the mind of nicole.

Tits or GTFO.

2011-02-07T22:18:00.003-06:00

From the outrage discussed on this blog post about SERAM by Sharon Moss and Lyz Liddell you would think that as FEMALES were walking in to SERAM, the males were telling them tits or get the fuck out. As a female, I feel incredibly pissed, offended, cheapened, and annoyed by reading this post. I was at the SERAM, and I can't remember feeling objectified or put down as a female at any point during the weekend. SERAM was an amazing event, and to me it seems as if Sharon and Liz made the unorganized, mendacity of a blog post to bitch for the sake of bitching.

You may not be aware, but I moved to Alabama from Michigan about a year and a half ago. In Michigan I was an atheist but never felt the need to join organized atheism because in Michigan beliefs were treated like penises, you can have one and be proud of it, but don't take it out in public, and don't shove it down peoples throats. As soon as I moved to Alabama I realized things were a bit different. Here everyone wants to show you their penis, and they want to know all about yours too. (metaphorically) This made me feel the need to join organized atheism. I found the NAFA group and after being scared to go to anything for about four months (I am really shy), I finally went. I bring all this up because I had read whiney bitch posts like the one above previously, and I thought that free thought groups were full of sexism and that guys were constantly slapping the girls asses or something. After attending a few events, I realized that NAFA wasn't sexist at all (well beyond sarcastic sexism).

Now the post made about SERAM makes me question every single other feminist whiny post I have read in regards to atheism. I missed the local panel (To quote a fellow atheist, I was practicing my god given right to sleep in on Sundays) but from what I heard from everyone I talked to, the lady who freaked out about being called a female totally overreacted. I heard this account from about a 50-50 spread of males and females, so I tend to think it is accurate. As for what was said about Sean Faircloth's talk, the account in the blog (which now happens to be cut out) was entirely inaccurate. The talk was about empowering women. It talked about how sex is a good thing, and how your only rule should be "consenting adults". The million dollar challenge was also not sexist. It showed how women, due to evolution, are the gatekeepers when it comes to sex. Evolutionarily it makes more sense for guys to have sex with as many females as possible, whereas a female will look for someone who is both sexually attractive and who seems like they would make a good partner in child rearing. I mean this is not necessarily how things work now, (there are plenty of guys out there who are in committed monogamous relationships, and many girls ((me)) who have no interest in having children ever) but overall it is still how things tend to happen. Sean was trying to point out that if a guy is determined to have sex with a random stranger by midnight, it probably won't happen, but if a girl wants to, she can probably make it happen. If anything, I think this is offensive to men, (apparently men can't control their dicks?) but some people feel like it was objectifying women because men might think about having sex with them. I am sure some guys did look around, pick a girl, and say, "I would try to sleep with that girl", but I can tell you that when Sean asked the same question of girls, I too looked around and picked at least three guys I think I would have been able to sleep with. Does this make me sexist? I HOPE SO!

Basically, the post about sexism at SERAM made it hard for me to even think straight. I really just wanted to post really obnoxious sexist comments to start a flame war because I was so full of anger. If you want to complain, get something fucking real to complain about. Shut the FUCK UP about your poor feminist morals being offended. If you want to get rid of sexism in atheism (though now I question on whether it is even there at all) start respecting yourself, and stop posting ignorant shit where you sound like a whiny 13 year old, then maybe people will treat you as an equal.

nicole.

2011-01-25T00:45:00.002-06:00

Withdrawing from social activities.

2011-01-24T12:39:00.002-06:00

As of lately, I feel as if my level of personal interaction has gone way down. The weird thing is, I have been communicating with a lot more people, but they are all on facebook. I have this large network of what I like to refer to as fake friends. I have been going to work at 6am, and I immediately start listening to my ipod or pandora, at two I get out of work and go to my lab class where I also listen to my ipod. Around five I get done with class, and I run on the treadmill instead of running with a group (which I used to do), and when I get done, I go home and drink PBR while hanging out with my dog and my large group of fake friends. From what I have seen, I am not the only one like this. It is incredibly more effective to find friends on facebook who may be from anywhere on earth, that share your common interests. The chances of me going to a bar or something in Huntsville and actually finding someone I would want to hang out with are pretty slim. My reliance on facebook for social interaction makes me laugh, and also kind of makes me want to take a toaster in the bath. It makes me wish that there as such thing as the Metaverse like in Snowcrash. It would be nice to be able to interact with my fake friends as avatars instead of just messaging back and forth.

I am currently very obsessed with Mumford and Sons.. I can't get enough.

nicole.

Music/life

2010-12-16T15:57:00.002-06:00

I have been discovering all kinds of new music this week, and it has been awesome. I started listening to All Songs Considered, and I am so glad that I did. I am amazed that up to this point I had missed the band Black Keys, they are so grand.

I read two books last night. It is crazy, I have nothing to do at all, but at least I am catching up on some reading. One of the books was Enders Game which is absolutely amazing. If you haven't read it, I recommend it wholeheartedly.

I think I may be getting a dog which is pretty sweet. I love animals and ever since I lost my kitties in the divorce, I have wanted some sort of animal companionship in my life. I think a dog will be perfect because I can take it on runs with me.

2010-12-07T11:25:00.002-06:00

It seems that in my life I have varying phases of depression or happiness, and that for the most part I seem to have no control over these. Since around last January, I have been relatively happy. (Mind you this isn't all the time, I just mean on average, I would say I was happy) I think this has changed recently. The fact that my family moved from Huntsville leaving me in my house alone has hit me hard. I have never been good at relating to people. I could be for various reasons I guess, but most likely it has to do with the fact that I probably have an undiagnosed condition such as Aspergers or HFA. This means that I now live in a town in which I am 12 hours from my closest relatives, I don't talk on the phone, and I really don't talk to that many people in person. I am about to become a hermit, and this makes me unhappy. I am bad at social interaction, but this doesn't mean I don't want any social interaction. I actually quite like when I find someone I can talk to without feeling totally awkward. Since I have moved here, I have managed to make two friends. Previously I was hanging out with these two friends almost constantly, but now our jobs are making that quite a problem. I work first shift, one friend works second, and the other works third.

I have been trying to overcome this social anxiety and inability to relate to people, but nothing seems to help. I joined roller derby, I started running, and I joined a meetup group that does outdoor adventures. I haven't managed to make any friends from these activities, which makes me feel worse. I observe that everyone who is in the groups is friends with everyone else, but I never manage to break in. I think I am going to have to start becoming very serious about running and roller derby. If I refocus my energy in to athletics there is a chance I can prevent the inevitable self destruction I always seem to bring on myself. When I am depressed, I tend to make terrible life decisions. The only things I can effectively do while depressed is sleep, get drunk, and spend money that I don't have. I have trouble going to work, and I definitely have trouble getting myself to exercise. Depression even gets in the way of reading for me. Normally reading, running and eating are all among my favorite activities, but when I am depressed I don't have interest in any of them.

