Deon Barnard

I have been particularly bewildered by the nonsensical use of certain linguistic conventions on my Facebook wall recently. In layman’s terms, I can’t believe the illogical bullshit people speak! I’ll simply launch into a couple of classic examples of said fallacial weirdness.

Sample post: We have no reason to believe in a personal loving God. All the evidence suggests better and simpler natural causes for phenomena, like the way that evolution via natural selection explains species.

Crazy response 1: Evolution is just a theory! What a load of crap. We all come from monkeys? You’d have to be stupid to believe that.

Let’s look at this stunningly ignorant and smug response that ironically demonstrates just how close this person is to a monkey (his words)! Firstly evolution is not a theory at all in the way that this visitor is implying. Neither is Pythagoras’s theory a theory. Neither is germ theory a theory. For all intents and purposes these are practical facts. We may not know everything about these facts but they are undeniable and provable in a variety of ways and they all allow us the benefit of prediction. In scientific terms Evolution is as much a fact as electricity. When I flick the switch on my wall I understand (although only roughly) that it is electricity moving through a really thin wire that creates energy and therefore light. I don’t for one minute believe that God makes the bulb glow every time I flick the switch. God is the theory here (a really poor one) and electricity is the fact. Has this person ever read anything other than the Bible or Mills and Boon??

Secondly, highlighting his ignorance he demonstrates that he has no idea how evolution and common ancestry works. Who said we come from Monkeys? Modern monkeys and modern humans have a common ancestor somewhere in history. For that matter modern man and seaweed has a common ancestor too. But then again how can I expect people to know any better in a system of educational and ecclesiastical indoctrination such as the one most of us live in in the English colonies.

Finally, I don’t BELIEVE in Evolution at all in the way this gentlemen uses the word belief. I see the facts and come to a logical conclusion. This is not a faith position. So yes, I’d have to be stupid to ‘believe’ it – I’ll settle for simply thinking it through.

Crazy response 2: So where did everything come from then. Huh! Huh! You think you’re so smart. Can you create a rose???? Can you!!!?

I see men in white coats dragging this girl across a neat green lawn to a small white truck… Who the hell knows where everything came from? Science has some interesting and logically reasonable ideas based on available evidence. What does she have? An ancient myth that she accepted without half a peanut of evidence to support it. I go cold at the darkness of the human condition, if this is what it looks like.

Can I create a rose?? Uh… no. Nor can I create a watch or a car or a pencil – and your point is? Is she trying (nauseatingly) to infer that a rose is too complicated or beautiful to have come into existence by accident? She obviously doesn’t understand natural selection (or sexual selection) and its role in the evolution of species over millions of years. I’d suggest reading a book on the topic, but that might lead to her having to question her beliefs (gasp), so I won’t hold my breath.

Crazy response 3: Why do you have to hammer away at religion? What’s your problem? Why can’t we just all get along instead of forcing people to believe what you believe?

Ah, my all time favourite! The – ignore the proposition entirely and change the subject to something that will make everyone see what an evil monster bully this guy is – tactic. Is this a joke? I can say with full confidence that I have never ever gone onto a Christian’s Facebook wall and responded to a post like “Jesus is so cool, and his might and grace and everlasting love doth reign in mine heart like an oak planted beside still waters and lo! I behold his glory… (You get the point)… and then posted a response like, “you Christians are all backwards and stupid and why can’t we all just get along without God and manipulation and… (You get the point)! Why, because firstly, it’s their wall and they can post whatever they like on their own wall. Secondly, if there is no invitation for rational debate on the particular facts or logic of their post then I respect their unspoken rules. It’s very simple folk – you stick to the rules of the wall you’re visiting. On my particular wall the rules are simple:

1. Stick to the facts of the proposition or initial statement/post. Talk about the topic I’ve put up for debate, not your personal offence at being subjected to my thoughts simply because you happen to disagree.
2. If you have the temptation to change the subject completely, then feel free to take it offline or start a new thread on your own wall, or ask me if I’m interested in discussing your thread on my wall in a separate discussion.
3. By all means disagree – in fact disagree with all your heart, but then tell me why you disagree. Present the evidence, or at the very least present a string of logic that calls my own into question. This is what makes debates interesting and how we all learn something new.
4. Refrain from emotional observations like “you seem so angry”, or “why are you so scared of religion”, or “you’re clearly a very unhappy person” etc. These observations have nothing to do with the post and quite frankly I don’t give a continental what you may or may not think of my personality or my state of happiness. Worry about your own personality and your own happiness. I’m certainly not going to come to your wall and post, “You seem like such an insane individual… have you gone for a psychiatric analysis recently? J”

Crazy response 4: Dude, there is no evidence for evolution. They never found the missing link. Carbon dating doesn’t work.

Dude. Read a book! Almost anything from Richard Dawkins should set your facts straight. PS: Dawkins is an elderly gentle British biologist chap who has dedicated his life to researching and explaining the evidence, the links and the facts about evolution. A little research will also help you understand that although Carbon 14 dating is only accurate to about 5000 years, using Uranium-Lead and other dating techniques we can accurately date the earth at about 4.5 billion years old. I say it again; Evolution is as much a practical fact as the theory that stretching before playing football is a good idea.

The examples above are just a few of the many bewildering types of ‘argument’ that are regularly posted on my wall. I understand that many of us didn’t take Science even into the tenth grade, and certainly not as a college or university subject. Neither did I. I also understand that many of us go to church every week where we are preached a version of how the universe works as though it were scientific fact, by preachers who haven’t the faintest idea what the facts are except what they interpret from ancient scriptures that were written millennia before the facts were discovered. I can understand this too because I was just such a preacher. But for God’s sake people (figuratively speaking), we live in the year 2010! Are we seriously going to base our entire understanding of the universe on the facts presented by one book or one preacher or our parents?

I know that logic is not everything! I certainly have no visions of a Vulcan utopia on earth, but almost everyone uses logic and reason to live their daily lives at work and home. We use logic to use computers because we work more efficiently that way. We use logic to plan our holidays, job interviews and weekly schedules. We use logic to cook and all sorts of other things we may have convinced ourselves are all ‘creativity and imagination’. Without logic it is almost impossible to have a mutually enjoyable or beneficial conversation. I love imagination. I love creativity. I also understand the importance of logic, and when it comes to God and church and the doctrines of the church, logic tends to get set aside and replaced with dogma, defensiveness, fear and unwarranted emotional outbursts of anger.

So, next time you read a post somewhere that immediately triggers all your defensiveness and anger because at first glance it seems to be contradicting what you have been told to believe by church and holy books, stop and ask a few simple questions before responding:

1. What is the post actually saying?
2. Do I really understand the post and all the terms and ideas being put forward?
3. What do I think/believe about the facts being presented?
4. What do I agree with and what do I disagree with in this post?
5. Do I need to clarify something before I can intelligently respond to this post?
6. Do I understand the reasons why I disagree with certain facts in this post?
7. Do I just want to voice my anger, or do I have something meaningful to contribute?
8. Would I want someone to respond like I’m about to on my own wall?
9. Do I have facts / evidence / information that will benefit the conversation?

