Articles of Faith

Newly discovered species from partial jawbone and partial legbone!

Evolution shows that humans aren’t wired for monogamy, especially men!

God had no role in the creation of the universe!

In the past few weeks, I have read three articles by scientists, who manage to poo-poo faith and religion while simultaneously demonstrating that they, themselves, hold their own faith and religion.

The first article was about a potential new species that was discovered.  It seems some paleontologists located a part of a jawbone and a fragment of a leg bone that points to a new species of ocean going animal that may have been a predecessor of land animals.  They go on to tell the foods it ate, the way it hunted, and the unique ways it could walk on land and swim in the sea.  An artist’s sketch was given to help us picture it in its original environment.  Wait a moment!  Back up the train here.  The tiny piece of jawbone and the leg bone fragment were pictured.  The jawbone didn’t even have any teeth left in it.  These small pieces of bone told us all of that!?!?!?   The credulity required to believe these jumps-to-conclusion is beyond me.  While I am sure that we can learn something from these bones, can we really reconstruct an entire beast from these small pieces?  Can we really make assumptions on its ‘evolution,’ its hunting and mating habits, and its physique?  It sounds more like a fairy-tales about dragons coming from dinosaur fossils than real science.  

The second article explained that men aren’t wired for monogamy.  When it comes to cheating on our wives, we just can’t help ourselves: evolution is to blame.  "Men sport the longest and thickest penis of all primates", the author tells us.  Try not to picture this author in the Congo, chasing down a gorilla with a ruler and calipers.  He goes on to say that Homo-sapien women have “pendulous breasts” and “impossible-to-ignore cries of sexual delight.”  At this point, I'm definitely following this article.  How fun is that?  These characteristics, when compared to a few historic nomadic cultures and a species of monkey that likes group sex, proves that men are made for polyamorous relationships so that we spread our seed around.  The titillating text of this article made it a fun read, and I’m sure some dumb buffoon of a husband will use it as an excuse next time he gets caught with his wife’s best friend. (I’m pretty sure that my wife ain’t falling for it)  But, the simple truth here is that the article is ridiculous in the number of assumptions that it makes.  I can’t help but think that the author (a man of course) was building an alibi more than writing a serious book.  Perhaps he should try his hand at writing Penthouse Letters instead of scholarly texts.   

The final article was a snippet from the new book by Stephen Hawking, explaining that, because of the existence of gravity, the extremely large number of planets in the universe and the likelihood of multiple universes; chance alone explains the creation of something from nothing (the creation of our universe).  While Stephen Hawking is a brilliant scientist, far beyond my mental capacity, he begins with the premise that there is not God and therefore, all creation can be explained by chance.  Except that it can’t.  The logic flaw of ex nihilo creation still exists in a universe of physical laws.         

I am not a scientist.  I don’t even play one on television.  I am a man of faith.  That doesn’t mean that I am ignorant or that I throw logic out the window.  Quite the opposite, my belief system is based on logic and evidence… up to a point.  At that point, I have faith. 

I can be honest about that.  I’m not sure these guys are able to do that.

The scientific community and the fringe pseudo-science hangers-on would have us believe that all their work is based solely on rationality and demonstrable facts.  Yet the truth is, closer examination shows them to be men and women of faith too.  They begin with the premise that God does not exist.  They begin with the assumption that their idea of evolution is an undeniable fact.  They begin with the idea that they have all the necessary knowledge and cannot possibly be mistaken.  In their hubris, they miss their own faith, deny their own belief systems, and they presume to instruct us.

These articles, and many other like them, are articles of faith.

I don’t have any problem with science, or even the idea of evolution*, just the lack of intellectual honesty from those who would call themselves intellectuals. 

* I do NOT believe that science and religion are incompatible and I stand against those who say, “You just have to have faith,” or “God doesn’t want you to think about these things.”  I believe that God gave us our minds and the gift of rational thought.  We should use it.  I also do not believe that creation and evolution are mutually exclusive.  That, of course, is a much longer discussion, but ultimately, I believe that God created the universe, and it was well within His power to use any tools that He desired to make its creatures.

Thinking and Believing

What do you believe?

Why do you believe it?

