Shit that Pissed me Off – 4/28
San Antonio Mayor Implies Atheism Causes Poverty
Actually, that’s not what she said. A lot of Atheists are kind of up in arms and the thing is, I think what she said is worse than if she just targeted atheists.
Asked what causes poverty, she responded:
To me, it’s broken people. People not being in a relationship with their Creator, and therefore, not being in good relationship with their families and their communities, and not being productive members of society. I think that’s the ultimate answer.
So yeah, she could be talking about atheists. But let’s assume, for a moment, that what she meant was broader. She meant that people are poor because they don’t have a good relationship with god. God literally looks down from heaven (or up from heaven given that Earth is a sphere and we don’t actually know where heaven is located) and says “those people don’t go to church enough. I’m going to make them poor.”
I guess that makes sense if the god we are talking about is Loki.
It suggests that the only people who are productive members of society are people who have a good relationship with their creator. That would obviously exclude people like Bill Gates, who is an open atheist. He’s clearly not being productive.
It would also include people who call themselves Christians but don’t really go to church or do much to support their faith.
Basically, she’s blaming poverty on a lack of belief in god.
It seems silly to me given that Jesus was poor and I thought his relationship with god was supposed to be pretty solid. Poverty is not caused by god. It is caused by people. People who, like San Antonio Mayor Ivy Taylor, treat poverty as some sort of punishment which people deserve.
They suggest that if we just get poor people to church, god will fix them. Never mind that the poorest states in our nation are some of the most faithful. Faith has nothing to do with poverty. Belief in god doesn’t make you rich or poor any more than atheism makes you rich or poor.
Her answer is insulting to poor people. And atheists. And people of faith. When it comes to hitting a tone-deaf home run, she killed it.
Shit that Pissed me off – 6/5
There’s a New Kids’ Book About Hell
If you believe in hell, you don’t want your kids to go there. I understand that on a basic level.
Yet, when someone makes a book that is meant to scare kids into believing in god, I feel as if they need to question their fundamental beliefs.
Actually, this kind of looks like something from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Maybe it’s cooler than I thought.
They make god out to be a weak and petty tyrant. A tyrant who will punish kids for all eternity because two people ate a fruit they weren’t supposed to eat. Maybe it was an apple. Maybe it was a pomegranate. Maybe it was a tomato. Because tomatoes are a fruit.
Hell is a horror story. Most kids don’t respond well to horror stories. This book is intended to create faith through fear. I guess I feel god shouldn’t need to scare kids into believing.
Shit that Pissed me Off – 4/10
Police Officer Shot a Man in the Back and was Caught Lying About it
If you click through to the link, there is video of a man being shot to death. That’s important to know because you might not want to watch such a thing.
Early reports about this incident indicated that the victim tried to take the officer’s taser and the officer shot him in self-defense. That was the story the officer repeated over and over again. And it was a lie.
If I said I didn’t like ice cream, it would also be a lie. A harmless lie. So when the officer lied to save his skin, it’s kind of like that, right?
Even if the victim had tried to take a taser before the video starts, it is obvious he posed no threat to the officer when he was running away and eight bullets were fired at his back.
Without that video, the officer would not be facing murder charges. Thousands of people would be telling us that we weren’t there so we couldn’t know what really happened. We should take the word of the police officer because why would he lie?
I don’t know. Maybe for the same reasons as anyone else?
Shit that Pissed me off – 9/5
The Whole Jennifer Lawrence Nude Photo Thing
The problem is that there is a dialogue focused on whether or not Lawrence (and other celebrities) are to blame for the theft of their personal pictures.
Well let’s stop and think about this for a mom…NO!
I am writing this blog post on a laptop computer that is valuable. Now you, the reader, know I have a laptop computer you could sell for money. If you came over to my house, broke in and stole my computer would it be my fault because I made you aware that I owned it?
It looks a little bit like this
NO! That’s what we call theft! There are all sorts of laws about that shit.
It is not my fault for owning a computer any more that it is Lawrence’s fault that she owned nude photographs of herself (if indeed those are photographs of her – which she denies).
Theft is a crime. Owning things people want to steal is not.
Shit that Pissed me off this Week – 8/30
The Shitstorm Surrounding Miley Cyrus
So Cyrus did a performance at the MTV Video music awards that was two things: 1) Blatantly sexual and 2) Artistically awful.
Now the VMA’s are about the most gaudy ridiculous spectacle in music so the fact she was part of a gaudy, ridiculous performance should be neither shocking or upsetting. That’s what the show is all about.
The fact people are pitching a fit because she exhibited hardcore sexuality when she’s only (gasp) twenty is what is really bugging me here. Because if Miley Cyrus was a twenty something guy grabbing his crotch and dancing suggestively and her name was…say…Michael Jackson, hardly anyone would be complaining.
Woo!
Cyrus, though, is a girl woman and she’s not Madonna.
Of course, Madonna got all sorts of crap for being brazenly sexual as well.
Having watched the video, I think that the performance was awful. Her singing was breathy and not in her strongest range. She was more interested in showing off how “grown up” she was than in being a good singer (and she is a good singer – even if you don’t like what she sings). Her “dancing” consisted mostly of gyrating and sticking out her tongue. The three songs they chose to mash-up don’t really fit together. What was with the teddy bears anyway? I fucking hate “Blurred Lines.”
The fact that Cyrus engaged in suggestive dancing should not be the subject of criticism. It should be the fact she did it badly. If you want to be perceived as grown up and sexy, be grown up and sexy.
But while we all comment about Cyrus, we need to remember one thing. She gave that performance to get attention. And she got a lot of it.
Shit that Pissed me Off This Week – 6/28
Pakistani Actress Gets Acid Thrown on Her Face
Now why did this happen? It happened because the Taliban in Pakistan are doing this to a lot of women. Their religiously motivated hatred of women is so deep, it is driving them to assault women simply because they are asking for an education.
I don’t dislike Islam any more than I dislike other organized religion but this is a fine example of what bothers about most of them. On the one hand, they talk about how their treatment of women shows such a high level of respect.
On the other hand. That is bullshit.
You don’t throw acid on someone because you respect them. You throw acid on someone because you want to punish them for existing.
I’m just trying to find out on which page of the Koran you can find this picture. I’m sure it’s near the picture of a woman. Ha ha! No it isn’t. No false idols, remember??
The Taliban practice a warped version of Islam. That is true. Religion is so easily warped already and that is what bothers me. Any religion that suggests women must cover themselves to avoid tempting men (as all the Abrahamic religions do) has created something that can be warped in the most sinister ways.
And yeah, I think I’ll call throwing acid on someone “sinister.”
Shit that Pissed me Off – 3/1
North Carolina Student Could be Expelled for “Intimidating” her Rapist
What is happening here is a young woman was sexually abused by her ex-boyfriend. She has been speaking out about it and calling on UNC to improve how they deal with students who have been sexually assaulted. The University has responded by telling her that her speech is “intimidating” her rapist.
Well first off, who gives a fuck if a rapist is being intimidated? Fuck him. If he didn’t want the negative publicity that comes from raping someone, he shouldn’t have done it.
I’m so afraid that I’d get caught again!
I can understand that there would be some concern for this young rapist if she was calling him out by name everywhere but she isn’t. She isn’t naming him at all. She’s just pointed out that some guy was sexually abusive and the University has done dick about it. If he’s being intimidated, it is because she’s trying to make it harder for him to rape again.
Well, I can see why that would scare him. It makes perfect sense that the University would need to protect him.
Grail Diary 