Thoughts from August 2, 2001

(Future note: Before you read this, know this was written when I was extremely anti-religious. I’m still anti-religious, but this was written when I was hateful toward religion and religious people. I use the word “hate” very little today unless I’m referring to someone else’s hate. Most of these thoughts still exist in my brain and I feel the same way—just less violently than the words I used in this Thoughts paper. Read on if you want to, but know I only talk negatively about religion. If you are a non-believer yourself, you will probably enjoy this paper as much as I enjoyed writing it.)

What am I thinking right now? I’m thinking of a light at the end of a tunnel that doesn’t exist. I’m thinking of an existence on a planet where people exist, but they have enough brains to wake up and smell the coffee and not try to smell the light beams. What the hell am I talking about? I’m talking about life in a world filled with religion.

Religion attempts to soothe people by giving them hope through fantasy. Every day, I see the fish symbols people have on their cars. If you don’t know what fish symbol I’m referring to, consider yourself lucky to live in an area that doesn’t cater to uneducated people. I asked a Religio (my pet-name for religious people) what the fish meant once. The woman I asked was a co-worker and a nice person (so don’t think I’m completely calling her an idiot). She gave me an answer which basically said the fish was a symbol of a belief in God (or something like that – it has been years now). I’ve also seen the fish with Darwin written in them. I find those fish hilarious. Okay, I don’t see them and almost run myself off the road with laughter, but I find them a humorous anti-statement against the original fish concept.

Now, I’ve seen the Darwin fish being eaten by a “Truth” fish. When I first saw this, I was confused. I quickly re-thank (English!) the symbolism from a Religio’s point-of-view and understood it’s meaning, but the irony of the symbolism still gets me. The “Truth” they are speaking of apparently comes from the Bible. It relies on faith – not facts, scientific study, or reality. The words they wrote many years ago in the Bible are not to be questioned. I question everything. The symbolism of the fish says that the “Truth” of the Bible will win over the truth of Darwinism and those who agree with Darwin’s theories. This is hugely ironic, considering the number of facts backing up Darwin’s theories far outweigh the “facts” of the Bible. In actuality, the symbolism of the fish could be seen as a pro-Darwin emblem. It can be seen as a cyclical argument for Darwin’s ideas regarding evolution. The “Truth” of Darwinism is eating Darwinism itself just as more highly evolved fish will eat lower evolved fish. It’s a stretch, but I try to give the Religios driving around the benefit of the doubt. I don’t like automatically thinking of them as total idiots. They’ve just been misguided.

Besides ruining my viewing pleasure when looking at certain cars, Religion has ruined the world. It has added a fishy smell to otherwise positive (non-smelly) aspects of life. In case you are a Religio reading this and you take everything you read to heart, I’m speaking in metaphors right now. For some real talk, I will tell you religion makes people kill, lie, and hate better than any other form of manipulation. The religious wars still going on today keep killing people. Religion and religious people lie every day about the “facts” of life (not the TV show with Tootie). Religious people also spread hate about those who don’t believe as they do. If these religious people would spend less time on trying to prove the facts they already believe and more time exploring the facts and theories from every source, they would help eliminate much of the killing, lying, and hatred in the world. I just hate Religios. (Once again, for all those Religios reading this, I’m kidding. It’s an ironic statement at the end of the paragraph. Quit taking everything so seriously.)

Thank you for listening. And so ends my sermon for today.