4 Illogical Arguments Against Polygamy

1. God hates polygamy.

Some conservative Christians Americans would argue that, according to God and the Bible, marriage is supposed to be between one man and one woman. This is simply not true. Polygamy is very common in the Bible. So legalizing polygamy would be a step towards Biblical standards of marriage. However, while there are good reasons to legalize polygamy, the fact that the Bible approves of it isn’t one of them. If we’re going to base marriage laws on Biblical law, then women should be slaves, and fathers should sell their daughters for silver and beat them to death with rocks if they’re not a virgin on their wedding night… unless they were raped. In that case, the father should sell his daughter to her rapist. The “traditional Christian” concept of marriage being between one man and one woman who are in love, has no basis in Christianity. That’s a modern, secular tradition. If you want to live in a Christian theocracy, then you shouldn’t be standing against polygamy. You should be standing against adultery, divorce, and equality for women.

 

 

 

A list of verses in the Bible explaining marriage, including: Genesis 2:24, Genesis 38:6-10, Deuteronomy 22:28-29, Numbers 31:1-18, Exodus 21:4 and others

Click picture to enlarge

 

2. Polygamy is a slippery slope.

Some people would argue that polygamy is a slippery slope towards legalizing incest and bestiality. However, incest is illegal because it causes birth defects, and bestiality is illegal because an animal can’t consent to sex. Neither of these applies to polygamy.

 

3. Polygamy oppresses women.

You should not use this argument if you’ve never met a polyamorous/polygamous family, because you don’t really know what you’re talking about. I’ll concede that there have been polygamous families where women were treated poorly, but that was the decision of the individual men involved. It was not the inevitable result of people living together. If we’re to assert that people shouldn’t have the freedom to marry who they want because things could go bad, then that same logic would require us to make all marriage illegal. There are mountains of statistics of women being mistreated in “traditional” one-man-one-woman marriages. If you’re concerned about protecting people from themselves, then you should be petitioning to end marriage completely.

 

4. Polygamy would complicate taxes.

It’s noble to be concerned with other people’s taxes, but that’s not a solid enough reason to take away people’s freedoms. If tax laws are oppressive, the solution isn’t to accept oppression.

There is no solid, logical, coherent reason why polygamy should be illegal. The only reason for wanting polygamy to be criminalized is because you don’t understand it and don’t want people to live differently than you. That’s just cut and dry oppression. It’s not yours or your government’s place to criminalize love or domestic partnerships.

The only thing criminalizing polygamy accomplishes is demeaning, frustrating and destroying people’s lives. Legalizing polygamy would reflect enlightened values of adaptability, love, and freedom. We’ll never live in utopia as long as we’re taking people’s freedoms away for subjective, fantasy-based reasons.

If you enjoyed this post, you’ll also like these:

 

Barack Obama
The 2016 Presidential Election
Donald Trump
Voting
Corruption and Election Reform
American Laws
My Tweets About Politics

Why Stop with Just Making Drugs Illegal?

 

Drugs are illegal because they damage your health, inhibit your ability to function in society and lower your potential in the long run while increasing the likelihood that you’ll commit crime. That pretty much sums it up, right? Well, if those are solid reasons to make drugs illegal, then why stop with just criminalizing drugs?

Let’s make it illegal to drop out of school. Uneducated people lack higher-level social skills, are less useful to society and are more likely to commit crime. A lack of education is every bit as dangerous as drug use. In fact, if we’re truly concerned with the individual’s welfare, we would make it mandatory to stay in school through the completion of a bachelor’s degree or at least a trade certificate.

While we’re at it, we should make it illegal to eat fast food and junk food. McDonald’s food will literally cripple and kill you faster than marijuana, and in the meantime, it’ll give you health problems that will rack up extremely expensive medical bills. That’s every bit as tragic as a worst case scenario heroin junky. Obviously, you should go to jail for eating fast food.

Next, we obviously need to make alcohol and cigarettes illegal. They’re drugs. Cigarette packs even say right on the front, “This is poison.” Legal poison hurts you in every way that illegal poisons do. It’s cut and dry hypocrisy to make one poison legal to consume and another illegal. By the precedent we’ve already set, you should go to jail for smoking cigarettes and drinking alcohol.

We also need to make wage slavery illegal. Poor people have poor health, low potential and are more likely to commit crimes. If instead of letting CEOs become obscenely rich off the blood and sweat of slaves, we force CEOs to pay their workers a fair share of their company’s profits, then people won’t be so poor. Then they’ll be able to afford better food. They’ll be able to save and invest more, and they won’t have to resort to criminal activity for money. So it should be illegal to pay workers minimum wage.

Next, we should make religion illegal. Religion hinders logical thought, which puts a solid cap on people’s potential. It also forces barbarically archaic moral standards onto people that conflict with their natural instincts. As a result, it causes undue stress on individuals, which has proven to push people to dangerous ends. Religion flies planes into buildings and gets homosexuals lynched. Bibles are worse for your health than marijuana and should be correspondingly illegal.

Handguns and automatic weapons are the next big item. They kill people….and that’s all they do. Not everyone who has a gun is going to kill somebody, but not every crack head is going to steal to support their drug habit. Since there will be a few worst case scenarios, we should hunt down everyone who has a gun and send them to prison for years where they’ll almost certainly be beaten and raped. Plus, we should blacklist them when they get out so they’ll never get a good paying job again. That will certainly solve the gun problem without causing any other problems.

Let’s add television to the list as well. Television is by and large a waste of time. You get fat and stupid by watching too much TV. This is bad for your health and lowers your potential. Using the same precedent set by drug laws, television should be illegal, and people who watch television should be hunted and caged.

What else? Sports. Sex. Aging. Pets. Unkempt houses. Working too much. Asshole bosses. Driving. Hell, we may as well just lock everyone up. We’re all doing something that could hurt us if we take it too far. And since prison doesn’t have any adverse effects on health, happiness or potential, then once everyone is locked up in prison then everyone will be healthy, happy and able to fulfill their highest potential both for themselves as well as society.

…or maybe some other judicial reform is needed.

 

 

If you enjoyed this post, you’ll also like these:

 

Barack Obama
The 2016 Presidential Election
Donald Trump
Voting
Corruption and Election Reform
American Laws
My Tweets About Politics

 


My Theory On Illegal Immigration

"Schrodinger's Immigrant: Simultaneously stealing your job and too lazy to work"

 

Politicians and celebrities in America regularly bash illegal Mexican immigrants for being lazy criminals who leech off the system. There are about 10 million illegal immigrants in America right now, and you’re always going to have a few bad apples in any group that size, but generalizing illegal Mexicans in America as villains is detached from reality. The causes, consequences, and implications of illegal immigration are bigger than that. In order to see the real issue in the broader scope of things, you need to understand five things:

 

1. Illegal immigrants are people too.

Illegal aliens are just as human as natural-born American citizens. They come from the same tree of life that every other human being came from, which makes them more than just neighbors. They’re family, and from a cosmic perspective, they’re the among the rarest, most precious entities in the known universe. If there’s a God that created us, we’re all children from the same loving parent.

We’re all lost and stranded on the same planet. We’re all going through the same existential crisis, and when we die, we all return to dust. It would be illogical to have a conversation about illegal immigrants without acknowledging their inherent sublime majesty, and any solution to illegal immigration must take into account the dignity and respect due to every sentient being. To say that illegal immigrants are just outsiders who need to piss off misses the point of life.

 

2. They’re here to work and send money back to their families or they’re trying to build a new life in the land of opportunity.

In order to understand how to deal with illegal immigration, you need to understand why people risk traveling thousands of miles across deadly terrain in a strange land where they’re hunted by police. Most of the people who do that aren’t rapists and criminals. Some of them are women and children, but most of them are fathers who left their homes and their families to find work so they can provide for their loved ones. Some want to stay in America, but most want to return home after they’ve made some money.

Think about that, and then think about the words written on the Statue of Liberty:

 

“Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
‘Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!’ cries she
With silent lips. ‘Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!'”

 

The bedrock of American political ideology has always been love, hope, freedom, and industry. Those are the same values that have motivated so many Mexicans to answer the call of Lady Liberty.  That’s not to say that opening the borders unconditionally is the best solution, but that would be more American than building a wall from the Atlantic to the Pacific ocean and lining it with armed guards.

 

3. They do the jobs Americans can’t.

It’s a well-established fact that Mexican immigrants aren’t taking high paying, in-demand jobs. In 2010 The United Farm Workers organization challenged Americans to come work the jobs that Mexicans have been taking, and not one American took up the challenge.

It’s an understatement to say Mexicans are taking the jobs Americans don’t want. Frankly, they’re taking the jobs Americans can’t do. Immigrants work 13+ hours per day in inclement weather doing backbreaking work with almost no breaks for almost no money. Even if an American could endure the inhumane working conditions that immigrants suffer every day, their wages would be so far below the poverty line they wouldn’t be able to afford a basic quality of living much less The American Dream.

 

4. America’s economy is based on slave labor.

To say that Mexicans are taking Americans’ jobs today is like saying black slaves were taking all the good cotton picking jobs that colonial-era white settlers were entitled to. The work Mexicans do is tantamount to slave labor. Since America’s agricultural and construction industries (to name a few) are so heavily dependent on immigrant labor, that means the American economy is built on slave labor.

Any American who believes all the illegal immigrants should be deported is a hypocrite every time they go shopping because the low prices they enjoy are the direct result of immigrant slave labor. If all of these workers were deported, prices would skyrocket giving anti-immigration advocates a whole new set of problems to scream about.

Since the economy depends so heavily on illegal immigrants who don’t want to spend the rest of their life in America, the simplest solution to the problem would be to make it easier to obtain temporary working visas. The reason that solution hasn’t been implemented is because then American businesses would have to pay their slaves a living wage and give them all the perks entitled to legal workers. That would raise the cost of goods as surely as deporting all the undocumented workers. Very few business owners would lobby the government to do that. It works out better for their bottom line to keep distracting the public with talk of building walls while continuing to enjoy the fruits of slavery.

 

5. Mexicans go to America looking for work in the first place because South America’s economy and political structure have been systematically destabilized by the U.S. government. 

So many South Americans head North to find work because their economies and governments have been systematically destabilized by the United States government to ensure that none of its neighbors could challenge it economically or militarily. This has also allowed the United States to outsource jobs to South American sweatshops while also guaranteeing a steady flow of workers will come North to work inside America without any legal protection. So screaming at Mexicans for taking Americans’ jobs is blaming the victim.

(Documentary) The War on Democracy

(Documentary) Harvest of Empire

(Wikipedia) Latin America- United States Relations

No amount of victim-blaming will solve the immigration problem. We need to fix the fundamental problem with the economy, which is that our entire economic system is based on oppression and unsustainability. America and Mexico both need to build affordable, self-sufficient cities that don’t require its citizens to work themselves to death for barely enough money to survive. If/when that ever happens, nobody will need to leave their families and travel thousands of perilous miles to work in inhumane conditions, and nobody will have to fight each other for the ability to build a happy life.

If you enjoyed this post, you’ll also like these:

 

Barack Obama
The 2016 Presidential Election
Donald Trump
Voting
Corruption and Election Reform
American Laws
My Tweets About Politics

My Theory On Gun Control

Picture of an assault rifle painted like the American flag

 

The topic of gun control makes headline news in America every time there’s a mass shooting, which is almost yearly now. Even without those events, the topic of gun control rarely leaves the public discourse because Americans are killed and terrorized by guns every day. Even if Americans didn’t want to hear about guns, tens of millions of dollars are spent every year by both pro and anti-gun control groups to lobby politicians and create propaganda for the public. And guns are such a normal way of life in America that they’re celebrated and satirized in American movies and television daily.

With guns so ingrained in American culture, it’s impossible to have a productive public conversation about them. Both sides are right about some things, but they both overvalue some of their arguments. Since most mainstream news organizations are fighting tooth and nail for ratings, they tend to paint the issue black, white and divisive, but gun control is a kaleidoscopic grey area. It’s an enigma wrapped in a riddle.

Americans can speak with authority on guns because everyone knows somebody who owns one. But most Americans have never left America. There are 195 other countries in the world, and between them, every possible combination of gun control laws are in place somewhere. When discussing the possible consequences of implementing different laws, the question isn’t, “What would happen?” The question is, “What’s happening?”

