Taking the Survey

I have recently become a regular visitor and commentor at Ice Station Tango, a blog I highly recommend. J. Allbrighton aka Station Agent is blessed with an acerbic wit and the common sense to recognize the magnitude of the crisis in America. Today he posted a set of twelve survey questions on religion. I thought you might like to look at my responses.

Here's the survey:

1) What religion are you?

2) How important is religion to you?

3) Have you ever changed religions?

4) Is your spouse the same/different religion?

5) Do you agree that church and state are separate in America? Should they be? Why or why not?

6) Have other people's religious beliefs interfered with your life, if so, how?

7) Students should:

a) Not study religion in school.

b) Study their own religion in school.

c) Study all religion in school.

8) Who are some of the overtly religious Politcians you can think of who have used their faith to positively effect America.

9) Who are some of the overtly religious politicians you can think of who have hurt America by pursuing their religious beliefs over the public interest.

10) Should religious institutions be tax exempt? Why or why not?

11) It seems like America will never resolve this issue. Is 230 years enough already? Should America break up, or are we better off sticking together as one nation whether or not we can agree if it's under God or not?

12) Do you think religion has too much effect on government/laws/society? Not enough? Just right?

And my responses:

1)I am a devout evangelical atheist. For those unfamiliar with the term, my non-belief gives me just as much right to jam my ideas down YOUR throat as your belief gives you the right to jam your ideas down mine.

2)Extremely important. With hundreds of fanatical groups competing to jam their unsupportable fantasies down my throat, how could it not be?

3)I think I almost believed in God once during a particularly intense orgasm. For a lubriciously spasmodic few seconds I was a fundamentalist agnostic (of the Western Orthodox branch. I had to give it up because of their unremitting hatred of the Eastern Orthodox fundags)

4)See 3)

5)The separation of church and state in America is a unilateral arrangement accepted by State and ignored or exploited by Church. The Constitution made a poor choice of preposition when it guaranteed freedom of religion and not freedom from religion. Religion is a vast unregulated business enterprise that sells a product that requires neither manufacture, storage, distribution, nor maintenance. Its moral principles are the equal to purveyors of hard drugs and those who live off the avails of forced child prostitution.

6)-If you believe the sanitized version, Islamic fanatics on 9/11/01 killed thousands and plunged America into an endless war where thousands more have died, hundreds of billions have been spent, and the Bill of Rights and international law have been torn to tatters. If you believe the Loose Change scenario, change 'Islamic fanatics' to 'Dominionist fanatics.'

7)Students should be taught that the concept of God has been used by despots as a tool to control the masses since the beginning of recorded history. Any pinhead too obtuse to grasp this simple fact should be held back.

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9)George W. Bu**sh**, Pat Robertson, Tom DeLay, Bill Frist, Ralph Reed, and pretty much all the rest of the sanctimonious bastards.

10)Tax the crap out of them. Seize all their assets and distribute them to the poor. Hypocrites who have been preaching about alms and charity for millenia shouldn't be getting blowjobs from hookers in the back of chauffeur-driven limousines, nor building multi-million dollar crystal cathedrals.

11)Give them Utah. Confiscate any technology that isn't mentioned in the Old Testament, let them go back to herding sheep, or living on locusts and honey. The morons don't believe in science, why should they benefit from it?

12)Gee, I don't know. That's a tough question. Can I think it over and get back to you? It's so hard to make up one's mind without the threat of hellfire and brimstone or the promise of 72 virgins in Paradise.

AND THE BONUS ANSWER IS: 13)This is fun. Any chance of more surveys like this in the future?

"Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction." -- Pascal

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Hey, folks, get on over to Ice Station Tango and take Station Agent's survey on religion. The sample will be so skewed Station Agent will have as much chance of a scientifically objective result as he has of living off those south polar date palms he's been trying to grow. But it should be a lot of fun.

Postscript: I kind of like that Haloscan replaced 8) with the sunglasses smiley at question 8. It was unplanned but not unwanted. See, serendipity can happen to atheists too!

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