got to change.

This feud is going to cost us and cost us big because instead of disagreeing about the ideas, we went straight to personal attacks and insults. I think this means that many of us have a huge personal stake in the outcome and we have strong feelings about the subject. It's healthy for us to acknowledge this but there's a way to have a discussion to resolve our differences and, folks, this ain't it.

So, yes, at this point I'm disgusted and discouraged with our community. I'm disappointed and could easily have allowed myself to feel disempowered. But I have a determination deep down inside me - one promise that I've made to myself and I will not allow this fiasco to break it.

The theists did their best to keep me in the closet. I'll be damned if I let any atheist shove me back inside it now.

**Many people have been expressing the desire that we all shut up and stop talking about this. I disagree because I think our reactions show that we need more conversation, not less. I also chose to continue discussing my reactions to this because: a) I'm a woman and it affects me, b) I've been noticing this problem grow over the past several months, and c) people keeping asking why women don't participate as much. That question is now asked and answered - at least in part.

Learning to Listen

2011-07-02T23:48:00.001-05:00

After spending two days with some awesome freethinkers here at Lake Hypatia, I came back to my hotel room tonight to discover that there is major controversy aflame in the atheist world revolving around questions of misogyny, tone, and accomodationalism. Am I surprised?

Not in the least.

We're called "freethinkers" for a reason, you know. We all come to the table with our own thoughts and experiences and, in most cases, we're not afraid to be passionate people. Debating comes as naturally as breathing to some of us while others among us may be just finding their feet.

What we are not is perfect. We don't all have a perfect set of social skills. We don't all have a perfect ability to communicate effectively. We don't all have the tools to perfectly understand the needs of others. We come together with what we have in our toolbox so far and we come with all the assumptions and understandings that our experiences have taught us. The difference between us and religious groups perhaps is that we have a more flexible and vibrant framework in which to learn. There is no holy book giving us the rules on what's "right" - we have to figure it out for ourselves.

That said, we've got some important issues that we need more honest discussion on. This latest furor only proves to me that we're nowhere near where we should be. I see plenty of attempts to talk at the questions around women, blacks, and religious people but there's not nearly as much open dialog and not nearly enough listening.

The current "rebeccagate" situation seems to reflect different expectations as to what we atheists owe each other in the way of respect and fair treatment. Based on what I've read, Rebecca thought she was respecting Stef by addressing her criticism directly and using her name so there would be no misunderstanding. Rebecca seemed to feel that she was treating Stef honestly as an equal. Others, however, felt that Rebecca was picking on a smaller fish - a fish that could not (in that venue) fight back. Is it unreasonable to think that Stef might feel embarrassed or uncomfortable being singled out in a big meeting like that? No, I don't think that's unreasonable. If Rebecca singled me out at a CFI conference, I'd be embarassed as hell at first because that's my nature. I'm generally shy and I've had to work hard at embracing criticism to make me a better person. But while I might feel embarassed at first, I would quickly get over it and I would actually be excited that people were having conversation about something I had said. And I would ultimately seek out Rebecca for more dialog so that we could find some understanding - so that maybe I'd learn something I had not previously known. But that's just me and it's unrealistic to expect anyone else to feel or respond in the same way I would.

So what are our obligations to each other? Is it disrespectful for a guy to ask me up to his room at 4 am? Is it his fault if I feel uncomfortable or afraid when he gets me alone in an elevator to ask this? Is it my responsibility how I feel? Is there shared responsibility? Should I expect that each conference will be a safe zone where my name will never be called unexpectedly? Or should I expect that anyone who wants to use my work in a presentation will give me some forewarning?

I do not pretend to know these answers. I only know how I would feel and I can guess how I would choose to respond based on those feelings.

It's interesting that this came right on the heels of me brooding over my experiences here at the Lake Hypatia event last night. The people here are friendly, warm, and very accepting. I felt comfortable enough to mostly sit back and just observe these people as I would any other group. The thing that jumped out at me the most truly amazed me.

There was a great deal of commenting on the beauty of women. Many times I heard comments about how pretty a girl was, what a great smile she had, or how physically attractive she was. I did not hear a single comment about how great a guy looked. Now here is the real kicker: every single comment about a woman's looks was made by another woman.

I don't think most guys would dare make comments like that because they don't want to make women uncomfortable and they certainly don't want to be labeled sexist. Yet women seem to have little difficulty in publicly calling out another woman's looks. Why is this? I think it's because there is a fundamental mistrust between men and women. Women don't trust men because we've had such a history of abuse and oppression overall. I suspect that men don't trust women because they feel like they are always walking on eggshells - they don't know what words may evoke cries of sexism or harassment - so it's easier to say nothing at all.

Likewise, I think mistrust is a key component to the reason why blacks are so sorely underrepresented in our community. Blacks may have a difficult time trusting the motives and behaviors of white people. Whites may make hurtful comments unknowingly or may overcompensate by being way too nice. Likewise, whites don't always trust the black community. They sometimes feel that they'll be taken to task for using the term "black" or "African-American" - they often don't know which words to use or what's safe to say so they just don't say anything. It's ridiculous that the concept of race is stifling our community growth, particularly when we are the group who knows best that there is only one race - the human race - yet I think we are afraid to come together and be honest with each other.

Lack of open, honest communication between us can destroy our communities and our movement. We're never going to learn how to come together comfortably and meet our goals if we are afraid and suspicious of one another. Certainly, we need to be as sensitive as possible to the needs and feelings of others in our group. But we must also individually take responsibility for our feelings and our reactions to others. Rather than falling into the trap of tearing out each other's throats, we need to start asking more questions and actually listening to the responses.

Rebeccagate can become an awesome opportunity for us all to learn how to honestly discuss tough issues but it's not going to happen if we're set on transforming the ones who disagree with us into enemies. So many theists do that to us already - let's not do that to each other.

Coming and Going

2011-06-30T10:48:00.000-05:00

I've been sick with a cold or something for the past several days so I've been resting as much as possible. My goal has been to get well enough to travel this weekend because we have plans to go to the Lake Hypatia event in Talladega, AL, which is sponsored by the Alabama Freethought Association. So if you don't hear from me over the next couple of days, you'll know we're living it up in Alabama and that I've probably *finally* got to meet Dan Barker, Annie Laurie Gaylor, and many other wonderful freethinkers.

Have a safe and happy 4th if you're an American and, if you aren't, have a safe and happy weekend anyway!

How Mississippi Fails

2011-06-21T00:43:00.000-05:00

I've complained for a long time about the South in general and Mississippi in particular. People who have escaped this area seem to understand my hostility but the people who live here just can't understand why I'm so critical and negative. They seem to happily ignore the cesspool of ignorance, hatred, and lawlessness that pervades this area. I suspect that this, in large part, is because they are part of the establishment and, therefore, are part of the problem (though I doubt they'd see it this way).

Mississippi is always the last in good legislation and the first to push legislation that is harmful or stupid. Our state rushes to pass "personhood" amendments to protect invisible clumps of cells but it balks at the idea of having anti-discrimination laws in place. We're way more concerned about the products that are "conceived in rape" than anything that is "conceived in liberty." We aren't racist - of course not! we have black friends!! - but you know how they are. They are just different. They don't think like us. They don't act like us. They have *shudder* different values. Don't even get me started on the hatefest for gays and atheists.

A couple Sundays ago, I noticed that a local Dairy Queen restaurant was offering a 10% discount to anyone who brought in a church bulletin that day. Even though I knew this was illegal, I just sighed. No one here seems to care about the law or things like equal access. This Sunday, I noticed that DQ was instead offering "pastor cards" and the Backyard Burger sign next door sported this (as best as I can recall it):

Enjoy our service after your service. Get a free cobbler when you present your church bulletin!

That Civil Rights Act doesn't apply to atheists, I guess. It bothers me that no one sees this for what it is. If you're reading this and you don't feel shocked or angry, then consider for a moment that you might be seeing this from the position of an entrenched majority. What if the sign had said instead:

White people get a free gift with any purchase of $10 or more!

I bet that would get more people to thinking. Not only is the church bulletin idea bad because it caters to Christians but, if you think about it, it especially caters to a particular type of mainstream Protestant. Back when I was a Catholic, we didn't use church bulletins. We didn't need them! So Catholics and other non-traditional Protestants could easily be excluded from this promotion as well as Jews, Muslims, pagans, and atheists. Is it hateful of me to assume that the managers of these restaurants are just too ignorant to even realize that what they are doing is both illegal and unjust?

Speaking of ignorance, the Miss USA pageant had a question about whether evolution should be taught in schools. The answers just reinforced the growing prejudice I have regarding beautiful, skinny women. They all gave their little "personal opinions" as if their opinion was worth a damn to anyone. Let's be honest - Americans are generally more interested in the swimsuit competition than the Q & A. With stupid answers like these, who can blame them? Most of them came across as empty-headed bimbos to me, primping more over their "personal" beliefs and what they "feel" rather than making any kind of reasonable argument. Even the ones who supported the teaching of evolution did it in such a way that it hinged on their beliefs more than on the strengths of the science. These "I believe we need to teach everything" or "we need to let kids make up their own mind" approaches are absolute bullshit.

You do not get to decide what is real and what is not. Your beliefs do not determine reality. And the reality-based scientific community should never be asked to dumb itself down and pretend that majority opinion determines what's true.

Every single simpering ninny on that stage who answered with some variant of these should have been laughed off the stage and right out the door. But no, we don't mind a stupid answer so long as there's a fresh face and some perky tits to back it up. Miss Mississippi really did our stupid population proud with her answer:

"I think evolution should be taught as what it is. It's a theory so I don't think it should be taught as fact but I do think our children should know the theories that are involved in different sciences."

Miss Mississippi is certainly a product of our schools. She doesn't know what a theory is - to her it's just some idea that Darwin dreamed up. I'd just about bet you my last dollar that she's a creationist. Her god said it - she believes it - that settles it. The fact that most of the rest of these ladies didn't do much better makes me despair. Miss New Mexico did the best job in my opinion and even she left a lot to be desired.

Local politics are starting up in these parts. Political speeches are already being given in churches, finishing up with rousing choruses of Amen!. Nobody is going to complain. Nobody is going to do anything. Just like with the prayers given at every graduation ceremony in this area, nobody is going to say a word. They don't give a damn about the law.

Ok, I'm done ranting for now. I just wanted to get that out of my system so I can free up my resources to actually do something worthwhile. If I can keep my face out of my palms long enough, that is. I ought to sit up tonight and write out a year-long lesson plan on the theory of cannibalism that we can teach next year in schools. After all, my beliefs are just as good as anyone else's. We need to present cannibalism in the Health class as an alternative to the FDA's recommended diet and let the kids decide. Right?

Let's Turn Our Hearts Back to the Gods

2011-06-17T12:48:00.001-05:00

Something has to be done about this old world that we live in. Things are just not like they once were back in the days when our fathers and mothers were people of faith. Since we've abandoned the gods who founded our great civilization, we've experienced all kinds of calamity and grief. It's time to turn our hearts back to the gods.

I do not think the increase in dangerous thunderstorms throughout the land is a coincidence. Zeus will not be mocked. We have attempted to harness His lightning and use it to power our cities. Never once do we thank Him. Never once do we acknowledge the source of our electricity. And now He thunders across our skies, hurling His mighty bolts as retribution, calling us all to repentance for our pride. He is our Father and our Lord. We would do well to turn to Him again and hold fast to His ways.

I do not think the increase in tsunamis is a coincidence either. We have carelessly polluted the oceans and poisoned the life therein. We send our ships out into the seas with no sacrifice and no gifts to Lord Poseidon and no appeals for His mercy. How long do we think we can use the waters of this land as if we were their masters? Even as Poseidon was once in the belly of Cronus, so too may we one day be swallowed up the Lord of the Sea if we do not seek to please Him.

I do not think the breakdown of our society is a coincidence. Where once we valued traditional marriage consisting of one man + one woman + several young boys on the side, now we have people engaged in serial monogamy or even championing pure monogamy! Gone are the days of the vestal virgins and even more so are gone the days of the temple prostitutes. Where once we showed honor to Aphrodite through our enjoyment of pleasure with the young men and women for hire, now we banish them from our land. How our churches have fallen down on the job! They should be places of joy, not eternal grief. They should be places of passion and not sterility.

I do not think the problem of famine is a coincidence. People all over the world are starving when they should be enjoying the bounty of the earth. But without the proper sacrifices to Demeter and Artemis, how can we expect the land to yield its produce or the hunt to be maintained? In days gone by, our fathers and mothers honored the Lady by planting their own gardens and hunting for food - not this sacrilegious task of making a list and going to a store. If we want to return to traditional values and please the gods, we need to return to home gardening and canning at the very least. I fear we will have to water the crops with the blood of many human sacrifices to make restoration but that is the price of turning from the one true path.

Likewise, we have forsaken our god Dionysus with the counties of some states even choosing to ban His precious gift of alcohol! How can we expect bounty and blessing when we do not drink of His blessed vine or give praise to Him through the revels? How could we be so heartless when the Lord Dionysus died and was reborn for us? He is our personal savior.

Clearly, the time has come for us to get right with the gods again. Perhaps if we start now, it is not too late to receive their blessings again. Perhaps once again Zeus will walk among us and rape our women instead of destroying our cities with His divine wrath.

I sit here, watching Him hurl his thunderbolts across the sky furiously, and I pray that America will wake up before it's too late. But I also sit here somewhat content, knowing that no matter what happens, my heart is right with the gods and that my Father Zeus, by His awesome display in the night skies, is still in control.

The Power of Blood (and other irritations)

2011-06-15T00:47:00.000-05:00

I spend more time at the doctor's office than I wish to - it's one of the consequences of being a compliant bipolar patient. Today's visit confirmed a growing suspicion in my mind, the unquiet realization that delusion is so entrenched in this area that I will not live long enough to see it loose its stranglehold and so must suffer its stings throughout the rest of my life.

Yes, I'm feeling particularly pessimistic and irritable today.

After my first ER visit in February, I've become more observant when I'm in these medical clinics and hospitals. On the night of my nosebleed, I noticed with a great deal of concern that nobody seemed to care that I was gushing blood uncontrollably. The desk staff was so worried about me signing in that they didn't offer me a glove or a tissue until I complained. Was this an isolated incident?

Now it seems that was not the case. Today I found a bit of blood spattered on the exam room floor and bloody tissues and gloves in the regular trash right beside the examination table. I had always thought contaminated items should be placed in the red bags on the bins marked "biohazard" and blood spills were to be cleaned up immediately. Either I am wrong or the staff did not bother to follow that procedure.

My confidence plunged even further as I noticed the gospel CDs, religious poems and verses plastered to the walls of nurses' offices, and the Bibles stacked in the waiting room. The medical "professionals" of this office appeared to be more concerned with the "power in the blood" of Jesus than the power of someone else's blood to transmit disease.

I spotted junk emails, one printed out boasting an all-caps warning. I recognized it immediately as one of those tired old hoaxes, this one at least ten years old, that has been debunked on Snopes for ages now. Is this what passes for truth among these "professional" people?

I do not doubt the sincerity of these people. I don't fully question their competence either since they have always been professional enough not to bring up religion in the exam room. But I do wonder how such irrationality can find a home in such otherwise intelligent minds. And I wonder, I even fear to know, what other safety procedures are being half-done or not done at all. It's not like I have the option to go somewhere else. I have no insurance and no job so I can't simply choose to go to an office that is more professional or in which I feel safer. I have to take what I can get because I'm poor. I laugh now as I consider that the free market costs too much for someone in my shoes.

Every day I feel more suspicious and more paranoid. Where once I gave people the benefit of the doubt, I now see dark purpose in everything. I'm reminded of the bumper sticker that says, "Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get you." I wonder how much of my suspicion is justified and how much is my illness. In some cases, I do not have enough information to judge rationally. In other cases, I have so much information that I cannot sort it all out.

Which brings me to my next sinister conclusion. I have wondered for many years now if public education has not made us contemptuous of knowledge. How easily knowledge has been gained over the past century in free public schools. It's far different from the day when knowledge had to be sought out and those who kept the secrets of such wisdom were revered. In the past it was a great honor to be a seeker of knowledge. Today, everyone in America is forced to endure 12 years of instruction, learning more "facts" and "figures" than the people of antiquity could have ever imagined, and yet for all those facts, few ever learn how to reason. Now in the Age of the Internet, we can access even more information. It is all right there - almost for free - waiting to be had. There is no great sacrifice now to gain information and if one does not know how to ascertain good info from bad info, one is left to the mercy of what one wishes to believe (which usually has little to do with the truth).

There was a time when we were slaves to knowledge. We searched for it, praised those who had it, and appreciated the work it took to find it. Today, knowledge has been made slaves to us and we ride roughshod over it because we do not have to work hard to attain it. Knowledge has given us the ability to transmit our words across the globe in seconds. Knowledge has given us the ability to fly through the air safely and in comfort. Knowledge has given us the power to snatch people back from the eternal chill of death and to unnaturally prolong our lives. Yet we do not understand it - we do not care to understand it. We think we do not need to understand. We are content to let others do our "heavy lifting" while we sit back and enjoy the comforts of our slave kingdom. So long as the lights come on when we flip the switch and the thing comes to life when we press a button, we simply do not care.

What happens to people who carelessly wield a weapon that they do not understand? How long can a child brandish an assault rifle before he blows off his own face or that of another innocent? Does this explain how 21st century medical professionals - people who often wield the power of life and death - can be more obsessed with the power of the blood of a mythical god-man to save a soul than the power of human blood to contaminate and cause harm?

Is this all just the beginnings of hypomania? I'm losing my ability to discern one from the other.

My Parents & Their Propaganda

2011-06-11T00:34:00.000-05:00

I spent a few hours with my family tonight and, while I was helping my father with some stuff, I saw some of the Sunday School material he had printed out for his upcoming class. My sister and I had discussed just last night that my parents' church (which was a Missionary Baptist church when I was a child) is full-out Southern Baptist now and I mentioned how most of their material comes from Nashville and is all approved by the SBC. She mentioned that Lifeway Bookstores are pretty much just distributors of SBC propaganda as well. Sure enough, the copyright at the bottom of dad's pages was Lifeway. I read that first page with interest.

The story was about a Baptist who met a guy claiming to be a "pagan" who told the Baptist emphatically that he wasn't interested in the Christian religion. According to the story, the "pagan" had been heavily influenced by "secular" and "humanistic" philosophies. This had caused him to lead a life that, according to the literature, just didn't measure up to the standards of a holy god. From there, the story rambled on about sin and how awful it was that society didn't want to hear about it any more. I was unable to read further without attracting attention - something I definitely did not want to do.

It's hard to know how to speak candidly about religion with people who play fast and loose with words like this. The Lifeway piece uses the words pagan, secular, and humanistic as if they are all the same when they most definitely are not. Of course, I can't say for sure but I suspect they use these words interchangeably because they do not care about the actual meanings and they gain a lot by convincing Baptists that all non-Christians can be lumped into one evil group. It makes the whole business of convincing a powerful majority that they are a persecuted minority so much easier.

Consider how difficult it would be for me to come out to my parents as an atheist when they can't even grasp what a secular humanist is. To them, such a person is just like a pagan and their conception of pagans is driven by the Bible (and this kind of propaganda) as being wild hedonists who have orgies and promote child sacrifice. My job in convincing them that I'm just a decent person like anyone else is made ten times harder because of these sloppy stories distributed by the Southern Baptist Convention.

I guess the greatest irony of this is that my parents read this propaganda every week - they let it shape their thoughts and frame their discussions of the Bible and morality - and yet are more like the thing they fear than I am. After all, who is more like their concept of a pagan: the blood-cult Christian or the atheist who just wants to live and let live? I'm not the one who worships a god that has commanded genocide. I'm not the one who believes that lambs must be killed and blood smeared on the door post for salvation. I'm not the one who believes that the greatest thing in human history was our torture and brutal execution of a man so that we could bathe in his blood and be saved. Yet the SBC says through their propaganda that all of us who don't revel in that blood are wicked sinners who are lost.