Have you ever really thought about it?

Could you explain it and give any rational reasoning behind it?

Are your core beliefs based on something someone told you, something you have read, or is it based on something you have put some deep thought and energy into?

For example, I have a friend who told me, “You know, I believe that we all just keep living and dying and living again in one great circle that never really ends.” That’s nice. I read those books too. Robert Jordan’s ‘Wheel of Time’ series is a great science fiction fantasy series, but for the record, it is a fictional story with no basis in reality.

I worked with a guy who said to me, “I don’t know why you follow that Christian crap. It’s all false. They discovered the Dead Sea scrolls at Nag Hamadi and the Gospel of John Thomas proves that Leonardo Da Vinci married Mary Magdalene and they had Baby Jesus right after he painted the Sistine Chapel.” Oh. I read the Da Vinci Code. Did you look on the side and see where it says, ‘Fiction’? The book wasn’t even that good. It was a mediocre mystery. The movie was awful. Frankly, Dan Brown’s other two books, Angels and Demons and Deception Point were much better written stories. Even with the nudge, nudge, wink, wink disclaimer at the front of the Da Vinci Code, his scholarship and historical ‘facts’ leave much to be desired.

Time and time again, I meet people who say, “All religions say pretty much the same thing, I believe that all religions get you to heaven.” That’s one of my favorites. Do you know anything at all about the religions of the world? Have you read even one of their holy books? Have you read even a few words of them? Really? Buddhists get to go to heaven? Boy, won’t they be surprised, considering they don’t even believe in heaven. What about the Shinto believers who get to heaven and find out that all those trees and rocks were really just trees and rocks because all of the kamis were actually in heaven? Or, what about Jehovah’s Witnesses, they are expecting to get there and be alone, they won’t be happy to find the place so crowded. And wait a minute, which heaven? Will there be the eternal feasting and battles of Valhalla? Or the 77 virgins of Islam? How about we all get to be gods of our own Mormon world and populate it with spirit babies. Or, how about we all castrate ourselves and ride on the Hale-Bopp comet to heaven together? Hmmm.

Then there are those people who believe that there is one God who created the world. They tell these seemingly mythological stories about a flood and a rainbow, about prophecies that came true, about some guy nailed to a cross who came back to life and other crazy stuff like that. These Christians love to tell anyone who will listen all about it. Do they even know what they believe or why they should believe it?

I once knew a guy who loved to argue with Christians when he was in college. He was really good at it and often left them sputtering in frustration as he disassembled their ostensibly silly beliefs. Once, he even left a girl in tears in the middle of Ethics class as he talked her in circles about her Christian beliefs.

That guy was me, the first time in college. I’m not proud of it now, but I used to love to meet those young Christian zealots, marching their way into secular college classes, trying to introduce their faith to others. I knew some things about their Bible and beliefs better than they did and it wasn’t hard to frustrate them. I also knew the right buttons to push, the right things to say, to leave them confused and doubting. All of this was great fun at the time.

Until I met Al. Al was a pastor who actually sat down to talk to me. I was ready for him. What a fight this was going to be. I’d graduated from the featherweights and was ready for a heavyweight match. I knew that, as a pastor, he was going to be a harder nut to crack, but up till that point I was undefeated.

In the end, I was the one that sat there sputtering as he disassembled every argument that I had ever used. I lost round after round as he used logic and rational thought to slap down every silly argument that I had ever used against Christians. Ultimately, I had believed in nothing and therefore had nothing to stand on.

I have been encouraged by another Pastor, Chip Moody. He showed me the importance of education, the significance of searching for answers, and the power of truth in the face of earnest questions.

Thirteen years later, I am a Christian pastor, having gone though much struggle and long hours of study, three years of Bible college, and personal study. My studies continue as I go on to pursue my Masters Degree.

I realize these days, just how easy it would have been for any of those Christian kids to defeat me in arguments, if they only had been taught to discuss intelligently and defend their beliefs with solid apologetics. They were sent out as sheep among wolves but were never taught to be shrewd as snakes (Matthew 10:16). They were taught to love the Lord their God with all of their hearts and soul, but weren’t taught to use their minds (Matthew 22:37).

