Atheists... Your life is pointless

Here's what really pointless: Today, the President will give a speech outlining the administration's policy on Iraq but in Iraq, sectarian conflicts, decided upon which one of several martyrs of Islam one believes is the right and proper one, will continue to divide the people of that area, undermining whatever the President says. Islam is the great unifying religion, but first, practitioners of one sect will have to murder as many members of other sects as possible. Carry on.

In Africa's Sub-Sahara millions of AIDs deaths could be prevented if condoms could be used by miners and truckers, but the Catholic Church sees the use of condoms as somehow offensive to it's own imaginary supernatural being, thus condemning MILLIONS to lengthy, painful, unspeakable deaths. Let us pray.

And here in the USA, down a little side street in New York City, a committee is meeting for the fourth or fifth time, trying to find a proper way to decorate a lobby at the end of December. Chanukah, Christmas, Kwanza, which shall be represented and how? Wreaths, menorahs and poinsettias or just white and red and green garland? Just how much of the Co-op's maintenance budget ought to be relegated to the obeisance of mythic systems of belief? (We didn't do anything for the Hindus or the Jains.) Pass the Calendar.

It's difficult to see the benefits provided by the myths.

What are they again? And make sure you don't insult the beliefs of my friend or he and his brethren will destroy you,

for the love of God.

Joe(When is the National Christmas Tree Lighting?)Nation

Joe wrote-



Come on Joe-It's not the Church.It's all the grunting and huffing and puffing and squelching surely.Condoms demean the act and the people using them.That's a principle.How can that principle cause AIDS?That's ridiculous.

spend (it all on )us.

Joe Nation wrote:


Who is your friend?

Just a minor nit-picky point re Sub-Saharan Africa; while the Vatican's stance is absurd, the Vatican's influence in the region is not significant; the lack of condom use/other safe-sex practice is a cultural thing within the population at discussion.

It is one thing to have them available and quite another to force people to use them. Am I wrong in thinking that the Catholic poplulation of the area is low?

No, you're not wrong in thinking the Catholic population in the area is low. My point is that while unarguably absurd, the Vatican's position hasn't much to do with practice in the region.

I agree with timber; the Vatican has very little influence in most countries of Africa where HIV/AIDS are a problem. What is happening is also sad; families are selling their young daughters to older men that are infected. Many older men force themselves on young girls without guilt or any government consequence.

timber-

What's these www,yim,msmn and icq about.

In your profile, you can list a favorite website and contact info for various messaging clients.

All I know is what I read in the papers:

Catholic News

And there is this from the BBC/Bloomberg Networks

(Emphasis mine)

Vatican Says Condoms Don't Block HIV, BBC Reports (Update2)
Oct. 9 (Bloomberg) -- The Roman Catholic Church has urged followers in developing countries not to use condoms to prevent the spread of HIV by telling them the contraceptives have holes that allow the virus to pass through, the BBC reported.

The church's assertion is made in a British Broadcasting Corp. documentary, ``Sex and the Holy City.'' It airs Sunday, four days before the 25th anniversary of Pope John Paul II's papacy. The show questions the pope's teachings on sex and his influence on the developing world, including the church's ban on contraception, according to the BBC's Web site.

In the program, Cardinal Alfonso Lopez Trujillo, head of the Vatican's Pontifical Council for the Family, backs the church's stance. He says sperm cells, as well as the smaller virus cells that cause AIDS, ``can easily pass through the `net' that is formed by the condom,'' Steve Bradshaw, a reporter on the program, writes in today's U.K.-based Guardian newspaper.

The World Health Organization said an intact condom is impenetrable to the cells and that ``consistent and correct'' condom use cuts the risk of HIV infection by 90 percent, according to the program. The church's warning on condoms risks adding to a pandemic that has killed more than 20 million people, the organization told Bradshaw.

Catholic populations have declined in the developed world and increased in developing countries. Africa accounts for 12 percent of the total Catholic population of about 1 billion, double the percentage 25 years ago, according to the Catholic News Service.

`Laced With AIDS'

The church's position has forced an AIDS teaching center in Kenya to stop distributing condoms, with some priests saying the contraceptives ``are laced with HIV/AIDS,'' the center's director, Gordon Wambi, said in the documentary, according to Bradshaw. In another scene, a Catholic nun advised a choirmaster infected with HIV against using condoms because they couldn't stop the virus from infecting his wife, Bradshaw wrote.