Before I offer my theory on what combination I advocate, I want to share my personal experiences in the countries I’ve been to.

Mexico– Every Mexican has the constitutional right to own firearms, but there are very strict laws on what kind they can own, and they’re basically not allowed to carry them outside their home. The gun laws in Mexico don’t really apply though, because criminal organizations are stronger than the government, and guns are extremely easy to obtain. To be fair, there are a lot of places in Mexico where people don’t lock their doors at night, but other cities are nightmares to live in. Guns are the number one reason I would not live in Mexico.

Israel, Greece, Egypt, and Italy– When visiting each of these countries I didn’t know what their gun laws were. I was standing in a bazaar in Jerusalem when I heard random gunfire in the distance, and nobody around me batted an eye. I witnessed a large, angry protest smash a car in front of the Parliament building in Greece, which was surrounded by riot police carrying automatic weapons. In Egypt, there was a mounted machine gun in front of my hotel, and while living in Italy, I saw Carabinieri police with automatic weapons every day. In these four very different countries, I got very comfortable with seeing heavily armed guards on the street corners. After leaving Israel, I flew to New York, where I felt naked on the streets and longed to be surrounded by automatic weapons. Granted, if I were a black man in New York or a Palestinian in Israel, I would have had different experiences.

Slovakia, Slovenia, and Croatia- These countries have pretty middle of the road gun laws, and I felt reasonably safe. However, I was in a nightclub in Croatia, where one of my friends kicked over a bottle of beer and shattered it on the dance floor. An Australian we were hanging out with, who had been living there for a year said, “Be careful. That bouncer over there has seven lines cut into his forearm. That’s for each person he killed in the war. Life is cheap here, mate. Don’t piss people off.” So obviously, any debate about gun control laws must also address the larger issue of what causes people to be violent in general.

Germany, France, Austria, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Holland– These countries have mostly strict gun laws, but out of all of them, Switzerland has the least. Of all the countries I’ve visited, I felt the safest in these countries, and I felt the safest in Switzerland. This is partly due to laws, but these countries also have the highest quality of living of all the countries I’ve visited. The locals just don’t have as much stress and desperation motivating them to kill each other.

Kuwait- Regardless of the laws in the Middle East, weapons are easy to get. Life is cheap and hard, and there are a lot of ideological extremists who divide the world into “us versus them.” This is a recipe for violence, and weapon manufacturers are fanning the flames. I wouldn’t live in the Middle East even if I could, and every year hundreds of thousands of refugees risk their lives leaving their country because it’s a better option than facing the guns and bombs at home.

Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam– These countries have fairly strict gun policies, and the local religions tend to promote peace and harmony. I felt safe in these countries when I was in affluent areas, but I didn’t venture into impoverished neighborhoods because the threat of being robbed is very real there. Even when a society has strict gun laws and a pacifist attitude, poverty will still create criminals who have less to lose and more to gain from picking up a gun than obeying the law or social norms.

The UK, New Zealand– These countries have fairly strict gun laws, but they have high levels of economic inequality. I felt safer in these countries than in America, and I was more afraid of being stabbed than shot.

America– I went to two different high schools in Texas. At one of them, students had gun racks full of shotguns and rifles in their trucks, which they parked on campus, and nobody ever worried about it. When I attended the other school I lived two blocks from the projects and would hear random gunfire from my bedroom window at night. I would never walk the streets after dark. When I lived in Hawaii, I was awoken one morning by a man shooting an AK-47 randomly outside my apartment as he went door to door looking for the man who raped his sister. I told that story to a friend of mine in Texas, and I asked, “Where do you even get an AK-47?” My friend replied, “Do you have $300. I’ll get you an AK-47 today.” I’m afraid to live in America.

If there’s one thing most of the world agrees on, it’s that insane people and violent criminals should not be allowed to own guns. There’s nothing wrong that. It’s been said that, “Guns don’t kill people. People kill people.” But if you give a monkey a gun, a random person is going to get shot.

So my four solutions to gun violence are:

 

1: Don’t let crazy people and repeat-offenders own guns.

Another concept that’s not up for debate is that “opportunity creates the criminal.” The more people have guns, the more gun deaths will result from accidents and crimes of passion. Just because some people can own a gun responsibly doesn’t mean everyone can. If you want the general public to have easy access to guns, you need to ask yourself how many inevitable gun deaths you’re willing to accept for that freedom.

Any violent gun-owning criminal will tell you that the easier it is to legally buy a gun, the easier it is to illegally buy a gun. So it’s shortsighted to say, “Criminals don’t follow laws. So if the public can’t have guns, only criminals will have them.” In reality, the more guns the public has, the more guns criminals will have, and as I just mentioned, more otherwise peaceful people will become violent offenders.

To address this problem I would be fine with either of these solutions:

 

2: Only allow current members and veterans of law enforcement and the military to own guns.

The Second Amendment states, “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.” If the right to bear arms is related to militias, then it stands to reason people who own guns should be patriots who have some experience with organized fighting. I’m not saying this is the best solution to the gun control issue, but it’s better than allowing any crazy person to hoard guns.

 

3: Make gun safety a required class in public k-12 schools. 

It’s been said that, “American’s weren’t meant to be safe. They were meant to be free.” But the basis of the social contract is limiting people’s freedoms to hurt each other. You’re not free to drive a car without a license. You’re not free to practice medicine without a license. You’re not free to hold public office without meeting a few requirements. It’s easier to get a gun in America than it is to open a business, get divorced or buy a house.  There’s a limit to how many freedoms we should sacrifice for safety, but everyone’s life is already saturated with inhibiting laws. Screaming about gun control is screaming at a single tree in a vast forest that’s on fire. If you’re going to get mad that you don’t have easy access to assault weapons, you should be screaming about having to get a driver’s license or wear a seatbelt.

If you truly, madly, deeply believe that American citizens should be able to own guns in order to defend their rights from an oppressive government, you should already be overthrowing the American government. Americans aren’t free. The average American isn’t represented in government, and America isn’t the good guy. I’m not actually saying that we should all band together and violently overthrow the government. I’m just saying that if you use the “protection against tyranny” argument then you’re naive at best, a part of the problem at worst, and a hypocrite either way.

You already know you don’t stand a chance in Hell of defeating the U.S. military with weapons you bought from a pawn shop. As much of a beating as the U.S. military has taken fighting loosely organized, moderately armed rebels in the Middle East, America is still over there killing people every day. The American war machine will keep fighting until everyone you know is dead and the country is bankrupt. Armed insurrection in America is not an option.

You don’t need to overthrow the government to make America a better place anyway. Even if you did overthrow the government, it wouldn’t matter what kind of gun laws you put in place afterward. The main determining factor in whether or not people will commit crimes with any kind of weapon is ultimately poverty. If you’re screaming because you’re worried the government is going to take away your assault weapons, you’re distracting the public from the fundamental problem with society: the oppressive economic system. Regardless of what the current gun laws are, if you’re truly worried about your (or anyone else’s) ability to preserve your life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness, then you need to worry about poverty first and foremost.

So my final solution to the gun question is this:

 

4: Save the gun debate until after we’ve addressed the main threat to people’s lives that lead to most gun violence, to begin with: poverty.

Poverty causes stress and crime. Add guns and you have a recipe for perpetual violence that no amount of regulations can stop. If everyone were secure and content, like in Switzerland, you could give everyone a gun for free and you’d have less gun violence than a country with high income inequality and totalitarian gun laws.

 

If you enjoyed this post, you’ll also like these:

 

Barack Obama
The 2016 Presidential Election
Donald Trump
Voting
Corruption and Election Reform
American Laws
My Tweets About Politics

 


20 Problems Americans Accept As Normal, But Don’t Have To

 

1. “Corporate financing of political campaigns leads to corporate control of the country.”

You know it. I know it. Protestors know it, and nobody knows it better than politicians, but campaigning politicians never promise to end corporate sponsoring of politicians. Until that happens nothing will change, and we all know it, but people still act like it matters which politicians we elect when the only people they represent are their campaign donors.

 

Photo of a protester with a sign that says, "The heart of the problem: corporate financing of political campaigns leads to corporate control of the country."

2. The War in Iraq

George W. Bush told the world Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and gave Iraq an ultimatum: give up the WMDs or get invaded. Sadam didn’t give up the WMDs, and America invaded. Then it became public knowledge that the Bush administration knew Saddam never had WMDs. Then George Bush said the real reason the U.S. invaded Iraq was to free the Iraqi people. Then the U.S. spent 10+ years fighting off people in the Middle East who just wanted the American military to leave their country and quit killing civilians. Meanwhile, there are countless other people begging to be rescued and freed from ruthless dictators who are too poor to attract America’s attention. There should be an entire prison built to hold all the people who should go to jail for the Iraq war. We know this, and we accept that no one will ever hold the Bush administration accountable.

 

3. American soldiers are not fighting for the freedom of the American people in Iraq.

Nobody can agree on exactly why America invaded Iraq, but everybody knows it wasn’t for the freedom of the American people. There’s just no way to connect the two. So nobody knows what the American troops are dying for, but everyone just says “freedom” and lets them go on dying.

 

4. Global warming is real.

For argument’s sake, let’s suppose global warming isn’t real. Just because we can screw up the planet a little more doesn’t mean we should. In a lot of ways taking care of the environment is the most important thing we can do. It’s even more important than corporate profits. Suppose environmental regulations cost companies money, which lowers their profits, which forces them to cut jobs, which hurts the economy. The worst case scenario still can’t be worse than poisoning the planet until it’s unable to support life. We know we should be taking care of the planet. We shouldn’t be arguing about this.

 

5. We live in a wasteful consumer economy.

We slash and burn resources and produce mountains of trash. There’s a layer of garbage the size of a continent floating in the Pacific Ocean. We shouldn’t be using disposable kitchenware or disposable plastic bags, but we’re using more disposable goods than ever and speeding up our production of garbage.

 

6. University degrees are flawed.

The hardest part of getting a university degree is paying for it. It’s a glass ceiling for those who can’t afford it, and it’s an unfair advantage to those who can. It’s classist, and pampered idiots all over the world are riding their paper credentials to the top of their professional organizations where they’re destroying and squandering companies built by intelligent, hardworking people who couldn’t afford as many degrees as their bosses. The higher education system is broken and overpriced. A lot of smart professors have said all this a billion times, but the glass ceiling factories keep churning.

 

7. The war on drugs needs to end.

Legalizing drugs worked in Holland and Portugal. The results are in. The debate is over. Academics have made their case, and every year another South American politician tells America to end the war on drugs because it’s a futile war that does more damage than it prevents. Even American policemen are calling for an end to the war on drugs. The American people used the whitehouse.gov site to send a petition to the president to legalize marijuana. The president laughed at the people, the professionals, and all their evidence. Then everyone just said, “Darn.”

 

 

8. Nudity isn’t evil.

Women shouldn’t be forced or even pressured to cover their heads or their breasts. That’s basic human equality. If a 5-year-old kid in a nudist colony sees an 80-year-old penis the kid will be grossed out. If a 5-year-old kid sees an 80-year-old penis in suburbia the old man will go to jail and the kid will be told by a therapist they’re supposed to feel traumatized. You know what would happen if we got rid of all nudity and censorship laws? Not much… because nudity is not an issue. The people who told us to hate our bodies also told us it was okay to own slaves. We stopped believing them about slavery, and most of us have stopped believing them about sexual taboos as well, but more often than not we act like prudes so nobody will suspect we’re as amoral and horny as we really are. But deep inside we all know nudity and censorship laws are overblown and unnecessary. Even if a lot of people want censorship laws in place, if their right to not be offended supersedes another human being’s right to free will, then we’ve set a dystopian precedent. Come on. With as much blatant sex is on television, cartoons and the Internet it’s obvious that the world is okay with nudity and sexuality. We just haven’t come out of the closet to ourselves about it.

