Vote for your life

I made a comment a couple of days ago on social media that American citizens should vote on Tuesday as if their lives depended on it -- "because they do."

One person who responded to this said, "Come on.  Stop with the alarmist talk, it doesn't help anything or anyone.  My life depends neither on whether I vote nor who I vote for."

My response is that privilege will do that to you.  But you'd have to be blind not to see that not all Americans are so fortunate, and making this claim implies that you don't give a rat's ass what happens to them.  What I said was neither hyperbole nor a ham-handed attempt to stir people up; it was simply a fact, if not for everyone, for a great number of people who are finding their rights curtailed and in some cases their identities legislated out of existence.

Let me give you just one example -- Representative Matt Shea, of Washington State, who is on the ballot for re-election on Tuesday.  Shea is a religious nut job who just published a four-page "manifesto" outlining what should be our approach to fighting wars on God's behalf.  The part that stands out is this:

Rules of War

• Avoid bloodshed if possible.
• Make an offer of peace before declaring war.
• Not a negotiation or compromise of righteousness.
• Must surrender on terms of justice and righteousness:
• Stop all abortions;
• No same-sex marriage;
• No idolatry or occultism;
• No communism;
• Must obey Biblical Law.
• If they yield, must pay share of work or taxes.
• If they do not yield -- kill all males.

Yes -- there is a man running for Congress, as an incumbent, who believes that I (as a male supporter of same-sex marriage, and someone who doesn't obey biblical law) should be killed.

Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich, of Spokane County, has turned over the "manifesto" to the FBI.  As well he should.  It is a direct, specific threat against a (large) group of American citizens based on one thing and one thing only -- religion.  If someone can explain to me the difference between this and ISIS's continual cry of "kill all the infidels," I'd appreciate it.

Gustave Doré, Entry of the Crusaders into Constantinople (1877) [Image is in the Public Domain]

As for Shea, he said the comments were "taken out of context," making me wonder in what context they could possibly be put that would make them acceptable to any reasonable human being.  "First of all, it was a summary of a series of sermons on biblical war in the Old Testament as part of a larger discussion on the history of warfare," Shea said in a video.  "This document, in and of itself, was not a secret. I’ve actually talked about portions of this document publicly."

Which I'm calling bullshit on.  If you read the document, he is clearly not outlining, in some kind of academic way, the rules of holy warfare in Bronze-Age Israel.  He goes into some detail about the command structure of God's Army, using terms like "corporal," "sergeant," "captain," and so on.

Now, I'm no biblical scholar, so correct me if I'm wrong, but my sense is that these are not terms that were used by Joshua's soldiers at the Siege of Jericho.

Oh, and he says that to be part of God's Army, guys need to be circumcised.

Is it just me, or are these ultra-religious nutcakes really fascinated by guys' naughty bits?  I swear, people like Shea care more about what I do with my dick than I do.

The scariest part of this is that this is not some lone loony crying out in the wilderness; this guy is in a credible position of being re-elected.  Not surprising considering our leadership; Vice President Mike Pence is himself an evangelical hard-liner, to the point that after the shootings at the Pittsburgh synagogue last week, he couldn't even bring himself to get an actual Jewish rabbi to offer words of comfort.  The guy who did the speaking -- Loren Jacobs -- is a member of the "messianic Jews," sometimes called "Jews for Jesus," who believe that Jews in general are destined for hell, and will only be saved if they accept Jesus.  (The other upside, I guess, is that they get to keep their cultural Judaism, which is why people like Jacobs don't speak of this as an actual conversion.)

So yes, voting for one of these people is saying that you don't care if people in demonized groups live in peace or get murdered.  At least own up to it and stop trying to soft-pedal the truth.

In my fifty-odd years of being aware of politics, next week's election is far and away the one that is the most crucial.  It feels like we're at a crossroads between turning our nation around, reclaiming the tolerance and acceptance that have always been part of our national heart, or accelerating the slide into fascism.  So let me amend my statement in the previous paragraph; not only is voting for people like Shea accepting Trump's brutal, ultra-Christian, white nationalist view of what the U.S.A. should be, not voting is the same thing.  Because it's fucking well certain that the people who are on Shea's side -- and Trump's -- are not going to sit this one out.

So next Tuesday, vote.  Shed your complacency.  Find others who aren't sure if they want to make the effort, and give them a gentle nudge.  Offer to drive people to the polls.  If we can't do this, I fear that we are in for a very, very dark time ahead.