Now, as I teach each new generation of kids, I despair as I watch them go out into the secular college. Did I teach them enough? Do they know what they believe and why? I know there are people like the old-me out there waiting for them. I can only pray that for each antagonist out there, there will be an Al waiting to challenge their beliefs, to help them know the truth.

Al passed away several years ago, before I ever go to tell him thank you for all he did for me. Because of busy lives and distance, I only just found out this last year.

Thank you Al. I wait for the day when I can see you again and say thank you in person.


Father God, I thank you for men like Pastor Al and Pastor Chip. I pray, Lord, for those young men and women that go out into the world. I ask that you give them the strength to face those that would assault your word, the wisdom to defeat attacks with logic and reason, and the understanding to do this with gentle love and not with condemnation.

You can't understand this because it’s written in English.

A friend of mine recently shared her college experience with me.

She had an English Professor at the University of Arizona who enjoyed attacking Christian beliefs as a part of his class. He taught that there are no incontrovertible truths and that language could not possibly convey ideas between people due to the vagaries of our own narratives. Evidentally, he liked to pick on Christian kids taking apart their ideas, leaving them confused and unsure.

She said that she had to do a lot of debriefing with her youth minister and that the class was a real struggle because of the way he pressured students to believe like him and his regular attacks on anyone who believed differently or even questioned what he said.

I have toyed with the idea of driving to Tucson to audit one of his classes.
I don’t think that I could sit long in his class without challenging his credibility. He is either ignorant or a fraud.

I’d like to stand up in the middle of his class and ask him a few questions;

“How can you stand there, speaking to us about an idea, expecting us to understand what you are saying if you don’t believe that ideas can be conveyed by language?”

“How can you teach an English class (a language), expecting students to write papers expressing ideas in that language, that you will then grade (an idea) in the same language assuming they will be able to understand the grades that you gave them?”

“How can you grade papers for grammar or spelling based on the idea that there is a true and correct way to phrase ideas and spell words when you don’t believe that there are truths?”

Now, I’m a believer in being the devil’s advocate in arguments, challenging people to defend ideas, and asking students to think through positions that they hold. However, this professor is presenting ideas that he cannot even live by. Why, he couldn’t even drive to work in the morning, because road signs communicate ideas with the assumption that other people can understand the idea and the people who made his car assume he can learn how to operate it based on communicable truths. He couldn’t find his classroom on a campus map because it is communicating ideas from one person to another. Heck, if he was really honest, he wouldn't bother trying to cash his paycheck from the university because the value of money is an idea that is agreed upon by people.

I have to come to the conclusion that he doesn’t live by the beliefs that he professes (because it is impossible) which then makes him a fraud, teaching an idea that isn’t workable while attacking principals and ideas that are.

I wonder if it is worth four hours of driving time to drive to Tucson and back so I can attend his class.

Probably not.

If I argued with him, he probably couldn’t understand the ideas that I communicated to him anyway.

Peace in Our Time

This blog originally posted Monday, April 13, 2009 at 2:10pm

My daughter attends a Montessori school where they worship the idea of peace. They believe that, if we just teach the children, then one day we will have world peace. They have a peace pole, a peace garden, and lessons on peace. While I was on campus the other day, I heard one of the teachers telling a young boy, “There is NEVER any reason to hit someone!” Now, the boy in question was just playing with another boy and they were bopping each other in the shoulder for fun. (Boys…It has something to do with that Y chromosome.) Nevertheless, this teacher, whether she meant to or not, taught these boys a very dangerous lesson in life.

Over the years, as a youth minister, I have had quite a few kids from this school come through our program. While there is much to admire about the school, this veneration of peace at all costs is an unwise philosophy, and they inculcate the children with it. Even driving into the parking lot of the school, you see bumper stickers that say, “Visualize World Peace” or “Imagine a world where the military has to hold bake sales to buy battleships” or, “You cannot simultaneously prepare for and prevent war.”

They are basing their belief system on a false assumption – “People are basically good inside.”

That sounds nice, and I am sure many of us have heard it or even believe it ourselves. The only problem is that this concept is patently false.

