Tag Archives: God

Why I am an Atheist

Posted on by

In 1903, Kentucky-based newspaper “Blue-grass Blade” asked its readers to write in and contribute to a forthcoming feature named, “Why I am An Atheist.” Hundreds of letters soon arrived and many were subsequently reprinted in the paper; over a century later, in 2011, they were compiled to form the book, Letters from an Atheist Nation.

Below is just one of the letters. It was written by Minnie Parrish, a 23-year-old divorced mother of four who later went on to become the first female doctor to practice in North Texas.

Why am I an Atheist

 

Because it has dawned upon me that it is right to be so, and upon investigation I find no real evidence of the divine origin of the scriptures. And because I cannot, as a refined and respectable woman, take to my bosom as a daily guide a book of such low morals and degrading influences. Written by a lot of priests, I cannot accept a salvation that is based wholly upon the dreams of an ancient and superstitious people, with no proof save blind faith.

 

Everything that so many people think transpires from the supernatural, and many things that would really perplex the average mind, have a natural and material foundation in the workings of the human mind; that is, things that are not connected with our solar system.

 

It is ignorance of the scientific working of their own natures and mind that keep so much “mystery” in the air; and as long as there is a mystery afloat the people will ascribe it to the supernatural.

 

I am an Atheist because I know the Bible will not do to depend upon. I have tried it, and found it wanting.

 

In fact, I found in the scriptures the origin of woman’s slayer, and that it was one of God‘s main points to oppress women and keep them in the realms of ignorance.

 

I am in the ranks of Liberalism because of its elevating principles, its broad road to freedom of thought, speech, and investigation.

 

MINNIE O. PARRISH
23 years old
Leonard, Texas

ᔥ Letters of Note: Why I am an Atheist.

40 Things To Say Before You Die – Self Help

Posted on by

Before you’re sprawled on your deathbed, there are some things you really have to say. They’re not complicated. They’re not poetry.

They’re just short sentences with big meaning.

I hope they get you talking.

40
“I wonder.”

Give yourself time to think so the time you spend doing things will be better spent.

39
“Today was good.”

If you can say it once, you can say it again. And again. And again.

38
“I believe in this.”

A god, a plan, a company, a person, an idea—you have to put your faith in something.

37
“I’m not finished.”

Only you get to decide when your life’s work is done.

36
“Thank you for making this possible.”

Because nobody does anything alone. We’re driven and supported and thwarted by others at every turn.

35
“That’s enough.”

Food. Drink. Episodes of Law & Order. Pairs of shoes. Overtime. Articulating your own limits is powerful.

34
“I can do better.”

As soon as you say it, you’re that much closer to making it true.

33
“I’m sorry.”

But you can’t just say it; you have to mean it. Really mean it.

32
“I survived.”

Moments of danger are the plot points of an exciting life.

31
“You’re amazing.”

Let yourself be in awe of another person, and you’ll feel strong and weak simultaneously.

30
“I am home.”

Home is every adventure’s final destination and starting point—and we all need one to call our own.

29
“I did my best.”

If this is true, you did something amazing.

28
“How can I help you?”

Because you want people to come to your funeral, and if they can’t make it, at least they’ll miss you.

27
“I’m lucky.”

You are lucky, in a way that no one else is. Now, what are you going to do with your good fortune?

26
“I want that.”

Ask for it: that’s you get what you covet—from others and for yourself.

25
“This is wrong.”

If you never say it, you embody the statement.

24
“I quit.”

Not everything is worthwhile, and sometimes we don’t find that out until we’re in the middle of a rotten situation.

23
“Isn’t this beautiful?”

The more often you notice the gorgeous world around you, the happier you’ll be.

22
“Congratulations.”

Say this without jealously. Practice if you have to.

21
“Damn, I look good.”

You come from a long line of people who convinced others to sleep with them. Remember that.

20
“I can master this.”

The ability to learn is the foundation of every other talent.

19
“Hold the mayo.”

Ask for the little things on a regular basis and you’ll find that it’s easier to make larger demands on occasion.

18
“This is who I am.”

The nervous energy spent pretending to be something you’re not is better spent on practically anything else.

17
“Get out.”

It’s always harder to take back an invitation than to give one, but protecting yourself from personified trouble is always worth the effort.

16
“That was my contribution.”

Own what you’ve worked to create—that’s how your presence will be felt long after you’re gone.

15
“I’ll try it.”

Consider the impotence of never saying you’ll try.

14
“Tell me more.”

Really getting to know someone (or some topic) will help you better triangulate your own place in the world.

13“This is my favorite thing.”

Enjoy what you love and say this as often as you can.

12
“I earned this.”

There’s a layer of proud ownership over everything you possess that wasn’t merely given to you.

11
“I don’t care.”

