Remember when Chris Crocker defended Britney Spears in this tearful, screaming, epic video? Well he’s back with more emo in this tearful, screaming rant against Christians who insult Chris’ purpose or meaning.
I admit I laughed when I first watched it (wide-eyed, drama-shocked, nervous laughter). The crown of thorns? Wow. God instructs people to brush their teeth? Okeedoke.
I played it again and realized that beneath the hysterics, there is a worthy, relevant message. How could any Christian (or non-christian, but the video is about believers) point a finger at someone who’s different and off the beaten path of social acceptability and claim to know anything about how god feels about them or what god would want them to do? It is intensely arrogant that anyone could claim to speak for an infinite, unexplainable, unimaginable deity. If this god is so large and so all-powerful and all-knowing and all-loving, then how could one man, book, tradition, or creed even grasp one minute speck of an idea about what god is or wants?
Why is woo dangerous? I could pontificate for pages, but instead let’s look at a more-than-worthy example of some serious woo woo that is putting a child’s life on the line:
… A 14 year old girl, Tamar, was recently diagnosed with liver cancer which required immediate and aggressive chemotherapy. But her parents have shunned conventional treatment in favour of “mud” therapy. A team of oncologists at Princes Margaret Childrens’ Hospital advised that a seven week course of chemotherapy would give Tamar a 50-60% chance of survival. Despite the treating hospital pleading with the parents to consent to chemotherapy, eventually seeking the involvement of the WA legal system, the parents fled Australia to El Salvador.
Their preferred treatment is tea made from herbs, and red clay gathered from around the hills near their house in El Salvador. Tamar’s mother says that “Clay is basically the right medicine for any kind of illness, (it can cure) anything”. She went on to say, “..it dries up anything that is causing the illness in your system”.
(source)
You’ve got to see the footage to believe it:
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According to the common usage of this phrase, I am a “Militant Atheist”. Here’s why:
- I speak out publicly about my critical view of religion and spiritual belief.
- I maintain an atheist blog. le gasp.
- I will engage theists in discussion and debate about theology.
- I vehemently support the separation of church and state.
- I love science so much, I’d have its babies.
- I use sarcasm and ridicule to illustrate why I think certain things are, indeed, ridiculous.
- The most violent thing I’ve done in the name of godlessness is to gleefully throw a bible into the recycling bin.
Why is this a bad thing? Why should I be quiet simply because I lack faith in mythological creatures? Why do we give religious people a free pass to express their loud, evangelistic points of view and then shy away from expressing our own thoughts?
The word “militant” should not be assigned to someone like me who at worst is loudly expressing opinions and ridiculing the irrational.In the words of twitter user @HHeliBebcnof:
A militant Christian blows up abortion clinics; a militant Muslim hijacks airplanes; a militant atheist argues with people.
-@HHeliBebcnof (Science Man), 13-1-2010 21:36:52
I don’t stone you for being a Christian/Jewish/Hindu/Wiccan. I won’t burn you at the stake for being a witch. I will never kill in order to please a lack of deity. My lack of spiritual belief doesn’t make me want to hurt you. My lack of belief doesn’t tell me to bomb a building or damn someone to eternal torture. If I ever do something violent, it’s because I’m an ass–not because some imaginary friend would like it.
The term “militant atheism” needs to be utterly rejected by skeptics and atheists everywhere. If anything, call us Proud Atheists or Pain-In-Your-Ass Atheists. But don’t call a peaceful, intelligent movement a name that equates it with acts of violence, hatred, and bigotry. It’s easy to slander your opponents–to poison the well in order to make yourself the good guy. But cheap shots don’t make for a winning argument.
Check out a discussion on this topic at deconversion.org. Watch two great videos about “militant atheism” after the cut!
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Olin Thang on 
Cortez Frisch on 
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