Advocatus Atheist

I love Angelina Jolie. Truth be known, I've had an epic crush on her ever since I saw her in the cult-hit Hackers when I was but a prepubescent teen. Here's another little secret. I've never stopped crushing on her. But here's the thing. All the recent anti-Jolie hate which has arisen due to her bold choice to have a radical mastectomy has not sit well with me. In fact, quite frankly, it has pissed me off to the nth degree. Most the people hating on her are completely uniformed. Those few who are informed usually neglect to acknowledge that at the end of the day, it's none of their concern. It's her body. Her right. She is allowed to do what she thinks is best for her. The rest can butt out.  But that doesn't stop insensitive comments like this one  from being made: "A woman’s breast is the most eloquently powerful and universal symbol of the continuity of Life, and Woman as revered life-giver and nurturer. To convince a w...

Legalized Adolescent Marriage: A Form of Violence Against Women Let's face it, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to realize that in nearly every society where religion has prospered, it has done so at the sake of women's liberties. Whereas the power has traditionally gone towards the male, and the patriarch, who are the gatekeepers not only to a life of stability (based on man-made economical schemes which value the woman only as chattel  or breeding stock) but have also traditionally been the spiritual gatekeepers as well. And, well, where has this gotten us as a society? Nowhere fast, that's for sure. Every society which oppresses its women by restricting them equal rights, such as the right to education, the right to vote, the basic right to live a life without having to rely on a man or be in fear of what will happen if she voices her female opinion in opposition to a man, creates an imbalance which ultimately degenerat...

"It is hard to overestimate the influence of early training in the direction of superstition. You first teach children that a certain book is true--that it was written by God himself--that to question its truth is a sin, that to deny it is a crime, and that should they die without believing that book they will be forever damned without benefit of clergy. The consequence is, that long before they read that book, they believe it to be true. When they do read it their minds are wholly unfitted to investigate its claims. They accept it as a matter of course.... "In this way  the brain of man has become a kind of palimpsest upon which, and over the writings of nature, superstition has scrawled her countless lies."   --Robert G. Ingersoll  You can find this quote in my republication of Ingersoll's key works in the collection Reason Against Blasphemy .