I don't think my parents or their friends at church realize how much of this SBC propaganda is being fed to them, including things that aren't actually in the Bible. I wonder if they care. Probably not because the one time I asked my mom why she support the SBC and some of their horrid statements, she claimed she did not. She wanted to deny the fact that part of her monthly tithe goes to support their work which is largely anti-gay and anti-woman. In her mind, everything she gives and everything she learns comes from her "little church" that she loves. I don't think she would dare look at any of that literature critically and I'm sure she wouldn't say a word about it to anyone if she did. As for my dad, I've never seen anyone rationalize the irrational as well as he does. He's a very intelligent man but he honestly just turns his skepticism off when it comes to his religion.

I keep asking myself why I put up with all this and why I keep playing out this charade with them. It's true that I'm afraid of losing what little of a relationship I have with them but it's also true that I love them. I don't want to hurt them. Yet I can't help but feel like the time for truth is rapidly approaching. How in the world do you reason with people who are mired so deep in this stuff? Perhaps it cannot be done. Perhaps the best I could ever hope for is that we would agree to disagree.

Why Do Skeptics Suck?

2011-06-09T18:28:00.000-05:00

Have you ever thought about why skepticism is so unpopular - even in America? We all know that nobody loves a "killjoy" or a dasher of hopes and dreams. Isn't that how skeptics are often perceived?

Unfortunately, the answer to that is a resounding, "Yes!" People often have this image of skeptics (of any stripe) as being grumpy, miserable, pessimistic, gloomy people who want nothing more than to rob everyone else of any joy so they can feel equally awful.

Hollywood does not help the skeptic's case at all. The skeptic in most thriller or disaster films is always some flaming jerk, usually not very good looking, almost always male, and a complete prick. He refuses to entertain anything the protagonist (usually a good looking guy or gal) says, goes out of his way to thwart their investigations, and, if presented with solid evidence, will stick his fingers in his ears and yell "la-la-la" until the good guys walk away in disgust. He's the guy that almost always causes the destruction of the world and, ultimately, ends up dead because he didn't listen to reason.

People who behave like that are not skeptics - they are deniers. There is a big difference but the general populace does not understand that.

A skeptic will look at the evidence presented before making a judgment. A skeptic is more interested in the process than the outcome. A skeptic is able and willing to change his mind when the evidence demands it.

A denier, however, does not care about the evidence. A denier will jump through ten thousand mental hoops to keep from having to change his or her mind. A denier will do anything to ensure the outcome without regard to the process used.

Because this misunderstanding and negative stereotype is so pervasive, I am very glad to see more people announcing themselves publicly as "skeptics." It's a word that we need to proudly reclaim. It's a word that can change the future, transform the upcoming generations into people of process rather than people of outcomes. It's a word that can unite and heal us because it allows for disagreement and encourages us to work together to find more evidence rather than tear each other apart for an already-determined conclusion.

People think that skeptics (and their skepticism) suck because they've forgotten what the word really means. I argue that skeptics (and their skepticism) are great fun and have the most efficient way to find the truth. What's my evidence? Well, going back to entertainment, let me ask this: do people generally enjoy stories like those presented in Scooby Doo, Sherlock Holmes, Law & Order, etc.? Of course they do! Everyone loves a good mystery and a skeptic's life is all about solving mysteries. It's about engaging the wonderful, the marvellous, the mysterious - not ignoring it - and discovering the secrets.

Skeptics need to reclaim and repackage the word. We need to show the world that we are lovers of truth and mystery as opposed to the deniers of Hollywood movies who are sad sacks. I see a lot of prominent people doing that and it makes me happy and hopeful for the future. Everybody has a little skepticism in them somewhere. When we teach people the value of it and the great joy that can come from working together to separate fact from fiction, then I think the world will stop thinking that skeptics just suck.

Weekly WorldNut: So Very Persecuted

2011-06-07T01:36:00.000-05:00

This week has seen a plethora of stupid and crazy from the WND site so I thought I'd try to hit the highlights to bring you all up to speed.

First, WND readers are super-pissed at Facebook because, supposedly, Facebook is run by a bunch of lefty fascists who are singling out Christian and conservative groups to be archived. Never mind that many of the "lefty" groups I subscribed to are being treated the exact same way, this is an obvious persecution of conservative Christians in their mind (or what passes for one). The most ironic thing here is that WND, the tea party's darling of websites, is supposed to worship at the altar of private ownership and the free market. That means they should be just fine with Facebook discriminating against anyone they wish. But, of course, WND is not ok with that when there is money to be made from martyrdom.

One poor persecuted writer suggests this:

I have said on there that we need to create a social networking site for conservatives and Christians to be able to communicate, without the threat of deletion because our views don't fall in lock-step with the leftist agenda of Facebook...

We need a place where we can get together without having to be around "them"; the leftist trolls on there prove yet again why they are not like us and why we should separate from them.

Normally, I am against comments such as, "If you don't like it, just leave!" but in this case perhaps it is warranted. If your mind is so twisted into a martyr complex that you can't tell up from down and you get so butt-hurt every time someone disagrees with some tripe you've posted and you want to leave, then just do so. Nobody's stopping you. I'd be glad to see people stop posting ignorant stuff on Facebook even though it would leave me scrambling to find something else here to write about.

The second whine on WND I thought I'd address regards the Medina Valley High School's insistence to break the law and have a tent revival-style meeting instead of secular commencement exercises. Apparently, the first lesson we want our graduates to take out into the real world with them is that it's fine to break the law as long as you have the numbers to shout down any dissent.

Writer David Caldwell believes that Christians are being "assaulted" by secular forces that are determined to steal his freedom. He uses a lot of war language in his letter because, in his mind, we are indeed at war. He says,

I know that the forces of evil will continue to act against Christians and against the Hebrew people, and that those forces will ultimately fail in the end. But in this battle, we have shown these forces a small sample of the victory yet to come.

I had no idea that respecting the First Amendment, obeying years of established law, and preserving the rights of all citizens to be free from government coercion meant I was part of the "forces of evil." Certainly, I stand chastened and rebuked!

No, the sad truth is that Mr. Caldwell and people like him seem to know fuck-all about how the law works and why it's important. They think this country is blessed because we're "free" to be Christian theocrats. They don't understand how democracy works and that's why they cheerfully undermine it by using government power to promote their religious beliefs. Twenty years ago, I could sympathize with them. Hell, I might would have been one of them because I too was raised to believe that spiritual warfare was real and America was a Christian nation. But in this age of Google where information is quite literally at your fingertips, there is no excuse for ignorance. That's why I cut people like Caldwell, Angela Hildenbrand, and the idiots at Bastrop High in Louisiana no slack. They broke the law - willingly and with glee. And as Dark Matter 2525 says here (and I've been saying for years), according to Jesus, they are hypocrites of the worst kind.

Before you take me to task, yes, I know the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, in typical schizophrenic fashion, ignored precedent and went against their own ruling from 2000 to say it was ok. Best I can tell, their decision conflicts with previous Supreme Court rulings which makes it null and void (IANAL so if you know better, correct me). My point is that Hildenbrand and all the other godbots (that's what they are because they do not obey Jesus and would rather be seen of men) should have never filed suit to begin with. They should have never tried to disobey the law to begin with. Shame on them. Shame on every single one of them - especially those who felt that hooting and hollering like a bunch of monkeys somehow made them more holy.

Why am I fussing about this all the time? I've seen some concern trolls tell us that we're wasting our time, just making people mad at us, and that we've got better things to fight about. I totally disagree. What could be more important than preserving our Bill of Rights? And when you consider the Supreme Court's also schizophrenic rulings about the Ten Commandments monument in Texas vs the one in Kentucky, you must note that the reason given for allowing the one in Texas to stand was basically because, "Nobody's complained until now." That's why we can't afford to sit by quietly and let the mob run right over those of us who support the First Amendment.

Take a look at this:

This is a program from a typical graduation here in Mississippi. Note that there is an invocation given despite the fact that it's illegal. THIS IS THE RULE - NOT THE EXCEPTION HERE. Yet no one complains and I cannot complain. Why? First, because I do not have a child in that school district. But also I cannot complain even though I am a taxpayer because the courts now use the issue of "standing" to avoid cases that they don't have the balls to rule on. That's why it's vital that those who can complain should do so.

But back to my original point, the godbots say that they are the ones who are persecuted. How can any thinking person believe that? How can anyone who has enough sense not to walk out in traffic fail to understand the difference between government speech to captive audiences and private free expression? It takes a seriously programmed mind to not be able to understand it, I think. To these people, we are evil - and it's not just atheists but any Christians who support church/state separation too. All of us are evil and trying to persecute them for daring to suggest that they not be allowed to hijack public institutions to promote their particular brand of dogma. I think atheists and Christians (and anyone else) should proudly work together to keep church and state separate!

Last I'd like to quote a Muslim who took WND to task for calling Allah a "demon-god" in one of their articles. I guess Allah can't come down and defend himself any better than Yahweh can. Poor guys! Writer Abdullah Williams says:

If you believe what you post, then you might be retarded. If not, then it is evil of you to deliberately lie about God Almighty. Allah is the Arabic word for God.

I think you know that, and if I am right I hope Allah burns you in hell for your evil lies.

Yes, Muslims can dish it out just as well as the Christian theocrats, it seems, and they don't take it any better when it's dished back out at them. It would be funny to see them bickering back and forth, wishing doom and hellfire on each other over their imaginary, offended gods except for all the blood that's been shed over the centuries (and continues to be shed now) because of it. It's way past time for you guys to grow up and join us in the 21st century.

So, that's our week in WND. Just remember that these people are real, they vote, and they spread their dogma as much as they can. And before you start feeling too afraid for us atheists, do remember that they'll come after you if you aren't the right sort of believer too. Because they aren't interested in your "sweet Jesus meek and mild" and they aren't interested in you. They worship a warrior god who is coming back on a white horse to punish everyone else and take them to glory. Be very afraid.

Stigmatize Me!

2011-06-05T23:48:00.000-05:00

I've been thinking lately about ways in which I have been stigmatized by society. Now I didn't do this as some sort of "poor me" sympathy exercise but instead to see ways in which Americans, including the atheist and liberal communities, look down on people who are different. I think we still have a long way to go before erase these prejudices and, furthermore, I wonder what prejudices I still have that I am blind to.

The biggest mark against me, by far, is my atheism. I don't think it should be a big deal that I believe in one less god than the people around me and yet it is of monumental importance. Because I don't believe in any gods, I am automatically assumed by many (many, not some) to be evil, immoral, harmful to society, dangerous to kids, unpatriotic, unhealthy, arrogant, insulting, unworthy, unwanted, unreliable, violent and stupid. Let that sink for a minute. If you'll forgive the pun, that's an awfully big cross for anyone to bear. Coming out as an atheist in my area is tantamount to social suicide.

Another mark against me is that I am bisexual. Even though I have pretty much settled into a heterosexual lifestyle, people would consider me "nasty" and "deviant" if they knew that I am also attracted to women and have, on occasion, acted on those desires. I don't go around making my sexual exploits public but I do have to be careful about the things I say or the causes I support lest someone make the connection - as if it had any effect on their lives at all.

Another mark against me is that I subscribe to left-leaning politics, enough so that I can probably safely be classified as a "liberal" now even though I've not normally used that term. As we all know from the book title, "Liberalism Is a Mental Disorder" to some people and, certainly here in the South, liberals are considered to be lazy, bleeding-heart socialists who want to control the world (even my dad buys into the idea that our current economic problems are the result of an attempted socialist takeover). Never mind that my views are quite nuanced and I absolutely do not tow the Democrat party line at all. Never mind that I think socialism is an interesting prospect small-scale but would probably fail dismally on a large scale. Never mind that I support rational policy based on the greatest freedom and the least harm possible and am a huge champion of the Bill of Rights - I'm a communist nazi liberal...whatever that means.

Another stigma is being officially mentally ill. Because I am bipolar and I've spent time in prison and mental hospitals, I am naturally unreliable to the rest of the world. I'm not a good candidate for any job - I would cost them too much in insurance and sick leave. They'd have to work around my therapy and possibly make provisions for me to sit in an area that isn't so loud and distracting. They might have to watch me lest I go nuts one day and hurt someone (though I have never attempted to do violence to anyone). Because we all know that mentally ill people are more violent, right? Actually, no...but who cares? There are people here in Mississippi who actually believe that most mentally ill people are faking it for checks and they heartily resent that their tax dollars are supporting disability and medication for them.

Those are the prejudices I see in America, particularly here in the South. But lest we get complacent and think that the atheist and liberal communities are somehow more enlightened, here are some things I've seen in these camps.

I am stigmatized because I am female. Yes, women tend to see greater equality in atheist and liberal circles but there is still much work to be done. I have noticed, especially in liberal YouTube videos, that male commenters often leave very sexist, crude remarks about women in general. There still seems to be a lot of guys out there who think all women are gold-diggers, whiners, cheats, and man-haters and I know that there are women out there who do these things. I don't deny that. But to lump all of us in that category is insulting. By all means, point out the women who actually do those things - hold them accountable - but don't claim that we all act that way. We do not! Furthermore, people still tend to value a woman for her looks rather than her intellect or attitude. The atheist and liberal communities are not exempt - many times commenters will talk about how hot a girl is and not about the content of her video. As I've said before, I appreciate a beautiful female as much as any guy could but come on. Can we really do no better than that?

And that leads me to my next point. Another mark against me is because I'm overweight. There's just no place in this world for overweight women except, perhaps, as an object of scorn and ridicule. People still buy into the idea that fat people must necessarily be lazy, sitting around all day scarfing down donuts, chips, and candy nonstop. Never mind that genes do play some role. Never mind that studies suggest our gut flora might play some role. Never mind that many women take birth control which can cause significant weight gain (I gained 70 pounds in 6 months when I first got on it - yet I was eating normally and walking every day). Never mind that many women are on anti-depressants which can also pack on pounds. No, all of us fat slobs are just lazy and no good to hear some people tell it. But even if we were lazy, so what? Does that mean we have nothing valuable to say? Does that mean that we have no worth? You'd think so to look at the comments on articles and videos on the subject. The take-home message I keep getting is that women are valuable only if they are "sexy" and you can't be sexy (and therefore valuable) if you're overweight.

I've thought several times about making a YouTube channel when I finally come out atheist. Maybe I'd make two channels - one for atheism and another for mental illness. But after reading what people write about women, I don't think I want to subject myself to that ridicule. I want people to evaluate and critique my arguments - not my looks. I know what I look like. I know my strengths and weaknesses. I don't need something so stupid and superficial to be the focus of a YouTube discussion. And so I sit here and continue to write.

These are just my observations. If you have opinions, I wish you'd share them. Same or different, doesn't matter to me. I'd just like to see some discussion on the subject.

Stigma of Mental Illness - Video

2011-06-04T13:59:00.000-05:00

For those of you who are mentally ill or someone you love is mentally ill, you probably understand a great deal about how much these illnesses are stigmatized in society. The following video from Fora.tv provides an interesting look at this stigma and things we can do to change that. If you have about an hour to listen, it's well worth the time. This psychiatrist's (or is he a psychologist? I forget) father was incorrectly diagnosed with schizophrenia years ago and turned out to have bipolar disorder instead so he knows firsthand what it's like.

Perhaps I will post some of my own views about this later tonight or tomorrow. But for now let me recommend Fora.tv as a great place to find videos on all kinds of scientific issues. Have fun!

The Price of Atheism

2011-06-02T00:20:00.000-05:00

A couple days ago I wrote a post in which I described a recent falling out between my mom and my sister. I encourage you to read that first in order to get the context.

Today my sister called me to talk about the situation. She did not call me to pump me for information or to persuade me to be on her side. She called to tell me that she wanted to talk to my mom and get things resolved but she wasn't sure how best to proceed. She wanted to know my opinion, based on my experience, on how best to approach our "borderline-ish" mother.

Apparently, Mom had blown up my sister's Facebook page publicly and ripped her a new one. One of them deleted the post before I (and hopefully anyone else) ever saw it but my sister is afraid that word of this whole affair might be public now. Since her father-in-law is heavily into local politics, that would not be good advertisement. Plus, it sucks to have your private dirty laundry aired in public for the gluttonous masses.

Since I had already decided not to take sides in something that was not really my business, I simply said that I thought it was important to approach Mom as an adult and to act calmly and rationally no matter how she responded. Ultimately, my mother has to be responsible for her (re)actions and I think when she sees that her fits aren't working, she will calm down and start responding in a more adult manner.

During this conversation, I casually mentioned that I sympathized with my sister's discomfort because I knew I was always one question away from being treated in like manner and, quite possibly, disowned. My sister immediately knew what I was talking about (being an atheist - even though she could never bring herself to say the dreaded A-word) and commented that Mom didn't want to know the truth because she had already been told. I was surprised by this and asked what she meant. This is apparently what happened:

One of my cousins (probably the one who deleted my comment off his FB page) was looking at my page one day and saw where I'd liked something or linked to something that had to do with atheism. So he ran to tell his mama on me and she ran to my mama to tell on me. I kid you not.

Now I've double-checked my FB page and, yes, I do have likes to Dawkins, Hitchens, and some other people but I don't have any likes that are specifically tied to atheism. So I don't know what is on there that tipped my cousin off.

But more importantly, I don't know why this was any of their damned business and why they felt the need to run to my mother spreading rumors. And then my mother, not to be outdone, doesn't come and ask me directly. No, she might not get the answer she wants if she does that. So she goes to my sister and asks her instead. My sister had no intention of outing me and told her that she and I don't discuss such things (which, for the most part, we don't - it's not an issue in our relationship).

So now I am extremely angry with my cousins for being whiny little tattletales and I'm ill with my mom for being such a bigot. I was informed that my mom could handle me coming out gay better than she could me coming out as an atheist. Judging from how my mom acts, she can't handle anyone believing or doing anything differently from what she approves of.

My first inclination during my spat of righteous anger was to just get on Facebook and make a post saying something like this:

NOTICE: Since some of you have been getting into my business and talking about me behind my back, I want to set the record straight. I believe in one less god than you do. Yes, I am an atheist. I've never made a big deal about it - some of you chose to do that and you ought to be ashamed of yourselves. I've never asked a single one of you to change before I'd accept you but you think I have to believe like you or else I'm no good. Well, the defriend button is up there and, if you can't accept me like I am, I suggest you USE IT because you are not worthy of my friendship if you think like that. If you have any comment to make about it, post it here to my face instead of gossiping to everyone else. Thanks.

Of course, I didn't do that. I realized that if I did such a thing right now, this would only infuriate my mother and she'd accuse my sister and me of ganging up on her. She'd go into full histrionics and the situation would be much worse. I won't do that to my sister. I won't make this mess about me.

But here, in the privacy of my own blog, it is about me and I am pissed off. Never have I wanted to come out more than I do right now. I want to draw that line in the sand and let everyone who decides to hate me be damned. I'm ready right now to risk everyone's disapproval, to risk my parents' disowning me, to risk absolute disaster because I'm sick and tired of having to hide my words and thoughts. I'm fed up with not being able to be myself. I no longer want to be the only adult in the room - the only one who ever has to keep quiet so as not to upset anyone.

I'm almost 40 years old and my own parents don't even know the truth about me. That's the price of my atheism - that I must live a lie and let others love the image of me that they've created and not the real person who is crying out for just a little bit of tolerance.

Just a little bit - is that too much to ask from people who claim to follow Christ? Is it too much to ask from a religion of peace? Is it too much to ask from a country where people are supposed to be free to worship or not as they see fit?

Apparently so. Apparently, I'm asking for too much. It may be true that I don't owe my outing to anyone but I think I do owe it to myself. I'm really reaching the point where I can't stay quiet much longer. I need some direction, some grounding....before I absolutely explode.

I Have Questions!

2011-06-01T03:55:00.000-05:00

I have questions about this:

Why do they put this picture in every exam room? Is it really necessary? I mean, if you've gone to school for 2-8 years, I expect you know what pain looks like without consulting this graphic. If you're a doctor and you don't know what a pain face looks like, perhaps you aren't the doctor for me.

