SO:  humans, being exclusively dependent upon our intellect for survival (at least in hunter-gatherer times), should be accordingly paranoid about anything of which we perceive we are ignorant.  To quote super-shady ex-SecDef Donald Rumsfeld:

“As we know,
There are known knowns.
There are things we know we know.
We also know
There are known unknowns.
That is to say
We know there are some things
We do not know.
But there are also unknown unknowns,
The ones we don’t know
We don’t know.”

Beautiful, eh?  Inspired.  Eloquent.  Mother fuckin’ poetic, even.  Honestly, Rumsfeld looks like the kind of person who cheats at strip chess and thinks date rape is cool if you can forge the victim’s signature on a Love Contract… but if we could choose anyone to be the Secretary of Defense, I really, really don’t mind if we pick the guy who’s willing to break the rules to ensure victory.  Just don’t play chess with him, you’ll be fine.

You may have noticed I have a propensity to Unnecessarily Capitalize certain Words to add Emphasis.  These capitalized words are – within the Chocolate-Factory-esque workings of my mind – sorted into a big bin labeled “Concepts”.  There is a difference, in the context of my rambling dissertations, between good and Good, truth and Truth, reason and Reason… and pertinent to THIS article, the concepts Known and Unknown.  “Known” (big K) refers to the “known knowns” section: the things that we know we know, such as the chemical composition of capsaicin or how human eyesight works.  “Unknown” (big U) refers to the “unknown unknowns” section: the things we don’t know we don’t know, such as a newborn baby’s knowledge of the chemical composition of capsaicin or what a bat’s echolocation sight looks like.  The gap between, as mentioned in the first sentence of this article, refers to the “known unknowns”: things we know we do not know, such as the existence or nonexistence of the soul, or Luke Skywalker’s favorite ice cream flavor.  It is this space, the gap between the Known and the Unknown, that marks the chosen battlefield of Religion and Science.  Kinda like the battle for Minas Tirith, except all the orcs are right-wing zealots, Sauron doesn’t actually exist, the inhabitants of Gondor all have satellite Internet access and espresso machines and they don’t particularly give a shit whether Mordor agrees with them or not.  Aren’t metaphors fun?

ANYways: it is this gap between the Known (the realm of experience understood by Science) and the Unknown (that which lies truly outside our scope of comprehension) that our evolved sense of our own intellect finds disconcerting; we worry about the things we know we don’t know because these unknown things could, potentially, cause us harm.  For the sake of our discussions, I now choose to designate this “known unknowns” concept with the label “the Uncertain”.  It is this fear of the Uncertain that has historically driven people to Religion; Religion provides an answer to these questions – traditionally referred to as a belief – that can soothe the mind’s innate insecurity, but only at the cost of suborning one’s own intellectual integrity.  While using beliefs to subdue mental anxieties can be an effective means of instilling an individual or group with confidence, doing so leaves the individual or group unable to engage as effectively with real-world problems involving the area addressed by the belief.  For example: the belief that a personal, loving God is looking out for you and guiding your steps can give a person greater confidence in their everyday lives, which can enable them to actually perform better than they may have done in the absence of that confidence… but can also result in mistaking foolhardiness for courage, potentially leading the person into experiencing epic failures in situations where a more rational person (one who knows that only they are responsible for their successes and failures) would have adjusted their choices in a more situationally-appropriate manner.  In extreme situations, belief in divine intervention can lead to Superman Syndrome – a general recklessness in everyday actions and interactions due to the belief that Superman/God will always compensate for dangerous situations caused by your recklessness.  Wow, I drifted just a bit off-topic there.  Recentering.

