Today is my 42nd birthday. Whoopadee-doo. I’m spending it working all day and sleeping in a moderately-priced hotel room alone. Whee.JWs don’t celebrate birthdays, and I think that’s just silly. We all need one day a year to say “MEEEE”. It’s one thing we all have in common; we all have a birthday (actually, a birthday anniversary), and I really find it repugnant that a religion has taken that away from its people.Then I get over it. Too bad. More presents for Meeeeeee!
Happy birthday Dave!
Just been reading about why JWs don’t celebrate birthdays – it’s pretty hilarious.
Have a good one.
I asked a J. W. about this very subject once, and they actually gave me a reasonable answer (although I’m sure other J.W.’s might answer differently, and that there are probably other, religious-related reasons why they skip out on holidays). The J.W. that I spoke with said people should give gifts to family and loved ones because they love them, and not just because it happens to be a certain day of the year. She said, “Why wait until Valentine’s Day to buy gifts and show your spouse how much you love them, when you should love your spouse all year long?” She also told me that J.W.’s buy gifts for their family and friends all year long, whenever they feel like doing something nice. I still enjoy celebrating holidays, but I can see it from their point of view too.
Happy Birthday, Dave!
Happy birthday!!!
Happy Birthday Dave.
Have a nice day.
Saving one dog will not change the world, but it will change the world for that one dog. -Unknown
Happy B day Dave.
Happy Me-Day, Dave.
You’re exactly three weeks older than me, you old fart!
OT:
I guess she let Jebus take the wheel!
http://www.news4jax.com/news/17160771/detail.html
Happy birthday Dave!
So… What presents di dyou get?
Happy B-Day Dave! If I was there, I’d put you in a headlock and stick peanuts up your nose!
)
Seriously though I totally understand why some people don’t like birthdays. I’ve never liked birthdays one bit. It’s like a funeral when you’re alive still: A day for OTHER people to celebrate, at your expense. The difference is, you have to be there! Alive, I mean. Great.
Yes, I think we should pay attention to each other everyday, and not just save it all up for one day a year. I think we do well at that, for the most part, but obviously we could improve how we treat each other everyday.
Birthdays have also fallen under the spell of massive capitalism, like Christmas, Easter and Independence Day. It’s a giant marketing plan where everyone in America is expected to become involved in buying things, usually thing that aren’t really necessary or important to society in general, so that some giant corporations can get a little larger.
Plus exactly who wants to be reminded that they’re another year older, with witnesses present?? Unless you’re under 30, this is not a good thing to most people. It’s great to be alive and to have lived another year, but to slap a number on it, a label if you will, just seems to degrade the whole thing. Then we put that number on a cake somehow, even if we have to cheat in order to get such a high number on there…lol
I can’t believe you’re 42 Dave! You’re so young at heart, but then 42 isn’t old…See? We create a scale for aging because we care so much about these particular numbers. The Earth doesn’t care, nor does the sun, but those two bodies are about the only things that SHOULD care. Nothing else really even notices that another year has happened for us. Certainly not anyone on Mars, or the Borg…:o)Just us.
Of course I love a good party, and I don’t need a special reason to have one. Just being alive is a good reason for starters, imho.
I think we should just change to a four day work week, and consider that a permanent gift to ourselves. Let’s give Hallmark some time off too. lol
Joe Zamecki
Austin
You can tell us about your other women in the hotel room… we won’t say anything. We all know how much women come flapping to us atheists.
Jehovah’s Witnesses also don’t celebrate Christmas, saying that it has pagan roots and that the (mythical) Jesus was not born on December 25 — correct on both counts!
I couldn’t care less about my own birthday. But I’m fine with the commercial, nonreligious elements of the popular American Christmas. I’ve been to dozens of Christmas parties and not one has emphasized Christianity. None even had carols. The one Hanukkah party I went to was unpleasantly devout, with religious pop and devotional songs, and a menorah lighting + prayer.
Hanukkah is no alternative to Christmas for secular people. Happy birthday, Dave. I’m 42 too this month. “What’s your sign”?
Happy birthday.
Happy Birthday Dave!