Before I became a Christian in my early 20s, I searched through various religions and belief systems trying to find out, which, if any, were right. This was a primary issue that caused me to disregard many belief systems. You see, it was easy for me to look at the people around me, the events in the world, and truthfully within myself to see that people are NOT basically good. In fact, it is quite the opposite. Humans are basically selfish, destructive, and petty little creatures that are occasionally capable of beautiful acts of goodness.

Take a moment and stew on that.

It may not be the nice or upbeat, but it is the truth.

In fact, it was ultimately Christianity, and only Christianity that gave an answer to this: The fallenness of mankind. Mankind is a broken creature that, only by the grace of God has the ability to rise above our selves towards something greater. Anyone who has ever worked with toddlers knows, you don’t have to teach selfishness, brutality or cruelty. We lie, steal, cheat, and abuse from the start. You must teach goodness.

This brings us back to the teaching at my daughter’s school. I applaud them for teaching the importance of peace. I agree, war is bad, violence is awful. However, violence is not always the worst thing.

Sometime, violence IS the answer.

I cannot imagine them lecturing a perpetrator on the error of his violent ways as he is kidnapping their child. Let that teacher say, “There is NEVER any reason to hit someone,” as she watches her daughter being raped.

Sometimes, violence IS the answer.

Have we learned nothing from history? Hitler was not stopped by talking. It took the blood sacrifice of millions of young men to end his evil. Saddam Hussein, Kim Jong Il, Mahmoud Achmadinijad, and their evil associates are good examples. As the quote in Cool Hand Luke says, “What we’ve got here is a failure to communicate, some men, you just can’t reach” Sociopaths do not listen to reason, they do not respect talk, they don’t care about peace – the only thing that will get their attention is force and the willingness to use it.

Sometimes, violence IS the answer.

Between 800,000 and 1 million people were hacked to death in the Rwandan genocide.

The diplomats talked.

Thousands were killed in Srebrenica and other cities and towns during the ethnic cleansings in the breakaway republics of former Yugoslavia.

The diplomats talked.

Saddam Hussein gassed Kurds in Halabja.

The diplomats talked.

Murders, rapes, and killings go on in Darfur, Sudan today.

The diplomats still talk.

Peace has never come through talking, alone. Peace has only ever come through fighting for it, or using the threat of violence to bring the errant parties to the table.

Peace will only come to our world, one of two ways. When Jesus Christ comes back to judge the quick and the dead – there will be final peace.

Until then, peace only comes by those who wish to do good being willing to use violence to defeat those who are evil.

Alternately attributed to George Orwell, Rudyard Kipling, and Winston Churchill there is a quote: “good men sleep soundly in their beds because rough men stand ready in the night to do violence on their behalf.”Whether it be a soldier, sailor, marine, airman or a policeman, Thank God for those who ironically bring peace through violence.

Rodger S. Loar 13 April, 2009

You can't handle the truth

This blog originally posted Tuesday, April 03, 2007

mood: quixotic Category: Religion and Philosophy

The great and wise prophet of our times, Homer Simpson said, "Facts are meaningless, you could use facts to prove anything that is even remotely true!"

Oh the wisdom in those lines... If I hear another person say, "That's true for you", "There is no absolute truth", or some version thereof, I just might have an aneurism. People in our culture has become so willfully ignorant in their rush for 'tolerance' that they make moronic statements such as that. It drives me crazy. I hear it from kids in my youth group, I hear it from people at work, I hear it on TV, I heard it the other day from my 6 year old daughter! and I even hear it at Bible college of all places!

In case no one ever told you: By definition, something that is true is true for everyone. By its very nature, truth is that way. We may have discussion over whether or not something is true, but if it is true, then it is absolute.

Rules of Truth:

1. Truth Is! (It really exists)
2. Truth Is...Whether you believe it or not.
3. Truth Is...Whether you know it or not.
4. Truth Is...Whether you deny it or not.
5. Truth Is...Whether you want it to be or not.
6. Truth Is...Whether you understand it or not.
7. Truth Is...Whether it is culturally popular or not.
8. Truth Is...Whether it makes you happy or not.
9. Truth Is...Whether it disproves your beliefs or not.
10. Truth Is...Whether you try to change it or not.
11. Truth will stand up to examination.
12. Truth will not have true evidence that fully contradict it.
13. Truth means that two contradicting ideas cannot both by true (they could both be false)
14. Truth has power that may hurt people, destroy ideas, ruin plans, change lives. So do lies.

