Editorial cartoon of the day

This one's from Dana Summer at the Orlando Sentinel

Famous people on atheism

"The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the Supreme Being as His father, in the womb of a virgin will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter."

Thomas Jefferson

"But how has it happened that millions of fables, tales, legends, have been blended with both Jewish and Christian revelation that have made them the most bloody religion that ever existed."

John Adams

"My earlier views of the unsoundness of the Christian scheme of salvation and the human origin of the scriptures have become clearer and stronger with advancing years, and I see no reason for thinking I shall ever change them."

Abraham Lincoln

"Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, & the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people."

Karl Marx

"Our Bible reveals to us the character of our god with minute and remorseless exactness... It is perhaps the most damnatory biography that exists in print anywhere. It makes Nero an angel of light and leading by contrast"

Mark Twain

"Which is it, is man one of God's blunders or is God one of man's?"

Friedrich Nietzsche

"The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one."

G B Shaw

"I am an atheist, out and out. It took me a long time to say it. I've been an atheist for years and years, but somehow I felt it was intellectually unrespectable to say that one is an atheist, because it assumed knowledge that one didn't have. Somehow it was better to say one was a humanist or agnostic. I don't have the evidence to prove that God doesn't exist, but I so strongly suspect that he doesn't that I don't want to waste my time."

Isaac Asimov

"Religion is a byproduct of fear. For much of human history, it may have been a necessary evil, but why was it more evil than necessary? Isn't killing people in the name of God a pretty good definition of insanity?"

Arthur C Clarke

"To you, I'm an atheist. To God, I'm the loyal opposition."

Woody Allen

"Christianity is the most ridiculous, the most absurd and bloody religion that has ever infected the world."

Voltaire

"Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?"

Epicurus

The religion gambit

The French writer Edmond de Goncourt, once said: "If there is a God, atheism must seem to him as less of an insult than religion."

The greatest myth of fundamentalist atheism is that the movement is against god...it isn’t, its biliousness is targeted at organised religion.

In the soil from whence sprung Christianity, Islam, and Judaism there is a virus, and it has killed all rationality and generosity these modes of thought ever possessed — if indeed they did at all.

Hinduism and Buddhism are different sorts of animals from the Big 3. Hinduism in its polytheism is a potpourri of myth and fairy tale that has evolved from a way-of-life into a religion. Buddhism is a knee-jerk reaction to the rigors of Hinduism: its philosophy is flawed and weak and its followers have descended into idealists more resembling court jesters led by the increasingly redundant Dalai Lama.

Both Hinduism and Buddhism have been bolstered over the last half-century by a spurt in celebrity converts, but their lack of adaptation to the evolving social climate, signal them as endangered (Hinduism enjoys strong support in India, but it is swiftly being replaced with Islam and Christianity in other parts of Asia, and Buddhism is more chic than viable).

The Big 3 continue to barrel on with their power-bases relatively intact at the Vatican, Mecca and Jerusalem. Each of them also has at its vanguard a globe-spanning commodity, that will see them survive — if not flourish — will into the future.

Christianity focuses on conversion (baited by the promise of education), Islam on its persecution complex, and Judaism on the wealth of its patrons.

Atheism will find it difficult to bring down the houses of the holy by reason alone, for at the bedrock of religion is fantasy and blind belief. If there is one thing history has taught us is that the only way to destroy a religion is with religion. The ancient Greeks, Romans, and Egyptians will attest to this fact.

Hence atheism must now function on doctrine and it must promote militancy and fundamentalism. It must also lie and do so with great vigour...in other words atheism must become a religion.

With the writings and prodding of the likes of Dawkins and Gould, atheists can take their nascent movement to its eventual conclusion...spurring a new Age of Reason and Enlightenment, devoid of the idiosyncrasies, follies and dogma of organised religion.

When, however, this has been achieved the neo-Atheistic movement must disband or suffer the same fate of that which it vanquished.

Editorial cartoon of the day

This one's courtesy Lisa Benson of the Washington Post

Death to morality

It is a question of morality. As we move towards the second decade in the 21st Century, the moral shackles that have stunted humanity for centuries are coming loose. As the links crumble under the hammerfalls of independent thought and the rising trend of atheism, humans are rising to the challenge of expression without guilt.

Yet in the two countries that are supposedly at the vanguard of the millennial charge, morals embedded in tradition are digging their heels in refusing to buckle.

But before we talk about India and China, let us discuss morality itself. Friedrich Nietzsche did not mince his words when he said, "Morality is the herd-instinct in the individual."

The human mind was never equipped for a moral code, it was built to run on instinct: If we are threatened we defend, if we are hungry we eat, if we feel lust we copulate, if we are too many we migrate. It is as simple as that. With the advent of society, and more pertinently, religion, the specter of morality descended. The concept of right and wrong was created by religions to control what it considered the errant masses, or as Nietzsche referred to “the herd”.

Without the guillotine of guilt and the fire and brimstone sermons of the myriad of priests, mullahs, swamis and lamas, man would revert to instinct and discard the oppressive cloth of morality. Religion may be many things, but naive it isn’t. It has adapted the ‘moral code’ to suit its requirements, hemming in those that threatened its foundations and dared question its dogma.

As we passed through the centuries, religions rose and fell in a tide of calamitous forays. But through it all, one underlying theme remained resilient: the moral code. It did, however, metamorphose through time, as society ‘evolved’ it did too. Unfortunately for religion and its engraved foot soldiers, with the advent of the internet, the walls are tumbling.

