West Point crybaby cries
Let me preface this with an explanation. I have no religion, it’s been decades since I stepped through church doors, not because I don’t believe in God, but for different reasons entirely. I won’t discuss it because I don’t feel it’s an appropriate public discussion. So having said that, let’s look at this pencil dick moron, Blake Page, who has resigned from West Point because he thinks that his right to not have a traditional religion is being infringed upon at the US Military Academy. Of course, when he resigned, he had to explain it on Huffington Post because anyone who disagrees with the majority of the country feels a need to make a spectacle of themselves in public to prove how independent they are.
While there are certainly numerous problems with the developmental program at West Point and all service academies, the tipping point of my decision to resign was the realization that countless officers here and throughout the military are guilty of blatantly violating the oaths they swore to defend the Constitution. These men and women are criminals, complicit in light of day defiance of the Uniform Code of Military Justice through unconstitutional proselytism, discrimination against the non-religious and establishing formal policies to reward, encourage and even at times require sectarian religious participation. These transgressions are nearly always committed in the name of fundamentalist evangelical Christianity.
Two decades in the military, all of it with “No Pref” stamped on my dog tags, and I never had anyone preach to me about my lack of religion. There was a pretty young blonde girl in Hinesville, GA who tried to convert me once, but she wasn’t part of the military, and it didn’t take.
In fact, as I think back on my career, I don’t think I ever knew what the religious persuasion was of any of my leaders. I remember I had a Baptist minister as one of my squad leaders in my first platoon at Fort Hood, but he never tried to influence me or any of his subordinates.
And, oh, Page is completely wrong on the Constitution;
Many here are regularly told they do not deserve a place in the military. They are shown through policy that the Constitution guarantees their freedom of, but not from religion. Many are publically [sic] chastised for seeking out a community of likeminded [sic] people because it is such a common belief that Humanism and other non-religious philosophies are inherently immoral and worse.
The First Amendment says “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof….” I don’t see Congress making a law respecting religion, at West Point or anywhere else, so obviously, smartypants here doesn’t know what the Constitution says. That’s probably another reason that its good that he resigned from the academy.
As the President of the West Point Secular Student Alliance (SSA), a Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers (MAAF) affiliate, and first Director of Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) Affairs at West Point….
It sounds to me as if he’s a fanatic about his religion, or rather, the lack thereof, and I’m sure he’s probably done a fair amount of proselytizing himself about his personal superiority over Christians. That Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers shit gets me…like they are the only freethinkers on the planet just because they don’t want to be judged in this life by God. By the way, philosophies aren’t immoral, people are immoral.
I’m thankful that Page resigned from the Army, he wasn’t going to be a good leader, anyway, because he’s way too sensitive about his personal choices and I doubt he could keep his opinions out of the platoon CP. his single-minded adherence to all of those organizations instead of focusing on his studies and becoming a good leader would have had consequences under fire. I mean the dude can’t even read the Constitution. So the Army has dodged a bullet on this one.
Category: Military issues, Shitbags
Joe has questions that he can’t answer, and no one else can, either. Plenty of argument, but no answers. I know that desolate region like the back of my hand. And all the cream cheese frosting in the world doesn’t make the bitterness of that go away.
Joe: depends on what you accept as empirical evidence. Obviously, you want something along the lines of moving finger leaving words of fire in the sky. Don’t hold your breath; God is reputed to speak with a “still small voice”.
Try considering the numerous unexplained recoveries from terminal illnesses, perhaps. Or the elegant complexity of the universe, with its layers-on-layers of different structures, all apparently governed by a few simple rules of physics. Or the elegant logic of mathematics – including Goedel’s Incompleteness theorem and Turing Unsolvability, which show some questions cannot be answered in the general case.
Further: you are equating lack of proof with proof of nonexistence. That is an elementary logical fallacy – as innumerable students of mathematics have found out the hard way over the centuries. Just because you cannot currently prove something exists (or does not exist) tells you nothing about that thing’s existence per se.
In short: your last argument isn’t worthy of a high school student studying logic for the first time. Try again.
