Landen Hoffman About a month or so ago, my life dramatically improved after I basically stopped arguing with people on social media. First I announced that I was leaving Facebook entirely, only to have my wife talk me out of it, by surprise. But I did hold true to my promise to remove myself from all the "debate" forums where I wasted WAY too much of my life in ultimately fruitless conversations with people uninterested in reason and evidence when it might have an adverse effect on their current thinking. In fact, one of the most ridiculous arguments that I have had to deal with during my time spent as a Christian pugilist (never been very apologetic about my own thoughts and opinions) on the internet has been the claim by a few of the more outspoken atheists that miracles do not ever occur because God does not exist. It is ridiculous to argue about miracles because (a.) the definition of one is nebulous and (b.) people who don't believe in miracles can easily reject them as failing to meet their nonexistent criteria for one. To an atheist, a miracle probably requires them to see a physical manifestation of divine intervention, and even then they might dismiss their witness of a miracle as a hallucination their mind imagined because most atheists don't want to believe in God. Why would I say that? It sounds kind of harsh and judgmental, I suppose, but I said it because it is true. Atheists have made up their mind, and just like everybody else, they don't want to be wrong. This explains why there are so many atheists wasting their lives on social media arguing with … [Read more...]
Patriotism and the National Anthem
BEIJING, CHINA - AUGUST 27: Usain Bolt of Jamaica celebrates after winning gold in the Men's 200 metres final during day six of the 15th IAAF World Athletics Championships Beijing 2015 at Beijing National Stadium on August 27, 2015. (Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images for IAAF) Recently I promised to focus on "the bright side" of the news because of the constant onslaught of negative headlines. It's not as easy as it sounds. One of today's headlines at the Drudge Report promises to tell the story of a woman stealing a dog from a man in medical distress as paramedics worked to save his life. Who would do such a thing? More headlines scream that the president is a racist because he's said pretty much the exact same thing about Baltimore as the former major and current congressman (parts of the city are a rat-infested cesspool) because Trump has the wrong skin color: orange. Everything seems to be a controversy, even the first American flag created by anti-slavery Quaker Betsy Ross (because Colin Kaepernick said the flag she sewed was racist.) But I don't want to talk Colin Kaepernick because I don't agree with his politics, and the point is to look for the bright side of a story. For the same reason, I don't want to talk about Megan Rapinoe and her protests as a member of the U.S. Women's National Soccer team when the national anthem was played, even though her attention-seeking gesture upset me more than Kaepernick because Rapinoe represented our nation as a competitor but was allowed to disrespect its most powerful symbol, the flag. Since I can't … [Read more...]