clos3r look

Riots in Romania - The battle of Bucharest

2012-01-19T22:50:00.001+02:00

A brief background to what is happening in Romania and the protests going on.

It all started in the 1990's when a doctor who had moved to Romania decided to improve emergency rescue services. This doctor was Raed Arafat.
What exactly did he do, back then? He started an experiment with a single second hand car. Preparing it for special emergency situations. He parked it at the hospital where he was working and said that if something very urgent comes in, they have to send this car. It was the best equipped and he had a fireman coming with who would open doors etc.
At some point Dr. Arafat expanded this service all over Romania. By this time he got money from the government and was able to buy more cars and even helicopters. He started working with firemen who would open trashed cars or get into collapsed buildings to rescue people.
This service is called "SMURD" (Serviciul Mobil de Urgenta, Reanimare si Descarcerare) - Mobile Emergency Service for resuscitation and extrication.

Dr. Arafat was, by that time and until just recently, a state sub-secretary attached to the health ministry. He got a budget that he was using on this project and it works very well. There are other services like that but SMURD is working best.

Now, after pretty much cheating the Romanian People for a long time on a lot of levels, the President had the great idea to privatize SMURD. Of course Dr. Arafat opposed this so (to make it short) he was forced to resign from his position. Of course all this happened publicly and people only needed one more thing to explode.

So people were outraged, this plan is bad, it would cost more tax money and people are poor already, it would not necessarily keep the service level where it is now, and added to all the other bad things the president already did people now want him to leave.

They want immediate elections. They want the president with his party and ministers gone.

The president did not make a statement since the protests started and it's a week now and there are more and more people now.

Today is January 19^th 2012, there was a huge organized public meeting, 20,000 people attended in Bucharest, while somewhere else in Bucharest people kept protesting as usual.

Want more?
Here the “fun facts” that are not so fun.

This whole thing is getting ridiculous.

# A headmaster went from class to class with a police man, telling his students (all of legal age) that if they join the protests they will be kicked out from that school.

# Riot police gives tickets for shouting against the president

# Trains to Bucharest are being stopped in mid journey and people are being asked where they go and what they do there. Everyone who seems to be on the way to protests is kicked from the train.

# A father has been arrested, he wasn't even protesting. He was there with his 11 year old daughter, lost her in the masses. But he was arrested anyway.

# A man, standing on the side of the crowd, watching the protest without participating was shot in the leg and beaten up so bad that by now he lost the bones in his leg and needs an implant.

# A journalist was arrested for being there as a reporter, his press-id was ripped off and he was beaten inside the police van.

This list goes on and on.

Reactions from the officials?

In attempt to stop the protests Dr.Arafat was accepted back in his position by now.

The president did not talk to the public, yet.

The whole situation got international attention by now and the EP-president has warned Basescu to take the protests seriously and to address the complaints.

USA officials had a message for the Romanian People to protest peacefully and for the authorities to stop the violent repression.

Everybody seems to notice the situation except the president and the government.

Satanism

2011-11-06T21:37:00.004+02:00

A philosophy about life?
A form of atheism?
Hatred against Jahwe (the god of the bible)?
A form of rebellion?
Black magic?
Dangerous?
CoS (Church of Satan)

To get into it we need a basis and a few facts:
Satanism got it's name back in the times when christianity started rising.
The name "Satanism" has a long story. In short, a few stories got confused and mixed up in a weird way (greek myth about Helios, the fallen angel / angel got thrown out of heaven, the morning star in Isaiah/Bible).
So back then there was christianity starting to rise, and everyone who did not believe in christianity or dared to question something were said to be Satanist. So at this time Satan was the opposite of Jahwe (the god of the bible) if you want. So if you did not follow Jahwe you automatically were said to follow Satan. All kinds of things were made up, always pretty much the opposite of what was meant to be good and christian > black messes, demons, rituals, to name a few.

So for a long long time this is what was said to be Satanism and of course during trial there were forced confessions that underlined all this so after some time people did believe it.
But we don't want to forget, at this point, that it only started with people who simply didn't believe / questioned the belief.

So what is Satanism?

Actually there is no real Satanism. Yes, I dare say that. Why? I met so many people who told me they were Satanists. I am not judgemental and I never was, so I asked what exactly they believed AND I listened carefully.

So we go with the list from the top:

Philosophy about life
Everyone is "their own god" meaning embrace yourself. Question everything, don't follow blindly. Do what you want as long as you don't hurt anyone. Stay within the laws. Follow your dreams and your own targets. Take what you need / want. Don't care about what others think / say.
Some kind of atheism
A bit like what was mentioned above but with the strong "there is no god" mixed into it.
Hatred against Jahwe
Mostly people who are or used to be christians. Who got disappointed in some way. The community / church / priest / the bible / god didn't help / praying didn't work / lost someone important / lost something important / etc.
Ending up with a statement of hate against the god of the bible, turning the back on it and following Satan who seems more real.
A form of rebellion
Being different is something many people want and need. And especially want to show. Shocking people with "I am Satanist" and showing that one is different. Often this is gets really dangerous, depending on the people you get in touch with.
Black magic
No. Black magic is something different. There is no direct connection to satanism. There are people who call themselfes Satanist and "do" black magic as well as the other way around but not every Satanist is into black or any magic.
Dangerous
There are in fact some cults out there that are very dangerous and call themselfes Satanists. Those who actually kill and hurt people and animals, who do perform all kinds of rituals, who do illegal things.
CoS
Actually believe in the real existance of Satan. They do have a book just like the bible, they preach and you can actually be an official member.