Faith is a gift. Some folks get it, let it languish, and it fades. Others reject it outright. Some preserve and cultivate it. When I am as smart as all of the brilliant people of faith who have preceded me in this world, perhaps I will entertain doubt.
Hondo,
Mention it to people a lot smarter than me, like Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennet, Sam Harris or the late, great Christopher Hitchens. They would not agree.
Ah, a second technique of poor argument appears – “when you can’t argue the merits of your case, appeal to authority” – coupled with a second logical fallacy.
The second logical fallacy should have be obvious, but apparently wasn’t: excellence in one field does not necessarily imply even competence in an unrelated field. Were that the case, all of our political leaders would be geniuses across-the-b0ard, since they are obviously competent in politics.
If you’re buying that, Joe, I’ve got a great deal for you on a bridge.
Dawkins, Harris, and Dennett are all excellent scientists. That gives each of them no more insight regarding the existence of God than a homeless guy roaming the streets of Durango, Colorado.
Ditto Hitchens, who was a talented writer. Even while alive, that made him no more – or no less – of an expert concerning the existence of God than the next guy.
Further: various folks generally regarded as geniuses would disagree with the four individuals you name. Do the names Einstein, Fermi, Jefferson, and Descartes ring a bell? Though they might argue the particulars of His nature, as I recall all were convinced that God did exist.
In short: appeal to authority based on cross-functional competence is a big “NO GO” in rational argument, my boy. Try again.
Einstein did not believe in god, he furiously tried to back pedal on his oft quoted saying “god does not play dice with the universe”, said he was referring to universal laws and not the kind of god most people think of.
And you can’t prove the flying spaghetti monster doesn’t exist, so does that mean he (? she? it?) does?
If we’re going to get into proof or lack thereof, the statistical probability of finding other planets that meet the PERN level of support (parallells Earth, resources negligible), then the Drake equation clearly demonstrates a high probability. N = R* x fp x ne x fl x fi x fc x L (note: fl is f lamda) N = the number of civilizations in our galaxy with which communication might be possible (i.e. which are on our current past light cone); R* = the average rate of star formation per year in our galaxy fp = the fraction of those stars that have planets ne = the average number of planets that can potentially support life per star that has planets f? = the fraction of the above that actually go on to develop life at some point fi = the fraction of the above that actually go on to develop intelligent life fc = the fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space L = the length of time for which such civilizations release detectable signals into space In other words, the number of civilizations in our galaxy should be directly proportional to the star formation rate. So in other words, the probability of finding life on other planets is high. The possibility of finding intelligent life on other planets is proportional to the number of planets capable of supporting life. However, the Mars rover Curiosity so far has found only carbon-based molecules, but nothing organic in its parambulations across the surface of Mars. Of course, it’s only gone a small distance; the comparison is me going to the end of my street instead of to Chicago to see if there’s life down there. (Don’t get me started.) So far, this means that while there probably is life in the void beyond the boundaries of our solar system, so far we have no proof of it. To keep this clear, the term PERN is an acronym for the name of a fictional planet orbiting Rukbat, used by Anne McCaffrey in her… Read more »
“In view of such harmony in the cosmos which I, with my limited human mind, am able to recognize, there are yet people who say there is no God. But what really makes me angry is that they quote me for the support of such views.” A. Einstein
I have a Nikon D300 camera that I use frequently to take handheld photos of the moon. I have a LOT of them. They clearly show the tan coloration of some of the lunar soil in places.
Those pictures also show a dot slightly to the south-southwest of the full moon. It appears to move relative to the moon’s position.
I can get a helluva lot of fun out of telling UFO hunters that it’s a photograph of an alien spaceship orbiting the moon.
The reality is that it’s a couple of hot pixels on my camera’s sensor.
That doesn’t mean there’s no alien spaceship out there somewhere. There was, in fact, the ‘wow’ signal that was picked up by accident in 1977 at Ohio State University and has not been picked up since then. The truth is out there.