So this post was pretty pointless, but most of my posts are so I don't really care.

nicole.

Self promotion!

2010-11-09T09:30:00.002-06:00

So I play roller derby, and my team is having a people choice award for favorite derby girl. I want to win. Right now I am in 8th. Go vote for me! Here is the link . On another note, I was recently in a podcast, however I wasn't really planning on being in it, I just happened to be around during recording so i say one or two things in the whole podcast, and you can here me laugh often.

Lying to myself is over.

2010-10-06T13:18:00.002-05:00

So I ended my marriage. I feel quite confident it was the correct decision. At first things were really bad and I thought perhaps I had made the wrong choice, but I understand now that it is much better to work on happiness alone rather than ignoring yourself because you have someone else. In the marriage I felt trapped. I get bored easily, I am highly motivated, and I don't like to be told what to do. I am not sure why I would have decided that getting married was a good idea in the first place, but I am guessing it had something to do with youth. No doubt I am still young, but I like to think that I have grown at least slightly from this experience. I now know that friends are transient, and if you do something that they disagree with, they are quick to flee. Through ending my marriage though I got to see characteristics of my soon ex that make it apparent why I would have wanted to end it. For one, I told him about possibly wanting a divorce and he flipped out, quit his job, and moved back to Michigan within three days. He never even tried to talk to me about it. Also he told me he wanted to murder me, and that his friend was going to kick my ass if she saw me, all of which were very mature. I was married to an unmotivated, dependent, manchild and it was doomed from the beginning. He also took just about everything of value that we (read as me since I bought them) owned including things that were mine alone like my iPod and DS. The worse part of all of this though is the fact that he took my cats. He never even wanted cats, and I am quite sure he did it just because he knew it would make me sad. He also decided to write status about our divorce on facebook after unfriending me but staying friends with all of my family members. They all got to read his rants about how I am cold and not even just cold, but the queen of cold, the Ice Queen!

What I have learned from all of this? When you get a bad feeling about someone early in the relationship, don't delude yourself in to thinking things will get better.

procrastination

2010-09-17T13:47:00.002-05:00

I have a summary I need to write for class so of course I am going to write in my blog that I hardly ever use instead. I have recently discovered Broken Bells. This is a collaboration between danger mouse and James Mercer, it makes me feel infinite and alive. It looks like I will soon be looking for an apartment which makes me sort of sad. I hate paying way to much for a place to live and the cheapest one bedroom I have found here is 600 a month which is going to make me poor all the time.

life

2010-09-08T07:38:00.002-05:00

I am really sick of roller derby already which is sad. I am really not good at focusing my attention on one thing for a very long time. Yesterday Hitchens was at a debate in Birmingham and I had to miss it because I am paying for the second half of tuition this month and am by default poor. I am taking molecular biology, and it feels like a waste of time. I have a triathlon on Saturday and I hope it is not cold in the morning or I may cry when I get out of the water.

Christian rock Video

2010-05-25T16:05:00.002-05:00

So I guess a Christian Rock band will be filming footage for their video at my roller derby practice on Wednesday. I will be reppin the atheists. Got to figure out how to get a red A somewhere on my clothing or body that will be noticeable. : )

Alabama is so backwards

2010-05-25T11:14:00.002-05:00

I actually heard a campaign commercial today where a guy was slamming his opponent for wanting to teach evolution to high school students, and for only believing in parts of the bible. I would prefer a candidate that wanted to teach evolution and though the whole bible was a load of shit. I really don't fit in with the conservatives in Alabama because I can just imagine the attack ads that would run against a candidate who was an atheist scientist or something. (then again it seems as if all the scientists here are theists)

And yet we waste our lives

2010-05-24T11:45:00.002-05:00

It is sad that the work week is occupying the best time to do fun things. In this life, we must live. Why do we waste so much time doing other things. There is nothing after life. This is all we have.

Derby

2010-04-13T09:42:00.002-05:00

So I started Roller derby. This is pretty exciting. I seriously had been missing team sports I think except for the drama (I can already feel the undercurrents of it). I am not very good at skating though, but I hope to improve quickly because I am usually pretty athletic. Next week there is an exciting event for me to attend as well. I am going to go see Dan Barker speak. It should be an awesome time and I am quite excited about it.

grow the FUCK UP!

2010-03-23T11:41:00.003-05:00

Basically this is how I feel about all of the people bitching about health care right now. Shut the fuck up because you are making yourself sound like an ignorant asshole.

One of my friends put this as her facebook status: "Jill

is discouraged by everyone complaining about the healthcare reform bill. Until you are the one who is sick and you are the one who is unable to get the care you need because you can not afford it , you should not judge. I am incredibly grateful for my health insurance. Every time I open a statement, I am more and more ..."

She got a few supporting comments but it mainly just started a flamewar with totally ignorant comments by stupid people who think they are republicans. Such as this one, which is by far the worst:
"What about when someone takes your money and pays someone to murder a baby? And WTF does your health insurance have to do with this bill? Anyone could already get emergency care that they need, just not crap like cold meds. Boo hoo. No ones paying for my dimetapp or the vicadin that i'm addicted to. What about when you can't afford to fix your car or feed your family because you pay too much in taxes so other people don't have to work? Welcome to socialist America. I hope you're frickin happy. If you already have insurance this bill is going to screw you."
First off someone is going to take my money and murder a baby? I am pretty sure that murdering babies is illegal and when I see it done it is usually by the super religious who won't feed the baby because it wouldn't say amen. (who are probably conservatives) I am assuming he means terminating a fetus during the 1st or 2nd trimester also know as abortion, which is in no way shape or form killing a baby but allowing a women to decide whether or not she has to bring something she doesn't want in to the world. And if he is talking about abortions, the bill won't cover them because of a deal with President Obama and Stupak (who is as bad as a repub. in my mind) Also one of the reasons health car is so expensive is because people who have money have to pay for people who think they can automatically get emergency care even without health insurance. I can't stand these people any more. They are acting like little kids who didn't get picked for the team or something.

rawr!!

nicole.

yay for healthcare!

2010-03-22T09:37:00.001-05:00

Health care reform passed the house. I am greatly happy. I take the GRE at 1pm today. I want to own it. After I am done I want to drink whiskey and sleep. Sounds like it will be a good evening.

lifting ban on gays donating blood!

2010-03-05T15:02:00.004-06:00

I am so excited!! Senators are calling for the ban to be lifted that prevents gay men from giving blood. This is one of my main causes because it is really discriminatory and also stupid because it makes it so many people are turned away that want to donate. You can read about the story here. As the article states, science has really progressed since 1984, and we are able to accurately test for HIV.

nicole.