Also, why bother putting this in rooms when nobody seems to care anyway? I could go in with severe pain, making faces far worse than #5 (have you ever seen me scream?), and I'd have a snowball's chance in hell of getting pain meds. Illicit trade in prescription drugs is so bad in Mississippi that faking for drugs is apparently the rule now - not the exception - and so medical personnel seem to automatically assume that a pain face equals a sinister ploy to get a prescription for profit.

I have questions about this:

Image: Ambro / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Why is it that Pentecostals don't get the "holy ghost" at work, at the restaurant, or anywhere else where it's not socially acceptable? It's like the Spirit isn't going to show up somewhere if the believer might be in danger of getting laughed out of the room. If all these "gifts" and "signs" of the spirit are supposed to be there to prove Jesus to us unbelievers, then why do Pentecostals do these things when they are mostly out of sight?

And have you ever noticed that the Pentecostal speaking in tongues of "shalalalalala" sounds (to the untrained ear) an awful lot like Islamic prayers?

I have questions about this:

These magazines that are in the gray binders in every office: some of them say on the back that removing the binder from its designated area may cause an alarm to go off. Really? Is this month's issue of Good Housekeeping so critically important that you need to set up an alarm in case someone takes it to the break room or, god forbid, takes it home? Why are these magazines so well protected but our patient records and personnel files do not have such stringent security, often relying solely upon a lock and key?

Anyone who can shed some light on these subjects is welcome to comment.

The Price of Religion

2011-05-30T00:42:00.000-05:00

Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. And a man's foes shall be they of his own household. - Matthew 10: 34-36

As I have mentioned before, my entire family is Christian except for me. However, my sister changed denominations a while after she married from Southern Baptist to Church of Christ. The family took the conversion rather better than I expected even though the two groups take a very different view on the importance of baptism. The Southern Baptist generally think baptism is only a symbol of salvation whereas the Church of Christ considers it essential for salvation (i.e. if you aren't baptized, you aren't saved). You'd think that would be the other way around but never mind.

My sister told me a couple weeks ago that she wasn't going to let my nephew go to Vacation Bible School at my mom's church this summer. Apparently, last summer's indoctrination contained some denomination-specific things that the CoC doesn't agree with. My nephew, being an inquisitive and intelligent child, came home with a lot of questions. I'm not sure why this made my normally tolerant sister upset (perhaps it upset her husband?) but it did. So it was a great surprise for me to hear last night that my mom was planning to take my nephew next week. He was really looking forward to it so I assumed my sister had changed her mind.

How wrong I was! I got a note from my mom today and she was well pissed. Apparently, my sister dropped the bomb today (the day before it starts) that he would not be allowed to go. To say that my mom is furious would be an understatement. In her usual histrionic fashion, she has declared that she is "done with" my sister and my sister's in-laws as well. Mom is talking about tearing up stuff they have given her and never speaking to any of them again. I think it's safe to say that 99% of that is drama and won't last but I do believe she is genuinely angry and feels betrayed. Having this sprung on her at the last minute probably didn't help.

I'm caught in the middle, of course, or would be if I allowed such a thing to happen. I think the whole argument is stupid. Why would a family tear itself apart over something imaginary and foolish like this? How does any of this benefit the child? Are questions so dangerous that we must boycott certain events? If so, why not boycott certain people too?

In this scenario, everyone loses. My mom and my sister are in danger of losing their relationship. My nephew is in danger of losing time with my mom and his ability to choose what activities he wants to pursue (he's old enough, in my opinion, to start making some of these choices). I could lose goodwill and relationships also if I get involved.

My family thinks that they are pretty enlightened and tolerant people. Perhaps they are compared to the mainstream around here but they are letting their emotions run away with them. They are willing to break up our family over a question of what happens when you're dunked in holy water. Really - it's that stupid! Imagine explaining this to someone.

Neighbor: Oh, hi, Jane. How's your mom and dad doing?

Jane: I don't know. We've not been in touch for several years. There was a falling out in the family.

Neighbor: Oh, I'm so sorry! How terrible!! Do you mind me asking what happened? I mean, I've known you all for years and your folks are such good people.

Jane: Well, we had this argument about whether you have to be submerged in water or not before you're saved.

Neighbor: Wha....?

Jane: Yeah, they say it's not absolutely necessary but I know it is. Otherwise, the magic doesn't take.

This is the price of religion - even the ones that claim to be the most peaceful. Sooner or later, something will be said or done that doesn't agree with a particular dogma and somebody will get all bent out of shape. Even Jesus knew this and said so - at least he was honest.

It's Just One of Those Days

2011-05-28T04:23:00.000-05:00

As a person with rapid cycling bipolar disorder, I never know for sure what the next day will hold for me. I can watch the trends and judge with some accuracy in which direction things are most likely to be sliding but there are no guarantees.

Today is just one of those days when I woke up feeling awful. I have zero energy. I don't feel like I've ever done anything good and I have no chance of ever doing anything worthwhile in the future. I feel like today is the worst day of my life even though I know there have been many days in the past that were a million times worse. I feel like everyone is magically aware of my depression and that they are sitting around talking about how worthless I am. I would probably be able to see the imaginary scorn and disgust on their faces if I had been able to leave the house today.

This is how I feel and I'm sure you realize that what I feel is very different from what's probably true. But the nasty thing about depression is that the longer it sticks around, the more compelling it becomes until you start believing its lies.

Let's hope tomorrow is better.

Weekly WorldNut: We Have a Winner!

2011-05-26T23:39:00.000-05:00

I must confess that I'm a bit lazy today and I have other things that I need to do. So I'm not going to write about some of the things that have been twirling through my mind lately but rather share something with you that I think everyone ought to read.

Just as a broken clock is right twice a day, so too do people who often hold outrageously ludicrous beliefs in some areas find themselves correct on other matters. So while I do not share the beliefs of this letter writer as far as theism and religion go, I must applaud him on his solid understanding of church/state separation and why it benefits us all.

I hope you'll take the time to read this gentleman's letter. It is well-written and right on the money. I can only wish that the rest of the nutty crowd at WND will read and take note.

Facebook Fury: I AM LAZY!

2011-05-25T00:45:00.000-05:00

Someone was kind enough to send me a test on Facebook to see if I'm worthy enough to be considered a good citizen. Here's the test:

Whoa there, Blue! You're blinding me with those caps! Now before I get into the meat of the matter, let me say that I know this person somewhat and he has served his country and paid his dues. I do not question his patriotism or his loyalty to America.

What I do question is his understanding. I question whether he really gave any thought to this before he posted it and I keep leaning heavily toward the negative. And I wonder why, after so many years of dedicated service and after being in the trenches where it really mattered, he would blindly advocate this armchair activism.

Because, my friends, this is not an incitement to be a good citizen nor a patriot. It is not an encouragement to stand up and be counted, to ask the tough questions, to make sacrifices, and to do anything that might move us into a better future.

This is a call to do nothing. To be lazy. To assume the position of the status quo.

It is to blindly recite what you're told to like a good slave.

It is to swear loyalty to a piece of cloth, to a corrupt government, to an apathetic people.

It is to violate the Bill of Rights by asserting that this government will bow to a tyrannical god and, if you don't like it, the mob will say it louder and LOUDER and

LOUDER

until you submit. Because, in the end, you will submit or else you won't be counted as one of us.

Indivisible, my ass. Our country has been fractured since before the Civil War and time has not healed those wounds. Instead, they have grown deeper and the infection has set in.

With Liberty and Justice for all - except those who question, those who doubt, those who do not blindly repost.

You can have all the liberty and justice you want so long as you think and do as we say.

Yahweh (and we all know that's the only god they are talking about) does not deserve respect. He deserves eternal scorn for his wickedness in the same way that Voldemort does.

Our country does not deserve respect. We don't even try to live up to our ideals any more. We're more interested in American Idol than the American Constitution. We've sat around and given our freedom away to politicians and corporations that just want more, more, more..... We interfere in other countries, trying to police the world, when we cannot even properly govern ourselves.

The flag doesn't deserve respect. It's nothing more than fabric. It is an idol that we wrap ourselves in when we need to present ourselves as good patriots. It's an idol that we grovel to when we want something from it.

The military doesn't deserve our respect. Not as an entity. It has become nothing more than the strong arm of a corrupt government. It's a huge tragedy that our servicemen and women are being used to promote special interests instead of the American people. It's our shame that we have used these individuals up and we don't even demand the right to see the caskets - the high costs paid so we could sit around and be ignorant.

This is laziness. We have plenty of that already. We don't need any more.

Instead of posting worthless tripe like this on Facebook, how about posting the Constitution instead? Why not start with the Bill of Rights and post one amendment each day? Start a discussion and don't delete comments that don't agree with your ideology (like so many of my teabagger family members do). Be a real patriot and research that document, breathe it in again, live it. Love it. Embrace it with all your heart and share it with everybody you know.

Because the Bill of Rights is something worth respecting. It's worth cherishing. It is worth fighting (and maybe dying) for. It's worth pledging my allegiance to it. It's worth promoting and preserving for every single person on this planet.

And that is going to take a hell of a lot more work than simply reposting on Facebook.

Brainwashed in the USA

2011-05-23T00:57:00.000-05:00

The rapture didn't happen as Harold Camping predicted. When news sources finally caught up with him, he claimed he was "flabbergasted." He promised to get back to work Monday and speak on the subject then.

But nobody's going to be listening to Camping any more, right? Now that he has proven to be wrong twice, nobody's going to put any stock in anything he says.

If only that were true! Read the following, very distressing response from one of Camping's followers:

"I'm not as disappointed as everyone since I didn't fully believe him..."

Ok, fair enough. This guy never claimed to be a "true believer." Let's continue. Regarding the 1994 and 2011 failed prophecies, the follower says:

That was strike one, the man said. And this is strike two. Even so, he said, that doesn't mean the message is wrong.

The message was wrong in 1994. The message proved to be wrong again in 2011. Therefore, the message is not wrong. This is "true believer" logic at its best. A brainwashed mind cannot reason correctly. A brainwashed mind will believe that 1 + 1 = 3 if that's what it's told over and over - even when the statement is demonstrably wrong.

"I just know he's biblically sound," the man said. "I've never been one of these guys who think everything he says is true.

How does this make any sense? If he truly believes Camping to be biblically sound, why not believe what he says? And why does he continue to listen to Camping if he doesn't think the man is accurate on these things?

"I don't think I am going to stop listening to him," the man added, heaving a deep sigh before continuing: "I don't know, I gotta listen to him on Monday, see what he says on the radio."

And here we see the hallmark of the brainwashed mind. It cannot think for itself - it must go to the leader for further instructions. Why would anyone seriously listen to Camping on Monday if he proved false on Saturday? Because the brainwashed mind cannot admit it is wrong about the leader and the flawed system of belief.

It's easy to laugh at Camping's marks - especially when, after they've been royally fleeced, they go right back to him. And I think some amount of ridicule is right because that's the only way we're going to get through to people. But we need to remember that we all fall victim to beliefs, schemes, and conjobs at some point in our lives. No one is immune. Without the kind of brutal honesty that it takes to examine ourselves and our motives, we are likely to fall for the same cons over and over again. My goal has become to critically examine myself always and to see where I have fallen for such things and need to change. I hope that at least a few people who have bought into this silly rapture idea - no matter when they think it may occur - will take some time to seriously reconsider.

Because if you think a rapture is coming, you're really being as silly as Camping's crew. I love you all to pieces but it's true.

Maturity

2011-05-21T22:49:00.000-05:00

We spent tonight with my family and, because it is May 21st, something had to come up about the failed rapture. Seems like religion always comes up in shape or form but there's no way today could pass without us zoning in on the "We Can Know" crowd who, apparently, didn't know diddly squat.

I have yet to hear believers demand that we show these people some respect. I have yet to hear believers say, "Well, at least those people have some strong faith" or "Their belief is equally as valid as mine." No, everything I've heard or read from a believer has been full of ridicule and absolute scorn.

Which is as it should be except for one tiny thing...

Those people differ only in degree - not in kind. And the other believers totally fail to recognize that.

As we drove down the highway, my father remarked how he'd heard some foolishness from the "Campbellites" which is what the people belonging to the Churches of Christ used to be called before they got organized enough to gain some legitimacy. My mom talked about how some of her Pentecostal "holy roller" classmates used to mock their own religion because even they knew it was fake. I added that some of my Pentecostal classmates had laughed about making up words and reciting car brands really fast to sound like they were speaking in tongues. I said that I found it interesting that these people ridiculed their own faith practices when they were younger but now that they have children, they are all super-serious.

My father said, "Well, they grew up. They've matured."

I call it "selling out" and if that's what maturity is, I want no part of it.

It's the most common thing in the world for kids down here (who are likely to have no real future because their education is so bad) to graduate, get some piss-ant little slave-wage job, start pumping out kids, and then rediscover their religion. Most of these kids become conservative Republicans at the same time because we all know that's the politics that God prefers. These kids who left school with such hopes and dreams become the same as their parents were - or worse - because they never really had the tools to do anything any different. The establishment certainly does not encourage anything different despite their platitudes and sound-bytes. No child left behind, my ass. Our whole state has been left behind and they want it that way.

I believe that maturity is coming into an understanding that you don't know everything and you never will have all the answers. Maturity is accepting that you can be wrong and you probably are more often than you realize. Maturity is about learning that not everyone is like you and your way isn't always the right one. Maturity is looking dead into the fact that most of what you've always been told is a lie and that truth is hard-won and, all too often, unpopular. Maturity is learning to pick your battles and to be responsible for those outcomes. Maturity is about living up to best of your beliefs regardless of what everyone else is doing.

Maturity is not joining the status quo and being a good little robot like everyone else. It's not about brainwashing your kids into whatever political or religious drama you've got going on. It's not about dressing up nice on Sunday and going out to eat with the cool crowd after church. It's not about praying in public so you can look all holy. It's not about posting prayers and Bible verses on your Facebook page all the time so everyone will call you pious. Maturity is not about calling truth "lies" and embracing lies as "truth." Maturity is certainly not about lying on people because you are a pathetic, sad, nosy, hateful little person who thinks s/he runs the world (nice try, ladies, but you absolutely will not bring me down like that).

Maturity is also not about believers ridiculing the May 21st crowd for their faith in the failed Bible prophecy. Their belief is not more ridiculous or unsupported than the belief of those who think that the rapture will happen on some other undisclosed date. The better word for that action is, perhaps, hypocrisy.

So I must disagree with my dad. My classmates have not matured much over the years. They've hardened, crystallized, calcified into mindless zombies who don't know anything different and have stopped asking questions. They think they have all the answers and, by god, they don't want any <insert insulting term here> coming down here telling them what to do! They have never been out in the world and they are terrified of it. They are damning their kids to the same failed life as they have. And so the cycle continues.....

Maturity is something wholly different. I'll let you know exactly what it looks like when I find it.

We Need a Rapture in Louisiana

2011-05-20T16:42:00.000-05:00

I am ready for tomorrow's rapture because I hope it will take away the most ignorant, ignoble, clown-ass, redneck thugs from amongst us.

School-sponsored prayer is illegal under the First Amendment for what should be obvious reasons. Just as most people don't want the government interfering in their personal lives regarding personal choices, so too should people not want the government telling people when and how to perform their religious duties.

So when a student at Bastrop, Louisiana, asked the school to comply with the law as per the Constitution, you'd think everyone would be happy to do so. Of course not! Instead, they want to treat him like he's some kind of worthless asshole and they seem to be determined to break the law no matter what. Here's some video of the graduation practice held Thursday night:

Whoo wee! Let's scream and shout and holler and jeer! Let's show them here atheist fags how we do thangs here in America! We're gonna pray (and make you listen to it) no matter what because we are TEH MAJORITY.

Many of them really do talk like that. It's sad.

So, yeah, I'm ready for these people to be raptured. I won't miss people like this who care nothing for the law or for their fellow man. They are just a bunch of thugs who think they can impose their will on everyone because they are the majority. With a little googling or a few minutes on reddit, you can easily find where other students and folks in the community are acting like jerks and bigots about the whole thing just because they hate the law.

I won't miss them. Sweet Jesus, just take them own home so the rest of us can get on with trying to restore our democratic republic.

To Bastrop, Louisiana, and the teachers, students, and community members who have harassed and hated on this kid for standing up for his Constitutional rights: fuck you and your mob mentality. We don't want you or need you here. Now how does that feel for the shoe to be on the other foot?

Where's the Bipolar?

2011-05-19T16:10:00.000-05:00

I haven't written much that was specifically about bipolar disorder lately because I have not had a lot of overt symptoms lately aside from the terrible sleeping or lack thereof. When I sleep, I sleep a minimum of 12 hours. Sometimes it's difficult for me to awaken and, on occasion, I will get up simply to fall back asleep. But it is also common that after a couple days of this, I will not be able to sleep at all. I'll lie in bed and think of all kinds of wonderful posts, creative ideas for a YouTube channel, stories, songs, etc. I'll lie there and ponder the universe and my role in it and, above all, I will not be able to fall asleep no matter what medications I take or what things I might do.

I've also had some minor episodes of depression including one day when I hurt from a migraine and didn't feel like I'd ever get out of bed again. I felt worthless and horrible like a cloud of doom was descending upon me. Sometimes that feeling strikes me out of the blue and I do my best to shake it off. I also have been dealing with minor episodes of anger. Little things can tick me off and I find myself being unusually grumpy or impatient. Every now or then I'll get so frustrated that I want to hit the wall with my fist, throw something, or break something. I do not do that. I usually just slam my fist on my desk instead. The sound and the feel of doing so brings me back to reality.

This stuff might not sound so minor to you but it is to me. This is stuff I can live with although I do not find that it makes me very sociable or pleasant. I rarely go anywhere unless it's out to eat or to the store. Often the noise or the crowd will agitate me. I keep my public appearances limited. I'm beginning to wonder if I could even function well at a job any more because I really don't like being around people now. They irritate me even when they are being kind. I don't want to talk - it's too complicated. I don't want to smile - it takes too much energy. I just want to be left alone.

If history is anything to judge by, these are just signs of things to come. The numbness that I often feel is like a dam holding back the raging tide of emotions that are waiting to sweep me off my feet. In truth, I feel fortunate to have lasted this long. I credit the medication and a very loving fiancé.

This morning when I finally fell asleep as the sun arose, I dreamed that I lost my car, my purse, and my job at a school lab. I was being grilled by a psychiatrist that I did not know and the noise in my head was so loud that I thought it was going to explode. I tried to call someone for help and got my ex on the line. He told me he would never help me again because I left him. My mother got angry at me because I didn't have clothes for church. I lost the phone. I walked around campus in the dark, alone and disoriented, searching for my purse and my car. I knew any second some of the guys walking past would jump me, take me off somewhere, and rape me. I was so lost and scared. I woke up crying. Most of this is bits and pieces of things that have really happened (or distortions of those things) all jumbled up and pressed together. It's what my disease has to offer me - fear and grief. And the best part of all? It can't be cured. I will likely die with it if not because of it.

That's all the more reason to enjoy the good times and make plans while I'm able. It's all the more reason to do what I can for myself - even if it's to engage the world through this medium, to stay connected with society and continue to move on in the best way I know how. It's all the more reason to keep writing so that one day when I am gone, at least something of me will live on.

Southern Signs: A Church Like Fudge

2011-05-19T04:50:00.000-05:00

Seen today at what I believe was a Southern Baptist church:

Our church is like fudge - sweet and with a few nuts!

I suspect this is a good analogy and I'd add to it further. Too much of it can make you sick and leave you full of shit.

A Quick Note about Email and Comments

2011-05-18T03:38:00.000-05:00

Something weird is going on with comments. A few are going into moderation that should not be. If your comment doesn't show, please be patient. It is not my policy to delete or disallow a comment just because it is critical.

Also, if anyone has sent me legitimate email, please be aware that my address was recently put on a scam list and I am getting flooded with junk email and scams. If you wish to contact me, please put *litter box* in the subject line so I'll know it's legitimate. If you sent me something and I did not respond, please try again like this so I can find you. I welcome your email as long as it's on topic and decent.

Thanks for sticking by me thus far. I've got more ideas for posts coming up - just got to get more time to sit down and type.