At 11 years younger than me, you’re still a puppy. Drag that birthday out and celebrate with the family when you get back home.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEfH0KkLGrI&NR=1
Happy Birthday, Dave!
I tend not to make a big deal about my own birthday. What am I really celebrating – not dying in the last 12 months? The fact that 6 billion people can make the same claim — 16 million of them on the same day — doesn’t make the day seem so special, especially when I still have to go to work.
Of course this doesn’t mean that I turn down presents!!!
H A P P Y B I R T H D A Y
D A V E !!
Keep inventing and marketing those inventions!
Greetings to your wife and love to your daughter!
Annaswamy Natarajan
Non-Atheist
PS: Where are you these days?
I am in salubrious Virginia, celebrating my life everyday!
H A P P Y B I R T H D A Y
D A V E !!
Keep inventing and marketing those inventions!
Greetings to your wife and love to your daughter!
Annaswamy Natarajan
Non-Atheist
PS: Where are you these days?
I am in salubrious Virginia, celebrating my life everyday!
What do you get when you multiply six by nine?… nope.
How many roads must a man walk down? … nope.
How old is Dave?… hmmmm…er…nope.
Keep working on it, I am sure we will find the ultimate question someday.
Happy Birthday, Dave.
The last birthday I celebrated was my 30th. The last time I celebrated it was just a few months ago.
Happy birthday, Dave.
I don’t celebrate my birthday. I guess it just doesn’t make sense to me to “celebrate” anything with consumerism. I prefer books as gifts if anyone insists on getting me a gift. I read them many times, they tend to take up little space and, best of all, I learn something from all of them (even fiction).
HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAVE!
Have a great birthday. I’ve found, at least for me, life gets better as you get older!
I’m gonna celebrate my 7th 39th birthday this year. I used to love my birthday. As I got older, it got much less special. I guess I concentrated on the kids birthdays instead. The boys did make me a “bread cake” one year when they had forgotten my birthday. Two slices of bread (one an end piece) with frosting in between and candles on top. YUK. And YUMMY at the same time.
That said, I don’t work on my birthday – always take the day off. What do I do on that day? Whatever I want!!!
Happy birthday Dave!
Fairy Dog Mother
We just got a dog from a high kill shelter. We couldn’t save them all, but we did save one. She’s very sweet and after we got all the ticks and fleas off of her and groomed her, she’s also very cute. It’s amazing how many good dogs there are out there. I always encourage people to adopt one rather than buy one.
Hmmm…I think everyone missed this…
Dave doesn’t celebrate his own birthday either…
Happy Birthday Dave…
I for one love to celebrate life…
After all…it’s special. For there is no life anywhere else in the universe…
Looks like the post-before-you-think Phreeky is looking for an opportunity to interject his anti-choice rhetoric. So take this fool:
Read the actual study in JAMA. For years the anti-choice liars have been blathering about a problem that simply does not exist.
Happy b-day Dave. Maybe your present is peace and quiet.
Ex-jw so I’ll tell you bdays are pagan in tradition.
Christianity is a death cult which glorifies and teaches its followers to embrace and gleefully anticipate death. Atheism is the life affirming position.
Really? have you been everywhere in the universe to check? life outside of the Earth is a statistical certainty.
Happy b-day Dave!
Dave,
Well geewillikers, something we can’t argue about!
Happy bipartisan Birthday!
congrats Dave on avoiding your inevitable demise for forty two years. That sounds really emo and goth, doesn’t it? LOL.
I was raised in a family of devout JWs, and even though I was brainwashed, physically and mentally abused during the period of my life when all children assume that mommy and daddy know everything, I credit the difficult and painful separation and climb out of that brainwash with what I consider to be a more open minded and compassionate overview of the struggle we have with fundamentalists than most atheists or agnostics have.
JWs are basically very well meaning people for whom family and friends are extremely important. They are not stupid or uneducated, but possess a drive to search for reasons to believe, rather than putting their beliefs to the test.
