Putting the “fun” back in “fundotard.”

Last night I boogied down while dressed as a carrot for a video shoot for the Electric Illuminati, a band fronted by our own Don Goede with lyrics written by Ron English, who provided the wonderful Abraham Obama image for the cover—part of the Obama Artists’ Series and a nationwide bombing campaign that you’ve seen here and here and here. (You can see another video by the Electric Illuminati here.)

It was a lot of fun to be involved with, what with the costumes and the naked girls and the Dead-esque dancing. I’m sure I’ll have some pictures to show you soon. The point is, just before this goofy, joyful little evening, Diann Webb of Rainy Days/The Liberal Store pointed out to me the kerfuffle over the lack of atheist involvement at the DNC. She pointed me to this editorial by Freethinkers founder Becky Hale in the Gazette. Hale’s guest column was in response to an opinion piece published last Wednesday, which is truly one of the blindest, stupidest things the paper has ever published, suggesting that atheists are bereft of morality and are, furthermore, rude:

Imagine a world with no religion and one sees a world without the Golden Rule, devoid of most charities, hospitals and great universities. One sees hurricane recovery zones, minus all the chartered planes and buses full of churchgoers giving their time and money to rebuild homes. How many children are fed and clothed by atheist charity organizations? Approximately none.

I won’t dwell on this, because it’s old news, but DUH. The Gazette is aware that the Golden Rule ain’t in the Bible, right? And that nonreligious charities do exist? No? Oh.

Anyway, Hale’s column is excellent and worth checking out, if only for the surprising number of supportive comments and this, her penultimate paragraph:

You don’t know who we are because there are bigots out there who fire us from our jobs, terrorize our children, burn crosses on our lawns, and then react with outrage whenever we speak up. There is nothing to fear from us. We don’t shoot gay people, doctors we disagree with or even religious extremists. We don’t start wars needlessly and we don’t fly airplanes into buildings. Life is valuable to us. That’s why we treasure the opportunities and potentials of this world even without looking for rewards or fearing punishments in the next.

Hale’s got an excellent point, and the ‘Zette Our View illustrates it perfectly: that during what is supposed to be a week of coalition-building, of looking toward a bright and glorious Democratic future, it’s the religious tards who’ve created fission, not the nonreligious. Why? Because they—ahem, we—don’t need to exclude from the big tent based on superstition.

My other point is that I was dressed up like a carrot.

Posted by: Aaron Retka in Uncategorized | Permalink