Posted this to my main blog by accident:

Recently wrenthekwack on Tumblr posted the below graphic:

The caption he added to it was “Because how would a plane fly without oil? :)”

Very cute. :)  Of course, without oil we wouldn’t have most of our world without oil, including planes and skyscrapers to fly them into (or the computers to create and view this graphic).

Obviously, this is a very complex issue and the doctoring seen above was done on a graphic that originally suggested religion was the key to 911.  But which is it? Oil or religion that, if removed, would scatter the terrorism equation into the wind?

Well, FriendlyAtheist, one of my favorite atheists on Tumblr, took great issue with the idea that it was oil and not religion.  In short, he made some wild stabs at wrenthekwack graphic, 1) sarcastically suggesting that perhaps the hijackers were yelling “Oil Akbar” instead of “Allah Akbar,” 2) that somehow the graphic puts forward the idea that the USG was behind 911 (like I said, wild stabs), 3) the weirdest statement of all:

Last option would be to say that somehow the need for oil by the US made it worthy of attacking by these “atheistic” terrorists (since religion has nothing to do with it per the cartoon). Sure, whatever. Like the US is the only country that uses middle east oil.

Crossing religion out of that graphic doesn’t mean religion has nothing to do with 911.  So, that’s a very odd, extreme assumption to make.  And then the claim about the US not being the only consumer of Middle East oil?? As if America wasn’t the big kid on the block??  Who else would terrorists go after?  Seriously, FA, I’m thinking you banged this reply out in 30 seconds rather than thinking it through. Seems like such behavior is going around.

FA also added that it’s not about the money, either.  He quotes a study that says “The evidence we have assembled and reviewed suggests there is little direct connection between poverty, education and participation in terrorism.”

The suggestion of poverty being a part of it reminded me of something, so I left a waaaay too long comment on his post suggesting that, in fact, it is not about money per se, but is also not really about religion.  Here’s the comment I left:

Have you seen Thomas PM Barnett’s seminar “The Pentagon’s New Map”? (It’s on Google Video here: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4689061169761152025 ) I HIGHLY recommend you watch it. In it he says a LOT about how the world functions, but he puts forward the idea that the world can be divided into two sections. One section is the core and the other is the gap. The core is what we’d recognize as the “rich” section—the First World. The gap is largely the Third World. The gap is also where most of the terrorism in the world comes from. However, Barnett suggests that it’s not money that is the determining factor here, but connectivity. As in, communications. I distill this down to a simple concept: if you have a voice, you’re less likely to turn to terror. If you’re being ignored, you need to do something to get people to pay attention to you. Timothy McVeigh said as much before he was executed. Violence, he felt, was the only language the USG would respond to.

Now, most of US foreign policy tends to be determined by oil. Our involvement in the Middle East is largely about oil. So, in a sense, oil *is* a reason extremists in the Middle East are so pissed at us. If we would only find a way to replace the oil we buy in the Middle East with something we could make here in the West, we’d remove US troops from oil-rich countries (aka Muslim countries) as well as one of their main excuses. See, that’s what religion is—an excuse. A tool. ObL didn’t give a shit about Allah or 72 virgins. He was so rich while he was alive, he could have had 72 virgins any time he wanted. No, this was about power and influence. Sure, “Allah” might have been the excuse the actual hijackers had, but the guys who put the hijackers up to it are only interested power and influence. If religion didn’t exist, they’d use some other lie to convince those poor idiots to do what they did.

I’m all for atheism and spreading the idea that truth and proof are what should determine our actions and not some fictional god, but the reality is that religion is just a tool—an excuse—to do horrible things. It is not the true corruption that greed and power are. Religion is the lubricant.

Sorry for such a long comment…

I’m truly happy to see all of the new voices speaking up and against the louder voice of religion.  However, there’s been a lot of stupid-thinking on the part of my fellow atheists.  They think contradicting Believers is enough to “win.”  What good is it to make an argument against religion if it is faulty?  Remove religion from the planet and all of the religion-based strife goes away?  I don’t think so.  It won’t be religion-based anymore, but there will be other strife in its place.  We humans loooove conflict.  We’ll use nationality, race, sexual preference, gender, hair color, TV shows-preference, or some other bullshit excuse to divide ourselves up.

I’m against religion in its most common form, but to say it’s the sole thing that motivates terrorists is to adopt a rather shallow view.  If terrorists didn’t feel under attack, if they felt as though their way of life wasn’t being threatened they wouldn’t need to look for an excuse to “kill infidels.”

Religion is an excuse for everything.  Like I said, religion is the lubricant.  But fear and hate work, too.

friendlyatheist:

“Atheism is not a philosophy; it is not even a view of the world; it is simply an admission of the obvious. In fact, ‘atheism’ is a term that should not even exist. No one ever needs to identify himself as a ‘non-astrologer’ or a ‘non-alchemist.’ We do not have words for people who doubt that Elvis is still alive or that aliens have traversed the galaxy only to molest ranchers and their cattle. Atheism is nothing more than the noises reasonable people make in the presence of unjustified religious beliefs.”

—

Sam Harris, Letter to a Christian Nation (via dangets)

I’ve been thinking for a while now that I’d prefer to be called a Truthist.

OK, this is my last Friendly Atheist reblog for the day. I promise!