For people who lack the necessary education or intelligence to learn the scientific reasons behind the Uncertain (or during the vast, vast periods 0f history when Science simply did not know the reasons), Religion provides a plethora of simple answers to questions great and small.  When humanity was still developing from tribal social structures into full-blown civilizations, the Uncertain occupied a great deal more territory than it does today; the Uncertain covered such areas as the origin of lightning and rain, why trees and animals grow, and things float or fall.  This is in addition to the questions that still occupy people’s minds today, things like the nature (or existence) of an afterlife, where humans came from, and whether life exists (or is even possible) on other planets.  Since Religion could provide the answers (or at least an answer) to these questions that Science could not, the Uncertain has always been the realm of Religion and Faith.  This is why Religion has had such power throughout the entirety of human civilization; Religion can provide a feeling of security and community by giving the people a shared “answer” to life’s Uncertainties… belief and Faith derive their powers from the shared acceptance of Religion’s explanations of the mysteries of life.

The (perceived) conflict between Religion and Science is, metaphorically, a turf war: as Science brings more and more of life’s questions from the realm of the Uncertain into the realm of the Known, the realm of the Uncertain shrinks.  With it shrinks the power of Religion, as the less Religion is needed to explain the mysteries of life, the less Religion becomes necessary in the lives of the people to help overcome the biological fear of the unknown.  This impingement of Science upon the traditionally untouchable domain of Religion causes friction between the two philosophies… but it is, for the most part, a unidirectional friction; while Religion perceives its power to be diminished by the efforts of Science, Science does not particularly care about the fate of Religion aside from a sense that Religion is incompatible with reality.  Science observes, measures and extrapolates, nothing more… and confidence, in Science, derives only from observations any person of sufficient education can also make within the scope of reality.  This is the fundamental difference between Science and Religion; Science’s Truth can be built, in its entirety, from reasoned observation of reality; Religion’s Truth depends absolutely upon the acceptance of the facts presented upon the auspices of Religion itself… upon the acceptance of Religion’s authority.

Thus, Religion’s authority, Religion’s power, derives directly from the size of the realm of Uncertainty.  The more Uncertainty exists within a society, the more power the organization of Religion has to wield.  As has been previously posited: the odd, reflexive, circular logic of Religion seats the power of Religion upon overcoming fear of Uncertainty through the mass (mob) acceptance of a Truth supplied by Authority.  Therefore, the more Uncertainty exists within the peoples’ minds, the more valid Religion’s Authority appears to be… and ,due to the force inherent in any mob, the more valid Authority actually is.

This is the fundamental source of conflict between Religion and Science, the ultimate reason why Religious people actually oppose advances in Science that conflict with the teachings of Religion.  Any ground gained by Science (and by extension, Reason) is lost to Religion in the eyes of society… but only so long as society accepts the explanation put forth by Science.  This means that, from Religion’s perspective, they can prevent the loss of religious power concurrent with the loss of Uncertainty if Religion can ensure that either A) Religion’s followers choose to accept the teachings of Religion over the explanations of Science (thus choosing the reign of Authority over Reason); B) Religion can undermine its own followers’ intelligence or education to the point that Religion’s followers cannot understand Science’s explanations (forcefully substituting Authority for Reason); or C) manufacturing sufficient Uncertainty that its followers whom can already understand the teachings of Science have an apparently Reasonable alternative… which enables the follower to – seemingly legitimately – choose the Religious answer over the Scientific, essentially extending Religion’s dominion over both the Uncertain AND the Known (making Authority appear Reasonable; also known as pseudoscience).

The enduring strength of Religion in the face of a rapidly shrinking realm of Uncertainty can be derived from one of these three means of subordinating Reason to Authority.  ALL Religious people, in order to legitimize their use of Religious reasoning for their everyday actions, have to employ a certain amount of self-imposed blindness related to one of these subordinations.  Subordination is necessary AT ALL because Religion is, by definition, derived from the existence of Authority… while Reason is derived from reality itself.  Of the two, reality exists regardless of “belief” or “disbelief” in reality; all peoples operate within the scope reality by definition.  Conversely, people operate within the scope of Religion by choice; if a person can choose to be Religious or not, then Religion cannot, by definition, apply to all peoples.  Authority does not derive from reality; it derives from peoples’ acceptance of Authority.  As such, rules affecting the entirety of society can only be legitimately derived from the realm of the Known, which affects all of society.  Only people choosing to willingly include themselves within the bounds of Religion can be legitimately affected by that Religion’s rules.

