Being a Paedophile is better than being a woman.

At least, according to the Catholic Church. According to some people who have a vendetta. Perhaps I should explain.

Recently I found myself in the car, listening to the radio (as one does) when I changed the station to a talk show. The topic of conversation this time around was the argument against ordaining women as priests within the Catholic Church. I for one don’t see why the Catholic Church won’t allow women into the clergy, but that is not the topic of this post. Maybe another one in the future.

At the time I paid no heed, but then news reports started popping up regarding a new Vatican press release. A quick visit to Atheist Ireland’s website showed me what, precisely was going on. Oh dear, Vatican, you seem to have really screwed up this time. Comparing the crime of ordaining a female priest to the crime of child sex abuse, and then saying that the sex abuse isn’t as bad? I didn’t like you before, Vatican, now I…wait a minute.

After some research and browsing across forums all around the internet and listening to yet more news, the truth slowly unfurled, and I realised yet again why I despise the media. The whole thing, it appears, is hype. What actually occurred was that the Church had released a document which detailed both crimes within it. However, nowhere is a comparison actually drawn between the two. Granted, the document was originally regarding the sex abuse scandal, so perhaps throwing in the female priest issue was a fantastically stupid thing to do. And after reading said document myself the Church does declare automatic excommunication for the female priest, whereas the sex offender isn’t automatically excommunicated. That seems insulting and highly offensive to me. But nowhere is a comparison made between the two.

I found two major schools of thought here. The people out to demonise the Catholic Church, and the members of said Church who were stalwartly defending it. Both sides were hurling insults and making futile and quite frankly pathetic arguments to defend their own viewpoint. Be it discarding entire Gospels because they mention female disciples, or declaring every priest responsible for the abhorrent actions of a few. The only people who were making any effort to remain diplomatic and calm were the people in the middle who had actually done the research and found out that the media had simply misrepresented the Church’s intentions.

The Church certainly does seem to have shot itself in the foot, but it hardly committed as grave a crime as people are making it out to be. They did something stupid, but they didn’t outright compare female priests to child rapists. Not a massive improvement from the falsified accusation.

But it’s an improvement.

To Know Defeat

It’s difficult to embrace defeat, for all of us. Whether we admit it or not is another matter entirely.

Humans strive for success, be it in work or in love. In politics or in athletics. Everyone has their own goals, their own objectives in life which they struggle for. In most cases, they fail. For every one winner, every success there are tens and hundreds of failures. It is a sad fact of reality, but not one we should allow to defeat us.

Defeat is what helps us learn and adapt. When we lose a football game, we practice harder to win next time. When we are turned down for a date, we move on and try again (usually). Defeat gives us, in some twisted way, motivation to succeed. Because, to be quite frank, defeat is depressing. And nobody enjoys being upset, so they strive to ensure that they never experience defeat again. Or, if they do, to at least attempt in such a manner that they are satisfied even in defeat.

There are, alas, times when defeat is ultimate and final. When the despair of losing is so great that we give up ever trying. People cast aside attempts at reaching their dreams because the taste of defeat is foul and unpleasant, a taste they desire never to experience again. I am sorry to say that on more occasions than not I am one of these people.

But I’m getting better. Defeat has spurred me on to greater heights. I’m job hunting twice as much as before, I’m taking grinds in college, I’m starting to trust people again. I’m still fearful of failing, and I still don’t take as many risks as before.

But I’m getting better.

Why do we Pray?

Prayer is such an integral part of any theistic religion. In some religions, one must pray at certain times of the day, in others it’s simply something one does whenever they wish to communicate with their deity. But why do we pray?

Let us set my own religious stance aside for a moment, and seriously consider this question. For the purposes of simplicity, I shall utilise my own knowledge for this, which is of Christianity.

People come up with many different reasons for prayer. One of the first reasons I usually get told is to ask of their God(s) a favour. In the case of Christians, is this not sorely futile? It is mentioned numerous times in the bible, that God has a “Divine Plan”. This is a pre-written plan God has for us, for all humanity and all existence. It details everything which is going to happen to us during our time in reality. So why then would He change it because we ask it of Him? Why would God spend so long conceiving this plan, only to have it ruined when someone asks Him for something? Surely, then, He will not answer requests, for it will destroy his divine plan. Ergo, prayer for requests is futile and there is no need for it. Especially when people pray for a new car, or to wish someone harm, or to win the lottery. Can you honestly expect the Lord of Creation to answer such greedy and sadistic prayers? Such a thought is laughable.

