Atheism

The Ledge

- Roshan

Heard about this movie a year or so ago but only got round to watching it yesterday. The Ledge is a 2011 movie directed by Matthew Chapman and starring Charlie Hunnam, Terrence Howard, Liv Tyler, Christopher Gorham and Patrick Wilson. The film premiered in the U.S. Dramatic Competition at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival. The lives of a five people are focussed here with family, marriage, love, infidelity and religion takes focus in the dialogue driven script.

Detective Hollis Lucetti has just gotten the worst news he has ever had from a clinic. His doctor tells him based on tests that not only is he sterile and can no longer father children but that he has always been that way. Which means that the two small children he has had with his wife are not his. He confronts his wife at home before he goes to work and she confesses that she had a feeling that there was a problem. So she decided to go for an “arrangement” and had sex with Hollis’ younger brother to get pregnant and gave birth to two young kids. An enraged Hollis goes back to work when he is called to respond to an emergency; a man, Gavin Nichols is standing on a ledge as if to jump to his death. With a small crowd gathering below, it looks like a regular suicide attempt. Hollis reaches the small bunker room next to the ledge and leans throw the window to try and talk Gavin down. In a couple of minutes Hollis understands that Gavin is here not by his own choice and asks for the reason why.

Gavin then tells his story; he is an assistant manager of a big hotel in the city and recently met a woman in her 30s through one of the part time maids in the hotel. The woman, Shana, is also a music student and just so happens to be Gavin’s new neighbour in the apartment building they live in. Shana is hired and later her husband Joe invites both Gavin and his roommate Chris for dinner. At dinner Joe, a fundamentalist born-again Christian comes out as a rude bigoted man who mistakes Gavin & Chris for lovers, given that Chris is a open gay. Gavin, an atheist, despises Joe and leaves before they can eat and after saying thanks to Shana. Chris himself leaves in a couple of moments. Chris, who had lost everything and was helped by Gavin, tells him that he doesn’t think Shana, although religious, is like her husband. In the next few days Gavin flirts casually with Shana, intending to win her over and take her away from Joe, who he thinks does not deserve her. Although his intentions are casual and he treats it like a game in the beginning, when things becomes more serious he apologizes to her and they stay away from each other for a while. Joe invites Gavin over and apologizes for his rudeness as he thought Gavin was an atheist and gay too. The two then have a philosophical debate over religion, beliefs and ethics with neither convincing the other of their own point of view.

Meanwhile Chris is trying to get his relationship recognized by the religious organization where he and his boyfriend first met. Their relationship blossoms but their rabbi refuses to marry them as it is considered to be against god’s rules. Shana goes back to see Gavin and tells him her story – she became a drug addict at 18 and started selling her body to feed her addiction. One night her pimp sends her to a church to meet a customer, who beats her and leaves her lying naked at the church. There Joe, a former alcoholic who had amended his ways and started doing the “lord’s work”, helped her and later they got married, even though Joe dictates what Shana can & should do strictly as per his beliefs. As Gavin and Shana become closer, Shana decides she wants more than the  guilt and verbal abuse from her bully of her husband and they have sex when it’s just the two of them in the apartment. They meet whenever they can in secret and even arrange a meeting in one of the empty hotel rooms but Joe finds out about their rendezvous and is devastated. He then traps Shana and ties her up in the hotel room and calls Gavin out. After a discussion he tells Gavin to go to the top of the building opposite the hotel and stand on the ledge for over 3 hours before jumping off it right at 12 pm – or Joe will kill Shana with his gun. This is why Gavin is on the ledge.

Hollis tells Gavin his story as well, having made a connection with the about to be jumper. As it is almost noon the police try and find where Joe is holding Shana hostage but before they can find him Gavin, after telling Hollis to tell Shana that he loves her, says goodbye and jumps to his death. Hollis’ partner and the other cops manage to find Shana and arrest Joe, bringing him to the station. Shana goes back home after giving her statement and cries when she sees Chris. Hollis, takes Gavin’s advice and goes home to sit down with his wife and kids. As they have dinner his wife asks if she can say grace but Hollis, a Catholic, says not that day as the movie ends.