The internet has shattered all censors, all barriers — natural and man-made — and has brought sex and free speech to homes where once they would be the sole domain of the arch. The mighty code was being buffeted on all sides, and its tenacity chipped away.

But in India and China change was not as forthcoming, and the irony was evident. The two countries powering ahead technologically were reverting to tradition steeped in anachronism. China’s tradition is more political-based rather than religious, and in that it is fleeting (Maoism is ageing and unless it evolves drastically will be defunct within the next two decades). India’s, however, is stoically religious and therein lies its danger. What’s more disconcerting is the fact that the code is being propped up by the country’s youth rather than its dogmatic politicians and idiosyncratic holy men.

Inequality between caste and sex still proliferates society and women’s liberation movements are paid lip service at best. In fact the conservatism — social and cultural — in parts of cities like Mumbai and New Delhi mirrors the Middle East.

So why are India’s youth clinging on to tradition that has so evidently passed its sell-by date? Insecurity is one reason. Even sixty years after independence, India has a colonial hangover of gargantuan proportions. Fair skin is still considered a social virtue, and at times a necessity, and the West still holds the key to a kingdom Indian youth want to enter, but are too afraid they might not make the cut. Beneath a facade of bravado, lurks a stuttering child looking for acceptance.

It’s almost as if India’s sudden rise on the global stage has overwhelmed its youth who find themselves at a crossroads without knowing how they got there and whence they must go. So they cling to an ancient code as a drowning man does a life vest and mask it as patriotism.

But India’s youth must soon attempt to shake of the yoke and think for themselves. India’s old guard is selling jingoism and religomania by the boatload, it’s time the country’s youth sent the shipment back.

GQ needs a spine

GQ may not be the most macho magazine in its segment, but it does have its fair share of solid writing, so it comes as quite a shock that a piece on the infighting in Hillary Clinton's election camp, scheduled for next month's issue should have been dropped. According to The Slate GQ editor Jim Nelson may have come under pressure from the Clintons to drop the piece.
Slate writer Mickey Kaus has thrown down the gauntlet, demanding that the piece be published somewhere else...maybe even online.
"Could the piece have been as bad for the Clinton camp as the publicity they're now getting?" asks Kaus.
Maybe we will never know. GQ needs to come clean or risk losing a number of its readers.

What's new pussycat?

Now who said fashion couldn't be clever? Not me for sure, I think this dress is a corker

Joke of the day (this one’s for Mr Beckett)

After hearing a couple's complaints that their intimate life wasn't what it used to be, the sex counselor suggested they vary their position.

“For example,” he suggested, “you might try the wheelbarrow. Lift her legs from behind and off you go.”

The eager husband was all for trying this new idea as soon as they got home.

“Well, okay,” the hesitant wife agreed, “but on two conditions. First, if it hurts you have to stop right away, and second...” she continued, “you have to promise we won't go past my parents' house.”

How much?!

Talk about expensive desserts. The Fortress resort in the city of Galle, Sri Lanka has created a dessert that costs $14,500. The sweet dish called The Fortress Stilt Fisherman Indulgence is a gold leaf Italian cassata flavored with Irish cream, served with a mango and pomegranate compote and a champagne sabayon enlighten. It's decorated with a chocolate carving of a fisherman clinging to a stilt and an 80-carat aquamarine stone.

According to the resort the dessert has to be specially ordered. No one has ordered it yet...I wonder why.

Editorial cartoon of the day

Excellent one from Stuart Carlson at the Milwaukee Sentinel Journal

Page-I-Nation

The redesigned Style and Arts page for the Washington Post shows that you don't need 20 pictures on a page to make it eye-catching. Brilliant use of visuals and an understated palette give the page an elegant look, that brings it closer to classic Courant. Designers take note.

Poem of the day

E watch'd her breathing thro' the night,

Her breathing soft and low,

As in her breast the wave of life

Kept heaving to and fro.

So silently we seem'd to speak,

So slowly moved about,

As we had lent her half our powers

To eke her living out.

Our very hopes belied our fears,

Our fears our hopes belied--

We thought her dying when she slept,

And sleeping when she died.

For when the morn came dim and sad,

And chill with early showers,

Her quiet eyelids closed--she had

Another morn than ours.

— Thomas Hood

Shane’s at it again

Shane Warne and his ex-wife Simone (pictured during slightly happier times) have split for good after Warnie sent her a text message meant for another woman.

The message, which read, ‘Hi beautiful, I’m on the phone with my kids...the backdoor’s open’, was sent to Simone rather than the ‘woman’.

I presume Warne — who recently reconciled with his ex-wife — was not meant to be fooling around. Simone sent back a reply, which read: ‘You loser! You sent it to the wrong number’. Warne has— like every good man should — denied everything.

Of course everybody knows the danger of having too many numbers on your phone, especially when you’re a philandering horndog like Warne is. Damn those mobile phones.

Hail to the chief

Halo 3 is set to hits stores at midnight today and Microsoft is hoping to make a whopping $150 million in first day sales alone. That means Bill Gates will get richer, parent $70 poorer and kids 100 per cent dumber as they sit on their obese buttocks killing everyone in sight.

And speaking of Halo, what’s the buzz on the film version? Well, Halo fans can rejoice as the film is slated for a 2009 release. It’s being helmed by relative unknown South African director Neill Blomkamp and penned by Alex Garland who wrote the brilliant 28 Days Later and The Beach (I will refrain from mentioning the horrendous film version of the latter).

Guillermo del Toro was set to direct until he pulled out to do...errr...Hellboy 2. Wise choice moron. Hobbit-lover Peter Jackson is executive producing and the cast has not been decided on. Russell Crowe for Master Chief?