This movie cracks me up every time I see it:.. ..
My favorite line is "In fact, [humans] are the only animals who think they are supposed to be happy... all of the other animals can just be."
I'm guilty of it too... I cause myself undue stress by thinking that I need to be happy...
Anyways, on to me I guess... I am currently in a holding pattern getting ready to leave for Officer Candidate School with the Marine Corps to FINALLY become a fighter pilot... something I have wanted to do since I was a kid and the reason I joined the Marine Corps over 9 years ago!! (that didn't work out, obviously).
I have a 4 year old son (he will be 5 in September) who reminds me of the importance of making something of myself. My girlfriend/unofficial fiance/already acting wife Noel is the best thing that ever happened to me and my son, she has taken care of both of us through thick and thin and has allowed me to be a better person and father. She has quite literally saved my life on numerous occasions. I am forever in her debt, and eternally grateful.
I am an atheist. Yep. No childish belief in a magic man in the sky who is so kind an loving that he gave us disease, war, and my personal favorite: “Hell†for those that would not follow him blindly with absolutely no physical evidence... no sir-y Bob.
I never believed, really. Even at a young age, it made zero sense to me and all I needed were solid explanations as to how the world around me operated and science provided me those answers, and allowed me to learn things that are far more wondrous than anything found in the "Holy Bible" or any other religious text.
So a while back I decided to be more outgoing and outspoken about my lack of belief, which is REALLY tough in Jesusland (aka America)... and even tougher in the military (boy did I have to hold my tongue quite a bit in there to avoid getting my ass kicked). At the end of 2007 I took over for a local Meetup.com group known as The Phoenix Atheist Meetup Group. It's a local group that meets for events around the valley (and sometimes further) that helps to create a community of atheists/agnostics/freethinkers/etc.
It's a really satisfying experience to organize the group, I know how important it is to have a sense of belonging in a world that seems to ostracize you for taking a rational stance on things. If you are interested in becoming a member, please click the link below, all are welcomed and encouraged to come, interact, and just have a generally good time with some good people.
Click here to check out
The Phoenix Atheists Meetup Group!
I support Barack Obama for president in 2008 and 2012. This is the first election I got involved in and I actually canvased some neighborhoods in Tempe before the Primary in February... I don't know how effective it was in the big scheme of things, but it felt good to do something to try and get the country back on track, to help it align itself again on the principles that our founding fathers had such grand vision for our great country.
So there you go. A patriotic, military minded, liberal atheist and family man. An enigma, I suppose.
Want some insight as to why I am an atheist? Please visit:
50 simple proofs that god is imaginary
Some quotes I find extremely thought-provoking and I hope will find you well, and make you think
"A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death." -Albert Einstein
"The idea of God was not a lie but a device of the unconscious which needed to be decoded by psychology. A personal god was nothing more than an exalted father-figure: desire for such a deity sprang from infantile yearnings for a powerful, protective father, for justice and fairness and for life to go on forever. God is simply a projection of these desires, feared and worshipped by human beings out of an abiding sense of helplessness. Religion belonged to the infancy of the human race; it had been a necessary stage in the transition from childhood to maturity. It had promoted ethical values which were essential to society. Now that humanity had come of age, however, it should be left behind." -Sigmund Freud
"We must question the story logic of having an all-knowing all-powerful God, who creates faulty Humans, and then blames them for his own mistakes." - Gene Roddenberry [1921-1991] Creator of Star Trek
"The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one." - George Bernard Shaw [1856-1950] Irish-born English playwright
"Which is it, is man one of God's blunders or is God one of man's?" - Friedrich Nietzsche German philosopher
"Religion is a byproduct of fear," "For much of human history, it may have been a necessary evil, but why was it more evil than necessary? Isn't killing people in the name of God a pretty good definition of insanity?" - Arthur C. Clarke
"Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?" - Epicurus [341–270 B.C.] Greek philosopher
Quotes above from: Great Minds
Other very worthwhile sites:
American Atheists
Atheist Empire
