Thursday, September 30, 2010

Happy Blasphemy Day!

Today, I just have the urge to say one thing: your god sucks!

That's right - Agdistis, Ah Puch, Ahura Mazda, Alberich, Allah, Amaterasu, An, Anansi, Anat, Andvari, Anshar, Anu, Aphrodite, Apollo, Apsu, Ares, Artemis, Asclepius, Athena, Athirat, Athtart, Atlas, Baal, Ba Xian, Bacchus, Balder, Bast, Bellona, Bergelmir, Bes, Bixia Yuanjin, Bragi, Brahma, Brigit, Camaxtli, Ceres, Ceridwen, Cernunnos, Chac, Chalchiuhtlicue, Charun, Chemosh, Cheng-huang, Cybele, Dagon, Damkina, Davlin, Dawn, Demeter, Diana, Di Cang, Dionysus, Ea, El, Enki, Enlil, Eos, Epona, Ereskigal, Farbauti, Fenrir, Forseti, Freya, Freyr, Frigg, Gaia, Ganesha, Ganga, Garuda, Gauri, Geb, Geong Si, Guanyin, Hades, Hanuman, Hathor, Hecate, Helios, Heng-o, Hephaestus, Hera, Hermes, Hestia, Hod, Hoderi, Hoori, Horus, Hotei, Huitzilopochtli, Hsi-Wang-Mu, Hygeia, Inanna, Inti, Iris, Ishtar, Isis, Ixtab, Izanaki, Izanami, Jesus, Juno, Jupiter, Juturna, Kagutsuchi, Kartikeya, Khepri, Ki, Kingu, Kinich Ahau, Kishar, Krishna, Kuan-yin, Kukulcan, Lakshmi, LetoLiza, Loki, Lugh, Luna, Magna Mater, Maia, Marduk, Mars, Mazu, Medb, Mercury, Mimir, Min, Minerva, Mithras, Morrigan, Mot, Mummu, Muses, Nammu, Nanna, Nanse, Neith, Nemesis, Nephthys, Neptune, Nergal, Ninazu, Ninhurzag, Nintu, Ninurta, Njord, Nugua, Nut, Odin, Ohkuninushi, Ohyamatsumi, Orgelmir, Osiris, Ostara, Pan, Parvati, Phaethon, Phoebe, Phoebus Apollo, Pilumnus, Poseidon, Quetzalcoatl, Rama, Re, Rhea, Sabazius, Sarasvati, Selene, Shiva, Seshat, Set, Shamash, Shapsu, Shen Yi, Shiva, Shu, Si-Wang-Mu, Sin, Sirona, Sol, Surya, Susanoh, Tawaret, Tefnut, Tezcatlipoca, Thanatos, Thor, Thoth, Tiamat, Tianhou, Tlaloc, Tonatiuh, Toyo-Uke-Bime, Tyche, Tyr, Utu, Uzume, Venus, Vesta, Vishnu, Volturnus, Vulcan, Xipe, Xi Wang-mu, Xochipilli, Xochiquetzal, Yam, Yarikh, Yhwh, Ymir, Yu-huang, Yum Kimil, Zeus - they all suck! And humans are stupid for believing in fairy tales.

But do you know what else sucks? Your copies of The God Delusion, Skeptic magazine, A Brief History Of Time, The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, and Doctor Who. You know why they suck? Because nothing is fucking sacred, that's why!

Freedom of speech needs to be protected, but ideas do not. In life, there is no freedom to not be offended. If somebody's opinion offends you, either respond with your own opinion or don't listen/read/watch. Responding to offense with threats or physical violence is the domain of immature children, and should have no place in civilized society.

Edit: What I find really sad is that I started out compiling a list of every single god that I could find that humans have ever worshipped, and the list I have above is only a tiny fraction of the deities I found. After wasting over an hour trying to craft, edit, and format such a massive number of entries, I decided to trim it down to the selection of more "major and/or popular" gods you see. No wonder it seems like secularism is a constant, uphill battle against the forces of ignorance!

Tuesday, September 28, 2010

New Popular Music Video

Well, you're not likely to hear this on the radio, and that thought makes me very, very sad...



Saturday, September 25, 2010

Just Because...

I put this up for no particular reason other than I like the song, especially with updated political and pop culture references!



Thursday, September 23, 2010

The evils of Perfection

You've heard the saying, "Perfection is the enemy of the good". Here is a slightly different opinion on the idea of "Perfection" and how the ideals created by perfection are completely unreal and can cause depression, self-hate, and all manners of personal illness. The quick summary that I took away from that essay (and my summary doesn't do that essay justice at all - go read the whole thing) is this: so many people get so wrapped up in the fake perfection we see in people all around us, we can abuse and hurt ourselves for not meeting those same ideals, not realizing that nobody is actually perfect.

At the end of the essay, the author offers this challenge:
Will you help me spread "Real"? Tell us below just how perfect you aren't. You never know who might be alive tomorrow because you were real today. You never know who needs to feel like they aren't alone in their inability to be perfect. Even if you comment as an anonymous guest, please comment. Tell us what you struggle with. Tell a sad or dark secret. Get vulnerable. Get real. Let's see if we can get 10,000 people showing the world that we're not defined by perfection.
Okay, here goes: one of the biggest reasons why I haven't been posting as often as I'd like is that I feel like it takes me way too long to create a new post. I make a post, then reread it anywhere between three to ten times in an attempt to catch spelling and grammar errors, and to help meet technical writing standards, which is a subject that I struggled with in college.

