Where to start with this one? Um, how about with “I’m very opinionated”?
Seriously, I had two choices of what to draw for this week – something cute and funny or something more controversial. I’m not usually in-your-face with my political and (lack of) religious views, but there are times when I feel it’s necessary to point out a few things. For starters, I believe I have the right to express myself politically and sexually. For a woman, the two are so intertwined I can’t see how to separate one from the other. It’s to the point where I’m not just writing erotica to turn out steamy sex scenes for entertainment and profit. I’m writing erotica because that’s my way of saying, “Fuck all you people who think I should be meek and mild and obedient and hide in the kitchen while being barefoot and pregnant. I’m a woman with a brain and a cunt and I intend to use them both!” (And no, I will never apologize for using the word ‘cunt,’ just as a man would never apologize for calling his penis a ‘dick’).
Secondly, I actually am thankful for the things I listed in the cartoon above. In a different time and place, under different circumstance, my life would be a lot different, and probably not for the better. I do not take for granted my right to vote, my right to an education, my right to practice or refuse to practice the religion of my choice, or my right to keep other people’s stupid ideas off my body. No woman should take these things for granted, nor should we allow other women to do without these rights.
Third, don’t expect me to play nice if you push me to be something I’m not. I make no bones about my personal beliefs. I am an atheist and a Zen Buddhist (for those of you wondering, Zen Buddhism is not a religion, it’s a practice, and it has nothing to do with any idea of God). If you ask me to say grace at the dinner table, you will get what you get.
And that’s my little rant for today.
When I was a child, I was brought up as a Christian – Church of England, if it matters. I was even confirmed at the age of sixteen.
I think that was when I started to seriously question ‘Religion’. I’d been told that I’d feel all sorts of wondrous things. That didn’t happen.
I looked around, and thought about it a little. Each year, I did that some more. Each year, I became more and more convinced that Organised Religion – of any denomination – is simply “Do what I tell you, because I tell you,” and that more suffering had been caused by people using their Religion in this way than anything else.
Now I call myself an agnostic – small ‘a’. I’ll listen. If you can show me that it works, in an independently verifiable and repeatable manner, I’ll believe you. Otherwise…
I like Mark Twain’s definition of an agnostic which i believe he was. That is: I believe in God but don’t trust him (him/her if you are picky)
Tom,
I love that definition! Quite frankly, the reason I’m a Zen Buddhist is because Zen doesn’t even bother with the issues of a god, salvation , or an afterlife. It only focuses on what’s right here, right now, and let’s the rest happen as it may.
Steveh11,
Same thing happened to me. I grew up reading a lot and only attending church occasionally. I couldn’t join a religion now because quite frankly I simply don’t believe. And without belief, what’s the point of joining a religion?