Oy, Religion!

I am an atheist.

As occasionally happens, someone has noticed that some people 1) don't believe in god, and 2) some people buy books on the subject. This is, in the current hysterical climate of ultra-religious fervor that has swept the nation, newsworthy. (see here)

This article proposes to have a quick, inoffensive glance at a little ripple of atheism that seems to have stirred the surface of America's great lake of faith. I promise you, if atheists weren't so terrified of getting killed by zealots, that ripple would stand about fifteen feet high and would sweep the lakeshore clear into town, swamping half of Main Street.

There are two kinds of non-believers: agnostics, who state that nobody can know if there is a god or not; and atheists, who say there is bloody little likelihood of any god or gods. Except that people hedge their bets, because you never know, god might really be the nasty old prick from the Bible, the ranks of agnostics would probably swell to outnumber people of any faith. But nobody gives the mattter much thought. Why not? Because it doesn't matter. Sure, I believe in god, why not? Nothing has changed. If by some tiny chance there is a god floating around somewhere, he'll be mollified to hear I tipped my hat to him; if not, no harm done.

But it does matter. Think about it. Think long and hard about whether you believe in god, or if in fact you're just afraid of the possibility of god. Because the stakes are getting frighteningly high. It's time to think it over and speak your position, because the religious loonies are speaking for you, and what they're saying is extremely weird. I'm tridecaphobic, for example. The number 13. Why? Not because I really fear the number thirteen, but because over the years I've marveled at people being afraid of the number thirteen, until finally it's entered my mind as a kind of sick superstitious fascination. No 13th floor on a hotel? No seat 13, row 13 on an airplane?

But now it makes me nervous, even though I don't actually have any idea why 13 would be a worse number than, say, 534 or .8-- and what about 13.13? or 1313? Still, if somebody were to ask me, 'are you afraid of the number 13', I would say, 'no, that is superstitious rubbish'. Because the rational part of my mind is running things, not the part that thinks about magic. So do I believe in a creator of all things that set up the universe, listens to prayers, and doles out eternal punishment? No, I do not. I mean, come on, it doesn't take a great deal of analysis to realize the whole premise is silly. It reeks of very human-generated propaganda.

I quote from the article:

The article is about how atheist books are ascending the best-seller charts, and staying there, and golly, is this a trend?

I'll tell you the answer, although you already know it. I'm just being cute. There are millions and millions of perfectly sane Americans out there, claiming to be believers, or at worst agnostic, so please don't hit me, being held hostage by lunatics that really believe that 2000 years ago one guy, a tribal minority from North Africa, was born by magic through the direct intervention of the tribe's god, frigged around for 30 years, and was executed by the Romans after he took up doing magic. Being capable of magic, he came back to life and then disappeared. 

Elsewhere in the world, people are being held hostage by believers in a variety of equally fruity religions, such as the one where a guy announced there was a new version of that earlier tribe's religion, and the previous version no longer applied; he did a bunch of magic too, including a visit to Heaven on a half-mule, half-donkey with wings, where he got to hang out with the previous guy that did magic.