2010-03-04T12:02:00.002-06:00

And another bit to add to my previous sentiments here is an article about the economic problems.

profound thoughts that keep me worrying

2010-03-04T11:00:00.002-06:00

So I tend to over think everything to the point of it interfering with my health. Currently I have been sleeping like crap, don't really have an appetite, and I have no energy. The main reason I am like this is really stupid too. I am getting myself bent out of shape worrying about the economy in the United States of America. Not just as it pertains to me, but in general. After reading many articles about what the fastest growing jobs will be in the next ten years I see an economy that will just keep getting worse unless something big is changed. It is really ridiculous for me to worry about this because even if I think of a change that could help our economy, I wouldn't be able to enact it. How I see it is that most jobs worth having are leaving the US because it is cheaper to hire someone elsewhere. In the next 10 years seven of the top ten fastest growing jobs are minimum wage jobs such as waitress, retail worker, ect. The only three jobs on the list that are not minimum wage are nurse, nurse tech, and accountant, all three of which are jobs which depend on other people having money and don't really produce anything. In the next ten years, the college educated workforce is going to greatly increase, and there will be no jobs available for them but minimum wage jobs. It started with the well paying factory jobs going overseas. My mother used to work at Delphi and made around $28 an hour with an associates degree. Jobs like hers are practically gone now. Now the design jobs are even starting to go overseas. My father who does PCB design is having a very hard time finding a job because a lot of companies have their designs done in different countries. The corporations who make a majority of their money in the United States should stay in the United States. I am not saying this out of pure jingoism. I truly believe that as countries move everything overseas in order to increase profits and lower prices, they are going to screw themselves over. Soon people in the U.S. will not be able to get good jobs doing anything. and won't be able to afford their products.

nicole.

2010-02-19T12:39:00.003-06:00

Atheist Billboard Vandalized
So someone thought it was necessary to vandalize a billboard outside of Sacramento recently. It simply stated "Are you without God? Millions are" and someone felt the need to add "also lost". Things like this make me want to stoop down to that plebeian level because there are a few billboards around I-65 that could use some updating. One simply states "Hell is Real" I think this one could be improved by adding the tagline "It's wasting your time and money on religions". Or how about "Jesus Died for Our Sins" this could benefit from the tagline "so give me 10% of your income so I can buy nice cars and a huge house"

I have not been updating lately because I have an Olympics addiction. : )

nicole.

books and more books

2010-02-08T11:55:00.003-06:00

Literally read 8 books this weekend and bought around 14. I have an addiction and I think it is as powerful as crack. At least my new book buying trends are cheap. I go in to barnes and nobels or books a million and I just buy any book in clearance that looks like it could be interesting. I want to start writing my book but I am afraid that without my escape into the plots of novels my life outside of work along with the monotony of my job with come in to stark contrast and I will feel like I am dying on the inside. I have a problem where it is impossible for me to be pleased with anything ever because I am such a perfectionists that nothing and no one can live up to my high standards even myself. I am already having trouble getting out of bed most days, but perhaps if I write a book it will be enough distraction that I won't feel as worthless and bored all the time like I currently do.

my political side.

2010-02-05T13:12:00.003-06:00

In keeping with my previous post about idiots in Alabama, I have another one, and this one is a congressman.

"Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) has put an extraordinary "blanket hold" on at least 70 nominations President Obama has sent to the Senate"

This just makes me angry to the nth degree.

"While holds are frequent," CongressDaily's Dan Friedman and Megan Scully report (sub. req.), "Senate aides said a blanket hold represents a far more aggressive use of the power than is normal."

and the reason for his hold..

"Shelby is holding Obama's nominees hostage until a pair of lucrative programs that would send billions in taxpayer dollars to his home state get back on track. The two programs Shelby wants to move forward or else:

- A $40 billion contract to build air-to-air refueling tankers. From CongressDaily: "Northrop/EADS team would build the planes in Mobile, Ala., but has threatened to pull out of the competition unless the Air Force makes changes to a draft request for proposals." Federal Times offers more details on the tanker deal, and also confirms its connection to the hold.

- An improvised explosive device testing lab for the FBI. From CongressDaily: "[Shelby] is frustrated that the Obama administration won't build" the center, which Shelby earmarked $45 million for in 2008. The center is due to be based "at the Army's Redstone Arsenal."

I know I am not a congresswoman myself, but I know this isn't the way you get out of an economic recession. It makes me so mad that these stupid senators are dithering while people are losing their jobs. For example my parents who used to make a lot of money (200,000+) are now unemployed and underemployed. I also am mad because this guy is a republican. He is trying to get all kinds of money for Alabama projects, but in my opinion he shouldn't want these money wasters because it all eventually leads to bigger government and higher taxes which I though republicans were opposed to.

nicole.

eww really?

2010-02-04T10:28:00.002-06:00

I am sitting at my desk at work and just heard two of my colleagues talking about a masters class they have. They were talking about the telomeres on cancer cells and how the cancer cells never have apoptosis. The girl said I am not sure why is it that way, and the guy said, well god made them like that..... ahhhh living in the bible belt sucks my non existent balls.

God is not Great

2010-02-01T10:13:00.003-06:00

So I read God is Not Great this weekend, and it was a rather good read. (I also read Wild Things by Dave Eggers which was good too) I was rather surprised though when looking on reviews about it today on GoodReads how stupid people can be. Here is a quote from one of the reviews, and I will explain why it is upsetting me.

"Simply stated, Hitchens puts into words all the reasons I shy away from organized religion. The prejudices, sexism, the overall foolishness... At the same time, he seems oblivious to the fact that there are religious people out there doing great things; feeding the hungry, clothing the poor, building for the homeless. " (review by ring my bell on goodreads)

Okay now I will explain my problems with this. For one, Hitchens addresses this in his book. The reason why religion is bad is because even the nice chrisitians, muslims, jewish people ect. foster extremism. I guess the person who wrote this review just ignored that part. The problem with religion is that certain things are sacrosanct and people will not address them, and this leads to extremist views being left unchecked. Hitchens admits that he has seen religious people helping with charity work, orphanages, ect in other countries, but he thinks that secular charities are actually more helpful because they don't waste any time or money proselytizing.
Here is another quote from the review

"Mr. Hitchens, may I suggest a few new titles for your book?
Try "God Can Be Great, But Freaks Poison Religion" or "How Jerks Screw Up Religion"."

As you can see, this person who appears to believe they are an atheist or agnostic totally missed the entire point of the book and thought that Hitchens was just trying to be snooty or something. Yes your grandma may be a great christian who does a lot of good work for charity and donates a lot of money. The thing Hitchens is trying to point out is that your grandma would probably do the exact same thing if she was an atheist and wouldn't be so politically correct when is comes to not criticizing extremist behavior that should be criticized.

woohoo!!!

