on discussing religion

In the 1950s, America was gearing up for a war that never turned hot. One potent weapon lurking in the federal arsenal was propaganda, a tool with which the Nazis before them had enslave an entire people to murderous ends. That it had been employed to ill effect in Europe was of little concern to the policy-makers in Washington, D.C. – they required every measure at their disposal to hoodwink the American people into allowing them to spend tens of trillions of dollars on a 40 year-long struggle of the wills. The Red Scare is over, and the Iron Curtain is down, but one aspect of the Cold War continues to harm millions of Americans, even unto this day: the frequent invocation of the Christian god Yahweh.

From the pledge of allegiance to the words spoken by new presidents, one phrase has contaminated the speech of officialdom such as few others before it: “under God”. This foul credo even stains our currency, every dollar we print saying IN GOD WE TRUST. Why did the fear mongers and panic sellers of sixty years ago tether our once fine and secular nation to the tenets of one religion in particular? Did they tarnish the sacrifice made by our Founding Persons and the bygone Sons of Liberty merely to justify their hatred for godless, heathen communists? Did they shit on this republic's chest out of a wan sense of patriotism or were they simply oblivious to the lessons of history? For whatever reason, our money now promotes one religion to the exclusion of all others, and our children are now tricked into worshiping bloodthirsty, genocidal Yahweh before class, each day. When millions of Americans believe that a bearded old White man sits in the sky judging their every action and that a red-skinned pervert with hoofed feet is filling their brains with evil thoughts, we see just how badly those Cold War policy makers fucked up; when candidates running for public office have to curry the favor of wild-eyed, bible-thumping, chest-pounding fanatics or risk losing the election, we see just how dangerous it is to link religion to government.

It is important to discuss the topic of racism with other people, regardless of their skin tone, mindset, belief system, needs, wants, or fears. Americans of color lament that too few of their Caucasian countrymen speak about racism regularly, openly, and without compunction. As people who have been marginalized and despised for centuries, minorities recognize that ignorance leads to fear, fear leads to hatred, and hatred leads to death; they have learned firsthand the dangers that silence brings. Similar to racism, religion must be discussed regularly, openly, and without compunction in order to keep the individual from backsliding into a mindset calcified by relentless exposure to his shaman's fire-branded, unchallenged vituperation. In the words of our first president, George Washington, and his successor, John Adams (from the Treaty of Tripoli): “America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion.” It is as vital to the survival of our basic Constitutional rights to discuss the risks of our own state-sanctioned religious fanaticism as it is to combat the foreign-born fanatics who seek to do us harm. So, next time you manage to tear yourself from in front of the television, strike up a conversation with someone about religion. Please don't forget, though, that the faithful rarely enjoy talking about their beliefs unless they are being praised for them. Sic semper tyrannis.

mentiri factorem fecit – 場黑麥