 

9. Fox News is the most unethical, hypocritical, malicious disgrace in the history of journalism.

Fox won a court case that said they had no obligation to tell the truth. The entire world laughs and cringes at Fox News. This isn’t even a slanderous thing to say. It’s just a simple fact. The organization wears its business model on its sleeve for everyone to see. Fox News is not fair and balanced. It pushes the limits of free speech by lying and sensationalizing disinformation for the purpose of instigating social disharmony. That’s dystopian, and it’s real, and it’s still respected. That’s terrifying.

 

10. Israel invaded Palestine and forced the Palestinians into ghettos where they’ve been systematically stripped of their humanity and are being ethnically cleansed.

Israel shot aid workers trying to bring medicine to the Palestinians. Israel tortures Palestinians. These are human rights abuses. There’s no ambiguity here.  Just like there’s no secret or ambiguity that North Korea is committing human rights atrocities. The world superpowers know all about these problems, but they let it go on because…even if they didn’t actively create the problem they’ve been complicit long enough to share the blame…just like the general public.

 

11. Police shouldn’t beat up protesters.

When the police beat up protesters then you officially live in a police state. When it’s a crime for people to gather to demand freedom, justice, and representation in government then you live in a police state. When the police shoot a veteran in the head with a tear gas canister and crack his skull and then throw a flash-bang grenade into the group of people trying to rescue him, and nobody gets fired over that incident then you live in a police state. If warrantless wiretaps, x-ray body scanners and full body searches don’t constitute a police state then what line do you have to cross before you concede you’re approaching a police state? Maybe America isn’t a police state, but it’s not the land of the free. But people keep saying it is like if they say it enough times it’ll make it okay to get groped at the airport and have your E-mails read.

 

 

12. There should not be for-profit prisons.

There should not be prisons traded on the stock market. The richer a man can get by filling prisons the faster prisons will fill. We shouldn’t incentivize incarcerating as many people as possible by allowing prisons to exempt their inmates from their basic human rights so they can work in sweatshop conditions. We’ve seen enough movies about prison to know that the guards let the inmates tear each other apart like you’d expect animals in a cage to. They even made that “Scared Straight” program to make sure children understand how unethically human beings are treated in prison. We all know how inhumane prisons are, but we’re not using that knowledge as a call to action to do the right thing.

 

13. Suburbs are a terrible way to design a city.

Major suburban cities are congested, unsustainable, stressful and dangerous. Every single building looks the same, and the same businesses are on every corner. Everything is too far to walk to, and the suburbs are so bland and lifeless you wouldn’t want to look at them if you did have to walk through them. They force us to spend our lives in traffic wasting time and resources traveling. But cities don’t have to suck. We have the technology to build ultra-efficient floating cities for less money than it costs to maintain the broken, unplanned cities we’ve scarred the earth with. If nothing else, we could just stop expanding suburbia and start designing new suburbs more effectively. But we’re not even doing that. 24 hours per day somewhere there is a crane and a tractor clearing the earth to make way for another isolated, unsustainable, boring cookie cutter suburb. And they’ll keep going until there’s no land left. And we’re all watching the train wreck shouting for it to stop while paying our mortgages and rent in the suburbs.

 

14. Everyone who has ever bought a house knows that the housing market is a giant scam.

Mortgages are full of meaningless add-on fees and charges. Interest rates could be set at anything. They’re set high to squeeze more money out of the customer. That’s it. Banks don’t make money unless they’re fucking their customers in the ass. And we let them get away with it because we assume there’s some higher economic reason why it has to be nearly impossible to buy a home. But really it just comes down to “fuck you.” That’s why houses are so expensive, and that’s why homelessness is so common. Again, this isn’t a secret. But it is something you’re children are going to have to learn for themselves because apparently nobody is going to change the way banks fuck their customers in the ass.

 

15. Politicians should have competency and sanity tests.

Anyone familiar with politics at all can name a few examples of politicians who were arguably unqualified to hold office. There’s nothing un-American about competency exams. Everyone’s careers are built on competency and character tests. The people with the most responsibility should be held to the highest level of accountability. Anything less is a recipe for disaster. Everyone wants a better president, and it’s crossed everyone’s mind that maybe if we screen the candidates a little better, then we’ll get a better pool to choose from. If nothing else the voters would be fine with giving politicians drug tests…just like politicians have mandated that soldiers and school janitors have to take drug tests.

 

16. Everyone knows teachers are being used as a scapegoat for society’s failures.

Schools don’t suck because teachers are stupid. School suck because they’re underfunded and the parents have made it illegal for schools to enforce discipline. Every political and religious organization big enough to fill a P.T.A. board or donate to a politician’s election campaign can have their warped ideology forced onto the Department of Education. The one person with the least amount of say or control over the classroom is the teacher. And they’re too busy filling out paperwork for the performance-monitoring companies that are bankrupting the school to build meaningful relationships with their students. Kids in school know this. They know the system is rigged against the teachers. Everybody does, and we know it’s crippling children forever. But the only way it’s going to change is for parents to accept some responsibility for their children’s performance and cede some authority to the school system. Experience has taught me not to expect that level of humility from first world parents.

 

17. People want to be able to listen to any song whenever they want and watch any television show, movie or clip ever created any time they want.

And we have the technology to allow that. We’re just not allowed to use it. If Hollywood won’t give their customers what they want, then their customers will go somewhere else to get it. If Hollywood made one website where anyone could access any song, show or movie anytime and it would work without any hassle then everyone would pay a premium for that luxury. As it stands, you can either go pay a ton of money to a bunch of different services to get random access to media or you can go get it all for free on a pirate site as long as you’re willing to deal with pop-ups and virus threats. Customers don’t pirate because they’re evil. They pirate because it’s a more user-friendly way to access the content they want. Hollywood needs to stop blaming their customers for expecting a better consumer experience. The world is waiting for Hollywood to get its shit together and offer everything it’s got in one place for a flat fee. You can make excuses for why that’s not legally possible, but as long as that excuse continues to prevent customers from getting what they want legally, they’re going to keep paying pirates to host and organize pirated media. We’re all waiting for Hollywood to save itself, but we’re not holding our breath. All we really expect Hollywood to do is bribe more Orwellian-worded spying legislation through Congress.

 

18. Everyone knows Hollywood creates anti-intellectual crap that is lowering humanity’s potential.

“Jersey Shore,” “Full House” and “Saved by the Bell” should never have been on television. Television was supposed to help mankind fulfill its potential, not record it celebrating its suicide. Celebrities are irrelevant. If you buy celebrity gossip magazines at the checkout line you’re retarded. That’s not mean of me to say, because if you buy those magazines, you know you’re an idiot, and you don’t care. But when you look at those magazines in the future look at them as a test. The more of those that get sold the more people there are who are living in the dumbest reality you can create in a Los Angeles basement. The most dangerous force in the world is a large, frightened group of dumb people. The more gossip magazines you see, the higher the apocalypse threat level is.

 

19. Everyone knows their phones and shoes were made in sweatshops.

But if you boycotted every product that was made in a sweatshop you’d die from starvation and exposure. Slavery isn’t the exception in our economy, it’s the premise. So what do you do? Apparently, you just give up thinking about the problem and carry on with your life. We’ve been ignoring the problem for over 10,000 years. Why would we do anything different now?

It’s common knowledge that these problems and their solutions exist. People have been talking about them for years. Maybe if we just talked about them a little more we can actually fix them. If you don’t see any of these problems getting fixed in the coming years though, then that may be a good sign that you should invest in a bunker because we can’t stay this ignorant and apathetic forever without blundering into some kind of avoidable extinction level event.

 

20. It’s past time churches started paying taxes.

Taxes help people. Tax havens attract dishonest people. Taxing churches is a win/win situation for everyone. And why should believing in mythology be rewarded anyway? The tax-free status of religious organizations is archaic and obsolete. Even religious people understand that…even if they won’t admit it.

 

If you enjoyed this post, you’ll also like these:

 

Military Mind Control
Military Philosophy
Police Brutality
America is not the good guy

8 Reasons America Is Not The Land Of The Free

1: Your home is not free

In many cities, it’s illegal to sleep in your car or public spaces. So you’re practically forced to rent or buy a home. It’s becoming harder to find housing in neighborhoods that aren’t deed restricted and/or managed by a home owner’s association, which can fine you and ultimately confiscate your property as punishment for not mowing your lawn, planting trees that are too short, having the wrong kind of vehicle in your driveway, painting your house the wrong color or having a garage sale in your front yard without first paying for permission, etc., etc., etc.

 

 

Local, state and federal laws place further restrictions on what you can and can’t do in your own home. In some states, a deadbeat renter can stop paying and stay in your house rent free until you pay to go through the year-long process of having them evicted, and you can go to jail if you inconvenience them in any way while they squat on your property.

There are so many laws dictating how to buy/sell property that you have to hire a professional realtor to help you navigate the labyrinth of rules. Mortgage and tax laws double the cost of a 30-year mortgage, making it impossible for poor people to afford even the cheapest real estate. The laws that inflate the cost of housing don’t have to exist. The government that keeps saying it’s going to fix the housing market created and enforces those laws.

Even if you buy land in the country, where building laws are laxer, you still have to pay property taxes you never agreed to, or you’ll have your property taken away. So it’s impossible to move off the grid with no money and survive like our pioneer ancestors did.

 

2: Your roads are not free

Traffic laws are necessary evils. Drivers should have to stop at stop signs/lights, but many traffic laws fall into morally gray areas, like why you have to wear a seatbelt in a car (yet it’s legal to ride a motorcycle, which has no seat belt), or follow arbitrary speed limits in the middle of nowhere, park on the side of the road in the direction of traffic in low-traffic suburbs, register your vehicle every year or pay private companies for auto insurance. Probably the most cut and dry example of government overreach is jaywalking laws. If you can’t walk across the road, how free are you really?

Even if these laws are reasonable, the consequences for breaking them aren’t. If you have no savings and make $1,000 per paycheck, a simple speeding ticket can cost 10%-50% of your total net worth. If you’re poor, traffic fines come out of your rent and grocery money. If you’re rich, the cost is inconsequential. This is why some European countries have made traffic fines relative to income, so the rich can feel the same magnitude of consequences as the poor. This will never happen in America, and some people would call that a win for freedom, but I call the system we have now, economic oppression.

You’re almost guaranteed to get a ticket eventually, because law enforcement agencies partly fund their budgets by issuing citations. This motivates them to aggressively hunt and harass drivers. That’s life in America. When you see a police cruiser, you don’t feel safe. Fear and panic jolt down your spine, and you try to act as calm as possible and hope the shark circles away and eats someone else. This fear is completely rational, because everyone knows the cops are preying on the public for funding, and we all know they’re doing an amazing job at it. They shake down the public for $7.5 billion a year. The more money they make, the more tools they can afford to hunt more people with.

 

 

3: Your public spaces are not free.

It’s illegal to sleep, skate, loiter, smoke, or walk your dog in many public spaces. You can also be fined or jailed for public indecency and public intoxication.

I knew a man in Texas who walked home from a bar because he was too drunk to drive and was arrested for public intoxication. I went tubing on the San Marcos River in Texas, and when I reached the exit point, there were three police making everyone pour any alcohol they had left out in the river, and if anyone tried to bring an open container out of the water, they’d be given a ticket. Those police didn’t stop anything bad from happening that day. They just scared and harassed the public as usual.

Some American may say, “Yeah, cops are a hassle, but I don’t want drunk tubers and stoned skaters around me.” The more you justify banning any behavior, the more you justify banning freedom. You can’t go anywhere in America where some kind of behavior isn’t banned. Even if you leave the city and escape to nature in of the America’s national parks, you’ll have to drive past a guard shack where a government employee will charge you money and give you a list of all the rules you have to follow. Then park rangers will check up on you to make sure you’re following all the rules, and they’ll force you to leave when your time runs out.

 

Maury Povich reading a piece of paper with the caption, "You said this land was my land and that it was the land of the free. The fact that you're kicking me out unless I pay more money determined that was a lie."

 

Even though the First Amendment states, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances,” citizens are only allowed to organize a large-scale protest if they apply for a permit, and even then, the times and places you’re allowed to protest are severely limited, and the police will mace, taze, beat and arrest you for exercising your First Amendment right outside the cordoned area assigned to you. Even if you do everything right, you’ll still probably be attacked by the police.

