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Pastafarian Wins Battle To Wear Colander In License Photo
An anonymous reader writes "Eddie Castillo is the first American to successfully have his government-issued photo identification taken while wearing a colander, though DPS officials are reportedly planning to follow up with Castillo in order to 'rectify' the situation. Others have tried unsuccessfully, and Castillo told KLBK that he was surprised at his victory, which he called a 'political and religious milestone for all atheists everywhere.'" Two years ago Niko Alm won the right to wear a pasta strainer on his head although Austrian authorities required him to obtain a doctor's certificate that he was "psychologically fit" to drive.
I submitted a photo where I wear a pasta strainer for my official electronic health insurance card in Germany -- and it got accepted, no questions asked! Always good to get some laughs when I have to go to a doctor.
Head coverings were not allowed, but religious ones were exempt. Oddly enough however, a friend of mine got a photo accepted where he poses with a beer mug (Maßkrug, you know, the typtical bavarian 1l mugs). Maybe because that's a religious symbol as well?
Economic systems are not religions.
Capitalism and Communism are economic systems.
I'm not going to argue about Capitalism here. But Communism is not just an economic system. Its most famous version, the Marxist–Leninist version, but also the maoist version, provide a full-fledged philosophical world view. They have unverifiable dogmas, their own version of heaven. (On Earth, after the communist revolution is completed) They have rituals that mirror Christians Rituals. They sing songs in groups to the honor of the party, just like Christian sing songs to honor god. They claim superhuman status for their leaders. So these versions of Communism are religions, at least under functional definitions of religion.
And these versions are also atheistic, because a important part of their world view is also atheism.
Jan
THIS! A MILLION TIMES THIS!
Earlier this month I explained to the admin of an evangelical atheist FB page that I didn't want to see his sponsored posts. He accused me of being an overly sensitive Christian and of being afraid that my faith couldn't stand a little self-examination. I explained to him that I'm not a Christian and merely found him to be as annoying as any other evangelical with the audacity to intrude upon my day with his proclamations of good news. He was, in essence, acting like a non-believing Jehova's witness.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
"Sola scriptura" is a part of protestant Christianity, but there are many book based religions without such a rule.
"Sola scriptura" came out of protestant theology, but that doesn't mean all protestants believe that. Calvinists and Lutherans tend to, but In fact, most others don't. The Methodists, for instance, base their faith on what they call a "quadrialteral", only one vertex of which is scripture.
The confusion comes in because the protestants that do believe it also tend to be quite vocal (that's part of being "evangelical" after all), and tend to insist everyone else isn't a real Christian. It serves the purpose of a lot of vocal atheists to agree with them (as absolutists philosophies are far easier to refute). So an appalling amount of discussion about Christianity gets carried out with an implicit assumption that the majority of professed Christians don't actually exist.
There is no faith needed to state that "There is no god", because there's no fucking evidence to suggest that there might be.
Other faithless statements
- I do not own a billion dollars
- There is no flying armadillo that shits raw diamonds
- Religious people lack basic reasoning skills
"Discrimination against atheists is very real, and very widely accepted."
No it's not. I'm an atheist. In Kansas. The last time I felt discriminated against was when I was in college, because finding ways to be the victim of perceived intolerance/discrimination is something that most high school and college kids, including me at that age, excel at.
I've been in the corporate world for nearly 10 years. I don't bring up religion at all and few of my coworkers have ever brought it up either. At my last employer, where I spent over 7 years, I got promoted twice. Not once did a superior ever ask where I went to church, or if I went to church, or anything of the sort.
Here's an uncomfortable truth: we're assholes in religious discussions. Wearing a colander to mock religious people is being an asshole. I know, I used to be one. Then I grew up and realized that alienating friends and potential friends over an issue that can usually be left as "agree to disagree" is a dumb long-term strategy. Perhaps if we atheists would quit treating believers as simple-minded rednecks we'd see a fair amount of that alleged discrimination go away.