2010-01-29T11:57:00.003-06:00

stupid doctor killer gets convicted of 1st degree murder after just 40 minutes of deliberation. I am very proud of this jury in Kentucky. Now Roeder faces life in prison, which I hope he gets. You can't kill someone just because they provide a service that you personally disagree with. If you could, there would be rampant killing everywhere. Abortions are really helpful to some women, and it is not up to Roeder to decide to kill the doctor who provides them.

J.D. Salinger

2010-01-29T10:59:00.003-06:00

Yesterday my literary hero died. This makes me quite sad. Catcher in the Rye is one of the reasons that I love to read so much. I also love like Franny and Zooey and Nine stories. I read Catcher in the Rye again last night as a tribute.

On another note it is snowing right now in Alabama, always a weird occurrence. I have about 1 hour worth of work to do today because I finish everything I need to do by Thursday. This weekend I hope to finish watching season 1 of arrested development, read at least four books, study for at least two hours, and sleep a lot. It will be a great weekend.

I joined the atheist nexus, add me from my badge on the side if you so please.

nicole.

a question of mine

2010-01-28T11:24:00.002-06:00

In my experience with undergraduate studies, I have noticed a significant range in beliefs between different types of students. For example, normal biology students who plan on going on to graduate school seemed to be less godless than biology students who were getting the degree for pre-med. It seems as if the majority of pre-med students were really religious at least at my school. I wonder why and how such religious people attend classes that prove their dogma wrong daily, but still stay religious. I even had a Mennonite who was pre-med in my classes and I believe they are young earth believers. It almost seems as if an inclination towards god makes you want to know less about biology. I mean once you get past undergrad if you are going to med school, you mainly learn things about the human body so you won't be hearing about evolution constantly. wow I am really rambling today. Quite possibly because I feel like shit, I am starving, and I am really tired.

nicole.

how to be happy

2010-01-27T11:28:00.002-06:00

So I have always wanted a job in the biology field because I thought it would finally make me happy, but I am still depressed most of the time. When did I become such a person that I can never be satisfied with anything? I plan on going back to get my masters in biology soon but now I am almost thinking I want to go to school for aeronautical engineering because I currently feel like I want to work for NASA. I know that I never will though. One of the main reasons that I love biology is because it is incredibly easy to me. I have always been quite proficient in math, but it has never came easily to me.

On a better note I have finally after 5 years or so of contemplating writing a novel though of the premise. I am going to write an alternate history auto-biography, the idea for which I got from the dinosaur comics. In T-rex's book everything was exactly the same except T-rex wrote I was purple the whole time at the end. Mine will be quite different though. It will be a book about me written by me, but with things that have never happened and will never happen because it is about the me in a parallel universe. I guess when you think about it, it will just be a work of fiction in which I am the main character. I know that is seems really self centered to write a book about oneself, but I am only using myself to mold the main characters actions and motives because I know how I would react to different situations. It should be a fun time.

Poll: Fox most trusted name in news - Andy Barr - POLITICO.com

2010-01-27T10:37:00.000-06:00

Poll: Fox most trusted name in news - Andy Barr - POLITICO.com

They must have polled more republicans than democrats lol. Fox is so biased I can't believe people would call them the most trusted name in news

Zeitoun and the failures of FEMA

2010-01-26T11:31:00.003-06:00

I have heard and read a few segments lately about societies disconnection from items they use and things that happen elsewhere, and they were able to encompass where my lack of understanding of Hurricane Katrina and FEMA stemmed from. One segment that I listened to on NPR was about how if an alien tired to discern what it is that humans do on a day to day basis from our current artwork including paintings, novels, ect. they would think that we fell in love, talked, and occasionally murdered people or tried to solve murders. The average adult works at least 40 hours a week, but you would never be able to tell in most artful representations. We are increasingly separating ourselves from our work, and from the products we use. For instance, if I had happened to live in the 1500's rather than now, I would probably be in France, and would be a commoner. I would have a connection with everything I used. My dad or husband would have built the house using lumber he got from Jack the local lumber mill owner who bought it from Fred and ect. The cheese I ate with my bread for dinner would have been made by me, as also the bread would have. Everyone would have a very real connection to every object they used or consumed because there would be a personal connection to who made it. It current times I wake up to my alarm on my cell phone, which obviously someone made at sometime because it was there job, but it is something I have never thought of. The phone was charged using electricity which someone works to produce, but I never think of it being produced, it always just seems like it is magically there. These observations lead to a connection with another article I read. In said article, the author discussed how in my post apocalyptic movies, people will still have working Ipods ect. and how unlikely this was. One of the movies that they mentioned was Zombieland. I have saw this movie and nothing in it really seemed out of ordinary until the article pointed it out. Everywhere the stars go, there is electricity. This is post zombie Apocalypse. As the author said, there must be some hard working zombies down at the power plant. Now all this that I mentioned so far leads to my main point. After Hurricane Katrina I knew that things in New Orleans was pretty bad, and that FEMA messed up somehow, but I didn't know how or what had really happened. The book Zeitoun opened my eyes to post hurricane Katrina New Orleans like the news was entirely unable to do. I was disconnected from the tragidy by great distance (I lived in Michigan at the time and only met like 1 person who was displaced from Katrina) and by lack of personal experience.

Zeitoun was quite an amazing book. It was another non-fiction novel chronicling the trials of an individual written by Dave Eggers and was quite similar to What is the What. It told the story of Zeitoun an immigrant from Syria who owned a contracting business in New Orleans, and his wife Kathy. Zeitoun was a very busy guy, so when everyone was leaving town for the storm he sent his wife and children, but stayed in the city. The first part of the book was what I expected. He was riding out the hurricane in his house, stuffing pillows in broken windows, finding trashcans to catch leaks, and when the flooding came, putting important things from downstairs upstairs. When the storm ended he took out his canoe and went about town rescuing people and feeding dogs. One day while at one of the rental properties he owned he and three other men were taken to a temporary prison without being given any reason or being allowed to have any phone calls. They were then transferred to a maximum security prison and held there with no phone calls. His wife Kathy thought he had died. Someone finally called her and let her no he was in prison, but when she tried to call the prison they had no record of him being there because he was from FEMA. A lawyer friend of the family was finally able to find him and have bail set, and it was set for $75,000 which was around 100 times higher than it would usually be for they crime they were trying to charge him with without evidence (looting). They used a property deed to get the money for bail and got Zeitoun out of prison, but he was in for over a month for no reason. Also the other three men he was with were also kept in prison for up to five months. These were all innocent men who weren't given any information about their arrest or given a call, or had bail set, and this was here in the U.S. It makes me feel sick that we could have such a failure in our government. FEMA also had another nice showing in the book when they dropped off a trailer for the Zeitouns to use during recovery and never gave them a key or hooked it up to electricity. Kathy called various times to try to get the key or get the trailer removed from the property when finally she had enough and had a journalist write a story about it in the paper, than someone was by to pick it up the very next day. I believe that everyone should read this book. It was incredibly eye opening.