Being able to discern between what’s important and what’s trivial is a skill that will save your sanity and your schedule.

10
“Your secret is safe with me.”

Because it feels deep-down good to be trustworthy.

9
“Eureka!”

Being the first to know something is a delicious sensation.

8
“Let’s go!”

Where you’re going often matters far less than the enthusiasm you have for the trip.

7
“I trust you.”

We all need allies, and admitting as much helps forge alliances.

6
“I don’t know how to do this.”

It’s better to admit it and learn than to fake it and embarrass yourself.

5
“I’m terrified.”

Fear is an asset. It can save you from danger and alert you to trouble. Don’t ignore the tingles that run up and down your spine.

4
“This is going to work.”

When this is said truthfully, it’s an assertion of power.

3
“I made a decision.”

Autonomy transforms any activity from a chore to an act of destiny.

2
“I love you.”

We all want to say this, and we all want it said to us.

1
“I understand.”

More important than being right, or being important, is being truly aware.

Related articles

Pray on, Praya

Posted on by

hrc logo

When Polling Turns Against You, Voters Reject You, and the Parties Abandon You, There’s Only One Thing You Can Do to Ban Gay Marriage

Posted by on Mon, Mar 25, 2013 at 11:07 AM

Pray.

You can pray for the Supreme Court to strike down gay marriage. You can pray the justices will fear the wrath of a vengeful god. You can pray your bigoted little heart out. So that’s what Traditional Values Coalition president Andrea Lafferty, who has spent every other option, begs you to do in a letter:

In Washington this Tuesday, the Supreme Court of the United States will hear a landmark case that could redefine and ultmately abolish marriage as we know it. So I am asking you for one “donation” as we gear up to protect marriage here in Washington.

Prayer.

I know that’s not a normal request. This isn’t a normal time. As you know, the Supreme Court of the United States isn’t a legislative body. No amount of lobbying, no amount of protesting short of millions is going to sway the Justices of the court other than sound argument and conscience—and the impact of prayer. … They need our prayers. Your prayers.

Over the weekend and thru next week, take a moment to lift up this nation and our Supreme Court in prayer. Pray that God will allow them to be open to His word. Pray for wisdom. Pray for fear of the Lord. Pray for the millions who will be impacted by the decision of the Supreme Court. Pray for healing across America. Pray for a restoration of all things to Christ.

Pray for TVC and our mission. Pray to protect marriage.

The letter doesn’t end with a prayer, of course. It ends with a “donate here” button. And weirdly, their donation website isn’t collecting prayers.

Related articles

You look absolutely terrific, honestly.

Posted on by

Happy New Year!

edie close up

I just found this photo when I was creating the “New Years With The Beales” entry and seriously fell in LOVE with it.  Edith Bouvier Beale died over 10 years ago and is most known for a 40 year old documentary about her life with her mother and people are still inspired.  That is a S-T-A-U-N-C-H CHARACTER!  Do your best to become a S-T-A-U-N-C-H CHARACTER in 2013!

BLYTHE_DOLL_EDIE

Little Edie Blythe Doll
This is a special Blythe doll designed by Gina Garan and Christina/Oriettacat.  Gina is a successful photographer and operates a website devoted to the Blythe phenomenon and her husband, Asa, was a cast member of the GG Broadway musical.  Sounds like the best of both worlds!  For more information visit www.thisisblythe.com.

And If you feel like it, watch the whole movie:

3rd (Self Help) Day of Xmas – Helen

Posted on by

Seriously?  When Helen Keller communicates, everyone should pay attention.  It is a wonderful letter about the importance of helping others.

It is true, we are only as good as our treatment of the less fortunate.  Everyone needs some sort of help.

helen keller

In March of 1906, unable to preside over a public meeting of the Association for Promoting the Interests of the Blind, deafblind activist and author Helen Keller instead sent the following stirring letter to her good friend, Mark Twain. On the day of the event, Twain, who was chairing the meeting in Keller’s absence, read her stunning letter aloud to all attendees and later included it in his autobiography, predicting that it would “pass into our literature as a classic and remain so.”

It’s very easy to see why.

Wrentham, Mass., March 27, 1906

My dear Mr. Clemens:

It is a great disappointment to me not to be with you and the other friends who have joined their strength to uplift the blind. The meeting in New York will be the greatest occasion in the movement which has so long engaged my heart: and I regret keenly not to be present and feel the inspiration of living contact with such an assembly of wit, wisdom and philanthropy. I shall be happy if I could have spelled into my hand the words as they fall from your lips, and receive, even as it is uttered, the eloquence of our Newest Ambassador to the blind. We have not had such advocates before. My disappointment is softened by the thought that never at any meeting was the right word so sure to be spoken. But, superfluous as all other appeals must seem after you and Mr. Choate have spoken, nevertheless, as I am a woman, I cannot be silent, and I ask you to read this letter, knowing that it will be lifted to eloquence by your kindly voice.