The WHO, a United Nations agency, said women in particular suffer a loss of human rights when they are denied protection from HIV. ``Condoms need to be more widely accepted, available and used,'' according to the WHO Web site.

Sub-Saharan Africa is the region most affected by AIDS, the United Nations Joint Program on HIV/AIDS said on its Web site. Last year, about 2.4 million people died of AIDS in the region, where 29.4 million people are infected with the virus, the agency said. More than a quarter of the adults in four African countries -- Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland and Zimbabwe -- are HIV-positive.

Catholic leaders in Africa today said they'll do more to fight the spread of the virus, while continuing to oppose the use of condoms, according to Agence France-Presse.

``Using condoms as a means of preventing AIDS can only lead to sexual promiscuity,'' Dominique Bulamatari, the archbishop of Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo, was cited by AFP as saying in the Senegalese capital, Dakar, at the Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar.

Last Updated: October 9, 2003 11:37 EDT

(Twelve per cent of a billion would be 120 million African Catholics.)

Joe(Continue to avert your eyes)Nation

When any group gets desperate, they do desperate things. If this information were known to more catholics around the world, I would have to believe that more will leave the church.

thanks for the data behind my understanding, Joe.

Plus, more ignorance on my part here, aren't we in the US as a nation, not supporting help if condoms are listed among the help items? I am sure I've read that, but haven't retained links. No doubt I'm confused on whom is not supporting what.

Map of Catholics in Africa.

Don't forget what Bush promised Africa, and what he has actually done.

Wednesday, July 9, 2003
Africa and AIDS: Bush promises


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fully fund Africa pledges


The continent of Africa, long ignored on the world scene, is dominating world news this week with President George W. Bush's historic visit. The attention can trigger positive changes for America and African countries.

Bush is in Botswana today, continuing his trip to some of Africa's most promising nations. He's there to promote his far-reaching strategy that includes fighting the AIDS virus, which threatens to decimate the continent's population.

Also in Africa, the Liberia issue looms. President Charles Taylor has promised to leave the war-torn country, but he says he won't go until a peacekeeping force arrives. There may be a time for a U.S. military presence in Liberia, but we must be cautious right now. We need to stabilize reconstruction in Iraq first.

The priority in Africa must be to make good on Bush's promise to give $15 billion to fight AIDS.

Bush has recognized the critical humanitarian crisis in Africa. An estimated 7,000 people die from the disease each day, and as many as 40 percent of the population is infected in some countries. Massive aid would pay for prevention programs and badly needed medicine.

Along with an additional $10 billion in funds already earmarked to promote economic development, it would amount to the beginnings of an African Marshall Plan. And it would fight terrorism in a new way.

"Weak and unstable states that implode easily become harbors for terrorists," said Jamie Drummond, executive director of DATA, a group advocating economic assistance to the continent, in a meeting with the Enquirer editorial board Tuesday.

Countries with scare resources are more likely to see ethnic fighting, which breeds extremism, and develop governments that willingly do business with terrorists.

But some members of Congress favor cutting into the original funding promised by Bush. That would be a huge mistake.

Congress overwhelmingly approved military action to go after existing terrorists. Now, Bush is trying to end terrorism before it starts by eliminating the social and economic conditions that foster it, and he should get the same vigorous support.

September 02, 2005
VIDEO: Kanye West on NBC - "George Bush Does Not Care About Black People"
Kanye was nervous, but boy did he ever represent. I hereby retract anything negative I have ever said about him.

EDIT: A few thoughts.

1. Kanye couldn't have chosen a better time to say what he said. The right time to speak is whenever people are listening. If anyone was truly callous enough to use his comments as an excuse not to help dying people, I'm hard-pressed to see how you call Kanye the bad guy in that scenario.

And do you really think it matters, from a charity standpoint, what the celebrities actually say on these shows? That they're expected to win you over with the eloquence of their pleas? The celebrity's job is to put a celebrity face on the screen so people will watch the show and see the phone number.. Kanye's 15 seconds off the screen did nothing to impede that process, and he gave voice to the outrage many Americans are feeling right now, helped to spark much needed discussion on it. Plus brought the event far more publicity than it would have had otherwise. He did his job and then some.

2. Many are taking Kanye's last comment to mean that he thinks Bush deliberately conspired to leave Black people behind, that he saw Black people waiting for help and held it back because they were Black. But that is missing the point.

