adam and eve screed

Now that I've more or less recovered from my jet lag, caught up at work, and gotten my taxes somewhat in order...

The overarching theme of my trip to the middle east was, of course, religion. Everything in the country where I lived revolved around religion. There were two types of people. Those that were like wink wink, I'm a muslim, but I have no problem going to the tourist area to have a glass of wine and a cigarette. There were others that were so blatant about their religion that they would pray where ever they happened to be. Sometimes in my office I couldn't find a conference room because so many people were praying in them. Other times the one women's bathroom was locked so that someone could pray in there (this is annoying if only because there is always a mosque less than a block away from where ever I was working where people could go pray).

We had many discussions about religion. Personally, I think organized religion is bullshit. Just because you attend some religious service regularly does not make you a good person. And I would cite the first commandment, which is recognized in most religions: do not take god's name in vain. Some idiots believe this means don't use god's name as a swear word. It actually means don't ever say you, as a person, speak for god. I often pointed this out to my muslim counterparts with the argument that a person on earth can't possibly know or understand god's intent, if god even exists. So if a person tells you to do something because god said to do it, they are in fact committing a sin.

Further, on the 20+ hour flight home, I started thinking about this topic in more depth since I couldn't sleep (Lufthansa, for the record, is one of the worst airlines in the world, unless you are an underweight midget and can fit in those stupid seats).

The first part of the bible has to do with Adam and Eve. I started thinking that maybe it's a warning that everything else in the bible should be taken by the reader with a grain of salt. Because, what happens in that story is that Adam and Eve are perfectly happy hanging out until they gain the knowledge that they are naked, and then they feel ashamed. Compare that with the middle east where women have to cover up (in the emirates they even have to wear a black screen over their eyes). What this covering up does is to make women feel ashamed of their bodies.

So then god sees A&E covering up and he's like "dudes, what are you doing? oh shit, you ate one of those apples didn't you, even after I told you not to". Pretend, for a second, that the apple is religion. And that the religion drives the ideas that something natural (e.g. being naked) is cause for shame. Maybe what the story is trying to say is don't buy into religious beliefs because you will ruin paradise by creating artificial wrongs (e.g. being naked). Maybe god was pissed because he was like I designed things exactly the way I wanted them. And now you're going around saying shit is wrong when it was my original design.

And then what happens...someone else comes along as says "everything those guys believe is wrong, and I'm going to come up with a new set of rules" or "everything those guys believe is wrong, but they haven't taken it far enough". Suddenly stupid shit like the fact that muslim women can't wear nail polish becomes a religious law. Then other religions, like the christians, say that what the muslims believe is wrong. People start shooting each other over stupid shit that someone, NOT god, made up.

That's how paradise ends. Just like for Adam and Eve in the bible.