Actually, Joe, Einstein is generally regarded to believe in God as defined by Spinoza’s concept vice that of a personal God. Descartes’ concept of God was similarly non-personal – more along the lines of an “uncaused first cause”, as I recall. Jefferson was what we would probably call today a Deist. Fermi, as I recall, was Catholic and became agnostic later in life, probably of the agnostic theist variety. (And no, the two are not mutually exclusive. Agnosticism holds that whether or not some things are true are unknowable and that the existence of God is among those things that cannot be known definitively. Agnostic theists can indeed be and often are adherents of organized religions.) Thus my statement that these four would debate the particulars of His nature.
You might want to emulate the students you support and do a bit of homework next time before spouting abject nonsense.
You’ve now resorted to a third technique of the lost argument: bringing up an irrelevant point as a smokescreen. We are discussing the potential existence of God, and arguments related to proving He does/does not exist. Whether or not a hypothetical “flying spaghetti monster” does or does not exist is irrelevant to that discussion. Bringing it up is an obvious attempt to cloud the issue and/or derail the discussion. Not even a nice try.
Again: NO GO – and not even a particularly strong effort. Try again.
Well, whether Einstein embraced a religious concept of God is really neither here nor there as far as I am concerned. I have always been impressed with how man at various stages and in varied ways has recognized a devine power much greater than his mortal limitations. Understandably, man has attributed the devine spirit to all sorts of things–until, that is, the spirit took a human form to help us understand and tell us what’s what. The New Testament is fiction to some, as the Ten Commandments are suggestions to others. Call me whatever you like. Argue whatever you like. I fail every day at something but never in my belief in God.
For instance, I just failed in spelling divine. I wasn’t referring to Andy Devine.
Links to flying spaghetti monster-related items:
Images:
http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=flying+spaghetti+monster&id=3B86F69CA0940D1B32B7DA43CDB51315F71A8729&FORM=IQFRBA
Place of worship for pastafarians:
http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=flying+spaghetti+monster&id=3B86F69CA0940D1B32B7DA43CDB51315F71A8729&FORM=IQFRBA
Wiki reference to FSM:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gospel_of_the_Flying_Spaghetti_Monster
I guess the really IS a Flying Spaghetti Monster, after all, Joe.
Sorry, I posted the wrong link for the Pastafarians:
http://www.flyingspaghettimonster.com/
My apologies to all Pastafarians!
@ 159 .. That still do not explain the life forms in parts of Brokklyn!
Just found this in the AP article:
Page expects to leave for his grandparents’ home in Wright County, Minn., in the coming days. He plans to remain an activist on the role of religion in the military.
“I’d really love to be able to do this for the rest of my life,” he said.
@168.
“I’d really love to be able to do this for the rest of my life,” he said. Do what, annoy people?
@167 — Master Chief, everyone knows that the various and sundry life forms in parts of Brokklyn are actually resident aliens wearing poorly constructed humanoid disguises. They have, like all aliens, coming here for a better life, and will stay until the murderous queenbee from Zarkon flies into the sun.
Have you never seen Men in Black?
Shocker, just another angry and depressed atheist, railing against a world that he feels wronged him so.