He didn't say George Bush hates Black people, he said Bush doesn't care about Black people. And it is ABUNDANTLY clear that those in charge of planning for this disaster, from the Federal government on down, DID NOT CARE about an entire segment of the New Orleans population. The poorest twenty percent of New Orleans were INVISIBLE to the powers that be, as they planned for this disaster, and they enacted a plan that FORGOT THEM COMPLETELY, abandoned them and left them for dead.

The government showed without a shred of doubt, through their actions and inaction, that they DID NOT CARE about these people. And yes, the vast majority of these people were Black.

Should we dismiss that as a coincidence? Could Kanye have been more precise by stating that America doesn't care about poor people? Maybe. Class and race are always intertwined in these issues, so deeply we could spend a lifetime sorting them out. But the basic truth behind Kanye's rage is clear as ray of sunshine.

This is not about George Bush, the individual, seeing that Black people were stranded and holding back help because they were Black. It runs much deeper than that. George Bush didn't hate these people, he and his government forgot them, and that happened long before the levees broke.

George Bush is at the head of a government that has abandoned and forgotten this segment of our society on every level, throughout the planning for this disaster, and for decades before that. This is the culmination of decades of America not caring. The only shocking thing about Kanye's words is that anyone is surprised by them.


Kanye West on the NBC hurricane benefit

more complete version

and here's a transcript:

Mike Myers: [dutifully reads canned plea for charity on teleprompter]

Kanye: [abandons teleprompter] "I hate the way they portray us in the media. You see a black family and they say we are looting, you see a white family and they say they are looking for food. And, you know, its been five days because most of the people ARE black. And even for me to complain, I would be a hypocrite because I would turn away from the TV because it's too hard to watch. I've even been shopping before even giving a donation, so now I'm calling my business manager right to see what is the biggest amount I can give. And just to imagine, if I was down there and those are my people down there. If there is anybody out there that wants to do anything that we can help about the way America is set up the help the poor, the black people, the less well off as slow as possible. Red cross is doing as much as they can. We already realize a lot of the people that could help are at war right now, fighting another way. And now they've given them permission to go down and shoot us.

Mike Myers: [stands frozen in horror, decides to pretend nothing happened and stick with the teleprompter]

Kanye: GEORGE BUSH DOES NOT CARE ABOUT BLACK PEOPLE.Mike Myers: [descends into complete panic]

Posted by jsmooth995 at September 2, 2005 09:18 PM

Great map C.I.

Love the way he leaves the strong Catholic countries out... and works the "marginals" instead.

In the interest of accuracy, some may be interested in what Cardinal Lopez Trujillo has to say regarding the referrenced BBC piece, and The Vatican's stance on AIDS/Condoms/Extra-martital sex:


One of those stories that seems to have 2 sides ... imagine that.

Now, I don't endorse The Vatican's position on this (or on much else, for that matter), and I figure The Church has busily been painting herself into a corner on this issue. Its just not the corner, or the shade of paint, some folks seem to think it is.

Not realistic.

Of course the story has two sides which is why I offered the link from the Catholic News figuring that they would do their own damage, but now Timber has offered this, in part, as above:



Yeah, it's undignified even if you may spread the disease to your wife.

And does any one else find it odd that here in the USA we teach inner city youth to use condoms because it's the RESPONSIBLE thing to do, yet here it's claimed as a rejection of responsibility. How about the responsibility to not bring unwanted children into the world?

Then the third, all or nothing, chestnut. If condoms can't guarantee 100 percent protection then they are useless. Oh and by the way, you can't use birth control pills, IUDs or any other method to protect yourself or your partner.

Lastly, they present a lie. ....condoms help spread AIDS.HIV because they contribute to the breaking down ... blah blah blah. Can anyone show any statistic that shows an area, in Africa or elsewhere, where condom use is encouraged that the disease has increased over let's say five years?? Yet they continue to promote such blather.

All this talk about sex gives churchmen the shakes because it violates what I call the Eleventh Commandment: Thou shalt not be Human.

Persons being human are very difficult to control. Fear doesn't seem to drive them toward the collection boxes. They feel great joy, they engage in intimacy, they love their lives. What the Church wants is doubt. Maybe you are not good enough, maybe you have committed a sin, maybe you are having too much fun. Watch out.

Joe( Love Life. This one is all you get.) Nation