To know what the blind man needs, you who can see must imagine what it would be not to see, and you can imagine it more vividly if you remember that before your journey’s end you may have to go the dark way yourself. Try to realize what blindness means to those whose joyous activity is stricken to inaction.

It is to live long, long days, and life is made up of days. It is to live immured, baffled, impotent, all God’s world shut out. It is to sit helpless, defrauded, while your spirit strains and tugs at its fetters, and your shoulders ache for the burden they are denied, the rightful burden of labor.

The seeing man goes about his business confident and self-dependent. He does his share of the work of the world in mine, in quarry, in factory, in counting room, asking of others no boon, save the opportunity to do a man’s part and to receive the laborer’s guerdon. In an instant accident blinds him. The day is blotted out. Night envelops all the visible world. The feet which once bore him to his task with firm and confident stride stumble and halt and fear the forward step. He is forced to a new habit of idleness, which like a canker consumes the mind and destroys its beautiful faculties. Memory confronts him with his lighted past. Amid the tangible ruins of his life as it promised to be he gropes his pitiful way. You have met him on your busy thoroughfares with faltering feet and outstretched hands, patiently “dredging” the universal dark, holding out for sale his petty wares, or his cap for your pennies; and this was a man with ambitions and capabilities.

It is because we know that these ambitions and capabilities can be fulfilled that we are working to improve the condition of the adult blind. You cannot bring back the light of the vacant eyes; but you can give a helping hand to the sightless along their dark pilgrimage. You can teach them new skill. For work they once did with the aid of their eyes you can substitute work that they can do with their hands. They ask only opportunity, and opportunity is a torch in the darkness. They crave no charity, no pension, but the satisfaction that comes from lucrative toil, and this satisfaction is the right of every human being.

At your meeting New York will speak its word for the blind, and when New York speaks, the world listens. The true message of New York is not the commercial ticking of busy telegraphs, but the mightier utterances of such gatherings as yours. Of late our periodicals have been filled with depressing revelations of great social evils. Querulous critics have pointed to every flaw in our civic structure. We have listened long enough to the pessimists. You once told me you were a pessimist, Mr. Clemens, but great men are usually mistaken about themselves. You are an optimist. If you were not, you would not preside at the meeting. For it is an answer to pessimism. It proclaims that the heart and the wisdom of a great city are devoted to the good of mankind, that in this, busiest city in the world, no cry of distress goes up but receives a compassionate and generous answer. Rejoice that the cause of the blind has been heard in New York, for the day after it shall be heard around the world.

Yours sincerely,

Helen Keller

via Letters of Note: We have listened long enough to the pessimists.

“A Telephone Call” – Dorothy Parker

Posted on by

“A Telephone Call”
by Dorothy Parker (1893-1967)

PLEASE, God, let him telephone me now. Dear God, let him call me now. I won’t ask anything else of You, truly I won’t. It isn’t very much to ask. It would be so little to You, God, such a little, little thing. Only let him telephone now. Please, God. Please, please, please.

If I didn’t think about it, maybe the telephone might ring. Sometimes it does that. If I could think of something else. If I could think of something else. Knobby if I counted five hundred by fives, it might ring by that time. I’ll count slowly. I won’t cheat. And if it rings when I get to three hundred, I won’t stop; I won’t answer it until I get to five hundred. Five, ten, fifteen, twenty, twenty-five, thirty, thirty-five, forty, forty-five, fifty…. Oh, please ring. Please.

This is the last time I’ll look at the clock. I will not look at it again. It’s ten minutes past seven. He said he would telephone at five o’clock. “I’ll call you at five, darling.” I think that’s where he said “darling.” I’m almost sure he said it there. I know he called me “darling” twice, and the other time was when he said good-by. “Good-by, darling.” He was busy, and he can’t say much in the office, but he called me “darling” twice. He couldn’t have minded my calling him up. I know you shouldn’t keep telephoning them–I know they don’t like that. When you do that they know you are thinking about them and wanting them, and that makes them hate you. But I hadn’t talked to him in three days-not in three days. And all I did was ask him how he was; it was just the way anybody might have called him up. He couldn’t have minded that. He couldn’t have thought I was bothering him. “No, of course you’re not,” he said. And he said he’d telephone me. He didn’t have to say that. I didn’t ask him to, truly I didn’t. I’m sure I didn’t. I don’t think he would say he’d telephone me, and then just never do it. Please don’t let him do that, God. Please don’t.

“I’ll call you at five, darling.” “Good-by, darling.,’ He was busy, and he was in a hurry, and there were people around him, but he called me “darling” twice. That’s mine, that’s mine. I have that, even if I never see him again. Oh, but that’s so little. That isn’t enough. Nothing’s enough, if I never see him again. Please let me see him again, God. Please, I want him so much. I want him so much. I’ll be good, God. I will try to be better, I will, If you will let me see him again. If You will let him telephone me. Oh, let him telephone me now.