Weekly WorldNut: Let's Beat the Kids Again

2011-05-15T03:18:00.001-05:00

I had a nightmare last night in which my son was born alive and then lost to me due to negligence. It happened right before my eyes but I was too weak to move and unable to even speak. That dream pretty well sums up the helpless rage and grief that I feel deep down where even I can't always experience it.

This week's worldnut thinks we should start striping our kids again because we all know that a child that is thoroughly beaten down will know his place and shut his mouth. He won't learn anything except to rage against his oppressor and likely become an authoritarian abuser himself. And that's exactly what these folks seem to want - more abusers and oppressor to keep that system going. Let's not discipline and correct them so they learn to make good choices. Let's beat the hell out of them until they learn who's boss.

After seeing my dad switch my nephew the other night, I'm too disgusted to comment any more on this article. I just want my child back.

To the May 21st Crowd

2011-05-13T16:35:00.001-05:00

I know the big day is rapidly approaching. I can only imagine what you must be thinking and feeling. I know a lot of atheists have been bugging you for your money and possessions since you're not going to need them. Most of you have ignored these requests, some of you have retaliated with a lot of venom and vicious retorts, but not a single one of you that I have seen has seriously attempted to address the issue.

I'm not going to ask you to do so here. I'm not even going to make fun of your belief. I'm going to ask you for something altogether different. So to everyone who believes the world will end on May 21st in the "Apocalypse 2011" that's supposed to be coming, here is my request:

When May 22nd arrives, most of you will pick up with your lives and remain a true believer. You'll double down and dig in even deeper because, let's face it, it's difficult and embarrassing to admit (even to yourself) that you got scammed. But to those of you who awaken on this day and realize that you wasted your time and your money, that you invested in someone who was not trustworthy, and that you fell for the scam, please do not kill yourself. Don't beat yourself up to the point that you can't live with the shame. There is life after religion. We all get conned by someone at some point in life. We all fall for the quick fix - especially when we are vulnerable.

If you're brave enough to admit you made a mistake and you're willing to correct it, reach out to the rational community. Most of us have come out of systems that cheated us just like yours cheated you. We understand how you feel and, I believe, most of us will help. You don't have to be ashamed of your mistake and wear it like a millstone. You can get past this and rebuild a better life.

We can help. We will help. Ask us.

Southern Signs: Manufacturer's Recall

2011-05-13T16:25:00.000-05:00

I'm starting a new category today called Southern Signs. I'm coming across more religious and political signs lately that I think need to be shared. I will attempt to get photos when I can.

Recently, I saw this on a church sign:

Coming soon

Manufacturer's Recall

My first thought was, "Gee, that's really stupid!" because I immediately associated this church with the nutty Harold Camping/May 21st movement. I understand that this church believes the rapture is coming just like Camping does but I doubt they've assigned a date. Most Baptist churches point to the scripture where Jesus says that no man knows the day or hour. So it seems odd that they'd put up this message with May 21st being so close. I wouldn't want any guilt by association.

But then I thought a bit more deeply about the message and I realized I wouldn't have put it up any time. What is a manufacturer's recall? It's when a product came off the line defective and has to be recalled and fixed because it is harmful or does not work properly. Think about that.

This sign is saying that their god's going to call us back soon and it implies that the reason for this callback is because we're defective. That means he screwed up the design if you follow the analogy. It means we have a defect that is dangerous or makes us ineffective and we have it because he didn't get it right the first time.

If I were a church, I wouldn't want people thinking of my god that way because it shifts the blame from humanity to that god. And we all know that you can't keep selling the solution if you take away the problem...which, in my opinion, is all that religion does.

The Face of Pain

2011-05-11T05:05:00.000-05:00

When I was in high school and college, I didn't care one bit about history or politics. I thought they were the most boring creations of mankind. My partner, having been partly home-schooled and raised as a Jehovah's Witness, did not develop an interest in these subjects either (except that they were always, no matter what the event, confirmation that the end times were upon us).

Today we are very different people than we once were and we understand better how important these subjects are. We are coming to realize just how much humanity's failure to learn from the past is condemning our future. For the past couple of nights we've been listening to Dan Carlin's wonderful series, Ghosts of the Ostfront, a recounting of the fighting between Germany and Russia along the Eastern Front. If you are interested in hearing this, I encourage you to follow the link and download it all now while it's still available for free.

I'm not going to go into great detail describing this because Dan does that better than I ever could. What I want to point out is that by immersing myself in the accounts of these soldiers on both sides, I've come to realize that we Americans don't really know what it means to suffer hardship or to feel the bitter sting of real war. I don't say that to disparage anyone's service or sacrifice for my grandfathers and great-uncles proudly served in World War II, one of them receiving two purple hearts. I say it as a realization that we are perhaps too quick to criticize Europe for their reluctance to go to war and we are too quick to think that such bitter atrocities could never happen to us at home.

The Eastern Front is a prime example of what happens when two charismatic, megalomaniacal, paranoid leaders seize the reins of power and use rabid ideologies (political, socioeconomic, or religious) to control the masses. The death, torture, misery, and rage are simply manifestations of these malevolent egos run wild. I have long asked myself, much like Mike Huckabee's daughter is purported to have asked, why someone didn't say something to stop this madness. After hearing the diary accounts of the soldiers and generals, after imagining myself being given the option to kill or to have my family tortured and murdered, after seeing just how effective the propaganda machine is - not just then but even now in 21st century America - I understand better how such massive evil can be done with very little outcry.

Earlier tonight, I looked up some Eastern Front footage on YouTube. I remembered the subzero temperatures, the lice infestations, the horrific wounds both given and received, the rape, the torture, the decimation, and the brutality...all this inflicted not just upon the military but upon the citizens as well. Not just upon the enemy, but also upon the comrade who dared to delay or desert. I saw some pictures of those people and the tragedy became even more human. Pain had a face. It had a name. As Dan quoted from a German soldier, "Pain is international." That is apparent at the front lines where frozen corpses were laid along the road so the tanks could roll over them and gain traction. That is apparent when the people of the besieged cities of Leningrad and Stalingrad had to resort to cannibalism in order to survive.

I hope that one day I will be able to go to Russia and view the bone fields that have been left behind to mark such monumental suffering. However, I am not sure that I can emotionally bear the weight of witnessing this slaughter, even though it is now sixty years removed from me.

Not every soldier who fought there was evil but most all were driven to commit the most brutal, evil attacks upon their fellow man one can imagine. Would we be any different if our leaders pushed us into a war in which we, the people, were directly involved? How would we conduct ourselves? Would we abide by the rules of war and fight with honor or would we descend into the same pattern of looting, pillaging, and raping that occurs all too often? I fear we may already have our answer to that question in our behavior since 9/11 and it frightens me. America was too far removed from the Eastern Front to learn the lesson or to have to pay any of the monstrous costs.

I fear we shall fall into the same trap one day. It seems we are already baiting it and putting the blindfold on.

Here's Your (Religious) Sign

2011-05-10T01:11:00.000-05:00

We ate at a very good, new restaurant tonight. On the way out the door, I spied this sign on the garbage can. I'm not completely sure what it's supposed to mean.

I don't know about the average believer, but I don't pray to decide where to take my meals. I don't consult any scriptures to see what's on the menu. So I think I can say with relative certainty that Jesus (I assume that's the "HE" mentioned here) did not send me to this restaurant. If they want to thank Jesus for something, go for it, but I wish they'd leave me out of it.

Since I'm so used to being misunderstood and misrepresented, I figure some people probably think that, now that I've spotted this religious sign, I'll make some sort of fuss, complain to the owner, file a lawsuit, or stop eating at that restaurant in protest. I don't plan to do any of those things. It just isn't that big of a deal. It's more of a curiosity really.

If anyone has a different interpretation of this sign, I'd love to hear it. I'd especially like to hear from believers what they think about this sign. What does it mean? Is it effective? Is it sensible? Is it correct?

White Roses

2011-05-08T22:05:00.000-05:00

Today was my first Mother's Day as a mother but I have no child here to show for that. My mother gave me some white roses to plant for remembrance of something that I have, so far, coped with only by not remembering it. I have never felt so dead inside in my whole life.

We had a family get-together tonight and it was somewhat of a disaster. My nephew got in trouble and my dad beat the living daylights out of him with a stick. It was a sick flashback to my childhood that I neither wanted or needed. I was not able to say or do anything. I felt paralyzed in fear and disgust. Everyone else was quite subdued after it as well but no one said a word. Thus does the cycle continue.

The subject turned to politics and my mother, who by her own admission doesn't know anything except what she sees on Fox, went on an anti-Obama tirade. My brother-in-law and I asked her why she felt that way and she exploded against us, accusing us of not letting her have her own opinion and stating that we considered her a racist Nazi. I realized that the looney-tunes infection had reached her brain and just sighed. You can't even ask a simple question any more without people losing their shit. When she finally explained that she didn't trust anyone in Washington, I agreed with her. At that point, she stalked off into the house and didn't reappear for a good half hour. I doubt I'll attempt to have a reasonable discussion with her about anything again.

So that's how my day went - not a good aunt, not a good daughter, and no chance to see if I'd be a good mom. I am feeling sorry for myself but I think I'm entitled to for at least today. Tomorrow I'll just pick up and move on and at least I'll have some lovely white roses outside to enjoy.

Rapture Ready, Reality Retarded

2011-05-08T00:36:00.000-05:00

To the PC Police: the word "retarded " in the title means "to make slow; delay the development or progress of (an action, process, etc.); hinder or impede " as per Dictionary.com. If you have a problem with it, get over it.

Unless you're living under a rock, you've probably heard that the rapture will be here promptly on May 21st and the world will end on October 21st. I'm sure all of you have been busy preparing for this - even those of you believers who are not convinced. Better safe than sorry, right? That's what I always get told.

For the most part, I've no interest in the upcoming Rapture or in those who so steadfastly believe it. If people want to exercise their religious freedom by making harmful decisions or simply withdrawing from life, then so be it. One of the drawbacks of freedom is responsibility, after all, and there is no shortage of Darwin Awards to be handed out.

But despite my relative indifference, I do realize that quite a few people are going to wake up on May 22nd and have a serious WTF moment. Only a few of them will probably realize that they've been scammed and probably very few will commit suicide over this. Most of them will simply move the date forward and pick back up with their lives. I say this because it's human nature and because Harold Camping is already scrambling to provide an out just in case. He says if the Rapture doesn't happen on May 21st, then it's because the world has done enough prayer and repentance to buy us some time. And so the goalposts shift just a bit more to the right.....

NPR ran a story on the subject that highlighted exactly how this myth is harming some followers already. Believers in the May 21st date are predictably getting grief from those to whom they proselytize and they are experiencing tension with family members who do not share their beliefs. Perhaps more alarming, some believers are forsaking their jobs, education, and future plans since they feel it's all moot. Joel Martinez abandoned his job and his wife Adrienne abandoned her plans for medical school just so they could prepare for the coming Rapture. They packed up and moved from New York to Florida and they no longer have any income - they don't think they will need it.

I don't think that's a very safe bet. Harold Camping has already admitted to falsely prophesying the Rapture date, saying it would happen on September 6, 1994. When that date failed, he said he simply "had not completed his Biblical research," but there is no room for error this time. He's definitely right. Unless, of course, he miscalculated again, misunderstood the Bible code, was deceived by Satan, or was just plain wrong. Why would anyone trust this man with their finances and future? He has a proven history of being wrong.

Joel and Adrienne are likely going to wake up on May 22nd destitute and in despair. They may realize they were duped or they may think they simply weren't raptured and are hellbound like the rest of us. Whatever the case, they'll have nowhere to go when the rent runs out and no money for food. This family will be broken and defenseless, depending on the very shelters and assistance that our wonderful conservative parties are so happy to defund. Ironically, Joel and Adrienne will be faced with a much more desperate problem than what they currently have. They are expecting and the baby is due in June.

June...about a month after everyone is supposed to be raptured.

How does that work? Is there a L&D section in Heaven? They did not plan this well.

These people are ready for the Rapture but they have seriously compromised their ability to function in reality once this brouhaha is over. It's going to hurt and it's going to be ugly. It's going to be difficult to pick up the pieces and move on. Even if they manage to get back on their feet and regain the relationships they've cast aside, they still likely won't be any better able to question authority or think critically. They will probably seek out new ways to be victimized because they simply are not equipped to deal with reality.

Sad but true.

Life in the State Mental Hospital

2011-05-04T23:49:00.000-05:00

As promised, I'm going to write a bit about my time in the state mental hospital. I have also spent a little time in a couple of private mental hospitals but, except for some specific things that I'll mention later, it was not much different. This has been very difficult for me to remember and reflect on so I hope that you'll bear with me as I write this.

First, remember that when I came into this hospital, I was coming to it straight from a prison cell. One week of solitary confinement in jail was enough to drive me deeper into my broken mental state and there was not a single moment of time that I did not hear the myriad voices in my head arguing amongst themselves. I was unwashed and had not eaten properly in a week. I was cut off from all my friends and family. I sang songs to myself to try to hold on to my memories and my humanity since I had almost no conversation with anyone and had been given only one small book (a religious one) to read the entire time. I sang songs to try to block out the sounds of those voices that had taken over my mind and, I felt, driven me to this state.

Now I was taken, handcuffed, in a patrol car to the state mental hospital. The staff was extremely courteous and assured me that they wanted to help. They didn't seem to look down on me or judge me harshly for my condition. They wanted to make sure I was well taken care of.

My first interview was with my new psychiatrist, some nurses, and a couple of social workers. They asked a lot of questions and it was hard for me to answer them. I felt very self-conscious and afraid. It's always difficult to explain "hearing voices" to psychiatric staff because they never really seem to understand. They are used to schizophrenics and psychotics who hear voices from the outside. My voices always come from within. It's been that way since I was in grade school and it's both embarrassing and frustrating to try to discuss because it doesn't fit into the neat framework of any particular diagnosis. Of course, they also asked me about any physical or sexual abuse I'd encountered. I dislike talking about all that and I'm afraid that whatever answers I gave were probably very incomplete and unhelpful.

The staff made sure I was bathed and fed after the interview and then came the part I'd been dreading - the blood draw. I simply cannot get out of a hospital of any kind, it seems, without them sticking a needle in my arm. This was frightening and painful for me and I spent most of the rest of the day sitting on the couch shivering and staring straight ahead like a zombie.

The state hospital, like the others of my acquaintance, had a "day room" or two where they encouraged patients to congregate and watch TV, play games, or read. My last private hospital forced us to do this by locking us out of our rooms all day. The state hospital allowed us to go to our rooms during free time as long as we didn't abuse the privilege. I only knew of one girl who was locked out of her room during the day and she simply moved her blanket and pillow to the couch instead. I spent most of my free time reading classics that I'd just never gotten around to reading in my regular life so I could block out the disjointed conversation of the patients around me and I would not have to look at those poor women who sat there and just stared at the wall as if they were in a trance. It was not uncommon for one of the paranoid schizophrenics (there were several there) to suddenly look up and accuse someone of talking about them. You'd think that this would be frightening at first and then I'd get used to it but it actually worked the other way around. As time went by and this happened more often, I became unnerved by the behavior. Eventually, one patient ended up throwing her books across the room. Another time while we were in the medication line, a severely disturbed patient jumped another patient standing right by me and the aggressor had to be carried down to the padded room. I felt like the staff wanted to keep us safe but that someone might attack me at any minute for absolutely no reason. I never had any real reason to fear, however, for the most that happened to me was that a patient crept into my room one night and started whispering to me. The nurses found her quickly and rushed her out. I had 200 mg of Seroquel running through me that made me not really give a damn.

We had classes at appointed times throughout the day and night to help keep us on a structured schedule. Sometimes we learned more about our illnesses (though, to be honest, the information was very elementary and not of much interest to me) and sometimes we were allowed to talk about our experiences. However, the psychologist who led some of these classes did not like to waste time in this manner. He felt that by talking about our experiences, we were simply rehashing them and using them as excuses not to address our underlying problems. I thought this was terribly harsh at first but, as I listened to the women around me and then to myself, I realized he was right. All too often, we would recount something, not to learn from it, but rather to wallow in self-pity and get the sympathy of the other patients. It was one big circlejerk and he had no interest in hearing it. I listened to that skeptical psychologist more closely after that and I observed his style of listening critically and then asking the tough questions. I did that with myself and I did not like the answers I was getting. One day he seemed to be quite frustrated after listening to someone dance in circles around her issue and he said something like, "You know, 99% of you are not going to learn a thing in this this class. You're gonna go right back out there, make the same mistakes, end up right back in here, and then wonder how you got here again."

His point became very evident because of the band system we used. When a patient first comes into the hospital, she gets a white armband. While on a white band, the patient must wear scrubs and is very limited in where she can go and what she can do. She can have no visitors. It's an assessment phase that generally lasts for 24-48 hours. Once the patient shows she is responsible and stable enough, she gets a yellow band. Those on yellow band can wear their own clothes with a few restrictions and can have visitors. They are allowed to go to the gym or to any special events. A patient may stay on a yellow band for quite a while depending on how they are managing their illness and how well they are responding to medication. Those patients who are responding well and have shown consistent good behavior as well as taking responsibility for meeting classes, grooming, and such get a green band. These patients get full privileges, may stay up late on the weekend, and can even go home on a short pass if the doctor approves. These patients are very close to being able to go back home permanently. A patient who is non-compliant, starts fights, self-injures, or does anything like that gets a red band and is on full restriction. No one wants a red band.

Or does she? As I said, the psychologist's words became clear to me through the band system. It was quite common to see people on a yellow band do very well, get their green band and word that they could go home soon, and then start a fight or have a complete breakdown in order to get back on red band. I wondered whether these patients did this on purpose so they wouldn't have to leave or whether the idea of going back home was so awful and frightening that they couldn't stand it. It's hard for me to say. I saw one woman seemingly work through her issues, become a leader in our little group, take in new patients and help them get situated, talk about her plans for when she left and how she was going to really change her life. And when she got that green band and they told her she was going home, she lost it. First, she talked about how she was going to kill the men who had attacked her. Then she took to her bed and stayed in it almost around the clock doing nothing but screaming and crying. I can't rightly judge her or any of the others but I felt a great deal of compassion for them and, even now, I wonder where they are.

It's hard to say how helpful the hospital is overall. The regimented schedule really helps people who are struggling with mental illness but it is not sustainable unless the patient wishes to and is able to continue it once she goes home. At the hospital, patients are forced to take all medication - anyone who refused was held down and injected (so you better believe I took every single pill they told me to). But once a patient gets home, who sees to it that she takes her meds? Certainly a patient should be responsible and take meds but not every illness makes that easy or even possible. I think the hospital is good at bandaging up the worst bits but, even with social workers and doctors following up, it's just impossible for them to make changes where they are needed most - at home. I hope that as we learn more about mental illness, these providers will be able to optimize the care they give. However, I think our economic and social problems are going to make this extremely difficult and it may make little difference.

Most (and by most I mean well over 90%) of the patients did not have a good home life. Some came straight off the streets or out of homeless shelters. Others came out of jail because they'd been locked up for doing something dangerous. My roommate was a very sweet little old Pentecostal lady who happened to be a paranoid schizophrenic. She had pulled a gun on her neighbors because she thought they'd come over to steal her money. Regardless of where they came from, however, few of them got any supportive phone calls and fewer still ever had visitors. I was regarded as the most popular patient in the hospital because I had so many friends and family members who called daily and visited when they could. I had a tremendous support system that these other women could only dream of. This was especially driven home the day I heard a patient tell a nurse how badly she wanted to go home and the nurse replied, "I'm sorry, sweetie, but your parents don't want you back. They can't take care of you any more."

That's the crux of it really. No matter how good of a job the hospital does, real life is still waiting to chew these women up and spit them right back out. And so the real lessons I learned from my time at the mental hospital is that: (1) life is exceptionally hard for most patients, (2) society generally doesn't give a shit as long as they don't have to see us and deal with us, (3) even the best family and friends can only do so much, (4) most hospital staff do the best they can, and (5) patients who want to break the cycle are going to have a tough time doing it.