Although I was excited about the premise and the possibility of discussions between a fundamentalist and an atheist in a movie, something I had never seen before, the discussions are kinda cliched, stuff that you have heard in so many debates before but it’s worth watching once. The movie doesn’t really pan out but for what it is, it’s still worth a watch. 7 outta 10!

Completely Unfair & Terribly Stupid

- Roshan

Tell us about something you think is terribly unfair — and explain how you would rectify it.

What is totally unfair is the prestigious status given to religions in countries such as mine. Religions – no matter if they are wrong on certain points, are harmful and just plain stupid on others – is treated as sacred and anything that contradicts them is considered blasphemous. Well, fuck you and fuck your religion and you gods/prophets! If you are wrong, you are wrong. The idiots who believe everything that their stupid books and priests tells them – you are pathetic! If they tell you that the sun revolves around the earth and the earth is flat – you will believe it! Not only that, you want the rest of us to believe in your nonsense and make it illegal to teach anything that contradicts them!

This issue is a big one. If not in check you will have half the nation filled with idiots who know very little of the natural world that surrounds them. They won’t be bothered to understand how things come to be, how stuff works or how to create new & better things. Everything is magic! The god of the gaps belief is perhaps the most stupidest and most dangerous thing ever – it makes people complacent and lazy and dumb! Nothing was ever achieved by belief in the god of the gaps concepts! Ah fuck it, it’s not even a concept, it’s just a cop out. I don’t know and hence god did it is about as dumb as you can get!

So kick out the unfairness and make truth the norm. I’m not even saying that we should ban or abolish religions. That does not work. Let the believe but religions should be on the same footing as a fan club. Because when you look at it closely that’s what it is – a fan club. The worst kind but still nothing more than a fan club at it’s core. Give it the same powers as the fan clubs for football teams or movie actors! And tax the bastards to hell! They owe a lot to the government in back  taxes as well. And put that money to good use. Take the money from the churches, temples and mosques and feed the nation!

Freedom Of & On Facebook

- Roshan

Facebook has recently come under attack for failing to enforce its own guidelines on hate speech and violent imagery. Is it a website’s job to moderate the content users post, or should users have freedom to say what they want? Is there a happy medium? If so, how would you structure it?

Ho ho, this is a topic that I seem to come against quite often and is discussed almost everyday among friends & acquaintances. I don’t think anyone reading this post will be unaware of Facebook. You may not have an account there due to either disinterest or maybe you can’t be bothered as you don’t have regular access to the internet or due to a job/work issue you have either chosen or been advised to get rid of your account. The rest of you will have one. Sometimes your cat or dog or goldfish will have one too!

I’ve always treated Facebook like this; what’s in my page is what I want to share. I don’t care who you are, you should not be bothered about it. If you don’t like what I post, there’s an unfriend button. Go on, press it, I don’t give a fuck. If you do defriend it, you weren’t worth it in the first place. I have had so called “friends” de-friending me on Facebook because of an anti-religious post I have posted. Usually it is a post that is a news article about the wrong doings of the priests in either Hinduism, Christianity or Islam and some believers can’t handle the truth. And yes since I hate religion and all it’s shit and all the fake gods and godmen & saints & fuckers that have benefited from these shameful religions I chose to report it. If you can’t handle the truth fuck off. You aren’t using your brain.

However hate speech is different. And people, please hate speech isn’t the same as criticizing the evils of a religious organization or religious people. If you want to see hate crimes just look at some of the religious fundamentalists in any of the religion calling for killing a person who has offended them by “insulting’ their dumb holy book, their stupid religion or their godmen/prophet. They have whole pages on them. That should be reported. Calling for the death, rape or injuring a person or persons, animals, organizations, places etc is not right. Making changes for the betterment of humanity by calling out immoral activities in the name of tradition, culture or religion is needed. That how we progress.

You may agree, you  may not agree.

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The 10 Worst Things You Could Say To An Atheist

- Roshan

10.  ”It [evolution] took 20 million years? Monkeys don’t live that long!”