So here I attempt to draw this dissertation to a close: I understand and accept that there exist in this world people who prefer Religion to Science because they derive more confidence, more strength, from Religion; in particular, Religious people prefer the conclusions drawn by Authority (and the force of those conclusions) to those merely implied by Science.  This is generally due to one (or more) specific aspects of the Religious person’s personality: either they A) prefer the simple answers of Religion and are too lazy, complacent or content to look further (thus choosing the reign of Authority over Reason); B) lack the ability to choose anything other than the simple answers they are given (Religion) since they cannot comprehend the answers of Science (Authority having been forcefully substituted for Reason); or C) are in a position to directly benefit from the mob force behind Religious conclusions and attempt to bolster that force via aggressive or Reasonable conversion (perpetrating B upon others, cultivating A amongst the Faithful, and being guilty of making Authority appear Reasonable themselves).

But regardless of a person’s reasons for choosing or being Religious, I acknowledge that Religion can have a positive influence upon peoples’ lives.  I feel that people who practice their religion in a benign way deserve the strength and confidence with which Religion can, for whatever reason, provide them.  For these people, I am happy that Religion can enable them to do good in society.  My problem with Religion arises when it is used for things that are blatantly evil (Evil) when considered from a Reasonable perspective.  If people accept the rule of Authority, then they can be considered justified in perpetrating Evil acts endorsed by their Religion so long as they apply those acts only within their religion’s community.  But for people NOT within the Religious community, the rule of Reason holds true, and those acts which appear Evil (such as the outlawing of arbitrary objects, the insistence upon subordination of women, and the persecution of both homosexuality and people of other religions) actually are Evil, and thus have no place becoming laws of society in general.

In final conclusion (I promise): since so much conflict exists between the fundamental natures of Religion and Science exists, I would prefer that people derive their strength and self-assurance in the face of the Uncertain from Reason, as doing so gives a much, much better chance that person will not perpetrate Evil… even with good Religious intent.  It is definately harder to adopt a Reason-based morality and understanding of reality than it is to adopt a Religious one… but again: the benefit of doing so is being able to choose what is both Correct and Right, instead of what is merely Correct.  If you are a Religious person and have done things that are Good even in the eyes of your Reasonable friends, then I applaud you… but wish to make you aware that just as much Good can be done from a Reasonable foundation… more efficiently, too.  And for those of you who live Reasonable lives already, and who probably read my articled for no better reason than to confirm and strengthen your own convictions, I leave you with this warning reminder of the First Rule of Sentience:  never discount the possibility that you could be completely fucking wrong.

Comma Bitches.

ANYways, I do have a bit of a side project which is consuming signifigantly more of my free time now than it used to do… probably something to do with me no longer having an occupation where I spend all day watching four news channels simultaneously and taking notes. Literally. I AM PAID FROM YOUR TAX DOLLARS. How does THAT taste? Taste good? Like a greasy guy with a cheap suit and more teeth than a shark has his hand in your pocket RIGHT NOW? Seriously, I’m salaried… so you personally are, technically, paying ME to type this.  I may also be consuming alcohol, who knows?

I DO.  MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Seriously, you actually clicked on “Read the rest of this entry…” ?  How bored are YOU?

So, yeah.  Side project.  It’s a book of epistemological and religious philosophy under the working title of “The God Indictment: Irrational Arguments for Irrational Beliefs”.  In brief: the palpable, fundamental difference between people who are religious and those who are not is one of first principles.  People who make decisions based upon reason begin their lines of thinking within the sphere of the known, within the accumulated knowledge and experience available to them at that time.  People who make decisions based upon faith, however, begin from a different foundation: that the word of their religion is truth.  Therefore, anything arising from reality that contradicts their personal truth must be in error.  This is one of the key defining characteristics of irrationality: that evidence cannot influence one’s thinking.

