“When you die, I mean, there is supposedly a better life, right? Well, if you are an atheist and you don’t believe in anything, if you die, what is there to go to? Nothing. You are worm dirt. So for their son to die for nothing, and now he is no more ? that is pretty hard to get your head around that. So I don’t know how an atheist thinks. I can only imagine that that would be pretty tough.”Asked by ESPN.com whether the Tillmans’ religious beliefs are a factor in the ongoing investigation, Kauzlarich said, “I think so. There is not a whole lot of trust in the system or faith in the system [by the Tillmans]. So that is my personal opinion, knowing what I know.”
http://www.capitolhillblue.com/cont/node/2348This shouldn’t be surprising, just depressing.
“Worm Dirt?” Whatever . . .
If I could have just one wish it would be that somehow after we atheists die that we could see the surprise shock and disbelief on the faces of at least a few believers as they realize,to quote Porky Pig, “Tha-tha-tha-that’s all there is Folks!”
I agree with the poster who responded to the article on capitolhillblue that wrote “In the context of the discussion in the ESPN article, his comment was made around the fact that the Tillman’s do not seem to accept the fact that this was an accident. And despite every investigation they are not satisfied. He was pondering reasons why they (the Tillman’s) have not accepted the answer provided in all the previous investigations. “
Your headline is incredibly misleading and shows agenda.
At his brothers funeral Kevin Tillman remarked “Pat’s not with god. He’s dead”.
Atheists have a better sense of just how precious life is.
My wife has me covered if I die first but I do wonder if her and I were killed together if my brother or brother-in-law(who are xians) would disrepect me by saying nonsense at my funeral. I know my brother wouldn’t be a jerk but my brother in law has the Texas mentality I hate. He’s right and everything in Texas is great and if we were all more like him America would be great….at which point I laugh except he’s serious.
This comment just reinforces that as long as there is organized religion, there will always be hatred and bigotry.
Very sad.
Interesting-
The reason why the Tillman’s are having a hard time accepting any explanations into Pat’s death is because they were lied to from the get go.
That’s all this administration knows how to do well.
Jeebus! How many lies do they have to come up with to satisfy the Tillman family, anyway? For most families it only takes one or two! Why can’t they just pretend that Pat’s “in a better place now” and be happy about it?
Seriously though, alexatheist hit the nail on the head. Atheist families have all the more reason to mourn the loss of a loved one because they know that he really is gone.
Boise Jim – I’m not disputing why the Tillman’s are having a hard time accepting explanations of Pat’s death.
I’m saying that to say this is exposing intolerance for aetheists, as this blog headline suggests, is misleading. It’s also, imho, misusing a devestating situation for agenda gain.
Atheist intolerance? This is about a family trying to discover the truth … from a lying administration.
interesting
Forgive for speaking on behalf of Dave, but I think ‘Atheist Intolerance” refers to the comments made by Lt. Col. Ralph Kauzlarich and not necessarily the actions by our government.
The general issue has to do with nationalistic propaganda, while this post has to do with ramblings of yet another religiously bigoted fucktard.
Well, I went to the site and I read the whole thing… and to me, the comments above by Kauzlarich are anti-atheist in his discription of an atheist family believing their son is “worm dirt”.
Although the next thing he said was right, “So for their son to die for nothing…” But becasue of the context Kauzlarich said it in, it looks to be related to lack of religious belief which is ridiculously backed-up by the moron interviewer saying “whether the Tillmans’ religious beliefs are a factor in the ongoing investigation”.
Actually, Espn’s comment is more distressing to me and it pisses me off that no one answered what really should’ve been said! That it was the grandstanding on this young man’s death and the creation of the false circumstance of his death…the lie that the Bush Crime Family used to rah rah the sheeple to support this disastrous lied-into “war”. THAT’s why his Family won’t let it rest. They’ve been lied to and are determined to at least try to get to the truth. Thier religous beliefs or lackthereof have noting to do with it. Yeck! This is all just more right-wing corporate bs masquerading as news.
In my opinion, the point this officer completely missed was that Pat Tillman’s family was justifiably unhappy by the way the death incident was handled and the fact that the family doesn’t believe that Tillman is up in some sort of happy sky heaven has nothing to do with that dissatisfaction. But the investigating officer used their lack of religious faith as an excuse to turn the investigation into a personal attack on them during a time of incredible grief, and completely lost the point of what he was supposed to be doing, which was probing how our Army leaders let this clusterf*ck happen.
It makes me wonder if this officer believes the family isn’t entitled to the full truth because of their lack of faith.