The funny thing about the statements 'That's true for you' or 'I believe everyone has their own truth' or 'Truth is relative' is that even the people who say them don't really believe that. They say it when they speak of morals, religion, political concepts, or ideas (usually those that they are uncomfortable with). But, in truth, they don't really live that way. If they did, they would drive down the wrong side of the road anytime they want, because traffic laws are just someone elses belief system. They would allow their friend to get a medical license online and do their heart surgery for them, because biology is relative.

If truth is relative, then child molestation is perfectly OK. Murder is just a lifestyle choice. Stealing is acceptable as long as it makes you happy.

Truth applies to mathematics: 1+1 = 2.

Truth applies to science: A cat cannot breath underwater.

Truth applies to languages: words have meanings that can be understood by others.

Truth applies to history: Abraham Lincoln was president of the USA during the civil war.

Truth applies to health: The heart pumps blood, your teeth do not.

Truth applies to politics: Power corrupts people very easily.

Truth applies to morality: Killing innocents is wrong.

Truth applies to religion: One religion says there is only one God, another says there are many. Both cannot be true.

Some will read the list above and try to find nitpicky ways around each of these truths, but the core remains the same. Truth Exists in each of these areas.

You may not like that there is truth. Especially, if it means that what you are doing might be wrong. But that does not change the reality that truth exists.

Hold a handful of sand. Try to guess how many grains of sand are in your hand. Do you know exactly how many are there? Probably not. Can you know? Of course. You could count each grain. Truth is knowable.

Some would say that religion, morality, and politics lie in the realm of opinion, like trying to decide whether vanilla is the right flavor of ice cream or not. (Of course Rocky Road is the right flavor of ice cream, let's not be silly). But simple logic shows - if there is a God, and every religion disagrees on who He is, then only one can be right (or all could be wrong).

Simple logic shows that we can look at past political decisions and know that some were right for the nation and some wrong. So there was truth, we just didn't know what it was at the time. Few would deny that hurting others is immoral and wrong. The discussion comes when competing view points vie for the definition of 'hurting' or 'others' as in the abortion debate, gay marriage, civil rights, slavery, war, etc. One group believes one thing, one group believes another. These viewpoints may be opinions, but the opinions do not change the unknown truth.
Truth should be sought out. We should want to find truth in life. Most people don't want to look for truth because it might be hard to find, it might be hard to understand, it might now make them happy, it might call them to change.

I like to consider myself intellectually honest. I have beliefs in the realms of religion and morality that don't agree with everyone elses. I am willing to admit that I might be wrong. I am willing to admit that I am on a lifetime pursuit of truth. I am willing to admit that truth is often difficult to grasp and painful. I love discussing competing ideas and concepts, but if we are going to have a discussion of competing ideas, we both must realize that our beliefs do not change the core truth of the subject. We could both be wrong, or one of us could be right; but, if the ideas are contradictory- we cannot both be right.

This is why every high school student ought to take classes in Logic, Debate, and Philosophy. They ought to have a teacher that challenges their ideas and drives them to look at other points of view. They should be made to argue for things that they don't like. They should be challenged to seek truth in any question. This is painful and difficult, but it will ultimately kill the foolish relativism in our society. If you learn to think critically, then you begin to see the dichotomy that exists when people make unreasoning statements that deny the existance of truth (which they state as the truth).

I will teach my daughter to think. This means she will question the religion that I teach her. That means she will question my political stances. That means she will question the morals that I require of her while in our house. That is going to be painful for both of us, but the ultimate gift of rational thought will be worth it.

If you can't handle the truth, that's fine. Just don't blab your ignorance all over the place by denying that there is truth.

Sticks n' Stones (and lawsuits too)

This blog originally posted Wednesday, March 14, 2007

"That's So Gay". This phrase is actually the source of a lawsuit in California. A young mormon girl was being teased by other students because of her religion, with comments like "you must have 10 moms" and such. Her response to this was, "That's so gay." The kids making fun of her didn't complain about it. She didn't complain to anyone about the rude jokes they were saying. A teacher overheard this and reprimanded her with a written note in her 'permanent record' (scary organ music plays). So, her father promptly sues the school to get the written reprimand removed from her record.