That's my overall view of the time I spent there. If anyone has more specific questions, please ask. I'm sure I left out a ton of things I meant to say because I ended up rambling about some things I didn't mean to get off on. But, hopefully, I've given you a glimpse of what it was like both physically and emotionally. I never want to go back there again but it's a possibility that I face. Ultimately, it's up to me.

Osama and the Mouse

2011-05-03T17:36:00.001-05:00

I came home last night to a most disgusting sight. There on my brand-new kitchen floor was the remains of a mouse. Now I don't mean "remains" as in just a corpse. I mean there was nothing left but the intact guts, a pair of tiny feet, and a long tail. The poor creature's entire head and skin had been ripped off leaving only the juicy bits behind.

Some days I'm very grateful for my training as a biologist.

There's nothing more striking to me than to see nature do her dirty work. Watching my cat tote mice around by their heads, watching my snake constrict and then swallow mice....well, it's all pretty uncivilized and nasty. But that's just how nature works! The smartest, most fierce creatures conquer and devour their prey so that the next generation can live. It's a simplistic and incomplete picture to be sure but it's one of the main recurring themes of life.

Unlike the mouse guts on my floor, Osama bin Laden had not been in my face lately. In July 2006, President Bush said he didn't much care where bin Laden was because he wanted to focus on the more widespread threat. He disbanded the CIA taskforce that was assigned to bin Laden and we all kind of forgot about him and focused on other political things like the birth certificate, Sarah Palin's maps, and Glenn Beck's strange crying spells - important stuff to be sure. We sat around and fussed over stupid things while our civil liberties were siphoned off or, in some cases, stolen outright by both administrations.

Now Osama is dead and he's in my face again just like those nasty entrails. Some people thought it proper to cheer and dance in the streets. I don't remember anyone being too impressed with some of the Muslim community when they did that on 9/11. Others are crowing indignantly about how Obama doesn't deserve any credit for the kill and Bush was the one who kept us safe. Whatever - there is no arguing with people who refuse to acknowledge facts of any kind.

I'm not sorry Osama is dead. I will not miss him. I abhor his philosophy, his religion, his words, and his deeds. I don't blame America for going after him. I thought it was right on 9/12 and I still think it was right. When we started our foray in Iraq, I was devastated because I wanted justice done on those who had attacked us - not revenge on everyone who happened to have brown skin and speak a different language.

But even though I have some small satisfaction that Osama's personal hate is over, I've no illusions that this all will end. His legacy will live on and, likely, spawn new misdeeds. Ideologies die hard if they die at all. And I am under no illusion that his death will bring my civil liberties back. No, we've lost those - probably forever.

The mouse disaster was easy to clean up. The Osama disaster will likely never see an end. All the rights we citizens gave up to get this guy will never, ever, be given back and the lives lost in these wars can never been regained. We got our victory but the cost was way too high.

The Blame Game: How Not to Represent Christianity

2011-04-30T02:48:00.000-05:00

Everyone is still in shock at the devastation of our homes and the loss of neighbors and friends here in Northeast Mississippi and many people are looking to understand why this happened. It seems that most people aren't satisfied with the simple truth - that powerful natural phenomena occur from time to time and we humans happened to be in the way. We see people seeking a deeper meaning and that can often, unfortunately, take the form of someone playing the blame game.

You know this ugly game - it happened after 9/11 when some people said the tragedy was their god's wrath on America due to homosexuality, paganism, abortion, and kicking their god out of schools. It happened after Katrina when some people said the tragedy was their god's wrath on New Orleans for the sinful "Sodom & Gomorrah" lifestyles and for being a bunch of "lazy blacks". It happened after the Japanese tsunami when some people said it was their god's wrath on that nation for being predominately non-Christian. Whatever the situation, you can always find some jackass ready to proclaim that the disaster was their god's punishment for whatever they define as "sin". It's a stupid, spiteful, game and the people who play it disgust me.

Enter Margie Burt, a Smithville resident, who takes the opportunity to not only play the blame game but indulge in some local gossip at the same time. She knows exactly why Smithville, MS, was destroyed and many good people killed. Yes, it was her god's wrath! From the bottom of the article:

Smithville resident Margie Burt called Wednesday’s twister a message from God.

“The Lord’s tired of people not doing what they’re supposed to do,” she said. “He’s tired of people telling their lies and doing their drugs.”

How does she know this? Did her god come down and tell her? "Hey, Margie, this is Yahweh (you might know me better as just Jehovah). Did you see that storm I sent the other day. It was a helluva tornado, wasn't it? By the way, I just wanted to let you know, I did that because there's too much drug abuse in the community. Be sure and let the survivors know that, ok?"

Of course not. She has absolutely no basis for deciding that the storm was the work of a deity, much less that it was for this specific purpose. But she's not through. She's got to double-down on the stupid:

Burt, who rode out the storm in her pantry, also said it’s no coincidence the tornado hit hours after disgraced former Smithville football coach Dwight Bowling pleaded guilty to sexual misconduct.

So it's not just her god's wrath for drug abuse but her god was also pissed at the community because of a local pedophile. Is her god supposed to be mad because the pedophile got caught or wasn't caught soon enough? Why would he kill innocent people because of what someone else did? It was curious that Margie Burt would even mention this until you find out the next bit:

“I’m sorry this has happened,” said Burt, who previously was married to Bowling’s brother. “But I think the Lord has done this for a reason.” [Emphasis mine]

Yeah, and I'm sure Margie Burt has a reason for bringing Bowling up in the conversation with the reporter that had nothing at all to do with her beliefs about Yahweh and his pissy moods. I wonder why she is described as "previously" married to the brother. Did he die and, if so, why was Yahweh pissed at him too? Does Yahweh kill on command anyone Margie doesn't like? Or, more likely since her last name is Burt, she is divorced from the brother - maybe even remarried. Doesn't Yahweh get mad about multiple marriages these days too? Unlike Ms. Burt, I think I will refrain from any more idle speculation.

Predictably, most everyone is furious that Ms. Burt said these things and that the paper printed them. I can see their point but I'm kind of glad that they printed these stupid words. Now if a woman shows up at my door identifying herself as Margie Burt of Smithville, then I can explain to her that I have no time for self-righteous, delusional busybodies and then slam the door in her face. I kind of like having the stupid and hateful exposed so I can know who I'm dealing with. I am totally unfamiliar with journalistic ethics or the newspaper business so I don't know whether the reporter went too far in including all this or not. I will leave that up to those of you who know more. But you'd better believe that people want Margie Burt to leave town and they want this reporter fired.

As for me, this is what I want. I want everyone, particularly Christians, to take note of what it feels like when someone blames you for disaster like this. It hurts because it's untrue, unfair, and unhelpful. Please do not engage in this type of behavior. It makes Christianity look worse than it already does. That's why I'm so proud of my Christian friends who have publicly denounced this woman's words and her judgmental attitude. I hope they will always look back on this and remember that the blame game is no way to show any kind of love.

Facebook Fury: The Faked Butthole Is Whose Fault?

2011-04-28T17:07:00.000-05:00

Will I ever learn? I keep thinking I have maxed out the amount of stupid that one can possibly ever see on Facebook but then I always find something even worse. I probably have a hand print on my forehead now from all the facepalms.

As you probably know by now, we've been on the receiving end of some terrible storms. We have many dead, more injured, and extensive property damage. People who have suffered are, quite predictably, asking why and searching for any hope that they can find. I understand that and I have great sympathy for them. So it wasn't too surprising to see this gem going around on Facebook with the claim that it was taken after the storms in Selmer, TN:

For those of you who have been around the block a few times, you probably already know this is a photoshop job and looks more like a sky god stretching his butthole to the world than anything else. Of course, people are sending this around as if it is real and claiming it's some sort of divine message of hope.

One person was brave enough to point out that the thing is a fake and that whoever sent it claiming it was from Selmer flat-out lied. Everyone thanked him for standing up for the truth, right? Well, no...as I've said before, very few people around here seem to appreciate the truth. Instead of being grateful to this guy, they turned on him like a pack of dogs and he had to defend himself, reminding them that he is a "good Christian" like them.

I do not, however, want to waste a lot of time copy/pasting that exchange. It's boring and predictable. What I want to focus on instead is my cousin's wife's comment regarding the photo. Once she had been informed that the picture was fake and was being used in a manner not intended by the creator, she had this to say:

Zoom in on that last sentence there: "And if she didn't want anyone to steal it then maybe she shouldn't have posted it." WTF? By that same logic, someone could copy her family photos off her FB page, photoshop them to make them look pornographic, and it would have been her fault for posting them - not some perv's fault for stealing and editing them without permission.

I hope, I desperately hope, that this is simply the girl's grief talking and that she didn't really think about what she was saying. But I've come to realize that she probably means exactly what she said - at least in this case. When people think like this, how can we ever hope to have a free and fair society? This sort of thinking is just, well, muddled beyond belief!

Although I have promised myself that I would be more outspoken (and I have), I let this pass. I know she is grieving for her family and friends right now and I'm not going to bust her chops over what might have been some poorly chosen words about a picture that really isn't worth the argument. But I do wonder if, in a more calm moment, if she would stand by her words and, perhaps, try to defend them.

Sometimes it's all I can do not to rip the computer's power cord out of the wall and just throw the tower out the window.

An Open Letter to the People of Texas

2011-04-28T00:16:00.000-05:00

To the People of Texas and their governor, Rick Perry:

Dear neighbors,

I understand that you've been experiencing drought and that this sustained lack of rain has led to numerous wildfires. Furthermore, it came to my attention that the governor misused his authority to proclaim for "Days of Prayer" for rain. The proclamation further says that you Texans are often "strengthened, assured, and lifted up" by prayer.

We Mississippians, along with our neighbors in Arkansas, Tennessee, Alabama, and Louisiana have also been "lifted up" but perhaps not in the way you intended. You spent three days praying to your god for rain and instead our states have been devastated by flooding and tornadoes.

I call you now to answer for this tragedy that you have brought upon us with your prayers. You claim that your god answers your prayers - now you must take responsibility for what this deity has done in your name and at your behest. Is your god blind or just incompetent? Or is it your fault for praying the wrong way, praying too much, not praying enough, praying to the wrong god, or daring to ask that he change his divine mind?

Do not even begin to tell me that "god works in mysterious ways" or that "we just can't know." If you can't know or can't understand how your god's seemingly capricious mind works, then stop fucking asking for things! We've had towns wiped off the map. Our neighbors and loved ones are lying dead in fields. Don't even begin to try to weasel your way out of this with empty platitudes. You asked your god for rain and, by your logic, he sent it! That makes you responsible.

And so, my dear neighbors in Texas, I ask you: when will you come and help us repair our houses? When will you come help us bury our dead? When will you begin donating your time and money so that we can recover from the bumbling or wrath (whichever it is) of your god?

If you aren't going to do anything constructive, at least do me this one favor. The next time you decide to pray for "the healing of our land, the rebuilding of our communities and the restoration of our normal way of life..." be sure to include a Sarah Palin-style map with targets over the area you want hit. Either that or ask your god to not send you that healing, rebuilding, and restoration at the expense of the rest of us.

The last thing we need is to be on the receiving end of the whims of your god. Keep your problems at home where they belong.

I'm Tired

2011-04-25T14:51:00.000-05:00

Look back at the posts I've made over the past couple of weeks. That's what exhaustion looks like. Even though things are going pretty well here, I've had it rough with the bipolar. Some nights I stay up almost 24 hours (a couple times, more than 24 hours in a row) and other nights I sleep 12+ hours a day. I haven't written anything because I'm gearing up for the post I promised about life in the mental hospital. Unfortunately, thinking on this has caused me to have nightmares again so I've been putting it off. I won't put it off much longer, I promise. I intend to get that post out this week and get back on a semi-regular schedule. I also intend to answer some questions and reply to some comments here. Thank you for being patient with me.

Today I want to tell you what I'm really tired of - and I mean "tired" here in a fed-up sense. I'm tired of ignorant, lazy people whose approach to anything that they don't like is to stick their fingers in their ears and pretend it doesn't exist. These people have no interest in fruitful discussion or vigorous debate. They don't know much and they don't really want to know any more. They take pride in their sheep mentality because, of course, the other sheep praise them for being equally as dull and dumb as they are. I have sheep like this in my family and where, of course, should this arise but on Facebook?

My cousin posted a link about a recent incident in Brandon, MS (which is near our capital, Jackson) in which the police and a bunch of rednecks stopped the WBC from protesting a military funeral. Here is the link I found about it after I first heard it word-of-mouth from my sister. I laughed at first the way I'd laugh at some racist or gender jokes. They're funny, you see, even though they aren't decent or play heavily into unfair stereotypes. But when I was done laughing, I realized that something very important and very sinister had happened. I haven't laughed about this since. I can almost guarantee you that WBC is going to sue Brandon, MS, and they are going to make a huge amount of cash when they win.

Most everyone in Mississippi is loving this story. I suppose they think it shows how far our redneck justice has evolved in that, with one exception, no violence was done. Instead, the police and the community came together creatively and non-violently to protect the family and friends of the fallen soldier. That's a wonderful spin, isn't it? But it doesn't adequately explain what really happened. Here's another, perhaps more honest, way to look at it:

The government (in the form of the police) conspired with a mob to deprive the WBC of their First Amendment rights to free speech, free assembly, and free religious exercise.

Let that sink in a minute. Now substitute in other groups and see if you still feel as cozy as you might have done.

The police conspired with a mob of white people to prevent a black protest.

The police conspired with a mob of black people to prevent a white protest.

The police conspired with a mob of conservatives to prevent a liberal protest.

The police conspired with a mob of liberals to prevent a conservative protest.

The police conspired with a mob of Christians to prevent a Muslim protest.

The police conspired with a mob of Muslims to prevent a Christian protest.

See how that works? Not so funny when the shoe is on the other foot and, let's face it, with the encroachment of expanding executive power, it can happen. It's real funny when Fred Phelps gets "rough-talk and run off" but not nearly as funny when the government shuts down the First Baptist Church's protest against gay marriage or perhaps they shut down the Unitarian Universalist Church's protest against another war.

Of course, I commented on my cousin's post (nicely, I might add) to point this out. I asked the question, "Why are we sending soldiers to fight and die overseas for freedom if we're going to trash it here at home?"

A simple question. A thoughtful question. A compelling question.

And what happened? He deleted it. He let stand the snide remarks about the WBC being "whinny liberals" but deleted my question. He has every right to do that on his page, of course, but I'm really sick and tired of that attitude. I'm sick and tired of this mentality where the status quo can do no wrong and can never, under any circumstances, be questioned or corrected.

So I ask the question again: What do we achieve by shutting down WBC's protest? Did that soldier die for our freedom like everyone claims? If so, how did we honor his sacrifice by stripping away the First Amendment rights of a church (even one as loathsome as Fred Phelps')? Like I said in the comments on that site, we might as well have just pissed on that soldier's grave. Now his death is meaningless.

As for me, I'm tired of the circlejerks and the censorship. I'm tired of hiding in fear of a bunch of sheep. I'm tired of watching the way my mom's mouth puckers up and her face wrinkles in disgust every time she says the word "atheist." I'm tired of having to be the only one to keep my mouth shut and go along to get along. I'm done with that. What are they going to do to me? Rough-talk me and run me off? Good because I hate this place and I always have. Let them do their worst.

Flames for Freedom

2011-04-10T16:34:00.000-05:00

As promised, I am going to cyber-burn a copy of the Quran along with several other important documents in order to stand for our First Amendment right to free speech. It is not my intent to destroy any of the ideas that these things stand for but rather to demonstrate that our rights must not be held hostages by intimidation or threats of violence.

If we keep silent or do nothing for fear of what someone else might do, then we have already lost our freedom.

If we assign blame to the one who speaks rather than to the one who murders, then we do not deserve our freedom.

I do not hate Muslims, Christians, Buddhists, Hindus, atheists, or any other group. I do not hate America. I do not hate classical authors and I do not hate myself. I don't do this for hate - I do it for freedom. Worship as you please. Vote as you please. Read what you want. Those are your rights. This is my right: I'm going to destroy a copy of Plato, Paine, and de Sade's books. I'm going to destroy a copy of the Hindu, Buddhist, Christian, and Muslim holy teachings. I'm going to destroy a picture of the U.S. flag. And I'm going to destroy a poem that I wrote that is very dear to my heart.

I've put all these files in a folder called "Cherished Items & Ideas" because all these are cherished by someone. Some of them are considered holy and written by a god. Some are considered to contain bedrock principles of a free society. Some are considered radical and blasphemous. But every single item and idea in this folder is important to someone on this planet.

I'm getting ready to hit the button and delete these files forever. I'm going to permanently destroy my copies and thereby let the world know that I am a free woman and I can do this. There should be no outcry. There should be no backlash. If anyone chooses to commit violence or to hate me because I am doing this, then that person is responsible. I am harming no one.

Yes, I am sure I want to delete these files. The copies die but the ideas live on as they should. In the next 60 seconds, I will eradicate these beloved files from the face of the earth.

And it's done. No one was harmed in the deleting of these files. No one was prevented from worshipping their gods because I deleted a copy of their holy book. Democracy in the West did not fall because I burned Plato and Paine or because I destroyed a copy of the American flag. I did not fall into a fury or hurt myself because I annihilated a copy of my own poem.

And that is how it should be. There is nothing wrong with destroying these things. What's wrong is the actions some people take when these things are destroyed. Those actions are what must be condemned. I will not keep silent just because someone else might do something bad. Doing nothing admits defeat and I believe wholeheartedly in freedom for you and for me. I believe in it enough to exercise my right to speak out.

What about you?

Weekly Worldnut: The Face of Misogyny

2011-04-10T01:20:00.001-05:00

I'm so accustomed to watching people lie and misuse words to hide their motives that it's almost refreshing when someone just comes right out and says what is on their mind. This letter appears to be honest enough but there was nothing really refreshing about it. Mr. Wayne Olson, speaking to WND's "personal responsibility" crowd, has some very disparaging things to say about women and he blames us for America's problems. He says that America has become too feminized over the years and our empathy is what's costing us our world dominance. How are women destroying our country?

The Democrats feel the need to empathize with every need out there, from children's milk programs at school to providing mosquito netting in some God-forsaken village in Africa. This need to empathize is quintessentially feminine in nature, to experience the emotion of the victim.

Mr. Olson sees empathy as being a bad thing, a kind of weakness that is born of women and spreads through society like some kind of disease. He describes it as a "luxury" that women have because men have always been too busy doing important things to worry about how their actions affect anyone else. Because, of course, women simply can't control their feelings long enough to do anything effectively, you know.

Real men do not empathize as much as women do because it is a handicap to doing what needs to be done during the worst of times.

Perhaps it is true that we must separate ourselves from our feelings in times of emergency and war (I say "we" because women face such things just like men do). But needing to turn off our empathy short-term in order to finish a job does not mean that empathy is no longer necessary or is a bad thing. Also, what is up with this "real men" statement? Is Mr. Olson qualified to decide who is a real man? Is he saying that men who empathize with others are fakes?

Republicans and conservatives are made to feel that if they do not empathize with every person with a need, then they are monsters.

The main purpose of government is to benefit society by fulfilling certain needs. Obviously, we cannot fix everything for everybody (nor should we) but our politicians should be always asking themselves where they can put our money that would do the most good. That requires some amount of empathy and, yes, it is necessary to make the best decisions. In fact, I'd argue that one of the reasons we're in the mess we're in is because most of our politicians do not empathize with us at all. They do not seem to care much about our plight or about their responsibilities. But according to Mr. Olson, that's not their fault. That is women's fault because, of course, women can't put their feelings aside long enough to make wise business decisions or to do important things like shopping or budgeting.

But they are the more masculine group because they recognize the need to accomplish the mission: to keep the nation solvent.

Notice the positive connotation of "masculine" here. The Republicans and conservatives are the "real men" here, he says, because they're working to get the budget balanced instead of whining (or bleating, as he writes) about all the people in need. The problem is that no one is really doing anything to make things better - they are all too busy fighting for their own pet projects and earmarks while pointing fingers at the other side. The whole concept of Republicans as brave men fighting the good fight and Democrats being weak-willed women who can't stop giving away money would be ludicrous except for the fact that the Democrats are weak-willed and the Republicans have never met anything good that they bothered to fight for.

