I had some difficulty falling asleep last night.
I rationalise myself as an Atheist because of science and because of the cultural divides it invokes throughout the masses. My understanding of science has aided me in intellectualizing my resolve for concepts of unexplained, universal life forces at works. However, with that discernment being self-evident, I had never really considered and allowed myself to altogether comprehend what this exactly explicates -
that this is the only life I will have - materially and transcendentally.

We often distort the factual world we live in due to the adoration our society reveres for spirituality and private belief, whether it be religious or new age in interpretation. Human beings are innately delicate and often inclined in believing that we are entitled to another life besides the tangible one we embody. Nowadays we can't to see to be able to escape from superstition in the literary world, the entertainment industry,health industry that causes us to distance ourselves from reality because it's enlightening in the prospects of 'something else to come'. Nonetheless, we all know that just something is consoling doesn't make it true. Science fiction in film on the subject of the paranormal can prove engaging with respect to its thematic elements. When I was a teenager I wasn't interested much in paranormal oddities. I was rather fond of comic book superheros because I was engaged by their anatomical structures. Primarily with the mutants of the Marvel Universe; reason being that they were genetic byproducts, just as we are, in a more farfetched imaginative sense. I will say I was particularly fond of Stephen King's 'The Shining'. The scene with the creepy ghost twins whom were bludgeoned by their father by means of an ax left an impressionable mark on my conscious. Though I was able to distinguish all the entertainment value of it from reality. Some suscepitable people however are just enticed too far with their imagination, and then can make preposterous assertions that they deem as valid. Which seems harmless in regards to one individuals tailoured delusion, but when numerous people make a claim aware, it has the trend for it to gain ground and reverence. Unlike the concept of ghosts and spirits, the religious convert their assertions into anabridged convictions - initiated by a legion of devoted followers. Consequentially, this should raise questions in how we perceive the methodical differences between isolated hallucinogenic behaviour in contrast to systematic mass illusion.
Think about it - if one person has the delusion that they speak in telepathic transmissions to a metaphysical being that resides on the surface of the Earth's moon, one could say this would be a fairly lonely feeling; particularly because no one else would believe this and he or she would be omitted as mad bonkers. Ones faith would need a lot of suring up to be absolutely convinced that the supernatural entity that's communicating to them via moon is irrefutably real. Now if millions upon millions of people shared this exact same strong belief, this would give tremendous reinforcement to the faith of the idea that there is a celestial being on our moon. Group solidarity is remarkably seductive.

Getting back to what I originally intended to say with respect to now being fully self aware that after my life is lived. There will be no departing soul, no reincarnation, no said afterlife that will be selected for me based upon what kind of moral life I led - which is elucidated differently by dozens of disparate religions and denominations. When I die, there will be blackness and nothing more. I laid awake in my bed last night and pondered that very thought, and I admit, I was overcome with angst for a few moments. Then clarity - I saw just how precious my life is, and how far more liberating to free myself from believing there are beneficial and dire consequences at stake based on the accordance of how I live.

I want compatible monogamous love, professional fulfillment, all intertwined into a encouraging environment.
It is said that Sweden and the Czech Republic are the most Atheistic countries to live in. Having lived in one them already I think Sweden would be more progressive change of pace one day.

I guess we'll see.

"We are going to die and that makes us the lucky ones. Most people are never going to die because they're never going to be born. The potential people who could have been here in my place, but who will, in fact, never see the light of day, outnumber the sand grains of Sahara. ...In the face of these stupefying odds, it is you and I, in our ordinariness, that are here. Here's another respect in which we are lucky. The universe is older than a hundred million centuries. Within a comparable time, the sun will swell to a red giant and engulf the earth. Every century of hundreds of millions has been in its time, or will be when its time comes, the present century. The present moves from the past to the future like a tiny spotlight inching its way along a gigantic ruler of time. Everything behind the spotlight is in darkness, the darkness of the dead past. Everything ahead of the spotlight is in the darkness of the unknown future. The odds of your century being the one in the spotlight are the same as the odds that a penny, tossed down at random, will land on a particular ant crawling somewhere on the road from New York to San Francisco. You are lucky to be alive and so am I."

'Letting Go of God'

An excerpt of Julia Sweeney's (Saturday Night Live's Pat), one person monologue on letting go of religion.