I look forward to better, calmer, more interesting and thoughtful conversations going forward.

One of the ironic problems with a religious mindset is that you know everything, and everything you know is fact – and nobody else knows anything (of value).

“Why are we here?” “How did everything come to be?” “What does it mean to be alive?” “What happens when we die?” “What is right and wrong?” “How should we behave?” “What is wisdom?” “What is truth?” “How should we raise our kids?” “Does God exist?” “What is God’s will?”

These are all questions religion claims to know the precise answers to. The answers to these questions are not presented as possibilities or theories but as fundamental facts requiring no scientific evidence and tolerating no opposition.

Life was a lot simpler when I thought this way. When I woke up every morning I understood exactly how the world worked and felt comforted by my immortality, not to mention my ability to move mountains. God was on the throne and I was unstoppable. Anything anyone thought they knew about the universe was fundamentally flawed if that knowledge did not involve Jesus, and I was happy to reveal that wonderful truth to them. “Are you sick? Just trust in Jesus and you’ll be fine.” “Do you need money? Stop sinning (smoking, drinking and missing church services); pay your tithes (that’s 10%, but preferably more), and my God who owns all the cattle on a thousand hills will pour his abundance on you so that you cannot contain it.” Cattle? “Don’t worry about pesky academics and their so called knowledge – their knowledge is foolishness in the face of my faith!” “Why are babies born brain damaged? God has his reasons and we should be happy with that, (or maybe their parents sinned, or maybe it was Satan).” “Millions of people homeless in Haiti? Maybe God is just testing their faith, or the faith of all those he’s calling to help by going there to spread the gospel, (or maybe they all deserved it because of sin, or maybe it was Satan).

At any rate, everything was simple. Prayer, Faith, Sin, God or Satan could account for every phenomena in the universe from mega atrocities to the opulence of head pastors and successful businessmen. There was no need to question anything, and if you did, your questions were directed at the Bible from where you picked a sufficient number of scriptures to back whatever seemed an acceptable viewpoint in the context of your church and its leadership. The theories of science, despite all their practical applications (which I was more than happy to use to do God’s work) sounded arrogant and humanistic (other words for anti-Christian and ‘of the devil’). The only book worth reading was the Bible which I read about ten times (not nearly enough according to many preachers I respected). Anything based on logic or scientific reason was seen as ‘Greek’ rather than ‘Hebrew’ thinking and soon became a derogatory term for people who were more interested in the wisdom of man than God (a type of blasphemy). We had the facts. Other Christians had some of the facts. Non-Christians had none of the facts and needed to be saved!

During my period of de-conversion it became very clear to me that I would have to honestly ask all the questions again, from the beginning, and start reconstructing a view of the truth using a model that was more robust than simply recounting ancient myths or going with gut feel opinions. Only the scientific model is equally interested in disproving facts as it is in proving them, thereby keeping itself honest through rigid experimentation, peer review and welcoming contrary views that claim better empirical evidence. It is the fact that science is always questioning that makes it the most likely candidate for finding real answers.

Life is very different for me now. When I look at a thing I wonder about its nature. I read about everything and want to know exactly why people think one way or another. I realise every day how little I know and life has become the most amazing adventure of discovery. I’m not moved by emphatic statements like “God did it!” or “God said so!” – I want to know how you know what God did or said. I want to consider the other alternatives and find out what we as a species know already about each of those alternatives. The same applies in reverse – I’m not moved by statements from Skeptics about how inaccurate the Bible is or how dumb homeopathic remedies are – I want to know why and how they came to that conclusion.

Instead of saying this or that is truth, I now say this or that is what we currently think we know and I can’t wait for more to be uncovered. The universe, which I used to think was a pretty picture hung in the sky by God for our pleasure, never seemed too important to me considering it would soon be cleared away and replaced when Jesus returned, now seems teaming with possibilities and discoveries waiting to be stumbled upon. The universe is bigger and more spectacular than anything I ever imagined in my Christian world view and I just want to know more and more while I have the chemistry in my brain to know anything at all.

The one thing I wish for every religious person is that they might remove themselves from the influence and safety of their communities and churches for a time and ask, actually ask all the questions again for all the answers they have ‘known’ from childhood. Then in looking for the answers they would read and research the works of people who have come to different conclusions, and honestly evaluate those conclusions with an open mind. If after that you still think that God created the universe, and that you understand his will, and that heaven and hell exists, and that Adam sinned for all mankind in a garden with a talking snake, and that God answers prayers, and that we did not evolve… then God bless you!

Immediately upon reading the title of this post, numerous moderate Christians will respond with something similar to the following question I found on a friend’s Facebook profile: “so why take a dig at religious people? u have the rite not to believe so they have just as much of a rite to believe? and none of us should be arrogant enough to think that only what we believe is the rite thing”. All spelling aside, this is the kind of response I get on my blogs frequently. Of course, the reason anyone would make such a statement is that they truly believe that it doesn’t really matter what you believe, and that people should just get along. The problem with this view is that any religion, by definition, requires that its adherents reject all other religions and hold its own doctrines and myths up as the ‘only true path’.

No evangelical Christian believes that Muslims or Hindus are going to heaven. No Muslim believes that Christians or Buddhists are going to heaven. There is no tolerance in religious faith, and anyone who claims to be a Christian with the view “live and let live” is either not a Christian at all or has no serious understanding about what is being preached to them every Sunday. Religion, as it relates to believing in gods or ‘God’ is, in my view, the most dangerous and sinister activity of mankind, and I am firmly convinced that our hope of survival as a species is directly related to how soon we can throw off the shackles of superstition and religious ‘faith’.

One might say that religion is a type of spiritual discrimination, born out of exactly the same dull ignorance and supreme arrogance that births every other type of discrimination. As though our skin colour; gender; nationality; or what silly non-existent beings we subscribe to, could possibly make us “better” than anyone else, by some accident of birth that resulted in our being raised in a particular family, culture or nation. Moderate Christians everywhere would take offense to slavery or apartheid, but don’t seem to apply the same reasoning to their own bigoted religious beliefs.

So, why do people need to stop believing in God? I shall present here what I consider to be critical reasons. I will not focus on the overwhelming empirical evidence against the existence of God, or counter specific traditional arguments for the existence of God as I have done this in several previous posts and will do so again, no doubt, in the future. Instead, I want to look at some of the particular dangers and problems that religious faith imposes on individuals and nations alike.