One of our more popular stories is a non-Jew in ancient times comes to Rabbi Hillel, one of our more popular Torah scholars, and says, “teach me all of Torah standing on one leg, and I’ll convert.” Hillel thought about it, “love your fellow as yourself. The rest is commentary. Welcome to Judaism! No bacon, and we don’t have crab legs.” Joe, I think you fall into the common fallacy that I would even accuse luminaries such as Hitchens and Dawkins as doing. If religion is solely about mythological answers to deep mysteries, then it makes for an easy target. We can’t prove a negative in the same way the military can’t realistically accommodating a negative without un-accommodating others, which all too often happens. The point is, in religion, G-d inhabits the goodwill between human beings more than cosmic mysteries. Hillel’s statement, nor the Christian equivalent Golden Rule, does not put any qualifiers on the definition of fellow or neighbor. Not “neighbor or fellow that believes in Jeebus/Flying Spaghetti Monster/Cthulhu/Goat of Many Young”, just “neighbor.” Consider, the rabbi sums up Torah, and it’s not about Divine revelation on a mountaintop, but rather, about bringing out the divine through human relationships. And that exposes the other fallacy in the manner in which the supposed “free thinkers” attempt to engage religion, something people of faith too often take the bait on. You have to obviate the meaningful day to day qualities of religion in favor of attacking the esoteric elements, and when forced to tackle the grounded elements, the rejoinder is, “well that’s great, but it’s only caused more wars, these religions.” Which is it, then? If religion/G-d is of human making, then we are in agreement as to the root cause of the problems with the human condition. You can’t blame a G-d that doesn’t exist, no? This is one of those SAT formulas at its best: Religion is invented solely by man. Man does horrible things in the name of religion. However, if the Divine is artificial, then man invented religion, and man is the root cause of those horrible… Read more »
@ 170 … Ah … I forgot about those …
Catholics have a beautiful Mass but when it comes to knowing the Bible outside of the Gospels, we’re dead meat. Aside from SOME priests, the only Catholics I know who know the Old Testament inside and out are converts from Judaism and the only Catholics I know who know the New Testament inside and out used to be Baptists. Go figure.
Well, when anyone asks me about religion, I give them a blank look, then the “light bulb!” look and tell them “I’m a reformed Druid.”
Blank looks from them, so I explain: Orthodox Druids worship oak trees and kill bulls. Reformed Druids worship bushes and eat steaks, with french fries.
@148
“Joe: or, alternatively, it’s accurate recognition of evidence the Divine in the universe around us. How do you know with certainty which is the truth?”
@149
Um, there’s zero empirical evidence for a god?
Did subatomic particles exist prior to humans being able to point to empirical evidence of them?
BK (#172),
Actually I follow a lot of the tenets common to many religions as far as how to treat my fellow man, just not all the irrational fluff that goes with those tenets. But that’s probably why religions are adaptive for societies – it gets a bunch of nearly solitary xenophobic hunter-gathers and allows them to live in larger and larger groups without killing each other. How about we respect each other, treat each other with kindly, but ditch all the ritualistic BS?
Joe–horsey. Dead. Beating. Stop.
“But that’s probably why religions are adaptive for societies – it gets a bunch of nearly solitary xenophobic hunter-gathers and allows them to live in larger and larger groups without killing each other.” Right. Have you heard of Islam?
Well, believe it or not 2-17, even if you lived in a third world islamic country, your chance of dying by murder is many, many times smaller then if you had lived in a hunter-gatherer band 12,000 years ago, or a present day primitive tribe in New Guinea or the Amazon.
>>>Well, believe it or not 2-17, even if you lived in a third world islamic country, your chance of dying by murder is many, many times smaller then if you had lived in a hunter-gatherer band 12,000 years ago, or a present day primitive tribe in New Guinea or the Amazon.>>>>
Tell that to the little girls in Afghanistan-my husband had to medevac because some Islamo idiot blew up the market they were in..
We now see stage 4 of the failed argument: change the subject.
Very transparent, Joe.
So I’m in the depression stage? What comes next, acceptance?
Guess he found a library.
@187, still looking for that thesaurus though.
2-17 Air Cav: not exactly – seems to be using another one of his employer’s systems. Jonn just hasn’t banned this one yet.
— break —
Joe: you tell me whether or not you’re depressed. That’s not what I said at all. I merely remarked that you’d moved on to another technique used by one who’s failing at making a logical argument – e.g., changing the subject. Common, and predictable.
Awesome. Next time I’m in formation and they pray in Jesus Name, ima shout “HAIL, SATAN!” as is my right. No one should object.
BohicaTwentyTwo Says:
December 6th, 2012 at 4:16 pm
Shocker, just another angry and depressed atheist, railing against a world that he feels wronged him so.
~~~
Vs the angry Christards beating up on him. Got it.
#175 Ex-PH2: Is steak sauce involved, or is that considered syncretic?
@190. Go for it.
Holy good night! I googled the wise guy, ImanAzol, and he is a career commenter. I’m talking years worth and everywhere. Rather like PavePusher.
Imagine that
@192, steak sauce is optional and discretionary, always on the side.