So, there is no definition of Satanism that just fits.
Sorry to disappoint.

And as always, wanna add something, just answer to the post or if you want to say something but not publicly, mail me: clos3rlook[at]gmail[dot]com

Militant Atheism

2011-07-14T19:58:00.003+03:00

What comes to my mind when I read the title "militant atheism"?

a lot of arguing
never being able to listen and/or shut up for a minute
constantly bragging about your disbeliefe
trying to convince people

I must say, I do not like this.
Why are there so many people who can't control their urge to babble on?
You can never help someone into reason by ignoring their concerns, thoughts, teachings. Even if you have been at the very same point, you are not inside that persons head. You may know their answers in advance, you may know a lot, but you will not help anyone by cutting into a sentence, by getting loud in your argument, by throwing numbers and facts in their faces, by being in anyway aggressive.
Just think how you would react if some religious person would act like that towards you. You'd shut down immediately and get pretty angry for sure.

If you do have the urge to "convert" people into atheism then get down to their level no matter how ridiculous it seems to you.
Reason inside their believe system, question inside their horizon.
There are so many simple things inside their own teachings, that you can point out already without adding all your own stuff. So start small, and IF (yes only IF) you find a little hole of doubt in them you can use that but don't try to stab them. It is no use, you will get frustrated and they just shut down.

I for my part do not try to make someone an atheist. I am happy that I am out of religion and I am happy that, where I live, I can't be harmed for my disbelieve. If people ask me about my opinion or views on religious topics I make clear that I do not believe and that is normally enough.
I answer but I do not force anything on anyone.

There is a fine line between being honest and being a missionary. Think about it.

And here the video that inspired this post:

Run For Life

2011-06-29T18:15:00.002+03:00

On 2nd July 2011 there is a "Run For Life". People will run against abortion.

There are such runs every now and then, for cancer, aids, poor people, and lots of other things.
Raise awareness, yes. But raise it in the right way!

Why would you run against abortion?
I would rather run for it...

Here a bit of brainstorming:

Contra abortion:

Seeing the cells that are evolving into a baby as life already and therefore seeing an abortion as murder.
Give the unwanted kid a future in a family that will be happy to have a baby because they can't have one naturally.

Pro abortion:

Forcing a woman that does not want a baby (for whatever reason) may result in a crime. Thinking about dead babies in bushes and trash cans here.
Having abortion illegal helps a black market for illegal abortions or having people simply abort in another country.
Some woman may have to carry out a child from a rape. This will damage her psychological for a long time, being reminded of that bad crime that happened to her for 9 month continuously.
Some people might not be ready to it, bouncing back to the rape, which also happens to younger women teens or girls, some get pregnant, but their bodies are not ready to carry out a baby, so a birth or even just letting it grow inside might be a hight risk.
Scared women who life with abusive partners or families, have to hide the pregnancy and once it is not possible anymore they might just abort the baby themselve, of course under high risk again, but if you are scared out of your mind you will do such things.
Baby stays in the family but feels it is not wanted, not loved, abused.
Carrying out a baby that will have huge defects that will make it unable to ever life an own life and stay dependent for ever might be worse than not being born at all.

Anything to add, just Comment

becoming freethinker

2011-06-25T22:30:00.003+03:00

This is part 2 of 2.

I do this for two groups of people out there:
Group one: Those who are not sure if it is ok to think outside religious dogma.
Group two: Religious people who honestly want to know how someone can be honest and moral etc without religion.

As you saw from part one of this little series it is a long way to free yourself. Religious brainwashing sits deep. This religious brainwashing makes you think - let's say - "unfree".
And you have to free yourself, you have to start questioning things you never thought about, you have to look at things from a different angle.

What? How?

Well maybe start with reading the scripture that used to be the base of your faith from cover to cover. Research the "facts" in that scripture. Don't be happy with what you know already, go through it again.

Being a freethinker is not only about religion of course. But starting with your old scriptures is a good starter because this is what dictated you for a long time and without looking over it critically you can't make a real opinion about moral, social structures, politics, right, wrong, laws, etc.
You will start looking at todays life, you will find your own definition of moral, right, wrong and other things.
Don't think it is a process of one or two weeks. It takes years.

From my experience (because this is how the series started):

From a very early age my mother let me decide a lot of things. Like what relion I want to have, later it was what school I want to attend, and other more or less important things. When I had questions they got answered or I got pointed to the answer so I would have to figure it out on my own.

Not only that, I had to make some big desicions about my life all the way. Just to name a few:
When I was 11 I decided where to live, mother or father.
When I was 15 I got my mom to bring my brothers to my father cause he could deal with them better.
When I was 18 I kicked out my brother from home.

I never did these things to hurt someone and all the things I decided resulted in an improvement of living quality. Sometimes, even at only 15 years old, I would maybe pressure my mother, my brother, friends to do something but in the end they always saw it was a good thing.

Like kicking out my brother who made life for us too hard, he lied and drank and took drugs and would never never listen to what my mother says, and when he came back one night aggressive, fighting and talking about the gun he had hidden and then left because my mother got angry about that, that is when I packed his things and told him to leave once he came back, while my mother sat there in shock not being sure. BUT it helped us all. My brother very soon understood and changed, my mother got more relaxed and I had peace too.

So I was risen a religios freethinker if you want. The brain works very complicated. You put religion and the hole god thing into another "box".
So from the beginning, thinking for myself, deciding a lot of important things for me and with my family made me very sceptical and curios.

Learning and reading are good things, you grow on the things you understand. And starting to talk to others, really listening, really discussing things makes you think more and more on your own. You get to have real opinions, not dictated from someone or something (like an old scripture).