9.  ”So you don’t believe in anything?”

8. “Why are you mad at God?”

7.  ”When we meet in the afterlife, you will look stupid.”

6.  ”I have proof of God!”

5.  ”You can’t prove God, you just have to believe!”

4.  You did not have a genuine experience of salvation, or you were never a true Christian because if that were true you would have never left the Lord.

3.  ”I don’t have enough faith to be an atheist.”

2. “I’ll pray for you.”

1. “You’re going to hell,” and, of course, all of its variations: “You’re going to hell, faggot;”  “No, really, you’re going to hell”

From the Atheist Pig

“Why I Am An Atheist”

- Roshan

One of  of the most influential revolutionaries of the Indian independence movement who was martyred, Bhagat Singh wrote a pamphlet titled ‘Why I Am An Atheist‘ while in jail, awaiting his death sentence.

“As regard the origin of God, my thought is that man created God in his imagination when he realised his weaknesses, limitations and shortcomings. In this way he got the courage to face all the trying circumstances and to meet all dangers that might occur in his life and also to restrain his outbursts in prosperity and affluence. God, with his whimsical laws and parental generosity was painted with variegated colours of imagination. He was used as a deterrent factor when his fury and his laws were repeatedly propagated so that man might not become a danger to society. He was the cry of the distressed soul for he was believed to stand as father and mother, sister and brother, brother and friend when in time of distress a man was left alone and helpless. He was Almighty and could do anything. The idea of God is helpful to a man in distress.”

Towards the end he wrote “Let us see how steadfast I am. One of my friends asked me to pray. When informed of my atheism, he said, “When your last days come, you will begin to believe.” I said, “No, dear sir, Never shall it happen. I consider it to be an act of degradation and demoralisation. For such petty selfish motives, I shall never pray.” Reader and friends, is it vanity? If it is, I stand for it.”

Bhagat Singh (28 September 1907 – 23 March 1931)

Change the World

- Roshan

So I go to sleep tonight and I can choose that one thing had changed about the world? It’s easy. I’m going to go ahead and choose the one deadliest disease known to mankind that has caused more deaths, destruction, horror, chaos, causes friction, takes away your rights as a human, divides people, wants to run your life and still manages to piss off a lot of people on a daily basis – religion.

So I’d like to wake up tomorrow and find that all the temples, churches, mosques, gurudhwaras & synagogues of the world have been either demolished and malls, houses, public parks or something else nicer have been established there. I don’t see divisions amongst people, no recognizable differences that show up because there is no religion. There also seems to be no poverty, no homeless people because we’ve apparently had humanist programs created by the rich and the government to eradicate poverty, famine, hunger and homelessness. Oh and what’s that, every human has a safe home with enough power, food, water, plumbing and entertainment stuff? And say what; there are no reports of murders, looting, cheating, abuse, racism or rapes? Far out!

No money? What’s that, money is no longer needed because guess what, we’ve created a safe way to create food, clothing and everything we need because instead of fighting for money & power, we’ve pooled all the world’s scientific minds into creating clean energy. No one will ever need to be greedy for money anymore. Oh and what’s that, every family keeps a cat or a dog and sometimes more than one of each? Awesome. And guess what – we’ve aimed for the stars cause planetary exploration is up next and everyone wants to go visit the neighbouring planets and stars and see what’s out there.

Wanna join us?

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My Attempt At A Rap Song

- Roshan

You know that guy who made a rap song & video about how he hate all religions but loves his homeboy Jesus? He inspired me to write the lyrics of a short rap song. So here it goes:

I don’t believe in religions but I love the goodness in people,
No churches, temples or mosques or buildings with steeples,
Love one another don’t hate; it’s a crime,
We all share one world in this space & time,

Differences in race and colour and borders and creed,
These are the things that were created by greed,
Fear & oppresion that’s what religions bring,
All me and my fellow atheists want is for you to dance & sing

You think less of your fellow humans so you created a god
“Holier than thou” cannot hide the facade
Of the need to control by fearing the wrath
Of a pompous, egomaniac ghost – who needs that

Peace!!