Firstly, religious faith promotes fallacious reasoning and dullness of mind. By its very definition faith requires a suppression of logical thought. I often hear Christians saying things like, “your problem is you think too much… just believe!” These same people apply logic and sound reason to many daily activities like their monthly budgets, holiday planning, purchasing insurance or medical aid, passing exams, and so forth – but in the arena of God and church are quite happy to turn off their minds and believe absolutely ridiculous notions about unknowable beings they’ve never seen and ancient mythologies that have been proven inaccurate thousands of times over. This temporary insanity spills over into daily life where, “I’ll pray for you” becomes an honorable substitution for, “what can I do to help you?” and, “God will provide” becomes a praiseworthy excuse for not doing anything about it. The evil of this mindset becomes more apparent on a macro level when random natural events like the floods in Haiti are seen as God’s punishment on the sinful, and thousands of brainwashed people take to the streets after the event to ‘praise God’ for his mercy in saving them, despite the fact that God saw fit to exterminate thousands of innocent children. These same people will wait for God to show his great provision to rebuild their nation without as much of a consideration as to how radically different God’s actions are compared with his supposedly perfect and loving character.

The greatest thing that could happen to Haiti is for people to throw of the chains of religious indoctrination and see the world for what it really is; then, not wasting another minute in futile prayers and ceremonies, pick up the pieces of their lives and take full responsibility for their own future. This same religious blindness permeates even academic society where those free thinking individuals who tirelessly work at understanding the state of the universe for what it really is, are constantly opposed by well meaning religious buffoons who’s own interpretation of archaic biblical morality puts the brakes on progress in stem cell research or the teaching of the fact of evolution in schools around the world. Belief in God all too often turns otherwise intelligent people into arrogant and ignorant fools.

I was recently talking to a catholic friend of mine about the recent news story where E-TV had an interview with a man claiming that he had plans to kill tourists coming to South Africa during the football world cup. We started talking about whether E-TV had the right to keep the man’s identity and location a secret knowing that public security was at risk. We agreed that confidentiality is important in journalism, but there must be a line where the security of the public is more important than the confidentiality of an individual. Then someone brought up the similarity with priests and how they also vow never to give up a secret that is confessed in the confession box. My catholic friend said, “Well of course that’s different.” I asked how it was different. He said, “Priests have made a vow before God.” I was amazed that an intelligent man could simply turn off his faculties of reason the second the conversation became an issue concerning God – and that’s exactly the problem with faith! Faith and religion lead people to believe that any doctrines of the church (their church) and any issue that relates to God is above question, critique or any application of science or reason.

History has proven, and public news continues to prove, that where millions of people are happy to believe whatever ludicrous thing they hear from their pulpits and religious leaderships, they will from time to time birth fanatical elements capable of justifying, for the sake of God, the murder of innocents, the destruction of buildings, suicide bombings, religious crusades and the killing of doctors, scientists and free thinkers. Moderate religion may deny responsibility for these heinous deeds, but it is the solid core of moderate religion that incubates and prepares the seed of fanaticism, hatred and apocalyptic visions.

There will always be madmen and criminals looking for the power to control people – some of these will use religion to net a large following, and others will use religious techniques, banishing all religions but requiring worship of the state, or even the person of the ruler, as God. The fact that religion still perseveres in the world just makes it easier for these people to accomplish their goals, knowing that they have at their disposal hundreds, thousands or even millions who are willing to set aside clear thinking and give themselves to blind faith and credulity – even calling such gullibility noble and honorable and commendable.

The second major problem I have with belief in God is that it devalues this, the only life we have any reason to believe we have. Almost every religion, and certainly all monotheistic religions (Christianity, Islam and Judaism in particular), have at their core the firm belief that this world of sin and depravity is but a temporary detour on the journey to an everlasting place of happiness (for the faithful), or eternal agony and torment in hell (for sinners, unbelievers, homosexuals, and in fact anyone who doesn’t agree with their particular point of view). That may seem like a reasonable enough lure, or threat to make sure the flock tows the line, but in practice it is a devastating position that results in immeasurable suffering, war and death in this life all over the world. I have seen evangelical Christians ‘helping the Jews’ with the notion that they’re somehow speeding up the coming of Jesus and the onset of a new heaven and earth. I have seen Muslims blow themselves up along with a few infidels in the sure knowledge that doing so will please Allah and result in their receiving their choice of virgins in heaven. Religious wars present no moral problem when you know God is on your side and that he’s coming soon to give you your due reward. Poverty and economic devastation don’t seem so bad when you consider that soon it’ll all be over and your heavenly reward will be in relation to the hardship you suffered in life.

Where once religious conflicts were resolved with spears and stones, we now have the capacity to destroy all life on earth and go out thinking we’re doing the right thing by God. Religion has never been so dangerous and belief in God has never been so stupid. We have all the facts at our disposal to eradicate mysticism and religion and yet we hold onto it more tightly than ever. We know the earth is round. We know what causes floods and volcanoes. We know how diseases spread and how to stop them spreading. We know how species are formed through evolution by natural selection. We know that there is nothing to be scared of in the dark. We have as much reason to believe in a personal, invisible, all knowing, all powerful, all good God as to believe in an underwater civilization called Atlantis, or a flat earth, or unicorns and magic – and yet we persist in nonsensical beliefs that threaten our very existence as a species on this planet.

Belief in God is not honourable or reasonable. Calling that belief ‘faith’ and claiming that faith is better than reason is less than honourable – it’s downright evil.

Many of the people who have commented on my blogs and facebook posts have hinted or insisted that my criticism of faith is in some way hypocritical, in that Atheism itself is a faith position, or so they claim. So in my usual fashion I will attempt to turn on the lights of logic in the minds of the religious – hey, if I could be rationally born again I figure there must be hope for Christians, Jews and Muslims everywhere.

Let’s start with the term ‘Atheism’. Wikipedia has this to say –

Atheism is commonly described as the position that there are no deities.[1] It can also mean the rejection of belief in the existence of deities.[2] A broader meaning is simply the absence of belief that any deities exist.[3] Atheism is distinguished from theism,[4] which in its most general form is belief that at least one deity exists.[5][6]

This definition alone makes it clear that Atheism is not a faith position. Atheists don’t “believe” that there are no Gods in the way that Christians, for instance, “believe” in Jesus. Atheists don’t wake up every day having to stir up their faith in something that cannot be proven in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. I’m not even sure that ‘Atheist’ should be used as a term to describe someone who doesn’t believe, or that any such terms are even necessary. Do we have a name for people who don’t believe in unicorns? Do we have a name for people who don’t believe in alien abductions? Why should people who don’t believe in Gods (an equally unlikely myth) be called anything but ‘normal’?

Even Christians are Atheists as far as Allah is concerned, in the same way that Muslims are Atheists regarding Jehovah. We don’t call these people A-Jesus’sists or A-Allah’rists because it’s what they believe rather than what they don’t believe that matters to them. Isn’t it ironic that Christians use exactly the same reasoning as Atheists in their rejection of the ‘truths’ of Mohammed or Bhudda but can’t see how their own myths fail for the same reasons (and vice versa).