Women want a nurturing environment that addresses personal needs. It's more important to them not to hurt people's feelings than to have effective programs. Sharing feelings, holding hands, comforting each other is what women do, not men.

How does Mr. Olson know that? Did he poll American women on this or did he just pull it out of his ass? Like way too many writers lately, he stated this assumption as fact without bothering to ask anyone. Many women think it's very important to have "effective programs" such as a balanced home budget and they are willing to sacrifice and tell the kids, "No!" in order to make it happen. You can't run a household without being effective and lots of women - some single moms, others not - do just that every day despite Mr. Olson's delusions.

Men want a challenge, a quest, while women mainly just want to feel secure. Men want to get behind a bold leader and are more willing to go out of their comfort zone when the situation demands it.

Again, did he just pull this out of his ass? Lots of women thrive on challenge and many men enjoy peace and security. Likewise, it's possible to enjoy a happy medium between both extremes. Is it really so hard to imagine men and women who want security but are happy to tackle something challenging to break up the monotony or for a reward? Does Mr. Olson really think the world is black and white like this?

Our leaders are all too often touchy-feely girly-men, hamstrung by a need to incessantly empathize and unable to complete their mission: Keep the nation solvent. If more leaders do not find their manhood, those girly-men will soon have much more to empathize about.

Again, empathy is not the problem here. It's the unwillingness to empathize that has put us in unjust wars, has bankrupted our lower and middle classes, and has cost us our sense of security. The last thing America needs is more "real men" like George W. Bush who rush in blindly, proud and cocksure, without knowing or caring what the consequences will be. We need leaders who have an erect spine - not an erect penis - and women are just as capable as men are. In fact, I'm pretty sure I know some women who have much stronger spines and would fight much harder for a balanced budget than weak-kneed Obama ever did.

But these men and women don't exist in Wayne Olson's world. He's still living in the "Cowboy and Indian" days gone by. He's looking for a hero to ride into town, shoot the place up, and let God sort it all out. He doesn't need any pussies getting in his way.

I think that's a great idea and, if I were his wife, I'd make sure there was no chance he'd get too close to some any time soon.

I Was Wrong!

2011-04-08T22:23:00.000-05:00

I have always maintained that if new evidence or a better argument comes along than what I already hold to, I will change. Tonight I'm going to do just that.

I have had a strong belief against burning any kind of book for many years now. I detested the practice of book burning even though I accepted that it was a right guaranteed by the Constitution. So when Pastor Jones burned the Quran recently, even though I supported his right to do it, I thought it was a stupid thing to do.

I was wrong.

Thunderf00t's video shook my belief to its core and found it wanting. What I hate is the destruction of ideas, not property. Indeed, I have never stopped to be infuriated that someone deleted a file. He argues the position way better than I could ever articulate it here and so I will simply link to his video. I hope you'll take just a few minutes and watch it. It was 10 minutes that changed almost a lifetime of thinking. He is right and I was wrong!

On Sunday, April 10, I'm going to support Thunderf00t in whatever way I can. I may only be able to delete files since I don't have money to spend on throwaway hard drives but I'm going to do something. If you want to join in, go here and, at the bottom of the page, right-click on the little disk icon to download the PDF. You can copy and delete it all you want on Sunday to let the rest of the world know that freedom is not negotiable.

If Life Gets Rough, I'll Turn to God...Yeah, Right

2011-04-07T14:18:00.001-05:00

You've probably already read PZ's takedown of the article that appeared in Psychology Today which suggests that atheists may turn to God when things get bad enough. I want to put in my two cents because I know a thing or two about being an atheist during the tough times.

First, the article pisses me off for using the word "theory" when the word "hypothesis" should have been used. Psychology may be a soft science but there's no reason to be sloppy. Using "theory" gives this idea more weight that it deserves - particularly since the author doesn't cite any studies to back up his outrageous claim.

Second, I have a problem with the idea that:

...whether you believe in God is not as much a matter of how smart or educated you are, but rather, a matter of whether life has worked out in a way that makes you feel comfortable enough to be an atheist.

That seems to imply that we didn't reason ourselves into atheism and that we just don't feel like we need God because we've got it good. That's absolute bollocks - at least for me. I spent years...seriously, years...studying and learning all I could so that I could answer the God question. I didn't win a million dollars or come into some good fortune and say, "Oh well, I'm set for life. I sure don't need any divine intervention in my life now so I think I'll be an atheist." I've never really been "comfortable" in my whole life and my comfort level has not affected my reason.

My third problem is with this suggestion:

The idea that even hardcore atheists will, beyond a threshold level of stress, believe in God may sound unlikely to the die-hard atheist. But, perhaps that's because you haven't been put under a sufficiently high level of stress. And it's also because you have faulty intuitions about human nature: You believe that your identity (as an atheist) is set in stone, and can't be changed. However, findings show, for most traits, there is no such thing as a stable personality. Instead, we have propensities. For instance, we all have the propensity to be both a saint and a sinner, and whether we exhibit saintly or sinful behavior at a particular point in time depends on the circumstances in which we find ourselves.

I have had more high-level stress than this psychologist will probably ever know. I've dealt with 24 years of mental illness. I was sexually assaulted before I was a teen. I've been through two failed marriages (the first of which was filled with almost ten years of emotional abuse and betrayal). I've attempted suicide 5 or 6 times now...I'm losing count. I almost died twice two months ago and lost my unborn son. I've lost family and friends to various kinds of death. Believe me, I know stress. And yet that stress has not made me turn to God. I think that to run crying to God just because life sucks would be very dishonest and disrespectful, both to me and the (imagined) deity. It wouldn't be any sincere form of conversion - it would be more of a "fair-weather friend" type of thing.

I know that my atheism can change and it will should good evidence for God's existence come to light. That's a position of reason, not emotion. And what does my ability to do good and evil have to do with what I believe about God's existence? The mind boggles.....

My suggestion for this author: the next time you want to hypothesize about our disbelief, talk to us first. Do some research. Cite some studies. Those of us who arrived at our atheism by reason will not accept your hunches, guesses, and feelings as evidence. You have to show your work - we won't accept it any other way.

If It Had Been a Snake, It Would Have Bit You!

2011-04-05T22:55:00.000-05:00

I was visiting with the parents tonight when the subject of religion came up. It comes up every time we talk.

We chatted about some of the more unusual Christian denominations after I commented about First Amendment protection for "strange" religious practices such as hallucinogenic drug use, animal sacrifice, and tattoo/body piercing. The subject of "snake-handling" came up and I mentioned listening to Bro. Sam Singleton's story of watching his grandfather die a horrible death after being bitten during such a church service (I didn't mention Bro. Sam by name since he's an atheist. I was too chicken.).

My mom kind of rolled her eyes and said something about how stupid snake-handling was. She said, "The Bible doesn't tell us to do stuff like that."

Actually, Mom's wrong and I told her that. Check out the book of Mark 16:14-18:

Afterward he appeared unto the eleven as they sat at meat, and upbraided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they believed not them which had seen him after he was risen.

And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.

He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.

And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues;

They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.

I made sure to quote the first couple of verses for context: we aren't talking about just the apostles here. We're talking about everyone who believes and is baptized. Every single Christian should be manifesting these signs according to Jesus so that the rest of us might believe. So it's not altogether crazy to think you can cast demons out of kids, handle venomous snakes during worship, drink poison straight from the bottle, or rely on faith-healing rather than science-based medicine...not if you've bought into the New Testament message, that is.

Indeed, we have a New Testament example in the Apostle Paul himself. Let's turn to Acts 28:1-6 where a fellow believer discusses their escape from a wrecked prison ship:

And when they were escaped, then they knew that the island was called Melita.

And the barbarous people shewed us no little kindness: for they kindled a fire, and received us every one, because of the present rain, and because of the cold.

And when Paul had gathered a bundle of sticks, and laid them on the fire, there came a viper out of the heat, and fastened on his hand.

And when the barbarians saw the venomous beast hang on his hand, they said among themselves, No doubt this man is a murderer, whom, though he hath escaped the sea, yet vengeance suffereth not to live.

And he shook off the beast into the fire, and felt no harm.

Howbeit they looked when he should have swollen, or fallen down dead suddenly: but after they had looked a great while, and saw no harm come to him, they changed their minds, and said that he was a god.

This is an interesting example of how the magic Christian superpowers were supposed to work. Paul gets snakebit and, when he does not get sick or die, the natives spare his life. I guess it kind of backfired in a way since they didn't ask to be baptized - they just decided that Paul was a god (Did Paul disabuse them of the notion and witness to them? We aren't told.). But maybe these magic powers can be used for more selfish purposes and converting nonbelievers with them is just bonus.

Regardless of what was meant or how you interpret these passages, you cannot deny that they are there. My mom would like to, I think, but now she and my dad are just a little bit more knowledgeable about the book that they claim is the center of their life and should be the center of mine too. I doubt that Mom has given one more thought about it but, if she did, I'm sure it was to simply rationalize the verses away so that they don't apply to her. That's how she handles conflict, controversy, and condemnable acts in the Bible. To her, they either don't exist or they don't apply.

I'm not going to argue with her. Her interpretations are her own responsibility though I freely confess I do not want to see her start handling snakes or drinking bleach in order to prove her faith to me. But whether she likes it or not, the mandate for those acts is in her Bible and if it had been a snake, it would have bit her!

Cosmic Facebook God: My Idea of Deism

2011-03-31T20:51:00.000-05:00

If there is a creator god out there, it seems likely to me that such a being would resemble the deist idea of a god instead of the theist version. I simply can't conceive of a benevolent personal god for many reasons that I've described in other posts, not the least of which is the problem of evil. But I can see where there might have been some alien scientist or cosmic creator that set all this in motion. The trouble is that I don't think that being, if it existed, was very competent. Let me explain my thought in simple terms.

This creator, if it exists, is like a "Cosmic Facebook God." It logged in and started this whole scenario with the best of intentions, hoping to come up with something unusual and interesting like this:

Nice, plump, juicy, red strawberries. Mmmm.....

But Cosmic Facebook God got distracted. He stepped away from his computer and got busy with something else. Maybe his girlfriend dropped by. Maybe his mom was on the phone. Maybe he took a nap. Whatever happened, time went by and, without his guidance, things didn't turn out quite as well as expected. In fact, the whole experiment went sour and he ended up with something more like this:

Brown, withered, useless. Humans, left to their own devices, got better at war and violence than any other animal. So good, in fact, that they ran roughshod over the entire planet and each other. They ruined the experiment. What a disappointment!

Maybe Cosmic Facebook God is desperately asking his other "farming" friends for help now. WTB Unwither?

Even if this were true, it doesn't really answer any questions. If Cosmic Facebook God exists, we would have to explain its origins too. We'd be left with more questions, not fewer.

Fortunately, I don't think Cosmic Facebook God exists. It seems more likely to me that our existence is a natural phenomenon that we will one day be able to understand better through the rigorous application of science. Until that day comes, I guess we'll continue to argue about it but at least maybe sometimes we can have a little fun with it too.

Facebook Fury: A Missed Opportunity

2011-03-30T18:12:00.003-05:00

I'm going to just post the latest Facebook crap on my page and let you read it. Take a minute and let it sink in good:

First, I went to the page in question and it's almost entirely in Arabic so no one I know can read it, least of all these two people. I did find some English in the Info section explaining that the page is in protest to the Quran burning in Florida. You remember that, right? The silly book burning that didn't happen. Well, I've no idea what this page says but there are some videos posted that mock Jesus and Christianity, often using sexual imagery to do so. I understand why Christians would be offended by this.

The problem is the directive to report the page for being "offensive to religion" and showing "hate towards a religious group." Now, before everyone gets upset, I do understand that FB has a right to regulate the content of their site. I also understand that speech designed to directly incite violence cannot be tolerated. But the problem here is that if we get rid of everything that someone finds offensive, then pretty soon we won't have anything in print at all. The answer to speech you don't like is more speech, not less. Why do you think I fuss about these articles and posts and such? I do it because I want to counter what I think are bad ideas and because I think that's a much better solution than trying to control or eliminate other people's speech.

Sanitizing and eliminating speech is an authoritarian position that I must reject. I believe it flies in the face of our libertarian founding principles and is harmful for society. A healthy society must necessarily rely on robust debate and vigorous free speech. I also think the same applies to religion which is one reason why I would not support the suppression of religions that I don't like. If freedom of thought and speech isn't for everyone, then it's for no one.

But let's forget the political points and focus on the religious ones for a minute. WWJD? I looked in my Bible and I found this in the book of Matthew:

5:10 Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
5:11 Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake.
5:12 Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.

Is there some part of this that's difficult to understand? Jesus didn't say get mad and throw a fit. He didn't say complain until you've silenced your enemies forever. And he sure didn't say to respond like this:

Screw the bastards? This is not a good Christian response. This is not a compelling demonstration of the faith that you're telling us we are immoral for not having. Let's read on:

5:39 But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.

5:40 And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloak also.

Jesus says that if the owner of this FB page hurts you, do not fight against him. If the whole world rises up against you and talks trash about you and your faith, let it go because that is to be expected! That's what happened to the prophets, remember? Jesus says that if you are a Christian, you should be prepared to have evil done to you for your faith and you should respond with love.

5:44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you...

What in your response here demonstrates love? Absolutely nothing! You have missed a golden opportunity to live up to the best of your faith. You failed horribly. And why, please tell me why, should I take you seriously when you say one thing and you live like this? Why would I ever want to trade in my morals for such vanity and pretension? For such hypocrisy?

I know that there are people and organizations in America that thrive on fearmongering and convincing you that life as you know it is coming to an end. They have you up in arms thinking that your race, nationality, and religion are all under attack and in imminent danger of destruction. But even if this stuff is true (which it's not), don't respond with censorship and more hate. Don't show us the worst you've got - show us your best.

Otherwise, how can you ever expect us to do anything other than sit back and shake our heads in disgust?

**Update** Six hours later and this person has reposted, demanding that everyone report the page. In addition to the whine, people are claiming to be "sick" over this, calling for prayer (imprecatory ones, perhaps?), reassuring each other that God's going to come back soon and put a stop to this, and claiming that the page's owner is going to hell. The page went from 277 likes to now 364 likes. Censorship rarely ever works the way its champions intend. Here's the link! When I run the Arabic through Google Translate, it does appear to be a juvenile attempt to piss off Christians and ranting about how Islam is better (or more correct) than Christianity. Pot-Kettle-Black. It seems odd though since I thought Islam revered Jesus as a prophet but these guys aren't pulling any punches. Perhaps someone else can explain? Oh, I see some Satanic imagery too so now I'm really confused!

Depression and My Dreams

2011-03-30T15:12:00.001-05:00

I seem to be sliding nicely into my depressed state. I have a list of small things that I need to do but, when I think about doing them, I feel tremendously anxious. Making phone calls is the worst because I don't like the phone in the best of times. Now that I'm a little depressed, the idea of having to call someone makes my heart race and my blood pressure soar. I don't leave the house unless I must (which is rare) and I've been snacking on junk food way too much.

My dreams provide no measure of escape. I have recurring dreams about being hospitalized against my will. Last night I dreamed that I was committed to a mental facility in Louisiana (though I don't recall who did it or why). In this dream, I was able to talk to the doctors, at least, but they informed me that state law allowed for me to be held against my will for 35 days for any reason or no reason*. My main concern was my needlephobia, of course, for you just can't get out of a hospital without having blood drawn at least once. I did everything I could to avoid the nurses including trying to find ways to escape. I'm normally not the kind of person who would go to such extremes but this voice in my dream kept urging me to get out. She kept saying, "How far are you willing to go to escape?" The voice was not encouraging me to consider suicide but rather was giving me permission to use whatever means was necessary to get out. When one of the other patients told the nurses of my plan to escape, I remember confronting her in the exercise yard outside and pushing her to the ground saying, "You're going to regret this. For as long as I have to stay here, I'm going to make you pay for this every single day." I wanted nothing more than to give her my fear.

I've never been a violent person but I've lived with this voice off and on since I was a teenager. It's a sure sign that the pressure is getting to me. The problem is that the source of this depression and anxiety is amorphous, it doesn't lend itself into a simple shape that can be identified and dealt with easily. The feelings of worthlessness and failure are growing every day, it seems, with no end in sight. "What's the point?" I keep asking and I wonder why I maintain this silly blog, why I open myself up to such stupidity and grief every day, why I ever thought that anything I wrote could ever matter.

These are not rational thoughts but they hurt. This is one face of depression and I hate it. I live with its shadow in the day and I wrestle with it at night in my dreams.

I realized the other day that the next time I feel suicidal, I might hesitate to use some of the resources I have like the National Suicide Hotline. Why? Because I have this paranoia that if I reach out to anyone, I will end up in jail and the hospital again. That is how much I fear it - enough that I would suffer in silence rather than reach out for help. Again, it's not necessarily rational but it's powerful.

The really weird part of this whole thing it that I might wake up tomorrow and be hypomanic instead. I might just get up tomorrow, go on a house-cleaning spree, and then write 5 posts here because I can't get the words to stop racing through my mind. I wouldn't be any better off for it necessarily because that's not the same as being well. It's just flip-flopping to the other end of the spectrum.

And hypomania might be worse, you know. Because when I have that level of energy, I can answer the question: "How far are you willing to go to escape?" How far indeed? When I'm hypomanic, I can find solutions and (worse still sometimes) I can make them happen. Dangerous days, indeed, because as annoying and tiring as I might be, that other part of me is a million times worse. That is a part that no one should have to deal with. That is a part of me, my hidden voice, that I fear might one day be driven to do something that I would never want.

I've read that some people feel that they've been "blessed" by having bipolar disorder. I feel cursed. I can't understand how anyone who is plagued with this disorder can enjoy it except in their most manic states. Perhaps one day someone will stop by and explain it to me because, for the life of me, I can't see it. I can't imagine thinking that I'm better off for being sick. I can't see myself ever wishing this disease on anybody. Maybe that's a lack of vision on my part but I don't think so. The high days might feel good sometimes but even they leave a bitter taste when done. And the dark days? Well, let's just say they are dark indeed.

*I'm sure this is not the law in Louisiana or anywhere else in the U.S. You'll have to look up each state law to find out what they really are.

It's Who You Know, Right?

2011-03-29T16:07:00.000-05:00

The golden rule when it comes to getting a job down here has always been, "It's who you know - not what you know." The recession seems to have made this worse, not better. But knowing someone is not even enough sometimes. It helps if you have the right family, the right connections, the right politics, and - of course - if you go to the right church.

Needless to say, I fail at all those.

It doesn't help that our local WIN Job Centers are a joke. The one in my former town was mediocre at best. The lady had me fill out some applications but she did not want to answer any questions or help me prepare for any potential interviews. She was very clear that her lunchtime was approaching and she didn't want to deal with me. This happened immediately after I got out of the mental hospital so I was afraid to make a fuss. The WIN Job Center in this town is worse. The employees do not keep the hours posted on their door and appear to work hard when they are present to hide that fact. They claim not to know anything or be able to do anything. They couldn't appear more indifferent if they tried.

We got a break this weekend in that one of my mom's friends knew someone important and there were several potential spots open. My mom said that her friend had spoken to Mr. Important and he said we should go apply on Monday (you can already see how the he said-she said is a problem). Come Monday, his place of business sends us to the WIN Job Center which is empty despite the posted hours. Come today, they are open but they say there are no positions because of a hiring freeze. They call Mr. Important after some fuss and he says to just leave a resume'. Now I'm wondering who really said what because the whole thing is so mixed up.

I walk away from all this with a "Why bother?" attitude. It's hard to keep caring when every effort meets with failure and it feels like nobody cares. It's hard to keep going when all you hear is about how the politicians are cutting our throats and that they fully expect to gain even more power in the next election. It's hard to have hope when the money is running out and the rent, quite literally, is coming due.

I understand why people cling to their gods. I understand the need to beseech the skies when you have no hope left and you don't know what else to do. I really do sympathize. The difference, I guess, is that I don't want to add to my list of disappointments and I believe that unanswered prayers would be the icing on that cake. So many unanswered prayers...