Ah, don’t let my prayer seem too little to You, God. You sit up there, so white and old, with all the angels about You and the stars slipping by. And I come to You with a prayer about a telephone call. Ah, don’t laugh, God. You see, You don’t know how it feels. You’re so safe, there on Your throne, with the blue swirling under You. Nothing can touch You; no one can twist Your heart in his hands. This is suffering, God, this is bad, bad suffering. Won’t You help me? For Your Son’s sake, help me. You said You would do whatever was asked of You in His name. Oh, God, in the name of Thine only beloved Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord, let him telephone me now.

I must stop this. I mustn’t be this way. Look. Suppose a young man says he’ll call a girl up, and then something happens, and he doesn’t. That isn’t so terrible, is it? Why, it’s gong on all over the world, right this minute. Oh, what do I care what’s going on all over the world? Why can’t that telephone ring? Why can’t it, why can’t it? Couldn’t you ring? Ah, please, couldn’t you? You damned, ugly, shiny thing. It would hurt you to ring, wouldn’t it? Oh, that would hurt you. Damn you, I’ll pull your filthy roots out of the wall, I’ll smash your smug black face in little bits. Damn you to hell.

No, no, no. I must stop. I must think about something else. This is what I’ll do. I’ll put the clock in the other room. Then I can’t look at it. If I do have to look at it, then I’ll have to walk into the bedroom, and that will be something to do. Maybe, before I look at it again, he will call me. I’ll be so sweet to him, if he calls me. If he says he can’t see me tonight, I’ll say, “Why, that’s all right, dear. Why, of course it’s all right.” I’ll be the way I was when I first met him. Then maybe he’ll like me again. I was always sweet, at first. Oh, it’s so easy to be sweet to people before you love them.

I think he must still like me a little. He couldn’t have called me “darling” twice today, if he didn’t still like me a little. It isn’t all gone, if he still likes me a little; even if it’s only a little, little bit. You see, God, if You would just let him telephone me, I wouldn’t have to ask You anything more. I would be sweet to him, I would be gay, I would be just the way I used to be, and then he would love me again. And then I would never have to ask You for anything more. Don’t You see, God? So won’t You please let him telephone me? Won’t You please, please, please?

Are You punishing me, God, because I’ve been bad? Are You angry with me because I did that? Oh, but, God, there are so many bad people –You could not be hard only to me. And it wasn’t very bad; it couldn’t have been bad. We didn’t hurt anybody, God. Things are only bad when they hurt people. We didn’t hurt one single soul; You know that. You know it wasn’t bad, don’t You, God? So won’t You let him telephone me now?

If he doesn’t telephone me, I’ll know God is angry with me. I’ll count five hundred by fives, and if he hasn’t called me then, I will know God isn’t going to help me, ever again. That will be the sign. Five, ten, fifteen, twenty, twenty-five, thirty, thirty-five, forty, forty-five, fifty, fifty-five. . . It was bad. I knew it was bad. All right, God, send me to hell. You think You’re frightening me with Your hell, don’t You? You think. Your hell is worse than mine.

I mustn’t. I mustn’t do this. Suppose he’s a little late calling me up –that’s nothing to get hysterical about. Maybe he isn’t going to call–maybe he’s coming straight up here without telephoning. He’ll be cross if he sees I have been crying. They don’t like you to cry. He doesn’t cry. I wish to God I could make him cry. I wish I could make him cry and tread the floor and feel his heart heavy and big and festering in him. I wish I could hurt him like hell.

He doesn’t wish that about me. I don’t think he even knows how he makes me feel. I wish he could know, without my telling him. They don’t like you to tell them they’ve made you cry. They don’t like you to tell them you’re unhappy because of them. If you do, they think you’re possessive and exacting. And then they hate you. They hate you whenever you say anything you really think. You always have to keep playing little games. Oh, I thought we didn’t have to; I thought this was so big I could say whatever I meant. I guess you can’t, ever. I guess there isn’t ever anything big enough for that. Oh, if he would just telephone, I wouldn’t tell him I had been sad about him. They hate sad people. I would be so sweet and so gay, he couldn’t help but like me. If he would only telephone. If he would only telephone.

Maybe that’s what he is doing. Maybe he is coming on here without calling me up. Maybe he’s on his way now. Something might have happened to him. No, nothing could ever happen to him. I can’t picture anything happening to him. I never picture him run over. I never see him lying still and long and dead. I wish he were dead. That’s a terrible wish. That’s a lovely wish. If he were dead, he would be mine. If he were dead, I would never think of now and the last few weeks. I would remember only the lovely times. It would be all beautiful. I wish he were dead. I wish he were dead, dead, dead.