Atheists don’t go around ‘believing’ anything. The moment they do they would necessarily become something other than an Atheist. If we were chatting in the kitchen and you asked me whether I believed there were Angels standing around us I would say “no”. Why? Because on glancing around the room and finding no angels I would have no logical reason to believe that they were there. If I were asked to ‘have faith’ that they were there I would immediately wonder why I shouldn’t have faith that there were invisible chocolate cakes or some other unlikely thing in the room. Why angels? Why anything? The logic of Occam’s razor dictates that I assume that the only thing in the room is what can be seen, touched tested etc. until I have sufficient evidence to make me think something else. Notice I said ‘think’ and not ‘believe’.

Atheism is also not a religion. Religion has at its core a few fundamental principles: control; censorship; forced agreement; guilt; infallibility etc. all covered in a convenient goo of fellowship, concern, belonging, music, rituals and the promise of an amazing life after death. Remember Atheists are called Atheists because of what they don’t believe, not the things they do. What do Atheists do? Who knows! It’s like asking what A-Jesus’sists or A-Allah’rists do… anything they choose to do, except believe in God. There are good Atheists (Richard Dawkins) and bad Atheists (Stalin). There are Atheists that have personal rituals (without belief) and others who don’t. There are even Atheists who go to church for any number of reasons (except belief). Atheists are not Satanists either (contrary to popular belief) – Satanists believe in God but choose to fight for the other side, so to speak – their God is Satan.

Atheists are also not by definition Skeptics or Humanists. Skeptics are people who tend to doubt any claims that are not backed by sufficient evidence – obviously Deities would fit that category among other things like homeopathy, ESP, fortune telling etc. So clearly a lot of Skeptics would consider themselves Atheists by definition, but that would simply be an aspect of their skepticism. Humanists generally take the view that we all part of the natural world and that our problems can be dealt with through rational thought rather than deferring to an unseen deity. There is no standard definition for modern humanism except that it focuses on the concerns of man and generally accepts that mankind should decide what is right or wrong for mankind. Not all Atheists are humanists and certainly not all humanists are Atheists.

There are a growing number of people around the world who consider themselves ‘freethinkers’. These people generally reject the authority of religion, tradition and other dogma on the basis of facts, science and logic. I.e. the emphasis is on FREE. Freethinkers could be Atheists, Humanists, Skeptics, Agnostics or all of these together. I am certainly an Atheist and a freethinker. I’m slightly agnostic about humanism and my personality does not entirely suit the contrariness of Skepticism, although I enjoy the company of Skeptics thoroughly.

So, to sum it up: Atheism does not require Faith. Faith is only required when you’re trying to accept as true a set of beliefs that are not backed by any reasonable evidence, logic or even common sense (like most of the Bible). A person does not require faith to believe that there is no invisible man on a throne in the sky who apparently has a name and an opinion about your choices. A person does not require faith to believe that the whole Universe was not created in 6 days, 6000 years ago. A person does not require faith to believe that children’s stories like Noah’s Ark, or Moses parting the Red Sea, are exactly that – children’s stories. A person does not require faith to believe that the religions of the world can’t all be right.

The moment any religion publically produces empirical evidence that proves their assertions to be undeniably true, I will gladly convert (to the belief, if not the religious practices of that religion) along with thousands of other Atheists all over the world.

Recent surveys and studies reveal that there are a growing number of Atheists sitting in Christian churches, and even more surprisingly in leadership positions across denominations. This is of course not because Atheists have decided it’s time to go to church, but because Christians are losing faith and remaining in church for various reasons. Here’s an example of such a study by Dan Dennet and co. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_9w8JougLQ&feature=player_embedded.

I propose that this is not a new phenomenon, but rather that times have changed and people are more honest about their positions on surveys. In times past, confessing “I don’t really believe in God anymore” could have you burned at the stake. Today the consequences are not quite as severe – or at least not in most democratic states.

The reasons Atheists remain silent about their unbelief within their communities are varied and valid. I want to go through a few of them and encourage any closet Atheist to take the plunge and protect your sanity and integrity. As an ex pastor myself I can relate to all these fears and therefore do not judge anyone who keeps up appearances for the sake of their families and churches. Here are some of the ideas that closet Atheists war with – some have to do with what they would be giving up by stepping away from religion, and others have to do with misconceptions about what being an Atheist actually means.

1. I will disappoint lots of important people in my life.

Yes you will. If you’ve been a Christian for a long time you will have a network of people, usually including your family, that are secure in the status quo of who you are in religious terms. Most, if not all of those people will be horrified or confused or saddened or angered about your decision. Many will assume that you’re just going through a phase that will pass. They will reprimand you, pray for you, plead with you and possibly even disown you. They can’t accept your choice because accepting it would mean having to question their own faith, and religion by nature censors that line of thought. People you love will be hurt and feel that your choice is a personal criticism of their own faith. You might hear things like, “So what are you saying? Are you saying I’m wrong to believe in Jesus?” Scientific or logical reasoning will often just fuel the emotion of their reaction. If it’s your own family it’s even worse, after all, who wants to disappoint their mom or dad or brother or sister? All of this is exactly why you’re still pretending, and going through the motions. I can’t tell you there is any easy way to do this, but I can say that many others have survived the experience and are living a more honest and free life as a result. In time you will rebuild your circle of friendship and support. You will wake up every day knowing that you’re not being thought-policed and that the universe is a spectacular and beautiful mystery that is slowly being unraveled through a process of rational enquiry. People will get over their disappointment and carry on with their own lives. If you’re lucky you will find others you have know from Christian circles that have walked a similar path – this is always very encouraging, but not guaranteed.

2. I don’t have any other skills. How would I survive financially?

This can be a truly frightening thought! Most people, Atheists and Christians alike, are concerned about financial security. Often the issue here is our indoctrination in the timeline myth, which leads us to believe we need to have a job, a degree, certain experience, etc. to ensure our survival. We almost have the notion that we will surely die without these things. This is a ludicrous thought. Billions survive every day outside of the timeline and have meaningful lives – in fact many of the people I know living on the timeline really struggle to find meaningfulness in the monotony of suburban bliss. I guarantee you that the skills and experience you have developed as a missionary or pastor or counselor etc. are all extremely useful in the secular world and with a little planning and effort and deursettingsvermoe, it won’t be long until you’re able to make a living from them.

3. My reputation will be destroyed and I’ll have to start again.

In the book ‘U2 by U2′ Bono says, “You don’t become a rock star unless you’ve got something missing somewhere, that is obvious to me. If you were sound of mind you could feel normal without 70 000 people a night screaming their love for you.” I could relate to this immediately! In my 20′s I needed crowds of people shouting Amen at me to feel normal – to feel like I was making a difference. Not everyone has this extreme crowd personality, but all of us enjoy our reputations. I have found even those that come across as really humble, enjoy being known as ‘really humble’, and become quite ruffled when something tarnishes that reputation. Among Christians it is very common for people to build reputations that seem morally ‘above reproach’, although I have never met anyone whose life matches that label. Let people think of you what they will. I have discovered over the last few years that being true to myself is far more fulfilling than being true to my reputation. I have also learned to feel normal with a fishing rod alone by a river, without a crowd to be seen.