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This week's Skeptophilia book recommendation is a wonderful read -- The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot.  Henrietta Lacks was the wife of a poor farmer who was diagnosed with cervical cancer in 1951, and underwent an operation to remove the tumor.  The operation was unsuccessful, and Lacks died later that year.

Her tumor cells are still alive.

The doctor who removed the tumor realized their potential for cancer research, and patented them, calling them HeLa cells.  It is no exaggeration to say they've been used in every medical research lab in the world.  The book not only puts a face on the woman whose cells were taken and used without her permission, but considers difficult questions about patient privacy and rights -- and it makes for a fascinating, sometimes disturbing, read.

[If you purchase the book from Amazon using the image/link below, part of the proceeds goes to supporting Skeptophilia!]

Bargain basement miracles

You know, the quality of miracles has really gone down, of late.

Back in biblical days, god really knew how to conjure up a miracle, didn't he?  Consider the following:

• God makes Balaam's donkey talk (Numbers 22:21-31)
• Jesus feeds "a great multitude" with five loaves and two fish (Matthew 14:13-21)
• Joshua makes the Earth stop rotating so he can finish a very important battle (Joshua 10:13)
• Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead (John 11:1-44)
• Moses parts the Red Sea and drowns lots of Egyptians (Exodus 14:1-30)
• God smites the crap out of Sodom and Gomorrah, and turns Lot's wife into a pillar of salt for having second thoughts (Genesis 19:24-26)
• God makes the entire Syrian army go blind, and then cures them all a few minutes later (2Kings 6:18-20)

And so on.  That's just a few.  And I think I am not alone in saying that any one of these -- not all, mind you but one -- would be sufficient to convince me that I really should reconsider my stance as an atheist.

But these days?  Yesterday, on Glenn Beck's website The Blaze, Billy Hallowell posted a piece called "3 Real-Life 'Miracles' That Took Place on the Set of The Bible."  Most of you have probably heard about the Mark Burnett/Roma Downey production that dramatizes the stories of biblical times, which debuted on March 3 and which has received critical acclaim (most of the critics I read acclaimed, "Meh").  But now Hallowell -- and others -- have put forth a stunning statement: that there were some genuine miracles that occurred during filming, miracles that not only prove god's existence, but show that he is 100% in favor of Burnett & Downey's film.

So, what are these miracles?  Hallowell tells us all about them:

1)  When they were filming the scene where Jesus is talking to Nicodemus about the Holy Spirit, the "wind literally picked up on its own."
2)  Burnett and Downey had hired a "snake wrangler" to round up any poisonous snakes that might be in the set area and potentially threaten cast or crew.  Before they were going to film the crucifixion scene, the "snake wrangler" found 48 snakes.
3)  During the filming of the baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist, an "irreplaceable" piece of Jesus' costume came loose and floated away.  It was later found and returned by a kid who lived nearby.

And I'm thinking: that's the best you can do?  The wind "picking up on its own?"  (Because apparently under normal circumstances, the wind only blows when it's encouraged to.)  Some snakes... in a freakin' desert?  A kid returning a prop when everybody in a hundred-mile radius knew there was a movie being filmed?

As miracles go, those aren't exactly Grade-A quality, you know what I mean?  They're more "KMart Blue-Light Special."

You have to wonder, with all of the increasing disdain for religion you see in Western society, why god is insisting on playing coy with us.  It's a bit like the UFO cadre who believe that crop circles are aliens trying to communicate with us, and prove to a doubting populace that extraterrestrials are real.  You'd think, being super-intelligent aliens and all, that deciding to land in Times Square would occur to them as, on the whole, a more convincing alternative.  Likewise, if god really is invested in proving to humanity that he exists, the wind blowing is just not doing it for me.

Okay, yeah, I know the biblical passage about god being the "still, small voice" (1Kings 19:11-13).  But you know, that just won't wash.  God was sure as hell not a "still, small voice" when he smote 50,070 people for looking at the Ark of the Covenant (1Samuel 6:19).  So, what's going on, here?

Now, mind you, I'm not saying that god smiting fifty-thousand-odd people day after tomorrow would be a good thing.  That's a whole city's worth of people, for pete's sake, and there are no cities that have no redeeming features, even if you include Newark.  But some of the less smiteful miracles would sure do a lot to convince us doubters.

In any case, Hallowell's article ends with the line, "What do you think — mere coincidences or evidence of God’s intervention? You decide."

Okay, thanks, I will.  And my decision is: coincidences.  And in the case of the wind, it was: the wind.  If those are what pass for miracles these days, all I can say is that heaven's Quality Control Department sure is slacking.