If something is still unclear, feel free to comment or send me a mail to: clos3rlook(at)gmail(dot)com

becoming atheist

2011-06-25T02:18:00.004+03:00

This is part 1 of 2.
In this first part I will tell you how I became an atheist.

I do this for two groups of people out there:
Group one: Those who feel weird about not having a clear opinion about what they are, not sure if they are atheist, people on their way out of religion.
Group two: Religious people who honestly want to know how someone "loses faith".

When I was about 17 my mother told me how she found faith/god one day. It was kind of her special experience on a pretty sad day when she finally ended up in a good mood. Not going too much into detail here, it is her personal story.

But this is how it started that religion played a role in my life. I was a little kid and until school started religion did not play any role in my life. Not at all. We had Christmas and the Easter bunny but I didn't know about the religious part of it.
So when my mother found religion it was on me to chose for school which religion lessons I would like attend. Catholic or protestant. So I was six years old by that time and I had to chose. I chose protestant because I liked the teacher. And I liked the stories he told us in the religious classes. We read together from our book and so on, he was fun. But after half a year he left the school and we got a different teacher and so I asked if I can switch over to catholic. So I got to switch.
On weekends I would get lessons from a nun at the place my mother lived with my brothers. The lessons where about God and about right and wrong, heaven and hell. It was for me to be prepared for my baptism. I liked the nun, and I liked church service. It was all in all a really good experience, nothing bad at all.
The day when I got baptized was great. Everyone was happy, I got to hold that huge candle, got a nice dress. I did not understand why it had to be done but it was definitely a good experience and I knew that now I am a member of the church, officially.

I can't remember my father sticking around a lot with us. He was mostly not home, I do not have a lot of memories of him. My mother and father were married at the time but it didn't work so well so sometimes he was there, sometimes not.
At some point we moved to a small village in Bavaria and got pretty active in the church community. Choir and bible week and youth groups and and and. They were very active there and we where very involved.
We went to church every Sunday. The Priest was really nice and he made church service for children very interesting and interactive.
This was about the time when I first heard about sin and hell and heaven. And as everyone was afraid of sin and hell of course I was also. I wanted to be a good kid. So from the moment I learnt what sin means I was very afraid to go to hell. I would tell my mother literally everything and she would send me to the priest to confess to get clean again. And I did that a lot.
First communion was important for me. We got told we get to kind of marry God. We had to be good kids, confess before so we are without sin.
I had nothing to confess. There was nothing at the moment I had to step into the little chamber where my group did the confessions. So I said that I dropped my guinea pig by mistake. I got to pray one prayer 6 times. But the prayer had nothing to do with my confession, for me it made no sense, though of course i prayed.

Shortly after this, maybe I was about 10, my parents divorced and I had to stay with my father. He did not believe in God, he did not send me to church or talk about religion with me, there was no prayer before eating. Nothing. I asked him about it, and he said "because I don't believe there is a God"

This was the first little seed in me.

For kids the adults and especially the parents are always right. So I had something contradicting in my mind now. He was the first person in my life who did not believe something that played a big role in my life before.
Religion took most of my spare time until that point. I had some different opinions about some things in religion but I had not questioned the fact that there is a God. It was just given and totally logical. There is the big father in heaven who is looking down and helping and thinking of me and hearing me.

The seed my father planted in me was good. It made me think. Even when I had moved to my mother shortly after. For some reason it made a lot of sense to me that there might not be a God.
I had a pretty difficult, hard time back then already. And I had been taught that God is loving and caring and all-knowing, that God will help those in need, that all I had to do was pray to him. Well I did pray but for some reason nothing ever happened.

I remember actually arguing with my mother about the fact that I did not want to go to church anymore and she told me to go. So of course I went, the priest would have noticed me not being there anyway and I did not want to get in trouble.

This was when my choice was pretty much made. And I sinned for the first time without confessing. While my mother was at church service I took something like 1 or 2 DM (deutsche mark) from her purse and before church i went to get some ice cream.
I didn't tell her and I didn't tell the priest. I told no one and i was not afraid to go to hell. My problem with hell was solved because if there is no God there is no hell. It was my own choice to do right or wrong. For a few weeks I chose to do that with the icecream, and at some point I actually felt bad about it. Not because of hell but because I started to realize that this is not my money, that someone worked for it, and it is not fair to take it, so I decided to stop it.

About one or two years later we moved into another village.
I went to church there exactly once, I hated it and I told my mother that I won't go again. And she accepted it.

I didn't know the word atheist by that time but I knew that I do not believe in God anymore.
It felt weird. I was 13 by that time. Sometimes I found myself feeling observed. I had a weird feeling that someone is observing everyone of my steps but never revealing himself. Somehow the whole religious life before had not worn off at all. Sometimes I felt I had to pray, sometimes I felt I should go to church in the old village, sometimes I missed the activities. It took me about 4 years (10 - 14) to really get over it.

Then we moved again, into a bigger city nearby. Religion didn't have any role in my life anymore but the fact that i felt I had to believe in something. This was the only thing remaining. "I can't just not believe in anything" So I started looking for the right religion. I read about a lot of different ways of believing, systems I liked and did not like. What I liked a lot was Buddhism for the simple fact that there is not God but Buddha who is no god. I also started being interested in witchcraft a little.

When I was 15 I got the third catholic sacrament. I didn't do it for me but for my mother who would have been very sad otherwise (though she wouldn't confess that).