4. I would be admitting that I’ve wasted many years of my life.

For me, this was the hardest part of my journey to freedom. It’s a lot like a divorce – every now and then an old photo of happy times emerges from a box somewhere and a million mixed emotions wage war in your head and heart. Nobody wants to study 5 years of engineering only to become a human resource manager. We’d all prefer to invest time into the thing that matters – anything else seems like loss. I have come to realize though that nothing that happens to us is ‘good’ or ‘bad’ – they’re simply experiences that shape our minds and character and personalities and lead us to the next set of experiences. I wouldn’t be who I am now had I not gone through 14 years of Christian ministry, and why should I think any other version of myself would be a ‘better’ option? So I live in the present and enjoy the now for what it is.

5. I will lose fellowship and be completely alone.

This is a common critique Christians aim at Atheists. I recently saw this graphic and laughed out loud. Half a bean of logic will dismiss this outright, after all, why should religion have the monopoly on relationships? One positive thing I have to say for Christians is that they provide endless gatherings and opportunities to meet people and grow friendships. On the down side however, there is a tendency to only befriend people who agree with everything you say and therefore strengthen dogmatic stances and narrow viewpoints. The other night I joined up with a group called ‘Skeptics in the Pub’ and had an absolute blast. One thing about Skeptics is that they’re prone to disagreeing with just about anything you might have to say, and that is exactly what I enjoyed about the evening (other than the Guinness)! I came away with a whole lot to think about and even a few new friends. What religion you are (or are not) will not determine your ability to make friends – your attitude and participation will. If you’re looking for a free-thinking friend, hook up with me on Facebook, and I’ll introduce you to some others.

6. Without God and church my life will have no meaning.

Ah, this is a biggie! Some of my closest closet Atheist friends are scared to leave faith publically because it seems to them that at that point their lives will cease to have meaning. “But why are we here then?” and “I can’t believe relationships and beauty and memories etc. are for nothing – that it’s all over when we die. There must be something more.” These are the sorts of things I hear in conversation. These questions really need a whole article to address but there are two important things to keep in mind. Firstly, we don’t require a God for life to be meaningful. Relationships and careers and project etc. are meaningful in their own right because we make them meaningful. Why do we need a supernatural reason for something to be important or meaningful? Also, why should something be less important or meaningful because it has an end? Were my teenage romances meaningless because they ended? Certainly not! Secondly, we add value to the lives of future generations by what we do in this one. Sure, we don’t have to care about that, and many don’t, but it adds an enormous amount of meaning to my own life. For me life is full of wonder and purpose and I don’t fear death at all. I was oblivious before I was born and it didn’t inconvenience me at all – why should I be concerned about going back to that state?

I have an enormous amount of sympathy for ‘Christian’ Atheists and Agnostics who quietly plod along in the daily routine of their traditions, who force a smile when someone greets them with “God is Good!” and a lot of teeth, who listen to the blah blah of idiotic sermons week after week, and drag themselves away from an interesting project to go to cell group with their wife who they don’t want to offend. At some point the pain of your prison will have to become greater than the fear of your loss. I hope you find a way to ‘come out’ and be truly yourself!

I’ve been reluctant to write this article primarily because I’m not enthusiastic about wading through a mountain of Christian “we’re praying for you” responses. The reason I write this article about my journey from Christian leadership to atheism is that I’ve had numerous people, mainly Christians, asking me on Facebook, “what happened to you?” or “how did you become so anti?” or something similar – and even though I generally point those people in the direction of my blogs, the truth is you need to read several articles to put the whole picture together; so I’ve decided to put the answer in a single blog so that I can point newcomers here when the question is asked again.

I’ll start by dismissing the first assumption that comes my way, which is that I was ‘hurt’ by someone or some church and therefore rejected God in some kind of emotional tantrum. This did not happen. Sure, there were people within the ministries I was involved in that I didn’t see eye to eye with, but on the whole I enjoyed my time in Christian ministry and enjoyed the people and communities I was involved in. I generally had good relationships with my leaders and was happy to carry out my responsibilities with enthusiasm. If I had disagreements, we talked them out. People did not chase me away from God. If I believed God actually existed I would not be as stupid as to think people were any reflection of his character. So to all you well meaning Christians who are convinced I must have had some sort of “fall out” – sorry to disappoint you.

Some people say I was ‘on fire’ for Jesus! One of the most enthusiastic Christians they ever met. That’s probably true, but not because of the ‘power of God’ or anything supernatural – simply because I’m one of the most enthusiastic ‘anythings’ you’ll ever meet – it’s called personality, and mine is extrovert, charismatic, and crowd oriented. I’d be just as enthusiastic a Muslim if I was one, but I’m not. The level of someone’s enthusiasm or charisma has nothing to do with the truth content of their beliefs. It is precisely because there are a bunch of good communicators in the church that masses of people are led to believe absolute myth. I often feel a great amount of regret for my part in so many people being so ‘sure’ of something so wrong. I also regret the amount of time I wasted on those activities for so many years – but that’s another paragraph.

Like pretty much everyone else in South Africa I was raised Christian. Christened in the Anglican church, confirmed in the Methodist church, baptized in a Pentecostal church and later worked in various denominations around the world as a missionary and pastor/speaker. Like most Christians I never doubted the truth of anything I came to believe – the Bible, the sermons, the teachings etc all became part of the foundation of who I was. Muslims were bad, Hindu’s were mysterious, Atheists were demon possessed and Jews were confused cousins. By age 20 I was set firmly on the path of expanding ‘God’s Kingdom’ to all the poor unbelievers of the ’10/40 window’ and beyond (you’ll have to Google that one). Between mission trips and preaching in the middle of Africa I was doing theological studies and reading the bible, over and over again. Later I moved into local church ministry where I led youth groups, music worship teams, taught Bible studies and preached sermons. I was a Christian fanatic that wanted to save the world for Jesus.

By the age of about 25 something new was happening in me. My youthful, unquestioning, overzealous self started to be replaced by a thinking, tolerant, more observant me. I started developing a distaste for cliché, which Christians are so prone to use when they have nothing intelligent to say. I started realizing that the average Christian really had no idea why what they believed was true, except that it was, and that was that. This was not good enough for me. I thought that maybe a revolution was required in the church to make it more practical and relevant to an emerging post modern society. I started having church services where I would put all the chairs outside or bring in a rock band to liven the place up. I had people communicating with each other in church services and sharing real problems. The congregation in Bakerton grew from 20 people to 120 in a month, but no amount of transforming the physical activities from wooden pews to electric guitars, or bible studies to prophetic healing sessions could help me shake a growing niggle in my conscience that there were some fundamental problems with everything we stood for – primarily the exclusiveness of our beliefs and the idea that God would create billions of souls only to leave the vast majority to the whim of the devil while the Christians enjoyed all sorts of ‘advantages’ in this life and the life to come primarily because they were privileged enough to be born in a Christian country. My faith was fighting with my intellect and losing. I was becoming less and less satisfied to sit around giving the same message every week to Christians and never forming loving bonds with anybody else in the world. For some time I stopped preaching and active ministry involvement, although I remained an elder in the church. During this time I sat quietly and observed. I listened to the stuff we were proclaiming and watched the lives of people. I considered the truth of what we said, and did so rationally and calmly – and as I did, the illusion started to crumble all around me. I prayed frequently during this time for wisdom and clarity.