Ah well, that's the end of the "poor me" story for today though, I think, it's fair to say that millions of us are singing this song right now. At least I can use this time to work on the new FB page and read up on some mental illness studies. Fortunately, there are folks out there who are still able to work on these problems.

Changes

2011-03-28T18:46:00.000-05:00

I'm planning some changes to the site that will be mostly cosmetic since I'm taking this more seriously than I had expected to. Also, I now have a Facebook page. If you are out and you don't mind associating with me, I'd really appreciate your support.

I extend my continued gratitude to those of you who follow me and, especially, those who share. But I'm also thankful for those of you who end up here through other means, even if you just read one post and leave. It's good to know that I'm not alone out here.

Claw Crane Blues

2011-03-27T23:38:00.000-05:00

When I think I can't hurt anymore

I find another level of pain

There's no one to blame

For this wretching sadness

I fall into the hole

Like a toy

Deprived of joy

Hurtling toward a child's embrace

Each beat of my heart

A steady crank

Of that little hand

Until I burst forth

And no one's there

No babe to spare

Me one breath

Or yet to care

If I should carry on

In paraphasic bliss

If you don't know my recent history, it won't make sense. It may not make sense to you anyway. I don't tend to use punctuation when I write like this. And why am I explaining myself to you?

Personhood Revisited

2011-03-27T14:55:00.001-05:00

Back in October I blogged about an attempt coming up in 2011 for Mississippi to define life as beginning at conception by calling any fertilized egg a "person." According to OneNewsNow, this nonsense will be on the November ballot. As I said in October, I have no doubt it will pass. Mississippians seem to be notorious for voting for the most useless, wasteful, harmful, and insane things possible. If it doesn't work and it doesn't make sense, we'll approve it! Just show us to the polls.

A spokesman for Missionaries to the Preborn wants us Mississippians to know that this is our chance to defy the law and, hopefully, start a movement to overturn Roe v Wade. He knows this bonehead move will cost us millions of taxpayer dollars in lawsuits but he doesn't seem to care. We're his ground troops in this battle, his front line, so some casualties are bound to be expected. He has a message for us Mississippians:

"They have the opportunity to do it this November, and hopefully most of them will seize upon it, send a strong message to Washington, DC, and our Supreme Court that it's time for this bloodshed to be brought to an end in our nation."

I have a message for this organization and every other anti-choice organization that is wasting our time and money on unconstitutional measures and preventing women from getting the care they need. It's a message for all those who don't care about women and children but are only interested in obtaining the power to control women by denying them the right to safe medical care.

Fuck you. That's my message. Absolutely, 100%, fuck you and the horse you rode in on. While you're prancing about trying to pass this idiotic, anti-reality, useless amendment, the rest of us are going to be focusing on measures that actually work like education and contraception. You know why? Because I don't want women to be faced with that awful choice. I'd much rather each pregnancy be safe and wanted and I'm willing to support options that work instead of chasing fantasies that don't. Because I want to support women and children rather than control or destroy them. Because I'm a decent human being instead of a heartless or brainless tool.

I'm not your tool, you so-called "pro-lifers." I will vote NO on this amendment because it's scientifically inaccurate, legally untenable, and morally irresponsible. I will vote NO on it because it will not help and will only drive the issue underground. I will vote NO because I know you're not serious about this for the reasons I laid out in my original post.

I will vote NO and my neighbors will pass it anyway because they apparently never learn from history. And every month, hundreds of thousands of "people" will be thrown away on pads or sucked up into tampons and disposed of with nary a word said. Personhood, hah! What a stupid fucking joke.

Say It Ain't So!

2011-03-27T10:14:00.000-05:00

Once again I've had a comment deleted from a newspaper's website because some delicate flower was just too sensitive to handle the truth. I say this because the Terms and Conditions are very ill defined and deletion is usually done based on whining rather than the actual content of the comment. It's frustrating to have this done when you're trying to have a rational discussion with someone but I figured out a while back that no one on that site is aiming to discuss anything. Instead they seem to be there to pump up their egos and spread their "expert knowledge" on every subject imaginable. Now that I think of it, I wonder why I waste my time there. Perhaps I'm morphing into a troll.

Regardless of my motive, my original comment still stands. For all the Christian women out there who presume to tell us that the Bible is literally true, is the basis of our government, and is the only source of morality, I still say, "Shut up." I know that's ugly of me to say but your Bible is my source for that. The Old Testament is absolutely clear that women are no more than a man's property and should behave as such. If you don't believe that, then you either haven't read it or you're in denial. As for the New Testament, there are some passages in there too about women not usurping the authority of men. That means these Christian women (who take this stuff literally) have no business lecturing men on religious matters. The Bible says they should be silent and subject to man's authority.

So, the Bible says this and it's regarded as the font of all wisdom and morality. I say it and my comment gets deleted for violating the terms of service. It's just like the Westboro Baptist Church hypocrisy. If someone says that homosexuals are sinners and are destroying our country, they are hailed as pro-family, pro-values people. If the WBC says that God hates fags, they are hated and reviled.

Is it that people have no problem with the message but with the messenger? Or is it that they just don't like to hear the blunt truth - they want it watered down? I have a suspicion that they simply don't think the message applies to them.

Whatever their problem is, I'm not going to stop pointing out this hypocrisy and I'm not going to let people lecture me when they don't even try to live up to their own standards. Let them scream and holler. Let them flag and report. I've already gotten under their skin apparently and I'm not going anywhere.

The Disappointment

2011-03-26T03:32:00.000-05:00

Sometimes when a person survives a traumatic event in which others have died (like I recently did), he or she may develop what used to be called survivor guilt.

It is now considered a part of post-traumatic stress disorder or PTSD.

This post is not about survivor guilt. I do not feel guilty for having survived. Rather, in the first week, I felt enormously overjoyed to have lived through such a terrible ordeal.

But now I'm experiencing something else - something that I think is a mix of my bipolar disorder, postpartum depression, and grief. I call it "survivor disappointment" because sometimes I regret that I am still alive.

This is not a rational regret. I do not have any well thought out reasons for this feeling. No, this is a dangerous dip in my mood that makes me feel as if I would have been better off if I had not made it. It's a response to the grief, yes, and to the stress of trying to carry on with my broken life. It's a response to the stress of having to be strong for everyone when I sometimes don't feel like being strong. It's a response to my inability to be open about what's churning inside and that's something I'm going to have to fix.

I would not be better off dead and neither would anyone else be better off without me. I know this. I'm taking my medication and counseling is in my near future. I have no plans to act on these feelings but I intend to monitor them closely and write about them here as needed. More than anything else, I am determined that I will not do anything stupid to hurt myself or put myself back in the hospital. I've had enough needles and drama, thank you.

So please don't think this is a suicide note. It's not - far from it! It's an acknowledgment that my mood is becoming increasingly unstable and I'm going to need some help coping. Fortunately, I have a good support system here that can help me do just that. Rather than focus on how miserable I sometimes feel and how bad life has treated me, I prefer to consider the gift of life I now have. In the words of my beloved Nightwish:

I would just like to think that, it's not why it happened to me. But why was I saved? What else can I do now?

What else indeed? I have the rest of my life ahead of me. And yes, though oftentimes "the dark holds hard," I believe I can have a good future. I must be the one to make it so - even though sometimes the Disappointment is almost more than I can bear.

The Visit That Didn't Happen

2011-03-25T17:47:00.001-05:00

It's no secret to anyone who knows me - I'm sliding into a depression. Ok, I guess it's a secret to most everyone then. The point is that I don't want to talk and I don't want to write. I don't want to do anything and it's nobody's fault. That's just the way this thing goes.

There's been a running bet since we moved as to how long it would take for my mom to invite us to her church. So far she has not done so but she did tell us last weekend that her pastor had inquired as to whether he could come visit us. I don't know why he felt he should get her permission rather than ours. Perhaps it's that almost default assumption that I'm still a helpless child who needs mama to take care of her. Perhaps it was something more charitable. Perhaps he didn't really ask at all and she suggested it. Who knows?

I wasn't particularly worried when I heard the news because I know this preacher has a reputation for not visiting. His flock was rather put out with him in the past about not visiting the sick, the shut-ins, and the "lost" as they thought he should. Those who complained the loudest were often those who would not do any visitations themselves (though they would certainly be glad to pray). Even if I were interested in going back to Christianity, my home church is one of the last churches I'd choose.

Anyway, it was something of a surprise when my doorbell rang about an hour ago. I was about to grab a shower when our unexpected visitor arrived. I really despise unannounced callers - even my own flesh and blood. Imagine my unabashed joy to discover that it was the preacher man! I lurked in the back of the house and my dear partner opened the door for him. I don't believe the preacher even came inside. He just stood out on the step and introduced himself. He said he wanted to meet us "face-to-face" and invited us to church on Sunday. I didn't ask my partner how he responded but I'm sure it was with something polite. He's good like that.

That was pretty much it. There could be several reasons why the preacher did not sit down and visit with us properly, I guess. Perhaps he was rushed for time. Maybe he realizes that most people don't like proselytizing so he doesn't make a big thing of it. Maybe he doesn't really believe in what he's selling. Maybe he knows that I was "saved" and baptized in that church so I'm already guaranteed a spot in heaven (in which case, why didn't he come in and talk with my partner who was raised a Witness and let him know he's headed for that hell that Witnesses don't believe in). Maybe the preacher had heard that I have developed a negative view of religion and had a habit of asking really tough questions. Maybe he felt that since he had talked with the "man of the house," then there was no need to speak to the woman. Maybe he just didn't give a damn.

I don't know the answer and I don't really care. If he had come in and asked to speak with me, it likely would have been an awkward conversation. Unless he had some new evidence or an argument that I haven't heard a thousand times, I probably would have asked him some hard questions and shot down whatever fallacious drivel he offered. I would have been polite but I would have given no quarter. I didn't ask for this nonsense to be brought to my door and I don't need it polluting my life any further.

It's possible that my mother arranged this little "non-visit" but I kind of doubt it. She's trying hard to stay out of my life as much as she can with only limited success. The longer she lives, the more convinced the rest of the family is that she's suffering from a personality disorder (likely borderline) but no one dares to bring this up to her. She gets angry or else plays the sobbing guilt card any time she is criticized. I've accepted that she's not going to change and I tend to have more sympathy for her now than I once did. Nevertheless, I have already stood my ground with her politely, saying "No" when no needed to be said and not backing down. It didn't sit well with her but that's not my problem. If I'm going to act like an adult, she's going to have to do the same.

And so I end here by saying that I do not know whether my mom arranged this little meeting and I do not know why the preacher decided that a non-visit was in order here. There simply isn't enough evidence to justify a position in either case. Ultimately, I find that I do not care. I am not going to church this Sunday or, indeed, any Sunday unless I want to. Likewise, I am highly unlikely to buy into the preacher's religion - especially on the basis of anything he says. It might be judgmental of me, but I doubt that he has anything new to share with me about his god that would convince me that such a being exists.

Apocalypse 2011 Revisited

2011-03-19T22:53:00.001-05:00

When I sat down one night to write about the dead bird/fish phenomenon, I had know idea that my well-named little post would generate so much traffic - much less that it would continue to get the lion's share of hits more than 3 months later. At first I was a little depressed that people cared more about the alleged end of the world than my thoughts on atheism or my experience with bipolar. However, I've come to realize that this is an opportunity to promote a rational response to current events and so I choose to take it.

If you came here through a search engine in order to find out about the end of the world, please don't leave. Give me five, maybe ten, minutes to make my case.

People have been saying the world is going to end ever since there have been people. In our early days, it was a reasonable response to the disaster we saw and our inability to explain things. But as time has moved on and we have developed the tools of science, we can now understand why these things happen and, in many cases, we know how to either prepare for or prevent them. There is no longer any reason for us to be enslaved to wild speculation and prophetic doom. We can now look our future in the eye and see its potential threats for what they really are.

Certainly, it is possible that humanity, even the entire planet, could be destroyed any day. One astronomical event is all it would take to radically alter this "pale blue dot" so that no life could long survive. But the chances of such a thing happening are, well, astronomical. It's just not likely that you, your children, or their grandchildren's great-grandchildren will ever see such a thing. And as our technology and knowledge of space increases, the more likely it becomes that we could detect such a threat and prevent it. It's really a tremendous waste of time for the average person to worry about such a thing happening.

But if you came here looking for answers, you're probably worried about more immediate concerns: earthquakes and tsunamis, hurricanes and volcanoes, wars, famine, swine flu and such. Put together it sounds like a scary mix. The thing you need to remember is that this stuff happens all the time. It's been going on since the beginning. The difference is that now we can detect it better, see the effects of it more because of our population increase, and we can spread the news across the globe in seconds. This may give the appearance of more disaster but that's all it really is - an appearance.

What about all these prophecies? What about the psychic predictions? What about the religious promises that these are the "Last Days?" Well, in so many words, it's bunk. Look at this list of failed prophecies and tell me why you would believe anything remotely like that. Why would you believe any psychic or prophet when they can't even correctly predict events that will occur this year, much less an Armageddon-type disaster in years to come? Why would you put your trust in people who either suffer from a mental illness or else knowingly lie about these things in order to get your money? For the religious among you, look at this list too. Notice at the top where they quote Jesus saying that no one knows when the end will come - not even Jesus himself! If you only want recent predictions, look here. Link after link of failed prophecies. Link after link of liars, frauds, and absolute lunatics. Do not fall for their scams!

People say things are worse now than they've ever been and we are spiraling out of control toward the end of days. I beg to differ. Human society is much better than it has ever been before. We are a better people - less barbaric, more inclined to talk these days than to promote violence. We are slowly eradicating the evil practices of slavery, child abuse, domestic violence, and hatred. We still have a lot of work to do but we are getting better - not worse - better! Look at our medicine, our technology, our civilization. Can anyone really believe that life 4000 years ago was better than it is now? Simpler, perhaps, but better? I think not!

From now until the day you die, people will be telling you that the end is coming and some of them will claim to know the date and time. Be very wary of these people and examine their claims skeptically. Don't be deceived by the outrageous claims of disaster and violence. Put it all in perspective and ask yourself if this is really any different than what's always been going on. Chances are, it's the same shit on a different day. And regarding the real challenges that we face, remember this: we are the only ones who can change things. There are no miracle cures or magic fixes out there.

Choose to be part of the solution, not the problem. Steer clear of apocalyptic talk - it's all bullshit.

Image: Salvatore Vuono / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Reading Between the Lines

2011-03-17T18:29:00.001-05:00

I had to get up early today for my first doctor's appointment since the hospitalization. I didn't like getting up early. I didn't enjoy the hassle of getting in or getting my finger stuck. I didn't enjoy the interview with the Medicaid worker as she asked me questions and dates about the stillbirth. I didn't enjoy coming home to my mother who asked me about my visit and then proceeded to try to badger me into going on a diet. Apparently, Weight Watchers is her new religion. I wanted to tell everyone to read between the lines:

.....

You know what is? That's the sound of me not punching a hole in the wall with my fist. That's the sound of me not screaming some obscenities for the few minutes it took to get enough blood out of my finger to run all the tests. That's the sound of me not going off on the receptionist for trying to do her job. That's the sound of me not shooting myself over all my legal and financial worries. That's the sound of me not slugging Miss Medicaid as she encouraged me to try to have another child (with the implication that God would work it out next time). That's the sound of me not tearing out my hair and my eyes in another attempt to figure out my mom. Since I turned down her offer of dieting, you see, she's invited me over for pizza.

But it's not all bad, you see. I'm actually healing quite nicely and my blood, platelet, and liver enzyme levels are all pretty much back to normal. My glucose levels are in the normal range as if I'd never even been borderline diabetic. This is a lot to be thankful for and so I extend my gratitude to doctors and scientists everywhere and the people who support them.

I've got some really big decisions to make in the upcoming weeks - decisions that could permanently alter my life. I'm going to need to talk with a lot of people and do a lot of research. But there's one thing I won't do to help me make these choices.

.....

Yes, read between the lines. That's the sound of me not praying.

Warning! Offensive!

2011-03-15T21:51:00.000-05:00

There's an article up on OneNewsNow.com, a site run by the American Family Association that purports to give news in much the same way that Fox gives us news. This article asserts that the NEA is encouraging "sex talk" in schools at a United Nations meeting. In red letters below the headline, I read the following warning:

Caution: This article contains terms that some may find offensive.

I assume that the AFA thinks that words such as "Oral sex, masturbation, and orgasms" are the dirty words to be wary of. I found some words that I thought were much more offensive and it's a shame that the "good Christians" who run that site don't have the balls to call them out for what they are:

Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute

Those are the words that I found outrageously offensive. Why? Because as long as the Catholic Church continues to excuse and cover up child rape, the words "Catholic," "Family," and "Human Rights" have no business being in the same name. Period.

And while I'm on the subject, as long as priests are celibate and they keep doing the stuff mentioned above, they have no business lecturing anyone on marriage, children, or women's rights. It's offensive and shameful that so many people continue to look to these men (whether they are vicious perpetrators or silent enablers) for any kind of moral guidance.

Coming Home

2011-03-15T13:33:00.000-05:00

I'm back home at last if you can call it that. I don't - not really. Despite my brief time on the coast, I consider that to be my home and this to be not much more than a return trip to the Underworld. The landscape is about as bleak as my heart and fields of hay do not even begin to compare to the chaotic beauty of the ocean - even an ocean as gray and uninviting as the Gulf of Mexico can be when it comes too close to tentacles of Mississippi.

During the day, I keep an eye out for every tree and flower that shows some color. I cling to those colors and savor each one. By night I look at the stars, which seem to have exploded into view now that I am away from all the light pollution. They cheer me up for a while and remind me that life is short and fleeting. Be grateful, they say. Live like you mean it.

It's hard to do that though when you aren't in control of your feelings. Some days I get it and I can write beautiful mission statements about what I want my life to be and how I think I should live it. But the next day I wake up and I simply do not care. Not about anything. I had originally written this off as a natural part of my recovery but I think now that I am walking on a foundation of depression. Despite whatever mood I may present to the outside world, I just do not care about anything. This became most evident today when we went grocery shopping and I was too apathetic to even imagine what I might want for dinner this week. I don't think I would even eat if someone weren't here to encourage me to do so. I go through the motions because I should and not because I want to.

But this mood is not simply a dark depression in which I might stay in bed all day refusing meals and in obvious need of care. No, I seem to be in a mixed state because I can get out of bed and function relatively normally. As long as I get plenty of sleep, I can fake it. But let me have one bad night and I start cycling up. This happened the other day after I had spent a very restless night lying in bed and feeling like I was drowning in the inky blackness - literally drowning. I could feel darkness pouring down my nose and throat. My mind spun with ideas for this blog and I think I came up with at least four or five posts worth of ideas (most of which I have now forgotten). When the next day came, I was awake and alert but as the day wore on, I became excitable and erratic, easily aroused, impossible to sit still or shut up. I went from being able to sit and read an entire book to not being able to read a simple paragraph online. I could not enjoy my lunch in town because all the noise confused my mind. I began to hate everyone I watched - all these people with their stupid faces and useless expressions, just sitting there making noise so that I couldn't think - and equally, hating all their kids.

Kids, that's the worst part. Everyone seems to have them now. Cute little boys and adorable little girls, all with their perfect smiles and such. It's because of my hurt, I know, that I see them now and have this reaction. I assume it will get better with time. It's hard to know because no one except for my mother ever mentions our son. It's almost like it never happened and he didn't exist. I suppose people don't really know what to say. I don't know that I'd be glad if they did bring it up. It's a very awkward and miserable subject.

Of course, I'm not the only one with such griefs. Only today a friend of mine posted on Facebook about a friend's daughter who is having an operation for a brain tumor. Naturally, the page was flooded with calls for prayer and promises of the same. That's the remedy around here for folks who don't know what else to say or do (or can't be bothered to do anything). The doctors did an MRI first and the results were unclear so they did it again. My friend posted this in response:

docs jst nd to realize ths is outta thr hands

Can I get a facepalm? How would she feel if the doctors said, "Ok, this is out of our hands so we're going to take our equipment back downstairs and you guys can break out the oil and prayers. Good luck, cya!" I think that whole family would be livid. They shouldn't say stuff like this if they don't mean it and, let's face it, they don't mean it. That little girl is in surgery right now and everyone has shifted the goalposts from, "God's going to make the tumor disappear," to "God's going to make the surgery successful." If the child lives, God wins. If she dies, God will still win because he works in such mysterious ways that we just can't understand. Out would go more calls for prayer. Round and around we go on this cosmic carousel of bullshit.