Creation the movie

2010-01-22T11:01:00.002-06:00

So I would really like to see the movie Creation about Charles Darwin but apparently evolution is still too controversial for anyone outside of New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Washington, and Boston. This makes me really angry. Supposedly it is a really good movie that anyone could like even a Christian, and I won't ever see it in theaters because I live in the bible belt. Man I really hate the south 99.9% of the time. The link is to a page talking about how it was hard to even find anyone to distribute it in the U.S. I guess it is already out in the rest of the world. It seems to even have some stars in it (Jennifer Connely), but we still aren't getting it. I wish I lived in New York.
: (

nicole.

Tornados

2010-01-22T10:43:00.002-06:00

So yesterday there was a tornado in Huntsville. It wasn't very close to my neighborhood although I could see the funnel cloud. After the tornado on the 10 pm news the newscasters were going around talking to different people who live in the Five Points area, which is where the tornado hit. All of them were thanking Jesus that they didn't have their house knocked down or it a tree fell on their house that they didn't get hurt. Sometimes I feel like christians are so dense. The god they believe in technically caused the tornado to hit their area of town in the first place, and all they can think to do is to pray to jesus that they didn't get injured. Its like they take the fact that they didn't die as a sign that god loves them, but they totally disregard that all the property damage they have is from a tornado that their god either made or could have prevented.
Of course I don't think god made a tornado or could have prevented a tornado because I don't believe in god and know that it was unseasonably warm yesterday so a tornado wasn't much of a surprise. My point though is that the Christian God most of the people around here believe in is all powerful, so it had the power to not make the tornado or send it elsewhere, and didn't, and no one ever feels slighted by that fact.
It is like they no weather is not controlled by god because there is not a god, but god cares whether or not they live. It is backwards, stupid logic, but what else could I expect from this area.

nicole.

2010-01-21T13:38:00.002-06:00

so I am in love with the dinosaur comics, but I have been for quite some time. If I wasn't such a wimp I would get a tattoo of T-Rex but considering I still have an unfinished last unicorn on my side, I should probably wait on that and grow some balls. I am having a hard time being productive right now. There are around 800 books I want to read right now and I also want to study for the GRE but I have been watching television instead in the evenings. Stupid Animal Planet and Discovery Channel with the power they have over my attention span!

I got in to an argument with my mom about souls the other day because I said my sister didn't have one (she's mean but that is besides the point) and that it wasn't an insult because no one has a soul.

survey because I am so bored.

2010-01-15T15:23:00.002-06:00

1. Name: nicole.
2. Age: 22
3. Location: work
4. Hair/eye colour: blonde(now brown)/light blue
5. Height: 5’11"

And my contributions:

4. How do you react when you've just told a joke that completely bombed? say that only intelligent people get that one
5. Do you pay any attention to the clothes that others wear? Sometimes
6. What is one personality trait that you can both loathe and admire in a person? being a jerk
7. If an acquaintance were to tell you that something about your personality really bothered them would you care? Why or why not? no because i realize that i have quite a few flaws and it probably bothers me too
8. What if the person were a close friend? Same answer as 7.
9. When you read surveys that have been filled out by other people, do you really read the answers, or are you mentally answering the questions yourself? i read the answers
10. When shopping, do you believe that generally things that cost more are of better quality? kind of, in terms of jeans, more expensive usually means a better fit
11. Do you keep a dream journal? no way, i can never remember my dreams
12. What's your preferred explanation of why we dream? Is there any deeper meaning or is it all random? i dont dream haha
13. Do you think that voting is important? Why or why not? yes because if people don't vote, we end up with dumb assholes for presidents.. for example, more people went shopping the day after thanksgiving than voted.. wtf was up with that??
14. Do you prefer books/movies/stories that you can relate to, or ones that can take you far away from reality? i like crazy fucked up drug movies, and i don't do drugs.. same with books
15. How do you tend to place your memories on a timeline? For instance, do you tend to remember things as happening during a certain year (ie. in 2001), or age (when I was 16) or school year (when I was in grade 10) or in some other way? i can never recall when something happened really, but i can kind of looks at it as a mental picture and guess how old i was at the time.. yeah i am weird..

So I don't really have much to do at work today which is leaving me rather bored. I am so excited to rock climb tomorrow. Also yesterday i went on a hike with my awesome dad and his dogs. Good times.

Debt

2010-01-14T14:18:00.002-06:00

Debt sucks
my fault
I spent to much
while in college
now I pay for it
with my credit score
by the end of the year a I will be free
but my score will be wrecked
when will it repair
why did I do this

So I think the most painful thing ever is when you run over your heel with a cart. It hurts so bad, but it is such a whimpy injury. I started working out today. I currently have a BMI of almost 23. This is within the correct range for healthy not overweight or whatever, but I would really like to lose around 5 to 10 pounds so I look better.

nicole.

Any one else get one of these?

2010-01-13T11:05:00.002-06:00

Very odd thing in my email today. I got an invite to have an online chat with the director of the movie Creation. I am not sure why I got this invite and find it really weird. I am not sure if I should do it or not. I guess the chat is mainly about evolution; Science v. Religion, and making the movie. I am not sure if I want to take an hour and a half out of my GRE study time to do it.
It is getting warm again here in Alabama which I am very glad about. It makes me mad to live where there isn't snow but still have it be like 20 or less degrees Fahrenheit.

nicole.

dream

2010-01-12T10:06:00.001-06:00

I had an odd dream last night where I got stabbed to death the second that I walked out of a door in to an alley. It was really realistic and I was thinking, well I guess this is what it feels like to die. The cool thing is at least that I never thought of asking god for help, I guess I am an atheist through and through. (ps I awoke right after I fell to the ground)

nicole.

Studying

2010-01-11T12:56:00.002-06:00

I have been studying a lot for the GRE. I am unsure why the GRE is the required test to get in to graduate school. It seems sort of pointless to me. I mean any math class you take you are going to get to use a calculator and it will probably be at a higher level than college algebra. Also the vocab part seems odd to me. Why does it matter if you know a lot of obscure vocabulary? I think it would be more practical to have an admissions test that was more specific to what you wanted to go to graduate school for, but I guess that is just me.

nicole.

