ravens & NOTW

Recently, while riding my bicycle into town, I was passed by a pickup-truck driven by a lone individual. Affixed to the back of this man's vehicle were two stickers, one reading, “Ravens – Relentless,” the other, “NOTW.” It will not shock this blog's regular readers that I am lamenting the idiocy of the loose affiliation of non-Earth-bound religious fanatics who see themselves as being Not Of This World (NOTW), but so many of them live here that I find it hard to resist.

Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary from 1961 defines relentless as, “Mercilessly harsh, stern.” If one can glean anything from the teachings of Yeshua (also known as Iesu, or Jesus, the Christians' primary god), it is that one should be – always, and without fail – compassionate, honorable, and loving toward others, and that one should treat them as one would like to be treated. This ancient wise man encouraged his followers to be merciful and generous persons whose only wish it was to serve the lowly, to assist the meek, and to give aid to the disenfranchised. In the Christians' bible, one of the only times that Yeshua acted in a truly harsh or stern fashion was when he drove the money-changers out of temple by whipping them with chains in a brazen (but unsuccessful) attempt to rid faith of the sickness of finance. The compassionate individual cares for the Earth and for Nature; he wishes to shelter and to promote the growing and the teeming things, no matter their size, shape, or color; the last thing that the true believer in the message of Yeshua would do would be to drive himself around the countryside in a two-ton vehicle at high speed (burning crude oil and mowing crushing clouds of insects against the front of his car), or to live in such as way as to be dependent on driving. The last thing he would do would be to allow himself to become so enamored of a simple game that he would go out and purchase a sticker for his car instead of using that money to support a starving neighbor or save a dying species. A true believer in Yeshua's message would not to spend his time watching, discussing, or thinking about the intricate details of such a decidedly earth-bound and petty thing as American football – the true believer would spend his time musing about how best to uplift the poor, help the needy, promote the downtrodden, and live in such a way as to cause as little negative impact as possible to the health of this our only planet.

To attempt to love Iesu, football, and pickup-trucks at the same time is akin to trying to walk while sitting and standing. Please, dear friend, remember Yeshua's lessons of humility and mercy, and cast aside the creeping doubt that hides within relentless and unbridled passion.

mentiri factorem fecit © 場黑麥

counter-protesting | complainers beware

  The snow had been falling since dawn, and when I arrived on the square today, I was ill prepared for the sopping cold (much like the young girl who had been forced by her mother to stand outside in the driving rain). Unlike Friday, a day on which two separate grandmothers gave me the finger, today as I was standing out in the slanting snow, my fingers freezing, my sleeves dampening quickly, today we made some progress.

  At least two separate drivers flipped off the anti-choice crowd (without even attempting to show me their support), and at least four rolled down their windows to tell me how much they appreciated my efforts. Nonstop they came, the thumbs up, the shouts and the honks supporting my damp pacings. The signs I carried today: ANTI-CHOICE = ANTI-LIBERTY | NO ROSARIES IN MY OVARIES | I HEART PLANNED PARENTHOOD | NOT YOUR BODY? NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS. One old man rolled down his window to call me an asshole after I had switched to the No Rosaries sign, which also garnered constant attention from the two anti-choice protesters hardy enough to stand out in the freezing slush.

  As soon as I started singing a nonsense song about ovaries and vaginas and keeping your business out of them, the lone remaining pro-lifer all but ran to his car, and fled. When I reached my own car, I had to shake an inch and a half of snow off of my cowboy hat, and my poncho (upon which are portrayed dueling cocks) was soaked nearly through.

  The estate was a mess, branches sagging over the road under the heavy snow, some having fallen already to block the narrow country lane that runs past the house. I dragged them out of the way, trimmed the low-hanging branches, and high-tailed it back to the neighbor's house, where they had the heat cranked up high enough to dry my soaking clothes. Not long after I arrived, the family's teenage son (with whom I play mad video games) left the house unexpectedly. He returned after a short interval, shook the snow off his clothes, and recounted excitedly what had just happened.

  Apparently, the organizer of the anti-choice demonstration (who lives a few doors down from him) had approached him to ask if I was in fact the individual out on the square counter-protesting. He said she complained about the offensive nature of my signs, about a sign that supposedly read, KEEP YOUR PRAYER HANDS OUT OF MY VAGINA (thanks for the great new slogan!), and that she grilled him about everything from my motives to my motivation. He claims to have stonewalled her thoroughly; similar the claims of his father, who was also approached by this woman, and who claims to have denied knowing anything about anybody.

