Dan Popp
Mush of a mushness
By Dan Popp
Down with the great All which annoys me! Long live Zero, who leaves me at peace. — The Senator, in Victor Hugo's Les Miserables
Some months ago my local paper carried a "human interest" story about a couple that loves animals. The pair keeps a small menagerie of pets, including some cats. They are so fond of critters that they couldn't think of eating one. And yet...they own cats. Well, felines are carnivores — they need meat in order to survive. These folks won't slaughter animals for their own consumption, but they will slaughter animals for their animals to eat.
Now I'm not poking fun at vegetarians or vegans. "Some of my best friends," etc. Whether you refrain from eating meat for health reasons or religious reasons or whatever reasons, I support your freedom of conscience. But if you won't eat animals because you love animals, maybe you should watch an episode or two of Wild Kingdom.
The story about this mush-headed but kind-hearted duo is hardly worth noting except as it illustrates something bigger: the self-contradictions inherent in America's de facto state religion. And by that I mean the popular purée of atheistic-pantheistic-Darwinistic-nihilistic-socialistic-humanistic-Gaia worship, perhaps with a caricature of Jesus scotch-taped to the container. Mush religion. Worship of the mush god. The gospel according to E.T. The Extraterrestrial: "Be good" (perhaps with a Santa clause: "for goodness' sake.") Well, mushy spirituality leads to, and feeds on, mushy thinking.
The religion poured forth from the secular Bass-O-Matic is an unsavory mishmash of contradictions. Its adherents, like the animal-lovers, literally cannot live out their beliefs.
Their dogma says that man is only an animal, but their commandment is that man must follow different rules than all the other animals. Cats may eat meat, but their owners may not.
The mush creed proclaims that man was created by No One, from Nothing, by Accident; so there can be no ultimate meaning or purpose to existence. Yet they want to put man under moral obligation concerning his fellow chance-molecule-assemblies. Moral obligation for what — other futilities? And to whom — the Great Nothing?
They believe that man is merely a part of nature, but they preach on every digital street corner that man is responsible for nature, as if he were somehow outside and above it. Those conclusions follow not from The Origin of Species, but from Genesis.
It seems that the mushians want to have it both ways. They'd very much like to hold on to values derived from a biblical worldview — including human stewardship of the planet, and moral responsibility. But they reject any sort of cranky, judgmental God who would make us accountable for our supposed duties.
For the purposes of their agenda we must act as if some deity has crowned humans above all the other animals, while simultaneously believing that humans are in no way special.
We must accept that this god has put us in charge of the tiny random smudge called "Earth" and its meaningless life forms. But in order to have license for sexual behavior below the level of animals, we must believe that there is no god worth worrying about.
We must have absolute faith that Evolution alone formed the world and pronounced it good; but we must not allow any species to become extinct — that is, we must stop Evolution, now.
But to be fair, there is one thing that every mushian knows clearly: those Bible-thumping Christians hold illogical beliefs.
Cats aren't very smart. But they are consistent with their feline nature. And in that respect they seem to be smarter than some people.
© Dan Popp
December 21, 2009
Down with the great All which annoys me! Long live Zero, who leaves me at peace. — The Senator, in Victor Hugo's Les Miserables
Some months ago my local paper carried a "human interest" story about a couple that loves animals. The pair keeps a small menagerie of pets, including some cats. They are so fond of critters that they couldn't think of eating one. And yet...they own cats. Well, felines are carnivores — they need meat in order to survive. These folks won't slaughter animals for their own consumption, but they will slaughter animals for their animals to eat.
Now I'm not poking fun at vegetarians or vegans. "Some of my best friends," etc. Whether you refrain from eating meat for health reasons or religious reasons or whatever reasons, I support your freedom of conscience. But if you won't eat animals because you love animals, maybe you should watch an episode or two of Wild Kingdom.
The story about this mush-headed but kind-hearted duo is hardly worth noting except as it illustrates something bigger: the self-contradictions inherent in America's de facto state religion. And by that I mean the popular purée of atheistic-pantheistic-Darwinistic-nihilistic-socialistic-humanistic-Gaia worship, perhaps with a caricature of Jesus scotch-taped to the container. Mush religion. Worship of the mush god. The gospel according to E.T. The Extraterrestrial: "Be good" (perhaps with a Santa clause: "for goodness' sake.") Well, mushy spirituality leads to, and feeds on, mushy thinking.
The religion poured forth from the secular Bass-O-Matic is an unsavory mishmash of contradictions. Its adherents, like the animal-lovers, literally cannot live out their beliefs.
Their dogma says that man is only an animal, but their commandment is that man must follow different rules than all the other animals. Cats may eat meat, but their owners may not.
The mush creed proclaims that man was created by No One, from Nothing, by Accident; so there can be no ultimate meaning or purpose to existence. Yet they want to put man under moral obligation concerning his fellow chance-molecule-assemblies. Moral obligation for what — other futilities? And to whom — the Great Nothing?
They believe that man is merely a part of nature, but they preach on every digital street corner that man is responsible for nature, as if he were somehow outside and above it. Those conclusions follow not from The Origin of Species, but from Genesis.
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And God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. And God blessed them; and God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky, and over every living thing that moves on the earth." — Genesis 1:27,28 NASB
It seems that the mushians want to have it both ways. They'd very much like to hold on to values derived from a biblical worldview — including human stewardship of the planet, and moral responsibility. But they reject any sort of cranky, judgmental God who would make us accountable for our supposed duties.
For the purposes of their agenda we must act as if some deity has crowned humans above all the other animals, while simultaneously believing that humans are in no way special.
We must accept that this god has put us in charge of the tiny random smudge called "Earth" and its meaningless life forms. But in order to have license for sexual behavior below the level of animals, we must believe that there is no god worth worrying about.
We must have absolute faith that Evolution alone formed the world and pronounced it good; but we must not allow any species to become extinct — that is, we must stop Evolution, now.
But to be fair, there is one thing that every mushian knows clearly: those Bible-thumping Christians hold illogical beliefs.
Cats aren't very smart. But they are consistent with their feline nature. And in that respect they seem to be smarter than some people.
© Dan Popp
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