When I was 21 I switched over to the protestant church. I did not believe in it at all anymore, neither in Buddhism, witchcraft was interesting for me though. Very interesting indeed. I switched churches for the fact that for my profession I had to stay in some church and I got to the point where I hated catholic church so I left.
Privately I got very active in witchcraft which, by now, I would call it a religion but that's a topic for another day.
It stayed like that until I was 25. Though the more things I tried to do with all my cool witchcraft powers and energies from the universe, the less it worked.
And I discovered that in fact I can't do anything without actually doing it instead of just thinking it. And I started reading a lot and trying even harder and even more but nothing worked.
I used the Internet to find out more, watch clips, read things. About witchcraft, about different religions.
And during all the searching and reading it became clear to me that all these believe systems are bogus.

I am 27 years old now at the time I am posting this, and only now I can say I am almost completely free.
I am atheist which means I do not believe in God. I would say I am agnostic atheist because I can't know but evidence points against an existence of a God.

I am also a Freethinker, and this is what I will talk about in Part 2.

experiment with your mind

2011-06-22T23:59:00.002+03:00

A little experiment for you:
Think about your hobbies. What do you like? Walking the dog? Maybe playing some Backgammon? Chatting online? Did you find something? Your favourite hobby? Can you find a noun that discribes you as a person with this hobby? Like Tennis Player or Environmentalist...
Great!
Now think about your favourit animal please. Got it? Same thing as before, is there a noun? Are you a "Cat Person" or a "Dog lover" or something else?
Next one!
Your lifestyle. Are you an "Early bird", a "Vegiterian", a "Sleepy head", a "Smoker", a "Couch Potato", even more than one?

How many nouns like that did you find for yourself? 5, 10, more?

Maybe by now you get where I am going with this. If not:
People tend to put labels on everything. It is in our nature, it helps us understanding the world better. And there is in general nothing wrong with it.
We are social and like to be in groups that share same interest, and how build groups like that if we do not label ourselves.

But there is a label that some people in that group just refuse to use. It has such a bad "spirit".
"Atheist" a person that does not believe in a God or in Gods. This is all. But the word has this weird power to make a person with that label seem bad.
Why is that so?
Well If the majority of people around you use it in a negative way it gets stuck in your mind like that period. If you grow up in a very religious place and people keep talking about atheists in a very negative way then this is what you associate with it and if you finally discover that somehow you do not believe and should call yourself that you get a weird feeling of "i don't want to be called that".

Understandable.
Not only from that perspective

The other point is, if I am labelling myself with things I don't like or believe in I will get a ridicolously long list of things. We already have our long list from the beginning with things we do like. Now do we need that for the opposite too? I am a "no beer drinker" and a "a-unicornist" and a "no TV owner" and a "no ego shooter player" and a "a-flying spagettimonsterist" and a lot more. Get the point.

What did I want to say here?
>> If you do not like to label yourself but don't try to stop others labelling you because you can't.
>> If you are an atheist and you do not like the word, don't use it but don't expect others to stop using it.

Preparing your kids

2011-05-08T10:13:00.004+03:00

Some atheist parents in very religious countries might have concerns about preschools / schools.
Reasonable to be concerned if you do not wish your child to be educated in religion or to attend on religious services.
Often there is the possibility to "opt out" your child of all religious activities.

Two examples:

In Germany you can decide wether your child takes the subject "religion" or "ethics". This is very easy, parents simply decide this and as schools mostly are managed by the state or city, there is no problem.

In Ireland you can opt out you kid of the subject "religion" but the default would be to take it. Problem there is, that your kid has no right to be supervised during the time it does not attend. This is because most schools there are church regulated.

But it is not only school, subjects that you might worry about.

People are talking. Kids can be cruel to each other when one is singled out on some activities (like in this case religious activities).
So you might wanna prepare your kids for this situation as well as for being asked questions or getting into conversations.

Maybe a few ideas - a bit of brainstorming - for parents:

When they are toddlers (about 0 - 2 yrs) there is not yet much to prepare them for.
Even if they are in a religious environment, they don't yet understand or process the concepts of religion.
But once they reach preschool and school age (about 3+ years) you want them to be in a mindset that is healthy and strong already.
A few questions and answers that might come up during kindergarten and school:

Q: Why can't/don't we celebrate easter,christmas, thanksgiving, xyz?

A: Because we do not share the religion. They believe in some things that we do not believe in, but we have our own celebrations that they don't have.

Q: Can we visit the church/mosque/monestary?

A: Yes, we can!

YES you can!!! Very important. Never make it forbidden, visit, explain things there, but do this from an "outsider position". For example "Look, this is where the Jews pray. The women sit here and the men sit there and look they wear those little hats. Do you see this roll, it is there scriptiure where they read their stories from. Like the book about animals we have at home. They read the stories to each other like we do at home."

Q: Why do they believe xyz?

Now this is of course very tricky, you as an adult know how but, explaining all these social, political and personal things is not only long but also boring for a kid. Something that might be a good idea, to actually talk to people who believe. Friends, preachers... But make sure that you are available for any questions after that, so your kid doesn't get confused about things.

Q: Why do we not believe in xyz?

First explain what "believe" in this context means, then explain why. Reason, proof, etc

Of course these are just some ideas, you might find better ways.

Something that sounds logical but lots of parents do not think about this for some reason:

Only explain as far as your child understands and is able to process. To tell a 4-yrs old child about social and political or even psychological things about religion doesn't work. They don't understand it yet. Keep it simple and the older your child gets the more detailed you can be when you explain things. You can talk about it with a 14 year old person in much greater detail. Don't force anything but stay available.

If you have more ideas, hints, experience feel free to comment.