By 2005 I had stopped ‘paid’ ministry totally and had started what felt to me to be something more genuine and honest – I started corporate training. In that year I moved up to Johannesburg to improve my marketing opportunities and during that time I visited a few churches looking for my new ‘home’ (another cliché). Wherever I went I threw my weight into supporting however I could, but as much as I loved the people I had serious issues with the facts underlying the faith. I couldn’t help but feel that it was all just an incredible waste of time and resources. I was also doing a lot of training for a very broad range of people – Christians, Muslims, Hindu’s, Jews, Agnostics and Atheists and I realized just how little I really understood any of these people. I understood what they ‘believed’ sometimes better than they did, but I had never tried to befriend non-Christians without the hidden agenda of ‘getting them saved’. I realized how frighteningly arrogant Christians can be – at least those that actually do what their scriptures suggest they should do. I also started studying Philosophy and Anthropology, and in a very short time was inspired by the beauty of logical thinking and the integrity of scientific observation, hypothesis and testing, both of which were conspicuously absent in all religions, including my own. By 2007 I had decided that even if Jehovah existed, there was no clear mandate for Sunday services and all the trappings of church life, and decided to stop looking for a local church to be part of. Shortly after that I entered an agnostic phase, because intellectually, logically, and scientifically, I simply couldn’t see how any of the facts presented by Christianity could be true – but at the same time I was reluctant to give up the faith that had consumed a large part of my life and had come to define me.

In 2009 I woke up one morning and realized that I couldn’t stay satisfied with a state of agnosticism in light of the evidence against the world’s religions. The probability that a ‘God’ exists is small, but that any of the specific ‘Gods’ of our known religions (Jesus/Allah/Ja etc) could exist as laid out in the traditions is almost nonexistent. I realized in a moment of terror and relief that I no longer believed in any God at all and that non-belief would forever change the way that I related to the thousands of people who knew the ‘radical Christian’ version of me. All my reasoning and arguments are laid out in my other articles on Religion, so I won’t cover them here.

My period of ‘Agnosticism’ was the hardest time of my life. Everything I was, everything I’d done, had been defined in Christian terms, and suddenly it just wasn’t so clear anymore. I wept many tears during that time and felt a great sense of loss. I knew I would lose friends, many friends, as well as social recognition. The other problem was that ‘Church’ was what I did best and now I would have to reinvent myself, or more accurately, rediscover myself; but at the same time there was a part of me that was evolving and growing up and becoming free – for this I was excited. As the scales of superstition and dogma began to fall away, I kept going over my entire life again and again with new understanding of what was really happening in those times when I thought I was having ‘spiritual experiences’ or seeing ‘miracles’ etc. I have also come to realize what an incredible sense of guilt and worthlessness Christians walk around with and cover these feelings up with clichés about being weak in self but strong in Christ; and how much time and resource is wasted on meaningless activities. When I was a Christian I just couldn’t see any of this because we all just hid behind a language and semantic that kept us all in check.

It is hard to describe just how free and empowered I feel since throwing off religion. There are no ghosts, no Gods, no spirits – nothing that cannot be explained. There are elements, and energy and light and other measurable forces all doing an amazing dance in a mind-shatteringly large and beautiful universe. We are a young and evolved species of mammals that individually have precious little time, only about 80 years so, to add benefit and happiness for future generations as they evolve into greater creatures. For their sakes I hope we realize the folly of war and religion and mysticism and tyranny, and turn our eyes to the stars and peace and longevity and science and reason, before we become the cause of our own extinction.

The last few months of blogging and Facebook debates have been a real roller coaster ride. The responses have ranged from amorphous confusion, to intellectually challenging, to patronising evasion, to ranting hate speech – the sum total of which is rather eye opening.

It never ceases to amaze me how emotional people get about something they didn’t invent and have no responsibility to defend, as though saying something like: “The creation myth is far less likely to have occurred than the possibility of biogenesis followed by evolution through natural selection” could be interpreted to mean: “You’re really stupid and your character is seriously flawed!!” Of course there are people who fit that description, but those traits can be found in Theists, Agnostics and Atheists alike. When I propose an idea, I am simply hoping to get some rational response with underlying reasons for why people agree or disagree – quite simple really… one would think.

I am particularly fascinated by people who say, “I’m not religious – I just love God”, or the Charismatic favourite, “It’s not about religion – it’s about relationship” – a relationship that results in weekly temple attendance, weekly bible studies, prophetic-intercessory-worship meetings, daily devotionals, blessing of homes, religious marriage-baptism-funeral ceremonies… how stupid of me to call it a religion! “Of course, anyone else that does any of that stuff is certainly religious – what we do is relationship because our God is actually real” – ah, I must have missed that very crucial piece of the puzzle…!

So in the spirit of calling apples, apples, and to settle the debate about whether or not what you’re doing is religious…

1. YOU MAY BE A RELIGIOUS FANATIC IF
   
   1. You think God cares what banners or objects you hang in your church auditorium.
   2. You thing God cares if you understand how the Trinity works.
   3. You think God favours your church above everyone else’s.
   4. You would kill for God if you really believed he was telling you to do so.
   5. You think there’s a lake of fire somewhere in the universe called ‘Hell’ where most people (except those in your church) will be spending an eternity in spirit form crying in agony and gnashing their teeth!
   6. You think there’s a calm and white place in the universe called ‘Heaven’ where God sits on a chair (possibly tired from standing) and you’ll be going there in spirit form when you die to be very blissful and sing a lot about how great God is for saving you and a few others.
   7. You believe that God has a prescribed way for people to dress and live and love and cohabitate and have sex – and it’s your way.
   8. You believe that no one should ever dare question the existence of your God or the reasons why you believe because doing so would result in a great smiting upon that individual by God, and if God’s not quick off the mark you’ll be happy to do it for him.
   9. You believe that the best way to live is by faith and not intellect. If you can believe something without evidence, it is bound to be more real than believing any silly evidence that may be presented. After all, it’s those Atheists and Scientists (spawn of Satan) that are always asking why, why, why?!!?!!?
   10. You know how to deal with sceptics on Facebook… just ignore everything they’re saying and respond with something that will move their heart like, “It’s not about religion brother, it’s about relationship”, or, “what happened to you my brother? God still loves you”, or, “I’m praying for you”. That’ll show em!!
   11. You only watch God TV, only read books from CUM bookstore and have Hillsongs playing on your radio 24 hours per day – either to keep the demons away or more probably to make sure you don’t hear or see anything that might shake your immovable faith…
   12. You feel guilty when you don’t wake up in time to get to church on Sunday.
   13. You’ve been trying to ‘save’ your husband for 10 years but he’s somehow always happier than you are.
   14. You can’t speak to non-Christians because… well… you just can’t.