 

i was told i could protest

4: Your workplace is not free

Employers can force employees to wear humiliating uniforms and drastically censor the way they talk and act whether they’re at work or off the clock. Hospitals are fining and firing workers who are caught smoking cigarettes at home. Employers can take their employees’ blood and urine for drug tests. Employment contracts often include clauses that require applicants to waive any number or rights and freedoms.

Citizens who join the military sign a contract that waives all their rights. This is legal because they volunteer, but most troops enlist, not out of patriotism, but out of economic desperation. So America’s economy creates poverty that drives poor people to sign away their rights out of desperation and then go fight to secure an economy that creates poverty and uses that desperation as leverage to get people to “voluntarily” waive the freedoms they’re fighting for. In this way, the military defends poverty and oppression more than it defends freedom. You can say it’s necessary for the troops to sacrifice their freedoms, but don’t say America is the land of the free when 1% of the population isn’t.

Most Americans spend half their waking hours at work. So they spend half their lives in a space where they’re not free. If a foreign government took over America and extended the same restrictions outside the workplace, there would be riots in the streets since that would be a clear violation of human rights.

Many Americans will angrily defend these practices when employers do it, arguing that if you don’t like the terms and conditions of a contract, you’re free to go work somewhere else. This argument loses weight when every business in the country places similar conditions on employment. Being free to choose who takes away your freedom isn’t freedom. In a utopia, the needs of a business wouldn’t trump the dignity of the workers to begin with. It just goes to show how far America has gone down the road to dystopia that we would justify and defend our own oppression. Freedom is so foreign to us that we’re scared and disgusted by the thought of it.

Business owners have a lot to answer for, but they’re also victims themselves. Every step of the process of opening a small business is mired in bureaucratic red tape. The tax laws alone are enough to scare reasonable people into closing their business.

I registered a small business in Texas in 2008. I didn’t make any profit the first quarter and didn’t report it to the government. They sent me a letter saying that since I didn’t report any earnings, they assumed I made enough profit to owe $1,000 in taxes, which they billed me for. They didn’t fine me. They picked an arbitrary number and sentenced me guilty without evidence, which violates the legal principle of “innocent until proven guilty.” They could have just as easily worded it as a fine, but the fact that they went out of their way to frame their actions in a way that violates the Declaration of Human Rights just goes to show how meaningless that document is to the American government.

I paid the fine and closed the business soon after. If my company had been successful I would have eventually had to hire a lawyer and a human resource department to make sure I was in compliance with the thousands of laws I don’t have time to learn. Conservative Americans in particular cry that there are too many regulations strangling businesses, and while don’t believe companies should be able to freely pollute the environment or exploit their employees, every business owner can agree the government has made it soul-crushingly difficult to operate a business.

 

5: Your school is not free

Schools that don’t require uniforms still have some sort of dress code. While it’s good that kids aren’t going to school naked, the rules aren’t always reasonable. At my high school men had to wear a belt, and if they were caught without one, they would be given a piece of rope to tie around their waist. Many schools forbid wearing offensive clothing, which is subject to opinion. Others don’t allow students to wear red or blue clothing because it’s considered gang-related. There are also puritanical limits on how students can talk or act.

Moral policing is even worse in college, where teachers can be fired and students can be expelled for committing microaggressions that offend overly sensitive professional victims. Students and faculty aren’t allowed to speak out against legitimate grievances either. Staging nonviolent protests will likely end with you and your classmates being maced and arrested.

 

 

Teachers have even less freedom to dress, act and express themselves than students. They can lose their job and go to jail for breaking up a fight or defending themselves against a student who is attacking them, and they have little power to fight for more rights since it’s illegal for teachers to unionize in some states.

Some people might say the freedoms you lose in school are negligible, and that nitpicking them is just being whiny. This raises the question, how “big” does a freedom have to be before it’s important enough that it shouldn’t be taken away? Maybe Americans are so lackadaisical about their freedoms being taken away because they’ve been trained to get used to it at school.

 

6: Your electronic devices are not free

The American government spends billions of taxpayer dollars on top-secret surveillance technology that taxpayers aren’t allowed to know about, and if a government employee leaks this information, they’ll be labeled a traitor and face life imprisonment or execution.

Congress keeps telling Americans that their surveillance programs are well-meaning and limited in scope, but the public has to take that on faith and has no power to stop it. While citizens theoretically have the freedom of speech (when they’re not at work), the government has the freedom to sneak into almost any communication device to find out what you’re saying and who you’re saying it to. They also have broad powers to label anyone a terrorist, even peaceful political activists.  So Americans only have the freedom of speech until it becomes inconvenient for the existing power structure. Then they have the right to remain silent.

 

7: Your finances are not free

Even if you were free to dress, talk and act however you want, whenever you want, your freedom still only extends as far as your bank account. Nothing is free in America, and everything costs as much as possible. If you make minimum wage, which is less than the living wage, the cost of living necessitates you work at least 40 hours per week just to survive. Even then, your quality of life will be inhumane. You won’t be able to afford to travel, take time off (even when you’re sick or pregnant), change jobs, go to school, or go pretty much anywhere except to work and back home. You’re functionally under house arrest. While the government didn’t officially impose this sentence on you, they did meticulously craft the conditions that led to it.

If you have enough money to hire a lawyer and pay bail, you’re functionally free to break most laws. If you’re poor, you’re easy prey for the prison-industrial complex. Even if you obey the law, earn enough to save and have disposable income, your options in life are still limited to how much money you have, and every dollar you spend limits those choices. Since health insurance laws have made health care in America more expensive than anywhere else on Earth, the freedom money affords you will only last as long as your health. This guarantees that on a long enough time scale you’ll go bankrupt. Even after you’re too old to work, you’ll still have to answer to the hordes of bill collectors that have been hunting you since you were born.

 

8: Your county, state, and nation are not free

Police will tell you that “ignorance of the law” is no excuse for breaking the law, but there are literally too many laws for anyone to learn. It’s nearly impossible to figure out how many jurisdictions you fall under or how many agencies are responsible for policing you, especially since there are top secret security agencies you’re not allowed to know about. Given the ubiquitous presence of laws and law enforcement agencies, it should come as no surprise that America has more people in jail/prison than any other nation in the world. One out of every one hundred adults, and one out of three African Americans, are behind bars. If that isn’t evidence that America isn’t “the land of the free,” then how much worse does it have to get before it’s undeniable that there’s a problem?

There are millions of patriotic Americans who refuse to acknowledge America’s oppressive nature, and will tell any native who doubts their freedom, “If you don’t like it, then leave.” But unless you have a college degree, $10K and are in excellent health, you’re not fee to permanently leave. You can justify the glass ceiling of immigration requirements by saying, “Other countries have the right to decide who they want to let in their borders,” but that argument loses weight when every government has colluded to place similar limitation on travel. The fact that all the governments in the world have conspired to trap their taxpayers within their borders, doesn’t make it right.

Given all the examples cited here, let alone all the thousands that aren’t, it’s delusional to assert that America is “the land of the free.” Without being hyperbolic, it would be closer to the truth to call America a police state. It would require fundamental changes in the American system to turn it into a country worthy of the title “land of the free.” It’s going to take a lot of dialogue and cooperation to do that, but the healing process can’t begin until Americans collectively acknowledge their dystopian lack of freedom.

Please leave a comment if you have any other examples or stories of how Americans aren’t free.

 

If you enjoyed this post, you’ll also like these:

 

Military Mind Control
Military Philosophy
Police Brutality
America is not the good guy

What Are Transexuals? Why Are They Suddenly Popular? Why Do Conservatives Fear Them?

Sexual norms have been changing rapidly in America over the past few decades. In a country that used to have laws against sodomy, homosexuality has become so accepted that gays have been granted the right to marry and serve openly in the military. As shocking as this was to conservative Americans, they’re now having to cope with the fact that transsexuals are being accepted as mainstream celebrities, and the federal government is defending their choice to use bathrooms that match their gender identity.

Some Americans view this sexual revolution as a sign of progress. Others view it as a sign of the apocalypse and predict God is going to burn down America like He did Sodom and Gomorra as punishment for becoming such a perverse society. Others believe sexual tolerance is a liberal conspiracy to erase conservative culture in order to eliminate conservatives as a political opponent. Most Americans aren’t that dramatic or articulate about why they’re unaccepting of transsexuals. If you ask them their opinion, they may say something like this:

“I just don’t get why someone would want to chop their dick off.”

“How is chopping your dick off, not a sign of mental illness?”

“God made us how we’re supposed to be. You can’t change that.”

“If these people are so miserable with who they are, why don’t they just kill themselves?”

“Anyone who wants to dress up like the opposite sex is just a pervert. Plain and simple.”

“A lot of these people saying they identify as another gender just want attention. They’re just doing it because it’s popular.”

America is confused by transsexuals, but the explanation is actually quite simple. It’s just not something conservatives want to hear. Gender is determined by genetics, not by a decision you make. Gender identity isn’t a moral or philosophical question. It has everything to do with DNA and chromosomes. This isn’t a conspiracy. Nobody made up or reverse engineered the evidence for this conclusion. Impartial scientists tweezed apart the building blocks of the human body and reported the facts they found, and anyone can repeat the same experiments and find the same evidence that supports the same conclusions.

Everyone’s DNA is a little different by nature, and everyone has unintended genetic anomalies. Sex chromosomes aren’t black and white. We all fall in a grey spectrum. At the far end of the spectrum, some people are born with the genes of one sex but the body of the other. They have the wrong operating system for the hardware they’re using.

 

 

Transsexuals didn’t ask to be born the way they are, and they don’t like being trapped in the wrong body. Coming to terms with having a mismatched mind and body (let alone living in a society that won’t accept them) is so agonizing that almost half of all transsexuals will attempt suicide at some point in their life. The decision to alter their bodies isn’t something they do flippantly.

Granted, some people with normal chromosomes may choose to identify as the opposite sex because of events that happened to them in childhood or personal preference. Even if sexuality isn’t biological, and it’s only a choice for everyone… people should still have the freedom to do what they want.  Freedom isn’t supposed to be comfortable for anyone other than the individual exercising their freedom.

America has always had its own transgender members. If conservatives didn’t notice, that’s because they ignored, dismissed and oppressed them into oblivion. Conservatives aren’t facing a new enemy. They’re seeing their family for the first time.

There have always been transgender people in every country in the world. Historically, most cultures have treated their transgender members like outcasts. In India and Hawaii, they belonged to the lowest caste, but at least those societies acknowledged the existence of the third gender and incorporated them into the culture.

 

 

Christians are having a hard time accepting their transgender kin because the Bible never mentions DNA, genes, chromosomes or the third gender, but it says in black and white that homosexuality is a sin, and transsexuals are close enough to homosexuals to lump them together.

In Christianity, sin is a matter of life and death. So to Christians, it’s a matter of life and death that everyone acts Christian. From one point of view, taking away other people’s freedom to sin is saving their life. From another Christian perspective, sinners made a decision to turn from God, and the path they’ve chosen leads straight to Hell. Accepting sinners is accepting evil, and officially granting them the legal freedom to sin is tantamount to electing Satan for president.

It should seem suspicious that Christians are so invested in oppressing homosexuals and transsexuals for not living Biblically since Christians have been abandoning the teachings of the Bible since it was written. As clearly as the Torah states homosexuality is wrong, it also states homosexuals should be killed. Polygamy and slavery should be legal. It’s immoral to eat shellfish, wear clothes with mixed fibers, get tattoos, pull your penis out of your wife when you ejaculate, have a wet dream or go to church if your testicles are mutilated. It also says in black and white that you should kill adulterers, disobedient children, witches, and anyone who stands in the way of the Jewish theocracy.

Modern, American Christians don’t believe in these laws or follow them. While Baby Boomers are still deluding themselves into believing they’re Christian, Millennials are not. The world has already woken up from history and is moving on past Christian mythology. When the Baby Boomers die, the era of Christianity will be over. There will still be Christians, but they’ll be an irrelevant, impotent shadow of what they once were. Eventually, they’ll fade away into the history books.

 

 

In the meantime, Christians are left watching in horror and confusion as their culture disappears. Their fear of America becoming a secular nation is validated every time the government passes laws that give homosexuals and transsexuals equal rights. When the government sides against Christianity, it officially declares Christians have lost the culture war. These rulings are nails in Christianity’s coffin.