God Bless You - I Will Pray For You

2011-03-06T17:35:00.003+02:00

Ok I as an atheist living in a very Christian country hear that. Especially around Christmas, Easter time, etc. But also on other occasions like helping an old lady crossing the street (yes there are still people out there, doing that).

Many atheists react almost allergic to "God bless you" or "I will pray for you"

There are certain points I would like to address on this matter:

1. Some of the people actually really mean what they say. They are thankful or want to simply wish you something nice. They say it with a smile on their faces and a glow in their eyes. Yes, they mean it. They believe in God and in prayer and they know that what they just said is something very nice. They assume that you are believing what they believe and that you find it very nice to be told something like that.

2. Some people use it as a "f*** you". That's often in situations when they know they can't argue, or they are annoyed, sad, etc. And a line like "I am sorry you can't understand my point of view. I will pray for you" Meaning "I hope you will understand soon but for now I am not open to discuss more!" or in short "leave me the f*** alone!" will be very annoying to you but grow up, get over it. Taking it as offence is only stressful for you and not helping or changing anything.

I made a few observations and found out some stuff when it is about "God bless you" and so on.
I do not believe and I don't have to agree on the religion but nice people who want to tell you something nice around Christmas time they want you to say something nice back. They say "Merry Christmas" and (by now) I respond the same way. I smile and say, "Thanks, you too" and then I close the door and live my atheist life. Saying it won't kill me, I do not have to go to church on Sunday mornings, when sane people sleep. I will not tell them "I will pray for you" and I will not be the first in the conversation who says "Happy Thanksgiving" but I will respond nicely.

I also know that many atheist are so allergic to it because they don't really understand something important. It is not simple ignorance that makes those people say that. They are brought up in a system where you get to think very religious, where you know that people around you either think your way or will think your way soon if you work on them. Their religious behaviour also has a way of talking in it. Wishes like "God bless you" and "I will pray for you" are so deeply stuck in them that you will not get it out of them, especially not if you react totally pissed.

Any of you atheists out there who tells me that a "thanks god!" or something similar never slips out of there mouth sometimes is a liar. Sorry to say that.
Yes religion is so hard to get out of you and me.
Don't blame those who are still brainwashed for your unhappiness that it is still not completely out of you....

Cheers and 'till next time

Bible Part 1 (Genesis)

2010-07-22T17:07:00.004+03:00

Genesis (Chapter 1 + 2)

In Genesis chapter one we read about the first few days.

We learn that god likes to give one thing two names even if he is the only one who could care at all (light/ day - darkness/night)
We learn that there was already a difference between day and night, even if no stars or anything on the sky was made yet.
We learn that everything was full of water and that he parted the water from the water somehow to create something like a sky.
We learn that in some mysterious way the water could all go to one point without releasing some of it even if EVERYTHING was full of water.
Given all that, we had day and night, the sea and the land. and before anyone could do anything to the land, God created all sorts of plants ready and fully evolved. Also animals where there fully evolved. Notice that all that life was there before there was a sun.
So after all that work he thought, "oops everything will die if there is no sun", so he put the sun, the moon and the little stars on the sky.
Now he was ready to make the birds and the fishes, which he did and he saw that he did a good job.
Then God (who is now more than one because he says "us") make the people. They made a man and a woman.

According to that all the people from today are inbreeds and I wonder why, based on that knowledge, it is forbidden to commit incest (I do not say, incest is a good thing! I just wonder, especially for Americans who think that their nation has a Christian base.).

Anyway, god have a present for the two people they made. They give them the whole earth. They say that the two people are there to rule all animals, eat from all plants that carry fruits and the animals are allowed to only eat green plants. Tigers are animals so also tigers are allowed to only eat green plants, as well as wolves and sharks and bears and.... well you get the clue.

In Genesis chapter two we get confused

Well we already know that there is life on earth and chapter two starts with the seventh day. We learn that the seventh day is holy, a day to rest, because God rests on that day, too.
But then it suddenly says that no plants could grow because everything was dry. But he made life on day 3 and 4 so... ... well but who cares, we are good Christians and we do not question such things.
It says there that it came wet through the earth so that plants could grow and also that god now made a man from clay and he blew into it's nostrils to give him life.
So somehow he created the man, and only the man, before the animals while we just learned that he created people after the animals... hm.... whatever we are good Christians, we do not questions such things.
He put that man into the east of the world that is kind of a ... disk
He let trees grow and he put the forbidden tree in the middle.
He told the man that he is not allowed to eat from the forbidden tree because that would be his death sentence. The forbidden tree is called "The tree of knowledge of good and evil". So God does not want the man to know the difference between good and evil but he expects him to do good. Well, who cares, we are good Christians, we do not questions such things.

We already learned in chapter one that the animals were on earth before the people but now we learn that until now only the plants and the man where there. Because now God wants to make the man less lonely by making animals for him. But nothing was a good partner for the man so God had a great idea.

Somehow he knocked the man out to perform surgery on him. He took one of his rips out and filled that spot with meat.
From that rip he made a woman. So the rip must have been huge. Maybe it was really a good thing to get that huge rip out of the man.
Even if God used a rip and no meat to make the woman, the man says that this is made of his leg and his meat and has to be called woman.
Oh, and even if he never knew something like a father or mother because he was created and he has never been a child, he also talks about them in the end of chapter two.

Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani

2010-07-19T10:48:00.004+03:00

Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani is a woman in Iran who was sentenced to death for adultery.

Let's have a look at this case:

So there is a country that still has the death sentence. And adultery is one of the crimes you can die for.
Apart from the fact that no one has the right to kill anyone, how can adultery be such a bad crime as to stone someone to death for it?
And VERY important about this are two things:

This woman was raped

This woman was treated like a witch in medieval times. She was tortured over 90 times until she finally confessed.