    

2. YOU MAY BE A RELIGIOUS FANATIC IF you actually believe any of the following:
   
   1. That every living species of animal made its way, in pairs, to Noah’s house, and survived the journey – then somehow fitted onto a large boat and survived several weeks at sea – then left the boat and moved out into the world, previously flooded, and survived long enough to have offspring – and that every marsupial found their way (across the ocean) to Australia, not stopping anywhere along the way to inhabit any other part of the world, however no other animal decided to take that journey – and that the world’s population started from scratch again after the flood even though we know that Egypt was already in its 5^th dynasty (at least) at this time, not to mention the Minoans or Ancient Greeks or Chinese…
   2. That an all knowing, all powerful, all good, all loving God
      1. Created the devil.
      2. Licensed Joshua to perform genocidal exterminations of every living man, woman and child of at least 7 people groups.
      3. Allowed Solomon to have 1000 wives but sends modern day polygamists to hell.
      4. Destroyed two whole cities because of their sexual choices, not to mention turn an innocent woman into salt for the abominable crime of looking around.
      5. Was responsible for more killing, smiting, punishment, judgment, censorship and changing of rules than any of the most evil dictators of history, if the bible is to be believed…
      6. Answers your prayers about: your football team winning; which job to take; getting that new car; or how to forgive some poor sod who doesn’t know they did anything wrong – but can’t feed a dying child in the Sudan; or save a drowning child in Haiti; or heal a friend with AIDS – quite selective really.
   3. That the end of the world is coming soon and that all the conflict happening in Israel and the Middle East is all just God preparing to return to finally judge all the evildoers so that the good guys can get on with living forever in Heaven – and if there’s anything you can do to make it all happen a little quicker you’ll be delighted to help out. After all, who cares about all the Arabs and Muslims dying and suffering, it’s all part of God’s loving and generous plan for mankind who he made in his image.

It strikes me that it’s pretty hard to be religious and NOT be a fanatic! All the rules (of all religions) require faith-based obedience. The only way to keep from becoming a suicide bomber is to hang onto the ‘good’ bits of your religion and flatly ignore the embarrassing, illogical, insane parts.

Looking forward to your responses!

The point of this article is to highlight how billions of otherwise rational people gamble on insane odds in the area of their religious ‘faith’. Many religious people tell me that Atheists are making the gamble, because if they (Christians for instance) are wrong they ‘lose nothing’, but if we (Atheists) are wrong we ‘go to Hell’. I was a Christian, the convicted deeply sure kind – missionary, pastor – the works. I can tell every Christian that if they’re wrong (and I know they are), not only do they lose an incredible amount in terms of wasted time and personal resources, but they are accountable to humanity for terrible atrocities and ubiquitous control and manipulation of populations. If Atheists are wrong they bring a strong argument to a ‘loving God’ that they had no reason to believe and surely would not be punished for eternity for being reasonable. Let’s talk about that ‘reason’ not to believe…

Because this article is about probability and reasonable evidence I will use a casino metaphor. We’ll call it the ‘Casino Argument’. All over the world hundreds of thousands of people play slot machines at casinos. I don’t personally play because the probabilities of winning are so remote that I’d have a better chance of coming across that money by working hard, which is also more enjoyable to me than sitting on a stool and pressing a button for hours on end. Nevertheless, people keep doing it. They ‘believe’ they have a chance of winning because they have evidence that others have won – i.e. it is possible. There may be a one in a million chance of winning – insanely improbable odds – but those odds are backed by the fact that real people actually do win. We can get their addresses and verify their winnings with a bank statement or casino records. We have tangible evidence that million-dollar-winners actually exist in the world.

Now let’s say there was absolutely no evidence that anybody ever won at a particular casino. For years there was never an officially announced winner and the casino had no records of such a thing ever happening. No winner was ever published in a newspaper or announced on the TV. No-one had ever SEEN a winner. Would people keep going to that casino with one-in-a-million odds against them and no knowledge of their ever having been a winner? Probably not. A rational person, even a rational gambler, would find a casino where there was some evidence to back his faith in the machine.

But what if rumors started to circulate that a guy called ‘Moses’ (a popular South African name) had won a million dollars, but that he chose to keep it a secret and forbade the newspapers from publishing the story, and the casino conveniently ‘lost’ the records. On top of that Moses had no surname and no-one knew where he lived or how to find him. Would the ‘Moses Myth’ add weight to their belief in a win? For some it would, but for most it would make more sense to go to a casino where real people, rather than myths, won real money from time to time.

Now back to religion. The average human is not entirely stupid in my view – if I thought they were I wouldn’t bother writing these articles. On the contrary I see people making logical decisions every day. When people make decisions about moving home or personal finances or career plans etc. they use logic and reason. They weigh up the facts and go for the option that makes more logical sense. At times two options have the same weight and then they either go with feeling or preference or seek advice from someone who might tip the scales one way or another.

Why is religion exempt from this rational approach? Why do we believe ‘Moses Myths’ when there is an overwhelming amount of evidence to the contrary? Why do we hold onto something with insane odds when the odds presented by science and reason are almost undeniable? I think the reasons are similar to that of another great illogicality – love. They say love is blind and it usually is. Millions of people fall out of love every day and yet when they fall in love again they forget all the lessons learned from the previous round of insanity. Why? Because it feels good! Because we don’t want to be alone. Because we want to be acceptable and accepted. Because we need someone else to give us a reason.

Just because the benefits of feeling in love doesn’t make a ‘happily ever after’ true – so the benefits of religion (feeling good; communal acceptance; people to do things with during the week; feeling right or justified; something to stand for; etc.) don’t make the myth true. While religious people harp on about the ‘good’ that religions do for the world, they refuse to recognize how pervasively sinister the whole thing is, and more importantly, how they personally contribute to the insanity of war, death, bondage, manipulation and mind control from the warmth and safety of their prayer meetings, worship sessions and church family fêtes.

Many religious people will get personally offended by this article because, in their minds, religion, or certainly their own religion, is above reproach, question or analysis – it is simply true and requires no reasonable evidence! I do have hope however that some rational religious people, if that is in fact possible, will respond with probabilities and evidence to back up their belief and follow the rules of rational discussion they would use for any other topic.

The Christian Bible has a scripture that goes, “You shall know the truth, and the truth will set you free”.

I find it ironic that this scripture is often wielded in defense of that religion or simply to make them feel justified about their ‘rightness’ – as though the random use of clichés makes anything you say more accurate or truthful… after all ‘All roads lead to Rome’ so… well I’m not sure but it makes me sound clever so I’ll go with it. That said, I have to admit that I love the statement from an Atheistic perspective – and I agree that as we start reasoning, thinking and enquiring, we do find the truth and we finally become free.