It’s natural that Christians are frightened by Post-Biblical America and are frustrated with being pushed to the sidelines. It’s to be expected that they would lash out. No matter how many homosexuals and transgender people they harass, it won’t bring Christianity back. Violence and hatred were never going to solve anything anyway.

Now is not the time for hatred. Now is the time for everyone to pause, take a deep breath, and humbly consider the possibility their religion might be mythology. You owe it to yourself to do a few Google searches challenging whatever ideas you refuse to question. If your beliefs stand the most rigorous test of truth, you’ll just strengthen your faith. If you discover mountains of evidence that you’re wrong, you could free yourself from a lifetime of misguidance.

Christians who can’t let go of their modernized, watered-down version of Israel’s ancient mythology will just have to find some way to cope with the fact that transgender people are here to stay because there aren’t enough haters left to successfully oppress them.

When the federal government puts the next coffin nail in Christianity, and Christian anger flares up again, I urge Christians to pause, take another deep breath and ask yourself if you should really be angry that the world won’t accept your prejudices. Maybe you’re not the victim. Maybe you’re on the wrong side of history. You don’t want to be the bad guy. You owe it to yourself to question the beliefs that led you to screaming at people in bathrooms.

 

If you enjoyed this post, you’ll also like these:

 

Sex positions and techniques
General Sex Advice
Dating Advice
Relationship Advice
Philosophy of Sexuality
Friendship
My Tweets About Romance

Passages In The Bible Containing The Word: SEX

This is a list of passages in the Bible containing the word, “sex.” When you read these, ask yourself how many of them sound perfectly wise, like some God would write, and how many sound more like a bunch of primitive tribesmen projecting their customs, values, and goals into an apparently barbaric ancient mythology. The Jewish culture didn’t just slightly influence the teachings in The Bible. It’s the manifesto of Jewish culture, and taken on a whole, it paints a clear picture of a tribal theocracy using violence to subdue its citizens and neighbors.

I challenge you to look up the context of these quotes on Bible Gateway.com or listen to the full chapters on YouTube. In most cases, you’ll either find a longer trainwreck of barbarism or at least more inapplicable, culturally-relative values, customs, and beliefs.

The number of absurd verses in the Bible point to the fact that, on a whole, by anybody’s standards, it’s not divine. Put yourself to the test. The Skeptic’s Annotated Bible made a list of every commandment in the Bible, titled “Every Jot And Tittle.” If you go through them and check which ones you agree with and practice, you’re going to pass over more than you tick. Nobody follows the majority of the Bible’s teachings because most of it is either immoral or archaic.

You may find some passages in the list below that sound positive and teach useful information, but you’ll find more that contradict the good ones. The Bible gets more wrong than it gets right, and you shouldn’t revere a broken clock for stating the obvious twice a day.

 

Genesis 19:5 They called to Lot, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us so that we can have SEX with them.”

 

Exodus 19:15 Then he said to the people, “Prepare yourselves for the third day. Abstain from SEXUAL relations.”

 

Exodus 22:19 “Anyone who has SEXUAL relations with an animal is to be put to death.

 

Leviticus 15:18 When a man has SEXUAL relations with a woman and there is an emission of semen, both of them must bathe with water, and they will be unclean till evening.

 

Leviticus 15:24 “‘If a man has SEXUAL relations with her and her monthly flow touches him, he will be unclean for seven days; any bed he lies on will be unclean.

 

Leviticus 15:33 for a woman in her monthly period, for a man or a woman with a discharge, and for a man who has SEXUAL relations with a woman who is ceremonially unclean.

 

Leviticus 18:6 “‘No one is to approach any close relative to have SEXUAL relations. I am the Lord.

 

Leviticus 18:7 “‘Do not dishonor your father by having SEXUAL relations with your mother. She is your mother; do not have relations with her.

 

Leviticus 18:8 “‘Do not have SEXUAL relations with your father’s wife; that would dishonor your father.

 

Leviticus 18:9 “‘Do not have SEXUAL relations with your sister, either your father’s daughter or your mother’s daughter, whether she was born in the same home or elsewhere.

 

Leviticus 18:10 “‘Do not have SEXUAL relations with your son’s daughter or your daughter’s daughter; that would dishonor you.

 

Leviticus 18:11 “‘Do not have SEXUAL relations with the daughter of your father’s wife, born to your father; she is your sister.

 

Leviticus 18:12 “‘Do not have SEXUAL relations with your father’s sister; she is your father’s close relative.

 

Leviticus 18:13 “‘Do not have SEXUAL relations with your mother’s sister, because she is your mother’s close relative.

 

Leviticus 18:14 “‘Do not dishonor your father’s brother by approaching his wife to have SEXUAL relations; she is your aunt.

 

Leviticus 18:15 “‘Do not have SEXUAL relations with your daughter-in-law. She is your son’s wife; do not have relations with her.

 

Leviticus 18:16 “‘Do not have SEXUAL relations with your brother’s wife; that would dishonor your brother.

 

Leviticus 18:17 “‘Do not have SEXUAL relations with both a woman and her daughter. Do not have SEXUAL relations with either her son’s daughter or her daughter’s daughter; they are her close relatives. That is wickedness.

 

Leviticus 18:18 “‘Do not take your wife’s sister as a rival wife and have SEXUAL relations with her while your wife is living.

 

Leviticus 18:19 “‘Do not approach a woman to have SEXUAL relations during the uncleanness of her monthly period.

 

Leviticus 18:20 “‘Do not have SEXUAL relations with your neighbor’s wife and defile yourself with her.

 

Leviticus 18:22 “‘Do not have SEXUAL relations with a man as one does with a woman; that is detestable.

 

Leviticus 18:23 “‘Do not have SEXUAL relations with an animal and defile yourself with it. A woman must not present herself to an animal to have SEXUAL relations with it; that is a perversion.

 

Leviticus 20:11 “‘If a man has SEXUAL relations with his father’s wife, he has dishonored his father. Both the man and the woman are to be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.

 

Leviticus 20:12 “‘If a man has SEXUAL relations with his daughter-in-law, both of them are to be put to death. What they have done is a perversion; their blood will be on their own heads.

 

Leviticus 20:13 “‘If a man has SEXUAL relations with a man as one does with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They are to be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.

 

Leviticus 20:15 “‘If a man has SEXUAL relations with an animal, he is to be put to death, and you must kill the animal.

 

Leviticus 20:16 “‘If a woman approaches an animal to have SEXUAL relations with it, kill both the woman and the animal. They are to be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads.

 

Leviticus 20:17 “‘If a man marries his sister, the daughter of either his father or his mother, and they have SEXUAL relations, it is a disgrace. They are to be publicly removed from their people. He has dishonored his sister and will be held responsible.

 

Leviticus 20:18 “‘If a man has SEXUAL relations with a woman during her monthly period, he has exposed the source of her flow, and she has also uncovered it. Both of them are to be cut off from their people.

 

Leviticus 20:19 “‘Do not have SEXUAL relations with the sister of either your mother or your father, for that would dishonor a close relative; both of you would be held responsible.

 

Leviticus 20:20 “‘If a man has SEXUAL relations with his aunt, he has dishonored his uncle. They will be held responsible; they will die childless.

 

Numbers 5:13 so that another man has SEXUAL relations with her, and this is hidden from her husband and her impurity is undetected (since there is no witness against her and she has not been caught in the act),

 

Numbers 5:19 Then the priest shall put the woman under oath and say to her, “If no other man has had SEXUAL relations with you and you have not gone astray and become impure while married to your husband, may this bitter water that brings a curse not harm you.

 

Numbers 5:20 But if you have gone astray while married to your husband and you have made yourself impure by having SEXUAL relations with a man other than your husband”—

 

Numbers 25:1 [ Moab Seduces Israel ] While Israel was staying in Shittim, the men began to indulge in SEXUAL immorality with Moabite women,

 

Deuteronomy 27:21 “Cursed is anyone who has SEXUAL relations with any animal.” Then all the people shall say, “Amen!”

 

Judges 19:22 While they were enjoying themselves, some of the wicked men of the city surrounded the house. Pounding on the door, they shouted to the old man who owned the house, “Bring out the man who came to your house so we can have SEX with him.”

 

2 Samuel 20:3 When David returned to his palace in Jerusalem, he took the ten concubines he had left to take care of the palace and put them in a house under guard. He provided for them but had no SEXUAL relations with them. They were kept in confinement till the day of their death, living as widows.

 

1 Kings 1:4 The woman was very beautiful; she took care of the king and waited on him, but the king had no SEXUAL relations with her.

 

Ezekiel 18:6 He does not eat at the mountain shrines or look to the idols of Israel. He does not defile his neighbor’s wife or have SEXUAL relations with a woman during her period.

 

Matthew 5:32 But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for SEXUAL immorality, makes her the victim of adultery, and anyone who marries a divorced woman commits adultery.

 

Matthew 15:19 For out of the heart come evil thoughts—murder, adultery, SEXUAL immorality, theft, false testimony, slander.

 

Matthew 19:9 I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for SEXUAL immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery.”

 

Mark 7:21 For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, that evil thoughts come—SEXUAL immorality, theft, murder,

 

Acts 15:20 Instead we should write to them, telling them to abstain from food polluted by idols, from SEXUAL immorality, from the meat of strangled animals and from blood.

 

Acts 15:29 You are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from SEXUAL immorality. You will do well to avoid these things. Farewell.

 

Acts 21:25 As for the Gentile believers, we have written to them our decision that they should abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from SEXUAL immorality.”

 

Romans 1:24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to SEXUAL impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another.

 

Romans 1:26 Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural SEXUAL relations for unnatural ones.

 

Romans 7:3 So then, if she has SEXUAL relations with another man while her husband is still alive, she is called an adulteress. But if her husband dies, she is released from that law and is not an adulteress if she marries another man.

 

Romans 13:13 Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in SEXUAL immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy.

 

1 Corinthians 5:1 [ Dealing With a Case of Incest ] It is actually reported that there is SEXUAL immorality among you, and of a kind that even pagans do not tolerate: A man is sleeping with his father’s wife.

 

1 Corinthians 5:9 I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with SEXUALLY immoral people—

 

1 Corinthians 5:11 But now I am writing to you that you must not associate with anyone who claims to be a brother or sister but is SEXUALLY immoral or greedy, an idolater or slanderer, a drunkard or swindler. Do not even eat with such people.

 

1 Corinthians 6:9 Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the SEXUALLY immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have SEX with men

 

1 Corinthians 6:12 [ SEXUAL Immorality ] “I have the right to do anything,” you say—but not everything is beneficial. “I have the right to do anything”—but I will not be mastered by anything.

 

1 Corinthians 6:13 You say, “Food for the stomach and the stomach for food, and God will destroy them both.” The body, however, is not meant for SEXUAL immorality but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body.

 

1 Corinthians 6:18 Flee from SEXUAL immorality. All other sins a person commits are outside the body, but whoever sins SEXUALLY, sins against their own body.

 

1 Corinthians 7:1 [ Concerning Married Life ] Now for the matters you wrote about: “It is good for a man not to have SEXUAL relations with a woman.”

 

1 Corinthians 7:2 But since SEXUAL immorality is occurring, each man should have SEXUAL relations with his own wife, and each woman with her own husband.

 

1 Corinthians 10:8 We should not commit SEXUAL immorality, as some of them did—and in one day twenty-three thousand of them died.

 

2 Corinthians 12:21 I am afraid that when I come again my God will humble me before you, and I will be grieved over many who have sinned earlier and have not repented of the impurity, SEXUAL sin and debauchery in which they have indulged.

 

Galatians 5:19 The acts of the flesh are obvious: SEXUAL immorality, impurity and debauchery;

 

Ephesians 5:3 But among you there must not be even a hint of SEXUAL immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of greed, because these are improper for God’s holy people.

 

Colossians 3:5 Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: SEXUAL immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry.