IF she'd really have committed a crime, she would have confessed it much faster, because no one would go through such torture just because.
No, this woman obviously thought that if she can take it just long enough, they will stop torturing and treat her fair. But they didn't and so she made it stop by confessing. And she pays for it with her life!

Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani comes from a country that has Islamic leaders. And as everyone who gets informed about things knows, that in the Islam a woman is not worth much.
If a woman gets raped in this faith system it was her fault. There is no way that it was also or only the man's fault. Because the woman has to take care that no man but her husband sees enough of her to like her. She has to hide her body and face due to that. And SHE obviously did something wrong if a man liked/wanted her!
Sounds so logical and fair, doesn't it?
So the woman gets raped and it is her crime and she would be traumatized for life even IF it would be possible to get her out of it.
Not only the rape, which is already a big deal and a reason to be traumatized.
Also that EVERYONE around her obviously thinks that it is her fault and she can do nothing about it.
Also that other then running away and hiding or going to another country there is no way to escape bad looks, bad talking, cursing.
She will always be the whore, the bitch, the woman who made a man want her.
A woman in a country like Iran has usually no own money so she can't even go and get a ticket to leave.
She will have to worry for her physical health maybe even for her life once she is back at her family. Because, let's not forget that there are honour killings and this woman brought shame over her family.

So what is better for her? Taking the barbaric death penalty of getting stoned to death or getting free by some miracle but having to deal with all the problems that would come with it.

Give fairness a chance and ban religion from government once and for all!

Leaving a religion

2010-07-02T09:47:00.003+03:00

continuing from the last entry "Sliding into a religion"

So how to get out.
Sometimes not so easy.

There are two ways:
-> The way to just leave and break contacts and simply be never seen again.
-> The way to kind of fade away nearly unnoticed

The second way is not possible in many cases. Because people will try to frighten the person who wants to leave. And don't think "if you wanna leave, just do it". It is not that easy.
You are in there. You totally have some weird dogma and rules in your head. And even if all those things are wrong in your opinion, you can't just rip those things off, that have been hammered into you for a long time.
So sometimes a person gets frightened, let's have a look at those scary things:

"If you leave you can never come back!"
Yes, this is frightning, because you made friends and don't wanna disappoint them. Also if you chose to leave now and find out that you were wrong you will have a problem.
"If you want to leave you have to go now!"
Yes this is frightning, because most likely you did not intend to leave NOW but organize some stuff so everything is ready to leave. Like finding an apartment and job in another city, get in contact with old friends and your family, etc.
"You can't leave once you joined us. We are going to find you and bring you back!"
Yes, you might have signed something, and they really might try to find you and bring you back. And once you are back, your life will be a mess. Noone will treat you like before because you became the black sheep.
"You can't leave once you joined us. We are going to lock you up so you can't go!"
Some really f***ed up organizations do that so you will just say that you have to think about it a bit longer and you WILL freaking leave without telling them a word!

I am sure there are more things they can say and scare the sh** out of you but the point is. They frighten you because by leaving you frighten them.
You have your reasons why you want to leave.
You have intern informations.
You might try to convince other members to leave.
You might try to get public to convince many people to never join in the first place
You are no longer paying into their pockets.
IF they do illegal things you might even go to the police with prove.

So what should you do in the case that you can't just fade away unnoticed?

You are not going to tell anyone that you intend to leave! Not even your "best friend".
If you have to fear the group once you left, your very fist destination will be a police station! You have to explain the situation and not make it sound less.
You are not going to pack many bags when you leave! Just take your passport if you have acces to it and the most important papers like drivers license, birth certificate, etc
Once you are out and you talked to the police (if that was nessesary) you are going to call people you trust, like old friends or your family or a church if you are religious...
If you have children, you are not going to tell them beforehand. You will just take them at some point, say you make a trip or something, and go. If you tell them before, they might tell it to someone, don't forget they might still be very brainwashed.
If you have a partner who does not want to leave, you will not tell him that you do. You can get in contact with him once you are out and safe.

This sounds a little dramatic but often enough it is that dramatic.
Of course noone will scare you that bad if you just leave catholic church or so. But well there are enough sick religious movements around that will get heavy on you.

So, no matter how bad they will act on you, once you decided to leave, you are going to do it. You will not care about hurting anyone and you will not look back. If you are not very sure you want to leave, don't, because that is a weakness they will use to get you back.
If you are sure, there is nothing that can hold you anymore.
If there are things you are in charge of, don't care about it. Don't try to get everything in order before you leave. That gives others signs and you might be observed (depending on what religious movement you are in)
They will deal with it when they see that no matter what they do, they can not get you back.

Sliding into a religion

2010-06-29T19:38:00.007+03:00

That you have to be traumatised or in a bad phase of your life to slide into the hands of an organisation that is bad for your mental health is not true.
I have known enough people myself who had nice lifes, no trauma at all, and no empty space that needed to be filled by some faith, and they ended up in some weird religions.

So how (not why) does that work?
How do people get convinced about things that everyone else would reject?
Here a case that happens exactly like that hundrets of times per day.

STEP 1:

At some point you might talk to a person that says things that may sound logical to you and fits your world fiew. And you might even disagree on some matters and the person will say things like "yes i understand what you say, but did you ever think about this...?"

You might have a very interesting conversation and then suddenly get an invitation "look, i have a few friends who think the same. We meet for discussions every week. If you want, you can come, too."