Having worked in the military for a little while, I have met a (probably) disproportionate number of hardcore right-wing religious types.  What I have discovered is that these are NOT bad people; there is a bit of a disconnect between the objective mentality required to be a successful (or at least still alive) defender of one’s country and the deep and abiding hope that all homosexuals would contract a particularly specialized version of the Ebola virus… but they’re not bad people.  In the interests of diplomacy and being able to get any work done, I have developed a means by which to coexist intellectually with this particular demographic.  It involves doing away ENTIRELY with any line of rational discourse.  Yes, this is a huge fucking integrity compromise for me, but if doing so will purchase harmony with only myself paying the costs, then I choose to believe my actions are in the service of Good.

The key to reasoning IRrationally is to employ some good ol’ 1984 doublethink:  start with the postulate that God (etc.) literally exists and the Bible (etc.) is literally true, then find commonalities between the derivative lessons (or dogma, as needed) of the Bible and actual, real-world rationality.  Restraining your conversations to these topics enables a harmonious workplace at the cost of some mental self-flagellation on your part.  For the faithful, discussions of this type are the only way to effectively connect with (or alter) their thinking in a real-world direction: by definition, reason does not affect people who do not make decisions based upon reason.  Practically, since your argument does not agree with the truth of the Bible, your argument is faulted from beginning postulates on up, and can be discarded out of hand.  By beginning a line of reasoning from the same truth and adjusting course towards the Realm of Reason, one can display the utility of reason even within a religious context.

The book will be an examination of this type of interface, but with the diplomacy removed.  Reasoning in this way, accepting the other person’s terms and still managing to produce a conclusion that is practical, viable, moral and useful in the real world, is sure to make either a dedicated enemy or a lifelong friend, depending upon the person’s own intelligence.  Over the past two years or so of employing this sort of methodology on a consistent basis, I have reached an interesting series of conclusions.  One (or more) of the following conclusions, following logically from the truth established by the Bible, seems to be necessarily true:  1) God is either arbitrary or unnecessary;  2) God lacks either omnipotence, omnicognizance, omnibenevolence or omniscience;  3) God is either dead or absent; or 4) the Bible was actually written/inspired by Satan.

Someone is going to murder me over this book.  I’m not joking in the slightest, particularly given the implications of the fourth conclusion.  Most disturbing to my current way of thinking is that the fourth conclusion, assuming that God exists, is actually the most likely to be true; the other three conclusions would render the Bible inconsistent with itself.  However, given what is known of the universe in general and the nature of man in particular, treating the Bible as a piece of disinformation propaganda would enable the most good in the world.  Keeping the basic message of altruism that Christianity (and Islam, and Judaism, and Voodoo, quite frankly) claims is the meaning of their religion and discarding the literal truth of the Bible as being a naughty trick played by the Devil would, I believe, help a great many currently religious people make a more comprehensively positive contribution to the world and ease pretty much all of the doublethink cognitive dissonance required of them by religion.

So that’ll be the book, really.  I have the outline down pretty much as I want it, all that remains is to spew heresies and find a publisher headquartered in a fireproof building with really thick doors.  Think your typical Frankensteinian mob, but with modern, NRA-sponsored weaponry.  In all likelihood, I’ll be using this space to organize my thoughts for this book, so IF there’s anyone other than myself and Gerry reading this blog, then feel free to cut me some feedback as you see fit.  Much better than cutting me in a more literal sense.

Comma bitches.

So what did that previous paragraph have to do with the title of this article? Not terribly much, except that my boredom this morning led me to investigate various California political organizations, to include calitics.com, an admittedly progressive (read: Democrat) website that nevertheless seems to be fairly committed to serious and reasonable dialogue within the sphere of California politics. I make a big deal about not supporting either of the major political parties, but there’s some interesting stuff there, to include this story about the Catholic Church’s attempts to dodge somewhere between 3 and 15 million dollars in taxes owed to the city of San Francisco. This kind of thing always registers on my radar, both because I oppose the bureaucratization of spirituality (aka religion) and because I virulently oppose the invasion of government by the glaze-eyed armies of religious dogma.