What a ridiculous waste of time and money on the part of the school AND the dad!!!!! The judge should fine both parties for wasting the courts time and pitch them both out on the street.
It is a simple fact - kids make fun of each other. Kids are rude. Teens don't have the fully developed social skills (and medically, their brains aren't fully developed either) to hold reasoned intercourse over disagreements. This has always been so. Yes, we have the right as a culture to teach them, but this could have been handled so much better by the teacher and school.

The teacher and the school should have dealt with this by talking to all of the students involved and making the point that it is not proper to make fun of people for any reason (religion, sexual orientation, the size of their nose, etc). This didn't require a write up for anyone, at least for a first offense. All students involved should have been warned and let it go at that.

The school also should be the bastion of reasoned thought, but a quote from one of its lawyers shows this isn't so: "The district has a statutory duty to protect gay students from harassment, In furtherance of this goal, prohibition of the phrase That's so gay' ... was a reasonable regulation. OK. That's great, but she wasn't making fun of homosexuals. The school has recognized the cultural shift in the term gay to mean a homosexual, but they haven't recognized the more recent cultural shift to gay meaning something ridiculous or undesirable.

An even funnier quote comes from a professor from Berkley (nuff' said); "I wouldn't be surprised if this girl didn't even know the origin of that term," he said. "The kids who get caught saying it will claim it's been decontextualized, but others will say, No, you know what that means.' It's quite talked about." I personally wouldn't be surprised if HE didn't even know the origin of the term - it is from middle english and possible Germanic origins for a light hearted person. Gee, neither of the previous examples fit that definition.

The silly truth about the word gay is that American English is an unregulated language. We have no Real Academia Española like Spanish does that decides what words mean. Our language shifts and flows constantly. Does anyone remember when bad became good and cool became hot?

Another funny note about what the District Lawyer said; "The district has a statutory duty to protect gay students from harassment." Doesn't the district have a statutory duty to protect ALL students from harassment. That would include religion. Oh, but that isn't politically correct. It is OK to protect every miniscule subclass of human life in school, except religion.

Probably the funniest note of all. This girl is 18. She is off on her own in the real world now. Nobody cares what she did or said in High School!!!!! Anyone who is an adult knows this. Your 'permanent record' (ominous music plays again) doesn't matter in the real world. As long as you didn't commit crimes (and even most of those are expunged), you get out of jail free when you turn 18 and graduate high school. Big deal, she got a write up in school. So did I (lots and lots).

I never sat a job interview and had the interviewer say, "Mr. Loar, we were going to offer you this job, but we looked up your school record and found that you called Billy Riley a pooh-pooh head in fourth grade; I'm afraid you just aren't our type of person." No, all that really matters in the real world is if I learned NOT to call people rude names while I was in school. Oh yeah, and I was supposed to learn math, science, reading, and other important life skills.

The Dad and the School have been the most irresponsible parties involved. I expect teens to say stupid things. That's the point they're still learning. The adults here need to grow up and act their age. The teacher made a mistake in making this a written write up and by not dealing with the other students involved in an equal matter. The principal should have just issued a warning and left it at that, or, at least acknowledged later that they made a mistake in not treating all parties equally. The school district should have said, this isn't worth a lawsuit, we will just give her a warning and warn the other students involved about their conduct too. The district lawyers should have said, this isn't worth wasting taxpayer money in a lawsuit, just remove the written warning or issue equal written warnings to the other students. The dad should have said, this ultimately means nothing to my daughter's future and isn't worth wasting my time and money or the taxpayers money and just let it go. Someone here should have stood up and taken the high road.

None of them did.