And because you found it so interesting, the person knew so much and was so friendly and understanding and seemed trustworthy, you might come for one of those meetings.

You will find a group of maybe 10 - 15 people and a few "newbs" that came just to look, just like you did.

Someone will introduce you and show or tell you some things that sound convincing.

You will drink / eat together.

You will find one or more people that seem interesting in what they say and you might talk with them a bit.

You will experience a groupdiscussion about a generally interesting topic.

You will maybe see some lists, scedules, books, signs and get explanations for those things.

You might meet or see the leader and talk to him or at least see a picture or a video of the leader.

You will maybe be invited to spend the night there (wherever that meeting is) or at a house of a nice member.

You will definitely be invited to come again.

STEP 2:

You found the evening nice and you decide to come again.

So at some point you are there every week.

You make friends with group members.

You get invited to intern meetings because you are considered "worthy" (exchange "worthy" with whatever word you might find suitable)

You decide to take a look at that intern meeting

Someone explains you why it is important that things from the intern meetings stay intern. You might even have to sign something that says, you will not carry any information outside.

You might get something like a contract that makes you an official member.

You will have new discussions about topics you never thought about.

You will be carefully observed but you will not notice that.

Everyone keeps treating you nicely until you say something that doesn't fit into the "teachings / dogma".

Someone will explain you logically and with some pseudo-science why your opinion was wrong and the opinion of the group was correct.

It was logical, so you will believe it.

This will happen more and more often and you will not notice how these "logical" things become more and more unreasonable.

At some point you totally agree with all the teachings, you will accept the dogma.

You will not understand why some friends started to keep distance.

You will not understand why other friends or your family are worried.

You will not question a statement like "well maybe you should just break the contact with your friends. They don't wanna understand you anyway."

And you will think about it and then break contact with good friends, with family.

Maybe you will move somewhere else.

By now you already started paying real money into the movement you joined and it will be absolutely no problem for you.

You might get "enlightened", join courses, buy books.

STEP 3:

There is nothing more or very few to learn for you left.

You get the offer to start your own disussion group or you get offered a job inside the movement.

You will do voluntary work for the movement.

You will spend much time with your new friends in your spare time.

You will spend about no time with all the people that are worried about you.

You will lose more money for uniforms, books, events, vacations, etc

You will be in charge of some things, that makes you feel important

People will now come to you and ask for explanations or help

You will now be the nice person, that talks to a stranger and be understanding

You will finally invite people to meetings

The circle is now closed

Little last statement:
What I wrote above did happen. It happened to someone who used to be my best friend, and it also happened to other people i used to know, and sadly enough it happened even to me.
I, unlike many others but also like many others, found my way out and am by now able to see all the signs. Prevent myself from getting into something again.

If you want to get out of a religion or want to help someone with it read "How to get out of a religion" on this blog.

The three questions

2010-06-16T11:47:00.006+03:00

"What is God? Why do you believe in him? Why should anybody else believe in him?"
(Atheist Experience)

These three questions should be easy to answer for a believer. But for some reason it's not. Let's look at the standard answers:

Who / What is God?

God is my father in heaven.
If God is your father in heaven, then who is your mother in heaven? And why are they in heaven and not here at your side? And what / where is heaven anyway?

God is love!
So God is an emotion? In the bible he caused so much trouble, pain, and hate but he is love?

God is everything we can't explain and don't know!
So a few hundred years ago, we couldn't explain what a lightning is. So was God a lightning? We didn't know how rain starts so God was the cause. Today we discovered those two things, so is God now two things less? Is he going to melt away by all the things we discover? What happens at the point we know everything and can explain everything?

God is our creator
Please read about biology, physics, and chemistry

Why do you believe in God?

I had an experience!
Mostly the described experiences are easily explained with a bit of knowledge on topics like "Psychology", "Medicine", "Science"

God answers my prayers!
"Please let me pass that test" If you pass it was God help, if you don't you didn't study enough. Sounds logical to me.

I saw God / I can feel God!
Sorry man, you are delusional. If you would say "I saw the flying spaghetti monster, it touched my hand" you would go straight to a doctor, but not if you say that it was God.

Because I believe in the bible, Gods word!
The bible was not written by God. It was written by people who did not understand some things in their time so they said that a God did it. That happened in many other religions, too but that is another topic and will be discussed another time.

Because I don't want to go to hell!
You base your believe on the existance of a hell, that is not even really made by god but invented by believers. Invented just like the demons around the fallen angel who is sitting in hell between flames. Best you research the topic "Satan" and after some time you will see that it is not, what you have been taught.

Why should anyone believe in God?

Because he made everything!
Yeah, I know that one. "Look at the trees and the complexity of the human eye and ... oh my god the banana, it fits in your hand and your mouth!" - Again, please start reading.

Because if not, you go to hell!
But what if you don't believe in a hell? Why should you believe then?

In the end, after getting the "answers" I still have no clue.
So if any Monotheist (a believer in a one and only god) reads this, I would be glad to get an answer.
If you don't wanna post it here, just send me a mail to clos3rlook[at]gmail[dot]com

To stop thinking

2010-06-07T13:36:00.004+03:00

I watch "the atheist experience" very much. It is a show about atheism sponsered by the ACA (Atheist Community of Austin). In that show I heard about the "700 club" a few times now so I just had to check it out.

Now, I am not starting to rant on the program. I am going to tell you about two stories aired on the 700 club.