I’ll try to keep this short as I already posted the gist of my argument on the calitics.com site: the laws of a church (or any organization, for that matter) CANNOT overrule the laws of society. To do so invalidates the entire foundation of society, regardless of the intent of the organization in question. What keeps our society from becoming an Iran-esque Theocracy is the principle of separation of church and state, and I quote: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…” I choose to carry that philosophy a step further (because I would likely be an Activist Supreme Court Justice, because this just isn’t 1776 anymore) and make the following statement: any justification for a course of action that affects society in general must be supported by the facts of reality. In other words, debate surrounding any proposed law must be derived from the reality in which all our citizens reside; to attempt to justify a law via belief (ANY belief) is irresponsible, not to mention unfair to people who do NOT support that belief. The trick is distinguishing between opinion supported by fact (valid support) and opinion justified by mere belief, no matter how strongly held (invalid support). For example: a valid argument in favor of using animals as food sources would address the dentition of humans being indicative of an omnivorous diet, the increased calorie concentration required by active brains, the ease of humane treatment of foodstuff creatures and the relative value of human needs as opposed to those of other species; an invalid argument would be invoking either biblical support (God gave Man dominion over all the animals) or doctrinal support (PETA’s stated belief that any pain visited upon an animal is inexcusable).

While the Founders of our country are generally held to have included the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment as a reaction to the King of England declaring the Church of England to be the official religion of the Americas, the philosophy itself, as applied to the idea of society, remains valid: the responsible wielding of governance (and of force) over a nation must derive from logical thought and conjecture (the rule of Reason) as opposed to appeals to dogma (the rule of Faith) or force itself (the rule of Fear). The entire purpose of democracy is to establish this rule of Reason, to weigh ideas and laws based upon their merit to society… and I fear this may be an area where our Constitution and way of governance are no longer sufficient to protect our society from either Faith or Fear. There is, rather tragically, no provision in place that requires ANYONE in our society – either citizens or Congresspeople or Justices or the President himself – to actually follow the voice of Reason. Advocates of Christian reasoning for laws (such as laws banning homosexual union and abortion regardless of circumstance) should actually be the most dedicated to this principle of reason; if we were to allow religious justification as a valid form of support for lawmaking, it is not difficult to imagine what shape our country could take should adherents to a different religion become the population majority. I’m pretty sure that Christians (et cetera) would much rather have a secular in charge than an Ayatollah.

Our insistence upon the prevalence of Reason in our government is what protects us from religious authoritarianism, any religion’s authoritarianism. Even those people who would like a bit of their own religion in government should look to Reason as a defense against the religions of others in government. Perhaps the most depressing facet of this issue is that they do: when their religion is challenged, the religious are incredibly quick to enlist the aid of Reason when Reason supports their cause. Any other time, their beliefs are inscrutable and beyond reproach and how dare you even imply that their God could ever be wrong about anything ever. EVER. What was it Martin Sheen said in The West Wing… “When the facts support you, argue the facts; when the law supports you, argue the law; and if you don’t have the facts or the law, then bang your fist upon the table as loud as you can!” I think the reason why the religious try so hard to change the law is because the facts are unhelpful and their fists are tired…

…But then again, pretty much every special interest group in the nation has the same problem. Oddly enough, they use the same tactics, despite having no Bible backing them up. The fact that “Lobbyist” is a legitimate job title lends some credence to this quality of our society. It would appear that religion is not the only culprit in the search for special treatment, for the use of law against the fair interests of society. What really gets to me is that the rule of law is supposed to be an extension of the rule of Reason, but the process is embarrassingly easily corrupted under our current system of government. The biggest reason why I hope to eventually run for some kind of public office is that I long ago reached the point where I cannot trust anyone currently in government to govern responsibly. I have no illusions of affecting any kind of major change on my own; I do hope to gain a large enough audience to inspire some intellectual integrity in society at large. And maybe a harem. Our standards are only as high as our society demands… and I don’t feel that responsibility in governance is too much to ask. Only when we look to reality for our ideals will we once again function effectively as a society.