2010-01-07T10:51:00.002-06:00

So if you go to google and type Christianity is, it brings up a list of suggestions that include bullshit, ect, if you put Judaism is you get a similar list, same with hinduism and buddism, then try Islam and nothing comes up at all lol. Apparently the people are google are cowards.

My old hometown, the worst place in the U.S. per capita.

2010-01-07T10:01:00.002-06:00

entire story
Even as Saginaw lost more than 10 percent of it citizens — more than 7,000 moved away since 2000 — violent crime continues to climb, up more than 50 percent in 2008 compared with 2000, FBI statistics show. The annual violent crime statistics stretching back to 2000 expose the troubles.
The 2008 numbers released in September — the most recent available consolidating crime statistics for more than 8,700 communities — show that once again, as it has each year since 2003, Saginaw ranked as the No. 1 most violent city in America. The ranking is based on violent crimes per person in the nearly 850 cities with populations greater than 40,000

The funny part about this is that I recently moved from Saginaw to Huntsville, AL. When I lived in Saginaw you never really heard about the crime unless someone at work told you about the shooting that occurred in front of their house the night before. Now that I live here in Huntsville it seems like all they talk about on the news is crime. If I didn't know better I would think Huntsville must be like the worst city of earth, but i believe they are just obsessed with it down here. I believe Madison county, which is the county I live in has the most churches per capita and perhaps the increase in churches coincides with the increased focus on crime because it reminds them of reading the bible. (lol) On another note it snowed around 5 snowflakes and all the school are closed. It makes me giggle seeing as I was just in Michigan last week and it seemed to snow the entire time I was there.

nicole.

GED

2010-01-05T16:35:00.002-06:00

I really wish that while I was getting my bachelors degree I was planning for the future. It now dawns on me that I need to take the GRE so that I can go back to school in the fall, and it would be simply awesome if I had already taken it. I haven't taken a test in over a year and I feel like it is going to be difficult for me to do. Though on the bright side I usually own on standardized tests so perhaps I will do very good. All I need to do is good enough to go get my masters, so score isn't that important. I have a quandary though on whether to start right now going towards a Ph.D. or just get a master's in Biology first and then go get a Ph.D. in Micro or Epidemiology later in life when perhaps I will have my debts paid off and can live on a stipend. I think that is probably the best idea because my current job is pretty sweet and pays for one class a semester as long as I work here. I have been reading a lot like always and just finished reading The Financial Lives of Poets it was an excellent book about someone experiencing the recession much the way people in my family area and having the idea that perhaps he should sell Marijuana in order to keep his house. It was very funny, and a really quick read (about 2-3 hours or so) I just started reading Wolf Hall which is a story about Thomas Cromwell, and I hope it proves to be wonderful.

nicole.

2009-12-23T11:37:00.000-06:00

great dinosaur comic about logic.

it is just about time for christmas!

2009-12-23T11:31:00.002-06:00

I think it is hilarious. I am an atheist, but I totally celebrate Christmas, and in my family it has nothing to do with the arbitrary date assigned to the birth of the mythical son of god. I personally love giving presents and could care less about the reason. I mean if someone had since I was born convinced me that August 15th was the day for gift giving I would be fine with it. I am perfectly happy with my christ free celebration of gifts, and I am annoyed with people and their facebook statuses about keep the christ in Christmas. Yes, lets keep christ in the date that he was almost certainly not born but was picked because pagans already had celebrations at that time and didn't want to give them up. I hate when people don't know the reason for things being the way they are but just pretend they do.

My name is Jealousy.

2009-12-02T16:43:00.002-06:00

Really people if you haven't read Godless yet, you really should. I even would recommend it to non-atheists. Since Dan Barker was a born again christian and an evangelical pastor you get legitimate answers to questions fundies would ask about religion and points that they would use. He obviously has done a lot of reading on the subject of theology. I think my favorite part of the book was the Dear theologist in which he wrote a letter from God to Theologians. In the letter God asks why he wouldn't need a creator since we think that we need a creator and he says that he thinks he figured out that he was created by us. Its great. I also really enjoyed his refutes to the bible as a moral guideline and how he calls it the "bad book" rather than the good book. People saying they look to the bible as a source of moral guidence are one of my biggest pet peeves. I mean have these people even read the Bible? You only have to get up to maybe Genesis 22 to see God kill of everyone except 1 family (Noah), read about a man offering his two virgin daughters to a crowd of horny men instead of letting them rape the angels (so its okay to rape girls, just not guys), and to read about daughters getting their father drunk enough to have sex with him. I am sorry but I have been really drunk before, and I don't think you are ever drunk enough to have sex with family members. This especially seems weird for a guy because he would literally have to be obliterated to not realize the person he was doing was his daughter, but then I am not sure that everything would even work if you know what I mean.

Question

2009-11-30T13:37:00.002-06:00

Do you think atheists should celebrate during December?
In my opinion Christmas is a holiday that is barely related to religion anymore. When most people think Christmas they think consumerism, presents, santa claus, ect. I think it is perfectly reasonable for an atheist to celebrate because Winter Solstice has been a time of celebration for a very long time, and it makes a nice secular consumerism holiday in my opinion. It makes more sense to buy people presents celebrating the money you way able to make (yay capitalism!) rather than giving people presents because gods son was born, I mean how many other peoples B-Days do you get presents on.

nicole.

Thanksgiving

2009-11-30T12:57:00.002-06:00

How was thanksgiving for everyone? Mine was great as it marked my first day completely off from work in a month. Now I am back to work though which is sad. I was able to do some reading this weekend and read Godless by Dan Barker. It was very good. I thought it was funny how he reverse evangelized his parents because I have noticed family members and friends close to me becoming skeptics now that I am out of the atheist closet. I put up my secular consumerism holiday tree yesterday. : )

2009-11-25T15:51:00.001-06:00

Fox news says to treat atheists like trolls
I really dislike Fox news. The one blond lady is so dumb.. "If we let the atheists have billboards christianity will disappear." wow way to have faith (haha play on words) in your religion's staying power.

2009-11-25T14:42:00.001-06:00

The mind of nicole has been added to The Atheist Blogroll. You can see the blogroll in my sidebar. The Atheist blogroll is a community building service provided free of charge to Atheist bloggers from around the world. If you would like to join, visit Mojoey at Deep Thoughts for more information.

ID can be debunked in an article that takes 2 mins to read..

2009-11-24T12:08:00.003-06:00

Evolution vs. ID six things IDiots bring up again and again

A great article. I love how the evolution point needs only a line or two to debunk these points and show that IDiots like to ignore fossil evidence.

Why the anger?