This is silly. It’s silly to go wishing people were dead just because they don’t call you up the very minute they said they would. Maybe the clock’s fast; I don’t know whether it’s right. Maybe he’s hardly late at all. Anything could have made him a little late. Maybe he had to stay at his office. Maybe he went home, to call me up from there, and somebody came in. He doesn’t like to telephone me in front of people. Maybe he’s worried, just alittle, little bit, about keeping me waiting. He might even hope that I would call him up. I could do that. I could telephone him.

I mustn’t. I mustn’t, I mustn’t. Oh, God, please don’t let me telephone him. Please keep me from doing that. I know, God, just as well as You do, that if he were worried about me, he’d telephone no matter where he was or how many people there were around him. Please make me know that, God. I don’t ask YOU to make it easy for me–You can’t do that, for all that You could make a world. Only let me know it, God. Don’t let me go on hoping. Don’t let me say comforting things to myself. Please don’t let me hope, dear God. Please don’t.

I won’t telephone him. I’ll never telephone him again as long as I live. He’ll rot in hell, before I’ll call him up. You don’t have to give me strength, God; I have it myself. If he wanted me, he could get me. He knows where I ram. He knows I’m waiting here. He’s so sure of me, so sure. I wonder why they hate you, as soon as they are sure of you. I should think it would be so sweet to be sure.

It would be so easy to telephone him. Then I’d know. Maybe it wouldn’t be a foolish thing to do. Maybe he wouldn’t mind. Maybe he’d like it. Maybe he has been trying to get me. Sometimes people try and try to get you on the telephone, and they say the number doesn’t answer. I’m not just saying that to help myself; that really happens. You know that really happens, God. Oh, God, keep me away from that telephone. Kcep me away. Let me still have just a little bit of pride. I think I’m going to need it, God. I think it will be all I’ll have.

Oh, what does pride matter, when I can’t stand it if I don’t talk to him? Pride like that is such a silly, shabby little thing. The real pride, the big pride, is in having no pride. I’m not saying that just because I want to call him. I am not. That’s true, I know that’s true. I will be big. I will be beyond little prides.

Please, God, keep me from, telephoning him. Please, God.

I don’t see what pride has to do with it. This is such a little thing, for me to be bringing in pride, for me to be making such a fuss about. I may have misunderstood him. Maybe he said for me to call him up, at five. “Call me at five, darling.” He could have said that, perfectly well. It’s so possible that I didn’t hear him right. “Call me at five, darling.” I’m almost sure that’s what he said. God, don’t let me talk this way to myself. Make me know, please make me know.

I’ll think about something else. I’ll just sit quietly. If I could sit still. If I could sit still. Maybe I could read. Oh, all the books are about people who love each other, truly and sweetly. What do they want to write about that for? Don’t they know it isn’t tree? Don’t they know it’s a lie, it’s a God damned lie? What do they have to tell about that for, when they know how it hurts? Damn them, damn them, damn them.

I won’t. I’ll be quiet. This is nothing to get excited about. Look. Suppose he were someone I didn’t know very well. Suppose he were another girl. Then I d just telephone and say, “Well, for goodness’ sake, what happened to you?” That’s what I’d do, and I’d never even think about it. Why can’t I be casual and natural, just because I love him? I can be. Honestly, I can be. I’ll call him up, and be so easy and pleasant. You see if I won’t, God. Oh, don’t let me call him. Don’t, don’t, don’t.

God, aren’t You really going to let him call me? Are You sure, God? Couldn’t You please relent? Couldn’t You? I don’t even ask You to let him telephone me this minute, God; only let him do it in a little while. I’ll count five hundred by fives. I’ll do it so slowly and so fairly. If he hasn’t telephoned then, I’ll call him. I will. Oh, please, dear God, dear kind God, my blessed Father in Heaven, let him call before then. Please, God. Please.

Five, ten, fifteen, twenty, twentyfive, thirty, thirty-five.

No Ovaries Removed

Posted on by

No Ovaries Removed

On April 28th of 1952, medical staff at the Cedars of Lebanon hospital in L.A. wheeled an extremely nervous Marilyn Monroe to surgery where she was to have her appendix removed. Some time later, with Monroe unconscious and the procedure about to begin, doctors pulled back her gown to find the following note taped to her stomach. It was addressed to her surgeon, Dr. Marcus Rabwin.

Transcript follows.

(Source: MM-Personal: From the Private Archive of Marilyn Monroe; Image of Monroe in 1952, post-appendectomy, via.)

Transcript

Dear Dr. Rabwin,

cut as little as possible I know it seems vain but that doesn’t really enter in to it. The fact I’m a woman is important and means much to me.