Uniquely, they do not seek public office, nor do they vote. They discourage positions of police officer from being held by members. They divorce themselves from taking part in the course of the affairs of men believing that ultimately, when the devil is proved wrong in the court of heaven, that god will restore Eden to earth. They genuinely strive to be honest in business, they do not steal or lie, believing god is always watching their conduct.
But, their structure is extremely complex in that all are hiding their human imperfections from everyone else. Their materialism, their earthly ambition, their envy, their jealousy, their desire for recognition for spiritual achievement, and foremost, they hide their doubts and lack of faith in the deepest most secret cells of the mind and continually war against themselves in an attempt to become a genuine believer. Reason, which is supposed to prove their faith opens endless new questions and doubts. The primary function of their faith is that the Bible is the unquestionable word of god, therefore, any question you ask will incite a quote from scripture. Any attempt to challenge that premise will meet a brick wall.
But, my point is that these are not hated enemies, nor are many other members of fundamentalists sects, but, rather they are well meaning innocent victims of religions selling them false hopes.
While it angers a free thinker to see religions try to impose their will upon the public, and rightfully so, I think it is important at the same to understand that these are not bad people, but victims of a fraudulent scheme to unite their votes and financial resources into a political agenda.
NeoWolfe
Natarajan,
Great to see you on the blog. But as far as I can remember, you’re as atheistic as I am (you are all there is).
Comment from: TXatheist
Well that explains alot…
What’s wrong with this picture…?
Happy Birthday, David! Hope it’s been a great day for you.
What–
I found the report on women who have had abortions to be really interesting.
I know someone, very close to me, who actually had two elective abortions. She felt bad about them at the time, but felt that it was the right decision. No depression after either one. She went on to have a child who is now a teenager.
She loves her child but sometimes thinks that maybe she wasn’t cut out to be a mom. She’s had a lot more depression from being a mother than she ever had from having abortions.
I assume that you are asking why the existence of life on other planets is acceptable to me but gods existence isnt. The obvious answer is that we have an example of life evolving here on planet Earth and we know that there are many other planets orbiting within the “Goldilocks Zone” of other stars so there is no reason to doubt that life could also evolve on these planets. Its a scientifically valid deduction based on what we know of biology, astronomy, geology, etc and one day will probably be testable as we improve our technology. Since there is zero observable or testable evidence for supernatural gods we can dismiss this idea as nonsense.
thanks for all your best wishes folks!
One thing we can say with a degree of certainty, if life on other planets or god(s) exist they have come about by evolution by natural selection.
Phreedumbs leading questions are SO TRANSPARENT..it really gives away his lack of intelligence.
Neowolfe
And what does a “bad person” look like, sound like or behave like. This is an appropriate time to quote Steven Weinberg.
“With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.”
Happy BirthDave!
Pixel
Being a parent is hard and consuming work. Best wishes to your friend and her child.
Phreedm, also ex-catholic, ex-methodist and I looked into mormonism but never attended or became confirmed like the other 3 xian sects. I gave xianity a fair shot and became an atheist.
TX…I’ve got a question…
In all seriousness…What do you consider a “fair shot”…?
TX
Here’s Phreeky’s next response:
You may have just needed to try a little bit more. You were almost there! The human potential for deluded thinking is almost limitless. Shame on you for not living up to your potential.
Happy Belated Birthday Dave!!!!!!!!
I personally like having one day that I can be selfish and think of me ? MY birthday. The other 364 days I?m always looking out for others. When my dad died, I didn?t cry. I was too busy taking care of business and my Mother. 6 months later, on my birthday, I cried that my Daddy was not there.
I had a great time celebrating my last birthday at the American Atheist convention.
What,
I understand your comment and agree that when good people commit unspeakable acts, religion is usually not far away.
But no such label hung over the Civil War. It was just one segment of society whose social structure and economic dominance levered upon the oppression of an entire race of men. Unspeakable acts committed in the name of greed. Religion is not the only influence cripples our civilization, and the job of a free thinker with a conscience does not end with the extraction of religion from our government.
NeoWolfe
Neowolfe
Weinbergs quote reads: “But for GOOD people to do evil things, that takes religion.” I wouldn’t consider the greedy to be good. Weinberg’s quote stands.