2009-11-24T11:45:00.002-06:00

Why is it that people are always so defensive about religion. I mean you can criticize the music people listen to, the books they read (as long as it is not the Bible), the movies they like, and the food they eat, and people will just write it off. But the second that you criticize a religion, people freak out. In my opinion this would be because people are aware of the many flaws and falsities within religions and choose to ignore them. When people bring these up religious people like to put the headphones on and not here anything you say. It makes me angry though because it doesn't go both ways. I mean if you are never going to be willing to listen to the argument of another religion or an atheist, why do you expect us to listen to you. I am constantly having people give me flyers trying to convert me to a baptist, JW, LDS, Scientologist. Keep your religion to yourself if you wish for me to keep my atheism to myself.

nicole.

Some light reading

2009-11-23T15:40:00.003-06:00

I read The Greatest Show on Earth this weekend and definitely recommend it. It is funny that although it is evidence for evolution, it is also an entertaining read. It is much easier to read than On the Origin of Species, but I guess that would be expected. I ordered two new books from Amazon today, Godless and God is Not Great. I can not wait to receive these but have a feeling it will be awhile before I get them because I used super saver free shipping and Thanksgiving is thrown in to the mix. While I was on Amazon I also ordered an ornament for my car. It is a T-rex eating a jesus fish. It is part of my new social experiment. Since I live in Alabama, I am obviously surrounded by Christians. I am going to put this decoration on my car and see how often these nice Christians key me. I am not really concerned with scratches because I worked at a retailer for a long time so I have many dings from carts already. Any time I get keyed I am going to take pictures and post them on here. : )

nicole.

fear of death and religion

2009-11-20T11:51:00.002-06:00

When I contemplate the reasons someone would choose to be religious I usually can't think of any. I mean a lot of the time I guess it isn't a choice since parents indoctrinate their children from birth, but once someone reaches adulthood, what makes them stay religious. One of my guesses is that a lot of people stay "religious" because of the social stigma of being an atheist. Families sometimes shun the nonbeliever or at least constantly argue with them. Another is the fact that being religious can be an excuse to be a homophobe and an overall hater which I believe is probably a big factor for many people. But what about the people who think about it and really truly believe in god. Why do they feel like they must do this? I think that most of the time the reason is because people are so afraid of dying. I am really not sure why someone would be afraid of dying. You don't remember the time before you are born, what makes people think that they will have some kind of conscious thoughts after death? Why is it that people believe in having a soul that lives on? I think when you die, your dead. The end. To me this is not scary at all. Live life in a fun way, help others, and help the environment, when your gone your done unless you make some sort of lasting impression through a book or something.

2009-11-20T09:31:00.002-06:00

http://augustberkshire.com/2009/11/13/problem-evil-excuses-religious/

1) Unknown greater good.
God must commit or allow some evil to accomplish an unknown greater good.

But doesn’t that limit God’s knowledge and power? Doesn’t that say that God couldn’t think of a better way to accomplish his goals other than by torturing innocent people? Until this “greater good” is revealed to us, we are not obliged to accept this argument.

(2) God had to create Earth this way.
Natural disasters and diseases are an unfortunate but unavoidable byproduct of life-sustaining forces. A planet without natural disasters and diseases could not operate in a way that would support human life.

But doesn’t that limit God’s knowledge and power? Since God was creating humans from scratch, couldn’t he create us so that we could survive on a disaster-free and disease-free planet?

(3) Blame the ancestors and blame the victim.
All evil that happens to us is our fault, either directly because of something we did, or indirectly because of our ancestors, such as “Adam and Eve.”

This is known as “blaming the victim.” Typically, a victim of abuse believes that the more he or she is punished, the more he or she is loved.

But what did an innocent baby ever do to deserve a birth defect? And what kind of justice punishes children for the sins of their long-dead ancestors?

Also, how does this explain why animals suffer? Did they “sin” too?

For those of you who believe it is okay to punish people for the sins of their ancestors, why aren’t you in prison right now? Each of us has some ancestor who was a murderer. Human justice is obviously superior to God’s justice.

(4) The devil did it.
God isn’t really responsible for evil in the world, a devil is.

But who created this devil? And isn’t God supposed to be all-powerful? Can’t he stop this devil?

(5) God is testing our faith.
Evil is God’s way of testing our faith, like Job was tested in the Old Testament.

If this is true, what sense does it make to impose a “loyalty test” on an infant who dies from disease or natural disaster?

(6) Evil is really God’s love.
What we perceive as “evil” is really an example of “God’s love.”

However, this is a definition of love that we cannot comprehend because it is exactly the opposite of what we define love to be. Therefore, we can’t know that “God’s love” is really love – we have to take someone’s unconvincing word for it.

If disease is an example of God’s love, shouldn’t we all try to get as sick as possible? Are doctors violating “God’s will” when they try to cure disease?

(7) Evil is necessary for free will.
Without evil we would have no free will and we would be “robots.”

But what do birth defects, disease, and natural disasters have to do with free will? Do sick people have more free will than healthy people?

God has supposedly created a heaven where there are no diseases or disasters. Are the people in heaven robots?

(8) Evil doesn’t last very long.
Any misery that occurs to us on Earth is brief compared to an eternity in a wonderful heaven.

Any amount of evil is still evil and is contrary to the definition of “all-loving.”

(9) Evil is needed to appreciate the good.
Without the contrast of evil we wouldn’t appreciate what’s good.

But couldn’t God just give us an appreciation of what’s good? Why should we have to be tortured to appreciate the good?

(10) Evil is necessary for compassion.
We are born as self-centered people and evil is necessary for us to learn compassion.

But if God wanted us to be compassionate, why didn’t he just make us that way? Why this sadistic scheme of torturing innocent babies to instill compassion in their parents? What about suffering and death that occurs where there are no witnesses?

(11) Suffering builds character.
Humans are imperfect/fallen/sinful beings and suffering helps build character.

While building character may sometimes require effort – such as helping others, studying, and sportsmanship – none of these things tend to make us suffer.

And what kind of character is a baby supposed to be developing, who is born with a birth defect so severe that she will only live a few days?

(12) The Creator is always justified.
God is morally justified in tormenting people because he created them.

But this confuses the power to torture someone with the right to torture someone.

Do the parents who create a child have a right to torture that child? Does might make right?

(13) Without evil, life would be boring.
Humans like a sense of adventure and life wouldn’t be as interesting without the challenge of evil.

There is a difference between a welcome challenge and an unwelcome challenge.

People who enjoy a sense of adventure are free to choose which risks they wish to take. If a reporter deliberately approaches a hurricane, he has only himself or herself to blame for any negative consequences. But what about the people in the path of the hurricane who don’t wish to experience it?

(14) Evil brings us closer to God.
Evil is justified because suffering makes us turn to God for comfort.

But doesn’t that limit God’s knowledge and power? Couldn’t he think of a better way to entice us without torturing us first? How much gratitude, for example, should we show to a doctor for curing us from a disease he inflicted upon us in the first place?