Comma Bitches.

Ok, I stole the title for this post from a totally bitchin’ bumper sticker I spotted on a vechical at my last apartment, but it sums up my feeling on the subject quite nicely. So nicely, in fact, that I’m stealing it for use as the title of this post. There, the circle is closed.

Normally, I’m a pretty observant guy. When I moved to Colorado Springs back in August of Ought Six I had no idea I had entered the den of the beast. I was stumbling through life blissfully unaware that I could, at any moment, be molested into the ground by a swarm of foaming religious zealots. Yet I somehow managed to avoid becoming a salt’ed and holy-water’ed hole in the earth for an entire solar year. Imagine my surprise to learn – from Lisette, of all people – that Colorado Springs was home to the Universe Headquarters of the most rabid Christian missionary movement since Jimmy Swaggart conducted sermons from the men’s room stall at the Pasttime Bar and Grill. (Interesting story: myself and Gerry actually spent close to like six months living as shared-bathroom roomies in the old Jimmy Swaggart ministries dormitory when he went completely fucking broke and had to convert the things to “apartments”. Just shows to go that if a god does exist, He has a really assholey sense of humor.)

Focus On The Family is the moniker for a really, really big building (or maybe complex of buildings, the architectural plans I ordered depicting the location of the Boiler Room haven’t come in yet) in northern Colorado Springs that supposedly supports and directs the whole Convert The World campaign thingy. I have a few friends whose parents work at this place (and they’re all vehement non-Christians… I can’t begin to imagine why). Focus On The Family is where gay pedophile U.S. senators go to get quickie one-week absolutions so they can continue about their business as Perfectly Normal Senators again instead of, oh, I don’t know, going to fucking prison.

Apparently lots of people in the area worry that mere proximity to this place will start to have an insidious effect upon one’s brain waves or something. Apparently the people who frequent the Christian 7-Eleven have a reputation for bringing the slash-and-burn style of missionary mentality into other areas of their lives and interactions with others. Apparently people with a suspicious-to-hostile disposition towards religion in general (like, uh, myself) should be more worried about other people wearing FOTF t-shirts breaking into our homes Rainbow Six style, absconding with our children, and forcing them to, I don’t know, watch Fox News on one 56-inch TV and VeggieTales on another like 24-7. I only have two cats, myself, but I think the idea is that the catnappers (as is applicable in this hypothetical situation) would make them wear tiny kitty nun habits or something. Which would suck, seeing as how both my cats are males and Ptolemy is already leaning a little funny as it is.

But, to be perfectly honest here… I haven’t seen any of this sort of thing. And, being the religiously-vigilant guy I am, I’m pretty sure I would’ve noticed. The most pervasive thing I’ve noticed around here (excepting, of course, fawning references to Good Works on the Fellatious Network for Conservatives) are, appropriately enough, FOTF bumper stickers. Religious bumper stickers are perfect for our society. They allow the person to tote around vaguely passive-aggressive missionary slogans with virtually no effort, freeing up their vocative prowess to break out the big guns (biblically speaking) in the event someone takes the bumper sticker seriously. The slogans themselves are depressingly predictable; “Jesus Is Lord”, “What Would Jesus Do?” (sometimes abbreviated WWJD?… you know, to hang with the younger crowd), “A Baby Isn’t A Choice” (as if THAT wasn’t a drastic Saturn V rocket trip away from any attempt at logic conjecture), “In Event Of Rapture, This Car Will Be Unmanned!” (ha ha HA, asshole, Pride’s a SIN, you’ll be slummin’ in HELL, now!), “Have You Torched Your Heretic Today?” (for the truly honest ones), that kind of thing. So what interests me during particularly long red lights (and/or church parking lot tire-slashing expeditions… I believe that an omnipotent god could stop me in my tracks with a well-placed lightning bolt if He really wanted) is which other bumper stickers the religious one is in the company thereof. Mostly these are other religious materials or political campaign stickers for whichever Republican is running (oddly, I never see religion and Democrat side-by-side… or maybe not so oddly; the Dems seem less willing to shove their values on a person… which is not to say they don’t shove other things), but sometimes there’s something truly awesome and, I feel, indicative. Such as: “Jesus Loves Everyone” below a Confederate flag, or “Have You Read Your Bible Today?” right next to “Keep Honking, I’m Reloading My Gun!”, or even “God Bless America” nudging “Save The Whales, Bomb Iraq”. Loads of fun. You normally only get juxtaposition of this level in detective novels and psychopath-style slasher flicks. Or VeggieTales, for that matter… I’m pretty sure a VeggieTales episode where the cucumber reveals he’s been abducting his veggie buddies one by one and making a tossed salad in his basement would be an AWESOME season finale.

