I can honestly say I've never had a worshipful attitude toward science. I recognize science for what it is--the process of trying to figure out how things work. That's it. Its not fickle--it grows and changes as researchers continue to think they've figured things out. There's no central hierarchy, it's just an ever-growing body of knowledge. Some published papers are bullshit, some may lead to helpful technologies. Conceptual science rarely sticks its nose into my daily life, though if I'm seeking medicine for a gastric ailment I will seek the advice of a qualified pharmacist.
I don't think I understand your sentiment regarding love's enslavement. I certainly don't allow my behaviour, wants, needs, or opinions to be dominated by the people I love. If we differ, we discuss. Frequently we agree to disagree and leave it alone. We may try to persuade one another to conform to our thinking, but we are free to refuse. If we come across an insurmountable, relationship-ending difference, we're free to leave. That's one of the great things about being an adult--you're not bound to places and people that make you unhappy, and you're not required to do things that make you unhappy to please others. If you choose to...well, that makes me sad, but it's your choice.
Religions are not like this, however. According to many sects and theocratic governments, if your wants and needs do not conform to established teachings, you must change. Even if they are not harmful to yourself or others, your views and behaviours are not to be tolerated. And according to their beliefs, you can't get away--if you reject your religion to pursue that which makes you happy, you'll be punished--either after death or by your state. There is no room for the self in religion. If that makes me selfish. . . good. It's not anybody else's job to give a hoot about my distinct individuality.
The thing that is so different between mortal love and holy love, though, is that if you stop believing that an omnipotent supreme being loves you--not because you've done something wrong, but because you can't believe it exists--it disappears as though it never was. This is not so for another human being. I can't decide that Ben doesn't love me. Even if I try and convince myself he doesn't, my disbelief in it won't change it. Likewise if he stops loving me but I continue to believe that he does, that won't make him start again. But as soon as I realized I didn't believe in holy love, it went away and I felt fine. No grieving, no sense of loss. Quite the opposite--for the first time, things made sense and I felt whole.
I didn't have a gaping hole in my psyche or emotional needs that I had to turn around and fill with something else--physics or what have you. The desire to worship is not inherent. That's where a lot of people get lost, and where a lot of people try to interject their own Ism-bound interpretation of simple atheism. Atheism is not a belief. It is a concise declaration that you have an absence thereof, because "sansbeliefitude" sounds funny and custom decrees that you can't get away with saying nothing. Many people, particularly in the UK, are able to, one morning, state calmly, "I have no need of faith-based belief" and never think about it again. They go on with their lives completely unperturbed by it, without a need to justify it, mull over it, or even occasionally sit down and wonder why they're here at all. If someone asks them what the meaning of life is without belief, they can easily say, "it doesn't matter, and I'm happy with that."
I don't believe people are endowed with certain inalienable rights. I recognize that established societies tend to adopt a responsibility for the base-line well being of most of their populace. The fact that most Britons aren't huddled starving in the streets attests to England's general success in that pursuit. But it is a pursuit, not an inherent responsibility. No geographical region Has to have defensible borders, nor does it have to establish a system of governance that looks out for the well-being of its inhabitants. And a lot don't.
But spiritual rights and privileges are immaterial. Yes, every believer has equal access to their god, but that does not fulfil their physical needs. Among those who believe, they will always believe that their deity is on their side, regardless if they are in direct conflict with another believer. Right and wrong, good and bad, are still just as contentious within the religious world, and the winner is not always the most good. Because being convinced that something is god's way doesn't make it right, or good, or useful. And being convinced something is evil doesn't make it bad. That's why institutions schism so frequently. Then of course one is invited to align with a belief structure that suits their principles, but where does that land them? If enough people don't agree with it they can change it? That means mortals are calling the shots. The fact that religions disagree, in my mind, undermines the entire concept. And as everyone believes that their sect is the most right, the Real One, the one everyone else should drop what they're doing and join...impasse, again. It's funny, really--or would be if it didn't make people so angry.
But I think that's my trouble with it, in a nutshell--it doesn't make people happy. It does not placate, it does not comfort, it is not an opiate. I broke through religion because I found it was an undue burden. I didn't like the way it told me to view myself, others, the church, or the functionality of the world. Indeed, the fundamentals of nature had nothing to do with it--it was me. There it was, in black and white, submit to, get down, obey men--I couldn't. I wouldn't. I knew it was wrong. I realized then and there, age 12, that this set of moral absolutes was a construct of mankind intended to suppress the individual from within. No matter what it says, even if I got to write the rules of my own religion according to what makes me happy it wouldn't work. I can't accept that any set of absolutes or free-standing instructions on how to live are anything more than one person's way of controlling the minds of others.
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I realize that Fort Mill and the surrounding area are full of fundamentalist Christians, and you'll of course make plenty of them happy by trampling on the rights of women and severing our access to birth control and cancer screening, but believe it or not, it is not your job to protect evangelical Christians from being offended by the existence of Planned Parenthood. Planned Parenthood does not proselytize, it is not out to get you, and it is not staffed with baby-haters or rampaging atheists bent on world domination. They're there for the poor, the helpless, the scared, and the overwhelmed. They're there for women--a group it IS your job to protect. Your job is to ensure that people who are not causing harm do not come to harm. Not to ensure that the will of the mob is enforced on the maligned minority (or in the case of women, the traditionally abused majority).
You want to help prevent abortions? Ensure we have free, no-strings-attached access to contraception. Planned Parenthood provides this to women who can otherwise not afford it. Planned Parenthood gave me my IUD for free when I was broke, and it is to Planned Parenthood that I owe my freedom, my safety, and the fact that I've never needed an abortion. No one else in South Carolina offered me this. Nowhere else, aside from USC's student health center, could I find contraception I could afford.
You have to give us something. I don't care if contraception goes against your moral code--if you're not going to help poor women to have abortions, at least allow us to prevent unwanted babies. You will not make a woman want a child by taking away her ability to get rid of it. No woman seeks one out for fun. No woman thinks of abortion as a form of birth control. It's a last resort before your life is ruined. Before your Fundie parents begin beating you or throw you out of the house. Before you starve. Before you lose your job, your home, and your future.
You cannot force women who don't want children to abstain from sex. Sex is normal, natural, and important. Regular, satisfying sex is a vital component of mental health. Women enjoy it and should be proud of the fact that they do. Any religion that tells you otherwise is dangerous. Abstinence is not the solution. Psychological research has beaten this archaic notion down again and again. People don't, they never have, they're not supposed to. Give it a rest.
I've been in a monogamous relationship with the man I love for six years. I have always used protection, and I count on the IUD Planned Parenthood gave me. I've donated what I could to them every year since because I appreciate what they did. My friends' lives have been saved by the early detection Planned Parenthood cancer screening provided, both of the breast and the cervix. A PP practitioner even patched me up when I was injured.
By offering Prevention, Early Detection, and Termination Planned Parenthood has saved the USA millions, possibly billions of dollars on cancer treatments, complications of pregnancy, and legal fees. Planned Parenthood has made your job easier, and empowered women to live their lives without fear. If you kill Planned Parenthood, you know good and well that fear, abuse, and poverty will take its place.
Face it. The only reason to de-fund Planned Parenthood is misogyny. Do you hate women, sir?
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