1st story:
A man had a bad car accident. He crashed frontal with a truck. And it seems he might have been brain dead for some time, or he fell into a short coma, or whatever caused his brain to shut his body down for 90 Minutes.
That man reports how his dead family members, friends and teachers, waited in heaven. How he was welcomed. He reports about a constant singing he heard. He also reports about heavens gate, what it looked like.
His report clearly shows that he thought he was in heaven for those 90 minutes.

Thinking part:
That man was clearly a christian. And his whole life people around him and the church where talking about how you go to heaven or hell. And also he had some picture in mind how it would be on both places. He obviously was convinced that he is a good man and has to go to heaven. So when his mind was stressed out like that, it created exactly the picture he painted for a long time. For him it was like a proof, that heaven exists. He obviously never thought about the fact that he wasn't travelling anywhere while he was unconcious but his brain created the pictures.
I am pretty sure that the same man would have wondered if he maybe is getting insane, would he have seen a barking unicorn, floating trees and purple clouds in that moment.

2nd story:
A woman, her boyfriend, and her two children went hiking. The boyfriend fell down a rock and broke many bones, got brain damage and was at the hospital for a long time.
The woman reports that she prayed a lot, that she even started a blog and asked other people to pray for her boyfriends recovery.
He had to learn everything new (walking, talking, eating, etc), he had many surgeries.
After 4 months he left the hospital.

Thinking part:
The recovery simply had nothing to do with the fact that the woman was praying. He recovered thanks to the helicopter that brought him to the hospital. He recovered because of the good doctors and therapists and because of his own will to survive and learn everything new. Maybe he was a bit more relaxed then others in his situation, because he knew how many people are hoping he is getting well. But it is not the prayer or god who answers a prayer.
He would have gotten just as well, would everyone who had prayed just have called him or drawn a picture or light up a candle or knock on wood three times.

Example of a reaction that might be much more helpful then just stop thinking:
I forget to turn off the candle and fall asleep. At some point I turn around at night and with my blanket I knock the candle down. The carpet and curtains catch fire and I wake up when the room is full of dark smoke and the smell of fire.
My reaction: I am awake at once. I wake up my partner. I call the fire fighter while I grab a blanket try and extinguish the fire. I tell the firefighter what happened and where we are. If I see it is too much fire, I can't extinguish alone, I will turn the light on, try close the window, on my way out close the door, and get out of the house with all my pets. I will wait for the firefighters at the street.
I will hope they do a good job.
If they can extinguish it, I know it is not because I hoped so but because it is there job and they are well trained.
I will not perform any weird ritual believing that this will help...

Conclusions?
Ok, something happens to someone and suddenly the person and/or people involved stop thinking rationally.
They just do not use there common sense, their ability to think logically anymore.
What does people make to just stop thinking logically in such situations?
Shock? -> Even in a shocksituation it is possible to react!
The feeling that they can't help? -> You can always try to do something. And if it is only talking to a hurt person.

Bible argument

2010-06-02T12:03:00.003+03:00

"Did you even read the bible?"

If you as atheist talk to a christian you might hear sentences like that.
Well when I speak for myself I must answer with "well, not the whole bible but enough". This is my opinion just like the other person's opinion is that I have to read the bible even if I do not accept the concept of a god and religion.

When I have a discussion with someone, I talk in a way the other person understands AND accepts.
So if I talk to a christian about a christian topic I will use bible quotes, as the bible is accepted as god's word. Also I will talk about the dayly life of a christian including church services, praying, dogma, rules, reasoning, etc. With the person I will talk about the symbols in the text, the message between the lines and other things. I would also include something like that "it says in the bible this, science said that" and I will find out with that person and based on the person's believes what is more likely.

But the problem in most of these discussions is, that the christian will not use science or logical thoughts when they talk to you. They will talk about religious things only or they twist scientific facts in a weird way so it fits sooomehooow into their believe system.

As I got very tired of "Did you even read the bible?" I decided to read it from the beginning to the end. And I will take you with me on my journey.
Just a little information, I use a catholic bible. Telling you that, because there are slight differences between the bibles (orthodox, catholic, protestian).

So if you are interested in the bible follow the bible series on this blog.
If not, ignore that and read the other things.

The small abc

2010-05-31T10:55:00.007+03:00

A few statements about common misunderstandings by theists:

"atheism is a religion"
Atheism means that one does not believe in god or gods, religious dogma. It means that one will not follow religious rules. It means that someone's morality is not based on religious teachings.
Atheism is not a religion because atheists do not believe in religions.
If atheism is a religion, then "not playing soccer" is a sport.
If atheism is a religion, then "off" is a TV-channel.
If atheism is a religion, then "not playing card games" is a hobby.

"But people need religion, don't they."
No they don't. Why should they. Being religious is not the default position in which we are born, as many theists say.
When we are born we learn. And if our parents are theist, we learn that theism is the way of life. But if not, we don't and that is perfectly ok.
If you don't have to follow some weird dogma and if you don't think there is a higher power that controls everything, then you feel very free and you know that if you did something it was really your work and worth the effort.

"How could all this be if there wasn't a creator?"
Why does everything need a purpose, an intelligence.
Who are we, to think that we are so important and so sacred that some intelligence had to make us?
Is it really so unbelievable that the world started by "accident" and that everything after that "accident" just evolved? We think in years, months, weeks, days, etc, and that makes it so difficult to understand how long evolution takes.

"Which bad thing did happen to you, that you left religion?"
It does not need a trauma to lose faith. It only needs logical and critical thinking. Maybe some people lost faith because after a bad experience they started thinking clear. But not all.

"You are only atheist because you want to sin!"
Atheists have a feeling for morality. They know well what is wrong and right. But there is no sin. If you do something bad, it was not a sin, it was just doing something bad, morally incorrect.