– DJ Roshy Rosh aka Pimp Daddy Rocky

RIP : Christopher Hitchens

- Roshan

Influential writer, cultural critic & popular atheist Christopher Hitchens died yesterday due to complications of cancer of the esophagus. He was 62.

Over the years, Hitchens’ caustic attention was directed at a broad range of subjects, including Henry Kissinger, Prince Charles, Bob Hope, Michael Moore, the Dalai Lama and Mother Teresa. His career spanning 4 decades has seen him be a columnist and literary critic at The Atlantic, Vanity Fair, Slate, World Affairs, The Nation, Free Inquiry, and became a media fellow at the Hoover Institution in September 2008. Hitchens was diagnosed with esophageal cancer in the spring of 2010, just after the publication of his memoir, Hitch-22, and began chemotherapy soon after.

A well known debater, his confrontational style made him a huge set of admirers and some detractors as well. Identified as a champion of the “New Atheism” movement, Hitchens describes himself as an antitheist and a believer in the philosophical values of the Enlightenment. Hitchens says that a person “could be an atheist and wish that belief in god were correct,” but that “an antitheist, a term I’m trying to get into circulation, is someone who is relieved that there’s no evidence for such an assertion.”[14] He argues that the concept of god or a supreme being is a totalitarian belief that destroys individual freedom, and that free expression and scientific discovery should replace religion as a means of teaching ethics and defining human civilization. He wrote at length on atheism and the nature of religion in his 2007 book God Is Not Great.

Though Hitchens retained his British citizenship, he became a United States citizen on the steps of the Jefferson Memorial on 13 April 2007, his 58th birthday. Asteroid 57901 is named after him. He has 2 children from his first marriage to Eleni Meleagrou. In 1989 Hitchens left Meleagrou for Carol Blue, an American writer.They have one daughter.

Christopher Eric Hitchens (April 13th, 1949 – December 15th, 2011)

Aliens On Earth

- Roshan

Alright, one of my favourite topics. Here is my answer – yes I think that aliens have visited earth. Probably quite a few alien races over centuries. And you know what, I think that they probably thought that we were worth much and they decided that we weren't worth sticking around for, so they packed up their bags and left. They might never return.

I think an alien race built the pyramids in Egypt. and the ones in Mexico (at Teotihuacan). They built it as some kind of monuments and showed the humans of that time how to do it. But it became a lost art and no one can build them the same way anymore. I also think that they might have been the mysterious and well advanced land of Atlantis, which was supposed to be in the middle of the Atlantic ocean. People think that the land sank but you what I think? I think Atlantis was actually a flying city, large and able to sustain a huge population. When they decided to leave they created the illusion of a sinking land and hence the legend. In truth, they flew the flying city aka Atlantis away from Earth and back to where they came from.

Most of the aliens who visited us showed benevolence & even outright kindness. However some of them were not so polite and they did have some ulterior intentions. They wanted to enslave humans and in some cases make them subservient to them. Thus they created the illusions of being extremely powerful beings, using their advanced technology and gadgets to dazzle the natives how in turn worshiped them as gods. Thus the creation of legends of many gods in the heavens – Greek, Roman, Norse, Mayan, Incan, Hindu & the last of them Allah & Jesus.

Think about it; how come all the sightings of god were during the earlier periods of humans? When we were still so naive and lost and still not able to defend ourselves. All the gods visited earth when the only weapons we had were bows & arrows, spears, swords and a few catapults. Nothing mindblowing and certainly not dangerous to those aliens/gods. But when the guns & bombs started being created – not one single god to be seen! We frightened them fucker off and they have never come.

Think about it; all of them came and created religions. Once that work was done they are not to be seen. Fucking scardy cats all of them. In India we have hundreds of stories of all these gods coming to fight & kill all these demons and even humans deemed to be evil. Bows & arrows, spears & maces. Guns were invented – the gods lifted their dhotis and ran. Heck, they didn't help Indians during the British reign!!

