Old News

I've been doing a little thinking about something that was a hot topic like a month ago.

The Connecticut Valley Atheists erected a sign in the center of Vernon/Rockville along side a Christmas display, and a Jewish display (read more here: http://www.cvatheists.org/).

Anyway, the sign shows the twin towers and reads "Imagine No Religion".

At first I kind of supported the idea, like "yes, I'm all about representing the less popular consensus, so this appeals to me." Especially since it was causing an uproar with local Christians/Catholics, and heck, I kind of enjoy that.

The other hand though, feels like slapping the atheist community across their collective face. I mean really; you're implying that religion is the sole cause of the 9/11 attacks? Sure, that was part of it, but what about 200 plus years of imperialism? Capitalism? Imagine no money.

If you really *are* trying to get people to abandon religion, who exactly are you targeting? You should take your case to the radicals of religion, like the Islamic fundamentalists for obvious reasons, or the mega-pig Joel Osteen crowd for turning humble worship into an ultra profitable house of greed; not to the center of a relatively unassuming town. Your butter knife is just not enough to slay the dragon.

Christmas is important to a lot of people. I don't really enjoy it, don't believe in the whole Nativity thing, and haven't really decided how I would want to present it to my children, but I DEFINITELY don't want to have to explain a sign like that to a 6 year old child because some asshole hippie decided to make a first amendment case out of it in between his or her shitty graphic design temp jobs.

Shut. The fuck. Up.