 

1 Thessalonians 4:3 It is God’s will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid SEXUAL immorality;

 

1 Timothy 1:10 for the SEXUALLY immoral, for those practicing HOMOSEXUALITY, for slave traders and liars and perjurers—and for whatever else is contrary to the sound doctrine

 

Hebrews 12:16 See that no one is SEXUALLY immoral, or is godless like Esau, who for a single meal sold his inheritance rights as the oldest son.

 

Hebrews 13:4 Marriage should be honored by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the SEXUALLY immoral.

 

Jude 1:7 In a similar way, Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding towns gave themselves up to SEXUAL immorality and perversion. They serve as an example of those who suffer the punishment of eternal fire.

 

Revelation 2:14 Nevertheless, I have a few things against you: There are some among you who hold to the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to entice the Israelites to sin so that they ate food sacrificed to idols and committed SEXUAL immorality.

 

Revelation 2:20 Nevertheless, I have this against you: You tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophet. By her teaching she misleads my servants into SEXUAL immorality and the eating of food sacrificed to idols.

 

Revelation 9:21 Nor did they repent of their murders, their magic arts, their SEXUAL immorality or their thefts.

 

Revelation 21:8 But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the SEXUALLY immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars—they will be consigned to the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death.”

 

Revelation 22:15 Outside are the dogs, those who practice magic arts, the SEXUALLY immoral, the murderers, the idolaters and everyone who loves and practices falsehood.

 

If you thought this list was crazy, check out these:

The Wise Sloth Annotated Bible

Passages In The Bible Containing The Word: PROSTITUTE

This is a list of passages in the Bible containing the word, “prostitute.” When you read these, ask yourself how many of them sound perfectly wise, like some God would write, and how many sound more like a bunch of primitive tribesmen projecting their customs, values, and goals into an apparently barbaric ancient mythology. The Jewish culture didn’t just slightly influence the teachings in The Bible. It’s the manifesto of Jewish culture, and taken on a whole, it paints a clear picture of a tribal theocracy using violence to subdue its citizens and neighbors.

I challenge you to look up the context of these quotes on Bible Gateway.com or listen to the full chapters on YouTube. In most cases, you’ll either find a longer trainwreck of barbarism or at least more inapplicable, culturally-relative values, customs, and beliefs.

The number of absurd verses in the Bible point to the fact that, on a whole, by anybody’s standards, it’s not divine. Put yourself to the test. The Skeptic’s Annotated Bible made a list of every commandment in the Bible, titled “Every Jot And Tittle.” If you go through them and check which ones you agree with and practice, you’re going to pass over more than you tick. Nobody follows the majority of the Bible’s teachings because most of it is either immoral or archaic.

You may find some passages in the list below that sound positive and teach useful information, but you’ll find more that contradict the good ones. The Bible gets more wrong than it gets right, and you shouldn’t revere a broken clock for stating the obvious twice a day.

 

Genesis 34:31 But they replied, “Should he have treated our sister like a PROSTITUTE?”

 

Genesis 38:15 When Judah saw her, he thought she was a PROSTITUTE, for she had covered her face.

 

Genesis 38:21 He asked the men who lived there, “Where is the shrine PROSTITUTE who was beside the road at Enaim?” “There hasn’t been any shrine PROSTITUTE here,” they said.

 

Genesis 38:22 So he went back to Judah and said, “I didn’t find her. Besides, the men who lived there said, ‘There hasn’t been any shrine PROSTITUTE here.’”

 

Exodus 34:15 “Be careful not to make a treaty with those who live in the land; for when they PROSTITUTE themselves to their gods and sacrifice to them, they will invite you and you will eat their sacrifices.

 

Exodus 34:16 And when you choose some of their daughters as wives for your sons and those daughters PROSTITUTE themselves to their gods, they will lead your sons to do the same.

 

Leviticus 17:7 They must no longer offer any of their sacrifices to the goat idols to whom they PROSTITUTE themselves. This is to be a lasting ordinance for them and for the generations to come.’

 

Leviticus 19:29 “‘Do not degrade your daughter by making her a PROSTITUTE, or the land will turn to PROSTITUTION and be filled with wickedness.

 

Leviticus 20:6 “‘I will set my face against anyone who turns to mediums and spiritists to PROSTITUTE themselves by following them, and I will cut them off from their people.

 

Leviticus 21:9 “‘If a priest’s daughter defiles herself by becoming a PROSTITUTE, she disgraces her father; she must be burned in the fire.

 

Numbers 15:39 You will have these tassels to look at and so you will remember all the commands of the Lord, that you may obey them and not PROSTITUTE yourselves by chasing after the lusts of your own hearts and eyes.

 

Deuteronomy 23:17 No Israelite man or woman is to become a shrine PROSTITUTE.

 

Deuteronomy 23:18 You must not bring the earnings of a female PROSTITUTE or of a male PROSTITUTE into the house of the Lord your God to pay any vow, because the Lord your God detests them both.

 

Deuteronomy 31:16 And the Lord said to Moses: “You are going to rest with your ancestors, and these people will soon PROSTITUTE themselves to the foreign gods of the land they are entering. They will forsake me and break the covenant I made with them.

 

Joshua 2:1 [ Rahab and the Spies ] Then Joshua son of Nun secretly sent two spies from Shittim. “Go, look over the land,” he said, “especially Jericho.” So they went and entered the house of a PROSTITUTE named Rahab and stayed there.

 

Joshua 6:17 The city and all that is in it are to be devoted to the Lord. Only Rahab the PROSTITUTE and all who are with her in her house shall be spared, because she hid the spies we sent.

 

Joshua 6:22 Joshua said to the two men who had spied out the land, “Go into the PROSTITUTE’s house and bring her out and all who belong to her, in accordance with your oath to her.”

 

Joshua 6:25 But Joshua spared Rahab the PROSTITUTE, with her family and all who belonged to her, because she hid the men Joshua had sent as spies to Jericho—and she lives among the Israelites to this day.

 

Judges 2:17 Yet they would not listen to their judges but PROSTITUTED themselves to other gods and worshiped them. They quickly turned from the ways of their ancestors, who had been obedient to the Lord’s commands.

 

Judges 8:27 Gideon made the gold into an ephod, which he placed in Ophrah, his town. All Israel PROSTITUTED themselves by worshiping it there, and it became a snare to Gideon and his family.

 

Judges 8:33 No sooner had Gideon died than the Israelites again PROSTITUTED themselves to the Baals. They set up Baal-Berith as their god

 

Judges 11:1 Jephthah the Gileadite was a mighty warrior. His father was Gilead; his mother was a PROSTITUTE.

 

Judges 16:1 [ Samson and Delilah ] One day Samson went to Gaza, where he saw a PROSTITUTE. He went in to spend the night with her.

 

1 Kings 3:16 [ A Wise Ruling ] Now two PROSTITUTES came to the king and stood before him.

 

1 Kings 14:24 There were even male shrine PROSTITUTES in the land; the people engaged in all the detestable practices of the nations the Lord had driven out before the Israelites.

 

1 Kings 15:12 He expelled the male shrine PROSTITUTES from the land and got rid of all the idols his ancestors had made.

 

1 Kings 22:38 They washed the chariot at a pool in Samaria (where the PROSTITUTES bathed), and the dogs licked up his blood, as the word of the Lord had declared.

 

1 Kings 22:46 He rid the land of the rest of the male shrine PROSTITUTES who remained there even after the reign of his father Asa.

 

2 Kings 23:7 He also tore down the quarters of the male shrine PROSTITUTES that were in the temple of the Lord, the quarters where women did weaving for Asherah.

 

1 Chronicles 5:25 But they were unfaithful to the God of their ancestors and PROSTITUTED themselves to the gods of the peoples of the land, whom God had destroyed before them.

 

2 Chronicles 21:11 He had also built high places on the hills of Judah and had caused the people of Jerusalem to PROSTITUTE themselves and had led Judah astray.

 

2 Chronicles 21:13 But you have followed the ways of the kings of Israel, and you have led Judah and the people of Jerusalem to PROSTITUTE themselves, just as the house of Ahab did. You have also murdered your own brothers, members of your own family, men who were better than you.

 

Job 36:14 They die in their youth, among male PROSTITUTES of the shrines.

 

Psalm 106:39 They defiled themselves by what they did; by their deeds they PROSTITUTED themselves.

 

Proverbs 6:26 For a PROSTITUTE can be had for a loaf of bread, but another man’s wife preys on your very life.

 

Proverbs 7:10 Then out came a woman to meet him, dressed like a PROSTITUTE and with crafty intent.

 

Proverbs 29:3 A man who loves wisdom brings joy to his father, but a companion of PROSTITUTES squanders his wealth.

 

Isaiah 1:21 See how the faithful city has become a PROSTITUTE! She once was full of justice; righteousness used to dwell in her— but now murderers!

 

Isaiah 23:15 At that time Tyre will be forgotten for seventy years, the span of a king’s life. But at the end of these seventy years, it will happen to Tyre as in the song of the PROSTITUTE:

 

Isaiah 23:16 “Take up a harp, walk through the city, you forgotten PROSTITUTE; play the harp well, sing many a song, so that you will be remembered.”

 

Isaiah 57:3 “But you—come here, you children of a sorceress, you offspring of adulterers and PROSTITUTES!

 

Jeremiah 2:20 “Long ago you broke off your yoke and tore off your bonds; you said, ‘I will not serve you!’ Indeed, on every high hill and under every spreading tree you lay down as a PROSTITUTE.

 

Jeremiah 3:1 “If a man divorces his wife and she leaves him and marries another man, should he return to her again? Would not the land be completely defiled? But you have lived as a PROSTITUTE with many lovers— would you now return to me?” declares the Lord.

 

Jeremiah 3:3 Therefore the showers have been withheld, and no spring rains have fallen. Yet you have the brazen look of a PROSTITUTE; you refuse to blush with shame.

 

Jeremiah 5:7 “Why should I forgive you? Your children have forsaken me and sworn by gods that are not gods. I supplied all their needs, yet they committed adultery and thronged to the houses of PROSTITUTES.

 

Ezekiel 16:15 “‘But you trusted in your beauty and used your fame to become a PROSTITUTE. You lavished your favors on anyone who passed by and your beauty became his.

 

Ezekiel 16:30 “‘I am filled with fury against you, declares the Sovereign Lord, when you do all these things, acting like a brazen PROSTITUTE!

 

Ezekiel 16:31 When you built your mounds at every street corner and made your lofty shrines in every public square, you were unlike a PROSTITUTE, because you scorned payment.

 

Ezekiel 16:33 All PROSTITUTES receive gifts, but you give gifts to all your lovers, bribing them to come to you from everywhere for your illicit favors.

 

Ezekiel 16:35 “‘Therefore, you PROSTITUTE, hear the word of the Lord!

 

Ezekiel 23:3 They became PROSTITUTES in Egypt, engaging in PROSTITUTION from their youth. In that land their breasts were fondled and their virgin bosoms caressed.

 

Ezekiel 23:7 She gave herself as a PROSTITUTE to all the elite of the Assyrians and defiled herself with all the idols of everyone she lusted after.

 

Ezekiel 23:19 Yet she became more and more promiscuous as she recalled the days of her youth, when she was a PROSTITUTE in Egypt.

 

Ezekiel 23:43 Then I said about the one worn out by adultery, ‘Now let them use her as a PROSTITUTE, for that is all she is.’

 

Ezekiel 23:44 And they slept with her. As men sleep with a PROSTITUTE, so they slept with those lewd women, Oholah and Oholibah.

 

Hosea 3:3 Then I told her, “You are to live with me many days; you must not be a PROSTITUTE or be intimate with any man, and I will behave the same way toward you.”

 

Hosea 4:14 “I will not punish your daughters when they turn to PROSTITUTION, nor your daughters-in-law when they commit adultery, because the men themselves consort with harlots and sacrifice with shrine PROSTITUTES— a people without understanding will come to ruin!

 

Hosea 9:1 [ Punishment for Israel ] Do not rejoice, Israel; do not be jubilant like the other nations. For you have been unfaithful to your God; you love the wages of a PROSTITUTE at every threshing floor.

 

Joel 3:3 They cast lots for my people and traded boys for PROSTITUTES; they sold girls for wine to drink.

