Ideology and Insanity

A woman got on my subway train today and began to cite the ways we could all get into heaven. Mostly, her theory was, as you can probably guess, to worship Jesus Christ. After her loud and brilliantly-timed announcement (between Queensboro Plaza and 59th and Lex), which I got a special seat for because she was standing right next to me, she sat down in a seat by the window and began reading out loud to herself from the Bible, singing to herself, smiling... and basically acting crazy. Now, if she weren't reading from a Bible and instead reading from, oh I don't know, the Communist Manifesto or the latest novel by Danielle Steel, she'd be nuts. Of course, I don't think that the reaction on the train would be different, but I think in many places in the US, she'd even be admired.

I suppose this makes me an atheist. This woman has an imaginary friend who makes her run around subways screaming about someone, reading out loud to herself, and swaying to the gospel songs playing in her head. Nuts, right? Nope, just devout; no, really, crazy.

There are "pro-life" (anti-choice is what we call them in the pro-choice arena) people protesting in front of Planned Parenthood clinics in Wisconsin now protesting the pill. "The pill kills babies," they say. Now, I guess I should have seen this coming, but I guess in my heart of hearts, I didn't want it to be true. Sadly, it is. Now, these people: also nuts. Wrong, first of all, but that's not the point. They aren't going to pharmacies to protest condoms because they go on penises, which belong to men. They only go to places of women's health to protest women's health measures: mainly birth control and abortion.

Birth control kills because it might prevent implantation of an embryo, which I don't think it does, but let's leave that aside. They only care about women taking care of their lives. Sex, you see, is morally sinful, even though entirely natural, as is masturbation, and thus women should remain pregnant their entire lives if they choose to have sex. Sex is only allowed when conceiving children. So if you happen not to conceive, does that mean that you are sinning? Since pregnancy results statistically so rarely, are billions of women on a freight train bound for hell? Men, of course - go have all the sex you want.

On top of all this, these people also don't want anyone knowing about sex. Nope, it doesn't happen; abstinence is the key. Abstinence from what, you say? Stop asking questions. I'll have none of it.

Come on, these people are not just religious, they are CRAZY! Why can't we simply call a spade a spade? They believe in an imaginary force that will come down and smite us, and they think they are going to the happy place for shouting slurs at poor women walking out of health clinics. They're not morally righteous, they are just plain wrong - and they are CRAZY.