I’m going to share two stories with you about two seemingly very different topics, but both sharing a common theme. First, imagine that there was a law enshrined in your land as one of the most important tenements of your government, and that someone was violating that rule. Now imagine that everyone except one person was okay with that violation, so they let it stand. If one person pointed out the violation and got the law enforced, what do you suppose the other people ignoring the law would do? Do you think they would stay rational? Like maybe they’d say, “Well huh, I guess we were breaking the law. Okay, fair enough, let’s try to be better.” You think that’s what really happened?
Then you’re either naive or in denial. Because what really happened is, people started sending threats to a teenage girl because she’s an Atheist and had a prayer taken down out of her school. Separation of church and state? Whatever, hippie chick, there are traditions to be respected! (Traditions made by organized religions after that pesky idea about separation of church and state, and traditions that romanticize conformity and oppression as actually being nurturing and educating.)
(EDIT: The more I think about this, the more this real life event SCREAMS for a YA author to spin it into a courageous tale of a non-believer standing strong against Christian persecution. A 16-year-old protagonist, clearly in the right, being brave in the face of tradition and righteous indignation. You don’t even need no romantic angle to make this into a solid book with a great heroine. Come on, writers. I know one of you is bold enough to cover this story and give Atheist teens a book to rave about. Please, make this happen.)
And you say, “Well but that’s a few religious fanatics.” Nuh-uh, this girl has to be escorted to class by cops because EVERYONE hates her. Forget a “few rotten apples,” because this whole place is full of rotten sentiments posing as religious devotion. I find it sad how many people demonstrate their love of God by making threats against other people. It’s even worse coming from people who supposedly believe in turning the other cheek. But being honest, the day I see morally incensed Christians actually practice what they preach about turning the other cheek, I’ll be flabbergasted and speechless.
But let’s move on to story two, where a blogger is attacked as “the worst person in the world.” Pretty freaking harsh, so what did they do? Did he advocate genocide or make a case for eating baby seals in front of their sobbing mothers? No, he didn’t provide links to the HELLO KITTY items he was blogging about, and the fans of the merchandise are flaming him with comments like: “I don’t know how your wife can put up with you. I think it’s utterly disgusting and you’re not fit to live on earth the way you treat us.” (emphasis mine)
REALLY? For not linking to a mass-produced item that you can fucking Google in 3.6 fucking seconds from the search window of your browser? And what the fuck is wrong with people that every day they take first world shit and turn it into a reason to be rancid inhumane shitheads? The first story shows how religious dogma can turn ugly even as people preach about wanting to earn God’s love. But the second story is more disturbing because the “religion” that this man ran afoul of is the Hello Kitty fandom. And they’re wishing death on him with just as much venom as the people threatening the teenage Atheist. Neither group has a valid excuse, but looking at the second story, how can any fan not cringe and say “Okay, that’s taking our fandom too far?” So how come this poor guy is getting comments like this regularly? In short, what the hell is wrong with you people? Why is it that you can turn your first world problems into the worst travesty that ever happened, ever, but you can’t recognize when real travesties have occurred? Read the rest of this entry »


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