 

Amos 7:17 “Therefore this is what the Lord says: “‘Your wife will become a PROSTITUTE in the city, and your sons and daughters will fall by the sword. Your land will be measured and divided up, and you yourself will die in a pagan country. And Israel will surely go into exile, away from their native land.’”

 

Micah 1:7 All her idols will be broken to pieces; all her temple gifts will be burned with fire; I will destroy all her images. Since she gathered her gifts from the wages of PROSTITUTES, as the wages of PROSTITUTES they will again be used.”

 

Nahum 3:4 all because of the wanton lust of a PROSTITUTE, alluring, the mistress of sorceries, who enslaved nations by her PROSTITUTION and peoples by her witchcraft.

 

Matthew 21:31 “Which of the two did what his father wanted?” “The first,” they answered. Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the PROSTITUTES are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you.

 

Matthew 21:32 For John came to you to show you the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the PROSTITUTES did. And even after you saw this, you did not repent and believe him.

 

Luke 15:30 But when this son of yours who has squandered your property with PROSTITUTES comes home, you kill the fattened calf for him!’

 

1 Corinthians 6:15 Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ himself? Shall I then take the members of Christ and unite them with a PROSTITUTE? Never!

 

1 Corinthians 6:16 Do you not know that he who unites himself with a PROSTITUTE is one with her in body? For it is said, “The two will become one flesh.”

 

Hebrews 11:31 By faith the PROSTITUTE Rahab, because she welcomed the spies, was not killed with those who were disobedient.

 

James 2:25 In the same way, was not even Rahab the PROSTITUTE considered righteous for what she did when she gave lodging to the spies and sent them off in a different direction?

 

Revelation 17:1 [ Babylon, the PROSTITUTE on the Beast ] One of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and said to me, “Come, I will show you the punishment of the great PROSTITUTE, who sits by many waters.

 

Revelation 17:5 The name written on her forehead was a mystery: babylon the great the mother of PROSTITUTES and of the abominations of the earth.

 

Revelation 17:15 Then the angel said to me, “The waters you saw, where the PROSTITUTE sits, are peoples, multitudes, nations and languages.

 

Revelation 17:16 The beast and the ten horns you saw will hate the PROSTITUTE. They will bring her to ruin and leave her naked; they will eat her flesh and burn her with fire.

 

Revelation 19:2 for true and just are his judgments. He has condemned the great PROSTITUTE who corrupted the earth by her adulteries. He has avenged on her the blood of his servants.”

 

If you thought this list was crazy, check out these:

The Wise Sloth Annotated Bible

Passages In The Bible Containing The Word: PLUNDER

This is a list of passages in the Bible containing the word, “plunder.” When you read these, ask yourself how many of them sound perfectly wise, like some God would write, and how many sound more like a bunch of primitive tribesmen projecting their customs, values, and goals into an apparently barbaric ancient mythology. The Jewish culture didn’t just slightly influence the teachings in The Bible. It’s the manifesto of Jewish culture, and taken on a whole, it paints a clear picture of a tribal theocracy using violence to subdue its citizens and neighbors.

I challenge you to look up the context of these quotes on Bible Gateway.com or listen to the full chapters on YouTube. In most cases, you’ll either find a longer trainwreck of barbarism or at least more inapplicable, culturally-relative values, customs, and beliefs.

The number of absurd verses in the Bible point to the fact that, on a whole, by anybody’s standards, it’s not divine. Put yourself to the test. The Skeptic’s Annotated Bible made a list of every commandment in the Bible, titled “Every Jot And Tittle.” If you go through them and check which ones you agree with and practice, you’re going to pass over more than you tick. Nobody follows the majority of the Bible’s teachings because most of it is either immoral or archaic.

You may find some passages in the list below that sound positive and teach useful information, but you’ll find more that contradict the good ones. The Bible gets more wrong than it gets right, and you shouldn’t revere a broken clock for stating the obvious twice a day.

 

Genesis 34:29 They carried off all their wealth and all their women and children, taking as PLUNDER everything in the houses.

 

Genesis 49:27 “Benjamin is a ravenous wolf; in the morning he devours the prey, in the evening he divides the PLUNDER.”

 

Exodus 3:22 Every woman is to ask her neighbor and any woman living in her house for articles of silver and gold and for clothing, which you will put on your sons and daughters. And so you will PLUNDER the Egyptians.”

 

Exodus 12:36 The Lord had made the Egyptians favorably disposed toward the people, and they gave them what they asked for; so they PLUNDERED the Egyptians.

 

Numbers 14:3 Why is the Lord bringing us to this land only to let us fall by the sword? Our wives and children will be taken as PLUNDER. Wouldn’t it be better for us to go back to Egypt?”

 

Numbers 14:31 As for your children that you said would be taken as PLUNDER, I will bring them in to enjoy the land you have rejected.

 

Numbers 31:9 The Israelites captured the Midianite women and children and took all the Midianite herds, flocks and goods as PLUNDER.

 

Numbers 31:11 They took all the PLUNDER and spoils, including the people and animals,

 

Numbers 31:12 and brought the captives, spoils and PLUNDER to Moses and Eleazar the priest and the Israelite assembly at their camp on the plains of Moab, by the Jordan across from Jericho.

 

Numbers 31:32 The PLUNDER remaining from the spoils that the soldiers took was 675,000 sheep,

 

Numbers 31:53 Each soldier had taken PLUNDER for himself.

 

Deuteronomy 2:35 But the livestock and the PLUNDER from the towns we had captured we carried off for ourselves.

 

Deuteronomy 3:7 But all the livestock and the PLUNDER from their cities we carried off for ourselves.

 

Deuteronomy 13:16 You are to gather all the PLUNDER of the town into the middle of the public square and completely burn the town and all its PLUNDER as a whole burnt offering to the Lord your God. That town is to remain a ruin forever, never to be rebuilt,

 

Deuteronomy 20:14 As for the women, the children, the livestock and everything else in the city, you may take these as PLUNDER for yourselves. And you may use the PLUNDER the Lord your God gives you from your enemies.

 

Joshua 7:21 When I saw in the PLUNDER a beautiful robe from Babylonia, two hundred shekels of silver and a bar of gold weighing fifty shekels, I coveted them and took them. They are hidden in the ground inside my tent, with the silver underneath.”

 

Joshua 8:2 You shall do to Ai and its king as you did to Jericho and its king, except that you may carry off their PLUNDER and livestock for yourselves. Set an ambush behind the city.”

 

Joshua 8:27 But Israel did carry off for themselves the livestock and PLUNDER of this city, as the Lord had instructed Joshua.

 

Joshua 11:14 The Israelites carried off for themselves all the PLUNDER and livestock of these cities, but all the people they put to the sword until they completely destroyed them, not sparing anyone that breathed.

 

Joshua 22:8 saying, “Return to your homes with your great wealth—with large herds of livestock, with silver, gold, bronze and iron, and a great quantity of clothing—and divide the PLUNDER from your enemies with your fellow Israelites.”

 

Judges 2:14 In his anger against Israel the Lord gave them into the hands of raiders who PLUNDERED them. He sold them into the hands of their enemies all around, whom they were no longer able to resist.

 

Judges 5:19 “Kings came, they fought, the kings of Canaan fought. At Taanach, by the waters of Megiddo, they took no PLUNDER of silver.

 

Judges 5:30 ‘Are they not finding and dividing the spoils: a woman or two for each man, colorful garments as PLUNDER for Sisera, colorful garments embroidered, highly embroidered garments for my neck— all this as PLUNDER?’

 

Judges 8:24 And he said, “I do have one request, that each of you give me an earring from your share of the PLUNDER.” (It was the custom of the Ishmaelites to wear gold earrings.)

 

Judges 8:25 They answered, “We’ll be glad to give them.” So they spread out a garment, and each of them threw a ring from his PLUNDER onto it.

 

1 Samuel 14:30 How much better it would have been if the men had eaten today some of the PLUNDER they took from their enemies. Would not the slaughter of the Philistines have been even greater?”

 

1 Samuel 14:32 They pounced on the PLUNDER and, taking sheep, cattle and calves, they butchered them on the ground and ate them, together with the blood.

 

1 Samuel 14:36 Saul said, “Let us go down and pursue the Philistines by night and PLUNDER them till dawn, and let us not leave one of them alive.” “Do whatever seems best to you,” they replied. But the priest said, “Let us inquire of God here.”

 

1 Samuel 14:48 He fought valiantly and defeated the Amalekites, delivering Israel from the hands of those who had PLUNDERED them.

 

1 Samuel 15:19 Why did you not obey the Lord? Why did you pounce on the PLUNDER and do evil in the eyes of the Lord?”

 

1 Samuel 15:21 The soldiers took sheep and cattle from the PLUNDER, the best of what was devoted to God, in order to sacrifice them to the Lord your God at Gilgal.”

 

1 Samuel 17:53 When the Israelites returned from chasing the Philistines, they PLUNDERED their camp.

 

1 Samuel 30:16 He led David down, and there they were, scattered over the countryside, eating, drinking and reveling because of the great amount of PLUNDER they had taken from the land of the Philistines and from Judah.

 

1 Samuel 30:19 Nothing was missing: young or old, boy or girl, PLUNDER or anything else they had taken. David brought everything back.

 

1 Samuel 30:20 He took all the flocks and herds, and his men drove them ahead of the other livestock, saying, “This is David’s PLUNDER.”

 

1 Samuel 30:22 But all the evil men and troublemakers among David’s followers said, “Because they did not go out with us, we will not share with them the PLUNDER we recovered. However, each man may take his wife and children and go.”

 

1 Samuel 30:26 When David reached Ziklag, he sent some of the PLUNDER to the elders of Judah, who were his friends, saying, “Here is a gift for you from the PLUNDER of the Lord’s enemies.”

 

2 Samuel 3:22 [ Joab Murders Abner ] Just then David’s men and Joab returned from a raid and brought with them a great deal of PLUNDER. But Abner was no longer with David in Hebron, because David had sent him away, and he had gone in peace.

 

2 Samuel 8:12 Edom and Moab, the Ammonites and the Philistines, and Amalek. He also dedicated the PLUNDER taken from Hadadezer son of Rehob, king of Zobah.

 

2 Samuel 12:30 David took the crown from their king’s head, and it was placed on his own head. It weighed a talent of gold, and it was set with precious stones. David took a great quantity of PLUNDER from the city

 

2 Kings 3:23 “That’s blood!” they said. “Those kings must have fought and slaughtered each other. Now to the PLUNDER, Moab!”

 

2 Kings 7:16 Then the people went out and PLUNDERED the camp of the Arameans. So a seah of the finest flour sold for a shekel, and two seahs of barley sold for a shekel, as the Lord had said.

 

2 Kings 17:20 Therefore the Lord rejected all the people of Israel; he afflicted them and gave them into the hands of PLUNDERERS, until he thrust them from his presence.

 

2 Kings 21:14 I will forsake the remnant of my inheritance and give them into the hands of enemies. They will be looted and PLUNDERED by all their enemies;

 

1 Chronicles 20:2 David took the crown from the head of their king—its weight was found to be a talent of gold, and it was set with precious stones—and it was placed on David’s head. He took a great quantity of PLUNDER from the city

 

1 Chronicles 26:27 Some of the PLUNDER taken in battle they dedicated for the repair of the temple of the Lord.

 

2 Chronicles 14:13 and Asa and his army pursued them as far as Gerar. Such a great number of Cushites fell that they could not recover; they were crushed before the Lord and his forces. The men of Judah carried off a large amount of PLUNDER.

 

2 Chronicles 14:14 They destroyed all the villages around Gerar, for the terror of the Lord had fallen on them. They looted all these villages, since there was much PLUNDER there.

 

2 Chronicles 15:11 At that time they sacrificed to the Lord seven hundred head of cattle and seven thousand sheep and goats from the PLUNDER they had brought back.

 

2 Chronicles 20:25 So Jehoshaphat and his men went to carry off their PLUNDER, and they found among them a great amount of equipment and clothing and also articles of value—more than they could take away. There was so much PLUNDER that it took three days to collect it.

 

2 Chronicles 24:23 At the turn of the year, the army of Aram marched against Joash; it invaded Judah and Jerusalem and killed all the leaders of the people. They sent all the PLUNDER to their king in Damascus.

