Thursday, June 1st, 2006
Why I Want No Part of Organized Religion
Militant Israeli Guns Down Arabs in Protest of Gaza Pullout
On Friday, an Israeli army deserter, Eden Nathan Zaada opened fire on a bus full of Israeli Arabs killing four and wounding 22 (among the wounded were 7 non-Arabs).
Obviously, there is a certain segment of the Israeli population that is not happy with "Butcher of Sabra and Shatila" Ariel Sharon’s plan to withdraw the Gaza settlements. The best thing that could’ve happened for this faction would be for someone to off some "Ragheads" in an effort to provoke a violent response from the Palestinian street, thereby forcing Sharon to reconsider withdrawing the settlements. Based on the actions of Zaada, he was at the least a member of this faction. One can only hope that this gambit doesn’t succeed, and cooler heads can prevail.
However, seeing as how Israel is the third rail of American politics, I can only imagine that someone, somewhere will try to call me anti-Semitic simply because I do not blindly believe that Israel’s hands are clean in this matter.
Let me make myself exceedingly clear: Both sides are guilty as sin. Neither deserves our support. Unfortunately, we sacrifice our position as an honest broker by acting as though only the Palestinians are to blame for the unfortunate situation. In my mind, the best solution is - after admitting the awful truth above - to force both sides to come to an enforcable agreement that allows a two-state solution.
So to recap, here is why I am not a member of any organized religion:
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Christianity: Modern day Pharisees like Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, and James Dobson; Home-grown terrorists such as Eric Rudolph, James Kopp, etc.; The Christian Identity movement
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Islam: Osama bin Forgotten; The Taliban; 9/11
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Judaism: I wasn’t born Jewish; The Likud Party - like abused children, they would do to the Palestinians what the Nazis tried to do to the Jews
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Hinduism: One word: Kashmir
As you can probably tell, the recurring theme to my reasons for not liking organized religion is that it is too often used as a cudgel by wackos who presume to speak for the religion against groups that are disfavored by these same wackos.
(See original post on the old blog here - originally posted Aug. 8, 2005 2:17 AM)