I want to see the whole show.

Why I am a militant Atheist.

I watched this witty lecture by Richard Dawkins tonight, one I hadn't seen, and it made me reflect upon my understandings of myself and the affect science, religion, and politics have had on me for the past 24 years.




I felt inclined to pay homage to science with a little commentary because well, I don't have much else to do tonight. :)

Around second grade, I took a vested interest in primates by the sheerest accident. I read about Dian Fossey, the late anthropologist, in a children's book and saw the film, 'Gorillas in the Mist'. What particularly drew my attention to primates was the likeness they were to humans in relation to their subtle mannerisms, nurturing capabilities, the fact that they were able to learn sign language. At a young age I was rather awe struck by our intellectual similarities that they were able to grasp like us, and I steadidly became more engrossed in areas of zoology (all before I even understood evolution). In elementary school, I created a diorama of a habitual environments for Mountain Gorillas, in which I also gave a little presentation/lecture on how the largest of the great apes make use of their habitat. I won second prize.

I was first introduced to Richard Dawkins at a early age on PBS. I saw his Christmas lectures 'Growing up in the Universe'. He eagerly opened up my acquisitiveness for an array of explanations that I had previously only pondered in my own private thought as nothing than meager trivialities; daydreaming if you will.

I was given a sensible understanding of how organisms have evolved from bacteria to mammals in a slow, gradual, incremental process, such as that of the human eye.








During this, I still attended Catechism and had a workbook in which I still memorized Catholic assertions pertaining to how God created the Earth, and why Jesus makes me moral. I very much understood the contradictions I was seeing with both of my after school activities, but I didn't dare question it. I didn't know I was allowed to ask a question, and if I did so at a young age it probably would of disconcerted my parents, or made me the subject of ridicule amongst my peers. Though as I gradually got older, my understanding of science cultivated, just as the creationist movement became more strident, revolutionary, and absurd.

The truth is I care very deeply about the truth. I care about consequences that arise when the truth is defiled and distorted. I care about the truth of my genetic disposition and how Christians are manipulating it. (This was one reason why I felt compelled to leave the US for some time.) It effects me as it should effect most homosexuals. The raging argument amongst the three Abrahamic religions today criticize and construe homosexuality as a free willed choice, and not that of a biological disposition. Obama's invocation speaker says he doesn't really care if in fact being a homosexual is a matter of biology, but tries to rationalise in this perspective:




Aside from him proclaiming that he actually has gay friends, I'm troubled by his outlandish paradox that he is equating anger, promiscuity, or any other unhealthy forms of counter-propitious acts of human conduct in the same understanding as being a homosexual. This is now become a common strategic argument the Christian right implement. Instead of using the words 'temptation' and 'sinful', because it immediately implies religious dogmas; they now have found a new tactic to conceal their contempt for 'un-Christian virtues'. They use social scientific analyses in the same regards a therapist would feem compelled to remark that it's time one might need to have an intervention due to a spouses obsessive compulsive antics that's causing tension in his or her marriage, or perhaps a young girls addiction to sniffing aerosol cans. We would all concur these are matters that could and should require a call for legitimate interference and mediation.
However, the way one could articulate this mentally to a vulnerable, young gay person in respect to coming to terms with his or her sexuality is a disgraceful infringement on the practise of remedial treatment, and an abuse of power of psychology. Like drug addicts, they believe homosexuals should be subjects for rigorous rehabilitation. This is a travesty and what's most worrying is that people actually believe and postulate this concept of synthetic psychology as right mind, when in actuality it's nothing more than rudimentary proselytizing in disguise.

When former Evangelical head of the New Life Church Pastor Ted Haggard admitted to soliciting a gay prostitute for sex and methamphetamine for a duration of a few years, he was removed from his leadership position, and then underwent three weeks of comprehensive counseling, overseen by four ministers. Three months after the scandal first broke, one of those ministers stated that Haggard

"is completely heterosexual".

The minister said he meant to say that therapy

"gave Ted the tools to help to embrace his heterosexual side."

Dawkins had a interview with Ted shortly before his scandal broke:




Religion is huge threat to my genetic disposition, just as important, it narcissisticly perverts the truth of science. I wouldn't object to devoting myself to a career, which I will likely do, that would advocate science and reason over contriving methods of religious entrapment, which are hell-bent on keeping societies from progressing naturally and maturely.