Save please (I can’t ask enough) what you can – I’m in your hands. You have children and you must know what it means – please Dr Rabwin – I know somehow you will!

thank you – thank you – thank you – For God‘s sakes Dear Doctor no ovaries removed – please again do whatever you can to prevent large scars.

Thanking you with all my heart.

Marilyn Monroe

via Letters of Note: No Ovaries Removed.

Related articles

Ennui

Posted on by

ennui = A gripping listlessness or melancholia caused by boredom; depression.

SYLVIA PLATH

Ennui

Tea leaves thwart those who court catastrophe,
designing futures where nothing will occur:
cross the gypsy’s palm and yawning she
will still predict no perils left to conquer.
Jeopardy is jejune now: naïve knight
finds ogres out-of-date and dragons unheard
of, while blasé princesses indict
tilts at terror as downright absurd.

The beast in Jamesian grove will never jump,
compelling hero’s dull career to crisis;
and when insouciant angels play God’s trump,
while bored arena crowds for once look eager,
hoping toward havoc, neither pleas nor prizes
shall coax from doom’s blank door lady or tiger.

God Dies: An Essay by Frances Farmer

Posted on by

Today is Frances Farmer‘s 99th birthday.  I think about her frequently, mostly because I work diagonally from the Olympic Hotel where she was employed in the laundry room after her first rise and fall.  I think about how she walked this same block 60 or so years earlier.  To celebrate her birthday, here is the essay that launched her fame and controversy.

God Dies: An Essay by Frances Farmer

Film star Frances Farmer (1913-1970) was a senior at West Seattle High School in April 1931 when she gained her first taste of national notoriety, with this award-winning essay, titled “God Dies.” The essay won first place and a prize of $100 in a contest sponsored by The Scholastic, a magazine for high school students. It also generated considerable outrage, especially from local ministers.

News coverage of the award focused less on the essay itself than on its provocative title. Front-page articles in Seattle newspapers carried headlines such as “Seattle Girl Denies God and Wins Prize.” The stories were eventually picked up by the major wire services and distributed to papers around the country. Farmer received more than 100 letters expressing shock, dismay, and/or indignation. In Seattle, several churches held special meetings to discuss the “rampant atheism” in the public schools. “If the young people of this city are going to hell,” one Baptist minister reportedly told his congregation, “Frances Farmer is surely leading them there” (Arnold, 31).

Farmer made headlines again four years later, as a drama student at the University of Washington, when she won a trip to the Soviet Union by selling subscriptions to a leftist newspaper. She accepted the prize despite the fierce opposition of her mother, Lillian V. Farmer, who said her daughter had been corrupted by radical teachers. She left Seattle by bus on March 30, 1935, traveling to New York and from there to Moscow on a steamer. When she returned to New York, at the end of May, she cashed in the return portion of her bus ticket home and used the money to rent a room. Within weeks, she had met an agent, had a screen test, and signed a contract with Paramount Pictures.

Some years later, at the peak of her career as a film star, Farmer said the reaction to her high school essay had been a turning point in her life. “It was pretty sad,” she said, “because for the first time I found how stupid people could be. It sort of made me feel alone in the world. The more people pointed at me in scorn the more stubborn I got and when they began calling me the Bad Girl of West Seattle High, I tried to live up to it” (Collier’s).

Farmer starred in more than a dozen Hollywood films and several Broadway plays before her career was derailed by a series of commitments to mental institutions. Judged legally insane in 1944, she spent more than five years as a patient at Western State Hospital in Steilacoom, Washington. After her release, in 1950, she settled first in Eureka, California, and then in Indianapolis, Indiana, where she died in 1970.

Here is her essay, as published in The Scholastic on May 2, 1931.

“God Dies”

No one ever came to me and said, “You’re a fool. There isn’t such a thing as God. Somebody’s been stuffing you.” It wasn’t a murder. I think God just died of old age. And when I realized that he wasn’t any more, it didn’t shock me. It seemed natural and right.

Maybe it was because I was never properly impressed with a religion. I went to Sunday school and liked the stories about Christ and the Christmas star. They were beautiful. They made you warm and happy to think about. But I didn’t believe them. The Sunday School teacher talked too much in the way our grade school teacher used to when she told us about George Washington. Pleasant, pretty stories, but not true.

Religion was too vague. God was different. He was something real, something I could feel. But there were only certain times when I could feel it. I used to lie between cool, clean sheets at night after I’d had a bath, after I had washed my hair and scrubbed my knuckles and finger nails and teeth. Then I could lie quite still in the dark with my face to the window with the trees in it, and talk to God. “I am clean, now. I’ve never been as clean. I’ll never be cleaner.” And somehow, it was God. I wasn’t sure that it was … just something cool and dark and clean.