Yet the car on which I first spotted the “Focus On Your Own Damn Family” sticker had the most poignant bumper sticker collection I have yet witnessed… and there was only one other sticker to be seen: the stylized “Coexist” sticker. And that, in a vehicle, exactly encompasses my own perspective on religion. Cool Guy Barack Obama (I don’t agree with everything he has to say, but at least he makes an effort to explain the Why behind what he says) was recently criticized for saying that religious reasoning for laws (that force behavior upon the populace in general) should not be used by petitioners because using reasoning/justifications that do not follow from logical conjecture is irresponsible in a society that is founded upon logical conjecture. The Christians (radio, TV, pundits, etc.) jumped right the fuck down his throat for that… it seems they heard what he said as “Christians should not be allowed to participate in government because everyone in the country is not Christian” and they took offense/umbrage to the straw man thus created. (For future reference: straw burns very easily.) The point of the matter is that society is supposed (in huge quotation marks) to be derived from logic, which is generally accepted to be a common postulate point for all belief systems, and thus creates as fair a government (which affects everyone regardless of religion, etc.) for everyone as is humanly possible. IF a law is supported via religious justifications, THEN that law is inherently unfair (and, consequently, WRONG) even IF it gets the 50%+1 needed to become “The Right Thing To Do.” The reason we attempt (or should attempt) to use Reason instead of Religion is because we are a nation of many – often conflicting – religions and philosophies and our laws should reflect that fact. Law, in the original, Founding Fathers Democracy sense, was designed to be a departure from the rule of Kings and Church (read: Fear and Religion, respectively) in favor of the egalitarian rule of Reason.

What I perceive the single-line, unpunctuated bumper sticker “Focus On Your Own Damn Family” is intending to convey (besides flippancy) when placed in conjunction with the “Coexist” bumper sticker is this idea of keeping belief and value systems within the belief/value-system’s community so as not to create conflict by forcing (or attempting to force via law) those beliefs/values upon others. Consider, if you will: our beloved President tried, sometime during his first term, if I remember, to push a constitutional amendment through Congress that would outlaw the marriage of same-sex couples. My thoughts on polygamy aside for a moment… the only justification anyone could come up with that wasn’t dismissed as spurious (see also: bullshit) was that doing so would, and I quote, “Protect The Sanctity Of Marriage”. The prosecution calls your attention to the italicized word in the previous quotation. One cannot begin to characterize this lone piece of evidence as anything but a Religious Justification of the aforediscussed nature without looking like a complete evangelical lickspittle.