Well, this seems settled.

I'll talk about Halloween a little bit later. I must clear and expurgate myself of a nerving matter. I proposed the following question last night:

you meet someone. you are rather interested in them. you go on a date, but he/she quickly conveys that are not ready to date now due to a number of priorities in their life. they want to be friends, and you try to go along with it by being a good sport.
couple months later this same person comes to you and asks you for dating advice regarding someone.

do you have a right to be offended/upset?

I received the following responses:

Well than at least now you've seen his true color. You wouldn't want to be with a flake anyways. You know? You'll find someone that's honest and upfront with you from the start the way you want them to be. Don't settle for anything less than what's important to you.

YES! He sounds like a coward.

i would be offended and a little irritated, personally.
it might be okay if you were long time friends and had developed that kind of a relationship, but considering i'm assuming that this is about chris...i'd be a bit pissed.

I don't have a problem with him being interested in someone. My only qualm is being told one telling, not being able to date someone due to overwhelming priorities, then contradicting/downplaying you told someone that, THEN making it seem as if I am exaggerating this. I'm not inventing anything. I remember peoples words as well as their actions, and I hold them amenable to their vindications. If one can't own up to their previous renditions, well that says enough in order for me to make a critical discernment of their character. If this happened more than 6 months ago, I might have a margin of understanding, but this was about 8 weeks ago.
I probably should of rationalised this better before, but he seemed like his intentions were sincere. Though my patience only fourth goes for so long until these all and well intentions become dumbfounded by inconsiderateness, and I must expand in professing, flakiness, too.
I dealt with precarious friendships/relationships in my first 5 years of being out and gay. I'm all too familiarized from such experiences to know what's genuine, and what's spurious.

This past evening.

I had dinner and then tea with a guy I dated as well as with his boyfriend of a couple years.
We sat comfortably and talked about religion and politics. I left feeling happy for him.

Of course, there is no vendetta as a result of broken promises/lies said between us - so it's unlike other previous relationships, but still, that's rather unprecedented of me I must say.

I like when I surprise myself.

This woman is too smug for her intelligence.

The Lord will take care of us.

My, what a jaunty way to resolve all of life's oppressing complications; to prefer a candidate who puts reliance on a imaginary figure to resolve life's hard-hitting affairs, and worse, put credence in a world leader who advocates illogical interpreting in a time of a crisis. Hey, whatever makes one dumb and happy, but let the rest of us progress, and catch up to every other civilized democracy. People like this particular woman would benefit more in a tribal society on a deserted island, with a fire and brimstone constitution of all their own, inscribed on walls of a cave.

Barack Obama's late mother has been noted as an Atheist. Obama wrote in one of his book that she advised him to study the works of many religions, as her being an anthropologist, she felt it helped him understand in greater detail people in general. Obama has had to defend himself on numerous occasions that he is in fact a Christian, and he decidedly chose a Christian faith despite an upbringing from a woman of science, as well as a father that Obama claimed had no religious interests whatsoever. I am skeptic to the legitimacy of Obama's claimed religious preference, and in a good respect. I earnestly believe he is an intellectual, not a blind sighted religious fanatic. He of course has to contort this in order to get elected to public office

Do you ever wonder what story you're going to be in someone else's life?

Seriously, I only feel like associating with people who have known me 2+ years anymore. Then I could risk the chance of people writing me off as pompous or highbrow. I'm neither of those, and I don't exude any such related characteristics if one really gets to know me. Meeting new people altogether now dismays me.

There is a risk though just being candid and who I am. Fear of being subjected to scrutinising without accuracy. Never before in my life have I been self conscious about it. I have always deflected myself away from the mainstream with my overall appearance, the music I listen to, etc. Perhaps I should demote my individuality as I know it and start wear studded belts, throw away my science DVD's, and watch Project Runway like everyone else. Well, no, I am not going to do that, but I feel as if I have to start becoming intuitively aware of the infrastructure of the types of people I can correspond to with more agreeably and eloquently than others. Labelling who they are in simple words might be construed as bias, but in my own awareness, I have a rough idea of the qualities and peculiarities they exhibit.

I just feel a little hurt now, so hence the dramatic intonation in my words..

..moving on.