That wasn’t religion, though. There was too much of the physical about it. I couldn’t get that same feeling during the day, with my hands in dirty dish water and the hard sun showing up the dirtiness on the roof-tops. And after a time, even at night, the feeling of God didn’t last. I began to wonder what the minister meant when he said, “God, the father, sees even the smallest sparrow fall. He watches over all his children.” That jumbled it all up for me. But I was sure of one thing. If God were a father, with children, that cleanliness I had been feeling wasn’t God. So at night, when I went to bed, I would think, “I am clean. I am sleepy.” And then I went to sleep. It didn’t keep me from enjoying the cleanness any less. I just knew that God wasn’t there. He was a man on a throne in Heaven, so he was easy to forget.

Sometimes I found he was useful to remember; especially when I lost things that were important. After slamming through the house, panicky and breathless from searching, I could stop in the middle of a room and shut my eyes. “Please God, let me find my red hat with the blue trimmings.” It usually worked. God became a super-father that couldn’t spank me. But if I wanted a thing badly enough, he arranged it.

That satisfied me until I began to figure that if God loved all his children equally, why did he bother about my red hat and let other people lose their fathers and mothers for always? I began to see that he didn’t have much to do about hats, people dying or anything. They happened whether he wanted them to or not, and he stayed in heaven and pretended not to notice. I wondered a little why God was such a useless thing. It seemed a waste of time to have him. After that he became less and less, until he was…nothingness.

I felt rather proud to think that I had found the truth myself, without help from any one. It puzzled me that other people hadn’t found out, too. God was gone. We were younger. We had reached past him. Why couldn’t they see it? It still puzzles me.

ᔥ HistoryLink.org- the Free Online Encyclopedia of Washington State History.

Arguing Equality Chapter 5: Gay Couples and Children

Posted on by

This is a nine-part installment designed to help everyone understand marriage equality.  For some, it will be an education, for others, it will be helpful when discussing the subject.  I have included links to each chapter at the end, as well as information about the author.

CHAPTER 5:

GAY MARRIAGE AND PROCREATION

BUT GAYS CANNOT REPRODUCE

What purpose does marriage serve? Why should the government sanction it? Gay marriage opponents often utilize questions such as these to probe the heart of the marital institution, analyzing its essential form and function to demonstrate that marriage is – and ought to be – an inherently heterosexual institution.

Marriage, as the argument goes, is an institution created and celebrated for one all-important purpose — to sustain a healthy environment for raising children. As James Q. Wilson, author of The Moral Sense, puts it: “A family is not an association of independent people; it is a human commitment designed to make possible the rearing of moral and healthy children. Governments care — or ought to care — about families for this reason, and scarcely for any other.”

If the purpose of marriage is to raise children, then the question of same-sex marriage comes down to the biology of the sex organs. A man and a woman can have a child, but a woman and a woman, or a man and a man, cannot. Since same-sex couples cannot procreate, they cannot fulfill this basic function of marriage.

To put the argument simply, the purpose of marriage is to foster procreation. Gays cannot procreate. Therefore, gays cannot marry. This is not a matter of discrimination, it is simple human biology.

Below you will find the most popular ways of countering this supposition, and depending on your social and political outlook, you can choose ay one of them, or all. Click below to learn some of the basic arguments.

A) Gay People Do Have Children

The first flaw in this reasoning is that — contrary to popular opinion — gay people can, and do, raise children. Some gays and lesbians have children born from a prior heterosexual relationship, others adopt children, many go the route of artificial insemination or surrogate parenting. Indeed, what many refer to as the “gayby boom” is no small phenomenon — figures place the number of lesbian mothers in the United States at 1 to 5 million and the number of gay fathers at 1 to 3 million.

B) The Infertile Couple Analogy

There are far more sterile heterosexual unions in America than homosexual ones. The “anatomical possibility” crowd cannot have it both ways. If the possibility of children is what gives meaning to marriage, then a post-menopausal woman who applies for a marriage license should be turned away at the courthouse door. What’s more, she should be hooted at and condemned for stretching the meaning of marriage beyond its natural basis and so reducing the institution to frivolity. People at the Family Research Council or Concerned Women for America should point at her and say, “If she can marry, why not polygamy?” –Jonathan Rauch, For Better or Worse?

Procreativity speaking, there is no difference between a sterile heterosexual couple, a heterosexual couple who chooses not to have children, and a homosexual couple. Thus as a matter of logical consistency, if the government is to deny gays and lesbians the right to marry because they cannot procreate, then it must necessarily deny post-menopausal women and impotent couples that right as well.

As Mark Strasser notes:

It is at best disingenuous to hold that an essential precondition of marriage is that the couple plans to have children, but that the state’s requiring only certain people to meet that condition is a mere theoretical imperfection. In any case, no responsible legal authority believes that the desire and willingness to have children is an essential precondition of marriage except in the context of attempting to show why there can be no homosexual marriages.