This same type of thing (“It should be a law ’cause God said so, a-hyuk”) drives many of the Controversial Issues that for some reason define our political concerns today. It seems to me (there’s that perspective thing again) that a responsible government – and, indeed, any responsible religious person – would address all issues, of practical concern or religious, by considering what would be best for the population as a whole when making laws that affect the whole. When doing so, it is of constitutional and moral imperative that only logical reasoning derived from the actual, real universe decide the most appropriate action. It then descends to the religions to decide how a particular issue is handled within the scope and ability of their own community to shape and enforce a particular portfolio of beliefs and values. To use the Gay Marriage example: the simplest and most responsible action would be to allow marriage between any individuals that wish to bind themselves together for legal purposes and create a clear distinction between a government-derived “legal union” and a religion-derived “marriage”. There, Sally Super and Mindy Hottie went down to the courthouse and signed a piece of paper and now Sally and Mindy Super-Hottie are considered from the government’s point of view to be a legal union, just exactly the same as Sarah and Sean Coincon are a legal union. The term “marriage”, being now exclusively in the domain of Religion, may now be granted (or not, as would seem to be the heavily bigoted case) at the leisure of the Church, who may (as it is perfectly within their purview) do so once the members in question fulfill whatever prerequisites and responsibilities the Church requires. If Sally and Mindy want to have a Catholic wedding (and be in a Catholic “marriage”) it is up to the Church to decide whether or not to grant Sally and Mindy that request. If, however, the Church wants to “Protect The Sanctity Of Marriage” and disallow the marriage of Sally and Mindy, then that also is the Church’s right to do so. Such a thing would/may lower the Super-Hotties’ prestige in the eyes of Catholics, but they would no longer be second-class members of the society in general. This is the path of democratic responsibility.

See how easy that was? All you have to do is create a distinction between Religion and State and… wait, that sounds familiar for some reason… oh yeah, the fucking First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America. This technique can work with lots of hot button issues besides marriage. Take abortion. Allow it on a governmental level (although I don’t feel it should go unpunished in cases of open negligence… but that’s definitely a topic for another article. Here’s a hint.), especially when danger to the mother is a factor, but censor it (if so desired by the Church) on a religious level. This way, Pregnita can avoid being forced into a life of poverty (or raising a child in poverty, which is even worse… like chopping off a baby’s hand at birth) and the Church can just smile and excommunicate her ass. This makes things MUCH easier for the person having to make the difficult fucking decision in the first place AND gives Pregnita a whole new, clear perspective on how much the Church gave a damn about her all along.

The point of this article (and more than likely the point of the vast majority of civic-type articles I will write in the future) is that there’s a responsible way to handle these kinds of conflicts that results from adopting a broad and impartial perspective in one’s approach to problem-solving. Especially in matters of differing values and beliefs, the responsible course is to confine those values not derived logically from nature to the community willing to ascribe to those values willingly. Those values that are derived from nature (in particular, the survival and ascension of human beings as a species/social group) become the basis for societal norms (“laws”) and the question becomes one of how and how much. This is the meaning of coexistence: the ability to live side-by-side with peoples of different ways of life and not force your own way of life upon them. So Sayeth The Sean.

P.S. – From an I-plan-on-running-for-President perspective, this is exactly the way I plan on guiding the country. Each problem presented to me becomes a function of gathering as much information as I can (both objective and subjective; if we can’t have a Direct Democracy, a Presidential or Congressional Blog would be the next best thing), purposely disposing of my own preference (For example: I would prefer a nation where firearms are illegal for private ownership and everyone studied martial arts instead, but concentrating all the easy force in the hands of the police and military – and by extension, the government in general – would protect our citizens even while their Democracy was endangered. Remind me to throw down an article on THAT topic, too.), anticipating which solutions are most responsible, and choosing the course that does the most Good. Actually, this is exactly why I’m running for President: because there exists no politician that lacks an agenda, not to mention preferences, for the simple reason that they all have a platform. Their platform is comprised of their agendas/preferences; you can’t be a politician (you especially can’t be a GOP/Dem) without a platform from which to appeal to the masses. All I have is a philosophy… and mine is derived from my perspective of reality. So long as I continue to open myself to and absorb information (yes, to include plain-ol’ potentially-biased opinions) from whatever source I can, myself and those like me have a much better chance of doing a better and fairer job of guiding our nation. At least, that’s my perspective.

If I were a warrior poet, these would be my songs.