Free from what? Freedom suggests that we are enslaved to something in the first place – imprisoned – bound. Christians think they are free? What are they free from? – Apparently sin and eternal damnation. Let’s put aside for a minute the fact that most Christians disagree on which activities/thoughts/actions are “sins” and which are not, or that most Christians believe we’re born ‘sinful’ whether we like it or not, despite never having ‘sinned’ before birth. And let’s not even start looking at the absurd improbability of a place called Hell, let alone the fact that nobody can agree about what it looks like or who’s going there… What really is far more difficult for me to swallow is that Christians actually believe they have the monopoly on all things right and wrong – good and bad. A frequent response to my blogs and Facbook updates is, “How would we know what right and wrong is without religion?” Let’s take the set of ‘rules’ that are most commonly agreed upon – the Ten Commandments. Are you honestly trying to tell me you think the Israelites didn’t know that murder was ‘bad’ before they got the tablets from Moses? Do we think that without Christians preaching every Sunday the whole of humanity would go off on a murderous, raping, stealing spree of carnage and destruction? Have we forgotten that religion is so often the cause of this type of behavior and not the cure?

In exchange for promises of heaven and praising God forever (another absurd concept), we give up our freedom: Freedom to challenge nonsensical doctrines; Freedom to think private thoughts without being though-policed; Freedom to decide how we want to have sex; Freedom to do what we want on a Sunday; Freedom to consider the evidence and come to our own conclusions; Freedom to read what we want – hear what we want – watch what we want. Whatever truth Christians claim to ‘know’, it has not set them free at all – it has replaced real freedom with false promises, mind control and subservience. When I look at the Christian church, I don’t see freedom – I see millions of victims and a handful of opportunists who feed off the system. Don’t even get me started with the other religions. Religion has convinced billions of people that the life they live on earth is meaningless and arbitrary compared to the eternity they will spend in their respective ‘Heavens’ – so instead of recognizing the mind blowing significance of these 70 or so years and living life fully, they spend their time ‘denying’ the world and ‘preparing’ for the end – yet another absurd concept. Why would God punish or reward you for a gazillion years of eternity based on the decisions you made in 30 years on planet Earth? Who comes up with this stuff?!

If I have 70 years to live I’m going to live it as a free man! I will not be dictated to by the ever changing whims of religious groupings or fantastical myths. I will dedicate my life to making the world a great place for my kids and their kids – because that’s what I would have wanted my forefathers to do for me. I will resist all attempts to coerce me into relinquishing my free will for promises of life after death in a place that cannot be proven, tested or found. I will neither blame God, nor the Devil for any consequence of my own decision or any random event of nature. I will decide who I have sex with and how. I will decide what I look at, listen to, taste or touch. I will not allow my life and actions be reduced to a list of ‘rights’ and ‘wrongs’ to be judged by the self righteous. I will oppose mind control and oppression wherever I see it. This is freedom! Can you handle it?

In the spirit of reason, logic, communication and rationality, I am going to suggest a few reasons why people so often don’t make sense, and what they can do about their sense-less-ness. I refer to the way people engage in conversations, debates, critiques and other interactions with people where they’re trying to say something, but in fact say something else – or even worse, are trying to say something that really has nothing to do with the topic or context of the conversation.

There are several root causes for the dreaded disease of sense-less-ness:

• People don’t listen. Many people have the insanely annoying habit of listening only for gaps in the conversation so that they can continue to spew forth their out-of-context agenda at any cost. These people have no idea what anyone is talking about because they’re not engaged for the purpose of discovery or learning anything, but rather to give… and give… generously from their never-depleting resource of knowledge and oracle-like opinions. There are others in this category who simply don’t have time to both listen AND speak, so they err on the side of speaking. And then there are others still who can’t listen to you if they don’t like you – so the more offended they get, the less they hear anything you may have to say. You will never make sense until you learn to listen.
• People don’t understand or care about the rules of rational argument. This is my personal favorite! I can still handle someone who may not understand that they have broken three rules of logic in one sentence because they simply don’t have a clue what logic is or how to use it, but when someone who understands logic, insists on being illogical, for manipulative and bullying effect, I tend to lose my sense of humor. The following are NOT reasonable or logical arguments:
  • “Because I say so!”
  • “It must be true because I read it in a book”
  • “I’m fond of carrots. Some cakes have carrots in them – so I love cakes”
  • “Zulus are taxi drivers”

  It’s one thing for someone to get their argument muddled up in the heat of verbal dialogue – not everyone thinks quick on their feet – but there’s no excuse for sending an illogical email or letter which you’ve had time to think through and double check with a colleague for instance. Logic takes practice, and I have a strong conviction that all children should be taught logic and rational debating skills at school in their language classes, especially because so many kids drop mathematics as a subject in grade 10.

• People are dominated by their right or left brain. Not all systematic and logical people (left brained) make sense – mainly because they often lack in the emotional and people skills department. Often discussions only make sense in the context of both feeling (right brain) and fact (left brain). For instance, an emotional wife says something like “My whole world is crashing around me!!” Her left brained husband says “Don’t talk rubbish!” Of course, from a purely logical point of view he is correct in his assessment that his wife may be overstating the case, but he’s not connecting with the emotional truth that she feels as though she’s about to be crushed by a heavy weight. Her statement makes more ‘sense’ than his in the context of what is being discussed. Equally, an entirely right brained person might take every conversation down a rabbit hole of fantasy and feeling and ignore all rules of logic. To be truly good at problem solving you need to develop both sides of your brain and also learn to be in tune with irony and sarcasm, as most people don’t usually ‘literally’ say what they mean.
• People don’t know the difference between healthy debate and emotional warfare. All points of view that can be argued or defended are merely that – points of view. There are multitudes of people who simply cannot discuss some topics without getting ‘personally offended’, as though the topic defined them, and any disagreement is perceived as an attack on their character. Here are examples of points of view that have such people lashing back with personal attacks and irrationality:
  • “I don’t think God exists”
  • “Marriage is irrelevant today”
  • “Pornography can be healthy”
  • “Women should have the right to have an abortion”
  • “There’s nothing wrong with being gay – people have the right to have sex with anyone they like”
  • “George bush was correct to invade Iraq”
  • “The bible is not God’s word. It was written by men”

  These are the sorts of topics that cause people to switch off, stop listening and shut down – and they shouldn’t be! It’s 2010 – time to grow up and stop living in the dark ages of cultural and religious censorship.

So what can one do when they discover the early symptoms of sense-less-ness in their lives? Pray… Only kidding! Read – grow your paradigms and vocabulary which are tools for rational discussion. Learn about the language of logic (Philosophy 101). Listen! Listen to hear and understand – not to respond – then your responses will make sense. Grow your general knowledge and sense of the world. Practice – engage in debates on hot topics with people you trust and feel safe with, this will help you practice the techniques of reasonable and rational debate. And finally – don’t take everything personally – have fun talking to people, even when they disagree with you… no wait – ESPECIALLY when they disagree with you!