Leaving Jesusland

My last quick post.

NOFX hit home with their 2006 song "Leaving Jesusland", which luckily you can listen to below!
The lyrics are located immediately below that.  The current Mosque outrages across America really highlight the homogenized close minded country that Jesusland is creating.  The John Stewart post and this post go hand-in-hand.  



Lyrics:

We call the heartland not very smartland, IQ's are very low but threat levels are high
They got a mandate, they don't want man-dates, they got so many hates and people to despise

In the dust bowl, cerebral black hole, the average weight is well over 200 pounds
I hate to generalize, but have you seen the thighs, most haven't seen their genitalia in a while

Maybe that's why they're so pissed at us
They're all jealous we're having better sex

Queers, transgends, and lesbians, vegans and vegetarians
All you brownish red and yellow ones come out and join us on the coast

No longer svelte, they gotta punch new holes in the Bible belt
They've blown out the fire under the melting pot, the red blood of America is starting to clot
No compromise, no sight thru others' eyes, they're just flies spreading pieces of shit
You gotta emigrate, stop living in hate, what makes this country great is dwelling on either side

They don't want visitors in Jesusland
They want life bland and canned in the fatherland

We want people with college degrees, drug use experience and STD's
People with open-minded philosophies, come hug California trees
Cultural revolution now, neo-conservatives run outta town
We're gonna burn Orange County down,
And then we're off to Riverside, Bakersfield and Fresno too, then we're comin' after you

The fear stricken, born again Christian, they got a vision a homogenized state
Texas textbooks, Bibles, and prayer books,
They want them memorized, but don't want you to think

They don't want visitors in Jesusland
They want life bland and canned in the fatherland

Punk Rockers and emo kids, people doin' things the church forbids
Buddhists, agnostics, and atheists we're moving out of jesusland
Art students and thespians, (excluding country) all the musicians
We want all hookers and comedians, nihilists are welcome too

No longer svelte, they gotta punch new holes in the Bible belt

John Stewart - I Worship You

I will be short on time/energy for these next two posts, so both are going to be incredibly simple.
Hooray for me.

I have been a fan of John Stewart for quite some time.  He may be on comedy central but he criticizes important parts of American society and shares his views (in a comical manor).  John Stewart is usually brilliant and I wish more people would take watch/listen to him instead of the awful real news they feed off of.

Watch this brilliant clip where John addresses the 'Mosque at ground zero' and elsewhere in America for that matter.
Let me know what you think.

www.thedailyshow.com

The Bible: A Cultural Myth

As an atheist I think the bible is fictitious. Fictitious because the bible describes a spiritual side to reality which does not exit and does not accurately describe historical occurrences (as far as I know). However, I would proclaim that the bible is ‘based on a true story’. That true story is a tale of a culture and of history. The Old Testament describes many things like the tower of Babel which can be defended as historically existing. However, the Old Testament was passed down via word of mouth for thousands of years and the stories are exaggerated and warped versions loosely based on the true tale. The Hebrews originated from nomadic tribes of which many were enslaved to different cultures or merchants and saw much of Mesopotamia and northern Egypt. Many historians think when the Hebrews arrived in Babylon the great tower already lay in ruins. Babylon was the trading hub of Mesopotamia so many cultures and many languages came together there. Hence the Hebrews witnessed diverse languages and remnants of a great tower. Over generations they formed the tale which wound up in the bible to explain the tower of Babel. In my opinion a majority of the Old Testament is composed in similar fashion. There are also tales such as the great flood, which seem to be based on other myths, in this case The Epic of Gilgamesh.

The bible is a novel text for portraying a cultures world view and assimilation of ideas from other interacting, ancient cultures. Reading through the bible we can see a progression of the Israelites’ culture. Their way of life, laws, morals, and world view are all catalogued by the bible. Studying the personality of God in the bible reveals a change in the Israelites’ attitude and morality. The bible starts with a jealous, powerful, spiteful god. His morals seem backwards to the modern Western world, but coincide with the older eye for an eye philosophy. Many of God’s punishments are stoning to death. The early God does not appear omniscient and behaves like an emotionally unstable pre-teen. As the bible progresses we see God slowly change into a more forgiving, caring entity. In the New Testament the Israelites in ancient Rome have a different sense of justice and morality than their Hebrew ancestors. God begins to encompass the idea loving one another and being humane instead of being obsessed with rules involving worshiping himself. As man’s morality and culture changed so did their description of God. A long essay could be written on this topic, but the important point is that God changes and does so due to changing cultures. If God was perfect, omniscient, omnipotent, and helped dictate the bible he would be a stable character and would have a static morality – likely not mirroring that of his followers. Instead we see an embodiment of cultural values that changes through the exaggerated collection of tales we call the bible.

I am not aware of any other text which provides such a detailed an interesting view of the dynamic nature of human culture. If one were to follow up the bible with current religious writings he would find God has again changed his morality and his personality. Interesting.