by mr dan

In a challenge to the Town of Vernon’s yearly endorsement of Christianity, Connecticut Valley Atheists spent a chilly Sunday erecting our own display on the town green in Center Park.  Its Christian and Jewish counterparts were put up the day before (on the Sabbath, mind you).  On one side, the familiar crèche, with its somewhat miniaturized figures of Mary and Joseph flanking the blonde-haired, blue-eyed infant king; on the other a large and festive PVC menorah.  The town’s Christmas tree stands nearby.  And in the middle, our three-sided wooden sign greets pedestrians and commuters with the message:

30 Million Americans Are Good Without God.  Are You?

As in previous years, the back panel includes information on the solstice, not as a pagan holiday but as an astronomical event, an understanding of the physics of which marks the difference between religion and science.

CVA obtained a permit for the space (for a 25 dollar fee) and the town approved our design for the third consecutive year.  The specific message of the sign is that we who fall into that conservatively estimated group are fully capable of living decent and virtuous lives.  But the broader message is one of protest.  While our aims are peaceful, our goal is to make people realize that government property should not be used to make statements about religion, for or against.  We’d prefer that all three displays be removed and that the town, like all of its neighbors, let the people decide how they want to spend their holiday season.

It is our view that the government, at any level, has no business encouraging or discouraging religion of any kind, and is prohibited from doing so by the first and fourteenth amendments to the US Constitution.  The government should remain neutral on matters of faith and let its citizens practice freely, or not practice at all.  We have the right to be steadfast, resolved, pious, skeptical, scientific, open- or closed-minded, indecisive, ambivalent or apathetic.

CVA will continue the displays annually until the Town of Vernon stops endorsing religiosity.

mr dan is the vice president of Connecticut Valley Atheists.  The views expressed in this posting are his own and do not necessarily represent those of Connecticut Valley Atheists or its individual members.

by mr dan

We atheists are often asked that annoying question:  Why so hard on religion?  What does it matter to you if people believe what they  believe?  Who cares if people worship Jesus, Mohammed or the moon, if they throw salt over their shoulder or read their horoscope?  The emphasis of the question is that these mistaken and silly beliefs are nothing more than a nuisance to nonbelievers.

In the last two years, 58 albinos have been murdered in United Republic of Tanzania and the Republic of Burundi.  Now the AP is reporting that 10,000 more Africans afflicted with albinism are in hiding for fear that they too will be hunted and killed.  These are not ordinary acts of discrimination or xenophobia.  The Red Cross has deemed the killings “occult-based.”

Witch doctors are paying up to $75,000 for their bodies, which they use to make potions to bring luck, riches, health, and sexual virility.  They are being killed over silly superstition, because an uneducated populace believes they are magic.

The numerous stories are tragic and heart-wrenching.

Nyerere Rutahiro [...] was eating dinner outside in his modest rural compound, when a gang of four strangers burst in, and threatened to arrest him. As his wife Susannah looked on helplessly, the men began to hack at Nyerere’s arms and legs with machetes.

“We want your legs,” they shouted, “we want your legs,” his wife recalls, still deeply traumatised by what she saw.  (BBC)

A 10-year-old albino boy, Gasper Elikana, was killed on 21 October by hunters who fled with his leg, which they hacked off in front of his family having first beheaded him to stop him screaming. His neighbours and his black father, who was left fighting for his life in hospital, had tried bravely but unsuccessfully to protect him. (Red Cross)

Two mothers in western Tanzania have been attacked by gangs who were after their children who have albinism. The women were hacked with machetes when the attackers failed to find the two children. (BBC)

The senseless killings are motivated by profit and encouraged by religion.  Most of the potions and items made from the flesh, bones, blood and hair of the victims are produced by witch doctors in Tanzania. The victims are mostly from there, Burundi and perhaps the Republic of Congo. All are killed in the name of startling ignorance and superstition.

Believing it will bring them good luck and big catches, fishermen on the shores Lake Victoria weave albino hair into nets.  Bones are ground down and buried in the earth by miners, who believe they will be transformed into diamonds.  The genitals are made into treatments to bolster sexual potency.  (Daily Mail)

So no, it cannot be said that superstition and religiosity are victimless crimes.  When people must die because someone else believes that they are magical, the myth of personal faith being merely personal cannot be upheld.  To put it another way, when you believe in things you don’t understand, you will suffer.  Superstition ain’t the way.

mr dan is the vice president of Connecticut Valley Atheists.  The views expressed in this posting are his own and do not necessarily represent those of Connecticut Valley Atheists or its individual members.