I wrote my cousin Crystal about my interest of moving to Chicago, and she replied favourably to my e-mail. I liked that.

Little known fact, I watch this show obsessively on my computer everyday. I love it.

Elisabeth wore a 'Ameri-Cain' shirt today to elevate her exhausting Republican rhetoric.

Geez..

Apparently I have a profound effect on people with my viewpoints. Often whenever I stress another way of looking at a situation in casual discourse, merely another angle, people can get in such cahoots over it because I am casting doubts to an issue they thought their mind is clearly made up on. It's not my intention to cause mischief or take advantage of others, but if I enable people to think outside their normal realm of thinking, you would think that is a good thing? Something that might have some merit? If what I was saying had no exemplary base in argument, of course, my opinions should be easily omitted without regard to consideration; but if it does give them a reaction, then that's a clue. However, it's almost never the retort I was hoping for. Instead I have to be seen as some sort of threat for suggesting something opposite to their understanding. I then become perceived in such a negative sense. I hate that! I wish I could have a constructive conversation with someone that doesn't take offence to a point I raise. It's often people who are insecure on such issues that do this. I am one to criticise issues like this because I have been there numerous times myself on several affairs. I am insecure on many things, therefore I offer my perspective in regards to my experience on particular matters that have made a thorough difference in my life.
I just wish people could take my feedback respectively as something to consider, not something I am picking on them about.

I never really talk about my sister but my sister is the person who is probably most like me. We like some of the same authors, dress like we're from different decades, have similar views on culture and beliefs; only real solid difference between us is she is more lighthearted than myself. My decipherment to why that is that she's a Buddhist and I have more years on her, indicating more life experiences and then ensuing cynicism on my point of views. She got a new haircut in which I kidded with her as a "Scientology haircut", because I saw Katie Holmes with the same one. But it's cute though. :) I caught her this morning in the bathroom and snapped a picture of her, visibly bemused to what I was doing.

I ran into Chris today at Bean & Leaf out of chance. Chris was the chap I eluded to in ambiguously edited entries some time back. I found someone I thought could finally put my insecurities to rest with, and date them willingly without restraint. Well, conflicting circumstances didn't make that possible for us. It was difficult to get through without taking it personal, but it could of been much worse. We have been keeping in touch considerately via Internet since that happened. Today felt awkward though, and I so wish it didn't. It felt like one of those encounters you have with people that are no longer in your life and you feel obligated to catch up with one an others lives in 2 min duration where the entire context of the conversation is on a surfaced level. It's rushed, trite, and seemingly fake to put it blatantly. Perhaps I am to blame as well. I know I contributed to making things somewhat wavering between us due to the nature of my emotions at the given time. I just wish it didn't have to carry over to the present. I felt inclined as he was packing up his stuff to ask him if he wated to get coffee somewhere and talk in a more carefree/unadulterated fashion, but I hesitated yet again.. :/

Nowadays I'm not as daring or as adventurous with dating as I was when I was 20. So I guess out of respect of that fact that I shared a brief past or an experience with a person I just hope that there would be of a more of an interactive dialogue if and when I see them again by chance. Maybe that's false expectations. I know why I make such a valiant effort though and why these issues are so dear to me. It's always been easier for me to resent my (real) ex's and write them off as thoughtless and inhumane due to their choices and indecisions in putting my sensitivities at jeopardy. I don't want to do that anymore to people to whom did not do anything to go out of their way to disdainfully hurt me for far less vindications. Realistically, it doesn't work to my advantage and compensate for anything. For instance, last weekend I expected to have had a more elated reunion with Adam, but at the club we were both in, it went nothing further than him asking how my ex was and patting my behind whenever he felt inclined to do so.

I'm thinking more about Chicago. I'm aware that there are more slim findings as far as prospects of dating goes, but that's not what is on my mind. In cities, people are just looking for thrills. Suffice it to say though, that may just be what I need now. Not in the sexual sense, but I am obviously bored here and I keep finding ways in talking myself into getting settled here without making any ill or hasty decisions by "running away". But there are conclusive and explanatory reasoning's to why I still haven't committed with going through with getting a new apt, or a new car. I'm not ready to that here perhaps. Honestly I don't now what else I need to accomplish here anymore. I might need to redefine running away simply as moving on. I might be making some abrupt decisions in the succeeding months ahead.