16 July 2010
7 July 2010
The Egg and The Damnation of Richard Gillman are two well written short stories on metaphysics, religion and afterlife. Damnation… has been around for years, while The Egg is more recent and circulated on 4chan for a while.
[via:Lotta Söderholm & Waxy]
12 March 2010
26 February 2010
An intense, personal story about sexual abuse
Tech writer Joel Johnson tells the world about his family. Religion included, of course.
[via:Waxy]
4 February 2010
Scientologists in Haiti: A Firsthand Account
“”Their idea was to use the ton of money they had to buy food to distribute when they got there. But there was no food and no water. That was the point.”"
[via:Henrik Sultan]
17 November 2009
Hilarious African sodomy scandal headline
Best headline this year according to the Internet at large. Also, learn to appreciate your local, slightly higher quality news media while it lasts. Here’s a related newspaper article.
[via:Stephen Fry]
9 November 2009
30 October 2009
25 October 2009
A foldable Lego replica of the Kinkaku-ji Zen Buddhist temple in Kyoto. (#)
[via:Matias P.]
23 October 2009
Rewording of Jon McNaughton’s One Nation Under God
This is another parody of Utah artist Jon McNaughton’s creepy painting with a theocratic vibe. We get a thorough rewrite of the original’s explanations of the motif, with the nice JavaScript scroller and all. I keep my own backup copies of the original and this parody.
I recently discovered a less subtle, Cthulhu themed parody of the painting as well.
[via:jlelliot]
17 October 2009
One Nation Under Cthulhu McNaughton parody
The picture (origin unknown) delivers Lovecraft-inspired parody of a “One Nation Under God” themed painting that has floated around the Internet for some time.
To fully grasp the madness of this work, read the original’s very elaborate explanations and feel that theocratic rage scare the shit out of you (Backup copy). Yeah, these people are allowed to vote.
EDIT: Found another parody.
[via:Nelg]
20 September 2009
Reason as memetic immune disorder
“Religious communities actually protect their members from religion in one sense – they develop an unspoken consensus on which parts of their religion members can legitimately ignore. New converts sometimes try to actually do what their religion tells them to do.
[...]
The history of religions sometimes resembles the history of viruses. Judaism and Islam were both highly virulent when they first broke out, driving the first generations of their people to conquer (Islam) or just slaughter (Judaism) everyone around them for the sin of not being them. They both grew more sedate over time. (Christianity was pacifist at the start, as it arose in a conquered people. When the Romans adopted it, it didn’t make them any more militaristic than they already were.)
The mechanism isn’t the same as for diseases, which can’t be too virulent or they kill their hosts. Religions don’t generally kill their hosts. I suspect that, over time, individual selection favors those who are less zealous. The point is that a culture develops antibodies for the particular religions it co-exists with – attitudes and practices that make them less virulent.
I have a theory that “radical Islam” is not native Islam, but Westernized Islam. Over half of 75 Muslim terrorists studied by Bergen & Pandey 2005 in the New York Times had gone to a Western college. (Only 9% had attended madrassas.) A very small percentage of all Muslims have received a Western college education. When someone lives all their life in a Muslim country, they’re not likely to be hit with the urge to travel abroad and blow something up. But when someone from an Islamic nation goes to Europe for college, and comes back with Enlightenment ideas about reason and seeking logical closure over beliefs, and applies them to the Koran, then you have troubles. They have lost their cultural immunity.”
16 September 2009
Svårt sjuk grundare av Exitus r.f.: eutanasitillåtande lagstiftning inte på kommande
Jag finner en förskräcklig, grym ironi i att Gwen Marttinen, 82, säger sig ha “kommit till tro” och därmed inte längre känner sig förmögen att, om behovet uppkommer, själv avsluta sitt liv. Hon har därmed blivit offer för både andras och sin egen religions godtyckliga moral.
Racism in the background of US anti healthcare reform movement?
The article is more than a little partisan, but still an interesting facepalm inducing read.
[via:humble.fool]