 

2 Chronicles 25:13 Meanwhile the troops that Amaziah had sent back and had not allowed to take part in the war raided towns belonging to Judah from Samaria to Beth Horon. They killed three thousand people and carried off great quantities of PLUNDER.

 

2 Chronicles 28:8 The men of Israel took captive from their fellow Israelites who were from Judah two hundred thousand wives, sons and daughters. They also took a great deal of PLUNDER, which they carried back to Samaria.

 

2 Chronicles 28:14 So the soldiers gave up the prisoners and PLUNDER in the presence of the officials and all the assembly.

 

2 Chronicles 28:15 The men designated by name took the prisoners, and from the PLUNDER they clothed all who were naked. They provided them with clothes and sandals, food and drink, and healing balm. All those who were weak they put on donkeys. So they took them back to their fellow Israelites at Jericho, the City of Palms, and returned to Samaria.

 

Nehemiah 4:4 Hear us, our God, for we are despised. Turn their insults back on their own heads. Give them over as PLUNDER in a land of captivity.

 

Esther 3:13 Dispatches were sent by couriers to all the king’s provinces with the order to destroy, kill and annihilate all the Jews—young and old, women and children—on a single day, the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, the month of Adar, and to PLUNDER their goods.

 

Esther 8:11 The king’s edict granted the Jews in every city the right to assemble and protect themselves; to destroy, kill and annihilate the armed men of any nationality or province who might attack them and their women and children, and to PLUNDER the property of their enemies.

 

Esther 9:10 the ten sons of Haman son of Hammedatha, the enemy of the Jews. But they did not lay their hands on the PLUNDER.

 

Esther 9:15 The Jews in Susa came together on the fourteenth day of the month of Adar, and they put to death in Susa three hundred men, but they did not lay their hands on the PLUNDER.

 

Esther 9:16 Meanwhile, the remainder of the Jews who were in the king’s provinces also assembled to protect themselves and get relief from their enemies. They killed seventy-five thousand of them but did not lay their hands on the PLUNDER.

 

Psalm 12:5 “Because the poor are PLUNDERED and the needy groan, I will now arise,” says the Lord. “I will protect them from those who malign them.”

 

Psalm 44:10 You made us retreat before the enemy, and our adversaries have PLUNDERED us.

 

Psalm 68:12 “Kings and armies flee in haste; the women at home divide the PLUNDER.

 

Psalm 76:5 The valiant lie PLUNDERED, they sleep their last sleep; not one of the warriors can lift his hands.

 

Psalm 89:41 All who pass by have PLUNDERED him; he has become the scorn of his neighbors.

 

Psalm 109:11 May a creditor seize all he has; may strangers PLUNDER the fruits of his labor.

 

Proverbs 1:13 we will get all sorts of valuable things and fill our houses with PLUNDER;

 

Proverbs 16:19 Better to be lowly in spirit along with the oppressed than to share PLUNDER with the proud.

 

Proverbs 24:15 [ Saying 27 ] Do not lurk like a thief near the house of the righteous, do not PLUNDER their dwelling place;

 

Isaiah 3:14 The Lord enters into judgment against the elders and leaders of his people: “It is you who have ruined my vineyard; the PLUNDER from the poor is in your houses.

 

Isaiah 8:4 For before the boy knows how to say ‘My father’ or ‘My mother,’ the wealth of Damascus and the PLUNDER of Samaria will be carried off by the king of Assyria.”

 

Isaiah 9:3 You have enlarged the nation and increased their joy; they rejoice before you as people rejoice at the harvest, as warriors rejoice when dividing the PLUNDER.

 

Isaiah 10:6 I send him against a godless nation, I dispatch him against a people who anger me, to seize loot and snatch PLUNDER, and to trample them down like mud in the streets.

 

Isaiah 10:13 For he says: “‘By the strength of my hand I have done this, and by my wisdom, because I have understanding. I removed the boundaries of nations, I PLUNDERED their treasures; like a mighty one I subdued their kings.

 

Isaiah 11:14 They will swoop down on the slopes of Philistia to the west; together they will PLUNDER the people to the east. They will subdue Edom and Moab, and the Ammonites will be subject to them.

 

Isaiah 17:14 In the evening, sudden terror! Before the morning, they are gone! This is the portion of those who loot us, the lot of those who PLUNDER us.

 

Isaiah 24:3 The earth will be completely laid waste and totally PLUNDERED. The Lord has spoken this word.

 

Isaiah 33:4 Your PLUNDER, O nations, is harvested as by young locusts; like a swarm of locusts people pounce on it.

 

Isaiah 33:23 Your rigging hangs loose: The mast is not held secure, the sail is not spread. Then an abundance of spoils will be divided and even the lame will carry off PLUNDER.

 

Isaiah 42:22 But this is a people PLUNDERED and looted, all of them trapped in pits or hidden away in prisons. They have become PLUNDER, with no one to rescue them; they have been made loot, with no one to say, “Send them back.”

 

Isaiah 42:24 Who handed Jacob over to become loot, and Israel to the PLUNDERERS? Was it not the Lord, against whom we have sinned? For they would not follow his ways; they did not obey his law.

 

Isaiah 49:24 Can PLUNDER be taken from warriors, or captives be rescued from the fierce?

 

Isaiah 49:25 But this is what the Lord says: “Yes, captives will be taken from warriors, and PLUNDER retrieved from the fierce; I will contend with those who contend with you, and your children I will save.

 

Jeremiah 2:14 Is Israel a servant, a slave by birth? Why then has he become PLUNDER?

 

Jeremiah 15:13 “Your wealth and your treasures I will give as PLUNDER, without charge, because of all your sins throughout your country.

 

Jeremiah 17:3 My mountain in the land and your wealth and all your treasures I will give away as PLUNDER, together with your high places, because of sin throughout your country.

 

Jeremiah 20:5 I will deliver all the wealth of this city into the hands of their enemies—all its products, all its valuables and all the treasures of the kings of Judah. They will take it away as PLUNDER and carry it off to Babylon.

 

Jeremiah 30:16 “‘But all who devour you will be devoured; all your enemies will go into exile. Those who PLUNDER you will be PLUNDERED; all who make spoil of you I will despoil.

 

Jeremiah 49:32 Their camels will become PLUNDER, and their large herds will be spoils of war. I will scatter to the winds those who are in distant places and will bring disaster on them from every side,” declares the Lord.

 

Jeremiah 50:10 So Babylonia will be PLUNDERED; all who PLUNDER her will have their fill,” declares the Lord.

 

Jeremiah 50:37 A sword against her horses and chariots and all the foreigners in her ranks! They will become weaklings. A sword against her treasures! They will be PLUNDERED.

 

Ezekiel 7:21 I will give their wealth as PLUNDER to foreigners and as loot to the wicked of the earth, who will defile it.

 

Ezekiel 23:46 “This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Bring a mob against them and give them over to terror and PLUNDER.

 

Ezekiel 25:7 therefore I will stretch out my hand against you and give you as PLUNDER to the nations. I will wipe you out from among the nations and exterminate you from the countries. I will destroy you, and you will know that I am the Lord.’”

 

Ezekiel 26:5 Out in the sea she will become a place to spread fishnets, for I have spoken, declares the Sovereign Lord. She will become PLUNDER for the nations,

 

Ezekiel 26:12 They will PLUNDER your wealth and loot your merchandise; they will break down your walls and demolish your fine houses and throw your stones, timber and rubble into the sea.

 

Ezekiel 29:19 Therefore this is what the Sovereign Lord says: I am going to give Egypt to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and he will carry off its wealth. He will loot and PLUNDER the land as pay for his army.

 

Ezekiel 34:8 As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign Lord, because my flock lacks a shepherd and so has been PLUNDERED and has become food for all the wild animals, and because my shepherds did not search for my flock but cared for themselves rather than for my flock,

 

Ezekiel 34:22 I will save my flock, and they will no longer be PLUNDERED. I will judge between one sheep and another.

 

Ezekiel 34:28 They will no longer be PLUNDERED by the nations, nor will wild animals devour them. They will live in safety, and no one will make them afraid.

 

Ezekiel 36:4 therefore, mountains of Israel, hear the word of the Sovereign Lord: This is what the Sovereign Lord says to the mountains and hills, to the ravines and valleys, to the desolate ruins and the deserted towns that have been PLUNDERED and ridiculed by the rest of the nations around you—

 

Ezekiel 36:5 this is what the Sovereign Lord says: In my burning zeal I have spoken against the rest of the nations, and against all Edom, for with glee and with malice in their hearts they made my land their own possession so that they might PLUNDER its pastureland.’

 

Ezekiel 38:12 I will PLUNDER and loot and turn my hand against the resettled ruins and the people gathered from the nations, rich in livestock and goods, living at the center of the land.”

 

Ezekiel 38:13 Sheba and Dedan and the merchants of Tarshish and all her villages will say to you, “Have you come to PLUNDER? Have you gathered your hordes to loot, to carry off silver and gold, to take away livestock and goods and to seize much PLUNDER?”’

 

Ezekiel 39:10 They will not need to gather wood from the fields or cut it from the forests, because they will use the weapons for fuel. And they will PLUNDER those who PLUNDERED them and loot those who looted them, declares the Sovereign Lord.

 

Daniel 11:24 When the richest provinces feel secure, he will invade them and will achieve what neither his fathers nor his forefathers did. He will distribute PLUNDER, loot and wealth among his followers. He will plot the overthrow of fortresses—but only for a time.

 

Daniel 11:33 “Those who are wise will instruct many, though for a time they will fall by the sword or be burned or captured or PLUNDERED.

 

Hosea 13:15 even though he thrives among his brothers. An east wind from the Lord will come, blowing in from the desert; his spring will fail and his well dry up. His storehouse will be PLUNDERED of all its treasures.

 

Amos 3:10 “They do not know how to do right,” declares the Lord, “who store up in their fortresses what they have PLUNDERED and looted.”

 

Amos 3:11 Therefore this is what the Sovereign Lord says: “An enemy will overrun your land, pull down your strongholds and PLUNDER your fortresses.”

 

Nahum 2:9PLUNDER the silver! PLUNDER the gold! The supply is endless, the wealth from all its treasures!

 

Nahum 2:10 She is pillaged, PLUNDERED, stripped! Hearts melt, knees give way, bodies tremble, every face grows pale.

 

Nahum 3:1 [ Woe to Nineveh ] Woe to the city of blood, full of lies, full of PLUNDER, never without victims!

 

Habakkuk 2:8 Because you have PLUNDERED many nations, the peoples who are left will PLUNDER you. For you have shed human blood; you have destroyed lands and cities and everyone in them.

 

Zephaniah 1:13 Their wealth will be PLUNDERED, their houses demolished. Though they build houses, they will not live in them; though they plant vineyards, they will not drink the wine.”

 

Zephaniah 2:9 Therefore, as surely as I live,” declares the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, “surely Moab will become like Sodom, the Ammonites like Gomorrah— a place of weeds and salt pits, a wasteland forever. The remnant of my people will PLUNDER them; the survivors of my nation will inherit their land.”

 

Zechariah 2:8 For this is what the Lord Almighty says: “After the Glorious One has sent me against the nations that have PLUNDERED you—for whoever touches you touches the apple of his eye—

 

Zechariah 2:9 I will surely raise my hand against them so that their slaves will PLUNDER them. Then you will know that the Lord Almighty has sent me.

 

Zechariah 14:1 [ The Lord Comes and Reigns ] A day of the Lord is coming, Jerusalem, when your possessions will be PLUNDERED and divided up within your very walls.

 

Matthew 12:29 “Or again, how can anyone enter a strong man’s house and carry off his possessions unless he first ties up the strong man? Then he can PLUNDER his house.

 

Mark 3:27 In fact, no one can enter a strong man’s house without first tying him up. Then he can PLUNDER the strong man’s house.

 

Luke 11:22 But when someone stronger attacks and overpowers him, he takes away the armor in which the man trusted and divides up his PLUNDER.

 

Hebrews 7:4 Just think how great he was: Even the patriarch Abraham gave him a tenth of the PLUNDER!

 

If you thought this list was crazy, check out these:

The Wise Sloth Annotated Bible