The truth of the matter is both adult parties here are caught up in their own political agendas, although both parties would deny it. The school district, like many others in the country are falling all over themselves to show that they are 'diverse' and that they will go out of their way to show tolerance - that is to anyone but religious people. The dad here is so caught up his anti-homosexual agenda that he can't even see how unimportant this whole writeup thing is. (there is a lot of history there. the Dad has been protesting the school's tolerance policies and sexual teachings since 2000 according to another article. The school has also harassed his daughter due to the pressure he has put on them)

There is no excuse for making fun of people for any reason. There also is no excuse for adults to act like kids and fight it out on the legal playground over such a minor issue.

Frankly, I'd like to sit both parties down and tell them, "That's so gay."

Oh, That explains it.

This blog originally posted Thursday, September 28, 2006

Current mood: silly Category: Life

From an Article on CNN.com:
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- Too much testosterone can kill brain cells, researchers say, in a finding that may help explain why steroid abuse can cause behavior changes such as aggressiveness and suicidal tendencies.
Tests on brain cells in lab dishes showed that while a little of the male hormone is good, too much of it causes cells to self-destruct in a process similar to that seen in brain illnesses such as Alzheimer's.
"Too little testosterone is bad, too much is bad but the right amount is perfect," said Barbara Ehrlich of Yale University in Connecticut, who led the study.

Speaking as a guy, now I understand why Jr. High boys are that way. This also explains mid-life crisis, Pamela Anderson, sports cars, Baywatch, and the WWE wrestling. Girls have been telling us this all along, we were just too stupid to believe it.

Push off

This blog originally posted Tuesday, September 26, 2006

Current mood: cranky Category: Life

I was listening to talk radio the other day (yes, I know that probably kills more brain cells than inhaling paint fumes), and they were talking about the upcoming elections. People were supposed to call in and tell who they would vote against or what proposition they would vote against and why. NOT what they were voting FOR, but AGAINST.

Well, I kept hearing the same arguments regarding a few specific ones - Len Munsil (a Christian running for Governor), the Scottsdale Strip Club regulations, the anti-smoking ban, and the proposition about keeping pigs and veal calves in larger pens. Time and time again, I heard callers say, "They're just trying to push their morals/values off on us." Most often, this was in reference to Christians.

OK, can I be the one brave enough to say this????...... YES. YES, we are trying to push their morals on you. Duh!!! Now at least one of us in this conversation is intellectually honest here. For the record, if you vote for something (anything) in an election, YOU are trying to push your morals/values off on everyone else. That's what society and politics are all about.

In the valley of the sun, we have more than 4 million people. We don't all agree on everything. So, to make our society work, we have to come to agreement on what rules we will have and how things will be run. Therefore, someone wins (pushes their moral values off on others) and someone loses (gets someone else's moral values pushed off onto them).

That's life.

That's politics.

That's society.

Further, the very fact that we have a system where we get to vote for our leaders and not a monarchy is because a group of people pushed their values off onto the others. Read your history books, the largest group of people who fought for the British in the revolutionary war were colonialist Americans!!!! Didn't know that did you. Almost as many colonists were for staying with England than were for the revolution!!! Talk about pushing your morals off on someone else.

Murder is a felony in this country. That is someone's values that society agreed upon. Prostitution is illegal in this state but not in Nevada. That too is someone's values. Multiple wives, sex with children, income taxes, insider trading, and even the speed limit on the roads are all examples of someone's values being pushed off on the rest of us. I guarantee you that there are members of our 4 million community that feel differently about each of these issues. Tough luck. Some of them will even continue doing their own thing despite the law. When they are caught, then the policemen and judges will push our morals off on them. That's what we pay them for. That's the way the system works. Next time you get pulled over for a ticket, just try refusing it by telling the officer thay you believe that he is pushing his morals off onto you. Good luck with that.

It doesn't matter whether you are a member of the Sierra Club or and Oil Conglomerate, whether you are with PFLAG or the Christian Coalition, Planned Parenthood or Operation Rescue, PETA or the FFA, Anti-Smokers or R.J. Reynolds, Somos Americanos or the Minutemen - you want to push your morals off on everyone else.

Can we all just admit this?

Can we be honest here and quit making that stupid statement about pushing your morals off on me?

When we go to vote, you get your people to vote and I'll get mine. If you win, I have to deal with it. If I win, you have to deal with it. Sounds like fun, doesn't it.

I'll see you at the polls, and I hope I win.