Yes, indeed - I'm home. But it's not the happy ideal that the graphic above might portray. It's the place I remember where it doesn't matter what you know but who you know. It's the place where most people are trapped in a cycle of poverty and ignorance and, oddly enough, they seem to prefer it. I'd almost think they enjoy it. I am always painfully aware of the fact that if it were not for the influence of my family here, nobody around me would give a damn whether I lived or died. Why should they? I don't go to their churches. I don't speak their conservative, teabagger language. I am an outsider even though I was born here. I am the liberal, atheist enemy. That's never going to change so I must make my peace with it.

Peace, what a joke.

To My Fellow Humans

2011-03-12T20:46:00.001-06:00

Whether you are in Japan, Libya, Hawaii, or any other troubled area right now, my thoughts are with you. I wish I had a god to fix it all. I wish I had a magic wand to make it right. I wish I had billions of dollars I could send you in aid. All I have right now is my genuine compassion and goodwill for you until I'm able to make a donation.

Please, if you are able to provide any sort of relief for those who are suffering (either at home or abroad), do so. If there is one thing I stubbornly continue to believe in beyond all else, it is in the ability of humans to respond to horrific suffering with strength and determination. We and we alone can make a difference. As was said by Robert Ingersoll, "The hands that help are better far than the lips that pray."

http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/

http://www.redcross.org/

http://www.internationalmedicalcorps.org/Page.aspx?pid=332

http://www.globalgiving.org/

http://www.opusa.org/

An Atheist Wish on Ash Wednesday

2011-03-09T22:52:00.001-06:00

I remember my first (and last) Ash Wednesday service ten years ago. I don't recall what I gave up for Lent but I do remember getting a black, smudged cross drawn on my forehead and then promptly forgetting about when we went to Huddle House after the service for a late dinner.

Sometimes I still feel that filthy cross on my brow. Why I ever thought it was a good idea for someone to draw an instrument of execution on my body in ashes I will never know. Perhaps it had something to do with how dirty and worthless I felt at the time. Perhaps it was my desperate need to finally experience this Jesus that everyone talked about but no one could ever really show me. Perhaps it was the driving desire I often get to experience new things. Perhaps it was just herd mentality at work.

Whatever the case, my forehead has been cross-free ever since and I don't miss it. I don't miss the guilt and the grief. I don't miss the fear. I don't miss the never-ending parade of rituals designed to honor and appease God but which really served as nothing more than a cheap catharsis.

As an atheist, I no longer worry about the rituals and the prayers. I'm not bound to the ever-circling wheel of drama that Christianity offers. Nonetheless, I have something I want to give up this Ash Wednesday. I really do want to let this go - now and forever - but I don't know how.

I want to give up my cowardice.

I want to come out of this closet and be able to say, "Yes, I am an atheist."

I want to be able to say it without fear and shame. I want to say it as if it were the most normal thing in the world (because I think it should be!) and not as if it were some dirty word that I should hide from polite society.

I want to be an open atheist whose parents still love her. I want to be an open atheist who can still get a job in the local community. I want to be an open atheist whose car is not vandalized and who is not threatened with bodily harm.

Is this too much to ask? Is it, Mississippi? Is it too much for me to ask you to just let me be who I am? Can you make room for me now or do I have to continue to hide myself from everyone - even the ones I love most - just so I can survive?

I want to give this burden up. I want to take off this mask. Why won't you let me do it? Why are you so afraid of me? Was all the blood of my forefathers and foremothers not enough to buy me some acceptance here? Or is it true that I will always be white enough but never religious enough to be at home here?

I wonder if I will go to my grave with this secret. Will my friends and family only find out the truth about me once I'm no longer here to explain it? Will they care or will they persist with a religious funeral and burial in some "hallowed" ground any way just to be safe?

What will it take to get them to listen to me without judgment? Another bullet? Another bottle of pills? Is that what all those attempts were about? Was it the cry of a voice silenced for far too long? I refuse to take that path.

Ash Wednesday is about repentance. During Lent, one is asked to sacrifice something in preparation for Jesus's return. I want to repent of my cowardice and dishonesty. I want to sacrifice this pretense of indifference. How do I turn this desire into reality? I still don't know.

Facebook Fury: God is Not Your Personal Genie

2011-03-08T18:30:00.001-06:00

In addition to my Weekly WorldNut series, I'd like to introduce Facebook Fury. It's my way of addressing the stupid and conceited junk I see on Facebook since I obviously lack the courage to address it on my own Facebook page. I'd like to thank Jas for the title inspiration on this. He's quite right - God is not anyone's personal genie.

Here's the post that's got me riled up this week:

Hi Lord, its me ...things are getting bad here, gas prices are to high, no jobs, food and heating cost to high. I know some have taken you out of our schools, government & even Christmas. But Lord I'm asking you to come back and re-bless America, we really need ya. Thanks Lord, I Love you. ( Please Re-Post if you Love your Lord and want him back in Our Schools, our Government and Our Christmas!

First of all, things are not nearly as bad as this post implies. Yes, things are tighter than normal but we're still enjoying cheaper gas than most anyone else in the world. Most of us are not missing any meals or sleeping in the cold - even those of us who are unemployed. The fact that the people who posted this garbage all have jobs and are leading very cozy middle-class lives did not escape me. That they would whine and moan about things and seem to expect that God would magically fix things for them because they posted on Facebook while people the rest of the globe over are starving or suffering from war, famine, disease, and disaster makes me furious! It's hard for me to respect people when they are either so willfully ignorant or dismissive of reality.

Almost as bad as that is the assumption that God has been thrown out of America and this is the cause of their woes. What utter and complete nonsense! People are still free to pray and worship in this country as they see fit. Likewise, they may celebrate Christmas however they wish. The difference is that the government isn't allowed to endorse religion. We've been over this time and time again. Seriously, how many damn times do we have to discuss this before these people understand the concept? How freaking difficult is it to comprehend the difference between government speech and private speech?

I have news for these chronic moaners on Facebook: there are people the world over who are really suffering. If you had a meal today, your house is pretty warm tonight and doesn't leak, and if you have the ability to post your stupid shit on the internet, then you are not hurting. And even if you do have some problems, God is not your personal genie. He's not going to pop down here and work a miracle just for you because you whined on Facebook (which I guess is the modern day equivalent of rubbing a magic lamp). I certainly would not expect a perfect God to fix your petty little problems and ignore the plight of the children starving in Africa. And if you do think that He should or would do this, what the hell kind of person are you? I mean really?!?

Lastly, I hate the directive to repost this garbage. Like so many other ignorant, trash emails, this one puts pressure on other believers to repost. After all, if you "love the Lord" then you will repost it. And if you don't repost, you must not agree (and, therefore, you must not love God). How pathetic!

I wish for a change that believers would take the initiative to call this mess out for what it is - absolute worthless trash. It trivializes the real suffering that goes on in the world and cheapens God by turning him into a personal Wishmaster while promoting lies about our society. It's a shame that this stuff gets reposted without comment and that's partly my fault for not having the courage to speak out openly about it. But I'm not stupid. I have to live among these people and I'd prefer not to have my house burned down. I've accepted the fact that when bad stuff happens to me, no magic fairy is available to come down here at my beck and call and fix things. It's about time the rest of America figured that out too.

Limbo

2011-03-07T21:00:00.001-06:00

We made the trip safely despite a lot of traffic and terrible weather. It was relatively warm when we left the coast. Now it is freezing - it was 39 degrees last night! I'd call this place hell if it weren't so cold. It's weird being in a place where the major utility companies don't accept credit cards. Then again, maybe I should be glad this place has major utilities.

Speaking of which, our internet service has been ordered but it will be 4 or 5 days before it is up and running (which means I will have to rely on McDonald's or Subway's wifi until then). Maybe the company has to clear our service with God or perhaps they have to look up the chapter and verse to know how to hook it up correctly. Yes, I'm being ugly now - chalk it up to the cold.

Our house is huge and very nice. The lady who owned it is dead but the house is still full of her things. It feels weird in a way to see her stuff everywhere. We didn't actually "go through" her stuff but we keep finding things all over the place: bank statements, tax papers, religious books, and personal items. It almost seems wrong to crack an atheist joke in her house but, of course, her "spirit" is not there to disapprove. So although we are taking good care of the house and her property, I am working on shaking off that feeling of "disrespecting" her every time I say a curse word or make a godless remark.

There's really not much else to say right now. We're exhausted from the long drive, the unpacking, and all the running around. So far we've been so tired at night that we haven't missed the internet too much. Obviously, that's changing since we're sitting here in a restaurant listening to crappy music just to get some wifi access. Hopefully, by the time my home internet is running I'll have something worthwhile to talk about. Until then, I hope everyone is warm, safe, and happy.

Moving On

2011-03-04T10:48:00.000-06:00

I will likely have either very limited or no internet access for the next few days (maybe up to a week depending on how (in)efficient the local cable company is). Please enjoy the intermission while we pack and move out.

Weekly WorldNuts: War and Women

2011-03-02T18:13:00.000-06:00

Most of us know by now that the ultra-crazy right wing elements of our society are on the warpath against everything that does not fit into their ideology. Perhaps it's a sign of the times that some of them don't even try to hide their agenda but are explaining exactly what sort of crazy they intend to accomplish.

And so it is for letter writer Matthew Peak when he states unequivocally:

We can win the country back in the same way. We can work to clarify ideas and reframe debates. We can work to systematically dismantle the confidence people have in popular science [emphasis mine]. We can patiently challenge and resist liberal Christianity and defend our holy text.

He wants to win the country back by undermining science. Really? Is he talking about science he doesn't like such as evolution, global warming, etc.? Or is he really talking about "popular science" such as medical technology that saves millions of lives or the science that puts food on the table, enables us to travel in comfort great distances, allows us to communicate with others across the globe, and has enriched our lives in so many other ways? Does Mr. Peak really want to replace science with his holy text? Who else among you out there wants to replace modern medicine with ancient remedies such as drinking holy water and burning animals? Who else wants to go back to the days when we were little more than a bunch of ignorant savages running around killing each other for land and resources?

Notice how liberal Christianity does not get a pass here. In Mr. Peak's new world, liberal Christianity won't be allowed to exist. That's why, my liberal Christian friends, you need to stand with us against this outrage. There's no freedom of religion for you in their world. You are an abomination that must be "resisted." I find that disgusting indeed.

Unlike Mr. Peak, there are some WorldNuts that are still cloaking their message or turning the truth on its head entirely. Consider this gem from contributor Vox Day in his article, The New White Man's Burden:

The church will cheerfully lecture them on their failures while uniformly giving women a pass on everything from abortion and gluttony to a failure to honor and submit to their husbands.

What planet does this guy live on? Churches give women a pass on abortion and gluttony? Really?? Please show me where, either in churches or in secular America, that women are getting free passes. We are always the ones who bear the shame and difficulty of abortion. Men are largely absent on this and certainly no legislation is being passed to hold men accountable for their part in abortion. As for gluttony, compare overweight men with overweight women. It's not uncommon to see overweight men in positions of authority. They don't seem to take much of a hit for their weight - especially if they are making good money. For women, however, it's a whole different ballgame. Women often either get criticized or ignored if they are overweight. I often wonder how many jobs I've been passed over for because of my weight. I certainly know how many times I have been asked illegally if I was pregnant during a job interview.

I think back to my days in the Southern Baptist Church. When the pastor preached that men should be leaders in the households, a few of them shifted uncomfortably in their seats. Most of them just stared dazedly at the preacher with a look of utter indifference. It was a joke really because these men didn't want to be leaders at church, much less at home. If anything got done in the church or in the community, it was because women made it happen.

Nice try putting the blame on us, Vox Day, but you're wrong and everyone who lives in reality knows it. Did it ever occur to you that men are what they are and do what they do because that's what they choose? Your attempt to blame women, society, churches, and everyone else rather than put the responsibility where it belongs makes you guilty of the very thing you're accusing them of doing - it enables men to do nothing under the guise of "victimization." You know you've screwed up when your lies are so obvious that even WND readers are writing in to tell you how full of shit you are.

That's the crazy this week. I keep wondering how long a reasonably sane society is going to put up with this sort of idiocy. Somehow I can't see the upcoming generation being willing to throw their Xboxs and iPods on the fire because some fundamentalist preacher said science was evil. Likewise, I don't think the next generation of women are going to remain silent while pastors and politicians do everything they can to disempower them and force them to become home-bound, baby-making slaves. At least, that's my hope.

From Mania to Psychosis - My Personal Nightmare

2011-03-01T15:23:00.000-06:00

I've had this in the back of my mind for some time but some recent conversation has prompted me to go ahead and write it. It's going to be a very difficult thing for me to relive and share - very frightening and very embarrassing. But I think it's very necessary because this is where my journey to atheism really took off and it describes the dangers of letting mania go untreated for too long.

My bipolar disorder began at age 14 though I did not know it for what it was then. It mostly manifested as hypomanic states coupled with a great deal of irritability or depression (sort of like a mixed state). I had to work hard during the day to hide my mood swings from my parents and teachers. Every night, however, I hid away in my room so I could write about or just experience the strange feelings I had. As time went by, those feelings manifested themselves as visible and audible hallucinations. At first, I began seeing fuzzy shapes and hearing unintelligible whispers. They began appearing everywhere and I felt strange every time I saw or heard them - not really afraid, but...well, tingly, as if I had been given some special power to see and hear what others could not. As time went on, these became more vivid and more real to me, especially at night. As I lay in my bed trying to sleep, I could see the shapes materialize at the foot of my bed, I could hear them whisper my name, and eventually I felt them touch me. Sometimes the shape would become a very handsome, dark man with a sinister smile and soft hands. Other times the shape would become a gruesome creature, something like a gargoyle perhaps, with fearsome claws. No matter what appeared to me, I always felt like I was at the mercy of these creatures and, as this continued, I became afraid. Ultimately, I reached a point where these nocturnal visions became more like a nightmare in which every night I felt as if I were being held down and raped. This went on for three years and I never told a single person. I was too afraid and the voices told me that I deserved it. I was being prepared for...something.

Let me state here that I think in retrospect that this was a combination of my disorder and my mind's way of trying to deal with the sexual assault I'd experienced around age 8 or so. I cannot remember all the details of that assault so I don't know whether this was my mind's way of "remembering" or if it was in the grip of mania and just filling in some details. Either way, it was an awful experience and made worse because of its religious overtones.

When I left home, I descended into full-time delusion. I saw and heard and felt these things 24/7. I became consumed with hypersexuality and, during fuzzy times of which I have little memory, I began doing all sorts of things I would not have normally chosen. It didn't take long for word to get back to my parents and they forced me to come home and account for my misdeeds. I told them the truth and they called in a pastor (who happened to also teach psychology) who said I was probably suffering from "demonic oppression" but I needed a complete evaluation. I was sent out of town to a Christian psychiatric hospital. They ran a series of physical and psychological tests on me but, at the end of the week, they told me I was perfectly normal. The only thing wrong with me, they said, was guilt for being such a sinner. If I'd get back in church and act right, this stuff wouldn't happen. I have no words to describe how betrayed I felt. Because of the hospital's inaccurate and unprofessional diagnosis, my parents would not trust me again for a long time and I would seek a more permanent path to ending my pain.

I got married at age 18 and the sexual manifestations stopped but the rest of it did not. Instead of experiencing those attacks at nights, I dreamed instead very vividly. One night, I dreamed that the man was threatening me, telling me that if I continued to fight against him, he would kill me. I woke up with the sheets wound tight around my throat suffocating me. I sank into a deep depression that lasted until I failed out of college and attempted suicide. There's nothing like sitting in the middle of a rainstorm with a 9 mm pointed at your head. I was just about ready to pull the trigger when I blacked out. I awoke later back inside the house with the gun nowhere in sight. I still do not know what happened.

We moved back home near my parents and I re-enrolled in school. Even though I still had some lingering depression, the psychotic stuff stopped long enough for me to get my grades back up and finish college. I got a job that turned out to be extremely stressful and before I knew it, I was swinging back toward hypomania again. Within a short time, I was experiencing the irritability and then the hallucinations once again. When a friend disappeared under mysterious circumstances and later was found dead, I constantly dreamed of the dark man telling me that it was my fault. I wasn't allowed to have friends. He was my only friend. I withdrew from everyone. I couldn't tell up from down. I changed jobs thinking I'd have less stress but my new boss harassed me terribly and I ended up having to take medical leave for the rest of my contract. Hypomania became full-blown mania. I didn't eat much and I stayed up all night so I wouldn't have to dream. I used my newfound energy to apply for graduate school and somehow I got accepted. We packed up and moved several hours away. I was convinced that I was on the right path and everything would work out fine.

But it didn't. The psychosis returned and I had difficulty doing the simplest thing like going to the right class. Sometimes I would "come to" in a completely different classroom. Sometimes I awoke to discover that I never left the house. When I did make it to class, I wrote constantly about the darkness in my mind from which I now realized there was no escape. Needless to say, my stay there was short and I failed out again. As the psychosis ramped up, the hypersexuality returned and resulted in some extremely poor decisions that I feel guilt over even today.

I left my husband about that time (one of the best things I've ever done for myself) and stayed with my parents. For some reason I started sharing my psychotic thoughts with my mom. That's one of the ugly things about mania: mouth drops open and all sorts of junk flows out. I was sure (in my grandiose thoughts) she'd understand how important I was to the coming Apocalypse since she's a devout Christian. Nope, she was horrified. She packed me off to a local doctor for help. I still didn't get the right diagnosis but I did get some medication that eased the symptoms somewhat. Once the psychosis left again, I was able to start rebuilding my life. I used that down time to find a good therapist and, from there, a good psychiatrist who finally gave me an accurate diagnosis. I went through a lot of medication before I found a kind that worked well and I could tolerate but it was very much worth it.

I've gone through times since then when I was not compliant with my medication. This was back when the meds were causing side effects that I could not live with. Every time I stopped taking the meds, the symptoms came back (though never as awful as what I'd suffered before). I am now on a very low dose of a popular anti-psychotic and it has worked well for me so far. Keeping my stress low and having a stable home life is very important too. It's a shame that a person in the 20th century had to go through so much and suffer so long to find an explanation and a solution for this problem - particularly since I have a family history of this disease that nobody was willing to talk about until my second hospitalization.

Now obviously I've left out a lot of detail here and I'm sure I've forgotten a lot too. If you have questions, I encourage you to ask. I've already put myself out here just by having this blog but I do it for two important reasons: 1) to vent my frustrations as part of therapy, and 2) to share with others so that maybe they will not have to suffer as long as I did or maybe they can understand what a loved one with bipolar is going through a little better.

When I came to understand psychosis and the nature of my nightmares, I became very interested in how a person can tell the difference between what is real and what is not. It disturbed me that someone as intelligent as I was could be so fooled by hallucinations. What tools did I need to be able to tell the difference? If my psychosis had fueled this religious delusion, how did I know for sure that any sort of religious experience was real? If the angels and demons I had seen were fantasy, how would I know them if they became reality? I realized I was caught in a whirlwind and I desperately needed grounding. This put me on the path to skepticism and, ultimately, atheism. After all, when I prayed to God for relief, I continued to experience psychosis. When I took my prescribed medication, I got relief. It's a simple correlation, to be sure, but it has been a steady and reliable one. I no longer see monsters. I no longer hear voices. When I sleep at night, no one attacks me. Granted, this is not any sort of proof that God doesn't exist. But it is more reasonable to me to conclude that I have a legitimate, well-documented psychiatric disorder that responds well to medication rather than to believe I was caught up in some spiritual warfare in which God either could not or would not help me.

Whatever the case, this is part of my story. Make of it what you will.