Journal: Atheism

Ask a Christian, Jew, Muslim, Hindu, or just about anybody who believes in some kind of deity, how the universe began. If they've been schooled properly in their particular religion, they'll be able to give you a prompt, succinct answer. They'll tell you that they know that what they're telling you is the truth. That, or they will dance around your question, manipulating it, trying to get you to proove a positive statement, such as "God created the universe. This is a logical fallacy: the positive statement is what must be proven. Saying "There is no such thing as evolution because the current evidence is not convincing to me," is a perfectly valid argument. This is why scientists around the globe have to run around digging up fossil evidence and demonstrating evolution at work in backteria in the lab. They can then come back and say "There IS such a thing as evolution, and here are the things we have seen with our own eyes to back up that conclusion. And by the way, here is how you can reproduce our findings for yourself." If Darwin had instead based his conclusions on ancient Mayan writings, he would've been labeled a crackpot and summarily dismissed. Which, if you ask religious traditionalists (the ones with the other, "truer" ancient writings), was what happened to him anyway.

As an atheist, I'm proud to say that I don't know where the universe came from! Anyone who thinks they do is, in my opinion, arrogant on one level or another. You weren't there, and you have nothing to go on except some literature written by people who thought that the best way to deal with that agnostic down the road was to throw rocks at him until he was dead. And if you tell me these people were divinely inspired, read the Old Testament. There's some freaky, evil stuff in there. Astrophysicists, on the other hand, have some theories on how the universe was created, i.e. where the material for the Big Bang came from, but that's all they'll say they are: Theories. Again, if Stephen Hawking claimed that A Brief History of Time was mostly plagarized from some writing he found on a cave wall in France instead of pieced together using fully reproduceable calculations, they'd laugh him right out of his wheelchair.

Let me reiterate: All this talk of "Truth" (a word which, in its capitalized form, means "The person speaking will not listen to your arguments") really bothers me, and I won't be a part of it.

Now, for the sake of argument, let's say there is a God. It doesn't have to be the Christian God. This is just your average, run-of-the-mill, generic be-all end-all deity. I'll call it Fazoo. There are really just a few possibilities governing how I relate to Fazoo.

1. Fazoo cares about all people and wants them to act kindly towards each other. It rewards those who are decent in (what passes for) It's eyes by bringing their souls, which hypothetically exist in this argument as well, seeing as how it would be pointless without them, to a wonderful paradise after their corporeal bodies stop functioning. It punishes those who're indecent with some form of unpleasantness which may or may not last for eternity. Fazoo is the self-appointed morality enforcement official of the universe, and rightly so, since It created said universe. This reward and punishment system seems to apply in general to most major religions.
2. Fazoo cares about all people and wants them to act kindly towards eachother. Fazoo also wishes that all people pay homage to It. In order to pass this message to the peoples of the Earth, Fazoo sends emissaries in the form of shadowy, possibly insane individuals, talking animals, and inexplicable phenomena. It makes sure to send these divine representatives to the people of Earth during primitive, uninformed periods of their civilization. During modern times, where global communication and video, audio, and photographic recording exist, It limits Its signs to familiar religious symbols on soybean oil tanks in Buttcrack, ND and tortillas in Guadalahara. The rewards system still applies, but with the added stipulation that everyone must worship Fazoo in the correct way. Those who don't are doomed to (possibly) eternal damnation. Fazoo expects people to figure all of this out from the writings of people who lived 50 - 500 years after the prophets and miracles occured.
3. Fazoo doesn't give a flying fuck about anybody on Earth. After all, we're just blobs of water and organic molecules that're rather well-adapted to their environment. Fazoo is FAZOO, ALL KNOWING EVERYTHING ENTITY. It's got better things to do, like have a sandwich.

In life, I try to cover my ass for case #1. I try to be kind, generous, and otherwise good to people. Within reason, I try to make everybody feel a little bit better about themselves when I have the opportunity.

As for case #3, there's nothing I can do, so why worry about it. I figure, with all the stuff that Fazoo could conceivably do to me, I'd rather not attract Its attention.

If case #2 prooves to be true, I'm fucked. And, chances are, so are you, whatever the hell you believe. There are so many religions, who's to say which one is actually made by Fazoo? And what if Fazoo just wants us all to worship It in some way, no matter what? Well, I say Fazoo is an idiot and needs to get a hobby. It needs to either send a more clear, concise message, or It needs to stop wasting Its and everyone else's time. If this is indeed the case, I'm lodging a formal protest against Fazoo by refusing to worship It on the grounds that I was ill-informed as to my duties as a human/sentient being.

So, I'm an atheist because:

1. I don't care to spend the time it takes to have religion.
2. I don't care to presume I know things which I'm very sure that I don't, no matter what anybody from 2 to 3 thousand years ago (people who generally didn't have public sanitation OR digital watches) has to say about it.
3. Chances are, the way I live serves to cover my ass if I'm wrong about Fazoo's existance.
4. If I'm wrong about Fazoo's policies, I'm not interested in Its contorted bullshit, because I'm probably screwed no matter what, anyway. Bring on the eternal badness, and I'll see you all there. At least I was honest with myself.