  I have one piece of advice for the anti-choice crowd: next time, before you call the cops because you are offended by the public mention of a medical term (vagina), consider that your attempts at intimidation might cause the person on whom you snitched to resort to more colorful and creative terminology, words that you might decide offend you more. If the pro-lifers had just let me hold my vagina sign, I would have probably left it at that; since they ratted me out, I have made a new sign every day, with new and daring slogans that challenge the people of this small town to question why this struggle is playing out on their sad little square.

  I have the local ACLU chapter on speed-dial, primed and ready to go. The smell of escalation is in the air, and it reeks of excitement. I will fight to the last to secure the Blessings of Liberty for the people of America, and to keep speech free. Hence my new sign for Sunday:

WHAT'S NEXT? PRAY TO END FREE SPEECH

  Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp

religious oppression in PA

  I have recently been the victim of religious oppression. An inhabitant of the state of Pennsylvania, I was a few days ago in the market for buying alcohol, which I could not do because of the religious laws that have been adopted by this Commonwealth. On Sundays, upstanding citizens of legal age cannot purchase alcohol because it is forbidden in this state to sell booze on that day, not due to laws based on rationality or on efforts to secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, but laws based on the codex of one specific religion (even though the Sabbath, which occurs on Saturday, is the day that in the Christian bible Yahweh says to keep holy, not Sunday, a day not specifically mentioned as holy in that text).

  I am not a Christian, but I am being forced to follow its (purported) teachings. I am being oppressed by the rules of one specific religion, rules that have been incorporated into the laws of the state, making Christianity the official religion of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. This state of affairs violates the constitutional right of all Pennsylvanians to liberty by taking away our ability to decide for ourselves on which days we should wish to purchase alcohol for private consumption. Just as women would be incensed if they were forced by the state to cover their heads or to hide their faces out of some sort of religious observation (as the Taliban did in Afghanistan), I am incensed that I am being forced by the politicians and lawmakers of the state of Pennsylvania to follow the rules of a religion not my own.

  For some strange reason not rooted in the teachings of Jesus (who himself supposedly performed a divine act at the wedding of Canna just to keep the booze flowing) but located solely in the Old Testament of the Christian bible, religious zealots in this state have found a way to codify their beliefs into law, thus restraining me in my liberty and forcing me to live under the rules of a religion not of my choosing. Additionally, these religious laws force the individual to cross state lines on Sunday to purchase booze for private consumption back in PA, an action that, as bootlegging, is illegal at the federal level because it violates the Interstate Commerce Clause.

  In order for liberty to once again reign in this state, all laws based on religious codices must be nullified and struck from its constitution. This must be done in an effort to maintain the separation of church and state, and to forestall the implementation of additional Old Testament directives, the worst of which are found in Leviticus, where Yahweh demands the murder of homosexuals, adulterers, the incestuous, and girls who are discovered, on their wedding night, not to be virgins. The right to buy booze is just one front in the national war against Liberty that is being waged by religious conservatives: laws that prohibit abortion based on the rules of the Christian religion violate the individual's constitutional right to property by restricting her ability to decide to have unwanted growths removed from within her body.

  To be the shining example to the world to which we so often aspire, America must return to rationality by putting a stop to this oppression. If one state in the Union is oppressing its people religiously, by extension all states are being oppressive, violating the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution by passing laws that establish religion. If these laws are not struck from the books, and Americans do not regain the right to decide for themselves how best to lead their lives, our system, weakened as it has been by the actions of the greedy and the dishonest, will surely crumble under the continuing onslaught from one specific religion in a nation of thousands of different systems of belief.

  To end religious oppression in America, we must obey the constitutional mandate by securing for ourselves and our Posterity the Blessings of Liberty, a mandate that can only be fulfilled when the individual is allowed, unfettered and unhindered, to do those things she deems are best for herself and her body, so long as she is not infringing upon the right of any other person to life, liberty, or property.

  End this tyranny. Reinstate liberty among the American people. We will not stand to be ruled by one religion among many. Freedom will ring when the Blessings of Liberty are prosecuted as aggressively as certain religious observances. In the words of George Washington and John Adams, “[t]he government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion” (Treaty of Tripoli); let us honor these founding fathers by making sure America remains a safe haven for all peoples, regardless of creed or color, and by fighting to the last against those who would see us dancing to the tune of whichever god they have chosen for themselves.

Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp