Here’s the conundrum atheists have faced at each and every election. We have to cast a ballot for people making Life & Death decisions for us. At the presidential level those are LITERAL Life & Death Decisions.
A POTUS has the power to literally wipe out huge chunks of humanity. Not ‘quite’ with the press of a button but — awfully damned close.
If we take ourselves into that moment, all movie-like, and move in nice and close to THE POTUS as he ‘stares’ at ‘THE BUTTON’ we’d naturally need to understand WHAT WAS THE PROCESS that got him — and by extension US — to this moment of IMMINENT CATASTROPHE?
Sure, sure — there’ll be the immediate politics on the international stage but THAT didn’t just happen, those politics (whatever they are) were themselves the process of multiple processes — and one of those processes (a KEY process) is WHO this POTUS is as a human being. What ‘programming’ shaped them and formed their world view in a way that brought them HERE — to a moment of Imminent Catastrophe for Huge Chunks of Humanity?
What formed & still forms the values and ideas that were their personal justification for getting the World here?
Was it REALITY that informed them? Or was it RUBBISH?
Was it ASTROPHYSICS that informed their view of where ‘we came from’? Or was it stories — written by uninformed desert dwellers thousands of years ago — in ‘darkness’?
Does the POTUS in question view the collected texts we refer to as ‘The Bible’ as LITERAL HISTORY? Does he view these texts as the ‘literal words’ of a Magical Sky Creature (he’s never personally met)?
Does this POTUS believe that the Magical Sky Creature LITERALLY created the Whole Universe out of ‘nothing’ in ‘seven days’? Does he believe the cause of Human Suffering is a Woman eating a piece of fruit because a talking snake told her to? Does he believe the Magical Sky Creature flooded the earth cos he was so angry at HUMANS that EVERY CREATURE ON THE PLANET had to die?
Does this POTUS believe that the Magical Sky Creature HAD SEX with a Human Virgin in order to create a ‘Junior Sky Creature‘ that would eventually DIE FOR THE SINS of Humans?
It’s important that we know whether or not a POTUS believes if any of that is LITERAL TRUTH. Because, if they do? It means the basis for their whole belief system isn’t just flawed — it’s phony. It’s like doing your bookkeeping using a base 3 numbering system instead of a base 10. You’re going to look a lot richer that way. But you’re not richer. You’re LYING TO YOURSELF.
And if you go and make ECONOMIC DECISIONS based on your lying, phony math — you’ll lose your house, your possessions — everything. Because you DID THINGS based on bad decisions which themselves were based on the fact that you believed and still believe in rubbish.
So — yeah — it matters. Completely.