Perhaps then, people pray for others souls. This is a little more reasonable, but it too eventually proves futile. Depending on which Christian church you are a part of, it is likely that God will judge a person’s immortal soul on their own actions. The good go to Heaven, the evil to Hell. Alternatively, some Christian branches believe in Predetermination, where one’s soul is condemned or saved prior even to birth. This comes from God’s omnipotence and omniscience. God knows a person’s future (which raises an interesting point in regards to Free Will, which I shall discuss later) well before that person even comes into being, and hence know where their soul is going. In both these cases prayer does nothing for a person’s soul. You can beg God to spare a person from Hell all you like, but if they are judged on their own actions your prayers are ignored, and the same holds true for pre-determination.

Then, perhaps, one prays simply to communicate with God? Yet God is held to be something we cannot comprehend, something which we cannot understand. It is so far above us that He is to us what we are to ants. Then how can He be expected to understand us? How, if He governs all of reality and watches trillions of stars and quadrillions of planets with billions of lifeforms, can we honestly expect to be heard?

We pray for forgiveness, which serves at least some purpose, assuming God can hear us. But as I mentioned above, God most likely cannot hear nor comprehend us, as we cannot hear nor comprehend ants. And in the case of the Christian faiths which believe in pre-determination, then prayer for our forgiveness does nothing for the same reasons prayer for another does nothing.

So we come to the final point.

We pray for ourselves. There is nothing else for it, no other logical reason. I can understand why though.

It’s comforting, to believe that your prayers have an effect. That your watching God can hear you, can comfort you. I don’t blame those who pray, and in fact I am jealous of them for having found something to comfort them.

I must find some other way….

So….What’s with that Israel thing, eh?

I’m sure many of you are well aware of what happened recently in regards to Israel and an aid convoy en route to the Gaza Strip. For those not in the know, I present a few avenues of learning for you. Long story put short is this:

A group of ships attempted to break the (illegal) blockade Israel has placed on the Gaza strip, in an effort to bring aid to the trapped people within the Strip. Israeli forces proceeded to board the ships and fire upon the people on board. Between ten and 25 people died during the raid. Cue international uproar.

Now with you all caught up on the action, might I present my take on the whole political shitstorm.

On the whole, I’m thoroughly confused as to whose side to take. In the entire Israel/Palestine war I’ve switched sides more times than I care to admit. The whole thing’s so complicated I never know who I actually agree with. In this particular scenario, it’s no different. Israel claims they gave fair warning to the ships, which I suppose makes sense. They want to prevent Hamas supporters from getting weapons into the Gaza Strip so Hamas can continue to bomb their civilians. I for one don’t argue with the boarding action….not completely anyway. If fair warning was given, then the other ships should have known what was about to go down. The fact that the blockade is illegal in the first place kind of makes everything about as complicated as a rubik’s cube which is missing a block.

Where issue is taken, so to speak, is what Israel did during the boarding. They shot, and killed, several unarmed aid workers. Now, they claim to have been set upon by the troopers, and expect sympathy. They illegally committed an act of piracy against these ships and lethally shot people attacking them with fists and other pretty crappy weapons. The whole thing is a disgrace, and the soldiers who boarded should be held accountable.

Whether Israel will be punished for their terrible act of international piracy (boarding a ship in international waters where they have no right to act is piracy I am afraid) remains to be seen. Thus far, Israel has basically been allowed do whatever the hell it wants and can expect to get away with pretty much all of it. So long as America is on their side, no-one will touch them. But the UN Security Council looking set to hold an investigation into the incident, there is a small chance they will actually get some kind of sanctions put on them

Will the sanctions match the severity of the ones handed down to North Korea for similar atrocities? Probably not.

Bad Parenting 101

There are some awful parents in the world. There are the parents who beat their children black and blue, there are the parents which are addicted to drugs.

And then there’s the fucking asshole who waterboarded his own 4 year-old daughter.

I am not making this shit up.

For those who don’t know, waterboarding is:

a torture technique that consists of immobilizing the subject on his back with the head inclined downwards; water is then poured over the face into breathing passages, causing the captive to believe he or she is dying. In contrast to submerging the head face-forward in water, waterboarding precipitates an almost immediate gag reflex.

According to wikipedia.

How bad of a parent do you have to be to do this to your daughter because she can’t remember the alphabet? When she’s fucking four! I’m sorry about the horrific language here, but the last time I was this angered by the treatment of a child it was when I was reading about Fritzl. Of course, this is nowhere near that level of horror, but it’s still more than enough to send me over the peak. It’s when things like this happen that I start to think maybe having a test to see if you’d be allowed have a child is a good idea. Weed out the sick freaks like this guy and other equally messed up individuals.

In my opinion (as of writing this, it might well change in the future) being a parent is not a right. It’s a privilege. You have no right to have children if you can’t take care of them or even try to. I know not everyone winds up being a good parent, and it’s not always their fault. But if you’re a sadist you have no right to your child. Being a parent is a privilege, and if you abuse it then you should have that privilege taken away, possibly for good.

Opinions? What should happen to this guy? Does it make you question the idea that parenting is a right?

« Previous Entries