So there you have it, I think aliens have visited us, created some stuff and made up a few hundred legends of gods and all such bullshit. Most humans still believe in them and even take them too far. The descendents of those old aliens are laughing at us know. "Oh those stupid humans. What nonsense they believe?" Sigh!

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The Most Destructive Force to Mankind

- Roshan

Hands down Religion is the most destructive force know to mankind. Combined with racism and you have one tough bitch to handle. And if we are not careful religion will be the death of man. Every major war has a reason – expansion, wealth, power, greed but religion tops it all. Religion can destroy a nation and it’s people and if you though that religion is the reason for our morality – we have morals inspite of religion! The idea of a god was first created by thinking men as a means to explain that which we cannot explain but it has since evolved into something much more complex and dangerous.

Despite all the progress we have made as a species, we are still held back by the disease called religions. Imagine what all we could have achieved if it wasn’t for religions. We would certainly be exploring the galaxy by now! Religion is like a cancer; it spreads and fucks up everything in it’s past. As I type this some hindu fundamentalist leader is planning the next attack against what he thinks is “immoral”, some muslims are planting a bomb and christians fundamentalists are plotting to terrorism a non-christian community.

Religion keeps us from progressing. My family’s religion wants all of us to forgo everything and stay at temples, singing prayers and kissing the ass of some deity. Do nothing except that while our families are taken advantage of by fake “swamis” and give up our worldly possessions. Your religion does too. Most religious people don’t realize what the Bible, Gita, Ramayana, Quran, Torah really are – bad science fiction & fantasy novels! I like Star Trek – that doesn’t mean that I’m gonna be beam up anytime soon! Or apprehend someone because they violated the Prime Directive (lol, I am killing myself). Grow a brain!

“Imagine no heaven”!

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Rapture : Of, By & For The Zombies

- Roshan

Today, May 21st, is supposed to be Judgment Day and the coming of the Rapture. According to the Bible. So better take heed. So what is this rapture? After a brief study online, here is what I have come up with.

The Second Coming of Christ will occur in stages. First, He will remove all Christians from the Earth, to protect them. This is called “The Rapture.” The term comes from the Latin verb raptare, and the Greek word harpizo, both meaning “to be caught up” or “to be snatched up.” Jesus will “snatch us” out of harm’s way.

So, I’m not getting a ticket on the Jesus train, cause I’m not a christian. Worse, I’m an Atheist. Yes – capital A, small c. Forget about his second coming, I was never sold on the first one either.

On May 21st, 1988, God finished using the churches and congregations of the world. The Spirit of God left all churches and Satan, the man of sin, entered into the churches to rule at that point in time. The Bible teaches us that this awful period of judgment upon the churches would last for 23 years. A full 23 years (8400 days exactly) would be from May 21 st, 1988 until May 21st, 2011. This information was discovered in the Bible completely apart from the information regarding the 7000 years from the flood.

Ok, so if this is right, anyone who went into a church from May 21st, 1988 till today were worshiping in a godless place. Huh, must explain all those molestations of alter boys by them Catholic priests! Cause Satan was there instead. So he made them priests do all that molesting. Makes sense. So get this religious Christians, you were basically worshiping Mr. Lucifer for these past 23 years (if you went into a church). Now that’s something to think about!

By God’s grace and tremendous mercy, He is giving us advanced warning as to what He is about to do. On Judgment Day, May 21st, 2011, this 5-month period of horrible torment will begin for all the inhabitants of the earth. It will be on May 21st that God will raise up all the dead that have ever died from their graves. Earthquakes will ravage the whole world as the earth will no longer conceal its dead (Isaiah 26:21). People who died as saved individuals will experience the resurrection of their bodies and immediately leave this world to forever be with the Lord. Those who died unsaved will be raised up as well, but only to have their lifeless bodies scattered about the face of all the earth. Death will be everywhere.

All the dead that have ever died will rise from their graves? Good for us Hindus – we burn our dead ;) That’s finality. We don’t take chances!

So basically we will have the mother of all zombie fest. I’m getting my camera and making the  biggest Hollywood blockbuster EVER!