Posted on

Are You Doing Your Part to Kill God?

Had a thought last night:

Those of us who are atheists, we all came from somewhere. And it’s not such a reach to think that somewhere in our back trails, there are others who might appreciate a hand, in order to get where we got.

I grew up in Houston, Texas, went to a high school with shitkickers and country people. Good enough people, but also people mired in religion. I keep in touch with a few of them, and unfortunately, they’ve gotten MORE goddy rather than less, over the years.

I think one of the reasons might be Continue reading “Are You Doing Your Part to Kill God?”

Posted on

SF Fan All My Life

… And now someone I know has written an SF novel.

Jim Downey, former co-blogger on Unscrewing the Inscrutable, that historic godless blog created by Brent Rasmussen, is the author of Communion of Dreams.

The year is 2052, and the human race is still struggling to recover from a massive pandemic flu some 40 years previously.  When an independent prospector on Saturn’s moon Titan discovers an alien artifact, assumptions that we are alone in the universe are called into question.  Knowing that news of such a discovery could prompt chaos on Earth, a small team is sent to investigate and hopefully manage the situation.  What they find is that there’s more to human history, and human abilities, than any of them ever imagined.  And that they will need all those insights, and all those abilities, to face the greatest threat yet to human survival.

You can order it in Kindle, paperback, direct telepathic transmission, or as a nano-chip created by fearfully advance aliens and installed directly into your brain.

Okay, I made those last two up.

But you can get a free Kindle download for the next three days.

 

Posted on

Reader Question: Atheist Blood Drive

I willing to bleed for my fellow man (and woman).

I used to donate blood fairly often, when I lived in Houston. I got my gallon pin and then donated a few more times before I moved to a little mountain town in California and it became much less convenient.

I’ve been thinking for years I should get back into it.

But the way I imagine it happening is through an atheist blood drive. I did a little research and found that freethought/atheist groups all over the U.S., possibly the world, have already had the idea and made it happen regionally. Continue reading “Reader Question: Atheist Blood Drive”

Posted on

Shameless Attack on the Atheist Food Supply

KeeeRYST, now what?

It’s not enough that they want to keep us out of public office, or force us to touch Bibles in court, now they want to interfere with our tasty atheist snacks.

Oklahoma state senator Ralph Shortey (he of the snappy, cutting-edge web page) seems convinced that some food coming into his state contains portions of human fetuses. And he wants to ban it. He has introduced Senate Bill 1418, “An act relating to food; prohibiting the manufacture or sale of food or products which use aborted human fetuses …” Continue reading “Shameless Attack on the Atheist Food Supply”

Posted on

Short Stack #9

The next atheist book I write, I’m having it printed on the tanned skins of raptured Christians.

——————————–

Chinese New Year tomorrow! We enter the Year of the Dragon, the year of my birth! Yes, I am a Dragon!

And no, I’m not breathing fire just to prove it. Continue reading “Short Stack #9”

Posted on

Get Real: Losing the Love of God

Note for new readers: I lost my Dad, Dan Farris, a few months back. I’ve been thinking a lot about that, and what it’s doing to me. I keep a digital recorder with me all the time, and I record thoughts and impressions about the process and the milestones.

Here is one such thought. I relate it for the same reason I wrote my book, Red Neck, Blue Collar, Atheist — we have plenty of books and speakers to tell us about the WHY of atheism, but very few to tell us about the HOW. Yes, getting free of religion is about understanding the emptiness of religion, why it doesn’t work, why we shouldn’t accept it. But staying free of it, living your life day to day in the real world, is about figuring out the minute-to-minute HOW of thinking and living outside religion. Continue reading “Get Real: Losing the Love of God”

Posted on

Evil Chic: You Know You Want It

Seriously, this is a good cause: Evil Little Shirts.

The proceeds will support a very poised and bright young woman, Jessica Ahlquist, who spearheaded the recent fight to remove the unconstitutional Christian prayer banner from her high school.

Ed and PZ say it better than me. But hey, even if you knew nothing else about it, you know you want a shirt that says this:

 

 

 

Posted on

The Ashes of a Cowboy

I’m sitting here waiting for the USPS. My Dad’s ashes are coming in the mail today.

I was sort of happy-excited about it all morning, but now I’m thinking “Oh, crap. Here comes a solid reminder that I’ll never be able to hear his warm voice again, or have him invite me in for a slash of apricot brandy.”

That welcoming, wise – and yes, sometimes damned annoying – presence is gone from my life. He won’t BE THERE for me. Ever again.

In case you’ve wondered, after my trip to California that you all donated to make possible, the whole thing is still going on in my life. Continue reading “The Ashes of a Cowboy”

Posted on

The Brassican Heresy

Warning: The following post is long, and may contain insults to French people. And Christians. And probably frogs.

______________________________

I’d like to propose to you a daring hypothesis.

You may be surprised by it. You may be stunned. You might even be shocked. Because this is such a daring idea, some of you reading this right now may actually be horrified. There’s even the possibility – distant, but real, so I have to warn you – that one or more people about to read the following hypothesis will suffer deep psychological damage and end up under permanent psychiatric care, or possibly even comatose.

I don’t really want to just spring it on you suddenly. This is something so new, so different, so deeply significant, that I feel very strongly that it should have its own screen. It’s just not something I feel okay with plopping down in a sea of insignificant words, as if it were one common grain of sand on a vast beach.

This is something so special it demands treatment you’d immediately consider … unusual.

So. If you think you’re ready for it, brace yourself and look below the break. Here it comes: Continue reading “The Brassican Heresy”