Indeed, any argument that justifies an impotent heterosexual marriage also justifies a homosexual one, and thus if sterile or elderly couples cannot be denied the right to marry on procreative possibility grounds, than neither can gays or lesbians.

The argument laid forth below is for the conservative-minded. Quit simply, marriage, gay or straight, is good for society, and should therefore be encouraged. Many straight and gay single individuals would question why couples receive any benefits at all versus married or coupled individuals.

C) Insurance and Companionship

Of course sterile heterosexual couples can get married, a fact not likely to change any time soon. And for good reason. Despite the rhetoric of gay marriage opponents, marriage is widely considered to be “the bedrock of our civilization” for reasons as important, if not more important, than the rearing of children.

Marriage as Social Insurance

One of the biggest problems any society faces is how to care for an individual when they can no longer care for themselves. If single, an individual with Alzheimer’s or cancer might be fortunate enough to rely on friends or family. But then, again, they might not, in which case they will fall under the responsibility of the state – often at substantial cost.

The benefit of a marital “partner,” for both the individual and society, is to help guarantee that one will not have to rely on the government during times of need. As Jonathan Rauch notes: “If marriage has any meaning at all, it is that when you collapse from a stroke, there will be at least one other person whose ‘job’ is to drop everything and come to your aid.

From a purely economic perspective, marriage serves as a form of social insurance. Its participants are provided with a reliable partner “for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health.” It is for this reason that elderly and sterile couples are permitted, indeed encouraged, to marry – not because they will bear children, but rather because marriage promotes individual and societal stability.

Marriage as Companionship

Of course marriage is more than just a machinization of social insurance; it is an expression of love. When men and women decide to wed, it is not usually because they are contemplating the insurance features of marriage, but rather because they are in love and want to make a binding commitment to be together for life.

From a religious perspective, this “companionship” function of marriage was present from the very first couple onward. Indeed, according to the Bible, God created a partner for Adam not for procreative purposes, but rather because: “God said, ‘It is not good for man to be alone’ (Genesis 2:18).” Jeffrey John notes:

“Complementarity and companionship are at least as much a part of God’s plan in creation as childbirth. Indeed it is remarkable that in the Genesis account childbirth emerges only as an afterthought, and in the rather negative context of God’s punishment of Eve (3:16). It is highly significant that Jesus and Paul, while both referring to the creation story, never once mention procreation or physical sexual difference in their teaching about marriage. On the contrary, their stress is entirely on the quality of the relationship, and in particular that it should be a covenant of total sexual fidelity and indissoluble union.”

Marriage is not just about procreation and child-rearing. It is a system of insurance and a guarantee of stability, an expression of love and a promise of lifelong companionship. To argue that gays and lesbians should be denied the right to marry because they cannot produce children or have the “wrong sexual organs,” then, fails to take the entire picture into account.

Point/ Counterpoint

While most would no doubt agree that companionship is a noteworthy goal of marriage, many opponents would add that gender differentiation is a material component of that companionship. A man is meant to complete a woman, it is argued, and a woman to complete a man – a theory known among Christian scholars as “complementarity.”

However, lifelong gay and lesbian couples provide demonstrative evidence that one’s companion need not be someone of the opposite sex. Indeed, a vast array of sociological and psychological literature reveals that the bond between same-sex couples can be as emotional and powerful as that between opposite-sex couples. Psychologist C.A. Tripp, for instance, reports that:

[T]he settled qualities of the homosexual couple tend to be precisely those which characterize the stable heterosexual relationship. The similarities evidenced in daily life are especially noticeable. The way the partners interact as they engage in conversation, the way casual affection is expressed and minor irritations are dealt with, as well as how visitors are treated, or dinner is served, and myriad other details of everyday life are all more or less indistinguishable.

“The heterosexuality of marriage is civilly intrinsic only if it is understood to be inherently procreative. And that definition has long been abandoned in civil society. In contemporary America, marriage has become a way in which the state recognizes an emotional and economic commitment between two people to each other for life.” – Andrew Sullivan, The Politics of Homosexuality

via Gay Couples and Children.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Seth Persily is a member of the Georgia Bar and a cum laude graduate of Harvard Law School. While at Harvard, Mr. Persily served as Publisher of the Harvard Law Record and co-President of the Lambda Law Association. Mr. Persily obtained his undergraduate degree from Duke University, where he served as President of the Duke Gay, Bisexual & Lesbian Association. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa, with a B.A. in Religion and a minor in Gay & Lesbian Studies.

Mr. Persily worked at the Atlanta law firm of Sutherland, Asbill & Brennan before opening his own practice, Persily & Associates, which concentrates on employment discrimination and real estate law. He serves on the Board of Directors for Georgia Equality as well as YouthPride.

Related articles