“See you guys had things pretty chill but then you decided that you were going to be dicks about your bullshit beliefs being real. So now, you’re gonna pay with your extinction.”

There were many years which I gave religion the benefit of the doubt when it came to it’s impact on our society. I thought it was still basically a philosophy of good despite all the evil actions people did in the name of religion. Being agnostic back then seemed a more accurate position to take in the argument as any rational person would.

But there was the flaw in my logic, the concept of “rational”.

We hear a lot these days about how both sides need to listen to what the other side is saying. But really what that means is that we are expected to once again let these religious retards off the hook because “they were scared” or they were “mislead”.

The problem is they are always being “misled” or they are always “scared”, that’s what their philosophy at it’s core teaches them and why they seek it out. People find Jesus as they say, usually when no one else will speak to them anymore.

Despite what you hear from religious “experts”, the scriptures are more the work of sexually repressed clerics finding ways to validate their own aristocratic masters. Most telling of their biblical god is how all those miracles are so similar to the fantasies of these clerics who had no idea about how the world actually worked. Burning bushes were a sign of god. Rainbows were a sign of god, just enough milk left for a cookie recipe is a sign of god. etc.

The reason I know these things is because, wait for it…I HAVE BEEN LISTENING. I have been listening to all of this and I don’t buy that this argument is two way street anymore or that it ever was. This debate is indeed a two way street but one in which religion blocks the lane of reason and forces everyone to argue in their lane of belief. And we all know how narrow that lane can be.

But the reason I argue against religion now is that not only have I been listening but more importantly I have been paying closer attention to actions rather than their excuses. For me, watching has provided much more insight than listening ever did.

What I have seen are the those who have spent their lives condemning adultery suddenly excuse it and moreover in one special case embrace it as a kind of character builder for their messiah.

What I’ve seen are democratically elected representatives refuse to perform their duties because it contradicts their own religious opinions which they treat as law above civic responsibilities.

What I have seen are Catholic priests sexually molest children and proof that the church ignored those pleas of innocents while blaming that perennial favorite of “sin” as the cause.

But what I’ve seen isn’t new, I always knew about religious hypocrisy along with everybody else. However because so many want to only see religion as somehow good at the end of the day, I’ve turned a blind eye to these contradictions. I gave it the benefit of the doubt. But no more I say, no more.

Because like never before, religion with it’s carefully crafted centuries old mask of innocence has been torn away in giddy abandon as the possibility of once again overthrowing a civil authority for theocratic aristocracy was made possible by their new god, Trump.

Donald Motherfucking Trump.

A twice divorced New York trust fund huckster known for being the antithesis of what religion or humans are supposed to be. But what did I see happen when Trump dangled the repeal of Johnson Amendment, even more tax breaks as well as a Supreme Court stacked with anti-abortion judges?

Literally, religion abandoned all their principles for the opportunity to lie, cheat and steal with impunity while still expecting to be viewed as charitable.

Charitable like in the good old days of the Dark Ages.

But it is not just Christian ideology that is guilty, even though it does try to maintain an appearance of rationality which laughably tries to hide what it’s sister faith’s show us quite plainly. It’s not hard to see behind their Christian platitudes to the goal of god’s kingdom on earth. It’s foolish not to realize Christianity would install a theocracy just as Judaism and Islam have. In fact, that has always been the goal of religion.

One only needs to see populations of Iranian women in Burkas or Palestinian children savagely beaten and shot by Israelis to realize that this whole ecumenical tree bears a poison fruit that these people eat with abandon.

Religion gets a free pass though because defenders can justifiably say these extremists are not correctly following THEIR religion. But then just where in the world do these people get these ideas that are so incorrect? The answer, from the mother fucking scripture these same religions hold up as the sacred, infallible and incorruptible word of their god.

Time to admit that those others ARE correctly following their religion. The problem is when apologists and most lay people refuse to recognize that a book that prescribes stoning as a punishment isn’t speaking in allegory. What the “rational believers” excuse as quaint old customs are taken as the literal word of god by the less educated who don’t really get “context”.

So excuse me if take all those words I’ve listened to about christian kindness and charity and see them as blatant lies or worse as honest stupidity. But when I consider the life time of facts I’ve seen instead of these excuses I’ve heard, any protest religion makes can no longer taken seriously or given any credence. They have demonstrated time and again now that their religion provides no spiritual strength against such temptations especially for those held in high esteem by the faith. It actually does the opposite now.

With our nuclear stockpiles within reach of these believers, humanity can no longer afford to let this game of pretend continue. Especially by people who believe their god will not only return through some cataclysm but also who see themselves as above the laws of man.

For what god provides is indeed the way. The way to continually lie and I’m done listening to the lie of religion.