Kathleen
Just another reason why not to trust the almighty righteous….they think they speak with an authority that is fiction at best…no integrity…no real life experiences….
can u imagine justifying a lie with an imaginative authority….
holy horn toad swaggle batman
i thought we atheists weren’t patriots.according to old man bush we aren’t real americans so what was tillman doing what his grandsons won’t do.
Tillman’s family was lied to.
He was killed by friendly fire.
He was a nonbeliever.
Perhaps the family’s unrest lies with the possibility that he was killed because he was a nonbeliever.
Longshot, I realize, but maybe.
Doesn’t everyone have a right to know why their kid died? If atheists are “pains in the ass” for wanting to know the truth, then at least we aren’t pathetic lapdogs that take whatever lies are fed to us. This should tell the government that we are sick of being lied to and we aren’t going to stand for it anymore. They can use their nasty insults, but it won’t stop us from wanting to know the truth. What we should do is have a protest to show our support for the Tillmans and for other families whose kids were killed in the military and they don’t know why.
get out and vote this is a two way street the military protects us and we must protect the military from reckless leaders.for or against the wars in iraq/afghanistan i think most would agree the current admin.has not done a good job.
Even the sheeple are waking up to the lies of Bush Co. Today it was reported that Bush’s approval ratings were 28% and Cheney stands at 25%-both all time lows.
alex i don’t think they care.they know they won’t be impeached or that congress will cut off money for the war.
Karen
This has been my suspicion since the lies began.
Reason
I do not know if BushCo will be impeached or not but justice will be served. Those bastards would do will to initiate their own impeachments because what the American people and the world have in store for them is far far worse.
The one good thing that will come from all this is going to be the destruction of the religious right. This obsene government could not have happened without the support those intellectually and emotionally challenged evangelical idiots.
Comment from: alexatheist
Huh…?
Comment from: Charlie
This is a very profound statement…I guess it’s a matter of where one places their “imaginative” authority to propagate a lie…
alexatheist: “Atheists have a better sense of just how precious life is” How true! All theists seem to manage is shooting of their uninformed and obnoxious unasked yaps.
what: I hope the American people and world do have the worst in store for BushCo.
Charlie: “they think they speak with authority that is fiction at best” is right. (Don’t forget that these biblical jokes and their rantings belong in the Sunday funnies)
ps: I read the link and listened to the taped Waxman-Tillman hearing. I’m pretty sure I heard Waxman refer to another coverup from the top. Speaking of which it appears VP Cheney is being foiled by the truth with his scapegoat “slamdunk” excuse and criminal blunder with W into Iraq.
Unfortunately, friendly fire, “fragging”, and just plain old accidents are realties of war, and I don’t think there’s any point in speculating about if there was any motive behind Tillman’s death when we don’t know anything about it. I guess it’s possiblethat Tillman was killed because of his atheism, but it seems more likely that there were more mundane, less sinister reasons for his death.
Of course we just won’t know until a proper investigation is done (and that seems unlikely at this point). But still, there’s really no need to get (possibly) a persecution complex over something we really know nothing about.
Clich? time: Never assign to malice, what can adequately be explained by incompetence.
Of course such a Rule of Thumb is meant to be used as the first assumption, pending evidence. The real wisdom is that it is all too easy to vilify those with whom we differ.
Well, as bad as “friendly” fire is (and isn’t that an oxymoron), I can say with a reasonable amount of certainty that Tillman wasn’t fragged for being an Atheist. I’m with the Army CID, I’ve seen CID’s report, and I know the agents who did the investigation, including the firearms expert who traced the trajectories of the bullets. This was a big tactical nightmare, but wasn’t a fragging. However, that’s no excuse for all the issues and politics that followed.
I am an openly serving Atheist, I work with (and sometimes have to go outside the wire with) fundementalist Christians, so I take a personal interest when it appears Atheists could get fragged for being Atheists, but as far as I can tell, there have been zero instances of anything at all like that happening.
Kathleen
(temp resident of Baghdad)
Never in all my years of military service was my open atheism a cause of contention between me and my shipmates, nor between me and any of my superiors. We knew our duties and stuck to them, but piety was not one of them. Religious belief and observance was up to the individual, to be followed according to conscience, during off-duty hours.
That was then. Since the mid-eighties (when I was in the service) I have seen the evangelizing of the armed forces and it is disturbing to say the least. But certainly one rule remains: when you’re in a tight spot you won’t care what your buddy’s religion is when she/he comes to your aid and helps pull you out of harm’s way. Every military man and woman knows full well there are plenty of atheists down in the foxholes and up on the flight deck, and they don’t give a rip about your religious beliefs when the shit hits the fan. All they care about is whether you do your job right.