(15) Evil is necessary to prove God’s existence.
The existence of evil proves the existence of God because without a God-given sense of good and bad we would not be able to identify some things as evil in the first place.

But can’t an all-powerful and all-loving god come up with a better way to prove his existence other than by torturing us? Why not just reveal himself?

Conclusion
God has run out of excuses. He is either incompetent, indifferent, or cruel. Another way to reconcile the facts is to conclude that an all-powerful, all-loving god doesn’t exist.

I got this from the website that I listed above.

1. unknown greater good-- are you kidding me? I should believe that my Grandma died a painful death from pancreatic cancer because of the greater good? The worst of all of this is that we don't even know what this greater good is. Looking at the bible I would be inclined to believe this is a greater good that relegates women to a lesser position and chastises homosexuals for being born liking the other sex. Also this must be a greater good where we all do burnt offerings because our "lord" likes these. wtf

2. If God was all powerful he wouldn't need to create anything a certain way. Basically by saying he had to do things this way or it wouldn't work out you are saying that god has another god he is answering to. Its the same kind of twisted logic that is applied when people say that god created everything--who created god? I know people love magic, but there has to be a point where they start to wonder I would think.

3. Blame the ancestors- Just like August says.. we should all be doing life sentences for murder done by an ancestor at one time or another.

4. The Devil did it-- god made the devil so obviously god likes to watch us suffer. If we think of earth in the terms of the game Sims god would be someone who enjoys watching his Sims suffer. He would take away toilets and doors, make the Sim not sleep for days, ect just because it is a lot more amusing that way.

5. Why would god need to test our faith. If he is all knowing he can look in to your brain and see if his imaginary self is really your BFF.

6. Evil is gods love.. hmm this one is terrible I am happy I haven't heard it yet. By this comparison Hitler must be gods angel doing his bidding on earth?

7. you really don't need evil for free will. I can make a decision between two choices (i.e. having free will) neither of which are evil. For example for lunch today I can decide between eating at home or at a restaurant.

8. If evil is an example of gods love then heaven is probably a terrible place, why would you want to go there.

9. I do not need evil to appreciate the good. You can tell when something is good without comparing it to something bad, and god would be able to make us appreciate the good if he was so awesome in ways other than killing innocent people and creating raping murdering monsters.

10. see above.

11. A lot of things build character such as raking leaves or running 10 miles. Suffering isn't needed.

12. so we should respect gods decision to kill a family because he made them.. wtf. So my parents have the right to kill me right?

13. lots of non evil things are really fun such as rock climbing, snowboarding, reading, ect.

14. If god is so great he should be able to bring people closer to him without making them suffer.

15. evil is not needed. the Bible is full of religiously justified evil. By this logic I should know that god exists because one of my friends was murdered. (?)

These are always the explanations Christians use about their "loving" god. I always wonder why they put so much effort in trying to defend their imaginary friend when they could just become a secular humanist and go out to try to make things better in the world.

2009-11-19T09:33:00.001-06:00

http://www.reasonproject.org/scripture_project/

a bible for the scientific and intelligent.

have fun.

'Non Religious Billboard Brings Controversy To Nashville' by TheNashvilleFeed

2009-11-18T10:13:00.002-06:00

'Non Religious Billboard Brings Controversy To Nashville' by TheNashvilleFeed & NewChannel5.com - RichardDawkins.net

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The hilarious thing about this is right by Nashville there are many religious billboards that say things like hell is real and sinners go to hell but since the billboard is not religious the Nashville masses are having problems with free speech.

The Don't Diss Darwin Institute

2009-11-17T13:15:00.000-06:00

The Don't Diss Darwin Institute

In case you go to one of the nations top 100 schools.

Birth of New Species Witnessed by Scientists

2009-11-17T11:42:00.001-06:00

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/11/speciation-in-action/

Too bad it was witnessed by scientists not creationists because you know they won't accept it.

2009-11-16T10:58:00.001-06:00

http://thinkprogress.org/2009/11/15/palin-book-evolution/

Yeah Sarah Palin doesn't believe in evolution. Yuck to conservatives for having her be a possible v.p. of the US.

weekends over

2009-11-16T10:31:00.002-06:00

So now that the weekend is over, its back to work for me, oh wait I worked all weekend as well.. I guess thats just how it goes. So back to tales of growing up and realizing I was an atheist. I come from a family that is religious, but not at all in a scary fundie way. Both of my grandma's were very religious Methodists. The good thing about Methodists though (at least in the North) is that they have an open hearts, open minds approach to religion. This means they were very accepting to differences such as being gay or having made some bad life choices much like Jesus would have. I grew up going to church with one of them or my mom. I actually went to church every Sunday and was in Sunday school and youth group up until around middle school when I choose to quit going. I actually thought that no one actually believed in god, and being religious means that you were pretending that you believed really well. I know this is a ridiculous assumption but it has to be taken in context, I was only around 8 or 9 when I came up with this theory. I remember a period of time where I was trying really hard to believe in god to make my grandmother proud. I read the bible and did a daily devotional and none of it meant anything to me. I might as well have been reading the dictionary and devoting myself to Webster, it would have about the same effect spiritually. After my grandpa died despite my praying like crazy i gave up.

now that the first one is out of the way

2009-11-13T10:27:00.002-06:00

I am going to make this clear from the beginning, I am an Atheist. I am not sure if I have ever really believed in god. To me god has always been kind of like Santa, some big lie your parents told you which you realize is total crap as soon as you are old enough to use reason. I never really told anyone I didn't believe in god though as I had a feeling it would upset people. I went to church on christmas eve and easter each year, and even got married in a church. I however realized that my dad was an atheist, and decided that if my dad could come out then so could I. Even my first act that wasn't even outwardly apparent stirred up trouble. On facebook I became a fan of atheism. It was just a tiny little step, and it still upset many. My husband got an email from his mom almost immediately about how I was an atheist and it was terrible and she needed to talk to him immediately. All it really did for me was just make me want more people to know I am an atheist. It made me mad that people would rather have me pretend for their sake then to be what I truly am. The thing that makes me the most mad is that if I would have decided I was a fan of being methodist or jewish or something no one would have cared, but sense I am a fan of rationality it freaked everyone out. Why is it that Christians in the US aren't content with just being Christian, they think that everyone else needs to be also. Seriously I think they would have better accepted me proclaiming myself as a scientologist which is ridiculous.

first post woo hoo!

2009-11-13T09:55:00.000-06:00

I am writing this blog for myself because I am certain it will have no readers. I really love my new job, but I really can't stand Alabama. I feel like a total outsider here. I am surrounded by Christians and conservatives. If there is one thing I could get out of this, I would really like to find like minded people stuck in similar situations.