So this is me being real. I'm not re-reading this post or editing it later if I find a mistake or a sentence or two that I think can be rephrased better. Who knows - maybe after reading this essay I can convince myself to be a little less "perfect" and get some more posts up.

Edit: Okay, I re-read my post, but I didn't make any changes to it, even though there were about three sentences that I really wanted to rephrase. Don't hate me! ;)

Monday, September 20, 2010

Too much stupidity in the world

I'm still crazy busy with work and personal life, and it doesn't help that I've been distracted by a handful of stupid topics on the interwebs that have popped up recently. From rich folk bitching about a nonexistant tax hike to minor celebrity teabaggers, I've got over a half dozen lengthy diatribes full of indignation started but not yet ready to post.

It's high time I realized that I can't cover everything that I'd like to, and start picking one or two things to deal with at a time, and leave some of the heavier lifting to the professionals.

Thursday, September 16, 2010

My kind of holy book

I usually detest those smarmy, generic, and touchy-feely religious commercials you see for the Mormons, Catholics, Scientologists, ect. But here's one commercial I find compelling:



Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Busy-ness

After some wife-related health issues last week that required my full attention, I'll be spending most of my spare time at the Vancouver Canucks Young Stars Tournament in Penticton. Expect things to be quiet on the blogging front until the end of the week, at least.

I'm sure you two fans can find something else to read in the meantime.

Monday, September 6, 2010

Beer Is Life

This weekend I kegged my Oktoberfest/Altbier and set it in the fridge for cold conditioning. I can't wait to have some friends over to share it over some Bavarian sausage, sauerkraut, and schnitzel at a little home-spun Oktoberfest celebration!

I also racked my India Pale Ale from primary to secondary, dry hopping it with 28g of Cascade pellets. It's going to be quite good, but I want to see if I can let it age for at least a month in the keg before tapping into it. Sadly, it looks like it's going to be more of a North American IPA style and not as much like Bass as I was hoping. I think I might try picking up one of the Coopers or Muntons Pale Ale kits and hacking it with British hops and a couple of those enhancement kits to turn in into a 6+% hoppy mess of an IPA.

At any rate, I also fired up my Pilsner and Munich Dark Ale kits yesterday. Gotta get the fall brew schedule up and running!

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

The Forgotten Disaster

Humans are fickle creatures with extremely short memories. This spring, the world was witness to one of the greatest human-caused disaster in history when the BP Deepwater Horizon offshore oil rig exploded and began spewing what would turn out to be millions of barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico.

Yet, even before BP managed to cap off and stem most of the oil pouring into the sea water, people started losing interest in the horrible disaster. Perhaps it was due to the feelings of helplessness about being unable to help, or maybe the massive scope of the disaster was just so overwhelming that people no longer wanted to be reminded of the horrors that have been (and continue to be) wreaked upon the Gulf coast ecosystem. I am no particular news junkie, but I have barely noticed any coverage of of the BP spill in the mainstream media since BP announced that the flow of oil had been stemmed back at the end of July.

Amazingly, in less than one month, one of the most devastating disasters in human history has all but disappeared from the mind of the general public. How can this be? Counterpunch has an excellent report, Slow Violence In The Gulf And The BP Coverup, on the what has been going on regarding the oil spill since July 30th, and it turns out that BP has had much assistance in slipping the destructive results of their corporate malfeasance out from under the attention of most of the North American citizenry.

From the article:
Three vanishing acts are being played out in the Gulf: the disappearing of the oil from the ocean surface by Corexit, the disappearing of the story by the media blockade, and the disappearing from view of the shadowy private contractors who are making a mint helping BP and the Coast Guard keep a cover on the clean-up.
The short version is that BP has been spraying millions of gallons of dispersants (made by a subsidiary company to save money) in order to lessen the amount of obvious surface oil, especially at night in order to avoid reporting on the aircraft spraying poisonous Corexit into the waters of the already-devastated Gulf. They then have their own consultants issue ridiculously-positive reports on how all the damage has been almost fixed.

Next, BP has done everything in its power (and with help from the coast guard and private security companies) to prevent reporters from gaining access to affected areas. Individuals hired to assist in the cleanup must sign non-disclosure agreements or risk losing their jobs. Jobs that are critical to the massive numbers of people out of work because of the devastation done to the Gulf economy. On top of that, major media organizations seem to be completely uninterested in keeping the public informed on what kind of progress is being made in cleaning up the millions of gallons of oil spread throughout the ocean.

Naturally, the United States government has been compliant beyond all reason. The Obama administration has been almost completely unwilling to fight back against the lies and obfuscation from the rival Republican party, but the way they have allowed themselves to be used by BP in order to convince the American public that the spill is under control and the worst of the damage has been dealt with is almost sickening. The Democrats essentially handed over control and responsibility of the Gulf environment cleanup to BP, a company that has done everything it can over the past 30 years to prove that it has no regard for anything other than profit margin.

Anyhow, read the whole article. If it doesn't infuriate you, you're either BP president Tony Hayward or a horrible human being (but I repeat myself).

(H/T to Mike the Mad Biologist)